Nathan Webb's Battle Against Bullying and Quest for Work-Life Balance

Speaker 1: 0:10

Everyone, welcome back to the Motion Man podcast Today. I am thrilled to have with me my cousin-in-law Is that exactly the technical term. Nathan Webb, and he is the founder of Blaise Be Gone, which is a company that helps remove bullying from schools, and I'll let him maybe correct the best way to say that Also, he has three kids ages five to four months, which I should say a belated congratulations, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2: 0:42

We like him. He sleeps a lot.

Speaker 1: 0:44

So, nate, why don't we go ahead and start off? Why don't you share a little bit about Bullies? Be Gone where the idea came from and how you started it.

Speaker 2: 0:51

Yeah, totally, bullies Be Gone started back in 2018. So I did pest control. I sell pest control still do Long time through. This upcoming summer is gonna be my eighth summer doing it, and in 2018, i was starting my third summer. I was in Alabama and I was knocking door to door And I just had the feeling like I want to do more, i want to be more, i want to be more fulfilled.

Speaker 2: 1:15

As a door-to-door salesman, you can make a shiz ton of money, but it is not very fulfilling. It is low key. The sucks. It is very much a means to the end, or people who just really love money and don't really care the past to get it. They do it forever and ever. That's not me, and so when I was doing it, i was like I wanna be more. What can I do so I can be more fulfilled And, by the same time, maybe provide for my family? And I thought about starting this YouTube channel called Bullies Be Gone, cause I got bullied a lot as a kid and I learned some tough life lessons Several of them I wish I could have learned sooner, and so I started thinking about my stories and the different things that could resonate, and at the time.

Speaker 2: 1:53

I just barely graduated with my bachelor's in psychology, with a little emphasis on behavior analysis, and I had applied and been rejected from the school psychology program at Utah State. And I'm like crap, i got this degree in psychology. It's useless. What grad program can I do? And so I had been accepted into a grad program for school counseling, and going into that had reminded me about my passion for helping kids get through bullying. And anyway, while I'm knocking doors this summer that summer of 2018, i thought about. I came up with the idea for Bullies Be Gone, and initially it was just going to be a YouTube channel educating people about bullying and had tips and tricks on how to get over bullies and a mindset thing not really talking much about bullies, but more empowering bully victims. In the end, i figured out I didn't like YouTube very much, at least creating on YouTube, and I was a lot better at creating on Instagram, and so it turned into an Instagram page.

Speaker 2: 2:51

And then that next fall, i gave my first presentation. I was in one of my wife's seventh grade classrooms And I was like, oh my gosh, that was so much fun. I love this Cause. At the time, i'd been thinking, okay, what do I need to do to monetize being an influencer on Instagram about this subject. And then I spoke and I was like, oh my gosh, this is what I really want to do. I want to speak. And so it was tricky, because that is when I entered into my grad program was 2018 was when I started.

Speaker 2: 3:21

The fall of 2018, it's a three year program including an internship, and so I got my first paid speaking gig in 2019. The next year, my wife's aunt was a PTA president over in Caysville area And I gave my first presentation paid presentation And I was like, oh my gosh, i just got paid to do this, and so that's where it started. And then, from there, i've been able to partner with an amazing organization called Save the Kids. They helped get gigs for me and speak more and podcasting, and a lot of stuff has come from that, but that's where it started, that's amazing Having been, I swear everyone's been bullied, at least once.

Speaker 2: 4:02

Oh yes everyone's experienced unkindness. Maybe they haven't been bullied, but they faced unkindness that really felt like it.

Speaker 1: 4:09

Yeah, yeah, and there's still even a lot of bullying that happens at work. It's not consigned to the school environment No, definitely not. So when we talk about when you you know you're a school counselor you're starting by doing this speaking gig. Where are you at now? Because I believe you've made an important decision.

Speaker 2: 4:29

I have. So this last school year, between Save the Kids and my own efforts, i had gone out and I'd given quite a lot of presentations. And some people are like, how do you do that and work full time? I'm like I use my time off, i take my personal leave, i take my sick leave and I use that and I go speak with it. And I almost ran out this year, which was scary because then my wife had a baby in January. I'm like crap, i need to use this. And because I pretty much ran out, i was like you know what Something needs to give. I either need to do this less or jump all in.

