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Warren: Okay and welcome. I am Warren McDonald with the Challenge of Change and I am super
psyched today to have Sean Stephenson joining us from Chicago, Illinois. Welcome, Sean.
Sean: Thank you, Warren. Good to see you buddy.
Warren: Good to see you and it has been way to long; great to be seeing you via Skype
today. Why don't we start out, if you could give us a little bit of a snap shot on who
Sean Stephenson is? Yeah let's roll from there.
Sean: Sure. So, what most people notice right away is that I am not the typical individual.
I will back up a little bit so everyone can get a gander at the goodness here. So, 3 feet
tall, in a wheelchair for mobility, because I was born with a rare condition called osteogenesis
imperfecta; also know as blittle bone disorder. When I was born, the doctors told my parents
that I wasn't even going to survive the first 24 hours of life, because of this the condition
and what is great just celebrated my 32th birthday and all those doctors are dead now.
So...
Warren: (Laughter)
Sean: You can't always trust the experts. So, even take with a grain of salt of what
I have to say. Let's see, with this condition I had over 200 fractures by the time I was
eighteen. Something as simple as sneezing would fracture a collar bone or a rib, but
I say it causally now, because I have came out the other side, but my childhood was very
grueling. I mean 200 bone fractures, eighteen years of excruciating sclerosis back pain,
being stared at, not being able to play ball with my friends. There were a lot of frustrating
times, but as hopefully, we will get to in this interview. With all that said, I had
a magnificent childhood as well as an incredible life since then.
Warren: Yeah. Interesting, you got to love that about experts and doctors. Did they basically
just base that on experience, "Now, with our experience, from what we've seen you may not
get through the first 24 hours." They must have been astounded to watch you go on. Although
you were probably too young, but this must of kicked in at some point, that you had the
sense of proving them wrong maybe.
Sean: I don't even know. Some people are driven by silencing the skeptics if you will or the
cynics. I am not as militant or drive that way. I just like having a good time. So, at
a young age I realized, "Wait a minute, I don't just want to be the most successful
kid in a wheelchair at the time. I want to be the most successful kid." When I got to
a teenager I thought, "I want to be the most successful teenager." When I grew into an
adulthood I thought, "I don't want to bench mark myself amongst people with disabilities.
I want to bench mark myself towards the best of the best."
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: I haven't identified much with my disability or with those with disabilities. I have a
kinship when I see you at a bar and we start talking. I think there is an unspoken agreement
that we both have gone through our tough times, but that we came out the other side with a
good attitude. So full circle answer, to your question, yeah they looked at the statistics
and thought with my level of severity I probably was not going to make it. Then they said if
he makes it through 24 hours, then he probably won't make it through 48 hours. Then eventually
I think they just stopped making predictions that I was going to die, because they could
see I wasn't going anywhere.
Warren: Right. Yet, then it became a case of stepping back and then saying, "Look at
this guy go"
Sean: Yeah.
Warren: That is a huge, huge perception piece that you just touched on there and I talk
a lot about that how when you said you didn't go down that track of identifying with your
disability, but instead of identifying successful people in general and putting yourself up
there.
Sean: Yeah. That is something that gets mixed reactions from people. Some people hear that
and go, "Yeah!" and they celebrate it and they are like he's seeing them first. He sees
himself as an individual and human before anything other container or condition. Some
people rally behind me and get excited to hear me share that belief system. Other people
get very angry. They're like, well "You're not being true to your type or your kind,"
and it doesn't matter if you are black, gay, Jewish, a woman, disabled. It doesn't matter
what you connect to because you think you are that.
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: You are really limiting yourself if that's what you think you only are and I am
far more. Just not too long ago, I got a tattoo. See if I can show you here.
Warren: Oh, I see it.
Sean: I got a tattoo of the infinity symbol and my soon to be fiancée got one too. We
prescribed to the idea that we are infinite. You are not a disabled man in a wheelchair.
You are not your title or container or even your past.
Warren: Yep.
Sean: I think you are far more than all of that. So, perception wise I think you and
I are on the same wave length when it comes to life. The quality of life is not based
on the facts. It's your interpretation of the facts.
Warren: Yeah, exactly. It is funny you mentioned about people getting upset about not seeing
yourself as disabled. I had a guy say to me once, "You know what? I hate people like you,"
and then he went on to tell me a story about how he was like he was a full blown ***
addict and he would just say, "Do you know what? There would be nothing worse than me
when I was feeling in my absolute worst to then see a smiling guy in a wheelchair cruise
by." It was quite an eye opener for me, because I haven't really thought about it that way.
Sean: Yeah. I see it all the time too. For a long while, for about four years I taught
men of all different shapes and sizes how to be confident to attract the right woman.
