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Behind the Dreamers
We are talking to the achievers, the creators, the magic makers, and the dreamers. These are our friends. These are your friends. And they are living the extraordinary.
Behind the Dreamers
Transformative Journey: Entrepreneurship, Serving the Community and Local Politics with Lauren Davis
Are you ready to embark on a transformative journey with Lauren Davis - a serial entrepreneur, mother, community servant, and a woman who knows the value of time and the privilege of entrepreneurship? Buckle up as we take a leap into the world of an unconventional powerhouse who, alongside her husband, has built successful ventures, raised a family, and took a shot at local politics.
Lauren opens up about her path from being a rule follower to becoming a rebel. Her race for the title of Dallas County Judge has not only been an enlightening experience but also a testament to her belief that life is made up of a series of small actions. As we navigate the highs and lows of her journey, Lauren sheds light on her transformation both in personal growth and public speaking, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. One can't help but admire her courage and grit, the quintessential qualities of an entrepreneur ready to take on any challenge.
In an inspiring turn, we analyze the story of David and Goliath, a powerful reminder that the right preparation and experiences can lead to success. Lauren's interpretation of the story is a call to arms - to take chances, be confident in our capabilities, and contribute to the world. As we wrap up, there's a shared understanding that taking the first step is often the hardest, but it is the key to achieving extraordinary goals. So, get ready to be inspired and remember to be kind to one another as we navigate this journey called life.
These are our friends. These are your friends. AND they are living the extraordinary.
For a transcript of this episode, go to www.behindthedreamers.com.
Welcome to another episode of Behind the Dreamers. I'm Jennifer Loading and we are talking to the achievers, the creators, the magic makers and the dreamers. These are our friends, these are your friends and they are living the extraordinary Well. I'm so excited about my guest today. This is going to be so great. She says she's deeply passionate about making a positive impact in the community. For the past five years she's organized a pop-up barbershop at a local homeless shelter where they restore individuals' dignity one haircut at a time. She recently became engaged in local civics by running for Dallas County Judge. She said she believes it is our duty to serve our communities and seek opportunities to make positive impacts. So you guys are going to be in for a real treat today. I'm so excited to chat with her and get her on here and learn about what she's doing. But before we do that, I need to do a quick shout out to our sponsor.
Speaker 1:So today's episode is brought to you by Walt Mills Photography. If you are a creator needing post-production consultation or promotion, walt is your guy. Whether short films, youtube films, photography work or a new head shot, he can help you find a solution to match your needs. To learn more about Walt and his work. You're going to want to go to photosbywaltcom. All right, I'm so excited. Get Lauren on here today. So Lauren Davis, a mother of three, wife of 18 years, is a serial entrepreneur. Listen to this guy. She's the co-founder of the Gents Place Luxury Membership-Based Barbershop. Rascal Men's Grooming Product Line, operation Gentleman 501C3, supporting Veterans and the Homeless. And then she recently launched a media company called For the Love of Dallas, where she highlights those giving the most precious resource time. So, lauren, welcome to the show. I am so thrilled to have you here today and to learn about you and what you're doing to make a difference.
Speaker 2:So welcome, oh, thank you. Thanks so much for the opportunity and for having me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this can be so much fun. So you've done so many great things that I love that. It's like serial entrepreneur, right. Like so many of us have so many things going on in our world. It's like we just have all these little things that are happening and I think it's so much fun to be able to have the opportunity to be able to do that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it really is. And that's also why I started the show For the Love of Dallas, because I just realized, as I've gotten older and it feels like I have less time, you know, because I'm split in different directions that time is really our most valuable resource. And also, you know, trying to run for public office and run our nonprofit, seeking donations financial donations and realizing, like the span of people's financial success $10 can be like someone's $100,000. And it just started to really make me think about when people give their time. That's just something that there's a definite beginning and end. You know, 24 hours in a day, and when I've seen people just give like the vast majority of their time over, I just started to think about it differently. So it is a privilege to get to spend our time in any way, and being an entrepreneur allows me to spend it very freely, which I think is just so precious.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would agree with you on that and I think, you know, from mom to mom, I think we both can recognize, you know, the importance of that because my kids are, you know, are adults now.
