I'll get our team hope you bloody terrific. This is part two of the conversation between Josh Pittterman and Bianca Chatfield and myself from behind the mask Josh's show. We're doing a bit of a co share here on the You Project. This is part two. If you haven't enjoyed, if you haven't enjoyed, if you haven't listened apart one, you might want to backtrack, but it probably doesn't matter because they're different topics and different conversations. But anyway, here's
the second bit. Enjoy You know what's interesting about what the ankle was talking about, which was that kind of three sixty feedback that you were talking about, which is where they sit in front of a group that's really rooted in so when we think about how we think and why we think the way that we do. You and I have spoken about this hanging out. It's called metacognition is thinking about thinking and then so that's a real area of psychology, is thinking about how you think
and why you think the way that you do. This is a real self awareness door opening where you're like, oh, this is what I'm thinking and feeling. Now, why what does this thought come from. Where does this story come from? Does it serve me or sabotage me? Is it based in fear? Does it make sense? Right? And then the next layer up in the self awareness kind of pyramid from there is called theory of mind, which is you understanding how other people think. So that's the you understanding
your teammates. And it's not about agreeing or an aligning or condoning. It's just understanding. Like when I work without X and alcoholics, which I do, I understand them well now because I've done it a lot, but I've never had drugs and I've never had booze. So for me, it was a matter of trying to understand their version of life and their version of reality.
And addict to not having it. Yeah, so you understand that from the sure.
But when you understand, like how someone else thinks, it's almost like you learn their language. It's like I know how to speak which is my dad, and I know how to speak Mary, which is my mum. But if I speak Ron to Mary, it doesn't work, and vice versa, because I know how Dad thinks, I know how mum thinks. I know how athletes think. But also I know even when I was working with you know, Melbourne Phoenix and Vixen's.
For a minute, Bianca was different to other athletes, and so what I could say to her I couldn't say to someone else. So if I wanted the same outcome, I might need two strategies. And I think one of the mistakes that we make in high performance broadly and the pursuit of success, is that we think there's a three step plan. So when people go to me, what's the best way to X y Z, I go for who, though, because the best way because my best career path would be your worst. My best diet, you know, I ate
two meals a day, breakfast and dinner. But would I recommend that for you, I would not, because you're not me. You don't have my body sixty, you don't have my physiology, you know. And so it's trying to figure out because you think about the fact that one, our body is always telling us something, it's a biofeedback system. And two, if we go think of our life as an ongoing experiment and equals one and you're the experimenter and you're the experiment you well, we're always producing data. And if
we turn down the emotion. I know I sound like a PhD student. But if you turn down the emotion and try and figure out what is my life telling me, what are my results telling me, what is my body telling me, what's my career telling me, what's my bank balance telling me? And trying to do that with real awareness and humility and real curiosity, like, actually, what is that? You know? Like when people go what's her problem, they don't really want an answer. They're not really saying, what
is her problem? What is her story? What's happened? How can I help? Really that's an insult. What's her problem? It's like she's an idiot. You must all say the same thing. And so that opening that door on trying to understand yourself. And the tricky thing with self analysis is that you're trying to analyze the contents of your mind with your mind. You know, you're thinking about your
own thinking with your own thinking. And so going through life, I think realizing that we are looking at whatever it is situation, conversation, challenge, sporting career, singing, career, we're looking at everything through the Josh lens or the craiglens or the Bianca lens. And having that awareness like realizing that you lack awareness is like the beginning of awareness. Absolutely, It's like recognizing your unconsciousness is the beginning of consciousness,
you know. And it's I think, and this is deep, but I think it's that intersection of sociology and psychology and spirituality where the good stuff happens, not one or the other, all of it, and philosophy, philosophy and even physiology, because there's a physiological consequence to a thought. If you think you're in danger but you're not well, stuff happens in your body, you know.
Yeah, we talk a lot about this expansion of awareness on the show, and really, I think we talk about it because that is what is behind the mask and at a spiritual level behind you know, if the mask is the roles we play, the thoughts we have and all these sort of things, there is a space beyond that, and that space is awareness. But once we have that awareness, it's not about going I've got to ditch the mask. In fact, to pull on the thread of what you
were talking about with Mary and Royan and Bianca. It's about going, Ah, I can put on a little thin mask here that serves this conversation, and so we know how to be a chameleon in certain ways or wear these different masks for different engagements that we have because it serves it. But we're doing it through awareness, not through I'm just going to people. Please, I'm just gonna I'm just gonna do this for this person, this person, and you're just sort of it's it's unconscious master, and
there's this this different thing. Guys. I want to shoot back to a topic that has been plowing through my head, which.
