Nika: Hi everyone and welcome back to Pink Nest Podcast. Real stories of baking from shadows into soul fire. Today I'm having Andy with me from Elimitable. ⁓ from the UK who went all the way from high functioning imposter hiding self doubt behind success to that husband musician and to the person that is now helping others step into power without apologies gosh I said that good welcome Andy
Andy Casey: I love that and you even got a little choir from the dogs in the background, which I quite like
Nika: Yeah, that's a very non-podcasting environment, but that's fine, because that's just life, right?
Andy Casey: Absolutely. I've got three dogs and I normally plan my podcasts around everything in my life, but guaranteed Amazon wants to deliver when I'm normally doing a podcast. So, but not today.
Nika: Okay, so I always start at the beginning, which is childhood. So how was Andy as a child and how do you think that your childhood somehow shaped the way you are today?
Andy Casey: Wow, we go in there straight away. ⁓ Okay, I was an only child And my life has always kind of been a little bit like that even even now if I go to an event I quite like my own space I went to an event back last early when I was gonna say in the summer we're in the new year. ⁓ my god Yeah back back last summer ⁓ and you know, I do like I you know, I'm ⁓
Nika: Yeah
Andy Casey: I'm I'm a husband, I'm a dog dad, most importantly. But I still like my own space. And even though I like to my dogs on the beach, I still like to go and have my own time on my own. And I think that's something that definitely has stemmed from my childhood. As a kid growing up, I wouldn't say I had a typically traumatic childhood, but I had lots of stuff in my life that had kind of come up, cropped up. You know, my parents always, you know, looked after me, treated me well. But I did grow up in the the wake of my sister's ⁓ death and she died when she was five before I was born. ⁓ I always looked at her picture of her on our TV. She was always ⁓ kind of sitting there. You watch the TV at Christmas. She was sitting there on the TV and there was always this moment of ⁓ Feeling of kind of, my sister hadn't passed away, I wouldn't probably have been born. And there was almost a bit of me growing up, I didn't even realize that I felt this way. My mom was a massive community person, still is to this day, heavily involved in the church and being around people. I was brought up in kind of an environment where I was forced to listen to folk music. And I've always had music in my life and my parents were a key factor that. But kind of as I was growing up and I was getting older, I actually sort of learned to realize that there were a few things that didn't sit quite right in my life. One of which was my dad's alcohol use, which in the long term meant that he ended up having to have a liver transplant. And there was a lot of stuff that in my life as a child that I've never really realized that weren't quite right. And, you know, we had my grandparents come to live with me when we were like, with us when we were like 15, 16, when I was like, yeah, 15, 16 years old, which is a very poignant time in my life is going through GCSEs and had a grandfather who had dementia, you know, wandering out of the house at two o'clock in the morning without his trousers on, which was quite a comical story. But it was those little things that kind of happened throughout my life. But it wasn't until I got to about 40 that I actually kind of realized myself, ⁓ my God, like, I think I've actually been grieving the death of my sister my entire life. And that was a big poignant part for me, where when I started doing my own self development, I actually started to then look at the other things in my childhood. that had affected the way I am and the way I behaved and the way I you know, where I acted and so forth. So I think, yeah, my childhood was one of those things that I think as a kid, I just you know, I had a fairly good childhood, loved having a tree house, love throwing apples at cars from my tree house from from the back of our garden. And I don't know, it must have fallen off the tree. But yeah, if the police are listening, that that wasn't really me. It was about 35 years ago. It's fine. went no. But yeah, it's those kind of things that you suddenly as you get older, you suddenly realize, well, actually, I do this now because of something that happened in my childhood. So there's a lot of things for me that that definitely kind of shaped who I am today, really.
Nika: I read your website and I read about you of course and there is actually one sentence that really ⁓ stuck with me and it is that ⁓ ironically the more I pushed myself the further I drifted from the people I love most and I think this is a great way I mean a great thing for our next discussion. How did you figure that out? Because I think this is something that a lot of people can relate to if they once
Andy Casey: you Yeah.
Nika: realize what's actually going on.
Andy Casey: Mm So the way I would I would probably describe it is if you've ever wanted something like ⁓ like a fancy car or you've wanted to buy a particular item with materialistic and I'm going to say materialistic because obviously we're now talking about people. But then when you've got that thing that you spend most of your time polishing it and doing everything to keep it shiny, let's just call it a car and doing everything around to keep it safe, but actually never driving the bloody car. Not to put my wife and my daughter as a metaphor as a car, but I've always wanted to be a dad. And after going through our struggles with IVF and going through adoption and so forth, I've been running my business for, I've been self-employed now for coming up to 19 years. And I've been working for myself. I've always been my own boss. I've been able to have all the freedom I want in the world, but that comes at a cost of it's 11 o'clock at night. I'm on my laptop and I was doing everything for them in my mind. But realising that actually I was starting to do things like miss bedtime. I was starting to miss the bedtime stories. I was starting to miss the dates with my wife. I was starting to miss everything about it to the point that the girls would say something to me and I'd be like, I wasn't there then, was I? And it was the moments that I was missing. But in my mind, in my mind, my mindset was 100 % I'm doing it all for them, doing it all for them. And it was a... It was definitely a big pivotal shift for me. And that pivotal shift for me was when I realized that I was just getting to the point of burnout. I was earning really good money, really, really good money. That was with my photography and my video business. You know, having great months, some great clients traveling all over the place. And the no two days were the same. So it was really exciting. There was always really exciting things happening. And then my wife, when we adopted my daughter, my daughter had bilateral hip dysplasia. And it took me out of my business. And do you know what? That for me was one of those moments where I realised that actually being employed for me was something I could never do because I couldn't have been at those operations, probably. I probably could have been there for her going into hospital, but I couldn't have stayed with my wife in the hospital for a couple of days or. I couldn't have stayed nearby or whatever, everything we did. And that, that was my independence of me having that freedom as a business owner to go, actually, I can be there for the girls. So in a way, I'd already created this kind of, like this kind of vision that was like, I'm doing it all for them, I can do whatever I want to be with them. But as a, as a result of that, I was actually just like, I was starting to be I was there for the bloody important stuff, you know what mean? But it was the little things, you know, like, having dinner, I was, you know, coming home and my dinner would be on the side or coming, coming home and my daughter's in bed or, and it was those things that you suddenly go, all right, you know, or the worst one for me is coming home and they're both asleep in bed because I've been out working late or been editing or, and ⁓ I'm a musician as well. So working and doing gigs at night as well could also be one of those moments where you're something like, I just like, I joked recently, said,
Nika: Mm.
