I'll get a team. It's it's the next year, it's the year after the last year, it's this year, it's twenty twenty six, it's Tiff, it's Jumbo, it's us, it's you, It's the fucking the whole kit and kaboodle. And I'm excited. I'm just building up to a crescendo, but I'm pretty excited about this year. A bit of mayhem going on right now, but I hope. I know this is not our first showback, but I hope Chrissy was good for you,
or at the very least not horrible and chaotic. I know for a lot of people, Christmas and New Year and or New Year can be a time that isn't so much fun, that isn't doesn't bring so much joy, and for some people even is somewhat traumatic. So I hope you got through it okay, and I hope this year is amazing for you. Speaking of amazing, she is she is.
I don't want to be presumptuous, but I don't feel like that was a calling.
I wasn't even thinking about you, but all right, hello, this is amazing. I'm miss amazing. I should say, how are you?
Very good? Thank you very good. I'm ready for twenty twenty six.
Now have you done well? We haven't done one since last year. We haven't done one for probably a couple of weeks or a week and a half at least. Have you done one of yours? Or is this your first one back?
This is my first one back, and I's been a few at least two, if not maybe three weeks. I would say. I December was a little bit not the best, so I pulled up stumps earlier than what was planned on recording podcasts. Yeah, wait till the joy seeped back into my world.
And was it good to have a little bit of I don't know, time away from the microphone and the studio and to regroup a little.
It really was, And not not that it always is. I just think given what had gone on in my world, it very much was because I wasn't in a great space to use my mind and really engage and love the process of conversation at that time.
Yeah.
Yeah, so yeah, but it's been nice.
You know.
It was funny, like I work through Christmas. I don't really have an attachment to holidays or breaks or anything, but something about ticking over new year's into twenty twenty six just had this freshness and excitement about it that I didn't have before and for no reason. So I find that interesting.
Hey, yes, yes, I don't know. It's funny, like the psychology of time and the psychology of dates and days on calendars. And you know, I heard Tim Ferriss talking this morning and he goes, no matter what day you start, it's the start of a new year, right, And I was thinking, so, like today's January five, Well, it's the start of a new year, because one year from now
to be January five, that's a whole year. That's a you know, but we have all of these stories which are not bad, but they're good to reflect on, you know, thinking about thinking metacognition, you think, oh, why do I
think that? And I know of this is an old chestnut I've banged on about too many times, but it is an interesting reflection when you genuinely think that your chances are better of succeeding if you start on a Thursday rather than a Monday, because the Thursday in your head on this year happens to be January one or
whatever it is. And so you have a story that this is the right day and the other day is not the right day, when in actual fact, it's got so little to do with the fucking date, like essentially nothing, and perhaps your belief about the date or your idea about the date, or your intention around what you're going to do when that date, but even then, it isn't
actually about the date. It's about psychology. It's about your preparedness and readiness to do the thing that you say you want to do and haven't done for maybe the last ten January ones or whatever it was, but that you know, just that I'm and this is how I think, right, and I'm not really surprised, but part of me is surprised that people don't realize what a crock of shit resolutions on January one are for the majority, Like if it was a drug, it would never get approved by
the FDA or whoever, right, because most of the time when you take that drug in infurt commas, you don't get the result you want. You don't get better, or you don't improve, or you don't get healthy or you know, it doesn't. And it's not that it's a bad day, it's just the psychology around this is so fucking silly. And so irrational even when people going.
Part of this psychology that works for it though, because it's because there's a break in routine, and the problem is where routine habitual creatures. So it's really hard to start something new in the middle of the sameness of work and this and that, and there's no time or space. So in a way, unbeknownst to us, we get out of our normal operating system. And that's when those thoughts come in. I'll do this differently this time, because something about right now feels different, and that.
