Reframing Adversity + Resiliency with G. Michael Hopf (part 1)

What if your greatest setbacks could become your most powerful catalysts for growth? G. Michael Hopf, a Marine Corps combat veteran turned USA Today bestselling author, shares the remarkable mental frameworks that helped him transform painful experiences into stepping stones toward extraordinary success.

After three military deployments, careers as a commercial diver and bodyguard, and now 40+ novels to his name (with over one million copies sold worldwide), Hopf reveals how he developed the ability to reframe adversity through intentional thinking. "When I've been faced with something very painful, I allow myself to feel it for a period of time," Hopf explains. "But then I ask: What can I learn from this? What can I garner from this to add value to my life?"

Hopf's powerful insights include a pivotal story from his bodyguard days when he and colleagues were suddenly fired. While his coworkers reacted with devastation or rage, Hopf maintained perspective—a moment that sparked his curiosity about how our thinking shapes our reality. This exploration eventually led him to meditation, which he credits as transformational: "If I could give anybody advice that's actionable, it's meditate. I will put money on it that it can change your life."

The conversation weaves through Hopf's journey into writing—starting with children's books based on bedtime stories for his daughters and evolving into bestselling post-apocalyptic fiction. His advice to writers? "Write the story that you want to read. Don't try to write for other people, because you lose an authentic voice in that."

"If you can't commit to yourself, you can't commit to anybody else." 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Episode Introduction
• 3:01 Meet G. Michael Hoff
• 9:06 Learning to Reframe Adversity
• 16:14 The Power of Meditation
• 21:06 From Children's Books to Bestselling Novels
• 24:46 Episode Closing

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

All of us reach a point in time where we are depleted and need to somehow find a way to reignite the fire within. But how do we spark that flame? Welcome to Reignite Resilience, where we will venture into the heart of the human spirit. Resilience where we will venture into the heart of the human spirit. We'll discuss the art of reigniting our passion and strategies to stoke our enthusiasm. And now here are your hosts, natalie Davis and Pamela Kass.

Speaker 2: 0:41

Welcome back to another episode of Reignite Resilience. I am your co-host, Natalie Davis, and I am joined with none other than Pam Kass. Pam, how are you today?

Speaker 3: 0:51

I am fantastic. We were just talking about weekends away and the snow that we get this time of year in Colorado. That we wish would maybe not happen, but we're embracing it. It's making everything green and gorgeous down here, so listen.

Speaker 2: 1:05

I think a good rule of thumb. Anyone that doesn't live in Colorado. If you're curious, whenever you're listening to this episode, it probably has snowed at some point in time this week. So whatever month of the year, it does not matter.

Speaker 3: 1:19

And the funny thing is is Natalie and I live here, and yet we would rather be in warm climates by the beach.

Speaker 2: 1:31

I am looking for somewhere tropical, an ocean that doesn't have snow, I mean it's not a lot to ask?

Speaker 3: 1:33

No, I don't think so at all. So I'm done with the resilience of living through the cold weather.

Speaker 2: 1:37

Living through the elements, exactly. It's so funny because you are prepared for it, right? I mean, I go back and I look at pictures and there's like snow in May, there's snow in June. I've had a 4th of July where I was watching fireworks and it started to snow in July. It just happens. But when it happens, I still have like this trigger response of why is this happening? What?

Speaker 3: 1:58

is this? Yeah, yeah, I'm right with you. Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 2: 2:01

Yeah, so any time of year it's probably snowing, so don't worry, this is just what happens here in Colorado.

Speaker 4: 2:07

Yes.

Speaker 2: 2:08

Anyways, we have a lovely guest joining us today and I'm so excited to dive in. Well, I'll just turn it over to you, Pam, why don't you tell our listeners who's joining us today?

Speaker 3: 2:16

I am so excited for this one. So we have G Michael Hoff he. He is a US Today bestselling author, renowned for his post-apocalyptics and Western novels. He has penned over 40 books, including the internationally acclaimed the New World series, which has sold more than 1 million copies worldwide and been translated into multiple languages. A Marine Corps combat veteran, hoff's diverse background also includes roles as a bodyguard and commercial diver are infused into his writing. He resides in San Diego. Welcome, jeff, it is so great to have you with us today and excited to get to know your story a little bit, so I'm going to hand it over to you. Tell the listeners a little bit more about you and your story.

Speaker 4: 3:03

Well, first let me thank you, Pam, for having me, and Natalie as well. Thank you. I was listening to you guys talk about the snow. I don't have that problem here in San Diego.

Speaker 2: 3:12

One of my most favorite parts of the country, but that's okay.

