Brad Miller 0:00
We have Frankie Finn with us who's an author and a teacher and a creator and a retreat leader. And he is, has the website sacred plant retreats.com. And he is all about helping people in their life journey to understand discover what they were really put here on earth for and to discover their unique gifts and experiences, and to focus focus in their life and to have some inspiration. And these type of person he has a great story to tell about some of the things he is overcome in his life and some of the resources he's used to overcome adversity achieve some success in his life. And we welcome the pathway to pathway to promise Frankie Finn.

Frankie Fihn 0:46
Well, thank you so much, Dr. Miller. That was an amazing introduction, by the way, and it's it's an honor for all the beautiful things you stand for, to be a part of this wonderful show. Thank you, Frank. Appreciate it. And what is from here on I'll be up Frankie, and I'll be Brad you

Brad Miller 1:00
we'll just have a good conversation as as, as Frank said, Brother, Herman, they tell me a little bit your story I just mentioned a little bit of some kind of kind of took to the heart of the 10,000 foot view of your story here. But tell me a little bit about your story about where you've come from, what kinds of things you've had to do with your life and what you're doing now.

Unknown Speaker 1:20
Yeah, you know, it's really, really interesting, because

Frankie Fihn 1:23
I had, like an extremely dysfunctional childhood, by most people's standards. And I grew up where both of my parents were alcoholics. And my dad probably dabbled in every kind of drug you can imagine. And, and so I always had this continuing, like, crowd of unusual, weird, sometimes downright crazy characters in my life. And, you know, I can remember just like an experience when I was really young, where my dad had a girlfriend who was fighting a court case, for the custody of her son and the, the, the girlfriend had been a heroin addict for many, many years. And the guy she dated was also a heroin addict. And so they, they managed to make a baby and not even realize they did it. So seven months pregnant, and somehow miraculously, this baby who was born in the middle of heroin addiction, came out perfectly normal. And it's it's such a blessing, but she remember actually telling me and most people

Brad Miller 2:26
who, That's bizarre in and of itself, isn't it? My goodness, it's, it sure

Frankie Fihn 2:29
is, it sure is. And I can remember, you know, she told me once that she spent $100,000 on heroin, and like, seven months, or something like that, until she just ran out of money. And yeah, and you know, it's really sad seeing those addictions. And I remember, one point, they were fighting this custody battle, and, and because when you're dealing with two people who are like that level of extreme dysfunction, you know, both heroin addicts, it's kind of like, if you just show up, and don't do anything stupid, but Child Protective Services is going to side with you because they want the kid to be with the parents. And I can remember, there was a five o'clock exchange, and they had some friend over who had been drinking all day. And he asked, could I take the car to go up to the bar, so you went and drunk, drove to the bar,

Brad Miller 3:17
and

Frankie Fihn 3:19
ended up getting so drunk at the bar that he passed out in the driver's seat in the parking lot didn't go anywhere. And so they had somewhere to be at five o'clock, and at six o'clock, they weren't there. And it's seven. And eventually, they drove, it was about an hour drive an hour away, everybody in the car, you know, like very drunk and made this exchange. And of course, it was like, you know, kind of like Olympic fencing by that point, because everybody was fighting. And these kind of things were like, really normal in my childhood. I mean, for most people, that would probably be really extreme. And I remember when the, the friend finally came home, my dad had a fistfight with him and beat him up on the lawn. And then he just like, pass out on the lawn. And so for me, like to, to look back at life, and to look at all the ways have been able to, to be blessed and everything, like when I look back at just all the, the obstacles I was working against, in many ways, like if not for a higher power, I legitimately don't think it could be done.

Brad Miller 4:16
Well do what drama and trauma there and in your childhood growing up. And yet you somehow have managed to have some success in your life in the corporate world and some things like that, what, what got you there and I will get to your what you're doing now in a minute, but you somehow matriculated out into the corporate world. How did that happen?

