Episode 208 – 4 Years of The Jackson Hole Connection with Stephan Abrams and Michael Moeri

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Learning and reading is really important to me.

It hasn't always been important to me because my childhood was tough.

I was a challenged learner and a challenge reader, but.

I've grown into adulthood.

I've come to appreciate reading much more.

And when I read, I write down quotes and enjoy listening to them and reflecting back on those quotes and in, respect for Queen Elizabeth II I'm gonna provide a quote from her today.

When life seems hard, the courageous do not lie down and accept defeat.

Instead, they are all the more determined to struggle for a better future.

And that is Queen Elizabeth II.

thank you for her service.

And she was an inspiring person of how she gave her life to the crown and to the British.

And today you are listening to episode number 208 today's episode is a recap of the past four years and of the past year.

That's right.

I've been doing this podcast now for four years and thank you all for listening.

All of you.

Alumni of listeners and all of you, new listeners.

I appreciate it.

Please get out there and share this podcast.

If you find an episode which has inspired you, easy to share through whatever device you use to listen, sharing is caring.

That's kind of funny, huh.

But, really it helps me know that people are listening and, getting some value out of these podcast episodes and.

Today, Michael and I sit down and recap what has happened over the past four years, but also in the past year as well.

It's amazing how fast time goes.

I'm a friend of mine, RI Kowski said to me, when Lewis was really young, we were at a playground and he said, remember, Stephan, the days are long and the years are short.

And he's just so, so true that.

Days just seem so long and it just, before you know, it, it flies right by you.

So if you have children, give them hugs, whoever is in your life, give them all hugs and look at 'em tell 'em you love 'em and you care for 'em buy your significant other, a random, thoughtful gift, some flowers.

If they're allergic to flowers.

I'm a smoothie.

Just something to say, I'm thinking about you today.

And when you're in that line for coffee or free of your smoothie, maybe say, you know what, the person behind me, I'm gonna get their coffee too.

Just a little bit of random kindness, spread all around, helps build us all up.

thank you all for listening and supporting again.

And 208 episodes, four years.

I'm deeply honor.

That you invite me into your day each and every week.

And I could not do this without your support and the letters of kindness and enjoyment that you received from the podcast.

So thank you,

All right, Michael.

Welcome to the Jackson hole connection.

This is our four year recap.

We've been working together for four years.

Thank you for putting up with me for four years.

And most importantly, keeping me on track.

I try,

I try.

You're a busy man, so it's, uh, hard to keep you on track sometimes.

Well, I think we're all busy, Michael.

It's just, you know, am I sedentary?

No, I don't have grass growing around my feet.

I say that

yeah.

I can't believe it's been four years.

I, I still remember our first conversation sitting outside of cowboy coffee I I'm just so impressed with you stuff and keeping it going four years for a podcast in general.

That's really impressive.

And.

We've only missed a few weeks in this four year time span.

So, kudos to both of us, I'd say.

Yeah.

Kudos.

Well, I think I we're just gonna pat ourselves on the back of this whole episode.

Yep.

uh, well, I remember you once said that, you were even going camping at times and you had to see if the campground where you're at had wifi.

So you could.

edit and publish the episode at the LA because I'm so last minute with things

yeah, no, yeah.

Or to have to drive into the town quickly and make sure it gets uploaded.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, it's definitely been, um, something that has been on top of mind for the past four years, which is good.

It's kept me on track for, being able to put out some quality content and be connected to Jackson hole, especially now that I'm.

There anymore.

So it's been something that's keep me tied to the community as well.

I'm, very happy to hear that you still feel tied to the community and the community still welcomes you with open arms.

I can tell you over the past four years, Even though I've only missed a few weeks, maybe a few episodes.

There have been times that it's been a real struggle.

not just from the side of having a guest.

I mean, it's been down to the line like.

As I'm recording in the afternoon on Wednesday to get you the episode to edit.

So it can go live on Thursday, but there's ups and downs.

