"Driven to Guide" with Pat Sandone

Patrick Sandone (Founder and CEO) of Guide App – Patrick is a successful entrepreneur who built and sold his SaaS startup, Net Driven, after building a 100-person team. Prior to Net Driven, he ran his family business, Sandone Tire, for three years and nearly doubled revenues adding more than $10 million by implementing new technology solutions. He is also a former venture capitalist with Monitor Clipper in Boston and an investment banker with DLJ in NYC. He graduated from The University of Pennsylvania (Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa) with a BA in Biology and an MBA from Columbia (with Honors). Patrick’s five-year self-discovery and wellness journey helped him discover what living your best life means, learning the right mindset, emotional intelligence, purpose, and self-mastery.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Intro Pat Sandone
• 3:50 Sandone's background in the automotive industry.
• 7:45 Failure vs Growth
• 14:25 What was it like to transition from high school to college?
• 18:55 The story of how Pat got into medical school.
• 25:42 What is the guiding principle of a CEO?
• 28:48 What is the Culture?
• 36:30 What was the turning point in Pat’s life?
• 40:31 Jung’s Red Book and the inner subjective
• 47:01 The illusion of self is not separate from us.
• 52:45 The psychological cost of repressing emotions.
• 58:17 What is Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs?
• 1:02:46 What would a practice look like for someone with trauma?
• 1:08:10 The Peer Support Group model.
• 1:13:35 What’s exciting and scary about this.
• 1:19:14 The Western idea is that the cure for pain is pleasure.

Transcript

Joe Van Wie  0:03  
Hello, and thanks again for listening to another episode of all better.

Pat Sandone  2:17  
But before we could dive into all you have going on, I'd like to thank you for coming over. Yeah, it's good to be here. Joe. It's good to be here. I've known you for a long time. And you've done a lot of interesting things. And I'm excited to talk today. Yeah.

Joe Van Wie  0:08  
I'm your host, Joe van wie if you like what you hear, stop over at Apple podcasts, and all better was a rating and review. Today's guest is Pat sandal. Patrick sandstone is a successful entrepreneur who built and sold his first startup, net driven. After building 100 person team prior to net driven, ran his family business, Sam don't tire for three years and nearly doubled revenues adding more than 10 million by implementing new technology solutions. He's also a former venture capitalist monitor clipper in Boston, and an investment banker with DLj, New York City. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, with a BA in biology and an MBA from Columbia. With honors Patrick's five year self discovery and wellness journey helped him discover what living your best life means. Learning the right mindset motional intelligence purpose and self mastery becomes on today, because he's an old friend. And we talk about a life that would want to produce that kind of self discovery usually come from a well of pain and how it relates to the idea of addiction. He discusses a little today through work. And where this journey brought him and how it now is being consolidated into an app called God. So we'll get to talk about all of that. Let's meet Pat.

All right, we're here with Pat sandstone who has a lot going on. And we haven't caught up in a little bit, maybe a couple months.

The last time we chatted, we were talking about similar experiences happening over the last couple years. That sounds similar, like we found a similar kind of relief and meditation and how to deal with mental health and the same approach. So I definitely wanted to talk about that today. But can we start by maybe if someone didn't know Pat Sandow? And you have a newspaper? What you maybe we can even start there before Pat Sandow, what was the sand dome before Pat.

Pat Sandone  3:05  
So Sue Patrick sandstone before Patrick Sandow and existed. So yeah, the the article today was interesting. So my, my father's family, the sandstones were immigrants from Italy. And my, my family lived in South Philly. So that's where they immigrated to. And my great grandfather was an entrepreneur. So he was I think he was a second generation. He was like a first generation US citizen, I think his parents had immigrated to the United States. And he, he met Henry Ford. And he he he opened up what I understand to be the first Ford dealerships in the Scranton Wilkes Barre area. Wow. Yeah. So he had I think it was four or five, four dealerships. He also started the first talking movie theater in Philadelphia, at least that's what it said in his obituary. And his brother actually invented the rotary engine around the same time that wrangle got a patent on it. So the wrangle engine is what's used in the RX seven, it's the rotary engine. And at the around the same time that wrangle who's from Germany got a patent on it. My great grandfather's brother got a patent on it in the US, and some guy in Japan got a patent on it, like all around the same time. You know, because of I think the the, the connection that rango had, they used his model for the RX seven, but it was kind of interesting. So, this history in the automotive business started, you know, basically over 100 years ago with with my family, and then my great grandfather probably was worth about $100 million in today's money and he lost everything in the Depression.

Joe Van Wie  5:05  
That's mind bending. So the start of his career would have been the late teens or the 20s. Are we talking about,

Pat Sandone  5:11  
you know what? It? I'm not sure exactly. It's probably in the teens, he started being doing entrepreneurial stuff. And he was involved in a lot of different things. But the Automotive is where he kind of really caught fire and he actually, there's some buildings in Scranton, where you can still see on the side, it'll say Sandow Motor Company. It's faint paint. But you can still see like, you know, some of the buildings he owned, there was one on Wyoming Avenue where the train would come in, and would bring the vehicles and they were partially assembled. And then he had like a manufacturing facility there that they would put the cars together. So he would, you know, he'd get a body and some wheels and some other parts. And then he had like a little assembly plant, they would kind of finish the manufacturing and get them ready for for sale. Yeah,

Joe Van Wie  6:01  
I had no idea. It's, I feel illiterate because I've known you a long time. And I just always equate it sandstone tire, it was at someone started a tire company. Right. And now you're explaining he's the first franchise of a Ford, is it an act like a franchise then and he

Pat Sandone  6:17  
was I'm not sure if it was an actual franchise, where he sold like, just sold the distributor. And it was interesting. Somebody a couple years ago, they sent me an email and there was a posting on eBay. Somebody had bought a tool and dye company. And they were selling off like their library, they would keep like one copy of everything they did. And it was the little metal sticker badges that they would put on the vehicles. It's at Sandown Motor Company on it, and I bought it off of eBay. Already keep it. So I have like a little like, display box where I put certain things. And that's like one of the things in there. But it was, it's interesting, you know, we're talking about personal development, mental health. He was wildly successful. And he lost everything. And and when I was growing up, it was a very shameful part of my family. Really? Yeah. Because, you know, it was associated with failure. Right? If you're

Joe Van Wie  7:21  
Italian, see Irish, we'll be celebrating their failure to explore my grandfather.

Pat Sandone  7:25  
But it wasn't talked about very much. And yeah, and it was it was associated with failure. And I think, you know, some of the work that I did, to reframe it for, like, how many people can go from, you know, nothing to building an empire that's worth $100 million. Right? That's such an accomplishment. And it's unfortunate that, you know, it, it did an end differently, but still, like celebrating that success and what he was able to accomplish. But it's, it's, it was yeah, it was definitely something that wasn't understood or Well, you know, really talked about my family. I don't think people really even knew what happened. It was just that oh, you know, that was shameful. He lost. He lost everything. And wow,

Joe Van Wie  8:09  
yeah, you know, that's profound. I was going to ask you about that. So you grew up with the first story of a sandstone being an entrepreneur first second generation? American. So this is the entire experience of what sand dunes will do in the United States start businesses.

Pat Sandone  8:25  
Yeah, yeah.

