Speaker 1: Get everyone feeling a little bit emotional today, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure exactly what to put it down to it. I
Speaker 1: think it's twofold. I think it's one. We've got a
Speaker 1: really exciting guest today who's someone I've always wanted to
Speaker 1: meet in person. I feel stranger connected to them even
Speaker 1: than I've ever met before and can't wait to meet
Speaker 1: them in the flesh. And you'll find out who that
Speaker 1: is in just a second. And the second thing is
Speaker 1: I've got my dad staying with me at the moment.
Speaker 1: He has just just traveled all over Australia in his
Speaker 1: land Cruiser, sleeping on the roof under the stars with
Speaker 1: his partner. He's just done a sixty three night journey
Speaker 1: up to Cap York from Hobart, so from almost the
Speaker 1: most southern tip of Australia to the most northern tip
Speaker 1: of Australia, and we bought a little map of Australia
Speaker 1: and he's been doing FaceTime with Willow in particular my
Speaker 1: five Gelbert Charlie as well. But Willow has really been
Speaker 1: following his journey closely and putting a little little pins
Speaker 1: on the map as we have these facetimes to sort
Speaker 1: of track where Pop is at, and it's just been
Speaker 1: one of those beautiful sort of ways for them to connect.
Speaker 1: And he arrived back shaggy and long hair and beard
Speaker 1: and lots of red dust Avery's car, and he came
Speaker 1: home and had dinner with us last night. It was
Speaker 1: just beautiful for them to sort of connect and for
Speaker 1: him to spend time with little kids. So I'm sure
Speaker 1: anyone that's a parent out there couldn't agree with me more.
Speaker 1: Let's get on with the show. It's going to be
Speaker 1: an absolute belt. We have the incredible Hugh Van Coleenberg
Speaker 1: from the Resilience Project, from the Imperfect podcast. He is
Speaker 1: an absolute just one of the most beautiful, sensitive, intelligent,
Speaker 1: caring good people I think that I've never met, but
Speaker 1: I can't wait to meet. So Hughes coming up next,
Speaker 1: and we've got a question from Julie.
Speaker 2: During winter, I didn't really exercise a whole lot. I
Speaker 2: thought i'd get motivated when the weather got a bit warmer,
Speaker 2: but I'm finding it really hard. How can I shake
Speaker 2: this right?
Speaker 1: We'll get to that a little bit later. I'm sam
Speaker 1: with this is the wood life. Let's get into it.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna lie, I know I say not every week,
Speaker 1: but a lot of weeks that I'm very excited about
Speaker 1: today's guest. But I discovered this incredible, beautiful human being
Speaker 1: through his own podcast, which I'm sure many of you
Speaker 1: have heard, which is The Imperfect. I am thrilled to
Speaker 1: be joined in the Woodline studio today by the founder
Speaker 1: of The Resilience Project, author and co host of The
Speaker 1: Imperfect podcast, former teacher but now educator to tens of
Speaker 1: thousands of people across Austrain across the rest of the world. Here,
Speaker 1: Van Coleenberg, Welcome to the woodlfe.
Speaker 3: As you mentioned our podcast, I remembered a funny thing
Speaker 3: that happened last night. I was had a function and
Speaker 3: a lady came over and she said, I just want
Speaker 3: to let you know I'm such a huge fan Josh.
Speaker 3: I just love yourself as Josh. But it was my
Speaker 3: younger brother on the podcast, I'm not Josh. And then
Speaker 3: she went, oh, sorry, Ryan, Sorry. I was like, I
Speaker 3: can't correct her twice, so I just went with Ryan
Speaker 3: and two friends carriage. She goes, this is Ryan. The
Speaker 3: guy was telling her this is Ryan. The I was like, OK,
Speaker 3: so I was Ryan for about five minutes. So thank
Speaker 3: you for knowing who I am. That's right, I really
Speaker 3: appreciate that.
Speaker 1: Tell our listeners a little bit about your story first
Speaker 1: of all, and then let's get into the nitty gritty Ravens.
