Why is that some people make dreams seem reality why others face the doldrums of the day like a hamster in a wheel? In this episode Jimmy interviews his friend, Joshua Jenson a/k/a “JJ the CPA” to discuss the path it took for Josh to be a mega success in his chosen field. Josh shares the trials and the triumphs he experienced during the journey to becoming a national speaker and author.
Episode Keys:
- How to find and learn from a mentor who has blazed their own trail to success.
- Why it is critical to learn how to manage your time when working in your passions.
- Who you should be talking when designing your goals and dreams.
- When you must listen to your body to avoid catastrophe in the pathway to success.
- How to create great value for others by simply serving in your passion!
Podcast Transcription
JW:
Good morning. It is another beautiful day here in what I call the world of paradise. Yeah, not everyone is fortunate to live in the area I live, but folks, it is a beautiful day in the heartland of America. You know, I wanna thank our listeners across the globe, 58 countries. I’m told we are now being heard in 58 countries on the planet. I’d never fathom that. And we started this just a little over three years ago. We’re approaching that three year mark. And I’ll tell you, our team is just excited to keep bringing you those Monday morning moments of motivation that help you become bigger, better, and bolder in life. Today is not an exception I have today, someone that is exceptional, and I hope you picked up on that. I’m honored today, have one of my dearest friends, a colleague as well. And this gentleman is just so talented. I said, you know, I don’t know why we didn’t get him on the podcast before today, but, you know, we got lucky. I talked to his booking agent, I’ve talked to his assistant. I mean, it takes like, you know, weeks and months to get this guy tied down because he is that talented, that busy. I wanna welcome to the show today, someone that’s gonna help me talk about the area of life that he has taken to the nth degree. You know, on Live a Life By Design as your host. I’ve always brought to you people that are really just killing it in their area of expertise, of how they are changing the world. Not just big ways, but those gigantic ways that people then realize the value of what these people can bring to themselves and to the marketplace. And this day is going to be fantastic. I’m honored to have with me my dear friend Joshua Jenson, but we call him JJ the CPA, known better as America’s CPA. Welcome, Josh.
JJ:
Well, good morning, Jimmy. You’re very, very kind and it’s an honor to be here as well. And I know that we have been talking about this for a while for me to be on this podcast, and congratulations on almost three years, 58 countries. What an achievement. It doesn’t surprise me at all. You know, when I first came to Oklahoma about 26 years ago, you were one of the first people that I met in our great society of CPAs here in Oklahoma. And right off the bat, we were good friends. And you’ve always been a little bit further down the path, which means that I’ve always had the advantage of learning from you. And I wouldn’t say mistakes. I doubt you’ve ever made any mistakes, Jimmy. But, but nonetheless I’ve always admired you and and appreciate your friendship, and it’s an honor to, to be on your podcast with
JW:
You. Well, those kind words, of course. Very much verbose words of yours that said too much, because I gotta tell you, Ms. Williams, I’ll give her your cell phone number. She will call and list the numerous mistakes I’ve made. But anyway, hey, but you know what? Just like you JJ, we do not live in yesterday, man. We live today and we live for tomorrow. So, I wanna know something. You said you moved to Oklahoma 26 years ago. I was thinking it was further back than that. So thanks for bringing that back up as a memory. And we did meet at our Oklahoma Society of CPAs, which has been one of our sponsors here on Live Life by Design before a great organization of CPAs in Oklahoma. But tell me a little bit about Joshua Jenson, the young man. So tell me a little bit about your childhood. What, what was your family life like? Tell me a little bit about how you grew up.
JJ:
Well, I appreciate that because it’s a, it’s a fun story to tell about this one man in my life that has had such an impact. And it’s my grandfather, and it’s Omar Abbott Slater, CPA. And ever since I was about five, at least down to my earliest memories, maybe even a little bit before then, I was in just awe of this bigger than life personality. And he seemed to know everybody and everybody seemed to know him. We’d be able to go to a Dodgers game. And, you know, VIN Schooly knew him who was the former broadcaster forever with the Dodgers, and he knew some of the Dodger players, and we’d go to Disneyland and he seemed to know executives there. I mean, these are the places that are important when you’re five, right?
JW:
Absolutely.
