The Car Dealer Who Built the Dream - Then the Perfect Storm Hit | John Hirniak (Part 1)
Download MP3Right. Let's get into it. And get the conversation started. Welcome to Inspired Men Talk. Podcast where we sit down with real people and talk about their journey.
GaryJohannes:The stuff they've been through. The bits that shape them.
Peter Ely:And the moments where things started to change. We talk about men's mental health. But
John Hirniak:in
Peter Ely:a way that actually sounds like real life. Some of it's serious. And some of it is a little bit lighter.
GaryJohannes:But it's always honest and brave. Because
Peter Ely:most of this stuff doesn't get talked about enough. And if there's one thing we've seen time and time again. It's that there's always a way back. So I'm Gary. And I'm Peter.
GaryJohannes:And this is Inspired Men Talk.
Peter Ely:Hello and welcome to another episode of Inspired Men Talk. Today we have an amazing guest called John Hirniak. But before we get to John, I'd like to say hello to one of our stalwarts, it's Gary Johannes. Gary, hello.
GaryJohannes:Hello, and welcome to this episode of Inspired Men Talk. It's always good to be here.
Peter Ely:Thank you very much, Gary. And Gary is a solution focused hypnotherapist and the founder of Inspired to Change, and actually the driving force behind Inspired Mentorc as well. And I'm Peter Ealy, also a solution focused hypnotherapist based in North London. So, we're going go over and say hello to John. John, hello.
John Hirniak:Hello, and thanks for inviting me today and sharing some of my story and hopefully some insights. Thank you.
Peter Ely:Brilliant. John, we'll start, if you don't mind, with you actually telling us a little bit about that story then. So if wouldn't mind, tell us a little bit about yourself, who you are, and what we've got you here doing.
John Hirniak:Well, well, a little bit about myself. Me, I'm 62 now, married to Leslie for the last twenty three years. Got a daughter who's 20 and another daughter who's 16. My background, come from a pretty poor background, didn't have a lot of money, relatively successful, built up a nice life. Ended up working at Perkins Engines as as apprentice.
John Hirniak:I got into sort of engineering, worked in finance there, went back in research and development. But I always had this this this itch to have my own business. So I had some big businesses on the side, market stalls, all all kinds of little deals on the side. And eventually, about oh, let me get it right. About twenty seven years ago, I left and became a full time used car dealer before court.
John Hirniak:So the last twenty seven years of doing that, and I've just about closed it down now. So that's closed down now. And I'm a full time on being a transitional coach and a therapist. That's what I do now.
Peter Ely:Amazing. So we're going to dig a little bit into your journey if you don't mind because it sounds all kind of plain sailing but I imagine it wasn't because they never are. Right? So tell us a little bit then kind of a guess from from pre market store, what got you into the market store side, and then how did you go from there?
John Hirniak:I've always wanted my own business. And where that come from? I'm I'm not really sure. So I'd always been wheeling and dealing, as they say, all through my life. And then through default, we ended up car dealing.
John Hirniak:We we were trade dealing in cars. And back in the day, really good money in it. It seemed quite easy because I come from a mechanical background as well. And my dad worked on an awful lot of cars and dealt with cars as well. It kind of felt quite easy.
John Hirniak:We built that up and up and up till eventually took the plunge. Redundancy was offered at Perkins. I took the redundancy, left, opened up the forecourt full time, and it went from there. Got married, had the children, moved house. Yeah.
John Hirniak:It was all great. It was all great until it it wasn't.
GaryJohannes:So I that that sounds still quite nice, flowy. I've done this, and I've done that. But if you go back
Peter Ely:to, like, leaving school, getting that apprenticeship, and why you then still wield and deal? Do you had a great job for life as what I often say in Perkins, you know, in Peterborough terms, that's one of the biggest employers there's ever been. So why were you messing around?
