Ep 38: The Professional Noticer with Andy Andrews

Every public personality has a unique skill or trait that they leverage to build their audience. Some are one-trick ponies though and tend to have career arcs that begin to dip as they bring out new acts that are just repackaged versions of old ones. Andy Andrews is a personality of a different order though, and we are so grateful to have him on the show today to share the steps he has taken to stay relevant over the entire span of his career. He has appeared on national television more than 200 times and has written over 25 books, many of which are bestsellers including The Travelers Gift and The Noticer.

Andy is a self-proclaimed regular guy. He is not a CEO of a major company or the hero of some national disaster, but a dad, a husband, and a buddy. The thing that keeps people coming back and listening to Andy time and time again is a different type of quality – his ability to notice things that other people don’t. Importantly, people tend to find the things that Andy notices incredibly valuable too. Andy is a ‘noticer,’ and in today’s episode, he gets into how he has turned that skill into a career with many applications, from writing book after book to speaking in front of audiences as a motivator and even a comedian too.

WATCH THE INTERVIEW:

LISTEN TO THE EPISODE BELOW:

KEY POINTS FROM THIS EPISODE:

  • A way of keeping relevant: not by being a hero, but through constant learning.
  • How Andy has developed a skill in noticing unseen things that are valuable to people.
  • What our guest has done to turn his observations into consultation strategies.
  • The idea that The Noticer was a foreshadowing of the services Andy’s provides.
  • Conceptualizing ‘noticing’ as a form of expertise.
  • Why the first and third acts of comedians are better than their second ones.
  • Andy’s fear of producing too many books and rehashing the same lessons.
  • The necessity to keep learning new lessons in order to write new unique books.
  • Advice for going beyond your competition: think more deeply than them.
  • Broad genres that Andy’s books cover: fiction, nonfiction, spirituality, etc.
  • Wisdom to be gained by learning the difference between ‘what is true’ and ‘the truth’.
  • How Andy used his perception to find the true answer to how the Nazis killed 11M people.
  • Overlaps between techniques used for comedy and self-help: noticing things.
  • Using exaggeration, what people missed, opposites, and other techniques to achieve humor.
  • Another good technique for making speeches: the illusion of spontaneity.
  • An amazing strategy using allusion to spark audience participation and fake spontaneity.

TWEETABLES:

“I have developed expertise overtime at noticing things that are valuable to people.” — @AndyAndrews

“I want to #write #books that your grandchildren can pick up and unless they look at the date, they don’t really know when it was written.” — @AndyAndrews

You become a great #writer by being a great #learner. Your writing will follow your #learning. – @AndyAndrews 

A true thought-leader learns how to think until they arrive at a different and better conclusion than everybody else has come to. – @AndyAndrews 

The key to staying power as a professional keynote speaker is to remain relevant. You better keep learning, keep writing and keep perfecting your craft. – @AndyAndrews 

Part of the role of a great #author is to dedicate yourself to see the details that will be valuable to other people that most people overlook. –@AndyAndrews

I strive to write books that will last a hundred years because they’re based on time-tested principles. – @AndyAndrews 

ABOUT ANDY ANDREWS:

Andy Andrews is a New York Times best-selling author and one of the world’s most in-demand speakers. Andy has spoken at the request of four different United States presidents, worked extensively with the Department of Defense, and regularly addresses the world’s largest corporations. His books The Noticer and The Traveler’s Gift were featured selections of ABC’s Good Morning America and continue to appear on bestseller lists around the world having been translated into over 40 languages. His latest book is called The Bottom Of The Pool and his new subscription-based website is WisdomHarbour.com   

LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

Andy Andrews

The Travelers Gift

The Noticer

The Bottom of the Pool

The Heart Mender

The Professional Noticer Podcast

National Speakers Association

Speakers Bureau

Publix

RV: (00:07) Hey brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview. As always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/pod call brand builders, group.com/pod call. We hope to talk to you soon. RV: (00:55) I continue to just be honored at how people that I’ve admired and been mentored by, you know, over years ended up becoming my colleagues and then friends. And I think that’s one of the most amazing things about this business. And building a personal brand is like if you are first to student, then you just end up finding new ways to meet amazing people. And that’s, you know who Andy Andrews is. To me, I was first a student of his Andy is incredible. So he has been on national television more than 200 times. He has 25 books that have been translated into 40 different languages. His, the, probably the two most biggest best-sellers, one is called the Traveler’s gift. One’s called the noticer. Traveler’s gift is my favorite. AJ loves the noticer. A J also loves the heart mender, which is one that you may don’t hear as much, just really, really good. But Andy as a speaker has spoken for four U S presidents. Uhe has coached the special operations command for our country. He’s been part of nine consecutive national football,ucollege national football championship teams in a row. Uhe’s been married for over 30 years. And I just, you know, as I think about the people that we wanted on this faculty that you could learn from and go, man, this is somebody who’s impacted millions and millions of people. Andy wasn’t an obvious choice to have. He also has a new book out. It’s just worth mentioning. It’s called the bottom of the pool and that just came out in June, 2019, which shares some of his biggest business secrets that he actually was under contract to not share here into recently. So, Andy, thanks for being here, man. AA: (02:37) Hey buddy. I’m honored to be here and I could grieve. I may seem uncomfortable to sit and listen to somebody say those nice things about you, but I appreciate it and I’m, I’m honored to be here with you. Okay. RV: (02:51) Well, and I just I guess I get that, you know, it is kind of always weird to hear someone, but it’s also like, wow, you’ve done so AA: (03:01) The, it’s been a long climb to the middle for me. I hear all these things, you know what I mean? Like Rory, dude, will you call my wife, RV: (03:08) Tell him, tell her somebody say, well, I I remember watching you speak, I saw you twice when I was a kid. I, my teens and then early twenties once was at the national speakers association. And I remember just being like, man, this guy is amazing. And you are there. You’re there. That, yeah, I was there like as a young, like at first, like one of my first or second NSA conferences, AA: (03:35) The only, only one I’ve ever done. So I know which one you’re talking about. RV: (03:38) Yeah. Yeah. So I was there and and I think, you know, for, I imagine that a lot of the people watching now, you know, they may not, some of them are very established, a lot of them are established. They might be a doctor or a lawyer or a, you know, fitness, you know, celebrity or whatever. But in the world of speaking, most of them are watching cause they’re like, I want to speak, I want to stand up, I want to be on those big platforms. Inspiring millions of people. But like, I guess my, my first question is, what do you think is the, what does it really take to make it in the industry is, let’s talk about speaking first and then we’ll talk about writing and all of that. But, you know, you’ve been around for years speaking, you know, dozens of times every year, some of the world’s biggest stages for some of the biggest companies national football teams. Why do you think you’ve been able to get to that level and stay at that level for such a long time? AA: (04:35) That’s a great question. And even even the speakers Bureau said to me one time, they said, you know, most speakers have arcs, you know, they land the plane on the Hudson and then there they speak for three years. But you know, that story has been told or they have a, a specific thing and that, that once you cover everybody and then cover everybody twice, it’s hard to keep booking you. And, and and they said that I was one of the very few that ever experienced it, didn’t have an arc and you know, or a career arc. And, and they, and I told him, I said, well, the reason is because I’m a nobody. You know, I’ve a, I, it’s easy to have an arc if you have done something like I have five Superbowl rings or something, you know, but I don’t have any Superbowl rings. AA: (05:30) I don’t have you know, I have any gold medals. I wasn’t the hero of some national disaster. I’d never been the CEO of some major company or I don’t have a radio show and I’ll have a television show. I’m, I’m a dad and I’m a husband and I’m, I’m a friend and I’m, you know, concerned citizen. I’m a buddy and, and I have a, I have developed an expertise over time at at noticing things that are valuable to people. And so, so there are two answers to your question. One, one is you say, how do you, how do you do that and, and continue to climb and over time and remain relevant that that is a key to remain relevant. We all have authors that we don’t read anymore. You’re right, right. I