In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Arthur Levitan discuss:

  • Importance of knowing when to stop working
  • Impact of remote work on stress and productivity
  • Techniques for managing stress and maintaining mental health
  • Role of deep breathing in stress reduction and performance
  • Humility and adaptability in success and professional growth

Key Takeaways:

  • Establish clear boundaries for your work hours to prevent burnout and improve productivity by stopping when your brain is no longer functioning at its best.
  • Incorporate regular deep breathing exercises into your daily routine to reduce stress and promote mental clarity.
  • Prioritize social interactions and physical movement to counteract the isolation and sedentary nature of remote work.
  • Embrace a balanced approach to work and rest, recognizing the value of recuperation periods to maintain high performance and prevent long-term fatigue.
  • Cultivate humility and adaptability by acknowledging your knowledge limits and staying open to new information and challenges.

“Understanding when to stop is one of the highest forms of spirituality.” —  Arthur Levitan

Read more from Steve at Above the Law: AboveTheLaw.com/tag/Steve-Fretzin/

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Episode References: 

About Arthur Levitan: Master Arthur Levitan is the Founder and current Master of Quantum Tao, a non-profit community dedicated to studying Taoism’s ancient practices under his guidance. As one of the few Taoist Masters in the Western world, Master Levitan, who was recognized and ordained by the High Priestess of the Qingcheng Mountain Taoist temple in China in 2016, brings a unique perspective to his teachings. His school, California Tao, established in 2009, emphasizes practical daily applications of Tao and Qigong, making these ancient principles accessible to modern Americans. His book, “Outlast,” provides practical methods for managing internal energies through life’s challenges.

Connect with Arthur Levitan:  

Website: https://quantumtao.org/

Email: arthur@californiatao.org

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn’t Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody, before we get to the show, I just want to share that I’m now writing for Above the Law. If you enjoy this podcast, you might also enjoy my monthly columns. You can go to Above the Law and type my name into the magnifying glass in the top right corner to read my latest articles. Thanks and enjoy the show.

[00:00:21] Narrator: You’re listening to be that lawyer life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host author and lawyer coach, Steve Fretzin, we’ll take a deeper dive, helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now here’s your host, Steve Fretzin.

[00:00:43] Steve Fretzin: Well, Hey everybody. Welcome back. It is Steve Fretzin here with the be that lawyer with Fretzin podcast. We are rocking and rolling every single week twice a week to give you What it takes to be that lawyer and someone who’s going to be confident organized and a skilled rainmaker And I think you know, there’s I can’t remember a time and i’ve been in legal for 16 years where lawyers have been busier And the unemployment rate is like basically zero and there’s just a ton of work and I don’t know, you know How that’s happened, but it happened and people are getting higher rates And the other side effect is that I think lawyers are under some level of stress and in all this Business that’s coming in which again is wonderful better than the alternative But it’s how we deal with things like that and i’ve got a phenomenal guest today arthur.

[00:01:27] Steve Fretzin: How you doing, man? 

[00:01:28] Arthur Levitan: Good. Thank you for having me 

[00:01:30] Steve Fretzin: All right. And we, we’ve got you with the outside of forest behind you. So we, we said, if, if if a chipmunk or a squirrel attacks you, you know, we’ll know why. Okay. 

[00:01:40] Arthur Levitan: We’ll see if I can handle it. 

[00:01:43] Steve Fretzin: You ever had to wrangle a couple of chipmunks, you know, we’ll see how that, you can see, see if you, you know, if you can man up for that anyway.

[00:01:49] Steve Fretzin: Wonderful. So let’s, let’s, as we do start off with our quote of the show, which is retire when your work is done. Who’s that quote by? And then tell us a little bit about that. Arthur, welcome to the show. 

[00:02:00] Arthur Levitan: Thank you. That quote is by Lao Tzu, the writer of the second most translated book in the world after the Bible, which is the Tao Te Ching, which is 2, 500 years old and outlines the Taoist philosophy.