Speaker 1:But you know, when I started in the entrepreneur space, my oldest daughter was 18 months, and so I've been very privileged to be able to have that time right to be with them as they were growing up. And it's so funny now because, like I've always been busy, but I think, like my youngest is now really realizing that like I'm doing a lot of things and I'm like, dude, I've been doing them all along. I think you just got used to it, and now mom is kind of like branching out and I'm like this is my time to like do the things I need to do, because I've been the mom and been home and had to do, you know, put the kids first and stuff. So I agree with you that time is precious and I think as we get older, you know we do our priorities change and how you know we look at things very differently, and so I think, yeah, it's, it's, you know, putting the time in the right place, right Like putting our energy where it needs to be, and that's what's great about being an entrepreneur.
Speaker 2:It is. I mean, as an entrepreneur, you you know everything has a light and a dark side, and being an entrepreneur and having to make payroll in that way and the execution that's needed, all the things, it's not like my husband just said the other day. I was like, oh, I want something like I want a house in the mountains. You know we don't have any second houses, I want a house in the mountains. And you know, so my friends do. And he was like, if you're gonna pick and choose parts of people's lives, you have to take their whole life.
Speaker 2:Lauren and I was like, oh man, that's so true. We thought about that for a minute and it's. It's just like where, you know, with the entrepreneurial thing, yes, we have freedom of our time, but we also have the burden of the heaviness and the weight and the stress that comes with entrepreneurship. But that's literally and in everything in life, and I just thought that was, you know, so funny and very childish of me to say and him to say it, but it's like something that you constantly need to remember. Yeah, it's good that you said that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's good that you said that, because I do think I one of the mentors that I've been working with you know he said that you know, in your business, if you don't have a fire burning, you really don't have a business right. So I think that, yeah, you have to look at all the parts of this and take the good and the bad with it, because you know and that's the one thing I was talking about on this show is that you know I call I was hashtag this real talk right, because I think a lot of times we get into. You know, I came from the network marketing space and I was in that industry for 22 years and they try a lot of times. I'm not knocking network marketing, because I know Incredible people that have done really well and I featured them on this show and I did well in this. You know I won several cars.
Speaker 2:I know one.
Speaker 1:I earned several cars, so. But I think sometimes we glossed it over, right, like we glossed the the entrepreneurship over that. It's all roses and we're like, no, there's no pot of gold at the end of that rainbow. I mean, if you work hard, there is, but you need to work hard to make that happen. It's not just gonna pop up, right like you have to take the good with the bad, as you're saying. All parts of the life, you know yes, all parts of it.
Speaker 2:There's always sacrifice involved in that. You know to receive the reward always.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes. So tell us a little bit about what you're doing right now, because I said all this in here. You've got this luxury membership based barbershop and you're doing this. You've got this 501c3 going on, you've got this product line. So give us a little rundown on what this is that you got going on here.
Speaker 2:Sure. So our primary business that drives basically you know everything we do, puts the food on our table, gives us this Access to do other things, is the Junt's place. So my husband and I started together when we were 25, so almost 15 years ago this barbershop concept rates. Barbershop concepts were starting to pop up. So it was, is a. It's a kind of like a country club meets, barbershop meets speak easy. So it's an expanded concept. We take more square footage in other places. When guys walk in they feel like they're not even you can even see a barber chair when you walk in. It's a very classic, lots of dark stained woods and natural materials and I'm very minimalist but very classic Design and so the whole thought there was to just elevate that chore in life. Right, it's kind of a chore for men to get their haircut was for my husband. I mean, it's kind of not for us. We all like typically like going to the salon, but that wasn't necessarily the case 15 years ago for men. They didn't have their own space like that. And so I just said I want a company, that I have two boys and I want to build a barbershop that that I would be proud to send them, and a lot of times when it's male focused, it's gimmicky, it's over sexualized on. There's places that I call like Hooters for haircuts, which you know, to each their own, like I get it's not knocking anyone's thing, but that's just not when I'd want my husband going and or where I'd want my boys going, and so I wanted it a place that emphasized and accentuated and Exaggerated the best parts of a man, the best parts of their masculinity, and help send them out being better fathers and CEOs and heads of households and things, because we all have an influence on each other. And Speaking of time, again, these gentlemen are spending 30 minutes to an hour with us. It is our obligation, one as a Christian person, to send someone out of our establishment better than when they came in, and so that's that's the essence in the core of that business. So what branched off of that is our nonprofit operation.