Speaker 2: 5:01

And me and my wife were religious, and so we prayed about it and we went, and we went and talked about it with God And we felt like this is what we were supposed to do. So we decided to jump all in. So actually, today is this well, this is the last day that this is my background ever. This is my last day in my office actually, and then I will be doing Bullies Be Gone. Save the Kids Full Time.

Speaker 1: 5:23

Wow. So my next question was gonna be How did he go about making that decision? Now, you said you were a religious person, that you wouldn't pray and ask God about it. Can you share a little bit more about how you approached that conversation with your wife?

Speaker 2: 5:41

Yeah, so it had been something that had been on the discussion table per se for a while. The end game has always been oh man, I really wanna do this full time. I really wanna be able to do this full time. And so what tangible things, goals, can we set? that would give us a good gauge as to when we're think we're ready to do this full time And we're like money is important. So let's set some financial goals with this and see if we can hit them.

Speaker 2: 6:07

And so the last quarter of 2022, I was able to completely match my income as a counselor with speaking gigs, And so I was like okay, I was able, over that three month period, I was able to match that And that was full time, counselor, full time, wrestling coach, full time everything else as well. And just imagine if I open up my time to be able to could do the business full time, to reach out to schools full time and do everything else instead of sending any email with my 15 minutes I have in between kids and not making a single phone call and making an Instagram post at the end of the day and that kind of stuff. Imagine what I can do with that much more time. And so, once we hit some of those financial goals, we're like, okay, I think we can do this, But are we sure?

Speaker 2: 6:56

And so we're members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And so we went out to the nearest temple and we went and we prayed and talked to God about it, And it was very interesting. I had the thought of don't be afraid, don't be afraid, I can't drive a parked car, don't be afraid. And my wife had the impression of trust your husband When she told me that I was like, ah, scary, I don't like that as much because I the imposter syndrome. You're like, oh, trust me, I don't know about that. Can you just said it's gonna be okay. But combined with those two things, we're like okay, let's give this a shot. We're gonna regret it forever if we don't. And so that's how that decision was made.

Speaker 1: 7:36

Now, you mentioned that, that scare, that fear, One of our recent guests. His name was Ron Swanson sorry. Not Ron Swanson. He's the owner of a nut nest And he talked about how the weight is worth it, the emotional weight. You know that mental, physical weight is worth it Can you share? how do you manage the stress, the worry, the fear that comes with taking the sleep of faith?

Speaker 2: 8:08

Day by day And being open and honest with my communications, with my wife especially. A lot of times it's really easy to just bottle everything up, and, especially with my job, i'm forced to, as a school counselor, compartmentalize things And there's some things I can't talk about with my wife, some heavy things I can't name names. If some kid today was telling me he's planning on killing himself in depression and self-harm and having to call parents and to have a police officer take a kid to the hospital, some heavy stuff that I can't really talk about And that takes a toll. And so this is actually a little liberating because I can actually talk about all of my fears and concerns now in open and honest conversation with my wife, and if she's having a tough time she lets me know. Hey, i need not heaviness today. Can we have not heaviness? today? My abs are fricking, literally. Let's go watch Modern Family and laugh our heads off.

Speaker 2: 9:02

But having that open, honest conversation is how I've been trying to manage the weight of it all, And then not forgetting to do things that I enjoy and love. So oftentimes, especially as entrepreneurs, business owners, our hobby becomes our business And then all of a sudden we have no hobbies and we have no fun. But we feel, especially in this day and age, that entrepreneurship is cool. We feel a lot of pressure to monetize every single hobby and have document all the fun and turn it. But then that takes the magic out of all your hobbies And so I try to engage in stuff that I still enjoy, like playing Power Ranger video games on my Switch from time to time when the kids go down and the wife's in the shower doing stuff that I enjoy, and then talking to my wife when I'm feeling heavy.

Speaker 1: 9:45

Yeah, the burden or just the balancing of hobbies, of work, of family, can really get to you. How do you manage the emotions? Because that's something we haven't really talked about on this podcast. We've talked a lot about having open, honest communication with your family, setting priorities, setting boundaries, but there is just a lot of emotional energy, that kind of courses through us during the day, and especially you as a counselor dealing with suicide, dealing with everything that comes along with that. How do you manage the emotions so that A you're not numbing yourself to it and just numbing yourself to experience in general or hiding away from it, so you just constantly escaping from reality?

Speaker 2: 10:34

Yeah, that's a good question. I think what has helped me is a conscious effort to not manage my emotions, to feel my emotions. When something comes up, you feel it. You're pissed, be angry, you're sad, cry, you're happy, laugh. Feel your emotions, don't try and check them.

