MyndFit - Do the Mental Reps

Speaker 1: 0:07

I mean, let, let let's admit it. We've all got two wolves and a good one and a bad , and they both want to eat messed . I can tell we just gotta feed that good one a little more than the other one .

Speaker 2: 0:36

[inaudible]

Speaker 3: 0:36

We are live welcome people. Welcome everybody. I'm very excited today. I've got a very, very, very special guest , um, to , uh, first of all, I suppose to you been bit , um , I introduced myself because this is only my first or second official podcast. And , uh, I'm very, very happy to have a man here on the podcast today that , um, ironically helped me through a lot of my struggles. So I'm very, very excited to speak to , uh, this guests . But what I want to do is introduced him, but , um, I think I might get himself to introduce himself because he's better at it than me. So over to you, Nick,

Speaker 4: 1:16

I know myself better than you. Apparently I've got 43 years of learning about myself. So does that make me more qualified to introduce myself?

Speaker 3: 1:28

I would imagine so. Yes. Okay .

Speaker 4: 1:31

Um, yeah. Well , um , I'm Nick from mind fit, founder of mind fit formerly known as state of mind, formerly , uh , reconnaissance soldier from the Australian army, formally from hospitality formally from

Speaker 3: 1:49

Childhood. I was going to say, how far you're going to go back Childhood , stop

Speaker 4: 1:55

There. If you want

Speaker 3: 1:56

It. Now we can w we can edit that out, but let's just w their childhood we'll go with that. Let's go. All right .

Speaker 4: 2:06

Uh, yeah, so that's great to be here. Great to see you doing so well and coming through your stuff. And , um, uh , there's been a lot of adversity, a lot of challenges, but you , you seem quite equipped now to handle it, and now you're in a position where you're okay, so you can help others through sharing this stuff.

Speaker 3: 2:28

Yeah, thanks. Fine . And , and I guess that's , um, probably the big thing. And one of the reasons why I wanted to start the podcast obviously, was to , um, give people an idea on one my journey and what helped me get through my struggles. Um, and you being a big influence in that , um, part of though that, that journey of mine and , and, and getting to me to where I am today. So again, thank you, Mike, for coming on and being my first official guests. And , uh, I really appreciate your , um, your time today , uh ,

Speaker 4: 3:01

Pop your cherry. Thanks .

Speaker 3: 3:04

Um, so I suppose , um, uh , I guess what I'd like to ask you and , and, and sort of double down and click, click, double click on a little bit more on your, your journey. Um, and then you , and you mentioned the army and you mentioned , um, childhood, sorry . Um, but if you can just give us a bit of a rundown on where you've come from and , and your background in the army, and then also maybe talk about why you are at where you're at today, helping people and doing what you're doing

Speaker 4: 3:36

Well , yeah, it's , uh , uh, uh, I talked to people that I'm not, not special. I've just sort of been through life as we all do. None of us get through on sky. And , um, yeah, there was, there was , uh , a much younger version of me who went through some stuff who wasn't really equipped , uh, to, to manage the adversity that he was experiencing. Um, so yeah, I guess , uh, early childhood , um, had some stuff going on. My , uh , dear old dad , um, biological father had , had undiagnosed manic depression as it was called back then, which is bipolar disorder. Um, so highs and lows and he'd self-medicate , um, drugs and alcohol and that sort of stuff. And there was , um , in , in 19 , it wasn't very present, I guess. Um, uh , he he'd leave us, my , my sister at the pub, you know, it was probably two or three years old and he'd just forget that he had kids , um, it a bit bit, been a neighbor aged , um, paced . Yeah. Uh, and there's a group of friends that he hung around with. I don't have fond memories of them , um, and nothing bad happens, but it just, just, you just, you just want treated and handled properly, I suppose. Um, and yeah, there was those vol and EPASS on his behalf. And , um, so that was sort of the starts to , to this, this incarnation , uh, for me, and then , uh, uh, fortunate to have a really wonderful stepfather step in , um, and did amazingly well and took us on his shoulders and carried us , um , into a , a much broader future suppose , but he was still ill-equipped to suppose to handle, especially me. Um , the version I was back then at a young boy who was in touch with his emotions, I suppose, and , and quite sensitive. And , and dad kept telling me to stop being so bloody sensitive , um , as was the one from, from that era. Um, and cause he just didn't know how to handle it. Um, so then high school, you know , we'd moved around all, it says a little bit inconsistency in childhood. Um, and so, you know, I , I remember stealing things. I became very good at thieving. Um , very good at stealing , uh , stuff just, and I'd give it away, give it to people. Um, and I didn't realize it at the time, but upon reflection of have since learned that I was trying to, to buy friends , uh, I didn't believe in myself, I wasn't secure enough in myself to, to just trust that people would like me for who I am. Um, and I also had a lot of regret or remorse about, about being that way until I stepped into empathy and , and become compassionate to that version of me that existed. Um, yeah. Then, and then , uh, I saw I was a bit lost for a while for a long while that wasn't really contributing to society. Um, we grandparents, there's not a slotted door with moments. Grandparents sent me on that would bail out . Um , and I went on 22 day bushwalking up in the Bryn DiBella Rangers , despite myself that I still laugh about it to this day. Like they put me on this bus and there's this 16 year old [inaudible] , I'm sorry, I'll do anything. And I , that shipped me off to Canberra and I came back literally a different person. I found parts of me that I didn't know, or that have been laying dormant that then all of a sudden, I w I have divided , um, by being so far out of my comfort zone, I , I realized I was a very generous person giving and there was no smoking, no drinking, anything healthy, walking, caving, canoeing, all that sort of stuff. So I came back with a bit at the top, I suppose. Uh, and I was up in the morning and running six guys around lake window ready and in Ballarat and getting fit. And mum and dad were like, the, this is Nick's Dylan Canberra replaced him. And , um, and so that obviously worked a trade , uh, but I was still a bit lost in terms of schooling and work and everything. And then , uh , my sister's boyfriend had this friend , uh , who I became really from friends with , uh , really sort of looked up to him as a couple of years older. Um, so it was day on and day I was in the army reserves and he said, look, why don't you join the army reserves? Um , sure. Okay. I looked up to this bloke and , uh, next thing you know, I'm , I'm doing a beep test and all this other stuff to join the army and , uh, as luck would have it. And then I said for , for reservists, I think they used to do like a six week initial training. I its um, but I cut the first 13 week. I say programs . I was in Kapooka for 13 weeks , um, and came back from that different again, you know , um, severely fit , ridiculously fit. Um, and the army was there . It was great. It was , I found a lot of discipline that I needed that I didn't have. I was lacking a fan a little bit of direction, camaraderie , all that sort of stuff. Um, but it still, still wasn't quite enough. And I was only turning up an hour , uh , for one night a week. And so still didn't have much direction . Ah , okay .

