Train Your Mind To Unleash The Best Version Of Yourself With John Assaraf

Welcome to the Conscious Pivot podcast with international speaker, business mentor, best selling author of Pivot, and your host, Adam Markell. The Conscious Pivot shares the stories and wisdom of people who have successfully reinvented some area of their business and personal life. You'll gain powerful insights into how you can fully embrace new opportunities, increase your performance, and master the art and science of innovation and resilience. So please join Adam as he guides you on your Conscious Pivot.

Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Conscious Pivot podcast. I'm your host, Adam Markell. I'm just glad to be here. That's what I'm feeling today. Somebody said that to me in a conversation yesterday and I thought, geez, that just so, it just so nails it, you know, with everything that's going on in the world, everything that's been going on in the world, just to come back to that place of sheer gratitude. And that to me is. It's magic. It's as miraculous a thing as I've yet to find. I'm a meditator. I know how to toggle back and forth and create state changes for myself. And in very many ways, I am always talking about resilience these days. And yet the one thing that is will reset me faster than anything is just simply to be grateful. So I know it's simple, but it's also usable. And so I'm just glad to be here. And I have a lot of reasons to be glad. It's a beautiful day. It's gorgeous in Southern California. I know where you guys are all at this moment, but you know, there's a bit of an exodus out of California. Come to California. There's, there's space. If people are leaving, you can come. And it's a beautiful day. I get to spend the next 45 minutes or so with an old, dear friend. He's not old, he's just a good friend. Dear friend. And we've known each other a while, which is also pretty cool. I'm going to read a little bit about his background, his bio, et cetera, and then we're just going to get right into it because he brings so much to the table. I just want to, I want to suck the marrow out of this experience and I know you will as well. John Assaraf is one of the leading mindset and behavioral experts in the world who is appeared numerous times on Larry King Live, Anderson Cooper and the Ellen DeGeneres Show. He's written a new bestselling book, the New science to unlock your brain's. Hidden Power. In addition to his two New York Times bestselling books, Having it all and the Answer, that have been translated into 35 languages, John has been featured in 10 movies, including the blockbuster hit the Secret, the Quest for Success with Richard Branson and the Dalai Lama. And today he's the founder and CEO of MyNeuroGym.com, a company dedicated to using the most advanced, advanced technologies and evidence based brain training methods to help individuals strengthen their mindset and their emotional skills so they can unleash their inner power and maximize their results. As I said at the beginning, he's just a good man and he's my friend. So John, great to have you today.

So great to reconnect with you today, my friend. It's always a joy. And I enjoyed our pre talk, you know, before this, just catching up a little bit.

Indeed. It's been a minute. I mean, I think there's probably a lot of people who through this pandemic, have lost track of time. I have really no sense of time right now. I'm just going to where the pandemic began and where it didn't end to very big span of time and space in between. And you did something, you know, you're approaching, you're approaching. You're a big sort of a milestone birthday. I don't say it's a big birthday because again, you know, these numbers, what do numbers mean except what we say they mean? But you decided that you were going to go back to getting a six pack for yourself. Tell me. I really want to know. I want to know more about that. I'm putting you out there on this one because I was really, I was blown away by that.

All right, so on my 59th birthday over a year ago, I said, you know, I usually do something unique for the upcoming year. So I say, okay, I've got another spin around the sun, you know, what challenge am I going to give myself so that I am proud of myself, you know, for the next birthday? And so I've given up alcohol, you know, many years ago I said, okay, I have never had a six pack. I have been in good shape, but never had a six pack. I used to do mini triathlons. Never had a six pack. And so I said to myself, well, is it possible to have a six pack at 60? And I looked at some pictures online of guys in their 60s and 70s and I found even a few in their 80s that had six packs. And so I just said to myself, let me set a six pack at 60 goal. And so I actually cut out some pictures of some individuals, you know, online. This is part of my vision board. But this is a guy, you know, in his 70s that's in phenomenal shape. And I cut out a few of them. Another guy that is really, you know, healthy looking. And this is just part of my. My vision board. And there's an ultimate guy that I know is in his 70s, right, that, you know, is in phenomenal shape. And so I said, let me set a goal for six pack at 60. And so I started a year ago and asked myself, you know, what does my exercise regimen need to be? How many calories do I need to eat a day of? What type of food? What does my sleep habit need to be like, what does the, you know, the other components of it need to be? And so I just got on a path to the mindset that I needed, the skillset I needed, and the behaviors that I needed. And I just started to do some things different. I started to journal, which I rarely have done, of what was I eating, what was I doing, how much was I sleeping every day? And slowly but surely, I start to get into better and better and better and better shape. And then on my birthday, I did a photo shoot. I asked my wife to take some pictures of me with my iPhone to reveal that for the first time in my life, I actually, at 60, got a six pack. And as you know, and by the way, I also have to give up shirts.

I'm seriously, I'm just applauding some of you are watching, some of you listening to this, but I'm literally applauding this man. And that is well earned, brother.

Seriously, the hardest part, which was interesting, wasn't the exercise. It wasn't even the diet, it wasn't even the sleep. It was the giving up of my sugar addiction.

Yeah, tell us about that, because I was going to ask you, I was going to say, I recall you saying you gave up something pretty significant that you were addicted to.

So, yeah, even though I've been vegan for almost nine years, no alcohol for 12 years, I exercised, you know, five days a week before. Anyway, there was one thing that, you know, that was my life. Sacred cow, let's call it my life. Like, my mother was a great baker. And so cookies, cakes were always in the house. Candy was always in the house. And I like, after dinner, I like to have, like, a vegan dessert every night. And my personality is like, one is too many and eight is not enough. Right. So I wouldn't eat, like A small piece of pie. I would eat a third of a pie. I wouldn't eat a third.

If you can't go big, this just like, go home, right?

I'm like, all or nothing. And so I had to first of all, commit to no sugar for a year because I've done 30 days, no sugar. I've done 100 days, no sugar, only to go back to it. And so actually, interestingly enough, Adam, yesterday was one year without even a chocolate chip going into my mouth. Even on my birthday, where my sister. I was in Montreal with my sister and my dad and my family celebrating my 60th and my dad's 91st. They made me my favorite carrot cake and my favorite ice cream cake that's in the freezer. I didn't even have a bite on my 60th birthday because I was two weeks away from reaching my goal. And now that I've reached the goal and I haven't had sugar for a year, like, I don't want to start sugar again.

