The New Dreaming Podcast

Building Dreams and Brewing Success

• David Cook

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Walking into Good Good coffee shop in Brisbane's West End feels like being welcomed into a community where everyone knows your name and how you take your coffee. Owner Josh Power has created more than just a café—he's built a space where genuine connection happens over exceptional coffee.

https://bit.ly/Joshuas_Website

Josh's journey to business ownership is as rich as the coffee he serves. Growing up in Bowen, North Queensland as an Aboriginal and South Sea Islander man, he describes himself as "a dreamer" who would imagine creative futures while his father cast fishing nets along the shoreline at dusk. After moving to Brisbane to study remedial therapy, Josh worked in Indigenous health before spotting an opportunity to start a coffee window alongside his sister's medical clinic.

What began as "Little Peaches," a tiny coffee operation, quickly grew into Good Good—a thriving café that's now expanding to include deli-style sandwiches and eventually a wine bar. But what truly sets Josh's business apart isn't just the quality products—it's the intentional culture he's created. Drawing from his experience in health and HR, Josh has challenged the notoriously toxic hospitality industry by implementing professional workplace practices and creating a safe environment where staff feel valued and supported.

"We love our staff and it shows," Josh explains, describing how this translates directly to the warm, personalized customer service that's become their hallmark. This commitment to people—both employees and customers—has built a loyal community following and positioned Good Good for continued growth.

Beyond his business success, Josh maintains his creative spirit, planning to use the financial stability from his café ventures to return to his passion for music production. His story embodies a powerful message for other Indigenous entrepreneurs: trust your instincts, take risks, and create paths that honor both practical needs and creative dreams.

Ready for coffee that comes with community? Visit Good Good at Shop 2, 24 Beasley Street in West End, and experience what happens when business meets heart.

David:

Josh, welcome to the podcast. Thank you for having me, Brother, let's start with name, mob and where you're from.

Josh:

Yep, so my name's Josh Power, originally born and bred in Bowen, north Queensland, aboriginal South Islander man, like a lot of black people in Queensland and especially North Queensland, but I've been living in Brisbane for the last four years, on and off, yeah.

David:

And Bowen, tell me a little bit about your childhood school years, maybe those first 15 years.

Josh:

Yeah, no, definitely. So I lived in. Sort of my childhood started in Bowen and then my family we moved to Orange. Dad got work down there but the work was sort of a lot of mob in Bowen were transient between Orange and Bowen because of the picking season so we used to go down and pick apples while I was a child then. So I just helped a little bit and got a gay time as my payment. But then we ended up going and living in Orange for a little bit and then come back to Bowen, probably around year I think it was year nine, year 10.

Josh:

Bowen's a great small community Pretty much Bowen's. Like half a Bowen population is my family, so it has a really big black community there. It's near the ocean. You know you're always never out of food because you've got plenty of fish there. A lot of good memories of going fishing. Not that I would fish, I was pretty slack. If you asked my dad, he would go down to the cast net, but I was more of a dreamer, so I loved being in the salt water and going down. A lot of memories of going down just on dusk, dad taking out the cast net, catching a heap of mullet and whiting. While I'm skipping up and down the beach, dreaming about different things, my mind was all over the place Re-enacting some type of scenario that I've come up with in my head that I thought would make a great future or, in the moment, sort of magical creation. Yeah, bit of a weird kid but we grew up in a strong family, really loving and supporting. I was really blessed actually to be brought up in that type of family and I think that's you know, that's a lot of families who would mix South Island Aboriginal in Bowen, mackay, eyre A lot of good memories.

Josh:

Do love to go back and hardly ever go back, but when I do go back it feels you know, you get that real sense of belonging and home. And I've got a thing I go straight down to Grays Bay, take my shoes off, put my feet in the sand and it just feels like you know you're taking everything away and getting replenished. Yeah, unfortunately you always go back for funerals. Yeah, never really go back for um, fun times, happy times, but it is a good time, they are good times and good memories to go back and catch up with family yeah, when did you leave Bowen and what was the next step?

