The Tunnel Doesn’t Last Forever. Keep Going.

[00:02] Bobbi: Welcome to UnYielded: Thriving No Matter What, where we talk about how to make your next chapter in life your best chapter. I’m your host, Bobbi Kahler, and I believe that the best is yet to come back, everyone. I am so excited that you are here for this conversation. I think you’re going to like it. My guest and I met several months ago when I was a guest on his podcast, Grit, Grace, and Inspiration, and I think it’s fair to say, at that point, a friendship was born. He has a remarkable story, and he lives it with the grit to keep going the grace towards himself that is necessary, and he keeps providing inspiration for those around him. He has risen after facing a seemingly insurmountable challenge, and he is enjoying success as a life and business coach as well as an awesome podcast host. His name is Kevin Lowe. Let’s meet him. Kevin, welcome to the show.

[01:09] Kevin: Oh, my goodness. Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here.

[01:13] Bobbi: We’ve already been talking for ten minutes. I’m like, we could talk all day. And for the listeners, Kevin and I know each other because he was gracious enough to have me on his podcast, grit, Grace, and Inspiration. I get that. Right, Kevin?

[01:28] Kevin: You got it, right? You nailed it. Yes.

[01:30] Bobbi: Hey. All right, so, Kevin, let’s just dive in because you’ve got a very interesting story, and I think it’s well, obviously, it didn’t start in 2003 because you were born before that, but in 2003, you wrote that your life changed forever. Do you want to tell us about that?

[01:54] Kevin: Yeah, absolutely. So, yes, 2003 was a big moment in my life. I actually say that really that segmented my life as a point in time where everything would change. And so 17 years old, I was in my junior year of high school at Seabreeze High School. And go, sand crabs.

[02:20] Bobbi: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Your mascot was sand crabs?

[02:24] Kevin: Yeah. Our school was across the street from the beach.

[02:30] Bobbi: Oh, you poor thing.

[02:34] Kevin: Yeah, so it was terrible. So, yes, we were the sandcraft. Don’t try and think that the claw ain’t going to get you. I see where you’re going with it. Don’t be underestimating the claw.

[02:51] Bobbi: You know what? That is a good point. Just that image kind of scares me, I have to tell you.

[02:55] Kevin: Yeah, exactly. I’m telling you. I know. You’re already getting down on me.

[02:59] Bobbi: No. All right, so you’re a junior in high school. I won’t interrupt you again about this. Crabs or whatever.

[03:09] Kevin: Yes, I am a junior in high school. Really? Kind of. Life was going amazing. I had been a kid who hated school growing up. I mean, I hated it. Well, finally coming up like that, sophomore year, now junior year of high school, school is no longer the worst thing in the world. I think a big part of that was I had finally found a really cool group of friends. I had started driving in my sophomore year. Had got my literally my dream truck. It was a 96 forest green Ford F 154 x four. Yeah. Had 38 inch super swamper mud tires with eight inches of lift and dual flowmaster exhaust. Oh, baby. And, yeah, she was my baby. School was going good junior year. Rocking and rolling, having a great time, until, as I say, things are going great until all of a sudden they weren’t.

[04:14] Bobbi: Yeah.

[04:15] Kevin: And at this time, I had been having these I’ll call them health issues, but we didn’t even classify them as such. They were just some things that didn’t seem quite right to my mom and grandmother. I’m 17 years old. I still had not gone through puberty, had not hit my full growth spurt. So I’m only five foot three. Basically just this little dude and had migraine headaches, were pretty much just a part of life. Wow. I had all these weird things. I drank. My mom would tell the pediatrician, she’s like, you don’t understand. He drinks more than any other human you’ve ever met. The pediatrician always just blew off all the symptoms. Always just blew it off. Oh, he’s a late bloomer. Oh, he’s this or he’s that. Well, finally, my mom and grandmother, they had had enough. And so we got me to a new doctor, a new family doctor. And he took one look at me, one look at my chart, immediately pulled my mom out into the hallway and said, listen. He said, there’s something not right. We’ve got to get him to a specialist immediately.

[05:35] Bobbi: Wow.