Yeah.

So anyway.

All right, you know what? This is really interesting. And so many things, my God, we could go down so many wonderful roads. I got to know John. So what do you think it is that will. And I'm not looking to predict the future. And there's no judgment if for some reason you ended up eating sugar. Right, we get that. But I do want to get a sense, because part of your professional life is helping other people create new habits, break habits, use their brains to do it, etc. You know, and there's often that. That saying, you know, that people. People teach what they most need to learn kind of thing. Right. Which I buy. And I've been in that camp myself, you know, and I also believe that the strongest teaching comes from modeling. So you've got to be congruent often if you're saying one thing, but you're modeling something else, you know, it's an issue. It's an issue as a parent, for sure. So how is it that you think that you're going to get leverage, further leverage, or do you even need any more leverage to keep. To maintain this habit? Because clearly it's working for you.

Yeah. No, the answer is the science or the neuroscience of habits shows that, you know, a habit is nothing more than a reinforced neural pattern and, you know, thought emotional behavioral pattern that's triggered by certain things. And we know that a pattern that is interrupted for between 66 and 365 days loosens the proverbial grip on the pattern or the habit. And if you replace it with an empowering habit or pattern, it becomes part of something known as the default mode network or what I like to call your automatic self. So saying no to sugar now is not even hard for me. It's just not part of my current identity.

Right, right.

So my current identity is just like, you know, I'm just a, you know, a guy who doesn't eat refined sugar.

Right. I'm a no sugar. I'm a no sugar guy.

Just not, you know, I eat fruit sugar. Like I'll have a banana or berries. That's okay. But my specific, no processed, no, no refined sugar.

Okay.

Like when I eat a banana, I don't want four more bananas. If I eat a handful of berries, I'm fine. Right. But I also know the, the addiction levels or the addiction process around sugar and what it does to the reward center in the brain. And it just is a. Is a cycle of never ending desire for me.

Right. So now there may be some people that think, well, what if. What if you were to just like on your birthday, let's say you had accomplished this thing, had a piece of cake, what's the significance, do you think of that? And I know it's different for everybody.

It's different for everybody. So let me just share with you what I've discovered about me and my personality. And my personality tends to be all or nothing.

Right.

My wife. If my. If my wife bought a chocolate bar that had 12 pieces to it, she could have one a month till the end of the year. Yeah, I had 12 pieces, I would eat all 12 and see how much of yours you have left.

I love that about you, I gotta say.

So I would watch yours. And then if there's anybody else around that says, can I finish that? So I have a personality trait that can go destructive on me, can go disempowering on me, can go negative on me if I allow it to control me. So I have learned how to a, be aware of the destructive patterns that I have the first.

You're aware?

Yeah. There's a process that I've learned that I teach. It all starts with radical honesty first. And you and I have talked about this in the past. So radical honesty about what is the truth.

So, for example, the truth right now is you're saying you. You're an extremist on some level. That's the way you've grown up. Good. Now, a lot of people won't say that for whatever reason. They won't sort of just admit to themselves, hey, I am an all or nothing guy. They, they, ah, you know, I could, I choose this or I choose that. But they're, they're lying on some level if they don't just admit that one thing.

Right. So the first part is radical honesty and awareness. Right? So recognize then once I recognize, then I can ask myself a question of what is it that I'm really committed to, not interested in, Committed to. Because when we're interested, we come up with stories, reasons and excuses why we can't or why we won't. But if we're committed, that means no more stories, no more excuses, no more reasons, and we focus on how we can not why we can't. So my question was, am I interested in, for example, a six pack or am I committed to. And I said, oh, wow, that's a serious question because there's room for a deviation, but there isn't a lot of room for deviation. And so I said, I'm committed to this. I said, great, now let me come up with how I will, because I am committed. So what knowledge do I need? What skill do I need? What tool, what resource, what coach, what accountability partner do I need in order to make my commitment easier? Not easy, easier. Why? Because I have to stop certain things and I have to start certain things. And the very nature of our brain is it does not want to start certain things or stop certain things that it's already become used to and created habit loops in our brain to make them automatic, to conserve energy.

Object in motion tends to stay in motion.

Object in the object at rest tends to stay at rest. Newton's second law of thermodynamics. Correct. And so whenever I set any goal, my very, very next question is, am I interested or am I committed to achieving that goal? Now, you mentioned something that's very, very true about me. I have an extremist personality. So everybody is 100% addicted to, to their current patterns.

Say that again, John. I want this to drop in for people.

Everybody is. You know, some people say, well, he's an addict. I am not. Yes, you are. Yes, I am. Some of my addictions are constructive. Some are destructive. Some empower me, Some disempower me. Some are positive, some are negative. Some will help me achieve my goals, some will not. Period, End of story. The neuromechanics of the brain is that we are all addicted to the thought patterns that we have 6200 of them a day. We are all addicted to the emotions we are used to feeling. We are all addicted to the behaviors we are all addicted to the current results that we have averaged out over, let's say, six to 12 months. So when we are radically honest about ourselves, our results, our desires, and when we are radically honest about whether we are committed to the new outcome, then we say, I must then become radically obsessed with the behavior change that is needed. Right. And so, you know, when you have change proof. My read of that is I am able to change deliberately and consciously evolve myself to a higher order of behavior, thinking and emotions that help me achieve what I want. To move me away from what I don't want.

Yes. Anymore.

So when it came to, hey, will.

You remind us to come back to that point in a little bit? I don't want to stop your flow, but I want to come back to that. Okay.

Yeah. So, you know, so whenever, you know, I want to achieve something, I know about myself, I'm an extremist, Right. I get addicted like everybody else does. So I want to make sure that my thought emotional, behavioral patterns are constructive, empowering, inspiring me. Addictions, not expiring me.

Right. Positive addiction.

Positive addictions. Right. And, and like I said, like my wife, she can have a cookie and have two or three bites and leave it alone. I can't. I can't.

Your wife and I are very simpatico, buddy. Yeah, I know some of that in that respect.

Yeah. We've been out and my personality is not that way. My, my natural propensity of who I am is not that I accept, I.

Surrender, I allow, I surrender.