Speaker 3: So, I was seventeen years old. My little sister, Georgie,
Speaker 3: she was fourteen, and Josh and when I was eleven,
Speaker 3: Mum and Dad sat us down and said, your sister's
Speaker 3: got a mental illness. So, as you know, when we
Speaker 3: were seventeen, that was nineteen ninety seven, and we were
Speaker 3: not talking about mental illness. In course it wasn't us.
Speaker 3: I never heard of it, so I just didn't know.
Speaker 3: I had no idea what they're talking about, and I can't.
Speaker 3: I think my memories I could be conflating this in
Speaker 3: my mind, and I feel like I said, have pretended
Speaker 3: I got it, but I just didn't because there's just
Speaker 3: no one has ever talking about it. So I was
Speaker 3: in a condition called anorexia and eating disorder. A lot
Speaker 3: of people struggle with anorexia, males and females, as you'd
Speaker 3: know being a fitness industry. It's brutal and it ravaged
Speaker 3: my sister, well, it ravaged that family. Anyone listening right now,
Speaker 3: who knows someone who loves some of the mental illness.
Speaker 3: They know full well it's not just that person who suffers,
Speaker 3: it's the people of her close to them. So I
Speaker 3: remember thinking, I've been told when she eats food again,
Speaker 3: she'll be better. And I thought, okay, well, that can't
Speaker 3: be that serious. It really can't be that serious. It's
Speaker 3: just and so I just didn't get it. Fast forward
Speaker 3: four years, she's admitted to hospital for the first time
Speaker 3: in her struggle, and so she would have been at eighteen.
Speaker 3: I was about twenty twenty one, and I remember seeing
Speaker 3: in the house hospital there with her and I was
Speaker 3: looking at her, and the doctor explained that I was
Speaker 3: only allowed to be there for two hours every day,
Speaker 3: and he said, because I've told her she puts on
Speaker 3: a certain amount of weight, then you can stay for more.
Speaker 3: He said, you're her incentive. I need you to leave
Speaker 3: so that she wants to get out of He used
Speaker 3: to see her family more, and I remember were saying, well,
Speaker 3: how much weight does she have to put back on?
Speaker 3: And he said, well, when she gets now she's I
Speaker 3: don't know how tall she's. She's not a short person though,
Speaker 3: and he said, when your sister gets back up to it.
Speaker 3: She gets back up to thirty one kilograms. I can
Speaker 3: still letting you stay for more than two hours. So
Speaker 3: that's the moment. And I remember walking from there's the
Speaker 3: Austin Hospital in Melbourne and there's a bridge that you
Speaker 3: have to walk over to get back to the car
Speaker 3: park and it goes over a main road and as
Speaker 3: Mum and Dad, Josh and myself and I remember walking
Speaker 3: ahead of them and I was bawling my eyes out.
Speaker 3: I just didn't want them. I don't know why. I
Speaker 3: think as a back then I didn't want to see
Speaker 3: me crying. I just I remember my hands off my
Speaker 3: face and I was balling. It was about five minutes
Speaker 3: in front of mom and dad and it was we
Speaker 3: got in the car and then I couldn't hide anymore,
Speaker 3: and it was I think that's when I first realized,
Speaker 3: first of all how bad it was, but then also
Speaker 3: I realized, I think that I hadn't really given it
Speaker 3: the seriousness that it deserved. I didn't give it the
Speaker 3: attention kind I was kind of a bit annoyed at
Speaker 3: my sister at that point. I thought, can you not
Speaker 3: see what you're doing to Mom and Dad? And that
Speaker 3: night I remember was sitting at the didy the table
Speaker 3: and Dad, I reckon, I reckon. I'd seen him cry
Speaker 3: once before that, and it was when our dog died
Speaker 3: when I was about ten, and Dad was doing the
Speaker 3: dishes and I turned around and asked him a question.