It's just, I'm a real person, just like anybody else out there.

And sometimes I'm like, Ugh, it's a slog doing this.

I don't know if I can do it this week.

I don't know what to come up with to do right.

I write the introduction and then I read it to record it.

It's like, oh, I can't do this.

I don't know if I can.

And so it it's a struggle at times to, to keep it going.

But when I hear back from people about what they received from the interview, receiving an email that you pass on to me, or even when I hear of somebody's story and, and I think of a big example, with that as with S Stephano Durango, the worm cowboy mm-hmm . And I went into that interview, thinking of Stephano as

And then he talks.

I think it's spine bifida.

all the surgeries that he had as a child, he has an autoimmune disease.

and then he and his mom were held hostage in Venezuela and that's what prompted them to move from Venezuela to the us.

It's like, whoa, me struggling just to do an introduction.

And this, this guy is still moving.

Has all of these.

Challenges barriers put forth to him in life and he's still going and he's creating his own business, which is no small feat in

itself that reminds me of the Joe Stone interview as well when he was talking about his struggle and then people trying to relate and like, oh man, I shouldn't be complaining about this.

But even, even Joe Stone was saying like, that's your struggle.

I, the comparing of the struggles isn't necessarily something that you wanna do stuff

And, It was grounding for me to hear that from Joe, who is, strong, strong athlete.

And he was somebody who took risks.

He had a major accident and there were consequences to taking those risk.

You know what he still got back into the saddle and is fighting for himself and for him to live life at the level that he can live life.

And it is remarkable.

He accomplishes more as a paraplegic, a person who lives in a wh.

Then most people who have no injuries whatsoever and yeah, you can't compare one person's problems to another person's because they are all unique to the individual.

So

Stephan, I'm gonna turn the table on you a little bit, as we do in our recap episodes here, ask you a few questions and pick your brain a little bit about the past year and the past four years of doing this podcast.

I, I wish you all the luck because usually I don't remember anything past 10 minutes ago.

let's see what we can dig up.

My wife was like, did you hear me?

I'm like what?

yeah, that's, I'll stay focused on what you're asking me.

Michael.

All right.

Do your best, do your best.

I know you have a, a sick kiddo, so don't worry if, uh, something slips your mind here.

so within the past year, what do you think is the biggest takeaway you've had, uh, within your guest interviews?

Was there anything that was kind of like an overarching theme or you think everything was just completely different than the previous

years?

Um, I, I think it goes back to when I interviewed Ste O I thought I was just talking to somebody about his business and the worm cowboy.

And then I, I got a whole nother side of a, of a life story and it just shows that the more we take time to talk to people, the more that we really learn who that individual is.

And.

Again, going back to what Joe said about your problem is your problem.

My problem is my problem.

I can't compare the two, that has helped me just be a more mindful person.

It's also helped me, be better at practicing gratitudes, you know, writing that out.

When I do that during the day, It inspires me more to say, I might be sore or having an ache or a pain today, but I'm gonna get up and, and just go do it.

And, and then also learning from a gentleman, Hal Johnson.

I've known how for, for many, many years now, and I've had the honor to go to his house.

He cooked a fried chicken one time over at his house and.

Here's how Johnson and he comes in and I just got the best hug that I had had in so many weeks, other than from what I get from my kids and my wife.

But I'm a person who likes to hug and just getting that unconditional hug of friendship from how I, I hope more people can allow themselves to be.

I don't know if it's being vulnerable.

But if you're not a hugger, allow yourself to hug because it can bring so much joy to you by receiving that.

When I go work out at the gym, one of the training coaches is Charlie shingle.

He's a hugger, Charlie's a big guy.

Like he's just a, a stalky guy and he gives you a big old bear hug.

And it, it just a great way to start the.

It's six 30 in the morning.

So over the past year, was there like a nonprofit that you had never heard of that we've actually had on the show?

