#1677 The Coach Who Coaches Coaches - Harps

of followers. I have a lot of people who follow me on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn, and who listen to this show who are either trainers or psychologists or coaches, are involved in sport or high performance or the corporate space, who use some of my stuff, and by the way, of course, use all of my stuff that you want. And of course most of my stuff is not really my stuff. It's just stuff, isn't it. It's not like

there's a whole lot of new ideas. It's not like there's a whole lot of new information about human behavior or moments or psychology that is revolutionary. So I am always sharing things that have been known for a long time about human behavior and psychology and the human experience. But I share them in my own unique way, and I ask questions and tell stories and frame constructs in a way which I am told by many of you

seems to resonate, which is nice. So, but I do get asked by a lot of people if they can have access to, you know, my stuff. You know, like what when you get up and do a talk, what questions do you ask? What specific content do you draw from? And the truth is that you know, like last night, I did a talk for nearly seven hundred people. I have no slides, I have no PowerPoint, I have no video. I have one sheet of paper with a few dot

points on it that I bare look at. And because I have talked for so long and so many audiences about very similar subject matter, I while I wouldn't recommend this to everyone, of course, who's going to be teaching, coaching, speaking, doing workshops or standing in front of any kind of audience, because you're not me, not better, not worse, just different.

But it works for me. So when I'm just riffing in freestyle and talking about the human experience, I personally I'm better when I step on stage and I just open the door and I start talking. And every now and then I might look at a sheet of paper that I've got maybe five, ten, fifteen dot points, and those dot points are not so much a whole lot

of content rather than they are just conversation starters. But what I've got to share with you today is a bunch of questions that if you are a coach or a mentor, or a teacher, or even a psychologist or anyone who is helping people to help themselves, these are questions that are really good at starting a conversation, and

so I'm going to share them with you. I'm not going to expand too much on them because they're kind of self explanatory, and the real value lies in the answering of each of these questions for you, or for your clients, or with your clients, or in the moment of that coaching, teaching, connecting problem solving session. So the first question I ask people quite often is just like, why are you here? Why are you here? Why did

you come see me? Why did your book in? And then I just shut up and I get out of the way. I don't want to lead them. And sometimes people will open the vulnerability doors straight away, they'll pull back the curtain and they come out all emotional and psychological guns blazing, and you figure it out pretty quickly what's going on and what's not going on. And other people are more hesitant, more reserved, more fearful, and that's understandable.

But for me, without trying to dictate any particular direction or influence people to say or not say certain things, I want to ask them an open ended question and then essentially shut up. I want to get out of the way. And then so when they are telling me something, I'm here because, for example, I'm here because you know, I've got issues with my fill in the blank health cool specifically, what does that mean? Ask them another question.

I might go, you know, I get really frustrated about X. Okay, tell me about X. How long have you been frustrated? How long has this not been working? You know? Or I might have have real issues with my mum or my dad, or I have conflict at this cool, tell me about like what do those issues look like? How do they manifest? Has this been forever, this recent? What's changed? Are you different? Are they different? What do you think the issue is? So for me, a lot of the

questions are really just conversation starters. My idea of a good coaching session is when I'm doing probably twenty five percent or less of the talking. I think a lot of coaches over talk and under listen and look that's a big, big kind of asterisk next to that piece of advice, because it depends on the setting and the context and the issues that we're dealing with. Sometimes I will do relatively more talking than normal because that's what's required.

But I'm very aware that me over talking, me over sharing, and me under listening is a recipe for counseling disaster. The next question that I might ask, I'm just going to share a bunch of questions with you, and then you can either use these for yourself or use them

with others. And you would have heard many of these over time, but I think for some of you that have kind of said to me you want to develop your own model of coaching or teaching or working with people, or your own template, some of these might be a nice addition to your toolbag or your toolkit. So the next question is what are you currently doing that doesn't work? And I intentionally don't make that too specific, and they go well in regards to what I go anything anything

in your life? What are you doing? What is something that you are currently doing or typically doing or regularly doing that you know doesn't work. Don't overthink it. I'm pretty sure something's going to come to mind, And most of the time people will come back at me with

something quite specific, really quickly. And it could be that food's not working, or my training's not working, or this relationships not working, or sleep or money, or it could be obviously any component of the human experience that makes up the totality of their life, their world. And then so we will dig it deep, a little bit deeper. What does that mean when you say that you and money it's not working, that financially things aren't great. Tell me more about that. Tell me what do you think

the origin story is for that? Like what is it that you're not making enough dough? Is it that you're spending money on things you don't need? Is that you that you are using buying stuff as a form of retail therapy. Let's get to the let's get to the crux of that. And so it's a very broad question what are you currently doing that doesn't work? And it