I was an element to my business that I went through. It was a lot of fun and I really
enjoyed it. I received hate mail from some men who said one, I was probably lying; there
was no way I was getting a girl; two, that I was probably paying these girls. All these
men were coming up with this anger. At first I felt this need to defend myself and say,
"Well, why don't you talk to the girls? I can introduce them and have them tell you
that they loved being with me." I felt the need to be in that defensive position and
then one day the light bulb went off and I realized, "Oh, okay." They aren't doing well
with women so then when all of a sudden a little man in the wheelchair comes along and
is doing well. What does that say about them?
Warren: Right.
Sean: What are they going to have to do about -- they are not going to have an excuse anymore.
So they just have to just doubt the truth of it...
Warren: Yes.
Sean: So, they can go on living their small life.
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: That was a big eye opener when I realized that. Another moment of perception change,
I was in a night club once and I was with some friends. A female friend of mine and
we went on the dance floor and this other girl was there. I went to dance with this
other girl and she looked at me and she went, "Ew, no." She was like totally taken back
and my friend went to go punch this girl in the face.
Warren: Wow.
Sean: Because she was so angry that this person reacted that way and I interrupted and said,
"Whoa, whoa, whoa don't you realize that her reaction to me had nothing to do with me.
It has everything to do with her. She doesn't feel beautiful in her current body, "which
is smokin' hot." How would she feel in this container?" So she perceiving that she would
be miserable if she was in my container, because she is already miserable in her container.
So, yeah I get that people would say that to you or me, because it is like we shake
up the reality. We make them wonder if their excuses are really full of ***.
Warren: Yeah. No, exactly and it is confronting for a lot of people and I think a lot of people
don't get it. I know for me -- you just said earlier that you were born with this condition
and that is a lot different from me. This condition was thrown on me at thirty-two.
So, I've lived that.
Sean: You were thirty-two?
Warren: I was thirty-two at the time, yeah.
Sean: So, you were my age now?
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: I got it. Okay,
Warren: I was your age; a big boulder comes falling out of the sky or not quite and for
me it was a life changing moment, but I often think about before that time I didn't really
know anybody that used a wheelchair. It just wasn't part of my world. I haven't got specific
memories of reacting in that way and judging someone in that way. I think it would be...
I can't say that honestly, that it didn't happen; that I didn't react the same way,
because it just not part of people's normal world.
Sean: So, what I want to know is -- because people ask me this question all the time.
Do you think it is easier to cope when you are born this way, this way being an abnormality
that makes you adapt; or lose that which you had normally and go to a new reality like
your condition. Which one is more difficult? I think that it depends on what way you look
at it, right? Because I could say you had 32 years. You had my entire lifespan to climb,
walk, run, jump, and do all of those things...
Warren: Yup.
Sean: Normally and so you had taste. You got to love, but now you have to love through
a new channel, right? Verses me, who can only conceptualize what that must feel like or
be like, but also I didn't have to feel like something was taken from me.
Warren: Exactly. There's no having to deal with that loss. That sense of loss. Yeah.
Sean: Definitely not in an overnight kind of way. I was with my girl friend and a couple
of weeks ago I got frustrated with her. We were talking about something and then I started
to cry and she said, "What is wrong?" I said, "I still think after all these years I'm grieving
over the loss of what I deem at times, a loss of a normal body."
Warren: Right.
Sean: Even though perceptually I had the same body my whole entire life, but it is still
the comparison game of: What would my life of been like had I not been born in this type
of container? So, I don't think that even if you are born with an abnormality you never
question. I think you always perceptually wonder and maybe even do a little bit of mourning
at times when you are in a down cycle.
Warren: Right. Yeah. No, I could see that. I could see that for sure, because the reality
is that you are surrounded by people that are going at life in a "normal" body. Yeah,
I could see that. It is interesting. One of the things that I read about you, that I think
really helped you, was that idea that was instilled upon you from an early age that,
"Yeah, you can be whatever it you want to be." I think that is the differentiator right
there, from people that actually go on and create something with their lives as opposed
to people that spend their lives in misery. When I say that, I got to point out that I
am no longer talking about people that are in this disabled box. I am talking people
in general.
Sean: Well, my dad had always -- when I was a kid I loved the basketball. I loved basketball
and I still do to this day. I wanted to be in the NBA. Little tiny Sean wanted to be
in the NBA and my dad said, "You know what Sean? You can be. You are just going to have
to be in in a different way. You may not be able to pay on the court, but someday, if
you work hard enough, you could own a team."
Warren: Yep.
Sean: So, that is the thing. Your program is about change and the way I look at change,
Warren, is that the only limitation, the only "disability" -- take away the physicalness
of that. The only limitation of a human being is their refusal to adapt.