Speaker 2:Gentlemen, we do a once a year suit drive, so that's coming up in September. You can bring gently used suits men and women Into our clubs all across the country. We have, I think, 12 locations open, from Chicago to Bentonville, arkansas, to San Antonio, austin, houston, kansas City, and we take those down to Fort Hood, which is one of the largest army bases here in Texas and in the country, and we do a whole shopping event for the Soldier recovery unit and those are soldiers that are transitioning out for medical reasons at a military, getting their first civilian jobs. So sometimes we're giving them their first civilian suits, which is very expensive and a huge help. So that's our primary. And then we do a pop-up barbershop for the last five years at Austin Street Center, one of the largest homeless shelters here in Dallas, texas, which is so rewarding, taking that journey with people. A haircut is sometimes the first hurdle they have to overcome because if you think about it, your hair is dirty and matted and not well groomed. Like good luck on that job interview Right, it's things we take for granted, that we have access to and and they don't. So we provide that service there once a month. Amazing, we love it.
Speaker 2:People from the whole industry it's not just Jen's place. People from the whole industry come and I'm partner with my friend Samantha. She has a project called sincerely you project and she's been passionate about, you know, highlighting the stories of the homeless since she was a teenager. And then my podcast that I'm doing that kind of came out of my civic engagement when I saw just I got to experience like Meeting so many people and all the great things they do and I was like, wow, regardless of your political party, how much the world is trying to tribalize us right now.
Speaker 2:I found so many commonalities between Myself and others out there and the one thing was was our faith, wherever in the face. I've met some amazing Jewish people and other many faiths, including Christian and People who volunteered their time. They were service oriented. In the second you related on service because I'm very big About jails, I'm also working a project with another organization called one community USA, putting the first ever Barber college inside a jail so that people can get fully licensed before they leave. It's that when you care and want to serve the community Really, nothing else matters, really doesn't, and so that's what inspired me to do that show and just one of my great learnings from getting civically engaged, which was very eye-opening and exciting. Yeah, I want to come back to that in a few minutes but yeah, that's the run down.
Speaker 2:No, that's the rundown of what I've got, and there's a few other things in between, but but that's the bulk of what I spend my time on.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love this and I do want to ask you because I think this is so interesting. I love to get into the minds of entrepreneurs, especially people like you guys, because I think you're a lot you know I don't like to compare people, but I say there are a lot of us that are like this that we get this idea, sort of we have this big umbrella of things, right, and it branches out into all these other things, and I always tell people, you know, like mine, I'm a work life strategist, I'm certified in life coaching, but I have, you know, 22 years in business, so I'm sort of I hybrid the two, and then I have my podcast and my book and all these things are really just extensions of kind of the big message, right, but I think it's it's like we have this, this core purpose. You know, like this core thing and I think that you, I think many of us, share the same thing is that we're trying to serve other people, we're trying to find a way to reach more people and make a difference in their lives, right, we just have different vehicles that we use to do that.
Speaker 1:So I love what you're doing and I love that it's it's really spanned out into these other things for you, because when you tie it all together, you can see the big umbrella of what you're trying to do with all of it. You know, I think that's what I love. What I want to ask you though I think it's kind of fun is I always love to ask this question when I get people like this, because your husband and you are doing this together. So were you guys like I'm going to ask you specifically like when you were young, did you have sort of this entrepreneurial spirit as a child, or did you? Or did this just kind of evolve out of something for you?