Or have you heard of most of the nonprofit guests that we had?

Hmm, that's a good question.

I know I learned more about the nonprofits.

I think I was pretty aware of the nonprofits that were out there.

with Joe's him, the rebranding that he's working on with the Teton adaptive sports is working on to change it to Teton adaptive.

and then I think last year was Coombs outdoors.

It used to be Coombs, outdoors, sports, or, and their re been rebranding.

but certainly more insight into what the organization does.

has, has been very helpful.

Another interesting one because we're working, we're volunteering for them, friends of the Bridger Teton with Scott Colusa, and knowing that they're for the four service, they're the first one, essentially friends organization.

They're kind of a pilot program in some ways for what they're doing.

Gosh, the impacts that the forest is receiving due to lack of funding, but also the increase in, in recreation by people that friends group is gonna make some major, major impacts into the quality of experience that people have on forests.

So you've been doing this for four years, Stephan.

I know we've already talked about a little bit of, some of the ups and downs and some of the struggles, but what does keep you motivated outside of let's see, outside of hearing the feedback, is there any other motivation that keeps you going?

Stubborn Don't know when to stop.

I would think as well, talking to people, it's just another way for me to chat and growing up around my grandfather's hardware store.

And it was a slower time of life.

It was that time of life.

When there's no cell phones, there's no on demand television.

Their telephone at his store was not rotary, but the cash register there was where you actually had to push buttons to get to $12 and 59 cents.

And it didn't tell you how much change.

So people would just come in and talk.

They'd walk by the store and they'd come in and talk.

And, and that's what I like is having that opportunity to.

Be able to talk to people.

Do you have any instances where you had never met the person you did, the zoom interviews that you do and then you've ran into them in person over the past year?

Well, there's

been a few people I've actually made appointments to meet with like Annie, Dr.

Annie Finn with brain health.

She and I had coffee afterwards.

Have we run into people?

I, yeah, probably my life is I kind of go to work and.

Then in the afternoon, we're taking care of the kids.

So not running into as many people as used to.

I would say Annie Finn was one of the interviews this past year that made a, it made a pretty good impact on me.

just because, so I have higher blood pressure and.

The stuff that she does is right on par with trying to keep that stuff in check.

So if on her website, have you looked at some of those recipes she has on her website?

She has some really good stuff on there for some really creative, healthy meals.

So actually I've been checking out her website regularly to get some ideas for new meals and keeping things fresh in the kitchen.

So I would say that was one of the, one of the interviews that actually made a pretty good impact for me this past.

I'm I'm glad that to hear that it made an impact on you.

and yeah, you need to get that blood pressure and check Michael.

Yeah.

Well, I'm, I'm trying to work on it.

Yeah.

Uh, well, we don't try.

We do well,

I've lost 30 pounds in the past three months and I'm on blood pressure meds.

So

I'm trying like nice, good work, Michael.

Thanks.

I have looked at Dr.

Finn's website with her recipes.

They are.

Certainly very salivating reading 'em and eating well is easy, but what's not easy is us accepting that we need to do something different.

And the action of doing something different.

we as humans go to the path of least resistance.

So you creating a new habit of eating differently.

Then that will be your path to least resistance.

Yeah.

I

mean, even just the past, three months, it's just become a, it, I'm not even, I'm not even calling it a diet.

It's just a lifestyle change.

calling stuff like a diet or a fat or anything like that is not the way to live.

It's just a making smarter choices is really what, what it comes down to you

in.

Uh, I agree.

Yeah, don't call it a I, uh, with that about diet.

Yeah.

Um, it's just being more educated, more knowledgeable about what you should put into your body.

So we're gonna take a quick.

And hear from one of our sponsors and we'll be right back.

All

right.

So in the past four years, Stephan, how do you think you've grown as a person since starting this podcast?

Do you think you're the same guy you were four years ago?

Well, I, I hope I'm not, and I'm not gonna hope that's not right.

I am not the same person that I was four years ago.

