Speaker 1: I've got our team. I hope you bloody terrific Happy Monday. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're listening to this the day that
Speaker 1: it comes out, happy Monday. But whatever day, it is,
Speaker 1: happy that day for you. So we had a little
Speaker 1: problem with today's episode. Something that was planned fell through.
Speaker 1: But that happens, and that's okay. But in the spirit
Speaker 1: of making this a seven day a week for as
Speaker 1: long as humanly possible affair out Comma, I've decided to
Speaker 1: resurrect revisit this particular episode that I recorded quite a
Speaker 1: while ago. This is a freestyle me thinking out Loud.
Speaker 1: It's a solo. Of all the episodes that we've done
Speaker 1: heading towards two thousand, this has been the most talked about,
Speaker 1: the most shared and re shared, the most popular episode
Speaker 1: that I've ever done. I'm not sure why. I just
Speaker 1: think it, you know, for whatever reason, the ideas, the concepts,
Speaker 1: the energy, I don't know. The mood I was in
Speaker 1: on the day seemed to really resonate with people, and
Speaker 1: it seemed for many people to be relatively inspiring and
Speaker 1: motivating their words, not mine, which is very nice of course. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So we'll be back with normal scheduling Tomorrow. We'll be
Speaker 1: back tomorrow as normal on the U Project, but for today,
Speaker 1: let's revisit a little bit of a blast from the past.
Speaker 1: I hope this finds you well. Enjoy it all right.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the propensity that we have
Speaker 1: to give up to stop, to throw in the towel,
Speaker 1: to make excuses to rationalize not doing it anymore. And so,
Speaker 1: as you would have seen, I'm calling this podcast Becoming
Speaker 1: ungive Upable, which is a ridiculous title, but it made
Speaker 1: me laugh when I thought of that word unngive upable,
Speaker 1: because I would like to be ungive upable. I don't
Speaker 1: think I am that, but I think I'm working towards it,
Speaker 1: and I don't know that it depends what you call
Speaker 1: giving up too. I'm not talking about sometimes we just
Speaker 1: decide to not do something because that's strategically necessary or
Speaker 1: medically necessary or practically necessary. I'm not talking about that.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about I'm talking today about the things that
Speaker 1: we just throw the towel in on that we know
Speaker 1: that we shouldn't, the things that we rationalize when we
Speaker 1: know our rationale is actually bullshit, and the times when
Speaker 1: and again there's no I don't mean to be any
Speaker 1: judgment in this, just acknowledgment because I have done Not
Speaker 1: only have I done this, I've done it many, many,
Speaker 1: many times. So I'm speaking from personal experience that is
Speaker 1: me doing it, and also personal experience working with tens
Speaker 1: of thousands of people for decades who have also struggled
Speaker 1: with this idea of maintaining the behavior, doing the thing,
Speaker 1: doing the work, creating new have it's creating a new
Speaker 1: operating system, creating a new behavioral default setting, a new eating,
Speaker 1: default setting, exercise, default setting, work, default setting, relationship to
Speaker 1: fault setting, whatever it is, so that that thing that
Speaker 1: we used to do when we were temporarily motivated becomes
Speaker 1: the thing that we do all the time now because
Speaker 1: we've created a new blueprint. We've created a new system,
Speaker 1: a subconscious, conscious, behavioral, and practical operating system that aligns
Speaker 1: with our goals and our purpose and our values. And
Speaker 1: so what we know is what we know is and
Speaker 1: I've mentioned this a few times over the years, that
Speaker 1: gym owners can sell or gyms can sell more memberships
Speaker 1: than the gym can accommodate because they know that people
Speaker 1: won't come, They know that people will make decisions that
Speaker 1: they don't follow through on. They know that people will
Speaker 1: come in the door, or they'll hand over their money,
Speaker 1: they'll sign up for a year or two years, or
Speaker 1: they'll sign up on a direct debit, weekly, monthly, whatever
Speaker 1: it is, and more than likely they will not use
Speaker 1: that gym or those resources, or that membership the way
Speaker 1: that they intended to on day one. More people won't
Speaker 1: do it than will. So the gym that I currently
Speaker 1: train at has I think it's around fifteen or sixteen
Speaker 1: hundred members. I don't have data on how many go
Speaker 1: or don't go, but I go at all times of
Speaker 1: the day, and I can tell you I see a
Speaker 1: lot of the same people there, and I'm there seven
Speaker 1: days a week, and it's not often see I mean
Speaker 1: I see new people. Yeah, But you would think that
Speaker 1: if all of those fifteen or sixteen hundred people were training,
Speaker 1: that I would see just constantly different people than I don't. So,
Speaker 1: you know, the best guess is that they're or my
Speaker 1: best guess is that there are somewhere around fifteen to
Speaker 1: twenty percent of people who train who are current members,
Speaker 1: who train consistently and well and do what they intended
Speaker 1: to do. There's and again this is bro science. This
Speaker 1: is from forty years of working in gyms and watching
Speaker 1: There's maybe another twenty percent who are somewhat spasmodic. There's
Speaker 1: maybe another twenty percent who go every now and then,
Speaker 1: and then there's forty percent who are current members who
Speaker 1: pretty much never go. And so now that's not the
Speaker 1: fold of the gym. That's just a reflection on or
Speaker 1: a commentary on our ability to do the thing that
Speaker 1: we set out to do. Yeah, so I have a
Speaker 1: few questions. I want to go through some general stuff,
Speaker 1: some practical stuff, some cognitive stuff, and I want to
Speaker 1: ask a few questions. And I guess the reason that
Speaker 1: I'm very passionate about this is because as a coach,
Speaker 1: personal trainer, exercise scientist, you know, high performance speaker, blah blah,
Speaker 1: all the shit that I do. Not an expert though,
Speaker 1: by the way, not an expert, but just a bloke
Speaker 1: who's spend a lot of time talking to people about change.
