The Success Nuggets

Success Nuggets #42 - Love Through the Ages: A Journey of 50 Years Lynne and Rodney Peyton OBE

• David Abel • Season 3 • Episode 1

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Join us for an enlightening conversation with Lynn and Rodney Peyton as they share their extraordinary journey of love and partnership that spans over five decades. This episode dives into the essential ingredients for a successful relationship, highlighting how commitment, individual strengths, and shared dreams form the bedrock of enduring partnerships. 

Lynn and Rodney explore the importance of embracing change and seizing opportunities, exemplified through their captivating stories of travel and life experiences across the globe. Discover how their adaptability and resilience helped them navigate challenges together, fostering both personal growth and a thriving relationship. With an eye on the business world, they offer rich insights into property investments, stressing the need for strategic thinking and informed decisions within partnerships.

Through engaging anecdotes, they discuss their valuable mentorship experiences with renowned leaders, which have been pivotal in shaping their perspectives on continuous learning and relationship-building. As the episode unfolds, listeners are encouraged to reflect on the impact of positive influences and the power of maintaining a hopeful mindset, no matter the circumstances. 

Life’s journey becomes a shared adventure when surrounded by good people, and Lynn and Rodney’s wisdom leaves us hopeful and inspired. Tune in and learn how commitment to growth and embracing life's challenges can lead to incredible outcomes. Don’t forget to subscribe, share your thoughts, and leave us a review!

Speaker 2:

Amazing, amazing wisdom, entrepreneurs, success, success around the world.

Speaker 1:

This is the Success Nuggets podcast. Have you ever wondered what you could learn and how inspired you'd be if you asked incredible people from around the world about the patterns that drive progress? Get ready to dive into a world of insights and inspiration, of insights and inspiration. This is the Success Nuggets Podcast, with the founder of the Digital Lightbulb and your host.

Speaker 2:

David Abel. Welcome to the Success Nuggets Podcast, where we uncover the wisdom and insights of those who truly mastered the art of living an inspired life. I'm your host, dave, and today I'm thrilled to bring you a captivating episode featuring the extraordinary duo Lynn and Rodney Payton. I recently had a delightful conversation with this remarkable couple, whose journey together spans an incredible 50 years, and I'm thrilled they join us today. Good morning Lynn, good morning Rodney.

Speaker 3:

Good morning Dave. Thank you for having us.

Speaker 2:

Good morning. How are you? I'm well. Let's kick it off. Theme number one 50 years of togetherness. Let's explore that essential partnership that's thrived for decades. Where did you meet and how have we got to 50 years?

Speaker 3:

We met in Belfast, the regular Sunday meeting of a club in the university that we both went to. Rodney always gave me a lift home, which was sort of on his way, and after about six months I did say to him are you ever going to ask me out, or are we just going to keep getting a lift every Sunday? So that was really the start and the rest is history.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, she's pushed me every time since then. I mean, I saw her the first time. She was about five years younger than me then, and that's quite a difference to you to think 24, you're about 19. And when I first called for her, I was wearing a sort of tweed jacket and shoes and she was in jeans white jeans and boots. I looked at her and said my goodness, where are we going to go Because we're so different? She looked at me and said he's a big square.

Speaker 3:

We were like generations apart, so we went in and sort of hid out in a pub farm which got raided for drugs the next week and he blamed that on me because it was my choice. Auspicious start and there certainly have been lots of bumps in the road and I think times maybe when we even questioned the relationship. But it's like everything else in life, dave, you have to work at it. A successful marriage needs both people committed and a recognition. There's going to be times when it's not easy, but if you believe in it and if you believe in those boys, then you have to make it work there's a whole thing about two becoming one.

Speaker 4:

I'm not really into that. We're two different personalities and we remain two different personalities. Together we create a bigger whole, but each has their own personality and because of that, there are also tensions, because you're not one person. When we understood that and that together we were stronger than each one individually, together we made something bigger. That really is what's worked for us, and understanding that we're different within the same relationship.

Speaker 3:

And we're very different in how we do things. So I'm the like do it now, get on with it. Rodney's much more considered. Rodney values the instability a lot more than I do, but it's the complementarity of that that works, because he totally is my rock and if I get up into the middle of something and I'm thinking, okay, I need to run this fast, rodney, he's my sounding board, whatever. So lots of times we work independently.

