Navigating Life with ADHD: Rick Culleton on Business, Sobriety, and Happiness

Rick Culleton: 00:00:00

whoa, wait a minute.

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I, I'm not here to quit drinking.

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I'm perfectly happy with

my alcohol consumption.

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I've been drinking 38 years and

I have no intention to quit.

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Finally they cut me loose at 17, gave

me a diploma and said, don't come back.

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There's nothing like sparring

there, there's nothing that

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brings you so in the moment.

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If you can scrub away all the anxiety

and everything else that we have that's

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just kind of layered up on top of us.

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once you clean that slate,

you're left with happiness.

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And that's what we're trying to show

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wherever you are in life and whatever

you've been through, it has nothing

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to do with where you're going.

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past has no bearing on your future,

and you're free to change the direction

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you're headed at any time you want.

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Russell Newton: Hello listeners

and welcome back Social Skills

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Coaching I'm your host Russell, and

our guest today is Rick Culleton.

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Rick is an entrepreneur, an

author, and a mindfulness advocate.

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You have a book already out.

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Tell us about that.

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Rick Culleton: my first

book is Messed Up Like You,

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And it's a story that's framed

around me getting my pilot's

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license, which was a pretty unusual

thing to happen in the first place.

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it's got some great stories in it and

it's inspirational probably to anybody

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who's trying to get by with a DHD.

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Russell Newton: So tell us what a DHD

is and let's start with, as a child,

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because I don't think we have a real

understanding of some of the struggles

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that, that, diagnosis brings, to,

to children and their development.

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Rick Culleton: when I was a child,

they were all over the place.

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should we medicate 'em?

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Should we not medicate 'em,

put 'em in a special room.

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one point in the third grade, they

moved me into an accelerated class

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and put me with third and fourth

graders, the idea that I would skip

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the fourth grade and go right into

the fifth grade, which didn't happen.

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And I went from that class to the

fourth grade the next year where

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they thought they should hold me

back and keep me there an extra year.

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And then finally they cut me

loose at 17, gave me a diploma

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and said, don't come back.

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And so it was a bit of

a rollercoaster ride.

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And, you know, again, I didn't

really see I had a problem learning.

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I knew that I was all over the place,

but as a kid you didn't know that

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everybody else wasn't too, so it

didn't really seem to me to be unusual.

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Russell Newton: You are an entrepreneur.

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You have several businesses, in

several countries it sounds like.

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Are they related?

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Are they a wide variety of things?

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It sounds like you dabble

into a lot of different areas.

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Rick Culleton: very similar at all.

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And I deliberately look for things

that are, different challenges

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to keep me entertained, you

know, and I prevent the boredom.

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But my, oldest company I have

is about 20 years, 28 years old

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now, and it's based in Texas.

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We sell refurbished computer equipment,

a place called Discount electronics.com.

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and over the last 20 years or so,

I've been investing in real estate and

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opened a company in Austin that does

primarily, purchases, real estate,

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Fixes it up, rents it out.

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Commercial, residential,

multifamily, single family.

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We've expanded that into Colorado

and a little bit into Costa Rica

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where I got into the hotel business.

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started with vacation rentals down

there, that I moved an operation from the

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states into Costa Rica, and then later

changed the building type from homes

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and apartments and such into hotels.

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I enjoy working, so it's, a labor

of love I have great people, and

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I couldn't do this without them.

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that's a big part of being

successful is to have the right team.

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we've got some of the most

fantastic people both in the

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United States and in Costa Rica.

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the folks I work with, the

discount electronics, many of

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'em have been there decades.

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we're a family.

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It's a small company, 30 employees.

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we've all worked together for

a long time and I think we

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all enjoy our jobs very much.

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I've still got, one employee who's about

to hit the 10 year mark down there.

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the hotel manager's been there

since the day we opened up one

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of the hotels is on the beach.

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It's a beautiful spot to be.

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I'm not such an awful boss.

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they've got a pretty good job

and they enjoy life down there.

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And then the, the real estate company

is more of, on demand type thing, where

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I'll, you know, we have tenants, we

manage a lot of that with software.

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And then when we need people,

we sub out, we have regulars

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that we sub to all the time.

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One who used to be an employee who

now is a subcontractor that just

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does his own thing and works for

me in a variety of other people.

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but that's pretty much my work.

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You know, my email is very interesting.

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WhatsApp, you never know what's coming in.

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You open that phone up and you

don't know what language it's gonna

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be in, and you have absolutely

no idea what it's gonna be about.

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But I guarantee every morning.

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It's interesting.

