Speaker 1: I'll get a team. It's a You Project. What else
Speaker 1: would it be. I probably don't need to say that.
Speaker 1: I probably just need to start talking. I guess by
Speaker 1: now two thousand and something episodes in, but fuck it.
Speaker 1: Maybe there's a few new people who go, what is this?
Speaker 1: Who is this? Who is that? Man? What am I
Speaker 1: listening to? That's for you, that's for you newbies, of course.
Speaker 1: In the You Project, is the name is show? Craig
Speaker 1: is my name. I'm the host. We've been doing this
Speaker 1: for about eight years and DTR Sam Casey joins me
Speaker 1: on a regular basis from the thriving metropolis of Karatha,
Speaker 1: is it? That's right, Caratha up on the kind of
Speaker 1: northern confines of Western Australia, up there with all the
Speaker 1: big trucks and dirt and dust and industry and heat
Speaker 1: and mayhem. What is it that attracts you to that place? Why?
Speaker 1: Why are you there?
Speaker 2: Good question?
Speaker 3: You know, it's such a good mix of country and
Speaker 3: city life. I feel like Kartha is you know, you
Speaker 3: could look over and it looks like a city and
Speaker 3: it's got you know, you got your shopping centers in
Speaker 3: your cafes, and it's just it's so nice and parts
Speaker 3: and greenery, and then you could literally just turn the
Speaker 3: other side and you've got the mountains and the red
Speaker 3: dead and the hiking and it's so it's just such
Speaker 3: a good mix of country and city life, I think.
Speaker 1: And how did you? I mean, did you grow up there?
Speaker 1: Did you move there for work? Did something? Did you
Speaker 1: move there for a relationship or you know, I don't
Speaker 1: want to open in your doors, I shouldn't, but how
Speaker 1: did you? How did you end up there? Yeah?
Speaker 3: No, so my ex husband was in mining, so we
Speaker 3: originally moved up to another little town called Para Badoo,
Speaker 3: which is also in the Pilbra.
Speaker 2: It's a small mining town. And then we had moved
Speaker 2: from Parado to Karasa.
Speaker 3: So yeah, Crassa is definitely a bit more city life,
Speaker 3: but I've fallen in love with it and I absolutely
Speaker 3: loved the country, the country at all.
Speaker 1: Like as we record, it's October thirty one. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: we're heading into summer. What is like what is the
Speaker 1: temperature range? Typically not not today, but in general terms,
Speaker 1: like what's the So in Melbourne this morning it was
Speaker 1: actually mild, but yesterday morning in Melbourne I think it
Speaker 1: was five right, And we're stumbling into it, like it
Speaker 1: was five degrees Well where I was, it was five
Speaker 1: in Hampton, Like, what's the kind of range there temperature wise?
Speaker 3: Oh, we always hover around like the thirties and the forties.
Speaker 3: So it's yeah, it's really intense. And you get like
Speaker 3: a few months in the middle of the year where
Speaker 3: it's like super cold, but most of the time it's
Speaker 3: hot as like even now it's quite it's getting quite uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm used to it, but yeah, for.
Speaker 3: A lot of people, they're like, I cannot survive a summer,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, we haven't actually reached the summer yet,
Speaker 3: Like it's only Altoba.
Speaker 2: It's only going to get hotter now.
Speaker 1: For my listeners, my listeners from Canada and from New
Speaker 1: York and from Melbourne and from Hobart, they want to know,
Speaker 1: when you say it's super cold, what are you talking about.
Speaker 2: I would have my cardigan on when it's like the
Speaker 2: mid twenties. I can't deal.
Speaker 1: Mid twenties. Now, mid twenties. Everyone who works to Celsius
Speaker 1: knows what that means. Everyone else in fahrenheit mid twenties.
Speaker 1: I think Ballpark is mid to high seventies. Fahrenheit. That
Speaker 1: is just nothing in the ballpark of cold. Sam. It's
Speaker 1: not even a bit cold. It's nothing like cold.
Speaker 2: Oh I'd be shivering at that point, so you would be.
Speaker 1: No good in Melbourne. No. Wow, So you've fully adapted.
Speaker 3: I have.
Speaker 2: It's crazy how quickly your body adapts. I know.
Speaker 3: It's even when I just go down to bath, I'm like,
Speaker 3: it is freezing. Does anyone not see this?
Speaker 2: And everyone's like, what is your problem?
Speaker 1: Wow?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: So doctor Sam joins us every month or two. Just
Speaker 1: psychologists working mainly in the space of kids and play
Speaker 1: and educating parents around play therapy and other things, and
Speaker 1: helping helping families and helping individuals. Correct me if I
Speaker 1: get any of this wrong. But we just get together
Speaker 1: and have a general stuff around life and performance and
Speaker 1: thinking and psychology and human behavior. It doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be specific to kids. But you said to me earlier, Well,
Speaker 1: we didn't chat, we messaged, But you said to me
Speaker 1: on a message. I like a post that you put
Speaker 1: up the other day. If you don't follow me on Instagram,
Speaker 1: follow me if you would, Craig Anthony Harper. But I
Speaker 1: put up a thing on Insta and I'm going to
Speaker 1: read it, and you said you wanted to chat about
Speaker 1: it because it resonated.
Speaker 2: Why.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's the word resonated.
Speaker 2: What.
Speaker 1: Anyway, let's read it because I probably don't want to
Speaker 1: make you. I don't want to throw you under the
Speaker 1: swearing bus and make you read it. So the title
Speaker 1: is a bit fucked a lot human. Of course you're
Speaker 1: a bit fucked in the head. Of Course you overthink.
