Sharpen Your Moral Compass: A Conversation with Dane White, City Mayor

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Imagine doing something that brings you a great sense of pride, a skill or an achievement that brings you a sense of belonging and joy. What qualities do you possess that make you so sharp in that area? Is it people skills, like a sense of humor, maybe a sense of empathy or listening abilities? Maybe it's exceptional cognitive skills like creativity, problem solving, or critical thinking. Maybe it's physical skills like strength, speed, dexterity, or agility. The list of possible personal skills is never-ending, and we all have a unique combination of them, which makes us shine in different ways, and during different times and in different circumstances. Some of these skills are natural talents, while others take more time to develop. Like the bladesmith to metal, we hammer, file, heat, and polish our interests and talents until they become so refined we become a work of art. Our guest for today's episode makes reference to his interest in knife making, and I just couldn't help but recognize a correlation between knives and our element. There are essentially two ways to make a knife, stamping and forging. Stamping is when you cut the blade from a large sheet of metal with a die, similar to a cookie cutter. And forging is when you take a single bar of metal and use heat and a hammer and other tools to give it its shape. While stamped knives tend to be less expensive because they need to be sharpened more often and they don't last as long, a high quality stamped knife can be stronger than a low quality forged knife. It makes me think of those who came from humble beginnings and went on to do great things. Historical influencers like Benjamin Franklin and Marie Curie, to those of modern day like Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey. And it also makes me think of the current mayor of Escondido. Dane White has a fabulous story of coming from humble beginnings to go on to do great things. Let's see what he has to say. Where my interest came in talking to you was listening to another interview in a podcast that you were on, and your story really hit me. And I think it's such an excellent um example of how finding your element can sometimes be messy and take a long time. So I was hoping maybe you could just share your background with us a little bit, but um I'm wondering if maybe starting with the end in mind would be a better idea. And if you could just tell us a little bit about what you do now as the mayor of Escondito.

SPEAKER_00 3:23

Sure. So I'm uh I'm a lifelong resident of this city for the most part. Uh my family came here a little over a hundred years ago. So we've been around for a while. Um, grew up here, went to private school here, went to Escondido High School. And then uh shortly after my sophomore year started, I was sent to a boarding school in Stockton, Missouri. And it was an independent fundamentalist Baptist boarding school. And it was absolute misery for a year and a half. Um after about 19 months there, I got tired of being there. So on my first visit back home, yeah, after a year and a half, you're allowed to go home for a week. And so I decided I just wasn't going to go back to school and ended up running away. Um, long story short, made it to the state of Utah, hid out in my grandpa's basement for a couple of months, and then decided it's probably pretty wise to at least finish high school. Uh, it was going into my senior year. So my parents allowed my grandfather to take custody of me, finished high school. Before I even got to the finish line there, my grandfather kicked me out, uh, got involved again with drugs and alcohol, which is kind of the reason they sent me away in the first place. And then um right after high school, I got into some trouble, ended up in juvenile hall, stayed there for a couple of months. And it's it's funny. Grandpa kicked me out. I was renting a house from my boss, literally on the job side. It was in a machine shop on his property. And my job and my house were both waiting for me when I got out. But the judge was like, You're 17, we can't just release you, you're still a minor. So they called my mom, my dad, my grandfather, and nobody would come pick me up. So they had to place me in a foster home. And so I spent the next year in a foster home in Cedar City, Utah, which was I had heard horror, horror stories about foster care, but I ended up in a really good home. Um, my very first night there, I got up in the middle of the night, I think one or two in the morning to get a drink of water and did not know the house was actually it was pretty secure. They had sensors everywhere, and and I'm standing in the kitchen getting a glass of water in my pajamas, and my foster dad runs upstairs and says, you know, we've kind of got the place wired. So you trip something that woke us up. But now that I know you're just getting water, we'll just shut all that off. And from there, it was like this relationship of trust and uh responsibility. And I got a job and a car, and eventually just I actually tried to join the army to get out of foster care, but the army wouldn't take me because the the charges that I had went to juvenile hall for still weren't settled completely. So I just exited the foster care system and immediately fell back into drugs and alcohol, um, in and out of trouble for the next several years until I I think I was 21 when I finally had lost everything again and didn't have any place to go. And my mom was like, you know, you can live in my garage until you figure it out, and had an experience a couple of months into that where I I overdosed at a New Year's Eve party and just decided that I've from here I'm gonna get my life together. So checked into a rehab here in Escondido, which unfortunately doesn't exist anymore. The building is now 7-Eleven. Um, but from there, I ended up meeting my my in-laws, who I know you know, um, you know, halfway through rehab, trying to figure out my life. I have a job, don't really have any friends. Ended up meeting Mike and Pam through uh their daughter at church, and they immediately took me in like I was one of their own and really played a significant role in helping me become who I am today. And from there, I ended up getting baptized into the Mormon church and served a mission. Before I served my mission, I ended up meeting their younger daughter, who is now my wife, and uh came home. We got married, started having kids, ran for the school board, and uh eventually ran for mayor. And you know, one of the things that I want to say with all that about finding your element, growing up, I was hammered with you need to finish high school, you need to get a college degree, travel the world, then get married, then have kids. And I knew, I knew in eighth grade I was never gonna go to college. At the same time, I knew I was gonna work with my hands, and I knew there was just something more out there for me. And uh, it's funny, even years into my marriage, that hammering of you got to go to college to be successful, you gotta go to college to be successful. That I think hurt me in some ways because I ended up applying into BYU Idaho, and I got in, spent all this money to go for two weeks, and I told my wife, this is stupid. I would rather learn how to run a business by starting a business than by participating in a classroom that I can't even pay attention in for more than 30 minutes, anyways. So that was never in the cards for me. And uh, I eventually did start my own business in flooring, was semi-successful, but then uh when the campaign rolled around, realized you got to make a decision one way or the other. You gotta run a business or run for mayor. You can't do both, and I think I chose the right path.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Would you say that serving as mayor scratches that itch to run a business?

