G a gang. I hope your bloody terrific. So, as you well know, my job or the main part of my job, is talking to people about creating better outcomes on planet them in their world. And that's teams, and that's companies, organizations and individuals and people who want to become super good and proficient and elite at something. It's people who just want to think better, do better, create better, have less anxiety, more joy, more purpose, more focus, better outcomes.
It's the whole plethora of the human spectrum. And as part of that, you know, we always talk about strategies, and we talk about where you want to go and what you want to do, and we talk about the ingredients and the variables that need to be factored into the goal setting, in the structure and the process and all of that kind of very methodical strategic How do I become a better version of me? How do I become a better leader or a better boss, or a
better problem solver? How do I better manage my anxiety? How do I optimize my genetics? How do I be more productive and more proactive and more effective? How do I run fast, jump higher? How do I make more dough? How do I optimize my career, all that kind of stuff. And one of the things that I talk to people about which I have not spoken about a lot on the You Project, is our capacity to understand and optimize our own potential. So I just want to talk a
little bit about this today. I mean, this is not the start and finish. This is just me opening the door on a really expansive and big area of human performance and human behavior. But I would say that for most people. This is my experience and observation. This is not based on any research I've come across, but I've
worked with thousands of people for four plus decades. My observation and experience is that one, most people don't get anywhere near optimizing their potential most and two most people don't even really understand their potential. They don't understand how good they could be, or what they could create, or the level of change that could happen in their world if they did all the right things. Now, again, this
is not an easy thing. This is you know, this is not fun, easy and painless, This optimizing oneself but human potential. What I can do if I set my mind to it. What you can do if you set your mind to it. What you can do if you get yourself limiting thinking and self limiting beliefs and shitty self esteem and you know, all that stuff, and the self doubt and the fear and the anxiety and the overthinking and the analysis paralysis. What the fuck can we do if we don't let that stuff dictate who we
are and how we are and what we do. Now, that's not to say overcome the fear. That's to say work with the fear. That's to say, lean into the fear. You don't need to be fearless. You need to be courageous at times, as do I so and in fact, we can't be courageous by definition, being courageous as doing something that we're scared of. And so we're not looking for perfect people. We're not looking for fearless people. I'm
not looking for the most gifted people. I'm not looking for the athletic unicorns or the cognitive unicorns or the creative unicorns. I'm just looking for people who want to do better than what they're currently doing and want to figure out how can I get out of my own way? How can I begin to consider what is, for example, my genetic potential like what's possible for me? So there's what's actually possible for me. So let's say let's just
let's just quantify this. Let's say my and I'm talking about me personally, right, because there's no global you know, my potential is not your potential. My genetic potential is not the same as yours. My academic or athletic potential is not the same as yours. So what I want you to do is I want you to personalize this for you. So when you think about your genetic potential, we are talking about literally what is physiologically what is
genetically possible? What is the absolute high watermark for what you could do or achieve with your body if you did everything right. Now, I think there are very few people, including myself, who do everything right, whereas there is zero room for improvement. Let's just call that, let's call that level of genetic optimization for you. Let's call that ten. Now, if I said to you, do you want to get more out of your genetics? Would you like to be
physically physiologically improved? Would you like better health? Would you like a stronger immune system? Would you like better cardiovascular system or fitness? I should say, would you like more strength, more flexibility. In other words, would you like your body to work better than it currently does. I feel like most of you are going to say fuck yes. Maybe some of you will not use the fuck right, and so that is great, that's good. But then so now what do I do with that? What do I do
with that? So if ten is my genetic potential talk about genetics in this instance, then where am I currently at? And I think some of us think that we are doing way better than we are. I did a show the other day with Dr Jodie. We're talking about perceived
rate of exertion. We're talking about this thing that in Excise Science, the insection Excise Science and Psychology, where I would ask someone who's doing a movement in the gym, like a strength movement in the gym, or they could be running on a treadmill, or they could be skipping.