Speaker 3: He didn't answer, and so I asked him again and
Speaker 3: I didn't answer. So I turned around and he was
Speaker 3: and he was. I'll never forget the figure of his
Speaker 3: the silhoueut of his body over the kitchen sink. He
Speaker 3: wasn't washing up, his just shoulders dropped and he was
Speaker 3: just bowling his eyes out. And I remember then going, shit,
Speaker 3: we're just not a happy family anymore. Like we had
Speaker 3: such a we were so happy, and then all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, we just weren't. And I had this really
Speaker 3: and this is coming back to your question about where
Speaker 3: the resiliance projects started, but I remember I just had
Speaker 3: this really strong fascination, the question, what is it that
Speaker 3: makes people happy? I need to know what makes people happy.
Speaker 3: Not for my sister. I knew that was well beyond
Speaker 3: my I knew I couldn't help there, but I did
Speaker 3: want to make Mum and Dad happy again. I miss
Speaker 3: seeing them happy. And I wanted Josh he was eleven.
Speaker 3: This is just this is not you know. I was
Speaker 3: side the best time as a primary school kid in
Speaker 3: a high school kid. I didn't want Josh to be
Speaker 3: robbed without either and I just thought, how do I
Speaker 3: make everyone happy? And I had no idea. But that
Speaker 3: was when I was twenty and that's when I first
Speaker 3: became fascinated with the question. It influenced me to go
Speaker 3: and do primary school teaching because I thought, well, if
Speaker 3: I'm a primary school teacher, I'll stop kids getting a
Speaker 3: mental illness. I have no idea how, but that's what
Speaker 3: I want to do. And I remember my first day
Speaker 3: as a primary school teacher. I was twenty five years
Speaker 3: old and I was sitting there and I was like, right,
Speaker 3: time to stop these kids getting I have no idea how,
Speaker 3: and I didn't know what it's doing. I had no idea.
Speaker 3: Fast forward three years. I was in India and I
Speaker 3: lived in a village volunteer teaching. And this is a village.
Speaker 3: You're no running water, no electricity, no beds. Everyone's sleeping
Speaker 3: on the floor. And first day in the school in
Speaker 3: the middle of this desert community, there's no tables and chairs.
Speaker 3: The kids that sit on a dirt floor. There's no
Speaker 3: pens or pencils for them. They just sit there and listen.
Speaker 3: Half hour into the day, I thought, never in my
Speaker 3: life have I ever seen joy like this before? This
Speaker 3: is out of control. How are these kids so happy?
Speaker 3: I don't understand this? And I was meant to be
Speaker 3: there for two weeks. On my last night, I thought,
Speaker 3: I can't leave here. Oh you to leave here. I
Speaker 3: want to live here as long as it takes me
Speaker 3: to work out. What are these kids doing every day
Speaker 3: that makes them so happy? Is there anything I could
Speaker 3: learn of them? I can maybe talk to my sister
Speaker 3: about huge granted of the long shop, but we were desperate.
Speaker 3: My sister had been sick then for oh it was
Speaker 3: a long time, over ten years, and so I yeah,
Speaker 3: I lived there and I saw them do these These
Speaker 3: people did these three things every single day. They practice gratitude,
Speaker 3: They practice empathy, the practice mindfulness. There's a whole lot
Speaker 3: of other stuff they did, but those three things really
Speaker 3: stood out to me. I don't know why, but they
Speaker 3: just did. And I came back to Melbourne wanted to
Speaker 3: tell everyone, went back to UNI to study them because
Speaker 3: I was like, well, I don't want to go to school,
Speaker 3: and so I do this if it's not going to work.
Speaker 3: And there's heaps of evidence and heaps of science to
Speaker 3: say these things will improve your mental health, they'll make
Speaker 3: you more resilient, and so I thought, yeah, I'm going
Speaker 3: to start doing this and I want to be about
Speaker 3: only twelve years ago, I went to my first schools
Speaker 3: at a presentation and I went well, and I thought,
Speaker 3: this is my business, and I quit teaching. And I
Speaker 3: didn't even know I was starting a business. I didn't someone.
Speaker 3: I remember someone saying, oh, wow, are you're starting a
Speaker 3: business and I said, oh, no, no, I'm not doing that.
Speaker 3: I'm just going to schools to do talks. I didn't
Speaker 3: even know it was that at the time, and no
Speaker 3: one was interested. Like the school I went to and yeah,
Speaker 3: I love to have it in the school I taught out,
Speaker 3: I said love to and I was like, I'm on fire.
