#53 - Learning to Live Before Time Runs Out

What changes when you’re told your time may be running out?

For George Parry, the answer wasn’t to retreat from life. It was to live more deliberately.

In this deeply personal episode of Engaging Conversations, George reflects on a life shaped by extraordinary business success, devastating setbacks, alcoholism and recovery, faith, love, resilience and, now, the reality of serious illness.

George speaks candidly about the years he spent chasing achievement and control, and the transformation that came when he finally learned to let go of what he couldn’t change and focus on what he could.

We explore what success really means when money and possessions no longer provide the answers, why trust and reputation are among the most valuable assets we build, and why helping others can ultimately be one of the most rewarding measures of a life well lived.

George also shares his personal experience of voluntary assisted dying and what having choice and agency at the end of life has meant to him. Regardless of where you stand on the issue, his perspective offers a rare and deeply human insight into dignity, mortality and the importance of making the most of the time we have.

At the centre of the conversation is a simple message:

Choose love over fear. Reach out. Take the chance. Help somebody. And ask yourself: “What am I going to do about it?”

George describes himself as being “in extra time”, but perhaps his greatest reminder is that none of us really knows how much time we have.

George Parry’s Book - Order From Chaos

George has captured many of his experiences, lessons and philosophy in his book, Order From Chaos.

The book is available in both Kindle and physical editions through Amazon.

To find it, search:

Order From Chaos by George Parry on Amazon Australia (Amazon.com.au) by clicking on this link.

A direct link to the book is also included in the show notes.

Connect with George on LinkedIn by clicking on this link.

A Note for Listeners

This episode includes discussion of alcoholism, serious illness, end-of-life choices and voluntary assisted dying. George is sharing his own personal experiences and perspectives. This conversation is not intended as medical or legal advice. Please seek appropriate professional guidance for your own circumstances.

If this conversation resonates with you, please follow Engaging Conversations, share the episode with someone who may benefit from hearing George’s story, and leave a review to help more people discover these conversations.

Engaging Conversations is proudly created by Ecolibrium Headquarters.

Transcript

Welcome And Content Warning

Leon Goltsman 0:00

Hello and welcome back to another episode of Engaging Conversations. I'm your host, Leon Goltsman, and I welcome you here today where we share real stories from real people, highlighting resilience, community, and the power of human connection. Engaging Conversations is proudly created by our team at Eco librium Headquarters, built around the simple idea of bringing people together and giving them the opportunity to share their own voice. I'd also like to acknowledge some of the people and organizations who continue to strengthen the communities around them, including the Bondi & District's Chamber of Commerce. Survivor's R Us, the men and women of Fire and Rescue New South Wales and other first responders, and people such as Greg Piper, whose ability to bring people together has helped advance important conversations across our communities and parliament. Now before we begin, a brief note. Today's episode includes discussion about serious illness, alcoholism, end-of-life choices, and voluntary assisted dying. George is sharing his own personal experience and perspectives, and this conversation is not intended as medical or legal advice. In our previous episode, The Conversation Before the Conversation, I shared an unscripted glimpse into the moments before George Perry and I formally began recording. Today, you'll hear the full conversation. George has experienced extraordinary success, devastating setbacks, addiction, recovery, entrepreneurship, faith, love, loss, and now the reality that his remaining time may be limited. Yet, this conversation isn't really about dying, it's about learning how to live. Because, in truth, none of us really knows how much time we have. We spend so much time of our lives chasing deadlines, achievements and problems that seem urgent at the time. Yet, often it's only when time becomes limited that we begin to recognise what really matters. The people we love, the courage to reach out, the kindness we show others, and the difference that all of us can make. Whatever your own experience or beliefs, I hope you listen with curiosity, compassion, and an open mind. Because perhaps we shouldn't have to reach the end of our life before we finally learn how to make the most of it. It is genuinely my privilege to welcome George Parry to Engaging Conversations. So without further ado, let's get into it.

A Childhood Of Shyness And Books

George Parry 2:42

My name is uh George Parry. I started out as a um a migrant from England and came over to Australia. We lived in uh very poor circumstances, uh, and I was a very shy child. So uh for me reading was a a major component of my my early life. Essentially, it was to avoid social contact. And uh one of the things that that happened for me at that stage was that uh I did very well at school, but I was always the last one to be picked in team games. So I had great difficulties um in my early days uh with uh fitting in.

What Success Really Means

Leon Goltsman 3:27

You know, George, fitting in is something that we see more and more people uh trying to achieve, trying to do. Now, most people do spend their lives chasing success. Yes. You know, you're obviously reading your books, but believing that one more achievement, one more business, or say one more possession will finally make them happy. You have experienced both extraordinary success and devastating setbacks. When you look back now, what did success turn out to be for you?

George Parry 3:57

Well, look, I can tell you that for me, the success in my life was the transformation from the transactional fear-based George, the cool-handed George, trying to be in charge of everything, to a George who's focused on acceptance and recognizing that the only person whose behavior I can change is me. And so letting go of the yes buts and the if-onlies, I stopped spinning my wheels over other people's behavior and I started to focus on my own, and I realized that I was not in charge. In fact, I was so little in charge of my life, I can't control my next breath. And I needed to have a complete transformation of my life, and that occurred when I was 36 years of age, and I went to Alcoholics Anonymous because at that stage I was drinking myself into oblivion every night just to sustain the fantasy that I was in charge and I was in control. But deep down I was completely lost and miserable and had no idea what to do with my life. Everything I tried, I'd made lots of money, for example, and that failed to fill the hole inside of me.

Leon Goltsman 5:28

I mean you've had successful businesses and you have made a lot of money. You've certainly made lost, but you've you've built up a lot of relationships as well along the way.

George Parry 5:37

Well, look, uh, as it turns out, um I've I've got some health conditions which will shorten my life, and my cardiologist confidently predicted five months ago that I wouldn't be here in two months' time. Well, I'm still here. But what's happened is that that's been a very liberating experience for me because I'm I'm able to say to my friends, look, I'm playing an extra time. I won't be here for long. Uh, let's get together and share memories. And I've had 120 people reach out to me in the last five months. It's been wonderful. It's been a very uh inspiring thing to know that that people have so much love and affection for me. I just didn't know. I just did not know.