JJ:
But what I also, as I got older was interested in is the independence that he seemed to have in terms of he was traveling, he played golf all the time. He drove a wonderful car, he had a great watch, he had suits for the seasons. You know, he had a Sears sucker suit with the white shoes. And as I got into my teenage years and I started thinking like, most, when you get into high school, what am I gonna do for a living? I was like, you know, I wanna do whatever it is that my grandfather does. And so I have told people in one of my first interviews, Jimmy, back when I got my first job as a, in the CPA industry back in 1993, I told one of the partners, and he about fell out of his chair and hired me on the spot, was that I have been waiting to become a CPA since I was five years old, meaning I’ve been waiting at that time to do what it is that my grandfather did. So I went off to college, took my first accounting class on the first day, I called him and I said, all right, granddad, tell me now really what a CPA is. How did you become a cpa? How can I, how do I follow in your footsteps? And I’m telling you, Jimmy, the, the rest of the story is me following the advice almost that he gave me on that one day, which was, get your accounting degree, become a cpa, worked for a large CPA practice that you can get in the tax department. And at about a four or five year mark, open up your own CPA practice cuz you won’t know anything. But the only people that are gonna hire you are the ones that don’t expect you to know anything. And that’s what I did, Jimmy. So I graduated high school early, graduated college early. So I started my own CPA practice at the age of 25 and celebrated this last year, 25 years of that. And I just love being a CPA because it helps me get satisfaction from the standpoint of helping others. And now I feel like I more and more understand my grandfather’s joy because in the industry that we are in we get to touch a lot of lives and we get to help a lot of people. And in a very stressful situation for most, meaning I’m dealing with taxes. And so to help people feel more comfortable about that, understand it, not be worried about it, so to speak, and that pays out dividends in life, such as if I got a cold, I can get into the doctor quicker, right? If absolutely, if I ran outta contacts, I can call my optometrist and he’ll get me op, you know, contacts overnighted or the heat and air goes out, you know? And the reason I say all that is these are all clients, but they’ve become friends and lifelong friends similar to to you and I, Jimmy and you have these very similar circumstances I think in part because of our industry. But anyways, that is probably the, the, the, the vein that would run all the way from childhood up to now. And I talk about him often, and my son has heard me tell these stories so many times. He’s 20 and he is an accounting major and has made a, a firm decision to become a CPA and has joined the practice. And although he is a sophomore in college, he’s already bringing on clients. Now, of course, they’re 18, 19, 20 year olds. But he has that same excitement and so it’s just an honor to pass this down to him as well.
JW:
Oh, what a legacy. So see, that’s, that’s the key thing people don’t think about as CPAs, you know, they don’t think of us as that person that’s really ahead of the curve, multi-generational change, and also talking about the future a lot people just don’t understand what we do. I’ll never forget my, my parents. So I came from a very different background. So, so my parents were just my dad had a sixth grade formal education, a PhD in life as I call it, learned it the hard way, right? Had his own logistics company and did these things. My mother went back after she I was in high school, she got a GED and after I’d graduated undergrad school and went on to buy masters, she got an associates in business finally at a local community college. So I came from a very different background, but I gotta tell you, my own parents didn’t understand what a cpa, oh, you do taxes, they just assume all of us do taxes. So there’s so much more we bring to the table for people. And I love the fact you said, Hey, you know I’m not just in this for myself. I’m here to really pour out to others. Tell me real quickly, if you don’t mind, what is, it is a typical day for JJ, the CPA man, from the time you get up, how do you unfold and maximize the use of your time?
JJ:
Well, and I appreciate that. I tell you what, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve had to slow down a little bit in the sense that about a year, a little over a year ago, I had a mild stroke. And that really then made me kind of realize that I do have to do a little bit better job of taking care of myself. But one thing is constant. And, and, and this is I think part of maybe my personality and part of why I think being a CPA is a good match for my personality, something that I learned, you know, I think in part from my grandfather, but I mean, I literally wake up, and this sounds so cliche, but I wake up and I’m already thinking about my clients, I’m clinking about my friends because of the fact that I have my own CPA practice and I’m doing tax, and it’s, you know, driven by deadlines. But there’s always something going on as you have friendships. Now, I’m not waking up worried about ’em. And so nowadays, I, I’m gonna be honest with you, you might be the first person that knows this, but I spend about an hour now in bed, but I spend my first hour returning emails, looking on social media, replying to people, replying to the public at large that has questions about taxes or on any of my social media platforms. Then