The People Shaping Me This Month : Lessons From Unexpected Places

I'd like to ship you a free copy of my book Habits of High Performers. If you come and join the 2026 goal setting workshop, I will ship you one of these today. The link is in the notes. Please come and join me to set up the very best 2026 you could imagine. If you've set up goals in the past or New Year's resolutions and they haven't substantiated, I'm here to help you across all the key pillars of your life nail your goals. I'll see you there. Welcome to One to One with James Laughlin. I'm a former world champion and now I work with and coach professional athletes, entrepreneurs and CEOs of billion dollar companies. I'm going to share with you in this episode some of the insights and strategies, some of the tools that I use with my clients. Every week I'll bring you an insight, an action or a tool that will help you go from great to to greatest. My mission is to cut through the noise and help give you the tools that truly transform your mindset and help you to take the right actions towards your desired outcome. So let's dive in. Top of the evening to you. So I want to let you know there's a little bit of a change in how I'm going to deliver things. Well, every week I do a solo cast, a one to one, but that's going to change a little bit. We're going to just test it and what I'm going to do is once a month, maybe twice a month, I'm just going to give you a little update on things I've been doing, who I've been hanging with, what I've been learning behind the scenes. A little bit of a deeper dive. So got my journal out and I took some notes of what's happened over this last entire month since getting back from South Africa. So I've got my cup of tea here, my rooibos ready to rock, sitting here in the studio this evening and I've wrote down some really important things I'm going to share with you behind the scenes of some of the special guests I've brought in from my clients and what they've shared about life, about business, about leveling up in all areas of entrepreneurship, also about the launch of our event and some of the behind the scenes stuff with that, an amazing trip I had to Rotorua Rota, Vegas. Some of you may know it as sitting down with former lead psychologist of the sas. A few things I learned from her that I think will be really valuable for you in your life. So we'd love to hear what you think about this episode for sure. So in the last month, I guess probably it's fair to say that there's been a lot going on. However, the main priority has been the book launch. So Habits of High Performers is coming out very soon, right? In fact, if you're listening to this, on the day that it's went live, It'll be like two or three weeks. 26th of August 2025 is when it goes live. It's on shelves for all of you amazing humans who pre ordered it. It also ships direct to you on that day and I cannot wait for it to be in your hands. I've spent years handwriting, refining, editing, working with an incredible publisher, recalibrating it again, editing, getting feedback, getting endorsements. It's been a labor of love is probably the best way to describe it. There's been some trying times, some times where it tested my patience. But I'll tell you what, I have really enjoyed the process. I'm very excited for you to get your hands on the Habits of High Performers. If you're wondering what's in there, well, I give you the exact roadmap that the highest performers across every industry in business and life use. These are the themes I've seen from every high performer I've ever sat with, interviewed, worked with, coached. This is the exact framework and inside I actually share my entire system. So if you never wanted to work with me and you just wanted to get the results, you could get it from the book, go get it, order it from paper, plus actually go to the link below the habitbook.com, you can check it out. But that's been certainly something for me, I've had to stay focused on. So obviously I'm a dad, I'm a partner, I've got a business, lots of clients, traveling. But the actual number one priority this month and for the next few weeks has to be the book. I want to do it justice. So many great people at HarperCollins have been helping make this book what it is. So I want to do that justice. So I've really been staying focused on that. And the other thing I want to share with you that maybe will help you in your journey is don't be afraid to ask for help. Often I'm not good at that. I'll figure it out, I'll get it done, I'll work a bit harder. But actually with the book, I've had to ask for help and ask people to support it. And ask people to endorse it and ask people to buy it for their teams and ask people to go, would you buy a copy? Why? I want this book to get into the hands of the people that need it most. Those are the people who are busy. Those are the people who have big ideas but no follow