Joe Van Wie  8:28  
Wow, that's profound to to understand it as a failure. So it wasn't any time was it like disgust? Or was this something like this was just an eyesore of sandstone history? Like

Pat Sandone  8:38  
yeah, in the house? Yeah, I think it was, it was something that wasn't it was kind of like Boulder mon and Harry Potter. Right? You didn't talk about it. It was it was viewed as shameful and not really spoken about very much. And I think in part because my grandfather who started Sandow entire, he was a super intelligent guy had a full scholarship to go to I think William and Mary and the family business went bankrupt. And then he couldn't even go to college. Like he had to work to kind of support the family. He started Sandow entire in I think the bowl said section of Scranton under a carport changing tires, right? So went from a very wealthy existence to really like starting from ground zero and starting over and then he built that that business up. But I will say, you know, one of the things that was profound with my grandfather, I remember, you know, he's passed away and before he died, and I, you know, it was interesting, I went I had lunch with them probably a few weeks before he passed away. And, and I think he knew he was going to die. And I think he kind of was, you know, he was in his 90s. And I think he was ready, ready to pass away and, but he gave me one interesting piece of advice, which really impacted me quite a bit, which was, you know, just really lean into taking risks and he had talked about how in his business career, and I think partially because of what happened to my grant, my great grandfather, he leaned out of taking risks and took more conservative route. And he got what he got, he built a successful business, which my my father and my uncle took over and made even more successful. But, you know, he, he talked about a few opportunities that he had to maybe really make it big, and he didn't take them. And he said that, in his last days, they were his regrets, like, he didn't regret really anything else in his life, but not taking those risks and not knowing what would have happened, what you really, you know, inspired me when the time came to start net driven, which was my first solo entrepreneur, you know, startup, outside of any kind of family, family business, that I really, you know, jumped into that with both feet, knowing that, you know, what he had said, I didn't want to have that regret when I was nine years old, no,

Joe Van Wie  11:01  
to kind of bookend your grandfather, I just want to stop there. And he says, it's a regret. And so you hear this story. And that, that stayed with you this idea, but what is regret, like? So here's your grandfather, he built an entire life, he went up, came down, but then built his own business. That's a lot of liberty. And that's how you have liberty in this country. And he has a regret. What is regret? Is it is it a rumination of the life that didn't happen? And that sounds like, that's painful torment. And then without that, what drives a person? Yeah. So I guess that always stays with me. I never pocket what the idea of regret is, it's got to be wishing for the life that didn't happen, or you're finding yourself distracted from the life that is happening. With the life that could have happened. Yeah, who wants to live that

Pat Sandone  11:53  
way? Yeah. Well, yeah. And I think you know, it, what comes up for me is this idea of, you know, leaving it all on the field, right? A sports analogy, right, really putting your best effort forward. And I think when you do that, you know, there isn't regret because you're like, I did my best, but I think we're my grandfather, he did it, right. There's these moments where he could have given more, he could have leaned in more. And he leaned out because he was afraid of taking the risk because of the family history. And I think, you know, looking back, that became a source of regret because of right, you said what could have been? Yeah. And in, in that's the beauty of it, though, is he shared that with me. And that's, and I was able to learn from that and make different choices, then. Maybe then he made and he gave me the opportunity to kind of, you know, lean in more into my life and what I wanted to build,

Joe Van Wie  12:47  
it sounds like a very healthy development of life at the end of someone's life that he gets to share this with a grandson in the way you described. That sounds pretty nice.

Pat Sandone  12:58  
Yeah, it was. It was nice. Yeah.

Joe Van Wie  13:01  
So you grew up around a family business, and it's flourishing. It's an encapsulating a family and northeastern PA. Before we get into net driven, what was driving your academics like, because I remember when you went to college, like we're from Scranton, Pat at the London School of Economics, and I was like, wow, that's really prestigious. What was driving you? What did you want to learn in school? Yeah.

Pat Sandone  13:30  
So so I didn't go to the London School of Economics. I went to undergrad I did Penn, Wharton and Columbia Business School.

Joe Van Wie  13:38  
Man, I said this twice to you. Did you ever Yeah. I think we were talking with them. Like, I don't know why that's in my head. Right. But my own memories of

Pat Sandone  13:47  
that everybody, everybody's version of me is a little bit different. Right? That's part of reality. So you know what, it was interesting. I was not a good student until my sophomore year in high school. And so prior to that, I just didn't care about school. I just didn't see any purpose in it. Right. So, and I had ADHD, you know if that's a real thing, but I had a really hard time focusing. And I didn't really applied myself and I had a really hard time sitting still and studying. I was just a very rambunctious kid. And I remember so I played football, and I was I was, you know, really good football player. And I had a, I had some difficult times with my father, where he for him, me playing football was my identity, right? And he was very attached to me doing that and doing it his way. And over time, over years of living through that relationship, it started to take the fun away from football because you basically like, you know, I'd get home from three day practices in the summer, and he'd make me go in the backyard for another two hours and run plays with him as the last thing I wanted to do. That's it Oh, Over time, I'm just like, my love for the game which I had started to wear out. And I think in part to be rebellious towards my dad and not be controlled, which is, you know, part of my ego personality is this, like, I don't want to be controlled by anybody. So I quit. And it was a big deal in the community. And I remember like the captains of the football team came up and tried to, you know, coax me into playing again, I wasn't going to do it. And I needed to put that energy into something else. And I needed a different way to kind of achieve and succeed. And I put it into school. So you know, starting my sophomore year, I got the highest GPA in my class every semester. Prior to that I was pretty, you know, mediocre student, but really just turned it around really quickly focused on it. And I saw that as a way to create my own success, right? If I could be, if I could build my mind and apply that to something that was going to be my way to achieve independence, and maybe, you know, subconsciously not be controlled by anybody.

Joe Van Wie  16:07  
Was this a first time sophomore year in college that you fell sophomore

Pat Sandone  16:10  
year high school, high school? Yeah. So when I really started to kind of focus on school and start to do do well,

Joe Van Wie  16:18  
did it was there a relief to that independence even though there was like outside pressures from your, your community, your friends, your circle? were you experiencing an independent liberty? Like a celebration of this? And yeah, I

Pat Sandone  16:31  
think so. I think it was like, okay, I can be good at something else. Like this is something that I can excel at and focused on that. And then, you know, in then I wanted to go to Penn and actually didn't get in to pan out of high school. And I went to Bucknell and did very well, academically. I got to Foro. I got kicked out of school. I got kicked out of school for just being you know, I was a very, very rambunctious, young guy. Oh, yeah. And your friends

Joe Van Wie  17:02  
were the rummy's man. I never felt like this is an addiction, podcast and recovery. And I guess I if I could make one note and interject here, we're talking about some behavior that you we relate, you relate to when I talk about my addiction, but yours is kind of specific, did it start that sophomore year with work? Like just burying yourself?

Pat Sandone  17:26  
I think so. Right? Like really focusing on you know, excelling. Yeah, as a way to kind of like ignore or distance myself from some of the feelings, thoughts and feelings that I didn't know how to deal with. Right. And, and then that became my focus. And yeah, and then once I got to college, I was actually my first semester in college. I got I got thrown out of school for having parties in my dorm room, just generally disobeying like the rules. And interestingly, I, the evening, that in question where they actually said you did something, and they threw me out, yeah. I didn't do what they said. I took them to school court. And, and Scent of a Woman. Basically, I took them to school court asked like my professors, if they would help represent me, none would no no wanting to get involved. So I created my own like kind of narrative and like legal case. And I won, and over, they overturn the decision, they let me back into school. And then I applied to Penn and I got in an interesting, so the transfer class coming into Penn was small was about 200 kids. One of those 200 kids was Elon Musk. Really? Yeah. Holy God. Yeah. So I knew Elon Musk. I mean, he wouldn't take my call today. But yeah, you know, we were we were in a small transfer class and you know, hung out a little bit, and we went to parties. It was a big goofy kid from South Africa. Yeah, he

Joe Van Wie  19:01  
looks at pictures of Pay Pal pictures of him standing there with with Peter Thiel. He looks like he's 60

Pat Sandone  19:13  
his hair was Darrell. He's gotten taser, Jack's

Joe Van Wie  19:18  
never has been laid, and now he's a billion dollars.