[05:37] Kevin: So that would set forth a series of events. I look at it like a set of dominoes, and the first domino fell. And as they would fall, they would continue to get faster and faster and faster until the climax. So, lo and behold, the specialist, the endocrinologist. An hour away from my home. So over in Orlando, Florida, he would send me to have an MRI. I would have the MRI, and my mom would get a call from him on a Friday evening on her way home from work. She was driving. She was actually headed to meet up with me and my stepdad and stepbrother at our boat at the marina, where we are going to take it for the weekend up to St. Augustine, Florida. Wow. One of my favorite, favorite weekend trips that we would do. So my mom, though, she gets a call and it’s the endocrinologist. And he says, listen, he said, I’ve got results to the MRI. And he asks, he’s like, are you driving? He said, yes. And he’s like, well, listen, I need you to pull over.

[06:47] Bobbi: Oh, you know, right there. It’s not going to be good.

[06:49] Kevin: Exactly. He says, the results come back. He said, it’s worse than I ever expected. He said, we would come to find out that I had a plum sized brain tumor basically right in the center of my brain.

[07:06] Bobbi: Oh, God.

[07:07] Kevin: It had completely encased my pituitary gland. It was in the crosshairs of the optic nerve and was pressing against my carotid artery.

[07:19] Bobbi: Wow.

[07:21] Kevin: Thank goodness. This type of tumor was non cancerous, but without its removal, they gave me, at most six months to live.

[07:30] Bobbi: Oh, my God.

[07:31] Kevin: Yes.

[07:32] Bobbi: So how long do they think that.

[07:33] Kevin: You had that they feel as though this tumor came literally from the time that I was created. It was a situation where whatever the technical issue, like a cell went to the wrong place, literally. This tumor was a part of me my entire life, and now we find out about it six months before it was going to kill me.

[07:58] Bobbi: Right.

[07:59] Kevin: And so we find out about it. Luckily, we get hooked up. That doctor immediately on that phone call, he actually told my mom. He said, Listen, he said, I have the pediatric neurosurgeon on the other line. They’re ready to schedule Kevin for the first consult. And so we did. That doctor was the leading pediatric neurosurgeon in the country, again, ironically, just in Orlando, Florida, an hour from my home. And so, lo and behold, fast forward just a couple of weeks, and I find myself going into surgery. Now, at the time, the neurosurgeon was amazing, man. And he assured us, he’s like, listen, I do these all the time. He told me that I would be back to school in about three to four weeks. The biggest upset to me was that he told me that I could not ride my new four wheeler that I had just gotten for my 17th birthday, that I could not ride it for about six months, which I felt to be a little bit excessive.

[09:22] Bobbi: Six months feels like forever when you’re 17.

[09:25] Kevin: Yeah, forever. But I was good with it, though. I mean, after the initial shock of it with the doctor’s reassurance, it was a speed bump, and it was finally an answer to all of these problems. And so I named my tumor Bob. Bob the. I everybody asked that, and I’m like, I think it was because of, like, there was that children’s cartoon called Bob The. So I felt like just like, Bob the tumor just kind of fit. So we literally had a going away Bob party. My family. Yeah, it was a going away Bob party I love. And so when I went to surgery, literally, I had to check into the hospital the day before surgery. So surgery was set for October 20, Eigth, 2003. So on the 27th, I checked in, had all day long to spend at the hospital, them doing all their tests and all their pre op stuff. Anyways, that night, my hospital room was filled with my family. I had family from out of town come in. Everybody from my hometown, everybody was there. And I remember my sister and my aunt went out and picked up outback, steakhouse for everybody. And so I’m sitting in the hospital room bed in my little gown, eating outback, watching my favorite movie at the time was Too Fast, Too Furious had it playing on the laptop and just with my whole family. And the next day would happen. The doctor, the neurosurgeon, he would show up in the room bright and early. Apparently, I cracked a joke about, I hope you’ve had your weedies and stuff, and so went into surgery. And I say that I rolled through the operating room doors, and my mom and dad had followed me, and I never knew that that would be the last time I would ever see their face. Yeah, because at that point, everything would change. As I tell people, my life died in that operating room, and a new life began. And the new life that began would be different for a long time. It would be absolutely horrible. It was literally a living nightmare that I hated with every ounce of my being. And it was only through my faith and my family that I got through the darkness and I began to see again, because I was left completely blind. I came out of that surgery, nothing went right. Nothing went right during the surgery. No, everything went fine during surgery. Surgery was a complete success. I came out of surgery, they had no worries, concerns whatsoever. Everything was going to be perfect. Until then, not only did they on maybe about day two or three, I can’t remember the timeline is when they figured out it was actually my mom. And the head nurse figured out that I couldn’t see. Apparently, I was very compulsive, and I kept ripping off the little pulse ox machine that they kept putting on my toe. Well, apparently the nurse, he was talking to me, and he’s like, Kevin and he’s pointing to the pulse ox that had a blinking red light on it. And he’s like, Kevin, do you see this red light? You don’t touch this. Do you see this? And my mom said that. I said, no, it’s just black. And with that, he looked at my mom. My mom looked at him, and he walked over, and he flipped on the light switch, and he kept flipping it on and off, on and off, and said, Kevin, do you see this? No. No, it’s just black. It’s just black. And that’s when they found out. That was just one aspect, though. I had levels going crazy. I guess they came to figure out it was my sodium levels. Literally, it took my family shifts. They would take shifts of, I think they said, like, 15 minutes max in there, four of them at a time, just keeping me from pulling out my wires. I was going crazy. They literally said that I turned into the incredible Hulk. And if it wasn’t for them, the staff would have had no other option but to strap me down.

