Speaker 1: Good, our team, hope, you're bloody terrific. Just me today,
Speaker 1: just me, So if you don't like me, time to go.
Speaker 1: So I want to talk about decision making. And the
Speaker 1: reason I want to talk about this is because it
Speaker 1: is a constant thing that comes up, obviously when I
Speaker 1: talk to people about building their best life or the
Speaker 1: best diet or the best training program or operating system
Speaker 1: or business or brand or emotional state or all of
Speaker 1: those broad conversations that I have with lots of people.
Speaker 1: Because we talk about situations, circumstance, environment, we talk about mindset,
Speaker 1: we talk about behaviors, we talk about actions, we talk
Speaker 1: about outcomes, but we don't and we talk a bit
Speaker 1: about decisions, but I don't think we talk enough about
Speaker 1: the big and small, the incidental, the life changing, the
Speaker 1: high conscious, the low conscious, like some things we do
Speaker 1: with a very low level of awareness and consciousness, like
Speaker 1: when I ride my motorbike into the city and changing
Speaker 1: gears and I'm using the front brake and the rear brake,
Speaker 1: the front break with my right hand, the rear brake
Speaker 1: with my right foot, the clutch with my left hand,
Speaker 1: the gear changer with my left foot, the indicator with
Speaker 1: my left thumb and all of that I'm doing. That's
Speaker 1: low level awareness and consciousness. It's kind of programmed in.
Speaker 1: But I'm not accidentally pulling in the clutch or turning
Speaker 1: the accelerator with my right hand or the throttle more
Speaker 1: accurately known as in motorcycling world. You know, I'm doing
Speaker 1: all of those things. I'm making those decisions, operationalizing that decision,
Speaker 1: and then creating an outcome which is hopefully a safe
Speaker 1: passage into my gig in the city. And they're all choices,
Speaker 1: and they happen on a low consciousness level. But also
Speaker 1: on the way into the city, I'm thinking about stuff
Speaker 1: and I'm making decisions. Maybe I'm making Oh geez, if
Speaker 1: I get in there fifteen minutes earlier, I'll go and
Speaker 1: get a coffee. That's a decision. I probably need to
Speaker 1: have a WII before I get out underway, bit of
Speaker 1: a nervous weed. That's a decision. I might tell this story.
Speaker 1: I might not tell that story. Now I remember this
Speaker 1: group is that certain demographic. So I think I'll go
Speaker 1: with this style or this approach or this kind of
Speaker 1: information or content. I think I'll make it more interactive.
Speaker 1: I'll make it interactive because I've spoken to this group
Speaker 1: before and they are pretty cash. Last time, we'll see
Speaker 1: how we go. I've got to be in and out
Speaker 1: in ninety minutes, so I better make sure that I'm aware.
Speaker 1: I might put my phone down in front of me
Speaker 1: on silent where no one can see it except me.
Speaker 1: I can just keep an eye on the time. That's
Speaker 1: a decision, right. And then also I need to get
Speaker 1: under way. I need to finish on time. That's a
Speaker 1: decision if possible, because I have to be back because
Speaker 1: I have that other thing at that time. Blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: All these decisions and we all do that. We're all
Speaker 1: making decisions constantly. Cornell University out of the States suggests
Speaker 1: that we make somewhere over thirty thousand decisions a day.
Speaker 1: And obviously most of those decisions are not big, contemplative,
Speaker 1: life changing decisions, but you know, decisions. And I've spoken
Speaker 1: to a lot of people who over their journey, and
Speaker 1: if I'm being transparent and a bit self aware, I've
Speaker 1: done the same thing, spoken with people who have made
Speaker 1: certain decisions, and those decisions that they have made or
Speaker 1: even not made, they've avoided making, like they knew they
Speaker 1: should do a certain thing and they chose not to
Speaker 1: do it. Well, that's still a choice. But people who
Speaker 1: have made certain decisions and a year or two or
Speaker 1: five years later, they wake up one day metaphorically in
Speaker 1: inverted commas and they go, fuck, how did I get here?
Speaker 1: And how they got here was largely about their choices.
Speaker 1: So we think something. This is the cycle. We think something.
