Unveiling Your Alter Ego: A Powerful Tool for Personal Transformation with Todd Herman and Joe Polish - Genius Network Episode #204

Adopting the manners and characteristics of others. There's nothing false in it. We all need a point of reference to start with. And so adopting those manners from others and borrowing their traits as your own only helps you to develop the vision of what you're trying to become.

If you'd like to join world renowned entrepreneurs at the next Genius Network event or want to learn more about Genius network, go to www.gienstruitnetwork.com. first off, your book the Alter Ego Effect, which is the subtitles the power of secret identities to transform your life the way I first when I first read it, even though we knew each other before then, I was having a conversation with crazy ass Tucker Max and Tucker sees all kinds of books. He's had numerous New York Times best selling books. He's an avid reader and he's very blunt about what he likes and doesn't like.

Very blunt.

And I remember talking to him and this is in 2019. And I said, what is a book that you've read recently that's really unique and gains like a different perspective, it's not just a bunch of rehashed, another performance book or self help or personal development or whatever. And he said the Alter Ego Effect. He goes, it is a very unique approach on how to view becoming successful. And then he described it as you either do a lot of therapy or you adopt an alter ego. And so then I proceeded to get the book. I read the book and it's a really fantastic book. I've recommended it to a lot of people over there.

Yeah, I know you have because I get the pings all the time. So thank you.

You're welcome. Yeah, so we're going to talk about your book, but we're also going to talk about just how to be a more effective, better human being, how to deal with stress, how to look at trauma and all kinds of that's going on in the world. And like my book, what's in it for them? The similarities are they're both yellow. And so what's the logic behind these yellow books here? I mean I, I had, we're trying.

To make people happy in dark times. That's what we're trying to do. It's supposed to be a sunshine, happy color.

Okay, awesome. So how would you describe what your current focus and what you do professionally and personally? Like who the hell is Todd Herman?

So if there's like an umbrella that always hangs over top of my head and everything has to kind of like nest underneath it is my world is pretty much about transformation. So you know, alter Ego, that's about helping you transform your identity so that you can live to the capability or pursue the goals and pursue the change that you want. And then my 90 year company is about helping people to transform the way that they, they grow their business or build their business using what is my background, which is a sports performance approach. So there's certain principles in the sports performance world and I just simply took those when people started asking me to work with them in business. As I was growing the peak athlete before I sold it in 2014, I just took those principles and started applying them in business. And so that's about helping people transform the way that they kind of work or build their businesses. And then my up coach platform, I've been in the coaching space. You and I were talking about this before we started, like you've been in, we've been around for a long time and in 1997 is when I started. You're one of the few people who has me beat that's around the same age as me. And I love the coaching world for as much as some people. I find there's so many amazing people that are in coaching. And the hard part about growing, scaling and then selling the coaching and training business I've had is the delivery. It's actually the back end part. And at the end of the day, coaches, we're paid to help transform someone, like make a change happen. And so my upcoach platform is for helping coaches transform the way that they deliver their programming to people. So I'm all about transformation in some form or another. And so my current focus is definitely continuing to beat the drum of alter ego. I kind of borrow Bill Gates's mission and goal for Microsoft, which was a computer in every home around the world. And so my goal is still one of those yellow books in every home around the world. And so that'll be what I'll be doing until, you know, the day I'm gone. Because it's been, it's made such a big impact in the clients I've had the chance to work with over the years. And you know, I've said this quote on stage is that, you know, human beings, we always act through whatever we associate ourselves with. Your identity shapes your reality. And so there's a lot of platitudes around, hey, be your best self or be your authentic self. And all those things are really nice to hear, but there's no meat on the bone. I say, right?

And I think a lot of that changes because, you know, it's like Michael Singer in the untethered soul, you know, to thy own self be true. He opens up the book talking about that goes, well, what self are we talking about exactly? Scared one, the insecure one, the confident one. I mean, we.