[14:38] Bobbi: That’s right.

[14:39] Kevin: And my family wouldn’t have that happen. They stayed there with Know Kevin when.

[14:45] Bobbi: My dad was in the hospital last October. November. Well, the last week in November before he passed. When you’re talking about that, like just trying to rip the wires and the tubes out, it was just my sister and I there. And it was unless you’ve been through it, you don’t understand how hard that is to keep someone from doing that. Because he was 89 and he was sick, and my little sister and I are like, my God, we’re pretty strong, and it took everything we had. I can’t even imagine your family thank God they were there.

[15:20] Kevin: Oh, exactly. I came home. Now I have no memory of any of that whatsoever. My memory doesn’t start until sometime later on. Being back home is when my memory starts to come back into place, which is kind of crazy, especially when I hear my family talk about it. And it’s like this monumental moment in my family’s whole kind of history in our life, and that I was the center point of yeah, you don’t remember it at all.

[16:02] Bobbi: That’s right.

[16:03] Kevin: It’s kind of weird. It’s kind of a weird feeling, but yeah. So I was left completely blind. I was left unable to smell. I had short term memory loss for six months, plus had the realization that life would never be the same, even just from a medical standpoint. So the tumor completely killed off my pituitary gland. So I had to begin taking all these different medications and all to replace what the Pituitary does. So your Pituitary handles all of your body’s hormones. And so I start taking all these medications and all these shots, and some of them were good in the fact that I started growing. I started taking growth hormone, and I went from five foot three, started growing, like a quarter inch a month up to now, I’m almost six foot tall. Wow. Yeah. But as I often say, is that as amazing as medications are, they are a poor alternative, what the body should do naturally.

[17:16] Bobbi: That’s right. Because I’m sure there’s side effects.

[17:19] Kevin: There’s side effects. And it’s a constant balancing act with all of my medications, where I’ve honestly come to realize as time went by, that this condition, which they call being a pan hypopit, is a far greater disability than being blind. Wow.

[17:41] Bobbi: What’s a condition called again?

[17:43] Kevin: Yeah, it’s called panhypopit, I guess, like panhypopituitarianism. And so being blind, it was horrible. And it took a really long time for me to learn to love life again. For the longest time, my life was spent buying time until the day that God would heal me, because that was what I held onto. And I prayed every day. I prayed every night that that’s what God would do. And until one day, which it took a long time, it took probably about ten years wow. Before I came to a point when I said, you know what, God? I’m not going to give up faith that you’ll let me see again, but I realize now that it might not be till I’m in heaven. And so until that day happens, I’ve got more life to live.

[18:52] Bobbi: And that is so beautiful, Kevin, in ten years, it is a long time. Was there something that you can point to that made you come to that? If you want to call it an epiphany or realization, yeah, it was a.

