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Mental Toughness: Train Your Mind for Ultimate Success · Motivation Mindset Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: You're actually tougher than you think. You never knew that,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: and maybe you didn't want to take on the responsibility
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: because you know, people play a role in their own demise,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: so to speak. When you had opportunity to go out
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and explore or withdraw because you were afraid, you chose
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: to withdraw because you were afraid. So it's not only
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: that you were overprotected. Often it's that you were willing
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: to take advantage of the fact that you were overprotected
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: and run back there whenever you had the opportunity, you know.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: So maybe you're a kid in the playground, right and
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  Speaker 1: you're having some trouble with other kids, and you know
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  Speaker 1: in the back of your mind, I should deal with
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: deal with this myself, but you go and tell your
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: mom and get hurt to intervene, and you know that
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: that's not right. You know that you're breaking the social contract,
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  Speaker 1: but it's easier, and so that's what you do. You
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: run off to an authority figure and hide behind the
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  Speaker 1: great father, right roughly speaking, Well, the problem with that
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: is you don't learn how to do it yourself, so
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: then you have to relearn it painfully when you're forty.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: So then you take people out. You say, well, what
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  Speaker 1: do you afraid of? Rank it from one to ten.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: So ten is we'll make a list of ten things
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  Speaker 1: you're afraid of. The least. The thing you're least afraid
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  Speaker 1: of will call number ten, so we'll start with that. Okay, well,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid of elevators. Okay, Well, let's let's look at
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: a picture of an elevator. Let's have you imagine being
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: in an elevator. Let's go out to an elevator and
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: let you watch the terrible jaws of death open. Because
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: that's how you're responding to it symbolically, right, And you're
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: going to do that at it at the closest proximity
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  Speaker 1: you can manage. You find out, you go do that.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: It works. Your nervous is hell, especially from an anticipatory perspective, shaking,
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  Speaker 1: you go out, you stop, you watch it happen, and
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  Speaker 1: you actually calm down. You do that ten times and
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  Speaker 1: it no longer bothers you. Well, what you've learned that
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: you didn't die, But more importantly than that, you've learned
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: that you could withstand the thread of death. That's what
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: you've learned. And then you move a little closer, and
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: then you move a little closer, and then you move
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  Speaker 1: a little closer, and finally you're back in what's no
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  Speaker 1: longer the elevator. From a symbolic perspective, it's a tomb, right,
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: It's a place of enclosure and isolation, and you learn hmm,
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  Speaker 1: turns out I can withstand that, and then you're much
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: more together, much more confident. And that's often one of
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: the things that often happens in situations like that. I've
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: seen this multiple times, is that if you run someone
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: through an exposure training process like that and toughen them up,
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  Speaker 1: they'll often start standing up to people around them in
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  Speaker 1: a way they never did before. Sometimes people are bullied
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: because they can't fight back. This can happen to people
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  Speaker 1: who are weaker physically than their opponents. This is one
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  Speaker 1: of the most common reasons for the bullying experience by children.
