Nick Houpt: 0:06

What if the real key to success isn't found in the hustle, but in surrender? In this soul-stirring and deeply grounded episode, Grayson Marshall Jr., former Clemson Hall of Famer, coach, speaker, and author of Servant Made, not Self Made, opens up about faith, purpose, and what it means to truly let go of control. After surviving a near-death experience that required his heart to be stopped and restarted during surgery... Grayson redefined every metric of success, not by what he achieved, but by who he lifted. In this conversation, we explore why your purpose is more important than your plan, the truth about ego, identity, and the illusion of being self-made, how surrender is not weakness, but the ultimate strength, the spiritual mindset that helped him overcome burnout, isolation, and fear, The real meaning of peace, partnership, and living without lack. If you've ever wondered what it truly means to live with intention and what it takes to align your gifts with spiritual vision, this episode will meet you right where you are. So take a breath, open your heart, and settle in. This is Life Well Balanced with Grayson Marshall Jr. and me, your host, Nick Halp.

Unknown: 1:29

Life Well Balanced

Nick Houpt: 1:30

My man, Grayson Marshall Jr. I'm so excited to have you in here, brother.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:38

Me too, man. It's always a pleasure to hang out with my buddies and see what you're doing now. It's really awesome, but to have the opportunity here

Nick Houpt: 1:46

is a blessing, so I'm excited. Awesome. Thank you, thank you. I want to start by acknowledging you, my man, because we've known each other for years now, and you have just always been a great leader, a great mentor, and just an awesome person to me. and to people that I see you around. And I just want you to know how happy I am to have had you come into my life and teach me different things about business and spirituality. And then you played a huge role in the book that I wrote and helping guide me through there. So I appreciate you for that, my man.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 2:18

You know, I appreciate it. I think that when you know what you've been kind of assigned to do, you just kind of do it in a way that maybe most people won't get it. Most people seek self-serving when it comes down to their impartation in somebody's life. What am I going to get out of it? And to a fault, I've probably done the exact opposite. And it's created some challenges in my life because people ask me, well, why don't you charge for this or why don't you do that? And there was a time where I reflected on it and at some point felt like maybe I should. But at the same time, I began to really focus on what my faith says. And that's why... my life has shifted in an amazing way. After the surgery, it really gave me a whole total different perspective on life itself and what it really means. And so I think that what you alluded to is kind of who I've always been, Signature, but now it's who I am to the core of myself and I feel better than anything I've ever had. That's awesome.

Nick Houpt: 3:23

And we're going to take everything you just said and just start throwing it out there and everything. But before we do that, Let's start with the Grayson Marshall Jr. origin story. What kind of inspirations, what kind of people and challenges have brought you and helped mold you into the man that is sitting right in front of me right now? I

Grayson Marshall Jr: 3:43

think always wanting to defy tradition. I grew up with both parents at home. My mother's a principal. My dad was a teacher. My sister's the head of online education for DOD currently. So I grew up in a family that was very, very focused on academics, focused on intellectualism, focused on articulation. My mother would have a fit if I split a verb. But I think that what I saw was limitations. I saw a role that they had accepted in their life, and I appreciated it because they made the sacrifice to send me to private school. I was able to excel in sports and go and have a fantastic college career, Hall of Fame and ACC Legends status. But I think for me, it was always what's missing. I never wanted to be okay. I never wanted to just satisfy. And I saw that around me, even though the satisfaction I saw around me was apparently successful by all measures of what the world was. I knew there was something more. And so I think for me, I began to look at what could possibly be more. I didn't want to just settle for what I could be. That was just never how I was wired, but everybody else around me was. which is why I moved from D.C. to Florida. Because had I stayed in D.C., I just really believe I would have fallen into a successful life, but it would have been quote-unquote status quo for that, right? So whatever that measure was, and it was not a bad life, but I just didn't want that. There was something else that was there. So moving to Florida kind of changed that because I didn't want to be disrespectful and search for my purpose in my parents' house because that was kind of out of kind of out of character. What they said goes. And I know my mom and dad would have said to me, well, why are you waiting to figure it out? Why don't you just become a teacher? And it would have been 40 years later. Why? Because I would have gotten involved in something. I wanted to, again, have it as good as it could be, operate in the spirit of excellence. So I would have been the best one that I could be. But I just knew there was something more in me and they didn't understand it. It wasn't who they were. And so out of respect, I wasn't going to force them to try to figure it out with me or give me the time to do it. I just went and did it on my own.

Nick Houpt: 5:57

Well, the funny thing is, is you are a teacher. Absolutely. Just not by profession in that realm, you know? So it's like the best of both worlds, right?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 6:05

I say that all the time, Nick. It's like the one thing I didn't want to do was teach. And it's what I'm kind of wired to do, just not in the conventional way of doing it. And I think that was hard for me to explain and hard for them to grasp because they only know new teaching one way, right? So Yeah, it is funny. I mean, being an assist guy, having assist records that I have, it's all for making somebody else look good. It's all for kind of directing people into ways of success, which is just what teaching is anyway. So I think to the core of who I am, that's who I've always been. And now I've been able to define it through my faith and through my persistence and through some adversity. I've been able to say, this is what I am. This is who I am. And it's okay.

Nick Houpt: 6:48

Well, and that kind of embodies your, you embody the definition of what a coach is, you know, because where it originated was a stage coach and it was something that took you somewhere else to a different and better place. And so let's jump back to, you were talking about feeling that calling of something more. Let's talk to someone who's listening right now that feels like that, but they're under that umbrella of their parents and they want to make that change, but they just are scared or don't know how to do it. What's some advice you would give to them?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 7:25

