#1874 Success...And Then What? - Harps

be successful. Nobody wants to be unsuccessful. Everybody wants to be successful. But one of my interesting, I think interesting observations is when I would ask people, you know, whether or not they want to be successful in a really straightforward I say, I don't ever think what I'm about to ask you, just yes or no? Do you want to be successful? Everyone says yes because nobody doesn't want it.

And then when I say, tell me what that means for you, many people struggle to have an explanation or a definition or an understanding of what a successful life for them would mean. And I guess they think that they relate success to a change in circumstance or situation or outcome or income or job or brand or health or whatever. We're generally talking when we speak globally about, you know, being successful. We look up to successful people,

and we always talk about in our culture anyway. We talk about what they have and what they earn, and what they own, and what they drive, and where they live, and their movies and their music, and their achievements and their business and their wealth and power and influence and all of the things that we as a collective of

humans seemed to hold up as the high watermark. And I remember when I was a young fitness professional, I was working in gyms, and you know, as most you know, I started working in gyms when I was eighteen, and I was literally driving a crap piece of car. I was driving a car worth a few hundred dollars. I was working in gyms through the day for twelve or

eleven bucks an hour as a gym instructor. I was working in pubs at night for quite a while there, three or four years, getting punched in the face for also twelve or thirteen or fourteen dollars an hour maybe. And I was training every day, and I had a bunch of friends and in the middle of my less than impressive situation and less than impressive you know, job and income and all that. For the most part, I was somewhere between really content most of the time and

happy and fulfilled and curious and excited. And maybe this is just the way that I responded in the middle of that. But you know, while there were things that I wanted, you know, I wanted to earn better dough and I wanted to be in a job that I loved,

which I kind of was, but there were limitations. And you know, I certainly was not without ambition or aspiration, but I wasn't I didn't have, you know, some burning desire at that point in my life anyway to build some kind of you know, wealth or empire or you know, impressive portfolio of something. And not that any of that is bad, but just at that point in my life. But I guess, you know, when I thought about myself, I thought, gee, I'm impressive. I'm something people should aspire to.

I definitely didn't see myself as successful. I didn't think I was a moron, but I probably saw myself closer to the shit kicker end of the scale than the superstar end of the scale. And I would intermittently sporadically bump into people who were successful, and I would be I don't know I was going to say I would be impressed. I wasn't really impressed. I was more curious.

I was more curious about them and whether or not their success in inverted commas equated to a better I didn't think of it like this in the terms of these words or this explanation. But this is what I know I was thinking, and I just happened to be

able to articulate it better now. But I guess I was wondering or curious about whether or not their external reality, suation, circumstance, environment, brand, you know, business, money, looks, all of those things equated to them being happier than me and or more successful than me. Like, was success about what's happening around? Is success about what people can see and touch and feel and experience and you know, interact with Is that what success is about? Or is success about the stuff that

people don't see? Is it about my internal world? And maybe it's not one or the other. Maybe it's an intersection of both. Maybe it's a combination of both. I believe that you know, what's happening around a situation, circumstance, etc. Money environment. You know, if you're living in like I live in Melbourne, Australia, I think I'm very blessed and fortunate. I live in a great environment. I didn't. That's not

anything I earned. I just happened to be born in this amazing country and I feel blessed and grateful for that. So to me, that's part of success. But I didn't do anything to earn that success. That was just luck, you know. That was just hey, thanks mom and dad, and hey thanks Grandma and Grandpa. That's what that was.

But I remember when I started to work as a personal trainer and I started my own business and I started to you know, I was twenty six years old, and I was still essentially a slightly evolved Bogan from the country, slightly evolved and I wasn't overly ambitious. But I really realized that I didn't want a regular job. I didn't want to work nine to five for people forever.