Is another p.
Which is that you talked about growing up in this thing, about being you know, six foot two, and what that that was like for you and Craig. You talked about growing up and being a beast kid.
What are you laughing at? You're literally laughing. I've heard that therapy.
I've heard the best story so many times and it just makes me laugh because I love how he tells.
Yeah, well I want to. I want to. I want to hear this because our listeners, you know, might might not know your stories and and how these sort.
Of should I leave in this moment?
No, no, you be here. You know your need for this? Sure? Yeah? How these you know? Because I've had physical stuff too, that's really yeah, really it really affected me as well, you know, I speak about it in last week's episode. So yeah, how do these physical attributes play into your
feeling of not enoughness? And how that not not enoughness is, which is really an epidemic at the moment, plays into Abbia that the idea that I can't be successful because I'm inherently not enough because of the way I am. Did you guys have these sort of shame stories around your your physical appearance?
Jumpo. I will say, though, I wasn't really bullied, and that sounds really no.
So where does jumbo come from that?
I know that sounds like bullying, but like my mates call me jumbo. Really some of the teachers call me jumbo. My coaches call me Jumbo. Yeah, Like, for me, it wasn't it. There was more other stuff, like within the context of my friends and family, there was no obviously no bullying, but you know there was obviously like I was a big kid, like I was probably thirty thirty five kilos overweight, so I wasn't a little bit chubby
like I was. I was obese, and so there were consequences of that, But it was more that I just hated how I looked and felt and I knew that. And I mean, like when you're fourteen, it the biggest thing in your life is the biggest thing in your life, Like you know what I mean. It's like you don't like looking back now at what I understand to be real problems, you know, and what is going on in
the world. I look up back at, you know, fat little me, and I'm like, well, really, in the overall scheme of things, that was nothing, but you don't know that, you know. So for me, there was just psychological, sociological, emotional, and you know, physiological kind of crap that intersected. And I hate to bankle with this, but for me, it came to a head at the year eight swimming sports, which was where I really every time the swimming sports happened.
I went to a private boys' school. We had to swim, we had participate, didn't matter if you're the best or the worst. Everyone swims, everyone runs on sports day. And so every time it was my turn to swim, like my event would come because you know, they had group A through to group whatever H me and I would go and I would hide, so I would literally go somewhere so I couldn't be found and just make up
some crap like I wasn't feeling well or whatever. So the event would come and go and I would miss it. And this particular year, my sports teacher was kind of onto it and he grabbed me before I headed off. I headed off, he grabbed me and said, you got to swim. And so I remember standing up there. I was fourteen, it was year eight s Paul's Gatholic College.
It's Algon, and no one did anything wrong, like nobody was but I remember having to stand up there on the swimming block and there was I don't know all the school, So what's that six seven hundred kids and a bunch of parents and a bunch of teachers, maybe a thousand people. And this sounds ridiculous, but I just remember being absolutely beyond my imagination humiliated and embarrassed and shamed, and so that that was horrible, but it was also the catalyst. It's like I came home and I went
for a run. I've never been. I'd never been for a run. And when I say run, I covered five k's and four of it was walking, but I walked, jog, walked, jogged, and literally from that day, within four months, I lost thirty kilos from that day. Yeah, because I offer I think that sometimes that real psychological, emotional, behavioral, and practical shift happens off the back of an event like something, Yeah, there's an inner switch that turns on or flicks or
a light bulbile, whatever metaphor we want to use. But yeah, I just went, not, that's I'm never doing that again. That's never happening again. I'm never nuh And I just went it didn't matter. So I literally halved my food and I just ran every day. I didn't I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't know how to train, but it push up sit ups and ran. That's what I did. And then when I could then I was light enough and strong enough to do chins.
I incorporated chins and that I did push up sit ups chins run on repeat three hundred and sixty five days of the year. I became an absolute maniac.
Yeah, so you went the total.
I went from yeah, like completely unhealthy and unfit to obsessed.
Yeah. Yeah, I did the same the same thing, and they had to, you know, work through that relationship. But it also sparked like how interesting that that that sparked a whole career around yeah, fitness and health and bodybuilding and all sorts of stuff, but it also in helping yourself, even though extreme, it led you to a path of helping. Yes, And that's a beautiful sort of synergy and story in it or the book end of it.