Speaker 1: Of course you experience self doubt, imposter syndrome, insecurity, fear
Speaker 1: of rejection. Yet none of this can take away your
Speaker 1: potential to do amazing thing things, create amazing outcomes, rise
Speaker 1: above your limitations, succeed despite your innate human bullshit, and
Speaker 1: build a life that's meaningful, fulfilling, and beautifully imperfect, just
Speaker 1: like you. Yeah, that's for me. That's kind of the
Speaker 1: intersection of encouragement and being head over the hit over
Speaker 1: the head with like a stick or something. It's like,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to be positive and I'm trying to encourage
Speaker 1: and support people, and I'm trying to open the door
Speaker 1: on their understanding of their own potential and possibilities. Why
Speaker 1: did you like that? What did that? What resonated?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I see this.
Speaker 3: It just come up so much, you know, as the
Speaker 3: therapist right with clients, and I gues see them belief
Speaker 3: for myself.
Speaker 2: Right, this is just a humanity kind of issue here.
Speaker 3: But when you said they're about trying to be positive,
Speaker 3: I think a lot of the times people kind of
Speaker 3: see it as you know, let's just get over all
Speaker 3: these limitations and let's get over these insecurities and let's
Speaker 3: get over these kind of battles and then we can
Speaker 3: go do the amazing thing. And I feel like with
Speaker 3: your it was way more real. It was like, Nope,
Speaker 3: these things exist because we're human, and they will probably
Speaker 3: forever exist in some kind of capacity. But it does
Speaker 3: not need to stop us from going out and doing
Speaker 3: the thing right, doing the things that will help build
Speaker 3: us that meaningful life, doing the things that light us up.
Speaker 3: We can overcome all that, we can still reach potential.
Speaker 3: So I think quite often we think I'll just wait
Speaker 3: until i'll do this work and then I'll do that,
Speaker 3: or let me just get my stuff sorted first, let
Speaker 3: me organize my house, let me go to therapy first,
Speaker 3: and then I'll go do the thing, and we just
Speaker 3: don't realize that that stuff's never done. It is just
Speaker 3: never completed. The inner work is never completed, the outside
Speaker 3: chaost is never completed. We are constantly going to have
Speaker 3: Once you kind of get to one, overcome one level,
Speaker 3: you're already hitting.
Speaker 2: A next level, right, So we're always going to be
Speaker 2: chipping away at this.
Speaker 3: But despite all that, if we can kind of get
Speaker 3: I guess in our heads right that we don't need
Speaker 3: to solve the issue, We just need to like really
Speaker 3: learn how to create a meaningful life alongside the chaos,
Speaker 3: it can just be so much more fulfilling.
Speaker 1: Yeah, imagine if you and I waited until we had
Speaker 1: all of our shit together, no problems, no issues, his
Speaker 1: perfect Kragan, perfect Sam, and now they're going to start
Speaker 1: helping people, or now they're going to start their career.
Speaker 1: Now they're going to you know, it's like when you
Speaker 1: say it like that, people go, well, of course that's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: But you know, these things can, like dysfunction and genius
Speaker 1: can actually coexist.
Speaker 3: I think it's actually even better with that combination. To
Speaker 3: be honest, Like, you think of someone like say, with
Speaker 3: you you're a PT, right, imagine a PT that has never
Speaker 3: like in their minds. You know, I'm teaching you from
Speaker 3: the theory, and they separate themselves from their clients, so
Speaker 3: they're like, you just need to do this perfect plan.
Speaker 3: I've never had an issue with it, Just go get
Speaker 3: it done. They've never made a struggled with weight, They've
Speaker 3: never seen any of these kind of barriers. It's going
Speaker 3: to be very different to how you approach it because
Speaker 3: you're your own personal journey. So I think the more
Speaker 3: that we can embody you know, it's not You're not
Speaker 3: separate from me, like I'm hum and your mean, I've
Speaker 3: got these struggles to you do. I'm just here to
Speaker 3: like help guide you. But yeah, more normalizing, right that
Speaker 3: both can coexist, I think the better for everyone.
Speaker 2: I know myself, I definitely bring more to.
Speaker 3: The table as a therapist that has done her own
Speaker 3: in a work than when I wasn't and I was
Speaker 3: just trying to be the perfect therapist or I was
Speaker 3: just trying to be perfect.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like essent.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny because first and foremost you're and I
Speaker 1: mean there's in complete love and respect. You're just a
Speaker 1: person who happen like you just you're just a mum
Speaker 1: and you're just that's not good. And I'm just a
Speaker 1: bloke who has a podcast. I'm just a bloke who
Speaker 1: used to be a fat kid, than a fat teenager,
Speaker 1: than a fat adult, and and other things of course,
Speaker 1: and a bloke who's written some books and done some
Speaker 1: good things. And you've done lots of cools. But it's
Speaker 1: like this, It's this fucking fruit salad of variables, you know,
Speaker 1: good and bad, messy and sad, happy, and you know,
Speaker 1: and in the middle of all of that, there we are. There,
Speaker 1: we are trying to trying to figure out life and
Speaker 1: try to figure out us in the middle of life
Speaker 1: and that whole kind of you know, waiting until you've
Speaker 1: got your shit together. It's like my friends who clean
Speaker 1: the house before the cleaner comes, because I'm like, what,
Speaker 1: I don't have a plan, by the way, but it's like,
Speaker 1: you know, they're cleaning up before the cleaner comes, or
Speaker 1: because you know, we can't see mess. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: life is mess. You are a mess sometimes. I am
Speaker 1: a mess sometimes. And I think the thing about you know,
Speaker 1: because you've had your own challenges. I've had my own challenges,
Speaker 1: personal challenges and the fact that I didn't have and
Speaker 1: don't have great genetics, and I wasn't a brilliant this
Speaker 1: or a gift to that, or the fact that my
Speaker 1: default setting was kind of pretty mediocre. Means when I
Speaker 1: go to talk to somebody who's struggling, not only do
Speaker 1: I kind of from a training and an education, you know,
Speaker 1: and an inter electual perspective know how to talk to them,
Speaker 1: but also experientially I empathize. I'm like, I'm just like you,
Speaker 1: Like I get it. All those feelings or most of
Speaker 1: those feelings you have, I either have them currently or
Speaker 1: I have had them. So when I talk to you
Speaker 1: about all the bullshit that you're navigating and the adversity
Speaker 1: and the peaks and troughs and the mayhem and the
Speaker 1: overthinking and the underdoing, I'm talking experientially. First, I'm talking
Speaker 1: from a place of a personal awareness and understanding and empathy.