mean, we have conversations. Sometimes we go, yeah, you know, I used [inaudible] do you read so-and-so? AA: (06:34) Yeah, yeah. I used to read those books a lot. Oh, you don’t? No, no, no. Why not? Well, you know, just kind of, it got to be the same thing. Oh, okay. And so, you know, a lot of authors and speakers will hit on something and maybe it’s because they are a massive expert in something. Okay. and I have never been a massive expert at anything, but I am hugely dedicated to learning details that are valuable to other people that most people never see. You, you, and I know I have a background in comedy and you know, what a comedian does is to notice things that nobody else notices. And then when you bring them up, everybody goes, Oh my gosh, we all do that, don’t we? And I mean, that’s part of what a comedian does. And so to take that same thought process and put it into creating value for, for clients and for people and for families and for organizations and for CEOs and for churches and for communities. And so to, to create, to have inside yourself a passion for a passion, for learning things that are valuable to others. RV: (08:05) Yeah, that’s, that’s like such a great [inaudible], you know, type it into here. My own notes on how it’s just like, that is such a great tweetable moment of it is so simple. Like so is the noticer, you know, that, that the notice are such incredible book. Do you think that that book and what ended up being sort of like foreshadowing of your career was just like this, you know, the guy who, the guy who sees, who sees things that everybody sees but like turns them into lessons and, and that AA: (08:36) To, to a great degree, I mean, you know, and, and you know, I even have a, a thing I do now called the professional noticer and it is like my own thing, you know, and, and but that was, it was a foreshadowing because Jones that, Oh man, that came into my life years ago when I was living under a pier and in and out of people’s garages. You know, this old man, he, he, that’s what he called himself. He said, I’m a noticer. And when God was passing out talents, I didn’t get the cool ones. I can’t run fast, I can’t sing great. But I notice little things that make a difference to other people. And, and, and I’ve obviously, I’ve thought about that for years and years and years, RV: (09:23) Decades now. Well, and the thing I love about it is just there, there’s, there’s such an inherent service of that it’s like, it’s in the personal brand. You know, I think this is one of the things that’s so frustrating to me is that the personal brand is not about the person. It’s about the value they provide to other people. Like even what you’re saying is noticing things that are valuable or valued. AA: (09:50) Two, two RV: (09:50) Others and just like paying attention to that. And that is an expertise. So I’ve never, I’ve never thought about that with you before, of like, what is Andy Anders and expert on? But like that is your thing. Like that is what you do so very, very well. So can we talk about the books for a second? Cause so, so 25 this is your 25th bottom of the pool’s your 25th book AA: (10:12) If you say so. I have no idea. I’m sure somebody tells you that but I honestly don’t know. How do you, how do you, RV: (10:20) Right, so many but like books, like I once heard somebody say, you know the first book is easy. The first book is easy to write. It’s the second book. That’s hard cause it’s like the first book is like your life stories. But then after that is, AA: (10:33) Yeah, it’s like a, it’s like a comedian’s, a body of work. If you, if you want to find the funniest albums in a comedian’s body of work, go for the first and the third. Skip the second one because you know, the comedian has spent his entire life with the material that became that 45 minutes or an hour for that first thing that got him noticed or got her notice and, and that first hour and people ate it up and then all the money people came in and said, man, come on. Come on. We’ve gotta have something to follow up. We ain’t got one album out there. Come on. We’ve got to have something to follow it up. And so, you know, spent a whole lifetime gathering the material that everybody loved and six months gathering the material that was not as, not as funny as you know, but, but, but the people who last learn their lesson quickly now, you know if you, I, I haven’t been, I have not been smart in a bunch of ways as a, as a writer and, and I’ll tell you what those are. AA: (11:50) Because if you, if you want to, if you want to just make a ton of money and that’s all you want to do, there’s a lot of people that can tell you how to make a ton of money. And, and a lot of that has to do with what you have to do and what you have to be on a daily and monthly and yearly basis. And, and I was told right at the beginning of, you know, when the Traveler’s gift hit you know, that was my first novel and that was my first book with a major publisher. And I was told right off the bat, you know, okay, we got it. You know, they, I was signed to a three book deal you know, a book a year and, and I quickly realized, how do you do it? I do book a year, I don’t, I don’t know how to do a book a year. AA: (12:44) And, and the thing that I didn’t understand at the time, but I began to understand and it kinda got me, I say in trouble, not in trouble, but they were, they were disappointed in me because I was obviously not going to be one of these guys that, that pumped out book after