Latest / The You Project / #1953 Not Afraid To Be Afraid - Jim Murphy
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: I'll get our team. Welcome to another installment of the
- 0:02Speaker 1: You Project. Jim Murphy, Welcome to the land down Under,
- 0:07Speaker 1: if not literally virtually.
- 0:08Speaker 2: How are you? I'm great? Thanks Cregil.
- 0:12Speaker 1: Ha ha. I knew I shouldn't have told you that.
- 0:18Speaker 1: I was telling everyone before we went live. I was
- 0:20Speaker 1: telling Jim everyone that about how Australians tend to mutilate
- 0:24Speaker 1: names and chuck a Y on the end or an
- 0:26Speaker 1: O on the end, or abbreviate your surnames. So I'm
- 0:30Speaker 1: going to be calling you Jim Bow throughout the whole podcast,
- 0:33Speaker 1: just to get back at you. Tell my listeners where
- 0:36Speaker 1: you are and what time is it over there? It's
- 0:39Speaker 1: in the PM right, yeah, Sarah Creigil, I am in
- 0:44Speaker 1: New York City. Just I say New York City right now.
- 0:46Speaker 1: I've done here yesterday from Chicago.
- 0:50Speaker 2: Okay? Perfect?
- 0:51Speaker 1: And how's the how's the meteoric rise to fame and
- 0:55Speaker 1: recognition and attention.
- 0:58Speaker 2: It since I mean early this year?
- 1:00Speaker 1: I think we'll talk about it because most of Australians
- 1:02Speaker 1: won't know the story and with respect.
- 1:05Speaker 2: Won't know you, but a lot of them will.
- 1:07Speaker 1: Now, how's it been having a big kind of shift
- 1:11Speaker 1: in your reality?
- 1:12Speaker 2: From a public perspective, it's been amazing, you know, right
- 1:20Speaker 2: off the bat, the first week January twelfth is when
- 1:23Speaker 2: everything started with aj Brown and being reading the book
- 1:27Speaker 2: on the sidelines and being filmed, and that week it
- 1:30Speaker 2: was it was It's been an incredible change in my
- 1:35Speaker 2: life since then, with the message of inter excellence going
- 1:38Speaker 2: around the world. It's going to be in twenty five
- 1:40Speaker 2: languages this coming year. But the main message of interactionence
- 1:44Speaker 2: is what's important, not Jim Murphy and the messages, is
- 1:47Speaker 2: that cling to your life and lose it and give
- 1:50Speaker 2: up your life for others and gain it selfless is fearless.
- 1:53Speaker 2: And this is the most important thing, not not what
- 1:56Speaker 2: happens to this guy here.
- 2:00Speaker 1: It isn't I mean, one hundred percent, and I love that.
- 2:03Speaker 1: But also it's been great that this attention and recognition
- 2:09Speaker 1: and as the kids would say, brand awareness. You know,
- 2:12Speaker 1: you're a brand, Jim, brand awareness. I mean, it gives
- 2:15Speaker 1: you a platform to share these ideas and your ideology
- 2:18Speaker 1: and philosophy, you know. So it is really about the message,
- 2:22Speaker 1: not the messenger. But it must be great to have
- 2:25Speaker 1: the capacity to intersect and interact with millions of people,
- 2:30Speaker 1: not thousands.
- 2:32Speaker 2: Yeah, incredible gifts from God that I can hopefully be
- 2:36Speaker 2: a part of someone's lives, someone's lives and help them
- 2:41Speaker 2: have a transformed heart.
- 2:44Speaker 1: So could you just tell I mean, I know the story,
- 2:46Speaker 1: but my listeners who don't know the story. So you
- 2:48Speaker 1: wrote a book. Jim's book is called Inner Excellence Achieve
- 2:53Speaker 1: Extraordinary Business Success through Mental Toughness.
- 2:56Speaker 2: Did I get all of that? Correct? Yeah, that's exactly
- 3:00Speaker 2: what it was from two thousand and nine, the book
- 3:03Speaker 2: that was first published by McGraw hill, and then I
- 3:06Speaker 2: got to write in twenty eighteen and I self published
- 3:08Speaker 2: in twenty twenty. So the book that Aj Brown read
- 3:11Speaker 2: on National TV and during the Super Bowl was any
- 3:14Speaker 2: Excellence train your mind for extraordinary performance in the best
- 3:17Speaker 2: possible life. Correct.
- 3:20Speaker 1: Sorry, I've got that underneath my other night. I should
- 3:22Speaker 1: have read that, not to self. So just give my
- 3:25Speaker 1: audience a quick insight into January twelve this year. So
- 3:30Speaker 1: what for those who don't know the story, let us
- 3:34Speaker 1: know what happened.
- 3:37Speaker 2: Yeah. Sure. There's an NFL football player named AJ Brown
- 3:41Speaker 2: and he plays for the Philadelphia Eagles. He's, if not
- 3:45Speaker 2: the best wide receiver in the NFL, one of the
- 3:48Speaker 2: best in the NFL. And he was filmed during a
- 3:52Speaker 2: playoff game, the Wildcard game, which is the first round
- 3:55Speaker 2: of the playoffs, reading the book during the game. And
- 3:58Speaker 2: so they asked him afterwards, you know, you know, the
- 4:00Speaker 2: announcers zoomed in on it and said, wow, what's going
- 4:03Speaker 2: on here? This is very unique. They interviewed him after
- 4:06Speaker 2: the game and they said, you know, why were you reading?
- 4:08Speaker 2: Were you frustrated or what's going on? And he said, oh,
- 4:11Speaker 2: I bring that book in Excellence with me to every
- 4:14Speaker 2: single game. I use it to get prepared and centered
- 4:16Speaker 2: before the game. I read it after every drive during
- 4:18Speaker 2: the game. It gets me centered and that's why I
- 4:21Speaker 2: read it. And he said to you know, my teammates
- 4:23Speaker 2: call it the recipe. And so that was the start
- 4:27Speaker 2: in January twelfth, and then then they filmed them reading
- 4:29Speaker 2: it every game in the playoffs and including during the
- 4:31Speaker 2: Super Bowl. And have you subsequently met with him? Yeah,
- 4:37Speaker 2: amazing guy, very humble, gentle guy. And so it was
- 4:42Speaker 2: it was wonderful to get to speak with AJ. So
- 4:45Speaker 2: what's his royalty cat? Thirty percent? Has that work? Well? Yeah,
- 4:50Speaker 2: I mean I'm so grateful that AJ. See what AJ did,
- 4:54Speaker 2: was he he stayed true to himself. You know, you know,
- 4:59Speaker 2: if you're going to be reading a book, look on
- 5:00Speaker 2: the sidelines during the game, people are going to question you.
- 5:02Speaker 2: And what he did is he said, Hey, what I
- 5:06Speaker 2: want to do and show the world. You know, whether
- 5:08Speaker 2: the world likes it or not, I know they may
- 5:10Speaker 2: judge me, but that's up to them. I just want
- 5:11Speaker 2: to be true to myself and this book helps me
- 5:14Speaker 2: stay centered and focused. And so I'm going to do
- 5:16Speaker 2: that regardless of what the world says. It's going to
- 5:18Speaker 2: make me a better teammate, a better person, and a
- 5:21Speaker 2: better player. And so I'm going to do it even
- 5:23Speaker 2: though it may look awkward. And I think that's one
- 5:25Speaker 2: thing he showed us that that to be great, you
- 5:28Speaker 2: need to take risks, and you know, risk what people
- 5:30Speaker 2: think about you. And he also showed us that we
- 5:32Speaker 2: all have time to read. Yeah, yeah, did you when
- 5:37Speaker 2: you met with him? How does he like?
- 5:40Speaker 1: Does he does he have certain paragraphs or certain messages
- 5:46Speaker 1: that are highlighted that he just goes back and rereads
- 5:49Speaker 1: like a bit of a mantra, or like, clearly he's
- 5:52Speaker 1: not just browsing through the book on the sideline.
- 5:55Speaker 2: How did it work? Yeah, there's big sections that he
- 6:00Speaker 2: has highlighted almost every sentence early on in the book
- 6:03Speaker 2: in the first chapter that was really important to him.
- 6:05Speaker 2: And so inter Excellence is really about understanding that self
- 6:09Speaker 2: centered This is the biggest challenge that we face. It
- 6:11Speaker 2: leads to fear and when you're a wide receiver in
- 6:13Speaker 2: the NFL, you can't be focusing on your what you
- 6:18Speaker 2: want but can't control, and you've got to have this
- 6:21Speaker 2: sort of fearlessness and got to be willing to take
- 6:25Speaker 2: risks and to fail and put yourself out there if
- 6:27Speaker 2: you want to be a great receiver, which he is.
- 6:29Speaker 2: And so the book helps him stay centered and do that.