Speaker 1: And then I'm talking to you as a coach, mentor teacher, excise, physiologist,
Speaker 1: whatever the fuck.
Speaker 3: So that's the first bit, right, And you would have
Speaker 3: been going through that, and if you didn't have a
Speaker 3: self awareness, you wouldn't been able to put words to it.
Speaker 3: And I think this is why it's so powerful when
Speaker 3: you're talking from experience. I mean me and myself too.
Speaker 3: Like you know, when you learn so much theory, you know,
Speaker 3: you think that that's it. I just need to learn
Speaker 3: these skills, right, I just need to learn more information,
Speaker 3: But it's actually the process of these experiences. If I
Speaker 3: did not have the experience of going for something so
Speaker 3: out of my comfort zone, like a PhD, I wouldn't
Speaker 3: have known that resilience isn't this.
Speaker 2: Perfect path, Like you said, it's such a mess. It
Speaker 2: is a complete mess.
Speaker 3: The amount of I definitely, you know, felt like I
Speaker 3: could get through up most of the time, and yet
Speaker 3: somehow I did, right.
Speaker 2: So, I think we often put people on pedestals or we.
Speaker 3: Just think that to do the hard thing is just
Speaker 3: it's easy for some people, or you know that there
Speaker 3: are no challenges, or we see them as having some
Speaker 3: kind of you know, separate superpower. But if anything, no,
Speaker 3: they're just every day people like you said, that have
Speaker 3: that awareness, right, and that are kind of almost like.
Speaker 2: Challenging themselves and going, you know what, I've got this,
Speaker 2: but I'm still just going to keep going. I'm going
Speaker 2: to find a way. And you share that I think
Speaker 2: people can tell.
Speaker 3: I definitely can tell when I'm speaking to someone and
Speaker 3: they're really connected and they're aware to their own humanity.
Speaker 3: They come with the sense of humility but also confidence.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think relatability like when I go, oh,
Speaker 1: he's seventy two ways that I fucked up, and here's
Speaker 1: four hundred things that I got wrong, and here's some
Speaker 1: embarrassing moments, and here's where I gave some people some
Speaker 1: bad advice, and here's where I thought something that actually
Speaker 1: wasn't true, and here's what I had to unlearn. Then
Speaker 1: I think people trust you more rather than here's a
Speaker 1: bloke or here's a woman who went and did this
Speaker 1: degree and they got this bit of paper and they
Speaker 1: got that qualification, but they've never actually been through any
Speaker 1: of this, so it's all just a theoretical concept kind
Speaker 1: of plugged into their brain and then they wheel out
Speaker 1: this theory versus well, I have an academic and an
Speaker 1: intellectual understanding of whatever human behavior or sadness sort depression
Speaker 1: or anxiety or whatever it is, getting in shape, whatever
Speaker 1: the thing is. But also I have all this personal
Speaker 1: experience and all this other experience with all these other humans.
Speaker 1: And by the way, I worked in this kind of
Speaker 1: paradigm where people came to me for decades saying Craig,
Speaker 1: this is how I am. I don't want to be
Speaker 1: like this. You know, nobody comes to a gym because
Speaker 1: they don't want to change. Nobody says, here's my body
Speaker 1: and here's my money. I want to look exactly the
Speaker 1: same and feel exactly the same in twelve months and
Speaker 1: so and this is I think one of the things,
Speaker 1: just speaking specific to the fitness industry. Like I when
Speaker 1: I first started, right, I was eighteen years old. I'm
Speaker 1: working in gyms. You wouldn't have been born because you're
Speaker 1: annoyingly young. But anyway, but so you when you first
Speaker 1: start working, well when I did, when a lot of
Speaker 1: my friends did. So you go into the gym and
Speaker 1: you go, okay, this is a squad. This is a deadlift.
Speaker 1: This is how you do a chin. This is flexion.
Speaker 1: This is extension, internal external rotation, dumb bells, bar bells,
Speaker 1: kettle bells, they'd bars, straight bars.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: This is sets and reps. This is volume and workload.
Speaker 1: This is how bodies adapt to stress. This is all
Speaker 1: of these things, all of these physiological and practical things
Speaker 1: that we do to a body. And then and then
Speaker 1: a year or two or three and you're like, let's see,
Speaker 1: I know, you know, I still have lots to learn,
Speaker 1: but I know a bit now about training and progressive
Speaker 1: overload and nutrition and sleep and and genetics and help,
Speaker 1: you know. But my clients they're not here anymore, or
Speaker 1: the gym members they don't come, or they won't do
Speaker 1: anything hard, or they start five times a year and
Speaker 1: give up five times a year, or you kind of realize, oh,
Speaker 1: I realized. Listen, how much I understand about body is
Speaker 1: not nearly Bodies is not nearly as important as how
Speaker 1: much I understand about people, like the person, like the
Speaker 1: person in the body, and not only that. You go, oh, well, yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: I can write them a program and tell them what
Speaker 1: to do and why to do it and how to
Speaker 1: do it, when to do it, and I can give
Speaker 1: them a million bucks worth of gym EQUI and give
Speaker 1: them a gym membership and go, here you are. Here's
Speaker 1: everything from a training point of view that you need.