I get up and I have a, a healthy light breakfast, and I get into the office and work with my staff and my team and focus in on doing the CPA work. And then typically near the end of the day, I’m then back doing the same thing that I started the day with is the emails and the phone calls. And then also I do a lot of videos and I do seminars. And so I’m usually finding myself trying to do that near the end of my day. But I will tell you this probably really in the last four or five years I started to take hopefully a little better care of myself. Now, I, I say that I didn’t do it physically. So the thing that caught up with me with having a stroke was physically, and no one’s gonna know this, so I could say whatever I want, Jimmy, but, but, but, but no, this is true. Let’s see. So September, October, November. So four months ago to now I’ve lost 35 pounds and just eating healthier, sleeping better. But with all that being said, I think it just has always been a constant for me where I was wanting to put others first. Now, what I’m telling you is four or five years ago, I got a little healthier in that in the sense of, well, I realize I gotta also take care of myself. Not even just physically, but, you know, mentally and, and having more fun in life and enjoying things. And so all that being said I think it also came from a standpoint of not wanting to disappoint people. In my childhood. It, there was a lot of gloom to it. And I grew up. My family didn’t know where I lived other than my grandfather. He was the only one that knew where we lived, and I grew up under an assumed name. We were in hiding. And it turned out my mother had a issue mentally that caused us to be in these circumstances. And so all that to say, I was also just in a, I’ll just say it, I was in an abusive family relationship with my mom and my stepdad, and we’ve all patched things up and people are good and, and doing better for all that. But nonetheless, I think also since I was a little kid having a lot of confusion and always being put into an environment where it was easily negative or something was my fault, even though it was outta my control. So you couple that, and there was some unhealthiness that I tried to make positive, which was taking care of other people and not wanting them to be disappointed or surprised. And that turned into doing tax planning that was ahead of the game and never wanting someone to be upset on April 15th. And always having a smile on my face and wanting to make sure. So that all coupled well and it was part of my therapy forever, in a day in terms of just the daily taking care of people. And that’s why I say about four or five years ago, I realized I can’t take care of others to my mental detriment. I’ve gotta still take care of myself. And so I think I just burned myself out, is all that really kind of came down to, you
JW:
Can’t pour into others cups, JJ, until we fill our own brother, right? Yes. Can’t fill ’em up from an empty cup. You know, I tell people, everybody asks me, they go, Hey, you take a lot of time off Jimmy. I go, you know, I’ve been blessed. I got a great team. I can, I can function anywhere, prove we’ve proven that with Covid, right? You had to work probably from home at some point or whatever. But I tell people, you know, we can’t fill others until we fill ourselves, right? So the reservoir has to have full load. So talk to me a little bit about you, you lost this weight, you got your son now coming into the business, but talk to me a little bit about how you branched out your brand. I wanna tell you folks, JJ the CPA, a if you look it up online, just type in on Google, JJ the CPA, you’re gonna pop up this good looking face of my friend now 35 pounds lighter, as he said, he always looked great, but now he looks even greater. And he’s gonna show you there how you can get highly just technical, but yet entertaining and qualified c p e for CPAs that listen to our podcast, but just for general people go on and look and see what he’s done for branding purposes. Let’s talk about that. How’d you come up with the tagline? And I love it cuz my middle initials a J so I’m “JJ the Other CPA” is what I’m gonna start. Yeah, tell me, tell me how you came up with all that.
JJ:
Well, I appreciate that, you know, it came from a client of mine who basically we were having a tax meeting and this very client a couple of years earlier kind of has a sports background and he started calling me JJ and it kind of caught on. It was a group of attorneys and we all kind of had a same similar group that we did our referrals with and hung out with. And so JJ kind of started catching on for a couple of years and we finish up this tax meeting and they were having a phenomenal year. We came up with a plan, it was gonna save them about a million dollars, what we were gonna do in this restructure. And he stood up and he clapped and this is just a room of four of us, right? And he clapped and he started saying, JJ the CPA. And so with that it kind of just caught. And from there I saw an kind of an opportunity to separate myself in terms of that fun that kind of came along with that, you know, JJ the CPA and I had it on the side of my hat. I’m on a Dallas Cowboys game with my son and we got some last minute seats. So I’m on row one. Turns out we’re in the Dallas Cowboy employee section. Nice. Sitting right next to me is the CFO of the Dallas Cowboys. And he’s looking at my hat and he says, “JJ the CPA”. He’s like, “that is catchy. You need to trademark that, you need to take that to the moon.” Yeah. So I have trademarked that Jimmy and I love it. So if you roll it all the way back, I once upon a time wanted to be in politics. And