Join Angie Austin and Jim Stovall as they dive into the profound impact of habits on our lives. Whether it’s about forming good habits or breaking bad ones, Jim explains how these patterns define our success and failures. Drawing from personal anecdotes and wisdom from friends like Zig Ziglar, this episode unpacks the importance of making decisions once to automate a better future.
Welcome to The Good News with Angie Austin. Now, with The Good News, here’s Angie.
SPEAKER 04 :
This call is being recorded.
SPEAKER 03 :
Three, two, one. Hello there, Angie Austin and Jim Stovall with The Good News, and today we’re talking about his column, Genesis of Habit. Hello, Jim.
SPEAKER 05 :
Hello, Angie. I’m excited to talk to you about this because I think it’s among the most significant things we’ve ever discussed.
SPEAKER 03 :
Really? Oh, then I’m very excited about doing that. Let’s just dive right into it then. We won’t even chit-chat first.
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, you know, we succeed in our life by making a handful of good decisions, or we fail by making a handful of bad decisions. And, you know, if you wanted a recipe for failure, I would give you four or five bad habits today, and if you’ll follow those, you’re getting ready to have a bad life. Well, the converse is true, that if you will follow good habits and create them, you get on autopilot. And it’s, you know, so many of the decisions… exercising, investing in your retirement, spending time with your family and your spouse. These are things that should become normal to you, habits to you, very much like brushing your teeth. You just don’t even think about it. It just automatically happens. The advantage of a habit is you only have to make the decision one time, and then it becomes a habit, and then you’re on autopilot. The other way to go is you have to make the right decision every day or multiple times a day. Now, if you’re currently involved in a bad habit, it’s hard to quit doing something because… The universe does not like a void. It fills in. So, you know, I remember when I was a little kid, my grandfather quit smoking. He was of that unfortunate generation when they didn’t know smoking was bad for you. And then all of a sudden the Surgeon General came out with the warning, and these people had to quit smoking. And it was not easy. Well, I remember he always had a shirt pocket where he kept his cigarettes. And, boy, after he quit smoking, he would reach up there. Every two or three minutes, he’s reaching up there for his cigarettes. And they weren’t there, of course. So what he did is he put gum and mints and various other things in there, and he just changed habits for a while. And that’s so much better thing to do. And so if you will think about the behaviors – that are going to get you from where you are to where you want to be, and then you will turn that into a habit, you’re on autopilot, and then your future is assured, and you just wait to see what happens.
SPEAKER 03 :
So how do we initially, and I know you just explained that, but this deserves repeating, initially establish the habit? Yes.
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, you have to get a little bit of a crutch, a little bit of an assist here. Let’s say you’re going to start working out three times a week.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 05 :
And it’s not a habit. That’s not going to be easy to do. Now, two or three months from now, it will seem weird if you don’t go work out. So in the interim, I highly suggest you either get a trainer. or a workout partner. And they become kind of your accountability until the habit kicks in and does it. And I have found from people that really get serious about it, if you are going to get a trainer, if you will prepay the trainer, Wow, you show up because, hey, I paid for this. I’m going. Or you have a friend or a workout partner that you know is going to be there or they’re waiting on you, and you’ll do it. And then before long, it just becomes a habit. I mean, my friend Zig Ziglar, I remember when he started working out.
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s just so funny to hear you say that. My friend Zig Ziglar that everyone in the world knows. That’s wonderful.
