[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: The podcast for those who find themselves immersed in adversity and choose to write their story instead of having others write it for them. I'm Drew Duraney and I'm your host. Today's guest is Aaron Edgar. Aaron Edgar, the caring attorney and owner of the law office of Aaron Baker Edgar PLLC helps busy families protect their children and loved ones, preserve their assets, provide for the continuation of their businesses and save thousands of dollars with headache free estate planning and lifetime lawyering solutions.
She is especially interested in helping the parents of special needs children plan for their children's future.
She graduated from University of North Carolina Chapel Hill School of Law and prior to opening her Firm worked for 11 years for legal Aid of North Carolina to help better the lives of North Carolinians experiencing poverty. She has practiced law for 15 years and is a member of the North Carolina State Bar, her state and local bar associations, the North Carolina Master Chorale, Toastmasters International and Business Networking International.
Erin lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with her husband Rodney.
When she is not helping people plan for the inevitable, she enjoys bird watching, singing, composing music, reading books and watching Star Trek.
Caring is preparing and live long and prosper are her guiding philosophies as she supports her clients in preparing for the inevitable with ease.
Enjoy the show. Aaron, so good to see you.
[00:01:48] Speaker A: Good to see you as well. Thank you for having me.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Oh, it's my, certainly my pleasure.
I love before we hit the record button to actually catch up with my guest.
There's just something about the relational discussion that just enhances what happens after we hit the record button. So thank you for chatting with me for a few minutes before we hit record.
It was, it was my pleasure.
[00:02:20] Speaker A: Certainly mine as well.
[00:02:22] Speaker B: So folks, you know that I always, in the beginning, I love to thank the individual who introduced me to my wonderful guest and I want to thank Dr. Barnsley Brown for my the introduction to Aaron Edgar because it's been a wonderful relationship thus far. And Dr. Barnsley, I knew you had a reason for introducing the two of us.
Not just what Erin does professionally, but as her as a human being or she is a human being. So thank you so much.
Why is Aaron Edgar here, folks? Well, you guys know I always talk about how when we're young, you know, we're taught that life is linear and it's not a malicious teaching from our family or friends or society.
They want that for us and it'd be beautiful if it was. And for the most part, life is linear until it's not.
But that linear approach, if you do A plus B Plus C equals D, in that order. Everything's going to be fine. You know, we do believe it. And at some point in life, an external circumstance comes between one of those letters, and it changes our straight path of life into a more circuitous one.
And with that, human beings will then have that adversity right in front of us. And either we notice it or we don't. And if we notice it, we either take action or we don't.
And I believe there's three types of people out there, and for Aaron's sake, three types of women.
Woman number one has so many blind spots, so many things that are in front of her, and she doesn't see them, doesn't notice them, and she just continues to live life the way she's been told and the way she's been doing with no changes.
And then there's woman number two. Woman number two does notice that adversity, yet she says, I'm the victim.
Everything else is to blame. Life is doing that. To me, that is a barrier, that adversity, and I can't change it. It is what it is. And she goes along life on autopilot without any changes. And on her deathbed, boy, does she have a lot of regrets. And then there's woman number three. That's Aaron Edgar. It's the women and men I have on this show.
And woman number three sees that adversity, and she says, you know what? I am sick and tired of being sick and tired. This adversity is not a barrier. It's an opportunity. It's an opportunity for me to take massive action and work through it and become a stronger woman on the other side.
So with that introduction, Erin, if you could please reach back as far as you need to for that defining moment or defining moments, personal or professional, whether it was the tap on the shoulder, the whisper in the ear, or like what I needed two by four upside my head that transformed you and helped you become the Aaron Edgar. You are now going from the woman you are now to the woman from the woman you were.
You share that with the audience?
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Absolutely. I have two of them in mind, and thank you so much for asking me about them. It really did cause me to reflect kind of on my life. And when those defining moments really occurred, for me, the first moment actually was a circumstance change, a really huge life change, and personally. And the second moment was a professional change.