Pat Sandone  19:22  
But smart guy, smart guy, smart, smart guy and a visionary. But yeah, and then we went to Penn and I actually graduated with 3.97 GPA. And Wharton really up that's a lot of work. Yeah, I applied myself and, and, and again, I saw that as the thing I could do that would put me in the right spot because like a lot of other kids at Penn, I didn't have the connections to get a good job, right. So I figured, like the one way I can kind of come out here and start my career, right is by showing that I'm just great at what I do.

Joe Van Wie  19:55  
Is there an entrepreneurial drive here or is there an idea that you're gonna Uh, get all like an extra training when you leave work at some

Pat Sandone  20:03  
big, you know, on a company

Joe Van Wie  20:06  
what what was the end? Was there a flushed out end game yet? So

Pat Sandone  20:09  
I came into school wanting to be a doctor and actually got into medical school and through medical schools. But then I started realized like, that was really my parents dream for me. Yeah. And it's every parent's dream. Yeah, you know, I mean, especially, you know, from a town like this, like, that's the best thing you can be as a doctor, right? And I, I got into medical school, and then quickly realized, I don't want to be a doctor. Yeah. So I to confirm it. I talked to 10 physicians locally and asked them two questions. Would you do it again? And do you enjoy it? And nine out of 10 said, no, no. Now I at that time, to be fair, a lot of those doctors were going through a period where the, the administrative piece was becoming more onerous. And their ability to run their practice and do what they want was changing. So I think that was impacting how they feel about it. Because I think being a doctor is a great career. But for these guys, they're all in for what I wanted to get out of it, which was, you know, be an entrepreneur, I wanted to own my own medical practice. Like don't do it for that reason. So I was it was kind of stuck. Like, I was like, Oh, this had been my dream. And now I have achieved it. I don't want to do it anymore. And I had all these friends going into investment banking, and it seemed like on campus, that was the greatest thing you could do is get like a job at one of these prestigious investment you're always talking about this is 1995 9590 95. So I interviewed and I got like, like the prestigious investment banking job coming out at Wharton, the one that all the like the Wharton kids wanted. They were all they hated me because I only took a couple of Wharton classes. What firm are we talking to? So it was DLj, which was which was interesting. So Drexel Burnham was had blown up. And Drexel Burnham was like that the big, high yield bond juggernaut that Michael Milken started, right. And he's a Wharton grad. And we, in May be they were becoming a powerhouse on Wall Street. They had a merchant bank, they had this the top high yield bond department, they were growing faster than any other investment bank. And I got a job there. And I had no idea what I was doing. I was terrified. But I went in and I learned a lot. So I worked there for three years. And it was it was while I was there, they actually wrote If you've ever read the book with monkey business, it's a it's a book about Wall Street. And during that time, and all the craziness going on, written by two guys that I worked with ideal genuine

Joe Van Wie  22:44  
American Psycho vibe for the 90s

Pat Sandone  22:48  
American Psycho, but maybe like, there's another book that probably encapsulates it a little better. But

Joe Van Wie  22:54  
think of even that time the one was, but it's not American set garaging the what Americans are like in the Japanese mark. That's the one I read. I didn't read any other ones.

Pat Sandone  23:04  
There was I'll think of it there isn't there is a book that it reminds me of, but it was just telling the story of like, what it was like there was tons of money available. Nobody looked at any expenses. You can just do whatever you want. I was taking. It was like 22 years old, and I can take a town car anywhere I want. Like I go out on a Friday night, get a limo charged to the business drive around with my friends going from bar to bar, you know, injury. 911.

Joe Van Wie  23:30  
Yeah. And Hatton downtown. Finance is God. They're the gods of the universe, the Masters of the Universe, kinda.

Pat Sandone  23:39  
Yeah, exactly. So it was it was interesting. I think I was probably a mediocre investment banker. You know, I

Joe Van Wie  23:47  
was a great networker.

Pat Sandone  23:50  
I don't even know if I was good networker, but I learned a lot I learned a lot it really started to kind of give me it's kind of like boot camp for business doing that because you learn how to think like a CEO, right? You kind of learned the skills that a CEO needs to understand like the the finance and accounting side of running a business. What

Joe Van Wie  24:11  
were you observing first, if you had to, you know, generalize, one guiding principle what is the CEO doing?

Pat Sandone  24:18  
So I think the big thing is understanding how everything impacts the numbers, right? So you know, I think especially in a startup, making sure you've got enough gas in the tank to get to the end. And really having a discipline around an intuitive understanding about how every decision is going to impact those those numbers and how they all come together to build a successful business.

Joe Van Wie  24:42  
That's different than having just okay I got a finance background. I understand a numbers I'm saying hypothetically, right. But the CEO you said something it's intuitive. They see a story in real time quick, almost like intuition, right of what personalities will affect certain depart expense and trends are watching all this and they have to they're shooting from the hip. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they're like a tuning fork.

Pat Sandone  25:08  
I think in part, yeah, it starts to ingrain. The connection between behaviors and actions and how they actually create a income statement and a balance sheet

Joe Van Wie  25:20  
seem behavior, like the 90s, it was Jack Welsh was kind of the model of a CEO coming out of the 80s, that, hey, if you had an engineering background, you really know how to run a company. I don't know if you're noticing this, just as a caveat. I'm seeing a trend that people who study sociology now are being quick to be valued in executive positions, especially if they have some financial literacy. But if they studied and understand sociology, that the total immersion of culture and maybe it's even, it's irrational, some that's not a Milton perspective, right? I'm seeing that pop up everywhere and outside of Human Services and nonprofits. Are you noticing that that? Well, there's a value in business to be as have a sociologist at the table? Well, I

Pat Sandone  26:10  
think there's, it's more and more important now to understand the people side of the business, right? So I think in the 80s, and early 90s, it was about purely about the numbers and they count. And the people, you could just tell them what to do and put them in boxes, and they would they would do things and that's not the case anymore. And it's really about building I mean, I see my main job is building culture, right, building a culture in the business that will outlive me, right, so that ceding that culture, the behaviors, how people relate to one another, the systems that support the business of your sociologist, yeah, even culture, in a sense. And what's interesting about the business we have now is we have built into our culture, extreme vulnerability. And in human growth is like something that we talk about every day, everyone has their own personal development regime that they're assigned by the company. And they're expected to perform it out, you know, on their own time every day, and then talk about what they're learning about themselves and how they're growing in a morning meeting every morning.

Joe Van Wie  27:17  
Dream volatile, define that, like,

Pat Sandone  27:19  
I mean, we taught me industry invulnerable. Let's put it this way. Everybody in the company has cried during one of the morning meetings, sharing something vulnerable with the rest of the company, or

Joe Van Wie  27:31  
rewind, we were talking about the 90s. Now today, wow. Yeah,

Pat Sandone  27:36  
it's in what's what's in the reason we do that is because that is the culture we're building in the app. So what we decided is if we want to build this culture in our app, based on personal growth, authenticity and vulnerability, we need to first model it in our own company. So we are modeling that culture in our company, and giving people that the the tools to to grow as a person in our company, and then bringing that that same culture into the app.