- 6:34Speaker 1: What's your understanding of all, Like if you had to
- 6:37Speaker 1: try to explain, like my page day is literally in
- 6:41Speaker 1: the mind, right, and if even for meta and not
- 6:45Speaker 1: that I'm a journius, but even for me to try
- 6:47Speaker 1: to explain self awareness and the self regulation and understanding
- 6:51Speaker 1: the mind and metacognition and metaperception and all this stuff, right,
- 6:55Speaker 1: try to understand the self that's in the middle of me.
- 6:58Speaker 1: You know, how do you explain the mind to people?
- 7:03Speaker 1: Because part of the toddle of your book is trying
- 7:05Speaker 1: your mind. So if we don't understand our mind, we
- 7:09Speaker 1: can't try and it rot. How do we understand ourselves
- 7:14Speaker 1: knowing that our perspective of everything is a subjective one.
- 7:19Speaker 2: The first thing that understand is that you are not
- 7:21Speaker 2: your mind. Your mind is a part of you that
- 7:24Speaker 2: you need to train. And if you don't understand this,
- 7:28Speaker 2: and this is not something that we're taught in school,
- 7:30Speaker 2: that I am not my mind, then you're going to
- 7:32Speaker 2: fuse with your thoughts. The problem with fusing with your
- 7:35Speaker 2: thoughts is you're going to get a lot of thoughts
- 7:37Speaker 2: that come from the environment that are really negative and
- 7:39Speaker 2: maybe even horrible thoughts that come into your mind. And
- 7:42Speaker 2: if you don't understand that I am not my mind,
- 7:45Speaker 2: then you're going to think, oh, I just thought a
- 7:48Speaker 2: terrible thought. I am a terrible person. And this is
- 7:51Speaker 2: absolutely not true. The most compassionate, loving people in the
- 7:54Speaker 2: world have terrible thoughts that come into their head from
- 7:58Speaker 2: the environment and so sore and understand that you are
- 8:01Speaker 2: not your mind, but it's part of you that needs
- 8:03Speaker 2: to needs training.
- 8:05Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's I mean that awareness that in the
- 8:09Speaker 1: moment awareness that you're talking about, which is spot on.
- 8:13Speaker 1: It's like realizing that this isn't me. And this doesn't
- 8:17Speaker 1: mean I'm a bad person or even a good person necessarily.
- 8:21Speaker 1: It just means that I'm having this thought in this
- 8:23Speaker 1: moment and to be able to lean into that like
- 8:26Speaker 1: I'm always interested what's the origin story of this? Like
- 8:30Speaker 1: why is this here now?
- 8:31Speaker 2: This thought? Where did this come from?
- 8:33Speaker 1: And you know, for me, over the years, it's usually
- 8:36Speaker 1: been about insecurity or self doubt or imposter syndrome or
- 8:40Speaker 1: a myriad of other negative emotional kind of triggers, and
- 8:45Speaker 1: being able to perhaps have a thought like I'm not
- 8:50Speaker 1: good enough while actually knowing at the same time I
- 8:54Speaker 1: am good enough.
- 8:55Speaker 2: Do you know what I mean? It's almost this juxtaposition.
- 8:58Speaker 2: So I do a lot of.
- 9:00Speaker 1: I'm sure you stand in front of a lot of groups,
- 9:02Speaker 1: but I do a lot of speaking, and I can simultaneously,
- 9:06Speaker 1: you know, I did a speaking gig yesterday in Queensland,
- 9:10Speaker 1: which is up the top of Australia. We're down the bottom,
- 9:12Speaker 1: and as I was being introduced, I often have this feeling,
- 9:17Speaker 1: you know, this is the day that you're going to
- 9:19Speaker 1: crash and burn. They won't like you know, all this
- 9:21Speaker 1: stuff right, It's not overwhelming, but it's just there. This
- 9:24Speaker 1: could be the last time, you know. But I've got
- 9:27Speaker 1: all this knowledge, I've got all this data that says, well, Craig,
- 9:30Speaker 1: you're not terrible at this. You're not terrible. So there's
- 9:34Speaker 1: these two things that can coexist. One is this fear
- 9:37Speaker 1: that I'm useless. The other is the knowledge that I'm
- 9:39Speaker 1: not useless.
- 9:40Speaker 2: Right, yeah, And so what inter Excellence says is, let's
- 9:45Speaker 2: get out of that whole game altogether, that whole idea altogether.
- 9:48Speaker 2: As I am useless, i am not useless. I'm good enough.
- 9:52Speaker 2: I'm not good enough. I can do this, I can
- 9:54Speaker 2: do this. Let's get out of that altogether and be completelyelfless.
- 10:00Speaker 2: Because when you're selfless, you're fearless. And so if I
- 10:03Speaker 2: was thinking that I'm the one that's doing this, that
- 10:06Speaker 2: I wrote this book, that people are loving all around
- 10:09Speaker 2: the world, and that I'm making a difference in people's lives,
- 10:13Speaker 2: then it would be very stressful for me. But I
- 10:16Speaker 2: don't think I'm doing it. I'm not. I'm just well,
- 10:20Speaker 2: First of all, the book is just this compilation of
- 10:23Speaker 2: ideas that I didn't create. I just put them together
- 10:26Speaker 2: and God helped me put them together. And every good
- 10:29Speaker 2: thing I've ever done was God gave me this gift
- 10:32Speaker 2: that I've been sharing and being able to be a
- 10:35Speaker 2: part of. And so I don't want any self confidence whatsoever.
- 10:40Speaker 2: I don't even want to think about Jim at all.
- 10:42Speaker 2: I want to be completely selfless and therefore fearless. I
- 10:46Speaker 2: want to be trusting God, not Jim, the creator of
- 10:49Speaker 2: the universe, not me, and so I don't want to
- 10:52Speaker 2: be in the picture of whatsoever.
- 10:55Speaker 1: I love that kind of like I'm not the solution.
- 10:59Speaker 1: I'm just pointing to the solution. And I love that
- 11:01Speaker 1: you said that none of these ideas or none of
- 11:05Speaker 1: the wisdom comes from you, it comes through you, kind
- 11:09Speaker 1: of thing, right, which I think is so true.
- 11:11Speaker 2: And it's funny.
- 11:12Speaker 1: I talk about often the like the wisdom that comes
- 11:17Speaker 1: out of in your case, that comes out of the
- 11:20Speaker 1: Bible specifically, probably more relevant a New Testament for most
- 11:24Speaker 1: of us, but the Old Testament as well, but even
- 11:26Speaker 1: you know the Stoics and all of these insights and
- 11:29Speaker 1: all of this wisdom. It's it's like Socrates said two
- 11:33Speaker 1: and a half thousand years ago, the beginning of wisdom
- 11:36Speaker 1: is to know thyself, right, And I'm like, well, that's
- 11:38Speaker 1: literally part of my research. There's nothing new here, Like
- 11:42Speaker 1: we've been trying to figure ourselves out for millennia for
- 11:46Speaker 1: probably you know, millions of years, I guess, but or
- 11:49Speaker 1: millennia let's go six and a half thousand years biblically.
- 11:53Speaker 1: But you know, trying to understand why I am the
- 11:56Speaker 1: way I am and where do I finish and where
- 12:01Speaker 1: does the other stuff start? You know's the what's me?
- 12:05Speaker 1: What's not me?
- 12:05Speaker 2: And yeah, that's kind of It's a really interesting thought,
- 12:10Speaker 2: is to.
- 12:12Speaker 1: Not take pride in what you're doing or not to
- 12:16Speaker 1: be proud in that negative sense.
- 12:19Speaker 2: Yeah, I can share a little bit more about that,
- 12:20Speaker 2: Craig if you like. So as a performance coach, professional
- 12:26Speaker 2: athletes and Olympic athletes come to me to perform better,
- 12:29Speaker 2: and one thing that they often want is more confidence.
- 12:31Speaker 2: It was surprised to me when I first started working
- 12:35Speaker 2: with elite athletes that are some of the best in
- 12:37Speaker 2: the world. For a top ten player in the world
- 12:41Speaker 2: on the PGA Tour or whoever, saying they want more
- 12:43Speaker 2: confidence seems strange because they're, you know, already one of
- 12:46Speaker 2: the best. And what I found in my experience is
- 12:49Speaker 2: that there's something that's that's much more powerful than confidence.
- 12:53Speaker 2: And like I said, I don't even want to be
- 12:54Speaker 2: self confident. What's more powerful than confidence is presence. And
- 12:59Speaker 2: if you fully engaged heart, mind and body and attached
- 13:02Speaker 2: to what you're trying to do, then I'll take that person.
- 13:06Speaker 2: If we have two people of equal talent, I'll take
- 13:08Speaker 2: that person every time over someone who's confident, because because
- 13:12Speaker 2: when you're confident, you can be careless. But when you're
- 13:15Speaker 2: fully engaged, fully present in the moment, then you're going
- 13:17Speaker 2: to see way more opportunities and there's no fear in
- 13:20Speaker 2: the present moment. Fear is in general a self focused
- 13:23Speaker 2: future thing of what's going to happen to me. And
- 13:26Speaker 2: so that's how I think about confidence and presence.