I wanted to you know, I wanted to work for me and I didn't want I didn't want someone telling me what to do and what not to do all day. And it's not that that's good or bad. It just that it wasn't optimal for me. That it isn't optimal

for me. I realized that part of success would be me being able to create a model for life and work and living and learning, and that happened to be something that was an intersection of income and joy and growth and socialization and fun and laughing, and to be honest, when I look back, I was really naive. I didn't even I didn't know how hard that would be. But I'm kind of glad I didn't know, because maybe I wouldn't have taken the first step. But anyway, it all

kind of worked out. And there's been as many fuck ups as there have been triumphs, and as many troughs as there have been peaks. But I think I really started to consider the concept of success when I started to work with in the mid eighties and then late eighties, early nineties, and then on and on. But I first started to intersect with what we would call in our culture wealthy successful high achievements. So people had lots of dough people who owned their own company, people who drove

very expensive cars to train with me. I mean, their car was worth more than everything I owned in the world, people who from the outside looking in by most people would be called successful and by normal standards in inverted commas. Back then, most people looking at me wouldn't definitely maybe they wouldn't call me a failure, but they wouldn't call me a success story. I was just a kid working

in a gym, helping people get in shape. And for me, the first kind of light bulb moment around this kind of question around what is success and what does it equate to happened when I worked with more and more people who were commonly successful and miserable, or if not miserable, not as happy as me, not as hopeful as me, not as calm as me. And it's not like I was the high watermark at all, But I thought, Wow,

I'm driving a car worth six hundred bucks. I'm getting punched in the face three times a night for fourteen bucks or whatever it was. I've got pretty shitty genetics that I struggled to keep in check. I've got food issues, I've got body dysmorphy issues. I've got lots of issues. But I'm fucking happier than you. And it wasn't a judgment or a criticism, but for me, it was like, oh, it was an awareness, it was a curiosity. I'm like, wow,

so what is that about. And so people that were and also I'm talking about people who were well known some of them. I'm talking about some people who were somewhere between just really well known and famous on TV, on radio. I worked with lots of high profile people. I worked with people who were in industry and people who were in the commercial space with big businesses and brands.

I worked with people in entertainment and television. As I said, I worked with people who were what most people would call success stories. And now remember this is just my in the field research. This is my anecdotal evidence. This is not clinical research, but my anecdotal evidence. My observation was that the wealthier, more successful people that I worked with tended to worry more, tended to be more anxious, and more medicated for anxiety and or depression and or sleeplessness.

Now I'm not saying one equals the other, but if anything, the correlation for me, it wasn't necessarily that successful people will put an asterisk next to that, It wasn't that they were necessarily miserable because of the success. I don't know what the correlation was, but it seemed to be there was some kind of relationship and I could do

a deep dive into that. I've got some thoughts on that, but I guess the point of this chat with you is to maybe rethink, like what we think at success is or why we think it is the thing that we think it is. And I've told you this story, and so I'll not tell the whole story. I'll tell it in thirty seconds. But I got to the point where I had five different businesses, five standalone bricks and

mortar businesses, one hundred staff, three gyms. At that time, I was doing lots of things, making lots of money. All of my businesses were in profit, and very much compared to where I'd come from. I was wildly successful. If we're talking about success being commercial or financial, or brand or profile or credibility, if those things are indicators or KPIs of success, and I'm saying if they are, then I was successful. But in the middle of my

apparent success, I definitely was less happy than before. Now that's not to say a caused be I'm just saying what happened for me and that kind of that made me revisit how I thought and how I framed success and my relationship with from one of the better term success and whether or not my my then propensity to focus on outcomes and focus on results and focus on the destination rather than being in and just fucking loving the journey, you know, focusing on getting to the top

of the mountain, you know, because that's what we're told, you know, to get to the top of the mountain. And but I was so busy getting to the top of the mountain. I wasn't enjoying the climb. I wasn't looking around, I wasn't getting my feet in the dirt.