So the first moment was when I was nine years old.
I was.
My parents and I had this huge move. We moved from the state of Indiana where I was in a blind school, you know, five days a week and I would come home on the weekends. And I was sort of catapulted into a public school setting. Went from a class of seven to a class of 33 in my fourth grade year and came home every night and was challenged academically. And everything just changed for me on the turn of a dime.
And what I hadn't realized fully was sort of in the blind school setting, I was in a place where I was surrounded by, oh, in case you didn't know this, I happened to be blind. I think I forgot that part.
I happen to be in, in a place where, you know, I was with my blind peers. We were learning similar things at the same rate.
And I found myself very bored academically and my parents knew that.
And we also did not want me to be apart from them for, you know, like a week at a time. It just was not for us a healthy thing.
So they didn't like their jobs either, which was a help. So they picked up and moved.
[00:07:16] Speaker B: There you go.
[00:07:16] Speaker A: And they, you know, we all picked up and moved. And I could have chosen one of two paths at that point in, in transformational leadership, we call it stop, look, choose.
But I didn't know that terminology at that point. But I sensed in my nine year old brain that I had two choices.
I could either be really scared about this new environment or I could be really happy and choose to think about it as a big adventure, which, that was the choice, that was the path that I took.
And so I remember coming home from school the first day and telling my parents what a wonderful time I'd had, thinking to myself, well, it wasn't all wonderful, like kind of scary, but that's okay, it'll be wonderful. And it turned out that it was probably the most, probably the best decision that our family could have made. We had really hard struggles at first, and that's okay, we worked through them. I had struggles in my school career, but I decided to make school and education for me, about academics. And that was what it was for me because that was the way I could go forward and be the best person that I could be.
You know, I was apparently very intelligent and I channeled my, myself into that and learn to excel there and ended up going to law school and doing all those wonderful things. Law school was a huge awakening for me. It taught me that I didn't know everything, but that's another story for another time.
And so that was the first sort of personal defining moment for me.
The second shall I move on to the second.
[00:09:09] Speaker B: Yes, please.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: Okay. Awesome. So the second defining moment happened. It actually lasted a while.
I had to be hit over the head with a two by four on this one.
The first part of the defining moment was in 2018 when I had a family death.
And I was very unhappy in my job for a variety of reasons. The work environment was great, but the job itself was. It left a lot to be desired in a lot of ways and was. I was getting burnout.
So on that family death, and we realized that the person who died had this will and trust that was beautiful. But it was like 25 years outdated and nothing in it really, we don't think measured up to what the person wanted.
And it was a mess. The last six months of her life, our family was left in kind of turmoil. Like, how should we take care of her?
How did she want her?
You know, everything that she and my grandfather had worked so hard for, how did she want that taken care of? We really didn't know.
And there was a lot of hard feelings in the family after her death, which could have been avoided. And that's not set in judgment. It's said as, you know, wow, this was an easy thing to avoid, but people don't think about it. And so I made this commitment to myself that when I was ready, when I was ready, I would not let my community, you know, people in my community go through that. It was just not. It didn't need to be right. And.
And so, yeah, when I'm ready. Well, it turned out that there was a two by four that needed to hit me.
Covid happened.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: Oh.
[00:10:48] Speaker A: And so the pandemic was a huge value assessment for me as it was, I think, for a lot of people. And I asked myself, when am I going to be ready? When is it going to happen? It's got to happen now.
And that was the second part of that defining moment. The two by four hit me on the shoulder and said, you need to, you know, if you're not happy working for someone else because you want to do stuff your own things, your own way, you need to step out and start working for yourself and actually make this happen and make it happen now. Because this is a time where everyone is in this liminal space, where all this liminal space is my fancy word for this huge gap where we don't know exactly what's going to happen next.
