Frank King on Comedy, Confronting Suicide, and Financial Rebuilding

When laughter and profound insights collide, you're in for a transformative experience. This episode, we're graced by the presence of Frank King, whose journey from stand-up comedy to the realms of mental health advocacy and suicide prevention is as inspiring as it is entertaining. Frank recounts the seismic shifts in his life with a blend of humor and gravity, taking us from the relentless pace of comedy gigs to the sobering wake-up call of the 2008 financial crisis—a time that tested his resilience and reshaped his purpose.

Embarking on a path from punchlines to life lines, Frank illustrates the intricate dance of navigating a financial crisis, the rebirth of his career as a speaker, and the nuanced art of mentorship. His stories serve as stark reminders of the fragility of our economic systems, the inner workings of personal financial management, and the critical importance of maintaining mental well-being amidst adversity. As Frank opens up about the personal struggles that led him to the edge, he also highlights the redemptive power of humor and the profound joy found in connecting with audiences on a deeper level.

Frank's dedication to changing lives doesn't end on stage. His commitment to mentoring others through the process of securing TEDx speaking opportunities and his insights on community and support in mental health shine throughout our conversation. The importance of recognizing signs of distress and providing a helping hand is underscored by Frank's own experiences and his personal mission to foster open dialogue around mental health. As we wrap up, he leaves us with a powerful reminder: every laugh shared, every story told, and every life touched is a step toward a world where the finality of suicide is replaced with hope, help, and healing.

Colorado’s best business coach, Baz Porter, has a new mindset strategy mentoring service to help you unlock new heights of growth, prosperity, happiness, and success. Book your first meeting with the coaching visionary at https://www.ramsbybaz.com/

Chapters

• 0:00 Frank King
• 5:34 Navigating Financial Crisis
• 17:36 From Comedy to Speaking
• 20:45 Changing Lives Through Unlikely Mentorship
• 32:39 Preventing Suicide Through Understanding and Support
• 40:22 TEDx Coaching and Comedy Podcast

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome back to another episode of Rice and the Ashes podcast. It is a pleasure to have my next guest here today. He is phenomenal in the world of comedy. Hell of a story behind him. He is also the world record holder for the TEDx stage and he's a personal friend of mine because he's an absolute awesome guy with, as I said, a story that will blow your mind. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome my next guest, Frank King. Frank, how are you today?

Speaker 2: 0:34

I just hope I can live up to that introduction, dear God.

Speaker 1: 0:37

No, I'm sure you've had a lot better with your expertise and how many stages you've been on. Frank, tell us a bit about yourself. Obviously I know about you, but the audience doesn't Please enlighten who you are and how roughly you came up with this concept that you speak about today.

Speaker 2: 0:56

Oh, I speak on suicide prevention as a workplace health and safety priority. I started comedy the day after Christmas, 1984, 1985, and I hold the record for the longest nonstop comedy club road trip ever 2,629 nights in a row nonstop, and my lovely wife came along with me just for the ride. And then in 94, 93, 94, I got a job in radio as a co-host on a morning show and I took a number one morning show and drove it to number six in 18 months. And a friend of mine said you didn number six in 18 months. And a friend of mine said you didn't drive in the ground, you drove that in the middle earth, which I did. And by the time I got done, comedy clubs were closing faster than opening. So I became a corporate comic. And people ask me what's the difference between a club comic and a corporate comic? About $5,000 a night plus travel. So I'm no math major. That made sense. Did that till 2000, I guess the end of 2007.

Speaker 2: 1:47

Had my best year in comedy ever Did? 96 engagements. Corporate comedy grossed over $200,000 in 2008. The bottom dropped out of the world financial market. Speaking dropped off 80%. Speaking engagements dropped off 80% practically overnight and by 2010, I'd run out all my credit lines as far as I could and we had to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy, lost everything we worked for in 22 years of marriage.

Speaker 2: 2:10

And that's when I learned what the barrel of my gun tasted like literally Spoiler alert. I did not pull the trigger. I say that in all my keynotes. A friend of mine came up after a keynote recently and said, and I quote hey man, how come he didn't pull the trigger? I said hey, man, could you try to sound slightly less disappointed? The why I didn't pull the trigger is another story, but it actually kicked off my speaking career because I had always wanted to make a living and a difference. I just had no idea how to make a difference. And the meeting planners forced me into it. They said Frank, we can't pay you five grand anymore just to be funny. You have to teach our audience something. What am I going to teach them? So a friend of mine wrote a book called the Message of you Turning your Life into a Money-Making Speaking Career. Name's Judy Carter. She sent me a copy of it, said read it, frank, you'll figure it out.