Speaker 1: Off you go. But you don't understand you know, human
Speaker 1: behavior or the mind, or fear or anxiety or motivation
Speaker 1: or the lack thereof, or our lack of willingness to
Speaker 1: get uncomfortable consistently and all of these emotional and psychological
Speaker 1: and behavioral variables, and so you get shit results with
Speaker 1: your clients or your members, and you think, oh, fuck,
Speaker 1: I need to learn more about people, Like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: know a bit about bodies, but I need to learn
Speaker 1: more about people. So for me, that was the trying
Speaker 1: to understand. Yeah, I can write a program, and I
Speaker 1: can teach you about anatomy and physiology and biomechanics, but
Speaker 1: I can't understand how come I give these two people
Speaker 1: the same information, inspiration, and resources and one gets great
Speaker 1: results and another one with maybe better potential, gets terrible.
Speaker 1: Is that that's the nuance to try to figure this
Speaker 1: shit out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And the nuance around that because even when you've
Speaker 3: just made such a good point, because I feel like
Speaker 3: even when in my industry where it's really all about
Speaker 3: human behavior, we can make for example, you know, I've
Speaker 3: seen kids have this perfect behavior plan, right, and you've
Speaker 3: got all the theories and all like the strategies, and
Speaker 3: then it just doesn't work right as soon as it
Speaker 3: leaves the boardroom, and no one knows how to utilize
Speaker 3: that feedback and going okay, which part didn't work? Okay,
Speaker 3: we need to adapt this all right, let's try this out,
Speaker 3: let's stick with this that there is no kind of
Speaker 3: process for how do we actually anticipate that this is
Speaker 3: probably not going to work in the perfect way that
Speaker 3: we want it to. But then how do we start
Speaker 3: to make creative co creative plan that does work and
Speaker 3: it's going to be messy and it's not going to
Speaker 3: look as perfect as we want. And we probably you know,
Speaker 3: said ten things and we'll probably just need to focus
Speaker 3: on one or whatever else. But what is that refinement process?
Speaker 3: I don't think we get good at that. And like
Speaker 3: you said, they take this theory from a fitness book,
Speaker 3: and a perfect plan is for all the reps and
Speaker 3: you've got all the sets and you're like all the temposa,
Speaker 3: you know, on point and then the mom just doesn't
Speaker 3: do it and there's something else going on deeper. So
Speaker 3: you're right, I think so much of it is. I
Speaker 3: think it's that reiteration of going, this is never going
Speaker 3: to be your perfect plan. But we need to understand
Speaker 3: your barriers, what are the external internal barriers, and how
Speaker 3: do we keep working towards the planet?
Speaker 2: Does work?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I mean I noticed, for example, for myself when I
Speaker 3: started on the fitness journey. You know, I fell in
Speaker 3: love with weightlifting, and you know I was all about
Speaker 3: tasing that perfect plan and you know, for my goals
Speaker 3: and everything.
Speaker 2: But what I did anticipate.
Speaker 3: Is, you know, being a mom and you you know,
Speaker 3: look in the mirror and you're ready to do a
Speaker 3: workout and you're like, that mirror is daddy, I need
Speaker 3: to clean that first. And I've got this too, and
Speaker 3: I've got that too, and I've got that and why
Speaker 3: why should I be prioritizing this exercise that can wait?
Speaker 3: It was so much just this internal process that actually
Speaker 3: had nothing to do with my access to the gym
Speaker 3: or how much you know, again, this workout plan was perfect.
Speaker 3: It was his voices really in our heads that are
Speaker 3: telling us I'm not doing it in the way that
Speaker 3: i'man what's the point, Like, I've got other things to do.
Speaker 3: This is not a priority. And so I think if
Speaker 3: we're not working with clients that are willing to.
Speaker 2: Reflect right on what is that story.
Speaker 3: Inside their head about why they can't do the thing,
Speaker 3: how could you, ever, as a coach, really get a
Speaker 3: plan that's going to be workable for them.
Speaker 1: And I think also having enough situational awareness emotional intelligence
Speaker 1: and perception to go, oh, this is going to work
Speaker 1: for Sam, but this is not going to work for Jane. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And even though Jane and Sam are telling them in
Speaker 1: the same things and they've got the same challenge, the
Speaker 1: same protocol won't work as effectively. It might be really
Speaker 1: good for Sam and really ineffective for Jane. You know, so,
Speaker 1: I think for all of us, and you don't need
Speaker 1: to be a coach or a PhD or an anything
Speaker 1: for this. It's like, I think, very much like in
Speaker 1: the space of personal development, getting better, learning evolving for
Speaker 1: all of our listeners who are very much about selfish
Speaker 1: improvement I guess, or personal development whatever that means to
Speaker 1: them specifically, So much of it is really about trial
Speaker 1: and error, like try stuff, see what happens? Like, oh,
Speaker 1: what did you do? Cool? Oh well I tried two
Speaker 1: meals a day, Okay, what happened? Or I tried intermittent
Speaker 1: and fasting, all right, Well, how long did you not
Speaker 1: eat for sixteen hours? Eight? So sixteen eight split? Cool?
Speaker 1: What happened? Oh this that? How'd you feel? I felt
Speaker 1: fucking terrible? Cool? Maybe that's not for you, or maybe
Speaker 1: that exact protocols not for you, you know, maybe try
Speaker 1: I don't know, try fourteen ten or whatever it is,
Speaker 1: or maybe just have three meals a day, or but
Speaker 1: maybe you know, maybe you don't have your night meal
Speaker 1: huge or what I started running? Cool? How'd that go?