the reasoning was, when you’re 18 and 19 and 20, why does everybody wanna get in politics? Cause they want to change the world. Well, one of the things that drove into that though was I wanted to be, I think the face of something, right? And so anyways, I took JJ the CPA and I thought, you know, when I look around, I don’t really see anybody, anybody can point to and say that’s the face of being a CPA. And when we look at the financial industry or stock markets, or you name it football, there’s people kind of think in names. And, and I want you to remember this, this is at like, this is like 20 years ago. And so I kind of had this dream of, well, maybe I could just become like a CPA that encourages other people to become CPAs and, and I could do other things to make people feel more comfortable about taxes. Cause there’s only so much time in the day. And how could I then basically try and make the world better? But as a cpa, because I was fully committed to being a CPA, now I’ll say this, the kids get born right? And get into baseball and dance. And really all that was put on the, the back burner. And probably about 2018 I had a life change. And part of that was a life change, all this, you know, in marriage. And had a wonderful woman come into my life and I started sharing these things with her and she was like, you know what? Let’s start making this stuff a reality that’s been sitting on the shelf for about 15 years. And so really the wind betw beneath my wings came from now my fiance. And anyways, with that being said, it, it was having, I think somebody else say, you know what? That’s not crazy. You know what? That’s not arrogant. You know what? That sounds like a lot of fun. And as my kids were getting out of the house, my daughter’s 26, my son’s 20, I was like, well, what am I gonna do with all this extra time? And so started a YouTube channel, got JJ the CPA copyright or, or a trademark, wrote a book, self-published it, got a song on iTunes that Amanda helped me put together. We’ve hired a rapper and I wrote the lyrics and we put together a, a rap song that you can still find on iTunes. I make about 80 cents a year off of it Jimmy and spend all that at Starbucks. All right? Don’t spend. And I, and we kind of put together a package of, well what is JJ the CPA? And it was really mindset was to really promote the CPA industry for two reasons. One was, how could you do business with a cpa? And two, well, why should you become a cpa? So really we put in a good 19 months of every day, three posts every day of video. And it was constant social media. I started doing seminars on behalf of a wonderful continuing professional education group. And traveled around the country, went to 50 cities, had t-shirts made up, we made it into a tour and it really didn’t go anywhere, Jimmy and all to say we had maybe 30 views on a video, we might have a few interactions. Had about 2,500 subscribers. And at the time what we set out was we’re gonna give this two years and if it don’t hit certain certain benchmarks, then we’re just gonna do something else. Because it was really all for fun. It wasn’t to take away, I don’t want to ever stop being a CPA, I wanna continue to have my own tax practice. It wasn’t even part of that. It was literally sounds weird possibly, but it’s like I just, I wanna do this for fun. So I literally, at the beginning of February, I told Amanda, and this is in 2020, I said, you know, I don’t think I’m gonna put out any more videos because it’s tax season, it’s busy, I don’t have the time for it. We’re not gonna hit our goals. And so we really put it all to rest right at the beginning of September. And and then the pandemic hit.
JW:
So how you communicated during that time and I’m assuming went out with more videos, more communication pieces on social media. You know, the thing I love about what you’re telling me here is, is that you’re doing something a little different now, the title of this episode, I should have mentioned this to you JJ, the title of this episode’s actually don’t take a trail, blaze a trail. And so what you’ve done is literally taking what the CPA profession can do to those that are in need of those valued services and got noticed by them. So I’m like you though. I started this podcast and you’re gonna laugh. I bet we didn’t have 200 downloads the first three months, you know, and, and don’t take this wrong. I’m kinda like you. I know a lot of people, thousands of people on my LinkedIn and all this stuff. And I we’re promoting this like you wouldn’t believe. And I said to myself, I’m gonna give it a year. You know, everybody says a radio show, you gotta give it a year after the first year when the engineers sit down with me, I’ll be honest with you, I kind of went in the gap, brother. I said, you know what, this just isn’t making the impact. We’re not getting responses like we thought. He came into me and he said, well you don’t understand. You haven’t looked at your insights. And that’s how naive I was. So I went to our insights where we’re hosted and he goes you’ve got over a thousand a month downloads, which is good for the first year of a show, brand new show that doesn’t use explicit language and all these topics that are our taboo to me, you know, I’m just not going there. Right? Right. And then he said, and you’re in 13 countries. And I said, what you mean states, right? And he goes, 13 countries, man, wow. I said, seriously. So I said, well, let’s just do something else. So all we do is continue to pivot. We wanna bring our listeners the greatest and that’s why you’re on the show. So I wanna ask you some tough questions. Now, what do you see JJ the CPA doing in the next 10 years?