might be something small. It might be that I eat too much bread, or it might be something massive, like a significant relationship, Which is not say we're advising any to stop it or get out of it. But what we're doing is we're just opening the door on trying to explore what is and what isn't going on, and trying to improve understanding and awareness so that we can have greater clarity so that we can make better decisions. The next question is how are you If you are,

how are you currently self sabotaging? What is a thing that you are doing which is at odds with or in conflict with your goals? Who you want to be, how you want to be, how you want to show up, and what you want to do be, create and change? What are you currently doing that you know is a form of self sabotage. Now, that could be procrastination, It could be avoidance, It could be denial. It could be storytelling,

it could be lying. It could be a habit, a behavior, a consistent choice that we're making making decisions in the moment to get a little bit of dopamine going on. We're making decisions in the moment to make us feel good, to have that instant gratification to do that thing which temporarily drags us out of that funk. And so my propensity to constantly just press the dopamine button is a form of self sabotage. And there are million forms but

it's just again, this is a good question. This is a good question, or it might be something more obvious and fundamental, like I am currently making decisions that don't work. I am currently doing things which I know are stupid, but they make me momentarily feel good, so I keep doing them again, not self loathing, self awareness. The next question, and we could do a whole podcast on this, is just what is success for you? Do you want to be successful? Yes, you do? Cool? What does that mean?

And generally it's not going to be a thing, it's going to be a bunch of things. But let's start to open the door on getting clarity around what. Okay, you're here to talk to me. We want to have a conversation. Things aren't working, yourself sabotaging, things aren't where you want them to be. Awesome, You want to be successful, you don't want to be a failure? Great? What does

success mean for you? And we're not talking about what is the the you know, the generic kind of construct or idea or concept of success, which essentially is stuff and more stuff. But what does it mean for you? Really?

What does it mean for you beyond all the razzle, dazzle and the talk and the hyperbole about you know, grinding and hustling and winning away from all of that, and maybe it is all about money for you and that there's no judgment if it's that, maybe it's but I think for most people, really, when we dig a little bit deeper, success is something closer to the internal state that we want to be. And what I really want to be is I just want less anxiety. Rely

one is I want greater calm. What I really want is I want to know what my fucking purpose is and I want to live in alignment with my purpose. I want to live an authentic existence for me that

would equal success, and so on and so on. My next question is, and this helps people sometimes when they can't answer the previous question, that well, what don't you want, Like when we think about the life that you want to build and create and the existence and the career and the job and the situation and the environment you want to work in the health state that you want to be in, maybe you can't nail that all specifically. So maybe let's reverse engineer it. Let's go, well, what

don't you want? Well, I don't want to work in an office with fluo lights, buzzing over my head eight hours a day, five days a week. I don't want that. When I was very young and I didn't know exactly what my business would look like or my career would look like, I knew what I didn't want before I had absolute clarity about what I did want, and the awareness and the understanding and the insight that I did have is that I don't want to have a boss for the next forty years. So for me, that is

a form of reverse engineering. All right, Well, okay, Craig, you don't want to have a typical job and you don't want a boss standing over your shoulder telling you what to do and how to do it and when to do it. That's cool. But you still got to make money. You've still got to have a career, You've still got to pay the bills, and you can't sit on your ass until you're dead, right, So let's figure that out. So for me, and it's not that having a job is bad, it's not that having a boss

is bad. It's just not something that I wanted to spend my entire adult life in the middle of. So that was for me, the anti goal was, or the awareness was I don't want X. I didn't know what I did want exactly, but I figured that out over time. And by the time I started really working for me, where I had no boss and no job at all, was when I was twenty six, when I opened my first center and I had my first bricks and mortar business.

But from when I had that awareness and that awakening of what I don't want, it probably took me five to six years to turn that awareness of what I don't want into an actual thing that I loved being in the middle of. That was mine. That was mine. Another really no brainer question, which is super valuable, super helpful, and super practical, is again, you know, I think we complicate shit and overthink shit, But this is just a nice question. What's your life telling you? You're always producing

results and outcomes and data N equals one. You're the subject in the middle of your own project. The project is your life or you are the project urgo the you project in the middle of your project, the thing that we call life. In the middle of all of the outcomes and results that you are producing, what are you learning? What do you now know? What is your life? And by your life, I mean the results in your life, the outcomes, the relationships, the consequences of your choices, all