Speaker 2:I guess. So my husband and I have been together since we were 16. We met in high school. So you know, when you grow up together, like that, your passions and your world sort of you know intertwine and grow together and I think he was the primary entrepreneur in our life venture together. And I'm kind of entrepreneur by force, by support, because I'm never going to tell him, no, you can't live your dream. And you know he left a big corporate job that had all the things to do this and I was 100%, 50% part of that decision, right, like he wasn't going to do it if I opposed it. But I couldn't imagine a world where I did, because I saw his vision of what he wanted for our family and our life.
Speaker 2:Our middle son, who's had multiple open heart surgeries, was a, was a genesis of kind of that thought of needing to be in complete control of our time and our life and our destiny. So, but I would say my, my true nature is more of a rural follower. But as I've become my adult woman self, I've become a little more rebellious, less like wanting to conform, and so I think my natural state was more of like I like to take risks, I like to take big shots. I want to do something different. I don't want to conform necessarily, but kind of my maybe nature that I was raised in caused me to be more cautious.
Speaker 2:So being with him brought out that side of me and now I really can't go back. But I do probably desire more certainty than he does in life, like he has more tolerance for it and I just like tolerate it. So it's a, it's a blend, but I love it and I appreciate it and I would never change it. But had I not been taken on this journey through his primary role because you know we had kids young too, so I was primary mom when we were in the depths of entrepreneurship. So you know our roles have kind of shifted and moved over time but had I not had his influence, I probably would have been, like you know, a standard great employee in a company, because I love to work hard, to have the work ethic that you need to have to be an entrepreneur. But I probably wouldn't have fully started my own thing separate from him.
Speaker 2:So, it's a fun blend and a partnership.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thanks for sharing that, I know, and I think that's great because I think there, you know, there are certain challenges that come with. You know, couples working businesses. So I think it's great that you guys have found that right and I think that the important thing there is there's so much to take away from that, because I think your kids are learning incredible lessons through all of this. I mean, I always say more is common taught, so they're learning incredible lessons through this. But you know, I and I think also the support that you're lending, I think that that you know in this, because entrepreneurship is not we've already said this, you know several times already it's not an easy ride.
Speaker 1:That's a roller coaster. I mean, there's a lot of ups and downs, right, and I think if you are in a relationship where you have that support, oh my gosh, you can do incredible things. You know when you, when the two of you, are partnered up and you can go at this together. This is why you guys are having the success that you're having is because you partnered up, even if that wasn't your natural thing. And I like how you said by force, you know, like it was by force, it worked out, you know, and so I commend you to for that, because I think that's it's obviously serving me well, so and it's.
Speaker 2:it is in roles, yes, and roles have changed over the years and we know where our strengths and our weaknesses are and we just try to grow at the same pace in life. Just in general keeps us on the same track together, you know, and sometimes I'm stronger than he is in certain areas and sometimes he's stronger than me, but we just, you know, work at maintaining that balance and when we feel things getting out of balance, we just do our best to reset. You know we have weekly date nights Every week. We try to just constantly do our best to stay on the same page, because it is a roller coaster and you can get off track so fast and not even realize it. You kind of look behind a couple of days and you're like, oh no, how did that happen? So it's, it's a. You know it's not easy being in business together, but you know it's certainly worth it.
Speaker 1:Yeah good for you. That's awesome. Well, and speaking of, I do want to talk about the fact that you ran for judge because you mentioned non conformist and I like that word because I am a non conformist. You were totally speaking my language. I am just like not very good at rules. If the rule is stupid, I'm not very good at that. So I, coming from you, I really love like just to share a little bit about kind of you know what led to that and what your journey. You know you have to go into a major detail, but give us just a little bit of what led you to that and how that was for you.