Speaker 4: 3:15

It's amazing down here, but you know, I had that experience when I lived in Idaho. Like I opened the curtains this was years ago, not that long ago actually. When was it 10, 15 years ago and it was June 11th and there was like six inches of snow on the ground. I'm all, I have to go, I'm done. That was after seven years of living in Idaho. She goes I'm done. I'm like, okay, I get it, I get it Okay we're out. You can't argue. Idaho is beautiful, though, are you?

Speaker 2: 3:40

Northern Colorado, northern Colorado, on the front range, yep.

Speaker 4: 3:43

Okay, got it. Yeah, so there's snow there at all. It can snow there anytime of the year, then Anytime of the year.

Speaker 3: 3:48

And it's. We could have a day where you wake up and it's 75, and then it snows and then it's 80 in the afternoon.

Speaker 4: 4:00

It's just like it doesn't know what it wants to do.

Speaker 4: 4:02

And we just so about me, I grew up in a great family back east on a farm and it wasn't a working farm but I kind of wanted to have a lot of experiences in my life. So that's what prompted me to join the Marine Corps. I had really good grades, I was supposed to go to George Mason University and I was like I just really want to see the world and I did that. I joined infantry and I did six years and again I just wanted the experience of it all. I felt like I wanted to be part of an expeditionary force and travel the world and have these incredible experiences, which I did.

Speaker 4: 4:33

My time in the military was very eventful. I did three deployments and saw a lot of things, but overall I will say my military experience was great. Not that there weren't moments of intensity and suffering and a very uncomfortable experience sometimes, but I've just trained myself to just reframe things and look at everything as opportunities for growth. And so I just said, looked at my time in as just a really great experience, specifically for a young person to go through, and then it really framed my perspective. I got to meet a lot of incredible people and that's what's beautiful about the military. You get people from all walks of life doesn't matter black, white, doesn't matter, wherever you get put in and then you have one kind of common purpose together that transcends you as an individual, and I think that's what's really neat. We have our own unique reasons for joining, but then it gives us a common purpose to strive for and I like that.

Speaker 4: 5:23

And then so from there I got out, wanted to pursue more adventure commercial diving for a couple of years, bodyguard for over 10 years and then I decided to stop using my body and become more cerebral and decided to write. And then my writing career really has been blessed. I've been blessed with a lot of success and that's led me to just not for my own individual writing, to then going into helping other writers achieve their dreams, creating publishing companies and so forth. So today I'm sitting here 40 novels in myself as an individual and then also have penned and helped pen. I'm looking on the board over here 466 other books for other people. So I love to see people achieve their dreams. It's very important for me. I've had a lot of help along the way so I can do that I do.

Speaker 4: 6:07

That's incredible.

Speaker 3: 6:08

So you said that you learned how to kind of reframe adversity when you saw it. So how did you do that? I mean, it's just one day you're like, oh, I'm just going to.

Speaker 4: 6:17

No, it just doesn't happen and it takes the idea to come in your head Like Like you know, I can choose to well, there's been interesting experiences in my life that it wasn't until like the light bulb I went off in my head is like a man. I don't think men grow up until like late 20s, by the way.

Speaker 3: 6:31

I think that's scientifically proven. That is scientifically proven, like 26.

Speaker 4: 6:35

Not that we're counting, I was 28. I remember like I'm sitting in a bar in Kansas City. I feel like someone walked, like creeped in and like turned the light on. I was like, oh my God, I can. That's what that looks like. I just was like able to like see things from a different perspective. I don't know if the frontal cortex finally got formed, but I've been able to like kind of understand and see things a certain way. But then I wouldn't just like work on it.

Speaker 4: 6:58

I think working on the mind is like it's like anything else have to have practice at. It's like working on the body and you have to exercise it, just like you exercise your spirit. If you're say, you're spiritual or you're religious, you work on the spirit by going to church and prayer and things like that, and then the body, going to the gym, exercising, moving the body. And then there comes like working on the mind, and I do a lot of that through meditation. But it's also very conscious awareness and intentional thinking, not just allowing my emotional state to kind of drive me in a direction, but just like okay, is that really what I want to do? And so, because a traumatic event can really I mean, clearly causes emotional trauma and then you get to do with it what you want. And so I was like okay, so I have goals in my life, and so whenever I've experienced something that's very painful, I just have chosen.