This is the time for me to step out. You know, I was telling myself this and actually make this happen. And I did. And I can't Tell you, it's been 100% easy and it's, you know, and now I am an entrepreneur. I am doing estate planning for people and helping people in my community every day so that what happened to my family will not happen to others.
And caring about people in. In my own way and serving my clients to the best of my ability to do that. Thanks to that second defining moment.
[00:12:02] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: That two by four.
[00:12:04] Speaker B: You know, there's minimal two things I think of right away. And one is you did it scared in both your personal defining moment and professional.
And the second is you empowered yourself by, by self advocating because you could have taken one route personally when you moved and you took the more. The. The road less traveled, which was very empowering.
And then even with the work, you liked the work, but you like the place but not what you were doing. And you wanted to like, kind of write your own story, create your own path, and you made another empowering decision. So self advocacy seems to be one of your skills. Strong points, thank goodness.
And now you are advocating for others who are in similar situations.
When do you recall what really instilled in you, this self advocacy to really stand up for yourself? Was that mom and dad? Was it?
Tell me, you know, what, what gave you that strength of self advocacy?
[00:13:14] Speaker A: Well, I will say I'm not perfect. There are a lot of times when I don't advocate, but I know when it's happening because something changes, you know, in. In my life and in my perception of myself, and I'm no longer that happy person. I get in that scared place, Right. And now I can, like, notice it and shift into a state of self advocacy, partially because it's one of the strengths that, you know, it's something that is a strength. And there are a lot of times when, you know, I don't even see that. I don't notice it. And it takes other people, you know, like yourself to kind of wallop me over the head and say, hey, remember that?
And to answer your question, I think I believe that it was really my parents who stood up for me when I couldn't, you know, I didn't have the tools.
[00:14:04] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: And we say that, you know, that move. That's why it was so defining. I was like, well, wow, you know, we can make a change and all kinds of wonderful stuff can happen.
They stood up for me when I couldn't and were a huge force in teaching me to do the same. You know, stand up for myself, stand up for other people.
I am really not a person who goes in for rallies and mass protest. But I will stand up for one person at a time because that's where I believe the change happens, or at least a lot of the meaningful change.
And so I, you know, I learned that from. From them. Stand up for yourself. Stand up for the people you care about and advocate for your own greatness.
I don't think they said it in those words, but advocate for yourself because you can do whatever you set your mind to.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: That was something they always taught me.
[00:15:06] Speaker B: I love that.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: And there are people in this world who can't.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: It's true, because they're taught out. They're taught the opposite, and they're taught the opposite.
[00:15:13] Speaker A: Or they don't have the tools in front of them, or they aren't physically able.
[00:15:18] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:15:19] Speaker A: Or mentally able to do. But. But they. They can act within their means and still enjoy life. And I think that's very important.
[00:15:28] Speaker B: I want to ask you about the distinction between.
When you're in Indiana, in a. What was a classroom of how many? Seven.
[00:15:35] Speaker A: Seven. I think the biggest one I was in was 11.
[00:15:38] Speaker B: All right, so let's think of that as a. As your safe space because a. The quantity of people there, and they were all similar to you in terms of not being, you know, being blind and then going out of your comfort zone to classroom of 30 something of where we're probably like 99% of them had their sight.
Did. Were you treated differently? Did you notice it, or did you not care? Because I know that impacts a lot of people, regardless of what differences they have, where people are treated differently or judged, which is not a good thing.
What do you think?
[00:16:20] Speaker A: That's really an interesting question.
At that point in my life, when I was, you know, going into that public school setting, I noticed that in that. In that year, it started to become different as years went by because kids started learning from their adults in their lives. But in that year, when I went into that public school setting, the children did not treat me differently at all.
It was really refreshing. It was like, you know, let's get to know each other and let's hang out and do things. And it was great. The adults did.
I was held back academically in some ways that we quickly found out about. And my parents advocated for me again, but the adults did. As the years went by, the kids started to treat me differently.
And as the years also went by, I decided I was different.