JJ:
Well, and I appreciate that cuz it, it’s, it’s at another pivot moment. You know, when the pandemic hit there was so much going on and it was coming out quickly. There were two different tax acts and one of ’em was the paycheck protection program. And money was gonna roll out within seven days. It was already predicted it would run out within probably a day or two. And so I actually turned to YouTube and had never done what I’m getting ready to tell you I had done, which was I put together step-by-step instructional videos, but only meant for my clients. So I was calling clients and I was texting them and I was sending them, you know, here’s how you need to produce this. Gave them Excel spreadsheets, but it was happening so fast. So I stayed up all day putting together then working with my clients. And then as I talked through the clients overnight, I realized, and the banks, well we need need to know this. We gotta have this. And there was no time now all of a sudden to be able to help these clients one-on-one. So overnight I started just recording videos, stayed up all night for two nights and recorded a bunch of videos. I didn’t have a thumbnail on it, I didn’t really have any description. It was just p p p instructional number one, number two, number three. And within that time period, two weeks, I ended up getting monetized on YouTube. I had then now 10,000 subscribers and I’m now at 85,000 subscribers. We have over 7 million views monetized. And I think the big difference though was the videos that I were putting out during that time and really continued the entire year of 2020 were always aimed at helping somebody as though they were my client. So I never charged for anything, gave away things freely, create a website as a resource. And I think because of the credibility of being a cpa. So yes, I already had a book and a song and a title of JJ the CPA and a website and history of that. But I think it was really in those three letters of cpa, a certified public account at Keyword Public. And I really took that to heart where I was like, wow, here’s a moment to help people. We went live every day for two to three to four to five hours and I just answered questions. And I think because of that, the credibility of being a cpa, then the enthusiasm of wanting to help people and genuinely, and people saw that by it’s all free information. But then I had fellow CPAs and enrolled agents and tax pros that started really reaching out and saying, you have got to start doing continuing professional education. The stuff you’re giving away for free is better than what I’m getting that I’m paying for and I’m not getting any credit for watching your stuff on YouTube. So do something to get us to be able to follow up. So that led into 2022 maybe at the end of 21, but 2022. So two years really after the pandemic of then providing this continuing professional education, but in a similar manner, if you will. And then taking that information and doing videos. The pivot going forward is probably also due to taking better care of myself where I’m now just packaging my continuing professional education together so I don’t have to promote seminar after seminar after seminar and putting together something separate to help small business owners. And I’m pretty much done with worrying about, as I got caught up and worrying about the stats and the views and how people reply, you know, reacted to it. And I just have gotten back in the last couple of months of just doing what I did in the beginning, which is here’s a video on things I know my clients need to know, and now I’m just sharing it with you and I’m finding I’m getting new viewers. So with all that being said, it is fun and I’m excited about it. It’s allowed me to now do continuing professional education with other societies not necessarily a part of the group that I represented. So when I look 10 years from now, what I would love is that my son has become a CPA and he would be at that five year mark, which is about the mark that my grandfather said, you should be able to kind of take a, a small practice on your own A to Z. And I told my son, I never want you to buy me out. There’s nothing to buy out. I wanna pour into you. And you just becoming a cpa. And continuing the legacy of being a cpa is really truthfully enough. And so 10 years from now, what I would love is I still have the clients that I’m still working with cuz I stopped taking on new clients in 2018. And you know, as well as I do, Jimmy people retire. They sell their businesses. And so I’ll have a natural less and less workload, but doing then more and more of these seminars. But to a point of really in the off season. And and then really I’m hoping to be a scratch golfer by then. I don’t know where you are in your game, but I’m right now about a, I’ve kind of fallen into maybe about a 14 handicap, but I’d like to be a scratch golfer. And I’m hoping that both my kids are still healthy and they’re not married now, but they’d be married and have grandkids. And but you know, my grandfather until he passed was a practicing C cpa. So I don’t see it any different way. He played golf, he went in at 10 he enjoyed life, he went overseas. And so I hope to follow in those footsteps as well, as well as to continue to take care of the people that took care of me. And and then passing that on. So the, the, the fun thing is Jimmy, we’re at the age now where we have clients and their kids are now around that high school, college, early adult life. And it’s just perfect timing because my son Cooper is gonna, and is already now starting to work with that second generation of clients. And so anyways, I just couldn’t be more excited. I do wanna be around 190 pounds. I’m just putting that out there because when you put something out there, there you go, then it becomes a reality. I don’t, I don’t worry about being buff or doing a hundred pushups, but nonetheless I’d like to be healthy. And so anyways, that’s the 10 year mark I gave you probably a little bit more than what you’re asking for there. No,
JW:
No, that’s great. So I do think, if you don’t mind you, things come to my mind. I leave this is gonna sound rather geeky, but those of our listeners across the world know me. I leave a notepad I do ever note, I use Evernote to record everything so I can respond on my phone or get it up on iPad or whatever so I can see it with me at all times. But at night I on my nightstand, I leave a, a notepad and a pen and some of these ideas come to mind. So right then all of a sudden I got this epiphany. So his name’s Cooper Jensen, right? What about cj, the CPA And let’s go ahead and get that trademark buddy cuz that’s coming, right?
JJ:
Oh it is. Now I, I’m gonna tell you something cuz I don’t know that my son will listen to this, but we will surprise him. It was actually my fiance’s idea. We’re gonna surprise him with the trademark of J of cj, the CPA when he gets those three letters just for the fun. And maybe he’ll be able to carry on some of that fun. We’ve had him I’ve had him do some videos for me and the fans, I’ll just put it that way have responded to that
JW:
Man that that is so great minds think alike, folks. What? That’s right. I’m telling you, see, JJ and I have a great mindset, but his real, real benefit is having his fiance involved. Yes. It sounds like to me, you know, behind every great man JJ is a greater woman, I say. That’s right. Let’s talk, let’s take a little tangent here just for a minute. First of all, do wanna go on record? He’s got a better golf score than me on handicap mine’s at about an 18, 19. I haven’t played a lot. I don’t believe this. Yeah, no. Hey, I’ve gotta play more. I’ll be truthful with you. I I’m like you. Our businesses have grown so much and during the pandemic, we were so committed to our clients. I didn’t play as much golf as I should and it’s an outdoor game. But I picked up pickleball. How are you on the pickleball court?
