Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:23):
Welcome everyone.
I'm Nate Shearer, your host,and this is Mindforce, a podcast
that's all about diving intolove, life and learning.
Here, your mind matters.
Today, we'll be talking abouthappiness, accountability and
balance.
Let's start with a quickintroduction.
Tell us a little bit aboutyourself.
Who are you, what do you do andwhat brings you here today?
Speaker 2 (00:45):
yourself.
Who are you, what do you do andwhat brings you here today?
My name is Ernest Wood and Icoach men.
I say now is like everybody hastheir own definition of
happiness or legacy and I helpmen to find theirs, be able to
look in the mirror and go, hey,I like that freaking guy.
I think in our world that a lotof people we kind of lose
ourself.
We get wrapped up in trying tochase everybody else's dreams of
(01:08):
what we should be doing.
And yeah, that's where I got.
I got into a spot where Ididn't really like myself.
I didn't like the guy I saw inthe mirror.
I went on a long journey, tookme a lot of work and a lot of,
I'll say, falls on the face.
I wrote a book it's calledAsshole to Awesome A Journey to
(01:29):
Joy and Happiness, and when Ifinally finished the book, I
started chatting with otherpeople and I was finding that a
lot of people had that sameissue.
They just couldn't figure outhow to get fixed.
Like you know, we all read theself-help books and and we it's
almost like going on a diet,right, so many people go on a
diet, yet in two months therethey weigh five pounds more than
(01:52):
they were before they startedthe diet and, uh, I find that,
like self-help was almost thesame thing.
So that's what I do now.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Okay, perfect.
And just to set the scene,where in the world are you
calling from?
San Diego, california, nice,that's a good one.
Right there, that's a new one.
We've been all over the place,but San Diego, that's a new one.
One question I got just rightoff the bat how do you define
success?
I feel like that's such aninteresting thing.
People want to get wrapped upin money and cars and all the
(02:22):
things.
Read through some stuff on yourwebsite about how you were
chasing money.
You know how did you used todefine success and how do you
currently define success?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
That is a great question and I think many almost
every man kind of goes throughthese different seasons, or
pretty much everybody goesthrough different seasons.
When we were young I used toknow everything was just about
money, like I just wanted asmuch money as I could so I could
have the best car that I couldpossibly have, maybe take, you
know, some vacations, play golf,anywhere.
(02:55):
It was all like to me it wasall just because that's kind of
what I saw on movies or theinternet or whatever right, and
I always had the want to, youknow, succeed.
But it was then I got caught inthe rat race, right, because
you get, you find a job and itpays you the right amount of
(03:17):
money, pays you just enough tokeep you there while you do just
enough to work to stay there,kind of deal.
And now, like after finallyfiguring out who I was, it's in
like my definition of legacysuccess is just being it's
finding that happiness and Ifind it it's like a freedom,
(03:40):
because when you can actuallyenjoy what you're doing and
you're giving back to people andmaybe you can affect somebody's
life a little in a positive way.
That's my idea of success now,and doing an act of kindness
every day.
That's one of my big thingsthat I always try to do.
I'm not 100% on it, but that ismy definition of success now,
(04:04):
not 100% on it.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
But that is my definition of success.
Now, yeah, that's perfect.
Yeah, we had a person on theshow.
She went over kindness, thatwas her whole thing and she said
the same thing.
I'm not perfect, you know.
When I'm out in the car andsomeone cuts me off, I get
frustrated, just like everyoneelse.
But thinking about it andhaving that intentionality
behind it to want to take careof others and open the door, and
things like that, I think justthinking about it is a step in
the right direction, even if youdon't get to it every day, just
(04:27):
thinking about it.
Well, let's move into thewarmup.
First question I have for youwhat does happiness mean to you
and how has your definitionevolved over time?
So I guess this is very similarto success, but do you have any
differences on happiness?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
No, it's pretty much the same.
I mean happiness.
Like I said before, I wasalways thought I'll be happy
when I get more, I'll be happywhen this happens or happy when
that happens, but until you'rehappy with who you are and what
you are inside, you're nevergoing to ever, in my opinion,
you're never going to truly behappy.
(05:04):
You're always going to bechasing something that's not
internal to you.
Like I have a my little sayingis you gotta be, you gotta learn
to be happy with who you arewithout being satisfied where
you're at?
Because if you're, if you getthe, the difference with that
is's like if you get satisfied,you get stagnant, right, if
(05:27):
we're not constantly growing,we're falling behind and that's
just the way of the world.
So yeah, finding that happiness, and I just think it's just an
internal thing where you knowyou can look in the mirror and
go, hey, I like that dude.
He's doing what he can.
He's not perfect, he knows he'snot perfect, but he's a pretty
(05:49):
freaking good dude and he'sdoing the best he can.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yeah, I think I got to see if you can expand a
little bit, because the firstthing I thought of is goals
right, you want to accomplishthings, you want to set things
down the road.
So how do you distinguishbetween goals and that feeling
of I'll be happy when you dowant goals?
Right, but how do you balancethat?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I think this is one of the biggest things I ever
learned was being like.
Even on my book it's titledasshole, right.
Awesome is the far away thingthat I know.
I'm never going to be like 100%awesome.
It's kind of like my perfection, right.
But if I'm always making smallsteps to be a little more
(06:36):
awesome every day, then that'sthat goal thing.
Right.
I have a ton of goals andthat's why I say never be
satisfied Like you got to beagain happy where you're at.
That goal thing.
Right, I have the ton of goalsand that's why I say never be
satisfied Like you.
You gotta be again happy whereyou're at.
Like you have to find thatinternal happiness because when
you're happy and you know likethe process that you're trying,
(06:57):
you know where you're headed andyou're enjoying that process,
when bad crap comes up which isgoing to come up, we all know
that there's never.
You're, you're never going togo down a smooth, freaking road,
right, but when you can enjoythe process and then when those
little obstacles, or even bigobstacles, obstacles come up,
(07:18):
you just handle them, you justyou move around them, you figure
out a way to over around, evendig a tunnel to get underneath
it Before, when I wasn't likemyself.
Anytime an obstacle came up, Iwas a whiny little crybaby man.
I would whine and bitch andmoan, you know, at the job and
anywhere.
(07:38):
I figured in my childhood.
You know we all have ourstories.
My childhood wasn't the easiestso I always figured man, I went
through excuse my term, but Iwent through enough stuff.
Man, like I don't need any moreobstacles.
But now that, like, I foundthat internal thing obstacles
are fine, man, it's likeobstacles are the way.
(08:00):
I think there's even a booktitled that.
Right, there is by Ryan Holiday.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Yeah, he's awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
I've read a lot of his stuff, uh, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So like now, I almost look forward to some of the
obstacles because it I know I'mmoving in the right direction
yeah, I think there's like adifference between the emotion
of happiness and likecontentment or joy, or maybe
using a synonym for the sameword, because I think happiness
is more of the emotion andpeople want to feel it all the
(08:29):
time, but you're not going tofeel it all the time.
It's same with motivationyou're not going to feel it all
the time, but content or youknow whatever word you'd like to
put in there, and so I think alot of times the emotion gets
confused with the thing thatshould go on all the time.
It's like I feel good all thetime.
We're not saying you're goingto feel good all the time.
Like you said, you knowNewton's law or not?
Newton?
Who's the guy that messesthings up all the time?
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Murphy's law.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
Murphy's law.
There we go.
Murphy is there to just messstuff up, so we know stuff's
going to get messed up, but ifyou're being content and enjoy,
I feel like I prefer the termjoy, because joy can't really be
taken necessarily Like you'recontent, you're good with family
, everything feels good.
You're going to go throughstruggles but you can still have
joy, Happiness.
I feel like kind of comes andgo.
(09:12):
It feels like more likemotivation to me, but that's a
great reminder.
Next question I had for you wason accountability.
Trying to move through some ofthese pillars you got, Can you
think of a moment whenaccountability played a major
role in your personal growth?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
man, accountability was a super hard one, because I
was kind of that guy who, just,I love to blame everybody else
for all my crap.
You know, if the job wasn'tgoing well, oh that dude screwed
up more than I screwed up.
You know, even when I was, youknow, driving, I had horrible
road rage and it was always well, it was that guy's fault or
(09:51):
that girl's fault.
You know, like they can't drive.
What I learned was just takingthe only thing that you are in
control of in your entire lifeis your thoughts and how you
respond to stuff.
And I took a hundred percentaccountability in it.
(10:11):
And now, like, when I make amistake, I right away, I
freaking, just apologize orwhatever.
If I there's somebody toapologize to and if I, just I
just yeah, a hundred percent,like it, my, it's my reason, I,
I'm the reason, I'm there, right.
Even in a, even in a trafficjam, I try to say I'm the reason
(10:33):
I'm there, right, it's, youknow, like it's not everybody
else's fault there and it's just.
And when you can actually justtake accountability for
everything in your life, knowingthat the only thing you can
truly control is your thoughtsand how you respond to something
, it just makes it so mucheasier, man, and then you don't,
(10:54):
you're not in that victim andthat blame mentality.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Yeah, the victim mindset is is rough.
One of my favorite guys, kerwinRay Ray.
He actually passed away, Ithink late last year, but uh, he
said the sooner you take ahundred percent of the
responsibilities for everythingthat's happened in your life is
your fault, the better thingswill get.
Everything.
I mean you could try to go downthe road of the family and
whatnot.
But all the choices you've madethrough, however many years of
(11:20):
your life, those are all yourfault, you know, regardless of
the cards you were dealt.
So so that's a.
It's a really good one.
And the last one I have in thewarmup is what's one small habit
that's changed the way youmaintain balance in your life?
Speaker 2 (11:32):
I want to say the small habit is I learned about
breathing.
Breathing to me is it goes withsleep, but breathing is my
fundamental thing during the day.
I 100% make sure that I nosebreathe as much as humanly
possible.
There's a saying that youshould breathe through your
mouth as often as you eatthrough your nose Pretty much
(11:57):
never, right?
And if you look around ourworld today, man, they say like
60 to 70 percent of people mouthbreathe in it.
And when I learned to nosebreathe exclusively, even during
my workouts I like and I try towork out pretty hard I try to
only nose breathe.
There's a story about theSpartans when they train their
(12:20):
kids.
You know, physically what theydid was take a mouthful of water
.