I would ask them out of ten, ten being their absolute physiological limits in terms of whatever it is, whatever the fitness component is, so strength or aerobic fitness, or flexibility or power or whatever, I would ask them what they think they're working at ten being their physical limit, And often people would say I'm working at eight or nine, when in reality, we go back them and I have a chat and then they figure out within a short period of time they weren't working at eight or nine,
they were working at four or five. And that's not because they were trying to scam the system and scam me. It's just that they didn't truly realize what was possible for them. Now, having said all of that, I'm not suggesting that we're always redlining our potential, our genetic, athletic, creative,
whatever it is. We don't need to have our foot on the accelerator all the time, and we don't need to be working at that you know, that threshold, because that's not working at that level or trying to be at that level all the time. One it's not sustainable, to it's not realistic, and three we're going to be fucking exhausted. But what is really interesting to know is I have probably got a lot more potential. I'm talking about you and me. I've probably got a lot more
potential than I think. And perhaps what's holding me back is not my actual capacity for success or improvement or growth or development, but rather what I think, or rather my low standards, or rather my lack of willingness to full commit to doing the work to exploit that potential, or perhaps so I don't like pain, I'm addicted to comfort, or perhaps I'm lazy and this thing and me fulfilling my potential is not going to be a three day but rather a three year or a five year process. Right, so,
there are a myriad of reasons. And by the way, I'm not suggesting to you today that you should change anything or do anything. I'm just talking about this concept of what does it mean to use more of what we've got, Like when you say to me, if you and I are chatting, I would like to get more out of my brain. I would like to exploit my cognitive potential more. I would like to be able to problem solve better, think better, learn better. I would like to be able to focus for longer and have greater
mental acuity. I would like my brain to work as well as it can for as long as it can. Now, if what I just said to you is something that you would want, one, that's good. Two what's your plan? What's your plan? So part of my plan to optimize or at least move somewhere in the vicinity of cognitive optimization. For me, one of the many things that I have
committed to is lifelong learning. Part of that is the research and study that I'm doing at the moment with my doctorate, but also just in general terms, I'm always learning, I'm always researching, I'm always having interesting conversations. Not because I'm smart, because I am not particularly smart. I'm not a journius. I'm not an intellectual or academic genius by any means. But what I can do at any age
is I can learn new things. I can expose my self to new ideas and new information and new research and new studies, and I can train my brain. Right. So, in this whole kind of pursuit perhaps of optimizing and using more of our potential, I think part of it is getting clear about, you know, what it is that you want to work better, or what you're interested in. So when I talk about so even something as specific as this show, I think, what's my potential in podcasting?
I don't know what that is, by the way, but I'm pretty sure that I'm not peaking right now. I might find out down the track that I was. I am right now. Maybe this is the best, but I don't necessarily mean, what's my potential in podcasting, as in, what's the most money I can make per month out of podcasting, or what's the most bums on seats I
can have or listeners I can have. Maybe it's just maybe it's some of that, but maybe it's also how good can I be sitting in front of a comput to like I am right now talking to me in the moment right now for me talking to no one, but for you talking to someone because you're listening to this obviously after I'm recording it in this moment. But how good can I be at this thing? What can I do better? What can I learn? What do I need to do less of? What do I need to
do more of? How do I build? How do I build competence and skill and understanding and awareness in this place so that I can become, you know, the best version of me at this And when I start to think like this, you know, one of the things that I used to do a lot of not so much anymore. I didn't for a while, by the way, for the first hundred episodes, I didn't ever really listen to me because I do not like listening to me. But I eventually somebody said something which was critical but also true.
Somebody said something about, you know, my work, and it wasn't positive, but they were right. So I went back and I started listening, and I listened and I heard what they were talking about, and I went, all right, I've got to do better. So you know, if I won, if I can't take feedback, good and bad feedback, or positive or negative feedback. I mean, if it's honest, if it's real, if it's insightful, I'm up for it. If it's just people just sending hate my way, that's a
different thing. But we're talking about real feedback, informed, educated insight that might help me be better, I'm up for it. So I've always been interested, especially as the kid who grew up being not particularly talented. You know, as I've said to you many times before. You know, my default setting up most things athletically and genetically and all of those things was a mediocre. So I went, all right, Well, I can't get more talent, I can't get better genetics.