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  Speaker 1: Even the toughest of six year olds is no match
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  Speaker 1: for someone who is nine. A lot of that power
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  Speaker 1: differential disappears in adulthood, however, with the rough stabilization and
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: matching of physical size, with the exception of that pertaining
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  Speaker 1: to men and women, with the former typically large and stronger,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: particularly in the upper body, as well as the increased
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  Speaker 1: penalties generally applied in adulthood to those who insist upon
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  Speaker 1: continuing with physical intimidation. But just as often people are
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  Speaker 1: bullied because they won't fight back. This happens not infrequently
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  Speaker 1: to people who are by temperament compassionate and self sacrificing,
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  Speaker 1: particularly if they are also high in negative emotion and
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  Speaker 1: make a lot of gratifying noises of suffering when someone's
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  Speaker 1: sadistic confronts them. Children who cry more easily, for example,
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  Speaker 1: more easily, for example, are more frequently bullied. It also
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  Speaker 1: happens to people who have decided, for one reason or another,
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  Speaker 1: that all forms of aggression, including even feelings of anger,
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  Speaker 1: are morally wrong. I have seen people with a particularly
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  Speaker 1: acute sensitivity to petty tyranny and over aggressive competitiveness restrict
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  Speaker 1: within themselves all the emotions that might give rise to
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  Speaker 1: such things. With their capacity for aggression strait jacketed within
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  Speaker 1: a too narrow morality, those who are only or merely
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  Speaker 1: compassionate and self sacrificing, and naive and exploitable cannot call
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  Speaker 1: forth the genuinely righteous and appropriately self protective anger necessary
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  Speaker 1: to defend themselves. If you can bite you generally don't
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  Speaker 1: have to. When skillfully integrated, the ability to respond with
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  Speaker 1: aggression and violence decreases, rather than increases, the probability that
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  Speaker 1: actual aggression will become necessary. If you say no early
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  Speaker 1: in the cycle of oppression and you mean what you say,
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  Speaker 1: which means you state your refusal in no uncertain terms
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  Speaker 1: and stand behind it, then the scope for oppression on
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  Speaker 1: the part of oppressor will remain properly bounded and limited. Naive,
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  Speaker 1: harmless people usually guide their perceptions and actions with a
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  Speaker 1: few simple axioms. People are basically good, no one really
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  Speaker 1: wants to hurt anyone else the threat, and certainly the
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: use of force, physical or otherwise is wrong. These axioms
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  Speaker 1: collapse or worse in the presence of individuals who are
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  Speaker 1: genuinely malevolent. Worse means that naive beliefs can become a
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  Speaker 1: positive invitation to abuse, because those who aim to harm
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  Speaker 1: have become specialized to prey on people who think precisely
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  Speaker 1: such things. Under such conditions, the axioms of harmlessness must
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  Speaker 1: be retooled. In my clinical practice, I often draw the
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  Speaker 1: attention of my clients who think that good people never
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  Speaker 1: become angry to the stark realities of their own resentments.
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  Speaker 1: No one likes to be pushed around, but people often
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  Speaker 1: put up with it for too long. So I get
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  Speaker 1: them to see their resentment first as anger and then
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  Speaker 1: as an indication that something needs to be said, if
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  Speaker 1: not done, not least because honesty demands it. Then I
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  Speaker 1: get them to see such action as part of the
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  Speaker 1: force that holds tyranny at bay at the social level
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  Speaker 1: as much as the individual. Many bureaucracies have petty authoritarians
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  Speaker 1: within them, generating unnecessary rules and procedures simply to express
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  Speaker 1: and cement power. Such people produce powerful undercurrents of resentment
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  Speaker 1: around them, which, if expressed, would limit their expression of
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  Speaker 1: pathological power. It is in this manner that the willingness
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  Speaker 1: of the individual to stand up for him or herself
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  Speaker 1: protects everyone from the corruption of society. When naive people
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  Speaker 1: discover the capacity for anger within themselves, they are shocked,
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  Speaker 1: sometimes severely. A profound example of that can be found
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  Speaker 1: in the susceptibility of new soldiers to post traumatic stress disorder,
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  Speaker 1: which often occurs because of something they watch themselves doing,
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  Speaker 1: rather than because of something that has happened to them.
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  Speaker 1: They react like the monsters. They can truly be in
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  Speaker 1: extreme battlefield conditions, and the revelation of that capacity undoes
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  Speaker 1: their world. And no wonder perhaps they assumed that all
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  Speaker 1: of history's terrible perpetrators were people totally unlike themselves. Perhaps
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: they were never able to see within themselves the capacity
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  Speaker 1: for oppression and bullying, and perhaps not their capacity for
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  Speaker 1: assertion and success as well. I have had clients who
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  Speaker 1: were terrified into literally years of daily hysterical convulsions by
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  Speaker 1: the sheer look of malevolence on their attackers' faces. Such
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  Speaker 1: individuals typically come from hyper sheltered families where nothing terrible
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  Speaker 1: is allowed to exist and everything is fairyland, wonderful or else.
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  Speaker 1: When the wakening occurs, when once naive people recognize in
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  Speaker 1: themselves the seeds of evil and monstrosity and see themselves
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  Speaker 1: as dangerous. At least potentially their fear decreases, they develop
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  Speaker 1: more self respect. Then perhaps they begin to resist oppression.
