I Got a Love Letter From the Guy Who Sued Me

So back in 2018, maybe 2019, I got sued. Well, not necessot me. We got sued at escape climbing. We got sued by one of our employees who got injured on the job, and, or at least he was claiming he got injured on the job and then filed a workman’s comp, and that got, you know, declined. And so then it went to, like, this lawsuit or whatever. I guess it technically wasn’t suing us as much as it was suing the insurance company. Anyhow, this was a very interesting period of time for us. It was the first time that we had ever experienced an employee suing us and being like, what do we do here? And it was very hard because we felt we hadn’t done anything wrong.

There was a clear history and timeline here where this person was injured outside of the workplace and had told us this. And so it was just very, very difficult to feel like we were being taken advantage of and to not really understand, like, the court and legal systems are kind of designed against you as the employer in this situation. But the part that was the hardest was the person that was doing this was a kid that I had coached when he was just even smaller. He was like twelve or 13 when I first met him, or maybe 14. And he was a rock climber. And so I was coaching him in rock climbing. And then many years went by, and at this point, he was like 21, maybe 20 years old when he came to work for us at escape climbing. And it was hard because, you know, having known him for so long and since he was a little kid, and now to be on the other side of this lawsuit, there was just a lot of emotions and a lot of, like, hurt feelings, I think, around everybody at the table, but not.

Not so much. It was more for my partner, Ryan, because he was the one that was really having to deal with this. And the contention was really there between those two. And by consequence of this, you know, being a company I was involved with, I was involved in two, and to see the situation kind of play out was hard, and it really soiled the relationship for everybody involved. Now, I share that story because last night I got a text message out of the blue from this gentleman who had worked for us all those years ago and who had sued us. And it was such an unexpected text message. And he said, you know what? I’ve moved out to a different state. And I started a business.
I started this marketing and sales company. And I just wanted to let you know that we had some conversations back when I was working with, with you that had a really profound effect on me and how I look at the world. And in particular, I guess there was something that we had talked about once where I said, one of the greatest injustices our families can do to us is to not teach us financial literacy, to not show our parents, to show our kids the finances of the house, to show, how much are you making? Where are you putting it? How are you saving it? How are you thinking about this? To deny your children the opportunity to learn finances firsthand by seeing how you organize yours in the household, I think, is a great disservice. And this is a conversation that we had because at escape, we were working a lot with these younger kids who were just out of college, who were, like, 22 to 26 years old. So it was a younger demographic, and a lot of them didn’t have a lot of financial literacy, as none of us really do. As we’re coming out of school, you have to learn it the hard way. And so it was very important to us, to Ryan and I, that we teach this. This information in a way so that our employees are able to take their weekly paycheck and appropriately, you know, allocate it across their life in a way that’s gonna help them rather than hurt them.
And so we would put on weekly financial literacy training courses and, like, having part of our team meetings, talking about these things. And we were very open about how we run our finances. And to this day, and all my businesses, I try to be as open as possible with the finances, so everybody on the team can see, where is the money coming from? Where is it going? How are we thinking about reinvestment versus expenses and all this stuff? And he reached out, and he is like, I want you to know that that was incredibly impactful for me at that point in my life. And he’s running his business now, and he’s like, I want you to know that I’ve taken that to heart, and I’m doing the same thing with my employees and teaching them and trying to, like, be as open with my finances as possible so that they can see. And he’s like, you know, I don’t know where we are in our relationship. Off the back of everything that happened. He’s like, but I still look back on that time very fondly, and I really appreciate your mentorship. And it was really interesting because it was not a message I ever expected to get.
And largely because often when you’re teaching younger people, it can feel as though the message isn’t really getting through, and you can feel like you’re wasting their time. Like, they’re kind of sitting there like, oh, boomer, what are you teaching me here? Like, I don’t care about this, right? You can very easily get that vibe from young people. But it was just very interesting that all these years later, those messages have sunk in. And it reminded me of something that I went through personally with my father, which was, he has been filling me with great wisdom in my pretty much my entire life. But when I was young, teenage years into my twenties, those messages just weren’t really getting through their falling on deaf ears. And it would have been very easy for my dad to assume that he had wasted his time and that I just wasn’t getting it. And yet, when my life really pivoted on that crux of a moment in my late twenties where I was like, I need to figure this shit out, what I went back to that the words that were resounding in my head that tell me, this is the path you need to go, and this is what you need to do, were the words of wisdom that my dad had been sharing with me all throughout my life. And so I wasn’t able to put those.
Those lessons into practice at the time. But later, when I really needed them and I went deep, searching deeply for them, those were the messages that came back to the top. And I imagine that’s probably a little bit of what happened here with this gentleman, is like, maybe those lessons weren’t landing exactly at the time, but they were percolating in the back. And I want to share this with you because you never know the impact that you’re having on people truly in the moment and, like, how that’s gonna work, how it’s gonna have a ripple effect throughout the rest of their life. And I often feel this way with my content, whether it’s in this podcast, it’s on YouTube, it’s on Twitter or Instagram, wherever it is. I often feel like, is there. Is this actually helping people? Are people actually taking these messages, these lessons, and being able to apply them in a meaningful way in their life? Am I just wasting my time? Am I talking at a wall? Are people, do they like the ideas, but not necessarily to kind of put them into practice? And that can be very hard. And I’ve really struggled with that because a lot of content creation is kind of, you know, this one to many conversation where I’m talking to, you know, tens of thousands of people right now, they’re not able to necessarily talk back and share all their learnings and lessons and what’s going on in their life.
And a lot of you do, a lot of you leave comments and reviews and they shoot me emails and I try to read all of them and it’s amazing. And I love it. I love it, I love it. But even then, for whatever reason, it can be still be very hard to feel like you’re making a positive impact on the world. But I wanted to share this story because it’s likely you’re having a larger impact than you even realize. The people who are reaching out to you, it’s a far smaller subset than the macro group of people who are being impacted, but never actually share that with you. Maybe that’s with your friends, your family, you know, whatever it is. And so if you’re content creator, if you’re whatever, if you’re trying to make a positive impact on the world and you just can’t see yet the effects of that, stick with it.

Just know that you will only ever see just the tip of the iceberg and that there’s a whole lot below the surface that you’re not privy to. And don’t write people off either. And understand that, like, life is complicated and convoluted. And, you know, this guy, he sued us and yet was, was still able to take some positive lessons. And I think about him fondly despite the lawsuit and everything that happened there, and I wish him the best. And I’m really, really excited that those lessons were able to stick and that he’s paying that forward to his, his employees. So good for you, man. I don’t know if you’re listening to this, but good for you if you are.

And anywho that’s going to do for me, guys and gals, I just wanted to share that story with you. Hopefully it gets you through a hard time and, or brings you some value, gives you some insight, and that’s going to do it for me. We’ll catch you in the next episode.