Speaker 2: 10:56

I feel like a lot of times when we talk about manage our emotions, we try and check them. We try and hold on. Call me your senses, young padawan, call me the crap down, and really just feel them. You're feeling a lot of sadness. It's okay to cry. Did you just lose your entire crap on your four-year-old because you were annoyed and you'd had a long day and you snapped at them? Yeah, you did. Say sorry, you felt some emotions and you made a mistake. I don't feel like the key is not trying to manage them, but just feeling them. The negative outcomes, the snapping at your love ones, that comes when you try too much to bottle them up and too much to manage them. If you'd feel them right when the things happened, you'd feel it. It happened. Wow, that lasted a few minutes, instead of bottling up and ruining my entire week. So feel them, don't manage them.

Speaker 1: 11:47

How would you describe that as a technique other than just feel them? What does it look like to feel your emotions, especially that you're a business owner? you're working with employees. Something goes wrong. You think, oh, that shouldn't happen. You start feeling frustrated and you start feeling angry. Boom.

Speaker 2: 12:06

So exactly, you start feeling these things. It helps to narrate whether it's, especially if the anger or if that feeling is directed towards something or someone, being able to verbally say that out loud. Something happened, like someone screwed up and you lost money, or someone screwed up and you have to put out a fire. You can be open and honest, but man, this is really frustrating. I really wish this wouldn't have happened. This is something that has totally thrown me off today and this is really frustrating.

Speaker 2: 12:34

if I'm being totally honest, being honest with our emotions is a good way to acknowledge that we're feeling those emotions. instead of, ah, i'm mad, but I don't want to hurt their feelings, i'm frustrated, but I don't want to make them feel like I don't value them, words say the thoughts that are coming in, so they can validate the feelings that are being felt. And what does that do for you? It helps me get over them quicker, instead of just, oh, pondering forever and ever in silence, and then sometimes they're just amplifying in silence, saying them, getting them out into the open, making them real so that they can be real, and then you can move forward. It helps me process them a little bit faster. when I say them out loud.

Speaker 1: 13:16

There's a part of our culture, especially for business owners, especially for men, to be stoic, suck it up, yeah. to only be willing to express certain emotions, not to express anything that makes you a pure weak or unstable. or to, hey, leave the emotional crap at home, leave the emotional crap at work. How do you respond to that?

Speaker 2: 13:39

I respond to that by saying no, thank you. Oh, and this is a really trigger, happy topic, especially in the psychology realm toxic masculinity Right, we're not those people who talk about toxic masculinity. It's like we're not demonizing masculinity. We're demonizing the toxic traits that people have thrust onto, what they think it means to be masculine. Right, where it is toxic to bottle up your feelings, to leave the emotional crap and to never acknowledge, to never cry, blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 2: 14:13

It takes strength to cry. It is hard for me to allow my emotions in front of other people besides my wife, but when I do, i feel so much better when I do that, when I allow myself to feel my emotions, regardless of my audience, regardless of where I am, whatever it might be. Now it doesn't mean I'm going to consciously try to ugly, cry and get attention My guy liner running down my face. But if I need to cry, i'll cry. If I'm angry, i'll let you know. I'm not going to hide things When people I don't know, when people when the pressures of men to not have emotions.

Speaker 2: 14:53

That's why that's a big reason why I in my opinion at least, why men's suicide rates are a little bit higher, why men's mental health issues are a little bit longer lasting than our female counterparts, because we have that pressure to not have emotions and yet we want our kids to be emotionally healthy, but we're not allowing ourselves to have those emotions backwards, in my opinion. So to those people who say those things, i say no, thank you, no, thank you.

Speaker 1: 15:25

No, let's talk about. One of the things you talked about was your wife saying let's not have a heavy day Setting boundaries. Yeah, so there's two things here. I want to talk about setting boundaries and communication, but I also want to talk about two transitions I have found with business owners that are really difficult The transition of the chaos that can come with the morning with all the kids to work And then all the burden stressors that have built up during work, to the transition at home when the kids are tired or the wife really needs you to step in if she's a stay-at-home mom. But we've seen these two transition periods be the most difficult. Can you share some experiences or stories of when those transition periods have been hard for you and what you've learned about them?