Josh:

so I finished year 12, um, and back then when you finish, my birthday's at the end of the year, so I just turned 17. And then you graduated, um, and then I, you know, I was like I need to get out. I had big dreams and, as I mentioned before, I was a bit of a dreamer and I really wanted to head to the city and go to come. I came down to brisbane actually my uncle, my mom's brother, was living here and he said, yeah, you can come move here.

Josh:

I was, um, I did a, I was studying very out there but Swedish massage during my school year through this college in Airlie Beach and I'd go down on the school holidays and do my pracs. And then I came down and finished off at the Australian Institute of Applied Science, remedial therapy in sports injuries, and I come down and sort of growing up. You know you always worked hard. If you wanted something you got to. You know you got to use your own money and buy anything you know, make it work, for you Can't be asking your parents for money.

Josh:

But yes, I had two jobs. My uncle had a cleaning business. So for those who know Brisbane, I used used to back then they were just the wool stores and they're just finishing off. I think it was w1. There was none of that gas work, so that was all empty blocks there. But we used to do like the bond cleans in that building and clean for a lot of rich people there. And then I was um an in-house remedial therapist for stanford plaza, key west and um the treasury, the casino that's moved now. Um worked for a company called rejuvenators and that was interesting because I was still 17 and turned't turn 18 until the end of the year and I was, you know, had to really be quite professional and really learn how to act like an adult. But I wanted that too. I was like you know. I really wanted to be an adult and be treated like an adult, and so I just pushed myself into these spaces.

David:

Now just wanted to segue into it. I love that you said you're a bit of a dreamer. You're in a safe space to be dreaming, just so you know. Now let's talk about that sort of dream, the career and where you live in that space, and then we'll go into your current business.

Josh:

Yeah, what type of dreams are you saying? Where I I always love, I love music, so I love performing, I love dressing up, I love creating outfits. You know, yucks, my sisters, you know I'd be constantly making them dresses. I don't know how my. To be honest, the family didn't know I was gay. I was making dresses and know how my, to be honest, the family didn't know I was gay. I was making dresses and outfits and putting on little runway shows with my little sisters, and so I I love that whole world and space of being able to write music.

Josh:

I play the piano, um, sing it. Then I would always be thinking about the whole production of it. What kind of of film clip would I create for this song? But I always kept that to the side because I knew well, I didn't really know where to go and what paths to take, because it was ingrained in me. You know you had to work. So I just did things that I knew I would be able to be capable of. That moment that would be bring, that would bring in money. That was the biggest thing. It was like you know, to do anything you had to have money, um. So I've always kept that dream about being a creative and I just, you know, applied that throughout my life in different areas and aspects. But, yeah, that's, yeah, the dream, the dreaming space, comes from being a crit, you know being that way, that being wired that way, really you're an artist yeah you're always going to be an artist yeah and now your current business.

David:

Let's talk about that yeah, so we.

Josh:

So we about three, four years ago we started my sister she's a GP and she got a little space in West End and started a health clinic and then it had a little garage in it and we were like, oh you know, I think we could use that space and sort of turn it into a little coffee shop or coffee window. And my partner Lockie he was working in the hospitality industry as a barista and we said, yeah, let's do it. I was working in Indigenous health at that time and I really wanted to, you know, look at paths that actually could bring me to a place where I could actually have that freedom to financial freedom, the head freedom to be able to really put creativity at the forefront and not just be a side project anymore. Creativity at the forefront and not just be a side project anymore. Um, and I knew I couldn't do that with in that current space and work. So I was like, let's do this. I think we could grow this, jump in. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work, we can always go back to what we're doing beforehand.

