Speaker 1: Andy Reid, Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me. Paul. How are you?
Speaker 1: I am very good.
Speaker 3: I will be all the better in about a week
Speaker 3: when I submit my pH d.
Speaker 1: Finally, how long has that taken you?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: For four years.
Speaker 3: But I've had a bit of a false start because
Speaker 3: I started doing and something else and the end that,
Speaker 3: for certain reasons didn't happen, so I then started again.
Speaker 3: So I've got a made of mind, who goes, fucking hell,
Speaker 3: you've been doing a PhD forever?
Speaker 2: Seems to be the way right with that PhD carry on?
Speaker 2: I mean, look, it's far too educated for me, for
Speaker 2: the likes a little of me, but for the consistence, persistence,
Speaker 2: I think you should get one, just for persisting with it. Man,
Speaker 2: it's so impressive to see people that have just got
Speaker 2: the have just the resolve to survive it, right, It's
Speaker 2: very impressive.
Speaker 3: Well, often, you know, people take a long time. I
Speaker 3: know people have taken seventy eight years, but now UNIS
Speaker 3: and UNIS used to be quite happy with that, but
Speaker 3: now I think there's pressure a lot of pressure to
Speaker 3: finish on time, and I think the government has tied
Speaker 3: funding to that, which then drives behavior. Of course, I
Speaker 3: officially have a month left, but I want to get
Speaker 3: it in before then. No, I mean, we're not here
Speaker 3: to talk about my PhD, you and your book. But
Speaker 3: we before we get into that, we were just chating beforehand.
Speaker 3: We were both dragged here, kicking and screaming by our
Speaker 3: better halves, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, clearly against clearly against our will, clearly.
Speaker 3: And held here against our Jesus and blight. He's having
Speaker 3: a bit of a shocker at the minute, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Honestly, But I'm so glad to be this far away.
Speaker 2: To be honest, I went back in July to visit family.
Speaker 2: I had a grandparent of that sort of run her
Speaker 2: time in the sun and passed away, and it was
Speaker 2: I don't get attached to places that much, but when
Speaker 2: I went home and walked around where I was brought
Speaker 2: up and where I grew up, you know, played football
Speaker 2: as a kid or soccer in Australia as a kid,
Speaker 2: you know, in the park, local park, and that to
Speaker 2: see the state that it's gotten to, I just could
Speaker 2: feel myself getting tangibly upset. It's just it makes me
Speaker 2: feel so grateful, even with the ridiculous amounts of traffic
Speaker 2: that we have to copy here in Melbourne, and it
Speaker 2: still makes me feel so so grateful to be here.
Speaker 2: It makes me feel incredibly grateful to have kids that
Speaker 2: are getting brought up here as opposed to there. You know,
Speaker 2: it's it's never lost on us, right, how lucky we are.
Speaker 3: Really absolutely, And look I often say that in workshops
Speaker 3: actually when we talk about gratitude, and I say most
Speaker 3: most immigrants like us who live in Australia are like, Okay,
Speaker 3: the hell this place is just amazing. Honestly, when I
Speaker 3: hear when I hear Australians complaining, I think to myself,
Speaker 3: fuck off to a third world country for a year,
Speaker 3: and or I couldn't.
Speaker 2: Live in or go or go or go visit Derby
Speaker 2: for a week and see what it's really all about,
Speaker 2: you know, Western civilization apparently not indeed.
Speaker 1: But anyway, let's let's get back. Now you've had a
Speaker 1: wide and varied career.
Speaker 3: There's a potential suggestion there may be a bit of
Speaker 3: idiotsy going on there, but talk, what do.
Speaker 2: You mean potentially I might as well have it tattooed
Speaker 2: across my forehead.
Speaker 3: To be honest, it's only because I see overtones of myself.
Speaker 2: And yeah yeah.
Speaker 3: So to talk us through your career and then we
Speaker 3: will start to talk about the book and your podcast.
Speaker 2: Yeah sure. So I originally engineering educated, so I've got
Speaker 2: a degree in mechanical manufacturing engineering, but it was boring
Speaker 2: as batshit, so I decided to get people drunk for
Speaker 2: a living instead. I made the conscious not a lot
Speaker 2: of people fall into hospitality. I actually made the conscious
Speaker 2: decision to leave engineering and go into hospitality full time,
Speaker 2: and so ran bars and restaurants and big venues. So
Speaker 2: I'll let you know, before I was a Newcastle supporter,
Speaker 2: I actually ran the the alcohol side and the drink
Speaker 2: side of Sir James's Park for a time, which was incredible.
Speaker 3: Really, so just for our just for our listeners, the
Speaker 3: uneducated park is Newcastle United, which is a big football
Speaker 3: club soccer club for the Aussies, a big one in
Speaker 3: the UK. It's a massive club actually, and they just
Speaker 3: we were talking about this before we come on. They
Speaker 3: just won their first domestic trophy in over seventeen years.
Speaker 3: And there's been Jordan's all around the worded and floods
Speaker 3: of tears.
Speaker 2: Me included, man, me included. I had lots of people
Speaker 2: in Sydney kind of wondering if I'd had a mental
Speaker 2: breakdown when I was crying into my porridge or my
Speaker 2: oats or whatever it was at breakfast in restaurants and
Speaker 2: things like that. It was an emotional time. But anyway,
Speaker 2: so yeah, so around the bars I ran. I was
Speaker 2: a bar manager there for a while and then looked
Speaker 2: after a couple of hotels, ran a vocabar in London,
Speaker 2: and then like yourself man met an Australian lady who
Speaker 2: who swindled me over here kicking and screaming, and fell
Speaker 2: in love with fell in love with Melbourne, fell in
Speaker 2: love with Australia. And her father was a director of
Speaker 2: a real estate firm. So I was actual approcess of
Speaker 2: getting sponsored by a telecommunications firm. But he said, look,
Speaker 2: I think you'd be good in real estate. And that
Speaker 2: was over dinner. So I said, all right, well, if
Speaker 2: I'm shit, been me and there'll be no hard feelings,
Speaker 2: and discovered quite quickly, I'll say quite quickly. It took
Speaker 2: a little while, but eventually discovered that life can be
Speaker 2: really easy if you're just, if you're just true to
Speaker 2: who you are, and and so off the back of that,
Speaker 2: I ended up being quite successful in the real estate space,
Speaker 2: sort of selling sixty to ninety homes a year and
Speaker 2: going really quite well. But then fell in love with
Speaker 2: the craft of auctioneering and again my father in my
Speaker 2: former father in law, who I owe a lot too,
Speaker 2: threw me into an auction as the auctioneer with two
Speaker 2: weeks notice and it became an addiction straight away, not
Speaker 2: for the attention, but just for the freedom that the
Speaker 2: pressure brought into my mind. It was just that spot
Speaker 2: they're nowhere to hide, complete spontaneity situation that I just
Speaker 2: fell in love with, and off the back of that,
Speaker 2: became obsessed with the craft of auctioneering. In twenty seventeen
Speaker 2: started my own auctionineering business which is still running today.
Speaker 2: I do between sort of four to five hundred options
Speaker 2: a year in Melbourne real estate options that is what
Speaker 2: the auctions and one of the most statistically one of
Speaker 2: the most active auctioneers in Melbourne. In twenty twenty two,
Speaker 2: was lucky enough, was fortunate enough to be named the
Speaker 2: number number one auctioneer in Australia. Which big mouth, my
Speaker 2: big mouth and an accent. You knows it covers all
Speaker 2: sorts of inadequacies. It really really does, and.
