Latest / The You Project / #1738 Purple Cow - Pete Shepherd

Transcript

#1738 Purple Cow - Pete Shepherd · The You Project

0:00
Speaker 1: I get a bloody Champions Welcome another installment The Year Project.
0:03
Speaker 1: Tiffany and Cook, Peter Brian, Kevin, Mannix Shepherd. I'm not
0:07
Speaker 1: sure why Mannix. Then we'll start with Cook, who's in
0:11
Speaker 1: the top left square.
0:13
Speaker 2: Hi, Cook, I don't know where you find all the
0:15
Speaker 2: random names that just fall out of your mouth when
0:18
Speaker 2: you do it, you know.
0:19
Speaker 1: Can I tell you the etymology? No, not the etymology,
0:22
Speaker 1: the origin story of all of those names that I
0:28
Speaker 1: tend to spout. So when I was growing up way back,
0:32
Speaker 1: you know, just after Jesus passed away, so my dad,
0:36
Speaker 1: my dad, he used to tell me real deal. His
0:39
Speaker 1: name was Ronald Edward Patrick, Nan, Patrick Persval, Clarence Terrence
0:43
Speaker 1: James Ambrose Alowish's Harper. And I thought till I was
0:47
Speaker 1: about sixteen, that was his real name, Ronald Edward Personal,
0:51
Speaker 1: Clarence Terrence, James Ambrose Alowish's Harper. And I never even asked,
0:55
Speaker 1: but he would say that on repeat, and so that's
0:59
Speaker 1: what I thought he real name was. That's the best
1:01
Speaker 1: story ever. So I grew up, yeah, with that kind
1:07
Speaker 1: of bullshit, and you basically, well you become your parents fuck,
1:14
Speaker 1: which that is not a good thing. But anyway, God
1:17
Speaker 1: bless him. What is your actual middle name? Jonathan?
1:22
Speaker 3: But I just have to say, it's no wonder where
1:26
Speaker 3: you get your piss taking from, given that was what
1:28
Speaker 3: your old man used to do to you.
1:30
Speaker 1: Ah. My man used to constantly bullshit me about things,
1:35
Speaker 1: and I didn't know he was bullshitting me, so I
1:38
Speaker 1: would just be like, no, that's really my dad's name.
1:41
Speaker 1: And everyone's like, I don't think it is. I'm like, no,
1:44
Speaker 1: it really is, and they're like, you're thirty. Stop.
1:51
Speaker 4: Ah, we'll start with We'll start with the lady because
1:55
Speaker 4: we've got to be respectful.
1:59
Speaker 1: In the school. I haven't seen yet. Do you like
2:02
Speaker 1: that that I called you a lady?
2:03
Speaker 2: Yeah?
2:03
Speaker 1: Well we What have you been up to today, lady?
2:07
Speaker 2: I've been I went Do you know what I went for?
2:09
Speaker 2: I went for a walk with one of your mates.
2:12
Speaker 1: I don't have any mates, but go on Nicole Ldell.
2:16
Speaker 1: She's in town. I met her for a walk and
2:17
Speaker 1: some brecky. Then I come home, did a party. I've
2:20
Speaker 1: been head down, tail up since then. What is she
2:23
Speaker 1: doing in Melbs?
2:25
Speaker 2: She was coming to do some rail crossing analysis.
2:29
Speaker 1: Oh that's right, she's she's part of a PhD. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
2:33
Speaker 1: that's wow. Can I just ask her? You rubbing moisturizer
2:36
Speaker 1: onto your hands?
2:38
Speaker 3: Yes?
2:38
Speaker 1: So I was, do you reckon you could do that
2:40
Speaker 1: before we start? I mean, you know, I don't want
2:45
Speaker 1: you to be totally present, but could you leave your
2:47
Speaker 1: fucking beauty regime? I don't know before or after the show.
2:54
Speaker 1: I don't want to ask too much as an employer,
2:56
Speaker 1: but I mean, I feel like if you're rubbing shit
2:59
Speaker 1: in your hands, you're not at optimal kind of operating system.
3:07
Speaker 1: You don't see Pete rubbing anything into himself. No, I'm
3:10
Speaker 1: trying to find some moisturizer. I might join it. I
3:12
Speaker 1: feel like my hands are feeling a bit dry and now,
3:14
Speaker 1: Tip maybe we should bring you into the show, seeing
3:17
Speaker 1: as you are the focal point, but allegedly not yet yet.
3:21
Speaker 1: Hi Pete, how are you? I'm great? How are you?
3:23
Speaker 3: Craig Anthony? I've forgotten all those middle lams already. I
3:27
Speaker 3: was going to try and repeat him back to you,
3:28
Speaker 3: but I've forgotten very good, Craig Anthony. Is that's more
3:31
Speaker 3: than enough? How's you?
3:33
Speaker 1: And I have not spoken for a long time. I
3:35
Speaker 1: do not think we're spoken in twenty twenty four, Am
3:38
Speaker 1: I correct?
3:39
Speaker 3: I think we know? You might be right. I was
3:41
Speaker 3: going to say, we have, but maybe that was last year.
3:43
Speaker 3: I'm realizing that.
3:45
Speaker 1: I've lost track of time. Yeah, I was going to say,
3:48
Speaker 1: but I had my son.
3:49
Speaker 3: But my son's now eighteen months old, so that was
3:51
Speaker 3: probably about twelve eighteen months ago that we caught up.
3:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, how is? I was going to ask, how is
3:56
Speaker 1: the little dude?
3:57
Speaker 3: He's good, mate, Little Oli's gone. Well, he's eighteen months
3:59
Speaker 3: and full of energy.
4:02
Speaker 1: I joke.
4:02
Speaker 3: He's a bit like a shark in that if he
4:04
Speaker 3: stops moving at any point, he might die. So he's
4:07
Speaker 3: in a constant state of motion and chaos, which is great.
4:13
Speaker 1: Is he in the ninety nine percentile for height? He's pretty,
4:19
Speaker 1: he is. He's essentially the ninety or something. I don't know.
4:22
Speaker 3: He's long and lean and got arms and legs popping
4:25
Speaker 3: out everywhere, just like me.
4:27
Speaker 1: So it's good for anyone who's wondering what that's about.
4:31
Speaker 1: Pete is two meter, Peter. Ergo is a question, two Peter,
4:36
Speaker 1: what is being a parent taught you? Oh gosh, how
4:41
Speaker 1: long have you got? I think the.
4:46
Speaker 3: Short answer is no, pun intended it's a yeah. The
4:52
Speaker 3: long answer, it's a constant mirror to your own.
4:57
Speaker 1: Lack of.
4:59
Speaker 3: Patient presence and concentration. That's how I currently feel because
5:08
Speaker 3: Ollie can stick to an activity on repeat, I don't know,
5:12
Speaker 3: for twenty minutes at a time, for example, and after
5:15
Speaker 3: about the third minute, you can feel you. I can
5:17
Speaker 3: feel myself. I'll speak for myself, going, my god, I
5:21
Speaker 3: can't read this book one more time, and we're really
5:22
Speaker 3: going to read it again. And that constant need to
5:26
Speaker 3: change the activity I recognize comes from me, not necessarily
5:30
Speaker 3: from him. And it's like I find this happens multiple
5:34
Speaker 3: times throughout the day where I'll want to do something different,
5:37
Speaker 3: not because OLLI wants to, but because I want to.
5:39
Speaker 3: And it's like constantly checking yourself on where's that coming from?
5:42
Speaker 3: Why do you want to change activities? Why are you bored?
5:44
Speaker 3: Why you aren't interested in this book anymore?
5:47
Speaker 1: Yeah? Why can't you stay focused? Dad? This is important?
5:50
Speaker 1: You're not getting all the lessons in this exactly.
5:53
Speaker 3: There was a we had a pediatrician just after he
5:57
Speaker 3: was born.
5:57
Speaker 1: You get a sign a pediatrician and we saw him.
5:59
Speaker 3: And he said something off the cuff, which I think
6:01
Speaker 3: about almost every day was one of those like off
6:02
Speaker 3: the cuff comments from a doctor that I think has
6:04
Speaker 3: so much wisdom, which was is it bothering him?
6:07
Speaker 1: Or is it bothering you?
6:08
Speaker 3: And I just think about that all the time, because,
6:11
Speaker 3: especially in the early days of being a first time parent.