Josh:

So we started and we called it. My sister's clinic was called peaches by dr power and then we called it. My sister's clinic was called Peaches by Dr Power and then we called the little coffee shop Little Peaches and we're in a niche little area with. You know there was a lot of develop. West End's developing a lot, so there's always a new development, high rise, going up. And Lockie is very good at customer service and he can talk to anyone. He actually reminds me of how my granddaddy just talks to anyone, starts conversations up and so. But building like organic relationships with customers and Western just fitted in perfect for us. So we were very lucky that we're in that area because we just grew really fast, got a really big customer base and we also have a really good product as well. Coffee is a really big customer base and we also have a really good product as well. Coffee is a really big focus at our shop, um.

Josh:

And then there was a little not little 140 square meter um shed that came up. So these buildings that were in commercial properties they're old warehouses that have been converted and so the one next door to my sister's business, um, came up for lease and so we're like let's just do it. Didn't have much money to do it with, but we were like, okay, I'm good with numbers, um, and I like to cost out everything and sort of. I think that it comes with a creative brain as well. With some creative brains you can just really map out everything and if you can start to tag numbers and sort of timelines with that, then you have a really good project plan and you can see with little money what you can do. So we renovated it had nothing in it. We got permission. Dad used to be a builder at one stage there, so it was a little project for dad and me to work on and my parents are so supportive, like dad was mum and dad being so good to me so they were in there every day just helping putting up walls and the big four meter ceilings.

Josh:

Um, and yeah, we created this really nice organic um space. Um, and then part of my that's part of my downfall too is like if I don't like something, I want to change it straight away. So just recently, um, I was like, nah, I think we need to go down this direction, um, which is adding to what we already have, but which is predominantly we make good coffees, good service, a few pastries, a few toasties. I was like we need to expand on that and we're looking at different trends happening around. So we decided that we needed to do a bit of a change around, especially in the kitchen, so we can start baking our own um bread and a special type of bread, um, and open up a deli style um sandwich cafe space.

Josh:

Um, we have a liquor license too, so we're opening up a wine bar too in about six months time, um, but yeah, so it's a whole new direction, but with the same sort of bones, just adding a little bit more to that for the community, and we've started to um, hopefully we'll start to produce these items in the next couple of weeks. Yeah, there's been a bit of in the next couple of weeks. Yeah, there's been a bit of delays, as with every project, but we've had that recent cyclone that never came, but sort of came, so we've moved everything out, then moved it all back in, so we're getting all the ovens reconnected at the moment this week, and yeah it's been a long journey.

Josh:

It's been a hard journey, a lot of learning, but I think it's going to pay off Like it's working. I was hoping that it would work a little bit faster, but that's all that all comes with time. So the goal is to get this up and running, have it working really well, still be there, and then I can use some of that energy that I've invested into getting it to a point to put back into um my other priority, which is being a creative. Again, I love that producing and writing music. I love music, like I love writing I love that.

David:

Like you said, you're on the beach planning your music videos, yes, so there's a music video that we expect yes, there's gonna be a that we expect. Yes, there's going to be a follow-up.

Josh:

Different characters, everything. Yeah, it's quite out there. Yeah, now I want to see it.

David:

Yeah, and you'll be designing all the wardrobe and stuff. I will definitely. Yeah, now let's share with everyone the name of your business, where they can find you, and then we might talk about how you stumbled across IBA.

Josh:

Yeah, definitely so. The name's called Good Good now and we decided to go with that name because it's such a common name. Um response when you know oh, how you going.

Josh:

Yeah, I'm good, good. So we thought it was a bit catchy and it yeah, so it worked really well. Um, we're located in West End on Beasley Street, so shop three, shop two, 24, beasley Street. Um, I know I've known RBA for a while. Um, I'm actually they didn't know this, but I'm. In one of their annual reports I wrote a music. I wrote the runway music for one of their events that they funded, which was a Richmond football club fashion event about four years ago. So I was connected with IBA back then, but it was under my creative name, your stage name. Stage name. Stage name Can?

David:

you share that stage name?

Josh:

with us. Yeah, it's Kaya.