Speaker 2:

We'll sign us up for things without particular consultation because we know it's okay, but whenever I get stuck, he's my go-to person yeah, I'm a bit like you, lynn, I'm a bit of a get stuck in, but I think it is important to have those dynamics as much, as being together can mean a lot of things in common. Everyone is different now. You two also a little bit like me travelers. You like to get around the world. What kind of places have you been? I mean, you were 21, I think, when you first met, so you've gone through every stage together.

Speaker 3:

We have. We got engaged in Hong Kong in 1990. We bought our first home in America. We have family in Ireland, canada, then moved to North Carolina and in Perth in Australia. We've a terrible habit of getting involved in something everywhere we go, because even when the boys did gap years in New Zealand, we bought a flat from a guy on the plane on the way home.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, in the middle of Auckland when we first met. As part of my career, I had to do what's called a BTA being to America. So in 1980, we went to the United States. We really loved it, in fact. We were there for a year, virtually cried in the big phone For me. I would have had to completely retrain to stay there, though I was offered a job after the year. So we came back to Ireland to finish our training, so we'd been in the United States. We had a great time there. We learned to fly. That's because Lynn decided she wanted to go roller skate dancing and I said well, if you do that, I want to learn to fly. So I'll do roller skating if you learn to fly. So we did.

Speaker 3:

Don't trade off, do you? Yeah? Well, I think I worked that one.

Speaker 4:

We don't do much roller skating, no kidding, no, no, no.

Speaker 3:

But learning to fly was another huge experience in terms of the discipline, the planning, the checklists. That was good for me to literally have to do checklists before you took off. It was a very controlled environment, which was good. We worked in richmond, virginia, for a year and that was amazing.

Speaker 3:

But my dad always said the only day that he didn't succeed was the day he didn't show up. So I showed up with Rodney in America with no job and no work permit and within a week I had a job and it took me another three months to get a work permit. So I worked for three for three months. I was determined I was going to get that work permit. So I worked for three for three months. I was determined I was going to get that work permit. You know, show up, then figure out what the issue is, then find a way, because there's always a way. I mean I would have been absolutely lost if I hadn't got that. But then that job, which was in a crisis center for children and families who'd been physically or sexually abused, went on to put me in the vanguard of services when I came back to Ireland, because the work in America was more creative at that time. So just saying yes to that opportunity in America and then making it work then led to fantastic opportunities when I came back home.

Speaker 4:

It's also led to your whole career, I mean because you went up in childcare and because you got well known. Then she was head of kind of local divisions of the NSPCC and stuff like that, as well as being assistant director in the Southern Board. So all of that came from saying yes, you know. I mean I know others who say I don't want to go, I don't want to accompany my husband, all this sort of thing. But it's because those opportunities came and seeing them as an opportunity, not something you had to do, but we had it together. We had no money for the time. We were on the back of postage stamps to see if we could afford lots of things. I mean I remember coming back from Canada and working out if we had enough fuel for the car to actually get back to Richmond.

Speaker 3:

We were freewheeling down the hills.

Speaker 4:

And when she actually did start to get ped, you know, life became much easier and we could learn to fly and all that sort of thing. So by saying yes, by saying yes, we got so much, so much.

Speaker 3:

And we still say yes. We've just invested in a couple of things in Australia and on our next trip to visit our kids we're going to check those all out, and I think what we've learned over the years is it's not what you invest in, it's who you invest in. So we have made money, lost money. The biggest lesson is do your due diligence and, most of all, ensure that you can trust the person that you're working with. So we're very excited about a couple of new projects. I'm very happy and comfortable with the people we're going into business with.

Speaker 2:

Wonderful. I think they're really good lessons as well For the audience listening. They're starting to get a picture of some high performers here, Not just people who've been together 50 years and crammed. You've been very successful in all your careers. Navigating property investments was something I believe you got into in the 80s. Is that when it started?

Speaker 4:

Yeah, actually I think we were in the Canary Islands pushing some of the kids to the prom and somebody came to sell us timeshare and you think, oh dear timeshare actually we did buy into the canaries and I became involved in the committee there eventually.