Sounds good in theory, right, but if we look at the evidence, it doesn't work. Like most people who start about to work. No, no, it's no. You can't blame work because then you're attributing your failure to something beyond your control. Right, what you're saying makes sense in that Yep, it's different. We're not at work. We're in a different space, either geographically or mentally or emotionally. And it's a new year,
so mentally it's a new start. I get all of that, and I agree with you all of those points are true. But when you stand back and you look at the data or the forget opinions and ideas and beliefs. Just look at the evidence. The evidence is that most people who say they're going to change their life beginning on January one don't. That's just true. That's not an idea. So you now, does that mean people can't change on January one? No, not at all, not at all. But
you can change on January five. You can change on December twenty five. You know. It's just that. But I thought we might talk about this a little bit, like without doing the whole what are we going to do this year? And how are we? You know, I think it's been well. I just think you know me, and I think my audience knows me, and you of course, I think kind of rah rahring people up. It doesn't work, and it's good. You know. We talk about the value
and the lack of value of motivation. We talk about discipline and self control and focus and structure and planning and timeline and strategy, and we talk about all the things. But you know, at some stage we have to go. And this ain't a popular thing to say, but we have to go. I'm the problem because I'm not doing the work, Like the only one who can change my life is me, you know, and if my plan is that I accidentally succeed or someone's going to save me
or rescue me, then I'm in trouble. Now. That doesn't mean people can't love you or support you or help you. Of course they can. But ultimately, ultimately what's going to make my life better is my choices and my behaviors, and my resilience and my mental toughness, and my ability to do the things that I said I would do without the cheersquad, without the fans, without the clapping, without the recognition, without the approval, without any attention, it still comes,
you know. And we can slice it and dice it a thousand ways, and we can do all the fucking self help programs and books and videos and podcasts and even including this one. Right, I don't think this is the answer to anything, Like I think, like what a lot of self help tells you is that we have the ten steps, or we have the five steps, or we have the model, or we have the structure or the process, and all you need to do is follow this.
And yeah, that the point is to follow this is the problem that the do this well, nobody can do that except the human in the middle, you know. So if you've got fucking Tony Robbins in your corner and Oprah in your corner and the Dalai Lama and Jesus cheering you on, you still need to figure out what you're going to eat for breakfast. You still need to figure out whether or not you're going to go to
the gym and not fucking give up. You still need to figure out whether or not you're going to make smarter decisions.
What do you think it's missing and where do you think people can look and find that? Because a protocol is good because you don't have to think, you get something to do, you get the thing that works. What's the missing piece of the puzzle? It's because this I mean, obviously this is easily applied to fitness, but you can apply it to anything in life, any behavior change.
I think the missing piece of the puzzle is that we are not willing to do shit that we don't want to do. Yeah, like, well, the problem is it's like and people can jump up and down right a zen pic. So I was talking to somebody the other day. Right, I'm not saying don't take a dude, I'm not saying anything, but I'm saying, all right, well, how does the zenpic work. Well, it works on a range of levels, and it mitigates hunger and it reduces if you do. But ultimately, how
does it, like, how do people actually reduce? Like, what's the mechanism. Well, the mechanism fucking sit down, batten down the hatches is less calories? Fuck me drunk?
What?
And it's because people eat less? Right? And I'm not saying again, but well, is it possible that people just eat less? Well, yes it is, but it's uncomfortable. But ozenpic makes it easier and more comfortable. So I'm not anti or pro I'm saying it horses for courses. But what I am saying is here's what I know. When I do something that is hard, that is also effective
and also strategically intelligent, then what I like. For example, let me give a so we're not talking about fat and weight loss and people getting emotional, and I'm not going to talk about the you project. I'm going to talk about your podcast. What number are you up to?
Nine seventy eight, maybe.
Let's say a thousand, So you're up to the best part of a thousand podcasts. You've done years, right, and you've done good shows, not so good shows. You've had interviews where you went, I fucking killed it where I don't know, by the way, I'm just correct me if I'm wrong, where you fucked up, or you could have done it better. Where you look back at things in like I had no idea what I was doing and blah blah blah. But I developed and I learned and
I evolved. And now you're a thousand shows in and you did a lot of shit that was hard, and you produced it, and you got guests, and you reach out and you got rejected and you got accepted, and you sat on the microphone and you asked dumb questions and you asked good questions, and you got better and you developed. You went through fucking years and a thousand episodes of doing shit that now nobody can take from you.
You have got this intellectual property, you have got this skill, You have got this knowledge and understanding and capacity that you could never get through a fucking podcast version of ozepic. Right, So you did the work. Now you know now if you started another podcast tomorrow, your first podcast would be good. The first one would be good, right, because you did the things now, so too, with building a business or building a good relationship, or losing weight or building strength.