[00:02:14] Arthur Levitan: So most people have heard of the Taoist philosophy. Few people actually understand what it is. 

[00:02:20] Steve Fretzin: Well, I think we’re going to get into what it is in great detail, but, but, but why retire when the work is done? What that sounds like we should all be retiring at the end of a career, but I don’t think that’s what it’s about.

[00:02:31] Arthur Levitan: No, no. What it means is when you’ve done your best stop, because every, everything you do after you’ve done your best is negative return. So understanding when to stop is one of the highest forms of spirituality. And the focus on that will keep you from being a perfectionist, right? Yeah. Absolutely. When you, when you understand you’ve done your best, everything you do after, it’s not little micro gains, it’s actually all negative.

[00:02:58] Steve Fretzin: Well, the other part of it that, and again, I, everyone can have a different take on, on a quote like this and it’s. I think people are work. I mean, I get that I can work after hours, right? I can write an article. I can take a call from a client. That’s that’s my choice. I don’t have to have that choice. It’s it’s my choice.

[00:03:16] Steve Fretzin: And if I’m in the middle of something important, I’m not going to, but I think people don’t know when to shut off the work. And I definitely know when to shut off the work my brain stops working about 430 so that’s what I that’s what I know yeah my brain stops working it’s not functioning as well as it should and certainly by 8 o’clock I definitely but but is that so talk a little bit about retire when your work is done and how how people need to consider maybe shutting things down at some point.

[00:03:44] Arthur Levitan: Well, let’s, let’s use your example, right? You’re like, Hey, you know, I’ve gotten to a point in my life. I figured it out. My brain stops working at 4 30. Right. And if you’re self aware, you’re like, all right, I’m done because everything I do afterwards is going to be suspect. I’m going to have to relook at this anyway.

[00:04:00] Arthur Levitan: I’m going to be doing double and triple the work regardless. Right. 

[00:04:03] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:04:04] Arthur Levitan: Unless you fall victim to a favorite quote in America, push through the pain. 

[00:04:10] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:04:11] Arthur Levitan: So you’re going to be like, no, no, no. I’m going to push myself. I’m going to push myself. And every time you do that, the amount of energy you have to expand expand, like doubles and triples and the the output just nose dives.

[00:04:25] Arthur Levitan: Right. So a warrior, so these practices were developed for warriors and in the Dow, in the Dow, we have this understanding of yin and yang or male and female or light and dark or complimentary opposite energy. Right. So the male energies, what you’re talking about is. My brain is working. I’m pushing through, I’m getting stuff done.

[00:04:49] Arthur Levitan: Everything else, the female energy is the recuperation regeneration and getting ready to go into battle again. And if you keep staying in the male energy and I just got to get it done and everything, and don’t give yourself enough time to recuperate the next day, you’re going to be destroyed dude. Now, when you’re young, it’s okay.

[00:05:09] Arthur Levitan: Get closer to your thirties. That starts to be a problem, and further on, it just nosedives. 

[00:05:14] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:05:15] Arthur Levitan: So, knowing when to get into that state, where you’re recuperating. It’s insanely important. 

[00:05:22] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, and we’re going to take a pretty deep dive arthur into the spiritual side of Performance and and how people need to stay mentally fit and healthy and just to give everybody a little bit of a background arthur levitin is is the spiritual director of california dao And give us a little bit your your history is very fascinating and would you just give everybody a little bit of a of a Idea of what what where you come from?

[00:05:46] Arthur Levitan: My parents brought us brought me here when I was nine was born in ukraine became an entrepreneur around 18 19 And I haven’t stopped since Started a bunch of different businesses. A lot of it spoke, it was focused on technology and healthcare and was very lucky to be involved in some really fantastic projects and stumbled into a spiritual path in my early twenties.

[00:06:13] Arthur Levitan: And it all stemmed from the mantra that my immigrant parents gave me, which is make money and you’ll be happy. And when I started making fairly decent money in my early twenties, and I still wasn’t happy. I was really, really lucky to have discovered that that mantra didn’t really work out for me. It works for some, it did not work for me.