Speaker 2:Sure, yeah, the high level of it is prior to COVID era, I call it. I would have considered myself, you know, more of a conformist, more of a rule follower, with a little, a little bit of rebel and me like minority rebel, high level and needed a little in there, high level, need of certainty. And when COVID happened and we owned barbershop so we were part of the industry that was completely shut down, that took us inside out and so that took and took my. It was a journey because because, like a Sam rule follower, so I did all the things. We shut our businesses down, we did all the things and when I started to just really peel back the layers of what I saw in my experience happening and how it felt to have the government in my life in such a heavy way, it just caused me to, it just shaped. It's brought out in me the rebel and the non conformist and so in that parlayed into wanting to run for a county judge.
Speaker 2:Because what one of the primary issues was medical freedom. My son has to access life saving surgery, intervention through medical means for the rest of his life. So I am so invested in trusting our medical community I can't not trust it like. That puts me at a level of uncertainty in my life that I cannot handle. So I'm an action oriented person. That's another part of why our entrepreneurial partnership matches, because I take action, I don't just sit and complain. And so I said, oh well, then I'll do something about it. I don't like how the county county judge in Texas is county executive right, it has nothing to do really with judge who are not in a court or anything like that so as a county executive and they have the emergency management powers locally. And so when I saw that being kind of used indiscriminately and picking and choosing and the way it was handled, I just said I won't stand for it. And so I literally have never I barely was a voter at that time like I was not engaged in that, just like yeah, but I had never voted in a primary before, I'd never put a political sign out. Was so a political nauseating. You know it was like you know someone asked me you know whatever, who's my local Congress person and be like you know what's that.
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm part of that generation, just did not know and and I just I felt just so compelled to be part of the process and do something. And I just went big is just all sort of fit, these weird streams in my personality and I just thought why not? And once you, once you've gone on this entrepreneurial journey, you realize it's not one big actions, it's a series of small actions and you just figure it out, and so we've done that so many times. It didn't feel too crazy. It looked crazy from the outside, but for me it was a natural progression, a natural step, and so I did it and it was eye-opening.
Speaker 2:It was brutal. People hated me and people loved me. It gave you just extremes that life has to offer and you can't get attached to any one of them. And then you also realize how big of a show all of it really is. It's such a show. It's so much theater on both sides, like what we think we know is things people would say about me, things that attack our business. You're like you just made that up and there are people in this world who are just willing to make it up and it's bizarre. But it's such a growing experience I wouldn't take it back.
Speaker 2:I mean, the public speaking was awesome. The meeting people was awesome. The standing up for something I believed in was awesome. Facing fears was like out of this world. I mean, I was not a public speaker before and then I'm getting in front of thousands of people. It was just so ridiculous. At times I look at my husband. I'm like what am I doing? What did I get myself into? But you're in it, you just got to get through it. So it was cool. I lost. I won the primary, which is cool. That was super cool. And then I lost the general. But there's no losing when you take chances, so I loved it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, well, and I'm listening to you and why you were doing this. I was joke about this because there's these moments in my show where somebody will tell me something. I sort of get the chills because I'm envisioning this and I can hear your passion coming through and I think, yeah, there are a lot of things that happened during COVID that pulled a lot of us out of being a political Like myself didn't do what you did, obviously and I applaud you and commend you and bravery for that but there was so much stuff that happened during that time that it made a lot of us come out and get aware of what was going on. And obviously I didn't know you then and I didn't know about you having the barber shop and stuff. I did follow Shelly Luther stuff. I followed her. I actually got to meet her. It was funny because I went to go do a podcast on Shemayne Nugent's podcast and she happened to show up the same day. So I got to meet both of them on the same day and followed her journey. But there was a lot that happened that really pulled us out and so I love that.
Speaker 1:You said you weren't a public speaker and you sort of got thrown in this and I think, when we take situations like this and pull this into the entrepreneur space, I think a lot of times there's really no preparation for all of this stuff. Like you get passionate about something, you do it and you learn as you go, and when we sit and try to prep everything out, we're not necessarily. I mean, yes, there is a certain amount of preparation that we have to do, but sometimes we just have to be open to say that these things are going to come in and we're going to grow through this stuff that we're going through. You know what I mean yes, 100%.