through. Those are the people who are following through, but maybe not quite getting the results. And I need people to buy the book so that we can maybe potentially, if we're really lucky, hit the best seller list. And if we do that, that's not an ego thing. You know what that means. It lets all the booksellers and the beautiful independent bookstores know that this book's something that somebody wants. They'll put it on the shelves. More great humans like you will walk past it and see it at the airport or see it at your favorite bookstore and you might pick it up. And that's really what my mission is. I don't want to write a book, and six months later it's disappeared. I. I really want it to be a perennial feature and a perennial seller so that people can use it and apply it to their lives. So that's really been the big lesson is do ask for help. Do think about what you need right now from people and don't be afraid to ask. So next big thing to talk about was Rotorua. So I'm just going to make sure. Take this off as we go. Rotorua. So I was up there speaking at the FTMA conference, the Frame and Trust Manufacturers association conference. And I'll tell you what, I never knew that existed. But when I got there, I realized what an amazing collection of humans who are literally the backbone of this country, and I'm sure every other country in the world. Actually, there's lots of Aussies across for it, too. It was great, but they're such incredible people doing amazing things. They got together for a day and a half. I was fortunate to spend the entire day with them. I facilitated some panels, and I had way too much fun doing that and then delivered a keynote. But in the evening, I got to listen to my friend, Dr. Aliyah Bushelova speak. And I've heard Aliyah on my podcast, several other podcasts. We've chatted lots. But I never got to see her in action. And she was awesome. And I took some notes. There were some things that really stuck out that I think could be helpful for you, because as I travel right now, I'm sitting down with economists, I'm sitting down with business owners, chatting to audiences I sense there's a lot of tough times for a lot of people, certainly in particular sectors. Construction for sure being one of them. Retail, others as well. But for us to navigate these things, we've got to have tools, right? And so when I'm listening to great people, you know, particularly psychologists from the sas, what can I learn? And often it's the common sense things. But as I've said before, common sense is rarely common practice. So I want to just bring these up. First thing that she said that, I was like, whoa, got to write that one down. It's not about you, it's not about them. It's the context. Think about that for a second. I thought about it. I was like, whoa, that's pretty profound. I need to think about that a little bit more. When there's issues, when there's challenges, when there's aggravations, when there's friction, it's not about you, it's actually not about them. It's the context. And if we focus on the context, well, that gives us more self awareness. It gives us an opportunity to look at the bigger picture. It certainly will give us a little moment, a little micro moment to get out of our own heads, separate ourselves from ego, and think about our thoughts rather than react and take a big swing. So that for me was huge. It's not about you, it's not about them, it's the context. Where does that apply for you right now? What's happening in your life right now? You know, think about your relationships. Anything going on at home, you know, with your intimate relationship. Maybe it's a friendship, maybe it's a relationship you've got with a sibling or a child. Is there anything in any of those relationships where you could go, you know what? It's not you, it's not them, it's the context. And you can just focus on the context rather than a me versus you thing or I must win. Honestly, I find that little gem so timely. Really, really helpful. Now, the other thing I want to share with you, that I just loved, I really loved this. Aliyah said, be unapologetic about what you pay attention to and dismiss the rest. How cool is that? Get focused on what you want to focus on what you're passionate about, what you want to stand for, what you're creating, what you're writing, what you're speaking about, what you're standing for. Be unapologetic about what you pay attention to and dismiss the rest. Guess what? I've just given you permission to not respond to Every email today, I've just given you permission to not return every call that you've missed this week, I've just given you permission to not respond to every text message. Be unapologetic about what you pay attention to. Maybe this week this is a non texting week. Maybe this week's a. You know what? I'm not responding to all the non urgent emails this week. They can wait. And that's okay. When