Speaker 1: Like literally, you think about my job when I go
Speaker 1: into work with a company at one thousand people or
Speaker 1: ten people, we're talking about change, that is, how do
Speaker 1: we think better, do, better connect, better perform, better serve
Speaker 1: our clients? Better, create a better culture. How do we
Speaker 1: do better? Better equals change? Positive change. When someone comes
Speaker 1: to my workshop or a seminar, they're not there because
Speaker 1: they want no results or no change or no difference.
Speaker 1: They're there because they want to change. There's something about
Speaker 1: the way they think or do life, or behave, or
Speaker 1: interact or communicate or experience the world around them that
Speaker 1: they want to change. When someone joins a gym, it's
Speaker 1: the same. When someone sees a dietitian. It's the same.
Speaker 1: When someone jumps into my mentoring group on Monday nights.
Speaker 1: As you know, we're nearly finished our twelve week program.
Speaker 1: It's the same. When someone buys one of my books,
Speaker 1: it's because they want to learn, or they want to evolve,
Speaker 1: or they want to be prompted or motivated, or they
Speaker 1: want to be informed. Because why because something's not working?
Speaker 1: Why do people listen to this podcast? Well, for a
Speaker 1: range of reasons, but one of the dominant reasons is
Speaker 1: because there's shit I want to learn and understand and know.
Speaker 1: Because there's stuff about me or my body, or my thinking,
Speaker 1: or my habits or my life, or my behavior or
Speaker 1: my outcomes or my relationships or my self talk all
Speaker 1: my stories. There's something that I need to change. I
Speaker 1: know I need to change, but by the way, I've
Speaker 1: known that I've needed to change it for ten years
Speaker 1: and I haven't. So that's the conversation. The conversation is
Speaker 1: why not? How do I become the person that makes decision,
Speaker 1: the decision that creates, the plan that implements, the plan
Speaker 1: that does the work, that adapts to the bullshit, that
Speaker 1: works around the messiness of life and the messiness of people,
Speaker 1: and the messiness and uncertainty and unpredictability of things, events, happenings.
Speaker 1: How do I be that person that, in the middle
Speaker 1: of all of those uncontrollables and variables, me the controllable.
Speaker 1: I can control me. I can control my behavior and
Speaker 1: to an extent, my thoughts and my choices and my reactions.
Speaker 1: How do I be the person that doesn't keep giving up?
Speaker 1: And why am I not that person already? Do I
Speaker 1: have a history of stopping and starting? This is a
Speaker 1: question for you, the listener. Do you have a history? Again?
Speaker 1: This is not about beating yourself up. This is just
Speaker 1: about being honest. This is about being aware, This is
Speaker 1: about going You know what I do? I keep stopping
Speaker 1: and starting. I'm going to go welcome to a really
Speaker 1: big club. That's okay. You're not bad, you're not broken,
Speaker 1: you're not weird, You're human. Me too. I've spent a
Speaker 1: lot of my life starting and stopping things that I
Speaker 1: shouldn't have stopped. I should have just maintained. But did
Speaker 1: I know? Am I broken and weird? No? I'm just
Speaker 1: like you. We're the same. So the question is not
Speaker 1: what's wrong with me? The question is what is it
Speaker 1: that that precipitates this falling off the horse all the time?
Speaker 1: Or off the wagon, the metaphoric wagon that doesn't exist?
Speaker 1: What is that? So do I have a history of
Speaker 1: stopping and starting? And what's really what's really stopped me? Like?
Speaker 1: Why do I really give up? And if we're being
Speaker 1: really honest, okay, I'll be really honest. Why have I
Speaker 1: stopped in the past? Well, the main reason is it's
Speaker 1: hard the end and it's hard. It's uncomfortable. Sometimes, it's impractical,
Speaker 1: it's unfamiliar, it doesn't in the moment, it doesn't suit
Speaker 1: me in the moment. You know what I want in
Speaker 1: the moment. I want fucking cake, That's why. And I
Speaker 1: know that in the moment I can gratify myself. I
Speaker 1: can self gratify with cake. I can self gratify with chocolate,
Speaker 1: milk and ice cream mixed in the blender. I can
Speaker 1: self gratify with a hamburger with fucking white bread, sandwiches
Speaker 1: with potato cakes and salt and pepper and cheese and sauce.
Speaker 1: Oh fuck, I'm getting myself into a state as I speak,
Speaker 1: come on, right, and I know that I can eat.
Speaker 1: You know, I just talk about food because that's my issue,
Speaker 1: not drugs, not booze. But for me, that's been my issue.
Speaker 1: Why did I do it? Well, I did it. I
Speaker 1: did it because it made me momentarily feel fucking amazing.
Speaker 1: And so the biggest challenge for me, and dare I say,
Speaker 1: the biggest challenge for many of you moving forward, brothers
Speaker 1: and sisters, is our ability, Oh come on, our ability
Speaker 1: to gratification, Our ability in the middle of that shit,
Speaker 1: in the middle of that moment of fuck will I
Speaker 1: won't I in the middle of that moment of temptation,
Speaker 1: and that fucking no one's looking, no one will know
Speaker 1: I deserve this. Like what we do is we have
Speaker 1: this inner war where that we start to tell ourself
Speaker 1: a story that we know is bullshit, and we start
Speaker 1: to rationalize it. And usually the antidote or the justification is,
Speaker 1: it's all right, it's just now. It's all right, I'll
Speaker 1: go for a run later, or I'll start again tomorrow.