Leon Goltsman 6:30

Well, George, one of the things that really got me very excited to be meeting with you is I think you're an extraordinary person. A lot of people look at success and failures from one perspective. Yeah. But many people hide their failures because they fear how others will judge them. But you have spoken openly about those failures. Yeah. What have your failures taught you that success never could?

George Parry 6:54

Well, they've taught me that um emotion and uh love are far more important than material things. We use things and we love people, not the other way around. And and I I guess that was a complete transformation for me when I went to AA and finally, finally, finally, I surrendered the control that I had and handed it over to my higher power, which I call the healing power of love, and just let go. And I as I did that, well, I I'll tell the story.

The Moment Alcohol Won

George Parry 7:33

And on the 5th of October 1984, my drinking buddy Dennis came over and we went to the the Beach Hotel in Merriweather. And he said, George, I like your style. And I said, What do you mean, Dennis? He said, I can see what you're doing. You're trying to prove to your wife that you're not an alcoholic by being a perfect member of AA. But he said, We both know you're not an alcoholic. The only way you're going to prove that is by drinking like a gentleman. And I said, Dennis, that's a revelation. I can't fault your logic. And so we we we ordered a bottle of Horton's White Burgundy for a scientific experiment. We poured a glass each and tipped the rest of it into a pot plant. At lunch looking out over the over the beach at Merriweather, masters of the universe. At midnight we're still there, and there's twelve empty bottles on the table, and it suddenly dawns on me that I am an alcoholic. And of course, when I drink, I don't want to wake up. And I'm thinking, I'm drinking again, which means I'm going to die. I don't want to die. But I'm drinking again, which means I'm going to die. Yeah, but I don't want to die. I got a cab home and I'm lying in bed at two in the morning. I'm drinking again or I'm going to die. I don't want to die. And a voice comes into my head, try prayer. I thought, ah, come on. This is cool, Aunt George here. I'm in charge. And then the voice says, Yeah, but you thought you weren't an alcoholic, and now you are. Maybe you're wrong about this higher power thing. So I thought, okay, God, if you're there, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Now that's as far as I got because I felt this sort of hand reach in and grab the obsession to drink myself to death from me.

Serenity Prayer And Surrender

Leon Goltsman 9:35

But there's also that courage, you know, that could be applied anywhere.

George Parry 9:38

Yeah. It's a recipe for staying living.

Leon Goltsman 9:40

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I love the the second part, which is grant me the courage to change the things like even if there's only small things. Even the small thing. But then the third part, which is which is what a lot of people miss, and that is the wisdom to know the difference. And I think that's what we will talk a bit more about that, especially the philosophy part of our conversation. That your journey has been about resilience, identifying those things, yeah, but also coming back and bouncing out stronger.

When Business Lost Its Way

George Parry 10:11

Yeah, look, you know, we it during the the the heady days in the in the 80s and the early 90s, it was like winning the lotto every week. I had so much money coming in, I didn't know what to do with it. And we would just go on holidays and spend fifty thousand dollars on a an overseas holiday or whatever we wanted we could we could have. But I got seduced into a situation where rather than focusing on my customers, I started to focus on profit. And we s we we started to go into real estate, which I knew very little about. I'd taken on a business partner. The whole direction of the company moved from uh uh servicing a hundred thousand customers with consumables for their their newly purchased computers to using the cash flow from that to develop very large industrial estates which have got long-term payback periods of seven years. And that that brought me unstuck, or brought us unstuck. And uh and we were in a situation probably where we we went from ten million down to minus a hundred thousand in a five-year period.

Leon Goltsman 11:31

Well, it seems like instead of shifting your focus on people, you started shifting your focus on money.

George Parry 11:37

That's exactly what happened. And and I guess the universe paid me back. I said, no, that's not the way to go, George.

Leon Goltsman 11:44

I don't know about paying you back, and I see it more like I think he still needs to learn a couple of things.

George Parry 11:49

I did, I surely did. Yeah. I ne I needed to learn that um you get what you give in life. Whatever you you want in life, uh and I I guess I've learned this this from practical experience. As Ziggler says, yeah, you can have everything in life you want if you'll just help enough other people get what they want.

Leon Goltsman 12:10

And that's actually one of my favorite sayings. Yeah. The best way to succeed is is helping other people get it. Helping.

George Parry 12:17

Absolutely. Yeah. And and they will then, of course, willingly help you. Of course. They'll they will crawl over broken glass to to come and thrust money into your hands and say, you know, here's do this for me.

Leon Goltsman 12:30

Yeah. Well, George,

Helping Others As A Strategy

Leon Goltsman 12:32

you and I both know quite a lot of people in different areas, in different groups. Yeah. But one of the things that I found a lot of our listeners are either business people or going into business or know someone who's in business or just wants to succeed in their own thing. Yes. And there's that popular belief that it's not always what you know, it's who you know. But I'm going to take it one step further. It's not always what you know, it's who you know, and whether those people like you.

George Parry 13:01

Absolutely. You you do have to be a as the old Chinese proverb says, man who cannot smile should not open shop.

Leon Goltsman 13:11

Oh, well, that's that's another important one as well.

George Parry 13:15

Yeah, you you need to you need to be able to relate to people. And of course, that was the transformation that occur occurred in my life. Yeah, w when I went from my my childhood and my youth, where where I I was resentful and bitter, and life hadn't uh done me right, and I was unhappily married for one, and nothing I did, you know, I made a lot of money, but it just turned around and and thundered snows at me. I I I couldn't find any contentment or satisfaction in making, you know, ten years' wages. Uh when I was teaching, I I was only making twelve thousand. Because you're a school teacher. I was to me. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but I was a hopeless school teacher. You're a great teacher now, I can tell you that much, George. Yeah, yeah. Well, thank you. Uh no, look, um uh I I I um I put that whole thing down to the transformation of my life when I let go and I let go of fear, I let go of self-pity, you know, resentment only rots its container.