You know, Nick, four years ago, I would have given different advice because I really thought it was about motivating self. And I thought it was about you deciding you wanted to do it. And again, that was the resilience and persistence that I always had. I was going to make it happen. And that was the mindset that I believe was the true blue pin for success. You're going to make it happen. You take a risk. You do all those things. And they are, that is an aspect of it. But the biggest thing I found was, and that's why I wrote the book, servant made, self-made, right? Success as we know it or as defined in the world today is about self. You hear everybody talking about I'm self-made or I'm self-made and they literally relish in the fact that I'm doing this alone. This is the narrative that we have. And what I found was, and I always knew this, but now it's even more evident, you don't do this stuff by yourself. But that's the way we're wired. So when you take athletics, where I came from, when you take entrepreneurship or business, all of those things seem to be defined by a narrative of you got to go make it happen, right? Well, I've come to understand that if it's you making it happen, then if you say you have a spiritual or faith-based foundation, then where's God and all that? And so you really find out that the finite life that you have, there's not much there. You come to an end. There's only so much you can do. And so to give someone advice right now, what I would tell them is, is that find your purpose, not your plan. People have mistaken plan for purpose and plans change. Purpose doesn't. That's why we continue to move and try and do other things because it was a plan, not a purpose. And purpose is about patience. Plans usually have an end date for them, right? I give this amount of time for it, or I got to switch the plan. So I think what most people end up doing is not understanding purpose because no one ever told us or asked us what our purpose was. They told us to find a career path, find a plan that works, find something you're good at. But that doesn't necessarily mean that's your purpose. And because we live in a world that doesn't focus on that the way I believe we should, Most people don't find their purpose. They find something to do that becomes their hobby, something they feel comfortable with. All of those are in direct opposition to success because nothing about success is going to ever come from anything comfortable. So it's really battling two personalities or two different lifestyles that are out there. And we've forever battled the wrong one. And that's become the biggest issue that we have, which is why success for so many is fleeting. And it doesn't last because it was just a plan. And when that plan changes, now they have to go refine the new plan. If you know your purpose, if you really understand your purpose, then you never stop doing it. You never look to retire. You never look to quit. Why? Because it's my purpose. It's what I do because it's how I'm wired and how I'm framed. So when you look at coaching, that's how I'm wired. So I'll do that forever. I can do it without thinking about it. I can do it. Why? Because it's my purpose. And that's where I really believe people have to make a significant shift. Get away from some of the narratives in the world because they direct you away from your full calling of who you're supposed to be.

Nick Houpt: 10:47

And I think too, when people get in that realm of, I have to make a plan, I have to make a plan, they don't move forward because they're just stuck in the planning mode. And I think when you do realize your purpose, then it's almost inevitable. And no matter what you do, you're still gonna get pulled into that direction of what your true calling or dharma or purpose is,

Grayson Marshall Jr: 11:12

right? You can't run from purpose. You'll always find it'll always be there. Now you'll ignore it because nine times out of 10, it's not wrapped in the essence of the world, right? So there's certain things that you want in the world to achieve that might not be what your purpose is. But again, it's back to where the foundation is. For me, it's biblical. So when I look at where my life is, if it's not rooted in biblical principle, then it really steers people away from where they should be. And you find emptiness. You find people that have had success in the natural, but they're empty in the heart. Why? Because they haven't connected purpose to the successful walk that they would like to have. But it's about seeking the kingdom. And what is the kingdom? The kingdom is true submission and surrender. Well, we live in a world that's focused on who self is. So you're only going to get what self can derive. If you really want to have purpose and really have peace in that purpose, then you have to seek ye first the kingdom. So what does true surrender look like? True surrender is just taking an understanding of what kingdom is and doing what he says. If I work for you, you're my boss. I got to do what you say. If I don't do what you say, You can get rid of me. You can redirect me. But I've literally surrendered to this as being where that is. Because we're so self-driven, we don't surrender to anybody. Matter of fact, we think surrender is weakness, right? When there's full strength in surrender. So when you're fully surrendering, if, again, for me, here's what my Bible says. Here's what my king says. Here's what I'm doing. Kingdom is led by a king. We live with a mindset of democracy. So in our minds, our voice matters. What I say or how I feel determines how I act. That's not how a kingdom works. In a kingdom, whatever the king says, go. It doesn't matter how you feel. Whether you like it or not. Correct. So full surrender means I'm going to do what he says do, whether I like it or not. I'm going to do what he says do because that's the good thing for me. That's what I'm about. There's a mindset, again, that we battle against that takes us away from doing that. Well, what's our tradition? Our tradition says me, me, me. Our tradition says self, self, self. Well, God's word says surrender, submit. So again, serve. So man's definition says do your own thing. God's definition says serve. So we're going to do our own thing. Well, then I'm not in full submission. So that becomes the essence of where the true walking in purpose comes, right? I had a guy I know, a phenomenal speaker. I don't want to use his name, but he literally gave this illustration of what kingdom looks like. He said he went over to England to speak. He said he got off the plane, they picked him up, and they drove him to the event. And the event wasn't in the place that he thought it was going to be. It was a little more run down. So he did his show. He did his talk. And when he got done, out of politeness, the English man came to him and said, I apologize for the venue. but the queen had need of our building. And he said, what do you mean? He said, well, the queen had need of the building, so we had to give it up and here's where we were. He said, what are you saying? He said, I'm saying that in our country, no matter what you have, if the queen or king has need of it, you give it up. And that was mind blowing to him that that's the way, but he directly related it to what it looks like when you have a king. When the king says, this is what I need for you to do it. This is what I want from you. If you fully surrender to the king, you do it no matter what. And I think that's where we have gotten away from. And it keeps us away from truly being servants the way we should be. And because of that, we battle with our own mind, our own narrative, and we don't know what to do. And that becomes a challenge. So people who are looking to really move beyond to where they need to go to, the key to it is surrendering. If you surrender to the rule, again, this is all predicated on your belief in Christ. If you don't have that belief, then what I'm telling you doesn't matter. But if you have that, here's where the dichotomy is. This is where the battle is. You're trying to do it the world's way. The tradition says self, self, self. Well, kingdom says surrender and let me walk you through it. And that is a true trust issue, right? Because we don't trust what we can't see, right? So we trust ourselves more than we trust God. Well, trust yourself. You're finite. You trust him. He's infinite. So that's what it comes down to. Truly, Nick, what do you really believe? And unfortunately, for a lot of people, they believe more in themselves because they've been trained that way.

Nick Houpt: 16:06

And I think people just don't want to let go of control that they think they have. Absolutely. So someone that feels like. They can't surrender. And so we just had a friend of mine on here, Rob Swimer, and he has a book called Surrender to Your Adversity. And so we went through this whole thing on surrender. And he always says surrender, but never give up. And so what he breaks it down is, is taking a step back to fully understand the whole plan. So someone that's trying to maintain control of their life, How do they start the surrender process?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 16:44