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Russell Newton: how do you

go about building that team?

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What do you look for?

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expand on that, and then when you

have a team together, obviously

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you're doing some things very right

that keeps that team together.

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Can you talk to both points?

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Rick Culleton: to hiring, I, I really

look for self-motivated people.

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I am not an over the

shoulder kind of boss.

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I don't know where anybody is.

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I don't know what time they

come to work, when they go home

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or where they're working from.

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And for that, you know, it just requires

somebody that's got self-discipline

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that knows how to get the job done.

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I don't care if you work

four hours or 12 hours.

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I prefer you don't have

to work 12 hours and.

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It's just a matter of getting

the job done, you figuring out

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how to do it and getting results.

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The hotel's a little bit different

in that, you know, we have places

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there where people need to be, you

know, somebody's gotta be sitting at

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reception, so there's a schedule and

they need to be there to check people in.

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And, you know, it's a little bit different

hiring there because you need somebody

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bilingual and there's a lot of other

requirements, but this kinda electronics

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and most of the folks that have been there

long time, have had varied positions.

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You know, they'll come in the door

as one thing, you know, one of my

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favorite stories is a guy that we

hired outta the Home Depot to lay

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bricks at the construction of a

new store back in: 2010

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And when we finished up, I gave everybody

a little bit extra money, thanked

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them for the work, and said goodbye.

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And the next day I came in when

the store opened and he was there.

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And I said, well, you know,

Fernando, what are you doing here?

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And we're done.

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And he goes, no, I'm gonna work.

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And I'm like, any work for you.

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And he goes, I'll do whatever you need.

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I'm like, well, I don't need anything.

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He goes, you got this store.

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Somebody's gotta work here.

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Right?

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and he barely spoke English at the time.

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I'm like, you know, I, I'll find

something for you for now, but you

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need to find a job It's now 2025.

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That was 2010.

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He is our number one computer technician.

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He, he's never left, got married,

had some kids, and has turned

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out to be quite the employee.

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Russell Newton: your bio talked about

a journey through A DHD, which we've

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talked about, and then it mentions

a phrase I've not seen before.

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Accidental sobriety.

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what does that refer to?

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Rick Culleton: you know,

that's an interesting story.

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I was on a path I was having a

lot of anxiety, which I think is,

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Pretty typical for entrepreneurs.

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And, sometimes we don't even

realize how much we're living with.

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And, mine had gotta the point where

I'd wake up in the morning trembling,

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like literally shaking in bed

and have to get outta bed quickly

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because it was just gonna get worse.

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when I'd stop and think about

what was causing the problem,

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I really couldn't get to it.

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There were acute things every single day.

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It was something different.

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Or sometimes it would be the same things.

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It could be money, it could

be this, it could be that.

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And you'd see a recurring theme,

that once this problem left

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my mind, another one, fill it.

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and I knew that, these weren't

really problems of the severity

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that I was giving them credit for.

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And I received an email one day from a

woman by the name of Julie Hutchinson.

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it read, would you like to Wake Up Happy?

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And then the email proceeded to.

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Sound like she'd been peering

through the windows and watching me

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because it was just very spot on.

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And I showed it to my wife and I

said, this is just kind of crazy.

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And so I responded to the email.

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It turns out that Julie,

was a family member of some

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people that I knew very well.

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two of her family members

had worked for me.

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One of them, her niece and I

had worked together very closely

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and had traveled together.

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And, so that there was a

little bit of trust there.

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And, I started a course that she

took, called Core Performance.

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And, was tricked a little bit, maybe

outta my own naivety in, in a few ways.

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But the first one was that we started

breathing exercises, which is a meditation

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practice that I still use every day.

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I do the same, meditation

that we learned back then.

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Did it today, and I'll do it tomorrow.

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during this process, as we were getting

in here through this, she told me about

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a month in, she said, Rick, you know,

you're gonna find, when, when this

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anxiety leaves and you get all of this

under control, you're probably not

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even gonna need the alcohol anymore.

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And I said, whoa, wait a minute.

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I, I'm not here to quit drinking.

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I'm perfectly happy with

my alcohol consumption.

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I've been drinking 38 years and

I have no intention to quit.

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And, a couple months went by and I

was in Manhattan in my apartment one

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day and had gone to see an old friend.

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I bought a bunch of beer that

morning and I loved, IPA still do.

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I just drink it without the

non-alcoholic version now.

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And I, I bought some pretty expensive

beer down the street from my apartment,

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brought it back, put it in the fridge,

walked around town most of the day and

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came back at about five o'clock threw

it and all the rest of the alcohol down

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the trash chute from the 45th floor,

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a hit the bottom and I

never had a drink again.