Speaker 1: On a neeza sort? Well, why don't you try stare
Speaker 1: mast or elliptical strider or whe an't you Maybe your
Speaker 1: runners are fucked? Or maybe you should run on grass,
Speaker 1: or maybe you should run on dirt or sand, or
Speaker 1: maybe you should do deep water running on like, there
Speaker 1: are so many fucking things that we can try. We go, Oh,
Speaker 1: guess what my body loves when I do this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when I get eight hours sleep, I feel fucking amazing.
Speaker 1: When I have six, I feel terrible. Guess what When
Speaker 1: I get up in the morning and I have half
Speaker 1: a liter of water and I don't look at my
Speaker 1: phone and I go for a walk and I just
Speaker 1: spend thirty minutes without any stimulants or stimulation, my day
Speaker 1: is so much better. But when I pick up the
Speaker 1: phone before I even get out of bed, and I'm
Speaker 1: like in fucking cognitive overload because now I'm anticipating problems
Speaker 1: that might happen later in the day. My central nervous
Speaker 1: systems fried before I get out of bed. My brain's
Speaker 1: fucked and I have a bad Oh okay, so don't
Speaker 1: do that, Like you don't need like nobody needs a
Speaker 1: sam or a crag to go, hey, do this or
Speaker 1: don't do that. It's like our body is always telling
Speaker 1: us what's working.
Speaker 3: It's all the feedback that we need and if anything,
Speaker 3: that's going to be way better, right, because what works
Speaker 3: in one says in the fluff isn't going to work
Speaker 3: in the other.
Speaker 2: So I think that is the secret.
Speaker 3: And it's just that process of really approaching your life
Speaker 3: with curiosity.
Speaker 2: That's a researcher. Let's try this. That doesn't work, Like
Speaker 2: if it's working for.
Speaker 3: You, great, If it doesn't change it, like I'm not
Speaker 3: you and you're not me. And I think that's you've
Speaker 3: hit the nail on the head when you say that
Speaker 3: there is no expert out there that will ever be
Speaker 3: able to work for you because they don't have the
Speaker 3: feedback that you've got on your bodies and how that
Speaker 3: feels and you know, how is that working with your life?
Speaker 3: So I think if we are able to approach it
Speaker 3: in that way of going okay, that's not working? What
Speaker 3: else can I try here? And how does that feel?
Speaker 3: And how does that fit in? And then that, like
Speaker 3: you said, process of adjustment, refinement, revising it. I mean,
Speaker 3: that's what we should always be doing. Was never really
Speaker 3: arrived have we with that? We just keep tweaking things.
Speaker 1: And you know what's interesting is sometimes you just you
Speaker 1: do you don't even do it because you're trying to
Speaker 1: be you know, the n equals one guy or girl.
Speaker 1: You know, you're not trying to be the experiment and
Speaker 1: the experiment. You're just like, ah, I'm going to do this.
Speaker 1: And you do something with no huge expectations and you
Speaker 1: get I'm leading to a story, but you get really
Speaker 1: amazing results, are really significant results that you didn't anticipate.
Speaker 1: And so I would be fourteen months ago now I
Speaker 1: was sitting literally where I am now, and my phone beaped.
Speaker 1: I was in my office at my desk. My phone
Speaker 1: beat and basically it was the step counter thing on
Speaker 1: my phone going, you haven't walked very many steps lately,
Speaker 1: like you know, you lazy fuck. And so I looked
Speaker 1: at my phone and I've told this before, but I
Speaker 1: was like, for the last you know, two weeks averaging
Speaker 1: four and a half thousand steps a day. I'm like,
Speaker 1: fucking hell, that is that is not many steps for
Speaker 1: a bloke who's allegedly some kind of fitness expert or
Speaker 1: you know, high performance coachy, Like fuck how And I
Speaker 1: just went and at the time I was feeling like,
Speaker 1: cognitively not great. I was just a bit that right,
Speaker 1: because the only walking I did was really incidental, Like
Speaker 1: I wasn't really going four walks, I wasn't doing hardly
Speaker 1: any cardio. I was lifting weights every day. But on
Speaker 1: that day, from that day until right now, I just said, well,
Speaker 1: from tomorrow, I'm doing ten thousand steps a day, rock bottom.
Speaker 1: And it could be twenty, it could be fifteen, it
Speaker 1: could be but whatever, I'm not doing less than ten.
Speaker 1: And so, however many days that is three hundred and
Speaker 1: sixty five days plus a month or two, so maybe
Speaker 1: four hundred days in a row I've done, at the
Speaker 1: worst ten thousand steps or ten thousand, one hundred or
Speaker 1: something up to over twenty thousand. But what's interesting for
Speaker 1: me is, and it's very hard to be totally objective
Speaker 1: about you, because you are you and all of that.
Speaker 1: But as objective as I can be, my energy ironically,
Speaker 1: the more I walk, the better my energy. You would think, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm out expending energy, so I'll have less energy. No, ironically,
Speaker 1: within reason. I mean, I'm not walking thirty or forty
Speaker 1: thousand steps a day, but I guess I average twelve
Speaker 1: to fifteen thousand on average. And my energy is better,
Speaker 1: my brain works better. Not that I was fat, but
Speaker 1: I've dropped about five kilos of fat. Like I'm very
Speaker 1: lean now. I was eighty five kilos. I'm eighty kilos
Speaker 1: now I'm still got. I think pretty much the same muscle,
Speaker 1: same strength, same function, but I'm carrying five kilos that
Speaker 1: obviously I didn't need. My energy is fucking great, My
Speaker 1: cognitive function is good, my emotional state is better. And
Speaker 1: I actually it's like this sounds weird, but my body
Speaker 1: misses it if I don't do it, you know. So
Speaker 1: I just made one tweak and that is just walk.