it comes to high performance, we've got to be masters of saying no. High performers are so good at saying no. And that's why high performers are never busy. People who are perennially busy busy are definitely not high performers. They just aren't. Oh, I'm so busy, I've got so many things on. Okay, you're not going to be achieving great results, you know, sitting down with someone amazing like Hamish Care, the Flying Kiwi. You know, he's our gold Olympic medal winning high jumper. It's very clear to me. He prioritizes one thing, high jumping, that's it. Everything else he just dismisses. And yeah, he makes time for a relationship, makes time for eating, but all of that actually helps and supports and serves his mission of being the world's best high jumper. What are you being the best in? What do you want to be world class at? Maybe you don't want to be an Olympic champion, but surely there's something you're like, oh, if I double down on this, I could be the world's best. I'm telling you right now, if you get clear on what it is and you work so hard, give it five years and I promise you, you will be in the top 5%, maybe even top 1% of the world. Give it 10 years and you'll arguably be one of the top one or two people on the planet at whatever it is you put your mind to. For you, it might be rugby, it might be leadership, it might be investing, it might be parenting. It really doesn't matter what it is. But when you try to be good at all the things, you tend to dilute your results, dilute your priorities, dilute your results. So get clear on what that is. I just want to say Aliyah was awesome. And if you don't have her book, get her book as well. It's absolutely phenomenal. I'll make sure we put a link in the show notes. It's all about resilience. Dr. Aliyah Bushelova. Okay, HPL. HPL. As you might know, or may not, each year I host one event, High performance leadership Event for self leadership, for being a better leader, being a better person. And trust me, I need it every year because I've got a lot of work to do and I've got a lot of growth to do, but I don't want to be busy being busy. And hostess four or five times a year, once a year, we open the doors always in Christchurch. This year it's going to be at the Christchurch Town Hall. We've just opened the doors. In fact, something really weird happened. We opened it to our wait list. We have an HPL wait list. And within an hour, 65% of the early Bird tickets were gone an hour. And then the next day we opened it up to our email list and if you're not on that, you should probably get on it. And we got another 20% gone. So all the Early Bird tickets are nearly gone. So if you're thinking, I'd like to go, you know people in the past that we've had there as guests, Sir John Key, former Prime Minister, Sir Steve Hanson, former All Blacks head coach Wayne Smith. We've had. This is where, you know, your brain blanks. I had Zeon Armstrong last year, former President of Adidas North America. We've had. Who else have we had? So many great guests. Kieran Reed, former All Blacks captain. We try to get a blend of business and sport and life. This year we've got two guests confirmed. The third, I know who it is. But you don't yet. I'm going to reveal it very soon. But the first two guests, Dr. Aliya Bushilova, who I just spoke to you about, she's locked and loaded. You do not want to miss this opportunity. This will be transformational for you. So secondly, we've got the amazing Dom Harvey. Dom Harvey is a New Zealand icon, so committed and driven to his art, has been at it for over 30 years. We get to learn a lot about persistence, commitment, vision, drive, pivoting when things aren't going right. And he's just an amazing guy, incredible personality. And last but not least, well, I can't tell you just yet. We'll reveal that soon. Our email list will be the first to find out who that last is. And trust me, you, you do not want to miss that announcement. It's going to be incredible. And I know the event will sell out. It sells out every year. So if you're thinking about doing it, come and join us. Get your ticket right now, click the link. I'll make sure the team puts it right at the very top along with where you can find the book.

Hey, James here. I wanted to take a quick moment to let you know about something. Look, I get asked to deliver keynotes and workshops for teams and companies on all over the world, from London to Antarctica, from America to Australasia, from armies to small businesses, to large corporates, to sports teams. But I go in and deliver keynotes around the mindset of high performers, around the habits of high performers, about how we navigate change. If you would like me to come and speak to your team or speak at your conference or deliver a bespoke workshop, please get in touch with my team. Carolinejlochlan.com will be able to help. I. I'll also make sure that we put that in the show notes.