David:

Kaya. How do we spell that?

Josh:

K-Y-A-H Nice. You can find me on Instagram, kaya Music. Nothing on there. I've taken it, stripped everything away, yeah. So I knew about RBA back then then and we were really looking for a financial input to get us to that next stage. So I knew exactly what we needed and I had quite a detailed business plan projections and it was good that we already, I suppose, had trade as well Not that you can't go within without being an existing business. What we were projecting was actually, um, had substantial, you know, supporting information and real life lived experience within the business to be able to say, yep, that is attainable, that is, you know, that fits within the scope. But, um, yeah, so I went through, I started the process with them. Um, we um talk through you know, they were really supportive around. You know what documentation we need and do we need someone to run through our accounts? And we're, but we're, we were already on top of that, we have an accountant.

David:

Essentially, because you have that producer's brain, since you were that kid on the beach. You're the artist. But you see the logistics and the numbers and you said you're good, you're good with numbers, so you were aware of, you were aware of IBA. Yep, you've gone in, you've, you've given them lots of great stuff that they need. And then the next step then, once you got that, you were looking for some startup or not startup really just some financial.

Josh:

Yeah, just a financial injection so we could implement these new changes without having to have too much strain on the business as well. There's also the grants with RBA. So the grant worked really well. It was a certain percentage that could go towards so we were able to buy out all the equipment that we were leasing and that, you know, effectively reduced our outgoings because we now own those assets.

Josh:

And then there's different support that the RBA, you know, said they can offer. We haven't taken them up on them yet. But there's not just the financial investment in you know, either startup costs, but um it's. They do also have other avenues where they can support you with, you know, marketing or accounting, or business training or a mentor and you do have a mentor with you. But if you were not well versed in those spaces that you know, there's a lot of those wraparound services. It's sort of like an allied health services, you know, but for business support, where you've got all these different, they have all these different access. You have all access to different wraparound services. So the process was quite smooth.

David:

Yeah, it was pretty smooth. Yeah, pretty smooth After that sort of financial support was there? How was that ongoing support? Were there any follow-ups that you needed anything to deal with them, and how was that?

Josh:

Yeah, they're really easy to engage with the follow-ups, um, they you're handed over to from that team to a different team who support you from, uh, you know, throughout your journey and your your contract with IBA, um, and they will touch you, they touch base with you. You know, once a month or you know you've got their personal number so you can just not got their personal number so you can just not personal, but a direct number so you can contact that person. And then there's just the check-ins and then, yeah, it's pretty, it's very different to if you were going through one of the four big banks.

David:

Yeah, traditional, the traditional lenders. And for someone out there, maybe they're looking to start a business they've just started, they're looking for a bit of stuff to maybe take control and own those assets. Yeah, just a bit of advice for someone out there that could be in a similar position and when you started, bit of advice.

Josh:

Really listen to your gut actually and you know, if you know that industry. Well, if you know, you see something and you see the vision of it and you actually can feel that you know actually this will work, even though you might not think you have the tools or the capabilities of doing it. Just run with that Like you can listen to yourself. You'll know that it's right, yeah.

David:

It's really good advice, especially for mob. Yeah, you've got to start to trust yourself.

Josh:

Don't be ashamed in these spaces. You can walk in these spaces and know in these spaces, because you have a right to. Not only have a right to, but you know we can do things a lot better too.

David:

Yeah absolutely Deadly is in the DNA.

Josh:

It is, it is, it really is.

David:

Yeah, and I believe that in all the arts, creative business, most definitely Just having that access, yeah, to get the opportunities.

Josh:

Yeah.

David:

And IBA helps with that. Like we talked about the traditional lenders being able to provide that, yeah, let's talk about some of the highlights for GoodGood so far.

Josh:

Being able to create a really good, safe working space. We love our staff and it shows our staff. We've got eight staff now. Eight or nine, nine staff now. We just interviewed a new recruit last week. A new recruit last week, um.