Speaker 1: And then you go, well, you can either walk and
Speaker 1: just chill out and just think about nothing and just
Speaker 1: give your brain a break and your mind a break.
Speaker 1: And just like, I live eight hundred meters from the beach,
Speaker 1: So walk to the beach, put your toes in the sand,
Speaker 1: walk along the edge of the water, do whatever you want,
Speaker 1: or just walk the other way back through suburbia, the
Speaker 1: leafy streets. You know, do whatever you want, or listen
Speaker 1: to a book, or listen to a podcast, or make
Speaker 1: some phone calls. But the bottom line is, you know,
Speaker 1: for me that one, I mean, it's obviously it takes
Speaker 1: a little time, but it's such a simple change, and
Speaker 1: honestly it's had a profound impact on everything from how
Speaker 1: I feel, to my work, to my productivity, to my
Speaker 1: moods everything.
Speaker 2: And see how powerful is that?
Speaker 3: You knowing that is always going to be more powerful
Speaker 3: than reading a study saying that you know you should
Speaker 3: do ten thousand steps, like that feedback that you've got
Speaker 3: for yourself. And I love those kind of things to
Speaker 3: add into your lives where it's like the needle movers.
Speaker 3: You know, when people get so overwhelmed with all these
Speaker 3: different strategies, all these different tools that they can use,
Speaker 3: it was like, what, what's the things that we can
Speaker 3: really focus on that are the needle movers? And I
Speaker 3: think walking is definitely one of those because of really
Speaker 3: how much mental and clarity it can give you, but
Speaker 3: also like the physical benefits. But yeah, when our body
Speaker 3: notices that it is amazing. And I think that's why
Speaker 3: we should always be doing these little tweets experiments with
Speaker 3: ourselves to be able to track those in because how
Speaker 3: would we know if we don't give ourselves a chance
Speaker 3: to try different things, Especially when you've noticed something, right, Hey,
Speaker 3: I'm not really moving as much, you know, I need
Speaker 3: to change that, Like, let me do something about it,
Speaker 3: let me see how my body responds.
Speaker 1: And also I think, you know, like listening to you
Speaker 1: know when people say to you, oh, Sam, you know
Speaker 1: what you should do, and then they proceed to tell
Speaker 1: you what they think you should do. Yeah, And while
Speaker 1: they might have good intentions, for the most part, people
Speaker 1: don't know what you should do. No, I don't even
Speaker 1: know what they should do. Half the time when people
Speaker 1: go to me, hey, Harps, you know what you should do?
Speaker 1: I go, yes, I do. I just shut them down.
Speaker 2: I think that that's You're right.
Speaker 3: It's kind of phosphating because like, no one knows your
Speaker 3: unique secondstenss but you and I think there's definitely a
Speaker 3: time and the place for that, especially when you're searching France.
Speaker 3: It's talk to me for about what's worked for them.
Speaker 3: But I think a lot of the time, we just
Speaker 3: don't give ourselves that time to really think for ourselves
Speaker 3: because what you're doing, let me go try something, Let's
Speaker 3: see how my body responds. How do I feel in
Speaker 3: my body throughout the day. Like, we just don't give
Speaker 3: ourselves enough time to check in with ourselves and get
Speaker 3: that feedback, and then we get frustrated when the therapist
Speaker 3: doesn't give us ideas or the experts not being the
Speaker 3: expert that we expect them to be. And I think
Speaker 3: it's like we outsource our power. I mean, they're never
Speaker 3: going to know our lives like us anyway, so why
Speaker 3: do we think that they hold the answers?
Speaker 1: You know, I was thinking about this and talking to
Speaker 1: somebody recently, like I've been doing I've been fitness, health, wellness,
Speaker 1: high performance for my whole life, with my holiday life
Speaker 1: forty four years right, adult life that is so adeen
Speaker 1: to sixty two. And you know, people often say to
Speaker 1: me something like, especially in a workshop or a seminar,
Speaker 1: like what are the three biggest factors you know? And
Speaker 1: you might go, ah, sleep or you know, diet or
Speaker 1: this or that and you know or strength training or
Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah, blah. This is what I think now. Now,
Speaker 1: this is assuming that people in a relatively relatively comfortable
Speaker 1: space where they have access to food and safety, and
Speaker 1: you know, like we you know, we're not living in
Speaker 1: some threat threatening environment or I think the biggest detriment
Speaker 1: to our health, the biggest thing that's fucking up people's
Speaker 1: health broadly mental, emotional, and physical health, is stress. And
Speaker 1: I think that, like, yeah, we talk about food, we
Speaker 1: talk about exercise, we talk about sleep, we talk about
Speaker 1: you know, mental health, and this is part of it,
Speaker 1: of course, and we talk about you know, boozs and drugs,
Speaker 1: you know, all of these things. And I know stress
Speaker 1: is not just a thing. It's a multitude of things.
Speaker 1: But our ability to get out of stress or that
Speaker 1: stress state to be to access calm like it like
Speaker 1: we think we need. We think we need biceps and
Speaker 1: abs and lots of dough and a pretty face or
Speaker 1: a handsome face or fucking whatever, you know, like a
Speaker 1: brand and lots of followers. And we want those things.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying we shouldn't, but we don't need
Speaker 1: those things. What we need is we fucking need calm.
Speaker 1: We need peace, We need that inner state.
Speaker 2: Of bliss like presence.