Speaker 4:

And then we came to the states and it has worked out extremely well for us because we planned what we were going to do. We didn't just buy on a whim and hope. We planned where we were going to do what. And it has worked out extremely well for us. That was the first thing. And then when we went to the States in 1990, we bought our first property there for retirement and the bloke who sold it to me and said, well, would you not think of renting this out while you're not here? And we said, well, somebody said don't worry about it, you'll always be able to fix it up. And then he phoned a couple of months later and said well, I mean, that's working for you and you're getting rent in. Would you fancy some more? And we started to gradually build up. That's where really we began in property in the States.

Speaker 3:

It was really quite opportunistic, because when the boys went to college in Scotland, in Glasgow, we bought flats for them, but we bought HMOs so that they could live in them and rent rooms to friends and learn how to manage their flats. So that was good. And then I bought my first do-er-upper in an auction in Belfast. I had no clue. All I knew was I wasn't leaving the room without buying something. So I bought this disastrous property in Belfast for 25,000. But do you know what I learned so much from the experience of actually doing it up? And then I think what we learned at the time of the recession was we had always been buy and hold investors. I think that was because just somebody said that was how you do it.

Speaker 3:

And we realized during the recession that we held on to things far too long, that there is a time to sell, even if it means taking a hit. And for us we took some considerable hits both within America and in the UK at that time and really did lose our shirt on a number of deals. But what we learned was cash flow is so important. If it doesn't cash flow from the word go, then don't do it. And we had to let go of all the things that weren't cash flowing.

Speaker 3:

I think the other thing is we treated our property investment as a bit of a hobby, a bit of a longer term strategy and for me at times, because I typically had to deal with it a bit of a longer term strategy and for me at times, because I typically had to deal with it, a bit of a nuisance. You know, having to leave the work I was passionate about, which was supporting leadership in children's services, to actually make sure that all the plumbing was working and that there was a tenant in a flat. But once we went to a number of business conferences and got some coaching and I realized you have to treat this like a business and you have to treat it seriously. And that's when it all started to turn around and is now very lucrative.

Speaker 4:

It's funny the number of people we meet who say they're real estate investors and they've like two properties and they're thinking about another one.

Speaker 4:

I mean, we had you know, it was gradually built up into that. We learned a long time ago never to be the smartest people in the room. We're high in our professions, but when we went to this other sphere of business, we were not. And to go into a room and just sit and listen and learn from people who know a lot more than you do, put it into action and I find very successful people will help you if you just talk to them. Don't tell them what you think, but ask opinions and how they did things. They're very, very good at sharing with you.

Speaker 4:

We have had some wonderful mentors and coaches, from JT Fox, from Hugh Hilton, and we were with Tony Robbins for 10 years and those all worked very, very well for us by listening, by serving, especially with somebody like Tony Robbins. You don't work with Tony Robbins, you work for him, but we were senior leaders with him for a long time and learned so much from him in terms of mindset and the ways of doing things much from him in terms of mindset and the ways of doing things that by being humble enough to go and do that, we have actually grown and developed a lot, and that continues to this day. That's great.

Speaker 2:

You're not tony robbins minis either. You know. I would expect someone more louder, as well as brilliant, to hear from that mindset point of view going back just a moment, right when you first became property investors.

Speaker 2:

You navigate the little bumps and the loans. Rodney, when you talk about 2008 and lynn was saying you lost your shirt, how did you go back in and you're the sensible one here from what I understand roughly sorry, but what contest. How did, how did lynn convince you to get back in there again after such big adversity? Now, that wasn't just small we didn't lose.

Speaker 4:

We lost a church on some property like penthouse. We had a couple of penthouses on on the post in Tampa and St Petersburg and and I mean we bought them for one and a bit million and they were worth of one to 550,000. I mean they just dropped right out because by the time you'd taken them off plan to the time that they completed, the market had gone out, yet we had contracted the buyout. Now, one thing we did do we never, ever, defaulted on anything. When the banks came after us about those, we made sure that they were whole, which means now we can borrow away from the banks. They're very, very happy with our credit, whereas other people we know that just handed them the keys back, they won't be able to pay the money to. And banks have a long memory. And it's not just the bank you're in, but the banks tell other banks that was such an important point.