They had to do their 10K runand come back with that same
amount of water.
They were not allowed to.
You know, obviously, if you'reholding water in your mouth,
they're not breathing through it.
I have found that it is huge.
I mean, it helps with mentalclarity and it really makes my
(12:45):
days go a lot better becauseanytime I start getting stressed
out, I do my mindful breathing.
It brings down my anxietylevels and I actually cured my
depression.
Depression ran in my familyforever.
My uncle killed himself.
My grandma basically slept onthe couch and withered away.
(13:05):
Until you know, my mom hadissues with it, my brother had
issues with it.
I had days where I felt likethis big, nasty black cloud was
on my head, but since I'velearned how to breathe, man, I
haven't had one day ofdepression.
I still feel like crap somedays, but not depression.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Yeah, that's different, right?
Yeah, I lost my grandma tomental health, so that's why one
of the reasons I kicked off theshow.
But I wanted to ask what doesthat look like?
Can you walk us through?
Do you close your eyes?
Are you sitting a certain wayLike what does that?
Do you know if someone hasnever done any deep breathing or
anything like that?
You know?
Can you walk us through, kindof what those moments look like
when someone sets like theeasiest one that, like I do I
(13:46):
don't even know.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Probably at least I try to do it at least once an
hour or, yeah, about once anhour.
This is besides meditation andthe wim hof breathing.
But you sit up like super tall,kind of like your superman pose
, uh, chin down just a littlebit a deep in through the nose
and it's going to be about a sixto seven second through the
(14:08):
nose and you're down into thebelly right, hold for like one
second and then out through thenose and you do that and it's
going to be out through the noseslightly longer than you did in
through the nose.
So like, say, if you do a sixsecond in, do a seven second out
Something you know really closeyou don't have to be put your
timer on or anything but doingthat you're connected to your
(14:31):
parasympathetic nervous systemand it's almost like flipping a
switch, man, I mean, when you'regetting worked up and you just
do two of those little breaths.
It's like I had to give you astory.
My grandson was having it likealmost an anxiety attack.
I mean, he couldn't catch hisbreath.
He's just like shaking hisstuff.
And I talked to him and I'mlike do the nose, let's go
(14:52):
through the nose.
And we worked, you know, acouple of times.
We got him like five to sixseconds and then all of a sudden
, two breaths, he was done, hewas breathing, he was cool, very
able to go.
Done, he was breathing, he wascool, very able to go.
I'm telling you, man, andthat's you know, they say the
diaphragm is the least usedmuscle in the entire body
because we all forget to, youknow, use it while we're
breathing.
(15:13):
You see people breathing, theregoes, you know, and there's,
there's all kinds of bats likepeople over breathe nowadays.
Over breathing doesn't allowfor that carbon dioxide buildup
which pushes the oxygen into thestream.
That's one of the major badthings about mouth breathing
also.
But yeah, just that littlereset man, six to seven seconds
(15:34):
in, seven to eight out, with aone second hold only using the
nose, using the diaphragm.
It's beautiful.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Good stuff.
Well, before we get into yourthree main pillars, I wanted to
see if you had a question for meno, not yet, man.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
I think you.
You throw some great stuffright in the middle there.
You add on some awesome thingsyeah, I got a curiosity.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
It was born into me, so I gotta know a little bit
more.
So your first main pillar ishappiness.
How many people chase happinessbut struggle to find it?
What do you think are the keyingredients to lasting happiness
, or joy, as I like to say?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And that's why I like to say that everybody has their
own definition of it, because Iagree with you.
I'm going to just switch aroundreal quick.
But I use the same thing withnice and kindness, right,
because to me I hate that word.
Nice it's like if you look itup, it's something like ignorant
person or whatever.
Like that's a true definitionor where it stemmed from.
(16:33):
And if you watch how the worldacts, right, the nice people
usually get taken advantage of.
They have no boundaries andkind, and.
But if you're kind, you knowyour boundaries and you're also
helping.
And that's where, like, I usehappiness and you can use joy or
content in that same way.
So maybe I might have to moveit around from happiness because
(16:54):
you know, like you startedmaking my brain think about it,
but, uh, I have to bring thatquestion back around because I
just oh you're good.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
What do you think are the key ingredients to lasting
happiness?
You said you know it works.
For a couple months, you know,and then you're back on the diet
.
You're five pounds up.
What makes it stick?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
What I found that made it stick was actually
internalizing it, right?
So many people and this was meis you're always chasing the
definition of like somebodyelse's definition of it, right?
You, like a lot of us, do.
You know our neighbor got a newcar, so if I get a new car I'm
going to be happy too, right,and we're trying to always
(17:37):
impress the person that.
So rats man, like we, you seeit all the time keeping up with
the Joneses, right?
But once you learn happinessand like you're happy with who
you are, it just lasts like it's.
It's not something to that youhave to chase like you're going
to have.
Because I always say thisanalogy it's like having you
(17:57):
know your GPS on your phone Ifyour current location isn't on,
it's not going to take you towhere you want to go.
And that's where so many of usdon't know where we're even
(18:17):
starting from.
And I think that's the hardspot with like self-improvement
also right, because we justdon't know where we're at.
Like we have so many littletriggers, little things that
twist us up, little knots insideour backpack full of freaking
rocks that we just keep addingto.
And that's where that wholeknowing who you are, knowing
(18:41):
what makes you tick, knowingwhat causes your triggers, and
get eliminating those and, uh,getting rid of some of those
knots inside.
And breathing is gonna.
You know, learning meditation,it helps get rid of those knots,
man, letting that, I mean, mostpeople can't sit in a room by
their self for two minuteswithout having some kind of
(19:02):
outside stimulation going on.
Yeah, I got to grab that phoneRight To me, man.
I love like I could sit here inmy little room and breathe for
hours on it and it just it openseverything up.
And then all of a sudden, whenI'm done doing it, man, I feel
like a freaking genius becausemy brain's working right.
(19:23):
I'm like, oh crap, all this.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Yeah, so, yeah, do you have any exercises or
anything for someone thatthey're not sure what their like
focal point is in life?
Is there a way to like workthrough it with words or
identifying what's important toyou?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
what I always have people do is you're going to do
it in about and it's going totake about three days.
So one day you're going to doit in about and it's going to
take about three days.
So one day you're going to setyour clock for five minutes and
just brainstorm, like writehappy in the middle or whatever
your word is right, write it inthe middle, and just continually
write for five minutes whateverpops in your mind.
(20:00):
I mean, even some of the crapmight not even fit in there,
right, but whatever fits.
You know, like whatever youthink, just write, write, write,
write and at the end of it kindof see what comes up, and then
kind of circle or put it into anorder and then leave it alone.
And then the next day you comeback and you're going to do it
again for five minutes, sameword, just brainstorm as much
(20:23):
crap.
Some of that stuff's not goingto be exactly the same and some
of it's going to be different.
And then the third day, samething.
Or the second day you're stillgoing to find the little common
themes, right.
Third day you do the same thing.
But now you look at all thethings and a lot of times you're
going to have this commonalityand then you can grab those
(20:45):
right and like, hey, maybe maybeyou find gardening like every
time you think of happiness,gardening pops up right.
So now, now you start a littlegarden, you start something that
that's going to trigger that,whatever that internal thing is.
Or maybe you figured out, whenyou put happiness maybe a bunch
of triggers started popping up,like every time, like I've had a
(21:09):
couple people do that is, theydid this exercise, but what they
found was all the crap thatdidn't make them happy.
So what we did was they foundall this crap that didn't make
them happy and we just startedlike trying to eliminate them.
Right, like you know, at theend of the day, they would sit
on the couch and drink a beer,so, and they, so what we do, we
(21:31):
got rid of the beer for you know, the one beer, and we had them
do a walk or do some push-upsinstead, and then all of a
sudden, like how his mindset setmindset shifted was he wasn't
looking at the stuff that didn'tmake him happy.
Now he started looking at thestuff that didn't make him happy
.
Now he started looking at thestuff that made him happy,
because so many people don'teven ever take that time to
(21:51):
think, hey, what actually makesme happier, makes me enjoy life?
Right, we're always thinkingabout I got to do this or I
can't do this, or right.
And then adding gratitude to itis three things every single
morning, write something thatyou're grateful for.
One about you, one about, likeyour spouse or, you know, a
(22:12):
partner, whatever.
And then one about the world.
And that's proven, and I thinkit's four or five weeks.
Just doing that every dayincreases your happiness.
25%, that's like.
There's a proven study on that.
Wow, you just take that to thebank, that's guaranteed 25%,
that's like there's a provenstudy on that.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Wow, you just take that to the bank, that's
guaranteed 25%.
We like that, that's good stuff.
It's pretty guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
You still got to work on your brain, though.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
I love the actionable tips and tricks.
I feel like a lot of self-help,it's like hypothetical and
things like that.
So I love the things.
You just do it and it'll workout.
We actually did one at work.
Our big boss, brigadier GeneralFlowers, he lives in DC, he did
a values exercise and it waspretty, pretty difficult.
(22:54):
It seemed like it was going tobe very simple and very easy and
it's funny, the simple thingseven turned out to be kind of
difficult because it had a pagefull of words and you circled 15
words and you're like, okay, Ireally like these family friends
, you know the things that jumpout at.
You're like, okay, but then youhad to go and make the 15 into
10.
So then you're giving away fiveof those and then you start to
(23:15):
feel a little weird and then yougot to take the 10 down to five
and so then you're reducingagain and feeling like that
feeling of you know, giving theones away or you know the rack
and stack of that priority inyour head was kind of difficult.
You're like, oh cool, the 15was easy, but when you get down
to five, like what actually arethey?
Are you able to, you know, giveup some of these things, and
that's where it was a littledifficult to get down to five.
(23:37):
I did it a couple of times justto see if it was kind of the
same.
But you know it lined up.
I think three or four out ofthe five are all the same, so
it's a good exercise.
It seems good on both sides.
I like the idea of thinking thethings that you don't need
anymore, Because I feel like alot of times those are just
there by default.
I feel like that person wasprobably grabbing the beer at
night, you know, not thinkinganything of it.
Do I really need it?
(23:57):
Probably not.
You know, it's not helping oneway or another, just one.
It's not really doing much ofanything, but I could be doing
something more productivebreathing, walking, doing
something else.
