Full Circle with Dr. Ty Belknap: Homeless Teen to Techy Nerd to Working with At Risk Teens

What can we do to help you?

Oh wow.

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 taking the positive side to it.

And here on the podcast, that's what I want to do for you.

Because no matter what you may be going through tonight, I hope to inspire you to focus on the positive.

And you know what?

I hope that I can also be a source of inspiration for you to just keep on smart.

Hey, welcome back to the podcast.

I'm Kevin Lowe, the host of The Lowdown with Kevin Lowe, and you are tuning in for episode number 71, my awesome conversation with Dr.

Ty Bellna.

Now, I think a lot of times we hear the term of somebody going full circle.

And well, Ty's story is, in my opinion, going full circle, but with a slightly different twist, because he's not back to where he started, but rather using where he started to now ignite the flame in what he's doing today.

As a teenager, Ty found himself homeless, literally living on the streets while still in high school.

Yet somehow he would overcome the odds.

He would end up finding himself living as a beach bum and surf instructor in Hawaii before then going back to the Pacific Northwest, where life really took off for Ty.

He got into the technology space.

And we're gonna get to dive into all of that.

But then what I think is really amazing is the fact that today not only is he in the tech space, but like I said, he went back full circle because today he's working and helping with those teenagers who are where he was.

He's working with homeless teenagers at risk teens, giving back.

And I can tell you from my own experience, that is the best thing you can ever do because you want to make really good use of our own life experience.

You don't keep it for just yourself, you share it with others, just like me.

I love being able to talk to people who are going through challenges in life, who maybe have suffered some type of life-changing disability.

That's why I've gotten into life coaching, where I'm working with those who have had their life completely turned upside down, and they're just lost, and they're trying to figure out how to keep going in life, and they're just not sure how.

Well, that's how I'm able to use what I've been able to overcome to now help them.

And I see that in today's guest, Ty Bellknap.

And well, I think you're gonna really enjoy his story, and you know, I hope that it inspires you to maybe look at your own past experiences and how you can be using those to now be a benefit to somebody else today.

But before I get to my interview with Dr.

Ty Bellnap, I have to give an awesome round of applause to the podcast sponsor, Freedom Nutrition Coaching.

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Okay, now with my interview with Dr.

Ty Bellnap.

Ty Belknap, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Cody.

I'm very excited to be here, but I gotta say, I'm glad that you're interested in interviewing me, but I think you're the one that needs to be interviewed.

You have such an amazing past.

You didn't take lemons and make lemonade.

You made a lemon store, dude.

That is awesome.

SPEAKER_01: Well, you are so awesome, man.

I appreciate that very much.

And yeah, I mean, you know, we we we all gotta have a lemonade stand at some point in our life, you know, and so I just but we know the store to go to when we need to make our stands.

Exactly.

Absolutely, absolutely.

Yes, and and and we well, we make it with plenty of sugar around here, so it's good to go.

So yeah, well, well, but no, but seriously, man, thank you very much.

That means means very much to me.

So I appreciate that.

Yeah, definitely.

Yeah, so Ty, I feel like everybody s has this story in life, and some people's, you know, some people's life stories are a little bit, you know, more interesting than others.

And that's what kind of captivated me about you was the story of of this guy who kind of early in life started to having to defy the odds.

And so I would love it if you could take us back to those teenage years, because I know as a teenager you would become homeless.

Yes.

But I would love to know what was life like before that and like what led up to that, if you don't mind sharing.

SPEAKER_00: No, no, I don't I don't mind.

I'm not gonna get into too much detail.

I'm not from an abused family, at least not no physical abuse at all.

My parents were they were more interested in developing life for themselves more than they were in their children, I'll say.

And so really what happened was uh at one point my parents decided that they wanted to move to a different state, and I didn't.

And so they said, okay, well, we're gonna leave you with these other people and have fun, basically.

Yes.

And what they didn't know was that the people they left me with were drug dealers.