You don't maintain control if you surrender. You can't. And that's what it comes down to. When you look at surrender, here's the understanding of it. And again, having a mindset of surrender and step back and evaluating means you're still putting your mind on it. I'm still trying to figure it out myself. I want a better perspective on it to see how to move forward. When you fully surrender, you trust him to lead you. Proverbs 3 and 5 says this. It says, trust in the Lord God with all thine heart. Lean not to thine own understanding and all thy ways acknowledge him and he will direct your paths. It's truly surrender. It's as if, Nick, I was your guide and you were completely blind. You have to trust me with everything. Every last bit of it. Well, that's what true surrender is. I got to trust you with everything. The problem is, again, the mindset that we have is about destinations and timeframes. So we have an expected and we have an expected outcome whenever we do anything. Well, in the Bible, when you look at Paul said this in Romans 8 and 28, he said, all things work together for the good, for them that love God and those that are called according to his purpose. If all things are working together for your good, Nick, then I would contend there are no wrong decisions. Because even if you make a wrong one, if you trust that God is leading you the right way, he'll work it out. We have to really trust that. What do we do if I make a mistake and I'm trying to fix what I did wrong? I'm trying to manipulate it to fix it my way. If you just trust him and you keep seeking him, if you keep surrendering to his word, if that's your posture, he's going to work it out for you. But most of us have been trained to, especially men, I got to fix it. I got to make this happen. And we feel the pressure societally. We feel the pressure in relationships. We feel all these things. It's like, I got to make it happen. Well, the minute you go to do that, God's kind of saying, okay, go ahead, Nick. I'll be here. When you get done, I'll go ahead. And again, because of the resistance and because of the perseverance and persistence that we have, we'll go harder than we need to go, right? Because we're going to fix this thing, man. I'm going to figure this thing out, right? Instead of just surrendering, right? Because we believe that someone's watching us and their opinion of our apparent failure is the way they did with Job, talking about him. When he was going through his stuff and everybody's saying, see, you ain't as righteous as you thought, right? You're not that way. Look at what you're doing. Yeah, your God's doing this to you and you're supposed to be all great. That's kind of where we live. We live in this world of worrying about what somebody else is going to say. So we don't want to fail. We don't want to make mistakes. So we live conservatively. We live well below where we could be because we want to succeed. And success, and that's a personal thing. achievement. Whereas success in the kingdom says surrender. Success in the kingdom says, let it go. So it's, again, it's us battling two worlds, almost two different ways of living. And this is what our choice has to be.

Nick Houpt: 19:50

There's so many things I want to unpack in that, but let's start with why are men wired like that? Why do we feel like we have to be like that?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 20:00

The responsibility. We were made first. God made us first and he told us, here's your responsibility. Literally, I want you to do this. He told Adam, you get to name everything here. Everything's under you. Everything is here. What you want to do is right here. He says, subdue, have the earth dominion. It's all yours. There's a lot of responsibility on that. And that carries over in every aspect of life. Now you add to that societal influence, right? Where we look at how these things have transpired over time, right? Men were in a position, even going back to slavery days, right? The man was that guy. The woman took care of the kids, took care of the family, but that's the way it was. And there's always been a signature with that. There's always been a badge of honor that goes with the ability to do that. Ask a man who struggles with that, what he feels like. He feels like less than a man. And now you have a society that really emasculates them and really heaps on the fact if you're not doing this, if you're not becoming this, if you're not providing this, then you're not a man. And that's not what it's supposed to be. So again, I think it's the pride that comes into being a man. It's the pride that comes into the insufficiency that we have actually been labeled with. And we really fight to do that. especially in the world today of relationships. Part of the evaluation of a man is the bag they bring. The bag, the business, or the bedroom. It's one of those three. And that's just kind of how it works out, right? So that's how men are evaluated. Less about the surrender and submission. It's more about their provision. That's part of the big challenge that we have as men.

Nick Houpt: 21:45

So now with that, how does that tie into ego and identity?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 21:49

It's who we are, ego and identity. That's man itself, right? We're supposed to be made in the image and likeness of God. Your identity is in what the world has defined you as, right? Or what you see yourself in the world as, or what you are trying to become the opposite of what it was. So if your dad was this way, then you want to be completely opposite, right? Or if you were raised poor, you don't want to live poor, right? There's all these things that go into it. If your identity is in Christ, then that's what you should be modeling, right? That's who you should be following. That's the image that you should be. There should be no ego when it comes to it because I know who I am. I know who this is based on my lineage, based on my heritage, based on my DNA, my bloodline. I'm a child of a king. I wouldn't have any ego at that point because it's who I am. But when I don't have that, when I don't know who I am, Nick, when I'm still trying to figure it out, I have to create ego. I have to create identity. Why? Because I have to be accepted. If I made an image like this of Christ, I'm already accepted. But in the world, I have to be definitively put into a category that people will like. And if they don't, then I find myself an outcast. And again, that's when mental health and all those things become critical parts of people not even being able to cope because they don't know who they are. And you take all of the issues of the world today, political, social, religious, all those things, they play a major role into defining. We have to choose sides. And I didn't choose no side. Don't worry about what color I am. It doesn't worry about what political affiliation I have. If I'm like God, then it don't matter because none of those things are a part of him anyway.

Nick Houpt: 23:30

Now, were you always like that? Or do you think when you were younger and playing basketball and then growing your businesses as you got a little older, I'm sure you had somewhat of ego and identity tied with everything like that? Or have you always had this this spiritual path to where you kind of maintain focus?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 23:49

I would never say that it was a spiritual path because I was born and raised Roman Catholic. So I didn't open a Bible until I was 27 years old, 28 years old. But I do believe that humility has always been a part of who I am, right? I've reduced myself to the point where at times I didn't feel like I was worthy. Not being recognized for the effort that you're making often sets you in a different place emotionally. And you try to make the effort to prove. I think that was it. I think for me, it was never about ego because I was never the greatest when it came down to affluence or acknowledgement, but I was always there. And I was always the one to get count on. And I was always the one that delivered. And at the end of the day, I was the one standing, right? But I've never been included. I've never been in the in crowd. I've never been, I stay as isolated as anybody. And that's not a victimization characterization. That's just me. I'm just not, I was never invited to the cookouts. You know, I was always here about this stuff later. You know, I was just never in the in crowd. I just never was. So I don't ever think I, in that respect, I couldn't have an ego. Having success in sports, it puts you on a pedestal at times. But for me being 6'2", being around basketball players, I was still a normal guy. I remember taking Evie to Clemson with me at one time. And I remember telling her, she said something to me, she said, you're tall. I go, no, I'm short. And she goes, you're not short. I go, yes, I am short. And I was saying it in relative to basketball, right? So when she gets to Clemson and she sees seven-footers and 6'11", 6'10", 6'6", and she goes, oh, yeah, you are short. And I think that, again, that's perspective of how I would see myself, right? To a normal person, I'm big. But the world I was in, I'm a little dude. And I played with a guy who won six NBA championships, five NBA championships. I played with two guys that were 14-, 15-year career guys, right? If they were sitting here right now, they would tell you that part of their career success was playing with me at Clemson because of what I was able to grow them through and teach them through and help them through. And I loved the fact that I could turn on TV and that's my former travel mate, that's my former roommate, that's my guy, right? I could look at it that way, but I was never worried about what didn't happen for me. And I just always believed that something good would happen. So I've never had really an ego just because I've never, ever been in that space. I've always been valued at what I can do for other people, Nick. And that's usually in a space of, well, get him because he'll do it. But after that, we don't care. And I've lived that way my entire life. But it has changed since my surgery. I think things were really brought into a different level of perspective. When you are this close to not being here, that was a big piece of reflective retrospection. And I think that's what moved me from self-made, even though that I would never have said that was it. But when I began to think about it, when I began to hear and look at the things I was reading for motivation, motivation doesn't last. And motivation is about self. It's about moving you. When I looked at the people I was reading and listening to, I'm not saying that stuff isn't important. What I'm saying is it doesn't last. And what I found is if I trust servant-made because he says the greatest amongst you is the servant. So when you look at that as your model, servant-made is greater than self-made. There's more to it. We just don't have that as a narrative in the world today where that's the most important thing. It's more about self. What can you do for, you know, well, I got to get mine. How do I do mine? And I don't fault anybody for being successful or working hard. But nine times out of 10, it's working hard to futility because you're still looking for something when it's not there, right? And that's what I believe that has to change for people. I think if you really surrender to being a servant, and again, we could go on for hours about why that's different now, but if that's your heart, it's truly being a servant, then I believe you'll get