[19:11] Kevin: Was a it was a book with the exact quote that I basically just was it was a book from a guy named Eric Weinmayer. Now, Eric Weinmayer is completely yes, and he is one of the first blind people to ever summit Everest. He was also one of the first blind guys to ever kayak the entire Grand Canyon. And it was in Eric’s book that was about him kayaking the Grand Canyon, that at the very end of the book, it didn’t even have anything to do with Eric. It actually was his guide, and the guide who he had on the river that day was at the end of the book. They were literally done with the entire trip. And that guide, he went out there, and he was standing in the middle of the river, and he was facing upstream. And the book describes that he has his hands outstretched, his fingers splayed, letting the current run through the fingers, and he said to the river, he said, Listen. He said, I’ll be back someday, but for now, I’ve got more life to live. And when I read that, that’s when it hit me. I thought, I don’t have to ever give up my hope, my faith, my dream of seeing it again. But until that day, I’ve got more life to live.

[20:42] Bobbi: That is wonderful. That is just wonderful. You know what’s curious here is when I was in grad school, Kevin, we did a team project, and our team chose we had to contrast two different teams, and our team contrasted Eric’s team that climbed Mount Everest, okay? Because not only did he summit, they did not lose a single person from his team. Like, every person made it to the top and back down, and we contrasted that with a team. It’s known as one of the worst. Up until when we did the project, it was one of the worst disasters in Mount Everest history, and it was two highly successful guides. They were incredibly experienced climbers, and a number of the party, like, several people of the party died. And I remember, though, reading Eric’s book and also the movie what is it? Farther than the eye can see, I think, is the name of it. It’s a movie about how Eric and his team got him to the top and back. For anyone who has not seen that movie or read that book, unbelievable what they did. It’s so inspiring.

[22:01] Kevin: Yeah. Wow. Now, here’s something else I’m going to share about this that’s very ironic, because I’ve actually had Eric on my podcast, which was just awesome.

[22:14] Bobbi: I can’t even imagine.

[22:15] Kevin: But here’s what’s funny, though, is because when I went blind, I believe it was in 2003, the year that I went blind is the year that he summited Mount Everest, if I’m not mistaken. Then he wrote a book. Well, all I can remember is everybody at the different blind services or people talking, giving us books is everybody kept talking about this guy, Eric Weinmayer, who summoned Mount Everest. I hated him. I hated every mention of it. They kept ramming it down my throat like he’s some blind superhero, because at that point in time, I wanted nothing to do with it.

[23:05] Bobbi: That’s right.

[23:08] Kevin: It’s so funny, though, because it was just at that point, I had this whole picture in my mind made up of who he was, of a person that I didn’t like, that he was some quote unquote blind superhero trying to make that this horrible life seem great. And I hated it. And I hated it until the day that when I actually listened to his audiobook about the one of Kayaking, the Grand Canyon, and it made me realize then, oh, he’s just a cool guy like me. It’s just that he can’t really it’s really like this fascinating story with Eric in my own journey of this new life, of being blind, of going kind of full circle, is pretty cool.

[24:01] Bobbi: It is. And you know what? What I love about you mentioning that is sometimes I don’t know the best way to say this. Like, when we’re going through something dark, when we’re going through a challenge, people, they mean well, and they’re trying to give us hope or whatever, and it’s like but if it’s too soon, it can come across wrong. Like, I think about when, in 2000, 2020, the Big East Troublesome fire came through where we lived in Colorado, and it took out 198,000 acres in the space of well, most of that was gone in the space of two or three days, and it was an emergency evacuation. It took two weeks to find out if we still had a house. And people were like, well, you should feel so lucky that you made it out alive. And it’s like, we do feel lucky that we made it out alive, but it felt preachy. You know what I mean? It was like, ask me how I feel. So I’m glad you mentioned that, because I think that’s really real.

[25:11] Kevin: Yeah, absolutely. I think that with anybody who’s going through anything in life, you got to meet them where they are. You don’t need to be the savior. They don’t need a cheerleader at that moment. They need a shoulder to cry on.

[25:24] Bobbi: Right. And sometimes I think it’s like we try to be the savior or the cheerleader number one. I think people mean well. And I also think that sometimes it’s like we can have so much discomfort because someone else is feeling bad or something bad has happened to someone else that we’re trying to solve it so we feel better. You know what I mean?

[25:48] Kevin: Yeah, exactly. 100%. Yeah.

