July 23, 2025 • 40 mins
Chris Marr, client communication expert and authority coach, shares powerful insights on establishing genuine authority by embracing authenticity rather than seeking approval. He explores how overcoming people-pleasing tendencies and speaking your truth creates stronger relationships, clearer boundaries, and more impactful communication both professionally and personally.
• Finding comfort in your own identity after years of feeling like "a square peg in a round hole"
• Distinguishing between authoritative communication and being an authoritarian
• How accidentally diminishing your authority through language and non-verbal cues prevents others from respecting you
• The inverse relationship: addressing difficult conversations directly strengthens relationships rather than damaging them
• Setting boundaries and becoming comfortable with saying "no" to things that don't align with your priorities
• Viewing confidence issues as skill issues—acquire the right skills to build confidence in any area
• Why external validation seeking prevents authentic connection and diminishes your impact
Connect with Chris Marr on Instagram @theauthoritativecoach or visit theauthoritativecoach.com to learn more about his book and coaching programs.
Thanks for listening & being part of the Mindset Cafe Community.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yeah, it's Mindset Cafe.
We all about that mindset.
Gotta stay focused.
Now go settle for the last.
It's all in your head how youthink you manifest.
So get ready to rise, cause weabout to be the best.
Gotta switch it up.
Gotta break the old habits.
Get your mind right.
Turn your dreams into habits.
No negative vibes, onlypositive thoughts.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
What is up guys?
What is up?
Welcome to another episode ofthe Mindset Cafe podcast.
It's your boy, devin, and todaywe have a cool guest.
He actually sent me a fewcopies of those things to be
recognizable, so it wasdefinitely a cool little thing
that I noted for even myself todo in the future.
(00:51):
But without further ado, youknow the guest.
He is a client communicationexpert.
He is has skills in theentrepreneurial space.
He honestly is the author and acoach and the expert of being
an authoritative coach, right,and an authoritative expert,
which is one of those thingswhere, even in the
(01:11):
entrepreneurial space, like youcan kind of take why you would
need that.
But even in the everyday space,I feel like we're going to dive
into some aspects that you needto, you know, create that
authority, create that authorityin your household, in your
professional space.
So we'll take some differentcaveats and stuff within that,
but his whole thing is stoppeople pleasing, right,
(01:32):
challenging your clients andbeing indispensable.
And, with 15 years ofexperience in helping
professionals across the globe,we're going to learn some stuff
today.
So, without further ado,welcome Chris Marr to the show.
Thank you so much for takingthe time out of your day.
Man Hop on.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Hey Devin.
Yeah, I'm excited to be here.
I love the intro music.
It gets you like it's got theright vibe right.
It gets you fired up.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
No, definitely, and it's awesome.
I mean, we're connecting fromto to explore different minds,
but also to explore differentminds from different parts of
the globe, because there's, youknow, different life experiences
, different things that you'veendured or gone through or seen,
heard, felt in your lifeexperience, and it's always cool
(02:16):
to resonate.
So I feel like this is going tobe super interesting.
Um, one, one thing I want todive into.
I like to kind of prefaceeverything by, you know what was
your bring-up life?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
what was your childhood like?
What led you into becoming acoach?
Well, it's okay, uh, go back towhen you were born, 1981 right
okay, cool, um, I could pick up,yeah.
So I've been asked some similarquestions like this before in
the past.
I think there's some likesignificant things that have
shaped me.
Um, definitely, I think just totouch on something you
mentioned there, though that Ithink there's something very
important about connecting withpeople in different parts of the
(02:52):
world.
Like your state's a small place, scotland's tiny.
There's only six million peoplein Scotland.
You know, it's like a such asmall place.
If you're not like bridging outto connect with people across
the world, like you're missingout on meeting the best people
that you can, right?
So I think that's such animportant point you've already
made.
I think what was significant forme as a child was like very
much an introvert, want to spenda lot of time on my own, and I
(03:16):
feel like it took me such a longtime to like figure out and be
confident about just being me,like I feel like it's even I'm
43 years old now and I feel likeI'm I'm more I'm.
Obviously I've been working onit, of course, but I feel like I
can turn up and be me and notfeel like I need to like dial
back certain aspects of mycharacteristics that like just
(03:39):
to be acceptable.
For example, like I am too muchfor people, I go too fast, I've
got high standards, I getobsessed with things and like
they're sort of as you can, likeas you could imagine, like I
collect books and you know I getobsessed with things.
But I think in the past, it'slike as I was younger, I think I
had a real problem just findingmy space in the world, like
(04:02):
where, like I've had troublelike with groups of friends and
just being a bit of a loner atsome points in my world, like
where, like I've had troublelike with groups of friends and
just being a bit of a loner atsome points in my life as well,
and I think I just struggled alot with just trying to find
where I'm supposed to be.
I used to say that I was like asquare around, a square, peg in
a round hole, and I felt likethat even in like my early stage
of my career, like in my early20s, going into my late 20s, I
(04:25):
just felt like I didn't quitebelong, like I was.
There was something just weirdabout it and I think it just
took me a long time to figureout who I am, what I'm supposed
to do, what makes me happy, whyit's okay to have, why it's
actually completely fine just tobe me and actually even more
(04:45):
than that.
That.
That's actually what peoplewant me to be.
They want me to be myself.
And so I think, like Istruggled with all of that, I
had my own journey through allof that and try to figure that
out.
I think that's probably the most, you know, shaping of me is
like accepting myself and beingmy own friend and all of that
(05:09):
and knowing that if I can becomfortable in my own way, that
that's actually good foreverybody because I'm happy and
therefore that can you know,that sort of like that energy
comes out in everything that Ido.
So I think that's been thatjumps front of mind for me is
like how significant it's beento kind of even just accept the
troubles of all of that.
(05:30):
I think my mum recently justshe said to me I didn't realize
that you struggled so much inlike you know, in high school,
you know I was like, yeah,there's periods where I was
hanging out on my own in thecomputer room like I didn't have
any friends, you know.
And she was like I didn'trealize that and I was like
isn't that fascinating, you know?
So I think that's been.
(05:54):
I feel like that's been athread for me that I'm so
pleased to kind of landed in apositive place with all that.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
No, and it does make sense, and I think a lot of
people go through that right anda lot of people are just trying
to find their place in theworld and trying to figure out
what their purpose is, were youan only child no, no, no, okay,
I was not.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Not only was I not an only child, I was part of a
blended family as well.
It was actually so.
I had my parents both remarried, and that introduced two
stepbrothers from each side, sothere's actually six brothers in
the family, and we're all aboutthe same age.
There was like three or fouryears between the six of us.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, but then I think that it's interesting.
You ask that because that wasactually a problem for me, like
sharing things, things having myown space, um, just having the
ability to connect with myparents, like there's a
obviously a dial, like it's hard, like there's all these people
and I think that's trying tofind your space and all that I
(06:57):
think quite challenging no,definitely I think they're it's.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
It's weird because I feel like there's challenges on
both sides, right, like when,when a is I don't want to say
too big, but a bigger familycomes with challenges.
Right, cause it's not too biglike, but a bigger family comes
with challenges.
Because, again, you kind of getyou feel like you get lost in
the shuffle.
Right, you're sharingeverything and nothing is felt
like it's yours, right, and onthe flip side of it, where you
(07:27):
don't have siblings, you don'tget that companionship or that
you know, you kind of get forcedinto.
When you're at home, you arealone, right, if your parents
aren't working or if you'rewhatever.
So there's that two sides to it, and so I think that a lot of
people face it in their owndifferent, maybe, ways and
definitions of it.
But I think that's one of thebiggest things with growing up
(07:47):
and, and you know, becoming anadult and even as an adult,
we're still all just figuring itout, and so the the reason I
say that is me and my wife had aconversation because I mean,
we're in our 30s and I wouldtold her I was like you know
what it's crazy is?
I remember my parents in their30 would told her.
I was like you know what it'scrazy is?
I remember my parents in theirthirties, like I remember my, my
(08:08):
dad's, you know, like 35thbirthday or whatever, and you
look at them as a kid and you'relike they have it all figured
out, like they know.
And then all of a sudden youyou're that age and you're like
they didn't have it all figuredout, like you were still just
figuring out as you go, likethey didn't have it all figured
out, like you were still justfiguring out as you go.
And it's so crazy to have thatlike realization that that's
(08:29):
what life is Just figuring itout as you go.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Totally agree.
Yep, like life is figuring itout.
I think that's a great sort ofphrase, because a lot of people
are want to get to a point whereit's figured out that's, and
the idea is like that isn't life.
Life is the journey of figuring.
You're just always figuring outwhat the next thing is.
You know, as you get older,you're just going to have like
(08:55):
more challenges, right?
Family members are going tostart to pass away.
Your kids are going to getolder, they're going to get
married, they're going to havekids, and it's like this have
kids.
And it's like this.
All there's just life is likethis, just these series of
chapters that you're goingthrough.
I hope, though, that the workthat I'm doing, and even people
that are listening to the showas well, are like I hope that
(09:16):
we're doing the work thatprepares us for those future
events.