- 13:31Speaker 1: How do we I know this nine to three step
- 13:32Speaker 1: plan neither is there with pretty much anything.
- 13:35Speaker 2: But how do we how do we be more present?
- 13:41Speaker 1: How do we I agree with you, but just telling
- 13:45Speaker 1: somebody don't be nervous, don't be fearful, is not a solution.
- 13:48Speaker 1: It's like somebody is fearful, somebody who is overthinking, Like
- 13:53Speaker 1: telling them to not overthink in a solution.
- 13:55Speaker 2: So how do we move towards interaxcellence? Really the whole
- 13:59Speaker 2: system of inner excellence. You know, the book is like
- 14:01Speaker 2: three hundred pages or something. It's really about that, answering
- 14:05Speaker 2: that question, how do I become fully present in a
- 14:08Speaker 2: world with so much out of my control, like my
- 14:10Speaker 2: careers on the line. How can I be fully present?
- 14:13Speaker 2: In fact, that was the question that I asked sports
- 14:16Speaker 2: psychologists when I first started off on this quest with
- 14:19Speaker 2: You know, I spent five years full time writing and researching,
- 14:22Speaker 2: fifty to sixty hours a week for five years in
- 14:24Speaker 2: a row, two and a half years in the desert
- 14:27Speaker 2: give away. Over half my possessions went to go live
- 14:29Speaker 2: a life of solitude, got rid of my TV. And
- 14:31Speaker 2: that question was how can an Olympic athlete train for
- 14:34Speaker 2: four years from an event that may last less than
- 14:36Speaker 2: a minute and have peace and confidence in that situation.
- 14:40Speaker 2: And that's what inter excellence is in one sense, largely about,
- 14:44Speaker 2: is how do we do that? And there's many aspects
- 14:48Speaker 2: to that, but it's really getting down to understand human
- 14:51Speaker 2: behavior and human optimization and human behavior is understanding that
- 14:56Speaker 2: the heart is the key to your life. And this
- 14:58Speaker 2: is the first thing, the first major breakthrough that I
- 15:01Speaker 2: learned in the five years of writing and research is
- 15:04Speaker 2: that if you want to make a difference in your
- 15:06Speaker 2: life or in anyone's life, you have to get far
- 15:08Speaker 2: more than your mind. We have to get to the heart.
- 15:11Speaker 2: And when I say heart, I mean your spirit and
- 15:13Speaker 2: your will and you doing your PhD in neuropsychology correct.
- 15:18Speaker 2: I think this is the number one thing that as
- 15:22Speaker 2: you continue to study, is to really add to your
- 15:26Speaker 2: research is the heart and your will and your spirit
- 15:30Speaker 2: and heart. I use some swords interchangeably, and it's how
- 15:33Speaker 2: do we train the heart? Because when you squeeze, what's
- 15:36Speaker 2: in your heart comes out, just like when you squeeze
- 15:39Speaker 2: an orange, what comes out is orange juice. Your heart
- 15:42Speaker 2: is the source of everything you think, say and do
- 15:45Speaker 2: in concert with your subconscious mind. And so we want
- 15:47Speaker 2: to get that heart to love most what's most empowering.
- 15:52Speaker 2: And this is what inter excellence is. And then when
- 15:54Speaker 2: you as you continue to do that every day, the
- 15:56Speaker 2: number one goal with inter excellence is to learn and
- 15:58Speaker 2: grow every day. A big part of self awareness and
- 16:01Speaker 2: the number one thing of that self awareness are One
- 16:03Speaker 2: of the number one things is to understand that my
- 16:06Speaker 2: greatest need as a human is for love and acceptance.
- 16:10Speaker 2: And similarly, the greatest fear is to not get that
- 16:16Speaker 2: love and acceptance, to get rejection, rejected, And so that's
- 16:20Speaker 2: why there's so much anxiety. A big reason why there's
- 16:23Speaker 2: so much anxiety in the world today is because if
- 16:26Speaker 2: I fail, if I look foolish, I'm going to get
- 16:29Speaker 2: judged in a huge way because everyone can see it
- 16:31Speaker 2: on social media, is going to get replayed over and over,
- 16:34Speaker 2: and then I'm going to get rejected, which is the
- 16:36Speaker 2: biggest fear. Do you think sometimes I love that? Thank you?
- 16:41Speaker 1: Do you think sometimes in our quest for love and
- 16:44Speaker 1: acceptance and belonging and connection, we perhaps insert ourselves into
- 16:50Speaker 1: the wrong relationship or the wrong group because some connections
- 16:53Speaker 1: better than none.
- 16:56Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, yeah. Yeah. We're constantly like this is our
- 16:59Speaker 2: greatest motivator is to get that love and acceptance. And
- 17:03Speaker 2: so we're looking at our world of circumstances and results.
- 17:06Speaker 2: What's going to get me the most love and acceptance
- 17:09Speaker 2: from everybody? And so in the book, I talked about
- 17:12Speaker 2: the acronym palms, possessions, achievements, looks, money, and status. And
- 17:17Speaker 2: so if I can increase any, hopefully all or any
- 17:20Speaker 2: of those five things, then I can get more of
- 17:23Speaker 2: that love and acceptance. But the problem is so much
- 17:26Speaker 2: of this oide of my control. And so then we
- 17:28Speaker 2: start really grasping and reaching and hoping people will will
- 17:31Speaker 2: love and accept them. So we're going to try and
- 17:34Speaker 2: come off in a way that you think better of
- 17:37Speaker 2: me when I talk. And so hopefully when we're talking,
- 17:42Speaker 2: I might slide in some things that make me look
- 17:43Speaker 2: good in a certain way so that you will say
- 17:46Speaker 2: some things that I'll feel better about myself, because that's
- 17:48Speaker 2: ultimately what I'm hoping for as a human. And so
- 17:52Speaker 2: if you don't have that sense of deep love, the
- 17:56Speaker 2: ideal is to be fully known and fully loved by
- 17:58Speaker 2: someone of great importance. If you go out into the
- 18:00Speaker 2: world without that, then you're going to do whatever you
- 18:03Speaker 2: can to get that from whoever you're interacting with throughout
- 18:05Speaker 2: the day.
- 18:08Speaker 1: Can you tell me about you're quite unique? I love that,
- 18:12Speaker 1: I love how how this is not the right word,
- 18:18Speaker 1: but it's all that comes to mind, how love focused
- 18:20Speaker 1: you are, and how much how much your beliefs, your
- 18:24Speaker 1: faith drives what you do, and that kind of I
- 18:29Speaker 1: know it's not an idea. I know it's a lived
- 18:31Speaker 1: experience of selflessness and kindness. Tell me about the intersection
- 18:35Speaker 1: of your faith and the science and the research and
- 18:40Speaker 1: the practical kind of outworking of doing what you do.
- 18:46Speaker 2: Yeah, so when I was in the desert, that's a
- 18:48Speaker 2: great question. I learned that the heart is the key
- 18:50Speaker 2: to your life. And so then the big question is, well,
- 18:55Speaker 2: what do I do with that information? How do I
- 18:58Speaker 2: train the heart? Like I've never heard anyone say this before.
- 19:02Speaker 2: And so what I learned, like I shared, is that
- 19:06Speaker 2: that we want to teach train the heart to love
- 19:08Speaker 2: most what's most empowering. And you know this is this
- 19:12Speaker 2: is this is a challenge. It's a big challenge because
- 19:15Speaker 2: as humans, we're constantly wanting instant gratification. I just want
- 19:20Speaker 2: to feel better right now. And the reason we don't.
- 19:23Speaker 2: Most people get stuck is that they come to these
- 19:29Speaker 2: uncomfortable places in their life. They get these feelings that
- 19:31Speaker 2: they don't like, and they try to get rid of
- 19:35Speaker 2: the feeling. And this is where addiction happens. Addiction is
- 19:38Speaker 2: anything that stops your growth. And so if we look
- 19:40Speaker 2: at the cell phone, for example, the cell phone is
- 19:43Speaker 2: this it can be this addiction that stops your growth
- 19:46Speaker 2: because we get these uncomfortable feelings and we've all done
- 19:48Speaker 2: it where I'm really uncomfortable. Right now, I'm going to
- 19:51Speaker 2: grab my phone and so I'm going to look at
- 19:53Speaker 2: things that will take my mind away from it and
- 19:56Speaker 2: I can get some relief, just you know, just like
- 19:57Speaker 2: watching TV. And so. But in excellence is the number
- 20:01Speaker 2: one goal every day is to learn and grow. And
- 20:04Speaker 2: that's learning grow and self awareness and learn and grow
- 20:06Speaker 2: and love with some encourage. So because who you're becoming
- 20:11Speaker 2: is the most important thing about you, not what you're achieving.