Speaker 1: Well I think about it, Yeah, the amount of people
Speaker 1: that you know and I know, and also maybe you
Speaker 1: and maybe me at times where like, fuck, it is
Speaker 1: just chaos in a bad way. And this is not
Speaker 1: you know, like I've had a couple of experiences this
Speaker 1: week which I won't boy you with, but just where
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my god, the opposite of what we're
Speaker 1: in right now is just bliss and calm. And of
Speaker 1: course there's going to be stress and mayhem in life,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I think that the better that you can
Speaker 1: manage that internal state, even if you are in something
Speaker 1: of a chaotic situation, to be able to be that,
Speaker 1: you know, that equanimity, that calm in the chaos. I
Speaker 1: think it's almost the biggest determinant of health.
Speaker 3: I think stress, you're right, is like the number one
Speaker 3: killer mentally of off us all, especially when you think
Speaker 3: about it. You know, being poor is stressful, but being
Speaker 3: rich can be stressful too, like being at home can
Speaker 3: be stressful. Working is stressful, like our lives and not
Speaker 3: inherently ever going to be stress free. And so, like
Speaker 3: you said, our ability not just to manage it or
Speaker 3: even to remain calm, but to remain present, because I think.
Speaker 2: Stress robs us off that.
Speaker 3: You know, a lot of the time people think that
Speaker 3: being opposite to being stressed is calm, but then we
Speaker 3: miss out on being present with joy and present with
Speaker 3: where we're actually at. Like, I don't see presence, it's
Speaker 3: just meditation. It's like, even despite our lives being super stressful,
Speaker 3: are we able to carve out time for joy, for play,
Speaker 3: for pleasure, for our goals all of that kind of stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 3: So I think that ability to be present with all
Speaker 3: the different states can be really hard, and that's when
Speaker 3: people really struggle with stress. And then that's when they're
Speaker 3: probably tend to substances or things to kind of numb
Speaker 3: it because they're like, I just don't know what to
Speaker 3: do with all this energy.
Speaker 1: I used to say to my especially some of the
Speaker 1: do declients, my old dude grumpy business men clients, and
Speaker 1: we talk about you know, health and wellness and work
Speaker 1: and all of the things. And I'd say, you know,
Speaker 1: we talk about their business, talk about their business plan,
Speaker 1: their financial situation, their fucking property portfolio. They're this, they're that,
Speaker 1: and and they've got a plan for everything, got a
Speaker 1: strategy for everything, plan for everything, but I wouldn't see
Speaker 1: any joy. Like with so many of them, there's fucking
Speaker 1: no joy, there's no like you look in their eyes,
Speaker 1: it's just darkness, there's no light. I'm like, oh, fuck,
Speaker 1: I know you're rich, I know you've got lots of stuff,
Speaker 1: but fuck, I'm glad I'm not you, because I just
Speaker 1: like looking into the face of misery. And I'd say
Speaker 1: to my guys, do you like having fun? And they'd
Speaker 1: look at me like, like, this is a fifty five
Speaker 1: year old guy. They look at me like, well, why
Speaker 1: are you asking me that? Where are we Like what
Speaker 1: I'll go, it's just straight forward questions, you like fun?
Speaker 1: Do you like having fun? And like, well, of course,
Speaker 1: I go cool, what's your fun plan? Like what's your
Speaker 1: fund strategy? And the idea of doing things just for fun,
Speaker 1: just for the process, right, not to build a brand,
Speaker 1: not to get any strategic advantage, not to make more dough,
Speaker 1: not to look good, not to none of that. Like,
Speaker 1: just just do something because it puts you in a
Speaker 1: state that's fucking amazing, you know, and it just it
Speaker 1: doesn't happen. I want to jump back to one thing
Speaker 1: you said, Like we're talking about stress, right, like, and
Speaker 1: I'm interested in your take on this. I have a theory, right, yea.
Speaker 1: My theory is even some psychologists I don't want to
Speaker 1: get in trouble with this. Fucking okay, Okay, here's what
Speaker 1: I think people think. I think that all you know, like, oh,
Speaker 1: this happened like they were in this situation and that's
Speaker 1: very stressful. And I'm like, okay, maybe let's break that down. Well,
Speaker 1: what about the other person that's in the same situation
Speaker 1: but is not stressed, right, yeah, So there's the thing
Speaker 1: that happens, which we in our colloquial kind of observational language,
Speaker 1: we go, oh my god, that is that is so stressful.
Speaker 1: That's a describing word. That event, that situation, that outcome
Speaker 1: is stressful. But we know that some people in the
Speaker 1: middle of that outcome or that event or that situation
Speaker 1: are not stressed. So then you might deduce doctor Sam
Speaker 1: that stress is an individual response created or facilitated by
Speaker 1: one's interpretation. I need their mind, right, I think. I
Speaker 1: think while events and situations and circumstances certainly can simulate
Speaker 1: a stress response, they don't always stimulate a stress response. Obviously,
Speaker 1: because we see that with the divergence of responses from
Speaker 1: not stressed to very stressed among individuals. I think it's
Speaker 1: the way that we process it that dictates our level
Speaker 1: of anxiety or stress, you know, or that physiological state
Speaker 1: that we get into.
Speaker 2: I think the way that we agree.
Speaker 3: I think the way that we process it, the way
Speaker 3: that we interpret it, but also the stories that we
Speaker 3: attached to it about what that means for ourselves.
Speaker 2: So it's it's.
Speaker 3: Like, I don't know, like a breakup, right, A lot
Speaker 3: of the time, you know, people are grieving a breakup,
Speaker 3: but not only are they grieving separating lives or someone,
Speaker 3: they have these stories about what that means for them
Speaker 3: or what has happened to them, right, or you know,
Speaker 3: they treated me this way because I'm like this, or
Speaker 3: I'm never going to find love.
