Skot Waldron:
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Hi, everybody, welcome to another episode of Unlocked where we talk about unlocking the potential of ourselves, the people around us in order to unlock the potential of our businesses and our organizations. This next guest, Dr. April Jones, she has a story to tell. And that's what made this my longest interview yet today because of the stories she tells. They're so good. She was a TEDx speaker. She has her doctorate and she's a pharmacist. She is starting a new academy for pharmacists in the spring. She is a board member. She is a nonprofit organizer. She's an author. She's done a lot of different things. But most of all, she is a mother, and she is a person that talks about fulfilling purpose in life. And those roles, she's found a way to make them all work and to do the things that she's doing to help advance what she feels like she's here to do.
And it all revolves around her mindset and the way that she's framed the unexpected events in her life. And we're going to talk all about those unexpected events. Well, not all of them, but we're going to hit on a few of them. The pregnancy, the cancer diagnosis, and how that journey has led to where she is today. So this is going to be super fun. I hope you get a lot out of this. Let's go.
All right. Welcome, everybody to another episode. We've got Dr. April Jones with us. And we're so excited to have you. We, I talk about we like I'm multiple people. I'm excited to have you. I think that we've been talking a little bit before this, and you have got quite the story. And you talk about the unexpected a lot. And we all have unexpected things that happen in our lives. You've had a series of unexpected things that have happened in your life that have led you to where you are now. And honestly, I can't even keep track after all that we've... I've got notes here of all this stuff and it's all over. So how does your brain keep it all in? Right? That's my question, is you're all over the place. You got so many things going on, and you're a mom, and you're a professional, and you do nonprofit. You're everywhere. So how does your brain do it? Tell me.
Dr. April Jones:
So I think I try to keep one common thread, and that is I prioritize things that I feel like will really help other people in terms of empower them to pursue their passions, to take their life to the next level, and to have faith. And so if there's anything that comes my way, I'm a do-gooder for sure. I like to feel like I'm doing good. I like to help other people. But really, unless a project comes across my desk that checks all of those boxes, then I have to table it for the other thing. So it's about prioritizing for sure, and just being very intentional about the things that you do and the way that you use your talent and your time.
SKOT WALDRON:
Okay, but the common thread with all of these is helping build purpose, helping people find and live out what they were built to do.
DR. APRIL JONES:
Absolutely. Unless you believe in reincarnation, you only get one shot at this life. So you got to make the most of every day. It's not guaranteed. And I learned that early on. And I think it's just ingrained that it's about perspective and it's about empowering the mind to get the body to do all the things that you want it to do.
SKOT WALDRON:
Okay, your book, No Mess, No Message, tell me about the title and why it's titled that and kind of the context of what the book is about because I think it ties into what you're saying a little bit here.
DR. APRIL JONES:
So that's kind of a fun story. When I decided that I was going to finish writing a book, so I had had some journaling that I shared with a friend whose son was going through a cancer. So we had been friends since we were young. And my oldest son, Tyler, had cancer when he was young. And so I had journaled some things. I was going through a tough time at one point, and I wanted to figure out like, "Why am I the way that I am? Why am I me? Why do I approach things the way that I do sometimes that feels different than the way that my friends would advise me to do it or the way that others maybe would respond? Why do I respond differently?"
And so I started to do some journaling. And then I tabled it for a bit. And then my friend, Angel, her son, Wesley, ended up... He had grown up with benign brain tumors, and then he got a new diagnosis of malignancy. And it was stage four glioblastoma. So it was not a good prognosis. And so I'd shared some of my journaling with Angela, and she said that, "You need to make this a book." So I committed to finishing a chapter every month and sending it to her. And it was like our thing, and she was working on developing Wesley Warriors Foundation, and I was working on writing because I promised her I would. And I held myself accountable to do that.