So I was, you know, I played the game, too, and held myself apart from a lot of the kids and sort of, you know, perpetuated it, too.
And so, you know, I had some part in that. And I'm not saying that to be judgmental, actually. It's just a noticing.
[00:17:40] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:42] Speaker A: And so as I, you know, grew up, my differences came out, and it allowed me that sort of holding myself apart allowed me, in a certain sense, to develop my own inner self and bring a lot of focus to my own inner, kind of like, reflective self and envision what I wanted for my life. And so in some ways, it was good.
[00:18:12] Speaker B: In some.
[00:18:12] Speaker A: In other ways, it kind of held me back socially a little bit. And so even now, when you ask me, well, you know, what are your friendships like, I'm kind of. Like, I'm kind of an infant. I isolate myself a lot. But I do know how to really listen to people and get deep into what people might not be saying.
And so, you know, take what you want from that.
It has been a strength in some ways, and in some ways it is a vulnerability.
[00:18:44] Speaker B: And I. And I, you know, I thank you, Aaron, for being vulnerable. But you have so many strengths that, that. And, you know, and some people, this whole judgment thing, it's very interesting because we'll think about it, though. When we're born, it's. We're like a.
Not a clean slate. Because you believe in spirituality. There's something there. But we're taught to be, to. To be judgmental. We're taught to be, I'll say the word, you know, race, racial, race. Racism isn't. We're not born with it. And a lot of good things and not good things are taught to us.
And at a young age, we don't know the difference between what's, quote, unquote, right and wrong. Right. We're. We're taught all of that. Yeah. We're told what's right and wrong. So to the parents out there, of. Of young people, think.
I just encourage you to please think twice about judgment and assessment. I always tell people that I talk about window versus mirror accountability.
It's much easier to look out the window and judge who you see out the window than it is to look in the mirror and judge who you see in the mirror.
None of us are perfect. I always encourage people, work on yourselves.
And until you're perfect, don't judge others.
Let's let kids be kids. And, and, you know, one of the big things, when we're told we're adults at 18, we're told what you can and cannot do. And we. We still have our inner child inside of us, we just happen to say no. To it too often. So you're still young inside. You're still that young child who did not have biases.
And you can reach back and kind of reflect now and live in the moment and be aware of the detrimental effects it is to treat people differently because they are different from you. So that's, that's my. I'll stop. Get off my soapbox and stop my lecture. But just. Aaron, you give some great points there.
So moving into the professional environment from the organization you were at, where you liked the place you were at, but the work wasn't what you were looking for. That transition to entrepreneurship and your own business.
Tell us about that transition, how smooth or rocky it was.
[00:21:15] Speaker A: So I woke up one day working for the place I was working at before and had, you know, a client list and cleaned it up and closed all my cases and did all the things I needed to do to leave.
And I woke up the next day with no clients.
I had a little bit of capital, personal capital that I had invested, you know, really not no income coming in, no security there.
I will say I'm blessed to have a husband who has been supporting us while I've been getting myself together and breaking even most years, but it, it was kind of a weird feeling. And all of a sudden I realized I had a lot of limiting mindsets that I had ignored.
Limiting beliefs, limitations that I was placing on myself that I had just ignored, not thought about.
And it had gotten me this far ignoring them. You know, it had gotten me to a. The ripe old age of 44, you know, and gotten me in a good career and well educated. But now I had to come face to face with them because I was in this business alone. And so there were these things like, you're not good enough. You can't make this. You can't do this.
You're really afraid. You have no skills in this field of. It was a different legal field and I had a lot of education, but I didn't have a lot of experience in implementation, which is a whole different ball game. In law and in most professions, you don't really know anybody. You can never, you know, build a network. How would you even do that?
All of these limiting mindsets really were getting in my way and. And I had no experience to really build a base on or no referral network. So, wow, what was I going to do?
And for a while I had, for a few months, I just had no direction for the first couple months. And then I joined Business Networking International and I've been a member Ever since.