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  Speaker 1: They see that they have the ability to withstand because
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  Speaker 1: they are terrible too. They see they can and must
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  Speaker 1: stand up because they begin to understand how genuinely monstrous
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  Speaker 1: they will become, otherwise feeding on their resentment, transforming it
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  Speaker 1: into the most destructive of wishes. To say it again,
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  Speaker 1: there is very little difference between the capacity for mayhem
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  Speaker 1: and destruction integrated and strength of character. This is one
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  Speaker 1: of the most difficult lessons of life. Life is difficult,
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  Speaker 1: and you cannot protect your children. What you can do
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  Speaker 1: is prepare them, and you can prepare them to be
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  Speaker 1: strong and courageous and truthful and resilient and reciprocal in
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  Speaker 1: their interactions with other people. And that means you equip
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  Speaker 1: them for what life will be, which is at minimum
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  Speaker 1: a series of difficult challenges and often more than that,
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  Speaker 1: because of course people go through very difficult times in
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  Speaker 1: their lives, and a resilient person is capable of standing
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  Speaker 1: up to things in the face of fear and moving
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  Speaker 1: forward voluntarily, convinced of their own competence and ability to prevail.
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  Speaker 1: And so the primary your primary goal is a parent,
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  Speaker 1: apart from facilitating your child's social desirability, which is a
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  Speaker 1: major obligation on your part, is to encourage your children
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  Speaker 1: and too, and I mean that literally, to instill in
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  Speaker 1: them a sense of courage in the face of the
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  Speaker 1: difficulties of life, and not to protect them from that.
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  Speaker 1: We don't even want to be protected from those difficulties,
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  Speaker 1: because a major part of life and its meaning is
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  Speaker 1: the challenge that comes with confronting difficulties. Maybe you are
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  Speaker 1: a loser, and maybe you're not, But if you are,
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  Speaker 1: you don't have to continue in that mode. Maybe you
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  Speaker 1: just have a bad habit. Maybe you're even just a
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  Speaker 1: collection of bad habits. Nonetheless, even if you came by
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  Speaker 1: your poor posture honestly, even if you were unpopular or
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  Speaker 1: bullied at home or in grade school, it's not necessarily appropriate.
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  Speaker 1: Now circumstances change. If you slump around with the same
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  Speaker 1: bearing that characterizes a defeated lobster, people will assign you
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  Speaker 1: a lower datus, and the old counter that you share
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  Speaker 1: with crustations sitting at the very base of your brain
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  Speaker 1: will assign you a low dominance number. Then your brain
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  Speaker 1: will not produce as much serotonin. This will make you
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  Speaker 1: less happy and more anxious and sad, and more likely
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  Speaker 1: to back down when you should stand up for yourself.
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  Speaker 1: It will also decrease the probability that you will get
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  Speaker 1: to live in a good neighborhood, have access to the
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  Speaker 1: highest quality resources, and obtain a healthy, desirable mate. It
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  Speaker 1: will render you more likely to abuse, cocaine and alcohol.
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  Speaker 1: As you live for the present in a world full
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  Speaker 1: of uncertain futures, it will increase your susceptibility to heart disease, cancer,
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  Speaker 1: and dementia. All in all, it's just not good. Circumstances change,
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  Speaker 1: and so can you. Positive feedback loops adding effect to
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  Speaker 1: effect can spiral counterproductively in a negative direction, but can
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  Speaker 1: also work to get you ahead. That's the other, far
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  Speaker 1: more optimistic lesson of Price's law on the parade of
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  Speaker 1: day distribution. Those who start to have will probably get more.
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  Speaker 1: Some of these upwardly moving loops can occur in your
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  Speaker 1: own private subjective space. Alterations in body language offer an
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  Speaker 1: important example. If you are asked by a researcher to
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  Speaker 1: move your facial muscles one at a time into a
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  Speaker 1: position that would look sad to an observer, you will
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  Speaker 1: report feeling sadder. If you are asked to move the
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  Speaker 1: muscles one by one into a position that looks happy,
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  Speaker 1: you will report feeling happier. Emotion is partly bodily expression,
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  Speaker 1: and can be amplified or dampened by that expression. Some
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  Speaker 1: of the positive feedback loops instantiated by body language can
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  Speaker 1: occur beyond the private confines of subjective experience in the
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  Speaker 1: social space you share with other people. If your posture
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  Speaker 1: is poor, for example, if you slump shoulders forward and rounded,
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  Speaker 1: chest tucked in, head down, looking small, defeated and ineffectual,
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  Speaker 1: protected in theory against attack from behind, then you will
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: feel small, defeated, and ineffectual. The reactions of others will
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  Speaker 1: amplify that. People like lobsters, size each other up, partly
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  Speaker 1: in consequence of stance. If you present yourself as defeated,
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  Speaker 1: then people will react to you as if you are losing.