book, after book, year after year, after year after year and built themselves into this this thing where there is a core group of, you know, I don’t know if I’ve a hundred thousand or million people that just buy everything. But for the most part, you know, when you step back and look at it a lot, and I, this is not everybody, this is, and this is more me I’m telling you about what I sure figured out I had to do. I did not want to become derivative and I did not want to, I did not. AA: (13:40) What does that mean? I didn’t want to to have somebody go, wow, you know, I’m four books in to Andy Andrews stuff now and it’s kind of the same story. And as Canada, the same message just like over and over again. And, and so I realized, I would tell him, I said, I have to learn. I got to abuse my kids. I get to be with my family. I’ve got to, I gotta walk around out there. I, I’m a relatively young person. I don’t know enough to write a book a year unless I continue to do the same thing and put it in a different way. Okay. Do you want to, you want to persist? Let’s persist. Okay. The next book is about perseverance and the next book is about staying in the game. And it’s like, come on really. I mean cause at some point the audience or your readers at some point people go, it was kind of same thing. And so I said [inaudible] and so it was to detriment of my career to, to not do that. I just, because I thought I’m not here just for this one time, these books that I write Speaker 4: (14:59) [Inaudible] AA: (14:59) I want to write books that lasts a hundred years. I don’t want to write books that in three years you read the book and go, well I know when that was written or that was written before the internet boy that was written when Brittany Spears was huge boy that was written when general hospital was on the air. I mean I don’t want to write books like that. I wanna write books that your grandchildren can, can pick it up. And then, unless they look at the date, they don’t really know. No, when was this? And so, so it has taken me a long time. My, my writing for years lagged way or let’s put it this way. My, my writing was trailing my learning and I, and, and so because I only learned so much and so fast and was determined not to lap that I did not want to get my writing ahead of my learning that it has taken me a while to get to where I really can put out some books now because I’m, I, I’m making, I’m connecting dots for people faster than I’m able to put a book out. And I’m so that, that’s, that’s [inaudible] the other part of it is just being, you know, a detriment to my career I’m sure was that I want I S and I still, AA: (16:42) I want to do something that’s valuable for you. Okay. You know, you and I, Rory have been around enough people in our lives that are enamored with what they do and, and, and, you know, and it’s hard not to be in this business cause you know, people, if people are coming up to y’all all the time, when is your orange juice? Okay, great. Excellent. RV: (17:13) That was something I was, I wanted to, I was going to ask you about too is like the whole being committed of service to others when you know some people are drawn to this cause you have the stage and the lights and you know, you, if you do a great job, if you do an incredible job, you know you make an impact and people are so grateful and gracious is, is, is the humor, is the humility. So just before we move into that, cause I do think that’s interesting on this last little part you were saying, what it sounds like to me is like you have to be a great read or before you can be a great writer. Like you have to be a good learner before you’re good teacher and you have your entire career. Like you, you chose at some point to slow down the release of books so that the learning could be out in front so that you were always, you know, and that’s where you, that’s where you were saying when the writing is lagging behind, it’s like it’s lagging behind your learning. AA: (18:07) Why am I, how am I learning? Yeah, I love that. Cause we just, we have to, because ultimately in the end, the whole, the book, the bottom of the pool, it’s all about the thought process. You know, at the bottom of the pool was not a book where you go, okay, these are the seven things you’ve got to do. And then you’re successful where you know, okay there’s the four things you do and then you’re all of a sudden, yeah, it’s not that. I told my son the other day, my 19 year old, I said, buddy, I said, I wrote this book for you and your younger brother because one day, I mean, you know, when I’m gone, the world is obviously changing all the time. Technology changes everything. And I said, so people will always tell you this is how you have to do it now or this is the industry standard. AA: (18:59) Well, you know, look at best practices. Well I said, there are always people to tell you how to do whatever. And, and I said all they’re doing, it may even be a great average, but they’re contributing to the average. Instead, at some point you are going to have to learn how to think to a different conclusion then everybody else has come to and [inaudible] you know, that is the only way. And if you look at the, you know, the, the quotes on the book, you know I spent a number of years now working with specific, some specific companies and specific teams and so to create results that are just ridiculous. And so if you’re really, if you’re a multibillion dollar company and you want to double in a year, well can you find