And now I say, how can I use that personality trait as leverage? As opposed to saying, oh my God, John, you are addicted to this and you're addicted to that. I said, okay, well, that can put me down. Well, I don't want to put myself down. I want to lift myself up.

I want to go back to the actual goal for a second, not to focus on that thing, the six pack, as the goal. But I'm going to ask you relative to this one point, which is that I believe as part of that second piece, the awareness that you described, that radical honesty and awareness and then this commitment piece that for me to be committed to something, it's really helpful if I understand why, why I'm committed. Right. So I'm going to ask you in a second, why the six pack? Why was that important to you? And I use that as an example. With my son in law, my daughter Chelsea's husband, Matthew, who's our son, Matthew, they got married about two and a half years ago now. And before that, he wanted to Be able to look, you know, really good in his tuxedo. And he's a big guy and he was over £200. He wanted to be just under 200 so he'd look great. And sure enough, he accomplished his goal. But three, four weeks after the wedding was over, you know, he didn't look like he did on his wedding day. So his goal, his why was to look good for the wedding and the pictures and all the rest of it is be feeling great. And that made sense, but then that, that didn't last. So I want to understand more, more at a depth how the why is important and why in fact you chose six pack at 60. Why was that important to you?

So let me talk about your son in law first and the rest of us, right, we can make decisions for a reason, a season or a lifetime. A reason, a season or a lifetime. So a wedding is a reason. Summertime and you know, your bikini or your shorts. A season. A lifetime is a behavioral change that you're committed to beyond, okay, the strategies and tactics for a reason or a season. So when we're looking at behavioral changes for a lifetime, we're looking at a change in identity for a lifetime.

Yep.

So before my 50th birthday and you, I don't think you and I even knew each other back then, adam. I was 243 pounds, 33, body fat, borderline diabetic, hypertensive and a fatty liver. 243, not, not a great recipe for my 50th birthday. You know, I got down to the best shape of my adult life because I made a decision for a lifetime and I have maintained. So then I changed my eating habits, my exercise, you know, I changed a whole bunch of stuff and got into really good shape. So why is 6 packets 60? I teach about the power of the human brain. I believe it's the most powerful bio organism in the entire universe. I think it's worth $100 billion or more. And it's capable of achieving unbelievable things. And so I know that, you know, having a six pack is hard enough at 25 or 35. I just want to choose another hard goal that would bust a myth. That would be, that would show people the power of inner sizing, which is strengthening your mental and emotional neuro muscles that then allow you to be mentally and emotionally strong to achieve more things. So we know we go to the gym to exercise or you swim and you know, your muscles get stronger, your internal organs get stronger, your nine systems get stronger, work synergistically together. But what about my brain, the greatest tool of all? Can I strengthen my neuromuscles of resolve? Can I strengthen my neural muscles of self confidence? Can I strengthen my neuromuscle of focus? Can I strengthen my neural muscles of changing behaviors? Because I decide to. Can I change my neuromuscles of Fill in the blank. We have a variety of different neuromuscles, just like we have a variety of different physical muscles. But many people, number one, I've never heard of it placed this way, nor do they focus it on every day. So I decided to use some of the stuff that I've researched and have used in my life for growing companies, for being in a great relationship, for getting into the best shape of my life at 50. And I said, well, what's like the next thing that I might be able to do that can prove once again to myself that, oh my God, it's right between my ears. It always has been, always will be. And so I just chose this goal. And it may be because I read a lot and I see magazines, I see, you know, people who are unhealthy, people who are healthy, people who are wealthy, people who are not, people who live a lifestyle, you know, that I resonate with and lifestyles that I don't. And so I am very visual. And so I have been asking myself a question. How do I. In my 60s, 70s and 80s and 90s, I made a promise to one of my sons, Noah, when we were on a chairlift in Telluride, Colorado, skiing many years ago. I promised him that I will teach your children how to board or ski. He was 13 at the time. He is 24 now. And so I have to project. What would I look like and feel like at 70, projecting when he might have kids. Right. 65. 70. 75. And so I have been on this health path so that the quality of my life is as good as it can be if I have any choice. Yeah, right. Listen, I understand shit can happen, and we know shit has happened, right? So I wanted to say, how do I give myself the best chance to spiritually, emotionally, mentally, physically and financially be in the best shape of my life in my 60s, 70s, 80s and beyond, if I'm given that gift, that's a strong why?

That's not a reason.

It's a lifestyle decision. It's a what's the human experience that I want and how do I honor life? Like, to me, you know, one of my favorite memories from one of our previous discussions, whether we were walking on the beach or talking, you know, on one of our calls, you know, it's like when you wake up and you put your feet on the ground. That's one of your, you know, gratitude moments. Well, I've been doing that since you mentioned to me. I actually talked to somebody about you and that yesterday, you know, and so I want to be in. I want to be living in honor of life, right? So the physical body is just the vehicle. And so it was just something hard to try and do and say, okay, I'm going to back it up with the behaviors to be in congruence with that.

And now I want to put a sort of a parenthetical in here for just a second, because I'm just noticing that, you know, this question about why. Really interesting one, John. And people ask it, and it's been asked and all that, you know, nothing too profound there. But I think what is not as readily thought of or talked about or understood even, is how. How it is that you future cast things. How do you future cat it? How does the why get executed? And for me, it's what you just described, that you looked far enough down the line to determine whether is this something I'd be committed to 10 years, 15 years, 20 years down the line or not? For Randy and I. Well, you brought up the I love my life. Practice this ritual that is a waking ritual. It's future casting for me. When I wake up, put my feet on the floor, say, I love my life. It's how I want to experience myself being that day. Yes, in that moment, I want to feel gratitude. But when I put my head on this pillow at night, at the end of the day, and I'm getting ready to. To be grateful for the. For the potential of being given another day, yet another day, I want to know that the day I just had was one I actually loved, no matter what. Like, you're married a really long time to Maria. Randy and I celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary on July 29. This past year, we created invitations and a vision board for our 75th wedding anniversary, which is July 29, 2064. We did that, I don't know, 10 years ago. So if we're future casting that we are going to be healthy, that all of our parts and pieces are going to be, you know, working, and our kids and our family and loved ones are going to be around, and we're going to be in our favorite place in this little island, and all. All this kind of stuff is going to be in place, and for that to happen, it informs the present moment. It informs every step between here and there, including whether I lose my. Whether I lose my shit in an argument with her or. Or I. Or I learn patience or she learns patience with me, which she's had to learn much more patience with me than the other way around. Or. Or how it is that we are taking care of ourselves, taking care of each other. It informs everything backwards if you can think far enough ahead. And so it's just wonderful that you tied your. Why not to? Because, hey, look, I just want to. I don't know, I want to be that guy in the picture that has that six pack or that eight pack. When I'm 60 years old, it's more like, you know, where is this going to impact my life? So I'll be able to be on a ski slope when other guys are sitting in their rocking chair. I'm going to be teaching my grandson how to ski. Yeah, that's really tangible, John.

