EP017 - Supercharge your Wellbeing - Chevy Rough

So this is the Whole Man Academy podcast. I am Anthony Asprey. Today our guest is Shevy Ruff. Shevy, you've already spoken at one of our Whole Man Academy events back in 2019. You are a wellbeing performance specialist and public speaker. You're often found speaking to big groups about the importance and impact of lifestyle choices. You help people and organisations unlock energy focus and clear thinking, which I like. You're a men's mental health ambassador for Calm, the campaign against living miserably. Chevy, welcome to the Whole Man Academy.

Thanks for having me, buddy. That's a lovely intro. I love it. I love an intro.

Thank you. I've been up all night working on that one. Now, we've got a big problem today is that you've got so much I think that you can add value to in the podcast and talking to guys who are listening about lifestyle and about stress and about fitness and everything that. I've tried to condense the things, but we've just spoken off camera saying we know this could go on a bit longer than normal podcasts. How does that make you feel?

Dude, I love it. I love conversation, to be honest with you. I think that's first and foremost, like, I love just shooting the breeze. And this isn't about me sitting here saying what I think everyone needs. This is just saying, like, hey, this is where we're at at the moment as a collective of coaches that I work with and how we kind of think and do things and just kind of, you know, batting ideas off another human being. Like, my way up the mountain isn't necessarily. Isn't the only way up the mountain. There are so many different ways up the mountain. So it's always a pleasure to have a conversation with people because it's much about me learning as hopefully me imparting some kind of small little nuggets or light bulbs, as I call them, for individuals out there. So, no. Excited.

That's interesting. You said nuggets. I've just recorded a quick thing on Instagram saying that if you listen to our podcast and even if you just get one or two little golden nuggets at the end, that is. That is time well spent in listening.

So it's a really. It's actually a big thing that I talk about quite a lot. So I obviously get asked to go into organizations or to work with communities on, you know, hey, Chef, like, we need you to come in and talk about stress, or we need you to come in and talk about mental health, physical health, productivity or whatever. It May be. And I'm like, cool, so what's your budget and how much time we got? Right, like, and then we can work from there. And as I, we just need like, you know, we've got some money for an hour. And I'm like, oh, no problem at all. What are your expectations? Well, you know, these are the problems that we've got. And I'm like, well, you know, do you think I'm going to come in there and change someone's mental or physical health or outlook in the state of an hour? No. And I think this is a really important thing to mention because I think people want the magic bullet to wellbeing. And I'm like, there isn't a magic bullet to well being. Good health, good mental, physical health, good wellbeing, good mental, physical, social health is a lifetime game, right? It's like, how can you make 2 to 3% gains this year and how does that build on next year, the year after that, the year after that? You know, when I'm doing a breath practice this morning, I'm not thinking about my state today. I'm thinking about my health in a decade's time. And I think that's always important. So it's kind of when I talk about going into companies, I'm like, okay, well you've got three options here. I can either come in and create a spark of change. And that's kind of like I'll sit there for an hour and hopefully I'll be able to be just a small spark where someone's like, yeah, actually that kind of makes sense. Or it might be a spark that they reflect on in two years time and they read a book and they go, oh yeah, that guy was chatting a lot of crap about that at one point. Or it's kind of like, you know, if you want me to make impactful change or lasting change, then I'm going to need to spend longer with your human beings. So the spark is actually kind of really where I specialize a lot in because due to the nature of people's budgets and the time I have with people in rooms, my job is to get their attention and then create a spark where possible.

That's really interesting. We're going to cover a bit more about the, let's call it the corporate talking. But I guess there's a good example of that is the Tony Robbins event where they get you to go for four days, five days. The longer, if you're someone like yourself, that can help people think slightly differently and maybe make some improvements. The longer you get with them, the better.

Yeah. And it's practice, right. We have to. Everything that every habit that we are trying to create in life is just us trying to take a step towards the person that we want to be. Right. And it's like we've got to remember that if we want to create new habits or new routines or new systems or pick up new tools that are going to take us a step in a new direction towards the person that we want to be, that's going to take practice, you know, and that's the thing you've got to put the work in. And it's going to take repetition, you know, and I think that's what people just don't. And that's going to take failure, you know, it's going to take. It's going to take two steps forward, five steps back. And I think that's what people. I try and impart with people that it's a long game and you've really got to put in the practice and put in the work to be able to get the outcome of the results that you want at the end of it.

That's something, as you said, I think a lot of people want the magic bullet be at with their nutrition or fitness or career or trying to deal with stress. I think that's one of those, as you say, it's compound decisions, isn't it? Each day you don't get a great body for going to the gym once and you don't have a healthy lifestyle by having a salad. It's about, you know, daily decisions and daily practice and it's the same.

And it's the same thing from. And I think this is really important that the same principles apply to shifting your mindset. You know, there are mindset interventions that can occur within the space of 20 minutes and half an hour that can have lasting effects with people like. But, you know, people have got to be in the right place in the right state for that to happen. I can't just walk into a room and be like, oh yeah, I could just get the way to change the way you think. And no problem at all. There's definitely. We can look at psychology and we can look at. There's some, definitely some tools out there that we can. Once again, I'm not a psychologist, I should make that really, really clear. But we can look at the world of psychology, we can look at the research and there are certainly some great tools that we can pick up to try and be able to just shift people's mindsets. Kind of. And nudge them. Right. That's the spark. Right. Like, being able to do that. But ultimately, to ingrain new behaviors and new ways of thinking is a marathon.

Yeah.

You know, I. I started on my road. I'm 30. I've just turned 39. Fuck. So I've just turned 39. And, you know, I've got a tattoo on my arm here, which was my 27th birthday. And I read an article which was man starts to become a. It was a bullshit article, I should say. Like, it was just like a man starts to become a man at the age of 27. That's when we start to kind of take the journey from boy to man, as it were. I was like. I was becoming very aware of myself, and I was becoming. I was becoming aware of my habits and my behaviors that they weren't healthy, they weren't sustainable long term. There was definitely darkness in me that I was running from and moving away from. And that was 1227. That was like 12 years ago, you know, and I was still working in the city, stuck in the square mile. And it wasn't an overnight thing to me to go from destructive lifestyle where I was, to now being happily married to my amazing wife, to be comfortable in the skin that I am as a man, and to have changed career and changed direction, like. But more importantly, to wake up every day and not living in negative thoughts, but actually living in a place of just being present, being grateful, being able to see the good amongst the bad and all the other shit. But that's taken time. It takes time and it's taken work, and it's been. It's not been a marathon. It's been a serious endurance event over the last 12 years to get here.

Well, that's. That brings us on to the first thing that I remember when we first met and I heard about you, that kind of brought you up on my radar is, of course, you worked in the city for a decent amount of time and which is similar to myself. And I just wondered if you could tell the guys that are listening kind of what you did in the city and why you left. Because it's a transition that I think a lot of guys in the city maybe want to make but haven't got a clue where to start or what to do.

So what did I do? I was responsible for the credit crunch. I'm pretty sure. Like, I have a clue what I was doing. I have a clue. So I kind of fell out of school at the age of 17, and so it was like 20 odd years ago and that was a time when they were giving anyone like a job in the city. Like you go into back office operations, no degree, no nothing, as long as you was a little bit cocksure and could be able to handle the traders and be a lads. It was like, yeah, come on down, get on board. So I started stuffing envelopes in a small brokerage firm, build up my temp CV and then I got a job at Credit Suisse once again making cups of tea and just stuffing envelopes. And then I kind moved more into settlements, trade support roles and again like I was like dyslexic as right, like seriously. And like my job was manual trade matching. This is when trades were done on pieces of paper and those pieces of paper were slipped in like to my in tray and then I had to match it against our counterparts in the market. Dudes, Dyslexia. I can't even spell that word. Like, it's like it was absolutely ridiculous. I was doing that job never clear, didn't understand the financial markets, didn't the square mile. I'd probably have a better understanding as I do now than I did while I was working in it, kind of. So I did that and then I moved into a career in recruitment, talent management, essentially sales, for lack of a better phrase, looking after investment banks and placing people into jobs within investment banks. But I kind of did that until 30. But I always say the real story for me and what you're asking at is that, you know, I. So when I moved into the city I had, I was, I mean I was a hugely lost young man, you know, just staggering, stumbling my way through life and one of my big problems and always has been, continuously has been my abandonment issues from my old man. You know, my dad kind of walked out at the age of 12 from our household. Literally overnight he had an affair. And there was a lot of anger in my house leading up to that, that moment and that time. So when I walked into the city, I never really got on with boys in school anyway. You know, I never really understood how to navigate the playground. I never liked football, I always pretended I liked football, I always pretended I could play football and then I show up and I couldn't. Like I was just. And I was always a yes person. Like I was a liar in school and I hate using that word because I was just trying to survive in the playground. But it was like, oh, you like this person? Yeah, I like this person. Or yeah, no, you know, my dad does this. I didn't even have a dad. But it was like, you know, it was that kind of like trying to fit in.

Yeah.

Was something. Sorry, but no, gone.

I was going to say, just thinking he's trying to fit in, isn't it? And it's a. It's a natural response. Because fitting in means that you maybe feel less pain from the people around you because everybody likes you a bit more. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, everything we human, like, we have a social brain. Like, this is what people have to realize. Like, our brain's default mode is social cognition. When our brain is not stimulated by anything else, our brain's default mode is to think about our place in the world with other human beings. Our relationships in the world, everything about us, our physical physiology is set up to mirror match other human beings. Like, if we're sitting in a room right now and we're connecting, our heart rate and our respiratory rate would probably start to match each other's. What? That's so cool. Right? Like, when we're stressed, we don't just release adrenaline and cortisol, we also release oxytocin. Oxytocin is the love hormone. It's designed to bring us closer to other human beings. Don't believe me? Cool. Ever ask for your mom when you're feeling really sad and you just want to cuddle? Yeah. That's your physiology dictating psychology. You've probably got higher level of oxytocin, which is trying to bring you closer to your mom, because evolution says that's a great way of you managing stress. So it's like everything about us is wired to where we are placed in the world with other human beings. So, like, in the playground, it was just that, like, where do I fit in in the tribe? I want to be accepted. Love me, love me, love me. Please be my friend, you know, And I was. I was called Chevy Ruff, dude. Like, and I was fat for a while and had hair and I look like a mini version of meatloaf. Like, I was just like, you pick on me as soon as I walked in. I was like, target. So I did that. And I say that story because it's important to understand the mindset or how I started to walk into the city, which was just really not knowing anything about myself at all, not being inward in any kind of way. And I went into the city and I suppose the big story. Not the big story, but the connector for me is that I remember going to the pub the first time and I never really drank. Like, even through the challenging times of kind of my old man. Leaving and being a teenager, 16, 17, I never really drank. I went and ice skated and played ice hockey on myself. You know, I was cool. But I went into the sit and I remember going down the pub the first time, and obviously I'm surrounded by a load of traders, a load of boys. And this was like, you know, you got. Remember, like proper Barra boys down there. Do you know what I mean? It was like. And it's, what do you want to drink? And I remember going, I'll have an orange juice, please.

No.

They were like. They laughed. They literally laughed. And they were like, here is a pint of Stella and learn to love it. And it was like, that was it. And it's really important to understand the psychology of being the young man that I was then, which was. I didn't understand the word no. I just understood that I wanted you to love me because my dad, in my eyes, didn't love me and he had walked away from me. And plus, I was surrounded by older men. You know, it's like these fatherly figures and then also younger men who I wanted to be part of their tribe. So just the whole environment set me up to just be like, yes. And then here's the interesting thing about it, is that I started to drink. And drinking gave me superhero powers. You know, like anxiety and depression and all these kind of things weren't even words on our lips like, 20 years ago, not even 10 years ago, not even six, seven years ago. It was hardly on our lips. And alcohol gave me superhero powers suddenly, because I was trying to always find my identity in the pack. What I realized is alcohol gave me the identity that I craved within a pack of men. It gave me humor. It let me be the joker of the pack. It was like the guy who would always be the last man. Dancing and, you know, it made me brave to go and dance with girls and chat to girls. Like, it gave me an identity. And then suddenly it'd be like, oh, we're going out for a drink tonight. Chev's in, right? And it helped me deal with that anxiety. And, like, I never had anything to say when I was sober. You know, you could get. I was a good, engaging guy. But ultimately, if you really tried to sit down opposite a table from me and for me to share and talk and be. To bring conversation, like, I wouldn't have anything there because all I had was pain and, you know, whatever from a childhood, like, I was surviving every day. I never had good stories. I never went traveling, I never went to university. I just rolled into the city. But then. So alcohol gave me the superhero powers to mask all of that. And then to cut a long. Long story short, I know you asked how I got out, and the. So I kind of did that. And then one thing led to another and alcohol turned into cocaine very, very, very, very quickly. So my story of working in the Square Mile in whatever capacity I was working in for up until I was. Well, I left at 33, but was really about dealing with the addiction around alcohol and cocaine. But cocaine was definitely the thing that was really destroying me.