Andy Casey: I still do about 30 gigs a year, but I joked recently, said, oh, I've got Saturday off. I was like, and I don't know if you ever remember the TV show, the Generation Game, but I said that the Generation Game is not on. And like, I've got a few messages on Facebook, which is just like laughing. But it's that kind of that kind of reality that like, I've been away that long, that actually, you know, a show that was on 20 years ago is not on Saturdays anymore. Yeah, so yeah, yeah.
Nika: Time just flies, doesn't it?
Andy Casey: I like the pivotal moment for me though, was I was standing at my, was in my studio with my wife and when my daughter had all these operations, my daughter, my wife kind of couldn't, wasn't in a position to work. And I think in a way I loved being able to be, say to her like, great, know, stay home with my daughter, be there for her. I can do everything. can supply, can supply, supply, that sounds wrong, doesn't it? I can support us, you know, and I, probably took quite a lot of pride in that. But as a result, she also then, as my daughter always got better and years gone on, she then came into the business and was probably living through my life a little bit because she was doing all the boring stuff that I don't like, like the accounts and that kind of thing. And we just got to a point where I just turned around to her one day and I just said, I can't do this anymore because I knew she wasn't doing what she wanted to do. I certainly wasn't doing what I enjoy most. And it just got to a point where I was just like, I can't do this anymore. And my wife turned around to me and she went, I genuinely thought you were asking me for a divorce. And I was like, no, why would I want to divorce you? Like, I'm married to my best friend. I've got like the most amazing daughter, the most amazing house, dogs. We've got an amazing life. Like, I'm just not happy. And then that was that pivotal shift for me where I was like, I've got to stop.
Nika: Thank
Andy Casey: I hate that phrase burning the candle at both ends because if you've been in any of the like the Christmas shops over Christmas, every candle has got about 50 wicks in it now. So yeah, so it's for me it's that it was that burning the candle both ends but in the middle of it I was just there going like I felt like I was I was constantly just getting battered by my own probably self neglect and the neglect of them really.
Nika: ⁓ You did a lot, so you had a breakthrough moment like you said and ⁓ there are probably mentors in your life. You probably read a lot of books. You did a lot of reflection work as well. But what actually dragged you from crossroads to your purpose when you figured out, okay, this is what I want to do in life.
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. quite a lot of there. ⁓ the big, the big thing for me, and it, it has to be when I kind of took control of my own fitness. That was the start for me because I, I did take control of my own fitness. ⁓ I joined the gym. I lost an awful lot of weight. went from 105 kilos down to 79 kilos. ⁓ and everyone around me was going. Bloody okay, see you're looking skinny. Whoa, whoa, hang on a minute. What do mean I'm looking skinny? I don't want to look skinny. I've like, I've worked hard. I'm like, I'm looking toned. And everyone around me made me feel how I didn't want to feel I didn't want to be skinny. I'm, you know, I tell people I'm six foot, but I'm probably about that much below six foot. But for me, when I then kind of came out of that moment I kind of hit a little bit of a lull because we when obviously went into coronial times I was able to work out in the garden I was you know I just you know I've not we've not seen a summer like it right I like ever like ⁓ but you know what that was is because it wasn't the fact that it was better weather it's because we appreciated it more and I think it opened my eyes so much to like ⁓ my god like
Nika: You
Andy Casey: I'm not spending enough time with the girls. not doing this. I'm not doing that. I'm not doing all of these things. And I did some online gym programming with some people. And I remember just one day there was like an online competition that was with turf games. And I remember one of the things that they said you had to do a box jump and I'd never box. I was like, and it had to be a certain, they put on it the height and I thought, oh great. So then I have a height. I had some old pallets in the garden. So I put two pallets on top of each other and then a dining room chair. I strapped them together and I just had so much joy of like, I've got it right. I'm at the right height. I'm blatantly not going to win a competition online. I'm not that fit, but I was doing it and I totally loved the process. I got to be like around with daughter and my wife in the garden. And I remember just that like throughout that kind of time, just appreciating life like ⁓ so I sort of through fitness kind of realized that actually when I feel better or everything else feels better, but the big ones for me, I worked with a couple of coaches. ⁓ I worked with a few coaches doing like working on my, my own mindset. ⁓ I realized that I've actually spent years in business. ⁓ I've got an awful lot of knowledge in business and growing with business, knowing what works. And like, I have a lot of that kind of, ⁓ experience. know, I know I've definitely made the fails, you know, and one of the presuppositions from NLP is that there's no failure, any feedback. And I love that because, you know, every little moment in my life that I've looked at that I've gone like, okay, this went wrong because so for me, like the people that kind of inspired me along the way was I worked with a coach guy called Paul Mort, who was an incredible guy. And it always feels like for me, that was another one of those moments where I was working with an online PT and the online PT, John and Leon from the lean machines that I work with. They wrote a book, ⁓ sorry, Leon wrote a book and in the book, he was talking about doing this thing called email domination that they've done. It's like an email academy. So help people with email marketing. And we're at this event with Paul Moore and at the back of the book, there was this reference to Paul Moore and his website. So I typed in Paul Moore. on my Instagram and I shit you not the guy was live on Instagram and I was like okay and I literally messaged him was like you're never gonna believe this I just read your name in a book and that was like a bit of a shift for me because that's where I worked on my mindset I didn't really need the business side of it but the mindset stuff for me and from then is when I then went full down and I spent a lot of time doing some various different coaching certifications. I spent six months training in NLP master practitioner as well. Got to meet some incredible people like Paul McKenna, Richard Bandler, that have kind of like, they've been along my journey. But there was one book that like really pushed me back into my purpose ⁓ and like my love of like self-worth. And I don't know if you ever used to watch Britain's Got Talent. But a friend of mine Merlin Cadogan was on it and he was juggling from memory because I've seen him do so many things over the years. I think he was juggling fire whilst in a ⁓ dive helmet that was full of water and then he had to juggle fire as scared of his man. Anyway, Merlin wrote a book and it's all about, it's all surf stories and it's like just all surf stories of this lad and his dad, his dad's a lifeguard and each individual chapter is like a different story. And it was all about, you know, growing up being by the beach. I was like, over the years, I kind of quite often now have kind of gone back to that book. In fact, it's right by my bed now, because I've just read it. And it kind of reminds me of like, what I most love. that is, you know, being around family, getting in the water, being by the ocean. And that for me is like the real like drive of like, actually, wasn't necessarily a mindset shift book or, you know, I've consumed a lot. am a serial consumer. But it was that little book for me that was like, oh yeah, like, I haven't been for a surf for a couple of years. like, how do I feel when I, you know, and I don't, I do this with my clients where you, you, you, you'll work for a moment where there'll be a particular happy memory. And we'll go back to that memory, for example, and I stopped remembering what it was like to feel cold getting out of the sea in the winter or, you know, that's that feeling of like, getting out the sea and you've had like 10 waves and you've had an amazing time. One of my favourite things is a shit surf is better than no surf. So for me, it's like that was like another little pivotal moment. yeah, every time I see Merlin, and do know what? He actually gave the book to my daughter, not me. So I've stolen it.