Relationships That Make Business Work

George Parry 14:16

I let go of people pleasing, I let go of control, and I decided to focus instead on acceptance. If I just accept everything that that happens, then I'm fine. I don't have to get stirred up over Donald Trump, I don't have to get stirred up over the price of petrol, I don't have to be negative. What I what I do is I accept that and and then I forgive. And I also try to maintain a sense of humor and not take myself too seriously. Attitudinal changes which take you away from that sense of of deprivation and entitlement that that came with fear. But if you let love into your life and acceptance, then life goes smoothly. And that that's what happened for me. There was a a complete transformation of my life.

How Fear Quietly Runs The Show

Leon Goltsman 15:14

Well, speaking of uh fear and love, and we know that that's almost as though they are two forces constantly competing within us. Yes. George, how do we stop allowing fear to quietly dictate our lives?

George Parry 15:27

Oh, well, by practice. We we we can stop fear from dictating our lives by stepping back and practicing and saying, hey, wait a minute, am I reacting sensibly to this? Am I reacting in a logical, Socratic method, or am I reacting with my gut and and I'm building a wall around myself to protect myself?

Leon Goltsman 15:51

Well, you just interesting you said building walls, which can become prisons sometimes. That's right.

George Parry 15:57

And of course, if you build them perfectly, yeah, they become your tomb.

Leon Goltsman 16:01

Yeah, well, and we talked about that uh leading up to today's conversation because I found almost everything we spoke about after it got me thinking. And this is why I'm just really excited for our audience to hear this podcast, because I think there's going to be a lot of people coming back to us. So it wouldn't surprise me, George, if you had uh all this fan mail come in as well.

George Parry 16:23

Well for for whatever length of time remains for me, of course, because as your listeners may know, um I've been given a um a short expiry date with my heart. But what's happened is I've just I'm not second guessing my life expectancy anymore. I'm just getting on and doing stuff. So I've done some of my assignments and the work that I took on and and my book was another thing. I uh it took me six weeks to write it because I'd I'd already read pre-written a lot of those stories in a previous book.

Goals Matter Less Than Journey

Leon Goltsman 17:05

Well, George, we were talking about a couple of things just earlier on in our conversation where we're talking about goals. One of the common denominators, one thing I I I see quite a lot of, yeah, is people tend to be so focused on their goals that they forget about the journey.

George Parry 17:21

Absolutely. The the the journey is the main important thing because the goal is not guaranteed, uh, but our our journey is. We we can guarantee that we will have a pathway through the jungle. And the the main thing I think is to find joy. Uh if your life is not full of joy, it's because you're not giving any. If you find your your life is joyless and bitter, and you you find no satisfaction in it, then it's because you're not helping others. When we give joy, then it's a it's uh it taps into synergy once again. It heals me as a giver, and it heals the receiver. Uh and this is the magic of of the universe, it's the magic of synergy. We are able to create something wonderful out of nothing, out of just ideas. Where when we're focused on fear, we're trying to hold on to what little we have. And it's it's dwindling away in front of us, and we're we're terrified of losing. And so we become very risk-averse. But what happened for me, because I had this experience of wow, I have a power outside of me that can restore me to sanity, it gave me a lot of courage to be bold and try different things, try big things.

Leon Goltsman 18:51

That's very Socratic as well.

George Parry 18:53

Yeah. I thought, well, what's the point in pursuing things that will only give me a 50% or a hundred percent return? I think there's some ideas out there that can give me a hundred times return or a thousand times the return. And I talk about this in my book. There are some nuggets of gold that we can pick up that will give you, your own personal life, a return of 200 or 500 to 1. And I've uh I I did that with my daughter's um, my daughter's uh B. I said, if we were to spend $250 on a hedge around the front of this garden, we would have a private garden room that your tenants would love to use, and it will add $50,000 to the failure. And sure enough, the bank agrees.

Leon Goltsman 19:45

Well, there you go. Every action has a reaction, yeah. Everything has a uh has a flow on it there. And I and I was very fortunate that I've got my hands on your book a week ago. Okay. I read it. Yep. And I and one of the things that I've taken away with me, uh and you've mentioned that walls do build prisons, yeah. I found that your work, it it it kind of creates a new connection. Love creates connection, purpose and freedom.

Reach Out Before Life Shrinks

George Parry 20:13

If you have the boldness, you have to reach out. Life is short. If you sit there in splendid isolation, waiting for others, they will they will respect your request and do nothing. If you're you're just sitting there with your arms folded, waiting and waiting, waiting, nobody will come and visit you. They'll say, Well, George doesn't want any visitors because he's not reaching out. So for anyone out there who's finding life is difficult, be proactive. Reach out. Reach out to people and say, Look, I've got a spare hour or two this afternoon. Let's get together. Is there anything we can do together? Well, I think we we're in this together. I I think i everyone has has their story, and each of us has a unique value, and that needs to be brought out by the healing power of love. A lot of people feel defensive and scared, uh, and they want to put up a a barrier of appearances or possessions, uh, all kinds of status to to say, look at me, I I'm untouchable. Uh, but we're all touchable, we're all human. And uh we're we're brought up the same. We we we need to belong, for one. Uh we need to be recognized, and we need to be needed, wanted, and loved as human beings. That's that's the humanity that's inside us all. Uh we're not machines. And I've met people who who think life is a machine and that if only they got more money they'd be happy. And they get more money and they're miserable and and they buy their friends and uh it doesn't work. You y you have to give of yourself. And and the other thing As I say, is that be wary of what you do because every action has a compounding consequence. Play the long game. Don't cut any corners. Don't damage your brand by cheating or by taking shortcuts. Always err on the side of generosity, and that will come back to you. Even if it doesn't come back to you from the person who you look after, even if they portray you or whatever, you are still putting good out into the universe. And and the third component of it, I guess, is that we need to recognize that there's love and there's fear, and one will drive out the other. So relentlessly we need to choose love and and not count the cost. Because in the long run, in in my life, love has absolutely outweighed any negative. I'm absolutely swamped with love. I have a wife who loves me unconditionally, and I've put her through the ringer, and she's never once complained.