Speaker 1: We have an idea, a thought, a perspective, a story
Speaker 1: about something. That's the genesis is the cognition, the metacognition.
Speaker 1: We think about it, we think about our thinking. But
Speaker 1: the real starting point really from an operational point of view,
Speaker 1: is we make a decision. We make a decision, We
Speaker 1: then take some action. We then take some action, and
Speaker 1: then that produces an outcome, and the outcome affects our
Speaker 1: reality good, bad, big, small, significant, insignificant, noticeable, unnoticeable. But
Speaker 1: every choice that we make generally is accompanied by behavior
Speaker 1: generally or action is then accompanied by some kind of
Speaker 1: result or outcome which has an effect big or small, tiny, ripple,
Speaker 1: massive wave in the life of us. And I think
Speaker 1: we need to get our head around the power of
Speaker 1: these decisions that we make and the role that they
Speaker 1: can play in shaping not only the outcomes in our world,
Speaker 1: but the quality of our life and also the way
Speaker 1: that we can transform ourselves. Like when I make hard decisions,
Speaker 1: decisions that I kind of don't want to make, but
Speaker 1: I know that I need to make based on my
Speaker 1: self awareness and my understanding of what needs to change
Speaker 1: for me, my operating system, my thinking, my behavior, is
Speaker 1: my habits something practical in my world. When I make
Speaker 1: a hard decision even though I kind of don't want to,
Speaker 1: and even though I'd rather take, you know, the easy
Speaker 1: option in the moment, But when I can delay gratification
Speaker 1: and I can push that impulse for ease and comfort
Speaker 1: and familiarity, if I can push that aside and go, ah,
Speaker 1: fuck God, I want to do it, but I need
Speaker 1: to do it, So I'm going to do it. So
Speaker 1: I make the hard decision. So I make that phone call,
Speaker 1: I go for that run, I sell that thing, I
Speaker 1: apologize for that behavior, I whatever I own up to
Speaker 1: that bullshit. Then not only am I changing what happens
Speaker 1: in my world and my behavior and my outcomes and
Speaker 1: my reality, but then I'm changing me because now I
Speaker 1: am the dude or the dude who can make decisions
Speaker 1: which are not comfortable, quick, easy, painless, but necessary to
Speaker 1: live in alignment with my values, necessary to create the
Speaker 1: outcomes I want to live, the life I want to
Speaker 1: live in, the body I want, the relationship I want
Speaker 1: to have, the career I want, or to build the
Speaker 1: career that I want, or to get the academic qualification
Speaker 1: that I want, or to write the book that I
Speaker 1: want to write, or to overcome the destructive habit that
Speaker 1: I want to overcome. There's virtually no cases of people
Speaker 1: becoming wildly successful that I'm aware of anyway, who haven't
Speaker 1: as part of their journey, constantly, if not very regularly,
Speaker 1: made hard decisions that most people would not make. You
Speaker 1: and I are decision making machines, and I believe that
Speaker 1: there's an absolute correlation between the quality of our decisions,
Speaker 1: the quality of our behavior, the quality of our outcomes,
Speaker 1: and the quality of how we're going to live and
Speaker 1: do life. So you made a decision to listen to
Speaker 1: this show. You made a decision to listen to the
Speaker 1: You Project today. You didn't have to. You chose. Some
Speaker 1: of you chose to subscribe. You didn't have to subscribe.
Speaker 1: You chose to. Some of you might make a choice
Speaker 1: to turn it off, and if you do, that's see
Speaker 1: next time or never. But some of you will choose
Speaker 1: to keep listening, and some of you will listen, some
Speaker 1: of you will have a light bulb or two. Some
Speaker 1: of you will go, well, that actually makes sense. Some
Speaker 1: of you might see yourself in my words. Some of
Speaker 1: you might resonated with resonate with the ideas, and some
Speaker 1: of you will make a decision to do so. Statistically,
Speaker 1: most of you will not. That's not an insult, that's
Speaker 1: not a provocation. That's how it works. So I might
Speaker 1: say something that for you, if you would turn that
Speaker 1: idea or that intention or that thought or that strategy
Speaker 1: into some kind of behavior, that might help, That might
Speaker 1: move you forward in some capacity, That might solve a problem,
Speaker 1: that might lead to a breakthrough, that might lead to
Speaker 1: some kind of growth, some kind of improved resilience or
Speaker 1: awareness or understanding, some kind of improvement on planet you
Speaker 1: or you can do nothing, also a choice. By the way,
Speaker 1: I don't know if you need to do anything or not.