I can't get more hours in a day. So what can I do? Well? While I can't get better genetics, I can better optimize my genetics. I can make better use of what I have. I can't get another brain. But what I can do is I can train this brain. I can optimize this brain. I can do things, as can you, that will make this brain work better. I'm not a naturally gifted academic, But what can I do to exploit and explore and optimize my academic potential? Well, what I could do is I could learn how to
study more effectively. I could learn how to research. I could learn how to read academic papers. I could put myself you know, the first degree I did. I was thirty six years old. I started in two thousand. I was thirty six years old. Almost everyone else in my year, first year exercise science, almost everyone else was a to or nineteen. There were a few older students, but they were twenty five six seven, not many, but ninety eight percent of the students in my year were literally half
my age. I was hands down the worst student. And I wasn't the worst student because I was the dumbest. But I was the worst student because I did not know how to do academia. I finished school in year twelve, which was eighteen years before so, and even in year twelve I did fuck all. So then eighteen years later, which is a lifetime later when you're eighteen, So eighteen years later at the ripe old age of thirty six, I can't use a computer. I don't know how to
log on. That's what they told me in the first lecture, or it was in a what they called a computer lab. Log on, use your student ID, bibby bobbity boo. I didn't know how to do any of that. I had to ask the person next to me. I didn't know how to do study. I didn't know how to do research. I didn't know how to do university. I didn't know how to optimize anything in that space. But I can't
get good at the thing that I won't do. So what I have continued to do over the years, and I suggest you do the same when you get clarity about what it is you want to optimize. Even though right now you might be a one out of ten in terms of skill and understanding and proficiency. Even though you might be a one out of ten, I suggest that you put yourself in a situation where you can use more of what you've got. How can you optimize or develop or get more out of your potential if
you're not doing the thing. One of my ever present questions is how strong and how fit and how functional and how operational can I be at sixty one? And the answer is thankfully and great, very grateful and pretty fucking strong because I do the things that make me pretty fucking strong and pretty fucking fits and in pretty good shape and pretty lean. Why because the things that create those results I have interwoven into my daily operating system.
I'm not in good shape because I'm lucky. I'm not in good shape because I fell on my feet. I'm not in good shape because I crossed my fingers, or I have some genetic advantage in fact, a disadvantage I would think over many people. But I realized that I can't optimize my body in terms of all of these physical variable strength and fitness and flexibility and general health and posture and bone density and muscle mass and all of these things. I can't accidentally end up being optimal
maximizing my potential. So I need to be strategic, and I need to do what's required to be able to do that. What about you? What are the things for you? You know that you're wasting some of your talent. You know that some of you know that you're wasting talent, you're wasting potential, you're wasting your brain. Maybe you're wasting your genetic potential. Maybe you're waiting for the right time. Maybe you're always you know you're going to do it,
but you never actually do it. Maybe it's soon, Maybe it shouldn't be soon, Maybe it should be now. Maybe Monday's not the starting day, maybe it's today. If today doesn't happen to be a Monday. When you hear this, what's my earning potential? I remember working in gyms and
earning twelve dollars an hour. I was working at one stage when I was twenty one twenty two, I was earning twelve bucks an hour as a gym instructor, and I was earning twelve or thirteen dollars an hour at nights working in pubs getting punched in the face for not much doing security. So I was working three nights a week in pubs. I was working five days a week in gym's my average hourly, it was like twelve
to thirteen dollars. And so for me, because that's how I thought, that was my experience, that was my environment, that was what I earned. So I had a self limiting belief that you know, what is Craig harperworth. At that time, I thought my potential was twelve, thirteen, fourteen bucks an hour. We're talking about the eighties here, a very long time ago. And then I met a guy who wanted max, who wanted me to train him to
do this thing called one on one personal training. And you know, I went from instantly from twelve bucks an hour as a gym instructor to thirty three and a third dollars an hour because it was one hundred bucks a week for three sessions with him. Now, all of a sudden, I'm earning nelly triple my hourly rate. And my overwhelming feeling was not gratitude or happiness. It was guilt, and it was imposter syndrome, and it was all of these things. Because I didn't understand my own earning potential.
