Talking About Life and Loss of Sight with Joe Rinaldi

SPEAKER_01: So many people think that my story is inspiring.

How I became blind at just 17 years of age.

They always want to know how I've done it and how I've kept smiling all along the way.

Well, I've just chosen to focus my attention on the physics.

That's what I want to do for you.

Because no matter what, you may be going through the I hope to inspire you to focus on the post- and you know what?

I hope that I can also be a source of inspiration for you to just be positive.

Hey, my name is Kevin Lowe, and I am the host here on The Low Down with Kevin Lowe.

And I'm excited to be bringing you episode 58, where I am joined by guest Joe Rinaldi.

A beautiful thing about life, about human connection, in my opinion, is that below the surface, we're all the same.

We're all human beings.

Despite what people may look like or what their voices may sound like, what they may classify themselves as, whether that's a career or nationality, we're all just human beings.

And we're all just trying to make it in this crazy thing they call life.

That's what I think is awesome about this realm of podcasting, is because I get to make these type of awesome human connections with people just like Joe Rinaldi.

From physical therapist to performance coach, Joe Rinaldi has a goal to leave this world a little bit better place than when he found it.

Through appearances on podcasts like this, plus co-hosting his own podcast and to writing and public speaking, Joe wants to share his story of sight loss, of struggle, and the power of a positive mindset.

Me and Joe, we were connected by a fellow podcaster who connected the two of us, both based on that positive mindset and this shared common bond of having problems with our eyesight.

What happened was an awesome conversation.

Two guys, two totally different walks of life sitting together and just talking about life.

And well, I'm super excited in the fact that I get to share it with you today, here on the podcast, episode 58.

Listen, if you're not already signed up for the email list for the podcast, please be sure to check out the show notes where you can find the link to get signed up.

Awesome way for me to be sure you're getting the latest episode delivered right to your inbox each week.

And a cool way for us just to connect right there via email.

Okay, here is my conversation with Joe Ronaldi.

SPEAKER_00: So I have something called best disease, and best disease is also known as juvenile onset macular dystrophy.

And for everybody who has no idea what I just said, I basically I've been losing my central sight since I was 10 years old.

And so right now I'm 27 and I am legally blind in my right eye.

My left eye, knock on wood, is pretty good at this time.

So I can function pretty much how anybody else would function who's sighted, and I can read, I can drive, I can do those things.

But you know, the reality of my condition is that it's very sporadic and unpredictable.

And so I've been lucky enough to have stable sight for the past few years.

But any morning I could potentially wake up and not have that sight.

So I just try to do my best, live every day to the fullest, and not take anything for granted.

But I I really view my my loss of sight as a blessing, and I'm sure that's something we can get into later if it's uh if it feels right.

But that's a little bit about my condition.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, wow.

That's interesting.

So now, so you said that started at around 10 years old?

Correct.

Or at least that's when you in when you were diagnosed with it.

SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, I actually woke up one morning when I was 10, and I realized that something was off with my eyesight.

I couldn't tell what it was.

I had just woken up and I opened my eyes, and I knew something wasn't right.

And so I just, you know, I closed one eye and then closed the other eye, and I realized that I couldn't see out of my right eye, and it had just happened overnight.

So my parents had uh, you know, rushed me to New York City and we saw a bunch of different specialists, and we finally found a doctor who diagnosed me with Best Disease.

And the way the condition works is that you can get a treatment to slow the progression when you have a flare-up, but there's no cure.

So every time you have an episode or a flare-up, your site gets worse, and then you can stop that from getting any worse at the moment, but it never gets better.

So it's kind of a you have to stay on top of it and you have to be always aware of what you're seeing with uh with Best Disease.

SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.

So did you did you do those treatments that you're talking about?

SPEAKER_00: Yes.

So the that first day when I had woken up early that morning, we ended up getting a I ended up getting a laser surgery that night, like pretty late.

