170. The #1 Thing A Man Needs In 2022

This episode is brought to you by our High Performance Father Coaching program where we help men juggle business, marriage and fatherhood to create the greatest balance and impact life has to offer. This is done with our philosophy that is at the core of achieving these phenomenal results in family, self and service and that is investing in yourself first so you can be a true 100% for yourself, but just as importantly for those around you that you love and care about. If you're a father struggling with choosing between your work work and your family, lacking balance and connection in your relationship, what your children need, your own needs whilst building prosperity in your business, head over to highperformancefather.com fill out the form and I'll have my coaches contact you to see how we can help you and if you're a good fit, what it looks like to join the winner's circle on the inside. But for now, take the time to yourself for yourself and enjoy this episode Foreign. Kick Off Season four the start of Season four of our podcast. Can't even believe I'm saying that. It's crazy, isn't it, how much time flies the Decade of Dads. We made this plan in 2019, coming into 2020 with shirts made and all, and here we are, we're entering year three of the Decade of Dads as well as the very first episode of season four. But I think all in all, episode 170 in total, it's pretty crazy when I look back. Not that I'm saddened or ashamed by my earlier episodes, but I just see so much growth, man. Like I need to redo episode one. I think that's probably an important one every season. I'll get round to that. Who is Alex Ranieri? Because. Because that changes and that is certainly outdated. Whilst it's probably the most listened to episode, coupled with some of our recent ones which have been absolute fire, mind you. And that's not fire because of me. It's fire because of the members, the fathers, the feedback, the training and data we're getting from the guys with testing and implementing and upgrading and everything we do in HPF is just. I just love it so much. I'm not going to say I'm just going to sit and settle on it either. We've got big plans, big plans this year to upgrade and evolve even more with a lot of additional bonuses and features for you guys who are non members as well as we expand and build out this umbrella of this incredible movement and what it really means to be a man in this modern world who dons the hat of fatherhood, of being a significant other, partner, husband and a member of society. So let's get into it. Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life. Man. I can't even say that without laughing. Not because it isn't true, but because I remember seeing that somewhere and I like taking the piss out of it. Welcome to the first episode of season four, the number one. What an episode we have here. It may be a motivational one maybe. I do love motivating, but I never want to be seen or deemed as motivational speaker. Not that it's bad, but I think what we can offer can provide. Again, not that they're bad, we can provide more depth in the approach of what we do with different actions that we take. Not just purely a shift in state, but in saying that that's what this podcast is largely about. Let's shift the state, let's elevate it, and let's adjust our eyes and change the set of eyes that we currently have to look through and see better possibilities, greater possibilities for ourself, for our children. The number one thing a man needs in 2022, this is a motivational one. It is absolutely one. Not that the others aren't, but the motivating factor of this is really the compound of what's been happening in the last couple of years. And the compounding effect of the last couple of years has been tough. It's been really tough, man. There's been more division, more separation, more anger, more frustration, more loss, more everything. But unfortunately a larger part of the everything is scaled towards the lesser. But here's something. Before we dive into this one thing, the number one thing a man needs in 2022, because this is powerful, man. Like, this is really going to help you set the stage for what the 360 odd days, depending on when you listen to this. I mean, if you listen to this in February, still use it. If you listen to it in June, awesome. It's June 2022. This will help you realign because maybe you didn't apply this for the first six months, maybe you did, maybe you can apply more. But before we dive into the number one thing, as you know, I like to roll out 10 to 20 minute intros. But no, this is, this is important. This is part of a Sunday charge up that I did for the men of January, 2nd, 2nd day of the year. And as I was designing and writing up the content, what we're going to go through with our mindset pieces, I do every Sunday afternoon, going off the back of the data, the runs on the board, the men have got where they're at, physically, mentally, emotionally, their feelings, their facts. Which means. I love this because it's always relevant. There's always continuity in what we do. It flows from where we're at, where the energy is at, where the world might be at. It just hit me when I was going through and looking at, I guess, actions, that was the big thing on our Sunday charge up the actions. And what hit me was it just came flooding in. It wasn't my thought, it became mine. And the thought that came in was because I was looking at the action that needed to be taken just for myself alone. I'll talk about the eight points to have a successful year. And there can be winners in a losing season. And we were winners, and we are winners. It didn't come without loss, didn't come without frustration, didn't come without pain, without sacrifice. And it just came flooding into my head. And what came flooding in was just the thought of man. Life as a default is loss. Like. The default of life is loss like it's. You could look at the opposite. The opposite of life is death. I get all that, but I'm telling you, man, the default of life is loss. Think about this. You don't eat, you don't drink, you die. Your heart doesn't beat, you die. You don't breathe in oxygen, you're dead. Plants, trees, they don't magically do their photosynthesis and all the other things moving around. Not that I'm a. Would it be a horticulturalist? I'm not sure, but I'm not a tree expert. But they die. I look at so many different points