Yeah, yeah, something really good came out of it. And it was good because I mean, I was obsessive, and I was insecure, and I had low self esteem and big ego and all of those things. And I got the like the burger with the emotional burger with the lot, and I got my sense of self and from what I looked like. And then by the time I was fifteen sixteen, I looked relatively good compared to the previous version. And then all of a sudden, you're not socially invisible.
Then you get a girlfriend, then you can actually run, and you get picked for sporting teams, and so that's the good. But the bad is you then correlate this, Oh well, if I look like this, I get these outcomes. If I look a bit better and run a bit better, and I get the there's like this, you know, linear correlation. When this goes better, that goes better, And then you think, well, imagine if I was an absolute freak, you know, and so you start to look for everything I did anyway
through my body. So I created this real unhealthy relationship with my body where I didn't know where it finished and I started.
And this is where the yeah, going back to the mask and the ego, really, it's where when we when we when we feed it, that that stuff, it takes on a life of its own, and it's very becomes very, very thick, and it's very hard to have that self awareness or to crack into that space of a selfhonness to see that within yourself because you know this, this is just what happens to sar when we get when we do that, the thing that you're doing is getting
getting hotter, getting more money, getting the bigger house, and we get fed the compliment, we get another pay rise, and it just keeps feeding, it feeds that. Yeah, the addiction feeds are not enoughness epidem.
I honestly think it's a thing for everyone.
I reckon if everyone dug deep on what controls them or what motivates them or what you know, feels like it has to be an obsession for them to just kind of navigate through life. I reckon when I look back at my career, the worst thing that I did, in the worst trait that I had was comparing myself to other people because not really, yes, I understood my body to a certain degree, but you're constantly getting that feedback.
And we spoke how that feedback can be really good, but you're constantly getting that feedback about you need to be fitter, you need to be stronger, you need to be leaner, and you're hearing that all the time because people are wanting you to be the best high performance athlete you can be, and you play the best you
can possibly be when you're out there. And I think I got really caught in that negative spiral of looking to the person next to me who had a totally different body but might have, you know, played a great game, and I'd be like, oh, she's leaner, faster, stronger.
How am I going to do that?
And rather than it took me a lot long time to really be narrowed down for me what I needed and what my body needed and how I could look after my body and train my body rather than trying to be like somebody else. And you know, I was in the Aussie team, and I was still comparing myself to everybody else because you have this pressure on you
and you're at selections to make the team. And I was a defender, and so you'd look at all the other defenders who might have been playing better or getting a start over you, and you were just analyzing them
about what it was that they had over you. And once I think I could strip all that back, and you surrounded yourself with good people like Craigo, with someone for me who i'd always go to and be like, oh, I just download everything and say this is what it's like and how am I going to get like this?
And you know, he would know.
What my body needed and help me with my body and not compare myself to everybody else. But that's what I really struggled with. I'm not a naturally gifted, freakish athlete. I had to train my ass off to be fit enough to play at that level. But where it got scary for me, I think was I would overtrain and I ended up with things like my injuries ended up being things like having glandular fever. And because my body and my health I could, I couldn't cope with how much pressure I was trying.
To put on it. Yeah, that's the body telling you to start.
Yeah, stop, like just calm down. And so over the years, and I had seventeen years in athlete life, and my last probably four or five is probably when I felt like I was in such a calmer place where I knew that I was in this team because of what I brought to the table, not because of you know, how I needed to change or who else I needed to be like or look like that I could still get the job done with my body.
So comparison, which is the thief so evil, thief of joy, Yeah, it was. Yeah, that's like diminished, that dissolved, and that's part of the reason why those last half decade was.
Yes, yeah, definitely, and I think it's still always there, but I'm now far more aware. When you go back to that whole self awareness piece, I'm far more aware
when I'm doing it. And if I generally like to be a positive person, I'm generally a positive person and quite optimistic, but I can really tell when I start to start thinking negatively and start even if I'm speaking negatively, I'm like, what am I doing right now That's making me like this, and I always know it's because I have been thinking about something that I've been comparing myself to or yeah, in some way I've been caught in that track and then I spiral into this negative space
and I just know you can never have a positive life with a negative mind, right. It's really the more positive you can be, or the more you know optimistic you are, the easier it is to find the answer and find a solution. And so I, yeah, it's a big cue for me when I get into that negative spra and you know, especially when I'm around other negative people that like to throw out the negatives first before the positives.
I'm like, well, get me out of here.
And I've become a lot strong with my boundaries around who around that, you know, take that away from you.