Speaker 4: 7:42

Again, it didn't happen overnight, it's just. It's through conscious and intentional thinking and practicing it, so that I have a mindset that when something happens, I pause and then acknowledge my ownership of why I might be there or why I might be experiencing it, and then I've changed my thought that this is now an opportunity, an opportunity has been presented to me and I get to do with that. You know, it's kind of like a door closes and people a lot of time look at the closed door but don't realize that when that door closes, multiple doors around them have opened, and if you only focus on the closed door you can't see anything else. And so when I've been faced with something is very painful, I kind of allow myself to feel it for a period of time, like, just like, feel that emotional state. But then I know that I need, I have other responsibilities in life, I can't live in that emotional state and that I have to achieve.

Speaker 4: 8:33

I have responsibilities to other people I need. You know I've got a family, I've got two beautiful girls, a wonderful wife and that I need to like. Okay, I need to snap out of that and so that I then reframe it. Okay, what can I learn from this? What can I garner from this to add value to my life? And I know that's a long way of saying it, but it just takes practice to start looking at the world that way.

Speaker 3: 8:52

I reframe things.

Speaker 4: 8:53

I might overuse that word a lot in our conversation, but I do. If I don't like it, I try to reframe it in a certain way.

Speaker 3: 9:05

It's like. What can I glean from this that I could add to value to my life? Did any of your training in the Marines and as a bodyguard?

Speaker 4: 9:08

and even as a commercial diver, play a role in that. No, it was later on in life that I started really exploring the mind, how it works. There was a couple of experiences I had that I've always found fascinating. There was I remember one time when I was a bodyguard, I worked for this family. It was one of the jobs I had. It was in very comprehensive detail. We had 37 agents working to protect one family down in South Florida and one day a bunch of us got fired.

Speaker 4: 9:31

And I remember that this has been a very poignant moment in my life because it was like one singular event. A bunch of us got fired all at one time and it was instantly. It wasn't like you got two weeks, you got a month, you're severed, it's gone, don't come back. And it was just a family that decided whatever they wanted they go in a different direction with their protection detail. But I was living with a couple of guys that were all on the detail and his name is Scott came out and he was crying, like, like crying, and we're like what is going on? He's like we've been fired. And then Kevin had the other guy was Kevin was there, had this very angry response and like threw a beer bottle, was acting all hyper about it and I was laughing and I remember like thinking like wow, there's one event, three different, like emotional responses to that. I was like what causes that? Like you can peel back the onions, like explore. It's like why did Scott act like that? He was like really, really shaken and upset. Scott was I mean, kevin was acting angry about it and I was like okay, because neither one of those experiences were helping these guys Like Kevin went off the deep end and started drinking a lot. And then Scott was just like I'm a victim of this and I just sat back and like everything will be okay, it'll be fine and everything ended up being fine. So I was like okay.

Speaker 4: 10:37

So how did my thinking? Did my thinking shape my reality? Did it allow me to see things? That wasn't clouded by enraged emotion or sadness? It was able to see the world for what it is. So those are some things that later on I started really taking a deep thought on and observation, and it was. I think I was in my late 30s. I really started exploring teachers like Tony Robbins and people adjacent to him and certainly started to understand the mind and how it works. I know it's very powerful. That's really got me down into understanding, reframing my experiences. And that's really got me down into understanding, reframing my experiences and really also reframing my past. Instead of looking at my time in the Marine Corps and complaining about things I experienced, I've now just reframed it as those were learning opportunities and everything like that. I've just adopted that thought pattern.

Speaker 2: 11:22

Well, jeff, I'd love to go into that space. First, thank you for your service and it sounds like before enrolling that you were a pretty good student. You were heading off to college. But the one thing that you mentioned is that you had this desire to see the world and travel and explore, and I mean there's a variety of avenues that you could take to get there and you've been able to successfully do so. But, looking at that experience, what are a couple of things that you feel have truly poured into you or molded you to get to this place, where you had, you know, this kind of this light bulb moment at 30 plus right? So now you're in your 30s and the light bulb has gone off and you realize that you have an opportunity to choose every time. Are there things that you see along the way that have led you to this point, or are there just specific things that have really molded you into the human that you are today?

Speaker 4: 13:04

It's the painful moments, you know, right, I know Tony Robbins talks about that Like that's a real motivator to get us to change and shift who we are. I mean, we can kind of suffer or kind of tolerate things when things are okay around us, right. It's when we're hit rock bottom, so to speak, when the pain is so much that it moves you to action bottom, so to speak, when the pain is so much that it moves you to action. It's a motivator, it is pain, and so there's been moments in my life.

Speaker 4: 13:29

I think we all suffer. It's not something that we all do. We are going to have those moments and there are going to be other moments down the road, and it's in my moments of loss and suffering. One of the minutes of it. It's horrible, we all know that, and so it's like, okay, how do I make it less so if I can? And then again, how do I learn from this? How can I come from this better than where I started? How can I allow this thing to enter my life and not have it cause me to go off the rails in my life?