6:13
Speaker 1: You're like, oh, he coughed three times? Is that okay?
6:15
Speaker 1: Like is he going to die?
6:16
Speaker 3: And they're like, look, it's okay, he's not bothered. You're
6:18
Speaker 3: the one that's bothered by the coughing. And I just
6:21
Speaker 3: think there's so much wisdom in that of like I'm
6:23
Speaker 3: constantly thinking something's bothering him, when in reality it's actually
6:28
Speaker 3: just bothering me. It's actually just that I want to
6:31
Speaker 3: go for a walk and get some fresh air. Not
6:32
Speaker 3: that only wants to get some fresh air. He's perfectly happy.
6:35
Speaker 1: Do you, because you're such a student of the mind,
6:39
Speaker 1: the human behavior, and you know all of the bits
6:44
Speaker 1: and pieces that make up the human experience, do you
6:47
Speaker 1: feel like turning him into a little experiment where you think,
6:50
Speaker 1: how many languages can I get this little motherfucker to
6:53
Speaker 1: speak by the time he's five? Totally, I'm like, if
6:56
Speaker 1: I read him twenty five books a day. Is he
6:59
Speaker 1: going to be absolute genius by the end of this,
7:02
Speaker 1: Like you know, when you know, like everyone talks about
7:05
Speaker 1: how incredibly malleable and kind of teachable a young brain is.
7:12
Speaker 1: Do you factor that in? I try to.
7:15
Speaker 3: I mean, the flip side is the fear based recognition
7:21
Speaker 3: of when you do something that you know you probably
7:22
Speaker 3: shouldn't in front of it and you go, oh, he's malleable.
7:25
Speaker 3: He's probably going to pick up on that. The fact
7:27
Speaker 3: that I just swore at the top of my lungs
7:28
Speaker 3: because I dropped the pan. I wonder if he's going
7:30
Speaker 3: to pick that up and start swearing very shortly. So yes,
7:33
Speaker 3: on the positive, but also, you know, I feel like
7:37
Speaker 3: I don't know if this is a gesture of me,
7:38
Speaker 3: but I feel like it's really easy to beat oneself
7:41
Speaker 3: up as a pins to look at your behavior in
7:44
Speaker 3: a negative light, which I guess I've already reflected on
7:47
Speaker 3: already in this short conversation. So it's it's a yeah,
7:50
Speaker 3: It's like it's like a tiny little mirror that follows
7:53
Speaker 3: you around just reflects back all of your little.
7:55
Speaker 1: Ismsh this is a very cragish question, but do you
8:00
Speaker 1: ever wonder what it's like for him to be around you.
8:04
Speaker 1: Do you ever think, like, what's the me experience for him?
8:07
Speaker 1: Like this little tiny dude looking up at this like
8:11
Speaker 1: skyscraper of a human. I wonder what it is like
8:15
Speaker 1: for him totally. I wonder if he's looking at me
8:20
Speaker 1: thinking why are you still here? I wonder if it's
8:24
Speaker 1: what is your purpose? And where is Munk there?
8:28
Speaker 3: Like some days I joke to my wife Tracy that
8:30
Speaker 3: she gets home from work and OHI He'll run straight
8:32
Speaker 3: up to her and he's like, thank God, I'm so
8:34
Speaker 3: sick of that. Like, I'm so sick of hanging out
8:36
Speaker 3: with this giant skyscraper who's offering me absolutely no value
8:40
Speaker 3: except providing me a little bit of food every now.
8:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I do.
8:43
Speaker 3: I constantly think about what I mean, what is going
8:45
Speaker 3: through the mind of a tiny toddler who is able to.
8:49
Speaker 1: Absorb and grow.
8:50
Speaker 3: Like if I think about how much I've changed and
8:52
Speaker 3: grown in the last eighteen months, I'd like to say
8:55
Speaker 3: it's heaps, because I'm a growth minded, you know, individual who.
8:58
Speaker 1: Practices what I preach.
8:59
Speaker 3: But the reality, compared to an eighteen month old toddler,
9:01
Speaker 3: the amount they grow and absorb and learn is mind blowing,
9:05
Speaker 3: mind blowing. So I do I think about it. I
9:07
Speaker 3: nerd out it on a lot, probably to a fault.
9:10
Speaker 1: Has it been an exercise in ah, because you have
9:15
Speaker 1: your own business and you're busy, But has it been
9:18
Speaker 1: an exercise in time management, resource management, energy management, high
9:23
Speaker 1: level problem solving? Because all the flexibility and freedom that
9:28
Speaker 1: you have, well, that's.
9:29
Speaker 3: Gone right right right, yeah and yeah, so yes to
9:35
Speaker 3: all of that. It's an absolute head fuck if I
9:40
Speaker 3: can say that in the sense that you I've deliberately
9:46
Speaker 3: set constraints on my time because I want to prioritize
9:50
Speaker 3: my family and my wife works full time as well now,
9:52
Speaker 3: so I don't work Mondays, for example, and I try
9:55
Speaker 3: and stop work at three pm to pick up Ali
9:57
Speaker 3: from daycare on the on the couple of days that
9:59
Speaker 3: is there.
10:00
Speaker 1: And the.
10:04
Speaker 3: Thing that that does is creates new stories in my
10:08
Speaker 3: head around are you being lazy? Are you not working
10:11
Speaker 3: hard enough because I run my own business. Are you
10:13
Speaker 3: losing momentum? Are you going to lose clients? Oh you're
10:16
Speaker 3: not working on Monday? What if the phone rings on
10:18
Speaker 3: my dad?
10:18
Speaker 1: You know?
10:19
Speaker 3: So there's these new internal self flatulating stories that I
10:24
Speaker 3: can hear and feel that I'm now navigating, Whereas in
10:28
Speaker 3: the past I think the story was probably you're working
10:31
Speaker 3: too much, You're doing too much. Are you staying present
10:35
Speaker 3: to your wife and your friends and your family. It
10:38
Speaker 3: feels a little more like the opposite now, where I'm
10:40
Speaker 3: not enoughing my own work, which is, you know, not
10:44
Speaker 3: super helpful.
10:47
Speaker 1: When you first become a parent, I don't know, and
10:49
Speaker 1: neither does Tiff, because well Tiff know, it's more than me.
10:52
Speaker 1: She's got animals. She is an animal, so she's a
10:56
Speaker 1: dog mum and the cat mum. But you're an actual proper,
10:59
Speaker 1: grown up adult parent. Is when you first became a dad,
11:05
Speaker 1: did you feel like a fraud? How long did it
11:09
Speaker 1: take before you go before you really felt like somewhat
11:13
Speaker 1: you knew what you were doing as a parent. I
11:16
Speaker 1: don't think I'm there yet. I think I'm still trying
11:19
Speaker 1: to figure it out.
11:20
Speaker 3: In fact, it's such a strange experience and adjustment because
11:24
Speaker 3: I don't even know how to articulate this. But I
11:26
Speaker 3: still am Tracy and I joke about this. I feel
11:29
Speaker 3: like we still have days where you think, when are
11:32
Speaker 3: the adults coming to take care of.
11:34
Speaker 1: All of us?
11:35
Speaker 3: Or who tasked us with this responsibility because this is
11:38
Speaker 3: now forever, and I keep thinking that it's just this
11:41
Speaker 3: little experiment we're doing for a year or two. But
11:45
Speaker 3: it's constantly reminding myself that this is a forever decision,
11:49
Speaker 3: which is great. And I constantly feel like I don't
11:52
Speaker 3: know what I'm doing because things are changing so rapidly.
11:55
Speaker 3: It's like the ultimate exercise in humility. Guess what You've
11:58
Speaker 3: got absolutely no idea what you're doing. This person's life
12:00
Speaker 3: depends on you figuring it out. So good luck.
12:04
Speaker 1: What perspective did it give you? Did parenthood give you
12:10
Speaker 1: and looking at the little dude give you that you
12:13
Speaker 1: couldn't have got otherwise? Oh? Good question. You're on fire today.
12:18
Speaker 1: I think that I think.
12:21
Speaker 3: My first reaction to that is the the realization that
12:28
Speaker 3: how I feel about him is how my parents feel
12:32
Speaker 3: about me. Right, And so I'm sure that a lot
12:37
Speaker 3: of listeners can relate to the feeling of when your
12:39
Speaker 3: parents frustrate you or annoy you, or are watching you
12:43
Speaker 3: do something when they're there and you're like, why are
12:44
Speaker 3: you watching me? And stop bothering me? And why are
12:46
Speaker 3: you asking me so many questions? And yet I could
12:49
Speaker 3: sit on the couch and watch Ollie play with a
12:51
Speaker 3: toy car, right, just about what I said earlier.