Joe Van Wie  28:08  
Let's come back to the app because I like that interjection. But a lot happens before this app is even something you would even want to be a part of that is true. And I think what drove you, from my observation, my friendship with you is really textured and meaningful. It's comes from a really deep well, of sincerity, and your own need of what you want it and what I know you actively went out to find for yourself, yes, now you're sharing it to a lot of people who wouldn't have access to the clinicians, therapists researchers, that you were able to get a hold of now that they're a phone call away, you built a whole team. But this comes from a longer story. Yes. So let's maybe jump out of the fun. And then the indulgence of the 90s. You you come back home eventually with a plan for a business. It's it's pretty unique in the autumn motor business. How did how, what's the genesis of this? How did you tell yourself I'm coming back home? Because that had to be hard to leave New York or was it? It was an intentional decision out? This is the time back.

Pat Sandone  29:17  
So I'll give you a few quick points that build up to that answer that question. So I spent three years on Wall Street. I spent about four years as a venture capitalist in Boston. And so actually, during that time, I got to live in Europe for for a year closing a deal in France. And so I lived between France and London, had great experiences, right just had great experiences, but I realized what I really want to do is build a business like that is really what I want to do. And so I was a little it's the right word. I think it was a little disillusioned by the the possibilities you know, available for with workings for Someone else yeah. And took time to go get an MBA and really reflect on what I wanted to do. And I think also during that time, you know, and I wouldn't admit it to myself then, but I was the the person I had been trained to be growing up was starting to crack, right. So that that, you know, that tough guy motif and personality, which is, you know, there's part of that that is truly who I am

Joe Van Wie  30:27  
Cavalier kind of attitudes, ya know, I'm working in every scenario of what you want, right.

Pat Sandone  30:32  
And but there was a, an also, there's this, this emotional side that I had just repressed that I, you know, I needed to express in some ways, and like, I realized I was on the wrong path. So I got this MBA, took some time off, and I decided I was going to move back home initially to take over the family business, I did that for a few years realized that that wasn't going to be the long term, you know, thing that I wanted to do, and came up with the idea for net driven. And what net Redman was was this way to deliver a online marketing system that was affordable to lots of businesses like my family's. At the time, there weren't good online, e commerce online marketing systems available, or if there were, they were really, really expensive. So basically, using a Henry Ford model of a manufacturing line, so we can reduce the costs of this system. And I started that in 2000, started to think about it in 2007. And then in 2008, started to launch it in 2009, we got our first customers. And before I knew it, I had a team of over 100 people, and we became the leader in North America, in our space, we had 5000 automotive businesses. And, and I surprised myself, to be honest, you know, I surprised myself how successful it was, had an opportunity to sell it in 2015. And jumped, jumped at that chance, sold it. And then what was interesting is that in those moments, so sold it, you know, logged into my bank account on my phone, and all of a sudden, you know, the numbers in there, you know, bigger than I ever thought they would be. And I found myself more depressed. And then I ever felt, and I think that what happened was, I expected that to fix everything inside of me, right? Oh, if I, if I have this kind of success, I'm just going to be happy. And what I discovered I was wrong. It actually, it compounded this sense of loss inside of me, like I've been running after the wrong goal. But I've been doing something that I thought was gonna get me a certain result. And I was wrong. And I appreciated all the success. I've had all I've learned, you know, the money I made, but it wasn't really what I wanted. So I decided in that moment, I'm just going to I'm going to I'm not going to work for a while I took four years off. And I probably spent several $100,000 and pursued personal development full time. And just to be clear that spent the money towards personal personal development. Yeah, yeah, I do spend the money on program grant

Joe Van Wie  33:27  
and people are listening. And you're gonna think you know, cocaine, sweets, Coney Island. Yeah.

Pat Sandone  33:34  
Yeah, this was like I hired the best coaches, I took the best programs, everything I could do, to really figure myself out what was going on inside of me, that I needed to address was my inner landscape was foreign to me. I had never really looked inside to see what's going on in there. Right. So it was really all focused externally. Yeah. And and now I realized I was looking at a friend, who had I went to Colombia with and he came out of Colombia focused on personal development, and my other friends and I, we would tease him, we'd be like, What are you doing? We're all going into finances this meeting entrepreneurs doing all this stuff. And like, what what are you doing with your life, but but he had, he had talked to me about his experiences and things that he had done. And he had encouraged me to do this first program, which was called the mankind project, which is a program actually, it was started by a Marine, and it was a program to help combat vets in part, coming to PTSD and other things like that. It was a weekend program. And it was a way to kind of prime the pump and get you to talk about the things that maybe you weren't even aware of that were bothering you. So I went and I did this program. And it really got me to start talking. And I started to realize there was a lot going on inside me that I wasn't even aware of, that were really bothering me. And it was interesting how they did it. I don't even know if I'm supposed to talk about some of the things they did but I

Joe Van Wie  34:59  
couldn't soon and just want to summarize up to this point, just so I'm understanding you had a break and of discovery, you're not feeling fulfilled, you want to start the business explorers with going back at the MBA. So you have this gear, you know, you could shift, I'm going to change some, you start net driven seven years, you worked a lot. I watched it, and it exploded. And was, you know, looking back in hindsight, no, with the awareness you have now, was there any indications or clues that when I look at this phone, and I see the end of this result, that maybe it won't be what I was looking for? Was there anything happening to my behavior? Or?

Pat Sandone  35:44  
Yeah, for sure, I think, you know, towards the end, it was like, there was something emerging, you know, within me that wanted to come out, like, you know, I think these repressed feelings, thoughts were coming out. And I couldn't keep the lid on anymore. And I think, I also started to realize that like, I just wasn't enjoying what I was doing and became forcing myself every day to go in and do what I needed to do to keep things running and get the sale going. And it was just, I felt like I was just falling apart. Like this version of me that had built this business was like, No, was like falling away. And a new version was coming into the forefront. And it was a messy process where you know, that kind of that transition of being it look good

Joe Van Wie  36:30  
to the public. You did, because you're a responsible guy. And I know you care about people it was it looked at how many people you employed, and I saw that stress on your shoulders and you carried it, Pat really well. And what you discovered after I think people will be just blown away, like that don't know, you just know you from a kind of a glance, and attach it to net driven and net driven success. But that's a lot. Now you meet a friend, your friend, you go back to him. How does that begin? You go to the trauma weekend? That's the start of therapy. Were you trying anything else before

Pat Sandone  37:10  
this? No, I so the one I have been meditating for about 20 years. So I, I'd be around the same time I started net driven. Maybe a little after I did a 10 day meditation retreat, and I was a guy who couldn't sit still for five seconds. And it required you to do about 10 hours of meditation a day. You eat a vegan diet, you slept in basically like a monastery.

Joe Van Wie  37:39  
And this is Buddhist principles like of impossible. incitement.