Speaker 1: You've you've just summed up my career essentially.
Speaker 2: Honestly, if people actually listen paid attention to what it
Speaker 2: is that I'd say that, I said, I'd have very
Speaker 2: little credibility. I think so. But the accent just lets
Speaker 2: me get away with all sorts, which is so much fun. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So twenty twenty two was fortunate to win that. I've
Speaker 2: been into the sales and coaching and whatnot. Originally I
Speaker 2: didn't want to because I came out of real estate
Speaker 2: sales because my auctioneering business sort of really kicked on.
Speaker 2: And then in twenty twenty actually, ironically, when I couldn't
Speaker 2: do any auctions, my career really sort of kicked on.
Speaker 2: Because it was a couple of days after mister Morrison
Speaker 2: locked us all away in Melbourne in the March, when
Speaker 2: I just woke up at two thirty in the morning
Speaker 2: and said to her, then, why it's probably one of
Speaker 2: the reasons why she's not my wife anymore. I woke
Speaker 2: up at two thirty in the morning and woke her
Speaker 2: up and just said, look, I've got to I've got
Speaker 2: to do a live show. And then I created this
Speaker 2: little show during COVID called The silver Lining, which was
Speaker 2: which had a purpose of maintaining connection in a disconnected society,
Speaker 2: and just did live interviews three times a day, seven
Speaker 2: days a week. And yeah, and then yeah, which was interesting.
Speaker 2: When I had to go back to England not long after,
Speaker 2: I decided to kick off with it for some family reason,
Speaker 2: so I was doing it in different time zone for
Speaker 2: a little while as well. And yeah, and off the
Speaker 2: back of that, just gained a whole bunch of notoriety
Speaker 2: within the real estate space and as a result went
Speaker 2: into the coaching side. Was a national head of training
Speaker 2: for a major franchise group across Australia and New Zealand
Speaker 2: for a couple of years. And now I run a
Speaker 2: podcast and help people to help make success more accessible
Speaker 2: for more humans. That's that's my whole purpose for being.
Speaker 2: And and I'm very very fortunate that off the back
Speaker 2: of my hospitality, my engineering, my real estate, my sales,
Speaker 2: my networking career, it's just all sort of come together
Speaker 2: and helped me to help a load of people, which
Speaker 2: is which is really cool. I find myself to be
Speaker 2: really fortunate.
Speaker 1: Very cool. And you've now I written a book.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and we actually share share a publishers. Who's awesome,
Speaker 3: Leslie Yes? And your books success aious? So why the focus?
Speaker 3: And you've got a podcast called High Performance People? Why
Speaker 3: the focus on success and high performance?
Speaker 2: Because what I've discovered, especially over the last couple of years,
Speaker 2: but it really has come into a massive focus when
Speaker 2: this whole book writing process came into being. I've written
Speaker 2: the podcast as well. I've really discovered that the majority
Speaker 2: of the world really has a problem with the whole
Speaker 2: concept and feeling of success because it's not I don't
Speaker 2: blame social media. I blame the way in which humans
Speaker 2: are using social media in the way that this human
Speaker 2: highlight reel. But it's it's really created a chasm between
Speaker 2: the haves and the perceived have nots, and the perception
Speaker 2: of success is becoming so bastardized, for want of a
Speaker 2: better word, to the point where someone needs to try
Speaker 2: and simplify all of this for people, right, And that's
Speaker 2: what I've decided to try and take on. Whenever you
Speaker 2: look at things like personal development and professional development courses
Speaker 2: and all these things, you know you get rich quick
Speaker 2: courses and all that sort of jazz that you see
Speaker 2: banding around all the time, and even when you look
Speaker 2: at some incredible literature, like you know, really world renowned literature.
Speaker 2: You know your for hour work weeks, your atomic habits,
Speaker 2: all those sorts of things, all those books, all your
Speaker 2: Tony Robins stuff. For a lot of people, they get
Speaker 2: inspired for a very short period of time and then
Speaker 2: they just sort of drift back to the norm. And
Speaker 2: I don't think that it's necessarily their fault. I feel
Speaker 2: that the information hasn't been made to feel relatable enough
Speaker 2: two individuals, or if you're looking at it the other way,
Speaker 2: I don't feel that individuals have been given the the
Speaker 2: knowledge and the awareness and the artillery to be able
Speaker 2: to consume any personal development information in a way that
Speaker 2: befits their life. So this success curious book that I
Speaker 2: put together, which was harder than climbing a mountain for
Speaker 2: someone who is riddled with ADHD, that was so difficult,
Speaker 2: and god knows how you're doing it with a PhD.
Speaker 2: I have no idea. I just feel that because at
Speaker 2: first I was always trying to be a thought leader,
Speaker 2: this whole thought and being in this notion of being
Speaker 2: a thought leader. Man, it used to do my head
Speaker 2: in because I'm like, I believe that I'm intelligent and
Speaker 2: believe I believe that I can simplify things in a
Speaker 2: really good way for people that they can understand and consume.
Speaker 2: But I had no original ideas, like the ideas that
Speaker 2: I came up with. It was a little bit like
Speaker 2: there's a million people that came up with Uber before
Speaker 2: Uber came up with Uber, right, and I was one
Speaker 2: of them, And it used to put a chip on
Speaker 2: my shoulder where now I've discovered my purpose for being
Speaker 2: on this planet is not to be the person that
Speaker 2: sings a brand new idea from the rooftops, because I
Speaker 2: haven't got enough of an ego to be able to
Speaker 2: do that. But I'm the guy that's got enough brain
Speaker 2: power to be able to make it feasible for people
Speaker 2: to understand.
Speaker 3: That's a very interesting that you say that, right, because
Speaker 3: I am I call myself a pro academic, which means.
Speaker 1: That I like to read all.
Speaker 3: The geeky academic research and then turn it into tools
Speaker 3: and solutions that normal people can use on a daily basis.
Speaker 3: And my space just happens to be around the resilience
Speaker 3: and hardiness and well being space, right, But very interesting
Speaker 3: some of your observations because you know that whole drive
Speaker 3: to be a thought leader and to come up with
Speaker 3: original stuff, right. But then you realize that a lot
Speaker 3: of the in inverted commas thought leaders are just reparroting
Speaker 3: other people's stuff and often.
Speaker 1: Not crediting them with it right time.
Speaker 3: And that pisss me off because I will always reference
Speaker 3: people in my talks. You know, part part of that
Speaker 3: is having that academic background where you say this person
Speaker 3: and then you interpret it right.
Speaker 1: But the amount of people are particularly influencers.
Speaker 3: In my space that I see talking about concepts that
Speaker 3: are clearly from someone else, but having complete ownership of
Speaker 3: those concepts is just.
Speaker 1: And it really infuriates because I'm like, you've just.
Speaker 3: Ripped that person right off, given them no credit whatsoever,
Speaker 3: and you're building yourself up.
Speaker 1: On a lie.