12:54
Speaker 1: All day like I just.
12:55
Speaker 3: Want to absorb and watch and ask him questions so
12:59
Speaker 3: much and the love and the care that I have
13:04
Speaker 3: for him.
13:06
Speaker 1: I don't know.
13:06
Speaker 3: I just feel like it's so easy to take that
13:07
Speaker 3: for granted when you think about your parents, but like
13:09
Speaker 3: the recognition that how I feel about him is how
13:11
Speaker 3: my mum and dad must feel about me and my
13:13
Speaker 3: brother and sis days has been mind blowing. And I
13:16
Speaker 3: think I heard that intellectually, but I don't know if
13:18
Speaker 3: I understood it emotionally until I experienced it myself.
13:22
Speaker 1: Does that make sense? Now? Feel free to not answer
13:25
Speaker 1: the following question, but I'm just curious if you could,
13:28
Speaker 1: and then we'll move on from parenting, which is not Well.
13:31
Speaker 1: I didn't actually have a plan. I never have a plan.
13:33
Speaker 1: My only plan going in was that I would probably
13:37
Speaker 1: talk to you. That was That's the extent of my plan.
13:41
Speaker 1: So my question is how does it work practically? So
13:45
Speaker 1: you said the little guys in daycare twice a week,
13:50
Speaker 1: you work full time and your wife works full time,
13:53
Speaker 1: So how did the other five days a week work?
13:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this is one of the great juggles that
14:01
Speaker 3: I feel like I appreciate everyone around me with kids
14:04
Speaker 3: has been doing for a lot longer than I have.
14:07
Speaker 3: So how we structure it, because Tracey's only been back
14:10
Speaker 3: for six months, is I take Monday off with him yep,
14:15
Speaker 3: and do a little bit of work when he has
14:16
Speaker 3: a nap, but mainly take the day off. He has
14:18
Speaker 3: daycare Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, so three days not too and
14:22
Speaker 3: then Friday we have a sort of Tracy works from home,
14:26
Speaker 3: there's a babysitter that comes, and then I finished a
14:28
Speaker 3: bit early. There's like a juggle that happens. She takes
14:31
Speaker 3: the morning, babysitter takes the middle, and I take the end.
14:33
Speaker 3: And then weekends we have as a team as a family.
14:36
Speaker 3: And that's at the moment what's sort of working for us.
14:39
Speaker 3: And I say sort of because one of the reflections
14:42
Speaker 3: we've had in the last couple of weeks is she's
14:45
Speaker 3: I don't know if we need to go this hard
14:46
Speaker 3: in the next six months or the next felve months,
14:48
Speaker 3: because having both of us work so much and.
14:49
Speaker 1: Travel so much. Yeah, I don't know.
14:52
Speaker 3: I'm sure you've experienced this too, that the days of
14:55
Speaker 3: us saying during COVID, we'll never travel again, we'll do
14:58
Speaker 3: everything virtually seems to have gone out the window. And
14:59
Speaker 3: I seem to on a plane every week, which is
15:02
Speaker 3: awesome and I love it, and being in person with
15:03
Speaker 3: a bunch of humans is great. And the reality is
15:07
Speaker 3: like we've had weeks, and we have multiple weeks where
15:10
Speaker 3: Trace will be on the plane and get home on
15:11
Speaker 3: one a Wednesday, and then I'll high five her and
15:13
Speaker 3: get on a plane and go way till Friday. And
15:15
Speaker 3: there's just so much juggling in between. So that's how
15:19
Speaker 3: we're doing it at the moment, and I don't know
15:21
Speaker 3: how sustainable it is, though.
15:24
Speaker 1: It's hard just remind my audience or inform my audience
15:28
Speaker 1: who have never met you before, like what you do?
15:30
Speaker 1: What's your job? I spend.
15:36
Speaker 3: My days thinking about working within and helping people in organizations,
15:45
Speaker 3: mainly in the in the frame of leadership development and
15:48
Speaker 3: executive coaching. I would say I could put a bunch
15:51
Speaker 3: of labels on it and fancy stuff on it, but
15:53
Speaker 3: essentially it's all about helping leaders be better leaders, helping
15:55
Speaker 3: executives be better executives and what.
15:57
Speaker 1: Sits behind that?
15:58
Speaker 3: As you know and your listeners will underly know is
16:00
Speaker 3: helping humans be hopefully slightly better humans.
16:03
Speaker 1: So yeah, I.
16:04
Speaker 3: Run workshops, I coach one on one and work with
16:08
Speaker 3: a bunch of clients and corporates around Australia.
16:12
Speaker 1: As we're recording this, it's eight days away from Christmas
16:15
Speaker 1: and whatever day's bloody fifteen or sixteen days away from
16:18
Speaker 1: January one, and it's traditionally a time of the year
16:23
Speaker 1: where everybody reflects, and not everybody, but a lot of
16:25
Speaker 1: people reflect about what they did and what they didn't
16:27
Speaker 1: do this year and what they're going to do or
16:29
Speaker 1: want to do next year. And you know, we've had
16:33
Speaker 1: repeated conversations about New Year's resolutions and so on. What's
16:38
Speaker 1: your kind of thinking and messaging around this time of
16:43
Speaker 1: year because everybody does do a little bit of a
16:46
Speaker 1: stock take, I think, or most people do a bit
16:48
Speaker 1: of a stock take. And I'm doing a workshop tonight
16:51
Speaker 1: which by the time everyone hears this it will be
16:53
Speaker 1: done and dusted. But it's called pre season twenty twenty five, right,
17:00
Speaker 1: having a bit of a chat about what's your kind
17:02
Speaker 1: of thinking around? Broadly speaking, you know these times of
17:06
Speaker 1: the year where we reflect than when we sometimes press
17:09
Speaker 1: the reset button or the refresh button and actually making
17:15
Speaker 1: that work, or making that a productive and an effective
17:19
Speaker 1: thing rather than a thing that we just do on
17:22
Speaker 1: auto pilot, which kind of rarely amounts to much. Yeah.
17:26
Speaker 3: I think that last part is so crucial because I
17:29
Speaker 3: think it's awesome to reflect, and I do it myself.
17:34
Speaker 3: I encourage anyone listening to do it. To reflect on
17:37
Speaker 3: what went well, what went less well. To reflect on
17:39
Speaker 3: what gave you energy or what gave you less energy.
17:41
Speaker 3: To reflect on what let you up in twenty twenty
17:44
Speaker 3: four versus what didn't. And you know, there are tactical
17:47
Speaker 3: ways you can do that, Like I like to look
17:48
Speaker 3: through my phone at my photos because my assertion is
17:51
Speaker 3: the things you took photos of were generally things that
17:53
Speaker 3: were interesting to you during the year. You can look
17:55
Speaker 3: through your calendar, you can do whatever it is that
17:58
Speaker 3: you need to do to reflect. But your point, which
18:00
Speaker 3: I think is the sound one, is and then what YEA,
18:04
Speaker 3: what do you do post reflection? So I, as a
18:09
Speaker 3: professional development personal development NERD, as a longtime friend, fan
18:15
Speaker 3: follower of you and many others, I love this stuff
18:18
Speaker 3: and I love thinking about it and earning out on it.
18:21
Speaker 3: But I know that a lot of people don't necessarily
18:24
Speaker 3: or don't have the desire, the interests, the capability, the
18:27
Speaker 3: skill of committing to change and making it happen. Not
18:31
Speaker 3: to say that I always am able to. So I
18:34
Speaker 3: like to oversimplify things, and the current oversimplified version of
18:37
Speaker 3: this that I look at is what do I want
18:40
Speaker 3: to do more of and what do I want to
18:41
Speaker 3: do less of next year based on what I've reflected on.