Because that is something that has given me, you know, some referrals. It's given me other professionals I can connect with. And if I know people who need them, then I send them to them. If they know people who need my services, they send them to me. And we all trust each other. And that to me, that know like and trust factor, which is so important in business is reflected in that organization. And so I've been a member ever since I realized I'd have to speak about what I did. And while I wasn't really terrified to get up in front of an audience and sing because I've done that all my life, speaking was a whole different ball game.
[00:24:09] Speaker B: Interesting.
[00:24:11] Speaker A: Yeah. So lawyers, we do have lives and have other interests, by the way.
[00:24:15] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:24:15] Speaker A: Not a lot of people know that or believe it, but we do.
And so speaking was a different ball game. So I had joined Toastmasters in an international.
[00:24:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:24:25] Speaker A: And I really threw myself into kind of selling from stage, if you get my drift, like promoting my services in speaking.
Another thing that I realized was that I would need business coaching because I don't know a thing about running a business. Running a law firm.
Goodness. So I had several different coaches over the years.
It's how I met Dr. Barnsley.
I had a couple of coaches coach me in the specifics of running a law firm and some of the KPIs, the performance indicators we need to look for in law firms, which are right, specific and unique.
And so all of those things together have helped me build relationships, which is really key if you're an entrepreneur.
Help with the mindset factor with the coaching and also learn how to access. I call it my inner promoter.
How to promote myself and not have as much of that imposter syndrome.
You know, I'm. I don't know anything. I'm not enough.
I'm a fraud, you know, whatever the case may be. Oh, I screwed up today. I'm terrible.
Not have as much of it as I was having before and notice I say as much because it's not going away, folks. It'll always be there. Every one of us has it.
[00:25:54] Speaker B: That's right. That's right. Yeah. Our subconscious there thinks it's protecting us from. From those negative selft talk. But we do have the power and control to tell our subconscious. Cut. Cut it out.
I am enough. Let's. Let's talk in a different way. And words matter.
I'd love to reach back and. And thank your husband for his support for you. And I'm sure you're a Supportive. Support him as he is for you.
I always love to learn how people meet the love of life. Did you mind sharing the story of how and your husband met.
[00:26:30] Speaker A: So Rodney and I met in a parking lot.
[00:26:32] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:26:34] Speaker A: And you know, both of us are visually impaired and neither one of us drives, so everyone's like parking lot. That sounds weird to me.
And it's, it's not as crazy as it sounds. We lived in know like in college dormitories. This is back when you had a boy's dorm and a girls dorm back in the 90s. And we lived, they were very close together and we were out in front in the parking lot and one of our mutual friends said, oh, I want to introduce you to my friends Rodney and Dwight. And then it turned out that 45 minutes later he and I were still in a conversation and virtually ignored the other two people.
And that being said, you know, we remained close with the other male friend that she introduced us to. He was the best man at our wedding. And you know, we were together for 10 years before we got married and we're still together 20 years later. So there must be something going on there.
[00:27:28] Speaker B: I love it. I love that story. Congratulations.
[00:27:31] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:27:31] Speaker B: Way to go, Rodney.
[00:27:32] Speaker A: There you go.
[00:27:33] Speaker B: I love it, I love it.
So, so getting back to what you do professionally now, give me an example of a client success story.
You know, just, you know, you don't have to name anybody's names but just give us a 50,000 foot level of the type of need an individual had where you were able to come through and provide them with life changing services.
[00:28:04] Speaker A: Absolutely.
So I had a client come to me.
She was a single mother, although I think she's since married, but she was a single mother. She had an 18 year old autistic daughter and she was, she wanted her daughter to be provided for upon, you know, mother upon her death.
And at the time she was not contemplating marriage and she was kind of alone in life. And so one of the other things that came up for her was I want to be supported too. If something should happen to me, I want to make sure that I'm supported so my daughter can be supported. And, and so her daughter was fairly high functioning autistic. She was also 18.