Speaker 3: 9:27

It says fatal side , a couple of fairly significant transformations before you were , you know , up until 8, 8, 2, 2 separate, probably two separate transformations.

Speaker 4: 9:36

I had a couple of skins, but I saying , um, but also I was started so far behind the eight ball that , um, you know, I still wasn't caught up to average Joe. Um, and so then, and then Dale and , uh, got, got cleaned up on his motorbike by car and passed away. Um, and so that was, that was pretty traumatic. Um, and, but he'd said to me before I died, he goes, ah , I'm thinking about you in the full-time army. Do you want to join a join with me? And I was like, if Dan says it and he said , Nick does it so sure. Yep . Okay , we're doing this now. Uh, and then obviously passed away, but it's still my commitment to him and another sliding door moment . So I honor that commitment and , and um, yeah, enlisted full time and it got shipped up to Darwin. Um, and that was the start of my full-time career . So I started off as a grant as a, as an infantry soldier. Um, and then , uh , ended up going to the school of AMR and learning how to drive Ahmed vehicles and Mr . Jordan Ray , Raikkonen the second cavalry regiment , um, which I loved , uh, the physicality of , uh , the , the nature of the work. And I was, it was awesome. I didn't feel like I quite fit it in, you know, I thought probably a bit too much or more than

Speaker 3: 11:03

Did , did you, did that, does that stand back from you initially, when you said before you were a very sensitive lead , was that why you didn't feel like you fit it in that army?

Speaker 4: 11:14

So , yeah , I was probably more emotionally mature,

Speaker 3: 11:17

Like too emotional for the army at that point

Speaker 4: 11:19

In time. I'd probably, and this isn't any ego involved. I'd probably had a higher EEQ than, than most blokes in there. Got it. Um, emotional intelligence saw, are you not that you want to go out and drink Bundy and burn down a tree after work? I'd want to go to the movies or hang out, go out for dinner or something. I sort of, I loved my job at , uh , I wasn't green , wasn't flowing through my veins, you know? Um, and I had a lot of friends, lots of friends in the army and did well. Uh , until

Speaker 3: 11:55

It's funny you say that because when you said that, then that kind of, for me, obviously being in the police force, there were times in the police force when I felt very similar , um, dealing with people, dealing with people in certain jobs that I dealt with them and having my offsider with me kind of looking at me going what you said . Yeah. That, that makes sense to me.

Speaker 4: 12:20

I didn't quite fit in,

Speaker 3: 12:22

But I did. I loved it, but it was almost like, yeah , it's probably a little bit low brow , I suppose, if that makes sense. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 12:32