And originally when I was writing it, I thought it would be called With A Grateful Heart because I felt like through everything, what's the one thing that I feel like has helped me think of things differently, get through adversity? And it's been having a great... Being able to have gratitude despite your situation. But in the publishing process, in the editing process, I was working with a creative editor with Book Launchers. And Tim was just the coolest guy, and he read through all my stuff. He was like, "Wow, you have a lot." He was like, "But if you could sum up your whole story," he was like, "And I love your title, I think it's great, but if you're going to tell me what this book was about in just a few words, the whole book, what is the whole book in one sentence?" And I was like, "No mess, no message." And he was like, "I love that. That's your title." And that's what it became because that's me and I think that that's everyone. We find credibility in our crisis.
My subtitle is Finding Purpose in Pain, Finding Strength in Struggle. That's the message that will help other people and you can't get that without the mess.
SKOT WALDRON:
That is really important for us in life, us in business, us in whatever we're doing, relationship wise and whatever. So your journey, you're going through school. You're cranking. You're advancing. Apparently, you're a lot smarter than me. I didn't even finish my associates degree and you've got like 12 degrees. I don't know. But you've been through this journey, and you get pregnant right before you're about to finish school. All of a sudden, you have this pressure, right? So this unexpected thing happens. You're like, "Oh, no, what do I do now? I'm about to finish school. It's my dream. I'm pursuing this. I'm cranking through." You were doing a dual major in three years, which is crazy. And now you have to make a decision. How hard was that decision for you? What made it easy? What made it hard? Tell me about that first unexpected issue in your life.
DR. APRIL JONES:
So yes, I was very driven. I grew up in a small town. And I think that I struggled a lot as a teenager from a broken home, very humble beginnings. I wanted to kind of recreate myself, I think. I wanted to reinvent myself or maybe just figure out who I was. And I felt like in order to do that, I really had to push my abilities. I knew that I could make good grades. But that always came relatively easy for me in high school, but I was like, "It's time to figure out what is outside of this place."
So I graduated high school a semester early, started a dual major at Union. And I wanted to change the world. I wanted to cure cancer for little kids, and I didn't even know any little kids then that had ever had cancer. But it just sounded like the most important thing that you could do, the best thing you could do for the world. So I was 19. And actually, my husband, Billy and I, he was three years older than me. We had just got married. He was a police officer in the Memphis area. And so I was in Jackson. He was in Memphis. We weren't seeing each other very much. We'd just gotten married three months before. And I'd seen him once. And we were very careful, but I got pregnant. And within that amount of time, I realized that...
So I found out while I was at work at the hospital, I share about the story in my book, but it was a really slow Sunday morning. It was like six o'clock in the morning, and we didn't have anything going on. I was working in the lab. And so the supervisor was going to show me how to use one of the machines. And one of the things that it did was do pregnancy tests. And so we didn't have any samples ordered. So she had me pee in a cup. And I was like, "Well, okay, that's fine. It's going to be negative, though. So I'm not really sure... I get you're showing me how it works, though. So whatever."
I gave her the sample, and we are just talking like, "Wow, everything is processing." I think it took like three minutes or something. And she was like, "What would you do if you were pregnant?" Just kind of like light conversation. And I was like, "Well, we just got married. It wouldn't be the end of the world, but it would not be ideal." And I was just like, "But that's not really what I thought." I'm just like, "If I was pregnant, holy crap. This would be the end of the world." And her eyes got big. And she had looked down and she was like, "No, really? What if you were pregnant because you're pregnant?" I was like, "What?"
And I remember I started to hyperventilate in the middle of the lab. I was like, "What are you talking about?" And so went to the bathroom. And it's kind of hysterical. And my best friend worked with me, that went to college with me. We had our classes together, and she was about to come in for work. And so it was from that traumatic moment to realizing... It's funny because I know that people have choices, but honestly, abortion didn't even occur to me. It was just that, okay, we have to figure this out. So the first thing I did, my friend Sarah walked in the door, I called her immediately. She walked in the door, and we start putting it on paper like, "Okay, well, if I got pregnant on this day, it's the only day I've seen Billy in the last two months. If I got pregnant on this day, when would the baby be due?" And it was going to be due Christmas Day.