Right, that we're figuring itout, but maybe we are just one
or two.
We're figuring out how to beprepared for two or three
chapters ahead of ourselves.
I think about that all the time, just wanting to be quite
secure in a lot of ways to dealwith some of these like not just
(09:40):
predictable, but absolutelycertain things that are going to
happen in life, um, and hopethat I'm going to be, like,
strong enough and secure enoughand just got myself together
enough to be able to deal withthose things in a in a healthy
way.
Um, I do think about that a lotactually.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Um, now that I'm thinking about it, yeah, no, I
mean, I mean, I'm in alignmentwith that for sure.
Like your goal is essentiallyto work on yourself, learn new
things and try to prepareyourself for those next chapters
, but at the end of the day,those chapters are going to have
unforeseen things, like youdon't know what you don't know
until you're in that chapter oflife.
(10:20):
So I definitely am in alignmentwith that.
I love that.
Well, so what I mean, what gotyou into to the authoritative
coaching?
You know what?
What spawned that?
Speaker 1 (10:31):
so I cut my teeth do sales and marketing.
Coaching was where I reallyspent all my like a lot of my
hours there, um, and I think,through what?
So very organic I can't there'sno other way to say it like I
didn't know 10 years, I couldn'thave predicted that this is the
brand or this the part of thestory.
Um, I think it was very muchabout just getting as much from
(10:54):
every experience as I can.
So as I started to teach and asmy hours started to clock up
and as I started to work withlarger and larger organizations
in fact, a lot of my clientswere in the states um, larger
and larger companies, I wasworking with leadership teams
and marketing teams and salesteams and all of the work that
comes with that and all thechallenges that come with that.
I think as part of that work, Ijust started to extract a lot,
(11:14):
like I learned from everything.
I documented everything,journaled, everything, um, and I
think it's just sort of anatural evolution to find myself
in a place where I'm doing thiswork work mainly because all of
it is all about communication,right, when you really marketing
and sales yes, lots of tactics,lots of software, lots of tools
, all of that stuff.
(11:34):
But if you want to get teams tobuy into a strategy or to buy
into a vision or to do theirbest work even you do you need
to be a world-class communicator.
You need to be able tocommunicate at your highest
level.
And so I found that, as I wasgoing through my own journey,
(11:55):
people started to ask me how Icould help them with what
they're doing, and so there wasthis organic sort of like
movement towards taking thatexpertise and coaching other
people in client facing roles,specifically coaches and
consultants, people like accountmanagers, sales teams, anywhere
where leadership teams,anywhere where there's like a
(12:17):
high stakes sort ofcommunication happening.
And over the last 10 years I'vebeen working with a group of
people on this.
We sort of figured out how tohave high stakes conversations,
how to get buy in from a groupof people, how to communicate
more effectively essentially inorganizations and in life in
(12:37):
general.
So it became honestly like Iwould do this work for free,
because, uh, it's a real passionof mine to want to help people
to communicate more effectively,because it is the key to
confidence as well, like beingable to go into any room and
feel confident that you canspark up a conversation that can
hold your own in a room likethat, I think is it's just an
(13:00):
example, really, of how goodcommunication skills are.
Working on, your communicationskills can actually set you up
for success across your wholelife.
So there's a big deal and itcontinues to be.
It's just interesting to me,the more I work on it, the more
work I realize there is to do inthis space, and so I think my
sense is that this is the restof my career is specifically in
(13:23):
the communication space no,definitely, and, and I think
career is specifically in thecommunication space no,
definitely, and I think that isone of the foundational pillars,
essentially, of life andsuccess communication, right.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
And so what does it mean, I guess, in your
definition, what does it mean tobe authoritative, and why is it
important?
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Yeah, it's a good question, because the word
itself could have negativeconnotation, right?
So when people hear the wordauthority, they think power over
, like somebody has power overme telling me what to do,
micromanaging me or whateverthose negative senses are.
But that's not really it.
(14:03):
Authoritative is more like howyou turn up in the world.
So the whole idea is like well,look, if you want to be, if you
want people to listen to youand you want to have some
influence, you want to haverespect, you want to have some
control.
I think we all want agency,right?
If you want control, influenceand respect, the way you turn up
(14:23):
in the world is going to havean effect on that right.
So you could be.
Most people that I work with areaccidentally diminishing their
authority without they don'teven really know that they're
doing that, and it's everythingfrom the non-verbal language
that they, the way that theycommunicate non-verbally even
down to like literally the wordsthey use that diminish their
(14:44):
authority.
And what they don't realize isthat because you're doing these
things, accidentally orotherwise, that people are just
not listening to you, theyaren't being influenced by you,
they aren't treating you withrespect, they aren't treating
you like an expert, and wewonder why, you know, we can't
get clients, or we can't build abusiness, or we can't get what
(15:05):
we want in life, um, and it'sbecause of these things I think
we need to think seriously abouthow we turn up in the world in
an authoritative way, right,that we can be almost like you
turn up confidently, uh,committed, convicted to your
ideas, so that people listen to.
You.
Think this guy, this personhere he's, he knows what he
(15:28):
wants, um, he believes in whathe's talking about.
Um, and I respect a person likethat because you think that you
know, for the most part, you'regoing to get the truth from
that person as well.
Like they're not trying to besomebody that they're not,
they're not changing who theyare, just to fit in.
Like I had somebody, um, Idon't know.
(15:49):
Can you swear on this show?
yeah, you're good, right, cool.
Um, I when I remember when Ifirst met somebody in a
professional setting and I'vegot like sleeve tattoos and
whatever and I turned up andshe's like, oh, the first time I
saw you, chris, I was like thisguy does not give a fuck.
And I was like exactly likeyeah, and not in a way where,
like I'm I'm like judgmental ordismissive about the work that I
(16:11):
believe in the work that we'redoing, but I don't give a shit
if you like me or not.
Like that is not affecting theway that I turn up, whether you
like me or not.
Um, and that's such a powerfulposition to be in to not need
anything from another person.
I don't need a pat on the back,I don't need your like.
(16:32):
I don't need you to even try tolike me to turn up here and do
my best work and it's such agreat thing to let go of.
Like I don't need to try and besomebody that I'm not in order
to get something that like tomake me feel nice about things.
So I've kind of gone down arabbit hole there.
(16:52):
But like the whole idea is liketo be able to turn up in an
authoritative way is really aninternal work which is like who
am I and how can I beself-assured in this world?
And it's almost like your corevalues, like who do I want to be
, what do I believe in?
And instead of the opposite,which is, if I need to be liked,
(17:13):
it's all about external things.
Right will Devin like me, Ican't.
I can't say the things I wantto say, in case the audience
that I annoy somebody, astranger that I've never seen
before, I heard of before.
You know it's like you'rethinking about everything that's
happening outside of the world,but actually some of the most
important work you could do foryourself is internal work.
It's got nothing to do withanybody else.
It hasn't even got anything todo with the books or the courses
(17:35):
.
It's actually hugely internal.
Like what do I want?
Who am I?
What do I believe in, how do Iwant to turn up?
Speaker 2 (17:45):
those are the big questions I think that have
helped me even to try, like toreally transform myself into
being authoritative and turningup in the world in that way no,
and I think that's a superfreeing um that space to be in,
right, and it's like we do wantpeople to like us but, at the
(18:06):
same time, it doesn't impact us,right?
Positive or negative, ifsomeone doesn't like us, like if
you don't like me, you don'tlike me.
It is what it is, you know, andthat's it's.
It's a personal problem, right?
Speaker 1 (18:19):
you know I'm not going to change who I am so that
you'll like me.
My hope is that you'll like mefor who I am like.
So we're all human.
Yes, I want to be liked and yes, I want to be friendly with
people, but it doesn'tnecessarily need to be friends
with people, right?
I'm not going to go around it.
So there's like the danger isthere's a fine line between all
(18:39):
of this and being an assholeright right, and that's not what
we're.
We're not talking about being anadult deliberately being an
asshole.
That's not it.
That's like part, like part ofthe formula, perhaps of it.
Like I take some of that, someof the the things that assholes
have, which is like they can behugely direct but they don't
give a shit about how you feel.
For example, let's have thedirect piece, but let's also
(19:01):
have the empathy for others,right, and so there's.
There's a combination of thingsthat we can pull together here
that I think is getting in theright order.
So what I say is like, if yougo into these especially
professional relationships wherethe stakes are high, if you
have a high need to be liked,what you risk is never being
respected.
However, if you go into theseprofessional relationships
(19:23):
letting go of the need to beliked, there's a good chance
that you'll be respected firstand then perhaps liked, right?
So what are you?
What do you want to risk here?
I know that I don't want torisk the respect, so I'll risk
the need to be liked yeah, and Imean I think that it goes even
deeper too.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
It's like if your real goal is to be liked by
everyone, you're going to beessentially kind of like super
liked or like loved or admiredby no one Because you're a
little bit of this and they likethat aspect of you, but then
you're a little bit of this forthis other group of people and
so they're like well, thatdoesn't really vibe with me.
(20:03):
So it's like you have to betrue to who you are and it, like
you said, it's not meant to be.