Speaker 2: Like they've always got these stories attached and that's why
Speaker 2: it's really.
Speaker 3: Stressful, because they've got a story about themselves around that
Speaker 3: about really this empowering story.
Speaker 2: And I think that's.
Speaker 3: What's stressful about a lot of the situations, when we
Speaker 3: doubt our ability to handle it, when we think we
Speaker 3: can't ask for help, when we think it should be
Speaker 3: a certain way we should be managing it better or
Speaker 3: I shouldn't be able to be so impacted by it.
Speaker 3: That's where the resistance lies within them stories versus like
Speaker 3: you said, it may be a stressful situation, but we
Speaker 3: can kind of process it and move forward with it
Speaker 3: because we don't have those yeah things holding us back.
Speaker 1: Now, this opens another door. I know we've got to
Speaker 1: finish soon, but this opens another interesting door, which is
Speaker 1: the metacognitive door, which is starting to get aware of,
Speaker 1: or be aware of, how you think and leaning into
Speaker 1: curiosity around oh, why do I think this?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: Why is my story? Ah, this is a problem. And
Speaker 1: Sam's in the same room with me, and her story is, oh,
Speaker 1: this is interesting, right, Where, Like I think, when you
Speaker 1: start to think about why do I respond this way?
Speaker 1: And we're not talking about self loathing, talking about self awareness, right,
Speaker 1: but why do I respond this way? Why do I
Speaker 1: believe this thing? Where did this belief come from? Did
Speaker 1: I choose this belief or this is this belief a
Speaker 1: byproduct of sociological osmosis. I just inherited it from the
Speaker 1: people that I'm around, Right, Where does this fear come from?
Speaker 1: What is this story? Where does this story come from?
Speaker 1: Why am I telling my like all of this is
Speaker 1: like self cognitive curiosity and investigation, where you go, oh,
Speaker 1: what actually is creating this response in me? This elevated
Speaker 1: heart rate, breathing, adrenaline, cortisol, sympathetic nervous system. What is
Speaker 1: creating this stress reaction is not the thing, but rather
Speaker 1: my story. Yes, And then once you start to lean
Speaker 1: into the story and understand the story, then I think,
Speaker 1: definitely not easy, but it opens the door on be
Speaker 1: able to self regulate better.
Speaker 3: Oh, because then we can kind of really gain a
Speaker 3: bit more awareness. Okay, this is why I'm having this
Speaker 3: really struggle reaction. It's not just to that event that happened.
Speaker 3: It's because of how I'm seeing the event. It's a
Speaker 3: story I'm saying about myself. Well, you notice these patterns
Speaker 3: of like why is it why do I always blame
Speaker 3: myself for everything? Why does it always end up in
Speaker 3: me just being there's something inherently wrong with me? Like
Speaker 3: why do all my stories end up in that way?
Speaker 3: And I think if we can then see that pattern,
Speaker 3: we can start to rewire that within our brains. We
Speaker 3: can start to write a new story, one that's way
Speaker 3: more empowering, one that doesn't you know, leave us feeling powerless,
Speaker 3: or leave us feeling like, yeah, it's just us and
Speaker 3: we can't change.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of those stories are driven by emotion.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, how you can feel not good
Speaker 1: enough while simultaneously knowing that you are.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: It's like I can get up on stage to talk
Speaker 1: something that I've done literally thousands of times and have
Speaker 1: a level of fear and ans, which is kind of
Speaker 1: inappropriate and kind of doesn't make sense for somebody who's
Speaker 1: done the same thing thousands of times. And there might
Speaker 1: be this fear driven, low level kind of idea in
Speaker 1: my consciousness that like, this is the day you're going
Speaker 1: to fuck up. They'll hate you. You're actually not very
Speaker 1: good at this, You've just been lucky, right, while also
Speaker 1: intellectually going, well, here's the data, Craig. You've been doing
Speaker 1: this for forty years and you've done a lot of it,
Speaker 1: and you're not terrible at it because you've got evidence.
Speaker 1: You've got evidence to say that. You know. It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: you've run a marathon. You've got evidence, you know. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, there's a voice going you could
Speaker 1: never run a marathon when you've actually run ten of
Speaker 1: them exactly.
Speaker 3: There's a proof in the evidence right there. But also
Speaker 3: it seems like you've just got a bigger purpose, so
Speaker 3: you've got a meaning for that. You're like, I want
Speaker 3: to contribute in this way. I've got something to share
Speaker 3: is the world. And I feel like when we're connected
Speaker 3: to a bigger purpose like that, we don't then get
Speaker 3: caught up and do someone like me or to someone
Speaker 3: not like me? Are they happy with this talk? And
Speaker 3: they're not happy? You're like, I'm on a mission and
Speaker 3: I'm here to serve and I've got something to share,
Speaker 3: and so I feel like that if that's your why, right,
Speaker 3: that's what will keep us going despite the little ups
Speaker 3: and downs of the emotional side of things.
Speaker 1: And I think also going, oh I'm scared and that's.
Speaker 2: All right, or I'm I'll do it anyway.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna overthinker, that's all right, Which is where
Speaker 1: we started with a big bit fucked a lot of
Speaker 1: human We've done the full circle.
Speaker 2: Right, we have, Yeah, feel the fair in it. Anyway.
Speaker 1: It's always good to talk to you. How do people
Speaker 1: connect with you?
Speaker 3: You can find me on Instagram at doctor sam Casey,
Speaker 3: or my website which is www dot Dotor, Samcasey dot
Speaker 3: com your ice.
Speaker 1: I'll see you in a month or so.
Speaker 2: Great Thanks, CAG