And so we made arrangements so that the mother could have estate planning documents that provided for her and made arrangements to provide for her daughter and someone could kind of help her daughter navigate through financial minefields because her daughter was not, you know, money was just not something that she was good at and she had some routines that she was accustomed to. So we made other documents that kind of outlined the routines that she had in, in her life so that people would know how she was accustomed to being cared for. Although she didn't need a guardian or anything, she was self sufficient, could live on her own.
But there were also routines that she needed to follow and people that needed to kind of look out for her. So we arranged that.
And also one of the other things we arranged is for the daughter to make arrangements for her own healthcare, her own financial support in case something happened to her.
Because while she was competent, she was also alone too. She didn't have a husband or know like a team of people around her that hospitals could legally, you know, well, not legally is the wrong word, but who would automatically go to for, for information on her and how things should happen for her.
And so that was really a success story for me and for the mother and for the daughter. And they both expressed to me how they felt cared for and supported by people that they knew and trusted who would help them out.
[00:30:46] Speaker B: You know that. Thank you for sharing that story because I mean it's aligned with where I'm at right now because my son is 23, he's got autism. And again highly functioning cognitive like you're, like your client.
And what's interesting is I've seen that many of the high functioning, I hate that term high functioning, assuming the others are low functioning. But you know, ones who cognitively are strong and more social skills and emotion management is where the weakness is.
They're misunderstood growing up because on the outside you cannot tell for the most part that they have autism because they are articulate and smart and speak. And it's only when there's a misstep in their routine that kind of puts a, you know, kink in their social skills or, or managing emotions that people then wonder what's going on and the first thought is behavioral issues as opposed to the fact that they have autism.
So what, what I guess what message would you give to a caregiver, a parent of a high quote unquote, high functioning child with autism? What kind of motivational advice would you give them in their own caregiving like the self care? Because it is challenging to see your child struggle and be articulate and being able to say that they. My son says he's a burden to me and he.
I hate hearing that word, you're not, you're never a burden. So I don't know what words of encouragement do you give to a parent of a high functioning Autistic child.
[00:32:38] Speaker A: And I would say just at the outset that many children, especially disabled children.
And you know, the word disabled has its drawbacks. I definitely approve of it over the word handicapped, which to me always felt weird. We'll go with disabled because that's actually the one I'm comfortable with using.
We always feel like a burden.
Well, I mean, maybe not all of us, but many of us.
And so it's something that we have to be reminded about. We're not burdens.
And so did it do it again?
[00:33:14] Speaker B: Yeah, we lost your visual.
[00:33:16] Speaker A: Hang on.
[00:33:17] Speaker B: Sorry. We'll wait.
It's worth waiting for. There we go.
[00:33:21] Speaker A: There we go.
Some of us do feel like burdens and it's worth reminding ourselves that we're not. And it's always helpful when other people remind us that we're not and don't get frustrated or upset with us, like, well, of course you're not a burden. You know, why would you think that?
And our society has taught us to feel like we're lacking.
[00:33:42] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:33:43] Speaker A: So we feel like something's missing, even if it's not.
And it's always interesting to remind myself as a disabled person that I might have a sense that's lacking.
And I have other things that got developed as a result of that.
And one of the things that I would suggest that parents do, this actually relates. One of the things that developed in me is that sense of presence that I alluded to earlier. I didn't say presence, but I said I know how to hear things that people don't say.
And I, when you ask me, well, how do you do that? I don't know, just some intuition, something.
[00:34:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:31] Speaker A: And this is something that can be developed. I believe in anybody.
[00:34:35] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:34:36] Speaker A: And so one of the things that I would suggest to parents and caregivers of high functioning or otherwise disabled adults is that sense of presence.
There are things that they need and even when highly articulate, perhaps can't communicate what they need or why they're having some kind of meltdown today and life just isn't working out.
And so parents are in. Caregivers often get frustrated because, like, what did I do wrong? Like, I'm doing all I know to do and they're having a meltdown. Why weren't they having it yesterday?