Pat Sandone  37:43  
Yeah. incitement. It was at the Insight Meditation Society in barre, Massachusetts, okay. And which is a well well known place. And so I signed up. And I think they were just like, Who is this guy that showed up to do the meditation retreat was it

Joe Van Wie  37:59  
Thursday in this direction, far prior before net driven is closed out, you have a great success, you're out, you're already you're already waking, you're searching for things

Pat Sandone  38:10  
I was I was in and that was powerful. And then I kept that practice up for the time during that driven and I think it was part of what helped me be successful. And that driven because I was able to focus my mind a little more. But it was, it was the beginning. But there was it started to make me aware that there was going more art more on inside me than I realized. But I didn't allow myself to go too deeply into it, because I have this mission in front of me to get net revenue from one end to the other. And once I let go of that, once that responsibility was was was released, then all the other stuff that needed to be dealt with started to come to the forefront. And it really was a wild journey for four years. And in some ways, I am sure you're familiar with Carl Jung, but if you ever read his

Joe Van Wie  39:00  
his red book, I don't know what I'm familiar with. First is his ideas with addiction because he had a profound influence on Bill Wilson, the founder of AAA, okay, and they had a correspondence. That's where my interest started. But his ideas archetypes which you know, everyone likes, I really zeroed in on the idea of shadow self and I think people who like Jung and have alcoholism and addiction I believe this idea of me this this version of me that I stopped nurturing or I'm embarrassed of probably a 15 year old version of me that I've you know, kind of betrayed, where I would never want my company. This is the alcoholic just exploding a couple times in my life, but that's where I really young resounds with me. And his approach is not neurological, like the way out is almost the same as that retreat your own Yong Yong speaks to that a little more. That there's a space between I mean identity and reality, like the reality of experience that you could find in the meditation you're describing. That's what I like about Jung. But I'd never read or, like, did a deep dive into his books.

Pat Sandone  40:13  
He was a pioneer in that he really explored the inner subjective in a way that in made it scientific. Yeah, so the inner subjective is always difficult, because you can't objectively verify that it exists. It's our own inner experience, right? You can't measure it, you can't you can't analyze it. But he, he went through this period of awakening, where he wrote down all of his experiences, and it was really profound in that he was exploring the images that exist in his mind these feelings, and, and vividly and profoundly writing them down. And a lot of them were really weird. Like, he would just have these during meditation have these visions come up in his mind, in these almost like dreaming while he's awake and meditating, and then writing down what what's happening and how it's impacting his life. And it went on for a period of like, I think it was like seven years where he he had these experiences, and then he wrote them all down in the Red Book. And his family was embarrassed to even release it. I mean, it wasn't until after his death that they actually released the book to the public. But it is his exploration of the inner subjective experience and how that impacts our external life.

Joe Van Wie  41:28  
I got to read that I could see the embarrassment to it's not with the form of all his breakthroughs. This is his

Pat Sandone  41:35  
journey, his inner journey. And then it was, you know, in because our dream world and our inner subjective experience isn't neat and tidy. I mean, there's no

Joe Van Wie  41:45  
clear difference. I mean, it's hard to i, Sam Harris has a wonderful podcast, I'm a big fan of but he had a sleep expert on there, and they're talking about the state of dreaming, you're in a state of psychosis. It's a hallucination. If we're saying this is the base reality, right? And you're sitting in this room, we're awake and talking. But when I sleep, I have the same if I'm not aware of the dream, and I'm experiencing I'm in a state of psychosis. i It changed the perspective. And then when you return back here, you know, who's dreaming. But Jung touches on that a lot, which I think has the idea that I find comforting in Hinduism. Being raised Catholic, this idea that you wake up but waking up is not a person I didn't wait like a new Joe van wie didn't wake up an awareness woke up of a Joe van wie we that's kind of just a man I manufactured? Well, so that when you're saying subjective, I think it's just just let's clear that idea up that there is this something proceed identity?

Pat Sandone  42:54  
Well, it consciously Yeah. So so that's one of the things that I really became clear on is that who we are, fundamentally, is awareness. Right? I mean, that's who we are. And then there's this inner experience of an identity, that's really a collection of how our ego self interacts with the world, and a set of beliefs, and habits and other things that kind of create a personality. But ultimately, it's not us like we are, we are the awareness that exists beyond all that. And I think, you know, in a lot of different Eastern religions, it's about this process of becoming aware of those inner processes in seeing them from a distance as opposed to being your thoughts or being your emotions, it seeing your thoughts, seeing your emotions, and being able to distance yourself from them, you know, as not me. And I am the awareness of those things.

Joe Van Wie  43:47  
I still struggled talking about it, defining it, because it's some of its you know, like this last three years of what I needed to feel stable or fulfilled, where am I live, I lost my footing, like, how do you? How do you reconcile that in the last four or five years? Outside of the app, this journey I had, in the sense that you have this awareness, but how do you put back together when the ego shows up? Or a personality or your identity? Is it something beautiful, like the narrative we started with your grandfather, like, your story starts before you, you were here. And you're talking about images, this? You do a poetically, like how do you combat it safely and healthy?

Pat Sandone  44:34  
So the one thing I want to share that you just brought up is like, the way I see myself now is a continuation, right? Of everything that came before me and everything that will exist after me. And I think when you start to see yourself as more than just a, an individual identity, but part of a continuum, right? You know, the way I think about it is I started at the Big Bang, right? The energy that was created during the Big Bang and the processes and maybe before, right, who knows what came before. And then they they have created, you know, the the life forms and entities and everything that slowly over time evolutionarily has then created me. And and then whatever I create the ripples I create and how they'll impact people after me. Yeah, but it's really like, you know what when they talk about being one, I think that's part of the the ideas that, you know, I've been built by everything that came before me. And I am building everything that will come after me. And we've and I'm it's so tightly interconnected with the past in the future that I'm indistinguishable from it. Yeah,

Joe Van Wie  45:40  
I heard a couple of Joseph Goldstein is a teacher of meditation, but he doesn't he doesn't think unities the apt word to describe that like that that initial feeling when you drop acid, like a sophomore ik idea, it's we're all one. It's kind of true. It's the feeling. It's overwhelming. But he likes to describe it. And I kind of liked his nuance. He said, it's non separation, because there is some kind of agency that I have, that you don't have access to vice versa. But we're not, you can't separate us. My story is not separate from us. Yours, like you said, The Big Bang, I find there's a liberation in that. That was terrifying to me initially, because my ego was the only thing running in my life, right? I felt that makes me feel like I'm dead. Or, or I have nihilism, like, where do I grab meaning in this slippery slope? Man, as I dived into it, and I've heard you describe this in our conversations. There's a liberty and a fulfillment and a virtue and a calmness. And I guess a courage that shows up for me that I don't have to be afraid of, like you said, taking risk, but caring more, why am I so scared to be intimate? Or connect deeper? I didn't know how to do it until I still am learning?

Pat Sandone  47:06  
Well, I think it starts with connecting deeper with ourselves, right? So the more deeply we connect with ourselves more deeply, we can connect with others. And while I agree that there is a separateness, it's it is an illusion, and that, you know, I'm creating you and you're creating me,

Joe Van Wie  47:21  
every two seconds, it's a computer, yeah, and we're gonna quantum computers, I'm kind of rendering an image of you and around you,

Pat Sandone  47:30  
in the way you view me as impacting who I'm, who I'm being. And then it's, and then I'm, I'm promising Wharton School of Economics, according to you, and then I'm, I'm constructing an image of you, and I'm eating that back to you, and you're being impacted by it. But there is like, you know, the way I described it recently, and I think it resonates is, you know, think of like a muscle cell in our body. You know, now that muscle cell, let's imagine it has some type of awareness, which it probably has some rudimentary awareness, but not like ours, but it probably thinks that it is an independent agent. Yeah, it's like I'm the muscle cell, and I can do whatever I want. were unaware of the fact that it's really attached to a lot of other muscle cells, in an arm that's attached to a body that's attached to a brain. And its life is completely interdependent with all the other muscle cells in the body and everything around it. And it just, it may view itself as independent, but in reality, it's an interdependent system, and it's being influenced by all these forces that are really determining its outcome. Would you call

Joe Van Wie  48:39  
that in your words? And your, your understanding of this? Would you call that the illusion of self?