Like you know, I'm trying to bean asshole because that's just
the, the personal brand I wantto build.
If that's not it.
But at the same time, like foreven for me personally, like I'm
(20:30):
I'm more sarc, a dick, but atthe same time, like I'm not
going to sugarcoat it so muchthat you feel good about what
you just did wrong.
Right, it's like that's justright you know, or like they
don't.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
They don't get the message right like what did like
they don't get like exactly.
You're not clear.
You're not being clear exactlyright.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
And then even to, like you, compliment what you're
saying too.
Like, for example, when I was apersonal trainer, one of my
clients had asked me one timelike how come you're not, you
know, one of those trainers thatyou know is cheering us on?
And I was like, cause, that'snot me.
I was like, if you want to, ifyou want a trainer, that's going
to like I'm, I'm the personthat you like.
(21:04):
You don't need a high five fordoing the work you needed to do.
You did you get a high five forgoing above and beyond.
You killed it today.
You went above and beyond whatwas demanded of you.
That's, that's awesome, right?
Speaker 1 (21:15):
so that way, when I tell you good job, you know I
actually mean it versus oh,that's just how he says bye 100%
like so you've got like I talkabout this a lot, which is like
you've got to watch what you'regiving away, like if you're
always apologizing I'm sorry forthis, I'm sorry for that like
it starts to not only is it verydiminishing, it also starts to
(21:35):
mean nothing, right?
Or you're always saying thankyou for things, like I have this
debate with people like well,can't you?
What's the problem with sayingthank you all the time?
It's like because actually, alot of what we're doing is
actually just expected, right?
When I say thank you, it'sbecause something extraordinary
has happened, but everythingelse is just expected.
Similar to you.
(21:56):
I say to my clients it's likelook, 80% of my job is about
picking out and pointing out themistakes you're making and the
things that you aren't doing.
Well, right, I just need you toknow that, because most of the
time, I'm not going to bepatting you on the back because
you did a thing right.
If you want, you could dealwith that within your team,
internally, whatever, but that'snot what you're gonna get from
(22:17):
me.
Are we on the same page?
Does that sound like we can?
You know?
You're just making sure thatyou're managing their
expectations, but I think it'sgood, like, just reflect on what
you're saying, devon, as well.
It's like it's good to know,it's good to be comfortable
about that, about yourself,because then you're not
constantly anxious about tryingto be somebody that you are not
right.
That's kind of what you'resaying there.
(22:39):
It's like well, that ain't me,I'm okay with that.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
If you're okay, you know so yeah, and it's
exhausting being trying to besomeone that you're not.
So it's like it's a lot easierjust to be you and like.
People will resonate with youand like you for you being you
and have a deeper connection, inmy opinion, with you, because
they know that is truly you,versus you putting on a face,
(23:03):
and then they all of a suddensee a glimpse of the real you.
Then they're like, oh wow, likehe's fake or she's fake, right.
So I think there is, there isthat side of it as well.
So I mean I love the thingsthat you're saying now with with
that, I mean it goes into kindof what we're talking about,
like the people pleasing, right,and so how could someone almost
(23:26):
do like a self-reflection andsee if they are a people pleaser
or if it's truly them?
Speaker 1 (23:33):
really okay.
Well, it manifests itself inlots of different ways.
So, um well, number one is Ihave an assessment that you can
do.
So if you're a client facingprofessional, I have an
assessment that you can do.
So.
If you're a client facingprofessional, I have an
assessment that you can completethat will shine a light on
where your biggest peoplepleasing areas are.
So that's number one.
I'd be probably the quickestand easiest thing to do is to do
(23:54):
that assessment, which you can.
If you go to Instagram and goto the authority of coaching, dm
me score, I'll send you theassessment and you can do that
for free.
And that would be certainly oneway.
The other way would be to lookat like there's there's just so
many ways it manifests itself,boundaries as one right.
So if you're like overworked,overwhelmed, if you look at your
(24:15):
calendar and you are like, whydid I say yes to that thing?
Or you turn up for an event andyou're resenting the fact that
you're there and you don't evenlike these people, these are all
signals to you that you've saidyes to the wrong things.
What do you want?
What's the gap between when youlook at your life, where you
are right now, and what youwould actually like it to look
like, and how much agency orcontrol do you feel like you
(24:38):
have over affecting that?
So I speak to a friend aboutthis all the time.
He's like if I want to changesomething about my life, I can
do it.
Next week will be different.
A lot of people have to waitsix months before they can
change anything about their life.
That's a signal, I think, thatyou've set yourself up to be
like your.
Your calendar, your days, yourweeks have been controlled by
someone else or something else,or there's an expectation for
(25:00):
you, you know.
So I think that's definitelyone way how you're using what
you're saying yes to how yourtime's being used against how
you feel about that.
I think a lot definitely oneway how you're using what you're
saying yes to how your time'sbeing used against you, how you
feel about that.
I think a lot of people don'teven necessarily realize that
people pleasing is manifestingitself in your calendar, right?
I guess some of the obviousthings are when you are clearly
(25:22):
saying something to someone thatyou do not believe, like your
guts telling you one thing butyou're saying something else and
there's a mismatch between howyou feel and what you're saying.
Well, yeah, that looks reallygreat, that's a great dress
you're wearing there, fantastic.
But actually you think it looksterrible, and so I guess we
have to unpack that right.
Why am I lying right now?
(25:42):
Why is you know?
Why am I not saying what Ireally think?
Um, am I?
I think a lot of people worry.
This is, I think, one of thebig things devon is.
A lot of people worry that,well, they don't want to risk
the relationship that they havewith someone.
They think that if they say thetruth or say what they really
feel, that that's going tonumber one, it's going to create
(26:04):
awkwardness, it's going tocreate a difficult conversation
that we need to deal with, andthey're not prepared.
They're not prepared to riskthe relationship, so they say
something that's acceptable.
They lie essentially, they'relying.
Um, or they say nothing, right,they sweep it under the carpet,
hope it goes away, whatever.
What's interesting about thisthat I've figured out is that
(26:26):
there's an inverse relationshipwith this, which is a lot of
people don't want to approachdifficult things with people
like just everything from you'vegot spinach in your teeth to
poor performance or whatever itmight be, or a behavior that's
sort of holding you back frombeing successful.
Um, they, they shy away from itbecause they think if they say
that thing, it's going to pushpeople away.
The opposite is true.
(26:48):
So when I look at thisopportunity which is how I look
at it is this is an opportunityto galvanize your relationship
with people Try and see thedifficult thing that needs to be
said as an opportunity toactually strengthen that
relationship, because when youlook at the strongest
relationships you have, they'reusually built on difficult
(27:08):
situations.
We had to go through stufftogether and because we did that
, we're actually better off, ourrelationships better because of
it.
And so I think a lot of peoplethink that it's the opposite,
that they think if they do thatthing, they're actually going to
turn people away from them, andthat's a problem.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
No, it goes into that .
You find who your real friendsare when they tell you, like you
said the spinach in your teeth,like if I knew we were having a
conversation this whole timeand you didn't tell me.
And all of a sudden I talked tothe next person, like hey, you
have some of your teeth.
I'm like, oh wow.
Obviously it's embarrassing, butat the same time, like I was,
like the person I was justtalking to didn't say a single
thing, like I know, I gotta becareful on what kind of truth
(27:55):
they're telling me, or whatversion of truth that they're
giving me, because they don'twanna upset me or they don't
wanna, you know, whatever.
And at the same time, like,just like with that inverse
relationship that you're saying,I think it's so true, it does
strengthen that relationship.
It does, you know, create abond of trust.
Like they, they know thatyou're going to give them, as
hard as it may be or asuncomfortable as it may be.
(28:17):
They know that they can valueyour opinion because, like it or
not, you're going to give themthe, the truth that they need to
hear, not what they want tohear you teach people how to
treat you right like, don't,like, don't come to me.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
If you don't want the truth, like, if you want
somebody to appease you, then goask.
Like like literally everybodyelse, but if you want the truth,
then you come to me.
I would like to be I don't knowabout you devon, but I would
like to be known as that personin my life.
Like it's's disingenuous aswell, not to say the other thing
that's not disingenuine is likeyou don't say something in the
(28:51):
moment, but then you go andgossip about it to somebody else
.
There's this idea that it'slike you are hoping that this
person looks like an idiot, orthat they fail, or that they
fall on their face or whatever.
You're just waiting for it soyou can step on their, their
back and benefit from it.
Somehow there are people likethat in the world.
Right, we're that's again, Ihope that we only have like have
(29:13):
to deal with a few of thosepeople in our life, but they do
exist.
But the what we want is likeyou know what the stoics talk
about.
I think it's.
Seneca says this, he says orthat marcus aurelius is one of
those guys.
He talks about this idea oflike being like a smelly goat,
like when you're in the room,people know that you're there,
right.
In other words, if I'm in theroom, there's there's going to
(29:35):
be truth.
I'm going to say what needs tobe said.
I'm going to say what I see,again, just for the audience.
It's not the asshole piece,it's not it.
It's the other bit, which isthat if I don't say something
right now, the last thing I wantis, three months from now,
someone's saying why didn't youtell me sooner?