I understand your point about, let's say, going out for guys with a drink, especially who are older than you. And therefore, in theory, if they're all older than you, they're more senior. They have more senior positions than you as traders and brokers, which I saw myself. And do you think that's. That's the same with the drugs? And I ask that because from when I first started working in London, I'd go to a party and I'd be like 20 years old and still a young pup that's totally clueless from down in deepest, darkest Kent. And you'd have people say, like, there's as much cocaine as you want on that table. You go for it if you want to. And you'd be like, what? Like. And that would relate even back to drinking. I was. My nickname was lt, which stood for Lager Top. Why? Because I didn't want to drink the pints. Because I've always valued health quite highly. And I'd say, oh, I don't want a lager. But, well, I have a Lager Top. Because in my head, I'd say, do you know what? It's 10% or less lager, and I'll have that. But I couldn't say, no, I don't want to drink. I'd say, oh, well, I'll have one. It didn't even want it. And then you'd have eight of them. And then you get your superpowers.

Yeah.

Would you say it's the same for the. You know, with the drugs as well? It's because generally the people that are offering those at the time maybe are older than you and more powerful in your eyes.

Yeah, absolutely. And I thought the. I think that. So I work a lot with. I work within. So I work with any, Any. Any types of organizations, but I do. I spend a lot of time working with sales organizations. Well, sales teams, I should say, within organization. Kind of like, you know, your rain makers, your money makers, whether that's like your front office guys or whether it's your sales team or whether it's your client services team or whatever it may be. And I spend a lot of my time working with those guys because I understand the psychology of them and I understand how to communicate well being to people that necessarily just it's the last thing on their list a lot of the time, right? Like it's like, okay, cool. You can try and get them to light some candles and do some breath work. Like no thank you. But if I can come in, you know, it's just not, they're not going to get. So it's like, so I kind of understood how to talk to the busy minds. So I do a lot of work there. And within that I work with, yes, I work with a lot of C suite or I work with a lot of directors and managers, but I also work a lot like kind of mid level or senior salespeople or principals or account directors or whatever it may be. And again, I'm not a therapist and a psychologist and I keep my coaching very black and white in the sense of this is the things that you can do today to influence how you feel tomorrow. This is how you understand your human behavior, your human performance, human productivity, all these things. But obviously within that sometimes we get into it, right? We look at mindsets and we look at purpose and we look at values because it's really important when asking people to make change is what's driving that change. And people just wanting to run a marathon in a certain time is never going to keep them consistent with training. But them understanding the connection between running and then being a better father down the line, you know, in their health and how it can give them the energy and focus to show up for their loved ones at the end of the day and how it can help unlock all this psychology and this physiology. Like when they start to understand that, you know, and start to be more valid and how it lends itself to their value system, then people tend to be more motivated. So I do a lot of that and that's a lot of work that I don't just help people understand what their values and their philosophy systems are from a very basic level. And that starts to ask some deeper questions. I navigate them wearingly. But one of the big things is always purpose, right? Like what's my purpose here? Because I appreciate that I'm selling and I'm bringing money in. But ultimately a lot of people just aren't happy within doing that, you know, there's only so many watches they can buy. There's only so many suits they can buy, there's only so many cars they can buy, right? It's like. And the buzz of it is fantastic for some, but for others it's just not really filling the void that they want. So I start to look at purpose and trying to attach them to some form of purpose and I try and get them to think about their tribe and I get them to think about, you know, the youngest within their tribe and how they can add value and how they can be a stable place for these young people coming into the industry to learn and to grow and to develop and how we can teach them the lessons that we wish that someone had taught us when we were cracking on down the pub or whatever will be a voice amongst that. Or, you know, trying to get the 21 year old to realize it's not all about the Rolex on their wrist, right? It's so much more. But so I was like, I try and get them to connect with that. But one of the big things that I talk about and definitely with the guys who turn around to me because they open up and some of them are like, you know, they do drugs and whatever it may be. And I'm like, do you do drugs with younger people on the team? And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm like, how much do you instigate that? And they're like, oh. And it's. I just get them to think about the fact that they are role models in these young men's lives, you know, And I have worked with and I have spoken to C levels and directors and senior managers over the last couple of years that are hiding within their own. They are looking to distract from their own pain through alcohol and through drugs or through gambling and misery. Likes company. And they have a level of authority and seniority within their business and they have a lot of people who are working for them that don't want to say no. And they can suddenly find themselves being the leader of that pack, right? And driving the culture of the business. And that culture is being driven by their darkness, right? And I think it's like I kind of stopped them and I'm going like, back the fuck up for a second. Like, you do realize that this young man is trying to find his way in the world or young lady, you know, trying to find their way in the world. And they are looking to you for guidance. They are looking to you to be the order amongst the chaos. But you're just putting a couple of grams of coke in their hand or you're asking them to go pick up for you, you know, what signals and cues are you sending them that is going to dictate their future health?

And it's kind of like, yeah, yes, it is that. Because I think the thinking back, you know, the older guys in the city, if they're heads of desks or higher up in the company, as a youngster I went into the city and as you say, they were your role model. And quite honestly, you kind of do anything that they asked you to do within reason. And you know, for the younger guys that are listening, it sounds a bit like a bit corny, but you know, it's okay to say no, but it's having the strength to be able to do that in a situation where maybe you're out and you have been drinking and you get offered something or your boss is doing on a regular, regular basis.

Yeah, it's hard. And I think there's no, I think in these conversations it's always hard to say, you know, what, what can you do? Because I always like people to have actionable takeaways or things that they can start to think about. But it's kind of with this one, I'm like, it's hard. Like, I value that. And it's, it's such a long road to being able to be confident enough to say no, you know, or to be confident enough to say like, hey, like, hold on a sec, why am I saying yes to this? Like, what, what do I need right now? Like, and why am I not confident enough or what? What am I worried about? Because I'm kind of just joining in with the pack, right? Or just joining in with the boys. And that's, that's some big work and that's a long term piece of work. What I always say, I get very black and white again. So the advice that I always give people, if they really are struggling and if they do are finding themselves in these vicious circles where they can't say no, if they are down the pub a lot, then first of all you have to do is remove yourself. Environment cues behavior, right? If you walk into a church, what happens? You whisper, right? It's the environment cues a behavior from you. And you know, that's how our psychology works is once you've learned, like I walk into pub toilets now and if I see a granite, granite back surface, like marble backtop of the toilets and if I smell the bleach, I just want to get cocaine. Like my body starts to connect the dots. Yeah, right. And it's because the environment cues behavior. And that is, that cue has been ingrained into my brain, into my mind so deep that if I, that's why I can't have one pint anymore. Because I know if I have one pint that that is the first step. The second step is me going to the toilet to take a pee. As I stand there and take a pee. The third step is me putting my mobile phone out my pocket and ordering drugs. You know, it's like they're the steps that my body understands and that's an ingrained behavior. So for me, when people, if they're finding themselves in that position, it's like, well, first of all, you've got to remove yourself from environment.

So let's jump into. Actually, one of the things that I read that you'd said about the way you help people is about no hippie shit, which I thought was, which I thought was great. And because for the, not just talk about guys here, but for the average guy, you want some actionable stuff that you can do and as you say, not just kind of lighting some incense and wafting around the garden. So on the fitness kind of exercise stuff, I know you'd said any length of time spent at the gym is a success. So where would you, if you're working on a one to one level, where would you start with helping with their fitness and kind of encouraging some exercise?

Depends on where their starting point is, to be honest with you. I think first of all is just looking at, right, well, where are you? Like, where are you, how much are you moving in the week? What does the nature of that movement look like? How energy demanding is that movement for you and then how energy demanding is your life? And I think that's the really important thing to reflect on is we don't have two different energy tanks, one for training and one for life, right? We only have one energy tank. And when I talk about energy, I talk about stress, right? When our body is stressed from a physiological point of view, that is our body producing energy to be able to complete any task that is in front of us mentally or physically, right? The reason our respiratory rate changes first is, you know, and our heart rate pumps harder, is because our body is producing energy. So training is energy, life is energy. So we have to understand that relationship. First of all, where are your energy demands? And so within that I kind of then start to look at, well, if you know, why are you moving, right? What is, what is the bet? What is the purpose of your movement? Well, my movement is to feel better about myself. Okay. Well, your movement is to feel better about yourself. Fantastic. What's your relationship like with movement historically? Up and down. Cool. Do you have a lot of responsibilities in a high stressful job? Yes, I do. Cool. So let's just program you in going for three walks a week for 150 minutes at total. Because we know that 145 minutes of walking in the week has similar mental health benefits as antidepressants for a strong majority of people. Yeah, yeah. And that's what I think it is. I think we have to start to. So I talk about, you know, there's this wonderful thing that happens in our life where our inside views start screaming at us, telling us we need to sign up for a marathon or get back to the gym or head to yoga. Like our evolution and genetics fundamentally has given us movement as a tool to be able to feel better about ourselves. It is pivotal to our mental health, physical health, well being. Right. And we have locked in our genes and in our non conscious mind is this narrative all the time trying to present itself to us, like, go for a walk, get back to the gym. So we understand this correlation between feeling better and movement and exercise. So that's our inside view screaming us. But more often than not, there's inside noise. And that inside noise is like, oh, well, you know, if I go back to running, I've got to run five times a week like I was doing when I was 20. And life is very fucking different. Right? Or it's, you know, I'll only be successful if I lift this weight again or if I go back to doing squats and deadlifts or whatever it may be. Like there's this noise within us that's fueling our movement. And that inside noise is often fueled by outside noise because outside noise is culture. Right. Like what is? The front of Men's Health magazine consistently show us that Men's Health is six packs and big chests and big arms. Right. And Men's Health is get these biceps in 30 days. I don't want to knock on Men's Health too much because actually I do slowly see them trying to change the narrative. But it's important to see this messaging that has primed us for so, so many years. Go hard, go home, lift heavy, do headstands and yoga. So, you know, when I'm looking at helping people take those first steps, we've got to match the energy demands of training to the energy demands of life. And then also within that, we've got to maybe Reframe some of their expectations around the exercise that they're doing. And that's often stepping over more of a fixed mindset as opposed to a growth mindset. So quite simply, if you're really busy and you're really struggling to fit it into your week, I'm like, dude, go for a walk, you know, and then do something like just go for the walk. And if you really want to get back to the gym, but you're super struggling to get back to the gym to build that habit and that routine. I might be for the first month, I'm just like. Or the first couple of weeks, I'm like, cool, just pack your bag and leave it by the front floor. And that's it. That's it. So you're setting up that first cue, you're taking that step that you're breaking the habits into small, manageable chunks. And I'm like, okay, cool. So you do that for a couple of weeks and then what I'm going to get you to do is I'm going to get you to go to the gym and you're going to turn up at the gym and then you're just going to walk back out again and go to work. Because then we're setting the second. We're creating that second habit, that second cue. We're stacking these habits now of just going there. More often than not, they'll walk through the door by the time they get there, Right. And then. And then it's case of, right, I just want you to go and I just want you to have a shower at work and get changed. So shower in the gym and get changed at the gym for a week and you're just going to. So we just start stacking the habits, like looking at our human nature. Right. And how to break things down into small, sizable chunks. And. Yeah. So, yeah, to answer your question, I know questions.

No, I think that's good because it's making it achievable. I mean, I'm lucky that I love going to gym and always managed it. But even at those times, I would like you say I would leave my kit if I went of an evening, as soon as I got home, my gym kit was. Was there to stop me getting my bum on the sofa. Because as soon as the bum, you know, the few times it happens, you'd be like, oh, I just go in a minute. And you'd lose that window opportunity to get out there. And maybe that's one of the easy things that for guys listening, always say in the Mornings, you know, if your gym kit is out ready and you can roll out of bed and put it on, as opposed to having to think about what you're going to wear.

Well, this is, and you have to kind of, you also have to look at things like how to trust your, how to, how to make good decisions when you can't trust yourself to make good decisions, right? So things like time of days is really, really, really a really important one because, you know, to go. To start creating the habit of looking after yourself takes self control and willpower. Self control and willpower are muscles that tire throughout the day as you use them, right? So the good example that I give of this is, let's just say you decided you're going to eat really healthy, right? Like that's your goal for today. But then you've had a really stressful day with a lot of challenges. And remember, using self control is not just about sel, not to pick up a donut. It's also self control to be able to wear your emotions that you want people to see, right? Like, you know, it's to be able to navigate, you know, 20% of the calories that we consume go to your brain and your nervous system, okay? It takes energy to be able to think and demonstrate the critical behaviors that we want, the thoughts that we want. So you do that for the day and then you're just all out, right? You're all out of juice. You've just spent all that self control and willpower keeping your shit together. And then you go to Tesco's and you're standing there and you just can't make a decision on what to eat. And you have heavy decision fatigue. And a lot of people at that stage think they're failures. And I'm like, you're not a failure. You just don't understand physiology and how it affects psychology. And then the interesting thing is the reason that you probably reach for glucose, that is sugar or alcohol potentially, and there's a lot of conversation about this, is because the brain's fastest acting fuel source is glucose. So your brain is trying to help you make better decisions and it is craving energy to be able to do that. So things like, I'm like, okay, cool. So if you're not, if you haven't got the willpower and self control to make better decisions when standing in the food aisle at 6 o', clock, 7 o' clock on a Wednesday evening, then when are you in a place to make better decisions? When you've had a good night's Sleep on a Sunday and you're rested and you can go and do your shop and then what you can do is you can prepare your food and then you're taking the decision making out of it. So when you can't be trusted, you have systems and tools in place where you can be trusted. And I think the same thing goes for exercises. I know that if I leave training until four in the afternoon, five or six in the afternoon, statistically I will not go. Like, I just know it. So I'm like, cool, well, how can I set myself up then? Well, let's just get it done in the morning when I have more of that reservoir, that self control and that willpower to just make myself do it.