SPEAKER_00 8:44

Absolutely. Um, you know, my campaign manager actually ran my campaign for free. So in exchange, he bought a house and I did his floor. And the first hour into it, I remember thinking, this is miserable and I never want to do this again. So this definitely scratches that itch, and I think I'm right where I'm supposed to be. Great. And so what is it about your job that you like? What how is it tapping into your element? I think that there's two parts to that answer. Number one, running a business was difficult. You I'm up and gone before anybody else in the house wakes up. I'm home about dinner time, and then I'm exhausted, I don't want to do anything. And when Saturday rolls around, it's supposed to be a fun family day, but instead I'm resting because I got to get ready for work Monday. Whereas now my wife works at the high school across the street from City Hall. After this, I'm gonna go pick up my daughter. We're gonna have a picnic in Grape Day Park, and then I'm gonna go pick up my other daughter for school. I'm I'm an integral part of their lives now. You know, I drop the kids off at school, I pick them up, we have free time after work, so I have this flexibility I never had before to focus on my family, focus on me. But the second part is, you know, I've got a lot of life experience for a 34-year-old, and I think one of my strengths is I think differently than everybody else. And like homelessness, for example, I personally relate to that issue in in several aspects. And at the same time, I recognize, I think that the approach that everybody else is taking isn't working, and so I can offer a unique perspective and a different approach that works. So there's a lot of good things about this job.

SPEAKER_01 10:27

So it sounds like the tipping point for you was finding the church, or was it finding Pam and Mike?

SPEAKER_00 10:34

I think those go hand in hand. What happened was three months in rehab, I've got no friends. I've got basically my my life was work, rehab, work, rehab, work, rehab all day, every day. No friends, no social life. And at the same time, I did everything that they asked me to do, and I was more miserable then than I was living on the streets by tenfold. Um, because now you're sober and miserable, and you have to deal with your emotions. You can't go off and and get high to fix everything. So then when I found the church, I think the church offered me structure and it offered me purpose. Um, before, you know, you wonder who am I? Why am I even here? What am I doing here? And kind of going back to I knew I knew I was meant for more. There's absolutely nothing wrong with earning a living and providing for your family. There's nothing shameful about that. But when you're doing it and you know there's something more out there for me, and I just can't figure out what it is. Mike specifically is the one who pointed me in that direction. He was the one that encouraged me to run for school board, which ultimately led here.

SPEAKER_01 11:45

Right. So you're you uh you mentioned purpose, and I just love that because that's one of the things we're all about is an opportunity to achieve mastery through autonomy and a sense of purpose. And looking back, you know, if you knew then what you know now, like what could you tell your teenage self that might have shortened that learning curve for you?

SPEAKER_00 12:14

So you didn't have to keep you know that whole pendulum of clean and not clean and somebody asked me that same question last week, and I had to think about it for a minute. And the only thing really, if I could go back and tell myself one thing, it would be to stop caring about what everybody else thinks. Because, like I said, in eighth grade, I knew I just knew college wasn't in the cards for me. I knew I was gonna work with my hands, but I was being told you have to go to college to be successful. And those jobs where you work with your hands, those are dirty and disgusting, and you don't make any money. And nothing could have been further from the truth. And then at the same time, I think I wanted so badly to be liked and to be loved and to be respected that I was willing to do anything and like sacrifice my morals and my standards and sacrifice family family relationships for people who really now don't mean anything to me and have done nothing for me.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

So if I'm a young adult or a teenager and I am not fortunate enough to have a mic in my life to say, give this a try, are there some ways that you think it's like maybe some self-reflection kinds of questions that can guide you in that same direction as far as understanding what you like and what you don't like?