John Hirniak:Well on the side. I mean, you're right. When I first started at Pogo, I think it was 10,000 workers there, and I still got friends who still work there. They're they're managers now. And I could have stayed there and end up being in management and worked through the ranks.
John Hirniak:But I think I think there's certain people out there who've got this itch. This itch to I'm not sure what it is. Prove yourself. Do a bit more. Maybe it's a little bit not being not enjoying being told what to do.
John Hirniak:I kind of hated being told when I had to be there, when I had to go. And you've got this you know, got me there at 08:00, finish at 04:00, five weeks holiday a year. Yeah. It and that's not wasn't for me. It just wasn't for me.
John Hirniak:The good parts of it, yeah, great pension, work for life, good people, great land you're working with, great canteen, great health care. I mean, there's an awful lot of positives to to working at Perkins, and I'll be forever grateful for the opportunity they gave me from leaving school. Brilliant. Absolutely set me up for life. But if you've got that being your bonnet to to have that business, that's that's what you've got.
John Hirniak:And then I I sort of I started, want of a better word, dicking about at work, starting to become a pain in the ass because I didn't really wanna be there. Yeah. When I look back, slightly embarrassing that really what I should have done is left a few years earlier, but you sort of you haven't got quite got the balls to do that. So you start doing less and less at work and doing more and more on the side.
GaryJohannes:So what sort of things were you doing on the side?
Peter Ely:Well, we had the we had the
John Hirniak:Sunbed Company on the side. That's what one of the things we did. We had market stalls at weekends. Then we we went over to the car dealing. So we were selling cars at the weekend and trade dealing them.
John Hirniak:So buying them and selling them to other dealers or buying them and take them straight to auction. So we didn't have a premises as such, but we were car dealing, earning good money. And obviously, the more that money came in, the more you didn't wanna work at Perkins, the more you started to piss around and like, yeah, don't really need the job anyway, do I?
GaryJohannes:Yeah. And
John Hirniak:then it then it, yeah, it come to the point where there's a famous Italian saying that says, you can't live in two paradises. Are you that Or are you this? You're sort of messing about between the two. You're not Arthur and you're not Martha. You're neither one or the other.
John Hirniak:And it came to a point I met my wife. My wife had her own business, salon and that. She was doing really well. And she said, I can't believe you're staying there. And the wages had come down at Perkins.
John Hirniak:The wages weren't great now. They hadn't really kept up with inflation in the world. Okay. And felt that not me so much, but some of the guys I worked with were really, really clever. And even I thought they're not really getting paid for what they're worth.
John Hirniak:The obvious option you got, if you don't think you're getting paid what you're worth, leave. Yeah. Leave what you think you're worth. So that's what
Peter Ely:I thought. And with a little
John Hirniak:bit of backup from my wife, she encouraged me. She said, look, you can come and work for me if you really have to, if you want. So I took the, she took the dormancy and started full time card dealing for want of a
Peter Ely:better word with a forecourt. Amazing.
John Hirniak:That was it. So, yeah, we had a great life because it, you know, once we'd had the children, it it gave me the freedom to walk them to school, to pop out at 02:00 to watch them playing the trumpet or the, you know, the clarinet or whatever they're learning. It just gave you that real flexibility, which I love. I still do. Being able to do within reason what you want, when you want.
John Hirniak:It was great. Yeah. I loved it. I loved it.
Peter Ely:Yeah. No. I can definitely relate to that. It's a it's a beautiful sunny day today, and we're recording. And I did not go to work until 10:00.
Peter Ely:So, you know, it was like, I was up, I was sitting out and just sitting in the sun. And you're right, if you've got a nine to five, you don't get that freedom. So it is a lovely thing to do. It is a big old it is a big old kind of challenge, though. It is a bit of a it's a big step to take.
John Hirniak:Without a doubt, it's not for everyone. And people still say it to me now, It's not for everyone. It's a certain mindset that goes in. You gotta be comfortable with challenge. You gotta be comfortable with uncertainty.