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I'm sure I'm still not a hundred

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Russell Newton: Wow.

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Rick Culleton: what

caused that to be the day.

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I mean, it was something

I contemplated before.

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You know, I always thought, you know,

one day when the doctor tells me that

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my liver's gonna jump outta my body

or something that I would quit, I

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drank every single day of my life for

38 years, except for two days when I

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took my son in a Boy Scout camp out.

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So it was a pretty major change.

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Russell Newton: you now help others

find true and lasting happiness.

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Does that relate to, another

entrepreneurial adventure you have

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going is that personal relationships

are, are you a coach or a, a counselor?

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Rick Culleton: means of doing that

right now is through the second book.

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Um, but you can find out more

about that1@mymorningstack.com.

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But it, I took the, the meditation

exercise that I did and when

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I found that that was, um.

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Doing so much good.

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And then when I did it in the

day seemed to really matter.

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And I learned within a couple

months that the earlier in the day

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I did it, the better off I was.

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That became one of the first things I did.

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And then I, I, I took that piece that

came from having done the meditation

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and thought, you know, I'm gonna make

use for the, of this for a little while.

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And I developed a, morning

stack that I follow.

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And the second piece of that is something

I call techno fasting, which is where

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we, you just stay away from technology

for as long as possible in the morning.

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You don't wake up with a cell phone.

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But this is where we're going with this,

is to try to help people build their

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own morning stack and find That comfort

zone, that peace, that can be there.

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I believe that we're

all happy and peaceful.

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If you can scrub away all the anxiety

and everything else that we have that's

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just kind of layered up on top of us.

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once you clean that slate,

you're left with happiness.

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And that's what we're trying to

show is that, you know, you can get

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to this with just a little bit of

work, but it's a continuing effort.

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It's not, you know, the gym, you can't

go to the gym for a month every other

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day and get done at the end of 30 days

and go, look, I'm strong and fit and I'm

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gonna be great for the rest of my life.

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And, and.

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is the same way.

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You know, it's a, it's a,

it's a lifelong practice.

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If you want to be mentally healthy, it's

the same as being physically healthy.

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it's something you need

to work at all the time.

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You can't eat good one day and

then live on cotton candy and

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expect to maintain your health.

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So this is where we're going with this.

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it's a starter plan that it'll

get you going with your stack

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and then instructions as to

how you can develop your own.

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Russell Newton: what does

your average day look like?

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What are some of these things that you're

doing that you're willing to share?

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Rick Culleton: I have a special stack that

I brought with me because I'm traveling.

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I'm in Europe right now, so I

don't have a cold plunge that

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could carry around with me.

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I'm working on that, but

at the moment, I'm without.

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So, it starts out pretty easily.

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I get up very early, so I'm up at

about normally five 30 in the morning

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and, one of the very first things

I do, I drink a glass that's pretty

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much salt water, it's got magnesium

in it and so forth to rehydrate.

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And then I head outside, not looking

at light through the windows, but

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actually get out, get outdoors and

help reinforce my circadian rhythm

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and make sure that, you know, I'm

keeping my sleep cycle, in sync.

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And then I come back inside and,

meditate for whatever amount of time

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it takes me to get my 600 points.

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And then I do 25 pushups and I stretch.

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I've been nursing an achilles tendon

injury and I just started running again,

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so I'm being kind of cautious with that.

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I journal after I get done stretching.

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I have a quirky thing that I

picked up about a year ago or

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a little less with my journal.

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For the first paragraph I

write with my left hand.

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It's a neuroplasticity trick

that, on top of, keeping all

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the neurons firing in my brain.

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enough, I've learned to write pretty

well with my left hand, even in cursive.

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I'm impressed.

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I've even impressed myself.

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And so, you know, this is probably

where I would leave most of the people

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is like, this is where, you know,

if those things work for you, that's

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a great foundation for your day.

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You know, you're talking

about 40 minutes or less.

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So, I think that's that type of stack.

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It doesn't need to be those things.

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And then where I go from there is,

there's physical exercise every day.

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It's either gonna be running or

the gym and I'll go back and forth,

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and then I take at least one day

and sometimes two days a week.

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To recover.

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And I'm a gadget junkie, so I've

got an aura ring on one hand and

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a Garmin watch on the other hand.

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And, you know, I'm always looking

at the data and I listen to it too.

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So when it says, Hey, you need to

back off, time to take it easy.

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I do.

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I learned, just recently how

important the recovery part was.