Speaker 1: I'll be back on track tomorrow, and then it's July.
Speaker 1: This is what we do. And the reason the reasons
Speaker 1: that we do that are many. One of them is
Speaker 1: that we are, in many ways hardwired for pleasure. We are,
Speaker 1: and we are hardwired for instant gratification, and of course,
Speaker 1: as do I, we just love feeling fucking great. But
Speaker 1: the problem is that that feeling buck and great is
Speaker 1: very short lived. Nobody who is out of shape or overweight,
Speaker 1: or over fat or unhealthy, and I mean all of
Speaker 1: these things with respect, because I have been all of those.
Speaker 1: Nobody nobody goes and over indulges and then two hours
Speaker 1: later feels great. Nobody, everybody either physically or emotionally or
Speaker 1: psychologically or all of those, when they've just gone and
Speaker 1: overeaten and eating a whole lot of food that their
Speaker 1: body doesn't need, whether they've got this inner battle going
Speaker 1: on because they simultaneously want to feel great in the moment,
Speaker 1: but they also want to change their body over time.
Speaker 1: Nobody feels great about that, and this is our challenge.
Speaker 1: Our challenge is that well, one of the big challenges
Speaker 1: with this is that the journey that we need to take.
Speaker 1: This is why we talk about the narrow path, because
Speaker 1: very few people take this journey, and this journey is
Speaker 1: the I am not going to do that thing that
Speaker 1: makes me feel momentarily good. But also what's not going
Speaker 1: to happen is today I'm not going to change significantly.
Speaker 1: I'm going to avoid the cake or I'm going to
Speaker 1: avoid the chips and the potato cake sandwich. But I'm
Speaker 1: not going to necessarily lose weight today. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to wake up tomorrow and be ten kilos better off.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to wake up tomorrow with abs because
Speaker 1: my journey is maybe a three, six or twelve month
Speaker 1: journey to get to the place where I feel and
Speaker 1: look and function the way that I want. So what
Speaker 1: I'll do is I'll just eat this shit right now
Speaker 1: and I'll start tomorrow, and that dialogue will I will
Speaker 1: eat this shit and start tomorrow. That becomes a record
Speaker 1: in our brain that plays on repeat for fucking decades,
Speaker 1: and some of you. I'm talking right to you. I'm
Speaker 1: saying you need to take that record off that turntable,
Speaker 1: smash it in a million pieces, and create a new
Speaker 1: operating system. Also, we need to get to the point
Speaker 1: where we stop looking for something or someone or some
Speaker 1: pill or some program or some potion or some fucking
Speaker 1: scientific breakthrough to do the work, to do the work,
Speaker 1: because not only does doing the work ourselves create the
Speaker 1: outcome that we want, the physical outcome, right, not only
Speaker 1: does it create the outcome, but what it does it
Speaker 1: also changes who we are and how we think, and
Speaker 1: how we operate and how we do life. Because when
Speaker 1: you finally get to the point where you go from
Speaker 1: being the person who's going around and round and round
Speaker 1: in this kind of groundhog day existence of starting and
Speaker 1: stopping and losing a bit and gaining a bit, or
Speaker 1: giving up cigarettes and taking them up or whatever. The
Speaker 1: doesn't need to be anything about food or dope or
Speaker 1: cigarettes or whose It could be some other destructive habit, right,
Speaker 1: But when we keep going around and round and round
Speaker 1: in circles, we just build an existence for ourselves that's
Speaker 1: almost impossible to get out of. And time stands still,
Speaker 1: you know, And at the same time, it flies and
Speaker 1: we kind of lose perspective. And so for us, it's
Speaker 1: really necessary to go. The answer is me, there is
Speaker 1: no shortcut or hack or quick fix not to create
Speaker 1: lasting change. And we are we are challenged because all
Speaker 1: around us, you know, there would be many businesses, many businesses,
Speaker 1: many products, many services, many people that would be out
Speaker 1: of business. If everyone in Australia and around the world
Speaker 1: stopped buying quick fix type services, a lot of businesses
Speaker 1: would go broke tomorrow. Right if everyone stopped buying the shortcut,
Speaker 1: the fat burner, that, the eight weeks of this, the
Speaker 1: four days of that, the hack. This like, if everyone
Speaker 1: just went, well, I've done. Let me see, I've tried
Speaker 1: thirty seven different shortcuts, and here I am worse than
Speaker 1: when I started, worse, not even in the same place.
Speaker 1: I'm worse. So, after you do thirty seven shortcuts or
Speaker 1: thirty seven miracle cures or pills, or you listen to
Speaker 1: thirty seven gurus who will tell you how to get
Speaker 1: the result without doing the work right, at some stage,
Speaker 1: hopefully you get to the point where you go, oh,
Speaker 1: they don't actually care about me. They just want my money.
Speaker 1: And also not only don't they care about me, they
Speaker 1: don't actually know me. And this is why sometimes I
Speaker 1: polarize people for a range of reasons, because I say
Speaker 1: fuck a million times. Probably that's part of it. Ah,
Speaker 1: get over it, though. But the other part is because
Speaker 1: my message is not sexy, yep. My message is not
Speaker 1: feel good. My message is not oh yeah, you can
Speaker 1: do anything. You can't fucking do anything. You can't. You
Speaker 1: can't run one hundred meters in nine seconds. You can't
Speaker 1: get up on the roof of the house and fly
Speaker 1: to the house next door. You fucking can't. We can't
Speaker 1: all become prime minister. We can't all be elite athletes.