Speaker 2: 2:57

And I went into it bashing and I got nothing. Halfway through I thought, oh, my God, I do have something. Given my near suicide, I live with two mental illnesses. There are more nuts in my family than a squirrel turd. If I got some training I could speak on suicide prevention. And second hurdle was okay, who's going to take the comedian of two and a half decades seriously? That's when I decided to do my first TEDx. I thought if I do a TEDx on suicide prevention with humor, I can convince them. I can do this. And it worked. And then I got two more. They called me up. Two other events called and said do you have any more mental health topics? Oh yeah, and so when I've applied for the balance of those, I did get through LinkedIn. The university and the state of Assam, india, sent me a note and said would you do a virtual for us? We love your take on mental health, mental illness. So I did that and I'm getting ready to do my 13th one in November.

Speaker 1: 3:50

That confirmed now, frank, is that good, awesome. So, going back a few years, you entered the world of comedy and stand up, touring For anybody who has any job working at that level, and they're always traveling. What was the relationship toll between you and your wife?

Speaker 2: 4:10

because that must have been quite substantial at some point no, actually it's one of those things that either makes a marriage or blows it completely apart this is yeah, this is what I was getting to, so I actually brought you two together yeah, and we had a ball doing it and you got to be.

Speaker 2: 4:25

When you're in a car on the road, 365, 27 427 724 365 you need to. You need to be kind to one another and we decided you had to admit you were wrong right away and apologize, because when you get mad there's no place to go. Baz with the back seat, I'll be in the back seat. So, yeah, we had a ball. She thoroughly enjoyed it and it was like living in a frat house for her, because most of the clubs had a comedy condo where they put the comedians up for the week, so a three bedroom condo that they turned cleaned every week. So it was pretty much me and Wendy and two other male comics living in a frat house. But we met some amazing, fascinating, funny worked with Adam Sandler and Kevin James and Rosie and Ellen and Foxworthy and Ron White and Dr Ken Jeong and pretty much anybody who's a famous comic. Bill Maher today we worked with on the road, opened up some musical acts as well.

Speaker 1: 5:17

That's pretty incredible Traveling, doing what you love, having the relationship that you love In 2008, moving forward from that moment in the crash, I mean it affected everybody in the world and anybody who was a business back then. We all remember 2008. But did you see any signs before that, or just did it come straight out of shock, come out of the blue, and then all of a sudden, the economy crashes, life spirals.

Speaker 2: 5:45

Yes, it came out of the blue. I wasn't aware of the toxic mortgages being bundled and rated AAA by Moody's and I just I never. Why anybody believes anything Moody's says anymore is beyond me. Because the rating agencies rated them AAA. Yeah, we all believed it, and I know I didn't see it coming. I those were the days we invested in real estate. Real estate was always going up in value and I thought it would go on forever. I didn't realize there's a boom and a bust cycle, and so I now know I won't be taken by surprise again. There's seasons.

Speaker 1: 6:19

We can plant for the seasons and try and foretell what's coming, but that's often very hard. Yes, when we look at defining moments that moment where you came fast forward into 2010, where you had the barrel of the 38 I think it was yes, in the, in your mouth what was the turning point for you not to do it? Because a lot of people go why did you do it? Go and do it. We know that story, but we don't know what made you turn. And this, I think, is crucial, because a lot of people go to that point and you've, I, I've been suicidal and all the rest of it won't go into that now, but the it takes courage to come back from that and it takes something else. What was that defining moment like for?

Speaker 2: 7:11

you In suicidality there's something called burdensomeness. People feel like they're a burden. The world would be better off without them and we'd been financially devastated. My wife was devastated and we'd lost everything. And I realized I had a million dollar life insurance policy. So I'm thinking I can fix this. She'll be brokenhearted, but she'll no longer be broke. She'll have a million dollars tax free. So I practiced with a gun, made sure I could put it in my mouth and pull the hammer back, and then, having sold insurance straight out of college, I knew that most life insurance policies have a two year suicide clause. It's called the incontestability clause, but it basically is a suicide clause, meaning if you kill yourself in less than 24 months, it pays nothing but returns the premiums. If you wait for 24 months and a day, then it pays a million dollars. And I call my insurance agent and just by chance, I'd only paid in for 22 months. I had to wait 60 days to kill myself. Yep, so my life insurance policy actually saved my life. But when you heard that news, what?

Speaker 1: 8:12

was going on. Obviously, it wasn't a bullet going through the mind, it was something else going through the mind. What?