That's a great point. We try to cover a lot of that. How the importance of a morning routine for the guys that are either on our E Letter and or maybe listening to our podcast. And of course we're trying to say it hasn't got to be one where you get up and run 5K and you know, chant things for half an hour. It can sometimes be those little important bits, you know, the little. We call it move, breathe, think and drink. But even if it's a couple of minutes, as you say, just getting yourself ready in the morning to make the.

Better decisions, like, everyone's all on this, like, you know, the perfect morning routines, right? Like, let's remember that habits take a lot of fucking time to ingrain and develop. And if you're suddenly trying to create a morning routine that's full of like breathing and stretching and doing like multiple habits in there that you're trying to create. And it's like, I still, like, I'm working on, I work on my morning. It's the constant work in progress and you just got to do one small thing at the. So I think, you know, and it is about making it as. And it's also realizing that someone else's morning routine doesn't have to be your morning routine. I think we're all trying to, you know, we're looking for inspiration online, but that's exactly what it should be, is inspiration. It's like, be your own artist, right? Don't just mimic other people out there. And so I think definitely break it down if we're going back into morning to routines. It's a wonderful conversation. But I think the key thing that I say to people within the morning routines is, is about stacking habits. So things like if you want to read in the morning, then when I make coffee, I read two Pages of my book, you know, like. And that's what I do. When I make coffee, I read five pages. When I drink coffee, I read for. I read five pages of my book. When I make coffee, I sit in the bottom end of a squat until the kettle's boiled, right? I stack the habit. So one habit that is ingrained links to another. I brush my teeth, I stand on one leg. The reason I do that is because, you know, the older I get, I want to make sure that my balance and so forth is on point. So it's just a great way of doing a minute per side, per leg and getting the nervous system spot for the day. I have a bath every morning. Don't judge me. There's a reason why. But when I.

You've got to tell me the reason you can't.

Well, it's mainly because we don't have a shower. But to be honest with you, and we haven't had a shower for years. And I actually also really like it. So I don't typically meditate. Those who know me know I'm very deep within the performance breathing world. And I fully, fully understand or do a lot of work around breath and stress and energy control and not the woo woo fucking hippie dippy energy, but you know, actual energy. So I do that. But I, and I was like for years, for ages. I should meditate. I'm like, people see me sometimes as the mindful guy, right? I called myself the mindful mover. For ages I was like, I should fucking meditate. And I tried fucking. I don't want to meditate. I don't like meditating. Like, it's just not my jam. But I understand the power of that. In the mornings we can have a bump of cortisol. We can actually start to spike our stress response. Early doors. And what I know is that kind of reset. Setting my system from an O2CO2 point of view, from a breath point of view can just kind of put me in a better state energy wise in the morning, help me set my day up. So I understand that doing a breath practice is very powerful in the morning to set up my psychology and my physiology for the day. So when I have a bath I do breath work, right? So I have a, When I get in the bath, I lie in the bath. I do two things when I'm in the bath. Well, three things. I wash, obviously. The second thing I do is I do 10 rounds of what we call a 112 breathing cadence which is just settling up, setting up my internal physiology and then I do a gratitude piece. And I do that because again, this is psychology in the sense that we can retrain our brain to think positive thoughts and that we all know. Like people say, you start gratitude. I think like gratitude journals and all this. But actually the science behind gratitude and being able to show gratitude is phenomenally fucking strong. It's the thing that's got me through crisis is the thing that's got me through this crisis that we find ourselves in at the moment, as I lose a shitload of business and things are very challenging. But I am fucking grateful for the time I'm spending my wife. I'm grateful for all these things, blah, blah, blah. But I do a gratitude piece in the, in the bath every morning after my breath piece. But. And it's because I've connected, I've stacked the habits, you know, and it's like, it's what works for you. It works for me to do my breath and my gratitude piece in the bath. It works for me to read a bit of a book when I'm having a cough. It's AB testing, but I've been through so many different versions of that to get to these where I am now. And then the final thing I do is it's like no screen light before sunlight. You know, that's. I just wanted to throw that in there before because if people want to understand how to set the day up from a stress point of view and to be able to manage the day building in, no screen light before sunlight is one of the most powerful things that we can do. Because the sun sets our circadian rhythm for the day. Get at least 10 to 15 minutes of sunlight before 8am in the morning, even if it's cloudy outside. Because that just helps set your system, your physiology up for the day, which will therefore in turn dictate psychology or help support post positive psychology.

I think that's. There's so many points in there that a guy listening could take out of it and. But I think the important one, as you rightly said, was finding what works for you and being okay with it changing. So don't beat yourself up if you don't manage to achieve the things you want to do. I guess also it depends on if you've got kids and your environment there.

Yes, bro, 100, 110%. And life is always changing and adapting. And I think this is really important because I think also again, we set this like, oh, I've built my perfect morning routine. Let me tell you something. I have spent the last Year rebuilding my business. And I built my business around what I love from a personal development point of view, which is learning and studying. So I spent the last year building my. Rebuilding my business, rebooting my brand, rebuilding my offerings, my workshops, putting a lot of energy and focus in that and then looking at, like, what does a business look like in two years time? That's going to help me maintain my love of studying and learning and being able to be creative. Because that's ultimately how I see myself, is a creative within what I do. And like creativity, you need the optimal environment to be able to do that.

Right.

Stress does not lend itself to creativity. Okay. So it's kind of like I was like, okay, cool. So I need this amount of time in my week. This is what I need my week to look like, to be able to be behind, to learn and be creative. And I built my daily routines around that. I was. My exercise was finally getting under control. And then, hey, do you know what happened, like four fucking five weeks ago? We've got three more weeks. We got put on lockdown, right?

Yeah.

My business, I lost all my business. I lost all my revenue, all my income, all my future work. I decided not to build an online business last year. I wish I had bought an online business now, but I hadn't. But I'm like, cool, I can pivot. I can pivot. I can pivot. I hate doing webinars via PCs, because laptops, because I'm a guy that likes to go into a room and connect with human beings. But that's fine. I'm going to pivot. And where I'm going with this is my routine in a day of reading for two hours in a fucking day of like, getting to go to the library and study or, you know, my nice, like, going to an hour's jet. Like, I was like, not going to work. Not going to work. You know, my routine now needs to be how I can be at my desk for the next 10 hours in a day to be able to pivot my business and be able to do what I need to do. So I've had to amend my morning routines to be able to reflect that. But a lot of people, like, how can I juggle? How can I make sure that I can? And I've got people talking. How can I hold on to, like, dude, look, you're in a crisis right now. Your energy and focus is being diverted to what it needs to be focused towards. So adapt your routines and your daily habits to be able to divert some of that resource to where it needs to go, and then you can come back again. But for me, it's like, what's my minimal standard, right? My minimal standard is no sunlight before. No screen light before daylight. My bath, things I always do, right? Like, my bath is something I always have, and coffee is something that I always make. So I'm like, let me just do my reading for five minutes. Let me do my breath, let me do my gratitude, let me make sure I get sunlight, and then that's it. And then I'll build that out again as I start to adapt to the challenges ahead. So, yeah, it's really important. Life moves in different ways. You'll have kids keep changing and flowing with them that.

Well, it's. It brings me brilliantly on to the next point, which I saw you'd written about, which is learning to be in solitude.

And.

And I think for. At the moment, you people might be split into camps. You might have guys like me who have got a family, and therefore I'm. And I hate to use the word, but I mean, I'm stuck with my family for the whole time. So you don't get to go and be the man at work because you're at home all the time, but also you've got guys that are. Our co founder, Matt, lives on his own. So therefore, you know, whilst you're on lockdown, you might be FaceTiming people, but generally you're in solitude all day. And I wonder how that. How have you learned to embrace that and how a guy can kind of, you know, learn from your. From your kind of your lesson.

It's a great. It's super interesting at the moment. I think there's, like you say there's not. This is not an ordinary. If we're having this conversation during an ordinary time, I would kind of. If I know my patter, if that makes sense, but I'm kind of adjusting it at the moment because there are so many people into so many different situations. And this word, solitude now is a very, very powerful word. You know, it's like, it's, it's. And we've seen. I mean, amongst dudes, we. I mean, we've so obvious. I'm an ambassador for calm. I think they've seen a 37% increase in their helpline being called. You know, and to me, that demonstrates there's a lot of guys out there in their heads who are just kind of feeling maybe potentially quite alone. And so I'm kind of connecting all these dots around solitude. But let me. Let me take a Step back for a second and let me talk about how I talk about solitude before we got into this, right? So just to give people a bit of context. So the thing we have to remember, and I've talked about this a little bit earlier in this podcast, is our brain's default mode is social cognition, right? Our brain, when not stimulated by anything else and not asleep, is designed to think about our relationships with other human beings in the world, our place in the world, right? And it does that to better process the day and also prime us for future relationships and conversations. Because we need to be social, we need to connect, we need to do it, we have, our brain needs to process this. And our brain also needs to file away the experiences of the day, right? It needs to put them into the little filing drawers and be able to process it. So it's all there, being able to help dictate our future behaviors and so forth. So our brain needs time to. So now we've got to look at the problem. The problem is that we have and still now massively live in a hugely connected world, but also very hustle like culture where we are always feeling like we have to be on, right? Solitude is almost a dirty word. Or rest is a dirty word, recovery is a dirty word. But we have to understand that we need to spend time alone for our brain to process. And we also need to understand the benefits from a creative thinking, strategic thinking, like leadership kind of thinking way. Like when you're in the challenge at work and you're dealing with a problem, you're making the best decisions you can under fire. But where you learn from that is when you close down the stress cycle, right? It's when you're no longer in the struggle, but you provide relief. When you provide relief to stress, that's when you're tipping your internal physiology away from fight, flight or freeze to rest and recovery. So it's when you're tipping your nervous system from sympathetic to parasympathetic, right? Now we know that when you are more parasympathetic, when you add relief to the struggle, when you start to move away and push back on the stress in your life, that's when cognitively your brain starts to go, hey, here's some new ideas, here's how you can navigate out of this. This is what you should be thinking about this. But when we're stressed, it's just tunnel vision on the problem and ah, right. So it's kind of like really important that if we want to make better decisions in life, if we want to be able to lead our teams out of challenges and problems, or if we want to be able to be there for our family now and be able to communicate with our loved ones and our kids and our wife and so forth. We need to access those cognitive resources. And the only time we access them as efficiently as we can really is when we are more in a state of recovery and rest. Where does that happen? Within solitude. So it's, it's. And I always say like, that's kind of cool. I was like, cool. Well, if you don't believe me. How many times have you gone for a walk down the beach or walk through the woods and you've come up with a problem life. A problem life problem. You've come up with a solution.

Yeah.

90% of the room will put their hand up and I'm like, cool. That's not some wishy washy psychological feeling. That's your physiology responding to task and environment and then giving you access to new cognitive skill menus to better navigate this shit. Yeah, amazing zap, right? So it's like we already know, we've already used this tool. We understand that it's there. So it's really important that people understand. Like there is so much, but the challenge within it is that we are so disconnected, we can't take the headphones out, we can't separate ourselves from the phone. So what happens is that inbox that we should be dealing with on an hourly, daily basis is building up. So then we suddenly ask someone, we ask a dude to meditate and close their eyes, or we ask someone to commute to work or go for a walk without their headphones in there, they're like, shit, right? The inbox comes flooding in and it's because you, on the micro, you haven't, you know, if you let the, if you let those emails build up and those thoughts and you don't process them on a daily basis, on an hourly basis, right? We can look at how people can close the stress cycle down, start to get into anyway. But it's like. And that's the thing, and that's what people don't do. So it's like solitude is a fantastic, is a necessary tool to help us maintain our energy focus and clear thinking. And it's one of the most powerful tools that I work on with people to help them manage their energy throughout the day. So that's kind of how I talk about solitude and the importance of it and what it can do from us. But I also, I value at the moment that it's challenging. There are a lot of people, but I think the first, Even if you're alone and you're home alone, this is, it's putting in the. It's realizing. Because basically learning to become happy and okay with your own thoughts is a fucking hard practice. That's why I snorted cocaine all the time, because I didn't want to be left alone with what the fuck I was having to think about. But it's. The first step is learning to just be a little bit less judgmental of the thoughts that come into your brain. It's realizing that you're not broken. Your brain is just trying to process and do everything that it needs to do to help you fucking navigate and be an awesome bloody fucking human being. Which is really cool. So you should be like, looking at your brain going, cool, I really appreciate you because you're working and you're doing what you need to do. But I think it's then just kind of breaking it down into small sizable chunks. So it's learning to go for a walk and just maybe at the 10 minutes end of the last 10 minutes of your walk, take your headphones out and just kind of going, okay, let me just see what happens. You know, it's not going into deep lotus and trying to do a 60 minute meditation, because if you fucking won't do it, like, I don't still bloody do it because it's just. I'm just not in it. You know, it's breaking it down into small sizable chunks and learning to live by yourself and learning to practice solitude slowly and gradually and building on that gradually.