Frankie Fihn 4:37
Yeah, yes. So you know, I think it was it was really interesting. I was in a situation where I'm from, I'm from Windsor, Ontario, Canada, and it's about five minutes from Detroit, Michigan. So I always say that I grew up close enough to Detroit to hear the gunshots without being hit. And Detroit's, like, legitimately a pretty rough city. Yes, I know. And, and where I'm from, like, there's this kind of like, unreal written script in the stars that says, you're going to go up and work for one of the car companies for General Motors and Chrysler, that's just like all the industry there. And so a huge significant portion of all the, the the jobs in that area, either work for a car company, or work for a company that supplies them. And so there's this kind of like, path that was really laid out for me. And I was fortunate where I went to school got a really good job as a, or got a really good degree as an engineer, and was able to move up really, really quickly. And then, you know, I was kind of building this life that it wasn't really what I wanted. But what end up happening is 2008 came around the economy, all of a sudden, these car companies that were these havens of business, were laying off 10s of thousands of people. And it really forced my hand to go in life in a different direction. And so, for the last 12 years, how I've been able to live and obviously, it's, you know, it's been its own journey and growth, but I kind of live the, what a lot of, like, people dream about what they call the laptop lifestyle, where you can, you know, go around the world, because we actually, for the last two years, I think I've been around the planet twice. We've been in like, 30 countries. And

you know, we just seen many things and because, you

know, like, you know, the way we kind of like run our business works laptop, we're able to kind of work our own hours and our own times. And it's just been such a different blessing from the the craziness that I grew up in.

Brad Miller 6:29
That's awesome. That's a dream for a lot of folks and achieving that. But I'm sure that getting from fistfights on the front lawn with heroin addicts to this laptop lifestyle was not just a straight line of, you know, butterflies and wonderfulness. tell a little bit about some of the actions that you took, what are some of the things that you did to break some patterns there, Frankie to get you where you're at now, what are some of the bold things that you did?

Frankie Fihn 6:58
Yeah, I mean, I wish there's been a lot of little things, as you know, Brad, it's like when you when you make something of yourself. A lot of people are looking for that one thing, but it's usually like 10,000 little decisions. But I think there's a lot of really amazing habits that you can develop that if you're listening to this, that. And you had mentioned before the show, there was the five D's I'm trying to remember one was depression. One was divorce, one was death,

Brad Miller 7:25
and also was disease and debt money. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, basically, I believe most people have one form or another, they have to deal with those things in some form of some form of adverse something in their life that impacts that is due at least one or more of those things.

Frankie Fihn 7:42
Yeah, yeah. And I would say, you know, I'm no exception to that rule, I've had to deal with all five of them as well, I would say probably in the health might have been the most fortunate Not that I've never had a disease. But you know, I spent most of my life being healthy. But I can actually remember being really, really depressed for a lot of years. And I think people, a lot of people feel that way, where it was very interesting to me to have kind of like the success that my parents always dreamed for me at a very young age. And to realize what I wanted to do, because you know, when I was working in this factory actually became like a middle manager at the Ford Motor Company. And when I would go into work, and I would go to this thousand square foot plant, where I'd be surrounded by people that were mostly negative, like it was just that that particular plant was really negative, hostile, argumentative kind of place. Now, a lot of just kind of bad attitudes, I breathe in toxic chemicals all day long. It smelled I was 20 years old, I ever saw a pretty girl in any factory places. They were, they were a long ways from there. And it was it was miserable. But I would go home. And my parents are, you know, were they were just so proud of me, like my mom would be like, wow, you did it, you got health benefits, you're making like more money than I ever did, aren't you so proud of yourself. And I think a lot lot of people experience something similar, where you end up being successful, but successful in in what other people want to do. And then you find that there's a certain emptiness to it, where you're like, kind of miserable. And so I experienced this, like, really, really bad depression. And I and I remember, like, some days, you know, just thinking that, you know, I was going to die, and I was just going to be this miserable factory worker. And it just intensified. And I think one of the biggest things that I learned out of it, even though is a very, very difficult time is most people don't realize it, but you're either kind of like to use a sports metaphor with your life, you're either playing offense or you're playing defense. And in my particular, you know, miserable kind of factory job I was, I was playing defense, I let the company Tell me what I had to do every day, I'd let somebody else do all the thinking. For me, I didn't really ask a lot of questions about who I was, or what I really wanted to do, or what kind of do friends I made in the world. And I think the number one thing you can do, to get out of any sort of depression is to have that deep kind of self honesty and reflection. And then use that as a catalyst in order to like, be really real with yourself about what you really want. And the beautiful thing is I find when you when you're really honest about what you really want, it also will benefit a lot of other people to like, it's not just your own selfish dream, it's actually something that really contributes and betters the world. And I find when people are doing things they really love doing, and they're helping better people's lives. And, you know, they're doing the things that they're naturally good at. It just it seems to have an effect of, of, of whatever depression is the the opposite of that, where you feel blessed and inspired and purposeful, in amazing comes when to me when those three things align with just to say kind of once more, doing what you love, doing what you're naturally good at, and doing what people really need and contribute getting something to other people's lives. And I find when you do that, it's a very different experience.