some other multibillion dollar company in the mortgage industry like you are, that has doubled ever in a year, ever. Okay. Well if you keep thinking like they think you didn’t even get a chance [inaudible] RV: (20:22) Like you have to elevate your thinking and, and I w so one of the books or in this metaphor deepen your thing to the bottom of the pool, cause that that name, that name does sound like a horror movie, doesn’t it? The bottom of the book, but it’s beyond your boundaries and, and break through some of the stuff to a deeper understanding. I remember one of the other books that you wrote, which a short read, but it was at the time, I have to say, it wasn’t like, it wasn’t my favorite. I was like, Oh, and, and ever, but since I’ve been like, man, this book had a huge impact on my life was you wrote a book on how do you kill 11 million people? You know, was about the Jews and the Nazis and like, you know, all this stuff that was happening and you go through the whole book and then it’s like, how do you kill 11 million people? RV: (21:13) How do you kill 11 million people? You lie to them. And I was, that was so simple and I’ve been like, wow, people will lie. Like people will lie, governments will lie. Ceos will lie. Like people will lie. And until you learn to think for yourself I mean, that had such a profound impact. And I think for a personal brand, right? Like you are the noticer, you are the conduit of great ideas. We have to be the ones that are deepening our thinking that are not just kind of going with the flow. And so I think, you know, to hear you talk about how you’ve systematically kinda kind of done that and that. So, so that’s what every, every book is like that. It’s a deeper level of thinking. It’s a new thing that you notice. I think you used the phrase connect the dots. It’s like you see us a pattern or a theme and then you kind of come in and you’re like, okay, there’s enough enough instances of this that I’m going to just kind of connect the dots. And that’s a book, AA: (22:13) Right? And it’s, it’s, it’s curious because that’s the other thing I was going to say, that it’s probably hurt my career is I don’t, you can’t find all my books in one place in the bookstore. I wish they would put all the books in the Andy Andrews place or whatever place that is, but you can’t find them there. Because I, I’ve I’ve, I’ve had you know, nonfiction fiction, children’s current events, those different lists RV: (22:46) I’ve had business you’ve even had like spiritual, like yeah, you’ve been all over. AA: (22:51) And so it’s, it’s one of those kinds of things where you know, if you stick to what you do, okay, well I figured out something pretty valuable with that. How to kill 11 million people thing. I figured out something that that there, there is something beyond what is true and the scholar the truth, if you go beyond what is true all the way to the bottom of the pool, you can often find the truth and the problem in business and in our personal lives is most of us stopped with what is what is true and why wouldn’t you? It’s true. It’s the answer. It’s, it’s obvious it, that’s the right answer. It’s true but, and it produces results and you can be in first or second place and still be only dealing with what is true. But if you want to double or triple your results, if you want to get to a different of thing, you got to go find what is the truth. AA: (23:49) Now, a quick example is like if you took a blind person and put them in, you know, in a room and said, we’ve got an animal here. You never heard of it. It’s called an elephant. Gonna give you a few minutes with it. Want you to tell us what it’s like and tell us you know, how we could use it in society. And after 10 minutes, you know, the blind person may say, excuse me, the blind person might say, well an elephant is very wide, very tall, flat. He used them for a gate, several of them for a wall. See, that’s true. All that’s true. It’s not the truth because until you got to the bottom of the pool about an elephant, you would never have a complete picture of what an elephant’s really like or having any idea of the many ways it could be used. AA: (24:44) And so with the idea that the Nazis lied. Yeah, well that’s true. And everybody knows it’s true. Yeah. White man, they killed, they killed 11 million people. They you know, they create a world war for everybody. They were liars. They were deceivers. Everybody knows it’s true. Okay. But the thing that kept bugging me, the thing I kept trying to go to the bottom of Hill on that would have application for us today with our dealing with our, our families in the organizations and dealing with our own governments. The thing that had application to me was, and it kept bothering me about the Holocaust. It’s like, how do you kill 11 people now I’m not saying how do you do it? Like what weapons? Weapons. And I’m not saying like, how crazy do you have to be to do it? Okay. What I’m saying is we’ve all seen the pictures of the people at the railway stations, thousands of them loading themselves onto cattle cars. AA: (25:55) And there was a, a Nazi soldier here with a machine gun and 10 yards down there was another one. Machine gun G, why? What’s going on? How do you get these people to load themselves peacefully onto cattle cars week after week, month after month, after month until 11 million market acquire. They run it. Why don’t they fight? Why don’t they rush the guards? What are they high? What’s going on? How do you kill 11 million people? And