Nika: But it works for you and it very well, I guess.
Andy Casey: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I got to read that with her as well. So when she was younger, I read that with her and it was really nice to kind of almost kind of share it. For me, it felt like that book was just like it felt like it was written by me. It like it was written by my childhood.
Nika: Let's talk a little bit about your work. ⁓ You've said that you see high achiever patterns instantly. ⁓ What would be the most common imposter trap by your experience?
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. ⁓ The most common trap for me is probably hmm I the biggest trap they fall into, and this is probably something that you'll probably ask me about later on, I would imagine, but is thinking that what they want isn't good enough, or thinking what they've got isn't good enough. I experienced a ⁓ moment in my life, I was signed to a record label in 99, 2000, 2001, we were in a band, we were going over to America. And for me, I didn't feel like I was good enough because I was struggling on a particular part on a track and on this particular track, the lead singer who was a guitarist as well played that part, right? I was signed to the biggest record label in the world. And because I couldn't quite grasp it, I felt like everything was a failure. I was like, I remember coming away from it and like years later, just being like, you're in Sunset Sound. in Los Angeles signed to the biggest one of the biggest record labels in the world and you thought you were a failure like you got there because you turned up and did this and I think so many people do this they're like you know ⁓ they always want something else but like they their biggest thing is like they're like they look at they forget what they've got and they forget where they've come and the journey for me is something that you know I'm forever suddenly like having these like these moments where I suddenly bring up something in my in my past I'm like, ⁓ my god, yeah, I forgot and I found the picture of myself the other day. In fact, I'll probably post it on Instagram. And ⁓ it's me I wanted to be a clown when I was at school and I got told I couldn't be a clown because that it wasn't on the list that's in school careers advice, right? So I was told, ⁓ you quite like photography. And I was like, yeah, but I want to be a clown. I want to go to a circus school and to do this. I want to do that.
Nika: Hahaha
Andy Casey: And I kind of got battered down on it. And I was like, I remember at the time thinking like, ⁓ okay, well, you know, they probably know better, you know, that kind of thing. But when I look back now, I'm like, 44 years old now, or just at that moment, I just realized I'm 45 next in a couple of months, blimey, halfway to 90. That's good, though, right. But this picture I found is me dressed as a clown. didn't dress like a normal clown. I was almost like a jestery type clown. I was riding a six foot giraffe unicycle.
Nika: you ⁓
Andy Casey: at whatever age I was and I was thinking to myself when I looked at a picture the other day I was like you forget you had to ride a little unicycle to start with you forget you had to do the once you got the big unicycle and as a kid I ran a juggling club 20 pence come to my juggling club and when I launched it I had 20 people when I first when I first launched my business I didn't have 20 people sign up on my first day
Nika: Wow. ⁓
Andy Casey: when the the difference I was passionate about what I was doing and I was panicking about I was panicking about who was coming I wasn't panicking about the thing you know I wasn't panicking about juggling because I was loving juggling I loved unicycling I love still walking I love anything with fire which is probably why my hair is a bit more receding than it should be but for me back then when I was a kid I didn't give a shit how many people turned up they turned up because they knew I was passionate about it and they wanted to support me because
Nika: You
Andy Casey: I'd obviously made it exciting. think that's what a lot of people, they're so like, the biggest thing for me is they forget like what their passion and their purpose is. And they spend too many time, I mean, I'm sure we all do, you know. But people stay so much in systems and forget about like their passion and purpose. And then the biggest thing for me is they then go, ⁓ I'm not good enough because no one showed up. And it's like, well, actually, yeah, why did you start? You know, that's the big thing. Why did you start?
Nika: I think it's very easy also today with all the social media and everything being online and all you read is these success stories like I'm making millions and ⁓ my turnover went from 1k to 300k during one night and blah blah blah and it's
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Nika: Seriously super easy to feel like a complete shit Just because you you and it's it's also it's completely normal that you lose this passion because as a kid You don't have this your passion at work what you're doing So who cares if somebody shows up or it doesn't and this is really what we should be leaning more into Because I think I also personally think that once the passion is there everything else will find its place for sure It because it just has to it's just a rule
Andy Casey: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Nika: And we keep forgetting that particularly during our adulthood, think it's it's much harder to find this real flame within you than when you're a kid. ⁓ At least, yeah, that's how I see it. ⁓
Andy Casey: Mmm. Yeah, yeah, definitely.
Nika: So you've mentioned you're surfer, you've mentioned you're a musician, ⁓ and of course, dad as well. So tell me a little bit more ⁓ about your music career. Why not? ⁓ Music is my life. yeah, a little bit.
Andy Casey: You want to go down the music career? So right now all I do is I basically play for other people. ⁓ Weirdly, I was talking about my sister earlier on, but I wrote a song about my sister. I penned the last line of the song on her 40th birthday. I have written the song. I've got some incredible musicians playing on the tracks. The only thing that's missing is recording on the track is my vocals. and my bass guitar. She would be, if I'm right in saying she would be 51 this year. So 11 years later, I haven't finished the song. It's a classic creative person's thing, know, it's, it's like, you know, they always say like a builder's house has never finished being built. I definitely think, you know, being a creative is something that has kind of always been, it's been in my, it's been in my bones, like my whole life. I
Nika: Mm-hmm.
Andy Casey: I grew up with folk music around me. My dad was probably well known in the music shop because he would buy everything, he'd try everything. And I'm hoping he'll never listen to this, but he definitely was the owner of everything, but the master of none of them. He had a penny whistle. I remember him buying bagpipes one day, and I remember like, yeah, I can't watch that episode of Friends on...
Nika: I'm
Andy Casey: when Ross was playing the bagpipes, about laughing and just remembering my dad trying to play the bagpipes. But I think one thing he taught me was like, just to give it a go. And that's the thing that was key for me. So as a kid, I went off to the college, I did photography for a year. And once I did photography for a year, like, I've been asked to, I remember them putting a bag of potatoes on the table and being asked to draw them. And I was like, this is shit.