Speaker 1: We can't all be world famous singers. We can't for
Speaker 1: a range of reasons. That's not negative, that's just fucking real.
Speaker 1: But however, asterisk, we most of us can do a
Speaker 1: lot more than we're currently doing. And so, you know,
Speaker 1: I think we need to step out of the you know.
Speaker 2: The the self help bullshit and into the practical reality
Speaker 2: of Okay, I'm a grown ass man.
Speaker 1: I'm a grown ass woman. I have if I'm being honest,
Speaker 1: you know, I've been going around in circles with the
Speaker 1: same issue for a very long time, and I've asked
Speaker 1: a thousand people a thousand questions, and I've read this,
Speaker 1: and I've done that, and I've tried this, and I
Speaker 1: tried that. But nonetheless, here I am, and I'm still
Speaker 1: doing the same thing that doesn't work. I'm still choosing
Speaker 1: to do things. I am still consciously choosing to do
Speaker 1: things which self sabotage my own goals. I am not
Speaker 1: accidentally eating shit. I am choosing it. And the reason
Speaker 1: that I'm choosing it is because I'm not fully committed
Speaker 1: to the process of changing my life, habits, behaviors, out come.
Speaker 1: Because being fully committed, Like, why do people commit to
Speaker 1: twelve eight and ten week programs, Well, because they're twelve
Speaker 1: eight and ten weeks long, that's why. Because it's short term,
Speaker 1: because it's temporary, because I can stop, right, But why
Speaker 1: don't people do forty year programs? What? What? What? Because
Speaker 1: on a subconscious level, we want to get out of
Speaker 1: jail card. We like the idea of looking permanently amazing
Speaker 1: and having a permanently I'm talking about, you know, for
Speaker 1: our potential. I'm not talking about instant model. I'm talking
Speaker 1: about whoever you are, wherever you are, what you know
Speaker 1: what eight or nine or ten out of ten out
Speaker 1: of ten is for you, not compared to anyone. But
Speaker 1: when we go okay, everyone put up your hand. If
Speaker 1: you want permanent positive change, that is, you want to
Speaker 1: look feel function good forever. Everyone puts up their hand.
Speaker 1: Now put up your hand. If you're all going to
Speaker 1: do the work required forever, the hands stay down. Why ah, well, ah,
Speaker 1: because you've got to have a life. Oh yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Oh, there's my guy. You've got to have
Speaker 1: a life. Okay, you've got to have a life. Let's
Speaker 1: explore that. What does that mean? So does that mean
Speaker 1: if you're not eating shit or getting pissed or falling
Speaker 1: down or doing dumb things that are inconsistent with your
Speaker 1: values of goals? Does that mean you're not living your
Speaker 1: best life or you're not having a life. Oh no, no,
Speaker 1: but that's you said to me, you've got to have
Speaker 1: a life. So what does having a life mean? I
Speaker 1: would suggest that having a life means walking around in
Speaker 1: your best body, with your best health, your best mindset,
Speaker 1: doing your best job, being in your best relationship, having
Speaker 1: the best lifestyle. That doesn't mean it's all going to
Speaker 1: be perfect, of course, because nothing is perfect, and no
Speaker 1: one is perfect. But what's required for you to live
Speaker 1: more optimally or more ideally, or more congruently, or more
Speaker 1: authentically or more in alignment? You know, I believe that
Speaker 1: there needs to be a deep, deep, deep, deep internal revolution,
Speaker 1: not an external solution. A deep, deep internal revolution, not
Speaker 1: an external solution, because I have seen people with not
Speaker 1: much talent or potential or knowledge or resources or support.
Speaker 1: I have seen many people do fucking unbelievable things when
Speaker 1: they were one hundred percent committed to doing the work. Yep,
Speaker 1: you and I spoke with a lady yesterday who Marie who.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure the timeline of our episodes, but she'll
Speaker 1: either be up soon or she was on recently. By
Speaker 1: the time you guys hear this, I'd say she's probably
Speaker 1: been on recently. But she literally fell down a mountain
Speaker 1: four hundred and fifty meters and hit rocks all the
Speaker 1: way and was given no chance of survival. They basically
Speaker 1: went to retrieve her body. The rescue crew basically went
Speaker 1: just to collect a body. They got there and she
Speaker 1: wasn't dead obviously, and you know, I mean, she pretty
Speaker 1: much broke everything in her body, you know, fifteen, ribs broke,
Speaker 1: her spine, broke her neck, broke her pelvis, broke her foot,
Speaker 1: had her kidney, her liver, her lungs shut down. She
Speaker 1: was on eventilator, she was in a coma for a
Speaker 1: month and a half. She was good, you know. And
Speaker 1: now here's the thing. What's that skull? That's right skull?
Speaker 1: She had an internal brain hemorrhage and external brain hemorrhage,
Speaker 1: a form of a stroke. And here's the thing, right,
Speaker 1: And we spoke to her as we're recording this, We
Speaker 1: spoke to her yesterday. And what this woman, what this
Speaker 1: fucking incredible, amazing, inspiring woman has been able to do
Speaker 1: because she has just tapped into this fucking reservoir of
Speaker 1: possibilities and potential that most of us don't tap into.
Speaker 1: She is not gifted, she said it. She's not genetically gifted.