- 20:13Speaker 2: Because what you're achieving you may think is the greatest
- 20:16Speaker 2: thing in the world. But what I thought was the
- 20:18Speaker 2: greatest thing in the world when I was nineteen is
- 20:21Speaker 2: very different than what I think it is now. And so, yeah,
- 20:26Speaker 2: do you think that.
- 20:27Speaker 1: Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. Like in our
- 20:31Speaker 1: culture in Australia, I'm sure in the States, I'm sure
- 20:35Speaker 1: most places, like success is in the world, it's framed
- 20:42Speaker 1: as stuff. What you have, what you earn, what you
- 20:45Speaker 1: are and what you drive, where you live, what you
- 20:47Speaker 1: look like, what people think, you brand, bank balance, it's
- 20:50Speaker 1: all that external. I can see that stuff, right, And
- 20:54Speaker 1: you and I both know, I'm sure we both know
- 20:57Speaker 1: lots of people who are richly rich, rich, successful, and
- 21:01Speaker 1: from the outside looking in, it's all Hollywood and glamour
- 21:03Speaker 1: and razzle dazzle, But the inside out is sometimes psychological, emotional,
- 21:10Speaker 1: and spiritual bankruptcy. Right, So from the outside looking in
- 21:14Speaker 1: ace from the inside out a terrible experience. Talk to
- 21:18Speaker 1: me a little bit about success and navigating what the
- 21:24Speaker 1: world calls success, but then that lived experience in the
- 21:29Speaker 1: middle of that.
- 21:32Speaker 2: Yeah, this is this is the big illusion, this pursuit
- 21:35Speaker 2: of success, because Western culture says success is having those
- 21:40Speaker 2: five things possessions, achievements, looks, money, and status, and it's
- 21:43Speaker 2: really this cheeks your tail empty pursuit of these temporary transactions,
- 21:49Speaker 2: and well, we really want something meaningful and empowering if
- 21:53Speaker 2: you really think about it, what you want for yourself
- 21:56Speaker 2: and maybe your kids is from most of us, we
- 21:59Speaker 2: want I want to live a meaningful life with amazing
- 22:03Speaker 2: experiences and deep and enriching relationships where we're learning and
- 22:06Speaker 2: growing and making a difference in the world and with
- 22:10Speaker 2: an excelance. We have four daily goals that help us
- 22:13Speaker 2: help us do that. The number one goal is learn
- 22:16Speaker 2: and grow. And then within that our four daily goals
- 22:19Speaker 2: is number one is to give the best of what
- 22:21Speaker 2: you have today. Some days it's not going to be
- 22:24Speaker 2: very much, but understand that even if I maybe a
- 22:26Speaker 2: thirty or forty percent day, I'm going to give one
- 22:28Speaker 2: hundred percent of that thirty or forty percent. And then
- 22:30Speaker 2: two is to be present. Three is to be grateful.
- 22:33Speaker 2: Four is to focus on my routines and only what
- 22:36Speaker 2: I can control present, because there's no fear in the
- 22:38Speaker 2: present moment of greatest obstacle fear and there's no fear
- 22:42Speaker 2: in the present moments. We want to be able to
- 22:44Speaker 2: constantly practice doesn't mean to be present. And when I
- 22:46Speaker 2: say present at the highest level, I mean to have
- 22:48Speaker 2: a sense of freedom and joy and that the feeling
- 22:51Speaker 2: that anything's possible. And then gratitude is so important because
- 22:56Speaker 2: it's directly linked to inner piece, which is directly linked
- 22:59Speaker 2: to interstree strength, mental toughness, and they're all linked to beauty,
- 23:03Speaker 2: and so gratitude is crucial. And one thing that might
- 23:08Speaker 2: be helpful to think about is that we're either grateful
- 23:12Speaker 2: or entitled. There's only two options in your life and
- 23:15Speaker 2: your day to day life. You're either grateful or entitled,
- 23:17Speaker 2: and you can think of which one you were saying
- 23:20Speaker 2: yesterday by like, was I grateful yesterday? Didn't someone follow
- 23:25Speaker 2: me around and say, yeah, that's a grateful person, or
- 23:27Speaker 2: he was grateful or weren't you. You know, it's your
- 23:29Speaker 2: own you can answer it yourself. But and then if
- 23:32Speaker 2: you weren't, and then you were entitled. And so I'm
- 23:34Speaker 2: not saying this to say you should be a good person.
- 23:37Speaker 2: I'm just saying that when we're grateful, we're going to
- 23:39Speaker 2: have more inner peace in your strength. When we're entitled,
- 23:42Speaker 2: we're going to have less inner peace. And industryth wow.
- 23:46Speaker 2: And then the fourth one is to focus on your
- 23:48Speaker 2: routines and only what you can control. I love it.
- 23:55Speaker 1: So from when we were born till now, you and
- 23:58Speaker 1: may sitting on this chat you're chatting with a weird
- 24:02Speaker 1: guy on the other side of the world. You know,
- 24:03Speaker 1: you and I and everyone listening has been to an
- 24:06Speaker 1: extent programed. You know, we've been programmed by culture, media,
- 24:11Speaker 1: social media, situation, circumstance, environment, people, school, and then we
- 24:17Speaker 1: kind of, you know, we end up how we end up.
- 24:20Speaker 2: Part of its genetic part.
- 24:21Speaker 1: Of this programming, this unconscious conditioning of how we see
- 24:25Speaker 1: the world and beliefs and values and ideas and some
- 24:29Speaker 1: of that programming works in inverted commas, and some of
- 24:32Speaker 1: it doesn't, some of its self sabotages, some of it's empowering.
- 24:36Speaker 1: How do we how do we think more critically and
- 24:41Speaker 1: build more awareness self awareness and more space between the programming,
- 24:48Speaker 1: our involuntary programming, and who we can be? Is that
- 24:54Speaker 1: a stupid question?
- 24:55Speaker 2: Like? Does that make sense to you? Like?
- 24:57Speaker 1: I feel most people are a bipe, Like we don't
- 25:00Speaker 1: think the way we think the way we think.
- 25:02Speaker 2: Because we've been trying to think that way.
- 25:05Speaker 1: I believe I believe this is the best team because
- 25:08Speaker 1: Dad said it was the best team on this religion.
- 25:10Speaker 2: Because my family is this religion.
- 25:12Speaker 1: I'm a vegan because mom's a vegan, right, Rather than saying, okay,
- 25:16Speaker 1: apart from all that programming and conditioning, what do I think?
- 25:20Speaker 2: What's my truth? What are my beliefs? You know? Yeah?
- 25:25Speaker 2: I think I think if you just go with the flow,
- 25:28Speaker 2: you know, this is my life and this is what's
- 25:31Speaker 2: kind of been laid out for me, and you know,
- 25:33Speaker 2: up until you graduate from high school, that's definitely the
- 25:36Speaker 2: best thing to do, is to follow that path, or
- 25:38Speaker 2: it's a great thing to do, But once you graduate
- 25:41Speaker 2: from high school, now you're making choices on your own,
- 25:44Speaker 2: and if you don't really be true to yourself, then
- 25:48Speaker 2: you're going to become like everyone else and you're going
- 25:50Speaker 2: to live a life of mediocrity, let's say. But the
- 25:54Speaker 2: big question is what does it mean to be true
- 25:56Speaker 2: to myself? And so I talk about this in the
- 25:59Speaker 2: book that I wrote called The Best Possible Life, How
- 26:01Speaker 2: to Live with deep content and joy and confidence. And
- 26:04Speaker 2: I mentioned earlier about training in your heart. See, the
- 26:07Speaker 2: human heart needs training because we'll at least mind us,
- 26:14Speaker 2: because you can think about yours credit. So maybe when
- 26:16Speaker 2: you're you've been stressed and under pressure, you've always gone
- 26:20Speaker 2: to the thing that's most empowering to yourself into the world,
- 26:22Speaker 2: the most loving thing. But it's not what's happened to
- 26:25Speaker 2: me every time. And so we need to train our
- 26:28Speaker 2: hearts so that that it does not get caught up
- 26:32Speaker 2: in self protection and uh self importance, because then it
- 26:39Speaker 2: becomes overinflated or underinflated, and then we don't have an
- 26:42Speaker 2: accurate view of the world. And so in order to
- 26:44Speaker 2: have an accurate view of the world, which is what
- 26:46Speaker 2: I call humility, then we need to train it and
- 26:49Speaker 2: uh so that that's a daily process. Yeah, yeah, was there.
- 26:57Speaker 1: Was there something that preempted your journey to the desert?
- 27:04Speaker 1: You might not want to share. But did something happen
- 27:06Speaker 1: because obviously not. Most people don't go to the desert
- 27:09Speaker 1: for five years, sell most of their stuff and write
- 27:15Speaker 1: a book fifty hours a week or thereabouts.
- 27:18Speaker 2: Like that's quite an ietypical thing. How did that come about?