[00:06:35] Arthur Levitan: And I studied Buddhism for seven years, did a lot of practices of Buddhist practice, including fasting. My last fast too many years ago was for 22 days. And that changed my life. That re that rerouted the course of my life. And very shortly afterwards, I got a call. From a random person that I maybe have met that made an offer that I said yes to, and I wound up buying a house across the street from a Daoist temple, not knowing what Daoism was.

[00:07:06] Arthur Levitan: Long story short, walked across the street, changed my life, started my own school in 2009, started traveling through China, studying with the Chinese teachers, and wound up getting ordained. In the oldest Daoist temple in the world in Chengdu, China, which was pretty cool. Actually. 

[00:07:27] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:07:27] Arthur Levitan: So, and now for the last 10 years, I work with people, different walks of life, but mainly focused on CEOs, executives, and lawyers hire me in particular for their clients to help them get through Christ.

[00:07:42] Arthur Levitan: How do you manage your internal energy when life is falling apart? How do you get through the hardest things that are happening to you in your life? And how do you do it in a way that you not only survive, but you find ways of thriving in that environment. And that requires the warrior’s teaching, like what Daoism was all about.

[00:08:02] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, let’s take a a dive there into that then so We’ve kind of agree agree that you know people that are in positions like ceos executives lawyers that they have Stress they have struggles. They have you know perfectionism issues. They have Over, you know overachiever issues. They’re they’re just burning the candle on both ends.

[00:08:23] Steve Fretzin: So Why is that changed dramatically in your opinion in the last 10 15 20 years or is it is it kind of always been that way? 

[00:08:30] Arthur Levitan: No, it’s gotten worse And it’s gotten worse because the pandemic accelerated zoom, right? What we’re doing now, this is wonderful, 

[00:08:39] Steve Fretzin: but 

[00:08:40] Arthur Levitan: unfortunately, a lot of people are by themselves stuck at home, right.

[00:08:45] Arthur Levitan: And working and actually companies love people working from home because they found out people work much more than they do in the office. But what’s really important is that we as humans, if you look at our original design, if you go back with me, that’s really successful. On this planet, wasn’t our teeth, wasn’t our speed, wasn’t our strength.

[00:09:08] Arthur Levitan: It was our inter ability to be interdependent with each other. In other words, you have strength and I have strength together with much stronger than even both of us. 

[00:09:20] Steve Fretzin: It’s how it’s how things get built. It’s how it’s how our world has, you know, been developed the way that it has versus, you know, us all still living in a jungle.

[00:09:28] Arthur Levitan: It’s how we were able to take down mammoths. It’s how we became the apex predator on this planet. And now we’re getting rid of that, right? So we’re sitting in home away from our original design on a screen. And we’re not moving. We’re not breathing and our health is deteriorating quickly. And most importantly, our emotional health is deteriorating because we’re not making connections with humans.

[00:09:55] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Well, that’s, I mean, that’s cert, that is certainly a major issue amongst the others that we could probably talk about, you know, politically and, and on every, every level right now, there’s stress coming at us. What, so what are some of the things that, you know, People that are stressed and overthinking, you know, can, can, what can they do to sort of clear their minds?

[00:10:15] Steve Fretzin: Let’s start getting into the weeds on, on, on how people can start fixing things or start looking it up ways to, to, to clear a path. 

[00:10:23] Arthur Levitan: So if you’ve ever been in a stressful situation, whether you’re in traffic, whether you’re taking a unpleasant phone call or somebody is trying to punch you in the face.

[00:10:33] Steve Fretzin: That doesn’t happen every day. Just every other day. What kind of guests have you had? Oh, wow. You wouldn’t believe, no, but I live, I live in basically Mayberry. Like the worst thing that happens is a car gets broken into once a year. It’s there, or there’s a bunch of teenagers running around. Like, you know, it’s like, you know, there’s people living in a lot more stressful environments than me.