18:45
Speaker 3: So I haven't done this for myself this year, but
18:47
Speaker 3: I could probably almost do it on the fly, which
18:49
Speaker 3: is if I reflect on twenty twenty four and go,
18:51
Speaker 3: what are the things I want to I really enjoy
18:54
Speaker 3: it and gaming energy, it would be traveling and experiences
18:57
Speaker 3: with Ollie and Tracy, my wife. So what do I
18:59
Speaker 3: want to do more? I want to do more of that,
19:01
Speaker 3: and so what does that look like? Well, it probably
19:03
Speaker 3: looks like pulling out the calendar and going at least
19:05
Speaker 3: once a quarter we're going on a weekend trip somewhere there.
19:08
Speaker 1: It is in action.
19:09
Speaker 3: So in my mind it's the reflection is great, capture
19:12
Speaker 3: what works, capture what's not. But then to your point,
19:15
Speaker 3: the action of what are you going to do about that?
19:18
Speaker 3: I think is the critical question, and I think that
19:22
Speaker 3: I think that making it as small and attainable as
19:25
Speaker 3: possible is key.
19:27
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, what about the balance between, Like when we
19:32
Speaker 1: think about goal setting or change. Most of the time
19:36
Speaker 1: I'm generalizing in this not always the case, but we
19:39
Speaker 1: tend to set goals around external things, what we have,
19:43
Speaker 1: what we earn, what we get, what we accumulate KPIs numbers,
19:47
Speaker 1: stuff like data, results, yeah, versus the internal stuff who
19:54
Speaker 1: I am and how I am and like emotions and
19:57
Speaker 1: mindset and ticking those kind of for want of a
20:00
Speaker 1: better term, psychological, emotional, perhaps spiritual boxes. It's like, maybe
20:05
Speaker 1: it's not about out there, Maybe it's about maybe the
20:08
Speaker 1: next year is about in here. Maybe my situation, circumstance,
20:13
Speaker 1: environment isn't the issue, And maybe it's maybe I need
20:17
Speaker 1: to look inward not outward, because so much of goal
20:20
Speaker 1: setting is an inside out not an outside in process. Yeah.
20:24
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I agree with you that we tend
20:28
Speaker 3: to focus on external and outcome driven goals and objectives.
20:32
Speaker 3: Part of me wants to defend that in the sense
20:34
Speaker 3: that I think the reason we do that is because
20:36
Speaker 3: they're measurable. Yeah, And I think what can be hard
20:39
Speaker 3: to measure is how how do I measure my inner work,
20:42
Speaker 3: my internal monologue, my more present state. It can be
20:47
Speaker 3: really difficult to measure, notwithstanding the fact that it's actually
20:51
Speaker 3: hard to do, But I don't think that means we
20:52
Speaker 3: shouldn't try. So what I would what I would ask
20:56
Speaker 3: or put forward or or I guess, query or noodlene
20:59
Speaker 3: is can you have outcomes that are possibilities of a
21:06
Speaker 3: process that you are committing to follow, and not to
21:10
Speaker 3: have the outcomes as the thing that will determine your success,
21:15
Speaker 3: but to have them as possibilities that may happen if
21:17
Speaker 3: you commit to an internal process. In this case, that
21:23
Speaker 3: is your version of a success. So for example, what
21:26
Speaker 3: am I even talking about? If I was to say
21:30
Speaker 3: an outcome driven goal would be I am more present
21:33
Speaker 3: with OLI, Well, that's really hard to measure and quantify,
21:35
Speaker 3: and what does that even mean? Versus if I focus
21:38
Speaker 3: on a process of trying to I don't know, meditate
21:40
Speaker 3: every day, and I break that down to be anywhere
21:43
Speaker 3: between one to twenty minutes, then whether I get the
21:47
Speaker 3: outcome of being more present is a little bit outside
21:51
Speaker 3: my control. But I like to think that if I
21:52
Speaker 3: show up and commit to that daily thing, I'm more
21:55
Speaker 3: likely to get that outcome. So in my mind, it's
21:58
Speaker 3: less about the outcome is the thing that's going to
22:01
Speaker 3: make me happy. It's more about the outcome is the
22:05
Speaker 3: carrot that I hope I might get towards, but I
22:07
Speaker 3: know I can't guarantee that I will.
22:09
Speaker 1: Does that make any sense? Yeah? Yeah, clearly, you know what? No, no, no,
22:13
Speaker 1: it does. It's funny because also without knowing it, what
22:16
Speaker 1: you identified in there is what I don't know if
22:20
Speaker 1: others do. But I call it the psychology problem. And
22:23
Speaker 1: like in as a science, as a studiable, observable, measurable science,
22:29
Speaker 1: psychology is bullshit. And this is someone doing a PhD
22:33
Speaker 1: in it, right, because I could test Tiff today, like
22:37
Speaker 1: right now, we could do an assessment because it's all
22:40
Speaker 1: self assessment, it's all subjective valuation. And Tiff does a
22:45
Speaker 1: fifty item kind of protocol, you know, based on psychology, emotion,
22:51
Speaker 1: sociology and whatever, right, how she sees herself or how
22:55
Speaker 1: she feels. And then we get all this data from
22:58
Speaker 1: Tiff and we go, here's TIFF's data based on these criteria.
23:01
Speaker 1: But you know, Tip's a bit distracted and tired, and
23:04
Speaker 1: she's had a blue with her cat, and then she
23:08
Speaker 1: you know, then she does the same test tomorrow and
23:11
Speaker 1: we get completely different data. But in virtually every other
23:15
Speaker 1: science that is not the case, right, you know, Physics
23:19
Speaker 1: is physics, Biology is biology. You know, engineering is engineering.
23:23
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, it's it's it's all kind of
23:28
Speaker 1: going to produce pretty consistent results. But but you're right.
23:32
Speaker 1: I think it is that marriage between what is the practical, observable,
23:38
Speaker 1: measurable thing that I can do in my physical three
23:42
Speaker 1: dimensional world which will create this internal shift, yes, or.
23:46
Speaker 3: Will increase the probability of an internal shift? Is how
23:49
Speaker 3: I think about it, because you know, if I think
23:51
Speaker 3: nothing is guaranteed, there are so many things outside my
23:53
Speaker 3: external control, then everything is a game of probability. And
23:57
Speaker 3: so I'm a mass nerd. So I like to think
23:59
Speaker 3: about how do I increase the probability of the outcome
24:02
Speaker 3: that I'm hoping for or seeking? And in answering that question,
24:06
Speaker 3: I usually you can come up with a couple of
24:07
Speaker 3: things that you think might be the keystone, things that
24:11
Speaker 3: will increase their probability.
24:12
Speaker 1: At least that's how I think about it. When you're
24:15
Speaker 1: in front of a group and all of us get
24:17
Speaker 1: in front of groups, but you do it full full time.
24:21
Speaker 1: That's your job, that's your thing, and you rock up
24:25
Speaker 1: one day. I get asked a lot about speaking and
24:30
Speaker 1: just people to help people become not necessarily corporate speakers
24:33
Speaker 1: or professional speakers, but that right down to people who
24:38
Speaker 1: just don't want to be terrified when they're making their
24:40
Speaker 1: birthday speech or it's speaking at their daughter's wedding, right
24:44
Speaker 1: and everything in between. So you stand up there and
24:48
Speaker 1: you're talking to a group for let's just say it's
24:51
Speaker 1: a kenote, So you've got forty five to sixty, you're
24:53
Speaker 1: doing your thing. What are the things that you are
24:58
Speaker 1: aware of than the fact that you know the room,
25:01
Speaker 1: you know who you're talking to, You've done a briefing
25:03
Speaker 1: call or two, You've kind of got the lay of
25:06
Speaker 1: the land in terms of demographic and sociology and who's
25:09
Speaker 1: you know, what's the theme of the day and why
25:12
Speaker 1: you're there. Then you look around five minutes in and
25:15
Speaker 1: people are looking at their iPhone or they're disconnected, or
25:18
Speaker 1: they're looking out the window. What do you do in that?
25:23
Speaker 1: You know, because we can only prep and know so much,
25:27
Speaker 1: but in that moment, what are the skills that you have,
25:30
Speaker 1: or what's the awareness that you have where you can
25:34
Speaker 1: kind of get back to some kind of connection or
25:38
Speaker 1: rapport or like, what do you can you teach us
25:41
Speaker 1: something like because I feel like for a lot of us,
25:44
Speaker 1: we we might lose the room or lose ourselves and
25:47
Speaker 1: we're like, fuck, I don't know where to go from here. Yeah,
25:51
Speaker 1: I don't really talking about us. I'm having it before,
25:55
Speaker 1: intend it had it? Has it has?