Nick Houpt: 27:59

everything in life that you want. Well, let's talk about your experience with surgery and everything and give people an idea of kind of what you went through and then that transition period afterward of what changed, how you changed it, and what you implemented in daily life now as compared to before. August, 2024, I was

Grayson Marshall Jr: 28:22

at Clemson University at a golf tournament and I got dizzy. I grabbed Evie and I said, hey, I'm dizzy, I gotta sit down. So we sat down, got me some water. I retired early, went to bed, got up the next morning, played golf tournament, won the tournament. We're driving back home. September, I was driving around the city. I got really dizzy. And so I said, you know, I'm going to drive myself to the hospital. So I drove myself to the hospital. Oh, and my blood pressure was elevated. So they gave me something to bring it back down, but I drove home, right? So the doctor said he wanted me to take a stress test. So I go to Baptist. Well, a week and a half later, we went to Baptist, did a stress test. When I got done, they said that your heart enzymes are elevated, but okay. But we want you to go see a cardiologist. So I go see the cardiologist. And the cardiologist takes my blood pressure on my left side. And it was 90 points higher than on my right. So he says, I don't know what's wrong, but I want to do a sonogram. October 8th, Evie and I go down to Baptist downtown. Now we've been walking around downtown before the appointment. I go in. And the lady's doing a sonogram on me. And we're just having idle chit-chat. Where you from? You like the Jags? So after about 15 minutes, she just stopped talking. And I just thought it was early in the morning, 8 o'clock. So I was like, she ain't had her coffee yet. I'm just sitting there wide open. We're talking. So she got done with the sonogram. And she said, here's a towel. You can wipe the gel off of you. But sit there. I got to go get the doctor and tell him about the thing. I said, well, can you get Evie for me? So she said, yeah. So as she gets Evie, we're sitting on the table when the doctor comes in. And he walks in. He doesn't even say anything to me. He walks straight past me. He's on the phone. And he's looking at the screen she's looking at. And he's talking on the phone, looking at the screen, talking on the phone. So he looks back over at me. He says, do you have a headache? I said, no. He says, do you have any back pain? I said, no. He said, do you have any chest pain? I said, no. Why should I? He goes, yeah. He tells me I have a type A and B aortic dissection. And I said, what does that mean? He says, well, your aorta has expanded. Your normal diameter of your aorta should be three and a half to four centimeters. Yours is over seven. And she found a hole in your aorta the size of a ballpoint pen. Well, if anybody knows what that really means, the aorta and that concept is called the widowmaker. And if the widowmaker is punctured or is holed, there's instant death. So they couldn't figure out why. Literally, there was more wrong with me. So they immediately admitted me to the ICU. I never touched the ground again. They wouldn't let me walk or do anything because they were afraid that it would rupture. So two days later, I had aortic dissection surgery that went extremely well. They told me, they came in and talked to us and told me that they were going to have to lower my body temperature and stop blood flow to my brain and my lower body while they worked on my aorta. And then after that, they were going to warm my body back up. And so I said, wait a minute. I said, I'm not a doctor. I said, but it sounds like you're going to kill me and then bring me back to life. He said, basically, that's what we're going to do. So there was a whole lot going through that. We were asked about my last will and testament of my affairs and order. Well, we just wanted to have a sonogram, right? So two days later, we're having a major surgery. And it was the day the hurricane was supposed to hit. So there were so many, many factors that went with that, Nick. But to have gone through that, to know that the only reason I was able to go in to have surgery was because I was able to be on Evie's insurance. Because as a business owner, a single business owner, I never had health insurance. It was just expensive. So to have that happen, when you really start looking back to know that I met her on a dating app and four years later, our relationship would have grown to the place where that was something that was afforded to me and I would need it to still be alive. It's a different level of surrender. It's a completely different level of letting go and letting God, right? Because there's no way I could have put all that together. You know what I'm saying? There's no way, there's no plan I could have put together that would have accounted for all of these things to end up in this way. So when I really talk to people about what it means to be a servant, when I'm talking about fully surrendering, when you really look back over your life and look at where you are, no matter what age you are, there's no way you could have planned everything that's happened. If you really sit back and evaluate and look, lose a job, get a job, lose a friend, get a friend. All these things that have happened to get you to a place where you are, there's no way you could have planned all that. So when I look at who I am, I look at God really emphasizing in me the need to really enhance servant and really bring people to a perspective of, let's really talk about how you got here. Let's really talk about where you are. Servant-made, not self-made, Nick, is really about accountability. in a world that acquiesces us to excusing everything or blaming somebody else, if you're a servant, you're accountable. If you're a servant, you know what you're supposed to do and you feel bad when you don't do it. That's the way it should be when it comes down to serving. You feel bad when you're falling short. You have a different conviction about falling short, right? We don't have that. So I think that going through what I went through, knowing how All of it was orchestrated by his divine plan, one that I couldn't have done. It puts me in a different methodology of sharing with people, right? We don't make it a priority and we don't make servant a priority, right? So I think that's where that whole experience changed for me. I had to make it a priority. It was like, I had to look at me and I said, you know what? You focus on self. not from an egotistical or arrogant standpoint, but you focus on self. It's you're going to get it done. And if anybody knows me, I'll get it done. I don't care what I got to do. I'll get it done, right? If I got to go above and beyond, I'll get it done. So that to me is more self-made mindset, right? I'm not saying that you're so arrogant and egotistical even though there's a group of people that are. What I'm saying is that when you totally depend on you and nobody else, that's when you run into the problem.