And so the people they left me with taught me how to do drugs and kicked me out onto the streets.

Gotcha.

And that was about how that started.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

And so how old were you then?

Fifteen.

Fifteen.

Wow.

So now were you still going to school?

SPEAKER_00: I was still going to school.

It was difficult.

The school I went to was in more of a rural area, and so it was tough to get to.

And so that by the time I got into 12th grade, I had missed so many days the last two years that the principal basically came to me and said, I know that it was interesting.

He said, Came to me and said, I know you're homeless.

It's not acceptable.

You need to figure out something to do because we're not sure that we want you here.

And so I dropped out halfway through my 12th grade year.

I went back the next year to a different school.

And the different school was weird.

It was actually a little more strict.

I had to have a note in my senior year for any day if I was late, if I missed or anything.

So I would write my own notes and I would sign them myself.

And the principal, of course, quickly found that out, brought me into his office, and it was so totally opposite.

He said, I know that you're homeless.

I know that the address that you gave us is fake.

We're not going to worry about it.

What can we do to help you?

Oh, wow.

It was just so wild.

And so I ended up graduating.

I got my degree from that school.

They helped me.

I missed so many days that they actually legally were supposed to kick me out because it was still tough to get to even that school.

But they they were very accommodating for me and they they helped me graduate.

So I actually got my diploma.

SPEAKER_01: Wow.

Well, that's that's phenomenal.

Now, where where was that?

Where were you living?

That was in Brummerton, Washington.

Okay.

Okay.

So Pacific Northwest, basically, huh?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

Yeah.

I've been in the Pacific Northwest for a while.

When I turned eight, I was on the streets in Seattle, basically.

And rough town to be on the streets in, even if you're an adult, very difficult if you're if you're a teen, because during those times there are a lot of gings that that roamed the area.

There's still gangs nowadays, but I don't think they really bug the homeless down like they used to.

There's a lot more homeless than there used to be.

So there's camps.

Back then it was just you were on your own and you hoped that no one would bother you.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely, definitely.

So now I'm curious because obviously you went on to do great things.

I I believe the next kind of step in your storyline that I'm anxious to find out about is this time spent in Hawaii.

But but before we even get there, I'm just kind of curious because I feel like when somebody hits that lowest point in life of becoming homeless, so many people can't climb out of that hole.

SPEAKER_00: It is a very difficult hole to climb out of.

It's very much, in fact, I would love to go to our government, because we have a big homeless issue here in Washington State now.

I love to go to them and and have them just listen to me to understand that homelessness really has so much little to do with how much money they make or where they live, and it has so much to do with their mindset.

There's the difference between a homeless person and a street person.

A homeless person is a person who maybe just lost their job and lost their house until they can find another job and get back up again.

A street person is a person that doesn't believe they can get back up again.

And to me, that's the big difference between the two.

SPEAKER_01: Wow.

So let me ask you this.

So how long did that go on that you were basically living on the streets?

SPEAKER_00: For about three years.

When I was 18 years old, I got a chance to move to Hawaii and I basically became uh from a street person to a beach bum.

That's what I say.

That sounds cooler.

I tell people I was so poor in Hawaii that I had to eat lobster.

Because in Hawaii, if you know you go scuba diving at night, you catch your fish, catch your lobster, get up on the beach and eat.

SPEAKER_01: That's so funny.

Wow.

So so how did that even come about from this this kid, which I mean, I which I must say, uh, you know, kind of going back a little bit to what you were saying of you continuing to to go on to school and graduate, I must say that that again is another thing that I think is really phenomenal is the fact that I think most kids in that situation could care less about school.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: So I would agree with that.

It well, I would I don't know if I'd say most, but yeah, a lot.

Some some kids they'll they'll give up, not because they don't care about school, but because there's it's just life is just so stressful.

They don't know how to add that added stress of school into it.

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

So so you you graduate, and then how does this come about, this whole possibility for you to go to Hawaii?

SPEAKER_00: Well, the whole time I lived on the streets, I never actually told my parents.