I think a lot of times we thinkwe don't have enough time, we
don't prioritize.
Well, I know like I've neededto do things and I feel like I
don't have time, but somehoweverything seems to get done if
I sit down and actuallyprioritize.
(24:18):
So it's prioritizing, not theamount of time.
I wanted to ask about difficulttimes, so I feel like it's
pretty easy.
You had mentioned the car orwork's going well.
You're making, you know, decentmoney.
You know how do you get peoplethrough and cultivate that
happiness during the difficulttimes.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Difficult.
Like I said, man, difficulttimes are those things that I
used to hate them.
It was just like and I alwaysblamed, I always blamed somebody
else for my difficult times.
And that I think it comes backto taking accountability, man,
and knowing that you know thatdifficult time is probably there
because something that you didin the past right, or or a skill
(25:02):
that you haven't learned yet.
And then when you takeaccountability or responsibility
for everything that's in yourlife, it's easier to you know,
not get upset by them.
And then also knowing thatwe're not freaking perfect, man.
You're not perfect, I'm notperfect.
None of us are ever perfect,ever perfect.
(25:24):
There's gonna be a bunch ofcrappy days.
Even you remember that guy.
What was his name?
Orton.
He was a workout guy likefabulous shape, tokyo, yeah,
yeah, like he did an interviewand he's like probably one of
the most in shape people in theworld.
And they were like okay, you do, you do.
You know you're constantlyexercising, so you must feel
(25:45):
great every single day.
And he was like, oh hell, no,he was like dude, 75 percent of
the time.
I don't feel like doing thiscrap Right, even that guy.
And he's like one of the mostpositive people that I ever seen
and he still said he didn'tfeel like working out 75% of the
time.
The difference betweensucceeding and not succeeding is
(26:07):
when you don't feel like doingit, you still push yourself to
get the crap done.
Like you said earlier, haveyour little priorities in check
and check off those little.
Whatever the priority is ofthat day, and some days you're
going to feel fantastic andthose things are just going to
check off with ease.
Other days, every single one ofthem, is going to be a grind.
(26:28):
But it's all about like knowingyour why, knowing where you're
headed, what your big goal is,enjoying the process, knowing
that if you just keep pluggingaway at the process, that you're
going to get to where you wantto go and that's, that's how I
make it through those.
Those crappy days.
(26:49):
Believe me, I've been having afew of them myself lately and
I've been like holy crap, man.
I just go back to writing in myjournal doing the process,
doing the gratitude.
You just gotta gotta, you gottaenjoy that process, man.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I think words are important too.
I always try to draw on a pieceof paper if I'm not feeling it.
I try to write the wordconsistency over the word
motivation, because consistencywins every time.
Motivation, it comes and goes,but consistency.
I work out from 6 to 7 everymorning.
I don't like getting up at 5.
And you know getting some foodin and doing all those things.
(27:26):
But I know if I get to three orfour o'clock in the afternoon
after I'm done with work, I'mdefinitely not going to want to
do it.
So get it in early, not bychoice, but just to have that
consistency.
And another person I had on theshow, joe Rodonis.
He works for Tonal, the workoutmirror.
I love it.
One of the things I love thathe talks about is non-negotiable
.
That's like one of my favoritethings that he says like it just
(27:48):
helps solidify, even thoughit's just words.
It's like words matter andwords mean something.
So non-negotiable, like I don'teven have to think there's no
thinking that thing is going tohappen.
And so he talks about like hisworkout routine is
non-negotiable If he on monday,wednesday, friday, like it's
going to happen monday,wednesday, friday, if he feels
like it doesn't feel like it.
But hearing like that mantra inthe back of your head
(28:10):
non-negotiable it's like I wantto start to go down this path
and have my mind start to work.
But once I hear itnon-negotiable, that's all it
means.
That's it like there's nothingto think about.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
I'm going so yeah I was gonna say I just worked out
with joe this morning.
I don't know he's awesome, uh,but a good way of like just to
go along.
Exactly what you're saying.
Non-negotiable is I set up mydays or my morning is like a big
old algorithm, right, if, if Ido this and then I do this and
(28:42):
the more things that you can setup like that, because
discipline is almost like alittle water bottle, right, you
have this much during the dayand if you spend it all in the
morning trying to just get outof bed by the end of the day,
you're going to have a reallylow level of discipline.
Um, I think, did we lose you?
(29:03):
Did I lose you?
Were you back?
There it goes.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Sorry about that, man , you're good, you're good.
Hopefully I didn't cut you off.
Next question Do you believehappiness is a choice or
something that comes naturally?
Speaker 2 (29:15):
No happiness is definitely a choice man.
It does not come naturally.
No-transcript.
I think happiness is definitelysomething that you have to work
at a little bit, but once youfind it, it makes it a little
(29:35):
easier.
I don't know where I got cutoff, because I just wanted to
add to the algorithm thing Didyou hear yeah?
absolutely, because thealgorithm thing and like it
gives me my best chance ofhaving the best day possible.
Like, my algorithm in themorning is if I wake up, I drink
eight ounces of water with mypinch of Celtic sea salt and
then I do my breathing.
(29:56):
If I do my breathing, I do myworkout and I just everything's
piled like that Right.
And what I have found is thathelps with my happiness too,
because when I just when I knowwhat's coming and what's going
and I don't have any stress inthe morning, man, this thing is
acting up.
Is it mine or yours, you think?
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I don't know.
It seems fine and every timeyou seem to say algorithm it
gets mad.
It must be AI or something.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
It must be, it's like oh hell.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
no, did you make it all the way through?
Huh, did you make it all theway through the algorithm?
Speaker 2 (30:28):
or did it not?
record yeah, it got enough of it, you understand.
I mean, we'll get the picture,but what I was trying to say is,
if you have a good morningroutine and a night routine, it
gives you the best chance ofhaving a good day, right?
Because most people, a lot ofpeople, wake up in the morning.
They don't know what they'regoing to do, so they start
running around and all of asudden they find theirself going
(30:49):
to work 10 to 15 minutesrunning behind and they get
stuck in the traffic.
But having that nice littlemorning routine of some
breathing, some movement, someexercise, some stretching gets
everything flowing.
So I'll just leave it therewith that, since I keep breaking
up.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yeah, I mean that's a really good reminder.
I think it's the simple thingswe want it to be, these large
things.
And I know I'd heard to likeput out my workout clothes the
night before, and for thelongest time I think I went
years and I didn't do that.
I just got moved to the UK.
So I've been out here for aboutseven months and, like I said,
been on that six to seveno'clock workout routine and,
geez, putting out your clothesis so good.
(31:28):
I should have done that such along time ago.
I got my shoes out, I puteverything out.
It literally takes me aprobably one, one whole minute
to put my stuff out and it is somuch easier to just pop out of
bed and get to the clothes.
They're all piled there,they're nice and ready to go,
and like I don't think about itbecause I want to say, oh well,
I'm cold, or I don't want tograb my shoes, or well, I don't
(31:49):
know if I'm going to have socksor the socks I like or some
crazy thing, because the mind isjust so powerful, but when it's
there, like that one minutejust makes the whole morning so
much better.
So absolutely a great reminder.
Your next pillar isaccountability.
So how do you thinkaccountability contributes to
personal and professionalsuccess?
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Yeah, man, using that accountability you're just
because everything that comes inyour life is what you're
bringing into it Again.
I think that the only thing wehave control of is our thoughts
and our response, and onceyou're able to do that with life
and work, now you're not goingto be complaining about.
You know Johnny over there atthe water cooler, you know
(32:34):
wasting time because you can'tcontrol what he's going to do.
All you can control is yourstuff, your thing.
You can be the best employee,best version of yourself, and
that's where that accountabilitycomes in.
It's just you can't controlanybody else's stuff, man.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
And how do you do that Like, how do you, how do
people create a mindset wherethey're starting to embrace that
responsibility rather thanblame everywhere else?
How does that shift?
Like it sounds great.
How does that shift occur?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It took a lot of freaking work, man, but, like
again, I started it withbreathing, like I could not get,
I couldn't do it until, like, Ifinally learned how to control
or slow down my brain.
Right, because so many we liveoff our subconscious mind I
think what's the numbers 80, 85of the day is just controlled by
(33:26):
our subconscious mind.
We just do what we always havedone.
And that is the problem.
Like we just always do whatwe've always done.
And if, if, if, sometime in ourlife we became a whiner and we
got rewarded for it somehow, youknow, either by a little
dopamine hit from us or somebodyoutside of you.
(33:46):
So yeah, that guy's a dumbass.
So now you feel like you feltvalidated for saying it right.
So that's how that bad habitgot created.
And now to get the good habitit's kind of like what you said
before you have to make itsimple, you know, like by
putting your clothes out.
That's how you created the goodhabit, right, but getting rid
(34:07):
of bad habits can be done thesame way.
It's like making them hard toget to.
And and that's with thataccountability.
You want to make it simple atthe beginning, definitely make
it super simple, like every timethere was a little thing.
It's called like rocket ship Iwish I could think of the lady's
name.
But every single time that Icame up with a thought that I
(34:30):
wanted to do, like, say, workout, or if I wanted to go get water
, and but I was sitting theredoing something else I would.
It's like you can't five, four,three, two, one and you have to
go do it.
Right, you don't like, youdon't allow your brain to take
over or the subconscious to takeover and go nah, you don't need
it right now.
And I had to.
(34:53):
So I was doing that with thegood things, and then every time
that I had a bad thing come uplike, hey, go get some candy.
I had to switch that right.
I can't go five, four, three,two, one and go grab the candy.
What I would do is switch it to, making it harder to do.
So it was before I got thecandy.
I had to go do 50 pushups orwhatever it was, and by the time
(35:16):
I did my pushups I didn't wantthe candy.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
I don't know, it's just angry.
I don't know it's the weatherit's a full moon or something.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
Man, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
It's all good stuff so far.
It'll just make editing alittle bit more fun.
Yeah, but we like challenges.
Did you finish what you weresaying?
Sort of and you might have hada little F word in there too,
but yeah, I'm just throwing youoff here.
The next question I had were wetalked about practical things.
I love the practical ideas andtips and tricks.
(35:45):
So what are some practical waysto hold yourself accountable?
Have you found like differentapps, or what are some ways to
actually hold yourselfaccountable?