[25:53] Bobbi: On your website, you wrote something that when you found out you were blind, the world quit spinning, and it wasn’t supposed to happen like this. And then you said, but maybe I was wrong. Maybe all along it was God’s plan for you for this to happen. Can you speak more about that?

[26:15] Kevin: Yeah, 100%. I feel really fortunate in the fact that I can look at my life from this point, and I can fit it together like a puzzle. Every single piece of my story fits together like a jigsaw puzzle. The first 17 years of my life were preparing me for what was to come. God instilled in me characteristics of a person who would be better equipped to become blind. He made me super organized. I was a kid who loved to reorganize the kitchen pantry.

[26:54] Bobbi: You’re like my brother, right? There’s nothing better than organizing stuff.

[27:01] Kevin: Exactly. Now, cleaning is another story, but organizing and being sure it looks good is all my game. To the fact that I also had a childhood where I got to do and see so much. I was blessed to get to go on vacations. We went snow skiing in West Virginia. We went on a family vacation to Alaska. We would go all the time, know, lobstering in the Florida Keys, to going dirt bike riding in the middle of the Ocala National Forest. I got to do all kinds of cool stuff because God was preparing me for what was to come after I became blind. I can tell you that as tragic as it was, the blessings that have happened have been never ending, is that I can see just how it was all meant to be. Every piece of the puzzle, it was all meant to be. And I find such peace in that, in knowing that this was all in God’s plans, that he was in control every step of the way, and he still is to this day, all the way up to what I’m doing today. I can tell you. I know it’s in his plans.

[28:22] Bobbi: Yeah. There’s something really powerful when you recognize how our stories come together.

[28:29] Kevin: Yes.

[28:31] Bobbi: You know what it reminds me? Way back in the day, this was in the worked at a law firm in Chicago, and one of my dear friends, her name was Cindy, and she was pregnant and went full term. But when she delivered, the baby was still born. I think she knew a week or two prior to delivering that she’d lost the baby, but at that point, they induced labor, so she had to deliver a baby that she knew was already gone. And I remember talking to her afterwards, I’m like, God, I can’t imagine. And of know it was sad for her and everything. And I remember she said something, she’s like, you know what, Bobbi? She goes, I never want it to happen to me or to anyone. But she said if it had to happen to someone, she said, I think I was better prepared than what another person might be. And I remember just marveling at her strength. And there was no arrogance in that. It was just like a real humble. Like, if God intended this to happen to someone, I can handle this. And I thought, wow. And that’s kind of what I’m hearing from you at this point.

[29:45] Kevin: Yeah, 110%, is that I’ve realized that we can’t control what happens in this life, but we can control what we do with it. And I believe in all of my being that God knew that I would serve a greater purpose on this earth, having gone through what I did, than if I had it now. Would I have chosen this? No. The heartbreak has been unmeasurable. Even still, today, 20 years later, there’s times when it gets to me. Thank goodness. Time is an amazing healer. And that happens very rare, but it does. But at the same point, I am so grateful that God chose me to get to be the one to do it.

[30:36] Bobbi: Yeah, that’s amazing. It’s such a beautiful place to get to. Question for you. So you went through a ten year dark period and you just said even now, sometimes it still gets to you. What do you have if someone’s listening? Because we all face, right? Sometimes life is messy. It’s not just for you, it’s not just for me. Happens to everybody. Life can be messy. We can face brick walls. We can face our own dark periods. What words of advice or wisdom do you have for someone who might be facing something like that?

[31:15] Kevin: My biggest thing is to embrace whatever you’re feeling. If you’re sad, just let yourself be sad. Don’t start beating yourself up over the fact that you are sad.

[31:27] Bobbi: That’s right.

[31:28] Kevin: Don’t listen to the quote unquote experts who tell you, you know, you should be further along by now. Kevin should be accepting of this by now. Kevin needs to learn to accept this and move on with his life. That’s what my mom would hear all the oh. And I’m here to tell you that this is your life. This is your journey, it is your ride. And nobody knows it better than you. And so I am here to tell you to embrace it. But at the same point, know this that the tunnel does not last forever, that no tunnel is forever. That there is light at the end. And when you get to a point when you’re ready to see the light, then get up and start running, because you will. Sometimes it doesn’t seem like it, but it is. When you’re hurt when you’re sad, that’s just what you want to be. And that’s what when we talked earlier, when you want a friend, you want a friend not to help you. You want a friend to just cry with.