SPEAKER 05 :
One of the great things in my life, we met at speaking at an event, and I owe him so much, but he said, you know, we used to tell people with this strained, pained voice that you have to pay the price of success. And he said, in reality, you pay the price for failure. And over a period of time, you will enjoy the price of success. And he talked about when I first started jogging, he said, I went one block and functionally passed out on my lawn. I’m laying on my lawn trying to get some air. And the next day, I went one block and a mailbox, then one block and two mailboxes. And I just struggled through this. But then there was a day, several months down the line, I was on the road. I was up in the northwest walking. beautiful beachfront hotel. I’m jogging along the cliff there, and the sun’s out. And all of a sudden, I realized, man, I am not paying the price for success anymore. I am enjoying the price of success. And that’s the way it works. You just get to the point, you realize, this is just a great way to live. But I… I just cannot stress enough the importance of reducing those good decisions to a habit. Otherwise, you’ve got to make that decision every day. And I used to smoke cigars, and then I realized that was not good for me, and I made the commitment to stop. But I got the cigars out of my house, and I don’t allow them in there. Because when they were sitting over there in the humidor across my office… I had to make a decision every five minutes, am I going to do that or not? If they’re not over there anymore, now you don’t have to make that decision. They’re not here. So then I had to replace that with another habit, and it didn’t take long until it just seemed normal. But it was not easy in the beginning. And, you know, anybody that tells you getting rid of tobacco is easy has never done it, I can assure you, and I have great respect for people that do that. But, you know, get the accountability, get the guardrails around you so that, you know, you’re on autopilot, and then before you know it, You don’t need it anymore. It just doesn’t matter. It’s like when we learned how to ride the bicycle and my dad was running along behind me holding on to the bike and all of a sudden I realized he’s not there anymore and I’m actually doing this. And that’s the way good habits work.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, it’s so funny you bring up bike. We were just in Santa Barbara. We went up and down the coast with Faith and I wanted to show my husband on the west coast in California some of the cities that I’d worked in that I liked for retirement and Like, I like San Diego, Coronado Island, Orange County, California, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, I like, but not, you know, to live in. But anyways, we’re going through all these cities, right? Well, in Santa Barbara, they’ve taken State Street now that used to be able to drive up and down. And during COVID, apparently, they closed it down and they have electric assist bikes all along. So call me cheap, Jim, but I have a hard time. Like, if you have a family of five or six, because we travel sometimes with Gran Gran, and an excursion on a cruise ship is… you know, $200 each, we’re talking 1200 bucks. Well, I got the cruise last minute. So you’re almost paying for an excursion what you paid for the whole cruise, right? And I just can’t bring myself to do it. So I try to figure out something else to do. So we see these electric bikes. And I’m like, Oh, how fun because I want to see the Santa Barbara courthouse and I want to, you know, go look at some of the old buildings. You know, they’ve got a lot of, you know, homes that were built there in the 1800s. And so anyway, just grab the bike, right? And then Faith, my 16-year-old, says, oh, my gosh, I can’t believe you can ride a bike. And I’m like, I don’t think you forget unless you completely lose your balance. You know, granted, Jim, I did go up some hills because I had to get – I wanted to drive to the university, a ride. I mean, I did use the electric assist, which, by the way, have you ever – well – Have you driven with someone on a tandem bike with electric assist? Because if you don’t know Jim, Jim is blind. So have you done it?
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, I actually own a bicycle for two, but it’s side-by-side. Oh, I love it. And it’s got an electric assist. And I found the bike when I was out in San Diego, and they had them on the island where I was speaking. And I said to find out where they buy these, and I’m buying one. And I got one, and for many years I rode that bike.
SPEAKER 03 :
um three times a week and would go and the assist was really amazing and um it is isn’t it i mean because then because people were stopping on the hill that had a regular bike and of course you know i could i still stood up to give myself a little bit of extra power but um yeah it is really cool because you can still you know put some effort in but it kind of just assists you yeah yeah and it and it doesn’t do a lot it just does enough to get you over the hill Yes, it’s perfect. Yeah. And boy, when you’re biking in Santa Barbara, I mean, it’s really paradise. They really call it the California Riviera. I mean, it really is quite a beautiful spot. But anyway, so we rode bikes while we were there. And that was really neat. But my daughter was just astounded that I could ride a bike. Not so much my husband, because he’s younger than I am. And, you know, six, six and thin and goes to the gym all the time. But when you mention habit, we do family gym night and they usually lift and I walk and use resistance bands. And when Hope left for college, she was like one of our big motivators to get to the gym every night. It used to be all of us. And then Riley left for college. And when Hope left for school, it really changed our habit because she knew that we, quote unquote, had to go. And so she knew that her dad wouldn’t let her out of it because she was getting ready to go play her college sport. And so she’d be the one prompting us because she’d want to do something else. Faith, not so much. So we’ve had to get my husband and I into our own habit. independent of the kids now to go on our own but it has become such a habit that we do still want to go even you know if they aren’t um there with us oh by the way just an aside i don’t know if i sent anything to you but um hope was in the paper in her little town in tennessee she had um 20 kills in one game which is pretty astounding and then she was named like i don’t know like player of some tournament or something like that they put her in the paper so that was the first time for her that she’d ever been put in the paper but it was just really sweet because they they make a big deal out of their college athletes in this tennessee town and it was very sweet for her to see some of the payoff oh and then um for kills on her team uh the seniors play the most but um she’s a freshman that does is in the rotation all the time and so she’s number two on the team for kills and not far behind one of the 22 year old seniors and she just turned 18 so Who knows what she’ll be like when she’s a senior. So I guess my point to that is all of these habits of working out and the lifting and everything, the power that she’s been able to generate from these years of habits of going to the gym together, it’s paying off.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, it does. And she would be happy to know, as would you, on my satellite radio every day, they have the schedule of all the football, basketball, baseball, and everything I listen to. And they now have a radio broadcast that I can get across the country of women’s college volleyball. And it’s really, really fun. And it is so much fun that, you know, they have the announcer and they call, you know. And it is really good. It’s fast-paced. It’s fun. And, you know, I’ve tuned into several of those.