Yeah. Well, you, you went all in , you weren't consumed by , by the, the culture of it. Um, and I, I was , uh , balance in my life. Um, so we, so this was , uh , this was , um , prior to 2000 I was in and then , um, East Timor started kicking off and away with a reconnaissance. So we were the , in front of the tip of the spear we had, we were first to be deployed over there. Um, and so we were on 24 hours notice to move. We'd been done all this training in a heightened state of readiness and whatever, and it was the first sort of thing we're going to do since Vietnam, really. Um, so the cross , the old sergeants were pretty soft about it. They hadn't, they'd just missed a Vietnam boat. Um, and so that was a bit of a bottles. And then I believe in a house two days before we, we, the rest of the , uh , unit deployed. Um, so it was real interesting that , uh , you know, obviously there was a physical trauma, but I didn't w we didn't really understand the, that it was an emotional trauma as well. It comes with it , and I couldn't do my job, or my mates deployed or got left behind. Um, and I couldn't run anymore. I used to run , uh, represent the army and the defense fullest guides for , for running. I couldn't do that anymore. The , the knee sort of didn't rehab properly. I got a really bought your job done on it the first time. Um, and then you sort of get thrown on the scrap heap , and as it comes a little pasta, ization and bullying, so you sort of friends step away. Cause I don't want to be Todd with the same brush , um, as a , an experience, which I've since learned only recently in the last two or three years , uh, I can never really , uh, face it , uh , reconcile it, but I saw , um, a psychiatrist referred to it as sexualized violence. Um, so that group of dudes just were bored basically and just walked past. And , uh, because of the culture at the time, it was a toxic masculinity and I sort of jumped me, stripped me naked, zip tied me to a Y cage. Um, fire hose were pants enters off the vehicle , um, and obviously struggled and fought and whatever, but I don't , you can't do much about it. Uh , I could probably take him now though. Um, and yeah, and so, you know , I was obviously that was that companion with the trauma of not being able to Iran and all that sort of stuff anymore. So it was all of , was sort of series of events , um, that was having an effect on all level . I had no idea about , uh, and then, so I was eventually medically discharged and I wasn't linked into any SOC services or anything. Um, I was given 40 grand. I was a young dude. I was like, well, my ticket to Europe and

Speaker 3: 15:29

Yeah, well , if only mind fit was around back then

Speaker 4: 15:33

Probably someone said, hi, Nick , by the way, you've got mental health and it's your responsibility to look after it. And there's all these things you can do to look after it. Um, but I , you know , I talk to clients all the time. A stoic philosophy that we use at mindful is a more fatigue. Uh , I love a fate and I love everything that's happened. It didn't feel good at the time, but I've become a better person for having pains for it all. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 15:56

The universe doesn't make mistakes, I suppose. It's another

Speaker 4: 15:59

Way to put it. It's my karma. And there are no mistakes. You're right. It's all been perfect. So , um, and , um, it's , it's all of that has given me what I have now, which is I'm in a position where I help people on a day to day basis and reduce the amount of suffering they're experiencing and, and pass on tools and resources to them. So ,

Speaker 3: 16:23

Um, and , and, and, and you seen, obviously you seen me at my worst. I think you described me one as a car crash.

Speaker 4: 16:30

Oh , let me tell them to tell the listeners exactly what it was. Locks out . I think I was, I was just about to move into the new building, just a couple of doors up from my old office and I was in there and you have come wandering in looking literally, like you've just been hit by a bus. And I was like, what the is this mess? And I , luckily I didn't have a client at that time. And he found me and we sat down and had a chat and I'm like, yeah, right . You , you , you probably, you probably need some help,

Speaker 3: 17:00

Probably a bit of an understatement at the time.

Speaker 4: 17:03

I have to perform some traders immediately. And just to , just to tell you, you're a guy, but you, you , uh, w w what we call deep in the spaghetti brain, highly distorted and deep in , in your suffering. Yep .

Speaker 3: 17:21

Absolutely. My , you mentioned , um, mental health. And I think one thing I learned from you back then was, oh , I just want you to explain that your version of mental health versus mental illness, because you do it so well.

Speaker 4: 17:38

Oh , well, I do a lot of presenting and workshops and public speaking and whatnot. And my first question, my first, the first thing I say, when it , whenever I'm doing this is who has mental health and two or three brave souls might put their hand up. And I said , why, why are you putting your hand up? And they're like, oh, well, I've been diagnosed with bipolar. I've tried to commit suicide. I've got , I've got depression or anxiety. And I'm like, thank you. That's , that's very brave of you to put your hand up. But the reality is everybody in this room put their hand up. Um , so I'm going to diagnose everyone here as having mental health. What do you mean you can't do that? And it's as simple as it's . If you have a body, you have physical health. If you have a mind, you have mental health and mental health is simply just a spectrum of emotions. Some of them feel pleasant. Some of them feel unpleasant. Yeah . The one end of the spectrum, we've we feel sad and people don't have depression or anxiety. I hate to start that one in four people have depression. No, we all experience it . Uh , a state of feeling sad where it becomes problematic is when we get stuck at that end of the spectrum on the opposite end one in four people have happiness.

Speaker 3: 18:54

We don't hear that stat.

Speaker 4: 18:55

And it would be deeply disturbing if someone got stuck up that end of the spectrum, it was just constantly in a state of happiness. I might , you don't just start . I know . So happy. Okay. Yeah .

Speaker 3: 19:06

It's interesting. I think there's something wrong with that guy, but mental illness.