And so I was like, "Okay, well, I had J-term off. So that's like four weeks to recover after having the baby. I just got to figure out childcare situation and we're good." It was like I just decided to work it in. And to be honest, that's often how I treated unexpected, unplanned adversity from that point forward. There's no value in regret. There's no value in looking back and determining, like, "What could I have done differently that would have prevented this from happening?" That analysis is important to determine, how do you prevent things from happening moving forward? But basically, you just have to make a plan to deal with what's in front of you. And I think that very almost legalistic approach to, what is the problem? What do I do next? What are my options? What's going to give me the best outcome? That's what you have to do.
And then you incorporate that and blend it with having faith that God is going to take care of you through the situation and that you're not going to be dealt with more than you can handle, right? And so that's been a consistent approach of mine from there on out. And it's worked to be honest.
SKOT WALDRON:
So you call that persistent positivity, right? And that sounds really, really important because if you have persistent negativity, you're going to have a hard time getting through any of that stuff. It's just going to bog you down. You become a victim of your circumstance. It just breeds toxicity through all of your relationships and your work culture and your personal family life culture, and everything else in that space. And there's elements that I talk about a lot, right? It's this idea of inhibition versus prohibition. Prohibition are outside things that we can't control. COVID is a perfect example about prohibition. Restrictions put on us, quarantines that we just can't do anything about. We have to figure out how to operate within these things.
But when our mindset becomes, "That's it, I can't do anything now. I'm just going to sit here and be a victim of COVID or I'm going to be a victim of this circumstance. I'm going to be a victim of this new news of pregnancy. I'm just going to let it happen to me." You didn't do that. You freaked for a second. And then you empowered yourself and your mind to help overcome that through making a plan, through, "Hey, this isn't going to change who I am or what my dreams are. I'm going to learn how to work this in to what I'm doing."
DR. APRIL JONES:
Absolutely, yeah. Absolutely. I think that being a victim, allowing yourself to wear the victim mentality, to wear that is a burden. It's the burden that will prevent you from moving forward, is what I believe because I've seen it happen so many times. And it doesn't matter what advice you give or what tools or resources they have in front of them. If they see their situation as unfair and unfathomable, then you stick there and it's very sad. And I understand. I completely can empathize so much with that being a tendency, I think, especially in depending on the environment. Sometimes that's a learned behavior. We see that happen in our environment, or from our parents, or from just our surroundings. That we can just say, "Well, that's not fair."
But I feel like we always have a choice to do something. We always have the power to do something. So you have to analyze your situation to figure out, "Okay, what are the components of this that I can't change?" Things that have already happened, I can't go back and change those things. But what choices do I have moving forward? And that's where you have to put your focus.
SKOT WALDRON:
So why is it so important for people to understand that?
DR. APRIL JONES:
Because it's the first step in making a plan. It's the first step in the action plan, I believe. And for some, it's the motivation that they need. I think if you believe that you have no control, and if you believe that you are powerless to your circumstances, then you are because there won't be any momentum. You will have no momentum even if... I hate to say satisfied where you are because that's not a place of satisfaction. But it's almost like a place of inability. It is truly a place of inability because the ability starts in the mind. So you have to have the perspective that there is something that you can do before you can do it.
SKOT WALDRON:
We hear a lot about this. And there's life coaches, and there's people out there that talk about mindset. But let's talk about how that goes into the workforce just a little bit, let's touch on that, and your experience with organizations, your experience in your current role in a corporate environment. Well, you're in a lot of current roles, and one of them being a corporate environment. This mindset, persistent positivity, what are some different things people can do to lead to a successful culture inside of any organization that they're part of?
DR. APRIL JONES:
Part of it is understanding how the pieces fit together. I think there's a saying about some people can't see the forest for the trees or something. So it's about seeing the trees and the forest. So understanding what you're part of, and then how do you contribute and how do the people around you contribute to the overall organization? So understanding the goals, understanding the values, and making sure that you're in alignment with those. And then how does everyone's role play?