Speaker 2: 8:17

was that I live with something called chronic suicidal ideation and so I thought I can wait 60 days, that's not a problem. Fortunately, I wasn't marking days off the calendar. I don't recall day 60 or 61 or 62. I don't remember waking up thinking I can do it. Today I think things got a little better. Bankruptcy went through, phone calls stopped from the creditors, things got marginally better. Must have to break the surface and take a breath. Fortunately, and that's why I'm still here, I'd called my insurance agent and when he told me 22 months, the next thing he said was don't do it, because he delivered checks in the past when people had called and the policy was in force. Shortly thereafter delivered checks.

Speaker 1: 8:57

I find that bankruptcy is a very real thing for a lot of people, especially in the economy that we're living in right now. That's not political. I don't give a fuck about politics. For my listeners they know that I don't have a say, I don't have a vote. I really don't care. It's just what I am. But when we look at the economy right now and then the traits we had prior 2008, I must say there's a lot of similarity in a lot of ways. Not necessarily in the same field, but the same disruption, the same misdirection, the same fear and the media spreading the same sort of agendas to distract us from what's really going on behind the scenes within the economy. And when shit does get real, who's behind it? Probably the media, disturbing the waters and getting everybody in fear and panic. You were in the media for quite some time, frank. How would you advise somebody to look on the brighter side of life, so to speak? I would do what we did.

Speaker 2: 9:58

We decided we would become recession-proof. Sorry about that, it's okay, I'm back in a minute. I thought I turned my turn my notifications off. I don't know why I rang the. I would do what we did, which is you live small, we were over taller, we were overextended. Hang on, let me turn this off. We were overextended, credit cards and such, and so won't do that again.

Speaker 2: 10:19

We've been credit card I call it credit card sobriety for many years, meaning I haven't paid a cent of interest in a goodly number of years. After we rebuilt our credit, we were able to. Now I've got the travel credit cards and you get the miles, but it paid off at the end of every month. So I would say you need to be in a position where, if it all goes to hell in a handbasket, you've got six months of income in the bank. You have no credit card bills, no unsecured debt. We have a mortgage, but that's secured by the house. So I think it's a matter of having being prepared to ride out the inevitable next recession, or pandemic for that matter yeah, you've got it right.

Speaker 1: 10:59

I know people that actually help others build that sort of foundation where they can have I think it's three, six months emergency fund, which is very hard. It's not easy to get come to that point because it takes discipline. It doesn't hold other thing, take to with it. But the freedom you have with that is knowing if the worst comes to the worst, absolute shit hits the fan tomorrow. You've got six months cushion and go. I know I'm going to be all right Whatever happens. That's good and my bills are paid. I can still run my business. We can feed ourselves the cats, whatever is going on. Yeah, and that's important because people don't realize pets are family, whether you have a dog, a cat. We've got two cats, max and Milo. They hate me but they love her, it's true, and they'll go to her, but they're family and it's important to have that nest egg.

Speaker 1: 11:58

After doing that and going, was there anything that built a habit within you other than the financial discipline and coming back from absolute bankruptcy? Many people don't come back from that. They stay in that cycle and it's hell for the rest of that time that they can't discipline themselves because they can't get the mindset to dig themselves out? What rituals and disciplines could you advise somebody who's going through the entrance to that as in? They've got all these phone calls. The creditors aren't stopping. They can't seem to drag themselves back. What advice?

Speaker 2: 12:34

would you give them, if they can, if they haven't declared bankruptcy recently. It comes to the point where it just makes sense to do Chapter 11, which is they call it a wage earner's plan, where you pay a certain amount a month for five years and, even though you haven't paid off the debt, they wipe it clean. Chapter seven is you throw everything into a pot and the creditors get a dime on the dollar and you walk away with your car and your clothes and your pets. I would also say that the mistake I made last time was, rather than go deep into my speaking business, I tried all sorts of other businesses, side hustles and so I decided shortly after that that if worse came to worse, I would just go deep into my current business, go deeper into my current business.

Speaker 2: 13:16

I don't believe in side hustles. I think every moment in a side hustle you're taking time away from your primary source of revenue. I don't believe passive income it's a couple hours a week and passive income and yeah, you get those solicitations all the time, I'm sure, and I just don't. I turn them down because I think you should do one thing and you should do it better than anybody else and and be the expert or thought leader and have people seek you out for that thing, rather than try to do a little of this and a little of that.

Speaker 1: 13:47

Yeah, and you said something. Key there, frank, I think, is becoming the expert, not an expert. The an expert, a dime, a dozen, everybody's an expert. I'm a dozen, everybody's an expert. But there are very few people and you're actually one of them that can actually claim that they are the expert in what they do, and they don't just do it one off. It's not a unicorn business. You've done it consistently and you've not just helped other people. You've changed other people's lives, not just on stage but off stage, and you're congruent with who you are, whether you're in a crowd of 500 to a thousand, whatever people. And then you're still congruent. Whether you're in here with me or speaking to me on the phone, it's just still the same person. Yes, that that is a gift, and it's rare.