Speaker 4: 19:10

Sorry , if we're stuck on one under the spectrum or the ABA , it depends. It depends on whether it's pleasant or unpleasant. Mrs . Was still in trouble. So all I'm doing at mind fit is trying to teach people how to have an emotional response. That's in proportion to what we're experiencing, and the feelings are just chemicals. So essentially we want our brain, we're going to train and condition O'Brien to produce the right amount of the raw chemical in the right situation. And far too often, anything above that is unnecessary. So if it's an unpleasant feeling like depression or anxiety, or what can I have a lot of unnecessary suffering? Um, so yeah, mental health is this spectrum of emotions we need to, there's no such thing as a good or a bad feeling or a positive or negative emotion. They're all equally as important. They're all, they all have very important roles. If, if the dog dies, you need to feel sad. It's very important that you process let the chemical in, let it do its job and then let it leave. But a lot of people are the mental health field has created this fear of mental health, which is so

Speaker 3: 20:24

A lot of people in the gym will say, I need this workout for my mental health. And I say , no, no, no, you need to, you need to work on your emotional health

Speaker 4: 20:35

Once again. So, so when we exercise the brain produces chemicals, and if a person's feeling sad, then that can become codependent on the chemicals that exercise , um, credits for them. So in that regard, they're in an unhealthy relationship with somebody that's healthy. Yeah . They codependent on it. Um, so if we, if we can just learn to, if we can understand what's creating the chemicals, which is the thoughts, and what's creating the thoughts, which is the beliefs, then we can stop getting people in a position where they can move up and down that range of emotions. And when the dog does , don't have an aversion to being sad , uh , client , now that I ring me and he's like, Hey , um , I'm really, I'm really depressed. I'm like, how wonderful is it? Is it appropriate for you to be feeling that way? I said , well, what do you mean? I feel sad. I'm like, I don't like it or not liking it is going to deepen the experience of this and what's happening. And then you guys, oh man, the misses out of fall this morning, I've done all four together. It's pretty appropriate to feel sad then. Great, good job. I'll say the next session. Don't be sad.

Speaker 3: 21:53

Yeah. Enjoy that. Um, do you , do you believe that people , or do you think it's good that people have a fairly solid belief system in place to , to , to help with that or to

Speaker 4: 22:07

Cope with that? How do you define a solid belief system?

Speaker 3: 22:11

I guess, to have something to sort of fall back on in terms of their beliefs or their values and , and when, when something does happen ,

Speaker 4: 22:17

Um , most people are highly irrational and their belief systems are highly rational , highly mature . There's three core beliefs that we talk about that formulate human nature. So we're all born with these beliefs. I must be loved. I must be perfect and I must get what I want. And we're deeply attracted to this sense of utopia. Everything goes my way, smooth sailing all the time, but I guarantee you fall away. If the magic wand and you experienced utopia, you'd be bored shitless after about two days. And there'd be no depth . There'd be no contrast. There'd be no anything challenge. And just like a physical health and go back to what mental health is. It's just a body needs to meet resistance at 12 rounds. She had its 12 rounds in order to get stronger. And when the body gets stronger, it gets more resistant to disease and illness. Um, the body of the mind needs to meet resistance too , but when it meets resistance with most people, they get triggered because they're not getting what they want or the that's not fair or whatever. So they go into those distorted states that you're in and then the mental health , um, then the mind isn't strong. So it opens the doors up to disease and illness of which unnecessary anxiety and depression is the mind being sick. It's inside the mine's got a cold, it's not functioning and operating properly. So when I was in the army , uh , my mental health was in shape because everything was in place and everything was okay when things disappeared, I didn't have the foundation to, to keep moving forward. I got really stuck. My mind got very unwell. Um, so I had mental health issues and then that were left on attended to, so that developed into mental illness. Yeah, but so for me, that was in the form of severe depression and anxiety and to the point where my mind literally disabled my body and I couldn't open my door lantern door to go and check the box .

Speaker 3: 24:21

And at that time you didn't have the tools to do

Speaker 4: 24:26

I deal with it. I didn't know what was going on. I was in the experience. So I had no subjective awareness. I had nothing to constructively compared to I had no idea. I was just in a , and because it felt so, the only way I thought to get out of it was to end my life. And that's the only way I could think of to end the suffering and all the work I've done with people who've tried to commit suicide or had suicidal ideologies was assigned. I didn't want to extinguish that life force or stop the pain I wanted to. I didn't want to be in suffering. We don't like being in suffering by nature, but they didn't know how to get out of it. So luckily I learned, and what's

Speaker 3: 25:10

The source of all suffering

Speaker 4: 25:12

Attachment and ignorance. So attachments to getting what we want and everything being perfect. Um, and our cars and jobs and careers and money and status. And there you go, and blah, blah, blah, but also ignorance of the law of nature, which is everything's impermanent. So we forget that we're all a couple of chromosomes away from throwing feces at each other. We have to remember that we are part of the animal kingdom. We don't go for a walk in nature. We are nature. So we have to live within the laws of nature. And the laws of nature is everything everything's constantly changing. But now the Buddhist said that suffering because , and when we try and make permanence that, which is not permanent, which has everything. So , uh, till death do us part, you know , I'm in this, we're in this relationship.

Speaker 3: 26:06

Yeah, no . And , and people wonder why when people get divorced, it's so traumatic for people because they've got that in their head already, all the way together.

Speaker 4: 26:13

We died . Both of us, we are meant to where we are expected. We have an expectation and attachment and we shouldn't, we shouldn't be getting divorced. Okay. How's that working for you ?

Speaker 3: 26:25

Yeah . Let's leave . Let's live in misery together. Maybe not need to re rod . That means your , so essentially your, you sort of moved from a traditional therapy , um, to more of an educational based approach , um, where you sort of really try and create that shift with people when you, when you, when you talk to them . Um, is, is it a more of a , um, I think you say a bit more of a personal development type therapy rather than, Hey, sit down with me every week for the next, however long and , and keep saying the same over and over again, until we just get sick of saying it,

Speaker 4: 27:05

Keep going into the story and writing , living your truth . Let's

Speaker 3: 27:08

Talk about it again.

