About Joel Gaslin

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Content about Joel Gaslin - Personal

Learning about Joel Gaslin is easy. The content on this page will help you get to know about what makes me tick and the people who fill me with joy.

Why Create a Page About Joel Gaslin?

Good question. It feels awkward writing this because I don’t like to make the focus of my work about me. Helping others improve is my “why.”

My hope in creating this content is that you might read something here and think, “He’s a person like me, and if he can do it, so can I.” 

Also, I am grateful if you notice that I am blessed to have many wonderful people in my life. And they’re the focus of this page because writing about my personal connections to people important to me might make the about Joel Gaslin page interesting for you.

Growing Up

I was born in a small town in central Minnesota called, Little Falls. My Dad is a retired public school Superintendent and my Mom a nurse. I am grateful they’re both still healthy at 80 years old!

I have an older brother, Marty, who is a long-time high school math teacher in St. Paul. Marty is married to Tawni for more than 30 years and has two kids, Marty Jr. and Margaret

My sister Patty, is 14 years younger than me and is a successful Entrepreneur working to empower people with at-home medical testing and digital platforms. Patty is married to Andy, they have three kids, Will, Topher, Lilly, and they live in Fargo, North Dakota.

My Family - About Joel Gaslin

Soon my wife Jean and I will celebrate being married for 31 years. February 9th to be exact. We met in high school, went to the University of Minnesota together, got married, have four wonderful grown kids, moved around the country for work a bunch of times, and she hasn’t kicked me to the curb yet.  Whew, am I grateful for that!

You can read about my work here. This is what the members of our family are up to:

Jean

Jean works at Central Middle School in our town, Eden Prairie, Minnesota. She works in the Planning Room where kids who struggle go to plan for success. She does a great job with this and loves doing it.

Walking with friends around the lake behind our house is always high on Jean’s list. During the summer when she’s off school, Jean leads a walking club each morning and has lots of fun with that.

Tending to her garden at the Eden Prairie Senior Center with her sister Denise is another of Jean's favorite pastimes. And we all get to enjoy the harvest from their labor all summer long with tasty radishes, beans, artichokes, and lots of other veggies.

Together, Jean and I like to cook, travel when we can, hike, and most of all spend time with our kids and their expanding families.

Grace

Grace works at Minnesota-based Target Corporation in Marketing. She’s doing great there, loves the culture of Target, lives in downtown Minneapolis, enjoys cooking, comes out to see us often and is always pleasant to be around. 

Also, Grace is wired like me, so she gets up early and likes to read daily motivations/devotions. As a result, we have some fun early morning text message exchanges. 

Anne

Anne works at a software company called Helpsystems here in Eden Prairie. She leads the sales development efforts for the company and has teams in the US, the UK, Australia, and Argentina. The COVID-19 pandemic scuttled a planned ExPat arrangement she was planning last July, so Anne’s been living with us for almost a year now and it’s been wonderful to have her around again.

Anne is very much a combo of Jean’s and my personalities. It’s fun to see from close up all of the success she’s having at work. Since she’s worked from home since the pandemic began, we see how hard she works.

Anne, Jean, and I have a running text communication group called, “Roomies.” It’s fun and how we keep track of what’s happening. Mostly, we use it to plan food because we all like to cook and eat.

Mike

Mike also works at Helpsystems. He works in sales and is doing great, too. Mike especially likes it when people at the company ask if Anne is his wife? 

Mike lives in St. Louis Park, Minnesota with his long-time girlfriend, Meredith Cannon, and their Australian Shepherd dog, Pepper. Normally, we see them a lot, but the work-from-home situation gave them the flexibility to work and live in Naples, Florida with Meredith’s parents the winter. 

We miss them but can’t blame them for their choice. Hmmm, live on the beach or slog through a Minnesota winter?

Ben

Our baby, Ben, works at New Wave Enviro in Aurora Colorado as a Marketing Representative. He’s doing great there and is enjoying his work and living the Colorado lifestyle.

The highlight of 2020 for us was Ben marrying his longtime girlfriend, Celine Harmon, over Labor Day weekend. Because of the pandemic, it was a parents only ceremony that he and Celine arranged to happen in a beautiful park setting in Denver. 

Jean and I are grateful to welcome Celine and her family into ours. We look forward to the days ahead when we are free to see each other more often and are hoping for a celebration of their marriage here in Minnesota in the Fall of 2021.

About Joel Gaslin - Friends and Hobbies

Friends

Mostly because of Jean, we gifted with lots of friends. Some local and others from places we’ve lived over the years.

We spend a lot of time with two other couples and we call ourselves “Team Social.” We love trying new restaurants, cooking for each other, traveling together, and just being together.

Team Social is Jean and me, Chris and Kim Heim, and Dave and Shelley Hawkins. For you Minnesotans, you might appreciate the banter we have a back-and-forth with Chris being a Tommie, Dave a Johnnie, and me a Gopher. 