of life, not just us, other organisms, other animals, all of it. And you know what it says to me? The default of life is death. The dichotomy of life is life itself as a definition, is living expression. The dichotomy is life is death. I'm not pessimistic, I'm not cynical. Like, stay with me here, think about this. Think about everything else. You don't put fuel in your car. Doesn't run any. Like, I should have written a list and you might have thought, wow, Al's really smart. Look at him go. Where? I'm looking at a piece of paper with a list of 30 things. It's there. You don't need any more examples. You don't. It's there. The default to life is loss. Loss of life, death, decay, deterioration. And then you look at everything that Delays that, everything that counters that, everything that coexists with that, to counter, to excel in place of replace, is action. It's all action, man. Yes. You don't have to think about your heart, it just beats also to a degree. Unless you're doing exercise, specific breath work, you don't have to think about breathing, you just breathe. Like, I'm not saying breathe in an out owl in my head as I'm talking. So yes, a lot of things are autonomous, but the way that you delay, which is an inevitability, it is inevitable for all of us. But the way that you delay that, postpone it, counter it, overcome it, is action. It's action, man. You eat food, stay alive. You drink water, stay alive. Like it's action. The default Life is fucking hard. And it's not. I love Jordan Peterson, I think he's got amazing value, his books are incredible. But it is hard and it's not just going. Life is full of misery. Deal with it, put up with it. It's not about that. It's not about just sucking it up with emotions either. It's recognizing that life is really, really hard. You think because you got a belly full of piss and you had fireworks and celebrations and you went from 2021 to 2022, that your life's going to turn around, Wake up call. It's not the moon, the sun passed over. Once you've gone from December 31st to January 1st. Now I get it. Symbolically, we can wipe the slate clean, we can start again, we can ignite, we can create standards, we can create structures with our wife, with our business, with our employees, our staff, with ourselves. This is what I mean. I get all that. But it can't be a reactive state of affairs that leads to you going, this is the new me. It doesn't work that way. My New Year's resolutions started in September, like January. It's already done, man. January is everything I need to do. We've got our event at the end of this month, Kosciuszko. It's going to be incredible. January is already done. It's set, like in terms of my goals, what I'm going to achieve, what I'm going to do with my family, with myself, my body, with service, with you guys, members, non members. It's all done. It's already allocated for. There was no New Year's resolution for me. It's done, it's already in place. But action for most of you is something which is missing. It might be action of thought, action of feeling, action of emotion. Action of communication. Action of your physical application to life, to your children, to your habits. An action to your children could be listening. But this is it, man. The default to life is loss. How do we counter that? By taking action. You've got to feed your relationship or it'll starve to death. You've got to breathe life and breathe oxygen into your children through repetition, repetition, repetition. You ask them to do something and they don't do it. The seventh time and you get your knickers in a knot. Why? Everything else in life requires reps. But you're too frustrated with these expectations that your kids should have it done by now. So then you rouse on them and you put it over them like they're children. Man. I look at many 50, 60 and 70 year olds, man or woman, and I scratch my head. So take it easy on the ones that have spent a tenth of their time here on this planet, because some of Those in their 70s and 80s haven't even got it figured out. Action. The default to life is loss. That's a tough pill to swallow. If you do nothing, it's a liberating opportunity. If you do something and doing something with alignment, reflecting on what's important for you, what you desire, what you want, alignment to that, follow through with that is one of the most powerful things you can have. But you'll never do that something if you don't have this one thing. This is the number one thing a man needs in 2022. Can you guess? Have a guess because it won't be in the title. We'll see if you can figure it out. I'll give you five more seconds as I have a sip of water and we crack on into this bad boy. That's probably five seconds there. The number one thing a man needs in 2022 is courage. Courage, man, like the world is screaming, screaming for courage. You're not here to survive. You're not here to be a battler. You're not even here to chronically fight. Although there's times when you need to fight for what's right. What the world needs is courage. What the world needs is strong men. What the world needs is strong fathers. Is or are. What the world needs are strong fathers is strong fathers. I'm not sure. Pick one. You can, you can take it. This is what it needs. The one thing a man needs in 2022 is courage. You think things are already getting better or they will get better, Maybe. How do you know you so sure on that? Security of the four walls sucking at the proverbial teeth of whatever it may be, whether it's other people, places, things, government like. I'm not here to paint a picture that the world's ending. You might have constructed a perspective around what I'm saying that's related to what's been going on in the world. It's just the energy in the world as a whole. There's always going to be something, always going to be something. There always is. Look back through history, there's always something happening. You know, the world's always ending one way or another. And don't get on some high horse and ah, this is different now, or that's different bullshit. There's always a challenge. That's the point. The specifics of the challenge might be different. Technology's a challenge. You look at a teenager goes through more stimulus in a month than an adult would go through their entire life in the late 1800s, 1900s. Like, try and try and compute that inside of your head what teenagers are going through in a month and exposing