Speaker 3: Two from two. This is going to be on me
Speaker 3: doing like three schools a day for the rest of
Speaker 3: my life. And then I reckon, I got yess to.
Speaker 3: I only did five or six schools in the first year,
Speaker 3: and like had no money, and my housemates let me
Speaker 3: took out my bond at one point so I could
Speaker 3: and they put chipped in so I could get something there.
Speaker 3: Then they paid my rent at a certain point because
Speaker 3: I was really struggling like I hadn't and I kept
Speaker 3: getting enough worked, and I was doing emergency teaching as well,
Speaker 3: two days a week to just try and get yeah way,
Speaker 3: which is anyone who's been emergency teacher, although it is brutal.
Speaker 1: And what were you charging your school to going ah
Speaker 1: her mummy housing, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 3: At first I was saying, I'll go and speak to
Speaker 3: every level in your school, and so it was like
Speaker 3: five one hour sessions i'd do. I remember, I remember
Speaker 3: one school. I said how much is it? And I
Speaker 3: didn't know yet, you know, for five sessions it would
Speaker 3: be because as a maniacy teacher, I was charging you
Speaker 3: woud get two hundred and sixty five dollars before tacks
Speaker 3: a day emergeny teaching, and I went, I was like,
Speaker 3: it's a whole day, okay, So I said, I thought,
Speaker 3: I'll make it sound like a bargain. So I said,
Speaker 3: it's two hundred and twenty nine dollars and she has
Speaker 3: half for one session, and I went, no, the whole
Speaker 3: day and she went, okay, done, I book you went,
Speaker 3: and then so I'm charging John trn Dollson to do
Speaker 3: this like forteen bucks first session.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, ridiculous.
Speaker 3: It was just a dollar a student, no fifty cents
Speaker 3: a student for some of the schools I was going.
Speaker 3: It was just like but I didn't know. I had
Speaker 3: no idea what I was doing.
Speaker 1: The thing was you cared about the message? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we weren't a business guy who recognized an opportunity. He
Speaker 1: cared about the message. She going back to those three
Speaker 1: pillars that you discovered in India. Yeah, that are now
Speaker 1: still to this day for three core pillars. Yeah, this behemoth,
Speaker 1: incredible thing that you you know, you should. I know
Speaker 1: you're a very very humble person, but what you've achieved
Speaker 1: is nothing should have incredible. Thank you and you're doing
Speaker 1: so so much good. This is your accurate acronym gratitude, empathy,
Speaker 1: mindfulness jem. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So there was some really beautiful research downe In two
Speaker 3: thousand and one. Lady called Barbara Frodickson over in New
Speaker 3: York and she wanted to know what is the most
Speaker 3: common characteristic amongst resilient people, the people who cope well
Speaker 3: and bounce back, what do they have in common? And
Speaker 3: she had thousands of people. She had she did personality
Speaker 3: profiles on them and she had it already go so
Speaker 3: she had all their personalities mapped out. And then she
Speaker 3: was sinking, right, how do I test these people? Like, well,
Speaker 3: what can I do to them? Which is to like?
Speaker 3: And what can I get past ethics as well, because
Speaker 3: you can't just do something awful to people to just
Speaker 3: for the sake of research and to And she couldn't
Speaker 3: get she couldn't work out what it was. And then
Speaker 3: nine to eleven happened and she went, oh, now this
Speaker 3: is completely stuff. Now I can't do this. This is
Speaker 3: a terrible time to test people. This is just an
Speaker 3: awful thing that's happened. And she was on the train,
Speaker 3: I think she was on the train and she saw
Speaker 3: a couple the day after crying, like hugging and crying,
Speaker 3: and she was again thinking, this is just I can't
Speaker 3: this throws everything completely. The people that my subjects are
Speaker 3: completely in a weird headspace, say, And as she turned
Speaker 3: around and she saw them laughing five minutes later, still
Speaker 3: in tears but laughing, and she thought, actually, this is
Speaker 3: the perfect time, this is the thing I've been waiting for.