I wasn't and it for me anyway, And I think this happens for many people, you know, And this is probably what I was encountering and experiencing when I was a young broke pete where I'm meeting people who, you know, we have this idea that that we will achieve something, be something, do something, create something, and we call that success.

And then when we get there, we're there and we're like, fuck, I've done it, I own it, I've created it, I'm looking like it, i'm driving it, i'm wearing it, I'm living in it. I'm fucking yep, And then you go. But I'm still anxious. I'm still an overthinker. I still don't I still feel emotionally distraught. I'm still still all of my issues here, and not only are they here, they've maybe expanded because now I'm worried that people are only talking to me because they want something from me.

And by the way I've built, I had one X and now I've got one hundred X money, and fact, what if I lose some of that money? And what if I invest in this and it's not the right thing? And then what if people start to say bad things and my brand goes from good to less good? And what if and all of a sudden And again, this is not for everyone. And I'm also saying that that

building wealth doesn't have to equal misery. Of course, I'm just saying that for me, that was part of the journey and I had to figure out, or I guess, come to the awareness that having more is not for me.

And I think really for any of us, having more as not being more, and more stuff doesn't necessarily equal some kind of positive In turn, cosmic seismic shift where we go, oh wow, I've looked at all these things I've done, and I'm creating and I'm owning, and I'm earning, and now I'm emotionally great, now I'm psychologically and sociologically great. My anxiety has disappeared, and now I'm calm, and now I'm joyful, and now I'm clear. You know that may

or may not happen. I don't think it tends to happen for most people, and so I don't think these are just my thoughts. By the way, I'm not trying to point you towards anything today. I was thinking about this, which is why I'm doing this a little solo. But I think what is Maybe you put this under the

spotlight and see what you think. But maybe the smart approach is to realize that, you know, we're just psychological and sociological and emotional and physical and perhaps spiritual, depending on your belief system, creatures, just doing life, just doing life, and we want to do stuff and be stuff and

own stuff and get stuff and change stuff. And there's nothing wrong with the doing, being, owning, getting, and changing, nothing wrong with any of that unless we think this is my asterisk, unless we think that's our reason for living. Where I think all of the things that I've built and created and the things that I own and the money that I have and the you know, they're for me,

not reasons, but there are other resources. And so when we think about when we think about setting goals and moving towards what we consider to be success, I think there's a couple of important factors to ponder, And one is obviously, what's the thing that I'm chasing? What do I want? Like, what is my goal? What is not? What is the world tell me or my parents tell me, or fucking Facebook or Instagram tell me, or you know, media, social media, whatever mainstream media tell me. But what do

I think success is for me? And why? I think it's one of the most important questions we can ask because when we I think, when we start to get out of the group, think, out of the cult of thought that says success is about more, success is about bigger and better and ownership and staff right, I think we go we start to realize that where I live is not in my ad HTV, it's not in my

bank balance, it's not in my brand. Where I live is in my thoughts and feelings and emotion and that inner world of me, that inner world of me, and that's where joy and happiness and contentment and pain and agony and ecstasy, that's where all of those things live. And while perhaps you know, striving to do the things that we want to do, hustling, grinding, nothing wrong with those things, but also being aware of the other side of life, the inner world, not just the external world.

And I think that you know, to try to to try to put under the microscope our pre set beliefs and ideas about if I achieve this, then I will if I create this outcome or do this thing, or I weigh this much, or I look like this, and this is another big one too, with appearance and weight and all the pressure, much of itself created pressure. By

the way, I did the same thing. I desperately didn't want to be the fat kid, and I wanted to look a certain way, and I wanted to be ripped and jacked, and then I wanted to be big and muscular and fucking intimidating and all shit coming out of fear and insecurity. And then I did all of that. Then I built this body that was pretty fucking high performance and strong and liten fit and lean and functional, I did all of this, then I had this new,