Speaker 2: Oh it's mad man. And you could take it a
Speaker 2: couple of steps further and argue that the poor ancient
Speaker 2: Greek stoics and philosophers would be turning in their graves
Speaker 2: if they saw how many people were commoditizing their their stuff, right,
Speaker 2: like realistically, right, you look at your Aristotles, your Plato's,
Speaker 2: your senecas and all those all those insanely intelligent minds
Speaker 2: that that are just being translated and put into something
Speaker 2: that's got some sexy packaging around it and then and
Speaker 2: then fed out there for the masses to consume. You know,
Speaker 2: it's just I couldn't agree with you more. I'm I
Speaker 2: and I don't. I didn't do it on purpose. I
Speaker 2: didn't do it intentionally at first. It was just something
Speaker 2: that I did. I just like to give people their
Speaker 2: their their their flowers right to quote a modern day
Speaker 2: sort of parlance, like Rick Rushton, who's one of my mentors.
Speaker 2: It was one of my He was my original mentor.
Speaker 2: Like I talk about him in the book more, he's
Speaker 2: you know, I talk about some of my stories and
Speaker 2: he's the second he's like the second most mentioned person
Speaker 2: in my book because of what he's taught me. And
Speaker 2: I know and when he's taught me. He's been telling
Speaker 2: me about the fact that Jim Roan was him his
Speaker 2: mental right, yeh. And he quote any and he references
Speaker 2: Jim Ron's stuff and he always credits you back to
Speaker 2: Jim Ron. So I guess he's sort of conditioned me
Speaker 2: to do that. And I refer to myself as one
Speaker 2: of his disciples, right, you know, And I'm happy to be.
Speaker 2: I'm happy to be because realistically, man, is there's could
Speaker 2: you argue that there's no such thing as an original idea?
Speaker 2: Could you argue.
Speaker 3: That, yeah, that that is that is that is a
Speaker 3: very interesting concept, right, because that there's so much stuff
Speaker 3: that people come up with that has been thought about before.
Speaker 1: Because and and you know.
Speaker 3: Particularly in that spiace of psychology and psychology well being,
Speaker 3: that whole space, like you know, people can up with stuff. Actually,
Speaker 3: cognitive behavior therapy to to take a point, right, which
Speaker 3: is one of the third way of therapies, and and
Speaker 3: and and a pretty successful one.
Speaker 1: But when you look at the.
Speaker 3: Origins of cognitive behavior therapy, it was created by Ellison
Speaker 3: Beck in the fifties and the sixties, and a lot
Speaker 3: of it was based on Stoic philosophy, right, historics popping
Speaker 3: up again but again not credited to the Stoics, right,
Speaker 3: which is the little thing that annoys me. But that
Speaker 3: that's let's circle back.
Speaker 1: Into your your book.
Speaker 3: And so with that success curious, is there anything I'm
Speaker 3: sure there are lots of things, right, but the stuff
Speaker 3: that you have noticed consistent traits of successful people or
Speaker 3: or our habits or behaviors that seem to be reasonably
Speaker 3: consistent that normal human beings can take can run with.
Speaker 2: Well. The serial box answer for that is consistency and
Speaker 2: hard work and all those sorts of Like I said,
Speaker 2: I refer to a serial box words you get a
Speaker 2: free gift in a box of cereal, right, And it's
Speaker 2: generally one of them. The one the one trait that
Speaker 2: screams out to me, and it's been a lot of
Speaker 2: the time it's been with the podcast as well, is
Speaker 2: that successful human beings they know who they are, like
Speaker 2: to their DNA like, they know exactly who they are,
Speaker 2: and they are comfortable with who they are. Right. And
Speaker 2: it kind of relates to something a theory that I love,
Speaker 2: I fell in love with when I did some research
Speaker 2: around it for the book. It's called Self Determination Theory.
Speaker 3: AH by Jackie and Ryan. The second the second guest
Speaker 3: my podcast was Professor Richard Ryant, and I made I
Speaker 3: kid you not, and I disclosed on her that I
Speaker 3: have a man crush on him. So much stuff about
Speaker 3: self determination theory has massively influenced.
Speaker 1: And me personally.
Speaker 3: But a lot of the work that I do with
Speaker 3: with with people that's just a little little aside, right, Yeah,
Speaker 3: and brilliant, absolutely brilliant. I was very sorry, lucky to
Speaker 3: do a four hour workshop with him and and managed
Speaker 3: to get a photograph with him afterwards, which in very
Speaker 3: per but he was he was great on the podcast.
Speaker 1: That is so very happy to come on the podcast.
Speaker 2: That is so cool. Well, So, the way that I've
Speaker 2: sort of related it to or interpreted interpreted it to
Speaker 2: the people that I've met, is that the autonomy piece
Speaker 2: and the competence piece are pretty straightforward. It's that word element.
Speaker 2: It's that relatedness that a lot of people, as far
Speaker 2: as what I can see, have really really can't manage
Speaker 2: to get. They don't manage to achieve, they don't manage
Speaker 2: to understand and realize, right because I think that and
Speaker 2: I think a lot of it is to do with
Speaker 2: the fact that the world has become so noisy, that
Speaker 2: people are being influenced by all sorts of different things
Speaker 2: so much of the time. And you could, and it's
Speaker 2: becoming so apparent now that your gen zs and your
Speaker 2: gen alphers they're really struggling to discover their own identity
Speaker 2: because there's so much noise that they're not being not
Speaker 2: able to create the space around themselves to figure out
Speaker 2: who the hell they are and and a lot of
Speaker 2: that boils down to the fact that people talk about
Speaker 2: values and nauseum, and you see it especially in a
Speaker 2: corporate in the corporate landscape where like I said, values
Speaker 2: are seen as sales pictures as opposed to DNA understanding
Speaker 2: as to who one is and how one rolls. And
Speaker 2: I feel that the people that are a genuinely successful
Speaker 2: they are successful because of the fact that they know
Speaker 2: to the core who the hell they are. And I think.
Speaker 3: The word that jumps into my mind when you were
Speaker 3: talking about that is authenticity. And I think people can
Speaker 3: smell authenticity, and they can smell when people are being inauthentic.
Speaker 1: After sometimes after a while. Yeah, but but I do.
Speaker 3: Agree with you that those the people who are really
Speaker 3: successful like they are authentic. They know who they are
Speaker 3: and they behear in a way that's consistent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you said that, you said that you can
Speaker 2: smell authenticity. I personally feel that that that term has
Speaker 2: been completely ripped to shreds by the by the corporate landscape,
Speaker 2: and because a lot of people have now turned that
Speaker 2: into something that they sell, like, if you are authentic,
Speaker 2: then by definition, you should not need to sell it.
Speaker 2: It's a bit like in a sales analogy, right, It's
Speaker 2: a bit like the challenge between confidence and convincing. Right,
Speaker 2: So if you're not being authentic, then you feel that
Speaker 2: you have to convince people of who you are, what
Speaker 2: you're about, your wares, if you're selling or whatever. I
Speaker 2: actually said this in a talk yesterday in Adelaide that
Speaker 2: I actually believe that if you are confident in who
Speaker 2: you are, right ergo authentic in who you are, then
Speaker 2: you should never need to convince anyone about anything, because
Speaker 2: it just is is a statement of fact, right And
Speaker 2: in the real estate space, which is inherently one of
Speaker 2: the least trusted professions in the world, right, you know,
Speaker 2: and by reputation, one of the least authentic, I actually
Speaker 2: found it to be very very easy because I didn't
Speaker 2: have to make an excuse as to who I was.