Speaker 1: She's not. There's nothing special in inverted Commas about her
Speaker 1: other than her thinking and her behaving, and all of
Speaker 1: that is optional. Now. I know this sounds melodramatic, but
Speaker 1: when I talk to people and they start to complain
Speaker 1: about how hard their life is, I want them to
Speaker 1: sit down with Marie and you can go, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's all relative. Maybe maybe, but guess what we're
Speaker 1: all Where does our relative Where does our reality come from.
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about our situation, circumstance, environment, I'm not
Speaker 1: talking about our external world. I'm talking about our internal reality.
Speaker 1: It comes largely from our stories. And if our story
Speaker 1: is I deserve this piece of cake or whatever. And
Speaker 1: by the way, I'm not anti cake or pizza. I'm
Speaker 1: not saying, whatever your issue is, you need to apply
Speaker 1: this principle or you don't need to do anything. But
Speaker 1: I'm talking about applying these ideas and principles to your challenge.
Speaker 1: It might have nothing to do with food or your body.
Speaker 1: It could be something else. But what I know, and
Speaker 1: I've seen it time and time again, like with Johnny
Speaker 1: that got blown up, with my old man that had
Speaker 1: a heart attack and died three times, like with Marie
Speaker 1: that fell down a mountain, that normal people can do
Speaker 1: fucking incredible things when they have a story in their
Speaker 1: mind that says, oh, this is not optional anymore. This
Speaker 1: is not something I'm going to do if I'm inspired
Speaker 1: or motivated. This is something that I'm going to do.
Speaker 1: That thing that I used to do, I don't do
Speaker 1: that anymore. I don't do that anymore. This is my
Speaker 1: new normal. This is not only is this my new normal.
Speaker 1: I don't have a choice. Now I can't do the
Speaker 1: things I used to do. I literally can't do the
Speaker 1: things I used to do. So now I have to
Speaker 1: adjust and adapt to build this new life. And what
Speaker 1: I have said many times is we see what happens
Speaker 1: when people are backed into a corner through medical reasons
Speaker 1: or some kind of life threatening experience or some kind
Speaker 1: of catastrophe. We see repeatedly who have not been able
Speaker 1: to do certain things turn their habits, thinking, life, and
Speaker 1: behaviors around almost in a day because they had an experience.
Speaker 1: So what that tells us is that ability was always there.
Speaker 1: What happened in the experience, Well, what happened was there
Speaker 1: was a complete shift in thinking. Because the mind is
Speaker 1: the driver. The mind is the driver. Somebody said to
Speaker 1: me yesterday, how are you going with your PhD? And
Speaker 1: I went, yeah, you know, it's it's it's work, you know,
Speaker 1: And they're like, do you regret starting it? I went no,
Speaker 1: and they went, is it as hard as you thought
Speaker 1: it would be? And I went harder And I thought
Speaker 1: it would be hard, and They're like if if you
Speaker 1: were going to start, like if you didn't have it
Speaker 1: and you got the would you if you started again, Like,
Speaker 1: would you do it again? I go one hundred percent yep,
Speaker 1: you know, And so like I I'm constantly learning new things,
Speaker 1: and I'm constantly and it's not even about my area
Speaker 1: of research that I'm learning so much. I'm learning, of
Speaker 1: course because I'm studying and I'm doing a literature review
Speaker 1: with lots of other kind of insecting psychological theories and
Speaker 1: constructs and how they interact or intersect or relate to
Speaker 1: my stuff. All that. All the psychology. That's cool, that's
Speaker 1: relatively interesting, sorry, relatively easy. It's very interesting. It's relatively easy.
Speaker 1: But what's hard for me is learning how to load
Speaker 1: one hundred surveys into qualtrics and learn all of these
Speaker 1: programs and all of this technology and learn how to
Speaker 1: do you know. It's it's the because I'm fifty seven
Speaker 1: and not twenty seven. It's all the technology and all
Speaker 1: the stuff that you know, Like even last time I
Speaker 1: studied university was twenty years ago, and that you know,
Speaker 1: there were still computers around, but it was still very
Speaker 1: I mean, we still literally had a library full of books.
Speaker 1: Where I am there's no library. There are no books.
Speaker 1: There's no physical library. There's not Oh, let's walk into
Speaker 1: the because nobody uses them. Not where I'm at anyway,
Speaker 1: not not at PhD level. It's all online academic journals.
Speaker 1: You know, it's different. But I think once you go,
Speaker 1: and by the way, could I fuck up and fail?
Speaker 1: I could? I hope I don't, but I'm practical. I go, Well,
Speaker 1: of course it's hard. It's a fucking PhD. Of course
Speaker 1: it's hard. Of Course you're tired. Of course it sucks.
Speaker 1: Of course, it's long hours. Of course, it's a massive commitment.
Speaker 1: You're not doing a fucking you know, you're not doing
Speaker 1: a four week tafe course in fucking cake making. God
Speaker 1: bless all the cake makers. You know. It's like, this
Speaker 1: is what you took on, you fucking idiot. So that's
Speaker 1: what's record why I don't complain. So I don't complain.
Speaker 1: I just but if someone says to me, is it hard,
Speaker 1: I'll tell them the truth. Yeah. Is it exhausting, yeap?