We keep looking for the way to get the outcome without hurting. Yep, and it's in the hurting. I'm not talking about reckless you know, pain. I'm talking about strategic discomfort, like progressive overload in the gym, progressive resistance training. You know, you go in and you do something and it's painful. It hurts a bit, but in a week or two it hurts less, and then it hurts less, and then you lift more and it hurts again, but you adapt again, and over time, the thing that used to be painful
now is painless. And the thing that used to create a negative hormonal response or biochemical response stress response in your body now gives you a dopamine response because you fucking love it. Right, So you, the same human being, have changed your relationship with this thing in this example weight training, you in the podcast example, you've changed your relationship, knowledge, understanding,
skill capacity, and attitude about stuff. So now you can walk into anywhere and you could teach most people on the planet how to set up, how to develop, how to do a podcast, how to interview all these things right, and so at the same time, I'm not against shortcuts or if they're healthy and not ridiculous, but I just think this aversion that we have to doing the work, like we want the reward without the work. And I've said it, you know, we want the top of the mountain,
we just don't want to fucking climb. So it's it's, you know. And I'm all for rah rah and dick jokes and encouraging people and being silly and I'm all for you know, having fun and taking the piss. But you know, I was up at full thirty this morning and before my coffee, I walked eight kas, you know. And I'm not going aunt I great at all, because I'm not great. In fact, the reason I do that is because I'm not great. The reason I do that
is because I get fat as fuck. If I don't do it, if I'm not eating well, moving well, lifting weights, managing my last style well, making good decisions, doing smart things, I would be a morbidly obese sixty two year old or a dead sixty two year old. That's absolutely true. So what do I do well? Do you want to be dead or morbidly obese or unhealthy? No? I don't, Okay, what needs to happen. Well, create you need an operating system that works for you, and you either do the
thing or you don't do the thing. And so often it comes down to most people just won't do the thing because you can always rationalize, oh yeah, but like my last six years full time work, full time study, you know, full time research, full time work, work, seven typically seven podcasts a week, in state, travel, regularly, aging, parents, lots of shit going on. And I'm not saying I'm terrific. In fact, I'm telling you all the time I'm far less than terrific. But what I do is I go, well,
here's the problem or challenge. How do I solve the problem? How do I meet the challenge? What is the best thing for me to do? What is the best question for me to ask? The best question is not, oh, why does all this shit happen to me? It's so unfair. The best question is, all right, well this shit has happened. How do I navigate this?
What do you reckon? We have an issue also just admitting shit. It's not important to us, Like if we're not doing it, it's not a priority. It's not important to Why can't we just say that thing that society says, is great health or whatever it is or success doesn't rank for me because I'm not doing what I should be doing.
That is a really smart question. So you wouldn't have asked that in the first episode. You would have gone, what color is that T shirt? No? Sorry, I apologize. That's a good question. I thought about that the other day. That is very insightful because I think a lot of people say, you know, when we go, oh, what a values? Values are the things that are important to you? Okay, so hey, everyone in the room, put up your hand. If health is one of your top three values, all
the hands go up. Yeah, maybe seventy percent of the people in the room are not living in a healthy manner. And you go, well, why'd you put your hand up, because clearly it's not important to you because you're living a lifestyle which is inconsistent with, or perhaps the antithesis of reducing healthy outcomes. Again, no judgment, no hate, no just observation. I said, who's and you put up your hand?
And also, you know, so I think that we like to present ourselves in a way which makes us look best or better to the rest of the world, including me. I'm not saying, oh, humans do this, but Craig doesn't because Craig's fucking outstanding. Craig's a dickhead and insecure. By
the way, please love me, still an only child. But yeah, I think that's like I and I've spoken about this before when I went through a stage where I owned three gyms at the time, I was in my early thirties, and I went through a period of about a year where I was just eating like a fucking maniac, even though I was educated, even though I was knowledgeable, even though I was helping people get in shape, even though I was working with elite teams and athletes, even though
I knew what to do. It was like I was an alcoholic who picked up booze again and I just opened the door and I just gained thirty kilos. You know, think about this. This is just a little aside. So I mean, you know, I've got a fair bit of muscle. I weighed seventy nine. I weighed myself this morning, seventy nine. And when I was in that phase there, I weighed
one one seven tiff thirty eight kilos. Well, you know how big Brad is, you know, six foot four fucking bigger than me, bigger than He's about that, right, So I was, yeah, and I just my solution was done, change the way you eat. Get a bigger tracksuit, bro, you know, get some, get them, get some. You know, don't wear a singlet because you look like a fucking potato in a training out. So just get yourself some big, baggy, pucking hoodies. And yeah, it's but I think that, I
think that, and this is hard to do. But you know, over time, when we just really own up to our bullshit, and it takes a while to get ready, you know, because sometimes it's you know, you don't want to be embarrassed, you don't want to be humiliated. I get it. But it's like, but is it true though, Craig did you? Were you telling people to do one thing and behind closed doors doing another? Yeah? I was, I was right.