Brad Miller 11:04
That's, that's awesome. And I love the metaphor, you're using their Frankie of the Office of defense to sound like you, you were back on your heels playing defense, you're in a in the corporate world and the Ford plant just kind of getting by kind of dead inside. And then when you took offense, you took some charge of your life. That was part of the process of breaking out of your depression and breaking getting forward. Yeah, that's great. So that's kind of what you did sort of part of what you did that internal, intrinsic part of what went on with you that I just can't keep going this way. And yet, I got the feeling that with you. And a lot of folks that can only last so long that kind of that, that internal unhappiness and internal, I gotta change this internal. willpower can only last so long. And we have to get some strength or some energy from some other resources. And I find oftentimes at some sort of a higher power since we're for spiritual journey, and this would tell me about that a little bit. Is this any part of your experience, Frankie, some sort of drawing and some sort of higher power spiritual journey, which has helped to embolden you and your transformation?

Frankie Fihn 12:20
I mean, I would say 100% of it. And I experienced this. For me, what started happening in my life was, when I started to come out of it, there was people call synchronicity, and it was, it was really weird for me, I can remember, I would walk by a clock, and there was like, at the time, and there was a 99% chance it would be like 1111, or 111, or 1234, when I would walk by, and this would even happen when, you know, like, the DVD player resets because the power goes out. And it's set to the wrong time for three weeks, but I would still walk by the wrong time at 1111. And I remember for for months, thanks.

Unknown Speaker 13:00
Okay, this,

Frankie Fihn 13:01
somehow my like, subconscious knows the time. And it's just like, I'm just doing this to myself, I can't be like, all these signs are coming. And then I remember when I first started thinking that I would get like emails from people at 1111. And I would see these kind of symbols over and over, or I remember one time, and this happened to me numerous times, but I, I would turn on, like the local hockey games, or I'm Canadian, you know, I'm gonna watch some high

Brad Miller 13:25
scores i get i get sad. Sure.

Frankie Fihn 13:29
And, but I would turn it on, and the game would be tied, one one in the first and they would be on a timeout, and there would be 1111 to go in the first period. And it just started.

Brad Miller 13:40
That's all. That's awesome. That's how this kind of thing happens sometimes going. Yeah, I know. Sorry to interrupt you. But it's just interesting how that I've had that kind of thing in my life to where you just kind of have what we know, what is it? What is this supposed to me? What is this situation for me especially keeps happening again? And again? Yeah,

Frankie Fihn 13:55
yeah. And I think there's, I don't know how it was for you. But there was certainly a resistance in me, we're like, this isn't really happening. Like, I'm just doing this or, you know, like, I tried to come up with a rational reason for it that kind of explained away. And what ended up happening was like, it was just like, you know, this higher power was just beating me over the head with so many signs that I reached a critical mass where I'm like, okay, I can't deny it. And I kind of, for me, my own journey was a little Alice in Wonderland and following those signs. And what you find is, you know, there's a real challenge in the beginning, I think in like trusting this higher power that that is, you know, it's not leading you astray, because you don't always for sure, know where it's actually leading. And, but I think the decision to do that is actually, even though it's very, very scary, at first, it's actually the best decision you'll ever make in your life. Because, you know, it's a higher power for a reason, it knows, knows a lot more about what's going on. And I just

Brad Miller 14:52
believe that that's a resource that's beyond our, our own self, that is a resource of power, that can empower us. And if we lose our own self sufficiency, you know, we only have so much energy of our own accord. And we can draw on the power of whether it's your prayer life, or meditation, or reading or reading, or being connected in scriptures or some other sacred writing, to fill yourself with good stuff is such an important thing to do, because we just can't do it on our own. And you have to have that power in your life. And that's awesome. That's awesome. Tell me about I want to hear some more now, Frankie about relationships.

Unknown Speaker 15:36
About,

Brad Miller 15:38
you mentioned about some kind of toxic relationships that you had, growing up with your dad and some pretty unhealthy things. And so you experienced some part of relationships that drain energy, or certainly give us some bad baggage to carry with us. But I'm a believer that we need positive relationships and some loving relationship. So help us go forward and kind of fuel our journey to have what I like to call the promise life or life of peace, prosperity, and, and purpose. Tell me about any positive relationships. So or something that's helped you move through this process of life transformation? Tell me about that little bit.

Frankie Fihn 16:20
Yeah, and I can actually give you examples of both and I think is really valuable lessons for anybody listening to, to really think about this in your own life. So I mean, I feel like for real, like growing up for me, I got a PhD in what...