Speaker 1: You know, would you do it again? Yep? And you
Speaker 1: know why I do it again because one in a
Speaker 1: weird way, it is fun in a weird way. I
Speaker 1: kind of sometimes pain is fun, you know, but also
Speaker 1: what it's doing is it's I'm developing new skills, I'm
Speaker 1: learning a new language. I'm you know, it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: if you break your life into pretend your life as
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of rooms, you know, it's just your
Speaker 1: life is a composite of different rooms. And one room
Speaker 1: you go in and there's your family. There's your mum
Speaker 1: and dad, Melissa, and your sister and your brother in
Speaker 1: Laura and Hugo and what's her name, the little one,
Speaker 1: not Hugo, don't tell me, Olivia and Alexander. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: you know, that's one room. And then you go to
Speaker 1: another room and there's work, and then you go to
Speaker 1: another room. And you know, depending on where you're you
Speaker 1: kind of you have different levels of experience or different
Speaker 1: kinds of experience. So, for example, when I come into
Speaker 1: the podcast room, which is one of the rooms in
Speaker 1: the house, that is my life. You know, it's fun,
Speaker 1: it's enjoyable, there's a level of confidence and competence because
Speaker 1: I've done this many, many, many many times, and before that,
Speaker 1: I did a lot of radio, and so I come
Speaker 1: in here and as objective as I can be. I go,
Speaker 1: I'm not bad at this, I'm okay at this. This
Speaker 1: is what I do. But then I walk into the
Speaker 1: PhD room in my life and I'm like fucking l
Speaker 1: plates on and training wheels and falling down and getting
Speaker 1: up and bumping into things and asking dumb questions. But
Speaker 1: that's the room that I'm in when I'm doing academia.
Speaker 1: Then I go into the public speaking room that is
Speaker 1: part of my life. I go, I'm not bad here either.
Speaker 1: I've done this a lot. I'm okay, you know. Then
Speaker 1: I go into the you know, the Managing my body room,
Speaker 1: and you know bits of that. There are different cupboards
Speaker 1: in that room. There's the exercise cupboard, there's the food cupboard,
Speaker 1: there's the lifestyle cupboard. So even in that room, there
Speaker 1: are subrooms, you know. And this is the thing. Like
Speaker 1: what we do is we tend to stay in the
Speaker 1: rooms where we're most comfortable. What the byproduct of that
Speaker 1: is we don't grow. The byproduct of that is when
Speaker 1: we get forced into another room where fucked because we
Speaker 1: never leave our own room. We love being safe and
Speaker 1: comfortable and familiar and predictable, and we love but this
Speaker 1: is the thing, like when you are stepping out of
Speaker 1: back to our topic, when you are stepping out of
Speaker 1: a behavioral program that doesn't work, or a habit that
Speaker 1: doesn't work, or a lifestyle that doesn't work, or a
Speaker 1: situation that doesn't work, you're stepping into new territory, and
Speaker 1: part of your brain will fight that. Part of your
Speaker 1: brain will fight that because your brain's Fuck, we're not
Speaker 1: sure what's going on over here, so get fucked. Let's
Speaker 1: go back to the couch that we know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and also, all of a sudden, it's not as
Speaker 3: exciting as it seemed in your head when you were
Speaker 3: picturing it or thinking about it to begin with. In
Speaker 3: the reality of when you're trying to do whatever that
Speaker 3: task is and you're in today forty seven of an
Speaker 3: ongoing journey, it's nowhere near as fun.
Speaker 1: But it has to be done exactly. That's right then,
Speaker 1: And we've spoken many times about you know, the practical
Speaker 1: reality that motivation is temporary, and motivation is certainly valuable
Speaker 1: when it's there, but we know that some people stay
Speaker 1: motivated for three hours, some people three days, some three weeks,
Speaker 1: but nobody stays permanently motivated like in that state of
Speaker 1: motivat in that emotional that heightened emotional state of excitement anticipation.
Speaker 1: You know, nobody stays in that state permanently. People have
Speaker 1: peaks and troughs and good and bad days, and so
Speaker 1: we go, all right, well, let's acknowledge the impermanence of
Speaker 1: that state. Now, how do we create the permanence of
Speaker 1: this habit? How do I the dude who starts and
Speaker 1: stops and who is or has been dependent on motivation
Speaker 1: to get there? How do I become? How do I
Speaker 1: discard that addiction? How do I discard that dependence? So
Speaker 1: if it's there, I'll use it because it's a great tool.
Speaker 1: But when it's not there, so, you know, becoming ungive
Speaker 1: upable is about how do I keep doing what I
Speaker 1: need to do to live my purpose or my values
Speaker 1: or my goals, or to create my optimal outcomes, or
Speaker 1: to be aligned to who I say I want to become?
Speaker 1: How do I do that when I can't be fucked?
Speaker 1: How do I do that when everyone else would give?