But what makes me more comfortable to say this is one, it's true, and it aligns with one of my values to be as authentic as I can without being inappropriate. And two, I've worked with tens of thousands of people one on one in this process of physical, emotional, psychological change,
and virtually everyone lies about something at some stage. The amount of people who for my at least the first twenty years of my pteen career, all of my clients would fill out diaries in the old days before apps, so either like a spiral bound book, like a page by page diary which would have food, exercise, sleep, you know, coffee, tea, booze, water, supplements, you know, medication, blah blah blah. So they'd record everything that would have some kind of impact on the outcome.
I would say ninety percent of my clients lied. Not all the time, but I would look at what was in that fucking book and I'd look at them. I'm like, hey, Pinocchio, what the fuck is this? This is not what you're eating? I go, are you promising me? And they'd look at me. I go, look in my fucking eyes and promise me that this is what you are eating and there's nothing else. And they couldn't because they knew that, because they would write what they thought I wanted to hear or read.
I'm like, what I want is the truth, because when we deal with the truth, then we can create a real plan and a real strategy. But when I'm training you and I'm doing everything that I can do for you, and then you're not losing weight or fat and you're shrugging your shoulders and saying, but I'm eating perfectly when you're not, Then what you're trying to do is make it my fault, not yours.
It's a very funny process, isn't it like that when you think about that process. I remember my nutritionists. She's one of my best mates. I literally just went and had coffee with her, and years ago I got her I did a food diary I wanted to gain weight for boxing, and I showed her the diary and she goes, wow, this is very very detailed. I'm like, do not. She goes, no, people lie. I'm like, who pays for a nutritionist and then tells lies? You don't? How do you get there?
How do you get the information you need if you're lying about what's happening? This is a funny process to go. Well, obviously already in then in your mind you have to go to yourself, well, don't you already have some answers if you address those first and then just showed up with what you say you're already doing, and then you might already have a result happening.
Do you remember my story about the doctor that I used to train in the ice cream No, no, okay, so this is a true story, and nobody knows who this person is, right, so it doesn't matter. And I'm pretty sure this person is not a doctor anymore. So I was about twenty eight, so i'd been working in gyms for ten years. So I didn't know everything, of course, but I knew a fair bit. I trained a lot of people, maybe I was thirty and so I used to train this GP a lady, and she was quite
what's the word at the start. We ended up with a really good relationship, but at the start quite challenging and quite By the time she got to me, she'd tried a bunch of thems, she'd had a dietitian, and she'd had another trainer before me, even though there weren't many trainers around then, and she'd I don't know, she'd done all this stuff, and I'm like, well, what happened with all that? And she goes, none of it worked. I'm like, none of it worked? Like it didn't work.
I'm like, that's interesting. So anyway, she didn't want to fill out a diary because I think she thought, you know, by the way. She just saw me as a glorified gym instructor, which was fair, and she was a medical doctor with a six year degree, so what the fuck
would the buff ed with the big arms? No, right, So anyway, I'm like, okay, So I convinced her to well, I made that a condition because I was already busy, and I said, I'm not going to train you if you don't fill it out, because you know all the shit. I you say, you see me three times a week, so you're not with me for one hundred and sixty five of the one sixty eight so most of the
time you're not with me. And all of the things that you do when you're not here, you know, incidental occupational activity, supplements, food, sleep, booze, socializing, all of those things have an influence on the outcome, not just three workouts with me, so just to give me insights, so that blah blah blah, all the shit, right. So I started training her, and I was training her well. I was training her as well as I could with my resources,
skill knowledge. I was training and I really fucking tried hard because she was a doctor and I was a bit intimidated. And six months in six weeks into it, she had put on a kilo and I kept looking at he a diary, which, by the way, you know when people you can tell they sat in the car, well, I can tell they sat in the car sixty seconds before they walked in the door, and just scribbled some stuff in the book like it's not real. And I used to look at it. I'm like, I know she's lying.