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I was always go, go, go, go, go

ignore, you know, they're, they're not

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talking to me when they say slow down.

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So I was pushing it and I started to see

some data signs that looked really bad.

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Rate, my resting heart rate was going up,

my heart rate variability was going down.

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And so since I've started to listen

to these gadgets a little bit

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more closely, I'm doing better.

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So, you know, every other day I'll run,

every other day I'll go to the gym.

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and then once I finish that routine,

you know, it's then my workday really

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starts, you know, so when I get

that stuff out of the way, that's

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when I, go and on the computer.

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and one thing I left out in that

whole routine is the techno fasting.

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And that, you know, I

stay away from the phone.

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So my phone stays and do not disturb

all the time, every day, all day.

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But I do need to use it in the

morning for the meditation.

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I have a tone that plays, so

my breathing is, asynchronous.

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It's the same amount of time

in and out, which has been a

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very important part for me.

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So I do need that gadget for that part.

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But, you know, I don't

use it for anything else.

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: 00:14:10

When I'm done with the

meditation, I put it down.

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: 00:14:12

and then, you know, it's usually at

least two hours before I pick something

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up electronic or turn on anything where

you've got any screen or any even audible.

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: 00:14:22

I don't even let the news play

in the background or anything

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: 00:14:26

sleep's an incredibly

important part of the day.

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: 00:14:28

You know, we can't even talk

about a morning stack if you

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: 00:14:30

haven't had a good night's sleep.

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: 00:14:31

There's no point at all.

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: 00:14:32

Sometimes I'm just in it, you know,

I go out and see the sun when it's

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setting as well as when it's rising.

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: 00:14:36

So you get some of that light, at sunset.

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: 00:14:38

It doesn't be right at sunset, but

it's really important to send that

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: 00:14:41

signal to your brain that this

is the end of the day, especially

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: 00:14:43

for someone who moves around.

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: 00:14:44

And it's not just about going from the

states to Europe, but when I move from

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: 00:14:48

Colorado to New York, that two hours

difference, it's really important that

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: 00:14:50

I get reset, stay reset, then, you know,

if I need to at night, I use this little

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: 00:14:55

electronic gadget that makes you drowsy.

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: 00:14:57

It's got damp sponges.

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: 00:14:59

You put in your temples.

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: 00:15:00

It's called TDCS.

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: 00:15:01

Transcranial something.

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: 00:15:03

anyway, that along with Bin Beats

and knock myself out in seconds.

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: 00:15:09

Literally, I mean, literally

it's probably five minutes with

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: 00:15:11

that stuff and I'm, I'm out.

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: 00:15:15

I've fought TaeKwonDo for a decade.

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: 00:15:18

I've been, I have put my body through some

stuff and cold plunge makes me pain free.

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: 00:15:25

I forget about the endorphin

release or the, the weight

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: 00:15:28

Russell Newton: Really.

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: 00:15:29

Rick Culleton: the mental,

I am pain free and it's.

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: 00:15:33

Without it, it came back quick.

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: 00:15:35

I think it was day seven

without a cold bunch.

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: 00:15:37

Like here it comes.

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: 00:15:37

And, the same pain that I've probably

been living with for decades in my

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: 00:15:41

shoulders and neck didn't bother

me that much then, because I was

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: 00:15:45

accustomed to it when it came after.

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: 00:15:46

I've had relief for a

while, and it comes back.

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: 00:15:48

It's just a reinforcer is, and the lesson

behind all that is that, you know, once

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: 00:15:54

you learn the benefits to these things,

to eating healthy, to going to the gym,

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: 00:15:58

to getting enough sleep, it's not hard

to stay focused on them because it just,

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: 00:16:03

you know, do you want a great life?

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: 00:16:05

Do you want to be happy and healthy or

do you not, you know, it's your choice.

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: 00:16:09

Russell Newton: when you're building

your morning stack if you get one or

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: 00:16:12

two habits and then you build, do you

find it to be cumulative, something

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: 00:16:15

that you work on over a period of

time and it becomes a big part?

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: 00:16:19

Or did you jump into a large

part of it and just to maybe

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: 00:16:22

expand a little bit from there?

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: 00:16:24

Rick Culleton: is something that I.

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: 00:16:24

had to work on.

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: 00:16:25

And like I say, I'm no

different than anybody else.

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: 00:16:27

The meditation was on my list to

do, and in the beginning it didn't

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: 00:16:30

get done in the morning, and it was

oftentimes anxiety causing because

356

: 00:16:34

it was on my list of things to do.