when I found the answer, just like I was so stunned, I could not believe it. And that is you only tool. You create a policy of lies and they had four and he can get the book, I’m going to tell you the whole thing, but it had four different directors that were policies about what they would say, how they would lead them into the trap of believing them. AA: (26:44) You know how they would go and, and, and negotiate with them and they would take their money and then give them food and say, you’re fine. You’re, everything’s good. And the people are thinking, if they were going to kill us, they would just kill us. They wouldn’t take our money and give us food and exchange so they’re not going to kill us. Okay. And you know, you lead them to the point where you’re going, Hey, we got to get outta here today. We’ve got to get outta here because the Russian troops are coming over the Hill and we’ve got a place down here where we’ve got skills, factory jobs for all the men. The women will stay at home, the kids are skills. And so just if your father’s board, your people on the trains, please get them on. And peacefully they did. It was you lie. RV: (27:31) Yeah. So I think that that, that was profound and even though you’re not an expert per se on anything, it’s like your super power is noticing things like that, bringing through it, thinking through it, thinking through it. It’s like we have to advance the level of thinking that has been done for people. And it seems like that, you know, that that is a big part of your, of what your super powers. I so I know we’re, I know we’re running short on time there. There’s another little element that I want to just kind of ask you. It’s kind of like a little bit of a curve ball, but you, you brought up comedy and I, I wasn’t planning on talking about this, but you know, I never really noticed the parallel because between what you, what you do like your super power and, and comedy, but they are the same thing. RV: (28:21) It’s, it’s noticing the thing that most people don’t pay attention to but it like happens to everybody is, is you’re also hilarious on stage and you’ve always been so, so funny and you know, it’s like, it helps a lot to be funny in the speaking world. So like if, if you had to teach comedy or if there was something where it’s like somebody was not funny D like, do you feel like you were just born with it or is there something that you have learned in a way that’s like, you know, practical that anyone could take to, to become funnier in their writing and in their speaking? AA: (28:58) I think, I think you can learn to do it. I think now as far as the speaking goes, there are so many things that are skillsets. Okay. Within that. But there is one, there’s kind of a talent thing too as far as, but that basic talent, just being able to talk, just being able to to talk is, is that talent okay? But everything after that is a skill that you add onto it. And the, the funny part is, is not to tell jokes. You know, comedians don’t tell jokes, you know, you do material, you, you come up with observations. And so, so if you, if you narrow it down and look at where are these things are coming from, they’re coming from who is aggravated by this what have we missed? What is the exaggeration of this? And what if I dialed in really closely on this basically four different things. AA: (30:06) There are some offshoots from those, but you know, I mean, you don’t, you don’t talk about it, the exaggerations, you know, you don’t talk about a guy who’s six foot five, you know, you walked into the gym and I’m playing basketball against a guy who’s bigger than Sasquatch. This guy is like 11 feet tall. It’s a funnier story and everybody knows he’s not 11 feet tall, but it’s a funny, don’t worry ago. It’s exaggeration, you know? And then the you know, there, there’s so many ideas of, you know, of what, what have we missed? Okay. You and I, I used to do a bit about you know, when he and I would get into it, I’ve given to it by saying something about, wow, did you hear there in Texas? They did another like execution there and the prison systems and they, you know how they do it in Texas, don’t you? They do it with a lethal injection, which is a shot, basically what it is. I mean, you grew up, you’re terrified of shots and now they’re executing with, but I always wonder, you know, when, when you execute somebody with a shot, do they still rub the out go home? AA: (31:34) Like we don’t want to infect you want to kill you? Oh my gosh. No. It’s just a thought process of an observation and daily news. Just something that everybody is seeing. But in another way, Rory too, is what is the opposite of this? What is the opposite of this? So, RV: (31:59) So those are, so those are just, so basically if you just kinda like okay, notice the things that frustrate you and then kind of exam, you know, like just, you kind of work on that a little bit or, right. AA: (32:13) Cause you think, you think about, think about this. Am I the only one? Am I the only one? CNS? And then you know, and then you’re telling if people go, yeah, yeah, yeah, I did it. How many of those are there? Right. RV: (32:28) Well, I never made that connection, but that makes so much. That’s makes so much sense. It’s just like you’re, you are, you’re a noticer. Like as it turns out, like what I think Andy Andrews, part of, part of your superpower, which makes you funny and profound and insightful and intelligent, is you notice things that are of value to other people