the things that are happening in your life. What are those things telling you? Because that is in part your guidance system. And it's cheesy, and I've said it before and it does sound cheesy, but I believe it's true. Is that in many ways, you know, your life is the classroom, or the world is your classroom, and every day is another lesson, and every encounter and every experience and every person is a potential teacher. But we need to consciously be learning so that we don't keep doing

the shit that doesn't work. My next question is a little and more philosophical, but it kind of flows nicely off the back of the previous question, and that is what is my internal sat Nav telling me? And if you know me, then you know that your internal sat Nav is just kind of a term that I use for that wisdom, that instinct, that intuition, that that knowledge

from somewhere else, wisdom that we have. And it could be your internal sat nav could be that you know, like I said, it could be that intuition or that instinct, or it could be tied up in your values or your beliefs or your faith, or what you consider to be your purpose. But it is that internal source of wisdom and insight and knowing that is always there, by

the way, but sometimes we just don't listen. It is always there, It is always speaking, it is always caring and guiding, and our job, our job is to tune into that. Our job is to tune into that and sometimes what we're being told or the guidance that we're getting. And I'm not necessarily talking about anything particularly ethereal or spiritual here. I just think there's a deep, instinctive, intuitive

knowing in humans that is sometimes quite inexplicable. I think that we often know things that we've never been taught or told or trained to know. I definitely know I know things that I don't even understand how I know it. And I'm not a genius and I'm not special. But I think we all have that innate wisdom, that innate guidance system that is a gift that we need to pay attention to. So the question there is what is

your internal sat Nav telling you? The next question is what's your why we know what you want to do? You've told us we know you what we know that you want to do, be, create or change that thing. You want to achieve that outcome, that's good. What's your reason, what's the driver, what's the motivation behind that goal? What is the why? In inverted commas, behind your what? In inverted commas because when we think about, like if our

goal the what, what I want? That's my goal, and then I think about the reason, the motivation, the motivation behind it, that's my why. Well, I want to achieve the what, the goal, the outcome. I want to achieve that because I think it's going to give me the thing that I really want. My why, that's my reason. For example, when I say my goal is to move to Queensland and live near the beach and to live

in a better climate, and blah blah blah. Right, that's what I want, and that's for some people that's a fucking great goal. By the way, maybe that's what I want. But then, Craig, why do you want it? Well, well, I've got a bit of arthritis, so I feel like the weather's going to I'm going to be in less pain or I'm going to be I'm going to be happier because I'm in a nicer environment. I'm going to be able to work more effectively because X y Z, I'm going to be bottom line is, I think my

life will be better. So what I really want I don't really want to move to Queensland per se. What I really want is I want a better life experience. And I think if I'm in another state called Queensland, my life experience will be better. So my my what is I want to move to Queensland? My why is I want a better life experience? Well, one may equal the other, but my guess would be that more times than not comma not necessarily then maybe a correlation. There

may be no correlation. You might move to a warmer climate. You might move near the beach. You might wake up every morning and it's sunny and the birds are singing and the bees are buzzing, and you go, oh fuck. It wasn't a geographical issue. It was an emotional issue. I actually need more connection. I need more love. I need more people that care about me. And now I've moved away from my family and friends and I'm in this place. Yes, I'm near the beach. Yes it's a

nice environment. I guess I can make more friends. But I've just left part of what was my security blanket or part of what was my source of connection. And by the way, I've heard a version of that story many times. I'm not saying don't move. I'm not saying do do anything or don't do anything particularly, But what I am suggesting is that before you rush to climb that mountain to get to that goal, consider one, why am I climbing this mountain? Why am I climbing this mountain?

And two, maybe even more importantly, am I climbing the right mountain? The next question is, and this is a really relevant question for twenty twenty four because we are instant gratification addicts. The question is can you delay gratification? Will you delay gratification? Can you deny the quick fix?

Can you resist pushing the dopamine button? And whether or not the dopamine button comes in the shape of food or sex or gambling or spending money you don't you don't really have on things you don't need, or seeking attention online or looking for approval or validation or backslaps

you know, can you can you avoid that? Can you can you be the person who doesn't constantly need to be rewarded, doesn't constantly need comfort or gratification, because if you can be that person, you're probably going to build some real skills, some real understanding, some real resilience, and then when the shit comes, and the shit comes for us all, you're in a much better place because you're

used to dealing with discomfort. You're used to not doing the thing in the moment that your ego wants, or your shitty self esteem wants, or that brain wants to get relief from that thing that's temporarily painful. So being able to delay gratification in a culture that is obsessed with comfort now with instant gratification is a skill that's definitely worth developing. The next question I did a whole podcast on recently or a whole episode on recently. Is

