The Habit Architect

THA S2 EP#6 - The Balance Dilemma: What we get wrong about work and life

• Michael Cupps • Season 2 • Episode 6

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Is your benefits package really supporting your life—or just checking a box?

In this episode, host Michael Cupps welcomes Jordan Peace, CEO of Fringe, to explore how companies can rethink employee benefits to meet real, everyday needs. From flexible perks and retention to mental health and neurodiverse leadership, Jordan shares his personal journey with ADHD, fatherhood, and building a business with heart.

You’ll learn:

  • Why work-life flexibility matters more than balance
  • What employers often miss when designing benefit programs
  • How ADHD shaped Jordan’s leadership and systems
  • Practical ways to support mental health at work
  • How modern benefits impact recruiting and retention

Perfect for founders, HR leaders, and anyone rethinking the future of work.

This Show is sponsored by TimeBandit.io

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Michael Cupps:

Hello and welcome to the Habit Architect. Very excited to have our guest here today. We're gonna talk about a big topic, and it's a topic that is different for every company and every employee. And I think that's why the conversation we're gonna have today is really valuable to you. Life is loud, work is louder. Sometimes kids get louder, sometimes life happens. And as we go through the different stages of our life, the things that are important to us from our employer. Need to change with that, and which means that the employer needs to be thinking outside the box a little bit. It can't just be a cookie cutter. Here's our benefits package for everyone. When you know you're stressed and you're trying to figure out what to do in a certain situations, and you go to your benefits portal and all you really see there is your healthcare, which is important, your 401k, which is again important. But what else can the company do to enrich your life and help you through tough times? And if all is the kind of the standard things like weight loss and smoking cessation type programs, which are valuable in their own right, but maybe that's not what you need. It's time for companies to step up and offer things that will be helpful, whether you're Gen Z, millennial. Or Gen X or even boomers that are still in the workplace. Finding flexibility, finding what matches to you. It's what we're gonna talk a little bit today. Today, and I'd like to invite Jordan Peace to join me here on the screen. Hello Jordan. Welcome.

Jordan Peace:

I'm here.

Michael Cupps:

Excellent.

Jordan Peace:

Doing well, Michael. How are you?

Michael Cupps:

I'm very good. I'm excited to see you and I, we just came to the revelation. I was actually. In Richmond and you're from Richmond. And I didn't connect the dots fast enough. I'm already back in Dallas, . But I would've love to met you in, in person, so next time. But I wanted to learn more about you, but first, why don't we start with just telling us how Fringe came to be and maybe it had something to do with that opening that I mentioned.

Jordan Peace:

Yeah. Yeah. So it was a winding road. I was working as a financial planner, kind of financial advisor. Worked with a lot of Gen Xers and Gen y folks that actually didn't have a lot of wealth yet but were earning a decent income and I was trying to help them figure out. How to budget, how to invest, where to put it, how to prepare for the future, these sorts of things. And so because I didn't sell anything except for my advice and time, we ended up talking about all sorts of things as it pertains to money and employment and one of those topics was benefits. And what became so apparent to me is that people don't really understand the benefits, and I think they don't understand them. One, because they're written in some sort of alien language that only like finance and legal nerds like me would understand. But two, they're not all that relevant unless you're sick or. Dead or disabled or 65 years old, it's so what? Doesn't everyone give us the same stuff really? And so just what dawned on me was, man, companies are paying so much money every month per employee to deliver all of this actual value, as you pointed out. But the perceived value was quite small. And so I wondered could we flip that on its head? Would there be actually lower cost benefits or fringe benefits? That's the name on the shirt and so forth. That would actually have a really high perceived value and that we could help employees feel cared about and loved and seen and heard and like they're real people. So that, that was my hope. And then that's how we got started.

Michael Cupps:

And the interesting thing to, to me and I know people get this, but the benefits back to the employer are significant too with that. When your employees feel that, it's easier to keep them around, right? Because the cost of recruiting new employees is tough, but Oh, when you do need to recruit people, if you have a better benefits package, you're, you've got a competitive advantage it seems like.