I think that one of the things I've always tried to do, whether in a people manager role or a leadership role where I have direct influence, or as just a team member in my current role where we have just horizontal influence, I really try to embrace understanding whatever task is at hand or project is at hand saying, "Okay, what experience do I have or talent do I have specifically that I can make this better for the team?" So it takes communication. It takes understanding how each person on that team is a little bit different. And when they're engaged in a way that they're using their natural talents and the things that they enjoy, then not only are they happier, but you get optimal results.
So I think it's important to approach everything like a team. Of course, I have three boys. So I think about sports even though I was the cheerleader, I didn't play sports, you have to be both. You have to be the cheerleader and you have to be the team player. So if everyone understands their responsibility and you communicate together and you understand how each person's role contributes to the overall success of the team, then that's how you win.
SKOT WALDRON:
It's so important. I preach that all day. You're right. I don't think we exercise enough sympathy with others, right? Not necessarily empathy because maybe... I mean, we're all different. I'm not you. I don't think like you. I haven't been through your experiences, but at least I can try to sympathize. And I know it comes harder for some people than it does others to do that and to try to relate or try to understand. But understanding our roles, what our strengths are, what our weaknesses are, self-awareness to the point where we become empowered, right? We're not trying to be something we're not, but we're able to fulfill our potential because we understand that and we're able to assist others, right? I can be my own cheerleader. I can be my own strength. And then I can help others be theirs by filling in gaps for them, or letting them fill in gaps for me. And helping empower them, empower me. We all as a team will be united and move forward.
So I love that. I really love that. You talk about one of the biggest mistakes companies make are treating employees as dispensable. Right? And I feel like that mentality is shifting a little bit from the way it was 5, 10 years ago to what it is now. And especially with just business being flipped on its head this year. Talk about that. And is their experience or stories or what's your viewpoint on that?
DR. APRIL JONES:
Yeah. I think that unless someone is valued, then why would they have a reason to offer value to you? So when I went through... Especially when I'm in roles where I've been a new manager in an organization. So I'm new to the company, I'm new to the team, but I'm in a role of responsibility for a team. One of the first things that I always try to do is train with as many people as I can to understand what their role is. First of all, it sets the stage for developing a relationship and respect. For mutual respect, not a respect for me, but a mutual respect because I value what they contribute. They're doing a role that I'm not doing that's important. But also, there's likely a lot that I can learn from them. So they have years of experience that are different than mine. And there's a good chance that if I tune in, and I ask questions, and I really care about the person and not just the function, then I can take away some really valuable insight from them.
And so it builds a relationship, they understand that they're valued, and it allows me to learn a significant amount of information in a small amount of time. So that's one of the things that I would always do. And I would try to understand what gets them excited about their job. I ask them questions like that. Like, "When you're in this role, what are the things that you do that you enjoy the most? What projects have you done that really got you excited? Can you give me like an example of something that we could do better? Whether that's to make your job easier or make things more efficient. Where do you feel like we're lacking?" And just get that information as early as you can because again, it helps you see the forest despite the trees. You talk to the trees to figure out, "Where's this forest going?" Because if you can understand the culture and the dynamics, it can help you understand what's good, and again, what should we change? What should we not? What can we change? What can we not?
Just figuring out the... You have to know where you start from in order to determine where you're going. So I think that listening is the most important thing that you can do before you act or you speak.
SKOT WALDRON:
And there are a lot of people that should be listening more, right? A lot of people in leadership, a lot of people on teams, a lot of people in families that should probably listen a lot more. And again, it's a tendency probably of theirs to think they have all the answers and to try to solve problems as quickly as possible. But I think that we can be more effective in that role if we were listening a little bit more than doing. So let's bring it back around. So we talked about the unexpected at the beginning. Let's bring it right back around to that because you've had a few more unexpected events happen in your life. The pregnancy was one of them. Two years later, your son gets a bone cancer. Right?