themselves to and stimulating themselves with an entire lifetime, say from 1880 to 1960, what it picket. You know, obviously technology started to come in a lot more heavily through the 80s and especially 90s. But a lifetime of the simple life a month. There's always a challenge. Courage is needed. Courage from you, courage from me. It's not a set and forget. I look back at my journey and fuck me dead, man. I got some stories, like some ballsy shit where I took those steps and I failed heaps. I fell down heaps. I look back now and I'm like, ah, why, why, why did I have to. Why did I have to go through that for 20 years, 15 years before I started to feel like, before I started to find what home was for me and really hit my straps? It means, it does mean that I'm growing at the accelerated rate that very few will. Of course, I mean, you follow my journey for the last 12 months, you'd be like, fucking hell, man. Al's unstoppable. He's just moving at an exponential rate. So I'm blessed for it. Doesn't mean everyone should have to go through that or go through traumas just to accelerate and grow in their life at a good rate. But essentially, yeah, you look back, you're like, shit, man. There's always the chance that you'll miss. There's always the chance that you'll fail. There's always the chance that you'll lose courage. It doesn't mean you recklessly take risks or Dive headfirst into anything but courage, man, I might flog that word to death by the end of this episode. I don't think it's going to be a long episode. Doesn't need to be, but fuck me dead. A lot of men need a lot more courage in today's world. And that's an observation. It's not a judgment. Do you think I'm courageous every minute of the day? It's courage with what matters, courage with the most important things. It's courage as a cup that continually gets poured into, then pours out onto other things. It's not a set and forget it's because in 2018, I let my debt go up over nearly a quarter of a million dollars. And I had fuck all money in the bank account. I'm spending thousands of dollars on Facebook ads going, I'm rdm, baby, I'm all in. I will take this step. I will find a way to make it work. And I've got bills coming out in three days time. I had no fucking money. Like this is, you know, I'm not gonna paint the typical cliche story of I was on the street and I put my hand in my pockets and I had A$70 and all of a sudden I'm a Hollywood superstar. Fuck that shit. It doesn't mean anything to me because it's not my life. Whilst I can respect and appreciate this hardships from rags to riches, so to speak. This was like not even four years ago. This is very close. This is very real. This is a man with children, newborns, young children, mouths to feed. Taking that step, stepping into the unknown. Maybe it's. I don't know, maybe. Is it stupidity? Is it ignorance? Who knows? But I'll tell you what, the courage was necessary. The courage was real. Some of the stories that I'll share over time, people will be like, fuck, man, that's. That's some crazy shit. There's no way I would have done that. It doesn't make me any better. You all have the big leap. We all have it. It's just different shapes and forms. It just comes in different ways and it's never one. Here's the thing, man. Like, you can't just sit back on your hands when you're 42 or 46 years of age and go, yep, that's it. I'm good. I'll grow a little bit more, but I'm good. No, no, no. Life will find you. Life will expose you to exactly what you need to learn. It's got a funny way of doing that. It's the big leaps, plural. More than one. Because sooner or later, you'll be stuck at the end. Funnily enough, something like the Roadrunner came through to me. I'm not saying what happens to Wale E. Coyote is going to happen to you, but I'm serious. Like, there's a time when you need to take that leap again. There will be a time you need. And sometimes the big leap, it's long. The big Leap can be four months. It can be 12 months, 18 months, four weeks, four minutes. This is it. Line in the sand, done. I'm fucking done with that. This is what I'm gonna do. Funnily enough, you know, my big leaps, some were months in the making, others were a split decision. Nah, that's it. You know, And I shared that with Rob Pellegrini, one of our lifetime members as the Italian Stallion. I said, man, when you invested that money in me, 12 months, and you invested that money in yourself, and you paid 12 months in advance, it wasn't the money, it was the symbolism of this man is committing for 12 months. Of course, I'd work with people for years at that stage, but to go straight away into that, no, no, man, this is it. I'm in. I walked out, looked at my gym, looked at the floor and said, I'm out, man. I'm out. My calling is here. Life has finally positioned, maneuvered, found me. I have found life. It found me, that's for sure. I didn't grow up saying I wanted to lead. Fathers, we're all leaders. I'm not calling you followers, we're all leaders. But you know what I mean, it's crazy. Courage. When you look at the standard definition of courage, I'll read them out to you and what they are, because I want you to embed this. Not that it has to be absolute for you, but it's pretty close to the market, in my opinion. But I want this to really sear itself or embed itself inside of you. When we're looking at a lot of the examples we're about to dive into, and rapid fire courage, the ability to do something that frightens one, AKA well, I guess, you know, bravery. It could be called bravery or valor. There's also another one here. Courage is the choice and willingness to confront agony, pain, danger, uncertainty or intimidation. Courage is strength in the face of pain or grief. I want you to think about that for a second. Strength in the face of pain or grief. The ability to do something that frightens one. The choice and willingness to confront agony, pain, danger, uncertainty or intimidation. Here's the funny, here's the ironic part about all of that. If you don't show courage or bravery or valor. Three words, the three things a man needs in 2022. I like courage. If you don't face and confront the agony, pain, danger, uncertainty or intimidation with courage, you're going to have fucking way more of it. Let me let you in on a secret. If you don't show courage, you are going to have way more agony, way more pain, way more danger, way more, way more uncertainty, and a shitload more intimidation