Jordan Peace:

Yeah, definitely. I think the best talent runs to wherever the best culture is. Benefits are usually an outward. An outward expression of an inward culture, let's say.. And so they run to where the best benefits are. And not only do they do that, but they brag to their friends about these great benefits and this great place that they work and they recruit their friends. So they, your recruiting costs just went down. The quality of your recruiting just went up. And then, like you said, you keep people, which is incredibly valuable and really hard to do in today's world.

Michael Cupps:

It absolutely is. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And we do have a question, and I want to get to it when we get a little further into the conversation. It's about work life balance versus work-life flexibility. Andrew, appreciate the question. We'll, I promise you we'll get back to it, but I wanna talk a little bit about you because I was reading your background. And by the way if you're watching this and you're LinkedIn person, follow Jordan on LinkedIn, he's a great follow because he is honest and he's, and he shares what he's thinking, what he's feeling. And so I just, that's who I would prefer to follow instead of the kind of the canned. People, and not to criticized, I like to follow people that are more authentic on LinkedIn. So do follow Jordan. But you you came, you mentioned you came from a financial planning background, which seems to be vastly different. Somebody trying to sell mutual funds and life insurance planning and things like that to offering this kind of entrepreneurial spirit that you have. What, can you tell us a little bit about that? Were you always wanting to be an entrepreneur?

Jordan Peace:

I don't think I knew what an entrepreneur was until about, 10, 12 years ago, to be honest with you. But I always had a lot of ideas, always had a lot of creative solutions to problems or restaurants that I thought would be cool to start, or business ideas that I would share with my friends. But I never really saw myself as a person that was invited to that party. Or that I could even be an entrepreneur, right? I was the first generation in my family to go to college, for example. So I just didn't have a lot of exposure and, I shared maybe the hundredth idea with my best friend, Chris Luhrman, who's now one of my co-founders. And and I'd shared many ideas with him over the time. And it was often like, that's cool, man. Or like a little pat on the head, or go for it, but he said, that's the one and I want to do it with you. And I was like. Oh, wow. This just got very real. And and so I, I'm literally on Google just going, how do you raise money for a business idea? And I learned that there's something called venture capital and family offices and private EI didn't know any of this stuff. And because it wasn't really my business to know it, I was in personal finance, I was helping people with budget and those sorts of things. I wasn't thinking about business finance. And and so I've learned all of this on the fly as I've gone, and that's probably terrifying for my employees to hear, but it's just what you do. You just that's what an entrepreneur is. It's someone who just goes for it despite their ignorance and figures it out along the way. And that's really my story.

Michael Cupps:

That's amazing. And I do like that, especially I think in the age of ai, which we're living in now this ex, the opportunities are there for people. Even if they don't know how to do it, they're gonna figure out how to get to there because the information's so accessible. That's a great story. By the way, I'm also a first generation. Into college. And so I get what you're thinking. It, you you have to learn at a different speed than some people that maybe have been accustomed to that and growing up, but that's great. But hope you don't mind me asking. I know that you've done some posts about ADHD and living with that, not only just personally, but also just how that is running a business. How do you structure that?

Jordan Peace:

Yeah, it's tough. It's tough, I think ADHD in my childhood was something not very well understood. I think my parents did their best to, , send me to a doctor. I think I got a prescription at some point. It went into a drawer. I'm not sure I ever took it. I really don't recall. But it wasn't something I gave a lot of thought to. In fact, it was something that, and I, you can see this on my post, but that actually led to a great deal of shame. That I actually felt like, what's wrong with me? Why can't I do these executive functions? I didn't have those, that language at the time, but why can't I do these things that others can do? Why do I leave my backpack at school three outta five days a week? Or why can't I, remember to get into this habit or this routine and so forth. And so without medicine or without a lot of knowledge, over the course of almost 40 years, I just developed all sorts of. I could, I wish I could turn my camera and show you I've got a cork board over here. I've got notes that are pinned to it. There's things that. I can't keep permanently in my head, so they have to be permanent outside of my head, so there's sticky notes everywhere and it's a real struggle. It really is. I'm the kind of person that benefits from an EA (Executive Assistant) to a degree that I think most people don't even understand. I'm like, I will buy you a house. Just keep up with my email. Please, I'm desperate sometimes and trying to run a business and. We'll get to this later, but have a household full of five children and some of the other kind of volunteer stuff in the community. It's a lot. And when you struggle to remember and keep up and when developing habits is especially hard it's just a whole lot. And so I've had to lean in and really accept myself and accept the struggles of ADHD, but also explore the superpowers of ADHD and celebrate those as well. And that's allowed me to have a more balanced view of this. This thing this neurodivergence that I have.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah. Yeah. And it's amazing. I think you said something there, and I've said this before on my podcast with a, I think it was when we were talking to some marriage counselors about shame, that shame that why did I leave the backpack at school three times that shame? And the concept is shame thrives in silence and dies when it's out in the open. So when you can actually just come out and say, this is what I'm dealing with people and this is how I'm gonna deal with it. It makes everybody feel better, really, but particularly yourself because you're no longer trying to. Internalize it all yourself. So I think, I'm glad you said that. The interesting thing, I and Florencia, who's our producer, will be happy, I'm gonna say this, but that's a lot of, I, I managed a lot of people and then I managed'em globally and they were all, all across the world and I learned all of them. Were doing things differently now, and I could tell what worked to do, but how they approached it was vastly different. So that's why I wrote the book Time Bandit is because. Some things you can figure out and you can systemize and other things you just need to prioritize. And that was the way I got that, but I can't imagine doing that with five kids and one on the way. So how does how do you even get control of that itself?

Jordan Peace:

We don't have one on the way do, it's just five. We're done. In fact, we were done at four. And then there was a surprise. So what everybody, people are like, why do you have five? People will, it's funny, you have three kids, people look at you a little bit like, eh, that's a choice. And then you have four or five, and they just, they'll outright criticize you. They'd be like, what? Why are you doing this to yourself? And my defense is always I only had four on purpose, but it's, it is a whole lot. And, I think the only reason why I've been able to do it is because I have three co-founders that are great friends. They're also great partners, but they're just, they're very accepting of me. I'm able to say, here are struggles that I have. Here is a weakness that I have, and the response isn't oh, hey, step it up, man. The response is like how can we help? Yeah. How can we situate your schedule or situate your duties or your role in such a way that you don't have to live out of these weaknesses, but you can live out of these strengths. And I'm so grateful to have people in my life like that, but no one can help you if you don't let them know what you need help with. And that's been the biggest change in my own personal journey in the past, probably year, I'd say, is I'm learning how to ask for help. And it makes an enormous difference in life when you just admit what you need, help with

Michael Cupps:

that. That's great advice. I think just owning it, kind, letting everybody else know they can participate, whether they're accountability partners or, they can take the load. How do you handle like your day-to-day? Do you have a system for like meetings? I'm sure you have staff meetings or maybe project meetings, et cetera. How do you, yeah. Do you have any tricks or tricks of the trade there?

Jordan Peace:

Yeah, many. One is one is everything is on my calendar. Take a shower is on my calendar. Drive home is on my calendar, like pick ups, even though I'm p I'm taking the kids to school every single morning. You'd think that would just kinda lock in, but just in case. I've got it on the calendar every single day, every single time, and I just obey my calendar. It's my move. I just obey the things that I have said. This is important to me. I will agree to do this. This is a habit I wanna form. And so that, that's really big. Reminders are really big. Automated reminders on the phone, but then again, the phone sometimes is like just gone, which I love. I don't want it near me all the time anyway.'cause that's, that has its, that's a whole podcast about that topic. But but sometimes it's just notes in different places around, like I said, stickies and pinned up and so forth. And then when I'm in meetings, a struggle is to pay attention. It's to, to go an hour or an hour and a half on a topic where the way my brain works is I take in a little bit of information, I develop a theory, and then I go, yeah, here's what I think we should do. And I'm, I feel pretty certain like in the first couple of minutes. And that doesn't mean I'm always right. In fact, I definitely am wrong sometimes. Yeah. But it's really tough beyond that to focus on the details. And so I found that writing really helps, like not typing, but actually with a pen or a pencil to actually write notes. Or on a whiteboard or something tactile. Yep. Just putting that pressure down on the paper, somehow keeps me tuned in. I'll get up and pace. I'll tell people why I'm doing it. Hey, I'm doing this to listen to you not to not listen to you. Yes, I'm standing up so that I can focus. I'm pacing so that I can focus. I'm twiddling with, a fidget spinner so that I can focus, and as long as I communicate to people, that's what's happening. Then they're appreciative of it, but if they don't know, then they're like, what? What's with this guy? He is not even paying attention, yeah. That really is all about communicating with the people around you.