Yeah, I think it's, it's, it's important for the guys listening, as you said, to realize that there's no one way to do it. And it's maybe being easy on yourself, not pressuring yourself into trying to do the 60 minute meditation and maybe just thinking for yourself, what can I do to just calm my mind a little bit?

This is why walking, I think, is one of the most amazing things, because it's like a moving meditation, right? It offers an element of distraction, which is the world around you, you. So you're not completely alone, right? So you can go on the walk and you can say good morning to someone and you can look over the road and think about what people are thinking. Like, go on a walk. And just when you're walking around, think about, hey, I wonder what they're going through in life right now. I wonder what they're going through. Life. I don't know how they're Dealing with this situation right now, because we know that. Because when we start to actually realize that we're not alone in this, it helps us manage our health and wellbeing and stress and so forth. Start to do that. Like, go on a walk, but take the headphones out and just start thinking about these things, like asking yourself some different questions. And then also when the. And just start to just slow down, you know, and try and sit on a park bench for a couple of minutes and maybe take a notepad and a pen. And every time a thought comes into your head, just go, okay, well, my process is going to be I'm going to take the thought out of my head and I'm going to write it down. And then it's something somewhere. And then maybe I'm going to write down like a point on how I can action this or how I'm grateful for this or whatever it may be. And if it's an action, I'm then going to put that in my calendar and diary to do. And if it's something that I'm grateful for, no matter how hard it is, I'm going to find the gratitude. I'm going to find the good in it. And if I can't even. It's just the tiniest, smallest thing. If I can't today, I'm going to come back to that notebook tomorrow or the day. And it's just doing that. And so it's like you actually have got to process.

Yeah, that. That reminds me, there's a guy called Dave Allen who's written a book called Getting Things Done Dude.

Yes.

If you have read it. But what I love is, you know, he's saying your head is for having ideas, not for holding them.

So I didn't want to. It's that it's there. I just, like. I'm sure it's. It's. It's. I know it's here, so. Yeah, so that's. Well, I didn't want to excite. Sometimes I get too much into the black and white about things. And I also be conscious of just being too, like black and white about bits and pieces, but. Absolutely. So I look at the actual voodoo. So you kind of nailed it. The reason I say write things down is actually because of the same principles that in Getting Things Done tries to teach, which is. It's about ludic loops, essentially. So ludic loops are these kind of like in our heads. If we don't close a loop, if we don't close a circle, things just continue to float around in Our head, right? We have to close these loops. That's why if you get out of a car and you, you've turned off the radio halfway through a song, you keep playing the song in your head. Like our brains need to close things down, otherwise they just stay in there, you know. So the reason that Dave Allen talks about getting things done is getting things out of your head is because he knows that it costs energy for those things to be stuck in your head. You've got to remember this again. 20% of your calories go to your brain and your nervous system. You will you spend just as much energy ignoring thoughts as you do actioning them. Like it's really important that people understand that just because you can't hear the thought in your head, your non conscious is having to spend your energy and use that willpower and self control muscle to have it not being at the forefront of your head. That is resource that you could be spending elsewhere. Now imagine how many of those thoughts are ticking over in your head and how much resource you're having to put put in to keeping them at bay. So I spend my life emptying my head as best as possible because and that's a, again it's a practice. So by you getting those thoughts out and writing them down, at least it's out of your head and on a piece of paper, you know, so it's a fantastic point. Ludic loops.

That's the look it up and you know, learn a bit more about it. Think what this kind of brings it to in my head is being comfortable in your own skin.

I think that's the hardship of it, right. Like I think that it's, you know, and this is, you know, I pause a lot now because from a coaching perspective this is where I stop a little bit. You know, when I'm one on one with people or when I'm talking king and it's in this, I talk about this personally and I try and reflect on this person personally. You know, for me the conversation that I'm having around this a lot at the moment is imposter syndrome. You know, I think I'm really starting to reflect on those words is that I've always just realized that I'm someone I'm not or not being comfortable with the person that I am or do you know what that makes sense? Like I'm always like, you know, in the city it was, I was an imposter in the city. Like I was. Because I just wasn't being who I was. I was fueling it with Drugs and alcohol and just bullshit, right? Like, it just. I was an absolute imposter. So then what happens is I started to navigate out of that, and that was because I wasn't comfortable in my own skin. I didn't know what my own skin was. And then as I started to put on my new skin and started to find who I was and started to kind of like, okay, this is. This is the dude I'm trying to. Trying to be. As soon as I did that, I felt an imposter within that identity. And I still do now, right? Like, it's really. And I really, really, really try and drill this home to people. Like, because I can walk into a room and I. The first, I can seem like I'm super fucking confident. Like, people are like, you know, I kind of understand how to get people's attention, and I understand how to create a safe container. And that's a thing I've worked on. And that can fool people into thinking that I'm very confident. And I actually turn around at most of my talks and say, like, by the way, underneath, right now, I'm shitting myself. My anxiety is going through the roof. And I let people know that, and they think, what? Like, hold on a sec. You've just come in and made everyone laugh, and you've just made us all feel at ease, but yet you're shitting yourself underneath. And I'm like, yeah, why is that? It's because I don't feel like I deserve to be here. I just don't feel like I'm good enough. I don't. Right now, coming into this podcast, I probably spend 24 hours leading up to this thinking of reasons to cancel on you, bro. Right? Because I just don't feel like I deserve to be sitting here having this conversation. I feel like a fraud.

I'll say this whilst you say about imposter syndrome, this isn't a highly technical survey that we did, but on our Instagram, you know, we have a decent. I mean, for us, a decent amount of followers. And a while ago, I actually put up one of the. You know, you can do an Instagram stories, the questions, and it's a simple one. Do you feel or have you suffered from imposter syndrome syndrome? And 86% of the people. And that's. And there's. There's. It's probably 80% guys and then 20% girls on there, but 86% of them, and that was maybe 170 people said yes.

And I was like, I think, wow, it's fascinating. And it's wonderful to talk to you about it, because this is people. This is stuff I'm talking. I don't really talk about much in this. I'm still with some stuff I'm working on. I. I think it's an area that I'm going to start leaning into and reading up and looking at a lot more about. I think there's a lot to be said, and I think it's right. And I just think that we, you know, we get the promotion before we're ready for the promotion, right? And then it's the one that we fought for, and then we're suddenly in it and people are looking at us and we're like, fuck, should I be here? Like, you know, stepping into my marriage, it was like, I'm a husband now. Like, hold on a sec. What the fuck does that look like? Am I a good husband? Am I right? Like, you know, like, I got a dog. And I'm like, well, I'm a dog owner now. Like, I feel like I'm not a good dog. I. I don't know. Like, I just don't ever feel good enough, like, at what I'm doing, and I just don't feel like I. I should be there, like. And it's just a very interesting idea. I think you're absolutely right. Like, I think there are a lot of people who reflect on that, and I think that's a lot to do with the outside noise of the life that we are living right now. I think that we are constantly being presented. This is how it's like your morning routines, right? It's like, you know, this is the perfect morning routine. This is how I get up. This is how I do stuff of this is what I did. And it's like, well. And then when you're not living up to those expectations, you're just like, oh, fuck. Like, you know, I'm imposter. I don't deserve to be doing this. So, yeah, it's a wonderful subject area. Really wonderful subject area.

It's definitely one that I think for all of us, the different guys for the whole man Academy, you know, we've got a mixture of guys that are now helping us, and we've got a few, let's say, big things coming up. But I know when we had our event at Geese and Hawks, when David Gandhi spoke, and I spoke to one or two on paper, very successful guys who most people would know who they are, who we spoke about imposter syndrome, and you're like, dude, you're on Newspapers and, or you're on radio and what have you. And these guys have been doing their job for X amount of years but are still saying, God, I still don't feel like I'm qualified for, for this. And I'm waiting for someone to find me out, dude.

And it's really is. And like I said, I've been stepping towards working a lot with artists and creatives and there has been conversations with people who are very big and very popular who are standing in front of thousands of people and they're just like, I don't know why I'm here. I have no fucking idea why I'm here. And you know, I can actually completely and utterly understand that from a very micro point of view. Like I did So I did a. I suppose my, you know, I did so when I left the city five years ago now. So I kind of was cleaning up of the drugs, found running, found movement was found a new tribe and a new community to replace life down the pub and my friends down the pub and I started to make change and feeling good. And then I kind of like I left the left the square mile. Went traveling for a few months, came back retrained as a personal trainer, strength and conditioning coach and started to move towards where I am now. And within a year of me getting that I got a call from the BBC and they were like right, we want you to come on to BBC1 and we want you to coach 10 people with mental health conditions to the London Marathon. Nick Knowles will be presenting. William, Kate and Harry are going to be in it as part of Heads Together. And it was a two part BBC one award winning documentary. Like it couldn't have gone any better. And I spent six months of my life, 140 hours of filming. I took myself to the absolute brink to get there. But the story for me within all that was that I went from party guy drug addict Chev to BBC one primetime in two years. You know it was a pretty powerful move that I had made for myself. And I was also three months of getting married to my wonderful, wonderful, wonderful wife. So I had Holden sec. I had built the perfect life. Like I had built everything that I have fucking fought for. Like how amazing is this? I'm on BBC1. I'm getting to go like that. To all the people who didn't think that was a big thing for me, right? Like I was like fuck you. You thought I wouldn't make it. The big finger, Big finger, right? And then I was like I'm getting married and I'm a pretty good like fiance. Like I was like, like I'm a pretty good dude. Like, I'm proud of who I am. I'm working at it. I'm fucking working hard. And I was like, the airing of the second episode, I put my first antidepressant in my mouth. Like at the airing of the end of the second episode that went live, that went out and there's a whole other conversation I was having to deal with a lot of, yes, there was a gremlins locked away in the closet. There was chronic stress that was going on and a lot of my stress. A lot of the challenges going into that documentary in that program was just feeling like I did not fucking deserve it. It, you know, I was. And I just did not belong there. Like, who the fuck am I to be standing there on TV talking about running and mental health and well being and stuff like that? And it's, you know, I live, I still, I still live with it. I still walk into it, to a room with it and I think, do you know what one of the most powerful things that I now say when I walk into a room and I think again, like, let's advise for people on this subject matter is lead with vulnerability whenever going into any situation. And what I mean by vulnerability is vulnerability with guardrails. It's not about walking in and bawling your fucking eyes out. And like, you know, this is how I feel. It's like, look guys, you know, when I walk into a room and I do any talks, I probably did it at the whole man academy, you know, I'm like, guys, I stopped the room first of all. And I go, hey, I just want you all to know that like, you know, I'm pretty anxious underneath right now. It's going to be putting me into first gear. It's going to take a while for me to come down. You know, I have a fear of failure. I have a fear of this, right? Just because I've said that, it makes me feel better. Let's go.

You know, and I remember it made me say, respect you even more because I was like, oh, you know, he's not pretending that he's going to tell us everything that we should know. He's going to say, hey guys, I'm not perfect, I'm shitting myself.

And that's, and that's why I like to, I always like to say people like, and this is really important. And I would say like, I'm a map. I'm not the map maker. I'm A journeyman, right? Like I'm on the road with you right now. I don't have. And then the second thing that I do a lot now is like I walk in and I kind of go, right, before we start, X, Y and Z. And also before we continue, this is the reason why you shouldn't trust anything that comes out my fucking mouth. And you should be completely and utterly skeptical of every single thing I say. Number one, I do not have any letters after my name. I do not have a PhD. I am not a doctor, I am not a therapist, I am not a psychologist. So depending on what you value, I might not be the right person for you. And it's really important that you know that. And then I might list off one or two other things. And it's really funny because it's actually a very powerful sentence for me to say. And I've never said this really out loud and I think I still reflect on it. It's a very powerful sentence for me to say. Because education and smarts was something that I always. I never had it in the city, right? What did I say? I cussed myself out in the city. I was responsible for the credit crunch, right? Like, I didn't understand what was going on. And I always felt stupid because I didn't really get the bigger picture. You know, when I was doing the BBC documentary or training as a coach, it's like I always felt behind in my learnings and my knowledge and my education, you know, and moving into this space that I. You can, you can feel now. I put up a big guardrails about, this is my next. This is what I do and this is what I don't do. But it's like I have to, you know, for me it was always a big thing. I never thought I was smart enough. I never thought I was smart enough. So now to be able to walk into a room and just go like, right, by the way, I ain't fucking got all this shit after my name. And what I'm trying to, I suppose, get out with people advice is imposter syndrome is. I think we all think we have to present this best version of ourselves, just more often than not leading with complete fucking honesty and transparency.

Yeah, but it's what I. What I thought was important also is when you came to the event and you know, you said to the guys there, I am, you know, either anxious, nervous, I can't remember the exact terminology used. And that takes you back to the night that we had a kind of our launch event at Geeves and Hawks and myself and Matt had to stand up on the balcony and make a speech. And get this, I look down and not only have I got my, my dad and my sister there, who obviously I care about what they think, but you've got 150 people, all from various important things, but also you've got Jeremy vine standing there looking at me. You've got Gabby Roslyn, who I know, I grew up watching her on telly, got the BBC breakfast presenters like Tina Dahili and Ben Thompson and people from the very top of banking and etc. And I stood there and I was like, what the fuck am I doing up here? And inside I was shitting myself. But of course you, you realized that, you know, I had feelings of anxiety. I wasn't anxious, but I had feelings of it and I got through it. And one of my friends after was like, oh, how do you do it where you stay so cool? And I was like, no, no, you know, be okay understanding that, you know, it's, it's fine to be shitting yourself at that point, as long as you try and just control it as best you can.