Leon Goltsman 23:07

Well, the fear, from what I'm seeing, fear does build walls. Yes. Love builds bridges. That's right.

George Parry 23:13

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 23:14

The other thing you mentioned about courage, we hear young people saying that

Bold Ideas That Build Trust

Leon Goltsman 23:20

why doesn't good things happen to them? Yeah. It's not just young people. We hear a lot of people complaining why good things don't happen to them.

George Parry 23:27

Why does why does uh everybody else get the good um stuff and I get the bad stuff?

Leon Goltsman 23:32

Yeah, but but you've mentioned earlier in our conversation that courage is something that's really, really important. I think so. I think so. And we know perhaps one good suggestion we you know we might say to those young people is that fortune favors the bolt.

George Parry 23:49

It does. And the other thing you need to remember is that you need to have a good idea. You can pursue a bad idea uh to to the ends of the earth and get nothing from it. Your best investment is in researching and looking at what your passion is and whether you can monetize that by finding somebody who wants to buy what you what you want to sell. And so it's trying to find that happy medium where you've got uh a good idea, which in fact becomes, wow, it worked. You see, I I deal with very conservative people who sit on boards and and they look at me and say, George, where are we going to get the money for that? And I say, Well, you're going to get the money by earning it. Oh, we could never do that. You're talking millions, George. And I say, Well, you've never experienced winning the lotto every Friday. I have. I know what it's like to put out an idea into the marketplace and have it go crazy. You know, I I a quick example, I used to send out postcards to when I was overseas, I'd take my top hundred customers and send out postcards. I do this uh with when I I was overseas. I said we'd had some aerial photos of the farm done, and I I sent out a postcard and said to my top customers, a view from the farm. The next week I get a phone call from uh from Andrew, who's a top, really top customer. He said, Is this really the view from the farm, George? I said, Well, it's a bit of poetic license. Look, why don't you and your wife and kids come up on Sunday? I'll get Wayne and his family to come up and we'll have we'll have lunch together. So they all came out and we we went out on the tract and we had a a wild old time, you know, getting the kids' feet wet. They were on the back of the carry all and we were getting their feet wet. Uh, and and we just had a had an absolute ball. Uh the next Tuesday, Andrew sent uh uh an order for $27,000. And about two years later, uh at tax time, he sent in our biggest order ever.

Leon Goltsman 26:06

Wow.

George Parry 26:07

$72,000. At the time that would have been a lot of money. It was an awful lot of money. We were we were turning over about five or six million a year at the at that time. But the margins are so good. Yeah. Because I the the key to the key to that business was firstly it was it was something new. I could see that computers were going to take off particularly. You were one of the first people who bought the apple. Oh, well, it was there when 1978. Sometime in 78 when when Rudy and Lorna cracked open the uh the shipping container, I was there helping to grab one. So I might have been number seven or something. But I know a lot of people.

Leon Goltsman 26:44

At a time when people thought Apple was a fruit.

George Parry 26:46

Oh, yeah. Yeah. But you know, I I'd kept my eye on I could see. I'd bought I'd previously bought a little maths computer for drilling kids in in maths. I thought if we could do this in language, that would be fantastic. And I saw an advertisement in the September 77 issue of Scientific American, full-page ad for the Apple II.

The Customer List As Gold

George Parry 27:08

Uh it had dot addressable graphics, and I said, that's what I need. I want to be able to animate stuff, and I want to be able to ask questions about it. I want to have a you know, classroom assisted instruction. And and the key to my business was that um I sat down and I systematically wrote down the names and addresses of every school. And I also did deals with Sean Howard at Computer Land in Melbourne and with uh Brudy at Computer Land Sydney, uh, with um Imagineering with Jodie Rich and swapped mailing lists, my wholesale for their resale. And so as uh over time, I had a hundred thousand customers. Now that is an absolute gold mine. If you can get hold of a customer list of people who are interested in your product or who've had dealings with you, you you just systematically build it every day, every interaction you get their email address and put them on Facebook or whatever.

Leon Goltsman 28:12

It seems like your business wasn't just about technology and computers, it was about investing in people and their trust.

George Parry 28:18

Oh, yeah, yeah. Um well the the the um uh the key for me was my staff. Um what what we did is we had a very flat management structure, and everybody uh had to solve the the customers' problems. If the phone rang, you're responsible to answer. If the customer came, you went and talked to them. Uh and if they had a problem, you solved it. Didn't matter what it cost. We were running on 40% margin, so it didn't matter. And they were buying big. There was nowhere else to buy the consumables that wasn't twice the price. Yeah. Because I had the backup of a 100,000 database, I knew that all I had to do was find a product and get the price down. And I can I could put it out there.

Leon Goltsman 29:02

That that that is gold. That's better than the lottery.

George Parry 29:04

Oh, it's it's better than the lottery because you know perfectly well that if you can get that printer ribbon for half the price everybody else is paying for it because you buy a 40-foot container of it.

Leon Goltsman 29:17

But they were getting the same product, probably.

George Parry 29:19

They were getting the same product, but I was squeezing or twisting the arm.

Leon Goltsman 29:22

So you were representing the people you I certainly was.

George Parry 29:25

Uh but I was also representing the supplier in terms of volume.

Leon Goltsman 29:29

Well, they would have loved they would have loved you because they could not get

Legacy And The Hundred Bagger

Leon Goltsman 29:32

the volume anywhere else. They couldn't get the volume anywhere else. That's what I was going to say. Now, despite everything you've accomplished, then you've done a great deal. Yeah, and you're still doing a whole lot. Yeah. What seems to excite you most today is not just making money, it's about helping other people think differently.

George Parry 29:46

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 29:47

Now, why has legacy become more important to you, especially now than success itself?