JJ:
Well, you would wipe me with it because I have only watched it from afar.
JW:
Oh, you gotta get on the pickleball course. So if you want to lose weight and now don’t laugh, this is part of my workout. I, I lift three days a week. I do cardio three days a week, but I also play on top of that about four days a week of pickleball. And oh my, oh my gosh, about about two hours. You know, so, so the point is, I’m burning a lot of calories and having a great time socializing and not for this intention, picking up a lot of clients, cuz a lot of these people are older individuals getting ready to retire or are retired and they go, aren’t you the retirement planning experts? They go, yeah, that’s us, but let’s play some pickleball. And, you know, so we play and then after the game, y’all hand ’em a card and they get a free consultation. Come in, let’s talk. Nice. And, and I didn’t intend on that, but what I’m trying to tell that to our listeners, you never know where you can help someone in life. If you’re looking, you’ll see them, right? So I wanna shift just a little bit on something. If you could change with a snap of your fingers right now, just, just click your fingers and then it would change. What one thing would you change in your life that would make it even more enjoyable for you? What would you do?
JJ:
Well, this might not be on point, but I would’ve gone home for dinner during tax season. So I never missed a baseball game. I never missed a dance recital. I made sure that we still did a spring break and I sure made up for any time that I was at the office during those hundred days of tax season. But it’s the memories that I’ve lost at the dinner table during those hundred days, during the 20 years, you know, or so of my kids. And it, so it’d really just be that. Now, I don’t think I, I’m feel lucky in saying this, I don’t don’t think it made an impact on my kids’ lives because my daughter’s success, a successful dance instructor and went to New York and has a degree and, and teaches dance at the Oklahoma City Ballet, which is the premier place here in Oklahoma. My son is signed division one baseball. Wasn’t able to see that out because of Tommy John’s surgery. And now is on the track to become a CPA. So I don’t necessarily think it costs them per se, but I lost, I think I lost those memories. But here, here’s more. What I would say that’s more important behind that is I didn’t put myself during the busiest time of the year. First I put the clients constant from 4:00 AM to 2:00 AM I mean, so many nights it was two to four hours of sleep, you know, coming home and showering, laying on the couch for a couple hours and going back to the office. And that would be that if I would’ve changed. One thing was if I was home for dinner, then the rest might have been fallen into place because I, I, I hit burnout at about age 35. Had some real serious health issues recovered from that. And, and all to say that there’s always time to take care of clients and those clients that are worth taking care of, they always, and even back then, always would want you to put your family first. So me be clear, I don’t feel as though I neglected my family. But I’m just saying if I would’ve gone home for dinner and then back to the office that might have made a, a difference in my own health. My avoiding burnout. And so when you’re passionate about something and you love it, but then as I told you earlier, there was some negative parts to my passion, meaning I was passionate. But it was coming sometimes from a standpoint of, well, I didn’t want someone to be disappointed in me. I didn’t want somebody to be upset with me. If I made a promise, I better make that come true, you know, in, in, in a result. And with that being said, I lost myself in some of that. Now, don’t get me wrong, okay, I had the shoes still do. I have the watch and I have the car and all the things that come along with that kind of work ethic I had. So there was no suffering going on there, right? And I didn’t realize that I was costing myself. But I will say this, Jimmy, I do, when I had that stroke and it was mild, which which means that it lasted less than four hours, believe it or not. And for your listeners across the globe if you don’t get to a hospital within four hours, there’s actually not anything they can do for you. After that four hour mark. Literally nothing other than comfort you. Point is the blood clot broke up within the first four hours and I really didn’t have much of a physical issue going on. But I couldn’t repeat to this nurse practitioner two numbers that she told me to act. She told me two numbers and she told me to tell ’em to her backwards. And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t figure out how to tell time. And that little twink was, wow, I may lose everything if I can’t get back on track here. Now, luckily I didn’t need surgery. I didn’t have any physical issue that needed to be corrected other than blood pressure, cholesterol, losing weight. And they said, you need to reduce stress. And so I had to cut my practice down. This last tax season didn’t work overtime at all. I left the office at 4:00 PM every day. And we got everything done by April 15th. And big part thanks to Alana in my office. And so all that to be said, that’s a really long answer. It might’ve been on point, might’ve been off point, but if I would’ve put dinner first that one hour, then maybe I wouldn’t have had a burnout that I had to recover from. Maybe I wouldn’t have had a stroke. But nonetheless, I’m here healthier than ever. Hopefully still got many years to go.