I I completely stopped talking to them.

They had no idea where I was or what I was doing.

And they eventually did find out that I was living on the streets.

They found a way to contact me, and I would talk to them a few times, and that's where they had moved, is they had moved to Hawaii.

And so they offered me to move there with them.

Okay.

So so my living on the street, they they didn't, you know, just abandon me and say, live your life, we're done with you.

They they really did not know what was going on.

And so I don't blame them for anything that happened when I was younger.

It I don't think it was their fault, it was just bad circumstances.

But I also believe that any bad circumstances can have a silver lining and you can do good with it.

SPEAKER_01: I love that.

Absolutely love that.

So now, how long did you then live in Hawaii for?

SPEAKER_00: I was there for five years, which was good.

I I was very addicted to heavy drugs when I was on the streets.

I got off of those.

Unfortunately, I did still keep drinking, and in Hawaii, it's very easy to drink.

The town I lived in probably had about 50,000 people, but 200,000 people would visit every year.

And so Hawaii is basically a party state because people go there for two weeks, they party, they leave.

And then the next group comes, they party, they leave.

It's constant all year round.

I very rarely had to buy alcohol.

People were giving me alcohol all the time.

So unfortunately, it was very easy to be an alcoholic there.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

SPEAKER_00: Um, but but I did do some good stuff too.

I tried to start a couple of small businesses myself.

I failed with them simply because of my mindset.

I still had the mindset of a street kid while I was there.

I did eventually become a dive master, which was cool, I gotta tell you.

Other than the pay, it's one of the coolest jobs in the world.

I get to go down and swim with fish.

I've swum with sharks.

I swam with a manta ray once.

I even got close to a whale shark once.

This is an 80-foot-long sh whale.

Wow.

And that was just amazing.

There's nothing that can compare to something like that, just to watch that happen.

I even broke a rib once, a humpback whale.

I was I was free swimming, and I saw a humpback whale, and I'm watching it, and it came over to see what uh well I was, because he was curious, and he's swimming by me, and I'm touching this humpback whale.

He's swimming by me so slow.

But then his fin comes up and just kind of hits me on the side.

But of course, this is what, a 20-ton animal, and it broke one of my ribs.

Oh my gosh.

Dude, that's so crazy.

So it was it was a wild time of my life.

It was a time when I really started getting into spirituality.

There's a lot of spirituality in Hawaii, too.

And that's when I started realizing that that you are who you are because of who you think you are.

And that's what really started to change my mindset.

It still took a long time for it to happen, but that that was the start of the change in my mindset.

SPEAKER_01: Wow.

Yeah, that's powerful.

That's powerful.

I've I've heard I've I've I've interviewed a couple of people here on the podcast who who are from Hawaii, who live in Hawaii, and I get that from all of them is the islands there, they have a spirit about them.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so that's pretty awesome.

So after you've you've lived it up in paradise, having been forced to eat lobsters and and and and dive and and have these like national geographic type moments, you then moved back to the States, correct?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, move back to the mainland.

Two things I didn't like about Hawaii.

The island I lived on was Maui.

It's about 50 miles long.

So you have 50 miles to go and then you're done.

There's nowhere else to go.

And so it's it's small, and I'd like to explore.

And I had I probably explored that entire island.

And the other thing was Hawaii, technology-wise, is about 10 years behind the mainland.

And so while computers were doing great on the mainland, they were just getting started in Hawaii.

And if I wanted to know anything about computers, which I really wasn't that big on computers at the time, but it was just everything was just so much slower.

And I was ready.

I was ready to come back.

Like I said, I had a different mindset by that point, and I was I knew that I wouldn't get back into what I got into before.

And Hawaii was kind of a place to to reflect.

And like I said, it's it's very spiritual, so it's very easy to to go in and reflect on your past and reflect on where you want to go, but it's really not much of a place to grow.

And so that's why I decided to to move back to the mainland.

And the only part of the mainland that I really knew was the Seattle area, and that's why I moved back there.