John Hirniak:Because there's not a wage every week. There might not be any money this week, this month. You gotta be comfortable with that uncertainty, and that that that definitely is not for everyone. So yeah.
GaryJohannes:But I just wanna clear something up because John mentioned when he was, you know, dicking about at work and that, but he'd done stuff on the side and he had sunbed shops. I just wanna confirm that this lovely town you've got isn't odd. You're sitting on the left side The the
John Hirniak:truth is I do go on the odd sunbed in the winter just to cheer myself up, give me a little bit of color. But, no, I do tan really, really easy. And this this mad heat wave It was
Peter Ely:all natural. I've I've
John Hirniak:actually I've actually hid from the sun for two days, and I've still got it because I've walked the dog in the morning, walked the dog at night. I'm getting browner and browner. People keep saying, have you been away? No. No.
John Hirniak:I've been hiding. Yeah. But no. So Just
GaryJohannes:just to confirm,
Peter Ely:it's all natural.
John Hirniak:It's all natural. I'll I'll definitely got white bits. That's for sure.
Peter Ely:Yeah, you won't be too surprised, I'm all natural as well. Yeah, this pale pasty white, that's all natural, amazing. Brilliant. And so talking about the fact then, John, that sometimes you do get a wage and sometimes you don't get a wage, that can actually play a bit on your mental health. Were there any times when you've gone through that stage where it's played on you and you've had to kind of work through it.
John Hirniak:Not not in the early days. Because I I in my opinion, the the big change is children. Once you've got children, you're responsible. You can't just get up and leave. You can't well, you can, but it's it's it's a lot more challenging.
John Hirniak:Yeah. They need feeding. They need educating. They need showing the way. You need to be an inspiration to them.
John Hirniak:Certainly, there's an awful lot more pressure once you got children. You know, they need to be you know, let let's let's look. If me and me and Les didn't have any money, let's sell the house. Let's move to Spain, we'll live on the beach. It's all right.
John Hirniak:Yeah. But once you got children, that's that's a complete different ballgame. And I felt or found the pressure of not just providing for them, but educating them, caring for them, inspiring them. I take that ever so seriously, and it it does or it can do weigh quite heavy.
GaryJohannes:I was gonna say, there's some people, I know many of people, who find that responsibility quite overwhelming. Yeah. And it's not we don't want to. I mean, we know there's rogue parents and whatever, but even with the best will in the world, that's a lot for some people. They they go in there with the best intentions, but that's a lot for some people.
GaryJohannes:Yeah. Yeah. You never found that a lot. You found it.
John Hirniak:I've said, I mean, I've got a dog. And people go, oh, he's a lovely dog, isn't he? Yeah. But he's been trained. We walk him every morning for forty five minutes.
John Hirniak:We walk him every night for another, at least a half hour. He gets took to the vet. He gets groomed. He gets fed, or should I say, good food. He's a great dog.
John Hirniak:Now, it's a lot of work, but you could have a dog, couldn't you? And tie it to a breeze box and just leave it in the garden. And it's easy, isn't it? But if you're if you're doing the things to make sure your children are in a great place, It does take a little bit of effort. It does take work.
John Hirniak:You know, I I used to go to the school to their reading classes to help them learn to read. Lots of parents didn't for whatever reason. Some of them because they're at work. Some of them because they just can't be asked. That's the effort, isn't it?
John Hirniak:That's going out and teaching them to ride the bike, taking them to swimming, so teach them to swim, and all everything else we do. To try get a bit of a head start in life so they are in a good position to get on in life.
GaryJohannes:So so what gave you that ethic, that understanding of what you wanted to be as a parent? Where did that come from?
John Hirniak:Great question, Gary. I'm not sure. I think my dad was a big inspiration in my life. My dad come over from after the war. He was an asylum seeker prisoner come out of the prison camps in the in Rimini, North Italy.
John Hirniak:I was a was given asylum here. Camp he really wanted to get on. He really wanted to succeed. And, you know, even some of my family members, he would pay for them to maybe go to college and learn how to type so they could get a better job. He was really big on education.