You know, like I don't want, Idon't want that to happen.
So if I see something that'syou're about to make a mistake
(29:57):
or um, you know you're doingsomething that's kind of like
it's making you look like anidiot or whatever it might be,
we're going to have a chat aboutit and it's going to be great
because I'm here to help you.
Anyway, that's what I want.
I want to support you and helpyou to be better, right.
That's what it's all about.
So I think the people pleasingpiece, the how it manifests
itself, I think, is in.
(30:18):
I think you do have to.
You know, one of the gaps devonI'll say here is that I've
struggled with this with myclients a little is that they
don't have a big enoughvocabulary to describe how they
feel in certain situations.
So like sad, happy, angry, notreally good enough, right,
(30:40):
frustrated, worried, anxious,still not really that good of
contempt, resentment, like nowwe're getting somewhere.
It's like we need to get theselayers in place.
You need to be truly honest withyourself about how you feel,
with where you're, at, whatsituations you're in, um, how
you feel about the thing youdidn't say.
If you can get, I think there'sa something to tap into there
(31:03):
which is a signal that you arenot really being true to who you
want to be or who you are, andtherefore not truthful to the
people around you.
Like, if people can't trustyour what you say, then like
that to me, that's just, that'sa major problem, right, it's a
major problem.
(31:23):
And so I think you know thepeople I think about is like
michael scott or david brentfrom the office.
If you're in the uk or the us.
That's a guy, that's a peoplepleaser, right, he wants to be
liked by absolutely everybodyand, as a result, nobody likes
him, you know.
So, um, but, yeah, I thinkthere's I don't know how if you
(31:43):
have anything to add, devon,about how people pleasing
manifests itself.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
But certainly those are the, those are the big ones,
I think no, I mean, I think youyou hit the nail on the head.
I mean, obviously that's whyyou're the professional in it.
But yeah, I mean, if you feel,if you feel like you're saying
yes to something and then, rightbefore you're about to do it,
you're you catch yourself beinglike, man, I wish I didn't have
to do this right now.
And and then you're like allright, pumping yourself up and
(32:06):
put a smile on to go do it Likeyou're people pleasing right.
If you're looking at anappointment on your calendar and
you're like, oh man, I wish Idon't want to do this or I wish
that person didn't schedule,it's like why did you schedule
them?
It is also one of the most likeliberating things to and as easy
as it is you know there's thisword in the dictionary.
(32:27):
It's no right and it's hard tosay that, but sometimes, saying
it, it's the feeling you getfrom just being able to have
that self-confidence and thatself-awareness that not
everything's going to line upwith you, not everything's in
line up with what you got goingon, and being able to say no,
like I don't want to do that,and not have to give an
(32:47):
explanation why.
It does help Cause then if yousay yes to people, please are
you showing up as the bestversion of you, right Cause, any
, any person.
You show up as like that's aresignation or that's an imprint
of who you are in that person'seyes.
They're going to tell that someyou know.
Oh, that person showed up andthey were like X Right, and it's
(33:09):
like do you want that to be howpeople are?
Are kind of spreading your nameor referring you as yeah, I
think no is so important.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
There's two things that I did in the last 12 to 18
months that I think challengedme to push me outside my comfort
zone a little bit.
One of them was to make moreasks.
Right, I think we hold like wedon't want to again.
We're back to the same thing.
I don't want to annoy people, Idon't want to take a people's
time, I don't like.
This is all people pleasing,and I was like I'm actually
going to make more asks, asks,asks, as in.
(33:39):
Can you help me?
Hey, I'm looking to work withsomeone like this, who do you
know?
Hey, I'd love to work with you.
What could that look like?
Hey, I need a testimonial or areferral or an introduction.
Could you make that for me?
Like those types of asks, andpeople don't do those things
because they're afraid of like.
They afraid of like.
(34:04):
They just don't want to take uppeople's time.
It's like people want to help,we want to help.
So that's one side.
The other side, the otherchallenge I gave myself, was to
tally up, like not just tally up, but increasingly say no to
higher and higher stake thingsright when it makes sense.
Obviously it's not like a game,as in, I said no to something
that was actually a goodopportunity for me.
I'm not going to do that, butultimately saying no's to things
that are taking me off,distracting me to other things.
Um, I said no to a businesspartnership last year.
(34:26):
I've said no to a couple of bigthings this year that I
actually felt like like I really, under normal circumstances, I
would probably have got on theplane and taken two days out and
all the rest of it, but I hadsomething more important for me
at home.
Had I not had agreed withmyself about what's actually
(34:48):
important for me right now, thenI would have been saying yes to
lots of things.
It's quite interesting to methat we're back to the internal
piece.
Like I say this it's sort's ourbusiness.
It's actually quite interestinghow you can transfer a lot of
business stuff into normal life.
I'll give you an example a90-day strategy in your business
.
If you've got a really clear90-day plan for your business,
(35:10):
you know immediately what adistraction is like you should
be saying no to everything elseapart from what's in the
strategy.
That's, that's great.
Similarly, similarly in yourlife.
If you know what's importantfor you right now, like if, for
example, you're taking care ofyour health, your gym, your diet
, all of that you're probablygoing to turn down the
opportunity to do some travelbecause that's going to throw
(35:33):
everything off.
Point being is like if you wantto feel confident saying no,
the first thing you need to dois work on what's important to
get your yes Right.
What's the yes that should beimportant?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Definitely no.
I agree with that, and that'sthat's the thing is, you have to
put your priorities in orderand realize that you, as much as
people pride themselves onbeing able to multitask and, you
know, do multiple things atonce it's in reality you're
you're not going to get as muchdone if you're multitasking, but
you're also not going to get itas done as well as you could
(36:07):
have if you put your fullattention to it.
So I think that what you saidyou know it does hold a lot of
weight.
As we wrap up, I like to askone question, right, and this
question is the legacy wallquestion, right?
So, on the Chris Marr legacywall, what is one lesson that
you've learned along your entirelife's journey that you would
leave for the up and cominggenerations?
Speaker 1 (36:32):
Yeah, so that's a great question.
My immediate thought here issomething specific to do with
skill acquisition.
I think we're getting into aphase now where a lot of people
are questioning our educationsystems schooling degrees,
university, mbas, all that sortof stuff and I would love for
(36:55):
people to realize that orunderstand that their fastest
way, their quickest way tosuccess is to acquire skills,
which is not going to universityand reading textbooks and
passing exams or beingacademically proficient or
effective.
It's like what are the skillsthat you need to acquire?
You've got YouTube, you've gotcoaches, you've got podcasts
(37:17):
like this.
Where can you go learn theskills, acquire them quickly,
get them into your practice andbe successful?
I think, like if you realizethat, like your career
trajectory is based on skillacquisition, I would love if I
went back and I was able to tellmyself something like that at
20 years old.
I think there would have been aspeeding up, perhaps in a lot
(37:39):
of areas where I was like I'mjust one more skill, one more
skill, get the skill, get theskill.
And if you've lacked confidencein any area, it's not a
confidence issue, it's a skillissue.
You need to acquire the skillto feel more confident in that
area.
So I think I would like, I wantthat, that like I'm just
thinking about what I tell mykids.
(37:59):
It's like you're just you, justyou know.
If they come in, they're likeI'm having this problem where
I'm not feeling confident.
It's like what's the skill?
How do I teach you, how do wepractice it?
It's like that's it To me,that's the key to success.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
No, I, honestly, I love that.
It is, it is true, like skillsare everything right, and it's
not like you need to go out andlearn to be an electrician.
But do you not know how to sellwhen you're trying to open a
business?
Well, go acquire the skill ofselling, go take, and that's not
and a lot of skills.
(38:31):
It's not like you learn it andyou're done, like there's levels
to each of the skills, right.
So, skill acquisition, I wouldalmost like take it a step
further and be like the skillacquisition, realizing that
there's levels to the each skill, and acquire each of those
levels as you, as it comes.
So I love that.
I mean that's the first timesomeone has mentioned that, so
that I think that's so awesome,that's so true.
Where can people connect withyou and uh and get your book and
(38:52):
and you know you can reach out?
Speaker 1 (38:55):
Yeah, devin, thanks for that.
Um, the Instagram is the bestplatform for me.
Yeah, devin, thanks for that.
Um, the Instagram's the bestplatform for me.
It's like my.
That's where I live, really.
It's got all my recent content.
So if you're listening to thisand you want to get a little bit
more of this, then head over toInstagram at the authoritative
coach and you'll find all mystuff there.
You can also DM me there aswell.
So if you've got a question orsomething you want to pick my
brain about, then you can diveinto the DMs there.
(39:16):
And, of course, the author ofcoachcom You'll find out about
my book there and any otherprograms that I'm running, or
whatever, my podcast, my blogseverything's there as well.
So those are the two mainplaces Perfect.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Well, you guys heard it.
It'll be in the show notes, butyou know, chris, I want to say
thank you again for taking thetime out of your day.
And, guys, if you're listening,make sure you guys share this
episode with a friend, right?
And the reason I say that isbecause when you level up your
circle, your circle tends tolevel you up as well.