Comparison is a space of negativity, you know, because it's it's a negative self talk, really, and I think we can and I've been in times early on in my career where comparison did help me to succeed. It helped be the driver to go I'm not good enough on it. But it's never lasting.
It fuels that competitiveness to a point, doesn't it.
But you can always play the game of the someone who is better than me and you're and so it feeds the not enoughness thing. It feeds a self loathing and you know, and a negative and negative spiral.
And then you never actually acknowledging or you know, congratulating yourself on the little milestones that you make or the little things that you do, because it's never like what the other person did.
Or you're never enoughenough with comparison. I think it's it's a shocker.
I want to know for both you, the idea of success, Like when you were heading towards like I want to be, you know, want to be on the stage on a global level, and you were on the journey, but you weren't there and you were aspiring to get there. Then you got there and you were a sixteen year old netballer who maybe wanted to play for Australia who ended up being all of the things you were. What's the gap between what you thought it would be and what
it was like when you got there? Did it feel like you thought it would feel?
Yes and no is the answer. What I didn't realize growing up. I had big dreams and I always dream big. It costs the same amount of energy to have the thought of or have the dream of the stars and the moon as it does to you know, the top of the tin shed, So dream big, but also between where you are in that dream, as we talked about earlier, is a hell of a lot of hard work and a hell of a lot of sacrifice and so and
that's that's been the word really for me. It's you can have what you can potentially have in a first world privilege, you know, whatever, You can potentially have everything you want, but you cannot have everything you want at
the same time. And so getting to the top of the mountains for me, which were playing Phantom and Fanta the opera, playing Jean Valjean and Lami Is in London, they were the dreams of sixteen seventeen year old for me, and to realize them twenty years later, Yes, I sit with that pride of congratulations and for myself and not not just a pat on the back, but a really really long hug and a few tears. Yeah to that sixteen year old self who put those dreams out there.
I knew it was going to take a lot of hard work, and I was prepared for the hard work I've never been afraid of discipline and hard work. I've grew up really sporty person. I know what that's like to have that athlete mental. I wasn't aware of how
fucking taxing it would be on me, how exhausting. I wasn't aware of how much I would appease and plicate and try and make other people happy, to try and you know, make things happen for myself, say no to things like you know, between doing Phantom and lame Is, I had a week off. I needed three months off. I was that exhausted. But I didn't want to not have the opportunity. I didn't want those in positions of power to say, Honor, we'll get someone else. He's not
going to get to do it. I didn't want to lose the dream. So I sacrificed my own self and what I needed, Yeah, what I really needed to appease others. I didn't realize I do that. But then I've sacrificed relationships and the quality of relationships because I've been really selfish and really self motivate and self centered. In my career has had to be about me, or I've felt like it's had to be about me to be able to achieve things in the way I want to achieve,
so really sacrifice them. I've sacrificed time with family that I really really value now, I've sacrificed really important things with friends, milestones, births of babies, you know, bucks, weekends and just memories that are created. And so ultimately, when you look at the view from the top, there's a part of it that is magical because I'm feeling the feelings of playing those roles and there's nothing like that.
But I'm also part of it that is there's a sadness in it too because I've missed out on so many things and in playing those roles, the only way I could do it was really to be a monk. So I didn't have a social life living in London. I wasn't having a social life with my friends back home. So when I look at it, it's going, yeah, it's fantastic, and it's also cost a lot, and so it's not
what I thought. I only thought about the positive things, and those positive things I felt them and more, you know, ten ten x. Nothing is like playing Jean Valjean or the Phantom. That feeling of playing those or when you're there is nothing and talk about that feeling of bliss that I was talking about that and under it is that on roids, But what it costs me for the other twenty one hours of the day is a hell of a lot of sacrifice.
What about you the idea versus the reality?
Yeah, I think I often hear other athletes say this, and especially at the recent Olympics. Most people say this when they win their goal better and it's exactly what I felt was that when you finally do it and as a team you achieved that success that you thought you wanted so much, it's just a huge amount of relief that you actually have done it, that you can
tick it off. I've done it, But you're exhausted by it and you often have these big come down afterwards because you no longer have that same connection with everybody that you're doing it together, and you're trying to work through what you're going to get to, you know, get to that final game to win that gold medal or win that premiership, and then it becomes quite overwhelming. I think the exhaustion of it all exactly what you were talking about, that the cost of it all to drive
you to that success. And when I reflect on the moments that I remember most from my career, it is never the moments of when you actually win it, or the moments of getting your medal or you know, the premiership celebrations. You remember the dumb moments that happen as a team, when you're preparing, when you're in the change rooms, when you're being as you know, immature, with everybody mucking around it. They're the special moments that you really love.