SPEAKER_01: Okay.

Okay.

So now before we we get into to life then back in the Seattle area, I do have to ask, when you moved back to Hawaii, how did things kind of go then with your parents?

And and therefore?

SPEAKER_00: They went very well.

Like I said, my my parents kind of raised me to be independent.

And so when I first moved there, I stayed with them for a while, but I quickly got three jobs, not one, but three.

Everybody wants to live in Hawaii.

And so there are so many young people that move there and get a job and then realize that it is not the paradise they think it is, and they leave.

But there are so many of them that most jobs in Hawaii are minimum wage jobs, but it's not a minimum wage place to live, not when milk was$5 a gallon 30 years ago.

Exactly.

Yeah.

And so I literally I needed three jobs in order to live and actually have an apartment.

I didn't have an apartment, I'm sorry.

I had a room.

I rented one room for about as much as I now pay my mortgage.

That's so crazy.

Oh, yeah.

It's a big difference.

And that was kind of it.

I started my own dive master business.

And again, I was not business savvy at the time, so I was failing at it, but I had enough money to live for about four months in Hawaii.

And I started really thinking about it.

And I decided that I wanted to go back to the mainland.

And so when I moved back, I found out that I had enough money to live for a year on the mainland before I had to find a job.

SPEAKER_01: Isn't that something?

Wow.

Wow.

That's incredible.

So then that's when you kind of got took off further with computers and stuff.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

I as soon as I moved back, actually, I was walking around a mall one day and I got offered a job to sell computers.

And I laughed at the person.

I'm not a salesman.

I didn't know what I was, but what I knew what I was not was a salesman.

Yes.

And so I said no.

And I rode a bicycle around Puget Sound for about a year, just looking at the different areas, seeing where I might want to live.

Seattle was one place I knew I would not be living because just because of my past there.

Not that it's a bad place, it's just a lot of there were a lot of bad memories in that area.

And so I ended up moving to Bellevue, which is close to Seattle.

And I got offered a the same job from the same people because they still hadn't filled it a year later.

They're waiting on you.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

I like that.

I like that better than them not being able to film it.

But I finally said I said yes because my money was running out.

And then I just proved, you know, that I was right, that I was a terrible salesman.

SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh crap, we shouldn't have waited on this guy.

Exactly.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: But what I did find out is I loved fixing computers.

And so when I would sell a computer, if there was a problem with it, the people would hire me to come out and work on it.

And I made a lot more money doing that as well.

And so that kind of started my career in computers.

I found out that there, this is in 1995.

I found out that Microsoft was hiring for their new Windows 95 operating system.

First major change in an operating system since Windows came out.

And so I got the opportunity to apply for that, got the job, worked at Microsoft two different times, became a network engineer there for a while, and really just, yeah, my computer career exploded at that point.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's phenomenal.

And I mean, in in kind of a pivotal time, I mean, technology is always improving and advancing, but I feel like at that kind of time and then going into the 2000s, I mean, really started, you know, changing.

SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, I actually I first got into computers in 1990, which Windows 3.1 was out, which meant that most people wouldn't even own or even look at a computer because it was so difficult to use.

And so it by 1995, when I when I knew a lot about the hardware part of the computers and and simply because there was no training back then.

No one, nobody knew anything about computers.

And so I was completely self-taught.

And simply because of my being self-taught, I knew how to do enough stuff that when Microsoft, I applied at Microsoft, they actually asked me, they said, Did you want a third-level position with this with this new organization?

And I looked at him and I said, Well, yeah, if there's one available.

And the lady laughed and said, Well, there isn't.

Yes.

But I guess I had scored higher than almost everybody else that was there.

And there were a lot of people.

There must have been at least a hundred people applying for those jobs.

And not to say that I'm in anything great, it's just that that's how little people knew about computers back then.

Of course.

And so it's it it was really amazing to it's been amazing, and it still is.

Amazing to see all the changes that happen and how everything is growing, how everything is shrinking.