And I don't think any of us are the same people that we were one year to the next.

And It's a matter of what we do with, with that time.

And each person I speak with I'm learning something, I'm learning about them.

I'm learning about their story.

I'm learning about new information that can help me be a more informed individual.

Bringing back to my family, share it with friends, people.

When I talk to them.

so am I different?

Yeah, I'm certainly different.

I still have a lot of growth.

I know.

Which is why I'm not gonna stop reading.

I'm not gonna stop learning.

And, I mean, I gotta be a learner as an example to teach the little guys, William, you wanna come join, come on over.

And we, hi.

William's it going?

He's climbing up on the chair.

How you feeling?

You wanna say hello?

Hello.

Hi.

We're celebrating four years of the Jackson Hole connection.

You've been a big part of it this year.

You've been mentioned in pretty much every episode, at

least.

Did you know, you are mention you and Lewis are mentioned in every podcast episode.

We gotta say something in the microphone.

What's your, what's your favorite part of the Jackson hole connection?

Um,

I just like doing stuff with the

microphone.

All right.

Yeah, me too.

I like that too.

The boys love coming into the office and recording their own version of podcasts and they interview each other and interview their stuffed animals.

Nice.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Both of my kids like doing that as well.

Like I have it connected at all times on the desk and they grab it, even though I ask them not to, but they still do it, but it's still cute.

You know?

Do you do that?

Yeah.

Yeah, but I don't, but we don't know how to turn

it on.

I've show you how to Stephan.

Sometimes doesn't either

yes.

I've forgotten to

it's.

Alright.

There's just so many, a few of those where like, all right, I gotta pump up Stephan's vocals to make sure

we get to hear him.

Yes.

Yes.

so I'm, I'm good at making mistakes as we all are.

Yeah,

that's right.

Okay.

so over the past year, Stephan, is there a guest that made you laugh?

more than usual, I guess I would say.

What do you think was the funniest guess you had the past year?

Hmm.

Gosh, that's a tough one.

I, I don't know.

I know there's always some laughs in, in the episodes.

I think just because I've been friends with Hal for so many years, having him on there and, and doing it in person was very moving.

because people like how, uh, Little bit older he's in his eighties, people like that who are just happy and happy to be here, um, makes such a difference and had some good laughs with John Hammond as well.

Uh, he and our buddies he's a very kind generous person and it was radical generosity.

In business was, was what he talked about.

And even though that's very serious, we can still have laughs and he, and I have certainly had some good experiences together out there on the trails.

I think the, the banter between, uh, Lily craft and max weather was pretty good.

The beyond skid cooking.

Couple, And Brian lens of the laugh staff is always pretty funny too, so that I think those are probably the funnier ones that I remember.

That's kind of stood out.

Um, Mikey Franco is a really funny, genuine person too.

I mean, he's always, uh, a blast to talk to.

So I've missed conversations with him when I talked to him at K

well, All, all of those people, um, me singling one personality.

Oh no, I know.

It's hard to think off the cuff too.

It's been it, it is over 200 episodes.

So you have to think back who was even recent.

So

yeah.

so we

went from.

1 59 to 2 0 7, about 52 weeks a year.

That's right.

Yeah, we could guessed average of 52.

And so yeah, about 50

or so, somewhere around there.

And, and Michael, you are now starting your own podcast.

The moving question that you're gonna launch, you said October-ish and October-ish yeah.

Yeah.

I said October is only a few weeks away.

how did you come about the, the name, the moving question and wanting to do your own podcast?

so the name itself came from.

So when you move somewhere and you know this, you, you ask it a lot.

You ask it every single week in your podcast, basically.

So why did you move here?

Why did you pick Jackson hole to move to?

So I live in Bellingham, Washington now, and I get the same question out here.

Why did you move to Bellingham?

Why did you pick this area?

And so I consider that basically the moving question.

Why mm-hmm why did you come to this area?