Speaker 2 (35:55):
So I do.
I believe I'm a big guybeliever in journaling.
Every single day at the end ofthe night I go through and I
have like a little checklist.
Those are my, like my,algorithm, right, when I wake up
, I have to, I have to check offthose things and then also,
like reflection, you, you haveto look off those things and
then, also, like reflection, youhave to look back at the end of
the day and go, hey, was I goodat this part?
(36:16):
Or you know, like, where did I?
You have to know where youscrewed up and where you were
good at right.
You celebrate the good ones andyou kind of just give yourself
a little hey, I got to getbetter on the bad ones.
I also use Heroic.
It's an app that, uh, by BrianJohnson.
It's pretty cool.
It has all my little virtues onthere.
And then what I like toaccomplish in the three
(36:38):
different things that he uses, Iuse it.
And if you don't, you know,just get a journal, get a book,
it is super easy and just alwaysbe able to, you know, reflect
and think about what you didbetter today than you did
yesterday, because the wholegoal is just getting 1% better
every day and that might soundcliche, but if you do that
(37:01):
enough and your, your target isthat 1% better every day, you're
going to be.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
You're going to be a total different person at the
end of a year and you'd beamazed at what you can
accomplish I feel like the mostcliche things in life seems to
be the most true and accurate,because I feel like sometimes
I'm a walking cliche, like Ifeel like it's true.
One thing I love I didn't seeit until I was older, but
(37:27):
benjamin franklin had hisjournal published like in the
museum or whatever it was, andin the beginning, or you know
the very bottom, of his journalit said what good will I do
today?
And it had all the time slotsfor the day.
And at the end it said whatgood did I do today?
And so he would come back andreflect like, did I do good?
Did I help someone?
(37:47):
Did I do the thing I said I wasgoing to do in the morning?
And that was the first timeI've seen like that far back
where someone was not only doingthe initial things.
I feel like the front is easy,let's do these things this week,
but then we never look back onFriday, like, did I even do the
things that I was supposed to?
Like bullet journaling you passthe things forward or things
like that.
But journaling, that's a supergood reminder.
(38:11):
Your last pillar is balance.
So work, relationships,personal well-being, often being
pulled in all sorts ofdifferent directions.
How do you define this balance?
I kind of hate the wordwork-life balance.
I don't think it's really abalance, but what are your
thoughts on defining balance?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Can I go back to accountability real quick and
I'll jump back Absolutely quickand I'll jump back.
And a good thing aboutaccountability is a lot of times
we're in a position where we'reat because we lack the
discipline, right?
So this is where getting acoach comes in.
I've had to get coaches a lotand I always avoided coach.
(38:47):
I hated my coaches.
I was always the jerk at theend of the bench or on the court
talking crap, and.
But now I found that, like,coaches can hold you accountable
until you get to a certain likebest players and the best
people in the world all havecoaches to hold them accountable
to getting to where they wantto go.
So I'm going to end that withthe accountability.
Come back over to balance.
(39:08):
I was all about like, when Ifirst started doing this, it was
all about balance.
I was trying to preach balance,right, everybody gets locked up
with balance because everybodyautomatically thinks it has to
be like a perfect set of time,right, eight hours, yeah, it has
to be eight hours of this,eight hours of that and eight
hours of that where I'm not inbalance.
(39:29):
But it's like balance is for me.
You have your little things inlife, right, you have to have
your physical health, yourmental health, your
relationships, spiritual, andyou know your financial, and
they all need some touching hereand there.
You know you have to payattention to them.
They don't have to be eighthours, eight hours, eight hours,
(39:52):
but they all deserve their owntime slot.
Right, and I'll give you anexample.
Is, you know, sometimes whenyou're starting a business,
you're going to be working 12 to13 hours out of that day and
your family is not going to getthat time that they deserve.
They deserve, but if youcommunicate properly and you let
(40:13):
and you let them in on thewhole process and the journey
that you're on and include themin it, now, now you've given
them the respect that theydeserve by including them and
yeah, you know.
And then you tell them hey look, I might only have 20 minutes
for you today, but it's going tobe the best minutes of the day.
I'm not going to have my phoneon, it's going to be off, it's
(40:35):
just going to be about you andme for 20 minutes.
And, if you think about it,that's probably better than a
lot of freaking parents aredoing with their children right
now, because you see them at therestaurant and the little kids
are sitting there choking on hisfood while his parents are
watching freaking tiktok video.
It's crazy man it is crazy.
Speaker 1 (40:56):
Earlier you had mentioned kindness and what was
the other one?
Nice, nice.
So in balance, I think thisquestion's probably got to be
asked.
So you had said someone thatdoesn't set boundaries.
So how can setting boundariesplay a role in achieving this
well-balanced life?
Speaker 2 (41:13):
that is.
I think that's the hardestthing for people.
One of the guys I I'm coachingnow he's an awesome like
businessman, he's a fantastic,but he still has this little
thing about setting boundarieswhere, like, some of the
meetings will just run overRight.
So now his whole time getsscrewed up because he didn't set
that boundary correctly.
(41:34):
Another guy he'll setappointments, but if something
pops up, even if it's not 100%important, he doesn't feel like
he could tell somebody no.
So the other stuff thatactually was set up by
appointment gets pushed off.
And it's all about sometimes youjust got to say freaking no,
man.
And I do the same crap.
(41:56):
There's plenty of times that Iknow that I have to get
something done, but the wifewill come in and go hey, you
know, somebody in the familyneeds this and it's like dude,
if I tell her no, I'm going tobe in trouble.
But sometimes I just got to sayfreaking no man.
No, I got to do this.
This is the most importantthing that I have to do today.
(42:20):
That is their life.
I will help them when I get theopportunity and it's a it's a
delicate, fine line, but it'sone of those ones that you have
to learn and that is definitelya learned skill of being able to
say no, you know what?
I'm not going to go out to havelunch today.
I have other stuff.
That's a bigger priority, likeyou said earlier.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Yeah, absolutely so, for practical strategies and
things like that.
What tips or tricks have youseen for this?
Do you plan the week, do you docalendar reviews, or how have
you found ways to block time and, you know, just kind of set
some of those boundaries?
Speaker 2 (42:57):
So my time blocking thing, what I found works very
good for me I time block 28minutes.
So I try to do everything bylike 28 minutes because I know
at 28 minutes I can be 100%focused and do whatever I do.
But I also know that I needsome movement in my life, right,
because a lot of us will getbehind a computer and we'll sit
(43:18):
there for eight hours straightand they say, you know, sitting
is a new, like cigarette smoking, it's about that bad for your
body.
So I use 28 minute time thingsand I set out my priorities,
whether the number one, two andthree top things, and I aim to
get those done.
And then I have my kind offluff I call it fluff that are
(43:41):
the fillers throughout the day,always getting those Well, not
always, because none of us areperfect and there are a bunch of
days that I miss.
But at least start on it, right.
It's like what's that wholething?
Uh, how to eat an elephant?
One bite at a time, onefreaking bite at a time.
So you have your gigantic goal.
(44:01):
You have your gigantic goal,you break it down from.
You know, say it's a five-yearthing.
You break it down to the year.
You break it down to the month,you break it down to the day,
and then you break it for me.
I break it down to the year.
You break it down to the month,you break it down to the day,
and then you break it For me.
I break it down into 28-minutesessions and I find that works
super, super good for me,because I can even take my
28-minute nap and I feel wayenergized.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
Do you do family planning as well?
That sounded like it was allpersonal stuff.
Do you incorporate the otherfamily members or do anything
like that?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Oh, definitely, and you know, like.
So that's like for the work day, right, 28 minute session, and
then in the night I try to, Ialmost do the same little thing.
If it's 20, you know it doesn'thave to be 28 minutes with the
kids or the wife, but I alwaystry to set a part of the evening
that's just going to be aboutthere.
Work, work, work.
(44:50):
Shut the work off at like five,six o'clock, depending on the
day, right, shut that off andthen we eat.
I get rid of my my phone.
I go, plug my phone in adifferent place, I put it on, do
not disturb, and that's that'show, yeah, I plan that stuff.
Great question, because Ididn't.
I left that part out.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Well, yeah, you're good.
I just need to do better familyplanning.
So I'm trying to write down allthe tips I can.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
I'll tell you what.
Figuring it like a cutoff timeon the phone is huge.
Man, put it in a different spot, put it someplace that you.
It makes it a little moredifficult to get to and you're
going to all of a sudden go thatjust putting on, do not disturb
, put on airplane mode, whateverit is.
Find that time half hour, 45minutes, and it's better for
(45:39):
your sleep anyway, if you quitlooking at it sometime before
five, six, seven o'clock.
Speaker 1 (45:45):
Definitely true.
Well, ernest, let's bring itall together.
That was a lot of goldennuggets, a lot of goodness there
.
What's your final takeaway inthe pillars of happiness,
accountability and balance?
Speaker 2 (45:58):
I think they all go together in our life.
If we can, we can figure outhow to intertwine all those
little things right.
Your happiness to me, likebeing accountable made me a
little more happy.
Happiness To me like beingaccountable made me a little
more happy.
Being a little more happy gaveme more balance in my life.
So it's all about justintegrating those things into
your life and then, with balance, I'm going to go with those
(46:21):
five things.
You've got to learn how to sleep, breathe, eat properly.
Movement and eat, sleep, myfreaking brain and hydration.
You get those five things inthere and that's going to give
you the best opportunity to havebalance, because you're going
to feel better, You're going tofeel more focused, You're going
to have more energy, and whenyou feel better, then that's
(46:43):
where the happiness comes inright.
Physiology drives psychology,because when you feel like crap,
you're usually not happy andall that stuff rolls down.
So instead of rolling it downthe hill, we can roll it up the
hill and you keep feeling better.
Take accountability, becauseyou're the only person that has
control of what you're thinkingand how you respond to stuff.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
Absolutely Well, Ernest.
Thank you for coming out.
I'd love your feedback.
Share your questions orfeedback on Instagram, Facebook,
TikTok, YouTube or Buzzsprout.
Engage with us and we mighthear your suggestion on an
upcoming episode.
If you want to come on the show, let me know that too.
Share some goodness, help oneanother.
I love you all.
See ya, Bye-bye, Thank you.
Welcome everyone.