Speaker 3: So she went back to the data, and over the
Speaker 3: next five years, what she established was the most common
Speaker 3: characteristic amongst people who bounce back well from challenging times
Speaker 3: and not only bounce back, but bounce forward become stronger
Speaker 3: is positivity and positive emotion. Not to say those people
Speaker 3: bury their head in the sands and go it's not happening,
Speaker 3: it's not happening. They're fully engaged in what's going on,
Speaker 3: but they still find reasons to smile, they still find
Speaker 3: excuses to experience joy, and they still find reasons to laugh.
Speaker 3: And the story she tells in her research is that
Speaker 3: there was a couple she was interviewing who'd lost one
Speaker 3: and four days later someone emailed them and said, oh,
Speaker 3: we won't do a book club this week, obviously, and
Speaker 3: they said, now we've got to do it.
Speaker 1: We have to do it.
Speaker 3: We don't feel like we got to do this. So
Speaker 3: these are the people who still seek out positive emotion.
Speaker 3: And I'll tell you that story now, because that's what gratitude, empathy,
Speaker 3: and mindfulness do. There are ways of cultivating positive emotion.
Speaker 3: So gratitude the ability to pay attention to what you've
Speaker 3: got not worry about what you don't have. And most
Speaker 3: people in Australia, the vast majority, myself included, are so
Speaker 3: guilty of If I get that car, then I feel happy.
Speaker 3: If I buy that house and I feel happy. If
Speaker 3: I get this promotion, ENO feel happy. If I can
Speaker 3: run this time in my race, then I feel happy.
Speaker 3: I look at that person, absolutely gosh, if I had that,
Speaker 3: then I'd feel happy, and then we're.
Speaker 1: To get it.
Speaker 3: Yep, I'm not any happier. Nothing's changed. I'm just now
Speaker 3: I'm looking for something else I don't have in order
Speaker 3: to feel happy.
Speaker 1: So kids change that for me was I was a shocker, real,
Speaker 1: I don't know. You must have the house, must have
Speaker 1: the car, must at whatever, And I just chased it
Speaker 1: and chased it and chased it. And I was chasing
Speaker 1: it because so much was missing, like I didn't have
Speaker 1: the relationship, I didn't have the kids. So that just
Speaker 1: I just told myself this lie that almost like I
Speaker 1: don't have that stuff because I've been so laser focused
Speaker 1: on work or whatever it was. And when I get
Speaker 1: all this stuff, the rest will sort of fall into place,
Speaker 1: or the happiness will be there, or the boy it
Speaker 1: will be filled or whatever it was, and it just wasn't.
Speaker 3: It's a beautiful example you share. Then there's nothing wrong
Speaker 3: with wanting all those things.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 3: It's like they're healthy things to aspire towards, I think.
Speaker 3: And it's obviously served you really well. You know you're
Speaker 3: doing so well, but we just can't attuch happiness to them.
Speaker 1: With this positivity. How much of that have you learned
Speaker 1: through all the work you've done, is born versus learned? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Well, the beautiful thing about gratitude, for example, all the
Speaker 3: things we can talk about you can practice them. So
Speaker 3: the way we started practice gratitude. There are many ways,
Speaker 3: in really beautiful ways, to write someone a letter months
Speaker 3: a month to let them know why you're so grateful
Speaker 3: for them. And the research or the science says that
Speaker 3: things like increased optimism for a month over a life
Speaker 3: satisfaction will go up, symptoms of depression, anxiety can go down,
Speaker 3: and that lasts a month. Or if you want to
Speaker 3: practice daily, you could write down, what are three things
Speaker 3: that went well for me today, not three unbelievable things,
Speaker 3: and also not three things you're grateful for, because that
Speaker 3: won't last long. What went well today I had a
Speaker 3: nice coffee, went for a nice run. I enjoyed the
Speaker 3: run in my face today when I was running. Didn't
Speaker 3: think I was going to but it's quite nice.
Speaker 1: Just little things. It went well, that's it.