Michael Cupps:

That's fascinating. I wanna talk about that a little more, but I'm curious, are there any fringe benefits that in your marketplace that are specifically targeted at ADHD?

Jordan Peace:

I don't think, I actually don't think we have anything that's like directly targeted. There are a lot of things that help. Yeah. Yeah. Like Dashlane that remembers all of my passwords.'cause I sure am not gonna remember all of them. And sticky notes is not exactly the safest place to keep them.

Michael Cupps:

Yes, exactly.

Jordan Peace:

Yeah. But I use my fringe points on like fitness to a degree, and that helps like just getting the blood flow. Going every day is really useful. Keeping the brain sharp. But yeah, nothing in particular. There really aren't a lot of products or services out there that are targeted. I'm encouraged. There's more and more influencers and people coaching and talking about ADHD than ever, I feel like, in the last couple of years. So that's really encouraging to me. But yeah, we don't have any specific product. Yeah. I wish we did.

Michael Cupps:

It's interesting. I'm not very far from the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas, and I've gotten to know the dean of the College of Information and they actually have a lab. Where they're, and it started out talking about computer games, but now it's turned into what's distracting people. And they've got this and this. It's incredible. Sometime I'll, I'm happy to introduce you to them. I don't pretend to know the science behind it, but it's fascinating to me because they're thinking about how do we keep people focused on certain things? And it's an interesting study, so hopefully, like you said, there's more people working on it. There's more people talking about it, so it's, so that's good. So that, that's fantastic. And, i'm curious in this, if this is too personal, say no. I, do you see it in your kids or do you, are they too young? Do you not know, or?

Jordan Peace:

I don't know for sure. And I think that the sensitivity that I have there is because I've experienced so much shame and I so much don't want them to have that same experience. I I'm caught in between this. Decision of, Hey, do I go get a diagnosis and give them this? What could become a label for them? That obviously wouldn't be our intention. Or do I just treat them as if they probably do have this and just coach them up on how to live their lives and maybe they'll never need a diagnosis or a medicine, but it really just depends on the kid. I don't have any children where it's. So blatantly obvious. And usually that's that's more in the hyperactive side of the spectrum, versus the inattentive side of the spectrum when kids are hyperactive, you can see it typically. Yeah. Yeah. And but yeah, that definitely with a few of my children I see this not just the forgetfulness and some of those things, but it's the the intensity of the emotion. The overactive amygdala that is, just takes them to the point of this desperate, I can see it in their eyes. They cannot calm down. Yeah. And it's, and so just getting down on my knee. Hugging them, holding them, squeezing them, giving 'em a chance to even, like they even say having a child like push against you, almost like grapple with you a little bit in a, yeah. In a gentle, but in a firm way, helps them, use their body. So I, I apply all of the lessons that a parent with children with ADHD would apply, yeah. But without necessarily the testing and some of those things yet. Yeah. Yeah. And our society is. It almost encourages ADHD with the way that the social feeds are, they're trying to get you not to pay attention for longer than 20 seconds.

Michael Cupps:

It's That's right. It's the goal. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So even somebody not diagnosed with it may experience it because of just what's coming at them so frequently.

Jordan Peace:

Yeah. I heard this was, and I don't know if this is any truth to it, but I really enjoyed reading. This gentleman said that he looks at ADHD as an early warning sign of what all of society will eventually experience if we don't stop moving faster and faster and consuming things in seven second. Clips and some of that. We're actually training our brain to not be able to focus, and those of us with ADHD are just like the beacons are of like, Hey, here's what's coming. This is what society's gonna become all together if we don't slow down and watch things and have a plot and a point. Yeah. And so anyway, lessons, parental lessons there too. I tell my kids anything they wanna watch. I say nothing shorter than 20. If it doesn't have a beginning, a middle and end, a hero, a villain, a problem, there's no plot.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah, no that's great. I love that. That's great. That is great advice. I hadn't thought about that. I, my both of my kids are grown, but I've now got the grandson who's two and, it's funny because you it's the same but different.'cause I remember his dad when he was two, what he was doing, and I see that in, in the grandson, but I also see something else. So it's, I think that's a fantastic lesson that that they need to get the story, not just the ad. I guess is, yeah. Yeah. We got about 15 more minutes or so. And so let's talk a little bit more about Fringe because I do I'm fascinated by this. World of benefits. And we had a benefits broker on a few weeks ago, and she was fantastic. She was talking about benefits that you may not know you have that are there, and that's another problem, right? Yeah. It's, there's just not enough education about what the benefits are there for. So that's one aspect of it. But you've started this marketplace to provide a variety of different benefits that are. I, I, they're elective almost. I was going through your site, and so the company can say, I wanna offer these types of things for these kinds of outcomes, but then it's, then the employee gets a choice as well. Is that fundamentally, did I get that right?

Jordan Peace:

No, that's exactly right. It, it's all about choice. And there's several different reasons for that. One, I think we gotta treat adults, like adults, right? So I really, I don't really love this idea of, an HR team. Read some thought leaders said in 2025 it's all about pet insurance. That's gonna be the wave. And so they go out and get a pet insurance vendor and offer it to their people. And 9% of them care. And the other 91% is I'm glad we spent money on something that's not relevant to me. Thinks so to some degree it's just, it's respectful to say to an adult, that works for you. Hey. Our goal here is that you improve your lifestyle in terms of reducing stress or giving yourself some time back in your day or impacting the family positively, whatever the case may be. Yeah. You choose what's pertinent to you, right? And the second reason is because. Not only is there a diversity of who works for a particular company in terms of their age, gender, whatever, geography, but also life changes over the course of time. I know that quite well as a father of five, there, there's been a lot of time where my wife's been pregnant. There's been a lot of time where approaching something like the gym was not gonna make a whole lot of sense for a few months and then it does make sense. And then we need childcare, and then we need child activity boxes and then we need to start saving for college. And one person's life needs a variety of benefits over just a short period of time, much less a long period of time. And so how do you deliver that outside of choice?

Michael Cupps:

That's absolutely right. And what's interesting I, and I may tie into Andrew's, Andrew didn't ask a question. He was just saying he prefers work-life flexibility to work-life balance. It's good. It's a good statement. I get that. But what's interesting about, I grew up in the tech world, so 30 years in software technology companies, and I remember when the ping pong tables and the foosball tables showed up and the free pretzels, things like that. And it was interesting because it did elicit an interesting behavior. People got more playful in the workplace. They, you got to know people a little differently and stuff like that. Yeah. But I'm not so sure the design wasn't just to put that in there so they wouldn't leave, so they'd be working longer hours. And but that just comes to it is we need flexible benefits. We don't just need a ping pong table. If the ping pong table's there and people wanna play awesome, but there may be somebody else that needs something else and they've gotta be able to get, make those choices.

Jordan Peace:

Yeah, that, that's exactly right. It's given them the respective choice. It's also recognizing that people's lives are dramatically different than one another and that they're constantly changing. And we built this marketplace of services and some products and experiences as well. And we said, Hey this, these are the types of things that are gonna improve the life of your employee, and they're gonna associate you, Mr. Employer or Mrs. Employer, whatever with these moments in their lives. So they're gonna go out and get a massage and think, my employer paid for this. They're gonna go on vacation and that. You know that Uber ride or that Airbnb, my employer paid for this, you're actually impacting their life at a time where they're not, maybe not at work, not really thinking about work, but they're gonna associate the employer with some great moments in life, right? And some relaxation and kind of feeling like a real person. And so that, that's the core value. And then how the programmatically you wanna do that, whether it's. Recognition or wellness program or whatever the programmatic elements are. That's we'll figure that out, but that was the key thing that I wanted to get, I want to get across to employers, is you want your people associating you with their life and their family and the positive experiences that they're having, and not just. Hour A to hour B and a bunch of tasks that you give them because that's not a good relationship, that doesn't feel like a very full relationship between employer and employee.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah. And that's a fantastic way of looking at it. And I had a question here is, what does it look like when a company gets it right? And I think you just explained that is that they're offering this flexibility to. Not just the task list, but so how does it work? I'm sorry, go ahead.