DR. APRIL JONES:
Yeah. It was just before Tyler turned two. I was starting my second year at pharmacy school when I realized he had the tiniest swelling in his right foot. And I squeezed it and it felt like a little rock in there. And he actually had fibrosarcoma. It was one of those things where we had a misdiagnosis at first. We knew he had a tumor, but then we thought it wasn't cancer, and then we had surgery to take it out. And then we found out it was cancer. And so it was definitely a rollercoaster of emotions through that. He did endure chemotherapy, but it didn't quite work. And so he had an amputation. We decided that that would be the best path for him, was to do an amputation of his right leg below the knee. And he weighs two and a half at that time.
SKOT WALDRON:
Wow. I cannot even imagine. And it comes full circle, right? You talked at the beginning about doing oncology and saving children and what can you do? It seems like the most compassionate thing you can do. And your journey led you here to where your son had cancer. And then to make the decision of... I mean, not only is the unexpected of the cancer, the unexpected of now you're going to have a child that's an amputee. That is just another layer of unexpected things that happen and an event that happened in your life. And now you have to think about that. And how do you move on from that situation? And what was the persistent positivity that led you out of that?
DR. APRIL JONES:
And it's funny because it's a little bit more than persistent positivity. When I think about that, I think about looking at the bright side of things. And I tried to do that in that situation. But that was one of those things where it was incredibly difficult because there were components that I couldn't control. And there were also components that seemed unfathomable really. At first when we knew that he had the tumor, I would try to look at the bright side and I would say, "Okay, well, at least we know he does have a tumor, but at least we can have surgery and then we'll be done. At least it's not cancer." And then we had the surgery, and then I was like he wasn't healing the way that we wanted him to and the tumor came right back. And so we were like, "Well, at least we're just dealing with the recovery and we're not dealing with cancer." But then we found out it was cancer, and then it's like, "Then what? Where's your bright side? What could you possibly say is a bright side?"
And so that was difficult for me. It was kind of like a breaking point for me to determine, "Okay, well, where do you go from here? How do you be positive through this?" So that is where I really had to determine how to draw the line as in to what can I control and do that? I can be a good mom. I can give him all the love and attention that I possibly can. I can make him feel comfortable. I can enjoy every day that I get with him because I don't know how many I'm going to have. And then I continued to do school at night primarily because I'd study in the hospital during the day. We were getting treatments. I'd study while he watched just cartoons or whatever. And it was something I could control. I could study and I could take the test and I knew I was working towards something and doing something. So for me, it was almost like therapy. Most people think it'd be... It was stressful in some aspects, but to me, it was the only thing in my life I felt like I could control honestly.
And so I could be a good mom. I could get my school done. And then I couldn't control the cancer. So at that point, I had to realize that the only thing I could do is have faith. The only thing I could do was figure out... It's the first time I ever realized about the biblical truths of, what are the promises that are there for me? And how do I stand on those? That's something I think I'd always heard kind of growing up in somewhat of a religious environment. And I had to figure out how to incorporate logic and rationalism and science with faith at that point. And it changed who I was a bit.
SKOT WALDRON:
That's amazing. They talk about science and faith and the conflict, but there's harmony, right? There's harmony when you really think about what that includes and what that is. And your story is amazing. There's other unexpected things that happen in your life. But I want to kind of end on that story, right? And that experience that you've had through your life of dealing with these unexpected events. You wanted to offer something to my audience that's super cool. What is that? The free companion piece.
DR. APRIL JONES:
Oh, yes. So along with my book, I actually have a free companion journal. And it's a digital download. It's funny. It made me think about earlier, when you were talking about the things that happened to us, these external forces, and COVID, and these different things this year about we're not where we expected. So the name of my company that I formed when I published with my son who's now fast-forward, a cancer survivor, an internationally meddled adaptive athlete, a college student. When I published the book, he formed with me The Drifted... co-founded The Drifted Drum Company. And that's what it means. Drifted means ending up in a place that we didn't plan due to external forces. That's the dictionary definition of that. And drum, being something that can be emptied and filled over and over again. Whether you're emptying it out because you're pouring into someone else, or whether you're emptying it out because you feel like your situations have just completely depleted you, there's still an opportunity to be refilled as long as we are here.