25:57
Speaker 3: I mean I've got a story from this either I
25:59
Speaker 3: could share it. I think firstly, i'd say you and
26:01
Speaker 3: I perhaps have this in common, which is a comfort
26:05
Speaker 3: in throwing out the maybe the plan that we might
26:08
Speaker 3: have had based on where the audience is at. I
26:11
Speaker 3: think so much of keynotes, workshops coaching comes down to
26:14
Speaker 3: the same skill, which is can you meet the group
26:16
Speaker 3: where they're at? And if they're at a place of
26:19
Speaker 3: complete distraction and boredom or distraction with emails, then continuing
26:25
Speaker 3: the way that you have been for that first five
26:27
Speaker 3: minutes is probably not going to change that state. So
26:30
Speaker 3: in my mind, it's about can you meet them where
26:32
Speaker 3: they're at and if needed, change the state, change the energy,
26:36
Speaker 3: change the focus of the room, to create a pattern
26:39
Speaker 3: interrupt to get people away from the thing that they're
26:41
Speaker 3: currently doing if they are distracted. The way I think
26:43
Speaker 3: about that is connection over content. So I think that
26:48
Speaker 3: for me personally, go one of the days where I'll
26:50
Speaker 3: talk to an audience for forty five minutes without some
26:52
Speaker 3: sort of interaction. And in fact, if I was doing
26:55
Speaker 3: forty five minutes, for example, I would probably break it
26:58
Speaker 3: up into three fifteen minute little sections or three ten
27:02
Speaker 3: minute sections with a five minute interactive piece at the
27:05
Speaker 3: end of each one. And so if I had, for example,
27:08
Speaker 3: a group that I was five minutes into my first
27:11
Speaker 3: ten minute thing, and I was like, I've got an
27:12
Speaker 3: interactive element or a question i want them to explore
27:14
Speaker 3: with the three people around them in ten minutes time
27:17
Speaker 3: or in five minutes time, because we're five minutes into this,
27:19
Speaker 3: I'd probably just bring it forward and go and maybe
27:21
Speaker 3: even call it out and go, look, it's been a
27:23
Speaker 3: long day. If it's been a long day, I recognize
27:26
Speaker 3: there's a bunch of stuff going on for you all,
27:27
Speaker 3: and maybe a few of you are a bit distracted,
27:29
Speaker 3: a bit sick of hearing my voice. So why don't
27:30
Speaker 3: you turn to the person next to you and answer
27:32
Speaker 3: a question, which is, what's one thing you're hoping to
27:34
Speaker 3: get out of today, or what's one current challenge you
27:37
Speaker 3: have right now as it relates to this topic, or
27:39
Speaker 3: what's a story about something that you had for breakfast
27:42
Speaker 3: this morning, purely just to break the pattern of everyone's
27:45
Speaker 3: distracted and no one's making any attention whatsoever. My assertion
27:49
Speaker 3: is in most of my workshops based on how I
27:51
Speaker 3: think about them and structure them. And this is not
27:53
Speaker 3: for everyone. And that is the thing that most people remember,
27:57
Speaker 3: isn't the thing that came out of my mouth, It's
27:59
Speaker 3: the thing that came out of the mouth of the
28:00
Speaker 3: people that they talked with. So I see my role
28:04
Speaker 3: as almost a facilitator of those small conversations and almost
28:07
Speaker 3: to get out of the way to ask a question,
28:10
Speaker 3: to create space and connection with others, but to kind
28:13
Speaker 3: of not even need to be the one talking, if
28:15
Speaker 3: that makes sense. So, yes, that would be That would
28:18
Speaker 3: be my response to your very good question.
28:20
Speaker 1: I have a warm story if you like, if it
28:22
Speaker 1: one earlier today, earlier, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah go. So
28:25
Speaker 1: this literally happened.
28:26
Speaker 3: I was running a workshop ironically on being more effective
28:29
Speaker 3: in communicating and storytelling and about about five or ten
28:33
Speaker 3: minutes in I asked a question of the group one
28:36
Speaker 3: hundred and twenty people in the room, and I asked
28:37
Speaker 3: a question and not one person said a single word
28:43
Speaker 3: for what felt like eight minutes was probably only ten seconds. Yeah,
28:48
Speaker 3: And I was told prior you talked about briefing call
28:50
Speaker 3: that this was a super engaged group, very extroverted. You
28:52
Speaker 3: won't be able to shut them up, so be careful
28:54
Speaker 3: when you ask questions because they're so keen and eager.
28:57
Speaker 3: No one said a single thing, and I had I had,
29:01
Speaker 3: not even the person organizing the event, by the way,
29:03
Speaker 3: which gets I love that what are you doing? So
29:06
Speaker 3: I had this kind of out of body experience for
29:08
Speaker 3: other I think you might be I think you're bombing,
29:10
Speaker 3: Like I think this is going terribly So why don't
29:12
Speaker 3: you try something else? Because that didn't work? And so
29:16
Speaker 3: I said something like, oh, let's scrap that idea. Clearly
29:18
Speaker 3: that's not going to work, So why don't you turn
29:19
Speaker 3: to the person next to you and answer the same
29:22
Speaker 3: question and introduce yourself if you don't know them. And
29:25
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, it was like the room caught fire.
29:28
Speaker 3: I couldn't shut them up that were interacting. They were
29:30
Speaker 3: shaking hands, and it sort of became evident in this
29:33
Speaker 3: process that I realized that these people don't know each other.
29:36
Speaker 3: And so when we finished and the rest of the
29:38
Speaker 3: session went really well. When I finished, I walked off
29:39
Speaker 3: stage and someone came up to me and said, I'm
29:41
Speaker 3: so glad you did that turn to the person next
29:43
Speaker 3: to you activity, because we've been sitting here for four
29:46
Speaker 3: hours and not once have we had the opportunity to
29:50
Speaker 3: talk to or interact with the other people on our table,
29:52
Speaker 3: and they're total strangers. So I didn't feel comfortable speaking
29:55
Speaker 3: up in front of one hundred and twenty strangers. But
29:57
Speaker 3: I do feel comfortable introducing myself to the person next
29:59
Speaker 3: to me. So that very experience was what happened to mean.
30:03
Speaker 3: I think changing the approach of talking to a person
30:06
Speaker 3: next to you, connecting with another human, in my mind,
30:08
Speaker 3: is the simplest way to break that cycle.
30:11
Speaker 1: That's great. I love it. Can I tell Can I
30:13
Speaker 1: tell you one? Please hit me with a war story?
30:16
Speaker 1: I love these all right, So I need to be
30:18
Speaker 1: very careful about I'll tell you off air, but I
30:22
Speaker 1: can't tell you the name of the organization. But okay,
30:25
Speaker 1: So I had to do a talk about a year
30:29
Speaker 1: ago for one hundred about one hundred people who were
30:36
Speaker 1: a mix of psychologists and counselors. Right, so everyone in
30:41
Speaker 1: the room was basically like a mental health professional, all qualified,
30:47
Speaker 1: all smart. I had to do a whole day, a
30:51
Speaker 1: whole day, so I had to talk from nine till five,
30:55
Speaker 1: with breaks maybe eight thirty, No, nine till five. Anyway,
30:59
Speaker 1: So my plan was, and there's some other variables around
31:04
Speaker 1: this that I can't really share that it was just
31:10
Speaker 1: it was a tough group anyway, but that's okay. I
31:13
Speaker 1: was grateful for the gig I went in. My plan was,
31:16
Speaker 1: I'm going to do, like, my first bit will be
31:18
Speaker 1: just really a key, well little kind of fresh start
31:23
Speaker 1: of the day. Energy is good, a bit of interaction,
31:25
Speaker 1: a bit funny, a bit you know whatever. And it went,
31:30
Speaker 1: it went, well, it's about anate, right, It wasn't a ten.
31:33
Speaker 1: It's about an eight. Good interaction, pretty good energy, not amazing.
31:38
Speaker 1: But I'm doing a whole day essentially around self management,
31:43
Speaker 1: self regulation, individual kind of optimization, how to get the
31:47
Speaker 1: most out of them, you know, like and I'm speaking
31:51
Speaker 1: as the excise scientist, but also the psychology researcher. Obviously
31:55
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to teach them about psychology, but really
31:59
Speaker 1: I'm just like, like, how do you manage you? You?