Speaker 3: And if you do that every single day, the research
Speaker 3: says what happens is you actually start to rewire your
Speaker 3: brain to start scanning the world for the positives. And
Speaker 3: so that's how it can work.
Speaker 1: And so when you say we can practice it, which
Speaker 1: is the good news, and you're saying from a gratitude
Speaker 1: perspective daily.
Speaker 3: We've been saying daily for a long time. I met
Speaker 3: a psychologist literally two weeks ago who said it can
Speaker 3: be more effective to it once a week because a
Speaker 3: lot of people will do it, try and do it dali,
Speaker 3: and then they find themselves finding it hard to find stuff.
Speaker 3: So they get a bit pissed off about it and think,
Speaker 3: maybe I'm not that a grateful person. Maybe I'm actually
Speaker 3: not that grateful. Maybe there's not that much good to find. Yeah,
Speaker 3: but if you do it once awake, maybe some days
Speaker 3: for fifteen minutes four bed, you journal out and you go,
Speaker 3: what went well for me this week?
Speaker 1: So gratitude, What about empathy?
Speaker 3: Empathy is quite simply when you feel, when you can
Speaker 3: feel what someone else feels, when you put yourself in
Speaker 3: someone else's shoes. And the reason this is important is
Speaker 3: the more empathetic you are, the more likely you are
Speaker 3: to act in a kind way.
Speaker 1: And are there tips or tricks to get better at that,
Speaker 1: because I feel like that's something that some people naturally
Speaker 1: do and other people struggle with.
Speaker 3: Some people message me and say I don't think being
Speaker 3: too empathetic is a good thing, And I understand what
Speaker 3: they're saying because my wife Penny is so, so so empathetic,
Speaker 3: and I see moments where.
Speaker 1: Asin she carries other people's weight.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what you mean, she's watching news and yeah, it's
Speaker 3: going to take a couple of hours to cover from it.
Speaker 3: We had a magpie baby magpie fall out of a
Speaker 3: tree the other day and to have a backyard, and
Speaker 3: we didn't thing we could to keep it away from
Speaker 3: the pool, and we're so worried about it, and we're
Speaker 3: literally sapping away from the pool NonStop, and then when
Speaker 3: out for breakfast, came back and there's a baby magpie
Speaker 3: floating in our pool and there's parents. Sorry, there's a
Speaker 3: bit triggering for some people, and there's magpie parents just
Speaker 3: sit on the fence just looking at it, and it
Speaker 3: was awful. And we're got a five on or two
Speaker 3: older trying to explain it to Penny, still having a
Speaker 3: couple of ye She's still shuttered, shuttered, So I'm not
Speaker 3: saying that's a bad thing. She still shouted, but her
Speaker 3: mood was so affected by that. But I do get
Speaker 3: a lot of people saying, but too much empathy is
Speaker 3: not a good thing. I don't know. It's not my
Speaker 3: own expertise. I know that Brene Brown would say empathy
Speaker 3: is so important because when you're empathetic, you're more likely
Speaker 3: to be kind. And the neuroscience behind kindness, as you
Speaker 3: would know, like when you do something nice to someone else,
Speaker 3: your brain releases oxytocin, one of the four feel good hormones.
Speaker 3: And I'm not talking about out rageous acts of kindness,
Speaker 3: small things holding the door for someone, shouting somewhere, coffee,
Speaker 3: letting someone into traffic, a compliment like a nice, genuine,
Speaker 3: comp half felt compliment. Those things, from a selfish point
Speaker 3: of view, they're also very good for you. Your brain
Speaker 3: unless it is oxallytocin, you feel joy. I did this
Speaker 3: I did a talk for a group of neurosurgeons literally
Speaker 3: brain surgeons. That's an intimidating audience. Also not the best
Speaker 3: on it or didn see I'm banging us. A guy
Speaker 3: put his hand up as I was talking about the brain,
Speaker 3: and I went, I'm in trouble here. And he said,
Speaker 3: the kids you're talking about in India, there's one kid
Speaker 3: I spoke about in particularly. He said, is he kind?
Speaker 3: I said, without exaggeration, he's the kindest person I ever met.