It was like 10 o'clock.

I I believe the doctor had stayed way past when their shift was.

Like we were the only ones in the building, and I had a laser surgery.

And so what was happening was there was a fluid buildup behind my retina.

And uh it was happening because there were some blood vessels behind my retina that shouldn't have been there, and they were leaking fluid, they were leaking blood.

And so the laser stopped that from getting worse.

But the interesting part about the laser is that it was a cold laser and it was light activated.

So they actually gave me an IV of this very light sensitive drug.

And so I actually had to stay inside for three days, completely in the dark, like sweatshirts, sweatpants, like in the basement of my house, because if I got exposed to the sun, then the uh that chemical was still in my bloodstream and it would get activated by the sun and basically really screw things up.

So that was an interesting experience.

SPEAKER_01: Wow, no, dude, that's crazy.

Wow, that's really interesting.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.

Oh my gosh.

Oh, I was just gonna say, and and now, you know, the tr the treatments have shifted a little bit.

So in the the past couple years, they've shifted more toward injections.

So instead of a laser treatment, they will actually inject a small dose of a chemotherapy drug directly into the eye.

And uh it sounds it sounds worse than it is, to be honest.

It's not that bad, but it you know, it stops the bleeding, much like the laser stops the bleeding.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.

Oh wow, that but now you only have that when you're having an episode or an attack of it.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so my my sight will become more distorted.

I will have a uh more loss of sight when I have an episode, but then whatever the laser surgery or the injection, it'll stop the bleeding, and then my body will absorb the blood.

But whatever damage has been done by that blood, because blood in a place where it's not supposed to be isn't irritant.

So whatever damage has been done remains.

So it's kind of this battle of addressing the issue right when it happens, because you know the longer you let it go, the more permanent damage you're gonna incur.

SPEAKER_01: Okay, okay, wow.

That's that's interesting.

Now, now you said that it affects your central vision.

SPEAKER_00: Correct.

Yeah, my peripheral vision is fine, but if I were to just look through my right eye, if I were to close my left eye, all I would see is what's in my periphery, and I would have a big black spot in the middle of my my central sight.

SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's that's crazy.

And and and I I don't know, it I sometimes I make myself laugh at my own thoughts, is is I'm sitting here thinking, wow, that's so crazy.

And then I'm thinking, well, Kev, you you don't have anything, so it's it's maybe it's not so crazy.

SPEAKER_00: Oh man.

Is that I I mean, I have a I have questions for you, but I just on that real quick.

I mean, do you think often about what physically is happening around you in terms of like a visual representation, or do you picture the world in your head differently?

SPEAKER_01: No, yeah, no, you know, that's something that's actually very interesting.

And no, definitely my whole world is is definitely three-dimensional.

Everything has a place, and and you know, and it and I think it it's been like that from the get-go, from as soon as I had lost my sight.

But then especially once I developed the whole skill of of echolocation and and and using and using that, which, you know, basically, you know, I've I've trained my brain to now see through sound.

And so, so that even more so gives everything around me, you know, shape and and dimension and and where, you know, I'm, you know, it's not like that's why I always tell people, it's not like I'm just sitting in a blank room.

You know, I'm sitting in a room and there's furniture and there's walls and you know, there's everything around me.

SPEAKER_00: So yeah, that's that's very interesting.

I appreciate you sharing that.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, oh yeah, man.

Of course, of course.

So now how did that affect you after after you started losing that central vision as a kid?

Did that affect you then growing up, like sports and stuff like that?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so it definitely did.

I baseball was my first love.

And unfortunately, I had to stop playing baseball at a pretty young age.

I was just getting hit and hit in the face with baseballs, and so that was a tough sport to continue on with.

And I transitioned to football and track and field, sports where either I didn't need to look at a small object or I could just follow people.

In the case of football, I could watch where people were going.

And so, yeah, it definitely affected the trajectory of my athletic career.