JW:
Yeah. You know, and I will say you this early in my career, I’m like, you very passionate. You know, we’re both very passionate. We have a lot of similarities in our career path. I man, I was burning some 18, 19 in our days literally. So you’re gonna laugh as we got into April one, I would come home at two or three in the morning, I would shower, shave, change, suit. Well, I’d rest for about two hours. Change suits, go back. Yeah. And I realized when my children were very, very small, when they would call the office and the office would say, I have a list of VIPs, my assistants or the, that time director first impressions. Yep. Said, Hey, your, your, your younger daughter’s on the line, you’ll gabrielle’s on the line, whatever, I’d always take the call. Sure. And and it’s kinda like, daddy, when will you be home? You know? And I just melted cuz I’m sitting there going, I made these promises, right? I did the same thing as you. And I think with the CPA brand, you know, we do what we say we’re gonna do, we we get the job done, right? And so I looked at this and you wonder, well, what’s the, why does he have the title of this podcast? Live a Life By Design. Here’s the thing, I was living my life by default, JJ, not design. I didn’t design to wanna work 20 hours a day, bro. Sure. Was making tons of money. What good is that if ate you’re flat on your back with these cables pushed into you and tubes and all this stuff going, Hey, you gotta slow down in life, right? So you did some great things on pivoting for your health, mental wellness you family and so forth. I did a couple things too similar to you that I recommend to our, our listeners all do. I never missed a spring break. So when my kids were old enough to do a little travel or something, though, they say seven, eight years old age, I just told every one of my clients it’s right before a major deadline in the United States folks. So those of our listening foreign March 15th, a big deadline for us here in the United States for tax filing. So CPAs are just swamped on that date. But I left for spring break and I said, you know, if a client doesn’t appreciate that, I’m sorry, but family first, I’ve gotta go. Not one of my clients at a corporate said, Hey man, we don’t blame you. Go, we’re going ski, we’re gonna take off, don’t worry about it. Yeah. And I did that for my kids. I always schedule all my schedule, all my daughter’s dancers house. I have dancers as well. Any pro plays at the school, whatever they did, I soccer game, I was there. And I never regretted that. I do wish like you that I’d learned that lesson a little sooner, but hey, that’s life. Right? And I don’t live in yesterday. So let me ask you a couple other questions. So in, in, in terms of what you got going on in 10 years, you’ve told me that, but, but talk to me a little bit about what’s the next iteration look like for JJ to CPA in terms of promoting that brand?
JJ:
Well, I appreciate you saying that because I love actually the in-person and in terms of the interaction, and I’m still old school. My son is definitely gonna bring better technology to the practice as he gets older. We still deal with paper to scan it after. We still, now we, we got our good technology in play and we’re using good tax software, but I still go to my client’s offices to meet with them. I haven’t done a Zoom with a client. And in part because they’re all my age as well, they’re like, well just come on down as normal now. I’m, I’m, I am gonna back up. I mean, during the pandemic we did, I didn’t go to their offices, but we still didn’t do Zooms. We just did it by phone and email. But one of the things was before the pandemic, I also did seminars in person. And so that was one of the reasons I loved travel around from Oregon to New York, to New Jersey to Atlanta, Florida, I mean Colorado, Arizona, I mean everywhere, 50 different different cities. And I really loved the in-person interaction with instructing, so to speak. And the continuing education. So you’re not ever teaching somebody something new, but maybe you’re adding a new layer to something that they didn’t know before, sharpening their skills or whatever. But it was just fun to do it in person. So I really missed that in the group that I was doing continuing ed on behalf of everything, went to virtual. And after about six months of doing some seminars like that, I told them I’m not doing anymore. I, I feel like I’m, all I’m doing is talking to a screen I don’t even know how many people are on. And so when you start to have the in-person, I’m there and there’s probably gonna be a lot of people that won’t wanna do that. And so really where I would see myself in 10 years and, and, and this is now, this would be maybe something else that I put out there, and it’s just wild and crazy. But the eve of Christmas Eve, we have a tradition where we go see my sisters in Tulsa here in Oklahoma. So it’s about an hour and a half drive, and my kids always come with me. And anyway, so we’re driving there and my son says, you know, well, dad, I mean, you’re probably gonna hit a hundred thousand subscribers on YouTube, which is, you know, it’s beyond my wildest dreams. You know, all these other things you said said you wanted to do, you’re doing them you know, wh what’s the next big goal for you? And I said, well, you’re gonna laugh, but I said, if I’m just gonna put it out there. So Jimmy, you’re the second person to know. I said, this is big, here we go. I said, not because of per se, JJ the CPA, although I would be the spearhead of this, but I would love to fill a coliseum, you know, and they have to be, you know, 50,000. But I’d like to fill a coliseum of maybe 10,000 people that would wanna come and hear about a CPA’s journey and how a CPA has done throughout their life, how it’s touched people, but in a manner that’s not just so that someone would become a cpa, but it would be a story to share that would help somebody maybe just be a better business person or be a little extra