inside of your life. As you get older, at some stage, it'll just hit. It'll be there. Oh, you'll be like that Britney Spears song oops, I Did It Again, whatever it's called, like that. This is the irony behind everything that you're countering that you're presented with now. But too many men just kick that fucking can down the road thinking, she'll be right, maybe the wind will take it and I don't need to face it one day. And then you pick it up and that can is rusted. It's got shit grown all over it. It cuts you to pieces. And then you get burned, you get hurt, you get stunned, you get cut to pieces because you didn't dress it earlier. Go upstream and have a level of courage to face it now. And that's what I love so much about courage. It's now. You can't look back in the past and go, I was courageous. Because that's done. I mean, you can, but it's done. You can't look forward and go, yeah, look, I'll have courage in this, you know, I'll have courage in this situation. I'll have courage here and there. It doesn't exist yet. Courage is now. Courage is the ability to do something that frightens you now. Courage is having the strength in the face of pain or grief that you're facing and feeling now. That's what it is. We look at our four Cs, one of our principles. What does it start with? I'll go to the other three first. How's that sound? Commitment, competence, confidence. You're never going to commit to anything if you don't have courage. That's the balls to stand up and say, this is the right thing to do. You're never going to get competent at anything at the level you can with the highest skill set you can. Just like myself and what I'm doing now and continually developing and evolving with I'M not the same. Never will be if you don't have the commitment to follow through because you don't have the fucking balls to stand up and say, yes, this is the right thing to do. You have, I love that. I love that ad that I have with the, with me in the car. Not that I love that there's anger and pain and frustration and people, thousands of comments and, you know, our support versus our criticism heavily, heavily outweighed, you know, maybe 5, 10%. You either love me or hate me, that's cool, that's fine, that's your choice. But to look at that and see some of the abuse and some of the comments. I cop and whatnot. I fucking love that stuff. And when I say I love that, I don't love that there are so many men in pain reflecting their internal horrors and trying to use me as a scapegoat or outlet or. I'm not saying I love that because it shows how fucking tough I am. Even though I can take the fucking hits and they keep coming and I'll keep taking them because that's respect, that's confidence, that's courage. That's guys looking and going, wow, this man. Al can, there's no way I could handle that. And Al just. I had one guy who said the comments. What did he say? I love coming here to the comments just to watch you get burned. And I wrote back, I don't even feel any heat with a winky face. Like, I'm not here to be a smart ass, you know, regardless of how much as a keyboard warrior or verbally, you might think you get on your high horse or be sharp or witty and tear someone to pieces. I don't want to do that. That's wasted time. What I love about that, and I guess I said it a bit earlier, what I love about that is, yeah, it is courage. What I love about it is I can accept that. I can take that, I can face that, I can rise above that. That's what I love. I mean, I don't love that there's men in pain and hurting. I don't love any of that sort of stuff. So when I say I fucking love it, I don't mean I enjoy seeing people get angry and aggro and all that sort of stuff. What I love is, you know what, man? These people don't define know who I am. I don't take it personally. I feel for them. I try and help them, you know, like, it ain't weak to speak. Come on, if you need help Here, have this podcast. Join this free group. Do this, do that. Don't throw stones of assumption until you sort your own shit out first and dive into what we actually do. But what I love is I don't delete any of those comments. I don't pull any of them down. I have the courage to stand up to them and go, this is why I'm here. This is exactly why I'm doing this. You'll never have confidence if you don't build the competence and improve who you are. Because you haven't been able to commit and take the right actions. Because you haven't had the courage and balls to stand up and say, this is what I need to do and I'll do it. That closes out the four Cs. Courage, Commitment, Competence, confidence. You'll never have that at the level you can. Confidence is critical, man. It's not fearlessness. Not that I'm afraid of those comments, but it's not fearlessness. It's knowing what the right thing is and moving in that direction. That is your gut intuition, man. Like that is. That is inside of you. That's not your thoughts. That's not overthinking. That's not monkey brain, monkey mania, crazy shit going on in your head. That's your gut going, yes, this is right. We all experience fear. We all experience that moment of being scared. It's like, oh, shit, that's some crazy shit coming up. Or that's just happened or that's about to happen, or I'm no different. We all experience that. But when you chronically express fear or express that onto others, which we've all seen a lot of lately, I can't stand that, man. I can't sit with that. I can't respect that. Because you have a choice. You have access. You have access to lots of things. You have access to this podcast. If you chronically express fear, you're a fucking coward, man. Hey, I don't judge you for it. You can't have bravery, valour and courage without the opposite, can you? You can't have day without night. I'm not saying it's someone's purpose to be a coward in life so I can show how much courage I have. That's not the point at all. The point is there's a choice. And whilst we all experience the exact same things we all do, we all. I know we all have lists and they've got different names and different places and people on them, but we all experience the same shit, you look at life, we're all the same, man. We all experience the same stuff. The difference is the choice to hold on, to let go, to move forward, to move back, to grow, to die. To show courage or show cowardice. As we look at applying this to your life, this is what's going to help you start moving in the right