But the version of success that when you finally get there, I think, yeah, for me, it was always just really oh, I can stop banging on about that and you know, wanting to get that because I finally got it. And it takes your while to then find that next driver that's going to take you forward, what's going to actually allow you to put all that energy and effort into something. It takes a while to kind of sort that out.
I think within my own body what I want to do next and what I'm prepared to drive myself forward with.
Did you ever take moments actually to clock that this is I'm in relief and not in celebration and actually celebrate it.
Well, I think when I got to the like my last four or five years. That was when I was actually so much more aware of everything and aware that, oh, I'd really wanted to do this. I haven't been able to do this my whole career, and I've finally been able to do it and enjoy it with the people around me. But that did take to the end of
my career, and I reckon. I look back now on my career as an athlete, and I'm so much more prouder of myself than what I ever was when I was in the moments, And even when I finished, it took me a few years to be like, oh, bloody hell, I did that. And now I love the fact that I've done that for myself and that I can acknowledge that,
because I just don't think you ever have. Well, I didn't have the space mentally to be able to ever look at it like that, because it was always what's next, what's next?
I have to do next? You regret not celebrating those moments more? Would you advise people to actually sit in the celebration.
If you can.
Regreat celebrating I don't know.
I don't regret it.
I mean, I feel fortunate that I've got all these teammates who are beautiful friends of mine. We're all still so close and even now now we've gone through life of having babies and going through all and it's always your teammates, your old teammates that you go back to in those moments because they know what it's like or they've been through it before you and they passed down all their.
Knowledge to you.
And you know that's They're the special group of people that we always will talk about the good times that it happened and the moments that we did stuff together. So that's where I love being part of a team sport, and I have all these amazing teammates that I can continue to have those conversations in connection with.
Guys, I asked you to bring in a quote. You've got a little something that you might have.
A writer from the early nineenth century. Her name was Anasni, and she said, and she was I think this is in a couple of theological texts as well, but she said, we don't see things as they are, We see things as we are yea, which is really kind of in line with what we're talking about today, and especially the mind stuff.
It's like, yeah, it speaks to you know, what you're sort of saying about. There's there's the experience that you experience, there's experienced the other person experience, and then there's the experience itself.
There's the thing that's going on which doesn't mean anything, and then there's your story about Bianca's story and my story, and they're probably three different stories.
Yeah. I like that quote. For me.
It probably takes me back to when I first started and I had a coach, Joyce Brown, who was an absolute legend of the network world, and she was someone who really took me under her wing and coached me as a person.
And a player.
She's so much she cares so much about my life away from the court as well as a player. But she always used to say and put the quote up on it in our team room, if it's to be, it's up to me. And she wasn't meaning that in a you know, it's up to you to win the game or do it. It was about it's up to you to control what you can to change, to learn to evolve. It's all on your shoulders. Don't expect anyone to come in and.
Just fix it.
For you to be accountable, Yeah, and just always.
Be in that mindset of learning, and so yeah, I always remind myself of that, you know, even there's something that I'm expecting someone else to change for me. When I realized that, I could probably look a little bit deeper internally and figure out away myself that that's it's always up to me to have a think about that.
Yeah, and just to pull on that threat. I think it speaks to the idea of of accountability and blaming others for our lack of success. Oh, things not going away? How quickly we we point the finger. And it's maybe that relationship between shame and blame that you're feeling shame that it didn't work out and you don't want to take accountability that if it's up to it's meant to be, it's up to me. It's like what it was meant to be, it was turfold or yeah, and they screwed
it for me. Like how quickly humans love to do that, right.
Negative mindset that comes with that, and I just hate sitting in that space.
Yeah, I've got one. I often use a roomy quote. I do love a bit of thirteenth century Sufism. As you start to walk on the way, the way it appears and I feel like a lot as you start to walk on the way, the way appears, yes, but a lot of people don't want to walk because that
first step is the thing they're most scared of. Ye and when you take that first step that leads to step two, step three, you may not have it all sorted out, you know, But if you've plotted a destination you don't, you can also ditch the map and go it may I may have different paths to get me there. But if you don't plot a destination I think, and have a goal or have a dream, it's hard, but it's even harder if you don't, if you're not willing to just take the first step. And there's such a
fear barrier with that that first step. I want to sort of speak to where it's fear, you know, gotten in your way of not being able to succee.