I know this is not real. And then I thought, I'm to give it a few weeks. And then over six weeks she got fitter and she got stronger. But and maybe the one kilo was maybe it was a bit of muscle, or maybe it was a bit of fluid. But anyway, the bottom line was there was very little progress, next to no progress other than the strength and fitness. But her main reason she was there in her words.
I won't say what her words were because someone will find a reason to get mad at me, but it had you know, she didn't want to be an fat doctor. That's what she said to me, right, And I'm like, okay, cool. And then so we're going back. I'm like, are you sure and she's like, yep, don't question me. And Aaron may are you I'm like, all right, anyway, one day, I'm like, this is bullshit and this is going backwards. And so she gave me a diary and I got it. I said, I just want to have a chat with you.
And she was really straight away on the defense and she's like, what about. I'm like, well, I don't want to have the chat here. Well we can have it here. What about? And I'm like, oh god. You know when people are like that, You're like, I'm on your I'm on your side. Do you know what I want? I want you to get in shape, you know what I want to help you, you know what I want to
understand you. So anyway, I go in in a rare moment of fucking courage, I said to her, I said, this might be the start of something great, or this might be our last session. I said, And you can get mad at me, and you can whatever you want. I said, but I know that what you're putting in this diary is not what you're eating. I said, I know, absolutely no. And I said I know because even by then, i'd work with over a thousand people. And I said,
I've worked with whatever a thousand people. And I go, you know, because you're the one doing it, and I know the only thing that's not happening is you won't tell me the truth. Now, I'm not mad at you. I'm not disappointed in you. I'm not judging you. I just want to fucking help you. But I can't help you really on this psychological, emotional and physiological journey if
you can't acknowledge what you actually do. And then there was a bit of defiance, and anyway, the flood of tears came, this flood of tears, and I said, just tell me what you do and then I can work with you. And I said, by the way, I've got all the fucking food issues and all of this and the body image and body dysmorphia and shit self. I go, I get it. I get it academically and scientifically, and
I get it experientially. I just want to help, right Anyway, one of the things that she and she would eat nothing all day, which is quite very little all day, and that would be true. You know, she'd get up and have a coffee and she's like, I'm going to be so good today. Then she would get home after work stressed and neat a lot of food. And then when her kids and husband would go to bed. She would often drive to the supermarket at like nine or nine point thirty and get two Leaders of ice cream
and sit in the car. She'd take a spoon and she'd sit in the car and eat two Leaders of ice cream and then drive home crying. And I'm like, okay, like there's no like, I'm like, thank you, thank you for being honest. I go, now that we know what's going on, I go, No one else's you know, and no one knows who she is. But I go, we can deal with it. And I said, that's all I want. That's all I want because now I know and I can talk to you about that. And by the way,
have I made one thousand million stupid choices around food? Yes, I have the way. I understand that emotional and psychological urge to numb out with food. Fuck. Yes, I'm the chairman of the club, right. But that's one of those things, Tiff, is where somebody's got to go, Okay, I'm part of the problem.
And well, also I think, why do we carry so much shame?
And and.
I would say ownership, but I know we have ownership. But also we've got these biological bodies that respond to things. We've got this layer of unconscious psychology that's running running programs, and then we have behaviors that happen, and then from the outside we look in at ourselves and we hold shame and we hate on ourselves and doing that when we can't fix anything, if we can't be a little bit compassionate about you know what, I've got this ship behavior.
I have it a lot all of the time. I eat too much junk at times, and sometimes I'm really impulsive with it, and I go, fuck, that's a that's frustrating. I wish I wouldn't do that. But also, ah, there's I have to find the reason I do. That's the what's that behavior? About? What triggers? That's it? That's just a curious thing to ask. And I don't have to hate me about it. I can hate me a little bit sometimes because fucking I do you know? I do
ride that bus every now and then. But just think we have so much, so much unnecessary shame around the stuff we haven't explored in our own mind and body.