32:02
Speaker 1: How can you show up at work and be the
32:03
Speaker 1: best version of you physically, mentally, emotionally, socially, practically whatever
32:07
Speaker 1: that is for you. Blah blah blah blah blah. Like
32:09
Speaker 1: simple enough cool, which have done a lot anyways, So
32:13
Speaker 1: I do my opening keynote and then the boss comes
32:16
Speaker 1: up to me, and the boss says, that was good.
32:19
Speaker 1: And you know when people go that was good and
32:22
Speaker 1: you're like this is not good, It's like, no, that
32:26
Speaker 1: was really good. But I'm like, fuck, what's the butt?
32:29
Speaker 1: So I've still got the best part of you know,
32:33
Speaker 1: allowing for lunch and morning play, lunch and all that stuff,
32:38
Speaker 1: I've still got at least five hours of speaking actually
32:41
Speaker 1: speaking to go and he or she said, yeah, look,
32:48
Speaker 1: just don't talk about diet or exercise or fitness or
32:53
Speaker 1: you know, anything to do with the body, because some
32:56
Speaker 1: people will be triggered.
32:58
Speaker 4: Well that was literally about half my day's talking about
33:03
Speaker 4: just looking after and I'm not talking about being fit
33:05
Speaker 4: or being jacked or you know, eating paleo or I'm
33:09
Speaker 4: just talking about how do I manage my body to
33:11
Speaker 4: also manage my mind and my energy, Because better shape
33:14
Speaker 4: my body's in, I'm more productive and more efficient, you know,
33:17
Speaker 4: the better my brain works, because you know, there's all
33:20
Speaker 4: these physiological, psychological, and emotional and cognitive benefit through weight training,
33:24
Speaker 4: for example.
33:25
Speaker 1: You know all these stories about lifting weights and cognitive
33:29
Speaker 1: you know all this shit. So fifty percent of my
33:32
Speaker 1: content I had to handle. And then there's like a
33:36
Speaker 1: fifteen minute break and I've got to come back now,
33:40
Speaker 1: and I've ejected two and a half hours of content.
33:42
Speaker 1: At least, Do not talk about food, Do not talk
33:45
Speaker 1: about exercise, Do not talk about anything to do with
33:48
Speaker 1: the body, because now, remember I'm talking to psychologists. I'm like, surely,
33:55
Speaker 1: and I'm not talking about, Hey, how much do you
33:57
Speaker 1: weigh or what do you look like? You know, I'm
34:00
Speaker 1: just so fair to say that was the toughest gig
34:05
Speaker 1: I did last year. Yeah, you know so, but just
34:11
Speaker 1: you just got to adapt, don't you. Yeah?
34:14
Speaker 3: Do you I feel like I've seen you do this live,
34:16
Speaker 3: so maybe it's a it's a loaded question in the
34:18
Speaker 3: sense I know the answer it I've seen you do
34:21
Speaker 3: really well. Asking the audience for a bit of like
34:24
Speaker 3: we could go this way, we could go that way,
34:26
Speaker 3: and almost doing a straw pole in the moment, so
34:29
Speaker 3: that it's it's adaptable and flexible based on where the
34:31
Speaker 3: audience is at.
34:31
Speaker 1: Do you still do that? I still do that. I
34:34
Speaker 1: don't necessarily plan that, but I mean sometimes I'll go
34:39
Speaker 1: in and, like, what you don't want to do as
34:42
Speaker 1: a professional speaker, everybody is you do not want to
34:44
Speaker 1: talk after lunch for a range of reasons. One, they've
34:49
Speaker 1: been listening to people that may or may not be
34:51
Speaker 1: boring for at least four or five hours, and then
34:55
Speaker 1: they've just eaten all the free awesome, probably not very
34:59
Speaker 1: healthy food lunch, so they're in a fucking food coma,
35:03
Speaker 1: so they'reques dropped by thirty percent. Yeah, and they're not
35:07
Speaker 1: really that excited about you speaking because they're thinking about
35:10
Speaker 1: drinks at five point thirty and then you come in
35:13
Speaker 1: there like captain fantastic. So yeah, I it depends on
35:21
Speaker 1: Like sometimes I'll go in there and I'll say, tell
35:23
Speaker 1: me who's spoken, what's happened already, and when based on
35:26
Speaker 1: that information, I will create a different plan in the moment.
35:30
Speaker 1: Nice just because like I know they've been sitting, Like
35:33
Speaker 1: you said, they've been sitting for four hours. Yeah, so
35:37
Speaker 1: I'll go, well, let's not sit for an hour, because
35:39
Speaker 1: that's probably but that will be context and situation dependent.
35:44
Speaker 1: But I think that's part. I think that's part of it, Mate,
35:47
Speaker 1: is going, well, this was my intention, but I didn't
35:51
Speaker 1: know the dynamics of the lay of the land for sure.
35:53
Speaker 3: I think the other thing you do really well, which
35:56
Speaker 3: is something that I don't do this to the same level.
35:59
Speaker 3: But I have a similar philosophy, which is I'm not
36:02
Speaker 3: going to use slides because ninety nine percent of the
36:06
Speaker 3: other speakers are using slides. So I deliberately don't use
36:10
Speaker 3: slides and usually use a flip chart. And I know
36:12
Speaker 3: you love to use a whiteboard in a lot of
36:14
Speaker 3: your presentations, which I think already creates some sort of
36:18
Speaker 3: I think of it as a patent interrupt Yes. And
36:21
Speaker 3: so if I'm a speaker thinking about my presentation on
36:25
Speaker 3: a day where there's six other speakers, I could pretty
36:28
Speaker 3: safely assume that five of those six will have a
36:31
Speaker 3: lot of slides. And so if I'm an audience member,
36:34
Speaker 3: I've sat through five presentations and slide decks and you
36:39
Speaker 3: know they're not all the same, but you know, one
36:41
Speaker 3: PowerPoint presentation starts to look like another PowerPoint presentation. So
36:45
Speaker 3: even before walking in the room, I'm thinking, like, how
36:47
Speaker 3: can you be the pattern interrupt of Oh look this
36:50
Speaker 3: guy's not no slides that's interesting, or look at his handwriting.
36:52
Speaker 3: His handwriting's quirky, or something else that just triggers a
36:55
Speaker 3: slightly different part of their brain to react or to
36:58
Speaker 3: hopefully switch on.
36:59
Speaker 1: And the problem with a slide show, or the potential
37:04
Speaker 1: problem is what if your entire hour is dependent on
37:11
Speaker 1: like that's all you plan for. I've got twenty slides
37:15
Speaker 1: and you're at slide three and everyone's fucking nodding off right,
37:19
Speaker 1: what right? Everybody's clearly not you know, with you? And
37:24
Speaker 1: then you're like, ah, well this is not working. I'll
37:27
Speaker 1: go to slide for and then it's like, oh, but
37:30
Speaker 1: I don't have another plan because my plan is the
37:32
Speaker 1: next sixteen slides, and I think that back to your
37:36
Speaker 1: whiteboard point. I did one with AGL last week through
37:41
Speaker 1: our friend Lisa, and what was interesting was I'm up
37:45
Speaker 1: the front with my big fat black whiteboard marker and
37:48
Speaker 1: I'm writing on the board and I go all right,
37:51
Speaker 1: what are your thoughts on whatever? You know? I go,
37:53
Speaker 1: tell me, tell me when I say the term success,
37:58
Speaker 1: what comes to mind for you doesn't matter. Just go.
38:01
Speaker 1: And people are so I'm writing their words on the board.
38:05
Speaker 1: So they're writing up things, and I go, all right, now,
38:08
Speaker 1: let's talk about what stands between us and success? What
38:11
Speaker 1: do you think of the things? Don't overthink it, but
38:14
Speaker 1: what are the things that really get in the way,
38:16
Speaker 1: Not the bullshit things like time? Fuck time? What are
38:20
Speaker 1: the other things? You know? And they're like, oh, fear, procrastination, avoidance.