Pat Sandone  48:47  
Well, I think the illusion of self is the fact that we are constructed, right, our ego identity is a constructed identity based on some things that existed at birth, and experiences that happened after birth. But it's, you know,

Joe Van Wie  49:05  
this is where mental health proud, the Genesis if this ego, you know, we all have them, but some of them get in this, this, this feedback loop that muscles for your metaphor of trauma happens to an individual, and they just keep telling the story, even if it's not happening, they're going to search out a life maybe that could fulfill that pattern because of the sense of self. This is my story.

Pat Sandone  49:32  
Well, you know, it's interesting so there's I think there's there's a few different components of self right one is the thinking self right, which is the thoughts that we run and then there's the feeling self right. And and when trauma happens, they're both impacted. So there are there. We actually you know, we just with guide, we just were awarded top 30 status for mission Daybreak with which is a con contest to find the best wellness and suicide prevention solutions for veterans. And we got a quarter million dollars for that one of the things that we I think that that separated us is how we view trauma and how we wrote about it, and then how we how we want to help people process it. But one of my collaborators, wrote a really nice piece that talked about trauma is unprocessed experiences in the accumulation of unprocessed experiences create PTSD. So when something happens, that is overwhelming to the system, and we don't have the capacity to process all the sights, sounds, emotions and thoughts that occur, and it could be anything right, it could be, we're a first responder who's a shootout, we could be in a car accident, we could have some type of childhood trauma, whether it be sexual, mental, emotional, physical, in in that moment, this this event is so overwhelming, that certain experiences go into the subconscious for later processing. And then we because we need to survive, right, so we may not have be able to, like become comatose for two days and process all the things that are happening. So we, we put it into our subconscious, and we go on with our lives. And what PTSD is, and what we believe it is, is that that happens over and over again. And now you've got this subconscious that's full of emotions and thoughts and sensations that are unprocessed, in there is a psychological cost with repressing it. Right, and they want to be they want to come back up and be processed, because that creates a whole 3d organ organism. Yeah. And the way that it tries to come back up is it, it's subconsciously, and this is the shadow, it, it leads you into situations that look like the original experience, trying to get you potentially to handle them differently. Right? It's wild it is. So it's a wild mechanism for how we work. And I think it's something that's a little understood. And we, with guide, want to help people through that process, right, give them a way that they can do it on their own terms of processing those unprocessed emotions to bring them back fully into the present, which is really one of the one of the jobs of personal development, when we go on that inner journey is finding all those places where we have unprocessed emotions, thoughts, sensations that need to be processed in spending the time to work through them. And it can be painful, because it's going to bring up fear that needs to be processed sadness, anger, and it's going to you know, and then we have to work through the psychology of it, you know, it's, it bends our thoughts from being logical into kind of conforming to the event that happened, which can create, you know, the this, you know, us to make decisions that aren't logical or aren't good for us. So you've got to clean all that up. And you know, and I think we're just emerging into a place in our society where we understand it well enough to give people the tools to kind of do that where I

Joe Van Wie  53:11  
see it. I've been around mental health interventions on myself, since I'm 16. And the word trauma I think, a better language has arrived better definitions to this, that I think give better texture instead of this. Miss the descriptions a specially what I'm talking about, it's addiction. And I think my addiction arises out of unprocessed traumas addiction came up and defended me and made me but then it can have these really deranged effects or I'm seeking out adventure in some deranged way. But I can relate that we're in talking about guide. And I just want to just dial back one second guide is the app. When you say we, how would you say like, who are we talking about?

Pat Sandone  53:59  
So the team that guide me, we are very fortunate we have a great team of advisors, and team members. I think there's probably over 20 of us right now. So we have, I believe, seven or eight full time, team members, actually two new ones, that one who lives in Arizona and one who lives in Philadelphia who are here this week, kind of getting on boarded. We have a good team of local people, you know, working on it. And then advisors who are experts in personal development, mental health, digital mental health, finance, accounting, I mean, you know, just the the whole gamut of expertise that we need to build this out. And it is a it's a wonderful group of people. So some specifically some people that are on the team, actually a DME or high school fellow Domo high school graduate Jack kuciak. Who coach Yeah, Coach, great guy. He's a great guy and he's he's running our sales department. He's had a really successful career right guy Yep, and in a good salesperson, and we have Terrell McCaslin, who's kind of a transplant who's helping us think through our product, Andy Roque, guy from Wilkes Barre, who's running kind of operations. We just hired Chu Zor, who is a guy from New York City who's doing leading up development. And yeah, Aaron Aaron Morris, whose great great, great grandfather and Bennett Morse code. And his dad, his dad, and his dad was somebody

Joe Van Wie  55:33  
had to do it and you found them and you know, the grandfather talk. Yeah.

Pat Sandone  55:38  
And his his, his dad was actually one of Steve Jobs first employees at next. Oh, that's cool hearing but he's doing our back end development. But, you know, we have this great team. And you know, the thing we all share is that we we really want to understand ourselves better and become our best self, which is the goal of this right? self actualization. self actualization is really the goal. Yeah, it self actualization requires the messy business of of resolving the inner conflicts that we have. But on the other side of it, right, is that we emerge as being who we're meant to be it the interesting thing is, the way I look at self actualization is that it's kind of like the way a sculpture would a sculptor would look at a piece of stone is that the the sculpture he's going to create? is already there. It exists in the stone, He's removing everything that isn't the sculpture and what's left is the sculpture, right? And I think that's the way self actualization works. We are already our best self. It's there. Yeah, we just have to take all the things that are getting in the way of it being expressed. And what's left is us.

Joe Van Wie  56:46  
Yeah. And are you familiar with Maslow? Oh, very nice. Yeah, sure. With the app, so it's an app, it's this digital interface. There's a lot of questions, I have Pat, I'm trying to let me bring order to them. So they're linear. That's the way that's the foundation of this wonderful team, creative team bringing this app to life. And you had this four year journey of the influences not only from meditation, pretty much body, mind and soul. And you drew from a lot of consulting in your personal experience to offer the clinical kind of modality of what's been offered through the app. So that's its own kind of team of consulting. How does that work? Yeah,

Pat Sandone  57:29  
so we are a subclinical solution. So we use we use positive psychology, personal development, transformational learning, and other you know, subclinical solutions, to allow people to, to perform the tasks that will allow them to resolve and move out of the way all the things that are getting in the way of them being their best self.

Joe Van Wie  57:54  
Okay, that's why I was bringing up Maslow. So you got an app that's so it's got this hierarchy of needs of a pyramid. And the top of the pyramid for anyone is self actualization.

Pat Sandone  58:05  
Well, I later in life, he actually created a another, a new top to the pyramid, yes, life. Self transcendence trumps the self truths and right, which would be basically enlightenment.