Speaker 2:There's really no way to prepare other than just committing to taking every lesson there is to take out of all of your experiences, good or bad. You can't place too much judgment on them, because life happens. It's like what's in front of you, how are you going to deal with it, what are you going to take from it? And if you're just committed to taking something good from everything regardless, that's a preparation you need for the next phase of life, because I have a firm belief that God is always preparing us, even when it looks like we're totally down in the dumps, losing on all sides. Nothing's going right. It's preparation and I really learned that lesson because I wasn't raised Christian. I've just come to learn these things just through life and getting stronger in my faith.
Speaker 2:Is it the story of David and Goliath? And I had read that as a more awake person. I realized that wasn't his time, david's time in the fields, where he was thrown out quick thrown out to tend to the sheep, tend to the flock, because he wasn't big and bold and soldier-like his brothers. One could look at that and be a victim and say, oh, nobody loves me and parents don't love me. They don't appreciate me. I'm the smallest in my family but God was preparing him to take out a large predator with what he had, a slingshot and a rock on one shot. He was doing it day in and day out.
Speaker 2:So when he arrived to that battlefield he was like, oh, I got this. I do this all the time and other people are looking at him like it's completely foreign, how could you? And it's like, oh duh, I've been prepared. But if you don't take those opportunities and you refuse and resist the lessons, you suffer so much more and I've just learned that. I've learned that through resisting and suffering and I've learned it through leaning in and taking the opportunities. I've learned it through both, through doing both, and it's just been a guiding principle in my life. And some days I do a real good job of it and then some days do a terrible job. Some days I'm just like all resistance and just suffer my way through the day. It's not perfect and I would never want to portray it that way, but if you're guided by trying to pull the lesson out, that's true preparation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's so great that you brought up the story about David because I was at. I'm sure you know John Maxwell, he's a former preacher, he's a OK. I love John Maxwell. I've read so many of his books. I just bought his latest book and in the networking space we talked about him for many, many years. So I just think he's great on leadership and I always talk about. He says everything rises and falls on leadership.
Speaker 1:But I got invited to go to my husband and I went to Gateway Church a couple of weeks ago because we got a last minute invitation that he was speaking at Gateway and I was like we're there, Like I have never seen him live, we're there. And so in his sermon, of course when he speaks, he brings leadership into it. He always finds a way to bring his leadership and so he was talking about these different, like Esther and Rebecca. And then he talked about the King David story, which was the last story, and he was making it applicable and the thing he was talking about is don't put people into boxes, Limitations, don't stop you, and that was kind of the story. Of course he made it kind of fun.
Speaker 1:I was telling someone today about that story. He made it kind of fun. Like his parents, we were trying to pick which son is going to be the son that's going to be picked, and then they find out it's the one that they didn't think was going to get picked got picked. So it's a great story and it's the one out of all the ones he talked about that I remembered the most.
Speaker 2:So it's a great story. That's a good story. It's my favorite. I mean, I'm still learning. I'm a still growing Christian, so I don't know all the stories, but of all the stories I've heard, it's my favorite Because there's so many angles to it. There's so many lessons to take from it. There's so many. It's so rich in life lessons and, yeah, specifically in leadership and entrepreneurship, taking chances using your skill set. You've had experience with not being afraid to take chances, being confident and how God's prepared you. I mean there's so many lessons Like you could build a great life around that one story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this has all been great. I do want to ask you kind of a fun question, because I haven't asked this one in a while, but I want to see what you say on this, because I think you've said so many things, you've given so many nuggets and advice and it's like I was going to say what's been the hardest thing you've done? What has been like? What can we take away? You've said so many great things here already that I think have said this. What I would like to know is, if you had to sum up why your journey so far, maybe in a couple words, what would you say?