- 27:22Speaker 2: Why did that happen? What was going on with you? Yeah?
- 27:26Speaker 2: My dream, my whole life since I was eight years old,
- 27:28Speaker 2: was to be a professional athlete, and so I got
- 27:32Speaker 2: dropped by the Chicago Cubs and that was a dream
- 27:33Speaker 2: come true. But I played professional baseball for five years
- 27:37Speaker 2: and I got injured and had to retire, and I
- 27:39Speaker 2: was devastated. I was in my early twenties and my
- 27:41Speaker 2: whole identity was as Jim Murphy pro based off player.
- 27:44Speaker 2: When I lost it, I felt like I lost everything.
- 27:47Speaker 2: I was driving a truck for a FedEx downtown Seattle, Washington.
- 27:51Speaker 2: I get a call from a college teammate and he says,
- 27:57Speaker 2: can you take over this coaching this high school baseball
- 27:59Speaker 2: team Innercy, Seattle at saw Boys School, which I'd never
- 28:02Speaker 2: considered coaching. It just worked with my schedule. I decided
- 28:05Speaker 2: to do it, and so I have the best time.
- 28:09Speaker 2: We go undefeated. And so I was like, oh, how
- 28:12Speaker 2: do I realized my destiny was not to be a
- 28:15Speaker 2: superstar professional baseball player, but to be a superstar professional
- 28:18Speaker 2: baseball coach. But how do I go from coaching fifteen
- 28:21Speaker 2: year olds to coaching the Yankees and winning the World Series.
- 28:24Speaker 2: So I came up with this plan. I'm going to
- 28:25Speaker 2: get a master's in coaching science or physical education, and
- 28:28Speaker 2: so I can get a job teaching pe to pay
- 28:30Speaker 2: the bills and a coach of the high school baseball team,
- 28:31Speaker 2: win a championship, get a job in UNI, coach the
- 28:34Speaker 2: baseball team, win a championship, and work my way into
- 28:37Speaker 2: the pros. And so that was my plan. I enrolled
- 28:39Speaker 2: at the University of British Columbia and Canada. I started
- 28:42Speaker 2: a baseball team there. I get my master's in coaching
- 28:45Speaker 2: science and for my master's paper, I interview thirty nine
- 28:49Speaker 2: major League baseball managers and gms and other coaches on
- 28:52Speaker 2: how to build a championship team. Get a job of
- 28:55Speaker 2: the Texas Rangers two weeks after graduation. Dream come true.
- 28:59Speaker 2: But then I quit six months later in tears. It
- 29:02Speaker 2: was just was not a good fit. And I thought
- 29:05Speaker 2: I was a failure because I thought, this is the
- 29:08Speaker 2: best job that I could possibly do. It's going to
- 29:10Speaker 2: be this extraordinary life. I'm meant to be a superstar.
- 29:12Speaker 2: And I always had this kind of sense that every
- 29:16Speaker 2: girl is going to want to be with me, and
- 29:17Speaker 2: every guy is going to want to be me, you know,
- 29:19Speaker 2: this incredible egotisticol thing. And then so then Jim Murphy
- 29:25Speaker 2: pro baseball player becomes Jim Murphy nobody in my mind.
- 29:28Speaker 2: And then it happens again as a coach, and then
- 29:33Speaker 2: I get asked my Major League Baseball if I want
- 29:35Speaker 2: to be the hitting coach for South Africa for the
- 29:37Speaker 2: two thousand O Big Trials. I don't know if you
- 29:39Speaker 2: remember what city that was in, but it was somewhere
- 29:42Speaker 2: down south. I yeah, yeah, it was. It was about
- 29:45Speaker 2: city to Melbourne. Yeah, I look, it's good.
- 29:49Speaker 1: I mean, I try Sydney, they try, you know, they
- 29:51Speaker 1: have a go and it's good. It's just uh, they
- 29:54Speaker 1: like a pole cousin to Melbourne.
- 29:56Speaker 2: Everybody does the best of what they have in their heart.
- 29:58Speaker 2: Oh my Sydney listeners a just turning off now. So
- 30:03Speaker 2: I was fortunate enough to work with South African national team.
- 30:07Speaker 2: We win Olympic trials, go to Sydney and have one
- 30:09Speaker 2: of the biggest subset victories in Olympic baseball in history.
- 30:11Speaker 2: You get to meet Nelson Mandela. It was an amazing experience.
- 30:14Speaker 2: I'm still close friends with all those people in the
- 30:17Speaker 2: two thousand Olympic team. And after that, I fell in
- 30:20Speaker 2: love with Australia. By the way, still one of my
- 30:24Speaker 2: favorite countries. But after the Olympics, what am I going
- 30:27Speaker 2: to do with my life? I go back to being
- 30:29Speaker 2: a personal training which I did in grad school. And
- 30:31Speaker 2: then I was just getting restless and I wanted to
- 30:33Speaker 2: make a bigger difference in people's lives. I get a
- 30:36Speaker 2: call from my teammate in pro baseball, Ricky Shruggs, starting
- 30:39Speaker 2: a baseball academy in Tucson, Arizona, in the desert. Can
- 30:42Speaker 2: you come for the weekend and help me launch this thing?
- 30:44Speaker 2: I decide. At the time, I just didn't. I was
- 30:48Speaker 2: getting really restless, and I knew I just really felt
- 30:51Speaker 2: like I was created to do something important, something special
- 30:55Speaker 2: for the world, and I just didn't know what that was.
- 30:58Speaker 2: And so I was like kind of getting to your question.
- 31:01Speaker 2: I'm going to move to the desert. I'm going to
- 31:03Speaker 2: go live a life of solitude. I'm going to give
- 31:05Speaker 2: away most of my possessions, including my TV, live a
- 31:07Speaker 2: simple life, and I'm going to figure out what I'm
- 31:11Speaker 2: My destiny is, what am I put on this earth
- 31:14Speaker 2: to do? And I'm going to find something that I'm
- 31:16Speaker 2: willing to give my life for that I'm willing to
- 31:18Speaker 2: live and die for and dedicate my life to. And
- 31:21Speaker 2: so I left for the desert and that's where I
- 31:25Speaker 2: ended up deciding to become a personal coach to professional
- 31:27Speaker 2: baseball players. My first two clients too amazing. So I'm
- 31:30Speaker 2: going to put together a little manual how to have
- 31:32Speaker 2: peace and confidence under pressure for future pro baseball players.
- 31:36Speaker 2: Call up a sports psychologist, ask them how long? How
- 31:38Speaker 2: can Olympic athlete train for four years and for an
- 31:42Speaker 2: event that may take less than a minute and have
- 31:44Speaker 2: peace and confidence in that situation? That brings more questions
- 31:47Speaker 2: and answer. So I call another psychologists and another and
- 31:49Speaker 2: I spent five years full time writing and researching that question,
- 31:53Speaker 2: and through that that becomes the book inter of Excellence. Wow,
- 31:59Speaker 2: that is that is an interesting story.
- 32:02Speaker 1: And in the middle of all of that, I mean,
- 32:07Speaker 1: we'll jump out. I want to talk to you about
- 32:09Speaker 1: pressure or perceived pressure in a moment, but I want
- 32:11Speaker 1: to talk to you about I don't know. I'm scared
- 32:14Speaker 1: to open the god door. But did you grow up
- 32:19Speaker 1: in a religious household? Did you always have faith? Has
- 32:22Speaker 1: that waxed and wind? Have you?
- 32:26Speaker 2: You know?
- 32:26Speaker 1: The purpose bigger than me? Has that always been a
- 32:29Speaker 1: Has that been a constant?
- 32:31Speaker 2: Definitely not in my heart. If you ask people that
- 32:35Speaker 2: know me or know me most of my life, they'll say,
- 32:37Speaker 2: if you can believe it, Jim was even more self
- 32:40Speaker 2: centered back then than he is now. Extremely uh. And
- 32:45Speaker 2: so my life was really about Jim for most of
- 32:47Speaker 2: my life. And I think it's it's actually the default
- 32:51Speaker 2: is self centeredness. And so that's why it's a big challenge,
- 32:54Speaker 2: because self centeredness leads to fear, at least the comparison
- 32:57Speaker 2: and anxiety and fear. My mom is full Japanese and
- 33:01Speaker 2: she grew up in Japan and her lineage is Samurai,
- 33:04Speaker 2: and so I talk about that in the beginning of
- 33:05Speaker 2: the book. And so her impact on my life was great,
- 33:09Speaker 2: and my dad was also had a huge impact on
- 33:12Speaker 2: my life. But my life really changed in twenty ten.
- 33:18Speaker 2: I had a near mental breakdown. And this is right
- 33:20Speaker 2: after the book came out. It comes out in bookstores
- 33:22Speaker 2: around the world, and I spend my life savings. I'm
- 33:26Speaker 2: ninety thousand dollars in debt now and I'm in downtown Denver,
- 33:30Speaker 2: and my mind is kind of spiraling out of control.