Speaker 4: 27:11

Tell me again that you were abused. Um, yes, I have . I've been doing this for about 12 or 13 years now. And the first eight years I was operating as a counselor or a therapist or whatever, and people were coming in and Nick , um , I'm in suffering. This is my problem. I work family, friends, whatever life. And we'd, we'd go, oh yeah . And make them feel better after a certain amount of time. But then next time life happens back they'd Carmen and Nick I'm feeling sad again. Oh , okay. Right . And after you , after about eight years of this, I sort of something dawned on me that there might be a different way. And , um, I realized I was working for people instead of with them. That was his expectation. Um, I'm unwell . I'm going to go to Nick to fix me. Wasn't Benson square one day. And I literally heard this person, oh , Dr. Nick from across the carpark. I'm like , I'm not a doctor.

Speaker 3: 28:11

So don't , and you're not the dog from the same sense I bought it .

Speaker 4: 28:16

And , um, and so having that lived experience coming here from the lived experience position , um , I'm not clinical, you know , um , uh , build rapport much easier. I don't even wear the label of therapists and clients . They exist, you know, for, for the dynamic of their relationship, but assist another human. So coming into contact with another human soul. Um, so I I've just figured out that maybe if I start teaching people, these life skills, these tools, these resources tapping into the EEQ , self-awareness, self-management giving people the tools to self-manage and self-regulate and have an appropriate emotional response to what they're experiencing. So technically we call it psychoeducation , educating the mind, and we're doing cognitive retraining. So retraining how the, how the brain operates , um, a rewiring of the brain it's neuro-plasticity . So what we're teaching people, how to think constructively and be solution-oriented go into empathy, compassion, and let go of their expectations by the last stop, getting into that spaghetti, Brian's stated distortion. Uh, and apparently it works. It does.

Speaker 3: 29:31

And I can definitely testify to that. It does work. I remember a couple of 'em , uh , vividly to this day, and we're going back a few years now, but a couple of white boarding sessions that we did. Uh , I mean, I remember ringing you and saying mate, and I need to , um , need to have a chat. And we , we, we did a white boarding session and you walk away from some of the, some of the stuff apart from your stick figures, cause they were terrible, but it just gave me the tools to be able to self-regulate and , and then a hundred percent to this day, I was still, you know, some of the things that you , you you've taught me. And , and I spoke to people in the, in the past and the one beat one for me was that big , um, that I think it was the, between the stimulus and response. There's a spot , there's a spice . And you need to utilize that space. Well,

Speaker 4: 30:21

Frankl was a psychiatrist of Jewish descent living in Germany at the time he came into power, not a good time to ,

Speaker 3: 30:32

Um , good thing to talk about at the moment in the current climate. Yeah .

Speaker 4: 30:36

Yep . And , uh , he, that was his camera at the time. And then so much positivity has come out of this. So him and his family got sent to the concentration camps and only , only him and his sister came out the other side. Um, and he went back to work and got healthy and, and he S he formulated this theory that everything could be taken from a person, but the loss of the human rights, which is to choose how we feel in any given situation. And so I broke that down into an equation or a formula that said in between stimulus and response is a space. And in that space lies our power to choose. And in that choice lies our freedom. So I looked at how I'd been operating and looked at my claws for uprising . And I was like, yeah, that's good. In theory. But theory doesn't have an ego theory. Doesn't have trauma theory, doesn't have any rational mind. Um, so I sort of changed that around that's the goal, but what I realized we were doing is the stimulus was the same, but they'd react first. And then they'd go into that space. And then that spice wasn't their freedom. It was their prison. And , um, so just even just identifying that was game-changing because we can show people there's two ways of operating.

Speaker 3: 31:53

And I remember just your version of it was when something happens, just say to yourself, that's interesting. And that gives you the space.

Speaker 4: 32:02

Well, in that special lunch, who observed things objectives , there's no good or bad or right or wrong, it's the ego is determining that. Um, so when , when you can just sit back and say, that's interesting, you know, a couple of examples are I walked out the front of the house one day, I got spotters on the front of my truck. And I just noticed that there was no spots there. One day I spotlights. And I was like, cause of the train, this wasn't a conscious effort, but it was for many years. Um, but I just went into it naturally went into that spice and observed . And I like , that's interesting. I'm pretty sure those spotlights . Um , and then all of a sudden, Victor Franco popped up in the back of it. You know , I've just come out of the Holocaust and I get to choose how I feel about that. You've lost. Everything can be taken from a man spotlights, but the last smears or institutes, how he feels, I don't want to feel about this. Well, I want to , I want to feel appropriate. So I was a bit, it's a bit disappointing, but I didn't get treated . I didn't get stuck in those emotions. I had a day full of clients that I needed to turn up and be there for. So I've managed myself through that experience. And what can I do constructive thinking, what can I do not, I can't believe they're gone who the bloody mongrel where , uh , that's too easy. It's too lazy to fall into that mentality. So when's that constructive? What can I do? I can go buy new spotters and I can make sure I've got antitheft nuts on them. And I'll learn the lesson and keep moving forward.