Nika: Yeah.
Andy Casey: I understand it now, like they were getting me to look at different aspects of light and concepts of shadows and, you know, and the being able to come create something out of just something that was just lumpy brown and covered in mud. So I left college, I went to a different college, I went to music for a year, I was doing a performing arts course, and I was doing a, I was depping for another band who needed a bass player. And one of the girls who, who I know knew at the time, said, weirdly, I knew her from the previous college. She was like, ⁓ we're our summer ball. Like, your band play the ball? And I was like, yeah, it's not my band. But yeah, so I went back to the guys and was like, look, guys, I've got us a gig, but I've got to be in it because it's like, know, so we got the gig, the guy spotted me, asked me, told me he was quite drunk at the time. And he was like, my son's in a band and they've got a publishing deal. And I was like, okay, mate, whatever. Anyway, it was like back when, you know,
Nika: Yeah.
Andy Casey: CDs and tapes for a thing. So I called him the following day. He sent me a CD, I listened to the CD and was like instantly like there was a song on there called Full Blown Criminal. And it was Tom who was the singer wrote this song and it's like all of the songs on there were just like, I've never heard any, I've never heard any songs like these. I was like, these just feel different. I grew up loving, you know, the Bon Jovi, the Guns N' Roses. So yeah, we basically I basically ended up joining this band and we won the Battle of the Bands of the Country, which is called the in the city, which is like the the music business, kind of like almost, almost kind of battle of the bands, but for the music industry. And like previous people who'd won it were like Muse. think Stone Rose has won it once and yeah, loads of people have played in it. And yeah, so we did that. we just we basically once we kind of done that, that that competition and that thing that event, we basically our ground our feet and hit the ground for a long time. It was like, back and forward to America meeting record companies, we got signed to RCA in the UK. Yeah, it was it was some crazy times. And then after we lost that record deal, which was it was a six month development deal when we went from being a free piece to a five piece. The record company like this isn't quite what we signed. but then as soon as we were like, you know that you know, you have that instant moment that you're like, ⁓ someone said no, but like, we that didn't hold us back because everyone was like so into it. We had incredible managers. We have a UK manager and American manager as well. And the guy that looked after us in America was a guy who who like found and signed Kid Rock. We had Mike Scott from the Water Boys, his manager in the UK. So we had some incredible people behind us. And there's not a moment in that that actually, I think at the time, I don't even think I even would appreciated it the way it should have been appreciated. But yeah, it was like about two and a half, three years of just like utter chaos. But it was incredible. even now still, I I say I depth for bands all over the place. I play at functions, at weddings. I just get to play and to me, like being able to play music is just like allowing myself to still be creative. ⁓ And I love it, I love it, I love it. Music's just like, yeah, it's one of those things for me that if there's ever a moment where like I'm having a dull moment, if I just switch off, put headphones on and just pick a track. ⁓ you know, I can, I can find a track that will change my mood. And I do a lot of pattern work with clients and a lot of anchor work with clients. And for me, there are some tracks that I know that can take me straight back to a memory. If I want to cry, then it's Lazarus by the Lazarus album by David Bowie. don't know if you ever heard his last album. There was a document
Nika: David Bowie, of course. Absolutely. The best album out there.
Andy Casey: Yeah, this the best album, but at the same time, it's the worst album, right? It's like, you know, so for me, like music has been a pivotal part of my life and a part of my life that, you know, there have been like timeframes in my life, which are, you know, people have these these timestamps, I feel like I have music stamps, where different songs have made different impact. And I just I love it. I love it. Absolutely love it. I am One thing I do notice with a lot of people though is the fact that they sometimes, you know, they don't listen to music and they forget why or how that makes them feel. I'm sure everyone's got a song that will just make them be like, yeah.
Nika: No, for me also, music has been with me since the times when you were recording on a cassette so you had a radio playing and then you ran and hit record so you could listen to it later.
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. And then you did you used to have a pencil with a cassette so you'd rewind it while you were driving? Yeah.
Nika: Of course, of course, yeah, of course. So people that maybe the younger generation that is looking at this will have to check it out on Google what this is. But yeah, it was a real thing. ⁓ I think, I also think that the music really significantly changed. mean, the consuming of music changed a lot, particularly in the last few years. For me, it's definitely the nineties. I mean, eighties, nineties, this is the music that always gets me out of the chair and moving. I love it.
Andy Casey: Mmm. Yeah. Yeah, am I am I well, don't think we are because I think music keeps us fresh, right? I am I I was writing my I was a little bit I wrote I wrote my goals for this quarter and I every year I do like I was planning to do this on New Year's Eve But we were doing so much on New Year's Eve because I was actually home for a New Year's Eve for a change That we were just doing so many other stuff and I got a big pad out the other day and I just did 26 26 goals
Nika: Yeah, this just means we're old.
Andy Casey: One of the things I put on there was six live gigs with my wife and my daughter, because I think it's important that we get to experience those things together. But another one of them was that me and my wife can just go to like a funky disco somewhere and just dine. We don't drink, we don't need alcohol. Just go and have a good time and yeah, dance, yeah.
Nika: Mmm. dance yeah yeah love it too love it too believe it or not we're coming to the end of the recording already yeah I know what I'm saying have fun right I knew it
Andy Casey: Wow. You
Nika: Let me just ask you one last question, really to wrap it up. ⁓ What's one powerful truth that you wish every listener claimed today and it comes from your story from the path you walked?
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. this one's really easy. ⁓ because everything we do is based on the decisions we make. And everything we kind of achieve in our life is based on how we push ourselves forward. And the big thing for me is that everyone has a choice. Everyone has a choice. So I hear this so many times, I'm stuck in my job because if I don't, I won't get my pension. Or if I do this, I won't get this. It's all right for you because you would... And it's like, well, you only have to look at a lot of the entrepreneurs in the world right now. There are people who are homeless and they made the choice to have that pivotal shift to do what they wanted to do. And I think it's knowing what your purpose and your passion is and knowing that actually... you have a choice. That's the biggest thing for me is like, I mean, I feel like I'm saying it over and over and I'm like, you just got a choice. Like people believe they don't have a choice. They do. There are always options. Yeah.
Nika: totally agree with you and I hope this really lands with the listeners. Andy, thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast. It was such a lovely conversation. I think we could go there for hours if you have so many interesting stories. No, I didn't do that. ⁓ Thank you so much. Thank you.