Speaker 3:

That penthouse, that development was for 20 something luxury flats and we were one of only four people that closed. The rest walked away. It's just in the DNA If you say you're going to do something, you follow it through, even though financially it was a hit.

Speaker 4:

But remember we did not give up our day job. So I mean, I'm a trauma surgeon and I was working at that Lynn, you know, was high at that time, working for the social services, you know, and as in the NSPCC and things. So we had our salaries and we used that to keep us afloat. So the other lesson we learned is don't give up your day job to completely abandon one and go to the other without a backup. Now we would have enough savings and things, enough money in the bank that we could do what we please, but then we did not know to have a decent amount of money. I mean people, a couple of thousand in the bank won't do it. You've got to be able to live for at least a year and cover your expenses for at least a year. And if you can't do that, don't give up your day job.

Speaker 3:

You know it's just silly. To answer Dave's question, it wasn't so much that we got back in. We restructured everything that we were currently holding and then we actually, on the advice of our mentor, jt Fox, sold an apartment building at the peak in what 2020, and that gave us a cash sum to play with, and now we're in a global mastermind group where there are loads and loads of opportunities presented and we're stakeholders in a lot of ventures, rather than us being the primary. That's been fabulously educational, dave, because we get to go into business with, as Rodney said, people who are much smarter than us and they bring business acumen, they bring more real estate experience.

Speaker 3:

Some people are good at flipping, some people are developers. We just got paid out on a deal in New Orleans last night and that was the guy who we just really loved. His work ethic and his experience got paid on a very successful project, and you know, then, from experience, well, I'll do another one with that person, and while that was okay, I'm not sure I would go back into business with that person. So we've become much more selective, I guess, about who we do business.

Speaker 4:

And it's all about relationship. I think all the way through life we learned it was all about relationships in our jobs, in what we're doing. It's not the thing, it's who is doing the thing, and to get to know them closely and their ethics and how they perform. So how people do something is how they do everything. You know if people are, you know, promise something and don't deliver, that's probably what they do anyway, and so we stay away from them. So we have done what we said and we expect others to be that way if we're going to do business with them.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's right. Integrity plays a big line and a big thread through your whole lives. There was a quote there don't give up your day job. I've only ever heard that in a negative, sort of a joking way. Do you still have a day job? Absolutely Both of us. Yeah, and what do you do these days, lynn?

Speaker 3:

I consult to the children's services and mental health sector, helping them strengthen their leadership, helping them improve culture and improving workforce morale, and I also, during COVID, helped ASWA, the British Association of Social Workers, help them set up a free, volunteer coaching service for people who were struggling, and that's been very successful as well.

Speaker 4:

But I do a lot of still. I was a trauma surgeon, so I do a lot of medical legal work. I'm also an adjunct professor in Australia, so in tort law. So as well as my medical side, I also graduated in education, I graduated in law, and by putting all that together at my age now you know it's all about being relevant when you get to our age. It's about being relevant to the people around you, to the generation coming behind, and that's if we talk about legacy. That's really what I'm looking at is the mean, the thought process. I have, the knowledge I have, how I hand that on to others? I still use it on a daily basis doing medical legal work. But I also teach and train, both in social media and on LinkedIn, and there often I'm also in my job, you know, as an associate professor in Australia. So the experience you've had, you can put it all together and then keep growing, keep learning and remain relevant, and that's, I think, what keeps us going Continual growth and contribution.