Speaker 1: So there's no I'm not trying to emotionally or psychologically
Speaker 1: arm twist here. I'm just thinking out loud, like think
Speaker 1: about all like, think of from the moment that we
Speaker 1: wake up to the moment that we go to bed,
Speaker 1: we are constantly making decisions, but also we are constantly
Speaker 1: running stories underneath those decisions. And so yes, we need
Speaker 1: to check our decision making, but we need to also
Speaker 1: check our storytelling, which is really the platform to the
Speaker 1: decision making. Like, if I choose to put something unhealthy
Speaker 1: or toxic in my body, that's a choice, and I
Speaker 1: might say, my story might be oh yeah, but you
Speaker 1: don't understand my situation. I'd worked all day, I did
Speaker 1: an all day gig, and I was starving, and I
Speaker 1: went straight from my gig to Sydney Airport and I
Speaker 1: got to the airport and there was nothing healthy in
Speaker 1: inverted commas. So I just date that, well, firstly, probably
Speaker 1: a fib probably could find something that kind of almost filled.
Speaker 1: Maybe you could get a fruit salad or a yogurt
Speaker 1: or something right, but also, worst case scenario, you could
Speaker 1: not eat. That's a decision, And I'm guessing you probably
Speaker 1: won't die before you get back to Melbourne or wherever
Speaker 1: you're going, because you're not actually starving. And if you
Speaker 1: think you're starving, you literally don't understand starvation again, I'm starving.
Speaker 1: That's a story. What you are is hungry, and that's okay.
Speaker 1: And by the way, being hungry for a while not
Speaker 1: the worst thing. I don't think you should be hungry
Speaker 1: all the time, but being hungry, you know. So, we're
Speaker 1: constantly navigating the practical reality of our world, and we're
Speaker 1: making decisions constantly which either align or don't align with
Speaker 1: our values. We're making decisions with which do or don't
Speaker 1: align with how we want to be and who we
Speaker 1: want to be in the world. We're making decisions which
Speaker 1: align with our goals, with our truth, with our purpose.
Speaker 1: As I said, who we want to be and how
Speaker 1: we want to be in the world. Does this decision?
Speaker 1: By the way, most decisions are somewhat incidental, So let's
Speaker 1: not overthink everything from when we get out of bed
Speaker 1: or we'll give ourselves an aneurysm and do our own
Speaker 1: head in. But when we're making the stuff which is
Speaker 1: more significant and more flu influential on planet U, he's
Speaker 1: a really easy kind of he's a really easy no
Speaker 1: brainer question, which is does this does this thing that
Speaker 1: I'm choosing, does this decision align with who and how
Speaker 1: I want to be? Does this decision align with my values?
Speaker 1: Does this decision that I'm making to do this thing,
Speaker 1: to eat this thing, to not do this thing, does
Speaker 1: this stack up well against my purpose, my moral compass,
Speaker 1: And if it does, will make your decision. If it doesn't,
Speaker 1: also make your decision, there's no there's not meant to
Speaker 1: be for me anyway, any judge or provocation in this,
Speaker 1: but just rather this metacognitive process of thinking about our choices,
Speaker 1: thinking about why do I think? To make your choices
Speaker 1: are a byproduct of your thinking. You're thinking is something
Speaker 1: you can analyze. You're thinking is something you can put
Speaker 1: under a microscope. Here's a really good metacognitive kind of
Speaker 1: corridor to walk down. Why do I keep making decisions
Speaker 1: which fuck up my own life? That's a really good
Speaker 1: I don't know the answer, By the way, It's different
Speaker 1: things for different people. But for some people they make
Speaker 1: decisions in the moment which in the moment give them
Speaker 1: a dopamine hit or some kind of pleasure or some
Speaker 1: kind of momentary fulfillment or escape. I get that. I
Speaker 1: get that, I have done that. I have done that
Speaker 1: many times. But one day I wake up and I've
Speaker 1: been pushing the dopamine button like a motherfucker for fifteen years,
Speaker 1: and now I weigh one hundred and twenty kilos, which
Speaker 1: is what happened to me when I was a young
Speaker 1: personal trainer and I went from at one stage seventy
Speaker 1: nine kilos I'll be completely honest, up to one one seven.
