Hi everyone and welcome back to this week's show.
This time,
I'm introducing you to Stanley Bronstein,
Who,
Among many things,
Is an attorney,
A CPA,
An author,
A mindset coach,
A walking expert,
And a weight loss expert.
Stanley has multiple miracle stories to tell in this episode,
Including one from his early childhood.
And that incident from his childhood set up the entire rest of his life and actually created a space for Stanley later on in life to be present to another child who was suffering a loss.
There's no doubt in my mind that Stanley is unstoppable,
And his journey is a fascinating one.
From being incredibly,
Incredibly overweight,
He decided one day to take control of his life.
And that's the miracle as well.
That each and every one of us can change on a dime and live better,
Fuller lives.
So here's my interview with the unstoppable Stanley Bronstein.
I'm on my bike,
I'm leaving the school,
You know,
Any kids wondering what's going on.
I got one block away from the school.
I fell off my bike.
And I got back up.
And I realized what had happened.
And I turned stone cold.
And I did not cry,
And I got back on my bike.
And I wrote home.
I mentioned that when my mother died when I was eight years old at the funeral,
I did not cry.
I was stone cold.
Didn't I cry?
Nobody realized it.
Nobody did anything to pull me out of,
You know,
Pull me out of it or anything.
Didn't send me to counseling.
I just,
I was stone cold.
That's what it was.
I mean,
What actually happened was I was at school.
And the lady from the office,
Mrs.
Cleary,
I still remember her name.
She came to the door and she said,
Stanley,
You rode your bike to school,
Didn't you?
And I said,
Yes.
And she said,
Your father called and he said he needs you to come home.
And help them out.
So you can leave now.
I'm on my bike,
I'm leaving the school,
Any kids wondering what's going on.
I got one block away from the school.
I fell off my bike.
And I got back up.
And I realized what had happened.
And I turned stone cold.
And I did not cry,
And I got back on my bike.
And I wrote home.
And you know what's interesting?
I retraced my steps.
With my wife.
It's probably about six,
Seven years ago and went down there.
And we walked around while I retraced my steps.
I didn't realize the spot where I fell off my bike.
Was Catty Corner from The Orphan's Home.
And I'll show you something else interesting.
I have a totem animal.
That I like.
The snail.
Okay,
They are steady,
They are diligent,
They are persistent.
They get where they're going no matter how long it takes.
This is Stanley the snail.
Say hi.
Hello.
Hello.
How you doing?
Okay.
So.
When I retraced it with my wife,
We were over there.
I looked in the bushes right at the spot over there and what did I see in the spot?
There was a family of snails.
So I sat there and I said,
Okay,
That's good.
That's what happened the day she died.
So about 25 years later.
After I had become a lawyer.
One of my aunts,
My mother's sister,
Died.
And.
.
.
It was interesting,
The night she died.
I was with.
Another one of my aunts.
We were working together on a project.
It was just the two of us.
So it was,
There were three sisters.
So the one,
My mother,
And the one who died,
And the one I was with.
Sister I was with had her own trauma from my mother's funeral simply because she did not go to the funeral.
And the reason why she did not go to the funeral was she was a couple of days away from giving birth.
And she could not travel.
And the doctor said,
She told me that,
You know,
The doctor said when she was giving birth,
It was the saddest thing he'd ever seen because when she should have been happy,
She was crying because she was thinking about my mother.
So.
And so she had her own trauma from that.
And the interesting thing was,
She was the only one of my relatives who was probably empathic enough who would have realized the trauma I was going through at the time,
Who might have pulled this out of me.
And put me on my shelf,
But she wasn't there.
So it was the two of us.
So here we are.
It's the two of us together.
And by ourselves because we were working on a project when we found out about this.
And we were making arrangements to go.
She was in Las Cruces.
You know,
South of you.
Is where she lived.
And we were making arrangements to go there the next day to be a funeral,
Go see or whatever.
That in the middle of the night.
About 12,
One in the morning,
I heard my aunt crying in the other room.
And.
.
.
I got up and I went in there and I said,
Aunt Rosie just died.
And she said,
How do you know that?
And I said,
Because I heard my mother calling her.
It turned out that was almost to the minute that she died.
But going to the funerals the next day,
You wish people would bury people quickly.
So.
I went to the funeral,
I went to the cemetery.
What did I see when I walked into the cemetery?
I saw two young boys.
Standing there by themselves.
They were cousins of mine.
I'd never met them before.
This was their grandmother who died.
And they were both standing there.
Then one was about nine years old and he was crying his eyes out.
The other one was six years old.
He was standing there by himself.
Stone-cold with a dumbfounded look on his face.
Sound familiar?
I sat there.
And I looked at him.
And I said,
That's me.
So.
I said,
I will be damned if I let happen to this kid what happened to me.
So I'm walked over,
John.
I introduced myself to him,
I said,
I'm your cousin.
I said,
I know exactly how you feel right now.
You don't know what's going on.
You don't know what to think.
You don't know how your life is going to go on.
You don't know what to do.
You don't know what to feel.
And I told him,
I said,
It's OK for you to cry.
And I put my arms around him and I did not let go until he started crying.
And guess what happened?
Guess who else started crying?
All the tears that did not come out at my mother's funeral.
Came out of that field.
But the story gets better.
And here's where I'm going to tell you what I actually said.
I'm not going to sugarcoat it.
There was an older Orthodox gentleman who was there at the service.
And he said out loud in front of 20 or 30 people,
He said,
What are these kids doing here at this cemetery?
Kids don't belong at funerals.
A lot of Orthodox Jews don't believe kids belong in cemeteries.
Well,
I snapped.
One of the few times in my life where I've lost it.
I turned around to him and I said,
That was their grandmother.
If there's anybody who belongs here at this funeral,
It's those two kids.
And if there's anybody that doesn't belong here at this funeral,
It's you,
You son of a bitch.
You can get out of here right now.
And he shut up and he did not say another word.
So.
Not only did I get to.
.
.
Meet young Stanley.
Not only did I get to talk to young Stanley,
Not only did I get to hug young Stanley,
Not only did I get to cry with young Stanley,
I had an opportunity to defend him too.
It was wonderful.
And that's it.
That's my interview with Stanley.
I want to thank him for coming on the show and being such a gracious guest,
For being so vulnerable and sharing his weight loss journey,
But also the story of his mother's early passing.
Those kinds of events in our lives shape us forever and change us and mold us into the humans we eventually become.
Thank you for listening,
And here's my one request.
Be like Stanley.
Know that you can change at any point in your life.
That the world is your oyster,
That you can shape and create and mold anything you want,
Whether it's a better body,
A more beautiful space to live,
Deeper friendships,
Larger community,
You have the power.
The world is yours to imagine.
The world is yours to make more beautiful.
So be like Stanley and imagine what you will,
And then go out and make the world yours.