Josh:

But hospitality industry can be has had a bad reputation for the culture um from and I've experienced it too when I was younger working in hospo chefs yelling at you. You know all these expectations and the way you talk in the space and it can be quite an unsafe space, but it's been able to create. I've got a bit of a HR background but working in these health spaces as well and understanding ways of doing and being and creating these safe spaces and how to actually put it into a space and have it live there. So it's been great to be able to look what's out there. So we engage with what we're trying to do. I try not to do everything. So we have an accountant, we've got a service that we engage with for HR, workplace health and safety and they really mould around what your business model is and what you want to create and so if you, I think, by having those things in place, that's a good starting point of having you know really good HR, really good finances, really good accounting that you don't have to worry about, because that also translates back into your staff feeling like you know they're supported in the space, especially in our. With our we use a company called Bright HR and they've got part of their service delivery. They have an EAP service.

Josh:

So and you never really hear of that in hospitality industry, you hear of it more in your corporate spaces. So just all those little add-ons that we can apply from what I've learned in other industries to sort of change that culture and hospitality. That's like that's your bones of it and that's your structure of it. But it's also, you know, when I step into the space I might come in one day and I could be I've had like a shit night or I'm not feeling the best, but I always make sure and go, hey, how's it all going?

Josh:

You know, create, creating that environment of you know I'm here, I'm bright, it's safe. You know you can talk to me and we also have that. They're like I don't know they become like your family. You know you can talk to me and we also have that. They're like I don't know they become like your family. So your staff know that they can come to you with anything, talk to you. You sort of nurture them as well. So, yeah, I think it's great to have that, to be able to provide that opportunity and create that space.

David:

It's massive. That is quite possibly the most important milestone for a business is creating a safe work environment.

Josh:

And it does actually help your business. When you come in you'll see, it's really amazing because we know everyone, we talk to everyone and it has that really community feel and our staff have picked up on that right from the start. So you know we'll have a customer come in. One of our staff members, chloe, like hey, how you going, how's such and such, and have a bit of chat. They know their coffee. You having the same today? Oh, you're on oat milk, are you? What's?

Josh:

going you know those? It's always that sort of constant um community feeling now josh two things two things yep.

David:

One, we can't wait to come in, yes, and try coffee. Two, you use the word safe, and earlier, when we were chatting, you said financial freedom, but then you said mental freedom Yep, let's talk about that. And we've talked about milestones for the business Yep, but let's talk about some of the maybe tough times Yep.

Josh:

It's not all smooth sailing. Yep, it's not all smooth sailing, and when I say talk about mental freedom, I am it can. It's quite stressful and it can be quite a lot to um for, for, for your mind. But the difference is I know there's an end to that because I'm in this moment and it's working really hard. It's really stressful to get to this point, whereas, although the work I was doing in my other jobs and throughout my career were great, I just knew that I'd be constantly in that mindset. Yeah, and I don't mind being in that high-stress mindset for a short period, because I know there's an end to it and it's there's. I've got, there's something at the end of it that I'm, that I'm working towards for myself, and then it, eventually it will get easier it's not a place you want to live, is it?

Josh:

no, no, and it can be really stressful. You know, you'll see, we've been really lucky though we have been really really lucky in this space. But there is times where only like a couple of bad weeks and you know, profit, profits go down, you don't get as many sales because something's happened, um, and we've been caught out before. But then I looked at you know, how can we protect ourselves? You know, there's been some times with construction sites where they've had to shut us down. We weren't eligible to claim anything because we weren't covered for anything. So I then then you start to look at okay, well, I want to protect ourselves for the future. So you know, last year, luckily, I got built business interruption insurance and so you pay a little bit more, um, but as long as it fits within the budget, um, but it does protect you. It's all. It's knowing all those little things as well, yeah, but it's a learning curve, so I didn't really know too much about insurances and how that all works yeah, usually from a lesson.