So you're doing yourself afavor by sharing this with a
friend and helping them grow.
In turn, you grow.
(39:49):
So, chris, again, thank you somuch for taking the time out of
your day.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Thanks, devin, it was awesome.
Only positive thoughts.
Missing the game.
Life.
Mindset causes shits, got mymind on the prize.
I can't be distracted.
I stay on my grind.
No time to be slackin'.
I hustle harder.
I go against the current Cause.
I know my mind is rich to becollected.
Yeah, it's Mindset Cafe.
We all about that mindset.
Gotta stay focused.
Now go settle for the last.
It's all in your head how youthink you manifest.
So get ready to rise, cause weabout to be the best.
Gotta switch it up.
Gotta break the old habits.
Get your mind right.
Turn your dreams into habits.
No negative vibes, onlypositive thoughts.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
What is up guys?
What is up?
Welcome to another episode ofthe Mindset Cafe podcast.
It's your boy, devin, and todaywe have a cool guest.
He actually sent me a fewcopies of those things to be
recognizable, so it wasdefinitely a cool little thing
that I noted for even myself todo in the future.
(00:51):
But without further ado, youknow the guest.
He is a client communicationexpert.
He is has skills in theentrepreneurial space.
He honestly is the author and acoach and the expert of being
an authoritative coach, right,and an authoritative expert,
which is one of those thingswhere, even in the
(01:11):
entrepreneurial space, like youcan kind of take why you would
need that.
But even in the everyday space,I feel like we're going to dive
into some aspects that you needto, you know, create that
authority, create that authorityin your household, in your
professional space.
So we'll take some differentcaveats and stuff within that,
but his whole thing is stoppeople pleasing, right,
(01:32):
challenging your clients andbeing indispensable.
And, with 15 years ofexperience in helping
professionals across the globe,we're going to learn some stuff
today.
So, without further ado,welcome Chris Marr to the show.
Thank you so much for takingthe time out of your day.
Man Hop on.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Hey Devin.
Yeah, I'm excited to be here.
I love the intro music.
It gets you like it's got theright vibe right.
It gets you fired up.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
No, definitely, and it's awesome.
I mean, we're connecting fromto to explore different minds,
but also to explore differentminds from different parts of
the globe, because there's, youknow, different life experiences
, different things that you'veendured or gone through or seen,
heard, felt in your lifeexperience, and it's always cool
(02:16):
to resonate.
So I feel like this is going tobe super interesting.
Um, one, one thing I want todive into.
I like to kind of prefaceeverything by, you know what was
your bring-up life?
Speaker 1 (02:31):
what was your childhood like?
What led you into becoming acoach?
Well, it's okay, uh, go back towhen you were born, 1981 right
okay, cool, um, I could pick up,yeah.
So I've been asked some similarquestions like this before in
the past.
I think there's some likesignificant things that have
shaped me.
Um, definitely, I think just totouch on something you
mentioned there, though that Ithink there's something very
important about connecting withpeople in different parts of the
(02:52):
world.
Like your state's a small place, scotland's tiny.
There's only six million peoplein Scotland.
You know, it's like a such asmall place.
If you're not like bridging outto connect with people across
the world, like you're missingout on meeting the best people
that you can, right?
So I think that's such animportant point you've already
made.
I think what was significant forme as a child was like very
much an introvert, want to spenda lot of time on my own, and I
(03:16):
feel like it took me such a longtime to like figure out and be
confident about just being me,like I feel like it's even I'm
43 years old now and I feel likeI'm I'm more I'm.
Obviously I've been working onit, of course, but I feel like I
can turn up and be me and notfeel like I need to like dial
back certain aspects of mycharacteristics that like just
(03:39):
to be acceptable.
For example, like I am too muchfor people, I go too fast, I've
got high standards, I getobsessed with things and like
they're sort of as you can, likeas you could imagine, like I
collect books and you know I getobsessed with things.
But I think in the past, it'slike as I was younger, I think I
had a real problem just findingmy space in the world, like
(04:02):
where, like I've had troublelike with groups of friends and
just being a bit of a loner atsome points in my world, like
where, like I've had troublelike with groups of friends and
just being a bit of a loner atsome points in my life as well,
and I think I just struggled alot with just trying to find
where I'm supposed to be.
I used to say that I was like asquare around, a square, peg in
a round hole, and I felt likethat even in like my early stage
of my career, like in my early20s, going into my late 20s, I
(04:25):
just felt like I didn't quitebelong, like I was.
There was something just weirdabout it and I think it just
took me a long time to figureout who I am, what I'm supposed
to do, what makes me happy, whyit's okay to have, why it's
actually completely fine just tobe me and actually even more
(04:45):
than that.
That.
That's actually what peoplewant me to be.
They want me to be myself.
And so I think, like Istruggled with all of that, I
had my own journey through allof that and try to figure that
out.
I think that's probably the most, you know, shaping of me is
like accepting myself and beingmy own friend and all of that
(05:09):
and knowing that if I can becomfortable in my own way, that
that's actually good foreverybody because I'm happy and
therefore that can you know,that sort of like that energy
comes out in everything that Ido.
So I think that's been thatjumps front of mind for me is
like how significant it's beento kind of even just accept the
troubles of all of that.
(05:30):
I think my mum recently justshe said to me I didn't realize
that you struggled so much inlike you know, in high school,
you know I was like, yeah,there's periods where I was
hanging out on my own in thecomputer room like I didn't have
any friends, you know.
And she was like I didn'trealize that and I was like
isn't that fascinating, you know?
So I think that's been.
(05:54):
I feel like that's been athread for me that I'm so
pleased to kind of landed in apositive place with all that.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
No, and it does make sense, and I think a lot of
people go through that right anda lot of people are just trying
to find their place in theworld and trying to figure out
what their purpose is, were youan only child no, no, no, okay,
I was not.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Not only was I not an only child, I was part of a
blended family as well.
It was actually so.
I had my parents both remarried, and that introduced two
stepbrothers from each side, sothere's actually six brothers in
the family, and we're all aboutthe same age.
There was like three or fouryears between the six of us.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, but then I think that it's interesting.
You ask that because that wasactually a problem for me, like
sharing things, things having myown space, um, just having the
ability to connect with myparents, like there's a
obviously a dial, like it's hard, like there's all these people
and I think that's trying tofind your space and all that I
(06:57):
think quite challenging no,definitely I think they're it's.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
It's weird because I feel like there's challenges on
both sides, right, like when,when a is I don't want to say
too big, but a bigger familycomes with challenges.
Right, cause it's not too biglike, but a bigger family comes
with challenges.
Because, again, you kind of getyou feel like you get lost in
the shuffle.
Right, you're sharingeverything and nothing is felt
like it's yours, right, and onthe flip side of it, where you
(07:27):
don't have siblings, you don'tget that companionship or that
you know, you kind of get forcedinto.
When you're at home, you arealone, right, if your parents
aren't working or if you'rewhatever.
So there's that two sides to it, and so I think that a lot of
people face it in their owndifferent, maybe, ways and
definitions of it.
But I think that's one of thebiggest things with growing up
(07:47):
and, and you know, becoming anadult and even as an adult,
we're still all just figuring itout, and so the the reason I
say that is me and my wife had aconversation because I mean,
we're in our 30s and I wouldtold her I was like you know
what it's crazy is?
I remember my parents in their30 would told her.
I was like you know what it'scrazy is?
I remember my parents in theirthirties, like I remember my, my
(08:08):
dad's, you know, like 35thbirthday or whatever, and you
look at them as a kid and you'relike they have it all figured
out, like they know.
And then all of a sudden youyou're that age and you're like
they didn't have it all figuredout, like you were still just
figuring out as you go, likethey didn't have it all figured
out, like you were still justfiguring out as you go.
And it's so crazy to have thatlike realization that that's
(08:29):
what life is Just figuring itout as you go.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Totally agree.
Yep, like life is figuring itout.
I think that's a great sort ofphrase, because a lot of people
are want to get to a point whereit's figured out that's, and
the idea is like that isn't life.
Life is the journey of figuring.
You're just always figuring outwhat the next thing is.
You know, as you get older,you're just going to have like
(08:55):
more challenges, right?
Family members are going tostart to pass away.
Your kids are going to getolder, they're going to get
married, they're going to havekids, and it's like this have
kids.
And it's like this.
All there's just life is likethis, just these series of
chapters that you're goingthrough.
I hope, though, that the workthat I'm doing, and even people
that are listening to the showas well, are like I hope that
(09:16):
we're doing the work thatprepares us for those future
events.
Right, that we're figuring itout, but maybe we are just one
or two.
We're figuring out how to beprepared for two or three
chapters ahead of ourselves.
I think about that all the time, just wanting to be quite
secure in a lot of ways to dealwith some of these like not just
(09:40):
predictable, but absolutelycertain things that are going to
happen in life, um, and hopethat I'm going to be, like,
strong enough and secure enoughand just got myself together
enough to be able to deal withthose things in a in a healthy
way.
Um, I do think about that a lotactually.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Um, now that I'm thinking about it, yeah, no, I
mean, I mean, I'm in alignmentwith that for sure.