38:25
Speaker 1: I'm like, yep, good, good, keep it going. Then all
38:27
Speaker 1: of a sudden, we've got this dynamic and everybody's energy
38:30
Speaker 1: is good, and they're saying stuff that's now becoming part
38:34
Speaker 1: of the tapestry of what's going on, and what they
38:38
Speaker 1: said is now literally written in front of the room,
38:41
Speaker 1: and they're like, that's my that's my word up there,
38:44
Speaker 1: like look at you, look at you steering the ship,
38:47
Speaker 1: look at the I love that guy. Like co creation
38:50
Speaker 1: as opposed to you know, like a monologue, it's how
38:53
Speaker 1: can I how can I co create an experience with
38:57
Speaker 1: an audience as opposed to you know, like sure or
39:00
Speaker 1: talk at an audience, they're very different things. The other thing,
39:04
Speaker 1: I feel like it just is you remind me of
39:06
Speaker 1: and this whole conversation reminds me of is one of
39:09
Speaker 1: my mentors, and I'm lucky enough to say he's become
39:12
Speaker 1: a friend in Seth Godin, who's written twenty something New
39:15
Speaker 1: York Times bestsellers, but one of his books is called
39:17
Speaker 1: Purple Cow. Yeah, And I think about this concept so often,
39:22
Speaker 1: which is love this. I love this concept, by the way,
39:24
Speaker 1: which is.
39:24
Speaker 3: It's so I think it's really interesting when you apply
39:27
Speaker 3: it to public speaking, in particular, because the premise of
39:30
Speaker 3: the book is essentially, you know, if you look in
39:33
Speaker 3: most fields, well all fields of cows, you've got either
39:36
Speaker 3: I think it's brown cows, black cows, white cows, or
39:39
Speaker 3: a mixture of those three brown and black or black
39:42
Speaker 3: and white, and everyone looks the same. All the fields
39:46
Speaker 3: look the same. Can you imagine what it would be
39:48
Speaker 3: like if you saw a purple cow, like a cow
39:49
Speaker 3: in a field that was bright purple. You would call
39:52
Speaker 3: your friends, you would take a photo, you would post
39:53
Speaker 3: it to social media, You talk about it NonStop, you
39:56
Speaker 3: tell people later on. And his premise in the book
39:59
Speaker 3: is Essentially, when you're building products, when you're creating experiences,
40:02
Speaker 3: when you're thinking about anything as it relates to a
40:05
Speaker 3: creation that we want people to interact with, you should
40:08
Speaker 3: be thinking about making it purple. You should be thinking
40:10
Speaker 3: about creating some sort of purple cow that is remarkable,
40:14
Speaker 3: which is worth remarking at. So, if you're thinking about
40:18
Speaker 3: a presentation and you're thinking about your slide deck or
40:20
Speaker 3: not slide deck, or whiteboard or not whiteboard, in my mind,
40:23
Speaker 3: the question is how do I make this purple? What
40:25
Speaker 3: is the thing that people are going to walk away
40:27
Speaker 3: and go either take a photo of the thing that
40:30
Speaker 3: you did in that moment, or remind them to tell
40:33
Speaker 3: their friend later on or their partner of a dinner
40:35
Speaker 3: of like, can you believe I saw this thing or
40:36
Speaker 3: heard this thing?
40:38
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think you know you.
40:40
Speaker 3: And I've seen enough sixteen page slide decks or more
40:45
Speaker 3: like sixty page slide decks that there's not a heap
40:46
Speaker 3: of purple in them. And I think it's a really
40:49
Speaker 3: easy way to create a different experience for yourself if
40:54
Speaker 3: you can answer that question, what's your purple cap?
40:56
Speaker 1: I love it. I remember years ago I just started
41:00
Speaker 1: my PT business and I was probably two years in
41:04
Speaker 1: and my business skills were one. My management skills were one.
41:09
Speaker 1: You know, not fucking everything what I could train people
41:12
Speaker 1: and talk and everything else like nothing. And I'm trying
41:16
Speaker 1: to build a brand and a business and I'm trying
41:18
Speaker 1: to understand it. And I was training a guy called
41:21
Speaker 1: Jim Watts, who was the CEO of sin Killed, a
41:23
Speaker 1: football club, and he goes to me, well, I used
41:28
Speaker 1: to pick his brain because he was still is like
41:30
Speaker 1: extremely smart. Yeah. So I'd train him and he'd kind
41:35
Speaker 1: of mentor and coach me. And he goes, well, what's
41:38
Speaker 1: your USP? And I go what he goes? I go,
41:45
Speaker 1: you know, when someone asks you a question that they
41:47
Speaker 1: think you should actually called it right, I don't understand
41:51
Speaker 1: the question. I don't even understand the question. That's how
41:54
Speaker 1: fucking dumb I am. Not only can I not give
41:57
Speaker 1: you an answer to the question, I don't understand and
42:00
Speaker 1: the question. And then he's like, so that means your
42:03
Speaker 1: unique selling proposition. I'm like, oh what, I'm like yeah,
42:06
Speaker 1: and he goes, well, if you're doing what everyone else
42:08
Speaker 1: is doing and you're kind of selling the same thing
42:10
Speaker 1: the same way and delivering the same product at about
42:12
Speaker 1: the same price, and I'm like, purple cow, you know
42:17
Speaker 1: what's Yeah, it's like it's the same thing, and yeah,
42:22
Speaker 1: you might be. It's like people. Somebody actually asked me.
42:26
Speaker 1: A lady actually asked me recently her son's doing a
42:29
Speaker 1: personal training course and she goes, aren't there isn't the
42:32
Speaker 1: market saturated? I go, yes, but it's not saturated with
42:36
Speaker 1: brilliant trainers. It's just saturated. If you can be, if
42:42
Speaker 1: you can be the one percent, if you can be
42:45
Speaker 1: the unicorn. If you can and I could give you
42:48
Speaker 1: a list of twenty things that would make you a
42:50
Speaker 1: unicorn trainer. If you can do those and be those,
42:54
Speaker 1: you're going to be busy as fuck. You know. We
42:56
Speaker 1: had I had a go on recently Dre on who
43:04
Speaker 1: is it Andre Andreas anyway, Dre who was on the
43:08
Speaker 1: show recently, who's spent four and a half years in prison,
43:13
Speaker 1: came out of prison for dealing drugs. He's very open
43:15
Speaker 1: about his story and four years down the track, he's
43:19
Speaker 1: just opened his He did a degree while I was
43:23
Speaker 1: in prison, then he did another degree in exose science
43:25
Speaker 1: when he got out of prison. And I can't say
43:29
Speaker 1: how much he generates a week, but it's thousands as
43:32
Speaker 1: a pt and he's just opened his first center, but
43:35
Speaker 1: he's spent the last four years just out of jail
43:41
Speaker 1: training people in his garage at one hundred and twenty
43:46
Speaker 1: bucks for forty five minutes, and he's booked out and
43:48
Speaker 1: he's got a waiting list. Now, if you can do
43:51
Speaker 1: that in a shitty garage with all equipment, when there's
43:56
Speaker 1: gyms down the road with millions of dollars worth of equipment,
44:00
Speaker 1: if I was a trainer, I'd want to go and
44:02
Speaker 1: see what that guy does. If I was a budding trainer,
44:05
Speaker 1: I'm like, how does this guy with no equipment and
44:10
Speaker 1: no premises to speak of? What does he have? What
44:15
Speaker 1: is he doing that's making all of these people with
44:18
Speaker 1: lots of dough drive to his fucking garage and hand
44:22
Speaker 1: him hundreds of dollars a week? Fascinating? That's the thing, right,
44:26
Speaker 1: if you can brilliant whatever it is like, and he's.
44:32
Speaker 3: I feel like, in a business context you could think about, like,
44:34
Speaker 3: you know, the flip the flip of that I think
44:38
Speaker 3: about is you know someone with an awesome Instagram account
44:41
Speaker 3: or a beautiful website and they've spent thousands of dollars
44:43
Speaker 3: or millions of not They've spent thousands of dollars with
44:45
Speaker 3: thousands of hours crafting this beautifully unique experience on Instagram
44:50
Speaker 3: looks great.
44:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, versus the then.
44:54
Speaker 3: You know, there's the person who has this thriving coaching
44:56
Speaker 3: business it doesn't even know what Instagram is or doesn't
44:59
Speaker 3: even have Instagram. It's like, yes, they've got the garage equivalent.
45:02
Speaker 3: I'm just coaching people out of my garage here, Like,
45:04
Speaker 3: what are you talking about? I need an Instagram account?
45:07
Speaker 3: That is so true and even in the domain of
45:10
Speaker 3: and this. Of course, I'm not anti academia or anti qualifications,
45:15
Speaker 3: but so many people who have got degrees or honors
45:18
Speaker 3: or masters or PhDs or whatever, and they're good things,
45:22
Speaker 3: but it doesn't necessarily equate to any kind of success
45:25
Speaker 3: other than academic, right, I.