Josh:

Yeah, you learn what to do next and some people aren't afforded that opportunity to be able to live through that lesson, but we have been, so we're really lucky in that sense staffing as I said, although you are creating safe spaces, you know it can be challenging to have different personalities in a space.

Josh:

And how do you, how do you know when to you know step in and what do we need to put in place to ensure that this other person is feeling safe and not feeling, you know, hurt by this other person? And, um, how do you train staff so that they, they, they, they not only are learning, at the same time, they're building their capacity, but it's also um they're fitting, you know, and they're just, you know, training them up to fit and work well with the other team members, but you're training them up to um be where, where you want them or need them to be, at um to offer that type of, you know, that good service that we offer you're in business with your partner, you've got things happening.

David:

Is it hard to shake it off sometimes when you get home? You talked about when you go back to Bowen.

Josh:

Yeah, it is For my partner. He's really good at shutting off, and I probably annoy him a lot because I can't shut off at night. So I'm like, hey, what do you think of this? What do you think of that? So it's a good test on a relationship too, on how to work together every day, live together and then still find time to, you know, enjoy life together.

Josh:

Hasn't seemed like we've been able to enjoy life for the last couple of years, but we're getting to a point where you know we both share that same vision as well. If you are going to do it with someone though that's probably another learning I would probably say is that if it's a friend, family member or even your partner, really think about how that is going to impact your relationship. Can you work together? Can you live together? You do all those things together and you both have something to bring to the table, or collectively bring to the table that is going to support different areas, like Lockie brings so much that I can't bring, and then I bring all different things to the business.

David:

Outside of writing music, producing music, your creative side. Is there anything else Josh does to help shake off the pressures of business?

Josh:

I go in and out of going to the gym. When I do go I feel good, but it's that getting to there, yeah. So I'll go for like three, six, three to six months. Then something pop up and I'm like, oh no, I won't go, I won't go, I won't go, but I'm in, it does help, it really does help. One. It sounds really cliche, you know, keep health and fitness, body health, and so your body healthy, your mind's going to be healthy, but getting to there is, you know, that's another task in itself, but it does help. We started playing tennis and at least you know I love tennis, and so that you know, finding those little times we have two dogs taking for walks, spending time with the family, just having a good laugh. We try and go to a lot, you know, when families have big events. We've got a heap of family in Brisbane too. So making sure we're keeping connected and with family, yeah, Now, how important is it for mob to stay connected?

David:

When you're going through something, it's easy to feel you know, isolated it is.

Josh:

Yeah, it's really important. Yeah, and it's good where we are too, because I have a lot of mob that come in, that I know who live in the area and you can talk differently to them. To other customers you can say, you know, you can. Just they're like, how's it going? I'm like, oh, you know shit today Excuse my language, might have to take that out, but yeah, it's a different way of talking and it's nice them coming in, because all your cousins come in. We always have the cousins coming in. So yeah, it's really important because you can just be yourself.

David:

You must be a bit of an inspiration in the community. Like you know, you've got a good, good business. See what I did there. I was trying to be funny. You know you've got this great business. You sort of you're an artist, so you're putting yourself in a position to have that freedom, yep, to nurture that side as well. And you know, I feel like pretty inspired chatting to you.

Josh:

Oh, thank you.

David:

What does the next three to five years look like? It can be for Good Good. It can be for that music video that you're going to tell me all about and we're going to collaborate on. It could be anything.

Josh:

We are looking at two other venues. Um, what we know how, what works really well, is those little pop-up coffee shops, good coffee, and then maybe we're going to see how this deli goes. I have a good feeling about it. If that works really well, we can replicate that and look for. There's two other spaces that we're looking at. Both have room to be, both starting off as the takeaway coffee small coffee window space and then they can grow into the deli. So I think, replicating what we do and growing that over the next couple of years so that that builds, what I want to do is grow that money really fast.

David:

Yeah.