Nick Houpt: 34:50

Well, that ties in right here. You wrote, that you wrote that the self-made narrative often leads to burnout and isolation. Is isolation good or bad? I

Grayson Marshall Jr: 35:02

think isolation is good when you're refreshing yourself to really surrender. But what happens is people get isolated because they feel like they failed and they're pulling away because now everybody's seen them fail. They don't know what they look like anymore and they get tired, right? So when you're focusing on self, it gets weary. It gets... It gets aggravated. It gets tired. You've been a self-employed guy before. You know what it's like to build a business. When it's not going the way you want it to, it gets tiring. It can be exhausting, right? Because you're doing it all or you put faith in someone else who didn't come through, right? So now who do I bring in? Now I don't trust anybody anymore, right? So I'm just, forget it. I'm just going to do it myself or I'm just not going to do it, right? This is where it happens. But that's, again, that's the result of it being all on you. We don't trust people. Why? Somebody might take your idea. We worry about all these things. We worry about every last bit of this. So I got to be careful who I tell. I can't tell this person. I don't want them to know. Well, that's fear-based. I've

Nick Houpt: 36:03

had to sign NDAs just to hear about someone's

Grayson Marshall Jr: 36:05

idea. That's fear-based, right? Because again, that's about self. That's about me. If it's for you, it don't matter who else is around. It doesn't matter if anybody else is trying to do it. What you're supposed to do is you. Now, That same group of people, Nick, will talk to you about abundance, but they don't operate in abundance. If there's abundance, there's enough for anybody, but you're not. You're operating in scarcity because you're worried about what you're doing and you got to keep it so secret, secret. Why? This is what I mean. This is a self thing. It's a me thing. I got to control or hover my stuff. No, if it's about serving, you don't matter. I don't care who knows. Everybody can do this, but we hold true to these things. Why? Because it's about us. It's about self. When you're doing what you're supposed to do, it can't be about you. It's got to be about everybody else.

Nick Houpt: 36:55

Now, how does this all play into your mental health? Let's kind of tie that into. So once you had the surgery happen, do you think that put you on a new trajectory of what your purpose is? Or do you think you were living out your purpose before? Or did it just layer back more onto what your purpose is? It really defined it.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 37:17

Because the reality of life was now truly more evident than before. I think people think they have all the time in the world. And they think they, I can fix this, I can do this. When you're sitting there and I'm sitting in a hospital room in the ICU and they're telling me they're about to take me in for surgery. And they asked me how I was feeling. I said, you know what, I just want to go to sleep. I mean, they don't wake up on this side or wake up on the other side, but I just want to go to sleep. I mean, that's how heavy it is, right? So you really get to a place where I don't control any of this. You know, so I had to get away from me controlling everything. And again, not being controlling, but me being, as you said earlier, in control, right? I got to make it happen. I got to do all these things. Well, when you're under the knife of somebody else's control, you really get a different perspective. I wasn't one who liked going to doctors. That just wasn't me. I was like, yeah, I'm alive because of a doctor. That doesn't change my belief about oftentimes... Western medicine. Correct. But at the end of the day, though, I have to acknowledge that, that his skill set is what had me here, right? And if he wasn't walking in his purpose or what his skill was, I wouldn't be here. So I have to honor and respect that. So... it gave me a different perspective on what I'm supposed to be doing. So it was able to realign me with a more committed space of being a servant, right? And that's, and I'm telling you, Nick, once you do that, it's a whole different thing. Once you fully surrender, it gives you a peace. When we're anxious, it's because we are worried about time. We're trying to fix it all up. He says, be anxious for nothing. I got this. Because tomorrow's got its own problems. So I think when you really understand that, it gives you a sense of peace in your mental health. But when you're the one doing it, you're worried about what's going to happen next week. What's going to happen the week after that? I got to do something by Friday. This is all. He says, look, if you really can walk in this thing by peace, if you'll be my servant and trust me, you ain't got to worry about that stuff. And I think those are the things that I've always, I've told Evie many a time. I said, the one thing that I've had good practice in is trusting God. That's the one thing I have. So I feel like I'm pretty good and pretty well versed in just trusting God. When it doesn't even look like it's supposed to look, I just trust him. Well, what are you going to do about it? Trust him. That's the first thing I'm going to do right now. Be patient. You still have to do your part, right? Because you can't just sit and do nothing. But at the end of the day, it's, no, I'll do what you can do. I make the most of it, but I really focus on, am I trusting him? Am I leaning into who he is and what he said? Is his word true? See, what people have to come to grips with when we talk about accountability, you just don't trust. Let's just be honest with that. And if you're honest with yourself, maybe you can get to that different place. You want to pretend to be because you know you're supposed to be. But if you really trusted him, you wouldn't act like that. If you really believe that, you wouldn't act like that. Let's take the political climate, right? I

Nick Houpt: 40:32

mean, we only have an hour. But I'm going to give you two

Grayson Marshall Jr: 40:36

minutes. If you really, you have a world out here that, loves the new president you have a world i can't stand it right but if you trust god he's a president why are you worried about it if god put him there he's supposed to be there just like before with any of our previous presidents you might not have agreed on their political platform or what they stood for but if you trust god's plan then they're supposed to be there for whatever reason if it's to expose something if it's supposed to produce something whatever it is if you trust him. But look how many people are battling with it being right. So let's be honest. You ultimately don't trust God. That's what it comes down to. So we have to get to that level of accountability first before we can move past anything in our life.

Nick Houpt: 41:23

Now, we were talking about peace, and I really like that word and the concept of peace. How do you protect your peace when old habits or old relationships show back up? Tell me what you mean by protect your peace. So if we're sitting here, you and I live in pretty good peace, but let's say, so for me, I talk about this a lot, where I struggled with alcohol before. So let's say I'm living out how I'm supposed to, and then a situation comes up where I find myself around alcohol or people that I used to go out drinking with that are trying to show back up into my life and disturb that peace in the way of living now, how do I protect that?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 42:11