And I eventually had to stop playing football in college.

You know, I made a couple tackles and was noticing that my sight was being distorted every time I was I was hitting somebody or getting hit.

And so I went to see my specialist and he said, uh, in very nice words, he said, you know, are you planning on playing in the NFL?

And I said, No.

He said, Yeah, I didn't think so.

You should probably stop playing football.

So, you know, that was definitely tough for me.

And my identity, you know, had to change at that moment kind of abruptly where I lost my identity as an athlete.

And that was a tough transition for me.

But I think through the years and through the struggle and through everything with my eyes, I really come to embrace who I am, including who I am with my limited eyesight.

And I think that it makes me a better person.

I don't think, I know that it makes me a better person in so many ways.

And I wouldn't be the person I am today without the struggles that I've been through because of my eyesight or lack thereof.

And so I'm really grateful for it.

And I don't know if you feel the same or similarly in certain respects, but I definitely think that any struggle when looked at through the right lens really can be a strength.

And uh I've definitely found that with my eyes.

SPEAKER_01: Oh, 110%, man.

And and as far as as far as like struggling to find like that identity when you have to give up sports and stuff, you know, because because that was, you know, for for myself was a case.

I mean, I grew up riding dirt bikes and and rode dirt bikes and then had you know a big four-wheel drive truck and everything before I went blind.

And and and I think so often when somebody characterizes themselves who they they tell you who they are.

Most of the time, I think we describe ourselves based on the things that we do.

We are such and such career.

We, you know, enjoy doing this.

But in reality, it's kind of like, okay, well, that's things that you enjoy, you know, you do, but who are you really?

And, you know, and I feel like that's one thing that that having gone through what I have, having gone through what you have gone through, it makes you discover that and get down to who exactly am I, not what do I like to do.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I agree with that a hundred percent.

And I I think that it can be dangerous when we identify ourselves by titles or by things that we do.

Because at any moment, any of our titles or any of the things that we do, in your case and in my case, they can change rather suddenly.

And that leaves us really vulnerable.

And if we don't have that core identity beneath the things that we do, I think we're setting ourselves up in a tough spot because nothing in life is permanent.

And yeah, I think I think that's made it's made me better in a lot of ways to have to ask those tough questions through my own struggle and through my own journey.

And I honestly, just like someone who sits on a couch and eats potato chips 24-7, 365 days a year, just like their body is probably not very resilient.

I think that my mind and my emotional state and my ability to see the world through a certain lens, all of those things have become more resilient and I'm better off because of the struggle that I've put myself through, much like your body adapts from going to the gym.

And uh for the people listening to the podcast, I'm a I'm a big gym exercise fitness buff.

So if you hear me reference fitness multiple times throughout this conversation, that's why.

SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm I'm glad that you painted the picture that we're not talking to a scrawny little guy on the other end.

SPEAKER_00: I'm definitely not scrawny, but uh, I don't want you to, you shouldn't be picturing some like 250-pound bodybuilder either.

I'm somewhere in the middle.

SPEAKER_01: So it sounds good.

Sounds good.

And that that lady and gentlemen is as he's he's doing crunches right now.

Oh man.

So now I'm curious.

So now at what point then did you switch over and and find this career path of of when you went to school to become a physical therapist?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I was originally going to school out in northeastern Pennsylvania at Bucknell University.

That's where I walked onto the football team and I studied molecular biology.

And I thought for the longest time I wanted to be a medical doctor.

And it turns out after working in a lab and doing research and being in the nitty-gritty of that field for a little while, I realized how much I missed human interaction and I missed moving throughout the day.

You know, I spent probably a whole year sitting in a lab by myself with pipettes and microscopes and all that fun stuff.

And I realized I wanted a change and I wanted to be able to help people, and I wanted to be able to use a skill set that involved movement and exercise and education.

And so physical therapy felt like the natural best fit.