Speaker 2: 16:10

So when I make my posts to Instagram, i'm really active on Instagram And when I make those posts it's typically right after school And I'm always super stressed about it because I want to get back home, i want to help my wife and this and that. And in the past, before we had children, even when our first child was born, i'd have an issue being on my phone quite a lot Trying to engage my Instagram audience and different things. And that transition right after work where I'm trying to get that Instagram post in and I come in. There was a couple of times where I'm like I just want to be home already. So I came home, i went inside and I got on my Instagram to get things done And Kim was like I really don't like that. If you're going to be home, i want you to be home. I don't care if you take 10 extra, 15, 20 extra minutes to make that Instagram post, to do whatever you need to do so that you can just be home. And so when I started to integrate that into my life, not only for the posting of Instagram, but if I had a hard day at work, taking a second to decompress in the car and getting myself ready to go in my house and be dad.

Speaker 2: 17:14

There's an analogy that really stuck with me that I heard at Scout Camp once. It was about this old welder mechanic or something that he had been apprenticed following for the day And at the end of the day he was getting out of his truck and he stopped by a tree and he was just making a motion, looking like he was hanging invisible things on the tree before he went to go inside, and his apprentice is like what on earth are you doing? You are a crazy old man And I'm putting all my problems hanging in them on the tree before I go inside So that I leave them outside of my house. And I'm not saying you got to do that, guys, but it has helped me to take an extra 15, 20 minutes, take a beat in between work and home to become I am at home now, to transform to transform into dad.

Speaker 2: 18:10

I'm not business, nate, i'm dad. Take a second so that you can hang your problems, put them on hold, check them at the door, whatever you need to do, make note of them so you can come back to them later when you have time for them. But right here, right now, you need to be dad, and so that's helped me with that transition. Now the other transition, the craziness of the kid like the before the family, before you had to work. I'm more excited for that one because I haven't had to deal with that one yet.

Speaker 2: 18:39

That's something that's been a stressor for me is not being able to help in the mornings. As an educator, my contract time is 730 to 3pm, 730am to 3pm. My kids thankfully sleep from 8 to 730. Yeah, so like 8pm, 730, that's quiet time, and rarely do they arise before 715. I'm usually gone by 715.

Speaker 2: 19:04

Half the time I have a podcast recording at 7am, and so that's been a kind of a stressor for me is oh man, i don't get to help Kim out in the mornings, especially She has so many talents. Being a morning person is not one of them, and so I am a morning person, i'm an early bird, so I'm excited actually to have more like a 9 to 5 instead of a 730 to 3, or choose my hours so like when I'm home, i can help out in the mornings and get the kids to school and get them ready, and then, like by 9 o'clock, it's like easy to slip away and be like, okay, i'm going to do a thing for two hours, are you okay? Oh, yeah, we're fine. So I'm excited for that part. That part is something that I am more happy to help out with, because I haven't been able to help out with it for the last four years.

Speaker 1: 19:50

Talk about helping around the house.

Speaker 2: 19:53

Yeah, yeah, we're going to get that. It's a trap.

Speaker 1: 19:56

Let's talk about roles in the family, because you juggle the responsibilities of going to work. How do you engage in responsibilities at home, and have they changed since when you were first initially married?

Speaker 2: 20:13

So we are not super organized in the aspect of all right, it is the line job to wash my laundry and it is my job to make the money. But around the house, basically, we adopted the philosophy. We didn't intentionally say this is our philosophy, but we more realized oh wow, we do this. See a need, feel a need. We try and stay top of the day-to-day stuff Kim does while she's at home. But as you've got a couple kids, you got to keep those suckers alive. That's the bottom line. And so I'll come home and the dishes aren't done.

Speaker 2: 20:49

So after dinner, while the kids are playing around and Kim's doing whatever, i'll do the dishes. Kim actually guys hear this She takes out the trash sometimes. Okay, can your wife do that? y'all Just kidding, just kidding, just kidding. But seriously, we just see a need, feel a need.

Speaker 2: 21:06

She has her projects she's working on during the day And if I notice something that needs to get done, i notice something, some blaring thing, like we've completely run out of laundry, i should probably do the laundry. Then I'll do the laundry, i'll fold the laundry, i'll put it away. See a need, feel a need. Whatever you got time for, do it. And then, if Kim needs me to do something specifically and she doesn't want me to do something because she knows my go-tos. I do a lot of the dishes, i do a lot of laundry and I do a lot of yard work, and so if she needs something else done that she knows will take time, and if I do one of my power three that they won't be able to get to what she needs, then she'll let me know. Hey, instead of this thing you usually do, could you please do this instead, because I'm working on this? Oh sure, yeah, sweet. So I guess we just talk about it And then, if not see a need, feel a need.