Speaker 1: So what is that? That's thirty eight kilos I gained?
Speaker 1: And why Well, I could be more in depth and
Speaker 1: more detailed, but I was hitting the dopamine button, and
Speaker 1: the dopamine came for me generally in the form of
Speaker 1: food that I shouldn't eat, and not just food like
Speaker 1: types of food, but volumes. Right. I made those choices,
Speaker 1: I took those actions. I created that weight gain all me,
Speaker 1: Am I beating myself up? No? Am I being real
Speaker 1: and raw and honest? Yes? Did I create the problem?
Speaker 1: I created the problem because I made the decisions that
Speaker 1: led to the result. We have to be if we want, like,
Speaker 1: if we're serious about this idea of living our purpose,
Speaker 1: taking the narrow path, exploring our talent being the best
Speaker 1: version of us, optimizing our talent, our time, our resources,
Speaker 1: our genetics, our IQ, our creativity. If we are serious
Speaker 1: about doing that, then it needs to become something much
Speaker 1: more than a fucking intention and plan and idea, And
Speaker 1: they listen to a podcast. No disrespect, no offense meant,
Speaker 1: but we need to you know, I'm the theory guy.
Speaker 1: I write shit, I say shit. I stand in front
Speaker 1: of audiences and I share what I think sometimes are
Speaker 1: mildly amusing and staining inspirational things. But I have personally
Speaker 1: never changed one person. I've spoken to a lot of people.
Speaker 1: I've probably influenced a fair few people. I've poked and prodded.
Speaker 1: But I'm not the answer. The answer will always be you.
Speaker 1: The answer will always be your ability on planet you.
Speaker 1: The answer is you, your ability to make the decision
Speaker 1: to take the action, to persevere, to roll up your sleeves,
Speaker 1: to get uncomfortable, to fucking get up when most would
Speaker 1: give up, to step up when most would step down, right,
Speaker 1: that is? And that's a choice. Oh it's hard, I know.
Speaker 1: So what are your choices? Oh well, I can keep
Speaker 1: going on? Stop cool? What do you choose? What do
Speaker 1: you choose? Of course? It's fucking hard. Life's hard. Getting
Speaker 1: in shapes hard, business is hard, making money is hard.
Speaker 1: Having great relationships is hard. All of that shit is
Speaker 1: at times, I say underlined at times hard, not all
Speaker 1: the time. But growth and development and awareness and resilience
Speaker 1: and improvement and adaptation and awesomeness doesn't come from sitting
Speaker 1: on the fucking coucheating KFC going. Nobody understands me. How
Speaker 1: come I ended up here? How come? Well, I can
Speaker 1: only speak for me, but how come I ended up
Speaker 1: in the places that I ended up? For the most part,
Speaker 1: few variables out of my control. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: if I'm being honest and authentic and a bit self aware,
Speaker 1: most of the issues in my life were Craig created most,
Speaker 1: and of course bad things happen to me. Of course,
Speaker 1: I've had some shit go on. I've had friends die,
Speaker 1: I've had people rip me off. I've had people that
Speaker 1: I trust prove that they were not trustworthy. I've had disloyalty.
Speaker 1: I've had people steal money from me, lots of things.
Speaker 1: Of course, guess what that happens to a billion people.
Speaker 1: I'm not Robinson Cruz, So guess what even in the
Speaker 1: middle of those bad things happening, When I contrast my
Speaker 1: bad things next to some real bad things that are
Speaker 1: happening happening around the world right now, to other people
Speaker 1: in other countries and other cultures. My bad things are
Speaker 1: a fucking one out of ten on the bad thing scale,
Speaker 1: and I can immerse myself in self pity, and I
Speaker 1: can throw myself a pity party and invite everyone along.
Speaker 1: Or I can say, well, that sucks. That sucks. I
Speaker 1: wish that person didn't do that, but they did do that.