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s interesting because in high school, I don’t know, basketball takes quite a bit of skill and you can’t just run out there in high school and pick up basketball when you’ve never done it before because there’s the dribbling and there’s the shooting and there’s the defense and then there’s the different plays. But volleyball, my daughter picked it up at 15 and is playing in college, which is relatively late for someone that’s playing in college. And they have some semi-professional teams now, I guess, and they’re building some stadiums. I don’t know. It’s getting popular enough that they’re starting to make this a thing where you can go and watch and you can play semi-professionally here or maybe even professionally. I know overseas it’s a little bit bigger. And I’m a little bit torn on what they’re doing with the NAIA, which my daughter is in. A lot of the Christian schools aren’t like a Division I, II, or III. They’re an NAIA school. And she you can be, I think, up to around 30. So these girls overseas that are, you know, 26, 27, 28 that have played volleyball professionally or semi-professionally come over and they played a couple of teams that really were international teams from all over the world that were significantly older than my daughter. And I’m not saying I don’t believe everybody should have an opportunity to play college sports. But when you’ve got the U.S. kids that are 18, 19, 18 to 22, basically coming out of high school, and then you have the girls coming over from Poland and Serbia and Italy and South America, and they’re women that are really strong players. I mean, let’s just say with a couple of these teams, they didn’t stand a chance.
SPEAKER 05 :
You know, I experienced the same thing when I was on the Olympic team. You know, here in America, it was all amateur, and, you know, you were on your own with a coach and struggling, and then you’d get these European and Asian teams where – Frankly, they’re professional athletes. They may have called it they’re a major in the Army or something, but let’s not kid ourselves. They were there to compete. They were older. They had a lot more experience. It gave us an awful lot to shoot for. And but then, you know, when they opened it up to our professionals, you get the dream team and you got Magic Johnson and Larry.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yes.
SPEAKER 05 :
And then then the world changes.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yes. Well, Jim Stovall, it is always a pleasure. And we are out of time. Jim Stovall dot com. Thank you, friend. Thank you.
SPEAKER 02 :
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SPEAKER 03 :
Well, if you are just joining us, this is Angie Austin with the good news. Did you know that eight teens in the U.S. are killed in car crashes each day? I was surprised to learn that car crashes are the number one cause of death for teenagers. And so that’s the leading cause here in the U.S. I’ve got three teens. So that makes me a little nervous. There’s a safe driving program that aims to change the statistics and give new drivers the tools they need to stay safe. And this is National Team Driver Safety Week. And joining us is James Bell, head of corporate communications for Kia America. Welcome, James.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, thank you so much for having me on. This is, as you just well said, very important topic. So important that we get this out there.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, we had just recently a motorcycle accident right down the street from us at the high school where my kids go, and it was one of my daughter’s friends. I’ve got three teens, as I mentioned. And anyway, the boy who just graduated with my daughter and then the girl who was still in high school, they both died. died immediately. And we were just so distraught. It was like, you know, like, Oh, kids, the, the, you know, the streets closed down by the school. And then we’re hearing motorcycle accident. And I’m thinking, you know, you know, 20 something young man or something. And I was just devastated. And then my son, someone pulled in front of him just one year ago, actually today. Um, and, uh, it was, uh, they, they turned right in front of him. And anyway, he got, he totaled his car and the adult and the other car said, Oh, you know, it was the kid’s fault. Well, Thank goodness for those cameras, right? Because it was actually 100% her fault. And so that really, of course, helped us to have the camera because, you know, of course, then my son wasn’t at fault. But I do put them in safe driving classes. But I think the one that we’re going to talk about today comes about for a rather interesting reason. So let’s just start there in general, you know, what you’re doing for us during National Teen Driver Safety Week. Yeah. So, yeah, you made a great point.