direction. Go back to last podcast episodes, the eight points. How to have a successful life, go through all that. That's all valid, it's valuable, it's there. But one of our core principles of a high performance father is called the spine of hpf. How to have a real fucking backbone. And yes, I apologize to a small degree, I can't say wholeheartedly, but to a small degree to those who may not always approve of my swears, I'm not a swear addict, but I get very passionate about this. I don't want to drop f bombs every second word, but I'm very passionate about this. We need to have a fucking spine, man. Otherwise we will lose our way and everything we love and care about around us will fall down. The spine of HPF is high courage, long commitment. When you look at those two and it's broken into quadrants, there's an awesome visual. I should find this and post it. It's in our journals. It's in. Actually, here's my journal right here. You can find the picture and download it. I guess when we're looking at the spine, it's one of the very first. When you go through, got the introduction, bang, the backbone, the spine of hpf, the backbone and circles of significance. They are the two core principles at the very start of this journal. And I'll read this, actually. When you have the courage to know what's right and move in that direction, with high levels of commitment and action, you have the spine to become a high performance father. It's broken almost into a quadrant. High courage, long commitment. In the bottom left hand, you've got uncertainty because it's low courage, low commitment, which is fear, hesitation, no action, regret. Obviously, if we go to the right, it's still low courage, but you've got long commitment. That's known as drifting. It's a bad type of busy. Yeah, you're committed, you're doing lots of things, but you lack purpose. You're stagnant, you're unfulfilled. Okay, let's pull it back to the left and go up. If you have high courage but very little commitment, that's known as fantasy. You're living in fantasy land. It's fake. All talk. You're not getting real results. So sporadic courage with no follow through means nothing when you go the top right hand corner, long commitment, high courage, you have certainty. You are the king. High facts, high feelings, real balls, you are the king. That's one of our core principles, the backbone, spine of hpf. Courage is what's going to get you moving forward, man. I want you to think about this for a second. Where am I lacking courage inside my life? Where am I not standing up and rising to the occasion? Where am I not even creating the occasion? I'm letting life dictate to me what I should be doing. I'm letting life roll through me instead of me charging through life. People say they don't get opportunities. You're not creating yourself to reposition the opportunity to provide. Well, you're not recreating the opportunity to provide a platform to go, yes, there it is. Like you need to reposition yourself. It's like there's no opportunities. Well, look to the left a little bit. Oh, there's one. You need to take some sort of action. That's why I wanted to start this and have the intro of taking action. It's the opposite of death. So I want you to think about courage and ask yourself, where do I need this in my life? Let's have a look at family first. Courage. Having the courage to go up to your wife and start having some tough conversations because you know things aren't wholesome between you and you're probably not even having conversations at all. Being a true leader, showing courage by apologizing and not being too proud. Have the courage to not be too proud and apologize to your wife. Where you need to have the courage to open up and share your feelings and communicate better, because feelings are valid. If you can have an emotional attachment to something, you'll create the logical pathway. If you have a strong enough why, you'll endure almost any how to get there. You will find the way. Having the courage to be real and looking at your children and asking them what they need from you, what they desire from their father, what kind of father do you want? And being vulnerable. Having the courage to be vulnerable and transparent in an active manner, not a passive manner when it really. When it really jams you and you get fucked over later in life. You don't want passive vulnerability. You want active vulnerability. It's being transparent. It's having the courage to have those conversations to open up and seek that feedback. Having the courage to make decisions that are going to benefit and better you and your family. Having the courage to Make a decision for yourself and not ask someone else for permission. Have the courage to know what the right thing is and pursue that for yourself and your family, knowing that it's the answer. Which means having the courage to not just wash your hands of responsibility and let someone else make the decision for you. Having the courage to stand up and own your decisions, own your mistakes, own the great points a lot of you men don't have the courage to own. That sounds crazy, right? Is it a fear of success, Tall popping yourself, self sabotage? Have the courage to recognize the great things and go, yes, I'm going to communicate and open up about that and share that and own that, and I'm proud of that. That takes courage in a world where people want to be invisible, they don't want to be seen, they don't want to be looked at as too successful or judged for it or mocked or laughed at or. Fuck that. Fuck them. Have the courage to be the greatest family man you know you can be, which you and I both know means that the pathway comes with much resistance. It comes with discomfort, it comes with pain. But I promise you, man, it comes with all the rewards with your work. Having the courage to stand up for what's right and share that, to create conflict. Having the courage to have that collision with a worker or a colleague or your boss or your employees and be clear and be truthful and do it from a place of love and leadership, genuine, not just a yelling contest or trying to get on some sort of pedestal. Having the courage to do it from a place of humility, but do it because it's needed, because the truth needs to come out. It's hand in hand. Having the courage to speak the truth. Having the courage to live the truth in your workplace like I have, that we've, you know, in all our time, there's