But it's kind of more of a overarching question now at this point.

So the moving question could be, basically anything.

Why, what was the biggest challenge when you were moving?

Why did you decide to move?

Why did you pick this area?

So there's more questions than just that one, but typically when you move summers, like why did you pick.

and the idea kind of spurred from our move from Jackson to Bellingham.

I moved quite a bit when I was a kid as well.

So just talking to people that have picked up and moved, uh, and kind of focusing on families that have picked up and moved, because I feel like that changes things quite a bit.

It was my first move with, uh, a child moving from Jackson to Bellingham.

It's a whole other experience, being able to bring other people's lives into that move.

and so just talking to other people and helping people that are in the place of either picking up and moving themselves or thinking about moving, or maybe just moved and just trying to provide tips and advice, uh, to those people that are looking for it, because it can be a pretty solitary thing when you're moving.

You're usually the only person that's gonna be picking up and moving to that area, unless they're within.

Immediate family.

Usually there's in a group of people that are gonna pick up together and move to a certain area.

That's just not typically how it happens.

So it's just kind of a way for people to listen to other people's stories and just kind of relate to other people.

That's, that's beautiful, Michael, very well thought out and people move all the time.

I think you'll find lots of people

to talk.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's been fun.

I've already done a few interviews, but as I know, working on this podcast, trying to have a good group of interviews in the can ready to go.

Mm-hmm is a good way to make sure you're not trying to get somebody in the last minute to keep the episodes coming.

So , so I'm trying to learn from past experiences as well.

There you go.

And, and my family and I we've been, we've moved a few times this year.

We pulled the plug to make some changes to our living situation and going from a, a small house with two bedrooms, one bath to a little bit bigger house and doing so we gave my first home that I bought, we gave it away.

It went away on shacks on racks.com back in may.

I created.

YouTube channel and Instagram called building in the hole in 22, 22.

I always mess it up when I make videos, but that's all right.

And this summer, well, last fall we bought a camper, which is for sale by, by the way I saw that.

Yeah.

And still for sale.

Okay.

It's still for sale.

camper.

Market's not as high as it was a little bit ago.

And we lived in a camper from April 29th to.

Labor day weekend.

And the nice thing about moving out of a camper is when somebody rolls over the whole thing, your whole room doesn't shake anymore.

when we're not living in there, but there was never a moment that anybody said, I can't do this.

I can't do this anymore today.

And so now, where are you?

Where are you situated at the

moment?

We have some family friends that are kinda like my parents out.

I'm I've come full circle to my living situation.

Michael, when I first moved out here to live with my brother, I lived in somebody's apartment, north of town and they've remodeled apartments a little bit different, a little bit smaller, but that's where we're living right now.

in that apartment.

And the beautiful part is, is they said, stay as long as you need.

We don't have to worry about, are these folks gonna sell their house?

And are we gonna have to find a different place to move into?

we're very, very blessed And the thing is, is when we moved into the camper, when we were doing that, we had no idea where we were gonna go in the fall, but we moved into the camper.

And that day we were over at Sandy and Susan's and he is like, Hey, our, our tenant just turned in saying that they're moving.

Do you guys wanna rent the apartment from us?

Yeah.

and how, how was the progress going on your, your new home?

That's going in place?

It's all about windows.

I'm waiting to hear from the builder, the manufacturer, and, uh, and I in Utah about if our windows arrive, cuz once when windows arrive, they can install those and then finish the rest of the stuff.

But they frame that sucker like in four weeks I went down there two weeks ago.

It's completely framed.

It has all the electrical run and they were working on the plumbing and mechanical getting all that put in place.

And it's all in a factory inside 60,000 square foot facility.

And there had to have been 20 homes in there.

Hmm.

Now there weren't always many modules as ours.

Mm-hmm but still shows just how much they're working on all at once.

And going back to episode 200 with Esther.