Speaker 4: 13:53

Because sometimes people do. They kind of go what I call. They go into the wilderness, so to speak, and some of the people don't come out of the wilderness, they get stuck there because I still have things I want to do. Again, I have talked about responsibilities, and so it's those painful moments that I've examined. It's like okay, how do I make those less painful? Because it's hard to be productive. I think when you're suffering, don't do things, and so I've used it to say, okay, so I've got things to do. And it clouds us how we think no-transcript things less.

Speaker 3: 14:53

Have you come up with any tools that make it less like make in those moments?

Speaker 4: 14:58

Meditation for me has been I swear by meditation, I swear by just finding time daily. It's daily, it's like exercise, it's like breathing for me that I exercise my mind, I exercise my spirit. That way as well, I just disconnect from this world and just am with myself and connecting people called God, whatever you know. I don't want to go down that road because that's not even really important. I don't think it's about just getting out from all the noise and then quieting the mind, because that's what meditation teaches is how to quiet the mind and just be present in that space. It's a very precious space, the space of now. Very precious Because you close your eyes and everyone says I can't meditate.

Speaker 4: 15:39

It's hard, it is hard, but with practice, like anything like exercise, you just get better. So if you do it daily, you get better and you get better and you get better and then you can quiet your mind. And it's in that quiet mind and I think, like inspiration comes, the answers to things can come to you that you've been searching for, and those are the things that, if I could give anybody advice that's actionable, it's meditate, meditate, just, and even that could just be. It can be guided meditations. There's lots of people out there that you can find stuff on YouTube and whatnot, but even just like, go find a quiet, dark place, sit there, sit, but you'd be laid on your five-ball, sleep and just close your eyes and just try to focus on breath. The concept of focus on breath is that way, then, is your thoughts, are kind of you're going to be bombarded by thoughts.

Speaker 2: 16:25

Your brain wants to focus on something and if it's not your to-do list, or what you could have said or done differently, or what you need to wear the next day, whatever what you're- going to eat.

Speaker 3: 16:34

All the stories, all the stories.

Speaker 2: 16:36

Yes, yes.

Speaker 4: 16:37

Always. So this takes practice and I would say commit to yourself that. So this takes practice and I would say commit to yourself that Commit to yourself. If you can't commit to yourself, you can't commit to anybody else. That's true. That's my thought. If you don't love yourself and you can't commit to yourself, it's going to be very hard for you to honestly do that for anybody else. And so it's commit. I always say commit to yourself that Give yourself 30 days. I think anyone can do anything for 30 days and just meditate, and I will put money on it that it can change your life. It really can, yeah.

Speaker 3: 17:05

When you first started meditating did you find it hard to kind of quiet your mind? Were there things that you tricks that you found that, okay, if I could do this, it worked really well. Like you said, go to a dark room, sit any other tools or tricks to kind of quiet that brain?

Speaker 4: 17:19

It's a focus on something. And again, that's what people say the focus on breath. That's why a lot of people that teach meditation say that and just constantly understand you have to capture your thoughts and get rid of them and go back to breath. And it's this cat and mouse game. You're going to be playing for a while and just know that. That's what it is. And most people are like, oh, I didn't accomplish anything from that, or actually you did, because you were constantly going back to breath, going back to breath, thinking about breath. Stop that, go back and it's just.

Speaker 4: 17:43

It's about the committal, it's about the discipline of sitting down and doing it on a consistent basis. It's like going to the first time you go to the gym. You're not going to see any results. You're not going to go there if you're trying to bodybuild. It's not that first day, it's like day 30, maybe it's day 45 or 60. Look at any professional athletes out there. They're not great initially. It's that training and time and consistency, it's that compounding labor that gives them that ability that they had. They hone that ability even better than they are.

Speaker 4: 18:12

And so, again, it's not going to happen on the first day or second day or third day. It might happen after 30 days. You really start, actually a couple of weeks. You might start seeing some benefits from it. Then you keep leaning into it more. Maybe you start listening to someone who can guide you. That can help. There are different kinds of meditations you can do, but you'll start to be able to modulate your emotional state as well, because you can control your thoughts and you can put yourself back into whatever state you want to be in because you're controlling how you think and then that brain, heart coherence and you can control your emotional state so you don't overreact to something nice I think that's great.

Speaker 2: 18:45

I've mentored folks that have had a hard time embracing the practice of meditation and my advice to them has been give it time and starting with something that's guided right. Then you're not focusing on your thoughts, but instead you're focusing on the words for the guidance that you're receiving, and then you can scale that back and maybe you just have, you know, a soft sound that's in the background, and then you can find your place and find that, settle into that, the stillness and the quiet you know, and truly just being with your thoughts, or lack thereof, like dismissing the intrusive ones and being still and in that moment, like the power of now that you talk about.