I got in my own way. I now work in a space where, you know, in the corporate space, the corporate landscape, where I do about one hundred corporate gigs a year, whether that's a forty five minute keynote or thirty or one hour, or a two hour workshop or a half day workshop or a full day workshop with an organization, and you know, the money that gets handed out in that corporate space for events like that is ridiculous,
but it's not. It seems ridiculous, but it's not because that's what I'm not necessarily talking only about me, of course, but that's what high end speakers get. After a thousand years of doing it, I'm probably towards the you know, the better end of professional speakers, I would hope, right, And even now, all of these years later, I still need to be careful that I don't get in my own way, and I don't rationalize why I should feel
bad about this organization having this hourly rate. So so much of us exploiting and optimizing and developing and understanding our potential is getting our mind out of the way. My mind, my mind is my superpower and it's also my arch enemy. And you probably feel like that a little bit too. I mean, for years I have spent I have spent trying to, you know, manage my mind and optimize my mind, to optimize my choices and behaviors
and all of those things. But at the same time, you know that that that fear, that those fear driven insecurity driven fear based ideas that can pervade my cognitive landscape. You know, for me, that's that's ever present. And the volumes turned down a little bit now, but it's still an issue, you know, I think for all of us.
And so despite my own insecurity at times, my own self doubt at times, I still need to do what's required to be the best version of me and exploit what I can in terms of my own capacity and my own ability. And so you know, I will. I will make the decision that I know that I should make, despite my anxiety about the decision. I will take on the challenge that I know I should take on, despite
that inner voice of doubt. We recognize the anxiety, We recognize the fear, We acknowledge it for what it is. I literally sometimes say to myself, Oh, I see you. I recognize you over there, imposter syndrome, How are you? It's harps, you know, mister feel like a fraud? I see you as well. All that stuff. I recognize that stuff in me because I'm human, because I'm emotional, because I have fear. I recognize all of those things that
can limit me. But I can say reasonably confidently these days they don't get in the way like they once did. So my self doubt and my fear and my overthinking mind periodically overthinking mind, they can coexist with my courage.
They can coexist with my optimal decisions and actions. That if I wait in order for me to optimize my potential and my talent and my genetics and my time and my resources and my relationships, if I don't optimize that stuff, or I don't try to optimize that stuff, until all my fears gone, all my emotional and psychological issues are gone, all the self doubt's gone, all the self loathing's gone, I will never fucking do anything, and neither will you, because that shit's ever present, some of it,
all of it, you know. But I've never met ny anyone who's fearless. I've never met anyone who has zero self doubt. I've never met anyone who never ever second guesses anything. So and maybe that person exists, I just haven't met them. But if you're something like me, which is you can be the self doubting, self loathing, periodic overthink and that's cool. So there's a few things that you can do to optimize your potential. I'm going to
give you some simple ideas, but at work. So what can you do to optimize your potential and get out of your own way? So Number one is chunk it down, And by that I just mean rather than, you know, taking on the entirety of the project and fully committing to this thing that at the time feels like I'm painting the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Right, We'll just start at one end of the bridge and paint one bolt, you know, just chunk it. What is something that I can do today?