Speaker 3: And he said, and that from my point of view
Speaker 3: what I know about the brain, that's the reason he's
Speaker 3: so happy. And then he said, I don't mind the
Speaker 3: attitude stuff. I'm going to walk out before he starts
Speaker 3: being about mindfulness. But the empathy stuff, that's why he's
Speaker 3: so happy.
Speaker 1: That's it.
Speaker 3: That's the reason. And he said because his brain doesn't discriminate.
Speaker 3: His brain doesn't say, look, you're sleeping on a dirt floor.
Speaker 3: You know, one set of clothes, no running water, you
Speaker 3: don't get oxytocin. He said, if you do something nice
Speaker 3: to someone else, he said, it's a lovely reminder. We
Speaker 3: always get access to joint happiness, and it comes through
Speaker 3: doing things for other people. Which is a lovely kind
Speaker 3: of I guess validation from someone far more intelligent than I,
Speaker 3: far more qualified, but it's fascinating. I don't want to
Speaker 3: patronize people and say so, here are some strategies to
Speaker 3: be kind. I think we just got to get better
Speaker 3: at looking out for the opportunities to be there from
Speaker 3: other people. We walk past a lot.
Speaker 1: I reckon when you do that stuff, and this is
Speaker 1: not to be a hero. Shock is the look you get, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it happens so frequently, especially.
Speaker 3: When you're doing it when we're going was that same,
Speaker 3: Oh my god, the Bachelor.
Speaker 1: I have a lot of people said, Josh, when the
Speaker 1: h is the best flock? Gratitude, empathy, mindfulness. I do
Speaker 1: think people misinterpret what mindfulness needs to be to be effective. Yeah.
Speaker 3: We interview a guy called Jeff Warren on our podcast
Speaker 3: who has a big contributed to the Calm app which
Speaker 3: is and he's a genius and he's just come muffled.
Speaker 1: This is his thing.
Speaker 3: He said, this is what it is. He said, it's
Speaker 3: the ability to just be wherever you are. And I said,
Speaker 3: oh yeah, but without you have to say without judgment
Speaker 3: and he said, no, just like God, just stop stop.
Speaker 3: It's just being wherever you are. He said. We spent
Speaker 3: so much time thinking about tomorrow. We spend so much
Speaker 3: time thinking about two weeks ago or yesterday.
Speaker 1: He said.
Speaker 3: We don't spend a lot of time being wherever we are.
Speaker 3: He said, we've got to get better. But we all
Speaker 3: know what it feels like. We're not bad people, but
Speaker 3: we seeing at the dinner table, kids are chatting about
Speaker 3: the day. Two minutes in we go. I haven't listened
Speaker 3: to a word anyone said. It's that, you know, it's
Speaker 3: those little things. So just it's just for me from
Speaker 3: the people I've chatted to who I respecting it, it's
Speaker 3: just being wherever you are. You want to meditate at
Speaker 3: a Buddhist or treat, sure.
Speaker 1: Go for it.
Speaker 3: If you want to walk all up of the block
Speaker 3: and pay attention to what you can hear, and then
Speaker 3: every time you get distracted by what's happening tomorrow, you
Speaker 3: go ooh, I'm thinking about tomorrow.
Speaker 1: What can I hear? Go for it.
Speaker 3: If it's by MP in the morning and doing a
Speaker 3: ten minute meditation, great. Every single time you try to
Speaker 3: practice mindfulness, you're improving the ability to concentrate, your clarity
Speaker 3: of thought will improve. Equanimity, so the ability to let
Speaker 3: go of things like someone cuts you off in traffic.
Speaker 3: You don't get angry and hang on to the rest
Speaker 3: of the day. You go, Oh, they might be like
Speaker 3: for a job interview. God, if you are like for
Speaker 3: a job interview, you go in front of me every
Speaker 3: day of the week. Or maybe it's more serious, maybe
Speaker 3: someone's in hospital. Go for it, get in front of
Speaker 3: me rather than just going what how they do that
Speaker 3: to me?
Speaker 1: What's?