SPEAKER_00 13:41

That's a solid question. Um, you know what? I I am of the belief that everybody has a voice inside of them telling them what is good and what is bad. And I think we all have that moral compass somewhere deep down inside. And if you can find that moral compass and go where it says to go, everything is gonna turn out all right. It's not always gonna be pretty and it's not always gonna be easy, and sometimes it's gonna be lonely and miserable. But at the end of that road, there's something far greater than the other side.

SPEAKER_01 14:18

And have you thought anywhere, any more about where you will go from here?

SPEAKER_00 14:26

A couple of weeks ago, I got a phone call from a prominent politician in San Diego County that said, you really ought to think about running for state senate. The state senator, it turns out, and you know, you you run the largest city in the district, you'd have the best shot at winning. And that was so exciting to me because my run for mayor was quite different. Everybody kept telling me, you need to drop out, you can't win, you can't do this, you can't do that. Now I've got somebody very respectable drafting me to go even higher. And after that excitement wore off and I gave it some thought, I realized my time here is not done. I would love to seek another opportunity for four more years. But after that, I have no idea. I would have never guessed I would be here to begin with. But the the pattern of my life seems to be work hard, opportunities present themselves, and I can take them or I cannot take them and see where it goes from there. So if I'm fortunate enough to get another four years after this, which is still seven more years from now, I think I will set myself up for an even greater opportunity then.

SPEAKER_01 15:40

How did you find the work that you enjoy working hard at?

SPEAKER_00 15:48

You know, for so long, that's it. I don't know how to answer that because I I loved working with my hands. And, you know, like I said, I just knew that's where I was going to end up. I loved building and I loved creating. Uh, I was always told that I have a very good eye for detail and people were always satisfied with my work, but then I had employer after employer after employer that just kind of crushed my soul and it didn't become enjoyable anymore. And then this opportunity presented itself. And that's why I say work hard. I think the one thing that carried me through all of the downs was the fact that I could always find a job, always been a hard worker. If you hire me, I'll give it my all. I may not know how to do it now, but I'll figure it out and I'll be the best. And with that attitude, I was able to get through anything, including the misery of working for people who really didn't respect me. And that led me to this job where I love every part of this job. There's yet to be a day where I woke up and said, I really don't want to do this today.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

Well, you really are in your element.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

Very much so.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Um, so I I think the key word there is really just mindset. I mean, even when you were doing the work that you did not enjoy, you still gave it your all. Even when you were working with people that you did not enjoy working with, you still gave it your all. You weren't happy about it, but you trudged through it. And would it be right to say that it was all of that hard work in those situations that you didn't like that created the Dane that could now handle the office of mayor of one of the largest cities in San Diego County?

SPEAKER_00 17:37

I think that's exactly right. Um, you know, one of the things that I'm interested in watching, and someday I'm gonna get into is knife making. And you watch these guys hold steel over and over and over again, and it gets put in the fire and hammered and put in the fire and hammered over and over again until this nearly unbreakable piece of steel becomes this beautiful knife. Um, and the same goes for us personally. Things get hard, things get real hard. During the campaign, there were times where I uh locked myself in the bedroom and told my wife, I'm not coming out and don't bother me, don't talk to me. And that lasted two, three, four days sometimes. And I think that prepared me for the stress. I think the supposed to be stress of this job, but it's just it's almost non-existent now, you know, if that makes any sense.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

It's just a regular day in the life.

SPEAKER_00 18:34

Yeah. Which going back to something else, you know, you asked what's next after this. I don't know, but if the pattern of my life continues, I think there's some hard times coming which are going to prepare me for the next thing.

SPEAKER_01 18:46

Right? Yes, very well said. And now you know you can get through them.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Well, we all know that considering different people's perspectives is good for keeping an open mind. But as Dane points out, at the end of the day, it is our own voice or moral compass that matters most. What gives us a sense of belonging and significance is different for each of us. Dane knew college was not the answer for him. For decades, he thought working with his hands would be the key to his happiness. And while he continues to enjoy working with his hands, what he discovered to be the master key, that key that opens everything, is his attitude and his work ethic. Those are the qualities that bring him a sense of pride and sharpen his element. Get it? Sharpen knives. Anyways, so here's this episode's reflect and connect exercise. What is something you've thought you would like to be or be better at? Now take that thing and identify the frustrations and challenges associated with it. In what ways can you use your skills and your qualities to manage or overcome those frustrations or challenges? What purpose would that thing or being serve in your life or the life of others? Who can help you, either through motivation or mentoring, to get to where you want to go? These guiding questions are laid out in a document for reflection in our show notes if you're interested in using them for yourself or others. As you work through your way through the process, you'll recognize it is through patience, perseverance, purpose, and people that we find our element.