Episode 261. "I was skeptical at first, now it's transformed my life"

One of the great leaders in HBF with us today, Mr. Sean Hutton. Hutto is one of the established leaders and not senior by age. The man's only 25 years old, but they're looking good, mate.

Good look at 85.

Not at all, not at all. Amazing podcast in the works with you guys today to really get value out of this man who's had an incredible journey with hpf. He's one of the stand up leaders and all the members love him. He's such a legend, a great man. Mr. Sean Hutton, great to have you with us today, mate. Thank you for sharing the time.

Thanks for having me, mate. It's a bit of an honor, a bit of a, bit of a privilege to jump on with you and have a, have a bit of a chin wag for sure.

Hey, bloody earth. What's really interesting, because I was thinking of the title for this is like from the most HPF Hate filled skeptical man to a true fan for life. Is that what we'd call it, mate? Or you were a bit, you were a bit unsure. It's like, who's this, who's this redhead who's fucking swearing on the ads? Who's telling me about my life?

The angry Italian redhead. Yeah, scary man. Yeah, hateful is probably a strong, a strong, a strong word. But skeptical, definitely. Yeah, just, I guess bitten too often. And yeah, always, always skeptical of someone that promises the world. And you know, obviously not many deliver unlike your good self, mate.

It's because of the men like you that make it, you know, but it's, it's, it really is a, it's a tough, it's a tough landscape part on this is for everyone, whether you remember listening to this or not. Like, it's, it's really hard. It's really hard, man, because it's rightfully so that a lot of the world, especially today, or maybe it was always in existence, but today we can see it more with the access and spread of technology. A lot of the world is full of. But then who drives, who drives that? People. So that's the hard part because a lot of men are full of too. You know what I mean? This is the hard part where it's like, okay, we're connecting. Okay, well, can we help Sean Hutton? Is he a good fit for us? Can we help him though? You know, are we a good fit for him? And finding that sweet sports like, hey, man, would you believe rare in today's world. Let's have a handshake agreement as gentlemen and go, let's go. All in together and see where this goes. And so I deeply respect you for that, mate, because I get it. It's not easy doing this into our. Heading into our eighth season now. It is tough. It's tough for us. It's tough for everyone. It's tough for the man. The delicate part is which you're solid with man. You're really good and credit to you. But the delicate. Given that you like said you have been bitten before. But the delicate part is how do we help the man? Don't worry about us, choose us or don't. How do we help the man see past his own stories? Because that. That's man, that's what I've seen over the years, mate. That's always the limiting factor. At best we reach version 1.6 instead of 8.7 with. With some room to go before we leave the earth, you know. But what I found funny that. And we'll come back to that, is the skepticism was actually reflecting on how support and how genuine the men reaching out to support you was. I think from memory it was like, this can't be real. All these guys want me to win and they're really supportive and championing me and I think they might admit it. But. But we'll come back to that anyway, mate. But, but was that right? Is that what led to the. This can't be real, you know, but.

Yeah, it was very much like everyone had positive, genuine things to say and it was. And like you say, you know, today's world, in a corporate environment particularly, but even, even in, in, in the social world, you're trying to knock people down. That tall poppy thing or it's, you know, you're in it for yourself. You're trying to gain ground. You think the way to do that is to climb over others. And that was the mindset I took or have had. And it's sort of held me. Got me to where it was. I was gonna say held me in high, you know, high stead. But probably not because it sort of got. Got me to where I was. But yeah, that, that genuine place and all the comments and, and it just sounded fake. It was like, I think you said to me one day, like, we've hired 450 actors just to get you on board, Sean. Like, it's, it's, it's. It took me a long time to. To bust that skepticism down. And once I realized that it was. It just became a warming. Yeah, really heartwarming place to be. And it. And the, the benefit started to really flow. Yeah. And it was just a magic place to be around then. Just, it's easy to go all in when you know the guys are going to hold you up if you fall. It's just, yeah, it's just an amazing place.

Really made the tribes everything and like I said, you know, respect to myself, the coaches, all the other moving parts that make it what it, what it is in the service and deliverables. It's absolutely the men. You've cost me a lot of money, Sean. Those 450 actors weren't cheap, mate. You know, they've all just invoiced me. It's, it's. How long has it been? How long have you been with us for now?

Months. Just ticked over 12 months. So, yeah, I think it's probably money well spent really to be honest, up.

To your second season. And we're staffing 450 people for Shauna to resign for season two. But no, look, it's, we're not quite there yet with the physical catch ups where I can just engineer AI robots with human skins. So those people are real. But now look, it's a, it's a privilege in an honor, mate, to share your story today. I'd love to. Well, let's learn more about yourself. Love for you to share with the, the guys listening to this today. Just a bit of your history, your background, mate, and then we can navigate towards, yeah, life as a father, husband, as a man, you know, trying to provide and. But we'd love to learn a little bit more about yourself, mate, and where you've come from.