Speaker 3: 33:32

I utilized it not long ago. Exactly. That similar situation where I walked out, I heard a big bang, heard the dog bark or walked outside. And the lady from up the road had smashed into the front of my car and I stopped. And I just looked and she was standing at the front of the car, looking at it. She was in shock. She had a mask on and she was freaking out. And I just said, I said, are you okay? Is everything okay? Are you okay? And it was almost automatic.

Speaker 4: 34:03

And that's you I've just literally come here from recoding one of my podcasts. And we're just speaking of blokes , shout out to blokes podcast , whiskey ,

Speaker 3: 34:15

Brother , Ryan .

Speaker 4: 34:18

And we were talking about , um, rammed us who can get turned on to him if you , if you want your head exploded and , um, and rammed us coined this time . And he said, we're all just walking each other home. So spoiler alert for all the listeners, none of us get out of this alive in any way or the body doesn't. Um, and so everyone has kumbaya bows and we're just going to tip off the end of it. And so we can be kind to ourselves on along this and kind to each other. And it's , it's, it's a nice, simple little acts and your, what you just did. You walk to that lady home, you know, you , you didn't, you didn't get involved in and oh, my cow's not perfect. I'm not getting what I want. And you don't like me and you run into a guy , you can go into unnecessary suffering your , your mind, we call it , uh , in a state of equanimity or in an economist's mind, which means to be calm and composed, especially in a difficult situation. So that's, that's wonderful display of emotional intelligence. And you went into your Buddha nature, which is just compassion. It was .

Speaker 3: 35:26

And she messaged me later and said, thank you so much for your attitude. I'm sorry.

Speaker 4: 35:33

Wonderful ripple effect. It was amazing. Imagine going to that day structure thinking, oh, I can't believe you did this to me, blah, blah. How long are you going on early this morning and compare and the ripple effect. And she would have felt. And it sort of created discontentedness on so many people instead of just levels, but you went into constructive thinking and looked after each other. And if we could do that a little bit more than the world would be in a much different place.

Speaker 3: 36:03

Yeah, absolutely. Mate, look, I'm conscious of your time, Nico . Um, so thank you for that. You were still at a little bit of time, but I just wanted to ask you mate , what obviously the, the , um, the theme of my podcast is, is beyond the struggle. I'm interested to know what the common struggle is that people are having, that you do , or with you in terms of your clients.

Speaker 4: 36:28

Well, I dunno which level to answer this on. So I'm going to start down here and then work my way back up , um, beyond the struggle , uh, to me that just conscious of word in my head, and then the word is surrender. Oh, we've got to stop struggling and surrender and allow things to flow and allow things just to be as they are. Um, so that's on that table level on a dice dial level, paperless , struggling with it , ego that's that's the mine source of the work that we're doing is , is helping people to reduce the ego and get the personal tendencies. I'm a very caring person, but when, when, when that moves past a certain point, that greatest strengths becomes my greatest weakness and it becomes anxiety and I can become controlling. So I firstly had to sit with my nature and understand my nature and learn to love my nature without, oh , I cannot believe I'm doing that again. Or hide this about myself. Oh , that's very toxic. So I learned to love that nature. Then I can observe it and just keep it in balance. It doesn't happen all the time, but , um, and then on the surface level, most people are struggling with their attachments and it's just, as soon as something happens outside the parameters of acceptance, they go on. And as soon as they triggered that they're in no position to choose how they feel in that situation. No ,

Speaker 3: 38:02

I love that answer because I suppose that's why, and the reason I , I , I called it beyond the struggle is because I arrayed so many people say I'm struggling or I'm struggling with this, or I'm struggling with that. And, and for, for me, and , and people that are listening , um, that response or that answer then is , is essentially exactly what I'm trying to achieve is that you can get through your struggle, your adversity, your trauma, whatever you're dealing with it , whether it's minor or major, it's, it doesn't have to be a struggle. There are ways and techniques to get through it.

Speaker 4: 38:39

And it doesn't feel good when you're in it, but, and they , that has gone to the gym. If I came and did a training session with you, now, it would suck some of them do, but you feel so much better. I fall , I remember doing 50 K hikes and full pack and gear and everything and hiding it all the way through. But the feeling of accomplishment afterwards is, is amazing. So , um, yeah, it was, it was, I was going to say something then as well, but , uh, the train left the station and I will edit that out. No , no, I like it. Leave it.

Speaker 3: 39:15

That's perfect. I'm taking , I'm not editing anything out. Might , you've got some, one thing that I noticed on your research re resources page was , um , an add more, I can't even say Admiral, Ravens speech changed the world by changing your bed. Why did you put that on your resources page? Okay .