The dad self, the entrepreneurial self, the CEO self, The athlete self. The which self. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, there's. There's many reasons why I. I really like you. And one of them is that you're. You're very much a protector of your people. And when I first started doing building the peak athlete back in 1997, and I'm totally an accidental entrepreneur, and I like saying that to people. Cause I think there's a lot of stories out there that someone was so deliberate and so focused, and they grew and they scaled this business and they got into it. And I was. It was accidental. It happened on a football field because I got done playing college football. And I was volunteering at a high school in Edmonton, Alberta, where I lived at the time. And I was working with the defensive backs. And I was just really good at teaching them the mental game stuff more than anything because I played college football. I was a nationally ranked badminton player. But I'm not physically gifted. I'm not 64 and 245 pounds of solid muscle or something, right? And I had two older brothers who, you know, helped me develop my mental toughness as any older brothers do. And. And so these kids started getting some really good results, not just on the field, but actually in the classroom, because I was actually teaching them a little bit about how their brain worked for as much information was available back then. And a mom, Deb, said, hey, Kirby's getting such great results. Would you mind mentoring him more or coaching him more? And I was like, yeah, sure. Love to. And there was this long pause, and she, like, leans in and she's like, how much do you want to charge Todd? And I said, how about 75 bucks for a package of three sessions? And she was like. And I was like, vomiting in my mouth when I was saying, because who's going to pay me that much just to, like, you know, talk to a kid and teach him some stuff? And she's like, done. And so that was my rate for the first three years. Was like, I was super cheap, but it got me a lot of reps, right? And so I say that because when I started out, I was now trying to learn as much as I could about the inner game of things. And typically that would lead you to, like, psychology books. And I just was like, I'M a practical guy. Like, I grew up on a farm and ranch. You know, if my dad ever found an idea that was like crap, he would say, you know, well, that dog won't hunt, you know, and. And so I started diving into like other things like biology and kinesiology and all these other disciplines. And I started making way more sense of this world of human performance. And I say that because one of the key platforms of the world of psychology back then was that people who had oneself had the lowest rates of depression or depressive or anxiety disorders. Well, that didn't make any sense to me because here I have got clients and I'm like, we don't want that guy who's out there playing football coming off the field and acting that way in society.

Right.

That's a different self.

Yeah.

And there's nothing wrong with that. Of course. That makes sense. He's using a specific set of qualities and attributes to go out there and help him perform. So I was like, well, that's a good example of how the world of psychology is full of crap.

Yeah.

And so then in 2007, basically the psychology world had a complete flip on really three of their core founding principles about how human beings operate. And one of them is that now one of the largest fields of study for the world of psychology is many selves. Is that humans who actually operate through and see themselves, see themselves as having many sides of who they are actually have the lowest rates of anxiety and stress disorder. And the reason I say that is because so many people nowadays get caught up in the social media vernacular of authenticity and authentic self thinking that there's one you and there is nothing.

Yeah.

Because if we learn anything from the universe is we're energy.

Right.

So at our core we're really energy. And then we transmute that energy through the roles that we play. And so really the message in my book is more about using our creative imagination to intentionally bring forward who it is that you want to bring to these different roles that you have in your life so that you can perform the way that you want to perform. Yeah. And perform isn't in a fake way. It's like because performance at the end of the day is just your ability to get results. So anyways, and I. The reason I brought all that up is because you're very similar when it comes to marketing principles. You like to poke holes in things and, you know, point people in the right direction towards what actually is going to work for them.

Yeah. Just trying to be useful and trying to help you Know, I. I mean, I like the idea of a result leader is far more valuable than a thought leader, because any idiot could come up with thoughts or many people.

Damn it. Now I got to change the head title on my. On my. On my about page. Remove thought leader 18. If you're. Listen, remove Thought Leader immediately.

Well, you know, there are thought leaders, and I understand, you know, the way people describe it, but there's a lot of thought leaders that steal their thoughts from other people. And what you're saying makes me think of. So in what's in it for them? My book, my latest book, I talk about their situational behavior, and then there's situational ethics. Situational behavior changes. Like we can. You know, I'll tell a dirty joke to you. You know, maybe here, maybe live, or maybe, you know, but if you introduce me to your grandma, I'm not going to say the same joke, you know, but I'm not gonna.

She would love it, though.

She probably would. Yeah, she would have loved it. So. But the point is, you know, one of the things I talk about, most people have. Not everyone, but most people have drank beer. Most people have gone to church. But you rarely drink beer in church. Some people probably do, but there's situational behavior, but there's situational ethics. And me and you have had lots of conversations about ip. And what I really like about you, since we're both here edifying each other, is that you very much respect ip, you very much respect, you know, and we live in a world of authors and speakers and creators.

Yeah, the creator economy of taking other people's stuff and making yourself look really smart.

