TGP04 | Andy Lilienthal & SubCompactCulture

FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU LOVE DOING.
DO IT UNTIL IT KILLS YOU.

Andy Lilienthal and I sat down with a high level list of things I wanted to talk about—including discussing his life with a Mitsubishi Delica. We very quickly went off the rails. And it was awesome—even if we didn’t get back to the Delica.

We got to talking about how, when you figure out what you love doing, you rapidly get better and better at it. You’ll meet people along the way who recognize the hustle—and that’s where opportunity comes from.

IT’S NOT GONNA COME TO YOU.
YOU HAVE TO GO AFTER IT.

Note: The audio may not reflect the correct episode number or link. Brian lost count of episodes so we had to re-number them. 

Andy said,

“I think there’s a level of proactivity you must have to keep knocking, to keep knocking on those doors and constantly network. I don’t care if you have a full-time job or a business or we’re just struggling with a blog site on the weekend. You’ve got to keep moving.

The key is identifying a passion. [Mercedes and I] don’t have any kids, but we have a lot of things that we do, both automotive-wise and not. We work part-time jobs at a winery. We also travel whenever we can and work on our blogs together. We jokingly say we hate free time, but when it’s stuff you enjoy doing it’s not necessarily work.

Don’t get me wrong. There nights when you come home and you don’t want to do it anyone. I just want to sit in front of the TV and watch Netflix. I’m tired of writing or I’m tired of trucks. Just give me a drink and let me sit down and watch some tube.

The only advice I can give to people is try it. Just try it.

People say, “I wish.” Some people say to us, “I wish I could travel [as much as] you guys do,” and I think, ”I wish I could travel MORE than I do!” For pleasure, you know. I’m lucky enough to have integrated some work trips to really cool places.

It’s always kind of a joke at work, too, where some people are like, “Oh, Andy’s going on vacation again!” And I’m like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m going to a work event. It happens to be in MOAB—and I happen to LOVE Moab—and SORRY—not sorry.” I’m going to do what I love doing and so I’m sorry to those people who hate what they do and then feel they have to make fun of me because they’re not happy.

But some of [those trips] are better than others. sometimes I have to go places I’m not fond of for work, but I enjoy seeing all kinds of places and meeting all those people.

So just try it. What’s the worst that’s going to happen?”

EPISODE DESCRIPTION

If you like R/C or scale model cars, you’re going to love this episode.

If you want to work in the automotive industry (beyond sales or service), you will too.

If you’re an adventurist with a thirst for experience over stuff, boy howdy. We’re on fire.

Today on The Gearhead Project, Andy Lilienthal talks about how he ended up working for Warn Industries, started SubcompactCulture.com and CrankshaftCulture.com, and how his quest to break into the automotive industry began with scale models.

I had no idea going into this one. We had so much fun I forgot to ask him about his Delica.

Welcome to The Gearhead Project.