And so after my sophomore year at Bucknell, I transferred to Rutgers University, where I could study exercise science and kinesiology.

And that's where I got, you know, got that education that set me up to go to Drexel University, where I got my doctorate of physical therapy in 2019, and also where I met my wife, which if I had to pick one or the other, I would choose meeting her over the doctorate degree any day of the week, just in case she's listening.

Just in case she's listening.

SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad we we don't have a uh uh the latest episode of Snapped on our hands with with the wrong answer there, Joe.

So thank you.

Of course, of course.

Wow.

So now, no, I'm just curious.

I mean, with the eye condition you had and even just the treatment that you had to undergo, you know, whenever you had these attacks and stuff, did that affect your schooling?

I mean, obviously not too much.

I mean, because you're obviously one smart guy, but I appreciate that a lot.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know I, you know, in elementary and middle school, I guess more middle school, it didn't affect my schooling in a way where I was suffering academically, but it affected my schooling in a way where I felt very different and I lacked a lot of confidence.

And what I mean by that is, you know, right when this all first happened when I was 10 years old, you know, my parents encouraged me and advocated for me to make sure I was getting what I needed.

And so that meant sitting at the front of the room, asking questions, getting things in larger print, doing things differently than every single other child around me.

And I did not like that.

I did not like advocating for myself.

I'd rather sit in the back of the room, not get the information that I needed, and just pretend that everything was all normal.

And um, I learned over the years that I needed to stand up for myself in that way and really get what I needed, even though it was different from what everybody else needed.

So my schooling was affected in that way.

I felt very different.

But yeah, I mean, just taking more time to read things, needing larger print for certain things.

I would always get extra time on tests, which meant I would sit in a different room than the other kids, which I hated.

And uh half the time, I'm just one of those people who takes tests fast anyway.

So half the time I'd finish before everybody else anyway, and then I looked, you know, I looked pretty suspicious.

I was a kid getting extra time and I was finishing before the normal kids.

So, but yeah, I think throughout school, it was just I had to do things differently.

I had to learn how to adapt and I had to work maybe a little bit harder than somebody who didn't have what I was dealing with.

But I actually looking back, am grateful for that experience as well because it just went to show me that no matter what obstacle you're facing or what barrier, there's a way around, there's a way through, there's a way over.

You just have to put in the effort and you have to advocate for yourself and you have to try different things.

And I get asked all the time if I'm thinking of having a family.

And, you know, have you ever thought about not having kids because of your condition and potentially passing that on?

And my answer every time is no, I haven't thought about not having kids because of that.

And I, again, am very grateful for who I am, and you know, a lot of that is because of the condition.

I I don't think that it's uh it's a bad thing to have, you know, objectively it's not the best thing in the world, but it's not a bad thing to have.

And so school is okay for me, I guess is the short answer.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, no, no, no.

Yeah, no, and and oh my goodness, there's there's so much that that you you just said that you know I wanted to follow up on.

And and I think that the last part that you were kind of touching on, and is something that I know for myself, I think it comes with this whole process of I I started to use the word acceptance, and I'm gonna use the word acceptance, even though I hate when people say that.

But I feel like it is that process of acceptance, of even just accepting who you are and realizing that for whatever reason God chose to make us this way.

He chose to give us this characteristic.

And why why should we put limits on ourselves, you know, based on who God made us?

You know, and so when I listen to you, you know, talk and and and I think that that is the case of, you know, like when you're talking about having children and and what if you can pass it on to them.

And I say that even for myself, you know, because you know, I went blind from you know, having the a brain tumor.

And we don't know if it's genetic, but you know, what if it is?

And it's crossed my mind of that, you know, would I want to have children, would I, you know, want to run that risk of of passing it on to them.

And and when I say that, I feel like at some point though, sometimes life life is worth having the opportunity to live it.

My worst nightmare would I want anybody to have to go through, you know, what I have, especially my own children.