George Parry 29:52

Uh yes, well, legacy for me is important because at this stage of my life I'm coming to the end. And I want to, I guess, leave my mark on on the world, uh, to to leave the what I have learned from hard-won experience that um the most important power in the universe uh is love, is kindness and compassion. And so uh what I've tried to do is to share my experience, strength and hope, with others, that they too might be able to experience some of the things that have happened in my life. One can live a very conventional and and quiet life with nothing much happening, or you can take a risk. You can you can say, well, look, life is short. I think this is going to do really well. And rather than pursue something that has a small payoff, maybe I should pursue something that has a really big payoff. And I want to give people the confidence to do that. That it's better to chase a hundred bagger and lose than it is to chase a one-bagger and win. You you put uh $100 into a project and you make a hundred dollars, big deal. You put a hundred dollars into a project and you have a prospect of making, you know, ten thousand dollars out of that hundred. That's a hundred bagger. And they will make do make up for all of your failures. And failure is a wonderful teacher. If you're not failing, you're not trying hard enough.

Leon Goltsman 31:33

That's that's one of my favorite screens, actually. But also, a lot of people have goals and dreams, and that's fantastic. That they tend to put things off, they either procrastinate or they they spend their time planning, and by the time they get to actually doing it, they're burnt out. That's right. Most of us wake up assuming tomorrow, though, is guaranteed. People think they've got infinite time.

George Parry 31:56

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 31:56

But your health has made the limits of time much harder to ignore.

George Parry 32:00

Yes. Uh, given my impending exit from the scene, uh, I'm I'm having to be a little bit more deliberate about things and um um encourage people to take risks, but to not take ridiculous risks. Um I was very fortunate, and I talk about this in my book, to have been schooled in a very entrepreneurial, a kind of Montessori school, where we were allowed to um create businesses. And uh we well, my my business was a hundred bagger. Over two years I turned two shillings into ten pounds. And I I did that by using creativity and looking for the smart way of doing things. You know, though you often hear the expression that um persistence is the most important thing in life. No,

A Rice Project That Changed Lives

George Parry 32:53

it isn't. Absolutely isn't. Creativity is more important. If you can come up with a good idea uh that that beats everything out of the out of the the ground, then you should pursue that. And we did that in uh 2013 when Typhoon Hyen struck the Philippine farmers persistent with um, oh, we'll just keep on using our indigenous rice and keep using it. And and Manfred and I researched it and said, no, here's some rice over here that will produce three times the yield. And that was that was gold. That was that was what we tried to to get the farmers to take on. But they resisted us at every move because they were conservative and they thought they knew better, and that they were they didn't want to do anything that the Chinese had produced. And it took us five years. And what we did, we we tricked them. We we said, okay, we're going to grow our own rice. We're not going to bother about you guys. So Manfred rented a field and he grew his own rice. And it was it was a bumper yield. Uh it was 200 bags. And um I said to him, Look, when when you come to harvest it, I want you to arrive late on the scene. So he he arrived uh after most of it had been harvested. And the farmers said, Oh, Mr. Manfred, terrible crop, only 49 bags. And Manfred said, Oh, well, better luck next time. But of course, they did what we wanted them to do, which was to take ownership. We wanted them to steal it, we wanted them to think they'd gotten one over on us, and that then from that point on uh SL8 superhybrid rice became the standard rice that was used. And they didn't want to use it because they had to buy it, but they could see the value in that. And today, uh most um children are no longer working in in rice fields. The particular family of Manfred's wife, they've moved from a grass shack in Kalibo into an apartment in Manila. She has done her MBA. The boys are in high in university doing degrees, and it's all from one simple little idea to to uh take on super hybrid rice uh as the vehicle for them improving their financial situation.

Leon Goltsman 35:19

Well, from from little things, big things, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Living With Frailty Without Surrendering

George Parry 35:23

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 35:23

Most of us complain about small inconveniences, yet for you, walking outside or even bending down to tie your shoelaces can sometimes carry a bit of a risk. People don't don't realize that. There's so many capable people of doing great things, but we myself included, often we take things for granted.

George Parry 35:40

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 35:40

You know, but what do healthy people fail to appreciate until it's almost taken away?

George Parry 35:46

Um that's a good question. I haven't thought about it. I I guess my situation is my my situation in relation to uh frailty is I don't let my um my physical circumstance uh dictate my life. I I focus on what I can do rather than what I can't. And and fortunately, uh while I can get angina just from getting out of a chair, um my brain is still very functional and it is stimulated by conversation. So if I've got someone to chat with, I light up, I'm I'm on fire because you know it's going back into all my memories and and keep keeping um my brain healthy. Uh but physically no, I'm uh I can do very little. I can I I I can sit for about an hour and then I need to recline. And I I I can walk for about 50 meters. That's about my limit. But the main thing, as I say, is is to value what you can do.

Leon Goltsman 36:52

And what's within your control, of course.

George Parry 36:54

Yeah, of course it is. And it's it's it's within all our control. And I I tell the story of Mitchell, who um uh I'll quickly summarize that he had um he was um burnt up in a um uh a motorcycle accident, and uh for some years he was he was had no fingers on his hands and his face was he had no ears and he looked terrible. But he he rebuilt his life and then he had a plane accident and he um he became a a paraplegic.

Leon Goltsman 37:22

So he's a a bike accident. He had a bike accident, and then he had a plane accident.

George Parry 37:26

And then 10 years later he had a plane accident. And and you know, here he is, he's a burnt-up cripple, and he's he's sort of you know cursing God on the terrace of the Crested Butte, Colorado Hospital. Ah, before my uh uh accidents I had 10,000 things I could do. And this voice said to him, Yeah, but there's still 9,000 things you can do. He said, you know, he said, I I was complaining that the cake I'd been given has got a hole in it, but then I realized it's a donut. So he turned it to his advantage. He turned it to his advantage and became a motivational speaker, which is where I met him.