Yeah, it's part of my promise. Promise to me of the life that I want to live. You mentioned something that sparked something that I do every night when I go to bed. I call it signing my day. So as I lay in bed, just before I go to sleep, I review my day. And like an artist signs what she wrote or what she painted or what he painted or what he sculpted. I want to make sure I'm proud of signing my day. Today was the masterpiece I created with the life and gift I received. Right. I want to make sure that I have many more days where I am proud of that signature than not. And I've got plenty of experiences in my life in the past where I am not many of my younger, younger years. And so as I have gotten older and hopefully a little bit wiser, I want to invest my days in the moment so that I am living in the moment, which pretty much guarantees the memory I am going to have in the future. So if I pay attention to right now, this hour, this morning, this afternoon, this evening, then the building blocks for amazing memories and being proud are laid. So if I focus on the now and I sign my day. Ok. And if there are things, you know, what, tomorrow, let's adjust here. Awesome. You know, then the part of the signature for the day was to learn the adjustment for tomorrow. If I can keep creating these calibration points, then, you know, I'm going to trade my life for what I'm proud of and what I love for me. And that's really what's important.

It is. I want to. I want to put a footnote into this show because I know we won't have time to go into it, but it's, it's, it's something I want people to just pay attention to if they haven't, if they didn't already pick it up, you know, John, one of John's famous, very famous sort of acts, acts, things that he did which was featured in the Secret was this vision board that he created. And he mentioned a vision board he showed us, actually those of you that might have watched this on YouTube, you got to see John's vision board including dudes, dudes looking pretty good that he wanted to look like, you know, like the Jack Lane's of the world. And I mentioned a vision board a moment ago for Randy and I and our, our 75th wedding anniversary. So I know we're not going to talk about that at the moment, but the vision boards are really important part of this process for you, John. Right, that's. I just want to footnote that and get your vision, you know, a moment of thought on that. Super important. Yeah. Still, still.

This is my exceptional life blueprint. The first few pages you're going to see my, my family, the important stuff, you know, that's there. And then it's a blend of my current lifestyle and the lifestyle I want to, to live. And I blend them in, you know, in pages for health, wealth, charitable contributions, you know, things that I want to create. And then I have everything in here around the story of my life, my results for health, wealth relations, career, business, finance, charity contribution, now five years, 10 years, 20 years from now. And the reason I do this is I get very, very deliberate about what is it that I want to trade my life and time for.

Right.

So, and every day I look at this so that I prime my brain, my bio computer of these are the instructions that I want you to focus on. Right. And so if I prime my brain, if I give my brain the instruction, the bio computer, the instruction, then I can start to use the genius parts of creation.

You're a coder.

2 million years of evolutions created this sentient being called a human with a $100 billion bio computer. I want to be a really good operator of that computer. And so if you're going to look at computer software, the output is only going to be as good as the software and the input. So I want to consistently feed my brain the information, the energy information so my brain doesn't have to figure out, well, what do you want? I know what I want. I know what I want my energy to be like My health to be like my focus, to be like my wealth, to be like my charitable contribution, to be like my trips. I already have taken the time to say, this is what I choose that will make my life worthy for me, my wife, my family, the people who follow my work, my children, etc. And I don't need you to like what I like or to approve of what I want for my life. I'm trading my life for what I want, My fullest expression of that. And so I want to be very deliberate with flexibility, of course, for things to show up and come up, which we know they do.

To pivot where pivoting is needed.

Yeah, to pivot and to adapt. That's okay. But I am locked and loaded on what I want to trade my life for, period.

Yeah.

And so I start off with a. Like you and Randy do for, you know, when you're 75, you know, I start off with, what does it look like upon, you know, completion? And then I can change it along the way. So I'm giving my brain the Einstein part of my brain, the occipital lobe part of my brain, the motivational side of my brain, the behavioral cortex part of my brain. I am giving it the input it requires in order to create the output. And, you know, somebody once said, garbage in, garbage out. Bullshit. Garbage in, garbage rots. So I don't want to put garbage in. I want to put the best information in, the best instructions in, the best processes, systems, skills, tools, resources in. Because that's the way I'm going to achieve the masterpiece that I want for my life. I don't want to live an ordinary life, John.

I think you need to amp up your energy just a little.

That's like.

No, really.

I wasted so many years when I was younger, right. That I made a commitment to put as much as I can into my life so that I'm proud of it.

For me, to me, the word that really dropped in is the word deliberate. You know, that that's. First of all, it's a word that isn't used all that often, I think. And it's really. I think the one thing that I want folks to take that word today, and where can you apply it? Where can you use that word deliberate for yourself? Where can you create a more deliberate intention and action for yourself in some area? And I want to use this moment to pivot. There's a way to segue from what we're talking about now into how it is that, as you say, you're deliberate about your Desires, your intentions, your goals, you create almost a blueprint for what it's going to look like future. Cast it and then we know life happens. And that's the part that I think where it can take people sideways because life will happen and things will take you out of your great plan. I think maybe it was Mike Tyson that said, everybody's got a plan, then they get hit in the face and then there's no plan. Right? So the pivot, as the book I wrote some years ago would suggest, is a way to deal with that. Inside of that book is a chapter on resilience. I have a new book that's coming out later this year called Change Proof. And you brought that, that word up, that term up earlier. So I will really. And this book, the subtitle is how it is that we utilize. How do you utilize the power of uncertainty to create long term resilience? That's the key. Leveraging the power of uncertainty. And I was looking at an article in HBR earlier today that said our brains were not built for this much uncertainty. So what I want to do now, John, is just transition into a conversation about resilience. And I want to start first of all with your definition of it. So how do you personally define resilience?