But even more amazing is the changes that aren't happening.

Like computers are getting faster and faster and faster.

But when you dig into them, there actually hasn't been a change in computer hardware in 20 years.

It's faster and it's smaller, but it's still the same stuff doing the same thing.

That's true.

SPEAKER_01: That's very true.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, and and and I think I think that's a cool one.

And I kind of help but think when you're thinking back to the computers, I can remember being a kid, and the very first computer that we had, it was back when floppy disks were actually floppy.

You know, you could you know, you I remember holding them and you could, you know, kind of you could bend it in your fingers a little bit.

And you just can remember the the screen was like the black screen with like the lime green typing on there.

And and of course, of course, I was just a little kid, so the only thing I cared about was there was a a cool little game with like a fire truck that you would do.

It was like a little like almost a Pac-Man type game, you know.

SPEAKER_00: So so yeah, that's that's awesome.

That was that was the first computer I had as well.

And yeah, floppy disks were were floppy back then.

You didn't even have a hard drive.

You put in one floppy disk to load the program, take it out, put in the next floppy disk to save something.

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Oh my gosh.

We we have definitely come a long way, that's for certain.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

So kind of where did life take you from that point in terms of you know, business and stuff?

SPEAKER_00: Well, the second time I was working at Microsoft, there was an issue with a computer.

And they basically told us that we had to stay there until it was fixed, which took three days.

Okay.

And that was the day when I realized, and I got paid very well at Microsoft.

That was the day that I realized that I was training to be a very well-paid slave.

Yes.

And I said, I don't want this anymore.

And I had started businesses before, and I decided I'm gonna start my own business again.

And this time I'm not gonna fail.

And so I started my own business again.

That was back in 2002, and my very first year, I made almost to the dollar 10% of what I made my last year at Microsoft.

Okay.

I went from mid six figures to low five figures.

Yep.

Yep.

Very quickly.

And I was I was going right down the road of failing in my business again, and I realized that there was so much of me that still had that street kid attitude that, of course, I'm gonna fail because I'm not worth succeeding.

Literally, I'm that's how that was the back of my mind.

It's yeah, I could try this, but I know it's not gonna work because it, I mean, look at where I come from.

You know, and that's and I had to change that, and that's when I started changing that and started getting into much more of positive mental attitudes, changing the way I think, getting rid of the negative thinking more than anything else.

And my next year in business, I tripled what I made the first year.

Now, it still wasn't what I made at Microsoft by that point, but but I did triple it in one year.

And the only reason I believe that I tripled it was because I changed the way that I think about myself.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Our minds, our minds are powerful.

Yeah, very yeah.

Now that's a good thing.

So now, like what type of company was this?

SPEAKER_00: That was when I started my web design company that I've been doing for 25 years now.

Almost 25 years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so it's it's become a much more successful company.

It was getting pretty big for a while.

And I kind of realized that I don't want a huge company that I have to manage all the time or hire a manager and look over them.

So I've actually scaled it back a bit.

We have four employees right now.

We we do only online marketing, and I actually do business coaching.

I help other business owners, especially when they have that negative mindset, help them break those mindsets.

But that's really all we do is it's more of a small company, and I like the feel and the atmosphere of that better than back when I had, I think I had up to 12 employees at one time.

And it just seemed like it wasn't as easy to get to know everybody and to keep track of everybody.

Now, part of that is because my company almost from the beginning, I've had nothing but remote workers.

Uh currently my closest employee lives over 4,000 miles away.

And so it you don't see everybody in the office.

We have to zoom, you know, I actually was zooming way way back before COVID hit.

One of those few people.

Yes.

But but yeah, it's it's I mean, doing that with 12 people is not quite so easy.

So I scaled it back to four people and just I'm enjoying the the kind of work that I'm able to do with what we have now.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, that's awesome.

Now, did you did you start out only using remote workers, or did you did you go the the standard route at first?

SPEAKER_00: My very first employee was a local guy.