Speaker 1: How do I do that when I would have given
Speaker 1: up in the past? How do I do that when
Speaker 1: I don't? In inverted commas want to in the moment,
Speaker 1: How do I do that? And this is why just
Speaker 1: trying a new program doesn't work, because it's about our
Speaker 1: default setting. It's about what's happening in us. You can
Speaker 1: do all the programs, and this is why some people
Speaker 1: get results on one program and other people don't get
Speaker 1: results on the same program, because if it was about
Speaker 1: the program, everyone would get the same outcome. It's about
Speaker 1: the individuals doing the program. You know. I I might
Speaker 1: have mentioned this once before, but I read something the
Speaker 1: other day and it's in one of the groups that
Speaker 1: or I need to not get myself in trouble. But anyway,
Speaker 1: I'll just say it. Someone posted I don't know if
Speaker 1: I said this to you might have been for I
Speaker 1: don't know. I can't remember all the shit I say,
Speaker 1: but anyway, it's worth repeating. So somebody was coming towards
Speaker 1: the end of their twelve weeks of Body Challenge program
Speaker 1: and they were doing their final photos and the caption
Speaker 1: was is it pizza o'clock yet? Oh? The caption wise,
Speaker 1: you know here in my final photos? Is it pizza
Speaker 1: o'clock yet? Right? So, and by the way, this person
Speaker 1: looked amazing. But isn't it funny that we do this
Speaker 1: temporary thing eighty four days, and we look different, and
Speaker 1: we change our eating and we change our exercise, and
Speaker 1: we change our regime and our operating system, and we change,
Speaker 1: you know, what we're doing day to day. But the
Speaker 1: one thing that this person posts about is going and
Speaker 1: eating junk food. Now, wow, now I'm puh right. And
Speaker 1: it's not about the pizza. It's about the thinking. It's
Speaker 1: about the why you rewarding yourself with food that you
Speaker 1: avoided for the last eighty four days. Now you avoided
Speaker 1: that food for a reason. The reason is you wanted
Speaker 1: to change your body and how you looked and felt
Speaker 1: and functioned. And you did, and now you look good
Speaker 1: and now you feel good, and now you're functioning well.
Speaker 1: And now you're rewarding yourself with that thing that is
Speaker 1: actually at odds with what you've been doing. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: and this thinking, this, I'm going to reward myself with
Speaker 1: shit that so fucking annoys me. If you want to
Speaker 1: eat shit, eat shit, but don't motivate yourself with an
Speaker 1: unhealthy goal or an unhealthy target, it makes no sense
Speaker 1: to me. But the problem is that we have a story,
Speaker 1: and the story is Yeah, but if I don't eat pizza,
Speaker 1: or if I don't eat cake, or if I don't
Speaker 1: drink boozel, then I'm missing out. Let me tell you pizza.
Speaker 1: By the way, can you have some pizza or booze
Speaker 1: or cake? Of course you can. I've never been against
Speaker 1: any of those things. When I talk about food, I'm
Speaker 1: always talking about the story, the story that we have
Speaker 1: about food, because the story opens the door on the problem.
Speaker 1: If the story is I'm rewarding myself with pizza because
Speaker 1: I haven't eaten pizza for eighty four days, that's a worry.
Speaker 1: Because if we said to that person who now looks
Speaker 1: amazing after eighty four days, would you like to look
Speaker 1: good for eighty four days or would you like to
Speaker 1: look good forever? They're going to say forever. Then I'm
Speaker 1: going to say, why are you opening the door on
Speaker 1: this thing that probably I don't know about this person,
Speaker 1: But most people who do these programs, including me, I
Speaker 1: don't do the programs, but I'm putting myself in this group.
Speaker 1: Most people have had or do have issues with food,
Speaker 1: issues with weight, issues with appearance, right, and we know
Speaker 1: that managing ourselves around food that's not ideal is part
Speaker 1: of the problem. Right, And this is why I love
Speaker 1: and hate twelve week, ten week, eight week programs. It's
Speaker 1: why I love and hate them. I love them because
Speaker 1: they can be the beginning of something. They can be
Speaker 1: the start of something amazing and transformative. And their structure
Speaker 1: and process and accountability, which are all good things. There's camaraderie,
Speaker 1: which is good, there's social connection, which is good. But
Speaker 1: there's also this subconscious knowing that, oh, I'm finished in
Speaker 1: three weeks, I'm finished in two weeks, I'm finished in
Speaker 1: a week, I'm finished today. Is it pizza o'clock now? Right?
Speaker 1: And this is just the reality. And this is the problem.
Speaker 1: This is the problem. That food is not the problem.
Speaker 1: Our weight is not the problem. What the number between
Speaker 1: our toes is not the problem. Our health state is
Speaker 1: not the problem. They are all just the consequences of
Speaker 1: the problem. The problem is that we don't fully commit.
Speaker 1: The problem is that we give up. Call it what
Speaker 1: you will, We give up, we stop, we throw in
Speaker 1: the towel again, I said earlier in the show, there's
Speaker 1: a time to stop. Oh you've got a medical issue,
Speaker 1: you've been advised not to, you're in pain. All good,
Speaker 1: They're not excuses and they're not giving up. They're legit reasons.
Speaker 1: Reasons are reasons, tick, but excuses are not reasons. Bullshit
Speaker 1: stories are not reasons. And when I get people tell me,
Speaker 1: I would say two in ten it's a legit reason.
Speaker 1: Eight in ten it's bullshit. Ye, or it's a version
Speaker 1: of bullshit. And I know because I'm the biggest bullshitter.
Speaker 1: I spent the vast majority of myself lying, of my
Speaker 1: time of my life lying lying, And so I'm being
Speaker 1: honest about my lying. Did I lie to myself? Yes?
Speaker 1: Did I lie to other people about my own habits
Speaker 1: and behaviors? One hundred percent? I did. And it takes
Speaker 1: courage to say that because it's embarrassing and it's humiliating.
Speaker 1: But you know what else it is. It's honest. It's honest.
Speaker 1: And I can get defensive and go, oh yeah, but
Speaker 1: you don't but fuck and you get fucked and you
Speaker 1: get rooted and you or I can go nah, there
Speaker 1: is I'm the problem. I'm the problem, not self loathing,
Speaker 1: just self awareness. I'm the problem. You know what? When
Speaker 1: I ate myself to one hundred and twenty kilos or
Speaker 1: thereabouts compared to my current eighty three nobody had a
Speaker 1: gun to my head. I was. I owned gyms when
Speaker 1: I was doing that. I was an exercise scientist, for
Speaker 1: God's sake, I was a personal trainer. I was a
Speaker 1: gym owner. I was educated, I was intelligent. I had resources,
Speaker 1: I had information, I had access to everything that I needed,
Speaker 1: and I ate my way to obesity. Nobody's faults but me, Oh,
Speaker 1: you shouldn't be hating yourself. I'm not fucking hating myself.