Andy Casey: My absolute pleasure. I normally get told to shut up on these kind of things. My pleasure. My pleasure.
Andy Casey: I love that and you even got a little choir from the dogs in the background, which I quite like
Nika: Yeah, that's a very non-podcasting environment, but that's fine, because that's just life, right?
Andy Casey: Absolutely. I've got three dogs and I normally plan my podcasts around everything in my life, but guaranteed Amazon wants to deliver when I'm normally doing a podcast. So, but not today.
Nika: Okay, so I always start at the beginning, which is childhood. So how was Andy as a child and how do you think that your childhood somehow shaped the way you are today?
Andy Casey: Wow, we go in there straight away. ⁓ Okay, I was an only child And my life has always kind of been a little bit like that even even now if I go to an event I quite like my own space I went to an event back last early when I was gonna say in the summer we're in the new year. ⁓ my god Yeah back back last summer ⁓ and you know, I do like I you know, I'm ⁓
Nika: Yeah
Andy Casey: I'm I'm a husband, I'm a dog dad, most importantly. But I still like my own space. And even though I like to my dogs on the beach, I still like to go and have my own time on my own. And I think that's something that definitely has stemmed from my childhood. As a kid growing up, I wouldn't say I had a typically traumatic childhood, but I had lots of stuff in my life that had kind of come up, cropped up. You know, my parents always, you know, looked after me, treated me well. But I did grow up in the the wake of my sister's ⁓ death and she died when she was five before I was born. ⁓ I always looked at her picture of her on our TV. She was always ⁓ kind of sitting there. You watch the TV at Christmas. She was sitting there on the TV and there was always this moment of ⁓ Feeling of kind of, my sister hadn't passed away, I wouldn't probably have been born. And there was almost a bit of me growing up, I didn't even realize that I felt this way. My mom was a massive community person, still is to this day, heavily involved in the church and being around people. I was brought up in kind of an environment where I was forced to listen to folk music. And I've always had music in my life and my parents were a key factor that. But kind of as I was growing up and I was getting older, I actually sort of learned to realize that there were a few things that didn't sit quite right in my life. One of which was my dad's alcohol use, which in the long term meant that he ended up having to have a liver transplant. And there was a lot of stuff that in my life as a child that I've never really realized that weren't quite right. And, you know, we had my grandparents come to live with me when we were like, with us when we were like 15, 16, when I was like, yeah, 15, 16 years old, which is a very poignant time in my life is going through GCSEs and had a grandfather who had dementia, you know, wandering out of the house at two o'clock in the morning without his trousers on, which was quite a comical story. But it was those little things that kind of happened throughout my life. But it wasn't until I got to about 40 that I actually kind of realized myself, ⁓ my God, like, I think I've actually been grieving the death of my sister my entire life. And that was a big poignant part for me, where when I started doing my own self development, I actually started to then look at the other things in my childhood. that had affected the way I am and the way I behaved and the way I you know, where I acted and so forth. So I think, yeah, my childhood was one of those things that I think as a kid, I just you know, I had a fairly good childhood, loved having a tree house, love throwing apples at cars from my tree house from from the back of our garden. And I don't know, it must have fallen off the tree. But yeah, if the police are listening, that that wasn't really me. It was about 35 years ago. It's fine. went no. But yeah, it's those kind of things that you suddenly as you get older, you suddenly realize, well, actually, I do this now because of something that happened in my childhood. So there's a lot of things for me that that definitely kind of shaped who I am today, really.
Nika: I read your website and I read about you of course and there is actually one sentence that really ⁓ stuck with me and it is that ⁓ ironically the more I pushed myself the further I drifted from the people I love most and I think this is a great way I mean a great thing for our next discussion. How did you figure that out? Because I think this is something that a lot of people can relate to if they once
Andy Casey: you Yeah.
Nika: realize what's actually going on.
Andy Casey: Mm So the way I would I would probably describe it is if you've ever wanted something like ⁓ like a fancy car or you've wanted to buy a particular item with materialistic and I'm going to say materialistic because obviously we're now talking about people. But then when you've got that thing that you spend most of your time polishing it and doing everything to keep it shiny, let's just call it a car and doing everything around to keep it safe, but actually never driving the bloody car. Not to put my wife and my daughter as a metaphor as a car, but I've always wanted to be a dad. And after going through our struggles with IVF and going through adoption and so forth, I've been running my business for, I've been self-employed now for coming up to 19 years. And I've been working for myself. I've always been my own boss. I've been able to have all the freedom I want in the world, but that comes at a cost of it's 11 o'clock at night. I'm on my laptop and I was doing everything for them in my mind. But realising that actually I was starting to do things like miss bedtime. I was starting to miss the bedtime stories. I was starting to miss the dates with my wife. I was starting to miss everything about it to the point that the girls would say something to me and I'd be like, I wasn't there then, was I? And it was the moments that I was missing. But in my mind, in my mind, my mindset was 100 % I'm doing it all for them, doing it all for them. And it was a... It was definitely a big pivotal shift for me. And that pivotal shift for me was when I realized that I was just getting to the point of burnout. I was earning really good money, really, really good money. That was with my photography and my video business. You know, having great months, some great clients traveling all over the place. And the no two days were the same. So it was really exciting. There was always really exciting things happening. And then my wife, when we adopted my daughter, my daughter had bilateral hip dysplasia. And it took me out of my business. And do you know what? That for me was one of those moments where I realised that actually being employed for me was something I could never do because I couldn't have been at those operations, probably. I probably could have been there for her going into hospital, but I couldn't have stayed with my wife in the hospital for a couple of days or. I couldn't have stayed nearby or whatever, everything we did. And that, that was my independence of me having that freedom as a business owner to go, actually, I can be there for the girls. So in a way, I'd already created this kind of, like this kind of vision that was like, I'm doing it all for them, I can do whatever I want to be with them. But as a, as a result of that, I was actually just like, I was starting to be I was there for the bloody important stuff, you know what mean? But it was the little things, you know, like, having dinner, I was, you know, coming home and my dinner would be on the side or coming, coming home and my daughter's in bed or, and it was those things that you suddenly go, all right, you know, or the worst one for me is coming home and they're both asleep in bed because I've been out working late or been editing or, and ⁓ I'm a musician as well. So working and doing gigs at night as well could also be one of those moments where you're something like, I just like, I joked recently, said,
Nika: Mm.