Jordan Peace:

I was gonna say, when you feel like your employer cares, yeah, that's the whole thing. If you can accomplish that with employees that. And I hope that companies actually do and I think it's a mixed bag. Like I, I run into employers that I feel like actually have a big heart for their people and really care about their lives. I run into some that think it's strategic to say that they do, even though that they really don't. And then I run into some that just don't care at all. And they're overtly, it's like they're overt about the fact that they don't care. But I think if you can accomplish that. Feeling of man, I'm not just a number to these people. I'm not just this replaceable cog in this machine, but they actually see me as a person. Yeah. That will buy more loyalty than Absolutely. 5% raises every year. Ever would, or ping pong tables or whatever else.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you're I agree with you 100%. So how does it technically work? So is the company brings fringe in, and then what happens from a employer perspective and what happens from an employee perspective?

Jordan Peace:

Yeah so everyone gets set up with the fringe account and then the employer decides. What kind of funding do we wanna offer here? Do we wanna do like a monthly stipend or do we wanna do give everybody recognition points and they can give those to each other to say, Hey, thanks for help on that project, or, you were really awesome in that meeting, or whatever the case may be. The funding gets decided on. The funding lands into the accounts of all the employees. Everybody's got their own fringe account with fringe points and some of those points they can spend on themselves. And some of those points, they, all they can do is give them to others 'cause they're for the purpose of recognition or gifting. And that just creates all of this momentum, all of this engagement, all of this back and forth. And when the companies really do it right, you'll see stuff like this. Like you'll see somebody send a message, and of course they'll do like a. A gif that's like an inside joke as part of the company culture, and of the dancing baby or whatever the case may be. And it's like celebratory. And here's 50 points. Thanks so much. You're awesome. You're the man. And then others will pile on. They'll go, yeah, let me throw some points in there. Yeah, he did do a great job. Let me make a comment on that. And it just creates these really cool moments in a company that just wouldn't happen otherwise. Because you just don't have anything to facilitate that. And then what's exciting for the person receiving the recognition is not only are they being recognized by their peers and having this public or private moment of praise, which feels good, but then the points that they get, they actually can cash out for something that they actually care about. They're not just gonna get like a. A weed eater or some sort of plaque they will throw away in a couple of years, but like it's something real and tangible that is, is interesting and in our curated marketplace that's personalized to their life.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah. Yeah. That, yeah, that's great. And the, I think the flexibility is what's interesting about it because I didn't realize that about the rewarding too. That's fantastic. I think there's all, anytime you can enable. Team members to appreciate team members. That's an interesting thing.'cause it's usually this hierarchical manager appreciating certain people. Yeah, but employee and teammate to teammate. That's a fantastic benefit. I think that's incredible. Is there, and I know this would be like me asking you to name your favorite kid, I'm not. Do you have a benefit? Is there a benefit in your marketplace that you were like, wow, this is really cool.

Jordan Peace:

I tell you, it used to be Stitch Fix which is the, I don't know if Stitch Fix at all, but if you're busy and you don't have time to shop for clothes and you wanna look decent, there's this service. They kinda learn your style. You put in all your sizes and everything, and they just send you a box of clothes once a month, twice a month, whatever it's you're interested in. You take the stuff you want and they got a prepackaged envelope, and everything. Yeah. Put it back in, send it back, and you just pay for what you keep basically. Yeah, that was my favorite and I still love it, but that was my favorite benefit for a long time. But then honestly, I started wearing so much fringe stuff now, like I'm, now that our swag store actually has become my favorite benefits 'cause ah, we've got great brands and like really quality items that you wanna wear. So I just am like. Branded hoodie branded tank, top branded t-shirt. That's all I wear anymore is branded stuff. So that's how I roll with my Fringe points.

Michael Cupps:

Okay. I can already see it. You're pulling up to the school and with all the peace family and they're all wearing Fringe outfits, right?

Jordan Peace:

Yes. Perfect. I brand the whole family.