Speaker 2: 14:40

it's rare I was on a ship one time, had lunch with a guy and then that night I performed and he came up afterwards after everybody else had left and he goes. I got one question for you. I said shoot. He said, how can you be the same guy at lunch that you are on stage? Yes, being yourself took a lot of practice. It's not easy not to act, just to be. It sounds easy, but it took a while to get to that point.

Speaker 1: 15:02

Where it's me, wherever I happen to show up, it's always same guy but I love that's one of the qualities I like about you because you're that consistent, because you you're not trying to fit into a world that doesn't accept you and you you get exactly what you say on the tin. It's not I'm here, over here, and then, and then I'm here, I'm here and I've got tomatoes and beans over here. It's one of them things that I like about you, it could be partly age I'm 67.

Speaker 2: 15:28

It could be that I've faced death several times two aortic valve replacements, double bypass, heart attack, three stents total three cars. I've just to the point bass where I'd give a fuck, but I don't have any left yeah, I don't, I've got time to deal with that kind of thing.

Speaker 1: 15:45

I like there was a advert I saw on some channel I was watching and it was a jar of fucks, literally. They've got little. They're wooden little cutouts for the jam. They got fuck on them. And I someone I won't mention his name on here, but I, someone that I was associated with a while ago was giving these out in that look at that little speech he was doing. He's oh no, this is my last fuck. And then he gave it out. I thought it was amazing gimmick to start to give to the audience. It made everyone laugh. But what he was speaking about I know you do as well, and that's using failure as a fuel. How would you define that concept and help people understand how to use the failure as a fuel instead of sitting in what just happened?

Speaker 2: 16:28

Yes, it's probably the reason I'm still here today. After that 60 days, I wasn't still sitting in the yeah, we bought a book called how to Rebuild your Credit After Bankruptcy. There's actually a book. We began the process of getting credit cards with small credit limits and you build it up slowly and my wife would say if I fail at something, did you learn something? Yes, okay, let's move on. I think as long as you learn something from the failure, a friend of mine goes, it's not a failure, it's research. I now know one solid way not to do that.

Speaker 2: 16:59

There's a joke about Edison. I wrote the joke. Actually, edison supposedly 10,000 tries before he invented the light bulb. Give the guy a break. He was working in the dark. But yeah, it's a matter of. I think it's not how often you get knocked down, it's how many times you get back up. People have said to me have you ever quit comedy or speaking? I go yeah, I've quit a thousand times. The next morning I wake up and think, oh, who's gonna pay me that kind of money for that kind of time? All right, fine.

Speaker 1: 17:25

I think you learned a valuable lesson in the process of doing that, though it's not actually about the money. It was about the enjoyment, wasn't it?

Speaker 2: 17:34

oh lord, yes, it's, it's. I was born to do comedy. I knew that my first time on stage, first five minutes inside my head, open mic night. About halfway through my little set I heard this you're home and I'd known that since fourth grade, when I was nine years old. I knew that's what I should be doing as a living. And then the transition was difficult from comic to speaker, in part Baz, because comics get a reaction every eight to 12 seconds and you're speaking, they're paying attention but they're quiet. And for the first couple of months that was unnerving, because I'm used to that constant feedback and they would laugh because there were humorous moments, but not like doing standup. Now I've gotten used to it because I'm teaching them something. I know what's, it's fine. The best compliment I've gotten recently has happened two or three times. A meeting planner comes up and goes. I was watching them, watching you, and they were not looking at their phone. That's become a metric. If you can get their faces out of their phones, you've done something.

Speaker 1: 18:29

And it's key. I think you mentioned something earlier about having the difference between corporate-style work and speaking, and then the comedy act. Which do you prefer now?

Speaker 2: 18:40

I prefer the speaking because I'm saving lives. I believe saving and or changing lives, although every now and then bass, I'll offer to do 45 minutes of comedy at their the corporate banquet. I wouldn't do a comedy club now short of a plea bargain, but a corporate gig I would. I do, and it's nice to do 45 minutes of stand-up and not have to have learning objectives and takeaways and action items and save somebody's life. Sometimes it's just fun to be a comic. Do you get paid for?

Speaker 1: 19:12

that? Is it an extra you provide or is it part of a package that you do?

Speaker 2: 19:15

that I do. A package 12-5 includes a keynote, a workshop, and I'll either do mc all day, I'll do 45 minutes to stand up at the banquet or I'll auctioneer the fundraiser because I've been to auctioneering college but when you did auctioneering this is a fascinating.