Leon Goltsman 38:04

Good on him. Yeah. I was catching a plane once. Uh, I think it was just in Sydney, Kingston Smith Airport, and I remember feeling a little bit tired, depressed, because I really didn't want to travel wherever I was going to at the time. And I had a lot of work back in the office, yeah, and I was really, yeah, didn't want to be that. And then I see uh a bunch of school kids who all had some kind of a disability, yeah, whether it was impairment with movement, physical disabilities. Yeah. And you know what? They seem to be so happy. Yeah, I thought to myself, hang on a sec, what am I complaining about? I mean, this was just uh a reflection.

George Parry 38:42

Yeah. Look, we we all suffer from brain chemistry imbalances. Sometimes we we get a bit down and we think, you know, well, I know it's not fair.

Leon Goltsman 38:51

But your book, and and I'm gonna go back to your book now, because I was very excited to read it. As I mentioned, I read it almost straight away as soon as I got it. Okay, got my new Kindle. I I've never had a Kindle in my life. Yeah. That was the that made me go and buy a Kindle. Yeah. Because I really wanted to take it with me everywhere before we speak.

Order From Chaos And Opportunity

Leon Goltsman 39:10

Okay. And your book, Order from Chaos, feels in many ways like a metaphor for your own life. I actually think it feels like a metaphor to many people's life, which is why it resonated with me so much. So, how do we find opportunity when life seems to be falling apart? And that was my question. Yeah.

George Parry 39:27

Yeah, look, I think have faith, have faith that um uh every every there there are opportunities everywhere you look. And um with the expansion of artificial intelligence and exponential technologies all coming coming together at once, it can all seem overwhelming. But if we just sit back and and watch, we will see opportunities come up, and particularly if we involve ourselves with people. We don't involving ourselves with uh property or machinery or or things. Just involve yourself with people, find find ways to interact with people, and opportunities will come up in discussions, and you'll you'll hear one person's side of something and say, Well, I think I could help there. Or I know somebody who could. So, for example, um the uh the book that was Tim Roberts, who said, Oh, I know a friend of mine called Nigel, that's what he does. And so Nigel came over and he certainly put in far more effort than I I expected. He gave very handsomely and generously of his time to get my my book onto Kindle. And um that's what life is like, building a network of friends, of people that you can rely on, people that that you know you don't mistreat, you you treat with love and respect and kindness, and and always, always don't treat, don't, don't take the shortcuts. Be, you know, be wary of of um uh saying, aha, I think I can I can ha do a swifty here. No. That that that goes against the whole karma thing. But you build your brand and and you build your reputation, you build your network of people who trust you, and all of a sudden opportunities come up.

Leon Goltsman 41:25

And they do.

George Parry 41:26

They do. Well, yours has come about because it's absolutely absolutely.

Leon Goltsman 41:30

I mean, every day I'm still pinching myself to get to do what I'm doing all the time. I get to meet the most incredible people like yourself, of course. Yeah, but also it's because he said that strange I've just friends waiting to happen. That's right. And you know what? It's absolutely true. Talk to people, yeah.

George Parry 41:48

Say hello. Have the courage, have the courage to reach out, and and sometimes it's a dud, you know. But you never know if you don't the walls come up, boom. But you know, but by being vulnerable, by for me, for example, by uh expressing my vulnerability to people, in where where it's appropriate and where um we have the the the respect, I can express my vulnerability. And that opens up the the walls, you know, as we as uh Cohen talks about, you can add up the parts, you won't have the sum. You can strike up the marks, there is no drum. For every heart to love will come, but like a refugee. So ring the bells that still can ring. Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack, there is a crack in everything, and that's how the light gets in.

Leon Goltsman 42:42

That's beautiful. Yeah. That really is. That's his anthem. You know, just thinking about what you when you were saying that is when walls do come up, yeah, and it's usually because

Vulnerability As A Doorway To Connection

Leon Goltsman 42:52

people uh don't know that there hasn't been that um that history. So the walls are coming up. That's just people doing what they do, protecting themselves.

George Parry 43:03

Yeah, well, of course, it's uh it's all relative. You you you don't just dump on people. No. You you have to allow this all to evolve if you can if there's a history of trust and sharing.

Leon Goltsman 43:16

But I think it's it's the validation. When you give people that validation, I think that's when we see the wall come down.

George Parry 43:23

Yeah, yeah. And and that's and that's and that I think that's what I try to do in my book as well, to to offer a level of honesty about my journey, uh, so that people might also have the courage uh to live an intentional life and live a life based upon the giving and receiving of kindness. Yeah. Yeah. It all starts with with hello, doesn't it? It does, yeah. And and also looking in people's eyes and smiling. That that can break through because a lot of times people will do this. They'll def they'll deflect their eyes, they won't look at you. And and they'll blink their eyes and but they they're terrified of looking at you because that's a um yeah that's the um their defense mechanism Community is getting hard to find.

Rebuilding Community In Modern Life

George Parry 44:14

When when I was a boy there were dances, there were you know community stuff. Uh people would go to the beach and uh they'd all do stuff at the beach together. Um but nowadays i everybody's an individual and uh we've lost that sense of belonging. And of course we're now we're now mindless victims of the oligarchs. And yeah. So we need to find we need to find a new way to um to create community, to create purpose. And that's what I'm trying to do with the university and and the garden, because the university has become a hard-nosed business focusing on overseas students and focusing on building um apartments. I'm thinking, hey, what's required here is a new way of looking at things. We need to we need to educate people into uh wisdom and creativity and and human uh uh interaction rather than interacting with uh software and machines. We we we need to have good skills in human management and political involvement, so on. And and I I'm optimistic that that we will get through it. You know, we got through the the fear of uh um uh nuclear annihilation, we got through the Holocaust, we've got got through the industrial revolution, um, the Luddites, you know, everything we've we've overcome as as a society. But as I express in my book, there's a um a coming together of exponential forces that that are making it just so exploding.

Leon Goltsman 45:56

And that's what's gonna, I feel, will save society, will save our race.

George Parry 46:02

Yeah, yeah. I'm I'm optimistic that we will find a way through and that it won't be based on fear.

Leon Goltsman 46:10

Yeah.

George Parry 46:11

It'll be based on love and cooperation.