I think to that, it's like for me, it's about where am I going? What's the destination? So getting there, But really the prize is who we become getting there. It's not about the top of the mountain. It's about who you become climbing the mountain. Like you know, for me, all the stuff that I've done some good, some bad, some success, some failure. You know, fall down, fuck up,
get up, all that stuff. Like, it's really about the knowledge and the insight and the skill and the understanding and the experiences that you have in the middle of that. That for me, it's like that's.
The space between the first step and landing at the top of the mountain. That is Yeah, it's really the space. You know. When we had Ben Crow on, we also had called Asha Pacman on It's a great episode, but he would say, I'm sure Asha would say that from a soul's perspective, that's the space between birth and death. You know, all the stuff that's happening in the middle is the life, and that's where the dance is, That's
where the enjoyment is. That's where the curiosity, the adventure, the play of it all is happening on the journey to the destination, and we're so caught up in the destination we miss the life and being alive in the middle.
And I think, if you can be curious around your fear, right, So the goal is not to be fearless, because like, being fearless is stupid, because there are some things we should be scared of but that fear is going to keep you alive right at times. But we can be. In fact, we have to be scared to be courageous. If you're not scared, well there's no courage required. And so being being not controlled by fear but rather curious about fear is maybe the better paradigm to try to go, yeah,
I'm scared, cool, that's okay, you should be scared. That's fucking terrifying.
But now what Yeah, I mean a line scared and has that that that fear when it goes to kill an antelope, and that's what that's what drives that. We need that level of it. You know, I have that bit of fear every time before poor Antelope get on stage. I think Pav already said something like if you're not if you're not scared, then it doesn't matter to you. Then you don't care. You actually need a bit of that fear.
To adrenaline rush, that nervous energy. That's why that's why I love working TV now, especially live TV. It's the same adrenaline rush that you get as an athlete when you step out there onto the court. It's like, have you done your prep out? You go like it's up to you what happens next, and you.
Go with your liveness and liveness of it.
Well, I love it because it is like that if you've if you've done your prep, you should be able to figure your way out through no matter what happens, but also not expecting it to be perfect. It's okay if your stuff up or say the wrong thing, you just to find your way back. And I really that drives me a lot, and I love the energy from that. But I think there's not much that replicates athlete life out of outside of being an athlete, whereas live TV
and that. I guess it's performing like you, you really feel that same energy and yeah, sometimes it scares the life out of you, but it's bloody fun doing it.
Yeah, grenlemen, Rush, you've done some coaching in your time. You were the head coach of the Junior Neple Academy.
Yeah, I had in my own academy out with Victoria University.
Yeah. And do you still work in a mentor and coaching space in ways?
Yeah, so I work.
I work a lot in the leadership space, so working with people within corporates or within teams, and a lot of the stuff that we'll talk about is around that kind of team environment and the kindness and the work around the collaborating with each other and getting the best out of what everyone can bring.
To the table.
That's what I do a lot of working now, and I love that space. I love working with people. Again, it's like being in that team sport environment where you just got to figure out the best way forward for that group. It doesn't always there's not one kind of mold that.
Which speaks to what you were earlier, and you do a I mean, you just so much in this space. I want to having climbed mountains, and I'm curious about this because I'm in this space too, having climbed and got to the top of some really big mountains. What's the feeling like going back down the mountain and helping
others get up? Which once again pulls on the threat that you were talking about, really where that first part of life is probably about us, and then life shifts and it's really you know, not what you can get from it, but what you can give to it to give to others. What does that feel like for you, guys?
Yeah, I mean to me, like when I talk about it and I've said times the last part of my career was my best part of my career. I played better, I was a better person. I enjoyed it far more.
And it's because even in that moment as an athlete, I was the older player, and I got so much pride in watching the youngest girls come into the team and do their things for the first time, play their first game, you know, get out there in a moment, and whether it's change a game the way they played or eaten opposition that maybe it'd had the best of them in the past, and.
That fueled me.
That energy that you got and the pride that you get from seeing someone do something well or you know that's challenged them and you've helped them work on it during the week, and just what that can really do for them. And I think when you step back and now in the workplace that you do seeing people just the light bulb moments that they might have where it's like, oh, actually, if I think that way, maybe that is going to
help me. And you would get it a lot where people will come back to you and give you feedback about how that made them feel in that moment and what it's done for their trajectory, and it's not that you're changing their lives. It's just that you're get giving them one little thing that might help them be in a better space.