Speaker 1: I'm telling the truth, like just the truth. There's no
Speaker 1: self loathing, just self awareness. And this is the problem.
Speaker 1: We're so fucking precious that nobody wants to own up
Speaker 1: to anything because they feel like they're hating themselves or
Speaker 1: someone else is going to go TI, but you did
Speaker 1: your best, bullshit, You fucking didn't do your best, because
Speaker 1: your best is your best is a better outcome. I
Speaker 1: didn't do my best hardly ever, and you know this
Speaker 1: is the thing. Of course, there are going to be
Speaker 1: times when you know when you are trying and it's
Speaker 1: not working. Of course I'm not talking about that, but
Speaker 1: I'm just going we need to get to the point where,
Speaker 1: at some stage, and this is why I go around
Speaker 1: in circles and I go, hey, you go read whatever
Speaker 1: book you want, do whatever program you want, buy whatever pill,
Speaker 1: powder potion you want. Cool, and then in five years,
Speaker 1: when you're in the same place, come back to me
Speaker 1: and let's have a chat. And by the way, I'm
Speaker 1: not the answer. And by the way, my podcast is
Speaker 1: not the answer. And by the way, my programs and
Speaker 1: books they're not the answer. They're just resources. And anyone
Speaker 1: who tells you that you are not the answer to
Speaker 1: your own problems, they're scamming you. They want your money,
Speaker 1: they want your dough. I'm telling you you, your brain,
Speaker 1: your choices, your resilience, your mental toughness, your attitude, your
Speaker 1: decision making, that is the solution. That is the solution.
Speaker 1: You are the solution. And until you maybe hit rock bottom,
Speaker 1: which I hope you don't need to, maybe you're not
Speaker 1: going to change. I'm telling you a lot of people
Speaker 1: don't change till they hit rock bottom. The other thing
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you is you don't need to
Speaker 1: hit rock bottom. So, folks, I love you. I'm on
Speaker 1: your team. I know I'm a hard ass. Sometimes I'm honest,
Speaker 1: and I'm you know, by the way, off and wrong,
Speaker 1: I'm off and wrong. Could I be wrong about this
Speaker 1: or some of this? Maybe, probably, But what I do
Speaker 1: know is that I've been in this space helping people change,
Speaker 1: working with bodies, bums, legs, mines, carbs, fat, protein, micros, macros, thinking, beliefs, values, attitudes, emotions, psychology.
Speaker 1: I've been working in this space for a very long
Speaker 1: time with thousands of people, and a common observation and
Speaker 1: a common experience of mine, is people who don't think
Speaker 1: enough of themselves, who don't believe in themselves, who are
Speaker 1: always looking for some external antidote. And it's just sometimes
Speaker 1: it's just our willingness to say, you know what, I've
Speaker 1: never really really consistently done the work, and I'm going
Speaker 1: to do it and i know it won't be fun,
Speaker 1: and I'm okay with that, and I'm sick and tired
Speaker 1: of being that person who's I'm just done want to
Speaker 1: be that. And it's not about having some big cathartic
Speaker 1: breakthrough or moments or revelation from on Hey, brothers, sisters,
Speaker 1: But it's just about you know, going, yeah, I'm I
Speaker 1: hear your harps, I know what you're saying, you know,
Speaker 1: and the and if your next question is yeah, but
Speaker 1: how do I Well, my question to you is why
Speaker 1: won't you? Because you know how, how how how you
Speaker 1: change your life is you get up tomorrow and you
Speaker 1: don't do the same thing that you did today. That's
Speaker 1: how you don't eat the way that you ate today.
Speaker 1: You don't move the way that you ate today. You
Speaker 1: don't you don't talk, you don't choose the way that
Speaker 1: you did today. If those things are relevant for you,
Speaker 1: we literally just start doing what is uncomfortable. That is
Speaker 1: generally step one. What's uncomfortable, Well, what's uncomfortable is stopping
Speaker 1: these ten things that I need to stop. Okay, stop
Speaker 1: or stop one and build on it, stop two, build
Speaker 1: on it, and build up to the ten over time.
Speaker 1: Be honest, be brave, Be brutal with yourself, not brutal
Speaker 1: in a destructive brutal in a healthy way. There, I
Speaker 1: am doing this. I am fucking up. It is me.
Speaker 1: Sure I want to blame people, and sure I want
Speaker 1: to go oh, but you don't understand my situation. I've
Speaker 1: got you know, I've got this work and this many
Speaker 1: kids and this back issue and all those things. And
Speaker 1: I get it, and I understand, and you have my sympathy.
Speaker 1: But guess what there are lots of people with kids,
Speaker 1: there are lots of people with jobs, There are lots
Speaker 1: of people with shit genetics, there are lots of people
Speaker 1: in less than ideal situations. And while you have my compassion,
Speaker 1: that's probably not going to change in the next week
Speaker 1: or two. So what about wherever you are, however, Well,
Speaker 1: you can do it with whatever you've got available to you, time, energy, resources, knowledge, anything.
Speaker 1: Just start, Just start and put that get out a
Speaker 1: jail card. That's safety net out of the picture.