This is, you know, getting back to physiological point of view. You know, I think this is. So when I, whenever I work with people who are walking into environments, they've got to present themselves or, you know, they've got to stand up and, you know, talk about slide or give a powerful speech to a bunch of troops that aren't feeling that great. It's really important. And we can look at a lot of the science behind this. It's, first of all is getting people to reframe that feeling, right? So, and I kind of try and remove anxiety now from the vocabulary about what's going on. The reason that your chest is, your blood is pumping faster around your body, the reason that your breathing is changing is we can either frame it as anxiety or we can start to say like, hey, actually your body is producing more energy right now for you to be able to deliver at the task in front of you, of you. And we know this. So when people start to stop seeing something as a threat, as in fight, flight or freeze, and when they start to see things as a challenge, they actually get the same reward from their body. That is the tools, the blood pumping, but actually with less of the physical harm. So by actually reframing something mentally, the psychology, you actually start to shift your physiology energy, which is a really crazy fucking thing. So, you know, trying to get people to realize that actually hold on that feeling Is your body giving you the energy and focus to complete a task in front of you? That is your body's way of saying what you're about to do is really important. I don't need you to be all calm and zen right now. What I need you to do is take this energy and focus I'm about to give you and nail the fucking shit out of it.

Yeah.

And we know that when people have that simple mindset intervention, when they start to be able to reframe the anxiety as their body putting them into a challenge state, we actually know they perform better.

Yeah.

So it's a really simple thing, is that, that's where we start to talk about these mindset interventions, is realizing that feeling that you've got is a fantastic feeling. Channel that energy, channel that focus and you'll come out better on the other side.

We should be writing that bit down. I wonder. I was going to ask you also, when you're up talking to group, do you ever have it where, you know, you're talking to yourself in your head whilst you're. Whilst you're delivering to people? And I would guess for most people sometimes that those, those voices are the negative ones. It's a bit like peep show.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is like sometimes I must be really honest, I'm sitting there trying to do my flies up. I was like, you go for it, it's fine. So I actually. Yeah, so I probably saying for 90% of talks right now, I'd say I'm in flow. So I'm kind of like, that's, that's just where nothing else, I'm just in it and I'm just, I'm just going through it and that's what I really try and try and achieve. But I definitely have a lot of there. I do definitely deal with that voice in my head at stages. And it's actually really important. I use it as. I actually talk about it in a lot of my talks and I use it as a learning point and I talk about the facts of shit that's going on in my head. And the message that I try and drive home with people is we get confused about what stress is and what stress isn't in our lives. Like, you have to understand right now that you and me sitting here focusing on each other is a stress. Right. Like 20% of your calories go to your brain and your nervous system. We know that professional master chess players, what they called grandmasters or whatever, whenever they are playing in a tournament, they can burn up to 6,000 calories.

Wow.

But they're just sitting there. And this is what I try and be understand is thoughts, feelings, emotions come at an energy cost. Right. So, you know, and it's important that we understand. So if we understand that energy cycle that is this right now is an energy cycle, AKA a stress cycle, we understand that we're going to need to provide relief to this stress cycle once it's finished. So I won't go from this into another phone call. I won't go from this into the gym straight away or training. What I would do is I'll go for a walk for 10 minutes and I'll just help the system close the stress cycle down. So I'm then ready to engage with the next task. Right. And this is where we start to look managing energy on a micro level. So I get them to realize that. And I talk about the talks. I'm like, you just think I'm standing up here in front of you talking is. No, I'm talking through my mouth. That's more anaerobic than aerobic. That's burning sugars as opposed to fats. When I burn sugars. Sugars, that comes at high energy cost. Dah, dah, dah. But also, and you've got to realize, guys, is that as I'm working this room, I am navigating the thoughts, feelings and emotions of this room as well. You know, one, and the example that I give to get back is it's like, you know, to make people. I might have two minutes ago had a bit of banter with this person over here, or I might have said something, or I might have asked them to raise their hand to get the, you know, get the room going. Right? I might have. But halfway through that question, I might be thinking, shit, she's not ready to have this conversation or she's uncomfortable. And then I'll be moving forward and I'll be five minutes in and I'll still be thinking about her.

Yeah.

And I'll be worrying about her and thinking I've let her down. And then my brain will start cascading, you know, and that's, that's. These days where I'm am in my head is you can start having to work this room. I know where we're going. I kind of started. This is like, do I sit there and kick the shit out of myself thinking I deserve to be up there? Actually going to be kind of honest? Not so much these days. And this is a point to drill home. And is the difference between a fixed mindset And a growth mindset. And this is why I want to say, actually, these days I kind of don't kick the shit out of myself when I'm up there in flow and doing it. Because I'm not going to be the sum of one talk. And I'm not invested in how I'm going to do a talk this week. I'm thinking about my ability to do talks in 10 years time. Time. That's what I'm excited about. I'm excited about Coach Chev in a decade. Because I'm like, I know I'm okay now. I'm not fucking great, but I know I'm okay. But I'm like, if I keep working with a growth mindset and learning and developing and leaning into the shit, that scares me. And the only way I'm going to get better is by doing so. Even if it's a bad talk, even it's a bad workshop, when I step away from it, if I think, right, what did I learn? What I take away? What did I do better? Why wasn't this. If I go away with a growth mindset and think I'm not the sum of that one talk, then I'm like, it has value no matter what.

So it's like, it's so important for guys to hear you say that because you say it's a constant learning process, isn't it? Of not beating yourself up and maybe saying, what? What have I learned from what I've been doing?

Yeah. And you know, and again, this is. I think people ask me how I navigated my way out of drugs and change and. And God, it's so bloody hard because. And I always reflect on this now from a wellbeing point of view, right? Like, what was I doing? What did I get? And shit that makes complete fucking sense. Like, I started walking in a week and that gave me time to think and process. And I went into nature every weekend and oh, shit, we know nature helps shift physiology, which helps us manage stress, right? Like, I can get all this shit. But I think the common goal, the most common answer I have is, I fucking refuse to give up. Like, I always thought there was something more for me out there. And I promised myself that every single day, even if I went five steps forward, I would get up and crack on, you know, I wouldn't. I knew that I was going to do drugs again. I knew that I wouldn't be clean straight away. I knew that that would be a work in process. It took me from wanting to get clean to getting permanent and Clean. Took me seven years. And it was seven years of going back and forth. But it was a switch in mindset of like, fuck, I did drug last night. I fucked up all. Or I got angry with an ex partner I kicked off. You know, I'm ashamed of that behavior. Or I ignored my mum for three months because I just don't want to talk to her. Or I let down friends and didn't turn up to yet another social event because I was hanging out my ass. Or I just end up with fucking toilets not in drugs somewhere. And I never made it on time. Like all these things, right? Like all these behaviors that were my identity in my head, these negative things. I was like, I'm going to take each and every one of them on the fucking chin every day. Every day I fuck up, I'm just going to get up, I'm going to be like, I'll give myself a day. I'll have my ice cream moment. I'll get over the comedown or I'll deal with the emotions. But then I'm going to wake up tomorrow and I'm just going to crack the fuck on at any cost, you know, and if you're. If you're in my world, you're with me. I'll try and explain who I am. If you're not, I'll. I'm on. And I think that was the thing for me is I developed a growth mindset. I realized I just needed to keep picking myself up and learning, picking myself up and learning. And I realized I learned not from books, but from fucking failure in life, you know, and it's. I think that's the advice for guys who are trying to navigate their way out. You just got to keep ab testing.

Well, I appreciate you being so honest, and I think that's what we've. With the podcasts. One of the things we wanted and one of our values was about authenticity. Because we can all sit here and say, say, you know, I do everything well and I don't fuck anything up, but we all know that we're doing it constantly. And it's funny when we're talking about we're encouraged to be authentic, but I know we've said before, you know, okay, that's great, but now tell me how, how do I be authentic and how authentic?

I really appreciate you, brother, because this is a con. This is a big conversation I'm having with coaches and, you know, fellow friends. What is authentic to you? Out of interest, where are you on this subject?

It's an interesting one because I think it's definitely. It's evolved because when I had my mask on when I worked in the city. But being authentic now is where the podcast has been. The most important development for me is actually not talking to people about what they should be doing, because for me, I've made some stupid mistakes in my life, especially working in the city, and now it's being okay with that and being able to talk about it. You know, you're not shouting at people saying, I did this and I did that, but being able to talk about it and just be saying, yeah, guess what? I acted like a dick at various points in my life and probably still will, but that's okay. And just. Just try and relax and not try and prove yourself to anybody.

I think absolutely. You know, a couple of. Sorry, forgive me. A couple of things in there. I think it's. I think one. It's so hard to define. I think it's really. I'm still yet to be able to sit here and give a real definition as to what authentic is or be able to say something that people go, oh, fuck, yeah. Like, that makes. That makes complete. Complete sense. Because I'm. I'm figuring out that. But to be honest, I'm not actually even trying to figure it out in so many ways, because I'm like, I think I was just. Just doing me, you know? And I think that a phrase that comes to mind at the moment is I'm just trying to provide relief, not cures. And that comes from a dear friend of mine, Charles Oxley, who's reading a book and said it to me a while back. And it's not about just shouting at people. It's just trying to provide relief to them. And relief just coming in the form of like, hey, these are the lessons that I've learned, dudes. This is where I'm at. This is how I think I got here. By the way, if you ask me this again, in three years time, it will probably be different again again. You know, it's like, that's what life does. It changes and it evolves, and your thinking evolves and your feelings evolve and your outlook evolves. And for me, my authenticity, I think, comes from just really owning my shit, because that's how I connect with people. I'm just like, this is it, and not being worried. I think this is me shooting the shit with you now. Like, I think it's maybe, you know, presenting the version of myself that is true to me and not the version you want me to be.

Yeah.

You know, and I think that's. I think that's. I have a tattoo across my chest which says, I am not who I am. And I got that on my chest when I was like 22, dude. Like, I didn't even have any insight into health or mental health or my own shit. It was just. It was a sentence that resonated with me. I am not who I am.

Am.

And I think this comes down to, again, the social mask. And I think we're so busy thinking about what you're feeling, you know, you're thinking at the moment. And I'm so busy trying to feel like I want to fill gaps. I want to help you. I want to. I want to. Even as a coach, like, it's like, I want to help you. I want to provide. I want to provide the cure. Because the reason I want you to do that is because I want you to like me and I want you to accept my knowledge and see me as a fucking guru or whatever it may be. Valid, validate. And I want to feel the silence. I don't want to listen to you. I'm pretending like I'm listening to you, but all I'm fucking thinking about is how I'm going to fucking change your fucking world right now. And like, da, da, da. And just giving you a really good feeling. I think it's about not being afraid to say what needs to be said, no matter the outcome. Does a tree make a noise if it falls? If no one's. I don't know, I'm not looking for some ancient mystical thing there. But I think, yeah, that's what it is to me is not being afraid of the outcome while still being respectful.

That's one of the big reasons why, with our events with the whole Man Academy me, that it is important now. We always say, you know, we've had some high profile guys come in, and it's not always about having someone that's high profile there because it's difficult to continue to do that. But actually, for often the guys, the audience, seeing someone like David Gandhi up there talking, who they seem to think maybe has got a perfect life, and him saying, you know, being authentic and saying, guess what? Sometimes I got sick of going to the gym, you know, five, five or five days a week or twice a day and et cetera, and, you know, social media and the different things you have to deal with, it just helps. Guys go, all right, it is okay to, you know, find things challenging.

Yeah. And I think, I think it's super. I think we have to, in the men's. Like, we have to make this whole Man Academy. We talk about it, like, I always get. But we have to. I think, I think we're all like, why are we the fucking. Like, we are. Like, why we are. Why? Like, why the fuck are we so silent? You know, why do we struggle? Like, why? Why? I can see my wife is upset, like at the moment, and I can find moments where I'm struggling to connect or extend myself. Like, what the fuck is that behavior about? Like, what the fuck is that about? Like, I love her implicitly. Like, and I want to be there, but why am I struggling to accept? Like, why? Or like, why? Why anger? Why can't I talk about my anger? Like, why am I so ashamed of my anger in my late teens and my twenties, you know, it'. And I think we just, we just have to be able to, you know, be brave, whatever that is, and just kind of extend the conversations and just say, like, this is how I feel. But I don't even have an answer. I'm just letting you know it's going around in my head right now and it's there. Maybe we can figure it out together. I don't know. I just think, yeah, well, that's important.

That kind of brings us onto the point about. Originally, the whole Man Academy was kind of labeled as mental health events for men. But guess what? Guys don't want to talk about mental health or go to events. And some people might not like to hear that, but it's the, it's the fucking truth. I always use the example. When I worked at gfi, the company I kind of left in my last role. You had hundreds of guys on the broking floor. And if you'd have stood up on your chair and said, hey guys, listen up, there's a mental health event for men this weekend. Who wants to come? You'd either get abused, thrown something at you head, or just tumbleweed. And it's probably abuse. And I can understand it because guess what? When I worked in the city, if you'd have told me there was mental health event, I'd have said, there's nothing wrong with me, so I don't give a shit about it. Actually, we realized that mental health is just a segment of the, of the pie of life. I've just made that up, but you.