Andy Casey: I still do about 30 gigs a year, but I joked recently, said, oh, I've got Saturday off. I was like, and I don't know if you ever remember the TV show, the Generation Game, but I said that the Generation Game is not on. And like, I've got a few messages on Facebook, which is just like laughing. But it's that kind of that kind of reality that like, I've been away that long, that actually, you know, a show that was on 20 years ago is not on Saturdays anymore. Yeah, so yeah, yeah.
Nika: Time just flies, doesn't it?
Andy Casey: I like the pivotal moment for me though, was I was standing at my, was in my studio with my wife and when my daughter had all these operations, my daughter, my wife kind of couldn't, wasn't in a position to work. And I think in a way I loved being able to be, say to her like, great, know, stay home with my daughter, be there for her. I can do everything. can supply, can supply, supply, that sounds wrong, doesn't it? I can support us, you know, and I, probably took quite a lot of pride in that. But as a result, she also then, as my daughter always got better and years gone on, she then came into the business and was probably living through my life a little bit because she was doing all the boring stuff that I don't like, like the accounts and that kind of thing. And we just got to a point where I just turned around to her one day and I just said, I can't do this anymore because I knew she wasn't doing what she wanted to do. I certainly wasn't doing what I enjoy most. And it just got to a point where I was just like, I can't do this anymore. And my wife turned around to me and she went, I genuinely thought you were asking me for a divorce. And I was like, no, why would I want to divorce you? Like, I'm married to my best friend. I've got like the most amazing daughter, the most amazing house, dogs. We've got an amazing life. Like, I'm just not happy. And then that was that pivotal shift for me where I was like, I've got to stop.
Nika: Thank
Andy Casey: I hate that phrase burning the candle at both ends because if you've been in any of the like the Christmas shops over Christmas, every candle has got about 50 wicks in it now. So yeah, so it's for me it's that it was that burning the candle both ends but in the middle of it I was just there going like I felt like I was I was constantly just getting battered by my own probably self neglect and the neglect of them really.
Nika: ⁓ You did a lot, so you had a breakthrough moment like you said and ⁓ there are probably mentors in your life. You probably read a lot of books. You did a lot of reflection work as well. But what actually dragged you from crossroads to your purpose when you figured out, okay, this is what I want to do in life.
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. quite a lot of there. ⁓ the big, the big thing for me, and it, it has to be when I kind of took control of my own fitness. That was the start for me because I, I did take control of my own fitness. ⁓ I joined the gym. I lost an awful lot of weight. went from 105 kilos down to 79 kilos. ⁓ and everyone around me was going. Bloody okay, see you're looking skinny. Whoa, whoa, hang on a minute. What do mean I'm looking skinny? I don't want to look skinny. I've like, I've worked hard. I'm like, I'm looking toned. And everyone around me made me feel how I didn't want to feel I didn't want to be skinny. I'm, you know, I tell people I'm six foot, but I'm probably about that much below six foot. But for me, when I then kind of came out of that moment I kind of hit a little bit of a lull because we when obviously went into coronial times I was able to work out in the garden I was you know I just you know I've not we've not seen a summer like it right I like ever like ⁓ but you know what that was is because it wasn't the fact that it was better weather it's because we appreciated it more and I think it opened my eyes so much to like ⁓ my god like
Nika: You
Andy Casey: I'm not spending enough time with the girls. not doing this. I'm not doing that. I'm not doing all of these things. And I did some online gym programming with some people. And I remember just one day there was like an online competition that was with turf games. And I remember one of the things that they said you had to do a box jump and I'd never box. I was like, and it had to be a certain, they put on it the height and I thought, oh great. So then I have a height. I had some old pallets in the garden. So I put two pallets on top of each other and then a dining room chair. I strapped them together and I just had so much joy of like, I've got it right. I'm at the right height. I'm blatantly not going to win a competition online. I'm not that fit, but I was doing it and I totally loved the process. I got to be like around with daughter and my wife in the garden. And I remember just that like throughout that kind of time, just appreciating life like ⁓ so I sort of through fitness kind of realized that actually when I feel better or everything else feels better, but the big ones for me, I worked with a couple of coaches. ⁓ I worked with a few coaches doing like working on my, my own mindset. ⁓ I realized that I've actually spent years in business. ⁓ I've got an awful lot of knowledge in business and growing with business, knowing what works. And like, I have a lot of that kind of, ⁓ experience. know, I know I've definitely made the fails, you know, and one of the presuppositions from NLP is that there's no failure, any feedback. And I love that because, you know, every little moment in my life that I've looked at that I've gone like, okay, this went wrong because so for me, like the people that kind of inspired me along the way was I worked with a coach guy called Paul Mort, who was an incredible guy. And it always feels like for me, that was another one of those moments where I was working with an online PT and the online PT, John and Leon from the lean machines that I work with. They wrote a book, ⁓ sorry, Leon wrote a book and in the book, he was talking about doing this thing called email domination that they've done. It's like an email academy. So help people with email marketing. And we're at this event with Paul Moore and at the back of the book, there was this reference to Paul Moore and his website. So I typed in Paul Moore. on my Instagram and I shit you not the guy was live on Instagram and I was like okay and I literally messaged him was like you're never gonna believe this I just read your name in a book and that was like a bit of a shift for me because that's where I worked on my mindset I didn't really need the business side of it but the mindset stuff for me and from then is when I then went full down and I spent a lot of time doing some various different coaching certifications. I spent six months training in NLP master practitioner as well. Got to meet some incredible people like Paul McKenna, Richard Bandler, that have kind of like, they've been along my journey. But there was one book that like really pushed me back into my purpose ⁓ and like my love of like self-worth. And I don't know if you ever used to watch Britain's Got Talent. But a friend of mine Merlin Cadogan was on it and he was juggling from memory because I've seen him do so many things over the years. I think he was juggling fire whilst in a ⁓ dive helmet that was full of water and then he had to juggle fire as scared of his man. Anyway, Merlin wrote a book and it's all about, it's all surf stories and it's like just all surf stories of this lad and his dad, his dad's a lifeguard and each individual chapter is like a different story. And it was all about, you know, growing up being by the beach. I was like, over the years, I kind of quite often now have kind of gone back to that book. In fact, it's right by my bed now, because I've just read it. And it kind of reminds me of like, what I most love. that is, you know, being around family, getting in the water, being by the ocean. And that for me is like the real like drive of like, actually, wasn't necessarily a mindset shift book or, you know, I've consumed a lot. am a serial consumer. But it was that little book for me that was like, oh yeah, like, I haven't been for a surf for a couple of years. like, how do I feel when I, you know, and I don't, I do this with my clients where you, you, you, you'll work for a moment where there'll be a particular happy memory. And we'll go back to that memory, for example, and I stopped remembering what it was like to feel cold getting out of the sea in the winter or, you know, that's that feeling of like, getting out the sea and you've had like 10 waves and you've had an amazing time. One of my favourite things is a shit surf is better than no surf. So for me, it's like that was like another little pivotal moment. yeah, every time I see Merlin, and do know what? He actually gave the book to my daughter, not me. So I've stolen it.