- 33:34Speaker 2: I'm thinking, Okay, yeah, the books and bookstores around the world,
- 33:37Speaker 2: and Barnes and Noble, the biggest chain in the US.
- 33:40Speaker 2: But you have no money to hire someone to market
- 33:42Speaker 2: the book. You don't know how to do marketing, and
- 33:44Speaker 2: you don't like promoting yourself. This is not a good
- 33:46Speaker 2: marketing plan. And if no one hears about the book,
- 33:49Speaker 2: no one's going to buy the book. If no one
- 33:50Speaker 2: buys the book, mark Barnes and Noble will pull it
- 33:52Speaker 2: off their shelves. And this could happen in a few weeks,
- 33:54Speaker 2: and then five years of your life, ninety thousand dollars,
- 33:58Speaker 2: all of that, that's all gone, and you're going to
- 34:01Speaker 2: be also labeled a failure, a total failure, because everyone
- 34:05Speaker 2: knows you're obsessed about this project for five years and
- 34:07Speaker 2: ned failed. And if that happens, that I couldn't see
- 34:10Speaker 2: how this wouldn't happen, And this is what happens. This
- 34:12Speaker 2: is why we're created for a relationship, and this is
- 34:15Speaker 2: why it's so important to have to love others so
- 34:21Speaker 2: you can have people that you can share your fears with.
- 34:24Speaker 2: And because fear grows in the dark, and I didn't
- 34:28Speaker 2: have anyone that I could go to, and I pretty
- 34:32Speaker 2: much isolated myself for five years. And so this is
- 34:34Speaker 2: what happens when you isolate yourself, that you can have
- 34:38Speaker 2: these near breakdowns, which is what was happening to me.
- 34:42Speaker 2: And I thought, you know, if I'm a total failure,
- 34:45Speaker 2: you know, the book gets pulled off the shelves, then
- 34:47Speaker 2: I'm gonna have to get a regular job because no
- 34:48Speaker 2: pro athletes is going to hire a failure to coach them,
- 34:50Speaker 2: which is why I wrote the book to coach pro athletes.
- 34:53Speaker 2: And then if no one hires me, then I'm going
- 34:55Speaker 2: to have to get a regular job. But it's two
- 34:56Speaker 2: thousand and nine. The economy we're in a recession, so
- 34:58Speaker 2: no one's going to hire a failure, So I'm going
- 35:00Speaker 2: to die alone in the street. So that was what
- 35:03Speaker 2: the near mental breakdown happened, and my life and so
- 35:07Speaker 2: I think of my life as in terms of before
- 35:11Speaker 2: that moment, because that moment was a huge moment in
- 35:14Speaker 2: my life. I started my life to God. I meet
- 35:15Speaker 2: this homeless harpist who ends up possibly being an angel,
- 35:19Speaker 2: and my life completely changes. And I meet these people
- 35:22Speaker 2: that total strangers that tell me what's going to happen
- 35:25Speaker 2: in my life. They come true, and yeah, it was
- 35:27Speaker 2: pretty amazing what God's done. And when was that twenty ten?
- 35:32Speaker 2: That yeah, twenty ten. I wrote about this my life
- 35:36Speaker 2: story in the book The Best Possible Life.
- 35:41Speaker 1: Identity is an interesting thing, isn't it, Because when your
- 35:45Speaker 1: story is I'm going to be well.
- 35:47Speaker 2: I am right, I am this, or I am.
- 35:50Speaker 1: That, I'm going to be a finmous author, I'm going
- 35:53Speaker 1: to be this whatever, or I am I'm an athlete,
- 35:59Speaker 1: and then it took out you don't end up being
- 36:01Speaker 1: the athlete.
- 36:02Speaker 2: You want to be, or.
- 36:04Speaker 1: You know, I'm a vegan and then somebody disco or
- 36:07Speaker 1: then I get some information that doesn't sit with my information,
- 36:11Speaker 1: or you know, like when when that thing that we
- 36:14Speaker 1: identify with either turns out to be not correct or
- 36:19Speaker 1: flawed or it doesn't work out, then we don't know
- 36:22Speaker 1: who we are, you know, like I for a really
- 36:27Speaker 1: silly example, but for a long time to my Also,
- 36:29Speaker 1: I come from a personal training background like you, and
- 36:34Speaker 1: I actually set up the first personal training center in
- 36:37Speaker 1: Australia in nine ninety, right, So I have a big
- 36:39Speaker 1: background working with clients, and I used to teach and
- 36:42Speaker 1: even in the eighties, I'm that old you know about
- 36:44Speaker 1: the food pyramid. And then and then one day we
- 36:47Speaker 1: all kind of figure out, oh, maybe that's not exactly
- 36:50Speaker 1: the best science in the world. And then but I'm
- 36:53Speaker 1: really intertwined with that science or that message or that
- 36:56Speaker 1: version of the truth because I've been teaching it and
- 36:59Speaker 1: telling it and it and then i find out, well, Craig,
- 37:03Speaker 1: you're totally wrong. And then all of a sudden, I've
- 37:07Speaker 1: got to go I've either got to double down or
- 37:09Speaker 1: I've got to just say, oh that thing that I thought,
- 37:11Speaker 1: that's that's not true. And so that's a It's identity
- 37:16Speaker 1: is an interesting thing because you don't want to become
- 37:19Speaker 1: I don't know, I feel like you don't want to
- 37:21Speaker 1: become too entwined with well, a lot of ideologies or philosophies,
- 37:27Speaker 1: you know, because it can be fraught with danger.
- 37:32Speaker 2: Well, One of the biggest problems that we have as
- 37:35Speaker 2: humans is we have a single story for our lives.
- 37:38Speaker 2: What I mean by that is that we have a
- 37:40Speaker 2: picture of how my life should go and how it
- 37:43Speaker 2: shouldn't go, and pretty much along a certain track, and
- 37:48Speaker 2: oftentimes it doesn't go that way. And when it doesn't
- 37:50Speaker 2: go that way, then we get really thrown off and
- 37:52Speaker 2: have this real fear, anxiety and stress. But the cute
- 37:58Speaker 2: understanding is that you don't know it's best for you.
- 38:00Speaker 2: You know, you have your goals and your dreams, but
- 38:02Speaker 2: is it best for you. There could be if you
- 38:04Speaker 2: could take your top ten goals right now, and they
- 38:07Speaker 2: could maybe none of them are good for you, or
- 38:10Speaker 2: maybe there's twenty others that are way better for you
- 38:13Speaker 2: than the top ten you have right now. And that's
- 38:15Speaker 2: why I want to you know, the first principle of
- 38:17Speaker 2: inter excellence is to remember that all things are here
- 38:20Speaker 2: to teach me and help me. It's all working for
- 38:21Speaker 2: my good and hold things, hold your results and circumstances lately,
- 38:26Speaker 2: because far more important than what you achieve is who
- 38:30Speaker 2: you're becoming.
- 38:32Speaker 1: I want to chat a little bit about pressure and typically,
- 38:37Speaker 1: like you know, when we talk about athletes. We talk
- 38:39Speaker 1: about performing under pressure, and we know that we can
- 38:42Speaker 1: get guys or girls who are amazing in practice and
- 38:45Speaker 1: skilled and amazing you know, spatial awareness and timing and execution,
- 38:51Speaker 1: and theoretically they're brilliant and even practically they're brilliant in
- 38:55Speaker 1: a training setting where there's less or there's little to
- 38:58Speaker 1: know pressure at times, sometimes there is, but then under
- 39:05Speaker 1: extreme pressure. I worked over here with an AFL club,
- 39:08Speaker 1: which is the equivalent of an NFL club, which is
- 39:12Speaker 1: the Australian Rules Football League. So I worked with a
- 39:14Speaker 1: team over here for four years and I would often
- 39:18Speaker 1: see guys who on the training track were nine and
- 39:22Speaker 1: a half out of ten, but mentally and emotionally just
- 39:26Speaker 1: would capitulate at times not always. So when mentally and
- 39:32Speaker 1: emotionally they would struggle, then you know their skill goes down,
- 39:36Speaker 1: their timing goes down, their ability to read the game
- 39:40Speaker 1: drops off, their confidence drops off everything. What's your theory
- 39:45Speaker 1: on dealing with pressure? I feel like we have it wrong.
- 39:51Speaker 2: Oh yeah, so here's kind of how essentially, give you
- 39:55Speaker 2: a little analogy. Prout's come to me or Olympic anthiort's
- 39:59Speaker 2: come to me because the want to perform better, so
- 40:01Speaker 2: they want to be world number one. And when a
- 40:02Speaker 2: win a national championship or something like that, a world championship,
- 40:06Speaker 2: and they're looking for some transaction, they want to get
- 40:12Speaker 2: some achievement. That's I mean. I'm a performance coach. I
- 40:14Speaker 2: help people achieve great things when become world number one.