[00:10:53] Arthur Levitan: And nevertheless, every time you get into your car, it’s a stressful environment, even though you don’t see it because the chances for death is quite high. 

[00:11:00] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:11:01] Arthur Levitan: Right. And it may not be the fact that you’re a bad driver, but there are other people that are. 

[00:11:05] Steve Fretzin: Sure. 

[00:11:06] Arthur Levitan: So what happens to us on a physiological level is we stop breathing.

[00:11:12] Arthur Levitan: We hold our breaths. And if you were to notice yourself next time you’re in a bad phone call or stuck in traffic or angry or anxious or any of those emotions, you’re holding your breath. And what you do most, you do best. So do this long enough and you have trained your system to have very short breaths because you’re almost always suffocating because instead of having a deep, long breath, you’re always, you’re always gasping for air because you’re always holding your breath.

[00:11:47] Arthur Levitan: So it doesn’t start with an intellectual exercise. It starts with you being aware of how your breathing is in different moments of your day. Okay. And if you can stop long enough and it doesn’t take much 30 seconds, that’s the beauty of this stop long enough, put your hand on your chest, close your eyes and take a deep breath and ask your chest to relax.

[00:12:11] Arthur Levitan: As you’re doing that, you will start training the system to breathe deeper, the deeper you breathe, the more you engage your parasympathetic system, which is the break, right? The sympathetic system is the gas. Pushing, pushing, pushing. The parasympathetic is, Hey, let’s slow down and relax. So I’m just going to, I had this amazing martial arts teacher in my life.

[00:12:35] Arthur Levitan: He was, he was incredible. And he gave me a mantra, which I, which I’ll never forget in my whole life. He says, the strongest punch can only happen with the slowest start. It is not the strength that matters. It is the change in acceleration. So the slower you start, the softer you are in the beginning and the slower you start, the harder you, the faster and the more, more powerfully you can accelerate to that finish to the heart finish.

[00:13:06] Arthur Levitan: Right. And if you’re only doing, if you’re always in a state of tense. Yeah. And you can, you can only get harder that Delta of acceleration is tiny as compared to when you start slow, you can accelerate to that fast. 

[00:13:22] Steve Fretzin: Is there a method of breathing? So I can just, I can just slow down my breath, put my hand on my chest, close my eyes and breathe for 30 seconds.

[00:13:30] Steve Fretzin: Is it in through the nose out through the mouth? Is it like give a little bit more, a little bit more detail? 

[00:13:35] Arthur Levitan: Absolutely. So let me show. Okay. Put your hand in your chest. 

[00:13:39] Steve Fretzin: Okay. 

[00:13:39] Arthur Levitan: And as soon as I do that, several things happen because I’ve been practicing for so long. I’m instantly trying to relax my back, drop my shoulders.

[00:13:47] Arthur Levitan: And I take a breath in through my nose and they imagine it falling all the way to the bottom of my stomach. And then I use my stomach to gently press in. And I want to send the breath all the way through my mouth. And I want it to be soft and slow. Three breaths. As you start to do that, What happens is your, your body after a little bit, obviously not the first time, starts to lower the shoulders, starts to clear the head, starts to ground your energy.

[00:14:15] Arthur Levitan: And this is important. Why? Everything you’re talking about is people when they sit in front of a screen or they’re trying to push through a project or they’re trying to get to, to, you know, to prepare for a client’s case or whatever it is. They’re all up here, they’re all in their eyes, and they’re all in their head.

[00:14:33] Arthur Levitan: And what happens energetically wise, is you create the steam kettle effect, where the energy just is stuck here, and it creates heat. By the way, your brain, when you work it a lot, all that electrical work, creates heat. If you’re not grounding that heat, that heat creates distortion in your thoughts. Right.

[00:14:55] Arthur Levitan: So the whole body versus the 

[00:14:57] Arthur Levitan: head. 