Joe Van Wie  58:19  
And, yeah. So the apps is, is there an assumption before I use this app that other needs are met, like, you know, I've security shelter and water, I could I could be accessing an app, we're meeting somewhere, kind of some basics. It's not a crisis app. It's a

Pat Sandone  58:37  
it's not a crisis growth app. It's a growth app. And the idea is that I mean, in the way we pitched this to people is the best way to forestall a mental health crisis. A suicide attempt or any negative outcomes from a mental or emotional wellness perspective, is to do a daily practice in our our view on this and this is not just us, I think this is evolving in our understanding is that well, we all know that we need to take care of our bodies, right? That if we eat healthy and exercise, that we're going to have to have good physical health. And without those things, our physical health will start to fall off, right? We're very clear about that in society. What we're not clear about and what is coming to the forefront is the idea that you also need to maintain your mental emotional and your mental emotional and spiritual wellness in without a daily maintenance or a regular maintenance of those things. They will also fall off Yeah, and so we're providing an atmosphere where you can get your workout with mental emotional and spiritual wellness that's so so you know, and it's it's like you know, I love to lift weights and you know, I go in the gym, my son and I will go into the gym will lift weights. And when we do our benchpress every week, we get a little stronger, right and you can Build those aspects of yourself in the same way. And we provide the tools to do that. And part of that process is going back and processing unprocessed emotions, thoughts and sensations. Part of it is learning the mental frameworks that will position you to make good decisions in the future. Part of that is becoming more aware of your inner experience, identifying more with awareness and less with thoughts, emotions, and sensations. Yeah, so there's certain skills that we can teach. And the way that it works is you go in you, you know, list, you take a quick survey, talk about the things that you hope to experience from using the app. And then we assign practices. And the in it, unlike a pile and unlike a podcast, where we're talking, it's about really using micro learning to get people to do things. So do a practice that will help you process unprocessed emotions, do a practice that will help you to identify more with awareness, do a practice that will help you to change your thought patterns so that you can have healthy, productive mindset. So building skills by practicing just like you go into the gym, right? So, you know, nobody ever got strong by reading a book on on weightlifting, right, you've got to do it. And so we're providing the gym. You're chopping

Joe Van Wie  1:01:14  
wood, and you're carrying water. Yes, Fred always says that's what it's about, about thinking your way out of the problem, you're going to you're going to perform actions, and does this unfold as notifications. So I complete a survey, and it sees some of the needs maybe where I'm lacking say me myself, just to make an example, addiction. But it's stabilized. I haven't drank in two years, but I'm finding I'm restless, my anxiety starting to increase, I don't feel fulfilled, maybe at work, maybe stress is happening at the house. I'm watching it, I don't seem to be able to change it. Right. A friend recommended guide, I download it you just described I would fill out kind of a survey. What kind of nerd talk is that? What provides the layout? Is it AI? Or is there a human saying, Well,

Pat Sandone  1:02:09  
we have an algorithm? Am I supposed to do it? Yeah, we have an algorithm that, you know, based on our expert input, that once you fill out the survey and identify your needs will basically provide a prescription right for practices that will help you address the things that you want to address,

Joe Van Wie  1:02:25  
what would be a so you were talking a little bit about a sample practice. When you say practice, for someone who might not be familiar of the word like it's a daily meditation, or maybe an exercise? What would be a sample? For someone that maybe has some unresolved trauma, they're starting to at least articulate that this exists in their life, the apps now tool in their life? What would a practice look like maybe to unfold?

Pat Sandone  1:02:51  
So you know, what one? You know, I'll give you an example. And, and I'll tell you before I give you the example, I'll tell you a quick, funny story. So in my process of of trying to heal myself, I looked at everything. I just looked at everything. And one thing I looked at quickly, but not too seriously, but I was interested is is L Ron Hubbard and Dianetics right? Oh, yeah. And, you know, what interested me is that a lot of people do it right? How successful he's been. He's a science fiction writer, and he created a religion. And he's got millions of people who are, you know, you know, adherence and like, what does this guy do, and he's doing something that's interesting. And I was curious what, so I looked into it and his core practice, the thing that I think hooks people in is he has this thing, it's called an E meter. It's basically two soup cans hooked up to an electrical issue,

Joe Van Wie  1:03:46  
your Thetis make sure you're balanced, we don't have to throw more in the volcano.

Pat Sandone  1:03:52  
So it's basically two soup cans, too, to like an electrical reader with with with wires in what you have to do is you hold on to the soup cans, and you know, they're not they're actually metal tubes. And you talk about a challenging experience. Yeah, you do. And you have to keep talking about it until the electrical meter goes down. And I'm like, man, like, you know, in the what I came away with is like, the electrical meter as a prop, right? Oh, yeah, it's a prop. I don't know if it does anything. But here's what does something. If you can articulate a traumatic experience to another person enough times, right? It does start to process the emotion. So then all of a sudden, you get an opportunity to process all the emotions, all the thoughts, all the experiences, you got to keep talking about it until it's completely like it's just like you and I talking about soap. Well, then

Joe Van Wie  1:04:52  
you become a viewer or you're an object or you. PTSD makes. There's no space between experience Getting the trauma again, when you think are considered again, you're

Pat Sandone  1:05:03  
right in it re experiencing. So with that as a backdrop, one of the practices we have is a course called processing a challenging experience. And it has each course in the app has lessons, each lesson is a one to two minute video with an exercise afterwards. So this lesson, I believe, is is eight segments, eight lessons, this course is eight lessons in during the course you choose a challenging experience. And then in one segment, you list all the emotions you felt in another segment, you list, you know what happened. And then you share these things when you're done if you want with a small group, we also have a peer support system built into the app. In that process, if you run it enough times on a specific experience, you will process the entire experience, it's a proven method, it's used in a lot of trauma treatment, you know, usually facilitated by a very expensive therapist, we've broken it down and delivered it in the app or somebody can get access to it for you know, very little money.

Joe Van Wie  1:06:10  
And the peer support is surrounding this experience that someone can now have or a process with this with other people, almost like peer to peer, no power base, they're just supporting each other.

Pat Sandone  1:06:24  
So so so there's two main things going on in the app. One is you're taking these courses where you're performing a practice that is helping you become more aware of processing unprocessed emotions, building a better mindset, right. And then you have the opportunity to share your responses or other things. With a peer support group, the peer support group is usually 12 to 20 people, there is a moderator, Lauren, awkward da, who is a trained peer supporter, somebody who's trained in crisis management, somebody who is now Pat trained in, trained in life coaching, who's in there, and then she helps facilitate discussions in these groups to get people to support one another as they share what they would issue also

Joe Van Wie  1:07:12  
a safeguard for trauma that could be going sideways. And she's there to say, Oh, hey, we could here's some additional support or research sources,

Pat Sandone  1:07:22  
we also have an emergency button in the app, somebody can press it get connected to a crisis line, a therapist, you know, directly to a live person, if that's what they need. So we do have that she will if she sees the opportunity to get people connected with other resources. But really just on you know it, the interesting thing is it's completely anonymous. So we've we're working with a third party provider that will store all the personal identifying information in their database, they send us a number, and then that number goes in our database. So if we're ever hacked, all they know is that in person has a number, they have no idea who it is. And we as a company, we don't even know who that person is, we can't identify them, we just have that number. So it creates complete anonymity. Because I know for myself when I was going through this, you know, I was I'm a macho guy who was brought up in a macho culture, talking about these things was really difficult in the beginning. And I knew that it would have made it a lot easier if I could have done it anonymously, it D risks, the perceived downside, really, there's no downside, right? When you open up, you know, what I find is that everybody opens up with you, and they kind of share their story, because we all have one, you making it easier with this setting, making it easier, you know, so people can do it on their timeframe, with note a little budget, no fear of being found out for, you know, sharing some of these things. I mean, we really want to just lower the bar completely so that everyone can have access to it. And what I've realized, too, is you know, for looking back at myself, when I started my journey, there were three big things that got in the way. One was this fear of asking for help, like, I don't need anyone's help, right. I mean, and I think for a lot of men and women who are worrier kind of mentality that's common. There's this fear of being vulnerable, right? You know, just like this idea that vulnerability is weakness, and we can't really share what's going on inside us that was present. And then also, I wanted to have the ability to control my experience, do it on my timeframe when I wanted to not have to show up at some therapists office and sit there on their schedule. And so you know, I really wanted to create an experience that would work for me and people like me, and being able to create this type of environment just invites in a lot more people to kind of really grow and heal and find access to this work.