And so that sense of presence that just being with your child, even in their frustration.
And I realized that, like you get frustrated and feel helpless because there's nothing that you can do. Right. You feel.
And even being with them in that, in that frustrated space and Opening up to their frustration may give you cues that you are not aware of as to what is going on with them, why they're frustrated, or whatever the case may be, why they're not quite with it, why they're having a meltdown.
Everyone reacts differently. So I don't want to assume everyone reacts the same if their routines aren't followed.
And perhaps just being with them in that space, like, oh, honey, I know you're frustrated. I know it's not working today.
You know, I really feel that from you. Yeah, Maybe we can work together and figure out why.
[00:36:19] Speaker B: I love the way you approach that because it's more of a neutral statement. That's reassuring because I can speak for my son. He's looking for understanding, security, somebody to be there for him. And you're right. Just being in the same room, that presence is so impactful. So thank you for sharing that.
[00:36:41] Speaker A: May I say one more thing?
[00:36:42] Speaker B: Please.
[00:36:42] Speaker A: Because this is really important.
[00:36:44] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:36:44] Speaker A: Caregivers will not always be there for their children.
It's a fact. It's an inevitability.
Something may happen and you may not always be there. And that's why it's so important. I believe the other. The caveat to that is it's important to introduce others to your children who will agree to care for them. And it's helpful to do that kind of early when you're still there so that they can develop a relationship with those other people and be comfortable enough to open up to them and tell them why they need what they need, or even to be open and that person to be open in that same present tense with those same present senses to allow for that deepening relationship so that when the caregiver isn't there, that other person can slip into that role, can know, and the child can be comfortable enough with them to allow them into their lives.
[00:37:44] Speaker B: Absolutely. That is very important. Building a strong, trusting community around for your special needs child is extremely important. Important.
You know, it's interesting you mentioned the word disabled. I. I've been using lately the word differently abled because there's so many strengths that people with disabilities or people with special needs have and, and our, our job as the, you know, atypical versus typical. The typical is to encourage the strengths that they have to bring it out, man, because they're unique. And I've learned so much from my son. I mean, he fills a lot of my weaknesses up and we absolutely formidable team together. So, you know, the audience certainly has captured the essence of Aaron Edgar, and they're Going to want to get in touch with you, Aaron. So, folks, Aaron said on LinkedIn and Facebook, it would be at Aaron. Edgar Legal would be like the. Whatever the handle.
[00:38:46] Speaker A: That's the handle for Facebook and the LinkedIn is Aaron, period, Edgar, because that's the way it's set up.
[00:38:52] Speaker B: All right, that'd be great. And you can email Aaron. Best way to get in touch with aaron@edgar legal.com I get that right.
[00:39:01] Speaker A:
[email protected] and I'm sure these will be in the show notes.
[00:39:05] Speaker B: Yeah, I'll put all this in the show notes.
Anything we have not discussed that you feel is important to share with the audience, Aaron, that we missed.
[00:39:20] Speaker A: One of the things that I really believe strongly in, and this is coming from a personal as well as a professional space, is to.
It's revisiting what I just said, which is we will not always be there for our children. In my case, I don't have children, but my clients do.
And I want to give back to children as much as possible because they're our future.
And we won't, you know, we won't always be there for them to do that.
And so one of the things that I really believe strongly in is to build a supportive team for you and your children so that you can be there to protect them as long as possible. And even when they become adults, they're children.
And so those boundaries may change, but protecting them, leaving them a legacy, supporting yourself as much as possible and allowing them to support you in your. Your older years as much as possible, because I believe children are just. We feel so much honor in supporting the people who gave us life. It is beyond.
And I know some attorneys will tell you, you know, leave your children out of it. They don't need to be part of it. I believe that. I believe just the opposite.
Allowing them to support you, allowing them to know what is going on in your head is very important.