If you are worried about protecting your peace, that means that you give more credit to the people in your external than who's in your internal. If God is inside of you, nothing outside you should win. So I really believe, and again, this is for someone who is a faith-based believer. If you are fully focused on fortifying yourself in the things of God, nothing outside of you can penetrate that. That's important. So your peace comes from that security. You don't have peace because your security is in you and you don't trust you because we're human and we have made mistakes and we have faulted. So we're never enough to make it. It's our inability to surrender and trust that because we want to I want to do it myself. But if you are okay with who you are on the inside, it doesn't matter what happens outside of you. And I think that's more important. We tend to not focus on us properly. We spend time focusing on us, but it's for our own gain. Focus on yourself properly so that you can withstand anything that you face. That really exemplifies who you trust and what you believe. So how do you focus on yourself properly? When you're made in the image and likeness of God, you got to remind yourself that that's who you are. Who am I? This is who I am. And that's what you need to reiterate. When you were drinking, that's who you were. That was your new identity, right? So you were trying to get rid of that identity, right? That identity was nothing having to do with Christ at all, right? I think that when we align ourselves with what that looks like, now the problem, Nick, is that most people have never had a model of what that really looks like. They've gone to a church and they may have been upset about what the pastor said or this church, or they found something crooked within the church. Well, that was people. So you find out something, I don't like this at church. Well, now you want to lump everything in that category. It's no different if somebody said, all black people this way, all white people this way, all Jewish people that way. You can't put everybody in that category. But if you've been damaged enough or you've been hurt enough, that that becomes the reason, then everybody goes in that category. And I think that's where we have gotten to in a bad place when it comes down to who we are, right? So my identity and my peace comes from what I truly believe I am. And if we asked 100 people, they wouldn't tell you. They wouldn't know, Nick. They would know what somebody else told them they were. They would know what somebody else said, this is what you're good at, right? That's what their belief would be. It comes down to you knowing who you are. And if you are a believer and you are a child of God, then you have to align with that. What does that look like, right? It's no different than any other organization that you become a part of. You take on that persona. If you're a Jaguar fan, on Sunday, you are a completely different fool, right? Because I'm now a Jaguar fan, right? That's the identity I have today, right? So I act a certain way when it comes to that. When Evie's a flight attendant, when she gets on that plane, She's a flight attendant and she's all flight attendant when it comes down to it. The good part about it is that she knows who she is. So the her comes out of her, whether or not she's flight attendant or not. So they get to see who you are. When you know who you are, it doesn't matter what you wear. Most of us have to dress up a certain way to present who we are as opposed to know who you are. And this is just how I came to that. I think that's where people have to get to. It's truly Nick. a level of accountability that most people just are unwilling to go get because it makes you vulnerable. And those words in today's society, vulnerable, surrender, submission, in today's vernacular, they're weak words. In the kingdom, they are words of strength. And that's what you have to fight off. Which

Nick Houpt: 46:11

world are you living in? So you keep mentioning Evie. Let's talk about dating. Let's talk about, because I met my wife on a dating app too. That's where you should go. And you and I have had tons of conversations about dating. So let's talk about the person that's out there that feels like it's over, their dating life's over, they can't find the right spouse, they can't be who someone's looking for, or they're just having all these limiting beliefs, this negative self-talk, or they're just tired of waiting. I know that's a pretty loaded question, but let's kind of broaden that out a little bit of advice to people that just kind of feel lost in that dating realm. On a female side,

Grayson Marshall Jr: 47:02

they have to battle the individuality that they've been told to embrace. There's a narrative in the world today that would say to women, you don't need a man. They would say to women, you can be who you want to be. And all those things being at some level true, But again, the original plan was a man to have a help me, a man to find this perfect woman who God made for them. Well, all of the roles are out of order in life. They're just completely different, right? You have men not going to higher level education as frequently as women. So now you have women that are financially in a better place than a lot of men or more money than a lot of men. Well, often to men, that's a degrading thing, right? And when women hold it over their heads, it's a different level of emasculation, right? So I think all of those things that should have never factored in, factor into that. When it comes down to, I was married 20 years, Evie was married 26 years, right? 28 years. When you've devoted so much of your life to one way of thinking or one relationship, you don't know what the next one looks like because you go into the next one maintaining, I'm not going to have that again, right? So now you aren't really giving someone or this new person a chance to be an individual. You're critiquing them on what you will not do, right? And we've heard all this, well, watch the red flags, what all these things are. Well, why does that person have to deal with what just went on for 26 years with you? I remember telling her, I said, look, you'll never pay for a poor choice I made in my past. You had a clean slate. What I'm not going to do is if I see some of the behavior that was not appealing to me that I went through for 20 years, I'm going to call it out first. I'm not going to just let it sit there. And most of us allowed that to happen. You get too far in, now you can't get out, right? Because there's kids, there's all these other things that are involved. So I think that a person today that's looking for that person, I think, again, you have to decide, are you willing to be in a healthy relationship? And what do you define as a healthy relationship? If you define a healthy relationship as you do your thing and he does his thing, well... That's what you're gonna get. But if you really define a healthy relationship as two people working together, one giving leadership and direction without reducing the other one, both being elevated in the space that they need to be elevated and celebrated without any sort of argument or any sort of feelings of ill will or insufficiency, then you have that, right? So I think that was one of the things that was about, it was about us. It was both of us having patience with the other one as the other one was growing, right? And it wasn't about the patient for them growing. It was the patients that we needed to really re-identify what it is that we wanted or cement what it is that we were doing, right? So it's the desire, Nick, I think, to have a person. I think we've gotten so, again, so self in this world today that we have people, I don't know, I can live by myself. I'm good, right? And there's people who really have embraced that. And again, these narratives that have slowly become traditions keep you away from having families. We talk about, I mean, the world talks about the divorce rate. We talk about where people are. That's because people don't value relationships. Why, Nick? Because they don't trust anymore. Trust has been broken, right? And that is the same reason they don't live for God like they do. Because that trust, they put in somebody. And when that trust is broken, they blame God for it. God had nothing to do with that. And the person you don't trust, And I do with that person is the person that's before or the two people that are before, right? So again, when you don't allow trust to be what it is and love to illuminate like it should, when most of us don't know what unconditional love is, it's very conditional. It's very situational. You can't expect relationships to flourish when you've got rules that are limiting. When scarcity and fear are part of your relationship, just like they're part of your business or anything else, you can't expect it to flourish. You want a relationship that's full of abundance, that's full of love, that's full of energy. There's no limit to those things. But when you walk in with expectation and you walk in with limits, you only get so much. And that's why it doesn't flourish.

Nick Houpt: 51:26

So with everything you have going on right now, you have a good relationship, healthy relationship. You have good business. You're working on your purpose, living your purpose. Do you feel that your life is in good balance with everything you're doing? Absolutely.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 51:47

Absolutely, right? And you know I don't like that word too much. I know. So I think balance is great with that. But yes, in the way you defined it, absolutely. And I'm saying that is because there's not an aspect of my life that's lacking. So I think when you look at balance that way, I think it's all-encompassing. It's everything there. I think even if you put something on a scale, the thing on the scale sits better if all of it's in there, right? The scale doesn't move much. when it's there. So it's balanced on the scale. And I think that when you have your life that's not lacking, still not meaning you don't have everything you want, but when it's not lacking, right? When there's sufficiency, the Bible calls God El Shaddai, the all-sufficient one, the all-breasted one, everything that you need. When you are in a space where you have everything that you need, you live at a different level of peace, right? So I think that becomes the balance, right? Do you have everything you need? If you're still chasing, if you're still searching for something, I don't care what aspect of life it's in, whether it's your physical health, whether it's money, whether it's relationship, whether it's your job, if you're still chasing something, then you're not going to have that balance. It's getting to a place where there's no lack. And as I read my Bible more and more, there's no lack in God. There's everything you need that's there, anything you could ever want. So for me, it really aligns well with that. You were talking about purpose a minute ago, Nick, and I don't think people live their purpose and look for their purpose. I think they've returned to purpose. You had a purpose before you were even formed in this world. It's returning to it, right? But again, in the middle of trying to return to it, you're inundated with other opportunities or offers to do something else, right? Distraction, distraction, distraction. Shiny ball, shiny ball, shiny ball. So you're trying to get back to purpose and you've got all these things in the way. And if you never knew that you had a purpose, then you really don't know you're trying to get back to it. Now you're trying to find it through plans and distractions. and most people live life unfulfilled.