Warren: Right.
Sean: If you refuse to adapt, then you are more disabled than you and I have ever been.
If a person, whether they are a CEO of a company that they don't like the economy the way it
is, or a mother who is now a single mother because of a relationship breakup, or a kid
whose parents just got killed in a car accident. No matter how severe of a condition that you
are going through. If you refuse to adapt to what it is you will be limited.
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: In the same breath if you are willing to adapt the world is yours.
Warren: Yes. Even willing to adapt -- even trying to project that expectation of things
being different as well, I think really helped. It drove me nuts in the last couple of years,
I'd get brought in to speak to a company and what they really wanted me to say was, "It's
okay everybody; just don't get too freaked out, because the economy will come back. I
am like, "Okay, hang on; I am not that guy," because I'm not sure the economy will come
back. Actually, I am certain it will not come back in the same way. What will come will
be different and if you can wrap your head around that and fit yourself into that picture,
you will probably do better than you did in the last economy, but it this the idea of
you just hit on it. The williness adapts. People just want it all back. I think the
sooner we wrap our heads around that can't really happen. Time doesn't work that way.
Sean: You know what the biggest problem 150 years ago was for people running cities? It
was that they were worried to death about how they were going to have to remove all
the horse poop, because they knew with the number of horses would go up; would continue
getting bigger and bigger.
Warren: Right.
Sean: The number one fear in planning cities and stuff 150 years ago was: How are we going
to get rid of all the horse poop?
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: Yeah. I don't know about you, but I don't think a there is a single person that
I know that wakes up worried about horse poop, because it is not even in our awareness. Because
we have these things called cars and now everyone worries about gasoline prices and pollution,
but fifty to 100 years from now, they could go, "What do you mean they were worried about
pollution and gasoline?"
Warren: Yeah. We'll have found a new challenge by then for sure. A challenge that we will
have to adapt to, obviously.
Sean: Yep.
Warren: What do you think, is it purely mind set, in that perception piece that was instilled
in you, you can be anything; do you think that was the single most important thing that
helped you to get through something that a lot of people look at and say, "Holy ***,
that is a deal breaker. I don't want to go through life like that." The same way that
people look at me and are like, "No, don't even go there. I'd pull out a rope," or whatever.
Do you think that is the single most important piece, how that was instilled in you, that
perception piece? Or was there something else inside as well?
Sean: I think there was three things. One is certainly having that belief system fostered
by my parents. It is going to be a gift or a burden? That is the big question and I chose
to see it as a gift. Because I realized that everybody goes through pain and pain is inevitable,
but suffering is optional and I have never suffered a day. I have moments that I feel
upset, but I don't feel like I suffered. Because I know that this is not happening as a curse.
There is a greater purpose here. That was one element. The other element is the guide.
I think deep down inside was inside guiding me; that is unspeakable. The third thing,
and this is where people have the most control over, is that I really became a student of
success and successful thinking. So, I devoured books, seminars, audio programs, and conversations
with guys like you, to figure out how do you get to the top in business and health and
relationships. Man, once you start studying success, once you start studying happiness,
peacefulness, and compassion you start making that a regular thought in your mind and dumping
in newer information about how to be at your best.
Warren: Yes.
Sean: You can't help but continue succeeding in your life. You can't help fostering that
belief that everything is meant to happen for a reason.
Warren: Right, yet which is part of... Yeah, you just hit right on it. That's the cool
thing about the position we are in now. We get to put that out there to people as well.
Sean: Mm-hmm.
Warren: Yeah, that's an interesting thing. One of the things that drives me nuts and
I've been putting this thing out there for years and it is becoming less and less of
a crazy idea it's that, "Look people, just take your TV and throw it out the window,
right? Cut the cable and get rid out it. Stop having your mind infiltrated by all the garbage
that is out there, when there is so much good stuff that we can be taking in and and reshaping
the way that we see things."
Sean: Because we are not even doing it equally. What I mean by that, is like you know people
that watch the news, they are going to get about 95 percent negative dark information,
right?
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: That is just totally unbalanced, because if you really were to get your mind to be
opened minded, you would then balance it out by getting a good chunk of your day being
filled with positivity. I am not someone who recommends someone wearing rose colored glasses
and saying that there is not war and challenges on this planet. There certainly are, but I
think that if I was to guess one, eight out of ten people are really good. They're just
really good people. They just really want to live a happy life and go about their lives
doing good things for those they love; but that 2 percent or that 20 percent, they really
get all the attention.
Warren: Yeah, (phone ringing) and try and side track the rest of us and pull us down
that road. Because you are right. There is a lot of good stuff happening, but a big part
of it that I see too, is if we all take our -- my partner Margo puts it this way, that
the problems that we see outside in the world are a reflection of our inner selves.