So first and foremost, you mentioned Mike Tyson, right? So he and I just delivered a keynote address in the same place a few weeks ago. So. And he actually mentioned, you know, all your best laid plans go right out the window when you get punched in the face. So I was looking at that, not being rude, but just agreeing. So.

So you got, you got it, you got it from the man's mouth himself. How big are his hands, by the way?

They're not that big.

They're not that big.

His trunk and legs, very big. His hands were not as big as I thought they were. I thought we'd have like a club hand. But his torque, you could tell that he is built for speed and strength. So listen, so resilience, right, is of the visual. I would have is think of the bamboo, right? The bamboo is both firm and resilient and bendable and pliable to a certain degree. So it's flexibility goes along with this resiliency. My ability to endure is how I would frame resiliency, right? And you mentioned something that's really, really important to understand when we're dealing with the human brain. The way that our brain actually works is our brain is taking in information from, you know, sound and sight and tactile, our tactile senses. And it Is projecting into the future any potential consequence into the now and into the future, any potential consequence based on the neural networks in our memory system and the associations and the meanings that we have for things positive, negative, fearful, not dangerous, or not. And so we're actually living just slightly in arrears of real time because our brain likes predictability, and it is predicting every second of every day, except when you're asleep, right, what is going to happen based on what happened in the past. But it's releasing the neurochemicals that cause you to feel either the positive constructive consequence or the negative destructive consequence based on what's in the memory bank. So we don't like change, we don't like uncertainty, we don't like doubt, we don't like things like that. There's what I call the Einstein part of our brain is trying to imagine a beautiful future with possibilities and how we could achieve that. But there's another part of our brain that I call the Frankenstein's monster that is always doing this. What if negative. What if I fail? What if it doesn't work? What if she rejects me? What if I lose money? What if I succeed and fail? What if I'm embarrassed, ashamed, ridiculed, or judged? What if this, you know, kills me? What if it kills my wife? What if it kills my children? What if negative? So we have this constant battle between the left prefrontal cortex and the right prefrontal cortex, it's like gas and brakes in a car. And until we become better operators of these parts of our brain, which means we need to recognize the thoughts, emotions, feelings, sensations, and behaviors. We need to learn how to reframe things so they empower us instead of disempower us. We need to learn how to release the disempowering emotions that want to deactivate our motive for action and deactivate our behavior. And we want to retrain our brain to be in a heightened state of awareness or mindful, so I can make deliberate choices versus reactive choices that actually not even reactive choice, but just to react automatically. We want to learn how to respond versus react. And these are just skills that we learn. So resiliency is something you can learn. Being an adaptationist is something you can learn. Being more mindful, something you can learn. Now, in the absence of training, we.

Will adaptationist, an improvisationalist, understanding that, again, that the plan is going to change. It's one thing to have a vision board, but it's also something you have to recognize that, yeah, maybe, maybe the thing is going to turn out exactly how it looks on the board, but it's likely to look differently. And even if it turns out exactly the way you pictured it would, it will likely feel differently than you, than you imagined it would feel when you. When you first intended it. Yes.

The vision board is an instruction to the brain of, in some cases, I want to look exactly like this or something like this. Right. So many years ago, I had this. I saw this incredible painting by this artist. His name is Spar Street. And it was a beautiful, beautiful painting. And I took it, I put on my vision board, I said, oh, one day, when I can afford, you know, to pay for this type of painting, I want something like this. I want to commission him to do it for me. Well, upstairs, along this wall over here, there's like an 8 by 12 painting that sparse street created for me. That's not the exact painting that I had, but it's just like it. So it gave me the visceral experience of what I wanted it to be like. And then I said, okay, what do I have to do? How much do I need to earn? Who do I need to become? What are the knowledge and skills and tactics that I need to implement to be able to one day afford a piece like that? Right. So the painting caused more questions and a commitment to leveling up who I was to be able to afford it.

And what you said earlier, John, I think really important that we pause for a second to sit with this, because it's the experience that we're after. Our lives are a collection of experiences on our last breath, wherever we go from here. We don't know necessarily, but what we'll have in that moment is the felt experience, the visceral, to use your word, experience of what it was like to be alive for however long we were lucky enough to have that experience. So wealth or rich, you know, people want to be rich. Rich is not a number. It's not a set amount of money in a bank account. It's not the car or the house. It's a feeling. It's an experience that. That you associate with wealth or richness.

Yeah.

And I agree. Does that make sense or am I saying it, you know, in language that. Yep, here's.

Here's, you know, an exercise that I have. I've done myself, and I've taken some of my students and friends and even my kids is who do you. Or what do you refuse not to become like? I refuse, okay. To stand on the edge of my potential and not go for it and do the Very best. I refuse. I refuse to be on my deathbed saying, why didn't I do this or that when I couldn't? I refuse. I just refused to have that dialogue with myself then. And so then I asked myself then, what needs to happen today? What needs to happen in my identity? What needs to happen in my behavior so that I never feel that, so I can go into my future at 60, 70, 80, whatever the case is, I'm at 60 now and I say, what do I want to make 100% certain of does not happen? Then I can come back to today and say, how do I make 100% certain? Okay, that I become what I want to become? And then am I committed to this or that?

Yes.

Right. So you can use a negative move away from frame just as much as you can use a positive move towards frame. But I want to know what my own line in the Sands are.

Indeed. You said earlier that of course, the human brain hates uncertainty, or let's say the mind hates uncertainty. And fear is the thing that's created when there's any sense of unknown or uncertain times. We're living in the greatest of uncertainty and uncertain times at the moment, which is why the book is actually, I think, really well timed to meet the moment, because. And I'm not here to talk about my book, I want to get your thoughts on uncertainty. One of the things we discuss is how resilience is in essence, an antidote to that uncertainty. But resilience isn't one thing. It's not one amorphous thing. It's kind of a setup question. Even ask somebody how they define it, because there's as many definitions for resilience as there are people. You would ask how to define it. But what we have through research found out is that it can be chunked into four zones. Mental, emotional, physical, spiritual. And you are, among other things, known as a brain expert. So I want to. I want to talk about the mental side of it. I want to talk about how it is that you yourself, or in leading a company and working with other people who are interested in this and interested in elevating their results, how it is that you create mental resilience. I want to know what that looks like for you, John, and where you can point to something that would help to alleviate some of the uncertainty that has people in abject fear. And some. Some folks really stuck at this moment even.