But, you know, at the same time, you know, maybe there's a chance that they don't have to go through that.

Or I've learned so much from what I've been through that I can, you know, pass on to them and you know, and and make their life better.

You know what I mean?

And so, so I just I really appreciate you talking about that.

SPEAKER_00: Oh, definitely, definitely.

I mean, I don't know.

I think, right, uh I think it was Henry David Thoreau once said, it's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.

And that quote is a little bit ironic for for two people who are visually impaired to be talking about, you know, it's not what you look at, it's what you see because we don't see very well or at all.

And, you know, it's true though, it's not about the circumstances.

It's, you know, the circumstances are the circumstances, and so much of that is out of our control.

But what I think the beautiful thing about my condition, and it sounds like your condition as well, is there is a certain level of surrender.

And that's, I mean, that's just the word I personally am drawn to, and whether it's acceptance, surrender, or something else that resonates better, that we don't control what happens to us most of the time.

And we can't change right now the fact that we're going through these things.

But what we can control entirely is how we respond.

We can choose our attitude, we can choose our effort, we can choose our perspective.

And those are such Powerful qualities to develop.

The ability to have free will and choose your response in less than ideal circumstances might be one of the most desirable traits that I could ever want for myself, for one of my child children, or for anybody else that I care about.

Because, like I said, you know, life's hard and life has this way of throwing really hard things at you at the most inconvenient times.

And there's no getting around that.

And so I think it's this muscle that we develop over time, the ability to respond well to life.

And it sounds like you've had plenty of opportunities to do that and to practice that.

And I know I sure have.

So I would actually kind of flip it and I would feel really sorry for anybody out there who didn't have some kind of adversity in their life.

And I don't know if that actually exists out there.

If anybody has lived a life without any adversity, seems very unlikely.

But uh I think it's a good thing.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, totally.

And I don't know.

I think sometimes maybe those are the people who are the jerks, you know.

But no, it is though.

It is.

And and it is in adversity, going through anything in life, any type of hard times and stuff, to me, it just gives you that reality check, you know, and and that you need, and to to give you that greater appreciation for for the life that we're living and the gift that each of us have been given to be on this, you know, earth.

And to treat it as so.

Yeah.

So I I love it.

I love it.

Now, no, I'm curious.

So, so you you went to school.

So, when did you graduate, all of those many different colleges you went to to become a PT?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, sure.

So I graduated from Rutgers University in 2016 with my uh bachelor's in exercise science.

And then I graduated from Drexel University with my doctorate degree in 2019.

And uh yeah, so then I've been out of school now for a little over two and a half years out in what they call the real world.

And it's been good so far.

I'm really enjoying it.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, that's awesome.

That's awesome.

I love it.

Now, so now talk to me a little bit about your life today because you definitely threw me for a loop when when we've already made some changes since the last time when I first talked to you and got to meet you and stuff.

You kind of, you know, talked a little bit about it at the beginning, but what kind of has gone through your head like to make these changes in life?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I think there were a few factors that were kind of building over time.

And so the clinic that I was working at was uh relatively high volume.

And so I was seeing multiple patients an hour and just feeling increasingly tired and burnt out and sometimes apathetic.

And I don't like feeling those things, but I realized that I'm not at my best when I can't give undivided attention to the person in front of me.

And so that had been building for a while, and the pandemic happened, and that slower pace of life there for a little while just gave me some time to reflect and really reassess and reevaluate where I was and where I wanted to be.

And I watched my brother-in-law actually have their first child, my brother and sister-in-law, she's five months old now.

And so I got to watch him work from home and be really flexible with his time and spend a lot of time with his wife and his daughter and be present as a father.

And I realized as someone who does want to have children someday that I want those same things.

I want to be present, I want to be able to be flexible with my work so that I can be there for my children and not miss that time.

And I just realized that the path I was going down didn't check any of those boxes.