Yeah, sure. So I'm 55, happily married now. I've got a couple of adult kids, daughter's 25, son's 22. They've both got very good grounded partners. They've landed on their feet quite well, you know, pretty proud of both of them. I'm a sparky by trade. Spent a lot of time growing up playing Aussie rules and the last 20 odd years I was, I spent some time doing some martial arts, I dabbled in karate. Always been in leadership roles I guess most of my life. You know, I was captain of the footy club early on and things like that. I just sort of seemed to evolve that way for me. Found, found life was starting to get hold of me a little bit and sort of dragged me down to a point. But yeah, I guess I live on a bit of property so a bit of work around the house is good for me on the weekends. But yeah, trying to recruit, recruit the family into that has been a Bit of a battle and I've struggled that a little bit. But I think where I'm at now project managing for a fire alarm company, so got a few guys that work under me there, deal with some high profile clients there which have their, have their way. Yeah along those, those sort of lines.

I guess the, you'll find incredible mate. And it's nothing against the, the older bulls as well because we've got men that are older and men that are younger. But I would say our sweet spot is definitely in the 40s, which I'm sure you'd agree. But it's like it, it's, it's really tough for me because I just love the old, the older bulls that have so much wisdom and, and they add so much value back into the community. But also what I found historically Haro is they're definitely more rigid. Like they're just, they're less resistant. They're as rigid as your shoulder mate, after you had that operation. But look, they are, they, they're less resistant to change and, but they've got so much more to give. Like I really want to just plan that seed for men whether in your 30s or not. Like it will go quickly 40s or you are in your 50s, similar to Hutto. It's like man, like these are, these can still really be power years, you know, and, and you can always have power and influence. You can be a man in his 80s who's just filled with incredible stories, wisdom and mentorship like it, it never ends. But as a man with that primal power, mate, absolutely, you know, and well into your 60s. And so I always have a, not to compare members but I always do have a deeper appreciation, respect for some of the, the older bulls who, who join mate because a lot of the times either life has knocked them around too much and they're, they're too broken or they're just too resistant to change and, and they do stay set in their ways. I'm just curious on that for a minute because it sounds like high pressure role. You know, you're obviously working very hard as a leader professionally. You've got kids who are now growing and, or grown up. And so that would come with its own challenges with navigating, supporting them as they learn about the, the big wide world as we all do and then a season relationship. But then there's, there's Sean and himself physically, mentally, emotionally pouring into his cup like where did, where did all this come from? Where did this drive come from at 54 years of age to go no I want more out of life and. And I don't want to do it alone and I want to go to another level and. Because that's us men all in. Keep going and growing.

Like.

Yeah, I don't know. Where did that come from?

Yeah, I guess it sort of came from a want for something more. A bit of a realization that I was sinking into a bit of a dark hole. So I guess I had to go down quite, quite far to realize that there was more or need that I needed to find more. So, you know, I was lost. I was. I was just surviving. I was drained. I found myself being negative. I come from, you know, two parents that were. They had a bit of a negative outlook towards the latter part in life just. Just from what happened to them. And they let that build up and become a big story for them. So I turned into this grumpy old man, which I didn't enjoy listening to, let alone being let alone, you know, the perception of others on that. I was questioning everything and everyone that I loved. I was questioning motivations behind what they were doing, what they were saying. I was, yeah, I was just in a. In a. In a bit of a bad, bad place there. Imposter syndrome. I didn't feel like I belonged in the leadership roles that I was currently in. My health was slipping. Body was breaking down. Just lots of little negative things that made me realize that there's only one way from here if I don't change something. So I was slipping down. So, yeah, I just. I just had to start start looking around, I guess, and just seeing, you know, I dabbled in a couple of things with some fitness programs and got some body. Body conditioning back and some things like that. But yeah, the living with a regret, I think really dragged me down. I had had some regrets with just how. How I'd lived my life up until that point. So I guess once you realize that if you keep going along that path, there's only. There's only negative things that can come from that. It's time to. To course correct and find that that new way. So I don't know how it happened. Yeah. Whether I just stumbled upon it, but yeah, I found. Found the HPF on Facebook, I think it was. Found a line that really grabbed me and so I just looked into it a bit further. So found a video which led me to a podcast which basically grabbed me from there and changed. Changed the way I looked at everything. At least gave me some. I guess it gave me a little bit of. Of justification of how I got to where I was. And it wasn't just me being in a negative place or doing the wrong things, if you like. So it sort of gave me some justification and realized that there was others that were doing the same sort of thing and we're heading down that same path. You know, I didn't get to the point where I lost my relationship, but I was. I was pretty close and I was sort of getting to the point where I was blaming my wife and accusing her of things that just weren't happening. And that just. It started messing with my head, you know, quite, quite heavily. And that. That sort of snowballed and dragged me down even further. So, yeah, it was. It was a. It was a bit of a tough time that made me go looking for something. And yeah, I'm just so lucky to have found HPF was there. It basically shone a lot. So I followed it.