Speaker 2: I was who I was, and just by doing that,
Speaker 2: and again it wasn't by any any major level of intention.
Speaker 2: I just did it because it seemed to work, and
Speaker 2: people couldn't question me because it was just so obvious
Speaker 2: that I was just being who I was who I was,
Speaker 2: and I happened to have the information that helped people
Speaker 2: to make big steps, make a step forward.
Speaker 3: Right, And I think that that plays into relatedness, right,
Speaker 3: I'll see that that that and especially I think in
Speaker 3: any seals environment, people who naturally relate to others and
Speaker 3: can build relationships and rapport with others naturally tend to
Speaker 3: do very very well in seals environments because it's not forced.
Speaker 3: It's it's it is more it's authentic rather than than
Speaker 3: forced or or are are created. And again you can
Speaker 3: fucking smell like you know what I love is when
Speaker 3: I'm talking to you, and I've done this with real
Speaker 3: estate agents and other seals people, is that I'll just
Speaker 3: notice that they're starting to mimic my and then I
Speaker 3: and then I'll start to funk around with it.
Speaker 2: Stop and stuff.
Speaker 1: I'll sort of cross my arms and then stand a certain.
Speaker 2: Way and then just then do and then moving and.
Speaker 4: I'm just thinking, you fucking you, honestly, that's just a
Speaker 4: complete misunderstanding of of of basically CBT all right and
Speaker 4: and and n LP.
Speaker 2: It just yeah, they learn it, like like I said,
Speaker 2: they learn it off a back of a cereal box
Speaker 2: and think that that's correct, and without really understanding what
Speaker 2: it's about. And and and that's and the and the
Speaker 2: problem is when it comes to sales based industry is
Speaker 2: that because unfortunately or fortunately unfortunately, depending on how you
Speaker 2: look at it, the one true barometer for success is
Speaker 2: financial gain, right, it's commissioned, right. That's the only realistic
Speaker 2: barometer for success in a sales BUSI is ultimately I'll
Speaker 2: be sold enough, right. And for a lot of people
Speaker 2: that creates so much fear that they fear being who
Speaker 2: they are because if they are who they are, then
Speaker 2: they're concerned that people are going to judge them for
Speaker 2: who they are and as a result of that not
Speaker 2: give them the business. It was really interesting when COVID.
Speaker 2: I hate referring back to it, but it's a really
Speaker 2: significant point when we think about how our identities are
Speaker 2: attached to our jobs and our roles. When the lockdown
Speaker 2: officially started or officially kicked into gear, I was on
Speaker 2: the phone till like three am with real estate agents
Speaker 2: who until that point you would have thought they were
Speaker 2: made a teflon rights. Nothing stuck right. There were smooth
Speaker 2: as silk, and they were calling me in a panic
Speaker 2: because all of a sudden, they had their identities ripped
Speaker 2: away from them, and it made it very very It
Speaker 2: made a very very interesting dynamic out of nowhere where
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, everyone's going, shit, I don't know
Speaker 2: who I am, and it was really interesting. So and
Speaker 2: that sort of actually that's where the idea of the
Speaker 2: book actually started. The seed was planted at three, you know,
Speaker 2: in that sort of two three am in the morning,
Speaker 2: when I'm having this conversation constantly with agent after agent
Speaker 2: after agent saying Andy, like, what do we do? How
Speaker 2: do we And it wasn't a case of what do
Speaker 2: we do in terms of logistics, it was like what
Speaker 2: do I do with myself? What am I supposed to like?
Speaker 2: And it was just so weird some of these people
Speaker 2: that you'd thought were emotion less that were crying down
Speaker 2: the phone, right, very very strange, very very strange. So yeah,
Speaker 2: so that's that's essentially some elements of the book that
Speaker 2: I really sort of like to dig into, and what
Speaker 2: I've discovered having written it is because of where I
Speaker 2: like to see myself, you know, much like much like
Speaker 2: yourself in the work that you do. It's been the
Speaker 2: books that it's been really cool the books sort of
Speaker 2: being described as the is the precursor to any personal
Speaker 2: development that anyone wants to do, and it sort of
Speaker 2: gives people that extra degree of a foundation that allows
Speaker 2: them to actually understand who the hell they are before
Speaker 2: they go womening into any of this personal development stuff.
Speaker 3: That I'm going to take this conversation in a way
Speaker 3: and a place that I didn't think that I was
Speaker 3: going to take this conversation. Right well, I'm going to
Speaker 3: talk about religion right nice, nice, with the backdrop of
Speaker 3: I am a self confessed recovering Catholic. It's been in
Speaker 3: recovery for thirty years and forty years actually, I've been
Speaker 3: in recovery. But and I'm not a fan of religion. Actually,
Speaker 3: let me qualify that I'm not a fan of religious institutions.
Speaker 2: Okay, but.
Speaker 3: I would say, and I've been thinking about this more
Speaker 3: and more, and this existential vacuum that seems to be
Speaker 3: accelerating around us and with people with loss of meaning
Speaker 3: and purpose, and and just doing a number of workshops
Speaker 3: in the last couple of weeks and and on the
Speaker 3: topic of meaning and purpose and asking people you know.
Speaker 1: Who has a clearly defined sense.
Speaker 3: Of meaning and purpose in their lives, and just how
Speaker 3: little hands actually go up.
Speaker 1: I actually think.
Speaker 3: And then again, this is not my idea, but I
Speaker 3: can't I can't remember where I read it, but it
Speaker 3: was quite recently, and I actually agree with it that
Speaker 3: the breakdown of religion has actually caused this existential vacuum.
Speaker 3: And so let's let me add some color to that.
Speaker 3: And what I mean by that is that you know,
Speaker 3: when you were a kid, I don't know if you
Speaker 3: went to church at all, whether the real but I
Speaker 3: remember I remember going to church, right, and you know
Speaker 3: you'd sit and listen to the gospel or whatever it
Speaker 3: may be, whatever your church is. But what all organized
Speaker 3: religions do is there's a number of things.
Speaker 1: It's the number one.
Speaker 3: They give a sense of hope, right, But they also
Speaker 3: give a set of values for people and a guide
Speaker 3: for how to behave and a sense of collective identity
Speaker 3: which can be very very powerful.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: And my my younger brother is still religious, and it's
Speaker 3: that that is actually drawing them in not so much, and.
Speaker 1: Some people will will will talk about that.
Speaker 3: But when you take that away, when people are a
Speaker 3: there's a fir amount, particularly with Casolicism, of fear and
Speaker 3: brimstone and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1: But let's let's let's keep that out of it.
Speaker 2: Let's let's keep it. Let's let's not go that heavy
Speaker 2: with all that carry on. Let's start talk apocalypse any time.
Speaker 3: But for me, the positives of any organized religion are
Speaker 3: that sense of collective identity and giving people's values for
Speaker 3: how to behave right and and then that people then
Speaker 3: will tend to behave.
Speaker 1: Like that, a lot of them.
Speaker 3: And but then you take that away, and what that
Speaker 3: does is that's created an existential vacuum that people now
Speaker 3: have to do the work to think about who am I,
Speaker 3: what sort of a person do I want to be?