This is what I think every day regarding this thing perhaps that I'm scared of, or regarding this thing that for me is uncomfortable, or regarding this thing that for me might feel periodically overwhelming, and I don't know where I'm going to end up with it. What's one thing that I can do to create progress, even if it's
a tiny bit of progress. What's one thing I can do to build a little bit of momentum and maybe move the needle a little bit on the fear or a little bit on the other side of it on my confidence and as much as the next tip, as
much as possible. I'm going to preface this with an asterisk, and that is easier said than done, of course, is to turn down the emotion as much as possible, or at least get the volume down a bit, and turn up the strategy, turn up the logic, turn up the rational thinking, the plan, the process, the timeline, and we start to just like we would with any project or go the you project, just like with any project that is a three D out in our physical world project,
if we're doing some kind of project with our garden, or with our academia, or with our business, or with our not for profit or with out whatever it is. When we're doing a project, when we're committing to a process, we need logic, we need strategy, we need planning, we need accountability, we need all those things that I always bang on about, and we need to jump into the process as soon as possible. Now. I'm not saying eradicate the emotions, of course, because it's pretty much impossible. What
I'm saying is, as best you can feel what you feel. Right. I think there's a book called Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway. It's not the worst title and it's kind of true. So what are you feeling? I feel self doubt, I feel a bit scared, I feel a bit apprehensive. Cool, Okay, I get it. That's normal. That doesn't mean you're broken or weird or terrible at all. That means you're human. So despite those feelings, what are
you going to do? Yep, I'm acknowledging the feelings and now I'm turning my attention to what I'm going to do. What are you going to do? Okay? My third idea for you is this, in terms of how to optimize your potential, involve somebody else right now. That could be a coach, could be someone you pay or someone you don't pay, by the way, It could be a mentor it could be a friend that you know that will kind of keep you honest from one of the better terms,
someone who will call you on your bullshit. Somebody who will help you stay accountable and in the process, and somebody that might encourage and support and give you a pat on the back when you need it, but also go, hey, you're being for of shit. You need to dig deep and look. We need I think we need a mix of the reality stick, which ain't always what we want, and of course encouragement and support. But what we don't
need is a cheer squad. We don't need. You know, there's a lot of talk about cheersquads in twenty twenty
five and people you know who need a cheersquad. I think if you need a cheersquad to be able to do the things that are necessary for you to optimize potential or become successful, if you can't do that shit unless someone's looking or cheering or patting you on the shoulder or handing you a trophy, then you're in trouble because that is not practical in a world and a life and an existence where people are not always going
to be there to do that. So if somebody happens to be given you a pat on the back or telling you you're awesome, that's nice. It's nice, but it's not nice and it's not smart to be dependent on that because if we can only do the work, if we can only take the risks, if we can only get uncomfortable and be brave when people are looking on, well, now we've just created another dependency. Now we've created a new addiction. And my addiction is I need attention or
I won't do the work. That's a way to destroy, not optimize your potential. Can you do the work when nobody's looking. Can you do the work? And my last bit of advice is just and this is overly simplistic, but I'm going to explain it. My last bit of advice is, don't roll the dice and see how you go. Don't give it a try. Don't do that, don't go you know what. I'll start out and we'll just see what.
Don't do that because the moment that you go, oh, you know, I'll give it a go and I'll see what happened that you may's go fuck it, I'm not doing it. There's an energy that people have, there's a mindset that people have. I can't really articulate it well right now. I'm just thinking out loud, but I see it. I'm not always right, but I'm nearly always right. I meet people who want to change shit on planet them.
I meet people who want to be successful. I meet people who want to do this, change that optimize that, and with quite a high level of accuracy, I know the people that are going to do it, and the people are not going to do it. And it ultimately comes down to how much they fucking want it, how hard they will work, how fully they will commit, and their capacity to keep doing the work long after the motivation and the excitement and the emotion have died. How
well can you commit? How brave can you be? How uncomfortable can you get? Take away the safety in it, take away the get out a jail card, fuck off the escape clause. Fully fucking commit. And yes I'm coaching now, And yes I sound like me I always default to this done, but it's just fucking true. You know how many times do we need to hear stuff before we
go right? I'm in, I'm in. I'm suggesting that, and I could be wrong, but I'm suggesting that that you have a propensity or you have had at times, or do have at times to waste what you have to work with. And I'm also guessing that maybe you want to get more out of your talent and your capacity and your potential. So maybe today's a time to start. Maybe I'll be metaphorically cheering you on from way over here. See next time.