Speaker 2: 19:18

But, jeff, I think the most powerful thing that you said that we can just remind our listeners, like if you can't commit to yourself, like what can you expect yourself to get? Like you can't commit to others, right, if you can't make that hard commitment to yourself, you can't really commit to the other people around you or in your life.

Speaker 4: 19:33

That's universal truth. There are certain things that are universal truths. That's a truth. It's like you're lying to yourself. You make a promise to yourself to do something and you break that. The reason I think people have such guilt about things or they might feel shame on themselves, is because they've done that enough. They don't like themselves, like I'm a liar, like I lie to myself, I'm not willing to do this, I can't commit to it, and somewhere in there they've abused themselves enough, and yeah. So it's like the love thing too. It's like it's impossible to love another thing or another person if you do not love yourself. Yeah, powerful, absolutely.

Speaker 3: 20:07

I love that. Well, would you kind of share with us your journey into starting to write and what that looked like? What was the inspiration? And yeah, I mean 40 books.

Speaker 4: 20:16

Yes, Like and going from I'm prolific.

Speaker 3: 20:18

I mean all the things you did marines and diving, bodyguarding, and now author, bestselling author.

Speaker 4: 20:23

Yeah, I'm prolific, that's for sure. I've always been a big reader and I always was growing up just love to read, consume books, consume books. And it was the time after. So the journey of novel writing actually started. The very first book I ever did was a children's illustrated book, okay, and that I wrote under Jeffrey Hopp. That's why I have the G Michael. So if anyone's ever like, why are you a javelin player? I wrote a.

Speaker 4: 20:47

My very first book was a children's illustrated book about a dog called Doggyville and it was based on a story I would tell my girls at night. So I was like part of my job was like, as a parent is, I'd love to go in, I love to read the girls books. I just loved it and I go and I read it. So I read to them and and then there wasn't enough books and then I tell stories. So this was a story I'd made up and I was just tell them about this dog named Kiki and his travels. And then one night I came, I say I asked my wife. I was like what do you think if I turn that into like a children's book? I can't be that hard. I mean, ideas always seem easier than you know you practically putting them in executing stuff, and so she's like, sure, have at it. And then you know the manuscript wasn't very long, six, eight hundred words, not very long, uh, but then just the illustrations and I found somebody, so that's what started that whole thing. But that went. That connects to the, the novels, because that started as an idea and then again, through you know, consistent discipline, that ended up manifesting in my life. Here's a book idea, something real, you know, and I was like, okay, I did that, that's really cool. And I, how about if I did a novel? And then I set about to writing it? I made it. I was inspired by Stephanie Meyer. She's the author of the Twilight series, so the like, the genre wasn't. And what's funny is I never read those books. I've seen the movies. But I loved her journey.

Speaker 4: 22:01

Her origin story of how she wrote the novels and created the characters started as a lucid dream and super busy mom, her whole life, lots of things going on that she set about to doing it at night and she was again very disciplined and followed just married discipline and consistency, and every night she sat down to do it and I was like, you know, stephanie can do this, I can do this too. I like to look at people that had success. I don't want to model them like they can do that. I can do that too. I'm just going to model what they did. And so that's what I sat down at night, because that's what my wife is like, uh, like, just just don't quit your day job, you know, like, like you have. You know, he had dreams of becoming a bestselling author or whatever. I'm like no, no, I'll just do it at night, I promise.

Speaker 4: 22:42

But I dedicated myself to making it like a part-time job, like I was going to every night. I mean, the girls are in bed, everyone's chilling, I'm going to go downstairs, I'm going to write, I'm going to get myself to write so many words at the first novel done, and that's kind of was the genesis of that. I wanted to have been a big reader and then I found myself in a position that the reason I wrote the novel to answer the question was I wasn't finding a certain book in the genre I was reading. I was reading apocalyptic fiction. There was something missing and I was like, well, if I can't find it, maybe I'll write it.

Speaker 4: 23:15

And, by the way, that's the lesson I now teach writers the first person you write for is yourself. Write the story that you want to read. It's very important to do that. Don't try to write for other people, because you lose an authentic voice in that. It's write the book you want to read. And that's what gave birth to the end and it was a really cool journey with that. Had an agent fired, the agent self-published. It did really well. Quit my job, I mean it's. All this stuff happened in a very, very quick amount of time. They got a huge deal with penguin and never looked back thank you for joining us today on the reignite resilience podcast.

Speaker 1: 23:53

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