Speaker 3:

And I think we do. What you do, dave, like this podcast, is your contribution. It's helping other people who are on the way up or just people who want to continue to grow, by tapping into your network of successful people and sharing insights, and you know we do that on a regular basis as well. So we just got a lovely invitation from the university. We do a double act sometimes for them on expert witness and things like that, but it's lovely to be asked and I think it's lovely at our age to be asked to work with young people at university and to learn from them what their lived experience is, so that we can integrate that into whatever we're talking to people about.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I can see a real good circular. You call it learn and contribute.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, growing and contribution. The thing is to continue. We're learning new things all the time. I mean, I'm 76 and I'm continually and I'm thirsting to learn more. Should it be business? Should it be law? Should it be medicine? I love learning and, by definition, now I'm learning from people much younger than me, so I know it's difficult. You keep your mouth shut and you listen, and I mean you keep telling younger people that. But sometimes at our age you need to do exactly the same thing find out what's relevant to them, what's going on in the world, and then, using that plus your own experience, you can actually give back to them. You're giving them your, your wisdom of the ages, they're giving you what's going on today, and put those two together benefits both, so that continual growth and contribution is was what leads to fulfillment.

Speaker 3:

Really, it's what makes our lives feel full and, of course, so often we get the learning and we help them get the learning, not by telling but, as Rodney says, by listening and then by being curious and then by asking questions. But what if? What if my favourite question when I'm coaching somebody who's a wee bit stuck it's well? What if it's not as bad as that? What if there was a way forward? What if our son regularly phones on his way back from a mad day in the emergency room in West Australia and it's all like da-da-da-da-da-da, and sometimes it's a bit of a rant and I say well, what if you know? Great question.

Speaker 2:

It is a great question. Can I add one in there as well? Is that true? That's another good question.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, for I'm puzzled. Just explain that to me, because listening to understand as opposed to listening to respond. You know, normally when people are speaking to you, you have your own idea going on in the background and, of course, if it's your own idea, it's in the past. It's something you've already known and something you've already done. You're not growing if you're just speaking from your past. And a lot of times when people are saying something, even controversial, to you, you want to get in there and say something to counter it, as opposed to saying I'm curious, why did you come to that conclusion or what has that meant for you? And then you begin to understand somebody else's point of view and sometimes that changes your point of view when you understand as opposed to just listening to respond it's so fantastically powerful how language can just open everyone up like that Before we run into the final part of the show.

Speaker 2:

is there anything else we could have talked about or you wanted to share from a sort of thoughts or stories point of view?

Speaker 3:

I just want to say life is good and we have to look for the good, because we're bombarded with negative stories all the time. But life gets better if you surround yourself with good people, and that's why we love this connection with you, and that came about through Joe Foster. We met Joe through JT Fox, and that's how it works, and who knows where this relationship will go, dave, I hope we find things to do together, but I think we need to give a message, as life is good, it's what you make it, it's the people you surround yourself with and it's about having hope and when you feel stuck for any reason, keep looking for the options, because there's always a way, and it's just about finding that way, either on your own or by asking for help. But sometimes we ask for help from the wrong sources, so we have to be more cautious about where we ask for help.

Speaker 4:

Yes, Misery loves company and you can easily get together and pull yourselves down like crabs trying to get out of a bucket. You know they pull themselves down and I think that's true. It's be careful of your relationships, be careful of who you associate with. Relatives are relatives, but you choose the people you're with and you need to fire the negativity out of your life. Now, none of us, we, didn't come with silver spoons in our mouth. We had to work our way up. Life does require hard work and effort and no matter how brilliant you are, unfortunately I find in my life some of the most brilliant people who have it all going for them don't put in the work and the effort, but people who are not quite so brilliant but who put in the work and the effort and the dedication, they're the ones who succeed. And certainly the people we know at the top of their tree didn't get there by putting verticals luck. Luck came to them because of the work they put in. Beautiful.

Speaker 2:

Amen, Evan. And finally, what's your one golden nugget?

Speaker 3:

My one golden nugget is there's always a way. You just have to be committed and find it.

Speaker 4:

And for me it's beware of the company you keep, because you become a mirror of them. What a finish to the show.

Speaker 2:

Thank you so much for coming in. I absolutely love this episode and I will hope to see you again on the Success Nuggets and in person and out there on Zoom somewhere. Honestly, you rock, so thank you for coming in.

Speaker 3:

So enjoyed it, Dave. Thank you.

Speaker 4:

Thank you for asking.

Speaker 2:

We appreciate it very much and until next time, keep striving, keep smiling and continue to turn life's challenges into stepping stones for success. Join David and his incredible guests next time on the Success Nuggets podcast and to find out more visit oneGoldenNuggetcom. Thank you for listening.