Like your goal is essentiallyto work on yourself, learn new
things and try to prepareyourself for those next chapters
, but at the end of the day,those chapters are going to have
unforeseen things, like youdon't know what you don't know
until you're in that chapter oflife.
(10:20):
So I definitely am in alignmentwith that.
I love that.
Well, so what I mean, what gotyou into to the authoritative
coaching?
You know what?
What spawned that?
Speaker 1 (10:31):
so I cut my teeth do sales and marketing.
Coaching was where I reallyspent all my like a lot of my
hours there, um, and I think,through what?
So very organic I can't there'sno other way to say it like I
didn't know 10 years, I couldn'thave predicted that this is the
brand or this the part of thestory.
Um, I think it was very muchabout just getting as much from
(10:54):
every experience as I can.
So as I started to teach and asmy hours started to clock up
and as I started to work withlarger and larger organizations
in fact, a lot of my clientswere in the states um, larger
and larger companies, I wasworking with leadership teams
and marketing teams and salesteams and all of the work that
comes with that and all thechallenges that come with that.
I think as part of that work, Ijust started to extract a lot,
(11:14):
like I learned from everything.
I documented everything,journaled, everything, um, and I
think it's just sort of anatural evolution to find myself
in a place where I'm doing thiswork work mainly because all of
it is all about communication,right, when you really marketing
and sales yes, lots of tactics,lots of software, lots of tools
, all of that stuff.
(11:34):
But if you want to get teams tobuy into a strategy or to buy
into a vision or to do theirbest work even you do you need
to be a world-class communicator.
You need to be able tocommunicate at your highest
level.
And so I found that, as I wasgoing through my own journey,
(11:55):
people started to ask me how Icould help them with what
they're doing, and so there wasthis organic sort of like
movement towards taking thatexpertise and coaching other
people in client facing roles,specifically coaches and
consultants, people like accountmanagers, sales teams, anywhere
where leadership teams,anywhere where there's like a
(12:17):
high stakes sort ofcommunication happening.
And over the last 10 years I'vebeen working with a group of
people on this.
We sort of figured out how tohave high stakes conversations,
how to get buy in from a groupof people, how to communicate
more effectively essentially inorganizations and in life in
(12:37):
general.
So it became honestly like Iwould do this work for free,
because, uh, it's a real passionof mine to want to help people
to communicate more effectively,because it is the key to
confidence as well, like beingable to go into any room and
feel confident that you canspark up a conversation that can
hold your own in a room likethat, I think is it's just an
(13:00):
example, really, of how goodcommunication skills are.
Working on, your communicationskills can actually set you up
for success across your wholelife.
So there's a big deal and itcontinues to be.
It's just interesting to me,the more I work on it, the more
work I realize there is to do inthis space, and so I think my
sense is that this is the restof my career is specifically in
(13:23):
the communication space no,definitely, and, and I think
career is specifically in thecommunication space no,
definitely, and I think that isone of the foundational pillars,
essentially, of life andsuccess communication, right.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
And so what does it mean, I guess, in your
definition, what does it mean tobe authoritative, and why is it
important?
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Yeah, it's a good question, because the word
itself could have negativeconnotation, right?
So when people hear the wordauthority, they think power over
, like somebody has power overme telling me what to do,
micromanaging me or whateverthose negative senses are.
But that's not really it.
(14:03):
Authoritative is more like howyou turn up in the world.
So the whole idea is like well,look, if you want to be, if you
want people to listen to youand you want to have some
influence, you want to haverespect, you want to have some
control.
I think we all want agency,right?
If you want control, influenceand respect, the way you turn up
(14:23):
in the world is going to havean effect on that right.
So you could be.
Most people that I work with areaccidentally diminishing their
authority without they don'teven really know that they're
doing that, and it's everythingfrom the non-verbal language
that they, the way that theycommunicate non-verbally even
down to like literally the wordsthey use that diminish their
(14:44):
authority.
And what they don't realize isthat because you're doing these
things, accidentally orotherwise, that people are just
not listening to you, theyaren't being influenced by you,
they aren't treating you withrespect, they aren't treating
you like an expert, and wewonder why, you know, we can't
get clients, or we can't build abusiness, or we can't get what
(15:05):
we want in life, um, and it'sbecause of these things I think
we need to think seriously abouthow we turn up in the world in
an authoritative way, right,that we can be almost like you
turn up confidently, uh,committed, convicted to your
ideas, so that people listen to.
You.
Think this guy, this personhere he's, he knows what he
(15:28):
wants, um, he believes in whathe's talking about.
Um, and I respect a person likethat because you think that you
know, for the most part, you'regoing to get the truth from
that person as well.
Like they're not trying to besomebody that they're not,
they're not changing who theyare, just to fit in.
Like I had somebody, um, Idon't know.
(15:49):
Can you swear on this show?
yeah, you're good, right, cool.
Um, I when I remember when Ifirst met somebody in a
professional setting and I'vegot like sleeve tattoos and
whatever and I turned up andshe's like, oh, the first time I
saw you, chris, I was like thisguy does not give a fuck.
And I was like exactly likeyeah, and not in a way where,
like I'm I'm like judgmental ordismissive about the work that I
(16:11):
believe in the work that we'redoing, but I don't give a shit
if you like me or not.
Like that is not affecting theway that I turn up, whether you
like me or not.
Um, and that's such a powerfulposition to be in to not need
anything from another person.
I don't need a pat on the back,I don't need your like.
(16:32):
I don't need you to even try tolike me to turn up here and do
my best work and it's such agreat thing to let go of.
Like I don't need to try and besomebody that I'm not in order
to get something that like tomake me feel nice about things.
So I've kind of gone down arabbit hole there.
(16:52):
But like the whole idea is liketo be able to turn up in an
authoritative way is really aninternal work which is like who
am I and how can I beself-assured in this world?
And it's almost like your corevalues, like who do I want to be
, what do I believe in?
And instead of the opposite,which is, if I need to be liked,
(17:13):
it's all about external things.
Right will Devin like me, Ican't.
I can't say the things I wantto say, in case the audience
that I annoy somebody, astranger that I've never seen
before, I heard of before.
You know it's like you'rethinking about everything that's
happening outside of the world,but actually some of the most
important work you could do foryourself is internal work.
It's got nothing to do withanybody else.
It hasn't even got anything todo with the books or the courses
(17:35):
.
It's actually hugely internal.
Like what do I want?
Who am I?
What do I believe in, how do Iwant to turn up?
Speaker 2 (17:45):
those are the big questions I think that have
helped me even to try, like toreally transform myself into
being authoritative and turningup in the world in that way no,
and I think that's a superfreeing um that space to be in,
right, and it's like we do wantpeople to like us but, at the
(18:06):
same time, it doesn't impact us,right?
Positive or negative, ifsomeone doesn't like us, like if
you don't like me, you don'tlike me.
It is what it is, you know, andthat's it's.
It's a personal problem, right?
Speaker 1 (18:19):
you know I'm not going to change who I am so that
you'll like me.
My hope is that you'll like mefor who I am like.
So we're all human.
Yes, I want to be liked and yes, I want to be friendly with
people, but it doesn'tnecessarily need to be friends
with people, right?
I'm not going to go around it.
So there's like the danger isthere's a fine line between all
(18:39):
of this and being an assholeright right, and that's not what
we're.
We're not talking about being anadult deliberately being an
asshole.
That's not it.
That's like part, like part ofthe formula, perhaps of it.
Like I take some of that, someof the the things that assholes
have, which is like they can behugely direct but they don't
give a shit about how you feel.
For example, let's have thedirect piece, but let's also
(19:01):
have the empathy for others,right, and so there's.
There's a combination of thingsthat we can pull together here
that I think is getting in theright order.
So what I say is like, if yougo into these especially
professional relationships wherethe stakes are high, if you
have a high need to be liked,what you risk is never being
respected.
However, if you go into theseprofessional relationships
(19:23):
letting go of the need to beliked, there's a good chance
that you'll be respected firstand then perhaps liked, right?
So what are you?
What do you want to risk here?
I know that I don't want torisk the respect, so I'll risk
the need to be liked yeah, and Imean I think that it goes even
deeper too.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
It's like if your real goal is to be liked by
everyone, you're going to beessentially kind of like super
liked or like loved or admiredby no one Because you're a
little bit of this and they likethat aspect of you, but then
you're a little bit of this forthis other group of people and
so they're like well, thatdoesn't really vibe with me.
(20:03):
So it's like you have to betrue to who you are and it, like
you said, it's not meant to be.
Like you know, I'm trying to bean asshole because that's just
the, the personal brand I wantto build.
If that's not it.
But at the same time, like foreven for me personally, like I'm
(20:30):
I'm more sarc, a dick, but atthe same time, like I'm not
going to sugarcoat it so muchthat you feel good about what
you just did wrong.
Right, it's like that's justright you know, or like they
don't.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
They don't get the message right like what did like
they don't get like exactly.
You're not clear.
You're not being clear exactlyright.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
And then even to, like you, compliment what you're
saying too.