- 40:18Speaker 2: And it's like they're coming to me for happiness, which
- 40:23Speaker 2: I define as a positive temporary feeling based on what's happening.
- 40:27Speaker 2: They want to get transaction, and what I teach them
- 40:30Speaker 2: is how to have joy, which is a deep sense
- 40:31Speaker 2: of well being, freedom, and gratitude independent of circumstances. And
- 40:36Speaker 2: so can you remember your question?
- 40:41Speaker 1: I was just talking about dealing with pressure, and I
- 40:44Speaker 1: feel like our paradigm is, Okay, you got to try
- 40:48Speaker 1: and on the pressure. You got to you got to
- 40:50Speaker 1: put yourself under immen's pressure. So when the real pressure comes,
- 40:54Speaker 1: you're acclimatized, you know, mm hmm.
- 40:58Speaker 2: So uh. Interrextllence is really about a way of life
- 41:02Speaker 2: and understanding that there's there's way too much out of
- 41:06Speaker 2: your control to be attached to what you want. There's
- 41:09Speaker 2: too much out of your control and you don't even
- 41:12Speaker 2: know it's good for you, let it alone the best
- 41:13Speaker 2: thing for you. And so that's why we have these
- 41:16Speaker 2: principles about developing yourself and training your heart and your
- 41:20Speaker 2: mind and becoming a certain type of person, because the
- 41:25Speaker 2: more you develop yourself, the better you're going to be
- 41:26Speaker 2: in every aspect of your life on and off the
- 41:28Speaker 2: field and have more joy. And so it's really understanding
- 41:34Speaker 2: why do I want to become world number one, for example,
- 41:38Speaker 2: or why do I want to have a million dollars
- 41:41Speaker 2: or a million followers. So if we say I wanted
- 41:43Speaker 2: a million million dollars, well you don't want the money.
- 41:48Speaker 2: You want what you think it's going to give you, right,
- 41:50Speaker 2: I mean, we're not going to take the paper bills
- 41:54Speaker 2: and put them in a bathtub and roll around in
- 41:55Speaker 2: it unless you're a little bit crazy. What you're going
- 41:58Speaker 2: to do is you're going to take that money. You're
- 42:00Speaker 2: going to buy something with it. Maybe it's a house
- 42:02Speaker 2: or a car, and you don't even want the house
- 42:05Speaker 2: or car. What you want is what you think it
- 42:07Speaker 2: will give you some experience, which is going to create
- 42:10Speaker 2: some feeling. And so what you really want is these feelings.
- 42:15Speaker 2: And so what I help people understand is what do
- 42:17Speaker 2: you really want? Why do you want to achieve this thing?
- 42:19Speaker 2: And let's go for that directly, Because if you want
- 42:21Speaker 2: to live a life of deep contentment, joy and confidence
- 42:25Speaker 2: independent of circumstance, for example, a life with the easy
- 42:29Speaker 2: experiences and deep and enriching relationships where you're learning and
- 42:32Speaker 2: growing and making a difference, if that's what you really want,
- 42:36Speaker 2: then you can have that. Can you become world number one?
- 42:39Speaker 2: I don't know, but it's so important to understand, is well,
- 42:44Speaker 2: why do you want what you want? Let's go for
- 42:47Speaker 2: it directly. I asked this question, in the best possible life,
- 42:50Speaker 2: what would you rather have a ten million dollar house
- 42:52Speaker 2: on the water, paid off or would you rather live
- 42:57Speaker 2: in an apartment paycheck to paycheck, no savings of your life,
- 43:01Speaker 2: but be guaranteed and amazing experiences with deep and enriching
- 43:07Speaker 2: relationships where you're filled with love, peace and joy every
- 43:09Speaker 2: single day the rest of your life. Which would you
- 43:11Speaker 2: rather have? And it's a I think it's a really
- 43:15Speaker 2: interesting question because the human mind in Western culture does
- 43:19Speaker 2: not connect the two. It's those are opposites. If you're
- 43:23Speaker 2: living paycheck to paycheck, there's no joy, there's no peace.
- 43:27Speaker 2: But the reason why It's also such a good question
- 43:29Speaker 2: is well, why do you want the ten million this
- 43:32Speaker 2: beautiful house on the water, And like most of my life,
- 43:36Speaker 2: I would have chosen the house. But what if no
- 43:39Speaker 2: one could ever see it? Would you still choose the house?
- 43:41Speaker 2: What if no one could ever know you have it?
- 43:43Speaker 2: Would you still choose it? Because for me, most of
- 43:45Speaker 2: my life would have chosen the house. Because now I'm picturing, Oh,
- 43:48Speaker 2: I'm going to have these get togethers and people are
- 43:50Speaker 2: going to go, oh man, this is so amazing, and
- 43:52Speaker 2: they're going to have these great experiences, and of course
- 43:54Speaker 2: I'm going to be loved and they're going to say,
- 43:56Speaker 2: what a beautiful house. And I'm going to feel so
- 43:58Speaker 2: important and loved and I'm going to feel like amazing
- 44:02Speaker 2: because of what's going to happen, the attention and the
- 44:05Speaker 2: experiences I'm going to have in that. But if we
- 44:08Speaker 2: take that away and well with the inner excellence says, hey,
- 44:11Speaker 2: let's go for that directly. Let's go for those experiences
- 44:13Speaker 2: and that feeling that life directly. And that's what any
- 44:16Speaker 2: excellent says. Yeah, I love that.
- 44:19Speaker 1: I mean that's we grow up in stories of well
- 44:25Speaker 1: if I get that or own that or earn that
- 44:27Speaker 1: or look like that or have that, then I will
- 44:31Speaker 1: be content, or I'll be happier, I'll be fulfilled, or
- 44:35Speaker 1: i won't be anxious anymore, I'll be calm. So we
- 44:38Speaker 1: have this external kind of internal perceived correlation. Is that
- 44:43Speaker 1: when that thing in my external physical, three dimensional visible world,
- 44:47Speaker 1: the world that everyone can see, when I do that
- 44:50Speaker 1: thing or have that thing, then the byproduct is my
- 44:54Speaker 1: internal world, the place where living happens, not life. Life
- 44:57Speaker 1: happens out there, living happens in here. Then I'm going
- 45:00Speaker 1: to be all of these things. It's that kind of
- 45:03Speaker 1: what do you want and why do you want it? Well,
- 45:04Speaker 1: what I want is this, this and this, and then
- 45:07Speaker 1: tell me your why, because that's actually what you want,
- 45:10Speaker 1: like the reason under the you know, the goal, that's
- 45:14Speaker 1: what you really are after you know it's it's it's
- 45:18Speaker 1: so true, but it's so hard, especially you know when
- 45:23Speaker 1: we do live in a world that values those things
- 45:26Speaker 1: so much. And I'm not trying to sound too weird
- 45:28Speaker 1: or philosophical or.
- 45:29Speaker 2: Deep everyone, but it's just true. You know.
- 45:31Speaker 1: It's I've I would say, and I could be wrong,
- 45:35Speaker 1: but I would say. The people that I worked with
- 45:37Speaker 1: over the years who are really, really wealthy were probably
- 45:41Speaker 1: slightly more likely to be anxious and depressed and medicated
- 45:46Speaker 1: for sleeplessness than the people that I work with who
- 45:50Speaker 1: didn't have so much money. I'm not saying it's necessarily causal.
- 45:53Speaker 1: I'm not saying one equals the other. Of course, there
- 45:56Speaker 1: are lots of wealthy people that I know that are
- 45:59Speaker 1: pretty happy and pretty functional also, But when you believe
- 46:03Speaker 1: that that external achievement will equal this internal outcome or experience,
- 46:10Speaker 1: it's a slippery slope.
- 46:12Speaker 2: So yeah, I don't know.
- 46:15Speaker 1: I don't know that it's that it's hard in our
- 46:19Speaker 1: It's not impossible, but it's hard in our culture to
- 46:23Speaker 1: tell people you don't need all that, and they're like, well,
- 46:26Speaker 1: it's all.
- 46:26Speaker 2: Right for you. You know, what about what about the.
- 46:34Speaker 1: You spoke before about instant gratification And we've got about
- 46:38Speaker 1: six or seven minutes to go, so I appreciate your time.
- 46:42Speaker 1: I feel we are so predisposed to comfort and convenience
- 46:46Speaker 1: and certainty and predictability and instant gratification when real growth
- 46:52Speaker 1: and development and adaptation and resilience kind of lives outside
- 46:56Speaker 1: that stuff. So the question is we love convenience, We
- 47:01Speaker 1: love certainty. We love predictability, we love comfort, we love familiarity.
- 47:07Speaker 2: But my question is how do we put that.