The one thing I don't, and that was when I was doing a lot more web design.

We still do web design now, but it's a lot easier for people to do it themselves.

So mostly we kind of help with it now.

Back then, nobody could design their own websites.

You had to hire somebody.

And so we were a web design company, and the first person I hired was a graphic designer.

Because I know nothing about graphic design.

I can't draw a good circle.

And this guy was amazing.

I mean, he was so good at it.

I just, I mean, I would have paid him anything to stay on.

And I told myself at that time, this is back in 2004.

I told myself I would never hire a remote worker.

I it's gotta be local.

I want to be able to see them.

I and I know that they're not gonna be flaky and they're gonna do the work.

And he and I were talking one Friday about what we're gonna do on Monday, what the next week is gonna look like.

And he he took off.

And on Monday, I didn't hear from him.

And Tuesday I called him, didn't hear from him.

He finally calls me back on Wednesday and he says, Oh, over the weekend, I decided to move down to California.

I now only paint for vineyards, and I'm not doing the internet stuff anymore.

SPEAKER_01: Dude, what?

Like, what?

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.

Literally, in a one-day period of time.

The next morning he woke up and said, Nah, I'm gonna move to California.

So that's when I realized if local people can be that flaggy, then why not hire remote people?

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

Wow, wow, yeah.

Loyal D uh doesn't go real far, you know?

So yeah.

Wow.

So so what I think is pretty awesome though about that is because that's something that I know I have really found and had great success with.

I mean, matter of fact, this this podcast would not be possible without the freelancers that I have who, you know, from my from my podcast editor to the to the graphic designer, you know, all of them who who I hire, you know, remotely off of like the freelancer, you know, websites.

And so I just I think that's really awesome.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

In fact, yeah.

Like I said, now actually from that point on, I don't think I've ever actually had a local employee.

And the funny thing is, is I back in 2005, 2006, I literally had companies say, Well, we're not gonna hire you because you don't have any local employees.

And so basically they say, you know, you're having people from other countries doing all your work for you.

Well, that's what employees do.

SPEAKER_02: Exactly.

SPEAKER_00: But but yeah, they didn't like it.

And now I have companies coming to me saying, Would you please teach us how to hire remote employees?

Yes, absolutely.

And so actually, I'm me and a friend of mine, and it sh might be available by the time this comes out, is we're creating a training on how to hire remote workers, whether they're going to be freelancers or employees.

He just wrote the book How to Hire and Keep Great People.

It's Mitch Gray, is his name.

And so we're gonna do this training together.

And we've already decided that we're not gonna charge a penny for it.

We're just gonna give it away to people.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Well, I I think that's so funny because I just I literally, my next question to you was gonna be anything stand out above the rest that you've you've learned, you know, by working with remote workers?

Because I can tell you from my own experience, you gotta treat, like especially for for myself.

Like I'm a big fan of the site Fiverr.

And so so I use it for hiring my remote workers.

And but I have to say, I mean, you have to go into it with the mindset that like you've just signed up for like a dating app.

And so like I feel like that, like because like, you know, yeah, like their reviews may sound good, but you need to test them out.

Like, you got to get to know them, you know, and find out.

Because I mean, I I mean, I've hired some phenomenal people, and then I've hired some that have not been so phenomenal.

And so I think the training that you're talking about, I think is so needed.

SPEAKER_00: I have hired over 200 people from either Fiverr or Upwork as freelancers in the in the last 20 years.

Um and I agree with you 100%.

And there is, I I have found a very good technique that I use.

And basically, I'll go over the basics real quick for you.

Okay, just like you said, hire them for a small project, see how they do.

But here's the trick the first project they do for you is always going to be better than the second one.

Yes, except the good freelancers.

Yeah.

So if the second project isn't quite as good as the first one, you know you don't have a great freelancer.

Yep.

Because the the more projects they do for you, the more comfortable they get, the more sloppy they get, the more they think that they don't have to communicate with you.