[00:14:57] Arthur Levitan: It’s exactly right. What I just showed you is the beginning of a practice where you draw that deep down into your feet and into the ground. 

[00:15:05] Steve Fretzin: Okay. 

[00:15:06] Arthur Levitan: And that’s it. And if, once you learn how to do it, it takes 30 seconds and you’re often running to whatever you need to do.

[00:15:13] Arthur Levitan: But your the results of your work is going to exponentially change 

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[00:16:55] Steve Fretzin: The best part? They will find you a highly qualified English speaking VA based in Latin America for only a fraction of the cost locally. At fretzin, we use Get Staffed Up for Marketing Person and you know how good our marketing is. Learn more at GetStaffedUp. com slash BeThatLawyer. So we’re already taking away I think a number of great Tips meaning, you know, when you retire, when your work is done and knowing, you know, how to, how to cut it off and let go when, you know, you’re not in your zone of excellence or, you know, performance zone, we’re talking about bringing the heat down and grounding it because we’re breathing in a slow and, and, and focused way.

[00:17:35] Steve Fretzin: What else are, what else should we be doing during the day to kind of calm ourselves down when we’re feeling in crisis? 

[00:17:41] Arthur Levitan: So another really simple thing is go for a walk. Without headphones, without your phone, not long, 

[00:17:49] Arthur Levitan: 20 

[00:17:50] Arthur Levitan: minutes during that walk, turn around and walk backwards, 10, 20 steps without looking backward.

[00:17:59] Arthur Levitan: And that’s it. 

[00:18:01] Steve Fretzin: That’s I’ve never heard that before. What’s so what’s the story there? 

[00:18:04] Arthur Levitan: You change the way your energy flows in your body and you change because you now can, you no longer can use your eyes, right? So one of the things we need to get out of. We need to get out of our eyes and to get out of our head.

[00:18:17] Steve Fretzin: Okay. 

[00:18:17] Arthur Levitan: You will see that when you’re walking backwards without looking backwards, something else is working to keep you safe. And it’s not your head and it’s not your eyes. So we’re drawing the energy out and that’s it, 

[00:18:30] Arthur Levitan: right? Yeah. 

[00:18:31] Arthur Levitan: It is that simple. That’s the beginning of all those little practices. 

[00:18:35] Steve Fretzin: And don’t do this when you’re crossing the street though, we, we can agree.

[00:18:38] Steve Fretzin: Okay. 

[00:18:39] Arthur Levitan: Don’t do this. Make sure there’s not a cliff nearby. Stay away. We got 

[00:18:43] Steve Fretzin: cliffs. We got you know, traffic, 

[00:18:45] Arthur Levitan: your dog, 

[00:18:48] Steve Fretzin: your dog’s looking at you like, what are you doing? Weirdo. 

[00:18:51] Arthur Levitan: Yeah. Don’t go through crowd. I mean, yeah, no, no, but, but it’s, 

[00:18:55] Steve Fretzin: but, but what I love about that is I think what one of the, maybe one of the benefits of this is.

[00:19:01] Steve Fretzin: We’re so used to the norm. We’re so used to walking with headphones. We’re so used to walking forward and seeing what’s in front of us. It’s that we’re sort of programmed a certain way in a certain direction. And when you can break the programming and breathe differently or walk backwards, it starts to change how your brain and your body and everything function.

[00:19:19] Arthur Levitan: You’re that, remember that what you do most, you do best. So the patterns you get into walking forward. Looking, brushing your teeth, the same way, sleeping on the same side, all that creates patterns and all those patterns, then the grooves get, you know, remember the old vinyl records, the groups 

[00:19:38] Arthur Levitan: get deep and 

[00:19:39] Arthur Levitan: everything.

[00:19:39] Arthur Levitan: And the needle can’t get out 

[00:19:41] Steve Fretzin: your 

[00:19:41] Arthur Levitan: body and your system no longer adapt. 