Joe Van Wie  1:09:51  
I definitely want this to be audible to my audience and the people I'm around and addiction because I think it's an unbelievable resorts and I'm excited to use it. How does this scale out?

Pat Sandone  1:10:04  
So our model right now is our initial target market is veterans and first responders you know, we you know, when I look at myself, I really think of talking about archetypes before, you know, one of the archetypes that I embody is the warrior archetype, right. And I think a lot of people that are veterans and first responders also embody that archetype. And we really, you know, both men and women, and we want to make it available to that market first. So, Jack, who is actually going to be a state trooper, and he missed the test, and ended up going into sales instead is talking to a lot of different agencies that are first responder or first responder adjacent, and we're creating licenses for organizations. So it's not going to be available in the App Store to anybody initially, it's really going to be you've got to work for a company that sponsors this and we go after private employers as well, because the vast majority of human archetypes are the warrior archetype. So especially organizations that are heavy into manufacturing, warehousing, sales, you know, those, though

Joe Van Wie  1:11:15  
it's going to be offered, you know, it could be through employment, first responders, like a lot of family and law enforcement in the last three years for them was brutal. Oh, yeah. Not only the work hours, the distress for first responders, just domestic just the uptick of just regular domestic problems from being confined in the house. Yeah. It's good. Use it. Yeah, for sure. They get a schedule therapist, when are they going to go like and then keep that time that routine. And then this app sounds like a really approachable and meaningful thing that will make changes directly first responders lives,

Pat Sandone  1:11:55  
I think so in an in another part of that market is veterans like through the mission daybreak, where we were 1400 companies applied, we were chosen as one of the 30. finalists, top 2%. So I think the federal government sees what you see is that this could be a great way to serve our nation's 20 million veterans. And so we're pursuing potential opportunities there as well. But it is going after organizations initially. And as our initial target market,

Joe Van Wie  1:12:28  
I see a rise right now of a new circle of vets that are overcoming PTSD here in Scranton, that their loyalty and support for each other. Through trauma, addiction, keeping tabs on each other. I mean, it's it overwhelms me to be in a room with them. So there's, I mean, there's betas here.

Pat Sandone  1:12:52  
Oh, for sure. Yeah, for sure. I mean, I, I'm excited about it, I really do think that this could you know, what's interesting to talk about taking risks. So with net driven, I could see the I could see the end of the road, right, I could see the end of the road, and I knew it was gonna succeed. And I also knew that it wasn't necessarily going to be like a publicly traded billion dollar company, right? It was going to be a good, really solid multimillion dollar enterprise. And I saw that all the way to the end. What's exciting about this, and I think what was scary in the beginning, is I really could see this being a multi billion dollar company, right? This is something that eventually, every human being in the world can get access to, and it has that potential new, right, so nobody's doing this yet. We're kind of like at the tip of the wave. And I think that's super exciting, but also scary. It's interesting, like, stepping into that possibility was hard. You know, it's almost easier to step into something where there's limited potential and you don't have to worry, you know, it there's, I think what I experienced it within myself is there's also there's a fear of failure, which I was familiar with, because it stopped me from taking certain risks and but there's also a fear of success. Yeah, you know, like, oh my god, what would that be like if this became doesn't complete

Joe Van Wie  1:14:08  
everything I ever wanted, right? And I'm just gonna pause my consciousness for the next decade, freeze it in the joy of success.

Pat Sandone  1:14:20  
It's but it's exciting because in what I've been able to do is combine this desire to do to do well for myself and my family, but also to do good for the world. And I think when those two things to come together, it's really powerful for for our individual to experience because then every day becomes joyful because now you're you're you're meeting not only your ego needs, right, which is this, this desire to do well financially and have success and be looked upon favorably, but the deeper desires to impact others in a positive way and leave the world better than you found it. And then I'm thankful like, you know that those two things have come together here. And whatever happens, you know, over the long term, it's it's a, it's a different experience of living life, because I'm really being able to fulfill both sides of my needs and desires and one entity, which is a oneness in itself.

Joe Van Wie  1:15:20  
Where to someone, if they want to find out more about this, or an employer, small company, middle sized company, maybe there's something they would want to incorporate into their team? Where would they find out information? How do they?

Pat Sandone  1:15:33  
So we do have a website? And and then they could they, you know, the best person to contact would be Jack kuciak. Who runs sales?

Joe Van Wie  1:15:42  
Let's call him now alive? Yeah, I'll give him a fake. Do it? Let's do it. Get him on the phone coach? Well, Pat, I can't wait to see this develop, especially when it starts to hit. I don't know audiences and populations that are distinctly about addiction. I can't wait to kind of look at that. Because it's there. It's everything I, I need under you take away drinking and the sensation of drug use, which looks like a problem. It's not, it's the solution to something else that your app is really targeting and a guy like

Pat Sandone  1:16:21  
me, well, yeah, it really like drugs are an escape from the unprocessed trauma, right? We're just like, I used work as an escape from unprocessed trauma. Other people use relationships as an escape, right, giving to others, you know, probably don't have time to go into this. But you know, what, one of the things I identified is that our egos have like nine different expressions, it's almost a it's almost programmatic, right? You know, the more I understand it, and and they're embodied in the seven deadly sins, which used to be nine. And in each of those deadly sins, those, you know, are expressions of the deeper part of our ego, which, which really, you know, if you go all the way back, if at the core of our egos a fear of death, and then if you wind up one level, then there is the fear of being controlled. The fear of not being loved the fear of not being wanted the fear of not being capable. And these are the core of like, what we would call the deadly sins. And then each one of those nine points has its own expression of addiction. Yeah. So in for some people, it's drugs. For some people, it's work for a lot of men and women, it could be giving to other people in relationships as a way of ignoring what's going on here. Yeah, as a way of ignoring what's going on in ourselves, right. Don't

Joe Van Wie  1:17:43  
think Aquinas articulated this simply and concise as you did he keep a little more long winded about those. But that relates even in the eastern respect. So this is a western idea. The Eastern is that the cure for pain. The lie, I believe in addiction is pleasure. And this is going to lead to a real pit I'm going to I'm going to end up in a void. It's impermanence. This idea that I could deal with crisis and happiness are both going to dissipate. What's left in between those spaces can be really profound of what you found in the last four or five years building guide. Looking for this and to offer it other people are very excited that you came on today. Me too.

Pat Sandone  1:18:28  
I'm glad you called me Joe. It's always great to talk to

Joe Van Wie  1:18:31  
you is a great way to start the day. I got the morning off to do a podcast with my friend what other life would I want? Alright, I'll talk to you soon Pat. I'm going to see if this recorded, so hopefully

I'd like to thank you for listening to another episode of all better. You find us on all better.fm or listen to us on Apple podcasts. Spotify, Google podcasts, Stitcher, I Heart Radio, and Alexa. Special thanks to our producer John Edwards, an engineering company 570. Drone. Please like or subscribe to us on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. And if you're not on social media, you're awesome. Looking forward to seeing you again. And remember, just because you're sober doesn't mean you're right.

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