I'm Nate Shearer, your host,and this is Mindforce, a podcast
that's all about diving intolove, life and learning.
Here, your mind matters.
Today, we'll be talking abouthappiness, accountability and
balance.
Let's start with a quickintroduction.
Tell us a little bit aboutyourself.
Who are you, what do you do andwhat brings you here today?
Speaker 2 (00:45):
yourself.
Who are you, what do you do andwhat brings you here today?
My name is Ernest Wood and Icoach men.
I say now is like everybody hastheir own definition of
happiness or legacy and I helpmen to find theirs, be able to
look in the mirror and go, hey,I like that freaking guy.
I think in our world that a lotof people we kind of lose
ourself.
We get wrapped up in trying tochase everybody else's dreams of
(01:08):
what we should be doing.
And yeah, that's where I got.
I got into a spot where Ididn't really like myself.
I didn't like the guy I saw inthe mirror.
I went on a long journey, tookme a lot of work and a lot of,
I'll say, falls on the face.
I wrote a book it's calledAsshole to Awesome A Journey to
(01:29):
Joy and Happiness, and when Ifinally finished the book, I
started chatting with otherpeople and I was finding that a
lot of people had that sameissue.
They just couldn't figure outhow to get fixed.
Like you know, we all read theself-help books and and we it's
almost like going on a diet,right, so many people go on a
diet, yet in two months therethey weigh five pounds more than
(01:52):
they were before they startedthe diet and, uh, I find that,
like self-help was almost thesame thing.
So that's what I do now.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Okay, perfect.
And just to set the scene,where in the world are you
calling from?
San Diego, california, nice,that's a good one.
Right there, that's a new one.
We've been all over the place,but San Diego, that's a new one.
One question I got just rightoff the bat how do you define
success?
I feel like that's such aninteresting thing.
People want to get wrapped upin money and cars and all the
(02:22):
things.
Read through some stuff on yourwebsite about how you were
chasing money.
You know how did you used todefine success and how do you
currently define success?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
That is a great question and I think many almost
every man kind of goes throughthese different seasons, or
pretty much everybody goesthrough different seasons.
When we were young I used toknow everything was just about
money, like I just wanted asmuch money as I could so I could
have the best car that I couldpossibly have, maybe take, you
know, some vacations, play golf,anywhere.
(02:55):
It was all like to me it wasall just because that's kind of
what I saw on movies or theinternet or whatever right, and
I always had the want to, youknow, succeed.
But it was then I got caught inthe rat race, right, because
you get, you find a job and itpays you the right amount of
(03:17):
money, pays you just enough tokeep you there while you do just
enough to work to stay there,kind of deal.
And now, like after finallyfiguring out who I was, it's in
like my definition of legacysuccess is just being it's
finding that happiness and Ifind it it's like a freedom,
(03:40):
because when you can actuallyenjoy what you're doing and
you're giving back to people andmaybe you can affect somebody's
life a little in a positive way.
That's my idea of success now,and doing an act of kindness
every day.
That's one of my big thingsthat I always try to do.
I'm not 100% on it, but that ismy definition of success now,
(04:04):
not 100% on it.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
But that is my definition of success.
Now, yeah, that's perfect.
Yeah, we had a person on theshow.
She went over kindness, thatwas her whole thing and she said
the same thing.
I'm not perfect, you know.
When I'm out in the car andsomeone cuts me off, I get
frustrated, just like everyoneelse.
But thinking about it andhaving that intentionality
behind it to want to take careof others and open the door, and
things like that, I think justthinking about it is a step in
the right direction, even if youdon't get to it every day, just
(04:27):
thinking about it.
Well, let's move into thewarmup.
First question I have for youwhat does happiness mean to you
and how has your definitionevolved over time?
So I guess this is very similarto success, but do you have any
differences on happiness?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
No, it's pretty much the same.
I mean happiness.
Like I said before, I wasalways thought I'll be happy
when I get more, I'll be happywhen this happens or happy when
that happens, but until you'rehappy with who you are and what
you are inside, you're nevergoing to ever, in my opinion,
you're never going to truly behappy.
(05:04):
You're always going to bechasing something that's not
internal to you.
Like I have a my little sayingis you gotta be, you gotta learn
to be happy with who you arewithout being satisfied where
you're at?
Because if you're, if you getthe, the difference with that
is's like if you get satisfied,you get stagnant, right, if
(05:27):
we're not constantly growing,we're falling behind and that's
just the way of the world.
So yeah, finding that happiness, and I just think it's just an
internal thing where you knowyou can look in the mirror and
go, hey, I like that dude.
He's doing what he can.
He's not perfect, he knows he'snot perfect, but he's a pretty
(05:49):
freaking good dude and he'sdoing the best he can.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yeah, I think I got to see if you can expand a
little bit, because the firstthing I thought of is goals
right, you want to accomplishthings, you want to set things
down the road.
So how do you distinguishbetween goals and that feeling
of I'll be happy when you dowant goals?
Right, but how do you balancethat?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I think this is one of the biggest things I ever
learned was being like.
Even on my book it's titledasshole, right.
Awesome is the far away thingthat I know.
I'm never going to be like 100%awesome.
It's kind of like my perfection, right.
But if I'm always making smallsteps to be a little more
(06:36):
awesome every day, then that'sthat goal thing.
Right.
I have a ton of goals andthat's why I say never be
satisfied Like you got to beagain happy where you're at.
That goal thing.
Right, I have the ton of goalsand that's why I say never be
satisfied Like you.
You gotta be again happy whereyou're at.
Like you have to find thatinternal happiness because when
you're happy and you know likethe process that you're trying,
(06:57):
you know where you're headed andyou're enjoying that process,
when bad crap comes up which isgoing to come up, we all know
that there's never.
You're, you're never going togo down a smooth, freaking road,
right, but when you can enjoythe process and then when those
little obstacles, or even bigobstacles, obstacles come up,
(07:18):
you just handle them, you justyou move around them, you figure
out a way to over around, evendig a tunnel to get underneath
it Before, when I wasn't likemyself.
Anytime an obstacle came up, Iwas a whiny little crybaby man.
I would whine and bitch andmoan, you know, at the job and
anywhere.
(07:38):
I figured in my childhood.
You know we all have ourstories.
My childhood wasn't the easiestso I always figured man, I went
through excuse my term, but Iwent through enough stuff.
Man, like I don't need any moreobstacles.
But now that, like, I foundthat internal thing obstacles
are fine, man, it's likeobstacles are the way.
(08:00):
I think there's even a booktitled that.
Right, there is by Ryan Holiday.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Yeah, he's awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
I've read a lot of his stuff, uh, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So like now, I almost look forward to some of the
obstacles because it I know I'mmoving in the right direction
yeah, I think there's like adifference between the emotion
of happiness and likecontentment or joy, or maybe
using a synonym for the sameword, because I think happiness
is more of the emotion andpeople want to feel it all the
(08:29):
time, but you're not going tofeel it all the time.
It's same with motivationyou're not going to feel it all
the time, but content or youknow whatever word you'd like to
put in there, and so I think alot of times the emotion gets
confused with the thing thatshould go on all the time.
It's like I feel good all thetime.
We're not saying you're goingto feel good all the time.
Like you said, you knowNewton's law or not?
Newton?
Who's the guy that messesthings up all the time?
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Murphy's law.
Speaker 1 (08:51):
Murphy's law.
There we go.
Murphy is there to just messstuff up, so we know stuff's
going to get messed up, but ifyou're being content and enjoy,
I feel like I prefer the termjoy, because joy can't really be
taken necessarily Like you'recontent, you're good with family
, everything feels good.
You're going to go throughstruggles but you can still have
joy, Happiness.
I feel like kind of comes andgo.
(09:12):
It feels like more likemotivation to me, but that's a
great reminder.
Next question I had for you wason accountability.
Trying to move through some ofthese pillars you got, Can you
think of a moment whenaccountability played a major
role in your personal growth?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
man, accountability was a super hard one, because I
was kind of that guy who, just,I love to blame everybody else
for all my crap.
You know, if the job wasn'tgoing well, oh that dude screwed
up more than I screwed up.
You know, even when I was, youknow, driving, I had horrible
road rage and it was always well, it was that guy's fault or
(09:51):
that girl's fault.
You know, like they can't drive.
What I learned was just takingthe only thing that you are in
control of in your entire lifeis your thoughts and how you
respond to stuff.
And I took a hundred percentaccountability in it.
(10:11):
And now, like, when I make amistake, I right away, I
freaking, just apologize orwhatever.
If I there's somebody toapologize to and if I, just I
just yeah, a hundred percent,like it, my, it's my reason, I,
I'm the reason, I'm there, right.
Even in a, even in a trafficjam, I try to say I'm the reason
(10:33):
I'm there, right, it's, youknow, like it's not everybody
else's fault there and it's just.
And when you can actually justtake accountability for
everything in your life, knowingthat the only thing you can
truly control is your thoughtsand how you respond to something
, it just makes it so mucheasier, man, and then you don't,
(10:54):
you're not in that victim andthat blame mentality.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Yeah, the victim mindset is is rough.
One of my favorite guys, kerwinRay Ray.
He actually passed away, Ithink late last year, but uh, he
said the sooner you take ahundred percent of the
responsibilities for everythingthat's happened in your life is
your fault, the better thingswill get.
Everything.
I mean you could try to go downthe road of the family and
whatnot.
But all the choices you've madethrough, however many years of
(11:20):
your life, those are all yourfault, you know, regardless of
the cards you were dealt.
So so that's a.
It's a really good one.
And the last one I have in thewarmup is what's one small habit
that's changed the way youmaintain balance in your life?
Speaker 2 (11:32):
I want to say the small habit is I learned about
breathing.
Breathing to me is it goes withsleep, but breathing is my
fundamental thing during the day.
I 100% make sure that I nosebreathe as much as humanly
possible.
There's a saying that youshould breathe through your
mouth as often as you eatthrough your nose Pretty much
(11:57):
never, right?
And if you look around ourworld today, man, they say like
60 to 70 percent of people mouthbreathe in it.
And when I learned to nosebreathe exclusively, even during
my workouts I like and I try towork out pretty hard I try to
only nose breathe.
There's a story about theSpartans when they train their
(12:20):
kids.
You know, physically what theydid was take a mouthful of water
.
They had to do their 10K runand come back with that same
amount of water.