Yeah, yeah. And it's. It's. It's. It's. It's annoying. You know, there's Zig Ziglar, who has said some great things. I mean, I remember sitting on a couch with Zig in the early 90s for an hour while he was speaking at this big event. And we were backstage, and I literally spent an hour talking to Zig Ziglar. And then I sat through a hour and a half presentation of an infomercial company sitting down there pitching him. And Zig kept saying to me, what do you think? What do you think? You know, And I was like this young guy just early in the marketing, and. And so Zig, great speaker, and he had a line where he said, you can get anything you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want. The challenge, though, is that's not always true. It depends on who you help get what they want because you can help other people get what they want. That some will not do a damn thing for you and others will lie to you, abuse you, steal from you, betray you. And that's one of the difficulties of if you're a giver and if you go out there trying to just be helpful to people is you have to boundary yourself. And unfortunately, we usually don't learn how to boundary ourselves until you get taken advantage. And so I try to warn people that if you're going to be a giver, just know that it comes with the territory. You become a target for takers because the narcissists, the sociopaths, the psychopaths, you know, the takers of the world, they have an ability to sense and identify who they can get something from. And they can mirror empathy, even though they may not have any real empathy. And so it's interesting. So we've had conversations about that. So as it relates to the alter ego, then let's talk about all the stuff that you help people with Imposter syndrome. How do they view themselves? What their identity? I mean, there's many places we can start. I don't think there's one right place to start. But first, let's get to the definition. What does alter mean? What does ego mean? What is an alter ego? And then we'll talk about. Because my goal for today, as anyone watching or listening, is that you get a domino from this. You get some perspective and some insight that really gives you a way to improve your life. And that may be your business, that may be your family, that may be your health, there's a lot of stuff, and you're really skilled and that's what you help people do.

Well, I mean, to kick off too, I always say, does everyone need an alter ego? No, they don't. But what I do know is that with all of the most successful people that I've been around, or even reflecting on my own life, the more valuable tools that you have in your tool belt that you can grab and pull out when you need to, you're going to be able to skate through life and over challenges or friction a lot more quickly or more gracefully than, than others who get caught up in something. And so I think that the method itself and using alter egos or identity to chunk it up to another level is a really powerful tool that someone can utilize. So going back to your first question, alter ego, it was actually coined in 44 BC by Cicero, and Cicero is kind of widely regarded as the greatest Roman statesman and philosopher to ever Live. And a friend of his had basically sent him a letter asking him about advice on life now that he's this seasoned professional. And while he was going on this one caravan, he replied. And he. In it, he coined the alter ego term, and it means the other eye, or trusted friend within. And he basically is unpacking how throughout his life he's had to reinvent himself. And he would use basically the quote from Epictetus, who said, adopting the manners and characteristics of others, there's nothing false in it. We all need a point of reference to start with. And so adopting those manners from others and borrowing their traits as your own only helps you to develop the vision of what you're trying to become, basically breaking up his quote in some way. So that's useful to think about because you especially Joe, you know, with the Genius Network, and I was speaking about you with someone last night, and they were saying, just as I would, that you truly do have one of the greatest Rolodexes that's out there, to use an old term for people. But. And when I say greatest Rolodexes, it's not just the quantity of people in it, it's the quantity of people who have deep affection for you that are also in that. And that's extraordinarily difficult to reach. So you're doing a lot of things right. You should probably write a book on it. Oh, wait, you did. So we all know the power of having great people around us. Great friends, great peers, great coaches or mentors, great people to mastermind with or network with. But we don't think about necessarily how can we bring that tribe of friends and mentors into our own minds and the six inches in between. And so that's really what Cicero was saying. It's the other I, your trusted friend within. And I would carry it a step further. It's the trusted friends within. So that's the kind of base concept that's there. The other principles that kind of I talk about that I discovered in, you know, building the alter egos and the secret identities of so many athletes or leaders, is that one of the core things that makes it work so well is that it's. It brings an attitude of playfulness to it. Right. And I'll just share a little bit of science from the ages of 6 and a half months or 6 months to 7 years of age, roughly, in a child, they are basically operating in the theta brainwave state. Okay. This is all stuff that you would know a lot. You know, you have Beta, you got Alpha, then You got Theta Beta is like our waking mind. It's the awareness mind. Alpha is like, you know, some deep, deeper focus that you've got working on a task or something. And then theta is really deep, deep, deep creative focus. And it's where the zone and flow state typically sits as well. So you've got children that are in the zone and flow state most of the time. And that's what, you know to the parent that's listening, you know, that's why when you yell, hey, suppertime. And they can't, you don't come. And you're. Nine times you've yelled it and they still don't come. It's because literally they're just so caught up in the play, in the process of what they're doing because their brainwave state is in theta. Well, why is that? Well, that's because unlike a baby elephant who needs to get up and fend for itself immediately in the savannah, human beings don't. And we've got a lot to learn. So we're like little sponges at that age. We're just soaking everything up. There's no concept of me and myself and my identity at that age. Right. Because there is no me. It's just I'm a part of this family or, you know, like everything is mine or whatever.

Doing your thing.