[00:19:45] Steve Fretzin: That’s so interesting. 

[00:19:47] Arthur Levitan: Oh, I know what I’m going to do. And remember. Nothing, no adaptation ever happens when, when the environment is static. In other words, when the, when it’s too nice outside, when there’s no, there’s no stimulus to change, you don’t change.

[00:20:02] Arthur Levitan: Right. So your adaptability drops. 

[00:20:05] Steve Fretzin: You know, a great example. So I’ve been doing, this is, this is not a, this is not a you know, a brag or anything. This is just, this is just me talking about my life a little bit, but you know, I’ve been doing Pilates for almost two years now. And I’m going to the same place, the same times with the same teachers.

[00:20:20] Steve Fretzin: And there’s a number of studios within my area and I decided you know what I’m going to break away and I’m going to go to another and boy was I sore the next day and boy did I have a different teacher different experience different muscles and I’m just like I’ve got to mix it up like that that getting into those grooves that where it’s the same same same all the time.

[00:20:39] Steve Fretzin: It wasn’t working for my body anymore or my mind. So I think this is right in line with what you’re saying, Arthur that we’ve got to change, you know, change the grooves. If we want to, you know, have listened to a different song, there we go. That’s a frets and a frets and special. 

[00:20:54] Arthur Levitan: So you are obviously self aware.

[00:20:58] Arthur Levitan: And you recognize that you were getting into a rut, or you were getting into a place where you were no longer changing, your body was not reacting 

[00:21:06] Steve Fretzin: the same 

[00:21:07] Arthur Levitan: way. It’s exactly right. 

[00:21:08] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:21:09] Arthur Levitan: You did exactly the right thing, is change it up. See what other moves are there, see what something else is. Yeah. Right?

[00:21:17] Arthur Levitan: Really great. And, 

[00:21:18] Arthur Levitan: I can tell you from my own practices, if you do something long enough, and I’m sure this is the same in the legal profession, same everywhere else, the way you were five years ago, it’s not the way now, the way you understand the law is not the way you understand it. Now, the way you approach the courtroom is not the same way.

[00:21:35] Arthur Levitan: The way you approach clients is not the same way. You’re always moving, evolving, right? You want your body to be doing the same thing. 

[00:21:43] Arthur Levitan: Hmm. 

[00:21:43] Arthur Levitan: You want the whole system to be functioning as one rather than as different units. 

[00:21:47] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. I think that’s so critical. And, and it’s not bad, a bad thing to try new things.

[00:21:53] Steve Fretzin: It’s, it’s a very good thing on, on a number of levels and and just staying the course, you know, eating snicker bars, you know, for, right. You know, for, for lunch because you’re busy or, or not working out or working out the same way and not changing things up, right? These are all patterns that aren’t allowing you to maybe progress at the level that you could be.

[00:22:12] Steve Fretzin: Let’s transition. There’s something that, that you had said to me that really hit home. And I wanted to just have you explain it a little bit more. How can the concept of humility help you win or help you improve? 

[00:22:25] Arthur Levitan: So in Taoism, we have this principle, it’s called the reversion. And what it is, is in order to understand the concept really, really well, we want to look at the opposite to see the contrast.

[00:22:36] Arthur Levitan: So if you think, you know, if you want to understand day, look at night. And vice versa, good, evil, want to go to Nebo life and death, right? 

[00:22:47] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. 

[00:22:47] Arthur Levitan: Male and female. If you want to, if you want to truly understand the concept, look at the opposite of it to see the contrast. What is the opposite? Because humility is hard to understand and be, especially in our culture.

[00:22:59] Arthur Levitan: We don’t really practice it. There’s not really a clear definition of it. You know, when you think of humility, you think, think of some monks, you know, with weird haircuts and everything stuck stuck in the church somewhere. That’s not humility. So what is the opposite of humility? And that’s arrogant and arrogance is really easy to define.