And making sure that they're cared for, if they have different needs that may be required if you're not there, all of those things are very important. So building that supportive, protective team around yourself is very integral to what I advice that I give my clients and even advice that I give my friends because we should not go through this life alone. And if there's one thing in the modern age that I'm kind of really kind of freaked out by, it's that we're connected on the Internet, but our personal connections have really gone down and the rate of mental illness has really shot up. As a result.
So stay connected to the people you love so that you can protect them and they can support you.
[00:41:29] Speaker B: Love it. Love it.
Two final questions. You ready for this?
All right. All right, Aaron, you're sitting in your happy place and you're sitting down with young 7 to 10 year old Aaron Edgar. And you want to give her advice about life. What are you going to tell her, Aaron?
[00:41:50] Speaker A: I would tell her that she can accomplish everything that she wants to accomplish in life.
And, and the keys to doing that are commitment and resilience and love.
Because we all encounter people who do not understand us or situations where we need to kind of pivot and do things differently and maybe add things because the world is not made for blind people. It's just not.
And so I could choose, as 7 to 10 year old Aaron, to treat it like a victim and the world's out to get me and I'm just gonna be, you know, kind of like stomped on, I guess, and work for industries for the blind because that's, you know, the only place that will have me.
And I would encourage her to persist, be resilient, be committed and love everyone regardless. Because you know what? People show compassion, the world doesn't.
I'd hate to say it this way, but it's the easiest way to say it. The world doesn't know. Better yet, society kind of hasn't caught up to the fact that I'll use your term differently. Abled people have our own strengths too.
And the more we show the world that with love rather than with a bludgeon, you know, like, look at me, look at how amazing I am. The more that instead we say, you know, what? Did you know that?
So the more we encourage people to be loving towards us, be curious, the more the, the more effective we will be.
And the more we'll get people on, you know, advocating for us too, because then we'll show others who we love.
[00:43:49] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:43:50] Speaker A: So be loving, persistent and resilient is what I would tell her.
[00:43:54] Speaker B: Love that. All right, switch hats now. You're sitting down with young businesswoman, young entrepreneur Aaron Edgar, and you want to give her advice about business. What are you going to tell her?
[00:44:03] Speaker A: I would tell her the same thing because, you know, being on, being on your own in a business is not, it's not for the faint of heart.
So, you know, and I mean, you know, I talk about quitting every so often. I'll tell my husband I'm quitting. He's like, no, you're not.
I mean, you know, it's not for the pain of heart.
So I would give her the exact same advice. Be persistent, Be resilient. Learn how to pivot when life just isn't going your way. And be loving because, you know, it's kind of hard out there.
It can be kind of stressful out there.
And the more loving that we can be towards our clients and our friends and our fellow business owners. And I say loving in the broadest sense. I don't mean like going up and kissing people.
It's more like caring about people, being open to people and their motivations, their reasons for doing things, and being curious about people. Caring and open is what I mean by loving in that sense.
But the more we can do that and be resilient and committed and persistent, the more strides we'll make and the more we'll learn and the more experiences we'll gain.
[00:45:23] Speaker B: I love that. Well, Aaron, I want to thank you for not just coming onto the show, but coming into my life.
You're a wonderful human being.
Keep doing what you're doing. You're helping so many people, and I wish you all the best.
[00:45:37] Speaker A: Thank you, Drew. I've been delighted to be here.
[00:45:40] Speaker B: Everybody out there, please take care of yourselves.
Thanks so much for listening. If you enjoyed the episode, please subscribe and give us a review to help others find it.
I'd like you to answer this question.
Are you living the life you want to live, or are you living the life others want you to live? I'd like you to think about that for a second, because I strongly suggest you, you live the life you want to live. If you want to learn more about what I stand for and my services and how I'm able to help many men get out of their own way, please go to my website at www.prophetcompassion.com.
feel free to also email me at drewrophetcompassion.com I'd love to have a conversation with you.
Take care of yourself and choose to write your own story instead of letting others write it for you.