John Hirniak:And he just said, this country is the best country in the world. If you work it right, you can be whoever you wanna be. Don't miss that opportunity. So he was a great inspiration to me. And here's another strange one that that I remember as a child watching and being fascinated by, The Waltons.
John Hirniak:I used to watch I used to watch The Waltons. And if you watch it, there's a little lesson there in every episode. A little bit how you should live your life, a little bit about integrity. And I still believe that had put a big influence on me as well. And I used to love it.
John Hirniak:I I was fascinated by it. And I started do it in
GaryJohannes:my head now
John Hirniak:with a theme tune. You know, it makes me smile. You know?
GaryJohannes:In in my head now, I'm thinking, one's he? Is he John Boy or is he Sue Ellen? Or
John Hirniak:No. No.
Peter Ely:No. I'm not sure.
John Hirniak:Maybe a bit of all of them. Took a little bit of all of them with me. So, yeah, just I don't know. I suppose taking responsibility, taking responsibility of it. You know, my children depend on me.
John Hirniak:Everything I say to them and guide them, they're gonna take it on and think, is that how we act? Is that how we do it? Is you know, is dad lazy? No, dad doesn't do that. Dad doesn't stay fit.
John Hirniak:Dad doesn't learn. So I've tried to show them. Yeah. Put the effort in. You'll get the reward.
John Hirniak:You know, life will be Yeah. Put a bit of effort in. But show them, not tell them. That's that's the hard bit.
Peter Ely:Show It's really true. I was I was reading a book, and a chap was saying how he he got his fear of heights from his father, right? Where his father would get up a ladder and start shaking and you know, would try and avoid getting up the ladders and it built that fear of getting up on a ladder within him. And it is very true, there's a strong part of nature part of the nature nature debate. Right?
Peter Ely:And I think it's a very valid point about action because it's very easy for us to to kinda sit there and say, well, we can tell them what they should do. Yeah. And and we can. Yeah. But actually, if you don't live it.
John Hirniak:No. That that's the that's the bit. You start to do what I say. Show them. And that that's quite hard because, you know, when hey.
John Hirniak:None of us are perfect, especially me. And you're trying to lead by example, and that's that's quite hard. But children do keep you accountable. They keep you you know? And I see it all the time.
John Hirniak:People scream at their children, you know, not to smoke. Yeah. Yeah. You're smoking. You know?
John Hirniak:Yeah. Don't drink. Don't but you're you're pissed, dad, aren't you? You know? It's it's just, you know, stay fit, but you're not dad.
John Hirniak:You know? Yeah. Make sure you educate educate, but you're not dads. You know? So remember, we we were a big influence on him.
Peter Ely:And it really I mean, I knew
John Hirniak:this anyway, but then I then I trained to be an an ITT therapist. And as Gary knows, we we regress back to, you know, earlier life of what what's influenced us. And the one thing I realized is how much everything you say to your children and do can have an impact on them for the rest of their life. It's frightening. Yeah.
John Hirniak:Frightening. Yeah. Yeah. Ask your children what the things that they remember. You probably don't remember it, but they do.
John Hirniak:And you
Peter Ely:think Yeah.
John Hirniak:There's I didn't realize it had that much impact on you. Yeah. It did. I
Peter Ely:read an article about an archaeologist, and they said to her, they went, what drove you to become an archaeologist? And she said, well, when I was three, she said, my dad buried some bones, like dog bones or something in the garden. And so like, just dug up the bones and she was like, oh yeah, playing around. And her dad was like, I don't ever remember doing that. I don't ever remember that thing.
Peter Ely:But that excitement of finding the first few bones made her excited about becoming and following up and doing the archeology thing. So, yeah, it's a it's amazing what
John Hirniak:those small actually children yesterday. What's your favorite bits of all the holidays we've been on? Favorite experience of all the holidays we've been on? And it's amazing the stuff they come up with. Like, real small stuff.