45:27
Speaker 1: Mean, I've got it. Go on, I've got it.
45:30
Speaker 3: I was just going to say, I've got a bachelor's degree,
45:33
Speaker 3: nothing more. And I've worked with CEOs of some of
45:36
Speaker 3: the biggest companies in the world, from America to Europe
45:39
Speaker 3: to Australia, and not once has anyone said to me,
45:42
Speaker 3: can you show me your call it like qualifications? Where's
45:44
Speaker 3: your master's degree. Have you got a PhD? I've literally
45:46
Speaker 3: never been asked that question.
45:48
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, I said that in all my years of
45:51
Speaker 1: training people, which was over thirty right, one person, and
45:56
Speaker 1: it was just out of curiosity because they wanted to
45:58
Speaker 1: know how to become a trainer. One person that nobody
46:01
Speaker 1: asked me to see a bit of paper. But one
46:05
Speaker 1: person said, oh, what what qualification do you have? You know,
46:09
Speaker 1: and I'm like, thank god somebody asked, although is at
46:13
Speaker 1: UNI actually did it? It's like, yeah, nobody, you know,
46:18
Speaker 1: if you can. It's like you think about, you think
46:22
Speaker 1: about you talk a lot. Firstly, what was your degree in?
46:26
Speaker 3: I did an arts degree majoring in actually criminology of
46:30
Speaker 3: all things and communication.
46:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you talk a lot about human behavior and psychology,
46:38
Speaker 1: tips so do I.
46:40
Speaker 3: None of us have got a degree in psychology, none
46:42
Speaker 3: of us criminal elements of it. But definitely this was like,
46:46
Speaker 3: why do people solve crimes? Crimes as opposed to be
46:50
Speaker 3: better leaders?
46:51
Speaker 1: And you're not putting yourself up as a guru of
46:55
Speaker 1: human behavior or psychology or I just think that, you know.
47:00
Speaker 1: It's like I talk to people about diet but I'm
47:02
Speaker 1: not a dietician. But I'm not prescribing a diet. But
47:06
Speaker 1: I don't need to go to university to say, hey, Pete,
47:08
Speaker 1: Coco pops are probably not your best choice for brecky, right,
47:13
Speaker 1: you know, like you probably don't need a psychology degree
47:17
Speaker 1: to understand that calling yourself a fuck with thirty times
47:21
Speaker 1: a day is not great. It's probably not a good yeah,
47:24
Speaker 1: you know. And so do you have any aspirations one
47:31
Speaker 1: way or the other for twenty twenty five as we
47:33
Speaker 1: wind up here?
47:34
Speaker 3: Mate to be determined if there's anything more than continue
47:42
Speaker 3: to do what I've done. I've had this experience in
47:45
Speaker 3: the last few years where because I have spent so
47:49
Speaker 3: many years and so much time and energy nerding out
47:51
Speaker 3: on you know, personal and professional development and listening to
47:54
Speaker 3: podcasts and reading books and trying to work out, you know,
47:57
Speaker 3: what's the thing that you need to be doing and
47:58
Speaker 3: what's I thought. I got to the point where I
48:01
Speaker 3: was looking for some dramatic change that I needed to
48:04
Speaker 3: do every year, and at one point a couple years ago,
48:06
Speaker 3: it kind of dawned on me maybe it's less about
48:09
Speaker 3: the dramatic change and more about continuing to compound on
48:12
Speaker 3: the good things that you're already doing and so it
48:15
Speaker 3: feels like it feels like a counterculture un sexy thing
48:19
Speaker 3: to say. But I kind of am at the point
48:22
Speaker 3: of going, what if I just doubled down or continued
48:26
Speaker 3: to focus on the healthy habits that I already had.
48:28
Speaker 1: What if I.
48:29
Speaker 3: Continue to try and not work mondays and spend that
48:32
Speaker 3: with Oli. What would happen in twelve months if I
48:34
Speaker 3: did that rather than I've got to completely.
48:36
Speaker 1: Change the way that I live my life.
48:38
Speaker 3: So yeah, that's how I'm thinking about it, is what
48:40
Speaker 3: are the great things that I know are good for
48:42
Speaker 3: me and they give me energy? And can I just
48:44
Speaker 3: not focus on those again?
48:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense. And sometimes it's just like, well,
48:49
Speaker 1: where I'm at as good nothing. It's like this is
48:53
Speaker 1: actually good. Like when I do a stop take on
48:57
Speaker 1: what's going on on planet me, I'm very grateful, you know.
49:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's always quirks and things, and you know, certain
49:05
Speaker 3: thoughts that you have that you wish you didn't have
49:07
Speaker 3: or you can work on. But I tend to agree
49:09
Speaker 3: with I catch myself in this constance, can catch myself
49:13
Speaker 3: in a constant state of striving, which I feel like
49:16
Speaker 3: can actually be unhelpful to the point of what if
49:19
Speaker 3: you just were grateful for where you are and what
49:21
Speaker 3: you have right now, rather than looking for the opportunity
49:23
Speaker 3: to be better.
49:25
Speaker 1: Cookie, if you could do one thing better next year
49:28
Speaker 1: other than be you know, the calm in the chaos
49:30
Speaker 1: now that you're Tiff had a big spiritual epiphany and
49:33
Speaker 1: not even being funny, she did have a bit of
49:35
Speaker 1: a she's a bit of a renaissance woman's she's seen
49:39
Speaker 1: the light. Nice twenty twenty five. Is there something that
49:42
Speaker 1: you want to change in any particular way?
49:46
Speaker 2: There's something I am changing, And it's just consistency in
49:52
Speaker 2: my in coaching, like choosing one area of the multiple
49:56
Speaker 2: things I do and making that a real paw to
50:00
Speaker 2: develop me and develop it and can like consistently.
50:05
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and we can. I ask what lane that
50:10
Speaker 1: is because you kind of you've got your fingers in
50:13
Speaker 1: a few pies. Yeah.
50:14
Speaker 2: So that's the mind pt the the coaching people in
50:18
Speaker 2: terms so the workshops and the coaching programs that I'm
50:21
Speaker 2: that I'm doing. So I just want to get rich.
50:24
Speaker 2: That fills me up the most. I want to get
50:26
Speaker 2: really good at that. So and it's just about consistency.
50:28
Speaker 2: It's been three years since I ran a one off workshop,
50:32
Speaker 2: which I did last week, and it's like three years.
50:34
Speaker 2: Why you don't get better waiting three years?
50:38
Speaker 1: That's true, dude, that's true. If people want to thank you, tif,
50:42
Speaker 1: if people want to find you, follow connect with you,
50:44
Speaker 1: and come and see you and Ollie, how do they
50:48
Speaker 1: do that?
50:50
Speaker 3: Human periscope dot com is the website. I don't think
50:52
Speaker 3: Allie's on there yet, but feel free to reach out
50:54
Speaker 3: and ask a question and I'll send you a photo.
50:58
Speaker 1: That's your podcast. You stood on your pot The Long
51:00
Speaker 1: End six years and counting.
51:04
Speaker 3: Jen and I have still have three hundred and something
51:07
Speaker 3: odd episodes and we still have The Long on the
51:08
Speaker 3: Short of It. Gens five foot one, I'm six foot seven,
51:10
Speaker 3: and we spend twenty minutes once a week talking about
51:13
Speaker 3: a topic that relates to, you know, being a leader,
51:15
Speaker 3: being a creative, being a freelancer, being an entrepreneur.
51:19
Speaker 1: I don't want to be precious, but I keep clicking
51:21
Speaker 1: refresh on my email and I don't see an invite.
51:24
Speaker 3: But stand by, we've we only ever had one guest,
51:28
Speaker 3: and it's Seth Godin. We had no guests on our podcast.
51:31
Speaker 3: That's a good reason to make an exception. Hey, mate,
51:34
Speaker 3: we'll say goodbye Fair but your ace and father of
51:38
Speaker 3: the year.
51:38
Speaker 1: You are. That's what I'm going to call this episode,
51:40
Speaker 1: Father of the Year. We appreciate you. Thanks Mate, thanks
51:44
Speaker 1: for having me, Tip, thanks for having me Greig.
51:45
Speaker 2: Thanks guys,