It was a rigid, scheduled job, one that I didn't feel like I was growing or fully being my best self.

And it wasn't something I could see myself doing for long term.

And when I say that, it's not that I don't see myself being a physical therapist ever again in the future.

It's that I needed time to reevaluate and find a better balance of how I want to spend my time because I would love to treat patients under the right circumstances.

I would love to coach clients online like I'm doing now.

I would love to have time for writing.

I love the fact that it's one o'clock on a Tuesday and I can sit down with you and have this conversation because that's important to me.

And um, it's that flexibility and diversity of where I'm putting my effort and energy that I really value right now.

And it's just been, you know, I felt like I was climbing up this ladder for the longest time, thinking it was going to bring me to some really great place.

And last year I kind of got to the top and it was a diving board, felt like a diving board.

And I walked to the edge and checked it out, and I realized, you know, I had to jump, I had to leave my job.

And I stood there for a really long time, like months.

And it took enough people telling me that I should go for it for me to finally feel like I was ready to jump.

And, you know, I feel like I'm still falling toward the water, like doing a couple somersaults, like, you know, doing some tricks on the way down.

But we'll, you know, we'll see what happens when I hit the water.

I don't know when that happens or what happens, but yeah, it's I'm I'm feeling good about it.

But that was kind of the motivation.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Oh, well, that's awesome.

That's awesome.

Well, I all I can say is I'm envisioning uh you hitting the water, and I I don't think there's even gonna be a splash.

You know, it's it's yeah, yes.

That's perfect.

Well, that's sweet, man.

And you know what though, I think that's actually you know, I think that's actually really cool.

And and I think it's something that a lot of us can take away from just that little aspect of your story is, you know, sometimes we get so caught up, especially if anybody's listening, if you're in college or or maybe you've already graduated, you're in a career, and you find yourself in this situation like you did, Joe, where sometimes you feel like though, like you've gone to school and you put in all this effort and and spent all this money and schooling and that's been your whole focus.

And then you get to that end point and you're supposed to be happy and everything's supposed to be good.

And sometimes it's not.

And and to then though have the self-respect, the the respect for yourself to realize it and say, you know what, I'm not happy to just keep staying right here, even though maybe what I'm doing is, you know, changing directions to get a bit, that's okay.

You know, and so I think that's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you so much.

Yeah, it's you know, it's the sunk cost, you know, fallacy where people put so much time and effort and they invest it into this one thing, and it makes it harder to abandon that cost that would feel like it was just wasted or sunk otherwise.

And I think I'm lucky enough to have the perspective where that's not the case.

You know, I went to school and like I mentioned, I met my wife there, not exaggerating and not trying to flatter her or anybody, but you know, that's the best thing that's ever happened to me, hands down.

So even if I went to school and I couldn't finish for some reason, if I got to meet her all over again, it would be completely worth it.

And, you know, there's so many skills and connections and valuable things that I have taken along the way that abandoning currently the title of like a working physical therapist in a clinic, that doesn't bother me in the slightest.

And I think it circles back to the beginning of our conversation where we talked about site titles and identity and actions.

You know, I'm not what I do.

I am Joe Ronaldi, the human being, Joe Ronaldi.

And no matter what I'm doing in any given moment, I'm still that person.

And so all these experiences in life, whether or not I carry them on forever, such as being a physical therapist, like I'm okay with whatever happens because all of these experiences are adding to who I am.

Not one of them is dictating who I am by itself.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, I love it.

Absolutely love it.

Now, now I'm curious because I know you're you're working on a book or and you've actually you've actually already written a piece of a book.

Correct, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00: Is that right?

Yeah, so it's a little confusing.

I have so many different writing projects going on, and that's you know, one of the things is I want to spend more time writing because I want to be a great writer someday.

And the only way you get better at things is by doing them.

So, you know, I've had a blog that I've had for about four years now, and that's really grown and brought in me a lot of joy and hopefully brought in a lot of value to other people.