Speaker 1: 19:31

I love this because so it's so diverse and your experience is. It's not just in the comedy, it's not just in the corporate, it's not just in the speaking, it's so vast. What was your training when you went through the auctioneer training and I've been to farmer's auctions and other things. I don't even know where to start or begin with that. What was that like? And then what was the training like for that?

Speaker 2: 19:56

there's a different kind of auctioneering. For a cattle auction, okay, it's in quarters one, one quarter, one, half one. Let's see one quarter, one half three. Quarters one, one quarter, one, half one. No one, three, five, three. It's very fast. Yeah, all in quarters one, one quarter, one, half one. Thirty five, two, two and a quarter, two and a half two, because everybody's sober, if same with the car auction, very fast, because they want them on the block and off on the block and off on the block and a charity auction. They're drinking, so you have to go a little slower, yeah, yeah, one, make it on now. Two, make it two. Bid it on now two, two, make it three. Bid it on now three, make three, and in spanish. So I can do it in english and spanish or spanglish. I like the spanglish one. That's cool. People at a charity auction bid higher in their own language.

Speaker 1: 20:42

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:43

I did that.

Speaker 1: 20:45

I went to a charity auction for Federation of the Blind a couple of years ago and it was a massive gala in New York pouring down with rain. If you've been to New York when it rains, it lets the heavens open and it just doesn't stop.

Speaker 1: 21:02

I remember getting out four blocks away because we couldn't get to the place. It was full of roadworks and there was scaffolding everywhere. It was completely made. The roads were flooded so my wife and I were running underneath the scaffolding trying to stay dry with one umbrella. It's hilarious. Got there, it was literally the a-list event. There were celebrities there, a-list football, nfl players, baseball player, you name it. They were there and auction off everything for the federation for the blind. I walked in completely soaked to the bone and I had a tuxedo on. That was a brand new tuxedo, yeah, so it shrank. So you could feel it shrinking as it was drying. You could feel it shrinking, uh, and I'm not a big guy so I was like price this shirt was going in. But I remember listening to the auction. The auctioneer his name was nick lowry I interviewed a couple of years ago, a year or so ago fantastic guy, and he was very calm and very steady with what he was saying. But he wasn't you and I love nick, but he's not your finesse.

Speaker 1: 22:10

I wish I'd have known you back there because I'd have invited you to come down and do it, I would have done. I'd be like frank, got a gig for you, come down and do this. It'd be funny as fuck. Come on. But anyway, unlikely mentors. You've obviously had a wealth of experience and you've come across mentors that have formed and shaped what you're doing in in the world. Has there anybody been like come from left field, that's just changed your entire life in in mentorship?

Speaker 2: 22:41

um, yes, I was introduced to a gentleman, glenn Friesman. He had called a friend of mine, another comic, to help him add humor to a speech he was doing for real estate agents and she didn't have time so she referred him to me and we became friends. I added the comedy. We were chatting. I told him that I had unfortunately run credit cards up again and he said how much equity do you have in your house? And I said probably $300,000, $400,000. And he said interest rates are 2.99. You need to refi, you need to pay off the credit cards and you need to never do that again. And you're going to give me your passwords and your usernames and I'm going to keep frat.

Speaker 2: 23:29

And so we refied, paid off the credit cards and again I've got years of credit card sobriety, zero out the credit cards every month. So he changed our lives. Going into this, I was probably 62 at the time, 63, my wife's 62. Going into this part of your life, you, the time, 63, my wife's 62. Going into this part of your life, you don't want to be dragging credit card debt. And we've paid the $150,000 mortgage. We're down to $49,500 in three or four years. We've been consistently adding principal with the idea of paying it off in the next 24 months. At his advice, he changed our lives, financially certainly.

Speaker 1: 24:08

It's amazing when you meet someone like that, you just have that knowledge and help you relearn that discipline to do that and also facilitate that and be on your side. There's not many people, I don't think in the world now would actually do that for any others, which is incredible. When we look at resilience and concepts in resilience, obviously you speak about mental health, and this is May, when this is being filmed or being recorded. Filmed and recorded. This is meant going into Mental Health Awareness Month now. And what are the? Do you see a lot of trends going on at this time of year and, if so, what are them trends?

Speaker 2: 24:45

Sadly, the suicide rate among youth is going up. Has been for a number of years, I think, and I did a TEDx talk on this. It's tied to the smartphone and social media.

Speaker 2: 24:56

If you look at smartphone ownership starting in 2012, I think 55% of households in 2012, there's one smart device. Now it's 84%. And if you put that up against a graph of youth depression and thoughts of suicide, they're almost parallel. So I'm not saying there's a correlation or causation, but there's gotta be a connection. And that's one trend that worries me Men. In the US now eight out of 10 people who die by suicide are men. Another trend that is that's why we wrote the books we wrote on men's mental health because of that crisis among mostly 45 to 54 years old blue collar. They've lost a job, say in a factory, not necessarily to an overseas entity, but to AI and robotics, and men tend to tie their identity to their job. And so if you're a shop steward one day and the next day you're not, who are you? And that can begin a spiral.