Speaker 1: What are my values? What do I want to be
Speaker 1: known for? And and just with the work that I do.
Speaker 3: There's so many people who those questions are actually quite
Speaker 3: foreign to them. They actually haven't sat down and given
Speaker 3: that any thought. And then sorry, and I will throw
Speaker 3: over to you to then play it back to social media.
Speaker 3: In that existential vacuum, people get hooked into.
Speaker 1: These sets of values.
Speaker 3: Whether actually see this playing out the United States Republicans
Speaker 3: versus Democrats, and we see a lot of young men
Speaker 3: and nigh being sucked into the world of Andrew Tit
Speaker 3: and stuff like that because they don't have that other
Speaker 3: sense of identity. And then they get sucked in, and
Speaker 3: then they get given a set of values and through osmosis,
Speaker 3: almost through social media and the echo chamber.
Speaker 1: Commentary on that.
Speaker 2: It is such a good topic. I love this, So
Speaker 2: I'll start with a little story. So my daughter who's
Speaker 2: ten and is scarily emotionally intelligent for ten, right, and
Speaker 2: as a single dad, it does make me nervous for
Speaker 2: various reasons. And she asked me one time because there
Speaker 2: were she goes to a Christian school and she but
Speaker 2: she's really into science. She likes asking me stuff about
Speaker 2: space and all the sub jobs, right, And she goes, dad,
Speaker 2: you know, and I say yeah. She goes, you know,
Speaker 2: at the Big Bank, we were talking about the Big
Speaker 2: Bang theory and I'm like yeah, and you go. She goes,
Speaker 2: so was it the Big Bang theory that created the Earth?
Speaker 2: Or was it God? Right? And I went that' said
Speaker 2: bloody interesting question, that kid, And I said, and I
Speaker 2: love having these conversations. She's amazing. It's such a good
Speaker 2: human And I said, well, realistically, Darling, it all boils
Speaker 2: down to the word faith, and she goes, what do
Speaker 2: you mean? And I said, because whether it is God
Speaker 2: that you have faith in, or whether it is science
Speaker 2: that you have faith in, Ultimately, every sort of belief system,
Speaker 2: whether it's science, religion, whatever, it all starts with an
Speaker 2: element of faith. Right. Science has had has got proof
Speaker 2: to a certain point. But then ultimately all proof is
Speaker 2: formed on theory, right or for you know, and in
Speaker 2: order to form a theory, you have to have faith
Speaker 2: in something before you can form a theory, right so.
Speaker 3: And and with science, proof is not absolute. There's confidence levels.
Speaker 2: Exactly how many, how many, how many things did did did?
Speaker 2: Did we believe in until it was proved otherwise? Right,
Speaker 2: you know? So so everything, So I said, look at
Speaker 2: irrespective whether you whether you go down science track or
Speaker 2: whether you go down the Bible track, or whatever the
Speaker 2: case may be. Ultimately, the amazing, the beautiful thing is
Speaker 2: is that you get to select your own faith, what
Speaker 2: your what you your faith is. But the one of
Speaker 2: the things that makes us inherently human is the ability
Speaker 2: to have faith in something whatever that whatever that thing
Speaker 2: may be. Now well, when you talk about lack of
Speaker 2: identity and lack of purpose, the example that I've been
Speaker 2: giving has been there's been an increasing volume of protests
Speaker 2: going on in the world, right, and take the Palestine protests. Now,
Speaker 2: I am confident and I am hopeful, and I have
Speaker 2: optimism in society that a lot of people that do
Speaker 2: these protests are all very very well intentioned, right. But
Speaker 2: because they've, like you said, because they've really struggled to
Speaker 2: form their own identity, they are hooking themselves into the
Speaker 2: identity of being part of a pack, right, which is
Speaker 2: an inherently human thing. And like I said, I'd like
Speaker 2: to think that they've all got the best intentions for it. However,
Speaker 2: if you were to take a map of the world
Speaker 2: into a group of Palestinian protesters and ask them to
Speaker 2: point out where Palestine is on a map, they couldn't
Speaker 2: tell you. They would not be able to tell you
Speaker 2: where the gaza strip is on a world map, right.
Speaker 2: And And my point I'm making with that is the
Speaker 2: fact that, like you said, we as leaders, as people,
Speaker 2: not thought leaders, but as people that are comfortable enough
Speaker 2: to own their universe and own who they are and
Speaker 2: own their position in the world and what have you
Speaker 2: and their map of the world, we have a real
Speaker 2: responsibility a massive level of accountability to help people to
Speaker 2: understand their own identity in the world. And if we don't,
Speaker 2: and if we just accept that people are who they are,
Speaker 2: then we've only got ourselves to blame really as leaders.
Speaker 2: Now you can say that you can't change the world
Speaker 2: as one person, You're right, But there are enough people
Speaker 2: that do know and own who they are to be
Speaker 2: able to make some sort of a dent in the
Speaker 2: way that the world's going. But the problem is the
Speaker 2: fact that at the minute, a lot of us, if
Speaker 2: we're being honest, we're really sitting on the sidelines because
Speaker 2: ultimately we are human beings, and we see people that
Speaker 2: do try and make a difference get shot down via
Speaker 2: a million you know, Andrew Tates supporters who are all
Speaker 2: up for toxic masculinity and all that sort of jazz, right,
Speaker 2: you know, all the big loud, shouty people. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: I just feel that, like your kids are the best
Speaker 2: teachers sometimes. And when Eliza was questioning that, and I
Speaker 2: mentioned the fact that you get to pick your faith.
Speaker 2: As long as you've got faith in something, you'll be
Speaker 2: sweet as are not right whatever that faith is, and
Speaker 2: she's just sat back in a chair because we're in
Speaker 2: the car and the way back from school, and she
Speaker 2: just sat back in a chair and she went, hmmm, so,
Speaker 2: so I can believe in God and science And I went,
Speaker 2: of course she can. Of course she can. And that's
Speaker 2: the beautiful thing about being human is the fact that
Speaker 2: you can. You don't have to. Yes, religion has helped
Speaker 2: people to stay on the straight and narrow, depending on
Speaker 2: your map of the world, right, because there's certain religions
Speaker 2: that people think send you down the wrong path and
Speaker 2: depending on your orientation. But in a world that has
Speaker 2: got so much noise and so much choice, and I
Speaker 2: think we're paralyzed by choice these days, right, Whereas back
Speaker 2: in the day, yeah, the Good Book and that was
Speaker 2: about oh yeah, right, because you didn't have TVs and stuff.
Speaker 2: So I think that as long as I think that
Speaker 2: the topic of faith needs to be discussed, but it
Speaker 2: needs to be discussed in a holistic way where it's
Speaker 2: not just religious text. Yeah it makes sense.
Speaker 3: No, No, I totally agree, and that that you can
Speaker 3: do this and this right. So, just to come back
Speaker 3: to and we're walking a political type route here, but
Speaker 3: the whole Palestine thing, it's really interesting because I make
Speaker 3: a point of when I read read the news or
Speaker 3: go online, I will go on to The Australian, which
Speaker 3: is quite right wing, and I will then go on
Speaker 3: to the Guardian, which is left wing, and I always
Speaker 3: do that right and I'll be on CNN, I'll go
Speaker 3: to the algaze Era or.