Sure. So it's. It's a complex question that can go down a variety of different channels. Right. So think about going to the Gym.

Well, I'm going to, I'll, I'll target it a little bit more. You do something called the brain, a thon, right?

Sure.

And so what I want, I want to do is say a person that wants to work on their mental resilience, their resiliency between the years kind of thing. That, that's, what does that look like for a person when it comes to say working that out when they're working out in the neuro gym, your company. Sure.

So there's only four things that hold people back or four categories that'll cause somebody to be stuck and stay stuck or not fulfill their potential. Number one is when they don't have the knowledge or the skill to achieve the, the goal that they want. Health, wealth relations, career, business, whatever it is. If you don't have the knowledge of the skill that activates the self doubt, the lack of confidence, the uncertainty, and maybe even the fear neural circuit. The fear circuit's connected to the motivational circuit of whether you take action or not and whether you are motivated to move forward or not. So we have these, we have the three networks in the brain, the salience, executive and default mode network in the brain. Those are three major networks and then a whole host of circuits that turn on or off like light switches. So when we have the knowledge and the skills, right. We lower the chances that we're going to feel uncertain because we have the knowledge or the skills. So in the absence of knowledge and skills, if you think about the word stress, what does stress really mean? It means that the demand is exceeding your current capacity. What does stress really mean? The stress circuit gets activated only when the mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, financial relationship demand exceeds your current capacity to handle it. If you have the capacity to handle it, there isn't stress. Right. And so when we're dealing with the brain and we're dealing with this biocomputer of circuits and networks, if we have a lot lack of knowledge and skill, we trigger the uncertainty, self doubt, lack of confidence, stress circuit, fear circuit. And we know that these circuits are interconnected to other circuits of whether we take action or not. Part one, part two is, let's say I have a conscious or an unconscious fear and there's 50 different types of fears. So I might have a vision and a goal, I might be resilient. But if I have a fear of failure because of what failure means to me or my family, if I have a fear of trying my best and being embarrassed, ashamed, ridiculed or judged or disappointed again, I know that if the fear circuit is activated. Any one of those eight or nine fears I just suggested, I'm not going to take inspired action most of the time. Number three, if I have limiting beliefs, like what is a limiting belief in the brain? It's nothing more than a reinforced neural pattern that I developed either in childhood or in adulthood that got reinforced. That now is the filter by which I see the world and myself in it. So now if I have limiting beliefs, that means I have networks in my brain that is limiting my perspective, my paradigm, my emotional abilities, and my behavior. That's actually the neuromechanics of that. And then let's say I have a vision, a goal, and I have a big why I want to change. I want to pivot. I want to have this instead of that. I want to leave this to get that, start this and stop that. But let's say that I have a hidden self image that questions whether I'm worthy of it. Am I really deserving of that? This imagination of mine that sees a better future, a better job, a better career, sees me as a coach, sees me speaking on whatever it is that we're envisioning that happens in the occipital imagination side of our brain. But there's a hidden self image that may be disconnected from us actually believing and feeling that we are worthy of that or deserving of that. Well, if I have a disconnect between the vision and my hidden self image, that is like having one foot on the gas and one foot on the brake. The foot on the brain wants to keep you stuck here. The foot on the gas wants to go somewhere else. Now you have a lot of movement, but you are not getting anywhere. So when we are talking about the neuromechanics of change and performance and resiliency, it is a little bit more complicated to understand. Why is it that I could be resilient at work but not at home? Why is it that I can be resilient when I'm working out, but not resilient in this other part of my life? So it starts to get a little bit more complex. However, when we have these constructive beliefs about ourselves, when we have these constructive memories of when we were resilient in the past, it is transferable because now we have references that we can transfer over to here. And the truth is, we all have all of these character traits. But our belief in the character traits, the good ones and the ones that maybe not, are proud of our belief about what they mean, will determine the feelings and the behaviors. And so we are a complex creature. I get that. But we're not so complex that just like the Rubik's Cube that I always have on my desk. If we are committed to solving the Rubik's cube, whether it's 2x2 3x3 4x4 5x5 or the mother Rubik's Cube, if we are committed to learning how to solve it and we practice diligently and we rehearse, what we practice creates permanent patterns. And the permanent patterns that are constructive or the permanent patterns that build our lives and the permanent patterns that are destructive destroys our life. So either way we are more in control and we can deliberately and consciously evolve ourselves. Just like if you're committed to solving the Rubik's Cube, go to YouTube. Just follow the play by play instructions on YouTube. You can solve it in three minutes.

I couldn't agree more that it that we are complex beings. So I'm going to do something maybe sacrilegious because I want to simplify or even perhaps oversimplify this because I think that for me at least in my life, getting out of my own way has always been the most important thing. You know, a lot of other things could be in my way and I'm able to deal with that. But me, I'm usually the one hardest nut to crack. So the way I've cracked this nut has been through deliberate, use your word, deliberate actions that I take consistently over, over time. I, to me, I call those rituals. They're habits are things like I brush my teeth with the, you know, my left hand, it's a default, I just do it. Want to do something different, I pick up my toothbrush in the right hand. In fact, I'll, I'll offer that up. Anybody that wants to just check out how addicted John said you are to doing things the way you do them, Just brush your hand, brush your hand, brush your teeth with the opposite hand for the next week and see how that feels for you. But rituals, these consciously created new ways of doing things, has been the one thing that we've seen in our research to help people to create something that provides resiliency. So mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, in any of those areas, you can create a ritual and a specific kind of ritual. And that's why I want to get into this with you now, which is ritual for recovery. The research is fairly clear that endurance or trying to endure through situations is actually the most prevalent way people deal with stuff. And it's actually depleting. It's actually in the long term, not the Thing we want to do to create sort of the get the night owl award. But rather what we want to do is create recovery zones because it's in those recovery moments, just like at the gym, you're not going to work out for 10 hours at a time or work one muscle group day after day. You're going to rest that muscle group so that you can then get growth. And ultimately it's through recovery that, that you, that you, that you do create new results. So John, I want to find out more about your own rituals and specifically the ones that are more on the mental side or for brain health. Because again, I know you are very famous for a number of different things as an author, but you also do something called a brain a thon which almost sounds like a marathon or sounds like there's exercise in it. Exercise. You have a book called Inner Size. Right. So makes me think about exercise, but for the brain, for the mind. So rituals for recovery, that's one of the unsung heroes for creating resilience. I want to understand what your rituals for recovery look like mentally. Sure.