And that's that's kind of your proving ground.

What I do is I'll hire a freelancer for, like I said, a small project, and I'll gradually make them larger and I'll do this for up to a year.

Now, most freelancers don't last three projects.

That's just the way that it is.

But if I've got a freelancer that I can rely on for a year, I will then contact them and say, I want to hire you as a part-time employee.

And once they're hired as a part-time employee, if they do a really good job for another six to eight months, I'll then hire them as a full-time employee.

And that's how I've gotten every employee I have.

That's so awesome.

And it seems to work because, like I said, I've been through 200 people to find these four.

SPEAKER_01: Yep.

Yep, yeah.

No, exactly.

Exactly.

Like I said, it's dating, and you just happen to marry four people.

Yeah.

Yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_00: Legally.

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

Exactly.

Exactly.

For anybody who was just scanning through this episode, rewind and you'll get the context of what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_00: That's funny.

I love that.

SPEAKER_01: So, so business, you know, starts thriving.

You're doing amazing.

And which, I mean, like I said, man, I feel like, you know, your story is just so to me, so hopeful.

Hopeful to somebody who who's down in the dumps, whether or not they're they're homeless as a teenager, or or maybe they're just at whatever stage life they're in right now, and they're they're just feeling like, you know, oh my gosh, how can I ever climb out of this hole?

You know?

And and and I listened to your story though, and I think this is how.

Because like, listen to this guy, he did it.

I mean, Ty's pretty awesome, but I mean, he's no like Superman.

I mean, you know.

SPEAKER_00: So it it it really is all about mindset.

I graduated high school with a 1.89 GPA, which is basically a D average.

It's tough to get a D average, so I didn't fail any classes at all, but I got a D average.

Yes.

SPEAKER_02: Yes.

SPEAKER_00: I went back to college in 2006.

I got my doctorate, and I was on the dean's list every single quarter but two.

So I got a 4.0 or better every quarter but two, my entire college time, 10 years in college.

It's all about mindset.

That's pretty amazing.

SPEAKER_01: Now, I do have to say that as much as you've done that I think so awesome, the part of your story that that I guess has come later, later on in your life story, that I find so amazing, the most admirable, is the fact that you now today work with the kid that you were.

You you work with at-risk teens or or homeless teenagers, correct?

SPEAKER_00: Yes, I do.

I work with homeless teens in the Tacoma and Seattle area to help them see that, yeah, they're in a tough situation, but that doesn't mean that they are failures.

It's it's like I said, it's it's all about mindset.

And I'll tell you what, becoming homeless as an adult is extremely traumatic.

Very I mean, you lose your job, you lose your house, you lose your self-confidence.

Being homeless as a teen means somebody loves you so little that they kicked you out.

And that's almost almost impossible to come back from.

Yep.

And a lot of people don't.

I couldn't tell you how many people that I knew that killed themselves when I was a teenager.

It was it was quite a few.

Yeah.

And it's very unfortunate, but it's because of that.

And like I said, I don't blame my parents.

It wasn't that they were thinking terribly about me, but they even admitted themselves later on in life, it was because they were thinking only about themselves.

Yes.

And so, yeah, and they didn't realize how much that affected me.

Or my sister.

And my sister actually was homeless for many years after I was.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Wow.

Wow, wow, wow.

Well, I just have to say that coming from my perspective is I know how much joy I get out of talking to people and and and just kids.

Like I get to go to some different elementary schools and middle schools and and share, share my story.

The older kids, I get to share more about my story, what happened.

The little kids, I just make myself out to be a blind superhero.

And, you know, and but I can tell you how much it has meant to me every time that I get to go and I get to talk to those kids.

And especially, especially it's when the teacher has contacted me afterwards and had told me, you know, yeah, we actually had a student in that class who is homeless.

And she, and I remember that this one particular year, she had warned me about this one student.

She's like, you know, if there's anybody might give you some trouble, it's gonna be this one, you know?