probably only been maybe nine members that we've kicked out. That's incredible. It's incredible odds, by the way. Like, it's the amount of fathers who've helped. I'm not going to say they're bad eggs. They might be listening to this as well. They may still follow our journey. That's great. I hope they're doing well. But it just wasn't the right fit. It just didn't work. And I had to have the courage to have those tough conversations where I knew it was for the best interest of the tribe, but it would have come at a big backlashing and castrating of who I am and myself. Which means, yes, there was some, you know, there was Some stalking. Yes. There was some angry, abusive contact in all different platforms and trying to tear the name down, all that sort of stuff. And that's cool, man. Like, I don't, I don't own that. I own the decision, but I don't own any of that. That's not me. That's not who we are. And it's obviously very rare. Like I said, extremely rare. It's rare as head Steve, almost a non event, but it's there. So it's like, well, I had the courage to make the right decision for the tribe, knowing full well it meant that there were going to be personal attacks that come my way. That's what I fucking do. I have the courage to go, you know what? The customer is not always right. Fuck that shit. You give me your money. That doesn't mean I'm your bellhop. I don't fucking crawl around doing whatever you want. You come into our world, into my world, so we can help you turn your shit around and become a phenomenal man in your life in all areas. So let's get to work. Let's do this together. Let's be honest, let's be truthful, let's be on the level. I'm not your drill sergeant, make no mistake. And I'm not your cheerleader with pom poms in a delusional fantasy land. Everything will be okay. Just be positive. It can be all of that, but we do that after. There's a recognition of action. Action we take together. To win together, it takes courage. It takes courage to not be yes, man. Just let people walk all over you. I look back at my life, man. I had so much conflict in the gyms. The businesses, employees, trainers, clients. Not so much with, with RDM and HPF when I used to run the gyms. Crazy, man. And I look back, I was like, I'm rubbing my eyes right now. I'm like, it's tiring, man. I look at how many different con, you know, how many different points where, you know, there was a clash. And it's just, I look back though, and I'm like, you know what? Fuck that. Because if I had given myself up at my own personal value and integrity, if I had just said yes just because it was easier and less energy and just quicker to get it over and done with. And I get that sometimes there may be, but I look back over that, I'm like, that has carved me into the man I am. I'm not stubborn. I'm very open minded. I'm here to learn. Just like the rest of you are. It's the reason why I deliver such amazing podcasts. It's not because of me. It might be my voice. This is what I'm learning from all the fathers as well. Some of our old bulls in their 50s. I'm not in my 50s. I'm like, man, that's some cool shit. Like, I can put this together as a skill set that I have as the alignment coach and literally see the path. When a man's 40, when he's 43, when he's 46, when he's 49, when he's 52, when he's 55, I'm like, beautiful. Let's use a skill set from a different set of eyes to help these guys not get in that position. Like, that's not me. That's all of us. I love it. It's fantastic. It really is. Like, I'm truly humbled to be, I guess, the messenger, so to speak, in one way or another. Courage to change your business, to change your industry. Courage to take that step. Courage to step up to the plate and innovate and adapt and evolve. I could have probably juggled running gyms as well as real dad movement, but I'll tell you one thing right now, you wouldn't be listening to this. I would have just pulled the pin on both for sure. No way. That was way too much stress. Young children, traveling, multiple businesses, didn't have the team around me. No way. Having the courage with your work to change your business, to adjust, to innovate, to adapt. They're all laughing at me when I say they. A lot of people in the gym space and laughing online. Brick and mortar, man. Brick and mortar away. Awesome. How's that fucking going for you with COVID Like, of course I don't agree with how a lot of the principles or principles, a lot of the plays were put that really hammered the health and fitness space. I feel for them, man, I do. But I was willing to adapt to innovate, have more impact than ever. We've got Kosciusko in a few weeks, so I still catch up, live where I can with the men. But it's just incredible to see that what I do in this online space 100 fold the results to what I was doing physically in person with Jim's 100x. Easily, you're comparing different worlds, but, like, comparing the sun to the earth, like, it's just, how many times can you fit it in? I don't know. What is it, 38 million or some silly amount you might be that man will you know, you need to step up to the plate and have that courage to change or innovate or adjust your business, sell your business, start a different business, start a new business, do different education, start new education, change. I'm not sure. Go for that promotion, put yourself out there. Having the courage to know, not thoughts, also important, know my gut. I'm getting goosebumps down my, my left arm and my left leg. It's funny, it's always the left. Isn't that funny? The courage to go, I am all in on RDM. I would have had over 30 grand of gym rent at that stage. I didn't. I paid that to mentors and coaches. I paid that to mentors and said, no, no, no, I just need to keep investing in myself. I let my gym rent rack up over 30k, like I said. Had nearly a quarter million dollars in debt and said, nah, all in. All in. Like that's like I said. Some of you might think it's stupidity, but we're here now, aren't we? And I'm here now. So hard to take that one back. One has improved my life tenfold. But finally, courage for yourself, courage with family, courage with service, but having the courage to say, yeah man, I'm going to set my alarm, I'm going to do this, I'm going to follow through because this is going to change my life. Having the courage to challenge yourself with your training, with your nutrition, having the courage to go and get that fucking blood work done