Speaker 1: I wish I didn't lose that money. I wish that
Speaker 1: bad thing didn't happen. I wish my friend didn't get sick.
Speaker 1: I wish all of that, but me wishing doesn't change
Speaker 1: anything that happen. Now I need to choose how I
Speaker 1: will be and who I will be in the middle
Speaker 1: of this shit that I didn't choose or want. So
Speaker 1: the stuff that I didn't choose happens to me around me,
Speaker 1: because of me, inspite of me, And then I choose.
Speaker 1: I get to choose how I will be and who
Speaker 1: I will be in the middle of the shit. I
Speaker 1: get to choose if I will respond positively or negatively.
Speaker 1: I get to choose if I will be the solution
Speaker 1: person or the problem person. I get to choose how
Speaker 1: I will connect and relate and be with others. Will
Speaker 1: I be toxic to be around, or will I be
Speaker 1: the kind of person that people want to be around,
Speaker 1: not because I'm faking it, but because I'm working my
Speaker 1: ass off and I'm trying to be the bloke, to
Speaker 1: be the woman, the man, the person that lives their values.
Speaker 1: I can't change my genetics, neither can you. We can
Speaker 1: influence them, as I've said before, with epigenetics, or we
Speaker 1: can with behavior, I should say, and lifestyle. So that's
Speaker 1: that epigenetic kind of variables and influences. But what I
Speaker 1: can do is I can choose to optimize what I
Speaker 1: have been given at birth. Greg, here's your body, these
Speaker 1: are your genetics. Off you go do eighty years or
Speaker 1: so or whatever. Hopefully eighty, hopefully a bit more, who knows.
Speaker 1: But this is what you've got to work with. So
Speaker 1: in the middle of all the stuff that I can't
Speaker 1: change my genetics, I get the opportunity to choose to
Speaker 1: make a choice, to make a decision about what I
Speaker 1: will do with what I've been given. And now, over
Speaker 1: my journey, I have made bad choices. I've made dumb
Speaker 1: choices which created bad results. But the bad results were
Speaker 1: not about my genetics, but rather my inability to make
Speaker 1: good decisions, to optimize, and to execute on those decisions,
Speaker 1: which would create the kind of body that I wanted
Speaker 1: to live in. Fortunately for me, I found something, some
Speaker 1: self control, some discipline, did a bit of you know,
Speaker 1: self inventory, self searching, and now I have found a
Speaker 1: way to operationalize and optimize what I have to work with.
Speaker 1: But do I have great genetics? No? Now do I
Speaker 1: have an operating system and habits and behaviors and lifestyle
Speaker 1: which support the best outcome for my genetics? Yes? I do.
Speaker 1: Can you do that? Yes you can. Will you have
Speaker 1: a cheer squad? Probably not? In fact, I kind of
Speaker 1: hope not. You know, And this sounds harsh. Maybe the
Speaker 1: odd person here and there, or one person in your
Speaker 1: corner great. But here's my thing about cheer squads. People
Speaker 1: become dependent on them. And when you're dependent on the
Speaker 1: cheer squad, the backslappers, the trophies, the accolades, the validation,
Speaker 1: the approval, the round of applause for eating a fucking salad,
Speaker 1: you know, the standing ovation for getting out of bed.
Speaker 1: You're empowering them, not empowering you. And now you're just
Speaker 1: creating a new dependency. You're creating a new addiction, a
Speaker 1: new problem. If you have a cheer squat, great, I'm
Speaker 1: not against them, not a big fan support encouragement, yes,
Speaker 1: but this over the top kind of bullshitty. Everyone's a
Speaker 1: fucking winner. Everyone's not a winner. Everyone's not We're not
Speaker 1: all fucking winners. There have been many, many times in
Speaker 1: my life where I have not been a winner. I've
Speaker 1: been a dumbass, I've made bad choices. And we're not
Speaker 1: all fucking special and amazing. We're not. Sometimes we're dickheads,
Speaker 1: sometimes we're brilliant, sometimes we do good things. There's eight
Speaker 1: billion of us on the planet. We're so not fucking special.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean that you, to your family, though, are
Speaker 1: not special, or that your children to you or your
Speaker 1: partner to you is not special. Of course in that context, yes,
Speaker 1: But winding back the lens or stepping back in the
Speaker 1: global context, in the group context, we're just another an
Speaker 1: other fucking human on the big spinning blue ball. And
Speaker 1: that's not good or bad. That's just what we are.