Nick Houpt: 53:41

I like what you said about living and not having lack, not lacking anything because I was just having this conversation the other day and someone asked me, do you really think your life is in balance? And I said, yes, my life is totally in balance. I have everything I need and I went through everything that I was talking about and they said, yeah, but look at what your dream life looks like and look at where you are now How do they line up? And I said, well, if I never even reach that dream life that I envision, I'm still completely happy with the life that I have.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 54:19

But that's coming from somebody, Nick, who is very self-driven. Your dream life is the life you want, right? The surrendered life says, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and I'll give you all that stuff. So if you just do the surrendered life, you'll get the dream life. We think it's up to us to get the dream life. So if you're going to go get the dream life, all right, go do it. It comes with a cost that most people aren't willing to pay. It comes with emptiness. It comes with bitterness. It comes with frustration. But I'm telling you, this life over here, this life that's fully surrendered to the best you can, you wake up every day and this is where you want to be. When he's in the center of it, it can't be out of balance. I'm telling you, it's a It's an amazing thing. And that doesn't mean you don't go through challenges, Nick. That doesn't mean you aren't going to face things. I think people have a misconception of everything P and all, roses and everything. No, that's not what it is. But it is how you respond. It is how you express resilience. Because when I have everything I need and I don't have to chase anything that I don't want, it's a wonderful place.

Nick Houpt: 55:26

Yeah. I mean... Even when you go through those challenges and those struggles, you still have the peace knowing that everything's going to be fine.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 55:36

Absolutely.

Nick Houpt: 55:37

And that's a surrender

Grayson Marshall Jr: 55:39

piece. It is. When you're going through and you feel like you're the only way that it can be fixed, that's stress, bro.

Nick Houpt: 55:46

That's major stress. Because everything's on your shoulders. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I've been there. I've been there. I've been like, how am I going to do this? Let's take the I out of the equation. Mm-hmm. I like that. So from what I hear is a life well balanced to you is a life lacking nothing.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 56:04

Correct. Surrendering. And centered around Christ. That's for me. That's for me. A life well balanced, lacking for nothing, giving out of need, and embracing what God has for me. See, a life well balanced too, Nick, is nothing wrong with getting either. I think oftentimes when we do the servant thing, It becomes a level of piety and we reduce ourselves to not. No, you can still get and people give to you. If you're doing these right things, you will be blessed. Stuff just shows up out of nowhere. I mean, it's been amazing that the stuff that's happened in our lives with myself and Evy, the way we get to travel, the places we get to go, where people take us, what people do. I mean, it's just like. Grayson, come on. We just got back from, where were we, honey? Myrtle Beach? No, we were at Charleston. And literally went up and were able to hang out for a weekend with a buddy of mine who's a golfer. And his girlfriend is a country singer. And we ended up going to a Hank Williams concert that we got free tickets for. We ended up going to and hanging out with a girl who was one of the rally cats at Clemson, right? successful family. They owned about, they owned at one time, 21 restaurants. And so they took us around. We're supposed to ride on the boat, but we ended up just driving around town, going in this place, getting some meat there, going to this place. We literally are driving around Charleston, seeing Charleston for what it is. And someone else was crazy. You didn't control any. Absolutely. And we got to experience all kinds of, it's unbelievable. The stuff that happens when you really do that. Yeah. That's when you really know that it's God because I hadn't talked to her in 35 years. She saw me at a baseball game and they had been following the journey of my heart. And she said, when you want to come to Charleston, you tell me, we'll take you out on the boat. I hadn't talked to her in 35 years, but the relationships that you had, the trust that was always there, the trust that never went away, it maintains. And so now, 35 years later, I get to go experience it and enjoy it with the love of my life and the opportunity that's there. And there's so much more that's going on. That's why I really want to encourage people to not live so emotionally. Get out of your own way. Absolutely. Because when you do that, man, you'd be surprised

Nick Houpt: 58:35

what stuff shows up. There's so much stuff that I have now. And I don't mean stuff. Right. But in my life, what I get to experience and live daily It would have never even been on my radar. Absolutely. And now I'm so blessed and I'm like, this wouldn't even have been on my goals list or my dream life. And it's just, I just, I surrendered and I let go and I kept moving forward and rolled with the waves. And

Grayson Marshall Jr: 59:04

that's not easy. And I want you to be honest with you. Surrendering is not easy. Yeah. Because of what we have been conditioned to believe. It is hard to get past that conditioning. It's hard to get a bad... past social constructs. It's hard. I mean, it's 2025. We still got racial issues, right? I mean, it's just, it's crazy. And seemingly for the unseeable future, they're still going to be around. And look at what it's keeping us from doing. Look at what it's raising. Unrest everywhere. Nobody's at peace. Everybody's looking for a problem, right? And that's why I believe that at this time, servant made, not self-made is a beautiful life narrative that you can bring to anybody because it's got nothing to do with anything but these two things has to do with accountability and awareness. That's what it comes down to. Servant made, that is an accountability responsibility. I got to know that that's my responsibility to reduce myself, to humble myself. That's what I need to do, right? And the awareness of when I'm doing it, when I'm not doing it. That's all it is. And you can live the most amazing life just being accountable and aware.

Nick Houpt: 1:00:15

And it does take time. That's such a simple way to put everything. And it takes time and growth. But you just got to start. You got to start once you're aware and you know what you have to do. Then you can keep moving forward. And most

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:00:30

people are unaware, Nick, because tradition clouds them. So they can't see it, right? They think that what they're doing is right until they're able to step back and say, wait a minute. Or it's brought to their attention. Because my job isn't to debate or argue with you. My job is to present something different. Because I believe the world belongs to them that are willing to change their mind when the facts have been presented. And I'm doing and showing you something. You can decide whether it makes sense or not makes

Nick Houpt: 1:00:55

sense. Yeah.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:00:57

But when you look at accountability, it has nothing to do with me telling you you're wrong. It's more or less, well, okay, here's a scenario. What does this look like to you? Is there a change that needs to be made? If not, you're good. But I think we live in this world where we're trying to prove people wrong or point out the wrongness in people and that's not what we should be doing.