Speaker 1: Go to Fox News just to fucking see how different
Speaker 1: the world is.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, But for me it's like you read the
Speaker 5: Australian or Guarantee you you go back almost every single
Speaker 5: day there's something about anti Semitism, and.
Speaker 3: Then you go on to the Guardian and almost every
Speaker 3: single day it's about what's happening to the Palestinians. When
Speaker 3: did it ever become that your political leanings determined which
Speaker 3: group that you could have empathy for. Why can't we
Speaker 3: go fucking hell those attacks that have master did were
Speaker 3: horrendous and have massive empathy for them, and at the
Speaker 3: same time have massive empathy for the Palestinian people and
Speaker 3: all the suffering that's actually happening.
Speaker 1: Because of that, Like what why? Is everything?
Speaker 3: And this is my point about the world, with that
Speaker 3: existential vacuum and with social media and becoming more and
Speaker 3: more polarized around this that it almost has to be Hey,
Speaker 3: if this is your political leaning, this is what you
Speaker 3: have to believe, right, Yeah, if you're in the United
Speaker 3: States and you're a Republican, you have to believe that
Speaker 3: you shouldn't be supporting the Ukraine War and that all
Speaker 3: of a sudden, fucking Putin is not the horrendous fucking.
Speaker 1: Individual that he is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, but it's just for me.
Speaker 3: And but it comes back to this conversation that you
Speaker 3: were talking about about knowing thyself, and you know was
Speaker 3: unscribed in the article at Delphi know thyself, right, Yeah,
Speaker 3: that's the biggest thing. So in your book, Ard, the
Speaker 3: stuff that you've come across, what are some tips that
Speaker 3: you think that people could do for that self exploration.
Speaker 1: To know thyself.
Speaker 2: One of the first things that we should do that
Speaker 2: I that worked really well for me was when I
Speaker 2: had a bit of an identity crisis. It was a
Speaker 2: couple of days after my old man passed away, and
Speaker 2: I did an exercise around values right where there was
Speaker 2: like a huge, huge, however, many hundreds of values and
Speaker 2: it took me hours to wild it down to sort
Speaker 2: of three or four. I whiled it down to three,
Speaker 2: and and every time every round your job is to
Speaker 2: cut out half of the values that are on that list, right,
Speaker 2: and and and and the three that I said beforehand,
Speaker 2: the ones that I had involved things like ambition and
Speaker 2: determination and all this sort of crap. The three that
Speaker 2: I came up with when I was in a very
Speaker 2: vulnerable space, having just lost my old man. We're connection,
Speaker 2: fun and simplicity, right, which is not very corporate. Now.
Speaker 2: The thing that I've been saying to people is if
Speaker 2: is that if you if, if you put your values
Speaker 2: on a on a line on a bit of paper,
Speaker 2: and the exercise that you need to do that I
Speaker 2: think works quite well is put your values on one
Speaker 2: line and then put five or so other sets of
Speaker 2: values on lines above them below and go a bit
Speaker 2: usual suspects, right, and go to your loved ones and
Speaker 2: see if they can pick out who you Which one
Speaker 2: is you? Right?
Speaker 1: Ah? Nice? Okay?
Speaker 2: Because if you because if you do that, if you
Speaker 2: do that, and and and you love ones, the people
Speaker 2: that truly know who you are can't pick you out,
Speaker 2: then you've got a question whether they're your values.
Speaker 3: Yeah, or whether they're just things that you would like
Speaker 3: to have exactly.
Speaker 2: There, yeah, exactly. They're the projection of where where you
Speaker 2: would love to be, But they are not who you
Speaker 2: are now.
Speaker 1: Or where you think you should be. The tyranny of
Speaker 1: the Huldes.
Speaker 3: So now know that we are into this existential conversation.
Speaker 2: Yes, we would have thought there's people of our accents
Speaker 2: for using the word existential seriously, like ask our old
Speaker 2: schoolmates would be like going, who are these two.
Speaker 1: Faster?
Speaker 4: Come on?
Speaker 1: That'd be going, what the fuck are you on about?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Stop talking? Stop talking so foreign, I'm speaking English please.
Speaker 3: But anyway, So, the ultimate existential question I'm going to
Speaker 3: throw at you, and I know you talked about this
Speaker 3: in your book, is why do you exist?
Speaker 2: I exist to make success more accessible. I exist because
Speaker 2: I'm good at making things simple for people, right. I
Speaker 2: exist because I have a I have a purpose. My
Speaker 2: reason for being is my DNA is to make people
Speaker 2: feel that there that success can exist in their lives.
Speaker 2: And I know that sounds at the cold face of it,
Speaker 2: it sounds very corporate, and it sounds very white collar.
Speaker 2: The whole notion of success does feel very white collar.
Speaker 2: But success, for me is applicable to any element of
Speaker 2: your life. Right, So, for someone success might be defined
Speaker 2: by the way that their kids end up. Right. It
Speaker 2: could be defined by their parenting, you know. It could
Speaker 2: be defined by their health. It could be defined by
Speaker 2: their spirituality. Success for someone talk religion. Success for someone
Speaker 2: could be to be absolute in their behaviors around the
Speaker 2: Ten commandments for example, right, you know so? Or twelve?
Speaker 2: You know what I mean? So it's success holds so
Speaker 2: many forms. And my purpose, my reason for being, is
Speaker 2: to help people to get cool with that and to
Speaker 2: be and to actually go follow what success, how success
Speaker 2: is defined for them. No, I can't change the world,
Speaker 2: but I can change I can change the world for
Speaker 2: one person potentially. And if we were all to own
Speaker 2: who we were and to own what success looks like
Speaker 2: for us, because success, you know, from the iteration of
Speaker 2: success going back to Rome and Greece and whatnot, is
Speaker 2: the definition of the origin. The original derivative was to progress, right,
Speaker 2: And I think a lot of humans that get upset,
Speaker 2: cranky and end up kicking off is because they don't
Speaker 2: feel like they're moving forward in life. So therefore they
Speaker 2: have to make a lot of noise in order to
Speaker 2: be heard in order to move forward, whether that is
Speaker 2: through because they're feeling oppressed. Because there are people or
Speaker 2: they're a sect or whatever it is. Right, So yeah,
Speaker 2: so that's my that's my I mean, it's taken me
Speaker 2: a long time to get there. I was, I was
Speaker 2: really struggling with that for a long long time, I
Speaker 2: have to say.
Speaker 1: But very interesting. So I'll tell you it's given it.
Speaker 1: I've asked you the question.
Speaker 3: I will give you my tombstone statement. Nice which and
Speaker 3: I do this in workshops and get people to ride.
Speaker 1: A tombstone statement.
Speaker 3: And mine, excuse me, is military man turned educator to
Speaker 3: help others be better versions of themselves. Right, And look
Speaker 3: that that actually came from a pretty negative event where
Speaker 3: he friends of mine get killed in a helicopter crash.
Speaker 1: Two very very good means.
Speaker 3: But the point was that then set me on a
Speaker 3: path that ended up with this. But it's only about
Speaker 3: thinking about it that that it actually comes that.
Speaker 1: As I often say.
Speaker 3: To people, there is no purpose fairy, there's no faurry
Speaker 3: that's going to come along and give you the purpose.