Leon Goltsman 46:13

Yeah, absolutely agree with you. Now, um, throughout the conversation, we've spoken about life.

Voluntary Assisted Dying And Agency

Leon Goltsman 46:19

Eventually, every one of us also needs to speak about death, a subject many Australians still find deeply uncomfortable.

George Parry 46:26

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 46:26

Now you've publicly shared your support for voluntary assisted dying. What led you to that position and what do you hope people understand before forming their own opinions?

George Parry 46:36

Well, I uh applied for voluntary assisted dying when my cardiologist told me that my heart would fail in six to eight weeks, because I knew that if that were the case, I would end up with unbearable pain uh through angina, through blockage. I've had it before, and I I wanted to be able to have some agency in my departure. So it took a lot to get the lot of cross-checks and counter checks and different people involved. But we did eventually get the um the VAD kit and it's sitting in the cupboard. I haven't thought about it for five weeks, it's just sitting there. Uh but it gives me great comfort to know that if if if all else fails, I c I can sit in my lounge chair and take a mixture and just quietly fade away, and that'll be the end of it. Um, but what I've tried to do too is to put down my legacy, my ideas, my philosophy, and a lot of my life's stories into a book because VAD gave me the time. It gave me the confidence that that I I I wasn't going to have to worry about the end. So I I sat down for six weeks and I I wrote and I wrote and I wrote. And of course, um with with my heart, it's it runs fast, which means I'm full of endorphins, and I only sleep for two hours at a stretch. So, yeah, I was a bit obsessive about finishing my book. And um fortunately it went online just this week and and it's my legacy. I I'd I would love people to read it so that they could get a sense of of hope. That um even with all the the scary things that are happening in the world, uh, if we tap into the healing power of love and and make every interaction with people a winner, where we try to build rather than break down, we lift people up rather than push down on their shoulders to lift ourselves up.

Leon Goltsman 48:45

Yeah.

George Parry 48:46

So many people uh seek to push down on other people to elevate themselves and say, look at me. But the reality is that it doesn't fill the hole. I remember I always wanted a sports car, and I eventually bought one and I parked it in at the bottom of the the beach hotel there, and I'm looking down. I finally got my sports car, and I thought, is that all there is? Is that it? You know, I wanted I wanted a great feeling of love and happiness. No, I've just got a different car.

Leon Goltsman 49:20

Seems like all that is already within you. Yeah. Well, regardless of where people stand on the voluntary assist of dying, conversations about the end of life deserve compassion rather than judgment. What have you learned about dignity, compassion, and choice that you wish every Australian understood?

George Parry 49:37

Oh, look, it's um it's such a relief, and and I'm so grateful to the people who led who wrote the legislation and and pushed to get it through against the conservative forces of particularly the Catholic Church. Um that uh we all need to feel agency. We need to feel we're in control of our last days, and it's nobody else's business really. Why should governments or rather uh organizations, churches, um why why should anybody uh have any say in how I end my life? Uh if I'm suffering uh from extreme pain, and and of course we have all of the counterchecks have already been done, and I definitely qualify, uh no, there should be no argument as to as to this.

Leon Goltsman 50:33

Aaron Powell And you mentioned you having the control to be able to do that, but it's it's also dignity.

George Parry 50:39

Oh, certainly. Certainly. You you you don't want to go out in screaming pain with all about you tearing their hair out. You want to go out peacefully and quietly so that they can say, Oh, it was a wonderful death. It was a lovely death. And that's what's that's what it each of us deserves, I think. We deserve a good death. We're all going to die. Uh we don't need to run from it.

Dignity Choice And A Good Death

George Parry 51:06

We don't need to rush and embrace it either. But um, and indeed I'm not. I'm I'm very content to because my life is so much fun at the moment. I'm having such a ball. I really am. It's just so many people have have um expressed their kindness and love to me. I didn't know. Yeah. And and I a lot of the time too, they they tell me memories that I I'd forgotten. Uh you know, so I'm filling in a lot of my life with uh memories of others. So you know, life has been wonderful. I've had a a fantastic life. And um I I don't regret for a moment um all of the ups and downs. I mean, um going from winning the lotto every Friday to being spat out at the end of it with um uh no assets of any kind, no house, no car, no job, no income, and a hundred thousand dollars worth of credit card debt. Now, I would describe that as character building. I bounced back up, I refused to go bankrupt. I did a deal with the bank. I said, I can go bankrupt if you like, or I can pay you fifty dollars a week, and you have to stop the interest rates. And they did. They put the my hundred thousand in reduction, and over seven years I paid it off. Fantastic. Fantastic. But I tried lots of different big things, but um the the main thing that worked was Paul Lane's book.

Leon Goltsman 52:29

Yeah.

George Parry 52:29

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 52:30

Yeah. Well, I've got to say, George, it's just every time we speak, there's always examples. You're full of different examples of what works. Yeah. And I just think when we look at it, when we talk about death, most people think it's very morbid. No, not at all. I think talking about death, it's not about dying, it's about living. It's about realizing how limited our time is, how precious. Yeah. And we can never get back yesterday. That's right.

George Parry 53:00

You know, when people say to me, George, like I I I go into dialysis, how are you today, George? Mate, I'm great. I wake up alive again, you know. I haven't missed a day. Got a perfect record. Yeah. There you go. So you make fun of it, but but I uh yeah, look, life is so fantastic. It's so because you make it that way. Uh two men look through prison bars, one sees mud, the other stars. You know, it's it's all about your attitude. What's happening inside my head has nothing to do with what's happening outside my body. Yeah, yeah. Um I can I can blame everybody, and I point my finger at people, and I've got three fingers pointing back at me. What am I going to do about it? Not what are you going to do about it? What am I going to do about it? Using the that simple strategy of the surrender serenity prayer, letting go of all the things I can't change, but importantly making those little changes that are nagging at you. Absolutely.

Leon Goltsman 53:57

And and this is the thing, is if something's on my mind, I I look at it like a doctor identifying what the root cause of that problem is. In that particular case, it's something that's keeping me awake at night. Yeah. And if I can identify what it is, I can I can treat it.