Speaker 1: 25:51

I can relate to that when we look at the rates of mental health, depression, anxiety. You mentioned men in particular. Do you know any reason your experience from interacting with live audiences? Why would that be? Because it's just you said it's predominantly men.

Speaker 2: 26:13

Yes, reason for that. It's nowadays called masculine toxicity. We called it when I was a kid. Big boys don't cry.

Speaker 2: 26:20

Men tend not to reach out for help, and whether it's physical or mental. I had a couple of friends. One die of prostate cancer, one die of colon cancer. Both are imminently treatable if you have a PSA test every year and you have a colonoscopy every five. But men tend to neglect both mental and physical health. We're tough, we're not supposed to succumb. So I think that gets in a lot of men's ways.

Speaker 2: 26:43

If I can open up a guy when I speak, I always set aside 30, 45 minutes to take individual questions afterwards and I tell them I'll do a little general Q&A and then I'll hang around. If anybody's got a question they want to answer to individually. And there are guys come up. I'm amazed that. I was in Cincinnati on site at a construction project. I got done A half dozen guys. Each one had a question or story.

Speaker 2: 27:05

Last guy in line was a black guy, mid-twenties I'm guessing, crying so hard he can't speak. So I waited. He gathered himself. I said what's up? He said I haven't slept in two nights. I work on the fifth floor of this building. I think about jumping off every day. I said why is that? He said because I've lost three people in my life to violence in the last year. One of them was my daughter, who died in my arm. And how'd you like somebody to toss that grenade in your lap? Pull the pin.

Speaker 2: 27:30

And so the HR guy who'd hired me wasn't standing far away. So I waved him over and I said look, you need to take this nice young man by the hand, go get the EAP Employee Assistance Program binder, find the closest mental health facility and get in there immediately for evaluation because he is circling the drain. And I said that all in front of the gentleman who had just shared that story. A couple of months later I was talking to the meeting planner on another issue, just terrified to ask whatever. So finally got my courage up. I said what happened to that nice black fellow, frank? He got medicated and he's back on the job. So, men, you know what I believe what I do on stage as a man is give other men permission to give voice to these things, because nobody in his life knew that. I bet you there weren't many people in his life, certainly not his co-workers knew anything about. But that's, I think it's important.

Speaker 1: 28:13

It's an important safe space to have as well that many other people who are giving speeches, whether it be tedx or just a keynote, wherever they are, they don't hold that space afterwards. I think that makes you very unique in what you do. Not only that, you care, you genuinely give a fuck about other people, and it's not a bravado, it's real, which is why I love you.

Speaker 2: 28:39

I love what you do. You're in the military. I was at a military base, fort Irwin, outside of Barstow, california. It's 30 miles north of Interstate 10, straight north. They call it the world's longest cul-de-sac. It's the National Army Training Center and they brought me in there because they'd done an anonymous survey of the soldiers and 30% of them reported they'd had thoughts of suicide.

Speaker 2: 28:59

In the last year I did three keynotes. The last keynote I'm taking questions from the audience. And a young man said to me do you think the army is doing enough for mental health? And I said well, I can't speak for the army, but I can speak for Fort Irwin. That's why I'm here.

Speaker 2: 29:14

And then I said, not knowing, the one star general who ran the joint was standing right behind me with a microphone. I said I'm here because Fort Irwin gives a shit and I turned and I saw the star in the middle of his chest. I turned back the audience and said anybody here besides me just pooping your pants? And the general steps up and he said soldiers, frank King is correct, fort Irwin gives a shit because it starts from the top. And that was in October and April. I got a DM from the base psychologist. He said, frank, a soldier, walked in today. He said to me I'm depressed and suicidal and I'm here because Frank King said I had to tell somebody. So it's just a matter of starting the conversation, giving people permission to give voice to these things.

Speaker 1: 29:57

I love that. That's how you phrased it, because it is that and it's exactly that giving them permission and a safe space where they feel that it's okay to do that and have that conversation, yeah, most of the.

Speaker 2: 30:11

Please, I'm sorry, no, please. Most of the conversations start like this. I've never told anybody this. I get that a lot.

Speaker 1: 30:18

I'm going back now to my experience with the forces, and not necessarily in service, but certainly when I came out I had no identity To your point. Men tie their identities to what they do. And when I left, as the audience does know, I became a DJ. So I went from military to crazy deep town and DJ world for seven years drugs, women, rock and roll, etc. Party town, but it ruined my life. But the result of that was pushing down emotions so much but I didn't know how to cope with them.