Like, for example, when I was apersonal trainer, one of my
clients had asked me one timelike how come you're not, you
know, one of those trainers thatyou know is cheering us on?
And I was like, cause, that'snot me.
I was like, if you want to, ifyou want a trainer, that's going
to like I'm, I'm the personthat you like.
(21:04):
You don't need a high five fordoing the work you needed to do.
You did you get a high five forgoing above and beyond.
You killed it today.
You went above and beyond whatwas demanded of you.
That's, that's awesome, right?
Speaker 1 (21:15):
so that way, when I tell you good job, you know I
actually mean it versus oh,that's just how he says bye 100%
like so you've got like I talkabout this a lot, which is like
you've got to watch what you'regiving away, like if you're
always apologizing I'm sorry forthis, I'm sorry for that like
it starts to not only is it verydiminishing, it also starts to
(21:35):
mean nothing, right?
Or you're always saying thankyou for things, like I have this
debate with people like well,can't you?
What's the problem with sayingthank you all the time?
It's like because actually, alot of what we're doing is
actually just expected, right?
When I say thank you, it'sbecause something extraordinary
has happened, but everythingelse is just expected.
Similar to you.
(21:56):
I say to my clients it's likelook, 80% of my job is about
picking out and pointing out themistakes you're making and the
things that you aren't doing.
Well, right, I just need you toknow that, because most of the
time, I'm not going to bepatting you on the back because
you did a thing right.
If you want, you could dealwith that within your team,
internally, whatever, but that'snot what you're gonna get from
(22:17):
me.
Are we on the same page?
Does that sound like we can?
You know?
You're just making sure thatyou're managing their
expectations, but I think it'sgood, like, just reflect on what
you're saying, devon, as well.
It's like it's good to know,it's good to be comfortable
about that, about yourself,because then you're not
constantly anxious about tryingto be somebody that you are not
right.
That's kind of what you'resaying there.
(22:39):
It's like well, that ain't me,I'm okay with that.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
If you're okay, you know so yeah, and it's
exhausting being trying to besomeone that you're not.
So it's like it's a lot easierjust to be you and like.
People will resonate with youand like you for you being you
and have a deeper connection, inmy opinion, with you, because
they know that is truly you,versus you putting on a face,
(23:03):
and then they all of a suddensee a glimpse of the real you.
Then they're like, oh wow, likehe's fake or she's fake, right.
So I think there is, there isthat side of it as well.
So I mean I love the thingsthat you're saying now with with
that, I mean it goes into kindof what we're talking about,
like the people pleasing, right,and so how could someone almost
(23:26):
do like a self-reflection andsee if they are a people pleaser
or if it's truly them?
Speaker 1 (23:33):
really okay.
Well, it manifests itself inlots of different ways.
So, um well, number one is Ihave an assessment that you can
do.
So if you're a client facingprofessional, I have an
assessment that you can do.
So.
If you're a client facingprofessional, I have an
assessment that you can completethat will shine a light on
where your biggest peoplepleasing areas are.
So that's number one.
I'd be probably the quickestand easiest thing to do is to do
(23:54):
that assessment, which you can.
If you go to Instagram and goto the authority of coaching, dm
me score, I'll send you theassessment and you can do that
for free.
And that would be certainly oneway.
The other way would be to lookat like there's there's just so
many ways it manifests itself,boundaries as one right.
So if you're like overworked,overwhelmed, if you look at your
(24:15):
calendar and you are like, whydid I say yes to that thing?
Or you turn up for an event andyou're resenting the fact that
you're there and you don't evenlike these people, these are all
signals to you that you've saidyes to the wrong things.
What do you want?
What's the gap between when youlook at your life, where you
are right now, and what youwould actually like it to look
like, and how much agency orcontrol do you feel like you
(24:38):
have over affecting that?
So I speak to a friend aboutthis all the time.
He's like if I want to changesomething about my life, I can
do it.
Next week will be different.
A lot of people have to waitsix months before they can
change anything about their life.
That's a signal, I think, thatyou've set yourself up to be
like your.
Your calendar, your days, yourweeks have been controlled by
someone else or something else,or there's an expectation for
(25:00):
you, you know.
So I think that's definitelyone way how you're using what
you're saying yes to how yourtime's being used against how
you feel about that.
I think a lot definitely oneway how you're using what you're
saying yes to how your time'sbeing used against you, how you
feel about that.
I think a lot of people don'teven necessarily realize that
people pleasing is manifestingitself in your calendar, right?
I guess some of the obviousthings are when you are clearly
(25:22):
saying something to someone thatyou do not believe, like your
guts telling you one thing butyou're saying something else and
there's a mismatch between howyou feel and what you're saying.
Well, yeah, that looks reallygreat, that's a great dress
you're wearing there, fantastic.
But actually you think it looksterrible, and so I guess we
have to unpack that right.
Why am I lying right now?
(25:42):
Why is you know?
Why am I not saying what Ireally think?
Um, am I?
I think a lot of people worry.
This is, I think, one of thebig things devon is.
A lot of people worry that,well, they don't want to risk
the relationship that they havewith someone.
They think that if they say thetruth or say what they really
feel, that that's going tonumber one, it's going to create
(26:04):
awkwardness, it's going tocreate a difficult conversation
that we need to deal with, andthey're not prepared.
They're not prepared to riskthe relationship, so they say
something that's acceptable.
They lie essentially, they'relying.
Um, or they say nothing, right,they sweep it under the carpet,
hope it goes away, whatever.
What's interesting about thisthat I've figured out is that
(26:26):
there's an inverse relationshipwith this, which is a lot of
people don't want to approachdifficult things with people
like just everything from you'vegot spinach in your teeth to
poor performance or whatever itmight be, or a behavior that's
sort of holding you back frombeing successful.
Um, they, they shy away from itbecause they think if they say
that thing, it's going to pushpeople away.
The opposite is true.
(26:48):
So when I look at thisopportunity which is how I look
at it is this is an opportunityto galvanize your relationship
with people Try and see thedifficult thing that needs to be
said as an opportunity toactually strengthen that
relationship, because when youlook at the strongest
relationships you have, they'reusually built on difficult
(27:08):
situations.
We had to go through stufftogether and because we did that
, we're actually better off, ourrelationships better because of
it.
And so I think a lot of peoplethink that it's the opposite,
that they think if they do thatthing, they're actually going to
turn people away from them, andthat's a problem.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
No, it goes into that .
You find who your real friendsare when they tell you, like you
said the spinach in your teeth,like if I knew we were having a
conversation this whole timeand you didn't tell me.
And all of a sudden I talked tothe next person, like hey, you
have some of your teeth.
I'm like, oh wow.
Obviously it's embarrassing, butat the same time, like I was,
like the person I was justtalking to didn't say a single
thing, like I know, I gotta becareful on what kind of truth
(27:55):
they're telling me, or whatversion of truth that they're
giving me, because they don'twanna upset me or they don't
wanna, you know, whatever.
And at the same time, like,just like with that inverse
relationship that you're saying,I think it's so true, it does
strengthen that relationship.
It does, you know, create abond of trust.
Like they, they know thatyou're going to give them, as
hard as it may be or asuncomfortable as it may be.
(28:17):
They know that they can valueyour opinion because, like it or
not, you're going to give themthe, the truth that they need to
hear, not what they want tohear you teach people how to
treat you right like, don't,like, don't come to me.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
If you don't want the truth, like, if you want
somebody to appease you, then goask.
Like like literally everybodyelse, but if you want the truth,
then you come to me.
I would like to be I don't knowabout you devon, but I would
like to be known as that personin my life.
Like it's's disingenuous aswell, not to say the other thing
that's not disingenuine is likeyou don't say something in the
(28:51):
moment, but then you go andgossip about it to somebody else
.
There's this idea that it'slike you are hoping that this
person looks like an idiot, orthat they fail, or that they
fall on their face or whatever.
You're just waiting for it soyou can step on their, their
back and benefit from it.
Somehow there are people likethat in the world.
Right, we're that's again, Ihope that we only have like have
(29:13):
to deal with a few of thosepeople in our life, but they do
exist.
But the what we want is likeyou know what the stoics talk
about.
I think it's.
Seneca says this, he says orthat marcus aurelius is one of
those guys.
He talks about this idea oflike being like a smelly goat,
like when you're in the room,people know that you're there,
right.
In other words, if I'm in theroom, there's there's going to
(29:35):
be truth.
I'm going to say what needs tobe said.
I'm going to say what I see,again, just for the audience.
It's not the asshole piece,it's not it.
It's the other bit, which isthat if I don't say something
right now, the last thing I wantis, three months from now,
someone's saying why didn't youtell me sooner?
You know, like I don't want, Idon't want that to happen.
So if I see something that'syou're about to make a mistake
(29:57):
or um, you know you're doingsomething that's kind of like
it's making you look like anidiot or whatever it might be,
we're going to have a chat aboutit and it's going to be great
because I'm here to help you.
Anyway, that's what I want.
I want to support you and helpyou to be better, right.
That's what it's all about.
So I think the people pleasingpiece, the how it manifests
itself, I think, is in.