improved body, this two point zero version of men. In the middle of all of that fucking external bullshit that people could see was this insecure, overthinking, self doubting, self loathing baby in this giant body because I wasn't dealing with the problem. My body wasn't the problem. My body wasn't the problem. Like at a point where I'd gotten in shape and I was you know, but it was never enough. I was never whatever enough. I had to

be more. And when I got to the point where I went right this is where I wanted to be, there was no joy or satisfaction or contentment or calm because I always had to move the goalposts. But what if what if idea of success? What if the story that we tell ourselves, or what if the group think that we have around success is an illusion? Like what if everything that you now I'm operating on the assumption which could be flawed. I admit that because I'm talking

to a lot of people in different situations. So if this is not representative of your situational life, I apologize, But clearly you understand I'm talking to thousands of people, but I'm going to operate on the assumption that you're not starving, that you're not living in abject poverty, that you have a house, that you have heat, that you have a few dollars in the bank, that you can you know that your life on a functional operational level is

somewhere between okay and pretty good. Now, if that's the case, then what about what about the fact that you and I again I'm assuming here, but you I can get out of a chair and go for a walk. What about that you and I can turn on a tap and get cold water. What about that you and I can open a fridge and have food, We can get into a comfortable bed. What about the fact that and again this is so, if you're struggling with things, I

apologize and I'm sending you love. But what about the fact that you don't have a body that's riddled with disease at the moment? Is that amazing? Is that a reason to celebrate? Is that a version of success? Like think about people who find out that they're unwell. Think about my friend john that got blown up in an

accident that I've spoken about too much. God bless Johnny, who was told he or his family was told he'd never think, he'd never walk, he'd be a quadriplegic, and he'd be severely limited cognitively, he'd have a traumatic brain injury that wouldn't let him do life well. For John, success after two years or so of training with me and him doing all the work being the cheersquad, of course, but success for him was crawling on the floor of

the gym three meters. That was one of the best days of his life and my life to that point in time was seeing my friend who was told he'd be a quadriplegic, be out of his chair and be on the floor crawling and then eventually walking and now training with me three days a week in the gym, walking with his stick, still medicated all the time for pain. But guess what compared to what could have been and where he was, he is an incredible success story for

me anyway and for him anyway. Success is an idea. Success is not a thing. It's not a set thing. Because if success, for example, was all about let's just say this, let's give an example. If success was about having enough money to do everything that you need to do practically to live practically well, if that was success, and that equaled happiness. Then everybody that got to that point where they had enough money to live well would

be happy, that'd be content, they'd be fulfilled. But the truth is you and I know, and maybe you are that person from time to time, I know I am, if I'm being honest. Have I felt, even in the middle of my relative success wink wink, nudge nudge, have I ever felt like not enough, like I need more? Like this is not it like I've got a of course I have. But then I realized the problem is not what I've got. The problem is not what I have or not what I don't have. The problem is

my thinking. And so you know, it's a really personal thing this And I'm not trying to push you in a direction to and if you you're an ambitious person who's on your way to building all the things you're building business brands successful, this that great. I'm definitely not discouraging you from that. I think that's amazing. I still have commercial ambition. This is not a chat to denigrate

ambition or commercial success. Of course, it's just me opening the door going and then what, Okay, you built a brand, You've got lots of go you look good, you lost the weight, you achieve the outcome, you tick the box, you reach the KPI bibittybobbity boo, what now? And so I think sometimes it's not so much about shifting our external reality or ticking boxes. It's not so much about what is seen, what is evident to others, but rather what is experienced by us. And maybe no one's going

to see it. Maybe people are going to look at you and think you're not successful. Who cares? Who cares? If in the middle of what appears to be not particularly the high watermark for somebody else, If in the middle of that, you're pretty happy, You're pretty calm, you're pretty content, you're pretty fulfilled. You're living a life with purpose. You've got what I call spiritual, emotional and mental wealth

and social wealth. Then I would suspect, ladies and gentlemen, that you are doing better than many