and that are entertaining too. AA: (32:53) Other people. So you gotta be a little entertaining. So they will listen long enough to figure out what’s valuable. RV: (33:00) Yeah. But maybe, maybe there’s not as much randomness as one might think on the surface to, to all the various things that you’ve talked about. There’s, right. AA: (33:09) And here’s a, here’s a great, I mean, you didn’t ask this, but this is one of the best things I ever took from comedy and taking it into a speaking career. And that is, yeah, people will look at comedians they love and go, it just came out of nowhere. Man, this is so spontaneous. It’s just unbelievable. You know, people used to say that about Robin Williams, and Robin did have a lot of spontaneity, but that was only because he was allowed it. But it wasn’t, I mean, in a, in a typical performance, it might be, I don’t know, eight or nine or 10%, maybe spontaneous, but it’s like, this is not spontaneous, you know, on the tonight show, we saw him do this five nights in a row at the comedy store before he did it on the tonight show. And, and so what you’re wanting to create is the illusion of spontaneity. AA: (34:12) You want to create the illusion of it. And so, and I, I use this in my speaking a lot because I tell people, you know, we’re just having a conversation here and, and I don’t know, not really doing a speech, we’re just kind of, cause if I was doing a speech man, I’d have to be nervous because demanding that I be incredible. I already know that I’m not. And so, you know, let’s just kind of have a conversation and, and in fact we’ll just, we’ll just pretend we’re a big living room and having a conversation and I’ll go first dude, this guy thing. But what I’m saying about creating the illusion of spontaneity that I use a lot in speaking is I will create a situation. I know where I’m going now. The more it looks like, and you know, you’ve seen me, Rory, on stage. AA: (35:11) People go, he’s kind of nuts. I mean, it’s like this is the add poster child. I mean, and I know that. I understand, but I want him to think that because why do people go to bull riding? Why do people go to NASCAR? Just like you can’t take your eyes off it. There might be a wreck here any moment. Okay. And how many speakers have you listened to is like, there’s Bora, their minds, the information may be incredible, but if you’re, if you haven’t got something, and so what I want to do is I want to create something where the audience is involved with it. I know where I’m going. Give you an example. I used to do a routine, in fact, I heard it the other day on Sirius XM, so I haven’t been booked as a comedian for years. And every day I’m on six Sirius XM comedy channels. But I heard this one on Sirius XM the other day and I was like, wow. I, I used to do this routine about Lassie, about rumor that, and you’re so young. AA: (36:21) Yeah. But so Lassie and Timmy and, and I used to do this bit about Lassie, but rather than saying like, most people would go, Hey, do you remember Lassie? You remember Lassie from television. You know, wonder if funny how Lassie would do that. I mean that’s what a lot of people would do. Okay. But what I want to do is, I want to say, and is there a memory, we’re talking about television or something or some comment about television and go, man, when I grew up, we had great television shows. I mean I don’t, I wonder, we had animal shows, animal shows you what do they have animal shows now I don’t even know if they ha we, you remember him hearing you get my age. We had like a gentle Ben and flipper and Rin tin tin and a fury the horse and, and invariably someone’s going to go Lassie, Lassie. Remember Lassie? Never hell as you would. Here’s your cup of cars. Yeah. Let’s see. I do my bit. And the audience is going, dang man, somebody just said Lassie and the dude does four minutes on it. Unbelievable. It’s the illusion of spontaneity. RV: (37:41) Well, you’ve gone, you’ve gone far with this. The simple skill and, and trait of noticing. And I think that’s been super insightful for me. Hopefully for the people watching is just like the power of tuning in to what are the things that other people aren’t seeing and then developing those, whether it’s for entertainment or is for insight. That’s, that’s a super powerful lesson and we just appreciate you so much and we wish you the best and hopefully we’ll see you. We’ll see you back here again sometime. And anytime you ask, I’m William, so Andy, where do you want people to go if they want to like learn more about you, stay connected with you and all, you know, all of the stuff that you’re up to. Thank you. Meet me at Publix. I shop at Publix grocery saying you find more about may of let’s, ah, I, you know, I have a podcast too is not, is not as big a deal as yours, but it’s called the professional noticer. And we Speaker 5: (38:35) Do it every week and we answer questions and laugh and I have great time, but the professional noticer is my podcast and then we’re also doing stuff with a wisdom Harbor and Andy andrews.com. So, RV: (38:51) Well that’s awesome. As it turns out, that’s a good title for your podcast is not as much randomness to Andy Andrews as one might think. And you are a professional noticer. Thank you for showing us what that looks like a little bit behind the scenes that keep, keep making us laugh, man. Keep, keep inspiring us. We love it and we appreciate you so much. Thank you buddy. Honored to be here.

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