John Hirniak:It's not the big stuff. Yeah. I really love that. I love when we were in the sea, dad, at so and so. You can't remember it.
John Hirniak:They remember this real quirky little stuff that's long forgotten by me, but they really do remember it, you know. Ten, twelve years later, they really remember that moment. Yeah. We're we're in the sea and we were laughing and just real small stuff, not even the big stuff, which is quite scary if you think.
Peter Ely:And one of the buddies
John Hirniak:I'm most embarrassed by, and I really don't remember this. They go, yeah. Both my girls said, do you remember, dad, when you stopped the car on the main roundabout in Peebrough and got out of the car to have that argument with that bloke? And I said, no, I don't. I said, yeah.
John Hirniak:He cut me up with something that had gone on, and I'd stopped and he bibbed and this, that, and the other. I've stopped the car. I've got out the car. I'm ranting and wrecked, going berserk. And they're just sitting there terrified and embarrassed.
John Hirniak:And his Yeah. Mental bit. I don't even remember it.
Peter Ely:Yeah. That's crazy, ain't it?
John Hirniak:And and there's thought now that I did that, I yeah. I'm embarrassed. It's just and I've I've told them so that it wasn't big. It wasn't clever, and it was a stupid thing to do. And, yeah, I were maybe in a great place at the time, and that's why I did it.
John Hirniak:But, no.
Peter Ely:It's
John Hirniak:not how we should act. But yeah, scary.
Peter Ely:Yeah. It happens to us all. It happens to us all. It's a natural phenomenon. There's science behind it and we can explain it and we do explain it, but we won't explain it today.
Peter Ely:What's been your favorite car to either own or drive and why?
John Hirniak:Yeah, without a doubt. I mean, I've got a classic car. I've got a 1953 Buick. Bought it about nine years ago. I imported it over from America.
John Hirniak:I was brought up on American air bases as a child. So I've sat in fighter jets and hung around American air bases. Lots of American comics growing up. Loved the American dream. Fascinated by it.
John Hirniak:And that era. So, yeah, I I bought she's called Clara. I bought that. And I've I've not been out in her for eight months. And I actually went out for driving it two, three days ago.
John Hirniak:Wow. Nice. And I suddenly remembered how much joy it gave me. I'm driving along, big cheesy grin on my face, laughing away. And how many people, bib, wave, thumbs up, children stopping on the the roadside, you know, you know, wide eyed looking at it, pulled into a petrol station, three or four people come up to me, can I have a picture?
John Hirniak:Can you tell me about it? And I kind of kind of forgot that, how much joy it brings to me anyway. So, yeah, that's that's my favorite car to drive. My my mine is a 1953, Buick.
Peter Ely:That's a beautiful car. I believe you've got a picture of it on your on your Facebook. Is that right?
John Hirniak:Yeah. Think it's at the top there. Yeah. But I'd better change that. There's something else because but, yeah, it's still on the Facebook at the top there.
Peter Ely:Yeah. Amazing.
John Hirniak:Not only me, lots of other people and my children. We used to go to a lot of car shows, music festivals and that, and we're driving with a car. That's give us all a lot of enjoyment. I've done a few I don't do them normally. A few people have begged me to do the odd prom and a few weddings in it.
John Hirniak:I don't like doing them because of the pressure of turning upon the day and having to be there. But when I do them, it's just nice to to see their joy, and they they really enjoy it on the day doing the prom. That that makes you feel good as well.
GaryJohannes:I think, considering you've had twenty seven years selling cars and probably been in more cars than anyone I know. Yeah. And you go back to an old beat up old 50, old, old car. Nothing 50 car, what you would expect.
John Hirniak:1953 Buick Super.
GaryJohannes:It's better than all the other cars.