Josh:

I don't want to wait around, so that you know I can then put people into those positions who can actually manage the space. I still have my hand in it, but then I can move away and look at spending three or four days just in the studio writing.

David:

Love that.

Josh:

Yeah.

David:

An album.

Josh:

Hopefully. I have so many unfinished songs I've never finished. I'll finish one of my own, but yeah.

Josh:

That's great Hundreds of songs just sitting there. But, yeah, that's that would be the goal. My partner wants to get up. He's a makeup artist, so he wants to look at getting into it. He's a really good singer. I wish he was doing music and he might get back into it. He got a bit jaded with it for a bit, but, yeah, doing music together would be great. We used to perform together in Melbourne, did a lot of gigs, so, and maybe we will.

Josh:

You know you're quite happy when you're doing it too, because you're doing something you love, so getting back to that would be is a, and you're doing it too because you're doing something you love. So getting back to that is part of that long-term goal, as well as being able to have enough money to support family. I don't want my family or my parents going to old people home. I think they should be living with you on a property and should be able to support them. But that's hard to do, like not everyone can do that. But that's my dream is to be able to have that financial stability to do that, yeah, and then things can grow from there and the cost of living is getting.

David:

It's getting crazy.

Josh:

It's's really bad, yeah, really bad.

David:

And how does that affect the business?

Josh:

Yeah, we have been monitoring and looking at trends in people's spending. Things will go up, like I know our coffee's going up, but we have good margins in our coffees already, so that we have, you know, we have the space for the coffee price to go up. Yeah, we have been watching it. There hasn't been too much of a change in the way people are spending. I think it's the area we are located in, yeah, but that could change too. Yeah, it could definitely change, but we are keeping it close.

Josh:

We know trends on like why one week, so people are spending more than the other week, because then you know, it's your pay week. That's a normal trend, but haven't seen, um, much of a change just yet. But we're very aware that it could change quite rapidly the world. So, um, especially what's happening over in america at the moment, with all the tariffs and stuff like that, things could just, I can see things getting out of hand pretty quickly and if something happens and it doesn't, you know, that affects our business and we had to shut down, or so be it.

Josh:

It's not killing me you can start again, you can do something else. Can't control everything and I had to like I've really had to work on that on myself because I get that I used to get really caught up in that. But yeah, you just and in the moment you can get caught up on it, but as long as you don't hold on to that too long, you just get over it.

David:

Let's explore maybe one of those times you were caught up in that. You know what was going through your mind and how did you navigate that and how long was that process.

Josh:

Yeah, they can go in like over, like it'd be. You know, something will trigger it and it's like, oh my God, this is going to, this could be a big thing, you know, affecting the business, or affecting the financial, the finance of the business, and then I'll go straight into. So I get really stressed. But then it triggers this like um momentum or solution. Fine, it's on the computer, what can I do? Looking at, I've become a really good um user of chat gvt.

Josh:

I'm quite a whiz with it now how good is it so good and that's a whole new thing is how to use that as well, and I've used that a lot. I use it a lot now, um, and I talk to it and it's quite scary for a lot of people, but I talk to chat gpt like it's my friend, we, you know, to have conversations, and I can compartmentalize, like conversations into a pic, into different groups of that specific area of the business, or it might be a personal thing, and then at the end of the week I use it as a diary and at the end of the week, um, not every week, but I'll just um, I'll get it to debrief with me 100% see if any opportunities, opportunities or maybe something got missed or should I look at for the next week.

Josh:

But yeah, in those moments when I get really stressed, I can. You know I'm not a nice person. I can not be a nice person to be around because I'm very self-focused.

David:

You're a business owner.

Josh:

Yeah, but I make sure I do that at home. Try should I do that at home and try not to show that at work and around other people my poor partner has to put up with. Yeah, we talk about it and yeah, that's all the whole thing. You know I can, you know I can go off about stuff and then. But then we talk about it and then you make sure, you know, you make sure you go to sleep without having that having that result.