Correct, great, great, beautiful summary. And one the shame is understandable because we live in a culture that lends itself to that, you know, fat shaming, et cetera. Right, and you know I was the kid who got called jumbo. I basically my name was my fat body, right, So I get it. But you know, but also we can have that awareness of I'm making bad decisions and doing things which are at odds with my own health. That's we can have that awareness without having without having the
self loathing. It's like I do do this, not like I'm a useless fuck with I'm no good, I'm this no one can ever love me, you know all that, but just being able to acknowledge, like you can't change what you can't acknowledge, you know, like whether or not you know, like I had to realize I had to learn like, for example, when I started my PhD. Oh, I can't sit like say Melissa, unlessa can sit for an hour looking at something that's not that fucking interesting
and stay captivated and look because she I'm like a dog with three dicks. I'm eight minutes in, I'm thinking about lunch. I'm like no especially, so I needed to figure out, all right, how do I read academic journals and papers in a way that works for me, and the way that worked for me Initially, and this sounds fucking hilarious, is five minutes five minutes I just started, I go five minutes. I literally put my clock down. I'd set a five minute alarm and then I'd read
and go off. Then I'd fuck around five minutes. Then I'd come back and sometimes fuck around fifteen minutes, come back, right. But eventually I got to the point where like, now I can I think also because I understand what I'm reading better and my language is better, and my my you know, I've evolved somewhat, and my academic I guess resilience has evolved, but you know it's still for me.
Half hour is like I'm tapping out, you know. But then if it's something creative and something fun and something that I'm just fucking making up and writing and conceptualizing, and I could go down a rabbit hole for four hours and it feels like twenty minutes. But either way, you need to realize, Okay, well I need to get this research done or this study done or this so how do I do it? Like how Melissa does it
or how Tiff does it? That doesn't work for me, And like even you and I have spoken because you're more a pro academic than an academic, which is not
to say you're not intelligent. You're intelligent, but your intelligence and your curiosity and your learn happens in a different way to most of the people that I'm doing my PhD with, Like they're more what you would call typical academics, you know, which is not good or bad, if there is such a thing as a typical, But at that level, at that PhD level, there's a fair bit of similarity. Like they're really fucking good and they're really like in that little world of research and stuff. Oh my god,
it's like their natural habitat. I feel like I'm still the fucking the outlier. Six years later.
Was talking about this just this week, that idea around what like this we think that knowledge, stuff we know is our intellect. And there were subjects at school that I just downright fucked around in and maybe because of the classroom I was in and the people or the teacher I didn't resonate with. And so I as an adult when I moved to Melbourne. If you have passed me in the street said is Europe and America? Are
they the same place? I couldn't have answered you because I paid no attention to any geography or any of that line of study. And then then, even though I knew that was a choice, eventually that I figured it and I was like, well, you just chose not to pay attention. That doesn't mean you're dumb. You just didn't You didn't pay attention and learn it. But now when someone breaches that conversation, broaches that conversation, you feel dumb, like I thought I was. I was like, you're so dumb.
You don't even know the capital cities of places that everybody knows.
It's funny, yes, Well, intelligence is one fluid, it's two dynamic, and it's three. It's a spectrum. So somebody like the crab that you know everyone. One of my best mates, my training partner, is at least as intelligent as me, maybe I would guess, depending well, maybe more intelligent. And I don't think I'm a genius anyway, so that's not a big compliment for him. But he's a guy who
finished school at year nine. Who you know. But depending on the context or the challenge or the problem to be solved, or the room that we're in, I can be a fucking idiot, And he's a genius, and there are many times where I've had to default to his brain, like his brain works better with this kind of problem. So there are some people who quizzically are very knowledgeable
but not very intelligent. And there are other people who don't have vast acquired kind of pigeonholed knowledge that they've done, that they've acquired over any academic formal process, but rather they've got a lot of experience and a lot of innate wisdom and intellect that can help them navigate life better than the dude or the dude at with nine PhDs.
Yeah, or like the ability to problem solve and understand or sense make something new. I think about me in maths. I was a weapon in maths, but I paid no attention. So I got excellent marks, but I retained no knowledge. I couldn't tell you now what half mathematical equations are because it was I'd look at it, get taught that makes sense, tick tick tick, disrupt the class, and then you know, a year down the track, I don't know.
I don't know what that is. I can't remember. So there's people that can retain knowledge really well, but maybe it took them a very long time to go over it and over and over and a lot of hard work to just ingrain it and get it in, but it never made sense the same way.