Speaker 1: 30:55

And then back then there wasn't anything called mental health. Yeah, ptsd, yeah, go and see it, go and speak to somebody. We were conditioned even back then to not speak to anybody, to suppress that. Then that stuff and I think these conversations now, may mental health month every other month are important to have because if they're not spoken about openly and this is not normalized, as in, if you don't speak up, you can't get the help. If you don't speak up, people don't know.

Speaker 1: 31:32

And when it's too, by the time it is time to speak up, it's too fucking light and there's nothing about it we can do. If you're swirling around in the drain and trying to pick up bits and pieces from where you're going. There's nothing we can do, and that's terrible, not just for the person who finds you, but for every other capacity and pieces from where you're going. There's nothing we can do, and that's terrible not just for the person who finds you, but for every other capacity and everybody who knows you. Elevating others is a part of what you do, and elevating and influencing the future, which is what most of the people you speak to has. There anybody who in your life that shared a story with you, other than the guy from Chicago that really stuck with you, that made an impact, not just now, but made an impact in your life and you equally in theirs?

Speaker 2: 32:15

yes, I was at a dental conference and I spoke about the two mental illnesses that I have. One's major depressive disorder, depression pretty common, and the other is chronic suicidal ideation, which is rare. I've mentioned it to therapists who've been working 20 years in the business and they stare at me like a pig staring at a wristwatch. They have no idea what I'm talking about and I described it to the audience. I go look, it's like this.

Speaker 2: 32:39

People in my tribe, suicide is always an option on the menu as a solution for problems, large and small. And when I say small, my car broke down a couple of years ago. I had three thoughts unbidden One, get it fixed. Two, buy a new one. Three, I could just kill myself and that's chronic suicidal ideation.

Speaker 2: 32:53

So everybody's leaving the room after I got done no-transcript, and it was the first time this had happened. And she's crying again so she can't speak. So I said to her you have chronic suicidal ideation. And she nods her head and I go, you didn't know it had a name. Nod, you just thought you were some kind of freak. Nod. I said do you have a therapist back home? Nod, we'll do this.

Speaker 2: 33:14

When you get back home, set an appointment, tell the therapist everything you learned today and for God's sakes, tell them you Googled it. Don't tell them you learned it from a comedian. And then I got an email from her a week later, frank, I think I was at that dental conference simply to meet you. You have changed my life, and I can't say that about a lot of people. That was the first time that happened, but it's happened over and over and over since then. Sharing just that, because it's a rare condition, but there are a really number of people, often I would say almost always at least one person in the audience who has that, and they just think they're just some kind of free.

Speaker 1: 33:44

Yeah, I didn't even know the information. So I love doing these interviews and I love meeting people like you because I learned something and with that knowledge I can pass that on. That's what it's all about. Resilience and legacy is something that I know it's close to your heart. It's built who you are today. But if you were building a legacy for the future, how would you inspire somebody or a group of people to do that? I know it's changing the mentality of where things are, but what's the actualization of that?

Speaker 2: 34:18

It's a Donald Miller building a story brand technique. Make the audience the hero in the piece. What I say to them is there's good news. Eight out of 10 people who are suicidal are ambivalent. Nine out of 10 give hints in the last week leading up to an attempt, which means you can make a difference, you can save a life, and you can do it by doing something as simple as what we're doing right here, and that is having a conversation. If you know how and I have just taught you how so that would be empowering them to go forward and save lives thank you and I like that.

Speaker 1: 34:50

so if you touched on their symptoms or hints that they are going to or thinking about removing themselves from the planet, what would then be the commonalities of your experience that the signs are, so to speak?

Speaker 2: 35:06

Talk about death and dying quite a bit. You catch them googling death, dying or how to die by suicide, acquiring the means either stockpiling pills or buying a handgun or weapon. Getting their affairs in order is very common, especially if they're giving away prized possessions because they want to make sure the possessions go to the people they want them to go to when they're gone. There's a counterintuitive one which is very dangerous. They've been depressed for a long time. Now they're happy for no apparent reason. But you're happy because they're happy. They may be happy because they've chosen time, place and method and they know the pain is coming to an end.

Speaker 2: 35:36

A lot of people don't understand that most people who die by suicide don't want to kill themselves. I didn't want to kill myself, I just wanted to end the pain. So that's the. Yeah, it's all about pain. It's. I get questions every now and then. When somebody famous dies, like Robin Williams or Naomi Judd or Anthony Bourdain, why would somebody my friends email me, facebook message me, text me, call me? Apparently they all got together and thought Frank's crazy, he'll know. So why would they want to kill themselves with everything to live for? Chances are they didn't want to kill themselves.