What's really interesting about that is what I picked up was three. Three key things. There is the choices that you made, and I don't know if that comes back to the long game of martial arts we've spoken before about. This is quite a very incrementally disciplined game where you'll make big leaps and then it's just very small, long, consistent. What interests me is like three key things which I'll share. I just jotted down what you're sharing. The third thing is you're not alone is what most men go through, typically in their 40s. So you. You've done well. Maybe that's because of your background, both in sport and you. All the men who reach out HBF have high performing. Something like they've got high performance. They're not duds. So you've done the work. Doing the work. So for you, maybe you could extend that a bit more into your 50s, but typically this is definitely a common thing we see. So that's the third point. You're not alone. But the other two is where it was going. I saw where it was going out and the second one was through. Sounded like a podcast or maybe an ad. And then you looked into the podcast, you actually got clarity on how life came to be and get there. And this is a common thing for a lot of men. So I could see where this was actually going. I found the answer on how my life came to be, which helped remove, whether it's self judgment or outward blame, an acknowledgement and acceptance of, wow, this is a life that also. Third point a lot of men go through is that. Is that fair to say, mate, they were probably three key things. And how did you have that vision, though? I'm curious because a lot of men don't see where it's going as much as we have that visionary in us, and then it all just falls apart.

Yeah, I'm not sure how I found that, but I could tell I had moments of clarity, if you like. So I guess my wife was still being a loving supporting partner, although we had our, I guess, emotional separation differences. I could see in the moments of clarity how a lot of the cause for these, our, our disruption was my outlook on it. So that really flagged something to me to say this is all coming or stemming from you or at least, at least I'm making it worse by, by thinking along these lines. So that, that I guess gave me a little bit of clarity to, to realize that I need to do something to change it if I'm going to save this. And for myself, I need to, I need to change the way I'm thinking about it. I need to get a thicker skin. I need to, you know, there's lots of little things that were just cutting me up that just had no reason to, and it was just, just because I was so. Got to myself in such a weakened state, you know, and there's a lot of factors that got me to that point which are individual and we probably don't need to go into here. Doesn't really matter. But the point is you get to that and that they're not unusual factors. I guess guys, men, fathers, we all go through those things through life that do, they do affect you and drag you down and you do get to, you get to a point where they become too heavy and, and does. Does hurt you and you do become in a weakened state. So things do get, you know, it's that straw that break the camel's back type type scenario. So, yeah, I found that podcast and I remember the number because I've, I've referred it and I've actually sent a lot of, lot of, A lot of guys there to have a, have a listen to it when I can hear them making that same assessment of themselves. So. And it's all about a guy and his stories and how those stories affect his mindset and how they are not individual or special stories. Everyone sort of, every man's has those sort of stories and it kind of affects us all the same. So that was a bit of a groundbreaking thing for me to realize that this isn't just an unusual. You know, I'm not, I'm not the world's most special person all this stuff is happening to. And I'm. I'm now on a path where, you know, no other man's trod before. So to realize that and look, go looking for, for help in that area, I think, yeah, that, that podcast probably probably turned me around. And I don't know if it was the first one I listened to, but it must have been around that because I wouldn't have kept listening if the, if the podcast I was listening to weren't. Weren't leading me to that area. But yeah, that, that one definitely got me, got me, got me hooked listening to more. And that podcasts, actually, they helped for a while too. Like, you know, as a strong man, that's been, you know, pretty successful on paper. But the, the negative voice was sort of overriding some of that success, and I was getting louder and louder and louder. So to find that boost from listening to a few podcasts, it got me to a point where I started to talk to myself again in a positive way. And that helped for a while, but I was just too. In too weakened a state to really do that by myself. So, you know, it took 30 or 40 podcasts or whatever it was before I finally reached out and made the call. But, you know, what's the rush? But yeah, once I, once I made the call and I think, well, you actually called me and you're a persuasive fellow at times. So once I realized the environment I was looking into, the weight just lifted off and I just didn't have just not looked back since.

Yes, mate, that sounds really. What sort of. Yeah, well, who.