(30:18):
I think you do have to.
You know, one of the gaps devonI'll say here is that I've
struggled with this with myclients a little is that they
don't have a big enoughvocabulary to describe how they
feel in certain situations.
So like sad, happy, angry, notreally good enough, right,
(30:40):
frustrated, worried, anxious,still not really that good of
contempt, resentment, like nowwe're getting somewhere.
It's like we need to get theselayers in place.
You need to be truly honest withyourself about how you feel,
with where you're, at, whatsituations you're in, um, how
you feel about the thing youdidn't say.
If you can get, I think there'sa something to tap into there
(31:03):
which is a signal that you arenot really being true to who you
want to be or who you are, andtherefore not truthful to the
people around you.
Like, if people can't trustyour what you say, then like
that to me, that's just, that'sa major problem, right, it's a
major problem.
(31:23):
And so I think you know thepeople I think about is like
michael scott or david brentfrom the office.
If you're in the uk or the us.
That's a guy, that's a peoplepleaser, right, he wants to be
liked by absolutely everybodyand, as a result, nobody likes
him, you know.
So, um, but, yeah, I thinkthere's I don't know how if you
(31:43):
have anything to add, devon,about how people pleasing
manifests itself.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
But certainly those are the, those are the big ones,
I think no, I mean, I think youyou hit the nail on the head.
I mean, obviously that's whyyou're the professional in it.
But yeah, I mean, if you feel,if you feel like you're saying
yes to something and then, rightbefore you're about to do it,
you're you catch yourself beinglike, man, I wish I didn't have
to do this right now.
And and then you're like allright, pumping yourself up and
(32:06):
put a smile on to go do it Likeyou're people pleasing right.
If you're looking at anappointment on your calendar and
you're like, oh man, I wish Idon't want to do this or I wish
that person didn't schedule,it's like why did you schedule
them?
It is also one of the most likeliberating things to and as easy
as it is you know there's thisword in the dictionary.
(32:27):
It's no right and it's hard tosay that, but sometimes, saying
it, it's the feeling you getfrom just being able to have
that self-confidence and thatself-awareness that not
everything's going to line upwith you, not everything's in
line up with what you got goingon, and being able to say no,
like I don't want to do that,and not have to give an
(32:47):
explanation why.
It does help Cause then if yousay yes to people, please are
you showing up as the bestversion of you, right Cause, any
, any person.
You show up as like that's aresignation or that's an imprint
of who you are in that person'seyes.
They're going to tell that someyou know.
Oh, that person showed up andthey were like X Right, and it's
(33:09):
like do you want that to be howpeople are?
Are kind of spreading your nameor referring you as yeah, I
think no is so important.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
There's two things that I did in the last 12 to 18
months that I think challengedme to push me outside my comfort
zone a little bit.
One of them was to make moreasks.
Right, I think we hold like wedon't want to again.
We're back to the same thing.
I don't want to annoy people, Idon't want to take a people's
time, I don't like.
This is all people pleasing,and I was like I'm actually
going to make more asks, asks,asks, as in.
(33:39):
Can you help me?
Hey, I'm looking to work withsomeone like this, who do you
know?
Hey, I'd love to work with you.
What could that look like?
Hey, I need a testimonial or areferral or an introduction.
Could you make that for me?
Like those types of asks, andpeople don't do those things
because they're afraid of like.
They afraid of like.
(34:04):
They just don't want to take uppeople's time.
It's like people want to help,we want to help.
So that's one side.
The other side, the otherchallenge I gave myself, was to
tally up, like not just tally up, but increasingly say no to
higher and higher stake thingsright when it makes sense.
Obviously it's not like a game,as in, I said no to something
that was actually a goodopportunity for me.
I'm not going to do that, butultimately saying no's to things
that are taking me off,distracting me to other things.
Um, I said no to a businesspartnership last year.
(34:26):
I've said no to a couple of bigthings this year that I
actually felt like like I really, under normal circumstances, I
would probably have got on theplane and taken two days out and
all the rest of it, but I hadsomething more important for me
at home.
Had I not had agreed withmyself about what's actually
(34:48):
important for me right now, thenI would have been saying yes to
lots of things.
It's quite interesting to methat we're back to the internal
piece.
Like I say this it's sort's ourbusiness.
It's actually quite interestinghow you can transfer a lot of
business stuff into normal life.
I'll give you an example a90-day strategy in your business
.
If you've got a really clear90-day plan for your business,
(35:10):
you know immediately what adistraction is like you should
be saying no to everything elseapart from what's in the
strategy.
That's, that's great.
Similarly, similarly in yourlife.
If you know what's importantfor you right now, like if, for
example, you're taking care ofyour health, your gym, your diet
, all of that you're probablygoing to turn down the
opportunity to do some travelbecause that's going to throw
(35:33):
everything off.
Point being is like if you wantto feel confident saying no,
the first thing you need to dois work on what's important to
get your yes Right.
What's the yes that should beimportant?
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Definitely no.
I agree with that, and that'sthat's the thing is, you have to
put your priorities in orderand realize that you, as much as
people pride themselves onbeing able to multitask and, you
know, do multiple things atonce it's in reality you're
you're not going to get as muchdone if you're multitasking, but
you're also not going to get itas done as well as you could
(36:07):
have if you put your fullattention to it.
So I think that what you saidyou know it does hold a lot of
weight.
As we wrap up, I like to askone question, right, and this
question is the legacy wallquestion, right?
So, on the Chris Marr legacywall, what is one lesson that
you've learned along your entirelife's journey that you would
leave for the up and cominggenerations?
Speaker 1 (36:32):
Yeah, so that's a great question.
My immediate thought here issomething specific to do with
skill acquisition.
I think we're getting into aphase now where a lot of people
are questioning our educationsystems schooling degrees,
university, mbas, all that sortof stuff and I would love for
(36:55):
people to realize that orunderstand that their fastest
way, their quickest way tosuccess is to acquire skills,
which is not going to universityand reading textbooks and
passing exams or beingacademically proficient or
effective.
It's like what are the skillsthat you need to acquire?
You've got YouTube, you've gotcoaches, you've got podcasts
(37:17):
like this.
Where can you go learn theskills, acquire them quickly,
get them into your practice andbe successful?
I think, like if you realizethat, like your career
trajectory is based on skillacquisition, I would love if I
went back and I was able to tellmyself something like that at
20 years old.
I think there would have been aspeeding up, perhaps in a lot
(37:39):
of areas where I was like I'mjust one more skill, one more
skill, get the skill, get theskill.
And if you've lacked confidencein any area, it's not a
confidence issue, it's a skillissue.
You need to acquire the skillto feel more confident in that
area.
So I think I would like, I wantthat, that like I'm just
thinking about what I tell mykids.
(37:59):
It's like you're just you, justyou know.
If they come in, they're likeI'm having this problem where
I'm not feeling confident.
It's like what's the skill?
How do I teach you, how do wepractice it?
It's like that's it To me,that's the key to success.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
No, I, honestly, I love that.
It is, it is true, like skillsare everything right, and it's
not like you need to go out andlearn to be an electrician.
But do you not know how to sellwhen you're trying to open a
business?
Well, go acquire the skill ofselling, go take, and that's not
and a lot of skills.
(38:31):
It's not like you learn it andyou're done, like there's levels
to each of the skills, right.
So, skill acquisition, I wouldalmost like take it a step
further and be like the skillacquisition, realizing that
there's levels to the each skill, and acquire each of those
levels as you, as it comes.
So I love that.
I mean that's the first timesomeone has mentioned that, so
that I think that's so awesome,that's so true.
Where can people connect withyou and uh and get your book and
(38:52):
and you know you can reach out?
Speaker 1 (38:55):
Yeah, devin, thanks for that.
Um, the Instagram is the bestplatform for me.
Yeah, devin, thanks for that.
Um, the Instagram's the bestplatform for me.
It's like my.
That's where I live, really.
It's got all my recent content.
So if you're listening to thisand you want to get a little bit
more of this, then head over toInstagram at the authoritative
coach and you'll find all mystuff there.
You can also DM me there aswell.
So if you've got a question orsomething you want to pick my
brain about, then you can diveinto the DMs there.
(39:16):
And, of course, the author ofcoachcom You'll find out about
my book there and any otherprograms that I'm running, or
whatever, my podcast, my blogseverything's there as well.
So those are the two mainplaces Perfect.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Well, you guys heard it.
It'll be in the show notes, butyou know, chris, I want to say
thank you again for taking thetime out of your day.
And, guys, if you're listening,make sure you guys share this
episode with a friend, right?
And the reason I say that isbecause when you level up your
circle, your circle tends tolevel you up as well.
So you're doing yourself afavor by sharing this with a
friend and helping them grow.
In turn, you grow.
(39:49):
So, chris, again, thank you somuch for taking the time out of
your day.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Thanks, devin, it was awesome.
Only positive thoughts.
Missing the game.
Life.
Mindset causes shits, got mymind on the prize.
I can't be distracted.
I stay on my grind.
No time to be slackin'.
I hustle harder.
I go against the current Cause.
I know my mind is rich to becollected.
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