Speaker 2:Gosh, that's a good one, I'd say. So far, like the theme so far and I hope I get to experience. Another thing that would be really cool to advance in my life is I've been an overcomer, so I've been served up so many things to overcome. I have to know and assume that's for a preparation of an opportunity, like King David saying I'll step up and one would think it would have been maybe that campaign, but it wasn't, you know, because I didn't win right. I'm not in that position. So it's like I'm being served so many opportunities and I'm just trying to earn my way to the next theme of life which, you know, the ultimate goal, in my opinion, is to get into a place where I'm in full contribution mode, where my entire day revolves around how I can contribute to the world and other people's lives based on the life I was given. So, yeah, I would say that I'd say you know it's really overcomer and it's been a privilege to get these opportunities. They haven't been easy.
Speaker 2:You know, one's losing my dad young that was so he who's struggled with alcoholism and died drinking and driving. The last time I ever saw him was my high school graduation. He was just. He showed me.
Speaker 2:Love and pain combined Person I love the most is the little girl, and her daddy also caused me some of the most pain I've felt in life.
Speaker 2:So learning to deal with that but I was just talking to someone in a meeting before now and I realized what that's done in my homeless work and then getting to be in the public light is that I learned like I love the depths of humanity.
Speaker 2:I love the range that we can experience, as I've learned that your ability to experience sadness is directly correlated to your ability to experience happiness. And we cannot numb our way through life. We have to be willing to ride the full ride, not pick and choose everything. You have to be willing to go really low with yourself and with other people so that you can go really high. And I've just like just do everything through overcoming it's just made me realize that I just, you know like I just love humanity in all of its flaws and in all of its greatness, because the second you try to undo parts of it, you just you miss the whole point. So that overcome portion of my life that I'm still clearly in has been great and I'm just like super excited, god willing, for how I'll be able to use that in the next phase.
Speaker 1:So awesome. I think you just gave me the title to your show.
Speaker 2:And that was a bit that you said.
Speaker 1:I'm like the part that you said about the taking, taking it all in, like I might do this, is it? That's the part of this whole. That's what this whole show is about. Right there, the whole thing, it's taken it all, taking the good with the bad and over, learning to rise above and move forward. Oh my gosh, I'm like sometimes I do these shows and it's so funny because I go through and I'll be like you know I have to, I do it, I put him through the AI and I'm like, okay, we got to get the theme of this. I'm trying to pull like the message. You know the whole show, and I'm like you just nailed it for me today, like you just did my work for me today. So, thank you Contribution.
Speaker 2:I'm already moving in the right direction.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Alright, laura, this has been great. So if maybe our audience wants to get in touch with you, they want to find out what's going on, you know, with your organization, your work. Maybe we got somebody wants to get into that, that shop or whatever, where would you like us to send them?
Speaker 2:Yes, so the gents placecom is our business. I would love to have as many awesome men come in so we can make an impact and a difference in your life. You know I'm on social media for the love of Dallas. My episodes are under all social media for the love of Dallas. If you're more interested in my political side, you can find me on Twitter. It's where most of kind of like my political life lives. That's at mom's love freedom. So you might agree with me, you might not, but if you're interested in the politics side, that's, that's where it's at. You know, but I've I've found when you're a principled person and just want the best for people, people respect that regardless. I like, I love debate and I love to to agree, to disagree Again, the span of humanity that involves people I don't agree with on certain things. But we live in America and I love it.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, lauren, thank you for all that you're doing. You're amazing, and I hope everything goes well with your son. I know you got a lot going on with that and just keep doing it. Yes, for all the people listening.
Speaker 2:Yes, my son's facing his fourth open heart surgery August 24th. So you know all the praying people out there appreciate the thoughts and prayers because they make a difference. They really do. You can feel it Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well. I want to, like I said, commend you for everything that you're doing and love your energy and your passion, and you know how you're making a difference in the community. So thank you for all of that and, like I said, keep doing your thing.
Speaker 2:I, you can count on it and I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to you know share, because you know we, we advance in life by sharing our stories.
Speaker 1:I agree, I agree, and to our audience, of course. If you enjoy the show, please be sure you check us out on Apple, give us a rating over there, hit the subscribe button on YouTube. And, as I always say, in order to live the extraordinary, you must start, and every start begins with a decision. You guys, take care, be safe and be kind to one another. We will see you next time.