I have a weekly newsletter that I send out, which is full of kind of insights and thoughts and just the things that I'm consuming, whether it's books or podcasts.

I try to take all of that content and spit it back out for people in a way that's valuable and easy to consume.

And then I'm writing a chapter and a book.

So the book is uh actually don't know if I'm allowed to say the title.

Oh, what the heck?

Nobody cares.

It's called Forever Athlete.

And, you know, it's me and a bunch of other co-authors all writing a chapter each about our identities as athletes and how our identities transitioned and shifted after sports were over for us.

And that's gonna be a really great book, and I'm hoping it'll be published by the end of this calendar year in 2021.

And then I am currently in the beginning stages of working on my own book, and that book will be about a lot about what this conversation is about and more, to be honest.

And so my condition is called Best Disease, and the book will most likely be titled Bringing Out the Best, and maybe a subtitle in there, something about how losing sight has given me vision or something along those lines.

Really all about struggle and perspective and growth.

And I'm hoping one day that book ends up in the hands of people who need it.

And yeah, that's that's kind of what I'm working on in the writing world.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, oh man, I love it.

Absolutely love it.

Now, I think the idea of the collaboration is such a cool idea for every one of you writing your own chapter in that book.

I think that's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, it wasn't my idea.

I can't take credit for it.

I was just lucky enough.

Again, actually, I connected with this person via a podcast, and I was lucky enough to be asked to be part of this project, and I think it's gonna be really awesome.

And it'll be a nice way to dip my toes into the world of authorship without having to write a whole book entirely by myself.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely.

Yeah, because I can tell you it it's kind of a massive undertaking.

So yeah, yeah, man.

SPEAKER_00: Have you written a book, Kevin?

I have not.

I have gotcha.

I didn't, I just didn't know.

I thought, you know, you have all this wisdom.

I thought maybe it was down on paper somewhere, but maybe someday.

What do you think?

SPEAKER_01: I can tell you there is a uh folder on the desktop of my laptop that's titled my book, and inside of it is a whole bunch of Word documents of half-written chapters and ideas.

And and so, yes, it is definitely something that is a process that I'm working towards.

Nice, yeah.

Nice.

I love it.

Yeah, man.

Yeah.

So now what I think is just kind of cool about this is I absolutely love your your outlook on life.

And I think it's it's kind of like this eerie similarity of like how I view life, also.

And that's there's so much that you say, and I'm like, man, that's how I feel about stuff.

You know, and so I just I have to say, it kind of goes back to like I almost feel like this overall theme of like our conversation today, of this overwhelming theme of like human connection and our path, you know, crossing and and and just going with it.

And the people in those paths, you know, that we come across, we never realize when we first meet them how they may impact the rest of our life and why, you know, our our path has taken us this way.

And like you said in in your own story, maybe in the terms of you know being a physical therapist, the whole point of that was to have you meet your wife, you know, and then you know, and and I've said that for myself with starting this podcast is the most amazing people that I've got to meet only because I started a podcast.

You know, and so I just think it's really awesome how how life has this way of taking us, taking us places that we we never realized that we we needed to go or that we were going to be going.

Yet once we're there, you just kind of realize how awesome it all is.

SPEAKER_00: So that's actually a funny point that you brought up.

I, you know, in addition to meeting my wife, I was connected with a person.

And without giving away details or names, I was connected with a person through the profession of physical therapy who absolutely changed my life in a huge way.

And I hate to leave it as a cliffhanger, but it just for privacy reasons and and all that, I should probably leave it there.

But yes, I have been connected with many incredible people along this journey.

And to me, the people are the most important.

And I truly believe with everything that I am that everything happens for a reason.

Even if we can't understand that reason just now, I trust that.

And uh faith is a big part of my life, and that's a big part of that outlook.

But it's absolutely been true for me that the connections and relationships I've built have been the most important thing in my life.