So that's what The Drifted Drum Company is all about. And I wanted to do the companion journal for you guys for free because it goes chapter by chapter along with the book. My book is somewhat... It is about our story, but it's also a motivational about empowering you to have faith and to overcome the adversity in front of you. And the companion journal has extra... When I talk about these biblical truths that I had to figure out how to claim to to get through situations, it offers more of those, and it offers just really in-depth questions as to analyze your situation. How you deal with the things that you deal with, why you do based on experiences you've had in the past. And what perspectives you need to change, and what maybe are solid that you need to hang on to?
And so I really hope that from that, people feel that they can really not just get through adversity because it's not about that. It's about building from it. It's about allowing the pain to be part of the process, and figuring out how to develop the compassion for others in order to help them. So I think if we all did that a little more, it requires vulnerability. It requires honesty. It requires us to take off some of the polish and to be more authentic and imperfect. But it's so worth it when you see that you can help someone else.
SKOT WALDRON:
Where can people get ahold of your book?
DR. APRIL JONES:
My book is found almost anywhere. If you're an Audible person or a Kindle person, you can get it there on Apple. You can get it on Amazon. Walmart.com, I think, even has it. But the companion journal, or if you want an author-signed copy of my book, or if you wanted me to inscribe it to someone special that's going through something difficult, you go to thedrifteddrum.com. And you'll find the companion journal digital download free there, and my book is there. And then we have a lot of stuff going on there. There's some shirts there that are designed by my son. There is a new devotional that I just launched by another author. And that's where you'll also find event tickets. I held my first path to purpose retreat in December, so just earlier this month, and it was about aligning your life with your calling, and building a platform from those past pain.
SKOT WALDRON:
Beautiful.
DR. APRIL JONES:
Thank you.
SKOT WALDRON:
You're a mom, you're a professional, leader, nonprofit person, board member, author, event organizer, just a couple. Is there anything else? Oh, and you own a dog. So I guess you could pile that on too. Right? Well, thanks a lot for being on. This has been really, really good conversation. I've loved hearing your stories. I think that's what makes these interviews so special and personable, is the stories. And so I really, really appreciate that and the value you brought. So good luck on everything. Keep rocking it. You're doing some good work out there.
DR. APRIL JONES:
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Thank you for sharing my story. I challenge everyone in this new year to learn about the stories around them. I think there's so many that when we keep our professional, superficial face on all the time, we get to miss out on some really cool inspiration that is walking right around in our circle that we don't even know about.
SKOT WALDRON:
Very cool. Thank you so much.
DR. APRIL JONES:
Thank you. Happy New Year, God bless, and yeah, keep doing what you're doing. I love that your mission is also to give people tools to lead better. We need good leaders. And I just thank you so much for the opportunity to share the story and the positivity.
SKOT WALDRON:
So what do we do when the unexpected happens? Do we sit back and just do nothing? Do we sit back and just freak out and just let things happen to us? Build walls of protection because we're afraid? Or do we use that moment to learn? Do we use that moment to exercise persistent positivity in order to take action to plan the next step of what we're going to do to take control of the situation that we're in and help ourselves move forward? That's what I got from this interview. And I think that it's really, really important to understand that and the value that we put on ourselves, the value that we put on other people. I know I talk a lot about value from a corporate standpoint, of valuing others so that they return that value to me and to us as organizations. But why don't we talk about that as friends, as family members, as a community?
If I offer value, if I help you feel valued as an individual by listening to you, by talking to you as an individual, as a human, you will offer value back to me in the shape of a story, in the shape of a new education lesson for me, in the shape of some kind of experience of help or something that we are experiencing together. And that's what I love about these, is that I'm hearing all these stories from different people.
I'm really grateful for April and her being vulnerable enough to share those stories with us today. If you want to find out more about me, you can go to skotwaldron.com. I've got more interviews on there where you can hear other stories of other people that have shared their insights. Also my YouTube channel, like, subscribe, share. I would love it. I would love you to be more involved in that as well. So thank you for listening to another episode of Unlocked. I will see you next time.
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