Sean: Yes.
Warren: If we all get on board the take care of our own you know psychotic stuff and deal
with our own baggage, then that would be reflected in the outside world.
Sean: That's...
Warren: I got a sense that you are on board with that stuff.
Sean: As above and so below. Whatever is without is not within. I mean that I -- look at my
life; if my life is chaotic externally I go, "Okay," I go, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. What is going
on internally?"
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: Because when I really get my internals right, like my mediation going, my exercise
regimen, my proper nutrition, and keep my office and home clean things just work.
Warren: Yeah. Whoever put that one together, "As above as below," has nailed it. Cool.
So, what's in the pipeline for you? What kind of cool things have you got going on, that
you see in the future for...
Sean: Yeah. Well...
Warren: What kinds of things can we share with people?
Sean: ***, I am about to get married soon. That is a big deal.
Warren: You'll probably be married by the time people see this perhaps.
Sean: Perhaps. So, that's exciting. I will be completing my doctorate in a couple of
months, so I will Dr. Sean soon. So, then I can be an expert as well and be wrong too.
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: What else am I working on? We launched a really cool program called "Living At Cause"
not too long ago. You can get it at my website. It is a home study kit to help people get
more self reliant, take more charge in their life, and deal with self sabotage. Because
the biggest the thing that I find is if you can deal with what is causing you self sabotage,
then you are unstoppable. As long as you think that you not at the center of your life, that
someone else is at fault, you are going to continue screwing up.
Warren: That is something that you have worked on. By the sound of it, you are coaching as
well. It is helping people deal with...
Sean: I have a unique therapy practice. I have an office here in Chicago and people
come spend a day with me. It is 14 hours in a row and we peel back the layers to their
ego and get to the heart of: who they truly are, what they are needing to contribute to
this planet, and pulling away their excuses, their fears, their insecurities. It is not
for everybody. I only see a few clients a month and I see them only one time. So, it's
an intense process.
Warren: Yeah and that would probably be quite brutal I would think; the enlightening at
the same time.
Sean: Yeah. I am both loving and intense at the same time.
Warren: Through that, all of those that you have done, why do people sabotage themselves?
Sean: Because they aren't in rapport with themselves like you and I are in rapport right
now. We are having a good time. We have that level of...I think rapport has everything
to do with trust and respect. You can tell I trust you, you can tell I respect you, and
I can tell you trust and respect me. Therefore, we could say anything to each other in this
moment as long as trust and respect is there.
Warren: Yeah.
Sean: The problem is that most people don't have that with themselves.
Warren: Right.
Sean: They don't trust themselves and the certainty sadly don't respect themselves and
when you not in rapport to yourself you are going to constantly keep sabotaging yourself.
So, you need to start treating yourself the way you would treat someone you really admire.
That is you have to start trusting yourself and you got to start to respect yourself.
Warren: Yeah and only...
Sean: It is easier said than done.
Warren: Yeah. Yeah. It could be simple, but far from easy and only when someone can do
that can that be reflected outside of them in the way other people see them in the first
place. I have always put this across; especially to other people that are struggling with some
kind of disability, that you won't get somebody to see you as something other than a disability
until you can see yourself as something other than that. Again...
Sean: It is also about trusting the process, Warren, because look, I think sometimes gurus,
experts, authors, speakers we can come across both accidentally and purposely sometimes,
like we have all the answers and that we never have bad days ourselves. We never break own
rules, but we do. We are human and so I think the biggest thing is knowing that even people
that teach this stuff, like you and I do, it's not easy. Like you said, "It's simple,
but not easy," and we back slide. We have days that we don't even follow our own material,
but we also pay, we pay the consequences when we don't follow that material.
Warren: Right.
Sean: For me, it is also teaching people that you are exactly what you need to be, but that
doesn't mean you need to stay there.
Warren: Exactly. You really hit on something earlier as well, is that recognizing that
it's actually a choice that you have to make on whether you stay there or not.
Sean: Right.
Warren: Cool. Well, you gave me a couple of things to think about. (Laughter)
Sean: Awesome.
Warren: I'm sure people watching this are going to get a ton out of it as well. They
can find you online. What's the best website to find you, to contact...
Sean: Seantimes.com that is S-e-a-n-t-i-m-e-s.com; Seantimes.
Warren: Cool. So, people should run, not walk and check you out there. I just want to say
thanks again, Sean. It is good to reconnect and thanks for taking the time out to join
us here on Challenge To Change and look forward to hearing about more good things coming down
the pipe from Sean Stephenson.
Sean: Thank you, Warren.
Warren: Cool. Thank you and thanks, Sean.