So when I wake up and I start with my gratitude, practice. Then I do a morning meditation.

I love my life, of course. Every day, right?

My life every day, all day. Then I do a meditation every morning for 15 to 20 minutes. And then I actually have some custom made inner size audios for me that caused me to be in a state. Peaceful relaxation. First I use visualization, mindfulness, affirmations, declarations, promises, supplemental programming to prime my brain every single morning.

Yep. How long is that?

The audio out of 15 minutes to 20 minutes of that as well. From 6:30 to 8:30 every morning, that's my time. That is my time.

6:30 to 8:30.

That is me for my inner game and my physical body and my spiritual connection. So I do my exercise, my exercises first. Then I do my exercise for about an hour and then I have my shower. And then my very, very ultra healthy protein and some good fat for my brain. Omega 3, 6 and 9 and some fiber, protein smoothie every day with about 500 to 700 calories. That's how I start off every day by 8:30. I don't care if I'm in a hotel room, I make it happen there. I don't care if I'm at a guest house, I don't care if I'm in Antarctica or Alaska. Makes no difference. That is my morning routine. And then I have a meeting with my assistant after I shower to make sure that my day is planned out. And that any calibrations for my day are discussed, planned out, and, and we do that now every 55 minutes. As long as I'm not in a meeting. My mobile phone, okay, will ring like a little bell. And I do two inner sizes that take about three minutes. Inner size number one is called take six, calm the circuits. And all that is I take six deep breaths into my nose, slowly, slowly, slowly as possible. I hold at the top for about three seconds. And then as I release it through my mouth, I pretend that there's a straw in my mouth and I just blow it out through a straw very, very slowly like this. Even as I'm doing it right now, I can just feel decompression. Now why do I do that? I know that when I am going, I can get amped up and I get a high degree of energy. I know that we have a sympathetic nervous system and a parasympathetic nervous system. So the sympathetic nervous system is usually the fight, flight, freeze, react, reaction part of my brain. But the calm to respond part of my brain activates my Einstein part of my brain. So I want to operate more from the Einstein part of the brain, which is known as the left prefrontal cortex, more of the day than with my Frankenstein brain or the stressed part of my brain. And so when I take six deep breaths in through my nose, out through my mouth, as slowly as possible every hour, like, look at the time, it's one right now, right now that gives my brain the instruction to decompress, deactivate the stress circuit, activate the comp to response circuit. So I do it deliberately. Now, doing it deliberately means that my brain learns the pattern. Once my brain learns the pattern, it does. It feels for me, right? So I know that pattern, then. I do. So that's.

It's a ritual that ultimately you ritualize to habitualize. That's right.

So then right after I do my take six, calm the circuit inner size, I then do my aya inner size. Awareness, intention, action. So now what am I looking to do? Awareness of what I want to be aware of, of my thoughts, emotions, feelings, sensations and behaviors. The last 55 minutes.

Why?

Well, why does the captain of an airplane or the captain of a ship want to know their coordinates of where they are? Because they can make adjustments a lot faster, you know, if they, if they know exactly where they are. So I want to once per hour make sure that my thoughts, emotions, feelings, sensations and behaviors, my state is moving me towards the goals I want to achieve for today. Now, if I do that every day with this rule. Pay close attention, everyone. No judgment, no blame, no shame, no guilt, no justification. I'll repeat, no judgment, blame, shame, guilt, or justification. Why? When I'm looking and observing and mindful of a pattern for the last 55 minutes, all I want to do is practice observation and awareness. Being mindful without any judgment, blame, shame, guilt, or justification allows me to be an observer of patterns. And then the I in Ayah awareness is the first one I is intentional. I can say, okay, my intention for the next hour is this, this, and this. Awesome. Now I have a refocus. Now I've just recalibrated if I need to, or. Or now I can just accelerate if I want to. And then I say, okay, the A is action. What is one or two, or what are one or two action steps that I could take in the next hour to be on track, on purpose, heading towards what I want to achieve, how I want to feel, what I want to focus on. So now let's take a look at this. Throughout the day, if I've done that 10 times in a day, times, let's say, five days a week when I'm working, that's 50 opportunities I've had to be more mindful, more aware, more in control. Out of my stress zone, into my calm and response zone. Deliberate, focused, attentive. Can you see that? That's a ritual and a pattern that then builds on itself so I can calibrate, calibrate, calibrate all the time.

Now, in the middle of that, I want somebody to picture themselves in the middle of what John's just laid out. You get an email that you didn't expect that hits you right between the eyes, that kicks you right in the gut. Can you imagine the wheels of the car just screech to a halt? Right now, every good thing that was happening comes to a halt because you just received this unexpected piece of news, and it has kicked your reptilian brain into fear, into fight, flight, or freeze mode. So, John, putting yourself in that situation, what's different about the way you've trained yourself, deliberately trained yourself with that moment? Because you. You receive those moments. You have. Those things happen.

Let me forget about. They happen. Two and a half weeks ago, I was in Montreal with my wife, my kids. My brother was there with his kids. My sister's there with her kids and grandkids. To celebrate my 60th birthday and my father's 91st birthday. We took pictures. We were outside. We have amazing pictures and videos of everybody being happy. My father celebrating and happy, etc. He lives alone, still able to walk and talk and 100% cognitively there. I fly back to San Diego, all right, with my kids and 24 hours after I land here, I am actually on a live training. I get a text from my sister, call me right away. Dad has fallen. He is being rushed to the hospital right now. I get the text, right? And first thing I did, right, first thing I did was take six deep breaths. Yes, first thing I did, I was scared of it. I felt the surge.

Ok, the oh shit moment is I.