Josh:

Yeah, 100% it all sounds cliche and it takes a long time to get to that too, that self working on yourself. It doesn't happen overnight. You read all these different.

David:

you know that's the real thing, you see the quotes and you're absorbing content and you kind of just oh yeah, whatever. But then it really starts to sink in and as the years go by, you know you're like man, like I really resonate with this now and I understand like all those cliche things that people say to do with business and mindset.

Josh:

Yeah.

David:

It's, you're rewiring, you are Some of the way that we were brought up as mob.

Josh:

You are, you are Definitely rewiring some of the way that we were brought up as mob. You are, you are Definitely rewiring.

David:

But not rewiring the young boy on the beach.

Josh:

No, no See, that's part of you, who you are. I think it's rewiring. I always like so. My dad's black, black, like so dark, and I'm lighter skin and I always knew I had a different privilege to him. And growing up we would see, like, um, mum being white, um, we, my brother had cancer. Um, he's the middle child child he's not with us anymore, but, um, we used to drive down to Brisbane from Bowen a lot, um, and he got a lot of. He was doing treatment at the Royal Brisbane Hospital.

Josh:

So we did I did some schooling at the Royal Brisbane, um, and we would stop in like at Mackay or you know where all the hotels are, or we'd stop in at Rocky or the hotels and we would park outside and Morway's mum would just go in first and I always wondered why is she doing this? Why are we parked all the way out here? And it was for the simple fact that they would say a lot of the times if they saw Dad and us coloured kids, that there'd be no vacancy. And seeing that and knowing that at a young age, you're just like no, that's it. I was just like no. I'm never going to allow that to affect me. I walk into this space and I'm rightfully here, just as they think they are. I even have more right to be here.

David:

Yes.

Josh:

Love that and we do.

David:

It's important.

Josh:

Yeah, it's really important Every space. Yeah, to not be shamed when you're going to these spaces.

David:

How proud does it make you feel being an Aboriginal South Sea business owner?

Josh:

Very proud. It makes Dad very proud. He sits there and he's smiling up and he's like, oh, they're so busy today and it's just yeah, yeah, it's really um special to have him there and be so proud and calling up up the aunties oh, laurel, you know they're so busy today, they're sold out of all this and yeah, it's really like turning a new chapter.

David:

Hey, because a lot of mob growing up we don't see our families as business owners no, and uncles and aunties, yeah, not owning homes. But we're changing not changing the game, changing the landscape.

Josh:

Yep. You know, yeah, we are, and we've got to continue to do that and think bigger too, like big spaces. We can own those big spaces.

David:

Now for people out there interested in hospitality. Maybe they're creative as well. Let's close with just some advice for one person out there listening. They just need one thing from a truthful, honest place that you can share with them.

Josh:

You can't ever change anything, but I wish I could have done that and I probably would have done that back then was to if you are creative, or you're wanting to, let's say there's two things, creative, and or you're wanting to say just two things, creative and hospitality can go hand in hand really. Um, and they are. They are similar in a sense. But if you have that passion and that drive and it's in your gut, you're like oh, I know I can do that, but there's an easier path to getting money. You're working, maybe just in a completely different industry, but you've worked, you know. You know how to get into the industry because your family's in it and stuff like that. You could do it for a short time, but don't make it a.

Josh:

If you have a passion for something else, don't continue. You know, try not to continue that path. Always have, you know, put steps in place, whether it's, you know, taking a little bit of money from there, from that, to make sure it goes into your passion or your dream. Or if you do have the opportunity and you can run with it and you have, you know, you have that drive and that passion in your guts. Take, you know, take the risk. It's scary, but you can always. You know you only live once. You can always do something else. You can always go back to the other thing you are comfortable with and then restart. It doesn't end with that. It might fail. It might not fail, but if it does fail it doesn't matter. Just take the leap, do it again, do something else.

David:

Brother, thank you so much. All good Thanks for having me Having a yarn, sharing your story, and let's reconnect.