Yeah, and I think that, you know, even as grown ups, we think we're dumb or we think where I think very few people are stupid, very few. Everybody just has different kinds of intelligence. And yeah, Like I've been in some weird environments like prisons and stuff where I've worked, and you're like, you would think, oh, they're just going to be buffheads and bogans, and you know, and you're like,
I know, these these motherfuckers are super smart. They have figured so many things out, you know, and they're not necessarily smart in the way that we think it, although some of them are, but they've just learned how to not just survive but thrive in this horrible environment and how to you know, socially and financially and practically navigate this system and this culture and this And you're like, Wow, if you put me in that environment and just threw away the keys, I'd be fucked in a day and
a half, right, I'll be fucking wearing a dress and being spooned by some big motherfucker. So you know, that could be all right, I'm not sure, but you know, it's like, yeah, it's it's it's a it's a kind of like Chris, who's my senior supervisor, who you know, you know he's got he's a professor. He's a full blown professor at Monash. He's only forty one or two. He speaks seven languages, he's got two PA and he
is real deal intelligent as well as knowledgeable. But he's come to a few my gigs where I'm speaking and he shakes his head and he's like, I could never do that. He's like, how on earth do you do that? How do you stand up there for three hours with no notes? You know? How do you read the room? How do you build rapport? How do you make people laugh? How do you know what say and what not say?
And obviously you don't get it all perfect, but yeah, and I'm like, oh, yeah, it's it's like i have a kind of intelligence and skill and knowledge and aptitude that I've developed over thirty five years of doing the same thing or a version of the same thing. So then you build on your innate ability and capacity, and you develop lots of knowledge and skill over time, and then hopefully you get somewhere close to what we colloquially call mastery, you know, but I would you know, there's
not many things that I'm very good at. You know, I'm pretty good at a few things. Okay at some stuff, and shit ouse at most, you know, so, but it's just that thinking about, like, in terms of what I want to achieve, even back to the new year, this year, what do I need to get better at this year? Like what what if I could just pick one thing that I need to do better and maybe conversely, one thing that I should stop doing. What would those two things be?
You know what would they be?
Well? For me? One hundred percent And this is so cliche, but one hundred percent social media, Like I waste so much time and I don't even mean scrolling, I mean conceptualizing. I might spend an hour and a half conceptualizing one post, and I'll write and rewrite and rewrite because I realized I've got a lot of well it depends on what a lot is, but for me, I've got a lot of followers on Instagram, where I'm mainly you know, sixty two and a half thousand or something, and so you
know that if fair people are going to fait. Few people are going to look at it. And but I'll write and rewrite and sometimes I'll send it to you and I'll go any good. You might go yeah, it's shit or it's great, or it's because I want to try and get and I send it to Melissa. I want to try and get someone else's perspective. But I just spend way too much time on that.
But I think the nature of that, so you can look at it that and go, yeah, that's a lot of time for a bloody social media post, bro, But the nature of how you are doing that is a part of you developing your mind and your understanding of the content you deliver. Overall, You've evolved so much and so differently, and that's what I see when I see how you develop your online presence. Now it has changed how you communicate and how you share messages. So that's that's productive.
I think, yeah, thank you. Yeah, yeah. Look, I think as a as a podcaster, as an educator, as a professional speaker, as whatever else I am, Like, my my main skill is communication, and then under communication is you know, building trust and respect and rapport and understanding how people perceive and experience me, which is my PhD, and then understanding this moment in time for them right now, is what I'm talking about to this group of people making
sense or is it confusing? What level are they at intellectually, academically, sociologically so that I can share the message in a way which is optimal for them in terms of value. You know. So if I talk to a bunch of you know, blokes on a construction site, or blokes and women on a construction site, and I talk to them like their PhD students, that won't work. And again it's not that they're dumb, it's that they're different. They're smart
in a different kind of way. Conversely, if I talk to at Brain Park, Monash, where I'm studying, if I go into the boardroom and I talk to them like they're all fucking builders laborers, that won't work either, especially when I say count the first three times, so you know, like it's like, but the funny thing is you can be sharing essentially the same message. Like I've told this story probably ten times, but literally ten years ago now it would have been I spoke in two days in
a row. I spoke at Port Phillip Prison on one day and the next day I spoke at the Royal Australian College of Surgeons. So I spoke to three hundred surgeons in a room at Lawn at the Cumberland in Lawn, and the day before I was talking to violent criminals. And but on both occasions I was trying to help them to help themselves. How do we think better, do better?