Felt the surge, right? Just with him, 24 hours later, he's being rushed to the hospital. I felt the surge and I know I don't want to react, I want to respond. Felt the surge. I said, hey everyone, just give me one second. Hey sis, I'm on a call right now. Training right now. Is it okay if I get back to you in 17 minutes? Yep, sure, no problem. De escalated the situation and my reaction to response and needless to say, I find out a little bit later Wasn't that 17 minutes because we didn't know what was happening. But needless to say, my father broke his nose, broke his cheekbones, rushed to the hospital and intubated and was in a 12 day medically induced coma. So I flew the very next day to Montreal to do what I could do there versus here. And I stayed there for eight days, then I came home and my brother went there. So why am I sharing with this? Life is all about what you do when shit happens to you, right? So I wouldn't be much good in a reactive state, right? And the thing that I always like to remind people of is this. Firefighters have to learn how to calmly go into a burning or exploding building. That's a trained response. Astronauts, when all hell breaks loose, okay, as they're traveling at thousands of miles per hour, have to learn how to stay calm in the worst of situations. So do police officers, so do Navy seals. It's a trained response that with training becomes an automatic reaction.

That's the point. Exactly.

That's the point, right? So whatever we practice becomes permanent. So we can practice really stressful situations, right? So that we respond instead of react. Because we will always react under stressful situations at the highest level of our training. Because it's automatic.

Exactly.

There's no thought.

The practice does not make perfect, as we've been told. Practice makes permanent.

But perfect practice makes permanent patterns. But it's not even permanent patterns, they're just more soft wired. Until you change those patterns so when we are looking to create some high performance rituals and habits, let's understand that the best way to create habits is to reduce it to the ridiculously small amount of a ritual. Initially, you mentioned something earlier that made me smile because two years ago, over two years ago, I started to brush my teeth instead of with my right hand, with my left hand. I haven't stopped and it has been two years and nine months or 10 months. I still am brushing my teeth with my left hand. It's still uncomfortable and I will not.

Move back to my right hand is what I love about you, John. I love that about you, buddy. As you all could probably tell. You know, John and I can continue to talk for hours and hours and hours and maybe that's what you'd like and that's great. But for now we're going to bring this thing in for a landing. I want you to be able to go to the Show Notes to find out more, of course, about John, about his books and about his Brain A thon because that's coming up really soon. We'll have a link that you can join there as well. John in and I know this is not ever easy to ask a fellow speaker trainer there to limit an answer to sort of 60 seconds, but tell us about the Brain A thon if you can, in just a little bit here, call it a minute. I just want people to know what this is it what this is because we mentioned a couple of times.

So we're about to do our ninth annual Brain a thon. And nine years ago I decided to invite some of my top neuroscience friends and fellow researchers and share what is some of the latest stuff on changing our brain so we can change our income in our lives. And I brought on the best from Harvard or Oxford or Princeton and they started to share. Here's what we're discovering about mindset. Here is what we are discovering about emotional control. Here is what we are discovering about self talk. Here is what we are discovering about what holds people back. Here is what we are discovering about potential and actually achieving it. Here is what we have discovered about high performance versus being stuck in a habitude of more of the same. So I started doing these Brain A thons and every year between 50,000 and 150,000 sign up for our free six to eight hour event. Many people stay for the whole time. Some people stay for three or four hours. And this year we're focusing on how to change your brain so you change your income and your wealth and the peace of mind and the lifestyle that comes with that. And so we're doing it again for free, and people can sign up and I'll give you a link and we'll have a little bit of fun.

I love it. Beautiful. All right, so, John, I'll ask you one final question, and that is, I know you love your life, but I want to know, do you love your entire life, buddy?

Yeah, I do. Yeah. I love where I'm at in my life right now. It's the first time in the last probably about 10 years. It started where I'm starting to feel that I'm becoming wiser. Right. And I've learned the art of slowing down so I could pick up speed, if that makes any sense. When I was younger, I was like, fast, fast, fast, fast, fast. And now it's like, slow down. You know, slow. One of my friends, Phil Town, said, I think he learned this in the, in the Marines. He said, slow is smooth and smooth is fast.

Yeah, well, like a rubber band, you know, if you, you played that when you were a kid, made a little rubber band, you know, gun out of. And yet to pull it back, you pull a rubber band back slowly. You pull it back slowly and then it speeds up. So, yeah, sometimes we need to slow down to speed up for sure. I just to say this in the most direct terms, I love you. I love how you help people, how you show up in the world and you model what you speak about, because not everybody who talks about things or teaches or writes about things is always actually living that way. And I know how you live, and the two things are quite congruent. So if you don't mind my saying that to you, I appreciate that very much.

I appreciate you and love you too, my friend. I know it's important for you to be in congruence. Also, one of my holding companies is called Praxis International. And Praxis means the integration of your beliefs with your behavior.

And loving, you know, loving your entire life is what it means to be change proof. And so here's. Here's to all of us being agnostic to change. Meaning it's. Change doesn't take us out.

We just the only constant.

It's the only constant. Exactly. Now I put up on the screen, for those of you that may be watching this on YouTube, there's a. A URL that says resiliencerank.com. those of you just listening resiliencerank.com you can write that down. It's in three minutes, 16 questions that you can answer to determine where it is that you are showing signs of great resiliency and where it is that you might actually be in need of some improvement, mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, as John was talking about. Resilience is a complicated topic, so we try to simplify it. Three, four minutes, you'll have those answers and then, most importantly, you. You'll get the kind of resources, all for free, that might help you to create some of those new rituals for increasing your resiliency in one of those areas that might be lacking. I absolutely love the fact that we got to do this today. I love the conversation. We welcome your comments. You can go to AdamMarkel.com podcast to leave a comment or leave one on iTunes or anywhere else that you'd like. But we want to keep the conversation going. And if you've got questions for John, of course we would love to be able to direct you to John for those answers as well. But otherwise it is an absolute pleasure. I hope in this moment, more than anything, you have enjoyed yourself and that you truly do love your life, no matter what you love your entire life. That is absolutely our goal in doing this, and we appreciate your help as well. So ciao for now, everybody.

Thanks for listening, everyone. We hope you now have the tools and greater insights to navigate your own pivot. Help us inspire others by sharing this episode and leaving your comments over@adammarkel.com podcasts for more tips, strategies and support as you consciously pivot into a new business and lifestyle you love, Join our Pivot community on facebook@pivotfb.com.

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