Speaker 3: And then the fourth one is care. Your ability to
Speaker 3: care will improve And that's all from practicing Minfet's however
Speaker 3: you want to practice it.
Speaker 1: Mate, Thanks so much for coming on that.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thanks for having me. I loved watching in
Speaker 3: the Bachelor life, so we've better fan since then.
Speaker 1: But to finow episode them and here unpack.
Speaker 3: What could have been if I walk down there, No,
Speaker 3: it's better pleasure.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 1: It's funny you feel like you know people sometimes before
Speaker 1: you've actually met them. And listening to his podcast and
Speaker 1: following his stuff, and I don't know, I just felt
Speaker 1: very connected to it, to a person I'd never met before,
Speaker 1: and it was so lovely to finally meet him and
Speaker 1: to get a better understanding of what Jim really represents
Speaker 1: and just how simply all of us can integrate into
Speaker 1: our lives. That was just brilliant. Next up, we've got
Speaker 1: a question from Julie on motivation. As I've been motivated
Speaker 1: like many of you have just from that chat with you,
Speaker 1: Julie has a question about motivation.
Speaker 2: Hey, Sam, during winter, I didn't really exercise a whole lot,
Speaker 2: and that made me fall out of my routine. I
Speaker 2: thought I'd get motivated when the weather got a bit warmer,
Speaker 2: but I'm finding it really hard. Do you know how
Speaker 2: to stay motivated and how to work on it?
Speaker 1: How can I.
Speaker 2: Shake this rut?
Speaker 1: I think this is the million dollar question, and I
Speaker 1: would love to have a miracle answer for you. I'd
Speaker 1: love to sugarcoat it, but I'm not helping you if
Speaker 1: I do that. The answer to this question and not
Speaker 1: just from mutually from everyone that asks me this question,
Speaker 1: from all of our listeners that may be thinking the
Speaker 1: same thing. It needs to be gloves off and needs
Speaker 1: to be blunt unded to hit you right between the
Speaker 1: eyes with the absolute truth. And I promise you, if
Speaker 1: you accept this truth, things will get better. You have
Speaker 1: to stop waiting for motivation. And you ask the question,
Speaker 1: how do I stay motivated? You don't. You do not
Speaker 1: stay motivated. Motivation does not generate movement or momentum. Movement
Speaker 1: and momentum generate motivation, so it needs to start with you,
Speaker 1: not the other way around. The magical motivation fairy does
Speaker 1: not exist and is not coming along anytime soon, So
Speaker 1: you need to get up and get moving. The good
Speaker 1: news is from an exercise perspective, and I honestly believe this.
Speaker 1: Three exercise days in a row and you'll be back.
Speaker 1: Move your body just for a little bit, even three
Speaker 1: days in a row, and you will have your mojo back.
Speaker 1: And if I worked out yesterday, I'm more motivated and
Speaker 1: I have more chance of working out today, and so
Speaker 1: on and so on, and that beautiful snowball momentum starts
Speaker 1: to build, starts to build, and it keeps building, and
Speaker 1: it reaches the point where it's not about motivation. It's
Speaker 1: about consistency. It's not about motivation. It's about good small
Speaker 1: habits that we do every day. I had a great
Speaker 1: quote this week and it said it is better to
Speaker 1: be consistently good than occasionally great, and I think people
Speaker 1: that go up and down and they're either zero or
Speaker 1: one hundred, it does not last. Those that have habits,
Speaker 1: those that have consistency, those that just try and do
Speaker 1: a little bit every single day, are those that get
Speaker 1: to where they want to get to. Julie, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for that question. I hope I wasn't too harsh
Speaker 1: with my answer, but as I said, brutal honesty is
Speaker 1: what is needed when it comes to understanding motivation and
Speaker 1: where it plays a role and where it doesn't. As always,
Speaker 1: if anyone has any questions, I would love to hear
Speaker 1: from you, There's a link in the show notes. It
Speaker 1: can be about food, or fitness or mindfulness. Whatever you
Speaker 1: want to ask me, I'd love to help you. That's
Speaker 1: all for me. Another episode done and I will see
Speaker 1: you next week.