They were not allowed to.
You know, obviously, if you'reholding water in your mouth,
they're not breathing through it.
I have found that it is huge.
I mean, it helps with mentalclarity and it really makes my
(12:45):
days go a lot better becauseanytime I start getting stressed
out, I do my mindful breathing.
It brings down my anxietylevels and I actually cured my
depression.
Depression ran in my familyforever.
My uncle killed himself.
My grandma basically slept onthe couch and withered away.
(13:05):
Until you know, my mom hadissues with it, my brother had
issues with it.
I had days where I felt likethis big, nasty black cloud was
on my head, but since I'velearned how to breathe, man, I
haven't had one day ofdepression.
I still feel like crap somedays, but not depression.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Yeah, that's different, right?
Yeah, I lost my grandma tomental health, so that's why one
of the reasons I kicked off theshow.
But I wanted to ask what doesthat look like?
Can you walk us through?
Do you close your eyes?
Are you sitting a certain wayLike what does that?
Do you know if someone hasnever done any deep breathing or
anything like that?
You know?
Can you walk us through, kindof what those moments look like
when someone sets like theeasiest one that, like I do I
(13:46):
don't even know.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Probably at least I try to do it at least once an
hour or, yeah, about once anhour.
This is besides meditation andthe wim hof breathing.
But you sit up like super tall,kind of like your superman pose
, uh, chin down just a littlebit a deep in through the nose
and it's going to be about a sixto seven second through the
(14:08):
nose and you're down into thebelly right, hold for like one
second and then out through thenose and you do that and it's
going to be out through the noseslightly longer than you did in
through the nose.
So like, say, if you do a sixsecond in, do a seven second out
Something you know really closeyou don't have to be put your
timer on or anything but doingthat you're connected to your
(14:31):
parasympathetic nervous systemand it's almost like flipping a
switch, man, I mean, when you'regetting worked up and you just
do two of those little breaths.
It's like I had to give you astory.
My grandson was having it likealmost an anxiety attack.
I mean, he couldn't catch hisbreath.
He's just like shaking hisstuff.
And I talked to him and I'mlike do the nose, let's go
(14:52):
through the nose.
And we worked, you know, acouple of times.
We got him like five to sixseconds and then all of a sudden
, two breaths, he was done, hewas breathing, he was cool, very
able to go.
Done, he was breathing, he wascool, very able to go.
I'm telling you, man, andthat's you know, they say the
diaphragm is the least usedmuscle in the entire body
because we all forget to, youknow, use it while we're
breathing.
(15:13):
You see people breathing, theregoes, you know, and there's,
there's all kinds of bats likepeople over breathe nowadays.
Over breathing doesn't allowfor that carbon dioxide buildup
which pushes the oxygen into thestream.
That's one of the major badthings about mouth breathing
also.
But yeah, just that littlereset man, six to seven seconds
(15:34):
in, seven to eight out, with aone second hold only using the
nose, using the diaphragm.
It's beautiful.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Good stuff.
Well, before we get into yourthree main pillars, I wanted to
see if you had a question for meno, not yet, man.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
I think you.
You throw some great stuffright in the middle there.
You add on some awesome thingsyeah, I got a curiosity.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
It was born into me, so I gotta know a little bit
more.
So your first main pillar ishappiness.
How many people chase happinessbut struggle to find it?
What do you think are the keyingredients to lasting happiness
, or joy, as I like to say?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And that's why I like to say that everybody has their
own definition of it, because Iagree with you.
I'm going to just switch aroundreal quick.
But I use the same thing withnice and kindness, right,
because to me I hate that word.
Nice it's like if you look itup, it's something like ignorant
person or whatever.
Like that's a true definitionor where it stemmed from.
(16:33):
And if you watch how the worldacts, right, the nice people
usually get taken advantage of.
They have no boundaries andkind, and.
But if you're kind, you knowyour boundaries and you're also
helping.
And that's where, like, I usehappiness and you can use joy or
content in that same way.
So maybe I might have to moveit around from happiness because
(16:54):
you know, like you startedmaking my brain think about it,
but, uh, I have to bring thatquestion back around because I
just oh you're good.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
What do you think are the key ingredients to lasting
happiness?
You said you know it works.
For a couple months, you know,and then you're back on the diet
.
You're five pounds up.
What makes it stick?
Speaker 2 (17:15):
What I found that made it stick was actually
internalizing it, right?
So many people and this was meis you're always chasing the
definition of like somebodyelse's definition of it, right?
You, like a lot of us, do.
You know our neighbor got a newcar, so if I get a new car I'm
going to be happy too, right,and we're trying to always
(17:37):
impress the person that.
So rats man, like we, you seeit all the time keeping up with
the Joneses, right?
But once you learn happinessand like you're happy with who
you are, it just lasts like it's.
It's not something to that youhave to chase like you're going
to have.
Because I always say thisanalogy it's like having you
(17:57):
know your GPS on your phone Ifyour current location isn't on,
it's not going to take you towhere you want to go.
And that's where so many of usdon't know where we're even
(18:17):
starting from.
And I think that's the hardspot with like self-improvement
also right, because we justdon't know where we're at.
Like we have so many littletriggers, little things that
twist us up, little knots insideour backpack full of freaking
rocks that we just keep addingto.
And that's where that wholeknowing who you are, knowing
(18:41):
what makes you tick, knowingwhat causes your triggers, and
get eliminating those and, uh,getting rid of some of those
knots inside.
And breathing is gonna.
You know, learning meditation,it helps get rid of those knots,
man, letting that, I mean, mostpeople can't sit in a room by
their self for two minuteswithout having some kind of
(19:02):
outside stimulation going on.
Yeah, I got to grab that phoneRight To me, man.
I love like I could sit here inmy little room and breathe for
hours on it and it just it openseverything up.
And then all of a sudden, whenI'm done doing it, man, I feel
like a freaking genius becausemy brain's working right.
(19:23):
I'm like, oh crap, all this.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Yeah, so, yeah, do you have any exercises or
anything for someone thatthey're not sure what their like
focal point is in life?
Is there a way to like workthrough it with words or
identifying what's important toyou?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
what I always have people do is you're going to do
it in about and it's going totake about three days.
So one day you're going to doit in about and it's going to
take about three days.
So one day you're going to setyour clock for five minutes and
just brainstorm, like writehappy in the middle or whatever
your word is right, write it inthe middle, and just continually
write for five minutes whateverpops in your mind.
(20:00):
I mean, even some of the crapmight not even fit in there,
right, but whatever fits.
You know, like whatever youthink, just write, write, write,
write and at the end of it kindof see what comes up, and then
kind of circle or put it into anorder and then leave it alone.
And then the next day you comeback and you're going to do it
again for five minutes, sameword, just brainstorm as much
(20:23):
crap.
Some of that stuff's not goingto be exactly the same and some
of it's going to be different.
And then the third day, samething.
Or the second day you're stillgoing to find the little common
themes, right.
Third day you do the same thing.
But now you look at all thethings and a lot of times you're
going to have this commonalityand then you can grab those
(20:45):
right and like, hey, maybe maybeyou find gardening like every
time you think of happiness,gardening pops up right.
So now, now you start a littlegarden, you start something that
that's going to trigger that,whatever that internal thing is.
Or maybe you figured out, whenyou put happiness maybe a bunch
of triggers started popping up,like every time, like I've had a
(21:09):
couple people do that is, theydid this exercise, but what they
found was all the crap thatdidn't make them happy.
So what we did was they foundall this crap that didn't make
them happy and we just startedlike trying to eliminate them.
Right, like you know, at theend of the day, they would sit
on the couch and drink a beer,so, and they, so what we do, we
(21:31):
got rid of the beer for you know, the one beer, and we had them
do a walk or do some push-upsinstead, and then all of a
sudden, like how his mindset setmindset shifted was he wasn't
looking at the stuff that didn'tmake him happy.
Now he started looking at thestuff that didn't make him happy
.
Now he started looking at thestuff that made him happy,
because so many people don'teven ever take that time to
(21:51):
think, hey, what actually makesme happier, makes me enjoy life?
Right, we're always thinkingabout I got to do this or I
can't do this, or right.
And then adding gratitude to itis three things every single
morning, write something thatyou're grateful for.
One about you, one about, likeyour spouse or, you know, a
(22:12):
partner, whatever.
And then one about the world.
And that's proven, and I thinkit's four or five weeks.
Just doing that every dayincreases your happiness.
25%, that's like.
There's a proven study on that.
Wow, you just take that to thebank, that's guaranteed 25%,
that's like there's a provenstudy on that.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Wow, you just take that to the bank, that's
guaranteed 25%.
We like that, that's good stuff.
It's pretty guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
You still got to work on your brain, though.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
I love the actionable tips and tricks.
I feel like a lot of self-help,it's like hypothetical and
things like that.
So I love the things.
You just do it and it'll workout.
We actually did one at work.
Our big boss, brigadier GeneralFlowers, he lives in DC, he did
a values exercise and it waspretty, pretty difficult.
(22:54):
It seemed like it was going tobe very simple and very easy and
it's funny, the simple thingseven turned out to be kind of
difficult because it had a pagefull of words and you circled 15
words and you're like, okay, Ireally like these family friends
, you know the things that jumpout at.
You're like, okay, but then youhad to go and make the 15 into
10.
So then you're giving away fiveof those and then you start to
(23:15):
feel a little weird and then yougot to take the 10 down to five
and so then you're reducingagain and feeling like that
feeling of you know, giving theones away or you know the rack
and stack of that priority inyour head was kind of difficult.
You're like, oh cool, the 15was easy, but when you get down
to five, like what actually arethey?
Are you able to, you know, giveup some of these things, and
that's where it was a littledifficult to get down to five.
(23:37):
I did it a couple of times justto see if it was kind of the
same.
But you know it lined up.
I think three or four out ofthe five are all the same, so
it's a good exercise.
It seems good on both sides.
I like the idea of thinking thethings that you don't need
anymore, Because I feel like alot of times those are just
there by default.
I feel like that person wasprobably grabbing the beer at
night, you know, not thinkinganything of it.
Do I really need it?
(23:57):
Probably not.
You know, it's not helping oneway or another, just one.
It's not really doing much ofanything, but I could be doing
something more productivebreathing, walking, doing
something else.