And it's just like, you know, we can't, nobody can do life alone.

And so if there's one thing I can do for people, I hope it's to let them know that I'm there for them, and uh vice versa, coming across great people who are there to support and encourage myself.

It's just meant the world on this journey.

And I'm sure in the podcast game and as personable and outgoing as you come across here on the podcast, like I would imagine that's definitely the case in your life as well.

SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely.

100%.

Yeah, yeah, man.

Well, oh my goodness.

So, man, you just you kind of leave me speechless in the in the things.

I'm like, man, how am I gonna compete with what he just said?

So so amazing.

SPEAKER_00: No need to compete.

No need to be.

I think we're saying a lot of the same things, to be honest.

You know, it's a breath of fresh air to come across somebody who shares a similar perspective and is even going through something similar, although not the same.

And I think that's the beautiful thing about being human, is that even though our struggles and our lives all look different on the surface, beneath that is just this shared human condition where we feel the same emotions and we struggle with similar things at our core.

And they might come at different frequencies and different intensities and they might manifest in different ways.

But at the end of the day, you know, like deep down inside, we're all people.

And that's one of the things that's been so attractive to me in connecting with other authentic people is that people who are willing to share themselves with the world, like I think that's what we need more of because it kind of peels back those layers and the status and the title and this and that.

And you get down to the core of what makes somebody a person.

And uh it's really relatable and it's really refreshing and encouraging to just know that even the people out there who seem to have it all together, or the people out there who seem very different from us on the surface, they still share more in common with us than we might ever realize.

And I think that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_01: No, I I totally agree.

And and you know, and that's what I always tell people is it's one of those things, those those little hidden gifts that I feel came with with me losing my eyesight, is it makes it easier than ever before to see that in people, is to not get so distracted by that outer physique, by what they look like, what they're dressed like, what their hairstyle is.

I don't have any of that weighing on me.

And instead, you just get to get to know the person for who they are.

And and I think that's what attracted me so much to podcasting, is because that's exactly what podcasting is for anybody listening, is that everybody listening to this interview today sees you the same exact way that I see you.

And that's in the fact that we don't see you.

SPEAKER_00: So, you know.

I think that's incredible.

That is incredible, Kevin.

I absolutely love that.

That is so cool.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Well, Joe, so before we go though, tell everybody where we can find your blog and sign up for your newsletter and keep up to date on everything that's going on.

SPEAKER_00: Sure.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

So the best place to find me is on Instagram, it's where I'm most active.

So it is joeronaldi.dpt, which ironically stands for Doctor of Physical Therapy.

And uh, if you want to find my blog, it's just joRinaldi.blog.

And really, if you get to any of either of those two places, you'll be able to navigate and really find anything you want, whether it's the podcast, my newsletter, my YouTube channel, or just if you want to message me.

And I should say this that anybody listening to this podcast, I would love to connect with you, to hear from you, to be able to help in any way that I can.

And I say that, and I think a lot of people feel like uh he's just saying that.

I promise I'm not.

I would love for you to reach out, and I promise I'll respond.

And I would love to build that relationship and connection in any way that I can.

SPEAKER_01: Well, that's awesome.

And and I will back that up by letting anybody, anybody listening and they're wondering if the dude's for real, if he really is that nice.

I can tell you that the conversation that me and Joe have had when the record button was pressed uh versus when it was not is exactly the same conversation.

So I can tell you that the guy is legit.

So hit him up in the DM.

SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much, Kevin.

I really appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01: Of course, well, for you who are listening today, I hope you enjoyed another amazing conversation here on the podcast.

And, you know, I hope that that the conversation today can leave you with something that you can relate to your own life to positively impact tomorrow and uh just make your life a little bit better than it is today.

And that's the lowdown with evil.

I hope today's episode inspired you, motivated you, and excited you to get out and enjoy life, no matter what obstacles may be standing in the way.