Speaker 3: And you have to think about this. But I tell
Speaker 3: you there's a quote that I came across that I
Speaker 3: now use in workshops to set this up because I
Speaker 3: think it's pretty from Seneca the Stoic philosopher. And you
Speaker 3: mentioned the story you started this ship.
Speaker 1: Everybody who lists, everybody who listens.
Speaker 3: To my podcast goes, fuck it, he's going to talk
Speaker 3: about the Stoics again.
Speaker 1: But you started it unprompted, right.
Speaker 3: But it's Seneca, and he said, every individual birds the
Speaker 3: responsibility to be of value to humanity, possible to benefit
Speaker 3: a large number, if not to benefit a smaller group,
Speaker 3: and if that too seems unattainable, then to benefit their
Speaker 3: immediate community. But above all else, they must prioritize self
Speaker 3: growth and personal well being. And the reason I love
Speaker 3: that is that it just simplifies it. It's the stuff
Speaker 3: that you talked about. It's not about having a success.
Speaker 3: It's not about being a multi millionaire creating this startup
Speaker 3: and running an orphanage in Nepal at the same time.
Speaker 3: It's just about how can you affect.
Speaker 1: Your little corner of the universe.
Speaker 3: But the thing that I love that Seneca brings to
Speaker 3: it is that you.
Speaker 1: Must prioritize yourself growth and personal.
Speaker 3: Well being because if you sort your own shit out
Speaker 3: and are healthy, then you are going to be much
Speaker 3: more eable to deliver that and benefit to other people.
Speaker 2: Absolutely man and I actually had this battle when it
Speaker 2: came to being a parent because I really really struggled
Speaker 2: to set boundaries with my kids because I felt that
Speaker 2: I wasn't allowed I didn't think I was allowed to.
Speaker 2: I thought my kids would have should have complete one
Speaker 2: hundred percent unadulterated access to me. And it was only
Speaker 2: when I finally realized that I needed to set a
Speaker 2: boundary around my physical exercise that allowed me to feel
Speaker 2: so much more free to be a parent in the
Speaker 2: best way I possibly could be because they know now
Speaker 2: for the thirty minutes or forty five minutes that I'm
Speaker 2: doing the workout in my garage or whatever, they we've
Speaker 2: got an agreement that that is the one time where
Speaker 2: unless someone's arms falling off, you know, you know, if
Speaker 2: it's a debate over the bloody TV remote and they're.
Speaker 3: Not blood exactly right, exactly exactly, there's no blood involved,
Speaker 3: do not interrupt.
Speaker 2: Exactly if there's if there's blood or no breathing, then
Speaker 2: you're allowed.
Speaker 3: Okay, So another big question. I'm going to ask you
Speaker 3: the last big question because you also talk about this
Speaker 3: is what broke you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, I look, you know what I was actually
Speaker 2: thinking about then when you mentioned about your your eight
Speaker 2: colleagues and friends who died in a helicopter acc numberfore
Speaker 2: and it's ship right that a lot of the best
Speaker 2: versions of people are made through trauma. It's always been,
Speaker 2: There's always been something that really annoys me. And I'm like,
Speaker 2: how can we get around this? Is there any way
Speaker 2: of us as human beings that is there anywhere us
Speaker 2: being able to get around this whole thing of we
Speaker 2: have to suffer trauma in order to become more evolved
Speaker 2: in better versions of ourselves. Right now, the thing that
Speaker 2: broke me was the realization that I wasn't the perfect
Speaker 2: dad that I thought I was going to be. And
Speaker 2: that was really the straw that broke the camel's back
Speaker 2: because I've been running, I've been sort of existing on
Speaker 2: the convey about the life without really understanding who I was.
Speaker 2: And I just turned thirty and when my daughter was
Speaker 2: or recently turned thirty, when my daughter was born, and
Speaker 2: a few months after that, and when this automatic love
Speaker 2: that I've got told I was supposed to feel for
Speaker 2: this kid and all this sort of stuff just wasn't there,
Speaker 2: And I thought that was you know, what's the point,
Speaker 2: like if I can't even love my own child. What's
Speaker 2: the point, like, what's the point of existing? And in
Speaker 2: that started a chain reaction from a mental you know,
Speaker 2: I refer to it as my as my trip down
Speaker 2: or health lane, which is ten years. In a week's time,
Speaker 2: it will be ten years since I started on that
Speaker 2: trip of understanding that in order to evolve, you have
Speaker 2: to become a student of yourself, because if you can't,
Speaker 2: if you don't become a student of yourself, And it
Speaker 2: relates to what you said before, what Seneca said. If
Speaker 2: you're not a student, if you can't be a student
Speaker 2: of yourself, then you can never learn. You can never
Speaker 2: learn the things that are going to help you become
Speaker 2: a better person. Right. And so the thing that broke
Speaker 2: me was that realization that the life that I was
Speaker 2: living was not the life I was designed to have.
Speaker 2: And that was a massive kick in the pills, man,
Speaker 2: And it took me on a trip that nearly resulted
Speaker 2: in me you staring at my own mortality a couple
Speaker 2: of times and going through various ubsections and whatnot. But
Speaker 2: I always referred to it as the best bad thing
Speaker 2: that's ever happened to me.
Speaker 1: I love that term.
Speaker 2: Right, the best bad thing that's ever happened to me. Now,
Speaker 2: would I wish it on anyone else? No? And will
Speaker 2: I continue to try and figure out how to help
Speaker 2: people have this evolution without having to go through the shit.
Speaker 2: Of course I'm going to keep trying. But as we're
Speaker 2: both pointed out over the course of this conversation, inevitably
Speaker 2: something has to test you to an extreme in order
Speaker 2: for the diamond to come out of the pressure, right,
Speaker 2: and which is shit, But it's just it, just it
Speaker 2: would none of us have been able to work out
Speaker 2: how we can avoid it. So yeah, man, that's the
Speaker 2: thing that broke me was when I realized that I
Speaker 2: wasn't the dad. I genuinely felt that that was the
Speaker 2: thing that I was designed to do, and that was
Speaker 2: the one thing that was I was essentially, if I'm
Speaker 2: being honest with myself, it was the one thing that
Speaker 2: I was clinging onto in life was the fact that right,
Speaker 2: at least then I'm going to be a good dad
Speaker 2: when the kid turns up, at least then I'm going
Speaker 2: to be a good dad. So when I wasn't, I
Speaker 2: was like, shit, well i've got nothing. I've got nothing,
Speaker 2: And it was a prick of a thing to get
Speaker 2: go through. But I'm grateful that the mother and my kids,
Speaker 2: who I'm not with anymore, but I have so much
Speaker 2: respect for I'm grateful that she had the bottle, the
Speaker 2: nerve to actually fade, to actually square up to it
Speaker 2: in me, you know. And if it wasn't for her,
Speaker 2: I probably, I say probably inevitably, I probably wouldn't still
Speaker 2: be on the planet having a conversation with you right now.
Speaker 2: So I owe her a hell of a lot, not
Speaker 2: just for the kids she's provided for me, but the
Speaker 2: fact that she's given me. She gave me the opportunity
Speaker 2: to continue my existence. And yeah, and that discovery of
Speaker 2: the fact that I needed to learn who the hell
Speaker 2: I was at thirty was an interest in an interesting realization,
Speaker 2: but one I'm ultimately glad I've had.