am I living intentionally? Are you living intentionally? Each one of these questions, by the way, can be a one hour conversation with a person. What does that mean? Well, that means that you are consciously, courageously and intentionally designing your life, designing how you want to live, who you want to be, how you want to work, how you want your body to function and feel, your health, your mental, your emotional, your physical health, your relationships. Are you living

on purpose and in purpose? Are you designing and refining your own life? Or do you get up every day and do what you did yesterday despite the fact that it didn't really work. But you're just in this flow, You're in this momentum, You're just in this groundhog dayanus of behavior that doesn't really work for you. Do you need to be able to hit the pause button, reset and start again in some way, shape or form to

some level. Are you living consciously? Are you doing the things on a consistent level that will make your life better and you better? Or are you living unconsciously? Are you doing lots of things that don't work with no end insight? The next question is how will you stay productive and proactive when you're not motivated? These are not new questions, I know, but this is just maybe going to form part of your coaching template if you're a coach or a speaker or whatever, or like I said,

maybe they're just for you. But how will you stay productive and proactive and effective and doing what you need to do when you can't be bothered? Because that I can't be bothered state that is human, that is everyone everywhere, some of the time do I ever go through stages where I can't be bothered, where I don't want to do something, where I've lost focus, I've lost motivation, I've lost inspiration, and I'm reaching for an excuse. I'm reaching

for a get out of jail card. I'm reaching for a reason in inverted commas to not do the thing I know I should do. Of course, of course, not because I'm bad or broken, but because I'm human, just like you. So you and I if we say that we really want to be successful and learning and growing and evolving and becoming a better version of us consistently over time, versus starting, stopping, starting, stopping, in the zone, out of the zone, losing weight, gaining weight, effective, ineffective.

If we want to be more consistent with our choices and behaviors and our outcomes, then we need to find a way to override lack of motivation. Can your action? Can your commitment outlast your motivation? Can you do what you need to do when you don't want to do it? Let's just do two more and then I might do some I might do. I've got a bunch. I just realized I'm not going to get through these. I'll do two more. The next one is what is your accountability system?

So when the motivation thing happens and you lose motivation, like I was just talking about, how will you stay proactive and productive? What are the things that you will put in place? What are the KPIs? What is the system or the protocol that will keep you doing when most people would give up? You will be the person that steps up when previous you would have given up. What will keep you doing not giving up? What will

keep you doing? Moving forward? You need to think about that because if you are a person with a history of stopping and starting things and not completing things, and it might just be in a particular area of your existence, then the first thing that you need to deal with is that, like what has been my hurdle or my barrier or my reason for not getting the job done in the past? Asked what typically happens? And how do

I counteract that? And how do I navigate that? So this is not just another thing that I am trying. So an accountability system is anything that will help you to continue making the decisions, doing the things, rolling up your sleeves and ticking the boxes, even in the absence of inspiration. Motivation and or a cheer squad. And the last one that I'll do for now is about purpose. It is either for yourself or the people you're working with,

getting them to consider what their purpose might be. And this is quite a philosophical conversation because many of us grew up in this kind of this mindset that we need to discover our purpose, like it's something that we can find somewhere. I just got to go on a search to find it, and we're going to find it under some metaphorical, philosophical or ethereal rock over there by that tree, and we just move the rock and fucking

fuck there. It is our purpose. Whereas I believe that most of us will have many purposes over the course of our life, not just one. I don't think that I have a single purpose. But what I do know is that I get to choose it. I get to choose what I will focus on. I get to choose

what my life purpose will be. I get to choose where I will invest me based on typically that will be based on my values and my beliefs and the way that I want to impact the world and the things that I guess, in general terms matter most to me the things that I think are truly important, and so my purpose will be something that is a byproduct of those things, my values, beliefs, goals, intentions, even my personality.

And by the way, if you're going, so what is your purpose, Craig, So not my entire purpose, but definitely part of my purpose is helping people to find their purpose. Definitely part of my purpose is to help people use more of their talent and their potential and their energy in a way which is consistent with success. I believe that I need to have a purpose bigger than me.

I believe that I need to be my transcendent self so that the best version of me is the version that transcends my selfishness, my self centered, me focused existence, which can easily dominate. I know that when my life is all about me and I'm focused on me, ironically,

my life is worse. That's just my experience. Doesn't mean I do nothing for me or I don't take care of me, but it means that much of my life and much of my energy and attention and focus is about helping others to figure out their life purpose, their path, their mission, and how to operationalize and maximize what it is they have to work with based on who and how they want to be. I think that'll do for now. We'll call that coaching session one, and I may be back. Enjoy day.