Between Two Beers Podcast

What if the thing holding back your business - and your life - isn’t a strategy problem, but a story you’ve been telling yourself?

This week, business coach Di Foster sits down with Steve to pull apart the quiet narratives running his days: the belief that being constantly connected matters more than being present with his kids, the “survival mode” that kept him buried in the business, and the story about his own body that nearly had him on the sidelines.
It’s an honest, practical conversation about time, presence, persistence, and what actually changes when you rewrite the script.

In this episode:
Why Steve rebuilt his mornings around the hours that matter most
The real reason he can’t put his phone down at home - and the simple rule to fix it
Moving from survival mode to growth mode, and the one hire that changed everything
How a shift in mindset - not circumstances - changed the story he’d been telling himself about his body
Why “persistence” might be both his greatest strength and his biggest blind spot
Reflections: the new venture capturing the stories of families and the businesses they’ve built

This episode is proudly sponsored by Xero - one platform for accounting, payroll, payments and reporting, so your business stays in control as it grows. Start your free trial by searching Xero today. Terms apply.
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Content warning: This episode contains frank discussion of addiction, depression, suicide and self-harm, and may not be suitable for all listeners. Please take care while listening. Support details are at the end of this description.

Mike King is one of the most recognisable figures in New Zealand. Comedian, broadcaster, mental health campaigner, former New Zealander of the Year: he's been all of them, and he's spent the last few years at the centre of a national conversation about how we look after our young people.

But the man behind the headlines is rarely the one the public gets to see. In this wide-ranging kōrero, King sits down for the longest and most personal conversation he's given in years.

He traces the whole arc: a childhood spent certain he'd never be good enough, the delayed path through kitchens and the Merchant Navy, the comedy career that made him a household name, and the rock bottom that nearly ended everything.

He talks with unusual honesty about getting clean, the moment that made him walk away from comedy for good, and how a late-night radio slot became the beginning of I Am Hope and Gumboot Friday. Along the way he reflects on the criticism that follows him, the toll of the work, and why he recently stepped back from the charity he built.

Between Two Beers is proudly brought to you by One New Zealand. We believe that One NZ connects New Zealand, while Between Two Beers connects New Zealanders. And together, we are NZ's most trusted connection platform.

Steve and Seamus are proud to be dressed by Barkers Clothing.

If anything in this episode brings things up for you, support is available.

Need to talk? Free call or text 1737 any time, 24 hours a day, to speak with a trained counsellor.
Free counselling for young people is available through Gumboot Friday — http://iamhope.org.nz
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Content note: this contains a tribute to our friend and former guest Becki Ross and touches on assisted dying - please listen with care.

In this one: we open by accidentally reading each other's minds (one name, one count of three - you'll hear it). Steve buys a TV with five kids in tow and zero research, we settle who actually owes who a dump-run favour, and we take the Almighty crew on a thirsty tour of Hamilton - the Gardens' new medieval garden, Soul Bowl's new digs, and a Duck Island ice cream we had to eat on camera.

Since we last had her on the show, our friend Becki Ross has passed away, choosing assisted dying on her own terms. We sat down to reflect on her, to read her final message, and to hold onto what she gave all of us - "live your life to the fullest, find those silver linings and love your people hard." Thank you, Becki.

We get into why we've stayed apolitical for nearly seven years and won't put a sitting politician in the chair, run this week's between two bets, and look ahead to a huge run: Nathan Fa’avae and the Gilbert Enoka re-release out now.
We end the episode as we reconnect with One NZ Warriors CEO Cam George the morning after the grand final - a season one win short of the big dance, what the day after a loss like that actually looks like, and leading a club that's become the biggest story in the game.
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He's one of New Zealand's greatest ever athletes - 7x Adventure Racing World Championships, a decade unbeaten on the biggest races on the planet, and a record-breaking 1,000-mile paddle down the Yukon. And he's done all of it with a heart condition.

But this conversation goes way past the trophy cabinet. Nathan Fa'avae takes us from a lonely Pasifika kid in 1970s Nelson to the start line of the world's toughest races - and into the moments that actually shaped him: losing his mind after 72 hours without sleep, his outrigger breaking apart 25km out to sea in the dark while leading the World's Toughest Race, and the day his whole world changed on a chairlift when he lost his mum.

Along the way: why he built the biggest adventure race on earth for women, the puddle that sums up how he parents, why he raises his kids to struggle on purpose, and why, for him, success isn't winning - it's freedom.

Between Two Beers is proudly brought to you by One New Zealand. We believe that One NZ connects New Zealand, while Between Two Beers connects New Zealanders. And together, we are NZ's most trusted connection platform.

Steve and Seamus are proud to be dressed by Barkers Clothing.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Di sits down one on one with Seamus for an honest session about the thing he finds hardest: using his voice.

They get into why he defaults to making everyone else okay at his own expense, where that started (being the youngest, and a childhood of "seen and not heard"), and the real cost of staying quiet when speaking up would save time, money and energy.

Then there's the idea Di keeps coming back to: the joy of missing out. Not FOMO, JOMO. Why saying hell yes to what matters means getting comfortable saying "not yet" to everything else, and how Seamus used it to make a call the old version of him never would have.

They finish on a listener question every operator will recognise: how do you know when to leave a full-time salary behind and go all in on your own business? Di walks through exactly how she'd do it, step by step.

This episode is brought to you by Odoo.

New episodes of Accidental Business Owners with Di Foster, out now. Follow wherever you get your podcasts.
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