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: 00:16:36

And here it is, five o'clock and it hasn't

been done yet, especially when I was still

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: 00:16:40

Russell Newton: I.

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: 00:16:40

Rick Culleton: And six o'clock

is right around the corner.

360

: 00:16:42

So you, you know, that

was a big, you know.

361

: 00:16:45

I would do it, but it would be

late in the day and it didn't

362

: 00:16:47

have quite the same effect.

363

: 00:16:49

I would find that, I wasn't

getting the score that I needed.

364

: 00:16:52

I wasn't getting the relief from the

anxiety that I had gotten at other times.

365

: 00:16:55

And then if we had a scheduled class

or a meeting and I was doing it

366

: 00:16:58

earlier in the day, I felt better.

367

: 00:16:59

I didn't jump into it at all.

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: 00:17:01

I had no morning routine whatsoever

other than, wiping off my hangover

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: 00:17:05

and heading for the espresso machine.

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: 00:17:08

Russell Newton: And what was

the first thing that you started

371

: 00:17:10

that started building your stack?

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: 00:17:12

Rick Culleton: The very first thing

that I did for my stack was pushups.

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: 00:17:17

and I don't even remember

where that started.

374

: 00:17:23

Probably inspired by somebody

watching some YouTube video Almost

375

: 00:17:27

immediately, within a couple days

of starting with the pushups, I went

376

: 00:17:31

into stretching, just because I was

having so much flexibility, so many

377

: 00:17:35

flexibility issues all the way around.

378

: 00:17:37

And later on when I was having problems

with my Achilles, they reinforce that

379

: 00:17:40

thought with, you know, I don't really

have it, and Achilles tendon injury,

380

: 00:17:43

it's, the upper chain is just so tight.

381

: 00:17:46

I was somebody who just went to

the gym and just lifted all the

382

: 00:17:48

time and didn't pay much attention

to anything else other than that.

383

: 00:17:52

So that was the next thing.

384

: 00:17:53

It was pushups and stretching.

385

: 00:17:55

And then I don't even remember

What got put in there next.

386

: 00:17:59

the abbreviated version of techno

fasting came on pretty quickly.

387

: 00:18:03

I knew the phone and the computer

were big triggers for me.

388

: 00:18:07

I would use them all day long to.

389

: 00:18:09

Aggravate myself looking at things that

I shouldn't be looking at, whether they

390

: 00:18:13

were sales numbers or stock quotes.

391

: 00:18:14

it's crazy how self-destructive.

392

: 00:18:16

You can become with something like that.

393

: 00:18:18

You know, your body's doing something

that you know is gonna do all the

394

: 00:18:22

wrong things, just screw up your

endocrine system and send all these

395

: 00:18:25

signals that you don't want yet.

396

: 00:18:26

You do it anyway.

397

: 00:18:26

You know, like putting

your hand on a hot stove.

398

: 00:18:32

life is, um, is one big lesson, you know?

399

: 00:18:35

And if you're willing to, to, to pay

attention and, and learn along the

400

: 00:18:39

way, life becomes so much better.

401

: 00:18:42

You know, I think when I was a

young man, I looked to, to old age.

402

: 00:18:47

What now where I am is what I

thought was old age to, to be

403

: 00:18:50

something, to dread and fear.

404

: 00:18:52

And I'm so much happier today

than I ever was in life.

405

: 00:18:55

and it's because I've learned the way,

you know, as you're going through life,

406

: 00:18:58

you pay attention to what makes you feel

good and What, you should do, what you

407

: 00:19:03

shouldn't do, and then act accordingly.

408

: 00:19:06

And it's a great lesson it's something

that's just very, very enjoyable

409

: 00:19:11

Russell Newton: can you give our listeners

a rundown of your top recommended

410

: 00:19:14

books that are out there in addition,

of course, to messed up like you.

411

: 00:19:18

what else would you recommend for our

listeners, to implement into their lives?

412

: 00:19:22

Rick Culleton: that changed my life, um,

were Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.

413

: 00:19:29

seven by Dr.

414

: 00:19:32

Covey and, uh, rich Dad,

poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki.

415

: 00:19:38

Russell Newton: Great.

416

: 00:19:39

Yeah.

417

: 00:19:39

Very well known, very

popular and for good reason.

418

: 00:19:42

Some excellent works there.

419

: 00:19:45

Rick Culleton: thing that I'd like to

finish with is that, wherever you are in

420

: 00:19:48

life and whatever you've been through, it

has nothing to do with where you're going.

421

: 00:19:52

past has no bearing on your future,

and you're free to change the direction

422

: 00:19:56

you're headed at any time you want.