- 47:13Speaker 1: Stuff to one side so that we can step into
- 47:16Speaker 1: the stuff that's really going to build resilience and competence
- 47:20Speaker 1: and skill and understanding, which is usually the opposite. So
- 47:23Speaker 1: where we grow is in uncertainty, is in discomfort, is
- 47:27Speaker 1: in unfamiliarity, is in the not knowing.
- 47:31Speaker 2: Yees. So interaxcellence has three main areas that everything I
- 47:35Speaker 2: do with clients has helped them in three main areas.
- 47:37Speaker 2: It's belief, freedom and focused BFF like best Friends Forever.
- 47:41Speaker 2: And belief is really what's the key there. Beliefs I
- 47:45Speaker 2: define as a subconscious comfort level with what you feel
- 47:48Speaker 2: is possible in your life, and of course with that
- 47:51Speaker 2: what you feel is not possible. And so inter excellence
- 47:53Speaker 2: is about expanding what you believe is possible. This is
- 47:56Speaker 2: a major part of it, if not the main part
- 47:58Speaker 2: of interaxcellence. So how do we expand what we believe
- 48:01Speaker 2: is possible? Well, what happens is beliefs are feelings, and
- 48:08Speaker 2: we get when we come to the edge of our feelings.
- 48:11Speaker 2: In other words, we get to a point where we're
- 48:13Speaker 2: really uncomfortable most people back away and they're like, no,
- 48:16Speaker 2: too uncomfortable, I can do this. Stop stop getting out
- 48:20Speaker 2: of here. This is the average person, and you know
- 48:22Speaker 2: we've all done it. The people that have achieved extraordinary
- 48:26Speaker 2: things and have become selfless and therefore fearless, they get
- 48:30Speaker 2: to this, the uncomfortable feelings, and they're willing to sit
- 48:33Speaker 2: in that discomfort to grow, because that's where the growth happens.
- 48:36Speaker 2: And when you recognize that if I want to live
- 48:38Speaker 2: an extraordinary life with amazing experiences and all those great things,
- 48:42Speaker 2: then I need to expand what I believe is possible,
- 48:44Speaker 2: and I need to when I come to those moments
- 48:46Speaker 2: when I'm really uncomfortable, I need to be able to
- 48:49Speaker 2: embrace it and not leave that feeling. It's like Tom
- 48:52Speaker 2: Cruise said so well, is that everyone's afraid, including myself.
- 48:56Speaker 2: The difference is that I'm not afraid to be afraid.
- 48:59Speaker 2: And that's what I find. The biggest separator between the
- 49:04Speaker 2: best and the rest is courage and people that are willing.
- 49:10Speaker 2: And the great thing is that we can all be
- 49:12Speaker 2: courageous and if you're willing to face your fears, if
- 49:15Speaker 2: you're willing to be embarrassed and willing to fail in
- 49:19Speaker 2: a big way. Then if you're willing to face any feeling,
- 49:25Speaker 2: now you've got power. But we lose our power because
- 49:30Speaker 2: we come to the edge of this comfort level and
- 49:32Speaker 2: then most people will shrink away and like, no, I
- 49:34Speaker 2: can't deal with this. And so understanding the willingness to
- 49:39Speaker 2: have those feelings and to face any feeling is a
- 49:42Speaker 2: good question. Am I willing to face any feeling? Along
- 49:45Speaker 2: with am I willing to face my fears? Am I
- 49:46Speaker 2: willing to fail? And am I willing to be really uncomfortable?
- 49:50Speaker 2: And even if that feeling doesn't go away? Am I
- 49:52Speaker 2: willing to stay with it? These are really empowering things
- 49:56Speaker 2: that can expand what you believe is possible and change
- 49:58Speaker 2: your life. We can't be courageous and less we're scared, right, Yeah,
- 50:04Speaker 2: that's that's brilliant, cragl. In order to gain wisdom, we
- 50:10Speaker 2: need to go through problems, and in order to be
- 50:12Speaker 2: to gain physical strength, we need to break down the muscles.
- 50:15Speaker 2: We need to suffer. And in order to have courage,
- 50:18Speaker 2: we have to have things that create the need for it.
- 50:22Speaker 2: And so most people and most of my life has
- 50:25Speaker 2: been backing away from those things. But I don't want
- 50:28Speaker 2: to live that way anymore. I want to live a meaningful,
- 50:30Speaker 2: fulfilling life, and in order to do that, I have
- 50:32Speaker 2: to have courage. Yeah, I love it.
- 50:36Speaker 1: So appreciate your story and your humility and your self
- 50:39Speaker 1: awareness and your transparency.
- 50:43Speaker 2: So two questions. Then we're going to talk tell people
- 50:47Speaker 2: how to access your books. So my last two questions,
- 50:51Speaker 2: what's one question?
- 50:52Speaker 1: Two part is something that you're great at, something that
- 50:57Speaker 1: you are comfortable to say that you're really good at,
- 51:00Speaker 1: and something that you definitely need to be better at.
- 51:04Speaker 2: It's really interesting, Craig, because I don't think about myself
- 51:08Speaker 2: as as I try not to think about myself, and
- 51:13Speaker 2: I don't think of myself as great at anything, right,
- 51:18Speaker 2: I try. I try to keep myself out of the
- 51:20Speaker 2: picture because then I can be fearless when I start
- 51:23Speaker 2: thinking about myself. And when fear comes in, oh, I
- 51:25Speaker 2: might make a mistake. I might this might happen, or
- 51:27Speaker 2: that might happen, and I might look foolish, and and
- 51:30Speaker 2: you know these things that lead to fears, this self,
- 51:33Speaker 2: uh self and this center thoughts, and so you know,
- 51:42Speaker 2: I don't I don't really know if I'm great at anything,
- 51:46Speaker 2: but I know that I've I've had a lot to
- 51:48Speaker 2: learn and that, uh, you know, self centeredness is likely
- 51:53Speaker 2: the biggest challenge that I face every day.
- 51:57Speaker 1: All Right, I'll answer the question fully. You're a brilliant communitka,
- 52:00Speaker 1: You're a brilliant storyteller. You're brilliant at making complicated stuff understandable.
- 52:06Speaker 2: For the rest of us.
- 52:08Speaker 1: That's a gift, dude, Like you're great at that. And
- 52:10Speaker 1: being able to explain what can be really confronting, challenging,
- 52:18Speaker 1: uncomfortable kind of issues and concepts and constructs in a
- 52:23Speaker 1: way that's.
- 52:24Speaker 2: Very user friendly is great. Is great. That's why you know.
- 52:28Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure there's a bunch of reasons, but
- 52:30Speaker 1: for me, that's part of the reason that you're.
- 52:32Speaker 2: Doing so great and thank you so much.
- 52:36Speaker 1: Not that it matters from me, but I'm super happy
- 52:38Speaker 1: for you. Such a good human and you're doing good things.
- 52:42Speaker 1: So the book, I'm going to get it right this time.
- 52:44Speaker 1: Everyone in an excellence train your mind for extraordinary performance
- 52:48Speaker 1: and the best life possible.
- 52:49Speaker 2: Jim Murphy is the author.
- 52:53Speaker 1: I know you don't use the word mate over there,
- 52:55Speaker 1: but if I call you mate, that's friendship thing.
- 52:57Speaker 2: Mate.
- 52:57Speaker 1: Tell us about the more recent book that you've re
- 53:00Speaker 1: and what's that called?
- 53:02Speaker 2: Yeah? Thanks mate. My book and most recent book is
- 53:05Speaker 2: called The Best Possible Life, how to Live with Deep
- 53:08Speaker 2: Contentment and joined confidence. No matter what. That came out
- 53:11Speaker 2: in November, self published. We're putting out a new edition.
- 53:15Speaker 2: I signed a three book deal back in January with
- 53:18Speaker 2: his Shed Books, and so the revised edition will come
- 53:22Speaker 2: out in for very third Yeah. Great.
- 53:26Speaker 1: Hey, how can people connect with you? Do you want
- 53:29Speaker 1: people to follow on social media or check out your
- 53:32Speaker 1: website or what's the details for that?
- 53:36Speaker 2: Yeah, sign up for my newsletter inter Excellence dot com.
- 53:38Speaker 2: I share with you principles and ideas that I share
- 53:41Speaker 2: with my clients and any news workshops. We've got to
- 53:44Speaker 2: retreat coming up when we build houses in Mexico and
- 53:47Speaker 2: do inter Excellence retreats together with a great group called
- 53:50Speaker 2: Youth with a Mission. And I'm on social media as well. Facebook,
- 53:56Speaker 2: We've got a Facebook group and we'll be on Substack soon.
- 54:01Speaker 2: Instagram is inter Excellence Jim Murphy. So yeah, thanks so much, Craig.
- 54:05Speaker 2: I really appreciate you having me. We appreciate you. Breath
- 54:08Speaker 2: of fresh air.
- 54:09Speaker 1: I will say goodbye affair, but for the moment, thanks
- 54:11Speaker 1: so much for being on the new project.
- 54:14Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you, Craig