Know what I mean, I love that. I'm going to steal that. It's fine. But no, but I did. And this is what you. You know, when you mentioned before, like, no hippie shit, right? Like, I'm Very. The biggest things is like, how do I get people's attention? You can't coach anyone anything until you've got their attention. If you haven't got their attention, you're just pissing in the wind, right? And how do you get people's attention is by a bit of theater, It's a bit of creativity. It's about knowing your audience a little bit. But more important is about being able to speak the right language because that's how we use things to. That's how we communicate with each other, is through language. And language is everything. And, and if I start coming into a room of traders and start talking about like, this is how you'll manage your health and try and light some candles and hit some gongs and say, we're going to do a breath practice, it ain't going to fucking work. Right? Like, it's not like I have to pick my approach, right? And it's like I said, there's men in general. You're absolutely right. Like, if you try and sit opposite people say to me, oh, can you come talk to my boyfriend or husband about their head or whatever? And I'm like, okay, does he want to. Yeah, I think so. Okay, cool. Like, I'll arrange a coffee. You can go sit opposite him. Like, no, no, no, no, no, I don't want to sit, I don't want to arrange a coffee. I don't want to sit opposite him. We'll go for a walk around the park, you know, and I'll go for a walk around the park and I will spend ages talking about everything except what we're there to talk about. Because if I tackle him head on, he's just going to. Because he's still figured out himself. He doesn't. How the fuck do I know what he wants to talk about when he doesn't know what the fuck he wants to talk about? Yes, yeah, exactly. And it's. And it's guards up. But I do trust in the supercomputer that we have on top of our heads. And if you can create the right environment, people will start to access that supercomputer. Right? And it's. And I think that's the thing about mental health is you're absolutely right. Like, we don't. There is another conversation here as well in a second. But I just think, I think you're absolutely right. Like, I think, you know, with men, it's, it's. I think language and approach is absolutely everything. And I think that's why I love what you guys do because you're being, you're able to put in repetition and you're learning. And I'm like, I'm interested in whole man academy, not in six months time but in three years time. Because if you keep putting in the repetition, if you keep getting eye to eye, you're going to really start to figure out exactly how to communicate and you'll be able to find a formula that works for a certain, you know, population of dudes which is going to be very powerful. What's working in your world? What are you, what do you kind of, how have you guys adapt? What's working, what seems to be received?

Well, I think it's the good thing for us is we've got a good group of guys who are working on the whole man academy. So I like to think of myself as a, as an all rounder. But you've got Matt who you know is a BBC, he's institutionalised at the BBC. He might not admit it but he's worked there for 25 years. So that's going to happen. You know, Matt's a guy who is at the BBC. He's a writer, he's a journalist, he's gay. So he covers something that I said to Matt the other day. I said I didn't grow up with any people that were gay and even in the city, guess what, there was maybe one or two people I knew that were gay. So sometimes as a group I didn't know how to act around them. And I likened that to friends of mine who went to an all boys school, didn't have a fucking clue how to speak to girls when they left because they hadn't been around them to experience the nuances of how people act. And we've also got Scott, who's our, let's call him creative director, who he's into science and the arts. I can't give a shit about science and the arts. I haven't been to the theater. I don't care about that. That's great that he's interested so we can cover different angles because a guy isn't just what I'm interested in, he's interested in all these different things. And you know, we're very soon about to, I think take, go a little bit turbo in what we're about to do, but it's about adapting as well. As we said, the podcast was meant to be in London. Face to face, feel the energy, get guys in a room and have a good chat. Bad luck lockdown happens. Jump on, zoom and you know what it's been the best thing that happened to us.

Yeah.

Absolutely brilliant. I was, for a minute I was disappointed that, you know, that being selfish, that this had fucked up our plans for the podcast. No, we got started sooner. I probably wouldn't have been speaking. I spoke to a guy in Tuscany yesterday. I wouldn't have been speaking to him. We've got people from different countries listening to the whole man academy that of course, we were so constricted by our events. 30 guys come along or 50 or 60, that's great. But that's just those guys in the room. But now we've got this opportunity.

Yeah. Which is adaption. Right. That's what we've had people say with us. Humans do very well. Which is, which is adapt and thrive. And that's, you know, goes back to what we said before. It's just like you can get lost and, and wish that you was elsewhere or you just rolled with the punches, but actually there's always a positivity there at the end of it.

No, it's an important lesson for guys, I think, is the adapting. I mean, I can't remember who it is that said adapt or die and that you could put across to a lot of the companies that are going bust at the moment who didn't maybe move their markets online sooner. There's a good example. But for all of us at the moment, it is, guess what, you're stuck at home. We can't control that. So you, you know, some, for some people it is hard, but it's happening. So it's how you respond to it.

Yeah, and we talk about, so we talk about, you know, when dealing with stress, we talk stimulus, stimulus, stimulus and response. Right. It's a stressor and you respond to that. What people don't realize in the middle of that is choice. You know, no matter what this is occurring, no matter what this is happening. And, and like I said, I do not, you know, I agree that you're allowed your moments of kind of like fuck and bitch and moan and we're all allowed those. But you either think post traumatic growth or post traumatic stress is your call, it's your choice. And if you. And this is again, it's fixed versus growth mindset. It's whether you get stuck on this or you look at the opportunity to grow. And the thing about being challenged is that's where plasticity occurs. Right. When we are in a challenging environment. That is when the brain is in the best, optimal place to be able to learn. You know, I am, like I said, I've had to adapt and my business model and I'm looking at how I can do online stuff more and the amount that I have learned in the last week, I can have learned in three months. It's because my body is, the environment is giving my body and queuing my body up for these behaviors to be able to adapt really fucking quickly. And you know this, we talk about stress, we need stress in our life for adaption. And if you don't buy into it and you go to the gym, well, unfortunately you're living and breathing it in the gym. Every time that you go, you know, every time that you go for a run, every time you lift weights, you are stressing your muscles, you are stressing your body so you can then adapt and grow stronger. Right? And it's the key thing, and this is where I don't know how we ended up here, but important to recognize, I always have this conversation within this is that to adapt though we have to create the right optimal environment internally. You don't get, actually get stronger in the gym. You get, you create the adaption process. You get stronger in the following days as you start to close the stress cycle and start to move towards that rest and recovery state away from fight, flight or freeze. So that's when your body starts to heal. And the same thing goes for, you know, me adapting from this conversation, like at the moment, my brain is thinking over time, I've said a few things that I haven't talked about but before, I'm really interested in the authenticity conversation we just had. So for me to process this and adapt and be able to compile this into my algorithms internally and to do that, I need to create the right optimal environment to do that. So I need to make sure if I want to process this conversation today and if I want it to resonate on a non conscious level to be able to inform future conversations, I have to make sure that after this conversation I give my time, some time to adjust. I have to make sure at lunchtime I go for a walk for 45 minutes just to once again keep closing down the stress cycle today and have to make sure I get a good night's sleep. And if I can hit those metrics, then I know that I'm going to assimilate this conversation into my database. And therefore I have grown as a human being. If I just stay in a constant first gear and stay constantly stressed, then I'm not going to have learned from this. You know, and it's again, we can look at this from Dudes being stuck at home at the moment. We know that, you know, we all have been in the fucking conversation and in the argument with a loved one. Right? Fucking like tunnel vision. Like, I'm right, you're fucking wrong. That's it. I know there are a bunch of wonderful dudes watching this who 9 out of 10 times have gone for a walk or taken a moment out or stepped away and thought, fuck, I probably, probably should have handled that differently. Where I was right is wrong. I don't think I handled that the way that I'm happy with. And that's them adapt. That's. That's it. That's it. Amazing. You're in it. You're in it. You're in your adaption stage. Right. You've pushed on back on the stress cycle. You're closing the stress cycle down. Your body is now giving you access, your brain is giving you access to new cognitive resources to think about it and process it. And the learning is occurring. That's fucking cool. You know, and it's like, okay, cool, okay, now I recognize that. What can I do about it? And if you take that lesson and you process it and you adapt efficiently, you're less likely or you might make the same mistake again. You probably will make the same mistake again. But again, it's about making that mistake a few times and seeing oh, where you end up in five years, you know, and it's like, that's. Yeah, you know, that makes sense. I'm with that. Yeah.

I'll tell you what, that it painted the picture me also from, and you know, from working in the city that sometimes you would get, you know, you'd be under a lot of stress. You would be. Your job was to make as much money as possible. And you know, you were, you were judged on the amount of money and nothing else. And you could be an absolute twat and no one on your desk like you. But if you were doing big deals and making money in a management don't care. As long as they see the bottom line is the bottom line, then everybody's happy. And I remember one guy said to. Not to me, thankfully, because I'd like to think I was fairly level headed. But I remember him saying to a guy who'd had a big flare up, just go in the corner and have a word with yourself. And I remember laughing at that. And I used that myself for years because, you know, I couldn't. We can't help flaring up. Especially when you've got a phone in each ear, you've Just lost a deal. Your friend who's, you know, your colleagues were actually your competition. I mean, it depends. It was dependent on what desk you were on. But like it or not, the guys around you, if they got hold of a deal and you didn't and they just made 10 grand in a phone call and you'd be like, yeah, great. You'd be thinking, fuck you, I've just lost that. And that was your, that was the deal that day. But I used that, you know, just for a minute. Go off to the lose. I mean, there was nowhere to go but go and in the comments corner and have a word with yourself.

Yeah. And dude, that's it. And I mean, so many different pointers there. And it's like first of all, your body and your system is saying like, hey, there's something important to you right here. Right? Like, that's the first thing. Like, this is important to you, which is really great. So it's acknowledging that. It's acknowledging that, like, shit, this is important. And then now I'm. The reason I'm going to give you these resources and tools is because I'm going to help you navigate and learn from it, you know, but the problem is as human beings, we just get it so we can get it muddled, you know, and we can get lost in the negativity and the growth mindset goes, well, the only way that I'm going to get better is the only way you got better at sales calls was fuck textbooks. Like, I don't get me wrong, there are some great trainers out there. There's some great training courses and I can teach you how to welcome objections. Manager sales life cycle. I can talk about open questions, closed questions. I can talk about. We could talk about all I said I'll fucking deliver trails Sales training course right now. We'll give you some real good fucking mojo, no problem at all. Or what I can get you to do is give you that phone, give you a fucking roller deck and get you to pick it up a hundred times. You'll learn more picking up that phone a hundred times on how to deal with human beings and rejection than you will learning for anything that I've got to say.

Yeah, that's. It's funny. I laugh at that because it's like another podcast is, you know, how. And it's. I don't mean it's. We're all salesmen in life, aren't we? You know, if you're out and you're single, you're, you're, you're single. Selling yourself, hopefully to maybe find a mate and to get what you want through your partner and family. And I just smile because it is one of the podcasts we'd like to cover is, you know, it sounds selfish, but how to get what you want.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think so selfish, but I think it's super important. But the key thing here is to realize is everything is everything. You know, the same way that you get better as a runner is the days that you're done, go for a run and you learn from those. And why have I ended up there and. Or why did I get injured? What didn't I do right? What can I take away from that? The way that you get sales is by shit going wrong. And that is just a basic principle that underpins everything. You know, the way that I like to think that I'm a like pretty good husband right now, ish, kind of hopefully is because of the crap ass relationships that I've been through fucking historically. I can even sit there and hate who I was and regret on it, or I can say, hey, it was just building blocks of who I am. And here's the interesting thing. And this is where we start to talk about mindset interventions because this is where we can get people to see a bright spot in their life. You know, someone at. So that you might find a salesperson who's really good at this. Like, they built a business based on understanding the importance of failure, right? Like they're fucking, like, they get it, they ride it out and they keep. They stay cool, calm and collective and make good decisions every day. And if a deal goes south, they're like, cool. What did I learn? What did I take away from it? How could I be like. They're just, they're operators, right? They just know how to keep their shit together. They are crucial bruising because they have been through the wars and they recognize that and they understand that. But then they're in like, you know, they're outside of work, they're like fucking, you know, they can't look after themselves. They can't eat healthy or they can't do this, they can't do that, they can't get down the gym. They can't figure out a routine that works for them and they try and then they just quit.

Yeah.

Then I'm like, so as a coach, what I might do in that situation is go like, right, cool show. Tell me a time in your life that you have demonstrated the ability to demonstrate this mindset. This, this, this and this and this. And they're like, well, that's kind of how I look at work. And I'll do that. I'm like, cool. Now we'll just translate that model over to the gym. Same fucking thing, bro. Right? Like, it's the same thing. And I think that's the thing is what I get. So where I go with this is I genuinely believe that we all have the tools that we need to make ourselves feel better in life. Like, people don't actually fucking need me. I honest to God, I think people already are telling themselves what they need, need, and they have already demonstrated the skills that they need to demonstrate now in the past, historically, right? They have at some point demonstrated the mindset or the actions or whatever it may be. They just need to connect to that again and they just need to take more of a growth mindset and keep ab fucking testing. If you could do that, you don't need people like me. Like, you don't need coaches in your life. You just keep fucking putting one foot in front of the other.

Are you pointing them in the right direction, do you think? Giving it, Giving a nudge?