I think a lot of times we thinkwe don't have enough time, we
don't prioritize.
Well, I know like I've neededto do things and I feel like I
don't have time, but somehoweverything seems to get done if
I sit down and actuallyprioritize.
(24:18):
So it's prioritizing, not theamount of time.
I wanted to ask about difficulttimes, so I feel like it's
pretty easy.
You had mentioned the car orwork's going well.
You're making, you know, decentmoney.
You know how do you get peoplethrough and cultivate that
happiness during the difficulttimes.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Difficult.
Like I said, man, difficulttimes are those things that I
used to hate them.
It was just like and I alwaysblamed, I always blamed somebody
else for my difficult times.
And that I think it comes backto taking accountability, man,
and knowing that you know thatdifficult time is probably there
because something that you didin the past right, or or a skill
(25:02):
that you haven't learned yet.
And then when you takeaccountability or responsibility
for everything that's in yourlife, it's easier to you know,
not get upset by them.
And then also knowing thatwe're not freaking perfect, man.
You're not perfect, I'm notperfect.
None of us are ever perfect,ever perfect.
(25:24):
There's gonna be a bunch ofcrappy days.
Even you remember that guy.
What was his name?
Orton.
He was a workout guy likefabulous shape, tokyo, yeah,
yeah, like he did an interviewand he's like probably one of
the most in shape people in theworld.
And they were like okay, you do, you do.
You know you're constantlyexercising, so you must feel
(25:45):
great every single day.
And he was like, oh hell, no,he was like dude, 75 percent of
the time.
I don't feel like doing thiscrap Right, even that guy.
And he's like one of the mostpositive people that I ever seen
and he still said he didn'tfeel like working out 75% of the
time.
The difference betweensucceeding and not succeeding is
(26:07):
when you don't feel like doingit, you still push yourself to
get the crap done.
Like you said earlier, haveyour little priorities in check
and check off those little.
Whatever the priority is ofthat day, and some days you're
going to feel fantastic andthose things are just going to
check off with ease.
Other days, every single one ofthem, is going to be a grind.
(26:28):
But it's all about like knowingyour why, knowing where you're
headed, what your big goal is,enjoying the process, knowing
that if you just keep pluggingaway at the process, that you're
going to get to where you wantto go and that's, that's how I
make it through those.
Those crappy days.
(26:49):
Believe me, I've been having afew of them myself lately and
I've been like holy crap, man.
I just go back to writing in myjournal doing the process,
doing the gratitude.
You just gotta gotta, you gottaenjoy that process, man.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I think words are important too.
I always try to draw on a pieceof paper if I'm not feeling it.
I try to write the wordconsistency over the word
motivation, because consistencywins every time.
Motivation, it comes and goes,but consistency.
I work out from 6 to 7 everymorning.
I don't like getting up at 5.
And you know getting some foodin and doing all those things.
(27:26):
But I know if I get to three orfour o'clock in the afternoon
after I'm done with work, I'mdefinitely not going to want to
do it.
So get it in early, not bychoice, but just to have that
consistency.
And another person I had on theshow, joe Rodonis.
He works for Tonal, the workoutmirror.
I love it.
One of the things I love thathe talks about is non-negotiable
.
That's like one of my favoritethings that he says like it just
(27:48):
helps solidify, even thoughit's just words.
It's like words matter andwords mean something.
So non-negotiable, like I don'teven have to think there's no
thinking that thing is going tohappen.
And so he talks about like hisworkout routine is
non-negotiable If he on monday,wednesday, friday, like it's
going to happen monday,wednesday, friday, if he feels
like it doesn't feel like it.
But hearing like that mantra inthe back of your head
(28:10):
non-negotiable it's like I wantto start to go down this path
and have my mind start to work.
But once I hear itnon-negotiable, that's all it
means.
That's it like there's nothingto think about.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
I'm going so yeah I was gonna say I just worked out
with joe this morning.
I don't know he's awesome, uh,but a good way of like just to
go along.
Exactly what you're saying.
Non-negotiable is I set up mydays or my morning is like a big
old algorithm, right, if, if Ido this and then I do this and
(28:42):
the more things that you can setup like that, because
discipline is almost like alittle water bottle, right, you
have this much during the dayand if you spend it all in the
morning trying to just get outof bed by the end of the day,
you're going to have a reallylow level of discipline.
Um, I think, did we lose you?
(29:03):
Did I lose you?
Were you back?
There it goes.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Sorry about that, man , you're good, you're good.
Hopefully I didn't cut you off.
Next question Do you believehappiness is a choice or
something that comes naturally?
Speaker 2 (29:15):
No happiness is definitely a choice man.
It does not come naturally.
No-transcript.
I think happiness is definitelysomething that you have to work
at a little bit, but once youfind it, it makes it a little
(29:35):
easier.
I don't know where I got cutoff, because I just wanted to
add to the algorithm thing Didyou hear yeah?
absolutely, because thealgorithm thing and like it
gives me my best chance ofhaving the best day possible.
Like, my algorithm in themorning is if I wake up, I drink
eight ounces of water with mypinch of Celtic sea salt and
then I do my breathing.
(29:56):
If I do my breathing, I do myworkout and I just everything's
piled like that Right.
And what I have found is thathelps with my happiness too,
because when I just when I knowwhat's coming and what's going
and I don't have any stress inthe morning, man, this thing is
acting up.
Is it mine or yours, you think?
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I don't know.
It seems fine and every timeyou seem to say algorithm it
gets mad.
It must be AI or something.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
It must be, it's like oh hell.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
no, did you make it all the way through?
Huh, did you make it all theway through the algorithm?
Speaker 2 (30:28):
or did it not?
record yeah, it got enough of it, you understand.
I mean, we'll get the picture,but what I was trying to say is,
if you have a good morningroutine and a night routine, it
gives you the best chance ofhaving a good day, right?
Because most people, a lot ofpeople, wake up in the morning.
They don't know what they'regoing to do, so they start
running around and all of asudden they find theirself going
(30:49):
to work 10 to 15 minutesrunning behind and they get
stuck in the traffic.
But having that nice littlemorning routine of some
breathing, some movement, someexercise, some stretching gets
everything flowing.
So I'll just leave it therewith that, since I keep breaking
up.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
Yeah, I mean that's a really good reminder.
I think it's the simple thingswe want it to be, these large
things.
And I know I'd heard to likeput out my workout clothes the
night before, and for thelongest time I think I went
years and I didn't do that.
I just got moved to the UK.
So I've been out here for aboutseven months and, like I said,
been on that six to seveno'clock workout routine and,
geez, putting out your clothesis so good.
(31:28):
I should have done that such along time ago.
I got my shoes out, I puteverything out.
It literally takes me aprobably one, one whole minute
to put my stuff out and it is somuch easier to just pop out of
bed and get to the clothes.
They're all piled there,they're nice and ready to go,
and like I don't think about itbecause I want to say, oh well,
I'm cold, or I don't want tograb my shoes, or well, I don't
(31:49):
know if I'm going to have socksor the socks I like or some
crazy thing, because the mind isjust so powerful, but when it's
there, like that one minutejust makes the whole morning so
much better.
So absolutely a great reminder.
Your next pillar isaccountability.
So how do you thinkaccountability contributes to
personal and professionalsuccess?
Speaker 2 (32:11):
Yeah, man, using that accountability you're just
because everything that comes inyour life is what you're
bringing into it Again.
I think that the only thing wehave control of is our thoughts
and our response, and onceyou're able to do that with life
and work, now you're not goingto be complaining about.
You know Johnny over there atthe water cooler, you know
(32:34):
wasting time because you can'tcontrol what he's going to do.
All you can control is yourstuff, your thing.
You can be the best employee,best version of yourself, and
that's where that accountabilitycomes in.
It's just you can't controlanybody else's stuff, man.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
And how do you do that Like, how do you, how do
people create a mindset wherethey're starting to embrace that
responsibility rather thanblame everywhere else?
How does that shift?
Like it sounds great.
How does that shift occur?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It took a lot of freaking work, man, but, like
again, I started it withbreathing, like I could not get,
I couldn't do it until, like, Ifinally learned how to control
or slow down my brain.
Right, because so many we liveoff our subconscious mind I
think what's the numbers 80, 85of the day is just controlled by
(33:26):
our subconscious mind.
We just do what we always havedone.
And that is the problem.
Like we just always do whatwe've always done.
And if, if, if, sometime in ourlife we became a whiner and we
got rewarded for it somehow, youknow, either by a little
dopamine hit from us or somebodyoutside of you.
(33:46):
So yeah, that guy's a dumbass.
So now you feel like you feltvalidated for saying it right.
So that's how that bad habitgot created.
And now to get the good habitit's kind of like what you said
before you have to make itsimple, you know, like by
putting your clothes out.
That's how you created the goodhabit, right, but getting rid
(34:07):
of bad habits can be done thesame way.
It's like making them hard toget to.
And and that's with thataccountability.
You want to make it simple atthe beginning, definitely make
it super simple, like every timethere was a little thing.
It's called like rocket ship Iwish I could think of the lady's
name.
But every single time that Icame up with a thought that I
(34:30):
wanted to do, like, say, workout, or if I wanted to go get water
, and but I was sitting theredoing something else I would.
It's like you can't five, four,three, two, one and you have to
go do it.
Right, you don't like, youdon't allow your brain to take
over or the subconscious to takeover and go nah, you don't need
it right now.
And I had to.
(34:53):
So I was doing that with thegood things, and then every time
that I had a bad thing come uplike, hey, go get some candy.
I had to switch that right.
I can't go five, four, three,two, one and go grab the candy.
What I would do is switch it to, making it harder to do.
So it was before I got thecandy.
I had to go do 50 pushups orwhatever it was, and by the time
(35:16):
I did my pushups I didn't wantthe candy.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
I don't know, it's just angry.
I don't know it's the weatherit's a full moon or something.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
Man, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
It's all good stuff so far.
It'll just make editing alittle bit more fun.
Yeah, but we like challenges.
Did you finish what you weresaying?
Sort of and you might have hada little F word in there too,
but yeah, I'm just throwing youoff here.
The next question I had were wetalked about practical things.
I love the practical ideas andtips and tricks.
(35:45):
So what are some practical waysto hold yourself accountable?
Have you found like differentapps, or what are some ways to
actually hold yourselfaccountable?