Nika: But it works for you and it very well, I guess.
Andy Casey: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I got to read that with her as well. So when she was younger, I read that with her and it was really nice to kind of almost kind of share it. For me, it felt like that book was just like it felt like it was written by me. It like it was written by my childhood.
Nika: Let's talk a little bit about your work. ⁓ You've said that you see high achiever patterns instantly. ⁓ What would be the most common imposter trap by your experience?
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. ⁓ The most common trap for me is probably hmm I the biggest trap they fall into, and this is probably something that you'll probably ask me about later on, I would imagine, but is thinking that what they want isn't good enough, or thinking what they've got isn't good enough. I experienced a ⁓ moment in my life, I was signed to a record label in 99, 2000, 2001, we were in a band, we were going over to America. And for me, I didn't feel like I was good enough because I was struggling on a particular part on a track and on this particular track, the lead singer who was a guitarist as well played that part, right? I was signed to the biggest record label in the world. And because I couldn't quite grasp it, I felt like everything was a failure. I was like, I remember coming away from it and like years later, just being like, you're in Sunset Sound. in Los Angeles signed to the biggest one of the biggest record labels in the world and you thought you were a failure like you got there because you turned up and did this and I think so many people do this they're like you know ⁓ they always want something else but like they their biggest thing is like they're like they look at they forget what they've got and they forget where they've come and the journey for me is something that you know I'm forever suddenly like having these like these moments where I suddenly bring up something in my in my past I'm like, ⁓ my god, yeah, I forgot and I found the picture of myself the other day. In fact, I'll probably post it on Instagram. And ⁓ it's me I wanted to be a clown when I was at school and I got told I couldn't be a clown because that it wasn't on the list that's in school careers advice, right? So I was told, ⁓ you quite like photography. And I was like, yeah, but I want to be a clown. I want to go to a circus school and to do this. I want to do that.
Nika: Hahaha
Andy Casey: And I kind of got battered down on it. And I was like, I remember at the time thinking like, ⁓ okay, well, you know, they probably know better, you know, that kind of thing. But when I look back now, I'm like, 44 years old now, or just at that moment, I just realized I'm 45 next in a couple of months, blimey, halfway to 90. That's good, though, right. But this picture I found is me dressed as a clown. didn't dress like a normal clown. I was almost like a jestery type clown. I was riding a six foot giraffe unicycle.
Nika: you ⁓
Andy Casey: at whatever age I was and I was thinking to myself when I looked at a picture the other day I was like you forget you had to ride a little unicycle to start with you forget you had to do the once you got the big unicycle and as a kid I ran a juggling club 20 pence come to my juggling club and when I launched it I had 20 people when I first when I first launched my business I didn't have 20 people sign up on my first day
Nika: Wow. ⁓
Andy Casey: when the the difference I was passionate about what I was doing and I was panicking about I was panicking about who was coming I wasn't panicking about the thing you know I wasn't panicking about juggling because I was loving juggling I loved unicycling I love still walking I love anything with fire which is probably why my hair is a bit more receding than it should be but for me back then when I was a kid I didn't give a shit how many people turned up they turned up because they knew I was passionate about it and they wanted to support me because
Nika: You
Andy Casey: I'd obviously made it exciting. think that's what a lot of people, they're so like, the biggest thing for me is they forget like what their passion and their purpose is. And they spend too many time, I mean, I'm sure we all do, you know. But people stay so much in systems and forget about like their passion and purpose. And then the biggest thing for me is they then go, ⁓ I'm not good enough because no one showed up. And it's like, well, actually, yeah, why did you start? You know, that's the big thing. Why did you start?
Nika: I think it's very easy also today with all the social media and everything being online and all you read is these success stories like I'm making millions and ⁓ my turnover went from 1k to 300k during one night and blah blah blah and it's
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Nika: Seriously super easy to feel like a complete shit Just because you you and it's it's also it's completely normal that you lose this passion because as a kid You don't have this your passion at work what you're doing So who cares if somebody shows up or it doesn't and this is really what we should be leaning more into Because I think I also personally think that once the passion is there everything else will find its place for sure It because it just has to it's just a rule
Andy Casey: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Nika: And we keep forgetting that particularly during our adulthood, think it's it's much harder to find this real flame within you than when you're a kid. ⁓ At least, yeah, that's how I see it. ⁓
Andy Casey: Mmm. Yeah, yeah, definitely.
Nika: So you've mentioned you're surfer, you've mentioned you're a musician, ⁓ and of course, dad as well. So tell me a little bit more ⁓ about your music career. Why not? ⁓ Music is my life. yeah, a little bit.
Andy Casey: You want to go down the music career? So right now all I do is I basically play for other people. ⁓ Weirdly, I was talking about my sister earlier on, but I wrote a song about my sister. I penned the last line of the song on her 40th birthday. I have written the song. I've got some incredible musicians playing on the tracks. The only thing that's missing is recording on the track is my vocals. and my bass guitar. She would be, if I'm right in saying she would be 51 this year. So 11 years later, I haven't finished the song. It's a classic creative person's thing, know, it's, it's like, you know, they always say like a builder's house has never finished being built. I definitely think, you know, being a creative is something that has kind of always been, it's been in my, it's been in my bones, like my whole life. I
Nika: Mm-hmm.
Andy Casey: I grew up with folk music around me. My dad was probably well known in the music shop because he would buy everything, he'd try everything. And I'm hoping he'll never listen to this, but he definitely was the owner of everything, but the master of none of them. He had a penny whistle. I remember him buying bagpipes one day, and I remember like, yeah, I can't watch that episode of Friends on...
Nika: I'm
Andy Casey: when Ross was playing the bagpipes, about laughing and just remembering my dad trying to play the bagpipes. But I think one thing he taught me was like, just to give it a go. And that's the thing that was key for me. So as a kid, I went off to the college, I did photography for a year. And once I did photography for a year, like, I've been asked to, I remember them putting a bag of potatoes on the table and being asked to draw them. And I was like, this is shit.
Nika: Yeah.