She mentioned that, was there a letter from the previous, the people that actually got your old home, were you able to check out that letter that they wrote to Esther about the

home I did and I should share that it is a beautiful, beautiful letter and they were so grateful to be able to receive that structure, our old home, because building costs have gone up.

So.

That for them to go do a stick-built house is just beyond their budget.

And that's why we did a modular home is to build the structure itself is about half of what it would cost to build a stick-built home.

Have you been able to go check it out?

We haven't.

Laura is the main one who stays in touch with them and we've just lost touch.

So hopefully this fall will make it over there and be able to see it.

but we're very excited for them to have it.

They will.

They're probably in it by now, if not very soon.

And it was wild to see your house, it was emotional to see your house.

Being moved by semi.

I can only imagine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, I don't, I don't think our house here in Bellingham would move, would be able to move our structure.

So , I don't think it'd be able to be moved maybe, maybe, but I, yeah, I can only imagine I mean, you were in the paper too.

Your house actually in the paper.

It's pretty unusual for somebody to see their house being on a big, uh, flatbed truck being moved downtown.

So

there are so many Keystone life moments that happened in that house.

I proposed a Laura in that house.

our windows that we put in were our wedding gift.

And that's where we brought both of our boys home from the hospital.

so that's where we had our wedding.

Reception is at that house and the house is help build the memories, but the memories will always be with us and we'll still be in the same lot.

All right.

So Stephan, what other takeaways you have over the past year or past four years?

And what can people expect from the Jackson hole connection in year five?

Um, biggest takeaway over the past four years is

there's always ups and downs in, in life with everyone.

And.

From looking outside in people, just see, Hey, you're producing all these podcasts.

They're great.

you keep getting it done.

Awesome.

It's a real struggle to get it done, but at the same time, I still enjoy doing it.

So for everybody to realize for whatever you see in what is marketed or advertised.

there's another side to the story.

And if you have a struggle, you're not alone and don't ever feel as though that you are alone, so find someone to help you with it.

so please get out there and, and, and, and reach out for help.

Talking to people is so therapeutic and, and getting into deep conversation.

Genuine conversation is very therapeutic.

And what can people expect from the Jackson hole connection in the next year is to still have engaging content, to still help share people's stories.

And later today, I interview somebody that I've known for probably 20 years and being able to reconnect with, with her I'm I'm, I'm extremely excited.

She has a, a very, heartfelt story.

And, and I say that not with a pun in any way.

so I'm very excited to, to talk with Suzanne this afternoon.

All right.

That's all I got.

S Stephan, anything else you wanna talk

about?

I just appreciate year support Michael and sticking with me, and I, I appreciate the people who.

Continue to listen and they share the episodes and, and they write to us to let us know about that.

They listen to the episode and that's what keeps it going.

can't say that it'll go on forever.

Everything has an ending, but usually with an ending there's a new, bright beginning

as well.

All right.

S Stephan, well, that's the recap of year four.

it's been a pleasure working with you the past year as always.

And I appreciate everything that you're doing for my family and for the community in Jackson, and you have a lot going on there.

So I think you should probably get back to it.

And I look forward to you talking to you next time.

Indeed.

Thank you, Michael.

It was great to see you today and get

to talk to.

Yeah, you too, Stephen.

All right.

Bye.

All right, bye.

To learn more about the Jackson hole connection and other episodes, you can go to the Jackson hole, connection.com.

Look for episodes on the top and you can actually type in a search and type in somebody's name.

You can search by month.

so there's a lot of different ways to find the Jackson hole connection.

Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, give us some comments which you think.

And again, I really couldn't do this without the support that Michael has offered to me over the past few years of marketing this podcast and doing the editing.

Over four years.

And of course my wife, Laura, and my boys Lewis and William, I love you dearly.

And just so happens when I'm recording this.

It is my anniversary week.

So, uh, happy 11 years to me and to Laura for being together more so to her, she's put up with me for 11 years.

thank you so much for your time.

Cheers.

Till next week.