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah. not only is this a daily or an hourly calamity, but most importantly, it’s things that can be probably avoided. A vast majority of the teen deaths or inactions that happen are completely unavoidable. because they’re connected to bad driving habits. They’re not paying attention to, you know, the level or they don’t have the level of maturity, I should say, for making the good decision, the underexposed decision all the time. And so it’s a very difficult thing. And because these can be avoided, that’s where the BRAKES program that Kia is proud to partner with came about. And it’s why we’re i mean let’s put it this way my own daughter’s been through the program and knock on wood she’s had a good couple years of driving since then so i feel like it’s uh it’s personally and professionally gratifying that kia is deeply involved in this now i read that um a drag racing star uh actually was involved in getting this going can you tell us a Doug Herbert, I’m happy to say I’ve spent a lot of time with Doug. He’s a tremendous man. He and his family are great people. He made his fame and fortune as an NHRA drag strip driver, strapping himself into a car and teasing death, if you will, every time he did 300 miles an hour at full throttle down these racetracks. The sad irony in this is while he had that background… He had two teenage boys, sorry, sons, that about a mile from their house had a single car accident and were both killed. And for Doug, you know, again, for him making his living driving at the full extreme to then have his sons die, again, less than a mile from home, it was just too much to take. So he and his wife Mimi dedicated themselves from that point forward to providing some degree of assistance, some extra education, things that he wishes his sons had gone through. And, you know, it’s really about finding that line between, oh, driving is fun and driving is real and driving is serious. And the Brakes program, I think, does a fantastic job.
SPEAKER 03 :
Tell us a little about the Brake Safe Driving Program. I know now why it was created, part of the reason, but I know from driving with my teenagers, they don’t slow down for red lights. It drives me nuts. I’m like, why are you still on the accelerator? And there are like stopped cars in front of us. Why are you still on the accelerator? And I have to be honest with you. And some people may think I’m too much of a micromanager. I track them on an app. So I see all their hard brakes. I see all the fast stars. I see every route they take. And I also see when they speed and for how long they speed. And the funniest thing. Well, this isn’t funny, but I saw a bunch of donuts in the local park last winter. And there were circles and circles and circles. And I was like, oh, my gosh, my son was doing donuts in the park in the snow on the grass, like in the park. And so I showed him all these circles. Right. And I go, what is this? And he looks at it. He sees circle after circle after circle. I mean, how can you deny that? Right. It’s so great. We can track them now. But tell us a little bit more about the program.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, well, you know, you talk about slowing down before red lights. I wish my wife would listen to you on that. She seems to keep going and wearing out those brakes much more than necessary. Yeah, so the program is multi-level. It teaches kids, again, to have responsibility and discipline. get them a head start on the maturity of the many decisions that we face as drivers, facing not only changing weather and traffic conditions, but other drivers as well. There’s two particular parts of the curriculum which I think really resonate. One of them is that we put plastic tires on the rears of the car to help teach teen drivers how to steer themselves out of a spin. Now, your son, he was doing it on purpose. But the point of the story is sometimes we end up in a car that’s sliding, and so there are ways to mitigate that. But when you have a car with plastic tires, I don’t care if you’re Mario Andretti, you’re not able to mitigate that. The car will continue to slide around. And so that, I think that is a really important lesson. Not only is it kind of thrilling and fun, but it also reinforces for a teen driver that there are some circumstances that cannot be beat. So the point of the story is let’s not put ourselves in that circumstance. That’s the real learning there. And then the other one I think is really fascinating is they’ll have the drivers out on the, on the closed course going around cones. And if one of the if the instructor notices that the driver seems to be relaxed and confident, he or she will reach into their pocket, take out their phone and say, Oh, look, I just got this funny picture on my phone. And if the driver looks at it, they failed that part of the class. And not only are team’s, feeling a little bit, you know, uh, uh, death defying and pushing boundaries, but then they also have the impact of social media and the constant connectivity. And so, uh, you know, distracted driving is just as much of a killer, if not more than traffic, you know, weather patterns and things of that nature. So it’s, it’s a really great course. And again, it’s just, it’s just built to kind of put it a team driver in their place and recognize that, Driving is a dangerous thing. You know, today’s cars are so quiet and safe and comfortable. I mean, cars today have, you know, ventilated seats with massagers built into them. They’re wonderful. But things can happen quickly. And that’s the point of the brakes program.