and look into your body as a whole, as a system, and not neglect and just live on blood pressure tablets and all the other things that you're just slowly decaying in life where you've still got probably a good 40 to 50 years later left of high quality, but you're just going to accept the path of least resistance, which is not done with the agenda of your best interest at heart. See, when we go for the path of least resistance, that's because up front we front loaded a shitload of work, manpower, man hours to make sure we're giving you the greatest pathway specifically for you, and the greatest tools and systems, coaching and tactics or actions to build the right habits. That's how we're creating the path of least resistance for you, by going through lots of resistance with ourselves, with us, in ourselves, in what we do. Going submissively, passively to the path of least resistance is not great. Like when we're looking at this final circle, self, yourself, you. It's having the courage to look in the mirror and go, enough is enough, man. I need to fucking stand up. I might not be in the pit. Maybe I am a little bit. Maybe I'm walking the line. I'm on the edge. I may not be living in the street or looking to be saved, but this is fucked. Enough is enough. I want more from life. I want more from my life. Is it too much to ask for more? No, it's not. You're exactly where you need to be so you can step up to the plate and swing. It doesn't mean that you're dissatisfied with life. I used to say that when I was a bit younger. Not that long ago, maybe two years ago, three years ago. I'm grateful but unsatisfied. Fuck that. That's a horrible connotation to put on yourself. I'm very satisfied and blessed with what I have where I'm at, But I'm also still living and breathing. So why wouldn't I try and do more? Why wouldn't I try and grow and evolve? And sometimes doing more is doing less. I just got a caravan, so to travel around the country and spend more time in nature, creating space and slowing down my immediate environment is actually going to make me an even better coach, man, father and leader to other fathers around the country, because I'm just going to be able to dial in and zone in so much more. At that time, we'll have our team even more evolved and grown too. Dial in so much more on what my purpose is and the role I play in this phenomenal organization. So when I say I'm still here, I want to do more. It's not racing, it's not getting in the wheel and being that mouse and just doing more and being more busy. I can't stand that term, busy. It's not that. It's applying yourself, working smarter and harder, harder and smarter, realigning with what's important. Sometimes you might be great. Look, everything sounds great, awesome. But if you could change or improve just a little bit in one area, what does that look like for you? So sometimes it's just a reallocation of efforts, which is time and energy, reallocating those two finite resources to something else and just saying, you know what? I'm not happy with where I'm going. This path is not great. It was good up until 38. I'm 43 now, man. I'm 47 now. I don't want that anymore. I want to expand. I want to evolve. I want to feel like I'm contributing more to life. I want to feel more fulfillment. I want to feel more rewards in my life. That takes courage. That really does. Because whether you got some financial security, household security, relationship security, and I'm saying security for all of them because they're not completely real or absolute, because you don't control all of them to the nth degree. You might have that, but how long will you have that for? You know, if you think that you've got three years left and your marriage is going to go downhill, you need to cut that in half and then half again, you've got three months. Like if you have this intrinsic feeling that things aren't right or they're stagnant, or you're sitting there and you're in limbo land. But she'll be right. We've got a piece of paper, we're married. We're always together. Thick and thin, till death do us part. Sickness ending. Hot blood. No, no, no, no, mate. We all have a breaking point. This is the breaking point. When the perception of value no longer matches the perception of self value over a period of time, there becomes breakdown. If you continually grow down and wane and move down and your wife is outgrowing you, there will become a point. And the point won't be three years. No one's got time to fuck around. It'll just be that boom, that linchpin. It gets pulled, it drops. You throw your hands in the air, you go upstream. One year, one month, three years, five years. Like, fuck, man. But yeah, that's where I could have probably done something about it. Too late. That takes courage. Courage to say yes, this is. This is time, man. I want to evolve. I want to grow. I want to give back to myself. I want to be more in myself so that everyone else can win. Maybe we're the answer, maybe not. This isn't a call to arms, but it's the truth. We can all be more. Doesn't mean you're not enough. You are enough. You're enough so you can be more. So you can do more. We all have that in us. I hate waste. I'm addicted to growth. So shoot me. It hasn't let me down yet. Why? Because of our principles. I'm addicted to growth in family, self and service. So I'm not addicted to growth to become a billionaire. I'm not addicted to growth. Just being with my children 20 hours of the day. I'm not addicted to growth just to be on Mr. Olympia 10 years running, all of them. And isn't it funny? The equilibrium, the way they balance each other out. Balance might not exist, but they balance each other out. Balance might not exist, but life is a balancing act. And when you juggle these balls, they seldom turn into rock and never glass. My balls aren't glass. They don't break. I can drop them. They bounce straight up. In family, in self, in service, and they're bound with a fuckload of rubber bands, but they will break if I just keep dropping them. I'm not immune. No one is. And the way that you maintain integrity of self, integrity of service, of family, of life, of what is that you desire and want to improve on is through turning up, having and showing courage every single day we try. Some days you might not, but every single day, man. That's why the lion is the king of the jungle. The elephant's bigger. It's the mentality. It is the mentality which is one of our