Speaker 1: And so we are born with certain amount of time
Speaker 1: and certain genetics and certain abilities and resources, and that
Speaker 1: stuff we can't change. I can't change where I was
Speaker 1: born out of my hands. Can't change what I was
Speaker 1: born with, who my parents were, can't change my programming,
Speaker 1: my conditioning. I can't change the things that happened to
Speaker 1: me up until today. I can't change them. I can't
Speaker 1: change what anyone else does. I don't want to. I
Speaker 1: can't change the fact that bad things happen to good people,
Speaker 1: that pain and suffering will be a fucking ever present
Speaker 1: component of the human experience. I can't change any of that.
Speaker 1: But in the middle of all of that, I get
Speaker 1: to choose what I do with my time, with my talent,
Speaker 1: with my relationships. I get to make hard choices, do
Speaker 1: hard things, and create good outcomes. I get to optimize
Speaker 1: my natural ability and talent by choice or waste it
Speaker 1: by choice. I can't change the fact that you and
Speaker 1: I have twenty four hours a day, the same allocation
Speaker 1: you and me every day, fourteen hundred and forty minutes.
Speaker 1: But how you choose, how you choose to use Wow,
Speaker 1: say that ten times. How you choose to use your
Speaker 1: fourteen hundred and forty minutes is the thing. What I
Speaker 1: do with my time is the thing. Ah, But I'm busy, yep,
Speaker 1: me too, I'm busy too. I work full time, I
Speaker 1: study full time, I travel, I do lots of shit,
Speaker 1: and I'm not looking for accolades because I'm not special
Speaker 1: and what I do is not special. I'm just busy.
Speaker 1: But in the middle of the busy, I still make
Speaker 1: decisions with which align with who and how I want
Speaker 1: to be. I still eat the way, I still don't drink,
Speaker 1: I still don't use drugs. I still train every day,
Speaker 1: I still eat good food. And all of those things
Speaker 1: don't make me special at all. I'm not special. All
Speaker 1: of those things are just byproducts of my choices. And
Speaker 1: is it easy to navigate life by making tough choices
Speaker 1: and the right choices? Is it? No? It's not. It's
Speaker 1: just not. Is it easy to you know, to listen
Speaker 1: to this and then to actually go and fucking do something,
Speaker 1: not just go, oh, yeah, that resonated, that's good. Yeah cool.
Speaker 1: I love that that you like this. If you like it,
Speaker 1: I love it that it resonates. I love it that
Speaker 1: it may be a fucking light bulb. I love all
Speaker 1: of that. But none of that shit will make one
Speaker 1: bit of positive difference in your life, none of it
Speaker 1: unless you do something because it's in the doing of
Speaker 1: the something that you change, and then when you change,
Speaker 1: and then when your life changes, and then when you
Speaker 1: make those you make those decisions which lead to this
Speaker 1: better version, this better reality, these better outcomes. I didn't
Speaker 1: do what you did. It's always you. You are the problem,
Speaker 1: you are the solution. I'm just a resource. I'm just
Speaker 1: a bloke who happens in your ears every so often.
Speaker 1: You are not a character in anyone else's play. You
Speaker 1: are the author of your own story. You are the
Speaker 1: reality creator. You are the decision maker. Make some decisions,
Speaker 1: hard decisions. Don't fuck around anymore. Don't bullshit yourself, don't
Speaker 1: bullshit others. Don't believe your own stories. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: be reckless. I'm not saying doing anything, do anything dangerous.
Speaker 1: I'm saying, if you want to be strong, resilient, if
Speaker 1: you want to produce a don't let another week go
Speaker 1: where you just fuck around in a holding pattern where
Speaker 1: you just wait for the next week or the next month,
Speaker 1: or the next opportunity or the you'll wake up in
Speaker 1: a minute, you'll be it'll be twenty twenty five, and
Speaker 1: you'll be like, fuck, remember when Craig said that, see
Speaker 1: you next time.