Speaker 2 (35:55):
So I do.
I believe I'm a big guybeliever in journaling.
Every single day at the end ofthe night I go through and I
have like a little checklist.
Those are my, like my,algorithm, right, when I wake up
, I have to, I have to check offthose things and then also,
like reflection, you, you haveto look off those things and
then, also, like reflection, youhave to look back at the end of
the day and go, hey, was I goodat this part?
(36:16):
Or you know, like, where did I?
You have to know where youscrewed up and where you were
good at right.
You celebrate the good ones andyou kind of just give yourself
a little hey, I got to getbetter on the bad ones.
I also use Heroic.
It's an app that, uh, by BrianJohnson.
It's pretty cool.
It has all my little virtues onthere.
And then what I like toaccomplish in the three
(36:38):
different things that he uses, Iuse it.
And if you don't, you know,just get a journal, get a book,
it is super easy and just alwaysbe able to, you know, reflect
and think about what you didbetter today than you did
yesterday, because the wholegoal is just getting 1% better
every day and that might soundcliche, but if you do that
(37:01):
enough and your, your target isthat 1% better every day, you're
going to be.
Speaker 1 (37:07):
You're going to be a total different person at the
end of a year and you'd beamazed at what you can
accomplish I feel like the mostcliche things in life seems to
be the most true and accurate,because I feel like sometimes
I'm a walking cliche, like Ifeel like it's true.
One thing I love I didn't seeit until I was older, but
(37:27):
benjamin franklin had hisjournal published like in the
museum or whatever it was, andin the beginning, or you know
the very bottom, of his journalit said what good will I do
today?
And it had all the time slotsfor the day.
And at the end it said whatgood did I do today?
And so he would come back andreflect like, did I do good?
Did I help someone?
(37:47):
Did I do the thing I said I wasgoing to do in the morning?
And that was the first timeI've seen like that far back
where someone was not only doingthe initial things.
I feel like the front is easy,let's do these things this week,
but then we never look back onFriday, like, did I even do the
things that I was supposed to?
Like bullet journaling you passthe things forward or things
like that.
But journaling, that's a supergood reminder.
(38:11):
Your last pillar is balance.
So work, relationships,personal well-being, often being
pulled in all sorts ofdifferent directions.
How do you define this balance?
I kind of hate the wordwork-life balance.
I don't think it's really abalance, but what are your
thoughts on defining balance?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Can I go back to accountability real quick and
I'll jump back Absolutely quickand I'll jump back.
And a good thing aboutaccountability is a lot of times
we're in a position where we'reat because we lack the
discipline, right?
So this is where getting acoach comes in.
I've had to get coaches a lotand I always avoided coach.
(38:47):
I hated my coaches.
I was always the jerk at theend of the bench or on the court
talking crap, and.
But now I found that, like,coaches can hold you accountable
until you get to a certain likebest players and the best
people in the world all havecoaches to hold them accountable
to getting to where they wantto go.
So I'm going to end that withthe accountability.
Come back over to balance.
(39:08):
I was all about like, when Ifirst started doing this, it was
all about balance.
I was trying to preach balance,right, everybody gets locked up
with balance because everybodyautomatically thinks it has to
be like a perfect set of time,right, eight hours, yeah, it has
to be eight hours of this,eight hours of that and eight
hours of that where I'm not inbalance.
(39:29):
But it's like balance is for me.
You have your little things inlife, right, you have to have
your physical health, yourmental health, your
relationships, spiritual, andyou know your financial, and
they all need some touching hereand there.
You know you have to payattention to them.
They don't have to be eighthours, eight hours, eight hours,
(39:52):
but they all deserve their owntime slot.
Right, and I'll give you anexample.
Is, you know, sometimes whenyou're starting a business,
you're going to be working 12 to13 hours out of that day and
your family is not going to getthat time that they deserve.
They deserve, but if youcommunicate properly and you let
(40:13):
and you let them in on thewhole process and the journey
that you're on and include themin it, now, now you've given
them the respect that theydeserve by including them and
yeah, you know.
And then you tell them hey look, I might only have 20 minutes
for you today, but it's going tobe the best minutes of the day.
I'm not going to have my phoneon, it's going to be off, it's
(40:35):
just going to be about you andme for 20 minutes.
And, if you think about it,that's probably better than a
lot of freaking parents aredoing with their children right
now, because you see them at therestaurant and the little kids
are sitting there choking on hisfood while his parents are
watching freaking tiktok video.
It's crazy man it is crazy.
Speaker 1 (40:56):
Earlier you had mentioned kindness and what was
the other one?
Nice, nice.
So in balance, I think thisquestion's probably got to be
asked.
So you had said someone thatdoesn't set boundaries.
So how can setting boundariesplay a role in achieving this
well-balanced life?
Speaker 2 (41:13):
that is.
I think that's the hardestthing for people.
One of the guys I I'm coachingnow he's an awesome like
businessman, he's a fantastic,but he still has this little
thing about setting boundarieswhere, like, some of the
meetings will just run overRight.
So now his whole time getsscrewed up because he didn't set
that boundary correctly.
(41:34):
Another guy he'll setappointments, but if something
pops up, even if it's not 100%important, he doesn't feel like
he could tell somebody no.
So the other stuff thatactually was set up by
appointment gets pushed off.
And it's all about sometimes youjust got to say freaking no,
man.
And I do the same crap.
(41:56):
There's plenty of times that Iknow that I have to get
something done, but the wifewill come in and go hey, you
know, somebody in the familyneeds this and it's like dude,
if I tell her no, I'm going tobe in trouble.
But sometimes I just got to sayfreaking no man.
No, I got to do this.
This is the most importantthing that I have to do today.
(42:20):
That is their life.
I will help them when I get theopportunity and it's a it's a
delicate, fine line, but it'sone of those ones that you have
to learn and that is definitelya learned skill of being able to
say no, you know what?
I'm not going to go out to havelunch today.
I have other stuff.
That's a bigger priority, likeyou said earlier.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Yeah, absolutely so, for practical strategies and
things like that.
What tips or tricks have youseen for this?
Do you plan the week, do you docalendar reviews, or how have
you found ways to block time and, you know, just kind of set
some of those boundaries?
Speaker 2 (42:57):
So my time blocking thing, what I found works very
good for me I time block 28minutes.
So I try to do everything bylike 28 minutes because I know
at 28 minutes I can be 100%focused and do whatever I do.
But I also know that I needsome movement in my life, right,
because a lot of us will getbehind a computer and we'll sit
(43:18):
there for eight hours straightand they say, you know, sitting
is a new, like cigarette smoking, it's about that bad for your
body.
So I use 28 minute time thingsand I set out my priorities,
whether the number one, two andthree top things, and I aim to
get those done.
And then I have my kind offluff I call it fluff that are
(43:41):
the fillers throughout the day,always getting those Well, not
always, because none of us areperfect and there are a bunch of
days that I miss.
But at least start on it, right.
It's like what's that wholething?
Uh, how to eat an elephant?
One bite at a time, onefreaking bite at a time.
So you have your gigantic goal.
(44:01):
You have your gigantic goal,you break it down from.
You know, say it's a five-yearthing.
You break it down to the year.
You break it down to the month,you break it down to the day,
and then you break it for me.
I break it down to the year.
You break it down to the month,you break it down to the day,
and then you break it For me.
I break it down into 28-minutesessions and I find that works
super, super good for me,because I can even take my
28-minute nap and I feel wayenergized.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
Do you do family planning as well?
That sounded like it was allpersonal stuff.
Do you incorporate the otherfamily members or do anything
like that?
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Oh, definitely, and you know, like.
So that's like for the work day, right, 28 minute session, and
then in the night I try to, Ialmost do the same little thing.
If it's 20, you know it doesn'thave to be 28 minutes with the
kids or the wife, but I alwaystry to set a part of the evening
that's just going to be aboutthere.
Work, work, work.
(44:50):
Shut the work off at like five,six o'clock, depending on the
day, right, shut that off andthen we eat.
I get rid of my my phone.
I go, plug my phone in adifferent place, I put it on, do
not disturb, and that's that'show, yeah, I plan that stuff.
Great question, because Ididn't.
I left that part out.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Well, yeah, you're good.
I just need to do better familyplanning.
So I'm trying to write down allthe tips I can.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
I'll tell you what.
Figuring it like a cutoff timeon the phone is huge.
Man, put it in a different spot, put it someplace that you.
It makes it a little moredifficult to get to and you're
going to all of a sudden go thatjust putting on, do not disturb
, put on airplane mode, whateverit is.
Find that time half hour, 45minutes, and it's better for
(45:39):
your sleep anyway, if you quitlooking at it sometime before
five, six, seven o'clock.
Speaker 1 (45:45):
Definitely true.
Well, ernest, let's bring itall together.
That was a lot of goldennuggets, a lot of goodness there
.
What's your final takeaway inthe pillars of happiness,
accountability and balance?
Speaker 2 (45:58):
I think they all go together in our life.
If we can, we can figure outhow to intertwine all those
little things right.
Your happiness to me, likebeing accountable made me a
little more happy.
Happiness To me like beingaccountable made me a little
more happy.
Being a little more happy gaveme more balance in my life.
So it's all about justintegrating those things into
your life and then, with balance, I'm going to go with those
(46:21):
five things.
You've got to learn how to sleep, breathe, eat properly.
Movement and eat, sleep, myfreaking brain and hydration.
You get those five things inthere and that's going to give
you the best opportunity to havebalance, because you're going
to feel better, You're going tofeel more focused, You're going
to have more energy, and whenyou feel better, then that's
(46:43):
where the happiness comes inright.
Physiology drives psychology,because when you feel like crap,
you're usually not happy andall that stuff rolls down.
So instead of rolling it downthe hill, we can roll it up the
hill and you keep feeling better.
Take accountability, becauseyou're the only person that has
control of what you're thinkingand how you respond to stuff.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
Absolutely Well, Ernest.
Thank you for coming out.
I'd love your feedback.
Share your questions orfeedback on Instagram, Facebook,
TikTok, YouTube or Buzzsprout.
Engage with us and we mighthear your suggestion on an
upcoming episode.
If you want to come on the show, let me know that too.
Share some goodness, help oneanother.
I love you all.
See ya, Bye-bye, Thank you.
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