You gotta come to HPL if you're serious about leadership, self growth, personal development. It's the one event of the year where I go all out. We have an amazing collection of individuals, the people you will meet and connect with. You're just gonna love it. So go check it out. I'll put the page below. You can go check out more details. Any questions, just reach out to the team. We also have a lot of corporates and teams. Bring their entire teams. If you're doing that, we got discounts for you. So keep us in mind. So what else going on? Okay. Yeah, I want to talk about my cab driver. He's just amazing, just incredible. His name's Sanjeev and he's here in Christchurch. I want to shine the light on him because I'm so grateful for him. I'm at the airport a lot and traveling a lot. And his consistency, reliability, his friendship, his humor, his curiosity, it's so breathtakingly refreshing. And I see someone who's a young family man, committed to his family, has a vision for. His family has emigrated here from India. Like, what a huge, incredible commitment. And I think sometimes you and I are busy being busy and we don't always take the time to see everyone around us. I want you to think about the people around you that are helping you, serving you, connecting with you, working with you, partnering with you, and just see them, actually stop and see them and be curious with them. So I love, you know, whether it's a 5am trip to the airport or 8pm coming home from the airport, you know, it's 40 minutes in the car. Him and I spend and I laugh and I get curious and I learn and we share ideas. It's just. It's amazing. So I want you to think about the people in your life that you could just Be a bit more curious with and who you could be more grateful for. Because, you know, you go into a restaurant and someone you know, you might have a local. Maybe you have your local pub, your local cafe, and you go in, they know your name and how much do you know about them? What are their interests, what are their dreams? Where are they heading? What can you help them with? That's something I really take a lot of pride in, is, you know, where can I try and help someone? It doesn't cost you anything to help someone. And it certainly doesn't take away from your energy, so it doesn't stop you from elevating. So I want you to think about that for a minute. Who's the, you know, the Sanjeev. And I don't get sponsored by corporate cabs. This is not. I don't get any commissions or kickbacks. Uh, but certainly he's just incredible and certainly something I'm very grateful for this month. Who's that person for you this month? Uh, the other thing is, I'm really reminded this month the importance of having MVPs. In fact, I'm looking up right now in the background there, just at my. I've got a book launch calendar that I've put together for this launch. And it's looks like chaos, looks full on. But I know I'll get through it because I have got an MVP process. Well, four months ago, we had Rob Penny, the head coach of the current champions, the Canterbury Crusaders, and we're talking about his approach to helping the team. And he talked about them having three big goals every week. And I just went, that's interesting. Something I do with my clients. I call it MVPs. Every week I ask my clients, what's your MVP this week? Your most valued priority. And three at most. No more three at most. When you look at how the brain functions, it can't deal with 7 and 9 and 12. It just can't. The brain doesn't function like that. No matter what anyone tells you, your brain doesn't deal in those chunk sizes, three or four at a stretch. I like to do three. Very achievable. Same for the year, the quarter, the month, the week, the day. I always have three MVPs, and that's really helping me get through a relatively full on time. All you gotta ask yourself is, what's my most value priority this week? In fact, I have a mastermind group that I run and we have a little WhatsApp group and a WeChat group. And every Sunday when I'm doing Sunday success steps for the week. They all put in what their MVP was last week and did they achieve them or not? And then they put in and commit to the group what their MVP is for the week ahead. Folks, the amount of follow through when you tell people publicly you have an accountability partner or an accountability group, your chances of succeeding and following through with those goals significantly increases like 30 plus percent when you look at the research studies. Very big difference between people who have accountability and the people who don't. So MVPs write them down right now. What are your MVPs this week? What are your three MVPs today? And it could be business, health, life, family, whatever areas are most important to you. Have your M.3 MVPs cover those. Don't have nine, don't have 12, don't have 55, just three. Because you and I can achieve that, right? We can, we can deal with that. Okay, a couple other things before we wrap up. Recently had Sally Sinnett come and join my roundtable mastermind. So Sally Sinnett was the founder of a brand called Pumpkin Patch. And for those that don't remember that or don't know that it was an iconic children's clothing brand and went global. Started here in New Zealand. It started in Sally's head and it became something that she held in her hand. And as the great Bob Proctor has always said, what you can hold in your head, you can hold in your hand. She quit her job after going to a Bob Proctor seminar, quit it over the weekend and started Pumpkin Patch from nothing. And this went global. I mean, all the countries you can imagine, that's where Pumpkin Patch was, you know, over $800 million company, mind blowing. So we got her in as a guest and I do this once a quarter for my Mastermind members. We get someone very interesting from sport or business and sometimes politics and ask them how they think, how they plan, how they strategize, who helped them, what went wrong, what they learned from it. And we did this just recently, it was last Friday at the Northern Club up in Auckland. And God, it was just fascinating. The group were blown away, firstly by her absolute humility. Just a lovely down to earth human who gets it, who totally gets it. And she spoke from the heart. There is, you know, no, you know, if you look at what she's done in her life, she could have every right to be sitting, looking down upon others. But no, she didn't. She's one of those great humans who doesn't do that. And I deeply admire that. I really Love that. I wanted to share three things. There was about 55 things. After the guest leaves, we always debrief what all of us heard. Literally, there was 55 things that we took away from that. But here's the three most profound ones from my end that I think could serve you. Don't be everything to everyone.