Nick Houpt: 1:01:20

Yeah. Well, it ties into what you said here. You said legacy is about who you lift, not what you leave. Do you want to talk about that a little?

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:01:32

I think when you look at legacy, Legacy for most people is what they're going to leave behind, right? And we're all going to have one. But we have become single generation consumers. We're only concerned about what's going to happen in our lifetime, right? If I have the opportunity to lift other people up, I have the ability to affect lives for the next generation because I'm lifting up multiple people. We've all heard the whole saying, the old saying that a rising tide elevates, lifts all ships, right? So when you're growing and you're doing, the more people you're affecting, the better off you. Your legacy becomes that. Our legacy in the world's vernacular is what you're actually doing. It's a self thing. But legacy is about who you can lift. That's legacy. We look at Jesus. There were 12 people that he put around him. He didn't do all the preaching. He sent them out. And look at what you have as a relatable life this many years later. He just empowered other people. He lifted up other folks. Empower them. We don't want to do that because we don't want to see people do more than us. We don't want to see them go past us. Again, wrong mindset. But because we're conditioned that way, we keep people suppressed because of our desire to have control. Let them go do it. Leverage is a better way to affect the masses. Let me empower a bunch of people. I think as J. Paul Getty said, he'd rather have 1% of 100 man's efforts than 100% of his own effort. 100 people can do more than one person. But you got to be okay with some of them doing more than you. It has to be all right. But in a control-based world, we want to keep everybody subjective and want to keep everybody below. And you can only do what I say you can do. No. Don't do what you're going to do. I want to see you do more than me.

Nick Houpt: 1:03:26

Yeah. I mean, that's what it's all about. Should be. Now we're coming to an end here. So before we hop off, I want to make sure people know where they can find you, where they can get the book. So what are your social medias? Do you have websites? Where do you purchase the book? If they

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:03:42

look at Project 713 on all social media outlets, you'll find it because Project 713 has to do with Mark 713. So that's it there. The book is called Servant Made, Not Self Made. You can Google Servant Made, Not Self Made anywhere and it'll show up. What was unique about it was, Nick, is that I had a buddy of mine who was a former NFL player who actually does a motivational speaking class, master class. And he was teaching people how to get on bigger stages. And he hit me up one night. He said, Gray, I'm about to do this thing. Can you jump on? I said, yeah. So he was sharing with them how to get on bigger stages. And the key, he said, to get on bigger stages was being unique, not being niche. Most people who are looking to be speakers are trying to find their niche. And he said, not about niche, it's about unique. He said, how do you know what you're speaking about is unique? He said, go to the search bar and type in what you're speaking about. And he said, if you find other people speaking about it, then you're not unique. That doesn't mean you're not good. That doesn't mean you don't have value. You're just not unique. You're in a niche. And so now you have to fight in that niche. He said, if you're unique, He said, that's what people are drawn to. So I was sitting there online. I just typed in, servant made, not self-made. Not on YouTube, nothing. Except mine, except mine. I typed in servant made, not self-made on Google. Nothing but my words. So I knew then that out of everything that I have done in my life, everything that I have signatured in my life, it was all coming to this, right? Because the theme has been the same, but it was still laced in self-made. The BS blueprint is about building a better self blueprint. Well, you should build a better self, but it should be like Christ, right? So nothing's really out of it. It just had to mature. And now that I've gotten to a real convicted place about it, now servant-made is really the crux of what I was saying the whole time. Just didn't know how to say it because I didn't know that it needed to stand in its own space. So for me now, when I look at this, this makes so much more sense to me And now it appeals to the level of accountability someone has to choose to have. So I think that when Anthony said that, I was like, that was a light bulb in a bigger way, right? Because I think all of us want to speak to you. You may have a nutrition niche or you may have a law niche or real estate niche or whatever, right? And the motivational speaking world is so overwhelmed with people, right? Everybody's a coach and all those things. So how do you separate yourself, right? How do you get unique? The more I do servant-made, not self-made, the more it keeps me in my own little space. And I don't believe people will come to it. Why? Because the requirement is accountability. And people don't want to talk about that. Why? Because that's not sexy. No, it's not emotional. I think that's the biggest part of it is that it's not emotional. Being accountable is not emotional. But most of the influencers, most of the people out there want to touch on your emotion. You follow them because of the way they make you feel.

Nick Houpt: 1:06:58

That's

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:06:59

not what serving me is all about. And I think that's always been me to a T when it comes to coaching. You know, Nick, I'm no nonsense when it comes down to it. I'm your friend, but if you're messing up, I tell you, you know, bro, that's not, nope, nope. And I'll tell you why. Because I'm not worried about what you're going to feel about it. Not to have empathy or sympathy. I'm like, that's not what a coach does. I'm there to get

Nick Houpt: 1:07:22

you to where you're supposed to get to. So before we jump off of here, I know you don't like the word, but we do this speed round called balanced or unbalanced. You got it. So I'll ask you a question. You tell me if it's balanced or unbalanced. If you want to elaborate on that question, by all means. If not, we can keep moving, all right? You got it. Balanced or unbalanced? Wearing your story on your sleeve. Unbalanced. Always having the answers. Unbalanced. Taking time off to have a date night. Balanced. Leading by serving. Balanced. Hustle and grind culture. You'll like this one. We just talked about it. Speaking the truth even if it offends people. Balanced. Coaching others while still healing yourself.

Grayson Marshall Jr: 1:08:13

I think it depends on the person. I think oftentimes you can never wait until you're finished. to impart in somebody. So I think you have to realize how far along you are into what you're doing, right? Some of us never fully heal. And so we should not be helping people if we're still doing that. So some of us are going to live with some stuff that you just never get rid of, right? So I think that depending on the person, that question there, I think it can be balanced or unbalanced because you'll never be a finished product. So why would you wait to finish to help people? And at the same time, if you're still new to it, and you still are struggling in a place where you're still in that place of unbalance, then no, don't drag somebody in there. So you don't want to be in that place. But that, I think, depends on the person and everything.

Nick Houpt: 1:09:02

Tying your worth to results. Unbalanced. Coming on the Life Well Balanced podcast. The only thing to do. I think that's balanced. My man. Appreciate it. Thank you so much, brother. I have enjoyed every second of this. Me too. I love it. It's so good to see you. And I'm glad we got to sit here and do this, man. Continued success to you, my man. Thank you, brother. Thank you.