Michael Cupps:

You got walking billboard. There you go. There you go, man. You gotta do it. That is great. So let's let's wind it down here. I ask everybody the same thing. Is there one habit that Jordan does every day? You are gonna do it no matter what.

Jordan Peace:

I try to write every day. Good. Yeah. I try to write something. It, sometimes it's just a little personal reflection. Sometimes it's, you might call it a prayer. Sometimes it's, something that I wanna put on LinkedIn, I wanna share with people and engage with people on, but I try to write every day because my mind can be, my mind's very active, but also can be very chaotic. Yeah. And so having to take these chaotic, circular thoughts and make them linear. Put them into sentences on a page or on a screen that are like legible and understandable to another human being. The practice of that helps me clarify not only thoughts, but also feelings. Yes. And so if I had got a chance to give anybody a piece of advice on a daily habit, it's working out's great. Eating healthy is great. Big fan of those things, but right. Would be my number one piece of advice.

Michael Cupps:

Okay. And there's one more question I haven't asked any other guests because I just thought of, I was thinking about it this week, but I'm working on this concept that tomorrow's more important than yesterday and it's about being in today. So I just curious, what is one thing over the past five, 10 years that you believed then and now you don't, that you've dispelled that and you have a different way of thinking? And I know that's a big question.

Jordan Peace:

No it's a layup for me because of the ADHD thing. Two, two beliefs that I came away with as a child with ADHD one was that there's something wrong with me, that I'm broken in some way. And two was that I'm actually not smart. I. I actually saw myself as a person that was not intelligent. And so I, I've had to reprogram my thinking in that way, and it's taken friends and my wife and others going, Hey man, look at your life. Yeah, look at what you've done. Look at who you are. Look at some of these things that you've written, read them back to yourself. You're an intelligent person. And I had to I genuinely just did not believe that until pretty recently.

Michael Cupps:

That's amazing. I laughed when you said it because I thought, this is an intelligent person I'm talking to. I didn't ever feel the opposite. So that's, yeah.

Jordan Peace:

I think seeing yourself is the hardest thing to see. Yeah. I really have a pretty easy time reading people understanding what they're going through, what their strengths are. Maybe even some of what their biases might be and so forth. But I've realized that my view of myself is actually the most inaccurate read that I have on any human being on earth. And I wonder if that's true for a lot of people or maybe everyone. And that's why something like therapy and deep friendships and deep conversations are so useful because we don't actually see ourselves very clearly.

Michael Cupps:

Yeah, that's a great way to, to end the conversation other than tell us where people can find fringe. I, I know our, and across the ticker your LinkedIn was going, so certainly they should go follow you on LinkedIn. What, tell us where to find fringe and how to engage.

Jordan Peace:

We're, I'm actually excited. We're launching a new website in the next month. I'm writing it myself personally. Wow. And 'cause I, it's just so important to me that we're really clear about the value and I like to write, as I mentioned that's fringe.us. So right now you'll see the old one, which, nothing wrong with the old one, but it's coming up soon here. So that, that's a great place to find us. And then, anybody that's in the HR space, if they're looking for us. I'd say talk to your benefits consultant, talk to your broker. Obviously we can talk directly and we can get a demo going and all that good stuff, but yeah I think it's, I think it's really useful to work with a consultant that, can design the benefits suite and help with some of those things. I always point people to that direction too. But yeah, first and foremost, follow me on LinkedIn. Yeah, I'll talk about Fringe occasionally, and there'll be a link to click.

Michael Cupps:

That's fantastic. Thank you so much for joining us today. I really appreciate your time, Jordan. Thank you.

Jordan Peace:

Enjoyed it, Michael. Thanks for having me.

Michael Cupps:

Yes, absolutely. And everybody watching The Habit Architect stay in ne stay in tune. Next week we'll have another guest and talk about various things, and we appreciate that, but don't forget to go check out our training bundle. So learning how to manage habits, priorities, and tying those back to your values is all in that training bundle and you get the app and the book and all that stuff. So go check timebandit.io. Thanks again everyone, and we'll see you next time.

People on this episode

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Michael Cupps

Host
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Reem Metawei

Co-host