[32:40] Bobbi: That’s right.

[32:42] Kevin: I can tell you, for many times, I just needed people to cry with. And they didn’t try to fix anything because they couldn’t fix anything. We just cried together. And that’s what a true friend is.

[33:01] Bobbi: Yeah. They give you the space that you need.

[33:06] Kevin: Absolutely.

[33:07] Bobbi: Not the space that they need in that time.

[33:09] Kevin: Yeah, exactly.

[33:10] Bobbi: No, exactly. I love that, though, because it doesn’t last. It can feel like it’s going to last forever. I think about my own health journey. Right. I had no idea would I ever be well again. I didn’t know.

[33:25] Kevin: Yeah.

[33:26] Bobbi: I recently did on my podcast. I have the interviews and then I also have The Rise and Thrives, which are like short monologues, ten minutes or so. And I just did one. It was on one of the best decisions that Rick and I rick’s, my husband, we made during that time was we didn’t put our happiness on hold. We didn’t say, well, we’re going to wait until we see if Bobbi’s going to get well again, and then we can be happy. Because it’s like we didn’t know if yeah. At that point, the doctors are saying you’re probably going to spend the rest of your life in well, that’s a long time to wait, to be happy. But that didn’t mean that we were happy that I was you. And you also said it it’s your journey, you’ve got to figure it out. You’ll know, what’s going to work for you. Yes, exactly. So a minute ago, Kevin, you said you wouldn’t be doing what you’re doing now, like, God prepared you for that. So that’s a great segue. What are you doing?

[34:28] Kevin: I am right now, host of my own podcast, as well as a transformational life coach. And I’m only in this position in my life thanks to the Global Pandemic, which I’m a big firm believer that we got to find good and the bad. And for me, I had started my own travel agency in 2013. It was my own home based travel agency called Better Days Travel. And literally, I operated it up until 2020, which 2020 was going to be my best year ever. I had some amazing trips on the books. I even had a massive group cruise for me, my family, for clients. I think there was a total of close to 45 of us on a seven night Caribbean cruise to celebrate my 17th anniversary of the day that I had become blind, but also the day that my life was saved. And so that October 20. Eigth. And so it was huge. And then, of course, March came and the whole world ended. My best year ever went to the worst year ever. So now we’re. In Quarantine. And while in Quarantine is when I started a podcast. And I say the only difference between me and everybody else is that I’m still podcasting. But really, when I was a travel agent, I loved it. I enjoyed building a business, creating a brand, designing vacations, but I really knew that it really wasn’t what I was meant to do. But I didn’t know what else I was supposed to do. And so when the March of 2020 came along and the business shut down, I still wasn’t really sure. So I started the podcast as an idea to keep travel alive so that the podcast was going to be all about travel, mixed in with a little bit about just my life as somebody who’s blind. Well, quickly, the podcast kind of took over. And I’m starting to do these episodes more and more, these interviews more and more, and I’m getting amazing feedback from people listening, and I’m starting to get amazing feedback from the guests that I have on the show. And literally that led me to the point of totally just switching careers, switching focus. I had never even heard of being a coach. Yeah, I’m having all my guests tell me. They’re like, Kevin, they’re like, you see parts of my story that no one else sees. Or they’re like the way that you see the world. They’re like, you should really be a coach. And I’m like, I don’t understand what a coach is. That led me down this whole path to finally totally giving up travel gladly. At that point, I’m like, God has me going down a different path. And, you know, the way that I knew I was headed the right way is that it was effortless. As a travel agent, I worked at it every day. I grinded, and I did everything to try and make it work to fit a square peg into a round hole through the podcast. The podcast was effortless. And as it led into coaching, coaching was effortless. And I realized then that that’s when you know you’re on the right path in life is when you no longer have to paddle, but instead you flip over and you float on down the stream.

[38:31] Bobbi: Yeah.

[38:33] Kevin: And I’m like, this is it. I know I’m on the right path because I’m doing what I love, the podcast. I get to meet amazing people all over the world who I say, if it wasn’t for a podcast, I never even would have known existed. And for myself, that’s what it’s about. It’s about getting to bring to light the real life stories of the real superheroes in the world. The people like you and me who are just living life, who are overcoming stuff to keep thriving in life because we have a desire to live and to enjoy this life. And for me, that’s just what it’s all about.