[00:23:20] Arthur Levitan: Arrogance is a closed system. Arrogance is, I know everything it’s my way or the highway. Okay. Now let’s look at the opposite. What’s an open system. What is it like to be in a place where you understand that you don’t know anything? So an open system is able to take in information, a closed system is not.

[00:23:42] Arthur Levitan: So humility is not some crazy spiritual concept for the hell of it. Humility is about flexibility and adaptability to win in a battle. And that’s the key point. All these concepts are for warriors. Warriors go to battle. Warriors want to win that battle. Humility is a fundamental principle of how to win that battle.

[00:24:06] Arthur Levitan: If you’re an open system, you’re going to be able to see the subtle little motions of your opponent or the inflections of their voice. Right? 

[00:24:15] Steve Fretzin: Right. 

[00:24:15] Arthur Levitan: If you know, you don’t know anything. You’re going to be able to say, Oh, you know, I think I know this part of the law, but maybe let, let me check, let me check up on it again.

[00:24:24] Arthur Levitan: Let me reread it as if I don’t know it, 

[00:24:27] Arthur Levitan: see 

[00:24:27] Arthur Levitan: it with fresh eyes, right? That is a, that is, that is the whole point. The whole point is not so you’re going to become this great monk sitting somewhere. The whole point is that you win the battle. And humility is the way, it is actually the major, it is the concept in Taoism, and it’s based on water.

[00:24:46] Arthur Levitan: Because water is one of the softest substances ever. It flows all the way downhill, but it accomplishes everything. Water created the Grand Canyon. 

[00:24:56] Steve Fretzin: Right. Right. 

[00:24:57] Arthur Levitan: And yet it’s the softest substance. 

[00:24:59] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Wow. So we’re, we’re, yeah, I mean, we’re deeper, we’re deeper than we usually go on the show, but that’s a good thing, right?

[00:25:06] Steve Fretzin: We’re changing up things to here, having you on and talking about the kind of really spiritual things. Let’s, is there any other final kind of words of wisdom to share before we wrap up and get to our game changing podcast? Cause I just, I’d hate to miss out on, on one more gem from you before we wrap up.

[00:25:23] Arthur Levitan: So, and again, because I know I’m speaking to an audience of warriors, the one that I engage in battle in every day, one of the best quotes that one of my teachers ever gave me that I still follow, and it’s in line with humility, is the opponent is always smarter, faster, stronger. And if you keep that in mind.

[00:25:46] Arthur Levitan: You’re never going to underestimate them. 

[00:25:48] Arthur Levitan: Yeah. 

[00:25:49] Arthur Levitan: You’re always going to be on, on, on your best guard and you’re going to be able to catch everything. If you’re thinking, if you’re an arrogance and you’re thinking you’re smarter, faster, stronger, bad things are going to happen. 

[00:26:02] Steve Fretzin: Okay. So that’s, you know, for the lawyers, you know, we know a lot of lawyers who have, you know, pretty significant egos.

[00:26:08] Steve Fretzin: And you know, they’ve been around the block a few times and I think we still have to consider, you know, even even me, I’ve been working with attorneys business development, you know, I do know quite a bit and I see that through my clients and their success. I’m still always learning. I’m still always asking.

[00:26:24] Steve Fretzin: I’m always reading what people are writing and buying books and and listening to podcasts and trying to get smarter and better and. And you know, in a better position to help myself and others. But I think that really wise, really wise. Let’s speaking of a really interesting podcast, you mentioned this podcast to me and I perked up right away because I love history.

[00:26:45] Steve Fretzin: I’m, I’m not someone who sits and like, does, you know, spends hours and hours on history, you know, every day or anything, but You know, when I go into a new city or when I’m listening or, you know, reading a book, I love to, you know, read history and hear about, about great tacticians and whatnot. This is hardcore history and it’s a podcast.

[00:27:02] Steve Fretzin: Tell us a little bit about that. 