SPEAKER 03 :
I love the idea of the, you know, knowing how to get out of a spin. I don’t know if I would know that. And when my kid was doing these donuts, it was obviously in snow. You know, he was in snow. And when I get into a situation like that, I don’t know that I would really be that great at getting out of that. So what a great thing for the kids to learn. What are, James, the main causes of crashes in the U.S.? ?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, amongst teen drivers, it’s just, you know, lack of confidence in the tough situation or lack of skill set to recover. But more importantly, or more often, it’s just things that are necessary. You know, teens are often in cars with other teens. Maybe one is the lucky one that has a car or one is the lucky one whose parents will let them borrow the family car. So they’re taking them to the movies. They’re taking them to the high school football game. They’re the kind of driver, if you will. And so not only are they immature drivers for themselves, but now they also have the additional responsibility of taking care of the others in the car. So it always boils down to, in teen driving situations, just bad decisions. That is the primary problem we have here. In some cases, that’s part of the human experience. Teams, you know, we as young adults are made in some ways to push boundaries and find new ways to do things. But when it comes to driving, there’s only one way to do it, and that’s safely.
SPEAKER 03 :
You’re talking about bad decisions. Every time I have to drive in that parking lot across the street at the high school, I feel like I’m taking my life in my hands. It’s like the way they back out, the way they run through the stop sign, the speed at which they’re going to lunch, like it’s mind-blowing to me. And it’s funny because the SUV my son was in is a really heavy, like an old Lexus SUV. In fact, we brought him home from the hospital in it. And so it’s like, I don’t know, it was like a 2003 or something. Yeah. So my other daughter has a 2006, and she’s like, oh, I got the dumpy car in the parking lot. I’m like, dumpy? I’m like, I was driving that until two years ago. Like, give me a break. I’m like, those things are like tanks, you know? But all these kids have cars, you know? And a lot of them have really nice cars, which is mind-blowing to me. My son actually, James, went through – I’ve never in my life – gone through brakes while they were still under warranty. So we take his car in and they’re like, Oh yeah, it’s no brakes, but don’t worry. They’re still under warranty. And I’m like, who goes through brakes while they’re still under warranty?
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s a fair point. That that’s, that’s the driver that needs to go through the brakes program.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yes, yes. Well, how do kids get involved in the Brakes program? And maybe even mention how Kia, how you all got involved.
SPEAKER 04 :
Sure. Well, you know, we raise our families in the same places that everybody lives. I mean, while we think our cars are wonderful and very safe and have, you know, the latest in technology at a very fair and affordable price, which is so important, driving habits, you know, they impact us too. We live where you live. Our kids go to school where your kids go to school. So we just thought it would be a responsible thing to not only have the latest in safety technology in our cars, but then also take that next step of helping teen drivers know how to manage themselves better. We think that just makes communities safer and the communities in which we all live. So we felt a responsibility there.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, don’t judge me for this, James, OK? But I found that when I have a Tesla, so it goes pretty fast. I don’t like them to drive it too much. And I had one of those kids stickers on the back that says, you know, team driver. I have to tell you, I’ve left it on to their embarrassment because people are so nice to me that when I’m driving, I feel like I’m treated like a queen when I have the team driver thing on. So I’ve left it on my car because people are so courteous.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yes. No, I mean, it is a – that’s good to know because, you know, other people report that there’s a lot of crazy road rage out there. And I think it’s just because we all keep very tight schedules. We’re always moving and grooving. But driving is not a place to let your emotions get the better of you, not only for yourself but also for those sharing the road.
SPEAKER 03 :
And I do highly recommend attracting your kids the way we have. We even had a deal where if you got a certain number of hard brakes or a certain number of this or that, you’d be financially penalized and lose the car for a week. So they really had an incentive to not be doing the hard braking, fast acceleration, and speeding. All right, I just want to, again, review how people can get involved and get their kids involved in the classes. Where’s the best place to go?
SPEAKER 04 :
That’d be to a website called putonthebrakes.org. Again, put on the brakes. There you have a full schedule of all the different events going on around the country. If one isn’t in your neighborhood in the near future, it might be worth a pretty valuable road trip. It gives you good time to practice safe habits with your teen in the car, and the experience they’ll have is, you know, you can’t put a price tag on it.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I just want to say thank you for all you’re doing to help these kids and the lives that you’re saving by getting involved with the program and by doing these interviews as well. Thank you so much. Pleasure’s all mine. Thank you.
SPEAKER 01 :
Thank you for listening to The Good News with Angie Austin on AM670 KLTT.
