Rob Verhelst, aka Fireman Rob, was a two-sport collegiate athlete, playing both basketball and water polo. Post-graduation, he immediately joined his local fire department as a way to have a positive impact on his community. After just a year of service, Rob was sent to work search and recovery at Ground Zero only one day after the Twin Towers tragically fell. Nothing in his short 23 years of life could have prepared him for this moment, and it completely changed the trajectory of his life. While Rob has suffered many dark days, his service in NYC ultimately led him to discover meaning in his life.
Decades after 9/11, Rob now inspires people around the globe by speaking, delivering training, and competing in Ironman races while wearing 50 pounds of firefighter gear. He firmly believes that if you find your passion, you are more likely to take ownership of your actions, make more grounded decisions, and maintain resilience in the face of adversity.
As Rob has moved further along in his entrepreneurial journey, he has learned that his services aren’t right for everyone. He is not motivated by money and maintains a genuine reputation by only accepting clients that he believes he can successfully coach. Rob’s approach to purpose-driven success helps his clients discover uncomfortable and unrecognized limitations and effective strategies that can be used to build mental strength.
Join the Jo Bros on this week’s episode of Running Into the Fog to hear how Fireman Rob found success in the fire. Learn how to take control of your fears by living an action-based lifestyle, so you can become an impactful leader that is driven by purpose and passion.
Quotes
• “What you want to do with your life is leave a legacy. I always say it’s not how successful you are, it’s how much value you create for others.” (07:03-07:11)
• “And when I started speaking, it was very hard to tell my story because it’s not crafting it, it’s being vulnerable enough to tell people your mistakes, tell people that you are fallible, but at the same time the high points, you know, those are just gleaming moments in the whole thing.” (09:45-10:04)
• “It’s not what you get, it’s what you do with what you get.” (13:34-13:39)
• “If you find your passion and purpose, you’re more likely to take ownership of all your actions or inactions or words, which will correlate to actually making good decisions. And when you start to make good decisions, you have to have the emotional control to actually back up those decisions, and not steer yourself clear of that. Because when you have that emotional control, you can maintain that resilience, even in the challenges even in the darkness, even in the struggles to have faith in yourself over the fears that have driven you before. And inevitably, that correlates exactly to your mental strength that all of us are looking for.” (36:54-37:31)
• “Those trials and tribulations, the peaks, the valleys, the dark moments, the extremely dark moments, those are what create a person. That’s what creates a human that’s going to be somebody who can impact lives.” (40:46-42:00)
Links
https://twitter.com/TeamFiremanRob
https://nexaurorawdc.wpengine.com/
Arik JohnsonLinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/arikjohnson/
Derek JohnsonLinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/derek-johnson-cfa-190893/