[00:27:04] Arthur Levitan: So sure. Dan Carlin, he’s he goes deep and he doesn’t think of himself as like this professor historian. He’s, he’s like you and I, right. He reads these things and tries to understand. And what. What I find so incredibly useful and he’s, by the way, when you start listening to him, you just can’t stop the way he delivers it, his voice and everything is just amazing.

[00:27:27] Arthur Levitan: But what I find very important is around history is that we’re living in a society right now that gives us this illusion that we have this huge margin of error that we could mess up, fail, and still everything’s going to be. All right. And in a lot of ways we do. And that brings you into a place of complacency.

[00:27:49] Arthur Levitan: When you listen about the history of the lives of people who lived in society, who had no margin of error, zero, because that means that that’s a difference between you being alive and you being dead, the skills they developed, the perspectives they had, the moves they did, those are the ones you want to be studying because then you actually have a leg up living in the modern society.

[00:28:14] Arthur Levitan: For all those who are not, for all those who think we have a huge margin of error here. And we don’t, it’s an illusion. But we think we do. 

[00:28:23] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Check that out, everybody. Hardcore history. A very interesting Arthur, as we wrap up one, of course, thank our wonderful sponsors getting staffed up, get staffed up, right.

[00:28:32] Steve Fretzin: And I’m getting staffed up all the time with them. Lawmatics helping us on the software to automate our marketing and automate the way we interact with our clients. And PymCon coming up in September for the personal injury attorneys out there that want to have a first class experience and here’s some of the top marketing of people in the, in the world talk about how to grow your personal injury practice.

[00:28:52] Steve Fretzin: So Arthur, people want to get in touch with you. They want to either hear more about you, read more about you or get in touch with you. What’s the, what are the best digits? 

[00:29:00] Arthur Levitan: So quantumDAO. org is our website. Go on there. My personal email is, and it’s the other, it’s the other, it’s the parent company.

[00:29:10] Arthur Levitan: It’s Arthur at California DAO, T A O dot org. And that’s the best way to get in touch with me. 

[00:29:16] Steve Fretzin: Yeah, and all of that will be in the show notes as well. Everybody just thanks so much. This was, you know, look, we had 30 minutes to kind of take a deep dive and get into it. And I think, you know, three, four, five takeaways that my audience listening can, can say, look, I’m feeling stressed.

[00:29:31] Steve Fretzin: I’m feeling like I’m not winning it to the level. I’m not, you know, having as much of an open mind as I need to that, that you’ve given some really great Takeaways for them to, to get on track and get back on track more likely. So just thanks so much for, for coming on the show and sharing your wisdom.

[00:29:46] Arthur Levitan: Thank you. I really appreciate it. Yeah. And I love the Seinfeld quote. 

[00:29:50] Steve Fretzin: Yeah. No soup for you, man. I’ll tell you that right now. the top one at the top. Serenity now, I mean, yes. Screaming with anger, serenity now. Right. I mean that’s like the, the ultimate yin and yang or you know, of, of of the, the, what were you saying?

[00:30:03] Steve Fretzin: The, the, the, the, the white and the black and the, and the, yeah. Male and the female. Right. Serenity. Now. With an explanation exclamation mark right next to it. I 

[00:30:11] Arthur Levitan: love that. Yeah, good stuff. 

[00:30:14] Steve Fretzin: Thank you so 

[00:30:14] Arthur Levitan: much for having me 

[00:30:15] Steve Fretzin: Thank you. Arthur, man. I appreciate you and and everybody listen up you know just trying to continue to bring great guests to to help improve your life in the way that you’re Practicing the law and living the best lawyer life.

[00:30:26] Steve Fretzin: You can Being that lawyer with frets and every single week twice a week guys confident organized in a skilled rainmaker Take care everybody be safe. Be well. We’ll talk again soon

[00:30:39] Narrator: Thanks for listening to be that lawyer life changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice Visit steve’s website fretzin. com for additional information and to stay up to date on the latest legal business developments Development and marketing trends for more information and important links about today’s episode check out today’s show notes

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