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  Speaker 1: If you start to straighten up, then people will look
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  Speaker 1: at and treat you differently. You might object, the bottom
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  Speaker 1: is real. Being at the bottom is equally real. A
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  Speaker 1: mere transformation of posture is insufficient to change anything that fixed.
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  Speaker 1: If you're in number ten position, then standing up straight
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  Speaker 1: and appearing dominant might only attract the attention of those
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  Speaker 1: who want once again to put you down and fair enough.
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  Speaker 1: But standing up straight with your shoulders back is not
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  Speaker 1: something that is only physical, Because you're not only a body,
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  Speaker 1: you're a spirit, so to speak, a psyche as well.
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  Speaker 1: Standing up physically also implies and invokes and demands Standing
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: up metaphysically, standing up means voluntarily accepting the burden of being.
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  Speaker 1: Your nervous system responds in an entirely different manner. When
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  Speaker 1: you face the demands of life voluntarily, you respond to
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  Speaker 1: a challenge. Instead of bracing for a catastrophe, you see
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  Speaker 1: the gold the dragon hordes. Instead of shrinking in terror
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  Speaker 1: from the all too real fact of the dragon, you
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  Speaker 1: step forward to take your place in the dominance hierarchy
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  Speaker 1: and occupy your territory, manifesting your willingness to defend, expand,
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  Speaker 1: and transform it. That can all occur practically or symbolically,
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  Speaker 1: as a physical or as a conceptual restructuring. To stand
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  Speaker 1: up straight with your shoulders back is to accept the
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  Speaker 1: terrible responsibility of life with eyes wide open. It means
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  Speaker 1: deciding to voluntarily transform the chaos of potential into the
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  Speaker 1: realities of habitable order. It means adopting the burden of
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  Speaker 1: self conscious vulnerability and accepting the end of the unconscious
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  Speaker 1: paradise of childhood, where finitude and mortality are only dimly comprehended.
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  Speaker 1: It means willingly undertaking the sacrifices necessary to generate a
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: productive and meaningful reality. It means acting to please God.
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  Speaker 1: In the ancient language, to stand up straight with your
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  Speaker 1: shoulders back means building the ark that protects the world
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  Speaker 1: from the flood, guiding your people through the desert after
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  Speaker 1: they have escaped tyranny, making your way away from comfortable
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  Speaker 1: home and country, and speaking the prophetic word to those
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  Speaker 1: who ignore the widow and children. It means shouldering the
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: cross that marks the ax, the place where you and
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  Speaker 1: being intersect so terribly. It means casting dead, rigid and
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: too tyrannical order back into the chaos in which it
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: was generated. It meanswithstanding the ensuing uncertainty and establishing in
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  Speaker 1: consequence a better, more meaningful, and more productive order. So
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: attend carefully to your posture, Quit drooping and hunching around.
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  Speaker 1: Speak your mind, Put your desires forward as if you
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: had a right to them, at least the same right
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  Speaker 1: as others. Walk tall and gaze forthrightly ahead, dare to
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: be dangerous. Encourage the serotonin to flow plentifully through the
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: neural pathways, desperate for its calming influence. People, including yourself,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: will start to assume that you are competent and able,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: or at least they will not immediately conclude the reverse
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: Emboldened by the positive responses you are now receiving, you
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: will begin to be less anxious. You will then find
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: it easier to pay attention to the subtle social clues
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: that people exchange when they are communicating. Your conversations will
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: flow better with fewer awkward pauses. This will make you
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: more likely to meet people, interact with them, and impress them.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: Doing so will not only genuinely increase the probability that
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: good things will happen to you, it will also make
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: those good things feel better when they do happen. Thus,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: strengthened and emboldened, you may choose to embrace being and
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: work for its furtherance and improvement.