Speaker 4: 39:37

Have you watched the video? Yes. Right. So I asked clients to , to watch the video and just to take the notes of the points that he's making. And then I ask them to re watch it through a Manford filter and look at what he's really saying underneath it all. And I love that because , uh, he speaks about walking each other home. He speaks about compassion and empathy speaks about surrendering and letting go slow is smooth and smooth is fast. You love that. So now we got to stop being in a rush, slow down, be here now is another Ram Dass term. Um, but making the bed, it's just, you get this sense of accomplishment again. It's like, if you don't go to a gym session at 12 rounds, she had , that's 12 rounds , uh, paid for around very high for 12 or embarrass . Um, if you, if you don't turn up to the gym, a lot of people go into destructive thinking and put themselves down and beat themselves up. They're not being kind and walking themselves. Um, so if you can make the bed, you've got this, oh , at least I've accomplished something today.

Speaker 3: 40:46

Yeah. It's an amazing speech. And I watched it a long time ago and , um , loved it the first time I watched it. I'll put it in the show notes cause I be employed around to watch it. It's um, it's awesome. And it it'll make you hopefully change the way you think about , um , that , uh , those 1% is, and that was marginal gains on a daily basis.

Speaker 4: 41:06

And he also speaks about, you know, no matter what kind of day I've had, if when you come home and you get into a made bed that you made that morning. Yeah .

Speaker 3: 41:15

If that's all you get and the day and to win , it feels, but it feels good. Absolutely. Um, a couple of books, are you reading anything at the moment because you've got a couple of books on your website that I remember the way of the peaceful warrior. And obviously we've, we've already spoken about the Victor Frankl book, but the way the peace war is an interesting story, because I remember being in your office for a session and you had it on the desk in front of me. And I said, oh, this what's this book on you go, I don't know . Right out of the sport. I went out and bought it and I absolutely loved it, reading it at the moment. Oh , cool.

Speaker 4: 41:50

Yeah, it's a balance. Um, I was talking to a client yesterday and we got to be careful about not getting addicted to the growth. And , um,

Speaker 3: 42:02

This'll be interesting. I'm very interested to see what you got to say here.

Speaker 4: 42:06

I've got like a sub sub group class that we lovingly and laughingly refer to them as mind fit junkies. And it's like a half expect to say five or six of them at my backdoor every morning, Nick what's what's the day to day

Speaker 3: 42:25

When's , when's the next Tony Robbins seminar. What's the next podcast coming out . We're going to go to that.

Speaker 4: 42:31

Uh, and , and I cited him to this stop start brushing today. You are, and often tomorrow you may grow know . So , uh , I just want to preface what I'm saying. We would just be , just be mindful about getting addicted to the gross cause. Cause that becomes equally as problematic as not growing.

Speaker 3: 42:50

And also , um, you can read, but you don't necessarily not necessarily put that into Action as well. You can read and you can do all the self-development stuff, but if you're not utilizing it and putting it into action.

Speaker 4: 43:06

Well , so once again, it goes one of two ways, all the knowledge in the world is useless without application. So Bruce Lee, no, he's not enough. You must do. Um, to , you know , really in my feet when I have a psycho-education , but I say right now, go away from here and embody this. Don't do it . Don't just know it actually experience it and live it . Um, but conversely, play around with it.

Speaker 3: 43:31

What does Marcus Aurelius say? Waste no time arguing about being a good man. Just be one good man

Speaker 4: 43:39

Yoda. And there is once he said , um, there was no trial or not. Um, I'll just read it this morning. Uh, don't try something . Just, just do say , um, so, oh , and all that stuff's easier said than done. I love the philosophy that it's simple to be happy, but it's difficult to be simple. So once again, the theory is all wonderful and , and our conscious minds can intellectualize it and understand it. And the number one thing, a clot will sign a discovery session is, ah , just make sense. And I'm like wonderful though . That's the first part. Now you've got to go and take it off the whiteboard and into your life . Start with meditation, take it off the mat and go and live a meditative life. Don't just meditate. Don't have a meditative practice. And I got to employ it. Um, a book I always recommend to people to start off with is the four agreements. It's a little bit, we were at the start , but if you can sort of push her that and get to the actual agreements themselves , um, yeah. And , and take everything with a grain of salt too , you know, these, these fit addicts , um, just, just really trying to interpret and apply meaning to everything. And I'm like, don't just, just entertain the thought, entertain it for a minute. What is the Buddha said? Don't just blindly follow this going, try and break it, try and test it. Um, so don't just consume it.

Speaker 3: 45:13

Yeah. Good, good point on reading. GreenLights at the moment Matthew McConaughey. And I'm going to shout out to Mel one of my members. Um , and I hope you listen because you listened to the last one. So just start it. And she was the one. Love it. Love it. Love it. [inaudible]

Speaker 4: 45:31

I'm sorry. I'm uh , I'm sorry. I'm promoting this. How are you finding it? Not , not good. Good. Such a lazy word.

Speaker 3: 45:38

Well , honey , I've read like two pages bought it yesterday. You saw me at the bookshop yesterday. That's what I was buying better answers. So me yesterday, but dude .

Speaker 4: 45:48

And so you're buying us so you're in the bookstore. Um, yeah, so Boston books.

Speaker 3: 45:54

So that's soundcast books and podcasts and all the PIP personal development stuff just be, be wary.

Speaker 4: 46:02

Don't don't don't think about personally developing, going develop, develop the personality. Don't develop the person , develop the spirits, develop this .