I think that. And that's it. I think for me, it's about giving people some basic principles. Like, hey, here are some basic principles that you need to understand. Like, if you want to better manage your energy focus and have some clear thinking, then you've got to kind of understand stress and rest and the relationship between the two, right? So we've got to kind of understand those basic principles. If you can understand those principles, you're going to get really good at managing your energy. If you're really good at managing your energy, you're going to going to have the energy to be able to make better decisions and show up for loved ones as well as your work, right? You'll be the energy to go to the gym. You'll be able to have the energy to create habits and willpower. So that's kind of the principles. I can get you to understand the principles. Fantastic. And then for me, it's the mindset. Intervention is a very small thing. It's like, okay, cool, now let me just nudge you in the right direction. Let me make sure you've got a growth mindset and not a fixed mindset. Let me make sure you just kind of realize this is about a deep practice, right? And you've got to keep putting in that repetition. But it's also, I guess, okay to keep failing and whatever. And then once we've done that, then we start to look at, like, habits and Tools and systems and just kind of a little bit of guidance on how to ab test. And then it's like, dude, you kind of. Once you've got those, I'm like, off you go and do your thing and keep reading and keep learning and keep turning up seminars. But don't keep listening to me. Like, I don't want you on my books for longer than three months. You know, I don't want you as a coachee. I want you to come on board. Let me give you these principles. Let me give these tools. And I would rather you go work with five coaches, you know, and pick and cherry pick what's right for you. And then, hey, you know, you want to come back and have a conversation about that and do that? We can do that. But I just, I think there's, like, say, so many ways up the mountain, everyone's so unique that my job is just to give a few nudges.

That's an interesting one, saying, go off. And I'd say expand your mind by working with different people. We've spoken recently, actually, on our podcast about the importance and Scott, our creative director, says about the importance of getting around people that maybe are different to you and maybe even that you don't agree with.

Amen.

If we just hang around with people that agree with you all the time, I would call that a fixed mindset. And actually, I'm pushing myself now to listen to people that I initially go, I don't want to listen to them. And I'm like, you know what? Let's. Let's listen. And half an hour in, I'm like, shit, they've got some good stuff here.

And that's definitely. I mean, one of my big growths at the moment is trying to find people that really fucking disagree with me, but they're able to sit and have a conversation with me, you know, and want to have that conversation and debate. You know, I've got some quite polarizing thoughts around mental health. Like, you know, I just. I just do. You know, I've got some opinions on it. And it's. It's. I think. And it's okay to have these. These thoughts and feelings and opinions. I'm not saying I'm right. I just want to bring a different conversation to the table. But I surround myself with people who think quite similar to me or, you know, and that's the challenge that I have, is trying to find people who are ready to really fucking shoot the shit and have a conversation, because I know that's where my growth is. And Then also just people who completely fucking disagree with me. Like, completely disagree with me. Like, put me in a room with like, well, being's equivalent of flattering, do you know? And I just think that it's because I might be wrong. I don't even know that I'm right. I don't know. That's the whole point. And I can learn and I can grow. And I want to know, what are you reading? How have you got there? What are you thinking? And please challenge me. It's hard because I want to be right. And that's something I really make really clear because that's the imposter syndrome. And me, like, I want to walk into the room and be the smartest person in the room.

Yeah.

So I also know from it, not only from a learning development, but also from an ego perspective, I need to challenge my thoughts more. I need to be told shit that I don't want to really fucking hear inside me, you know? And I need to also be criticized. And I need people to pick me apart because that's how I will grow. And I also know that it makes me very fucking uncomfortable.

It can make you feel defensive. I know that from us talking with, you know, we've got various people kind of, let's say, advising us, unpaid advice, if that makes sense. You know, that would be really good advice about the whole Man Academy. And when I get it, because it's not what I want to do, a little part is like. And you go, yeah. And I'm thinking, fuck you. Like, I'm not taking your advice, but actually it's really good. And I've. Let's call it. I've meditated on it, which I haven't meditated, but you get my gist where I'm like, shit, it hurts me to look back and realize one of the people. When we did our, I think was our first or second event, I spoke to a friend whose hubby is a CEO of a very, very big company. And I told her about our whole Man Academy events. And she said he wouldn't send his staff to the events. And I was like, I was already offended. I could already feel my back going up. And I said, why not? Because it sounds a bit negative. And I was. Oh, inside I was pissed off. And you know, it takes. Takes a lot for me to get pissed off. And now we're looking real as he was totally right. If you just said it's mental health stuff and then it did sound too negative and we realized it's about, you know, it's about growth and not just focusing on the word mental because it doesn't help us at the moment.

It's really interesting. There's a couple of interesting things. They're like, firstly, like don't. Right, we've all fucking. I'm. I still am there. I can, I can phone up my closest confidence. Like I'd be like, oh, can. Like I've been rebuilding the business, rebuilding documents, rebuilding workshops, rebuilding everything. And I'm like, oh, can you read this? And I only just want them to read it and go, it's great. I don't actually want your fucking feedback. I just want you to tell me I'm fucking amazing and this is it. And then I get like fucking loads of like come back and like actual constructive feedback. I'm like, who the fuck does this guy fucking think he is? Like I fucking have now. And I deal with that consistently. Like my ego like, like shows the fuck up. Like hold on. But you know, and that's, that's a practice. But I think that it's funny actually you said something I love. You know my. Again, one of my potential polarizing opinions. It's not that polarizing, I guess but one of the opinions that I've got just to steer the subject away for a second is to just what you say about the mental health and negative conversation. So this thing I talk a lot about, I have talked a lot about behind the scenes is that I start to. Or I started to. So basically I, within my narrative I started to kind of drop a of lot, lot of the. I still use mental health because people understand what I'm talking about when I use those words and it just gets to the point and again you've got to speak the language that people understand to be able to get their attention. But it's. I shy away from using it too much. And also the level of content or conversation I have around mental health condition or mental well being conditions, whatever, like you know, anxieties and depressions and using these words and constantly talking about these things. Because there's a really interesting thing in psychology called primary. So you know, like the, you know people talk about like Facebook hacking us. I'm like, dude, like you know that like Sainsbury's and Marx's and stuff have been hacking us for like fucking like years. Do you know what I mean? Like marketing agencies have been hacking our human behavior and psychology for a fucking long time. You know. And it's really interesting bit of research which is that if I was to show you the word if I was to time you and how long it takes you to walk to that door behind you and back again. Nice placed plant, by the way. If I was to take the time that it took you to walk to that door and back again and then show you the word old and time you again, statistically you would be slower the second time when I showed you the word old, right? So we're constantly being primed by our environment and that priming cues, behaviors example again, as I said before, going to a church, dah dah dah, dah dah dah, right? Like does that. So we understand that, right? And we've got to think about that like our system. Like you've just stood out in front of a car and taken a step back without even realizing. Realizing like our non conscious is just constantly fucking like ticking away looking out for us. It's amazing. So here's the thing about mental health and I take a step sidewards and I look at the plastic conversation right now, right? So I just got rid of it. But look, I was doing this example earlier on. So if I was to show you a big old plastic bottle that I was drinking from right now, a lot of people would probably be sitting there going, well, well, he should probably get a container or why is he not drinking out of a glass at home? You know, it's like, think about the planet, right? Because we're all primed to be having this fucking conversation around plastic at the moment, right? But if you'd looked at it two years ago, if I was drinking out of a big bottle of plastic water, you'd be all thinking, shit, I need to drink my two liters a day. Yeah, right. So we can start to understand how outside noise, outside how culture influences and primes our behavior. Like how many people actually give a fuck about the planet versus they're just doing it because their friends are doing it. Or social media just asking the fucking question, right? Like I'm not saying that's the case. So here's the thing. So you've now you understand the power of priming. I'm like, okay, so we've seen a massive uptick in the conversation around anxiety and depression and stress and all these kind of things over the last few years. How much is that actually priming the behavior? Yeah, right. Like again, and I resize to anyone watching, I like to play devil's advocate. I'm not saying I'm right, it's just I like to have, have conversations. I like to explore these things. And this is like actually I kind of want to explore with experts on my podcast and try and get into this with people who have got letters off their name who can fucking give me a little bit more insight. But I just think it's really important that, you know, it's. And actually this is also fed by talking to a lot of people in the industry, talking to a lot of speakers within the mental health game, and talking to a lot of people who are open within their channels. And I'm sure they, like, they. A lot of people almost built an identity through their narrative around mental health and opening up. And if you speak to a lot of people within the industry who talk about their own journey, I'm pretty sure I know a strong majority of them, because I speak to a lot of. Majority of them turn around and go, I kind of just don't want to talk about this anymore.

Because honestly, I say, I'll stop you. I'll ask you to pause just because this is one of the big things for us. And it's so funny that you brought this up because we've been to events where there's speakers and, you know, Scott and I always, always talk about, what damage is it doing? Now, we understand that they've got their mean well, and there's great intent there, but what damage is it if I say to you, chevy, tell us about the worst day of your life, you know, take you back to it, and you'll feel your physiology change because you're going back and into that. Tell me about it. And then, you know, and we'll pay you for it as well. I mean, interestingly, what damage does that do to the person that's talking about their mental health and maybe going back to their attempted suicide or one of their darkest days and doing it maybe daily or weekly, we wonder, what's the consequence of that?

So you buy in and we. So we buy into repetition, creating desired outcomes, right? And we buy. Buy into every day. Every habit that we create is taking a step towards the person that we want to be. So if you're someone who is going in and constantly playing this thing on repeat and you are reliving these things on repeat, like, what is it dictating? And if you're writing about it every day, if your conversations online are about this every day, like, I absolutely know there are people online having, who have made very impactful change by opening up, who now have. Are struggling to step away, right? Like, and struggling. And they've created. Create an identity within that. Everything they've done, every step that they Take every post that they say, every word that they do, every talk that they do, every video that they do, every insta story they do is reinforcing this anxiety of being a depressive or being anxious or whatever it may be. So then how much is that on a non conscious level continuously to priming that behavior? And I think it is such an important conversation for us to have amongst us as a collective of talkers and coaches and people trying to change this conversation just from of a ton care of duty perspective. This is a conversation that we should be having behind closed doors, but also that it's great that we're having it because this is letting the outside world into conversations that we should be having as a collective and as organizations. Because how do we keep this conversation going, how do we maintain this conversation? But how do we have protective guardrails around it? And I said, you know, from my perspective, my talks used to be massively open vulnerability leading from everything and reliving my story again and again and again and again. And then do you know what? 18 months ago I was just like, I'm fucking done.

Yeah, I'm done.

And that's why if anyone looks at me in social media, you know, my, my, all my platforms closed down well over a year ago. I'm only just starting to come back on the line again now is because I just like, I was like, I don't want to talk. I was never really all the time. But it was definitely, I mean I talked through a lot of my going on to antidepressants coming off it and I connected and built an audience. And then you've got your, you're the mental health guy that took 10 people with mental health conditions. London marathon, and you're talking about your own mental health. It was like people like, oh fuck, you know, like this guy, this guy's the guy. And I was just like, I need to press pause because this can't be right. And now my talks just don't, you know, I very rarely share like how I got to where I got to, but that's taken work. And it's also scary because, you know, a lot of people who make incomes from this or do this, it's like how do I people identify with. It's like how do I, you know, it's like changing your Persona and brand. And I don't, I don't know, I'm waffling now, but that you're having this.

Conversation, it's a really good point. And it's one that maybe people won't Speak about because they fear that they'll sound, I don't know, mean, or.

Are you saying now not to talk? Sorry, I call these creative interruptions. I'm allowed to do. You're allowed to do them. But it's like now people saying, like, hold on a sec. Are you saying now that I shouldn't talk? Do you know what I mean? Like, hold on. You built your career out of trying to get people to open up and talk, or you created your identity or your brand, or you've got me trusting you and you've got me buying into you because you opened up and spoke, and now you're saying you find it hard or we shouldn't speak.

Yeah. Yes. Well, a good example of that is a. It's. He's a friend of mine, but we met through the whole man academy. And I remember the first thing when I looked onto his. One of his social media bios was he. He said. Living with depression was the first thing he said. And I, you know, with the greatest respect, I was like, dude, let me. Let me give you my advice, which. Take it or leave it. Throw it in the bin. I'm happy the way. But you're not just depression. You're living with happiness, sadness, joy, love, all the different feelings. And if you're going to. Every time you open your Twitter bio remind yourself that you're depressed, how is that going to help you? Please take it off and let me know how you feel now.

You're absolutely right. And I think this is because it's almost. And again, guys, I really made this clear. Like, I fully respect everyone's different, but it's. It's the, you know, I identify as someone who's living with depression, so how quickly do the habits that that person creates on a daily basis reinforce that identity? Right. If we're all about identity and wanting to fit in and have a social thing, and we want to, you know, think about how our place in the world always. And it's like, if we label ourselves with this, and it's a strong word, but if we put this label on us, if we wear this T shirt, how much through all our actions and everything that we got to do, are we just trying to reinforce that label?

Yeah.