Speaker 1: 21:52

I love that. see a need, feel a need, It just rolls off the tongue really well too.

Speaker 2: 21:56

Yep, yep, credit to Kim on that one. She's the one that said that.

Speaker 1: 22:00

Now I wanna kinda pivot for the last 10 minutes or so of this conversation to defining success for the family. There's a lot of chatter out there around what the family should look like. are families broken? are families failing? How would you go about defining success for your family, and why is that success?

Speaker 2: 22:25

Success in the family. There's a couple of things that I wanna that I immediately think of Number one. Do your kids know that they are loved, they are strong, that they're loved and that they will always be enough? Do your kids know that And do your actions reflect that? For me, it's funny. Sometimes people talk about success in terms of monetary gains, and while it's cool to have successful monetary things within a business and have goals like that, if your definition of success is based off of monetary things, it'll never be enough, because you can always have more money. And so success for me, especially in the family, is A if my kids know that I love them and B if my spouse, if my wife, feels that same way and if my actions reflect that, if my kids are always like Daddy.

Speaker 2: 23:21

For example, actually, one day my son came upstairs with a little Altoid can and I was like this is my phone, and I was like, oh crap, dang it. Dad needs to do some repenting here. And so we set some boundaries for smartphones for me and Kim, so that our kids could see that we want to set boundaries with our technology. And it was after a really tough week of having a newborn and both of us were just like we need to numb our brains. Y'all need to watch Puppy Dog Pows, we need to decompress. And afterwards they're like, look, eddie, i have a phone now too, and I was like, oh no, ha, ha. And so I had to do some repenting there. But yeah, making sure that our kids know that we love them and our spouses do too, i feel like love is the best way to gauge success for me, and if someone is feeling and knowing how much I love and appreciate them, then I feel pretty successful.

Speaker 1: 24:10

How do you determine if you are being successful, like how do you know if your kids know that they love, like, that they feel loved?

Speaker 2: 24:17

Example when my wife goes to pick up my son from preschool is the cutest thing because he will just arms out like an airplane and just run towards her mom. And then when I come home, same thing dad grabs my leg and stuff like that. When my kids want to goof around in rough house with me after a long day at work, that's how I know that I'm being successful as a dad because they want to be with me. The moment that my actions start to influence my kids in a way that make them not to want to spend time with me, that's when I'm not being as successful. That's when I need to maybe change some things so that I can be more successful in ways that they want to be with me because of the things I say and the things I do.

Speaker 1: 25:01

I love that Your kids want to be around you. Yep, Barring aside teenagers who are just there identifying As humans develop, we become more primitive.

Speaker 2: 25:12

When we get into our teenage, caveman, grunt years. But yeah, yeah, do your kids want to be with you And with teenagers? that's why I said, by the things you do and say Teenagers, they want to spend less time with you because they have friends, they have lives. Now It's not because of anything you've done. When it's because of something you've done or said, that's when we might need to change something.

Speaker 1: 25:34

Okay. One final question. Now you're early in your business career, but how long have you been married? I've been married seven years. Seven years. Okay. If you could distill some drops of wisdom that you could give young Nate newly married Nate seven years ago, about being a father, about being a husband, about being this new business owner, what would you tell them if you could go back?

Speaker 2: 26:05

Oh, don't stress as much, things will always work out. Put your phone down a little bit more and give hugs and kisses a lot more.

Speaker 1: 26:15

I love it, okay, well, everyone, this has been Nate Webb, founder of Bullies. Be Gone re-kids five to four months old. We're so grateful to have you here Now, nate. If there's anyone out there listening who thinks you know what, my school could really use a presentation about bullying, how to handle being bullied, maybe a message to bullies What's the best way they could get in contact with you.

Speaker 2: 26:42

You can always email me bulliesspeaker at gmailcom. Instagram. I always pay attention to my DMs and I always message back at bulliesbegone, bulliesbegone, bulliesbegone, And then I have a speaker form that I can send you to if you want. They can click on that and they can fill that out. Yeah, You can visit those things, email Instagram. Whatever it might be, I always respond.

Speaker 1: 27:05

Okay, great, we will drop that speaker form in the show notes for everyone. Again, everyone. This has been Nate Webb. Thank you so much for your time and the laughs and the wisdom. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2: 27:17

Thank you All right.