John Hirniak:No power steering, no electric windows, no airbags, no power brakes. And, you know, the magic of it is it's just it's it's from yesteryear. It's something that's built that lasts forever. The quality and everything, it just lasts forever. When I'm feeling a little bit down, when I'm feeling a little bit that life's against me and shit's happening, I think how many stories could the car tell?
GaryJohannes:Jesus.
John Hirniak:Dick Orman, who had bought the car off, he's passed away now. He would've gone through it as well. He he had children. He was he'd gone through the same shit as well. Same the family who had it before them, the Proudty family.
John Hirniak:Her name was Clara, actually. They would've gone through the same stuff. Yeah. And thrived and got through it. You're not the only one who's struggling with the mortgage, with the children, with your health, with parents passing away.
John Hirniak:And when all of the shit that comes our way in life, we all go through it. And ninety nine percent of the people survive it. So it makes me sort of think, yeah, what would Dick Old man say? If he was sat here, what would he say? Probably laugh at me and think it's all gonna be fine.
John Hirniak:It's all gonna be good.
GaryJohannes:So that I mean, that's a really amazing point, actually. That car, if it had if it had ears and it could tell what it's heard Yeah. It's like, wow. It's seen and heard a lot of things. But one of the things, you know, we spoke about you coming on the call before is this is Inspired Men Talk, and it's about people who have been there, done that, really found it difficult, and then got back up and worked out for it.
GaryJohannes:So we can show other people that Yeah. Everything's a chapter. We can move through it. So you've talked about what the card's seen. What have you seen?
GaryJohannes:Well In your story? Well because everything sounds lovely.
John Hirniak:You're We've gone through my life and what what's gone, and it's all great. And I'm I'm extremely grateful for my life and what's happened to me, the good and the bad. But it you know, it got to one point, yeah, where I think it was the recession of about fifteen years ago. Would it be fifteen? Yeah, about fifteen years ago.
John Hirniak:And yeah, it suddenly all started going wrong. When I look back now, almost like a perfect storm. Obviously, we've got the recession. My wife's salon was flooded. So we got two foot of sewage there, wading through it.
John Hirniak:It's insured, but as the business closed down and takes a lot of effort, we've got the second child on the way, which as people who've got children, you know, one child's part time parenting. Once you have two, it's full on. And takes a lot of pressure. We'd just moved to a new house. There was a lot of faults with it.
John Hirniak:We were taking the builders to court. So we're in a court battle with them. We've got a flooded salon. We got a new baby in the house. In the office next door to my car yard, my father-in-law had his business there and my brother-in-law worked it, and he was diagnosed with terminal cancer.
John Hirniak:So along with the family, but always there on a daily basis with him, I'm sort of mentoring him through that, which is quite difficult for me and the whole family. Yeah. Lot lots going on. And just when I needed to focus on my business, yeah, we got Tim, we got Fleeted Salon, a new baby, Charles Church Court. Yeah, the whole lot.
John Hirniak:And slowly, my money was dwindling until I was down to a £20,000 overdraft. No money. And I'm fucked. It's all over. I just could not see how I'm gonna pull this around.
John Hirniak:Yeah. Quite scary. And then you soon get into that dark space where you're overthinking, you're overwhelmed. Every move you make, you're overthinking. Because you're scared of making a mistake now.
John Hirniak:When you've got a bit of money behind you, you can afford to make a mistake. It's not the end of the world. But when every penny counts now, you're overthinking. The anxiety's gone through the roof. You're not sleeping.
John Hirniak:You wake up at three in the morning, covered in sweat, can't breathe. Not quite I didn't quite have a panic attack, but it almost felt right at that brink where I'm struggling to breathe. Sweat's pouring out of me. I'm getting up. And then I switched to having a few drinks.
John Hirniak:I'd get up at three in the morning, have a couple of drinks, calm nerves, which had a great thing. Then that becomes a habit. So, yeah, great place to be in.
Peter Ely:Yeah. I, thank you for sharing. First of all, thank you for sharing that. That does sound like the perfect storm.