Andy Casey: I understand it now, like they were getting me to look at different aspects of light and concepts of shadows and, you know, and the being able to come create something out of just something that was just lumpy brown and covered in mud. So I left college, I went to a different college, I went to music for a year, I was doing a performing arts course, and I was doing a, I was depping for another band who needed a bass player. And one of the girls who, who I know knew at the time, said, weirdly, I knew her from the previous college. She was like, ⁓ we're our summer ball. Like, your band play the ball? And I was like, yeah, it's not my band. But yeah, so I went back to the guys and was like, look, guys, I've got us a gig, but I've got to be in it because it's like, know, so we got the gig, the guy spotted me, asked me, told me he was quite drunk at the time. And he was like, my son's in a band and they've got a publishing deal. And I was like, okay, mate, whatever. Anyway, it was like back when, you know,
Nika: Yeah.
Andy Casey: CDs and tapes for a thing. So I called him the following day. He sent me a CD, I listened to the CD and was like instantly like there was a song on there called Full Blown Criminal. And it was Tom who was the singer wrote this song and it's like all of the songs on there were just like, I've never heard any, I've never heard any songs like these. I was like, these just feel different. I grew up loving, you know, the Bon Jovi, the Guns N' Roses. So yeah, we basically I basically ended up joining this band and we won the Battle of the Bands of the Country, which is called the in the city, which is like the the music business, kind of like almost, almost kind of battle of the bands, but for the music industry. And like previous people who'd won it were like Muse. think Stone Rose has won it once and yeah, loads of people have played in it. And yeah, so we did that. we just we basically once we kind of done that, that that competition and that thing that event, we basically our ground our feet and hit the ground for a long time. It was like, back and forward to America meeting record companies, we got signed to RCA in the UK. Yeah, it was it was some crazy times. And then after we lost that record deal, which was it was a six month development deal when we went from being a free piece to a five piece. The record company like this isn't quite what we signed. but then as soon as we were like, you know that you know, you have that instant moment that you're like, ⁓ someone said no, but like, we that didn't hold us back because everyone was like so into it. We had incredible managers. We have a UK manager and American manager as well. And the guy that looked after us in America was a guy who who like found and signed Kid Rock. We had Mike Scott from the Water Boys, his manager in the UK. So we had some incredible people behind us. And there's not a moment in that that actually, I think at the time, I don't even think I even would appreciated it the way it should have been appreciated. But yeah, it was like about two and a half, three years of just like utter chaos. But it was incredible. even now still, I I say I depth for bands all over the place. I play at functions, at weddings. I just get to play and to me, like being able to play music is just like allowing myself to still be creative. ⁓ And I love it, I love it, I love it. Music's just like, yeah, it's one of those things for me that if there's ever a moment where like I'm having a dull moment, if I just switch off, put headphones on and just pick a track. ⁓ you know, I can, I can find a track that will change my mood. And I do a lot of pattern work with clients and a lot of anchor work with clients. And for me, there are some tracks that I know that can take me straight back to a memory. If I want to cry, then it's Lazarus by the Lazarus album by David Bowie. don't know if you ever heard his last album. There was a document
Nika: David Bowie, of course. Absolutely. The best album out there.
Andy Casey: Yeah, this the best album, but at the same time, it's the worst album, right? It's like, you know, so for me, like music has been a pivotal part of my life and a part of my life that, you know, there have been like timeframes in my life, which are, you know, people have these these timestamps, I feel like I have music stamps, where different songs have made different impact. And I just I love it. I love it. Absolutely love it. I am One thing I do notice with a lot of people though is the fact that they sometimes, you know, they don't listen to music and they forget why or how that makes them feel. I'm sure everyone's got a song that will just make them be like, yeah.
Nika: No, for me also, music has been with me since the times when you were recording on a cassette so you had a radio playing and then you ran and hit record so you could listen to it later.
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. And then you did you used to have a pencil with a cassette so you'd rewind it while you were driving? Yeah.
Nika: Of course, of course, yeah, of course. So people that maybe the younger generation that is looking at this will have to check it out on Google what this is. But yeah, it was a real thing. ⁓ I think, I also think that the music really significantly changed. mean, the consuming of music changed a lot, particularly in the last few years. For me, it's definitely the nineties. I mean, eighties, nineties, this is the music that always gets me out of the chair and moving. I love it.
Andy Casey: Mmm. Yeah. Yeah, am I am I well, don't think we are because I think music keeps us fresh, right? I am I I was writing my I was a little bit I wrote I wrote my goals for this quarter and I every year I do like I was planning to do this on New Year's Eve But we were doing so much on New Year's Eve because I was actually home for a New Year's Eve for a change That we were just doing so many other stuff and I got a big pad out the other day and I just did 26 26 goals
Nika: Yeah, this just means we're old.
Andy Casey: One of the things I put on there was six live gigs with my wife and my daughter, because I think it's important that we get to experience those things together. But another one of them was that me and my wife can just go to like a funky disco somewhere and just dine. We don't drink, we don't need alcohol. Just go and have a good time and yeah, dance, yeah.
Nika: Mmm. dance yeah yeah love it too love it too believe it or not we're coming to the end of the recording already yeah I know what I'm saying have fun right I knew it
Andy Casey: Wow. You
Nika: Let me just ask you one last question, really to wrap it up. ⁓ What's one powerful truth that you wish every listener claimed today and it comes from your story from the path you walked?
Andy Casey: Mm-hmm. this one's really easy. ⁓ because everything we do is based on the decisions we make. And everything we kind of achieve in our life is based on how we push ourselves forward. And the big thing for me is that everyone has a choice. Everyone has a choice. So I hear this so many times, I'm stuck in my job because if I don't, I won't get my pension. Or if I do this, I won't get this. It's all right for you because you would... And it's like, well, you only have to look at a lot of the entrepreneurs in the world right now. There are people who are homeless and they made the choice to have that pivotal shift to do what they wanted to do. And I think it's knowing what your purpose and your passion is and knowing that actually... you have a choice. That's the biggest thing for me is like, I mean, I feel like I'm saying it over and over and I'm like, you just got a choice. Like people believe they don't have a choice. They do. There are always options. Yeah.
Nika: totally agree with you and I hope this really lands with the listeners. Andy, thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast. It was such a lovely conversation. I think we could go there for hours if you have so many interesting stories. No, I didn't do that. ⁓ Thank you so much. Thank you.
Andy Casey: My absolute pleasure. I normally get told to shut up on these kind of things. My pleasure. My pleasure.