motivated or wanna become a CPA. But back to that original goal when I was a young, young man was who’s the face of the CPA industry. So we could throw out all kinds of names, you know, Dr. Phil and Oprah and Susie Orman, and you’re like, wow, that’s pretty arrogant. Well, you know, what, what other goals do I have, Jimmy? And if you’re not gonna believe in yourself, who’s gonna believe in you? And if you believe in yourself, do you really need everybody else to believe in you? And what would be the reasoning for that? Well, I’m sure some people in my past may say, well, because you got one healthy ego that needs to be fed like a freight train with a, a heap of coal every minute. But you know what, I think what it is, is it’s the legacy of being a cpa. That’s really what kept me going in my childhood. Yes, it was my grandfather, but it was, it was the, the image of my grandfather. It was the perception that I had of my grandfather, which I believe to be true. But that pulled me through my childhood and, and pulled me out of the circumstances and motivated me to go to college and to get through college being the first that I knew in my family to be in college. And when I reconnected with my family that I was missing from at the age of 25. And you know, being a CPA and having my own practice and being positive, I feel about life and changing. I, I don’t feel I continued all the negative things I may have learned from the parents that I grew up with my mom and stepdad and was able to change that behavior and provide a positive future generational shift. But it was because of the CPA. So I haven’t, right? I probably, this is what I’ll be doing over the next 10 years. You know, how do you package that, that it’s not about JJ the cpa, it’s not about, well, here’s what I did and look at the watch that I have because I’ve had all that stuff for the last 15 years, right? It’s how do I incorporate that? And I am gonna tell you back to my fiance, she has been telling me and encouraging me, and in fact, we just got back from our annual first of the year trip to the beautiful state of Colorado. And she was talking to me again as we were coming back. And she’s like, you really need to put your story into a book, you know, JJ the CPA, behind the numbers, and tell people your story because of the way that it might just encourage somebody else. And so that’s why it’s an honor to be on your podcast, Jimmy, a a Life by Design. I think I’m similar to you. There’s been a life by default. And so there, there’s the big and wild and crazy. But again, I’m saying it for the third time, I guess if you don’t say it, it’s never gonna happen. But I will tell you this, there was something I told my son five years ago, and it was that I wanted to make a certain dollar amount in one day doing seminars. And I didn’t know how I was gonna do it five years later. The very first time, it was a year and a half after the pandemic, I did a seminar on how to get this credit that’s helping small businesses, and I only charged $97. And I gave someone a, that was a, a four hour seminar. Anyways, all, all the, that one day I made that dollar amount, which was earth shattering like what, 97? That’s how many people we had and the sellouts. And so anyways, if you don’t say it, and I guess when I say something to my son, then I feel real obligation to try and make it come true. So we’ll see, we’ll see. How would I do that? I don’t know. But it’s probably coming from doing things like this is just being honest with people and maybe trying to be a little transparent and not pretending that JJ the CPA is actually a superhero. He’s just a normal guy.
JW:
Once you get into that phone booth.
JJ:
Yeah, that’s right.
JW:
When we come outta that phone booth, Josh. But you know, this has been phenomenal, my friend. You have been outstanding today and helping us understand more about your line of work, what you’re doing for the public and, and people in general. And one thing I wanna say to you is this is you have such a, such an aroma about how you talk and how you re respect people. I think that’s why you have the success you have. You know what, I’ve had people that come up to me and they go we really didn’t think you were real, Jimmy. You always say you never have a bad day. You just have some days better than others. And they’re listening to these podcasts. Well, they’re getting a hold of, they’re local people are getting a hold of the people that work with my team, and they’re going, Hey, that’s him, man. He has never come to work with a bad day. And if he’s had a bad day, he’s might’ve shut his door. But we never heard any noise coming out there. You know, I’m just that kind of person. You are the same. I, I love, I think we’re cut from the same cloth, the kinda the brother from another mother, if you will. So one thing I would like to say to you is nothing but the best this year, my friend, for you and your family. Hope you have a wealthy and a generous and just an abundant lifestyle from here on out with health as the, as the primary key to that. So thank you so much for joining us. If you’ll hold for just a minute, we’ll get this closed out friend. Just one moment. All I can say is, I am inspired, Josh, you have done an outstanding job of what you do in your life, learning from that, that you made in mistakes. Now folks, we all make those same mistakes, but at the end of the day, we have to learn from them. And that is the key from that. Hey, this week’s challenge at Live a Life By Design is simply this. Look around your loved ones, hug your loved ones. Spend time envisioning what you want out of life to make it bigger, better, and bolder for you. Go to our Facebook page, Live a Life By Design Community. Leave us some insight of what you see as your bigger, better, and bolder future. And we look forward to hearing from you and listening to you and your comments as we improve our podcast for you in the year 2023. Appreciate you so much. Go out now, and Live a Life by design!