Speaker 3: And how long did it tick before you could and
Speaker 3: what And was there a point where you felt that
Speaker 3: you were turning the corner or was it just slow
Speaker 3: sort of chrysalis or did you actually was there are
Speaker 3: a few waypoints along the line where you went Actually
Speaker 3: I'm on an upwards trajectory and I can feel it
Speaker 3: in the tear step.
Speaker 2: It was. It was it was. It's very cyclical, and
Speaker 2: it's something that I will always be a student of
Speaker 2: because when I was initially going through it, those first
Speaker 2: few years that I was going through it, I was
Speaker 2: I'd feel like I was going well, and then then
Speaker 2: I would crash and burn, right, And each time I
Speaker 2: crashed and burned, you know, once I had made it
Speaker 2: out the other end, and sometimes I nearly didn't. I
Speaker 2: every single time I learned something new about myself, I learned,
Speaker 2: like I found, I discovered a fundamental building block off
Speaker 2: the back of each one, and and as I went
Speaker 2: through each one, those building blocks sort of grew, and
Speaker 2: the foundation got stronger, and the frame, the mental framework
Speaker 2: became a lot more structured and solid, and you know,
Speaker 2: felt more by design as opposed to by default. And yeah,
Speaker 2: and then now, you know, like I said, we're nearly
Speaker 2: a decade into it, and you know, I'm still you know,
Speaker 2: I'm still learning stuff about myself, right, and I always
Speaker 2: will do. And and it's an amazing thing to be
Speaker 2: able to be aware of that, because it means that
Speaker 2: I've you know, while there's always time, While there's always
Speaker 2: time in the game of life, there's always chances to
Speaker 2: score more goals and advance further forward and all the
Speaker 2: rest of it. But I think it was actually, I
Speaker 2: think if there was a watershed moment when I could
Speaker 2: when I sort of took a breath and thought, you
Speaker 2: know what you're going all right now? It was after again,
Speaker 2: it was after my old man passed away. And the
Speaker 2: way that I processed the grief was it was one
Speaker 2: of immense gratitude as opposed to immense sadness. I was
Speaker 2: grateful for the dad that I had, as opposed to
Speaker 2: the being sad for the man that I lost. And and
Speaker 2: when I when I and that, when that naturally happened
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, and once the dust had settled,
Speaker 2: I was like, you know what, I could have a
Speaker 2: bit of faith in my own mental framework. Now now's
Speaker 2: the time for me to now grow as opposed to
Speaker 2: build from scratch, right, and the foundations looking pretty solid,
Speaker 2: how can we now make this thing really pop? For me? Also? Yeah, man,
Speaker 2: So that was it, I guess.
Speaker 3: Very cool, And to me it were no more big, hard,
Speaker 3: curly questions. Well, I actually I want to give you
Speaker 3: what what excites you about the future.
Speaker 2: The fact that I know I've got so much to learn,
Speaker 2: but I am very much in control of my own
Speaker 2: existence now. After the first book, it's weird. After the
Speaker 2: first book, it felt like I downloaded the first version
Speaker 2: of myself and all of a sudden, I had all
Speaker 2: this space in my brain to think of about the
Speaker 2: second version of myself. Right, It's like I got rid
Speaker 2: of all the clutter. It's like I've done a big
Speaker 2: spring clean, a big garage sale and put it into
Speaker 2: a book. And now I've got all this space in
Speaker 2: my brain, which is wonderful. It's fabulous. So that excites
Speaker 2: me for the future. The direction that my kids are
Speaker 2: going in, I'm super excited for. Like, they are just
Speaker 2: two very very awesome and I know I'm biased, but
Speaker 2: they are. They're brilliant individuals in their own right. So
Speaker 2: I'm very very lucky that I get to have a
Speaker 2: very special relationship with them. And I know how lucky
Speaker 2: I am in that respect. Yeah, And I just feel
Speaker 2: that it's it's like I have an opportunity, and we
Speaker 2: all have opportunities. I know this is going to sound
Speaker 2: very patronizing. We all have opportunities moving forward as long
Speaker 2: as we understand and accept that there is still time
Speaker 2: in the game. Of life to be played. I used
Speaker 2: to have this big problem with satisfaction. I used to
Speaker 2: be chasing satisfaction and never got there, right and Alan
Speaker 2: Watts right, by the time you get there, it becomes here,
Speaker 2: so ergo there never exists, yes, And once I really
Speaker 2: come to understand that, and it allowed me. And this
Speaker 2: is one thing I am really working on, is the
Speaker 2: ability to stay present more often, which you know, when
Speaker 2: you have the interesting little bits of wiring that I've
Speaker 2: got there, it makes it a little bit of a challenge.
Speaker 2: But I'm really starting to own that. And as soon
Speaker 2: as I feel like I own the being present, man,
Speaker 2: the world gets cool, gets really really cool. So yeah, man,
Speaker 2: that's the opportunity is to be present more often and
Speaker 2: with the people that I have unfortunate to have in
Speaker 2: my life.
Speaker 1: Lucky boy, Yeah, yeah, lucky boy. Yes, aren't we all?
Speaker 3: So where can people go to find more about you?
Speaker 4: And a.
Speaker 1: A procademics guide to success?
Speaker 3: Curious and somebody who's actually had that lived experience, right,
Speaker 3: it's not just that you're parenting, are reparroting a heap
Speaker 3: of ship that other people have said, which which is cool.
Speaker 3: And this is a conversation that went down roots that
Speaker 3: I was not expecting. But I'm actually very glad that
Speaker 3: it did. But so, where can people go to find more.
Speaker 1: About you your book? They want to book? It's an auctioneer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, Yeah, well that that that's.
Speaker 3: Just my I have a conversation on the side about
Speaker 3: existential crisis.
Speaker 2: Which I probably could do while I'm selling a house
Speaker 2: to be fair now. But Andy Reid dot com dot
Speaker 2: au that's my that's my site. I'm a very easy
Speaker 2: guy to find because obviously with the work that I
Speaker 2: do in auctioneering, I'm a very out there sort of public,
Speaker 2: public facing sort of guy. So you know on Instagram
Speaker 2: at Andy Reid Coaching, very very easy guy to hit
Speaker 2: up there if you want to d m me. The
Speaker 2: books available on Amazon and again super lucky that it's
Speaker 2: available in the US, Canada, UK about to be available
Speaker 2: in India as well, which is pretty cool. God helped
Speaker 2: them with some of the words that are in that book.
Speaker 2: There's going to be some interesting Google searches in India.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you that for him for nothing. And so
Speaker 2: but yeah, you're absolutely right. A lot of the book
Speaker 2: is very self deprecating. You know. My old man used
Speaker 2: to say if you can't laugh at yourself, you shouldn't
Speaker 2: laugh at anyone else, which.
Speaker 1: I think is absolutely amen. There is my nod to
Speaker 1: religion to that one for sure. Andy.
Speaker 3: This has been awesome, So thank you for making the
Speaker 3: time to have the conversation and thank you for being
Speaker 3: vulnerable enough to share your story with authenticity.
Speaker 2: Mate, Thank you so much for having me. Man, it's
Speaker 2: been It's an absolute pleasure to be to connect it
Speaker 2: to someone that I have as much respect for as yourself,
Speaker 2: So thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you, Cheers, Met