George Parry 54:14

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 54:15

And most of the time, that's telling me to it's like a window into my own soul.

George Parry 54:20

Yeah.

Ready Fire Aim As Life Advice

Leon Goltsman 54:21

Yeah. So, George, imagine this conversation were your last opportunity to speak to the thousands of Australians out there.

George Parry 54:27

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 54:28

What would you want every person listening today to remember long after this podcast finishes?

George Parry 54:33

I guess my final message might be to people don't be afraid to take risks. Come up with something that you think might work, run it through your mind. Yeah. And then jump too soon. Don't wait. If you think it's going to work, give it a go. Ready, fire, aim. And then fire again. And fire and aim and fire again. Yes. You don't you don't wait until your target stops moving. That's right. You you you adjust your aim after you fire it, and then that's good practical advice. Most people don't do that. They they wait for perfection, and perfection will never come.

Leon Goltsman 55:16

Well, the perfection is the enemy of progression.

George Parry 55:18

Yeah.

Leon Goltsman 55:19

And what happens is that sometimes people are waiting so long to take their aim, by the time they fire, the target's gone.

George Parry 55:25

Yeah, that's right. Or the the the the gunpowder's got whacked.

Leon Goltsman 55:31

George, I've got to say one of the highlights for me of doing programs like this is getting to meet remarkable people. You are certainly remarkable. Well, I say um right now you're a treasure. Wonderful. And you'll continue being a treasure with your legacy that you're leaving behind. Yes. And I'm very, very grateful for the opportunity.

George Parry 55:50

Well, I'm grateful for you also because uh I'm not worried about money or anything if you know if if it takes off on Kindle, I'm not concerned about that. My main thing is to get my life celebration out there so that I can say to people, here it is. Bronny did a Facebook video, 43 minutes. There's no editing in that. Um then I've got my book out there, and then we'll have this uh podcast, and that will be a full, you know, trifecta really of well the trifecta is the the way we touch people's hearts. Yeah. Um you you might you might open um uh uh open the door uh with logic, but you open the wallet with love. Yeah, you open the heart with love.

Leon Goltsman 56:35

It reminds me also another thing if you could save one person, yeah, you save the world. Save the world.

George Parry 56:41

Yeah. I bel I believe that we can touch one heart. Yeah, we

Where To Find George And The Book

George Parry 56:45

change the world at the level of one.

Leon Goltsman 56:47

So, George, I've got my copy of that book. Yeah. I'm gonna buy a few physical copies as well and check it out to people. Oh, yeah.

George Parry 56:54

Someone give you.

Leon Goltsman 56:55

Well, I'll actually want to buy it as well, and I'd love to be able to share it and and and give it to people who could benefit from it. Yes. But also, more importantly, if people who are listening to this program would like to get a copy of that book, yeah, where do they get it from?

George Parry 57:10

Well, you uh the easiest way is to go to Amazon.com or Amazon.com.au and just type in order from chaos georgeparry.

Leon Goltsman 57:22

P-A-R-R-Y. Yeah. Fantastic. I'll also have all that information in the show notes. Yes. If people wanted to connect with you, say via social media, LinkedIn, email, what's the best way?

George Parry 57:34

Well, I'm on LinkedIn. It's uh I'm George Parry with a picture of a dog licking my chin. And there's a few George Parrys. But you can get me at George Parry48 at iClub.com.

Leon Goltsman 57:47

Again, I'll have all that information in the show notes. Thank you so much, George.

George Parry 57:51

Good on you, man. Really, really appreciate it. Yeah, let's say, but um, it it fires away and it's all good. And I this is all part of my uh life now, waiting for um the exit point.

Leon’s Closing Reflections And What’s Next

Leon Goltsman 58:06

Thank you so much, George. Now that was a conversation I genuinely valued and one that will stay with me for a very long time. I hope it does with you too. Spending time with George Parry reminded me that some of life's most important lessons are often the simplest ones, yet they're also the easiest ones to forget, especially when we become consumed by deadlines, responsibilities, and everything else that feels urgent at the time. What stayed with me most was George's willingness to look at life differently. It was his honesty, the success, the failures, the addiction, the recovery, the relationships, the risks, the regrets, and now the reality that his time may be limited. Yet his message wasn't one of fear. It was about choosing love over fear, reaching out instead of withdrawing, taking chances, helping others, and focusing less on what the world should do for us and more on the question George asks so simply, what am I going to do about it? George also reminded us that community still matters. I see that every day through organizations such as Survivors Are Us, through the work of our Chambers of Commerce and community leaders, through Fire and Rescue New South Wales and our first responders, and through people who continue to give their time and energy simply because they believe life can be better for someone else. A huge thank you to George for his openness, humour, and generosity he brought into this conversation. If George's story resonated with you, I also encourage you to read his book, Order from Chaos, where he shares much of his life, experiences, and the lessons he has gathered along the way. It's available in both Kindle and Physical Editions through Amazon, and I've included the link in the show notes. That is also at the heart of engaging conversations. This program has never been about speaking for people. It's about giving people the opportunity to use their own voice, share their experiences, and perhaps even help somebody else see the world a little differently. Whatever your own views are on some of the subjects we discussed, including voluntary assisted dying, I hope that George's story encourages you to think more deeply about life, dignity, purpose, and how we use the time we have. And there is plenty more ahead. In upcoming episodes, we'll explore Ballet Without Borders and the belief that opportunity should never be reserved only for those who can afford it. We'll also hear the story behind Beat the Burn and the firefighters supporting children and families affected by serious burn injuries. And we'll also continue taking engaging conversations into business communities, regional Australia, and some very interesting places along the way. So if you haven't already, follow the programme, share this episode with someone who might benefit from hearing George's story and stay connected. George said something near the end of the conversation that I think is a fitting way to finish. We changed the world at the level of one. One conversation, one connection, one act of kindness. I'm Leon Goltsman. Until next time, stay connected, stay curious, and never underestimate the difference you can make in somebody else's life.