[39:19] Bobbi: That’s so cool, Kevin. And your passion for your podcast, it just comes through.

[39:30] Kevin: I love it. Absolutely love it.

[39:32] Bobbi: Tell me this. So the grit, grace and inspiration. I love that title. Where did that come from?

[39:38] Kevin: Oh, my goodness. That came from literally, that’s not what it was originally called. I rebranded it twice as I continued narrowing down on kind of my niche and what I wanted to be known for. And so when I came up with this third time, I knew because I had been called the Low Down on Life and Travel, then I was the Low Down with Kevin Lowe. And even though Low Down was a cool play on my last name, it didn’t really speak to what the podcast was about.

[40:12] Bobbi: Yeah.

[40:13] Kevin: And so that’s when I really got serious and I’m like, what is it about? What do I want to be known for? And when I finally one day it hit me, I’m like, it’s grit, grace and inspiration. It’s having the grit to fight through the sad days. It’s giving yourself grace when it is hard, and it’s letting that inspiration light the way.

[40:35] Bobbi: Love it.

[40:36] Kevin: And if you can be the inspiration, that’s even better. Yeah.

[40:41] Bobbi: Because we all need it. We all need the inspiration.

[40:44] Kevin: Yes, exactly.

[40:47] Bobbi: So cool. And it’s funny, I started my podcast in 2020 and it was like, hey, the world needs some good news. The world needs some positivity right now.

[40:57] Kevin: Exactly.

[40:58] Bobbi: Yeah. And I think we might be a lot of people started a podcast and stopped. Now, you just hit 200 recently, didn’t you?

[41:06] Kevin: I did, yes. So I’m up in my two hundred s and feeling good. And so I’m kind of like you. I finally have gotten in a spot where I do an interview episode every week and a solo episode every week. And the solos were difficult at first, but I’ve almost come to really love doing the solo because I’m like it lets you kind of be creative.

[41:31] Bobbi: It does. But at first they are kind of harder at first because it’s like, okay, microphone’s on. What am I supposed to talk about?

[41:40] Kevin: Exactly.

[41:41] Bobbi: Wow. So, Kevin, where can people find out more about you and your podcast? What’s the best way?

[41:47] Kevin: Yeah, absolutely. So the best place is to head to my website. And that is the best place. And that will take you straight to the website, which you can find the podcast, you can find more about me, my story and my coaching services. But if you want even just a shortcut straight to the best place to listen to the podcast, you can literally just dograceinspiration.com listen. And that will take you to a page that has links to all of your favorite podcast apps with kind of quick win to get you to where you want to be.

[42:26] Bobbi: Nice. I just say this too, your website is absolutely beautiful.

[42:32] Kevin: Well, thank you.

[42:33] Bobbi: Great pictures. It’s a beautiful website.

[42:38] Kevin: Yeah, well, thank you so much. I feel like when you’re blind, whether people want to do it or not. I feel like you’re going to get judged a little bit. If it’s ugly, people are going to be like, oh, but he’s blind, so we’ll give him a break. So instead, I chose to go the totally different perspective and let’s blow their socks off and let them be like, man, I want a website as pretty as the blind guy.

[43:05] Bobbi: I love that. I love it because it is it’s beautiful.

[43:08] Kevin: Yeah. Well, thank you very much.

[43:10] Bobbi: Oh, my goodness, kevin, it’s been such a delight getting to talk with you again.

[43:15] Kevin: Yes, you as well. You’re absolutely amazing. And thank you so much for having me on your show.

[43:21] Bobbi: Oh, man, we’ll have to do it again sometime.

[43:24] Kevin: Yeah, I agree. I would love it.

[43:26] Bobbi: I hope that you enjoyed hearing from Kevin and hearing his story. Every time I talk with Kevin, I am uplifted by his presence and his perspective and just his overwhelming positivity. And I hope that you’re going to check out his podcast as well as his website. If you know someone who is facing a dark tunnel, as Kevin called it, I hope that you’ll consider sharing this podcast with them, as it just might be the inspiration that they need right now. I hope that you have a wonderful week and that you keep thriving no matter what.