Don't dilute yourself. Don't say yes to everything. I hear this people say just it's a yes year. I'm a yes person. Say yes and everything. Well, if you say yes to everything, you're going to be a busy idiot. Say no more often. Say yes to what truly matters. And don't try and be the master of everything. Don't be everything to everyone. Because if you do, you'll be nothing to anyone. Be really clear on that. Secondly.

As you might know if you've been listening for a while, I don't believe in work, life balance. I just don't. There's no such thing. There are times when our work needs us and it needs us to go full on. Like this book launch coming up. I promise you guys, I'm spending so much time on that. Not nearly as much time on other parts of my life, but it's a season and I got to do it justice. Now, the way Sally spoke about this, she said, always be heading back to balance. I love that you're never going to reach it. It's never a definite destination. But if you're heading towards it or back to Balance, it's kind of like it flows a bit more. Super busy. Oh, I realize I'm super busy and full on. Okay, I'll head back to balance. Get a holiday, hang out with the family at home, watch Netflix. Oh, super busy again. Heading back to balance. That's achievable. So I want you to think about, are you heading back to Balance and maybe when, when do you need to head back? I always like having a holiday on the horizon. Something to look forward to. It could be a small trip in the car, could be a flight, whatever, but always having something to look forward to. Last but not least from Sally, never talk shit about people in the company. It's a fireable offense. I just love this. I loved it. She said she learned it from her mentor and he said, never talk shit about anyone. Never complain, bicker, gossip about anyone in the company. It's a rule in the company. And if you do it, it's a fireable offense. And that was her approach at Pumpkin Patch. Like, don't talk crap. Be kind, be thoughtful, be solutions. Focused. It creates an amazing culture. How many times do you catch yourself getting involved with conversation that complains about other people or you hear others doing the same thing that contributes to a workplace with an unhealthy, maybe even toxic culture? So just embrace that beautiful rule from Sally. Okay, to wrap up, I've got one little thing for you to think about. I've been thinking about this a lot. I've wrote it down like five or six times this month. What you think about, you bring about.

What you think about, you bring about. This is something I've spent the last 20 years studying, reading, getting mentored on, being coached by the greatest thought leaders on the planet. And it's all on the mindset. And they all have different ways of saying it. But when I wrote this down, what you think about, you bring about, it totally resonated. Whatever you hold in your mind as your dominant thoughts, you take actions towards those. If they're positive thoughts, great. You'll take positive actions. They're negative thoughts. You're going to take negative actions. So whatever you place in your mind, that's your responsibility, nobody else's. You get to choose that. The words, the thoughts, the people, the relationships, the dreams, the goals, that's all up to you. You've got to be fully responsible for what goes in there, and it's up to you. What you plant. But whatever you think about, you bring about, you bring about in your life. So that's exciting, right? Because you can take full responsibility for that. So, folks, I hope you've enjoyed the slightly longer update. This is a bit longer than what I do for the wonder ones and the solo casts, but I thought it would be nice to kind of share some of what's going on. I am so fortunate to get into some of the rooms I get into and the people I work with, and I feel it's my duty to share these gems with you and hope that there'll be one that you can go. God, I needed to hear that today. So I hope there was one little gem in there for you. Please, if you find this episode helpful, just forward it to a friend. And if you want to review and all that stuff, that's cool, but just forwarding it to someone would be awesome and make a difference in their life. But for now, please get out there and lead your life on purpose. Thanks for tuning in to lead on purpose. If you find this episode valuable, please share it with one person that you think might benefit from it. And if you're serious about leveling up, please make sure you're subscribed to the show and continue to lead your life on purpose.