episodes before mentality maketh the man a little while ago. But this is. As I look back and reflect over 2021, I put out the list or the recipe, the formula to have a successful life and everything in between. From taking that step and going all in in 2018 to now, right now, my intuition, my energy, my gut, what it's saying, what it's seeing, what it's reeling, what it's reading, what it's feeling is in the world, in Australia, in each state, in each community, in each household, in each home, in each family, inside of each man, inside of each father, inside of you, inside of me, the number one thing man needs in 2022 is courage. Number one thing. This is a very interesting episode because the next step I go to is, what are the steps? Because every episode I try and do steps on the how tos. What are the steps? How. It's a fucking hard one, man. Good question. If you. If you haven't already asked it, what is the how? That's a really tough one. It is. I'm not here just thinking on the spot. I'm actually literally going through and processing. Because for me, what comes to mind straight away is, well, I'm gonna fucking die one day. One day I'll be dead and buried in the earth and none of this will even matter. That I thought was a problem, an issue or worry or scared or fear or doubt or concern. Why not have a fucking crack? It's like the whole why? Well, why not? How do we have courage? Get aligned with what you truly want? This is the how. It's very simple. Let's wrap this up. It's very simple. This is how you find the courage, but you need to implement it. You need to take the step. But this is how take some time out and stop, have some downtime and ask yourself, what do I want in my life? What do I want with my work, with my business? How do I want that to serve me? So how do I want to serve the world that's inadvertently going to serve me and what I need so that it's a great bond and relationship and trade and yin and yang. What do I want and desire and feel from my family, from my wife, from my children? Our Force method is amazing. I've got a Force method for married couples that I'm looking at experimenting with myself first. We're going to do it with my wife and I and a couple of other methods members. Force method for relationships. Those who haven't listened to the episode that has that in there. Force method is our real alignment, visions, goal setting, feelings, outcomes, roadblocks, commitments, evolution that we do for the man individually. Bringing in a married version. I want to do that with my wife. That's my mitt for this week. Our most important thing. And I told her that I shared that with her. She agreed, it's great, we'll do it. Take the time out and ask yourself, what do I actually want in my life? Like, what do I really want? What's important to me? I'm going to be fucking dead one day. Like, you will be dead. This is how the story ends. You're dead. What kind of life are you going to live though? Is it going to be a magnificent life that goes for 300 years because when you're physically dead, you're still living through your children? Or will it be the hard shit that just gets forgotten and washed away in the second or third generation because you never had impact? My life's going to be at least 500 years. That's the goal. I might only live for 80, I might only live for 60, maybe 93, but I want to live for 500 years through my children, children's children, children, like down the chain, down the line. That's what I want. I want a 500 year life. It doesn't matter if my consciousness isn't here to perceive it, it's irrelevant. What do you actually want? Cut the fluff and bullshit. From your head. What do you need to do to get there? Be real. Yes, it will include some thought, but I mean from your head. What I'm talking about is the naysayer inside. What do I need to do to get there? I Want to have ranchers in every state? What do I need to do? Okay, cool. This is the big vision. Big picture. Pull it back in. Courage. What will happen if I don't? What do you want? Big picture. What will happen if I don't? Big picture. What's the alternative? What's the pain in your life? What's the regret? You need both. What is the pain that you cannot live with? What's the one thing you don't want to say on your deathbed? Awesome. Fuck that off. That's not you. Now stand up and take action. What do you want in your life? What's the greatest, most severe, harshest pain and regret you'll have if you don't? What's the path to get away from minus A and go from point A to that point B? And then what's the very first thing you need to do? And start. Courage in itself is the precursor to the right actions. The end. I hope this serves you well. Take this with you. This is what we all need, including myself. My road certainly isn't going to get any easier with what we've got planned. What we're doing, what we're handling. It's going to get way fucking harder. But I'm ready. I'm game. I'm stepping up to the plate and I'm having a swing. The question is, are you going to be out there swinging with me? And are we going to hit some big fucking home runs that are seen and realized off the back of all the singles, all the doubles, all the triples? Not that I'm American baseball terms, but are you really going to step up to the plate and swing and make some solid hits and start moving in the direction that you want to? Because if you are and you want to and you do this, you do it first and foremost by showcasing and having and continually experiencing the fruit of your actions, which all of. All of which start with courage. And that's a wrap. I hope you enjoyed this episode and got some golden nuggets with possibly one or two aha moments as well. If you truly loved and enjoyed what you listened to, then I want to invite you to share this episode with someone who you know needs to hear this. It could be your brother, friends, colleagues, your uncle, even your wife. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that none of us are alone in the hardships we face. But the solution to getting back on top, winning can start with a gift from someone else. And that gift could be an episode like this. Because another man transformed is another family saved. Which is exactly what we're all about. Thriving and winning in life. There is no alternative. It's possible. It has been done. It can be done, so it should be done. I appreciate your support in spreading this message. Cheers, mate.