And so, but I'll tell you what was so awesome was that student was the most engaged, most just respectful, and wanted to ask the most questions and was just totally enthralled in everything that I was sharing.

And and you know, and I can't help but think, okay, awesome.

Maybe, maybe somehow, some way, like I can help her, you know?

Yeah.

And and and I think that, and I and I look at you and and, you know, I mean, you've been there, you've been in these kids' shoes, and now the fact that you can give back to basically, you know, to the child that you were, you know, is is pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_00: I enjoy, I don't push that I'm a doctor very often, but I do enjoy when I go in front of a group of homeless kids for the first time.

I get introduced as Dr.

Ty Belknap, and then they say, Yeah, and he was homeless as a teenager, because right there tells them that's where they are now.

It doesn't mean that it has to be where they stay.

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01: Um I love it.

I oh man.

Ty, you're an awesome guy with an incredible story that I am I'm absolutely just honored to to have you on my podcast, to have have those listening to us talking today that you know they've got to to hear your story to meet you.

And the the last question I have for you is maybe maybe we'll make you think a little bit.

And that is was there anybody along your journey, whether it was while living on the streets or in Hawaii or or once you came back, even in in these more recent years, that you feel like left an impact on you?

Because I feel like, you know, I'm big, I'm big on relationships.

And I always say that what matters the most in this life to me is the the relationships made and the experiences had.

And I know how how certain people, even people who we think are just mere strangers, can really impact us.

And I wonder when I listen to your story and I think how remarkable it is, and I think, oh my gosh, the the people that he's come in contact with.

And I just wonder if there's anybody who stands out in your mind as it has made an impact.

SPEAKER_00: Yes.

There was one person.

When I was homeless, I was walking down the street one day, and there's an old man.

He was probably at least 40 or 50.

I'm over 50 now.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, oh, old, old guy, yeah, yeah.

The older we get, the real easy we go, wait, wait, yeah, no, it's kind of young.

SPEAKER_00: You know, he looked like he was 120 years old.

He was a street guy.

And he was sitting there, and I'm walking down the road, and I for some reason I don't even know why.

I decided to just sit right next to him.

And he looks at me and he asked me for money.

And I laughed.

I said, Do I look like I have any money?

He asked me$5.

He says, Here, here, you look like you need to get something to eat.

Life really sucks.

So grab something to eat.

I mean, that's that's almost literally what he said.

That person changed my life more than anybody else because I looked at him and I told myself that very day, if I don't do something to change, that's gonna be me.

Wow.

There have been other people that have had a more positive inf influence, but it was that one person.

I mean, I looked at him and I said, I have to get out of here.

SPEAKER_01: Wow.

And the fact that the kindness of a stranger and a five-dollar bill.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, that that would I mean that was amazing.

I mean, he he I mean, the shoes that he had were falling off of his feet, yet he he gave me five bucks.

Yeah.

But the big the big realization was if if I didn't change, that would be me.

Exactly.

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01: There's there's so many powerful things in that one little little moment.

And so that's pretty awesome.

Well, well, Ty, I want to thank you once again for being a guest on my podcast.

And I just want you to know how much I appreciate your time today.

And man, I uh I wish you all the best moving forward in your in your journey.

SPEAKER_00: Hey, Kevin, thank you.

Yeah, you are such an inspiration.

I'm just I'm I'm very honored to be here today.

So thanks.

Awesome, awesome.

SPEAKER_01: Well, for you listening today, I hope you enjoyed my conversation today with Ty Belknap.

And you know, we we never know what what's gonna happen in this life.

We never know what tomorrow's gonna bring.

And, you know, and sometimes sometimes life just sucks.

It's hard.

And but you know, I really hope that Ty's story can be that inspiration, that motivation, and that reminder to you that, you know, even if you're in a bad place right now, that doesn't mean that you have to stay there.

That there's there's hope, that there's there's things that you can do to progress forward and you know, all in the effort to make tomorrow a little bit better than today.

And that's the lowdown with Heaven Low.

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.