You know, and it's this. And it's a very slight. Again, I appreciate there'd be some people listening to this that get very like, oh, this is. And it is just a debate. It is literally just a debate. But you're absolutely right. And I've worked with people similar and I've had conversations with people similar and I'm kind of like people who've really found identities with talking through their mental health and well being, that is, myself included. And it's kind of like, hey, this does not. This is not you as a whole. You know, this is. Yeah, this is one part of you, you know, and it's. I think it's really important to reflect and separate from that. And then it's, you know, it's. I think also when people have such strong tones and identity with that, it's like there's a belief that they can never necessarily change, you know, And I think that's a scary thing because I. 9 out of 10 times, if not more people can make change. I'm not saying that the great healing, but I absolutely have again and again worked with people and individuals and communities and charities. And, you know, I am fully in camp. Like, guess what? You can change the way you feel and think. How fucking cool is. Is that like how your brain is plastic? Like your brain can rewire itself. It can think happy thoughts. It can think gratitude. It can learn to live in the present. You know, I always said the other day, like, I was, I was. Example, like I said, I've been rebuilding stuff for the last year and it's been a lot of like, real focused, energized, creative days on hard days and bullshit days. And I struggle a lot with sleep and getting to sleep. And it was kind of. I was lying in bed, must be about six months ago, three months ago, I was lying in bed. It was like three in the morning, and I was looking up at the ceiling and I was like, you know, my head was just whirring because I was thinking about, oh, God, I've got to write a. Write this and do this and I've got to create this and do this. And I'm like, oh, God, I just wish I could get to sleep.

Oh.

And I'm like, hold on a sec. You're lying in bed because you've got creative thoughts occurring. You're lying in bed because you're energized and positive about your life.

Life.

I remember when you used to lie in bed every fucking day hating yourself, hating your life lost in pure fucking darkness and pain. And that was 59 out of 60 days. Then you'd have one break in the clouds for one day. But Now I have 59 days where I'm kind of like, life's pretty fucking good. I'm pretty cool. It's tough. It's tough. It's not. It's like bump. Pretty cool. And then I have the odd day here or there. I'm just like, you know what? I need to put fucking Netflix on and just fucking like disconnect from the world and hide from the world. But now that changes my. But I was like, how cool is that? How cool? How cool. I have flipped that dynamic. And I just think, I just always like to tell that stuff. I just think it's so important that people lost in thoughts and lost in feelings and lost in emotions and think they're stuck that way and they're broke that way. And with the right help and the right people to talk to and the right tools and the right mindset that all comes through practice and a B testing and growth and learning and development and failure and all that fucking shit, you can change. I think that is so cool.

You just used a word there, which we're trying to encourage people to kind of think about. The whole man academy is tools. And you know, it's like at the moment you've got YouTube and you could sit and listen to, you know, good motivational and maybe you don't like the word motivational, but you know, really good. Let's use positive, really good positive stuff all day. Or you could sit and listen to the news where it updates you on how many people have died in every country all day. And we say to people, what do you think at the end of that day? If you spend your whole time looking at the news, it is depressing. But if you spend your whole day in a growth mindset, if you can even a small percentage at the end of the day, hopefully that is going to put you in a better frame of mind.

Yeah. And you know, I don't think it's. Hopefully I think it will, you know, I think it's right. And again, I get people to take fucking. You know, I can be a couple cold coach in the sense of just like, hey, let's just take some fucking responsibility and let's just look at things right now. Look at what you can control to help self feel a bit better. You know, it's a great. The news thing is just coming back to the whole priming thing, right? Like the news is designed to feed on your fear and negativity because that's what sells. You know, you only have to listen to how journalists asks Boris, ask Boris and Sokok the questions like that when that. The way that they're asking the questions is they're just trying to. To draw out the negative and they're trying to draw out the headline. I think that's one of the real big insights that people should be taking away from those daily briefings is hearing how journalists communicate and the information that they're trying to pull because they're thinking about the end result. And the end result is tomorrow's headline. You know, so it's really important people understand that. And the reason that they do that is because from a evolutionary point of view, negativity is what gets our attention more than positivity, it's just a fucking fact. Because it's survival thing, right? We've got to be constantly cautious about our environment and everything that happens in it and the people in our tribe because we need to stay fucking safe. So if you are watching the news all fucking day long, you are just priming the non conscious to stay fucking anxious to stay wired. And it's that, that spending of energy without even realizing you're spending it, you know, and hey, I do this, you know, I've had to pull myself and put some metric, you know, put some tools and systems in place to make sure that I'm not constantly reaching the phone. And then you're building, but you're also building. Not only are you priming that psychology, you're also, you're also reinforcing the behavior with dopamine. Right. Because every time you're going for a scanner and a flick, you're rewarding new headlines. So you're creating this reward mechanism with negativity. Yeah.

You're rewarding yourself with it. That's, that's the worry that people won't understand. Yeah, I think you use that as a good example of, let's say Boris the other night when, when Boris was admitted to not just hospital, but they said he'd gone into intensive care. I've been staying very late dealing with everything that goes with the podcast. So I had it on in the background and I was like, oh, interesting. And you know what? For a whole hour, the only actual news they had was Boris had gone into, you know, into the critical care. And that was all they could actually say. But they managed to fill a whole hour of. The helicopter was over the top of the hospital and they looped in his talks he'd done on his social media page. And they interviewed a few kind of critical care doctors. And at the end of each of their talks they had to say, just to confirm, we don't actually know any more details than he's in there, but we're going to carry on. And if you'd have watched the hour, you know, especially the camera over the hospital and stuff. It was, man, it got your heart racing.

It's like casinos there, right? Like casinos at the casino machines, it's just bright lights and glitter and it's just that is that you're just trying to spike, right? You're just trying to get in it. They know exactly what the fuck they're doing. They know exactly what they're doing. They know that that fear and anxiety and I think that's just where it's really important. Like you're absolutely right. Like I think, you know, you can choose what you consume, you know, and I think that's really, you know, change your timeline and choose what you consume, but also realize that breaking the psychological connection with this stuff is a tough thing. You know, you're setting your physiology up for it. You're building that relationship and reward mechanism already. We were already fucking addicted to our phones and technology anyway. So you already like, you know, we're on the crack and now that crack is just fucking amplified with some good, good shit. So I think it's really important that people have to realize that just stepping away is also not an easy thing to do. You know, it's like me giving up drugs wasn't an easy thing to do. I think to give people clear actionables, as I always like to come back to, is if you're really struggling to disconnect is really create friction. Don't trust yourself. Friction is everything. You have to have got, you know, real bright lines. So when I get towards the end of the day, my self control and willpower is massively depleted. So I know that I can reach for social media very, very quickly. So what I do is I have a different password for Instagram, different password for Facebook, different password for LinkedIn, different password for Twitter. What I do is write that down in four pieces of paper. Those four pieces of paper are scattered around the house in different places. So I have to create a lot of friction between me downloading the apps and then putting in a long ass fucking password that's got high caps, low caps, every caps. Because it's just what you know, when I gave up drugs, I needed to give like my mum my bank card. So I couldn't get cash out the cash machine. Yeah, because I had to, I had to put systems and tools in systems in place to be able to dictate the behavior I desired when I couldn't trust the behavior I was putting out there. So I think it's really important people like it's it's, it's. How can. Some people are going to find it really hard. Some people have the gift and the gene to be able to do it. Some people have slightly different personalities and might find it really hard to switch off right now. So think about how you can create friction in your life to switch off. How can you put controls in place, give phones to loved ones, hide them in cookie jars or whatever it may be, but definitely, you know, change your timeline and consume some good, good shit on that. There is some wonderful shit. I was, I was crying watching. Who's the guy from the office? Mike. I don't care. But as the guy is in the office, the American version of the office, okay, he's in, he's in the film now with it. He's married to Emily Blunt. Quite happy. He's. He's created on YouTube, it's like he's called Mike something. And if you put in some good news or SGN and he's just done like a 15 minute newscast of like good news and it was like videos of, you know, like a husband singing to his wife in the nursing home who has Alzheimer's through the window. Are you fucking shitting me? Are you? I was like, it was like when I watched Marley and Me, I was like sitting there bawling my fucking eyes out. And then like, it was like, you know, this, this young girl who's just finished her last bit of chemo treatment on her way back from her hospital on her birthday, and the street to her house is lined up with all her friends in their cars with banners who are social distancing and welcoming their home. You know, it's the coaches who are doing like, you know, workouts on rooftops in Italy to all the neighbors on things like, you know, there's some good shit out there. Yeah.

Find it. That reminds me, one thing that we was, we were gonna write a short newsletter about it is reminding guys that, you know, hitting these feel good things. For example, yesterday, I've always loved the comedy face. Jacker.

Yeah.

And yesterday, I mean, I haven't watched it for years. Yesterday I was, I was looking after our two boys and I was like, I'm just gonna put that on in the background. And I was killing myself laughing and it felt so good to laugh. And I mean, laugh out loud. I think the kids probably thought I was slightly nuts or even more nuts. But, you know, that's a simple win, isn't it? What's the comedy love? Put it on.

Yeah, and I think that's we don't. We talk about ways of closing the stress cycle down, right? Like, how do I. On a micro macro level, like how after a stressful meeting or challenging meeting, how can I close the stress cycle down? Well, you can hug a loved one for 20 seconds. That changes your physiology, right? Amazing. You can talk to someone. That can be enough. You can go for a walk, you can sit by a tree, you can do a breath piece. Like, there are ways of changing your physiology. And one of the most powerful tools that we have to be able to shift our stress response is humor. And there is a reason that evolution has given us humor. And if you speak to any emergency services, you speak to any nurses at the moment, doctors or whoever it may be, they will instantly talk about one of the best ways that they manage things is people around them and the humor, you know, and it's such a powerful tool for shifting our state, for very much shifting our physiology. So I think you're absolutely right. Like, you know, where do you get that humor from? Whether it's providing humor to loved ones and seeing the bright side and being able to laugh at yourself and laugh with each other, or, you know, it is putting on a, you know, a Netflix special or looking at an old show that makes you laugh. And, you know, we're watching and it is really funny, actually, because if you look at our watching, I've just literally connected the dots and this work. So me and my wife started watching the US Version of the Office. And that's like our new daily protocol is that like every night before we go to bed, so we get to have dinner, we sit down, we talk or whatever. And we're both working quite a lot at the moment. It's A lot of people are, and we're trying to put a lot of energy and focus on into that. And then we get to like 9:30 or something. We'll put in like two or two episodes or three episodes, the Office. And we're just murking our way through the series. Series at the moment, actually, it's quite interesting because out of all the series that we could be watching, we're gravitating towards the light humor, which we sit there and we finish off our day laughing together, which is actually, on reflection, this is like a blog post or something. Now I'm like, yeah, it's white. It's great.

But it's.

It's.

I'll tell you why it's good. I mean, we. We try to ask at the end of each of the podcasts, like, one Bit of advice you could give to a man so he can do life better. And I think, I mean, you've given us various ones, but maybe the last one is that the simple, you know, go and find how it, how you can laugh, how you can have fun during the day, even if it's for a little window of it.

Yeah. And you know, be. You want to know how to be there for your loved ones. And I haven't, I haven't got the answer. Everyone's so independent. But I think, you know, be the humor where you can even, you know, don't be afraid to laugh at yourself and just laugh where possible and you know, remember what it is or how to make your wife laugh or your kids laugh, you know, and stopping and having a moment because I haven't got kids, but I know they're all craving that, that laughter and that attention and it only takes a minute or two to find it in the most seconds. I'm sure, you know, I'm sure that every dad can make their kid fucking laugh in seconds, you know, and just realizing that is such a powerful tool that you have in your household. And then also just with, you know, with your wife and your partner being able to bring that humor and if it's laughing at yourself, it's laughing at yourself and step over your discomfort and just fucking, just do.

Well, I think quite easily. We've recorded the longest podcast in our short history and I hope that drops the mic. I hope that the guy is listening and at some point we're watching because these will be going on on YouTube at some point. Watch when I've found days that are 28 hour days instead of only 24 hour. But before we finish, firstly, how could people get in contact with you? We'll put your deets on the show notes. But what's the best way to get in contact with you?

So best ways at the moment you can go to www.chevyruff.com so C H E V Y R O U G H to check that out. And I do say to sign up to newsletters, not because I want your details, but it's because I actually have a, a load of free webinars coming up over the next few weeks, months for people. So there's some great free resource that I'm starting to put out there. So do that and then you can find me at the wellbeingceo on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Perfect. We'll be tagging the shit out of you on all these different bits and we've got a beautiful picture of you to be putting up. Perfect. Firstly, just to say thanks for. For taking the time to speak to us. I know we've managed kind of, what, two and a half hours and hopefully it's all been valuable in some way. I know I've taken things out of this, and hopefully you have as well. But also to acknowledge you. Acknowledge you for the kind of the work you're doing, which is. And ultimately trying to do good in the world.

Thank you, brother. I really appreciate it. It's back at you. Back at you. Right. We're all just fucking trying to. Trying to do our bit and please our own egos at time. The same. Same time. It's. No, it's a fucking pleasure. I love coming on in these conversations. I love what you guys are doing. So thank you for having me, sir.

Brilliant. Well, I will gladly, as you said, maybe off air jump on your podcast at some point.

Yes, 100%.

We can just basically talk about all the. Exactly the same stuff.

Right. If you just flip this up, if you could just. I'll send you. I'll send you my logos and stuff like that. If you could just edit it in and do that, that'd be fantastic. Fantastic.

It's just. I nearly said it's cross contamination. That's something completely different, but. No, that would be. That would be ideal. Well, I'll stop the recording, but, Chevy, thank you for joining us today.

Cheers, brother.