I think if you can help and encourage people to think more of themselves, like I think most people's biggest barrier to success is literally how they think, not their potential, not their possibilities, not their genetics. You know, of course there are limitations, but you know, it's like, I'm not particularly talented. I don't have great genetics. I wasn't a
brilliant academic. And it's not that I'm the high water mark now, but you know, it's like I think for some people, and you two are both even though you said you're not naturally a great athlete, you're pretty good.
And I wasn't naturally a good singer.
Well, I actually think I'm naturally good singer.
Just actually, for.
Me, mediocrity was my superpower because it made me really fucking motivated because I knew exactly I just had to work harder because if I was going to be able to, Like, we had these compulsory cross country runs every week, and obviously when I was a fat kid one hundred and thirty kids in my year. Every week I would come one hundred and thirtieth because I would walk it because I couldn't run it. And then six months later I was winning every week, week after week after week number one.
And it wasn't because I was genetically great or fuck, he's an athlete, isn't he not. It's like I just ran seven days a week put in the world and so I was doing what they weren't doing. And then I started to create outcomes. And it wasn't about, oh, look at me, I'm a good runner. It was like, ah, so if I apply myself, what like, what's possible? Because my thinking was really the issue. Yeah, I didn't have great genetics, but they weren't terrible, right, And I wasn't
an academic genius but not a moron. It's like, all right, well, if I take whatever I've got, whether or not that's creativity or intellect or physiology, and I put eleven out of ten effort wrapped around that, what might I create? You know? And because we're all scared, I're all dysfunctional, and we're all a bit broken, we're also a bit fucking amazing, like, but we need to let the amazing out, and fear keeps the amazing in, you know, all laziness or avoidance or procrastination or you know.
Whatever, all the derivative fear correct correct.
And so it's like, if I can get out of my own way, if I can I remember having this moment the first time, and I don't say this to sound anything but just grateful. Where I ran an event. It was just a me event, just Craig Harper at Deacon and six hundred and seventy people in the six hundred and seventy person room, and everyone paid to go and see me. I wasn't at someone else's event. I wasn't at a convention. It wasn't a conference, and I was one of the speakers. It was like six hundred
and seventy. And I remember being blown away, like I used to be blown away that one person would pay to listen to me, you know, And then six hundred and seventy people on the sun they decided to come and listen to what I had to say, and I just remember thinking, not like ah, I good. I remember
thinking this is fucking amazing. How was this a thing where this many people want to come to listen to what I have to say, you know, and in that moment it for me it was all about, ah, yeah, like I'm not terrible, I'm not the best, but I've got I've got ability, and I've got potential that I
can optimize and operationalize and create some good outcomes. And so because I'm not this special human, I love working with other people who have got at least as much potential talent and genetic potential as me, and go, you know what, I actually think, if you can, if you can put in the effort and energy and courage, you'll do something fucking amazing. And when you say that and you mean it, because that that impacts them. Go, I'm not telling you this because this sounds good. I'm not
saying this to inspire you. I truly think I don't know if you will, by the way, because you might be fucking lazy and you might be whatever, But I think you could do something special.
So we've talked a lot about career and success. To sort of close out, I want to know in terms of a border spection of life, having you know, being in your forties and now sixty and I'm pushing forty for you guys.
What what what tox of forty.
What what does a more rounded life of success look like? If you go a successful rounded life look for look like for you guys.
Now, I think because my life is quite a typical in that I'm not married, I don't have a partner, I don't have kids, and there ain't many sixty year olds who are like that or who have never had that.
Are you wanting that?
I don't think. I don't think she's todd in here.
I mean.
Got this bit. I don't not want it, you know, But it's not like on my to do list, you know. But it's like, in some ways being single is an advantage in some ways not you know, some way is
the opposite. But I mean, like you, and this is no revelation, this is no massive insight, but you get to the point where you realize that really what matters is connection and love and people, and when you when you're younger, it's more more about ticking boxes and hitting KPIs and you know, ticking the to do list or whatever. Not always not everyone, of course, but for me it was.
But then you know, for me, it's like I kind of have a family of people around me that I intersect with that I coach that I mentor that I encourage, that I love, and when they do great, it makes me happy, you know. So yeah, yeah, so yeah, And
I don't you know, I've got old parents. My mum's eighty five in a minute, and my dad's eighty five, and you know, so things change and your priorities shift, and so most of like my priority in life right now is them, yeah, you know, and just they're you know, they're on the home straight, and just that they're as okay as they can be, and I be the best son that I can be for them, you know. And so that's like I think when you know, when people are sick or when things, you know, when you have
somebody that you know. It's like my training partner literally died in the gym five years ago, Like he had a heart attack. No he didn't, he had a cardiac arrest and died. He's fine, he came back, but he was dead for seventeen minutes. And I don't mean to
be melodramatic, because he's fine now. But when somebody that you love is literally dying in front of you, and you are the person, like you're the person that's going to maybe allow them to keep living or it's I didn't mean to go here anyway, but it's just what happened. It's like, oh my god, like nothing matters in the world. Like and it's amazing when when that's going on, how how much absolute clarity and focus you have about what is important and what is what isn't important? Is most
of what I think is important? Do you know what I mean?