Speaker 3: 46:12

Yeah. Nice. I like that develop . There you go. Nice. Cool, mate. As I said, I'm conscious of your time. I'm going to hit you with some I fast five oh , questions. Lovely quickly. Great . Um, so short, sharp answers, like what is the best investment you have ever made mental, physical, or financial,

Speaker 4: 46:34

Anything I've failed at

Speaker 3: 46:37

Ingesting ? That goes into my next question. What has been your biggest failure? Hmm .

Speaker 4: 46:42

Um, marriage was a doozy , uh, um, uh , uh , filed.

Speaker 3: 46:50

I'd love to put a bit of a trick question really because

Speaker 4: 46:53

No, it's my fault. I love the Jordan quote, Michael Jordan. He says I've been trusted with the game when he shot , uh , X amount of times and I've missed X amount of times and , um, S uh , filed Simon at times. And that's why I've succeeded.

Speaker 3: 47:06

Nice. Okay. Alive or dead. Who would you most like to sit down and have a drink or a chat with and why?

Speaker 4: 47:19

Uh, my partner, Emma .

Speaker 3: 47:22

Very, very good. How would you like to be remembered by your loved ones? Hmm, legacy question.

Speaker 4: 47:31

I don't know . I like to be remembered , uh , interesting one. I don't necessarily want to be

Speaker 3: 47:40

So interesting. So what he did there, you can use that spice city .

Speaker 4: 47:46

Uh, I don't necessarily want to be remembered. I'm very , I had a weird experience in Thailand once, and this was walking down this straight and it was, I was living there by myself at the time, knew nobody. And this dude just kind of walking up to me, he literally cross the streets and kind of looked at me dead in the eyes. He guys leave a mark, not a stain and then walked off. Yeah. Wow . I'm like , is that my candid camera what's going on? And I have no idea what that meant. So I don't want them to remember me necessarily a hope that , um, the , the imprints that the wake that I leave behind has , uh , has a wonderful ripple effect.

Speaker 3: 48:28

Yeah. I've heard a lot of some, or a couple of people answer a similar question like that. And I think ego can come into that, that answer kind of really

Speaker 4: 48:41

What you're asking. How would you like them to remember you? What did they want you to

Speaker 3: 48:44

Say? Or what do you want on your tombstone or, you know , that sort of thing. So

Speaker 4: 48:48

I have no terms up to my funeral, have a funeral, just shoot me off somebody to a shock and be done with it.

Speaker 3: 48:56

Awesome. I like it. I think that was the fast, fast five. That was a , that was a cool fast five. I liked that. Finally. Mate , do you have any , um, do you have any questions for me?

Speaker 4: 49:07

Um , what's the meaning of life

Speaker 3: 49:10

Pass ? Next question, right ?

Speaker 4: 49:12

No, I don't have a question for you . Um, I mean, I would, but , uh, I just want , I probably would like to pass on a reflection that I am proud of you and what you've achieved and, and , and the way you are now today and where you're heading with all of this are , uh , your credit to yourself and to your family. So thank you.

Speaker 3: 49:32

I appreciate that. Thank you. And it's been , uh , it's been a ride it's been real. The struggle is real, but as I think you said at the start of the start, when we first started talking about you wouldn't have changed anything. And now obviously I've said that because if I hadn't have done the stuff that's happened to me, I wouldn't be where I am now. Totally simple as that.

Speaker 4: 49:54

If you take a growth mentality and learn from it all, you're going to be okay if he gets stuck in what I don't have, and it's not fair and take that day strike mentality.

Speaker 3: 50:04

Yeah. Might how do we connect with you and mind fit if anyone's interested in getting in touch?

Speaker 4: 50:12

Um, this is a social media channel. Um , so it's mind fit program

Speaker 3: 50:17

And it's just, it's spelled on fit please because

Speaker 4: 50:21

M Y and D fit it's because it's my mind, it's fit

Speaker 3: 50:27

To the mental reps ,

Speaker 4: 50:28

Mentally fit mental health. That's what I might call it.

Speaker 3: 50:32

Well , mental rep , do the mental reps that might be the PO

Speaker 4: 50:34

Podcast title , the mental or mental reps. That's a tool that I teach people in coaching . And one of the 12 week of 12 month programs like [inaudible] , or like in the stick, their head into Monterey after getting run over by a class ,

Speaker 3: 50:54

All the podcasts too . But you've got the podcasts , blogs, podcasts. It's a beauty.

Speaker 4: 50:59

Yeah. So it's a ripper

Speaker 3: 51:00

Also, mate . Thank you again, Mike . I really appreciate you being on and being my first guest, as I said, it was , um, it was ironic that you are because you've , uh, you've been instrumental in my journey.

Speaker 4: 51:11

I love it. I love that you've reached out and asked me to be here and I genuinely feel like , um, it's , it's an honor to be here. So hopefully some listeners get something of value to psychotic ,

Speaker 3: 51:22

But no doubt. There was some gold in there, so. All right . Cheers mate. Thank you very much. And uh , we shall see you. Oh, well, you you'll be listening to me next week. Thanks guys.

Speaker 1: 51:43

I'm run up and tap you on the show and say, man, you won . Let them come tell you, you can go home. Now, let them say, I love you too . Let them say, thank you. Take the lid off the man-made routes that we put above ourselves and always play like an underdog.