Hobbies

I have a section on this site about cooking because that’s my primary hobby. Jean likes to tease me about how I like to make putzy, complicated recipes and test them out on our friends. She’s right. And sometimes they work and other times they don’t. A lot like life and business, eh?

Oh, and we love Food Trucks! We even had one at our house in a blizzard right before Christmas.

We used to play a lot of golf, but don’t do that much anymore. We like to hike, I run a lot and enjoy learning about all things related to marketing, selling, and strategy.

I serve on two volunteer boards: St. Hubert Catholic Community and The Franciscan Retreats and Spirituality Center. It’s not super easy being Catholic these days, and I am humbled to be a part of these wonderful organizations where I witness the grace of God on a regular basis.

Perhaps my favorite way to spend time is reading. If you look through this blog, on all pages and posts I link to books that I am ready or found interesting to read. Sure, they’re Affiliate Links, but what’s wrong with trying to make a buck or two? Haha!

If you want an interesting and timely read now, try “Work Disrupted” by Jeff Schwartz. It’s a great book about the future of work written by a really smart guy.

In Conclusion

Thanks for getting this far in reading my About Joel Gaslin page. A life-long struggle for me is pride. So please know that I write this page as a way to show that I am a real person, creating content based on experience, and wanting to help people build their confidence in marketing and selling their products.

If we’re connected in any way, please leave a comment below and tell me what you’re up to. And then let’s connect for a virtual cup of coffee or whatever.

Musings of a year of Content Marketing, Podcasting and Growth – Goodbye 2017 and Hello 2018!

By Joel Gaslin | January 7, 2018 |

Creating a 2017 review of content marketing and 2018 aspirations story is difficult and risky. It’s difficult because a look back at what happened with content marketing over any period can be frustrating, exciting, and excruciating all at the same time. Risky because as Zig Ziglar once wrote, “If it’s a give-up goal, tell everyone.…

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She said, "I will."  Again.

By Joel Gaslin | October 25, 2015 |

Yesterday,  Jean LeClaire said, “I will,” when asked by Father Rolf Tollefson if she will love me and honor me all the days of her life.  On February 9, 1990 she said words similar to these but instead to The Honorable Patrick Burke during his lunch break at the Hennepin County courthouse. I remember that…

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Par 4.5 – A Good Goal

By Joel Gaslin | September 5, 2015 |

The seventh hole at Bearpath Golf and Country Club is a 380-yard par 4, is the number one handicap on the course and a goal of making par is aggressive for a [player of my ability. The hole features a dogleg and a towering grove of trees on the right side of the fairway. Also,…

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An Amazingly Small World….

By Joel Gaslin | March 30, 2015 |

According to Worldometer, there are about 7.3 billion people in the world today. Bangkok, Thailand is the 15th largest city in the world with about 14.3 million people. Even with this data, it’s humbling to me how small the world may be at times. My daughter, Anne Gaslin, is away for this year teaching fourth…

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A New Homonym for Parents – Text + Lecture = Texture

By Joel Gaslin | January 21, 2015 |

As a father of four, mostly grown, kids I communicate with them often by text message. I have come to learn that sometimes the only chance that I have to offer a suggestion about a situation is through text message. I now call this “Texture,” and what I mean is a short lecture via text.…

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2015 – A Year to Remember!

By Joel Gaslin | January 1, 2015 |

Last night, my wife Jean and I celebrated a nice, simple New Year’s Eve with Jean’s sister, Denise. Jean made a wonderful salmon and beet salad that was a thoughtful diversion from the heavy, butter laden dishes consumed on New Year’s Eve’s of the past. Going around the table, we each talked about some things…

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Does How We Think Determine Where We Go?

By Joel Gaslin | December 14, 2014 |

When I set-off for college at the University of Minnesota in the Fall of 1984, my dad said to me, “You may major in whatever you want to as long as it is math or science.” I asked him, “Why math or science?” He replied, “Those subjects teach you how to think.” Unusual as it…

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Missing a Friend…Father Howard Hansen.

By Joel Gaslin | November 30, 2014 |

Father Howard Hansen entered my life on Holy Thursday, April 17, 2003. At the time, I was not ready to meet him or understand the impact that he would later have on me. Fr. Howard died on Palm Sunday, April 17, 2011. I attended the Franciscan Retreat Center’s Men’s Holy Week Retreat for the first…

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My First Published Article – Success.com

By Joel Gaslin | November 11, 2014 |

What’s the difference between bragging about something that you’ve accomplished and just being happy about something and wanting to share it? I’m not exactly sure of the answer to that question and do know that I reached one of my goals that I set for myself in 2014. I always write my goals at the…

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Connections That Have Stood the Test of Time

By Joel Gaslin | November 6, 2014 |

I graduated from Mayo High School in Rochester, Minnesota in June of 1984. The three guys with me above were my friends from grade school and we share many great memories together and still stay in touch via text, Facebook and occasional personal visits. In the photo above from left to right they are: Me,…

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