Speaker 1: 36:07

They just wanted to end that pain a good thing about you and ever being the expert in that field, I would know where to send somebody other than the professional help as in therapy, psychiatric stuff, which is the normal. I if my world, if I come across anybody, I'm like you need professional mental help from a psychotherapist or a psychiatrist. That's above my skill set, but what I also have. But what I also have is someone that has an awareness of it firsthand and also has a lot of connections in their field where I can refer out to help that person individually, not to refer out to get them on a TEDx stage although I do that but refer out professionally to go. You need to speak to this guy. Apart from him being fucking funny, he knows what that experience feels like and that's why I like one of the things I like about you.

Speaker 2: 37:01

Well, I put my phone number up on the screen every time I what that experience feels like, and that's why I like one of the things I like about you I put my phone number up on the screen. Every time I keynote my cell number, I go look, if you're suicidal, call 988, the new three digit number. If you're just having a bad day, call a crazy person. Here's my cell.

Speaker 1: 37:14

And that could make the difference between someone removing themselves permanently and or having a conversation that's going to change their life. It's priceless, it really is. When we talk about movements, frank, we talk about things we want to create for not just the future, but for the next hundred to a thousand years. If you could start a movement today, what would that be?

Speaker 2: 37:39

It would be ending suicide. Somebody asked me one time what's your goal? I'd like to work myself out of a job. I'd like somebody to say to me how come you're not speaking on suicide anymore? People quit killing themselves. It's a moonshot baz. If we close, it would be really. I'd like to more, more down to earth. I would like making discussing things like depression and mental illness and suicide as easy as talking about sports.

Speaker 1: 38:02

I'm going to introduce you to a couple of people that need not just TEDx stages, but other things as well. I'll talk about that separately. I really want to thank you, Frank, for your time. You've been so inspirational for not just me but so many other people in the world, and I want to thank you for sharing and just showing up. It's really a privilege to be in front of you today.

Speaker 2: 38:24

Thank you, Baz. My formula is take your pain and turn it into passion, your passion into purpose, your purpose into profit. I love that.

Speaker 1: 38:34

I know it's not ready yet, but when it is ready you have a special course you're currently putting together, aren't you, Yep? Can you just mention, touch on that to let everybody know what it's about, Because when it's ready, the link will be below so you can just click on it.

Speaker 2: 38:48

Yes, it'll be. We're doing the soft opening on May 6th and then we're doing this in the month of May and then May 11th it'll launch for real. It's TEDx Launchpad. Yeah, a gentleman reached out to me, found me on LinkedIn and said Frank, there's no comprehensive TEDx coaching online course from how do you find the app to how do you leverage the talk. So you should. We'll be glad to help you put together a comprehensive course on and it's everything I do in my live coaching only just in video form. And we also are creating a community on a platform called Clear it's. There'll be meetups and networking opportunities and collaborations and live events. I'll go on once a week for an hour and answer any questions. So we want to create a group of like-minded speakers as they work their way toward the TEDx talk.

Speaker 2: 39:38

You're doing an online course alone in your home by yourself in front of the computer, but if you have somewhere to go, you can sign up and get an accountability buddy so that you guys keep each other accountable as you move through the course. So it's where I'm really looking and it's just a. I never had a lower priced offer. My coaching's expensive. I never had a lower entry point with all that information. So I'm really excited about that, because every now and then I talk to somebody and I tell them what I charge. They're like oh my God, I go. Here's the good news I've got an online course I'm about to launch. It's a fraction of that, really.

Speaker 1: 40:08

Yeah. So I want to touch on the personal coaching, because there may be someone out there that can afford that pricing, whatever that is and they want to get a hold of you. Obviously they'll be on LinkedIn and the other socials. What's that process like, if it's?

Speaker 2: 40:24

one-on-one. It's my unique selling proposition. One is that I don't do group classes. It's an hour a week on Zoom, one-on-one. And the other unique selling proposition is we work on getting you a TEDx until you get one or we both die trying. So there's no tail end on it.

Speaker 1: 40:40

I'm yours until we score that ted x and then links will be below, whether it's to get connect with frank on linkedin or inquire about having that sort of coaching with him, and, equally, that lower tier course will be there as well. Is there any parting words you'd like to leave everybody with today?

Speaker 2: 41:00

Words of wisdom or comedy depends on what you want to go to. I can close out your podcast as a comedian would do it, baz, of course. If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate, subscribe and review and tell your friends. If you did not enjoy this podcast, we hope you have no friends.

Speaker 1: 41:17

From myself with that. I'm Baz Porter. This is Frank King. Live with purpose, my friends, and inspire with legacy. Take care.