Yeah, so you're basically like here, I don't know if it works in about but with your relation with your parents and your action with the gym partner, it's love overrides everything.
Yeah, And and like what you know, the insection of what I'm talking about now in a bit of science is that you know, when we talk about health, wellness, long longevity, success performance, we talk in a physical sense. We talk about you know, lifestyle and nutrition and sleep
and exercise and occupational activity and incidental activity. And but now more and more we know the research tells us that may be the most important thing in terms of immune system function, health, longevity, nervous system, gut health is our social life is our relationships is if you get somebody who ticks all the other boxes, you know, great diet, great lifestyle, no boozs, no drugs. They work out all the time, but they're lonely. It's not a good recipe, yea.
So love connection, there's an absolute correlation between you know, the emotional, the psychological, the sociological, and the physical consequence of all of that.
So that's so having love in your life, regardless of whether it's a partner of kids, or whether or not it's.
Romantic love or you know, laborador called Scooby.
Doo, but you yeah, you've got lots of love in your life, and that feels like a big measure of success.
And also for me, having purpose, Like the idea of retirement has zero appealed to me, and not because I'm a workaholic, but I've watched many people many retire and spiral like we have this story in our head that retirement is good. It actually it depends what retirement is, you know, if like you think about like my dad went literally from managing multi billion dollar shopping centers where
he had lots of people that he was leading. He had purpose, he had meetings, he had constant conversations, problem solving, creating things. You know, on a Friday he retires and Monday his biggest project is what to watch or whether or not he's going to go look at the tomatoes. And I reckon my dad aged five years in five months. Yeah, because we need whether or not it's at work or somewhere else, we need a purpose, We need a reason, we need a thing to do, and we need to
fucking keep using our brain. You know, we need to. I believe I'm very passionate about this. Like I'm sixty one, my brain works as well or better than when I was thirty. Like my cognitive function only because I do the work is right up there for my potential. But it's because I'm doing a PhD. It's because I read every day. It's because I teach every day. It's because I'm mentor every day. It's because I fucking think deeply.
Like we take our body to gym, we need to take our brain to the gym and keep doing it. And if you're over fifty listening to this, even more so, do you need to do it? Train your brain lift heavy things. That's my advice.
Yeah, And you speak to that purpose thing, and we're spoke to it in this chat. In some way, I think we basically need to ask ourselves three questions in life that I think are potentially the most important existential questions, which is who am I? We've discussed that a lot around the awareness chat what do I want to feel? You know, not just what do I want to do? What do I want to feel? And what's my what's
my purpose? And I think if you can answer those things, and I think some people kin'd even answer the first one, they didn't even know who they are. But if you're can answer those three questions and and it might shift and you know, move in some in some ways. But that the three questions I think are really important to come back to often in life. And yeah, going back to the original question, what does a rounded life as success look like to you? Now?
Well, I mean.
I've probably hit nail on ahead, but just around that love element, being able to do what you love and
spend time with people that you love like. I think it's quite simple now, not as in it's simple to do, but it's just if you can do that and find that and chase that feeling of things that make you feel good and that you love to do, to be able to make that and call that a job, I think I feel very grateful and I want to be able to continue to do that as for as long as I can, because I give my best to it
because of it, you know, because I love it. And then obviously being and surrounding yourself with all the people that you want to spend time with.
Love and share love. Yeah, which is you know, the end, A full circle back to Chris Martin Good gave so much, and it's yeah, that's the connection that we're after. That is the that's the oneness, you know, when we're in that space of love, we feel such a oneness. Guys, chatters hearts, thank you so much for coming on today. It's been amazing to chat. I love that we've gone down the path of success and it's led us to
so many different tangents. Thanks to you for your energy and passion and wisdom and experience and all and all those shares. I really appreciate having you both on you.
It's been great.
Thank you. Good see shatters, good sneer mate, thanks mate. Well there you go.
Gang.
I hope you enjoyed that. I love him. He's a good dude. I love her. She's Ace and of course I love you. See you next time.