Be better? What's working, what's not. There's similar themes, but the style and the language and the energy and the delivery were nothing alike because the group was nothing alike.
You know, even just preparing for that, like the energy you bring into that space dictates how they respond. So having an awareness on even just that component, I think is I feel like that the time I'm at now when it comes to speaking is going on now when I speak, it's not it's not familiar rooms or familiar environments. And that is a really new variable because in the past everything's come from networking or relationships that I already had so comfortable, and now I'm like, oh, there's I
don't get that luxury anymore. And then there's a there's no expectation that I'm familiar with that they might have of me. And who I am and how I am.
That's hard, yes, yeah, but imagine this. I said to you, Haytiv, can you do me a favor. My friend's kid is in grade six down the road. It's thirty grade six. Is they just want someone to talk to them for thirty minutes about health and fitness, just whatever you want. They're all eleven and twelve. Health fitness like a bit of fun, a bit of whatever. You would go in there,
you would crush it. You'd talk for thirty minutes. You'd think about who they are and how they are and the right language and the right level of messaging, and you do it. Now, I could give you the same directive, but say it's to a bunch of eighty year olds in a nursing home. But I want you to talk about essentially the same stuff. So immediately you're going to communicate differently, plan differently, and the examples or stories or
language or cadence all going to vary. And you will do that without thinking, like you won't go, oh, I bet make sure I don't talk to them like they're twelve year olds. You just get in and you do it. So this is you know, it's like when you talk to a three year old who runs up to you and you go, oh, hello, what's your Oh what's that? That's a big boat? Oh my wow? Kind of boat is that? But imagine saying that to a twenty four year old. It's like, what the fuck are you doing?
You know? Imagine if I went up to a blokeout in the front of the Hampton's who was on a motorbike, and I went, oh, hello, what's your name. That's a big motorbike. That's a big throubber between your legs. Look at you. Oh sure, name Barry. Hello Barry, what a big motorbike you've got.
You know, I just had the You just reminded me when I went for coffee with my friend was up with Mara and Beane, and I was walking up the roads of the Sunshine. It's beautiful, the sky is blue, it's amazing. And then this old man was walking towards me and he stopped and he goes, I just want to say to you. So I stopped and listened.
He's yes, yes, I want.
You to have a beautiful day. And I was like, oh, thanks, And then I spent five minutes or so. He goes, I just love talking to strangers and I love making people laugh. And he told me some jokes and then I gave him a hug, and I like, I was so lovely. I don't know what made me think of that.
I should have done you should have got his number and taken him out to a movie. I'm kidding about that. I was going to say something much more hilarious, but when.
It was so nice, right, like he goes, there's so much bad news and there's never good news, and there's a lot of good people around, and I was like, you what fucking lovely dude.
Bless that old dude. Well, it's been a fun chat Tiffany and Cooks, followers, friends, typ family. I hope you have a great year. Reach out to us if there's something that We've got a whole bunch of guests. This year is going to be I would like to say an improvement on last year. I don't think last year was terrible, but last year, twenty twenty five was a very, very busy year for me, and I don't think I did my best work. I think I did some okay
work regarding the podcast. My intention this year is I'm not sure how many we're going to do per week just FYI. Some weeks it'll be seven, some weeks it'll be four or five. But I really want to get some great people, some new people, have some great interviews, have some different conversations. I know we're always circling around personal growth and development and self help and human behavior
and self optimization. I get that. But if you've got any suggestions, and not your brother in law who's a fucking trainer in Epping, we don't want him. But if you've got any suggestions for guests or shout out to all our trainers in all topics or conversations you would like us to have, just hit us up on the Facebook page. If you're not a member of that, come on, bro, Sophine, get the fuck on do You Project Podcast Facebook page. It's been real Tiff, good to see you again. Oh
just a quickie. Are we still in love? Or have you ditched him? Sorry? I almost got through the whole party. You can cut this out though.
Still going strong, has still going strong? Thank you very much?
Right, have no, I'll leave it at that. That's that's what I won't even know. So many funny things I could say for the benefits of the listeners, I'll refrain.
Thank you.
We'll talk off here, but thanks. It's been real