And so because they don't have an identity, they're able to shape shift. So well, they're playing nurse, one second teacher, jumping off the couch as Superman or Wonder Woman or Batman or Thor or whatever, going out front to play with as their favorite basketball player or football player or whatever. They're just adopting these traits. And it's because everything in the world is big. I'm not as tall as you, Joe, and so I want to be big like you. And then at the age of seven and a half or eight years of age, depending on gender, then you're all of a sudden, frontal lobe starts to kick in, reasoning skills. You start, wait, there's me. And I'm separate from these people. So you start to develop this sense of an identity and you start to think, I want to be more like the 12 year old. And you start acting like the 12 year old and you start leaving behind all this creative, playful self. And that's the thing I love about you. Even inside of your office here, there's so much, you know, well, crazy shit. Really?

Yeah. I want to see how you describe all this.

I'm not gonna pull any punches. There's a ton of crazy. You got a very Unique set of art curation that you've got, but it's, it's, it's beautiful that way. So I say that because a grounding principle that makes this work so well is it when you're really playful, it removes ego from the process. And when I can remove ego from part of this process of helping an athlete perform, or a leader or a CEO, entrepreneur, dad, mom, whatever, they can fall into and find more of their capabilities and traits and perform up to whatever is nested with inside of themselves.

Yeah. That's very interesting. So do you find yourself dismantling? Maybe that's the wrong word. But you're certainly taking a look at their identity and how they behave and you're giving them another perspective and you're giving them a methodology to step out of themselves if they become so damn serious. Because like, and you write about, you write about this in your book, people lose the playfulness of being a kid. And there are the few individuals that become, you know, more playful and they become more engaged in life. And that to me is such an important thing to offer. That, and I think that's what your methodology actually provides.

Yeah.

Is it gives people like, man, you're stuck. You can be very financially successful and hate your life. Yes. And that, and you could be, you know, if you're starving and have no means, that's a whole nother situation. But you know, human happiness has very little to do with the external, it has to do with the internal. Unless the external is you're in a war torn country or you know, you're just in constant, you know, fight or flight. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

So, okay, so do I find people and dismantle that current identity so that we can rebuild the new identity? There's a danger in that for me because I am not a therapist. Right. Like, and this is what we see nowadays is, listen, I don't try to solve all your problems. Right. I'm, I'm wholly unskilled at that. I'm very good at helping people move forward. And do you know the performance coaching that we do and using the methods. But the nature of navigating between the 6 inches of people's ears for 27 years is sometimes you poke a sore spot and there's a trauma that's there. And while in that moment I'll let them share or whatever, I'll always point them in the direction of what is 5 incredibly world class experts on treating trauma or depression or whatever it might be there. But at the same time, none of my clients are able to move themselves to the sidelines for the next three years and get themselves fixed. They still have to go and do their thing. So if that's the case, how about I give you some tools to help you navigate this with less stress, less anxiety, and let me help you disassociate from the current story that you got about what you think you can or cannot do, or let me disassociate away from the way that you think you need to be doing this. No, Todd, the way that I get results is I am a hard charger. This is the way that I work. Or I found over the years that many of my athletes especially found that they would actually not get treatment on some of their, you know, past issues because they felt like that was what was. Gave them their edge. They don't lose their edge. If I, Todd, if I give this thing up, then am I really going to be able to go out there and kill it on that court or crush it on that field or something like that? And I'm like, yeah, you hundred percent can, because it's not removing your capability.

Yeah. There is a famous. It reminds me of a famous philosopher. I can't remember his name. He said something along the lines of, the last thing that a human ever gives up is their suffering. And a lot of people, I think, that hold on to, like, I don't want to lose the edge or what. It's almost like a drug addict that'll be like, yeah, I make great music when I'm. You know. Because if they get sober, their music is going to suck. Not always.

Yeah. Yeah, well. And Alfred Adler, one of the founders of basically the world of psychology, his frame on the human experience is always, we're doing everything because it helps us achieve a goal, whether it's a negative one or there's something that's there that you are. It's helping you achieve some sort of goal. And people are like, I don't want the goals or I don't want this world. And I'm like, no, it's most likely there's some sort of goal that it is accomplishing for you, whether it's the attention that you would get from it or, you know, you re experiencing the pain because you associate yourself as having someone who's just, I live a pained life, you know. Right.

You know, my friend Anna Lemke, who wrote, you know, Dr. Anna Lemke, dopamine Nation.

Yeah.

She writes about, you know, S and M and bondage and she writes about pain. And there is a dopamine hit. That comes from pain. And so everything is, you know, people, what humans want is they want more woo or less. Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So. And sometimes the woo comes through doing exciting, healthy things. Other times the woo comes from consuming sugar, taking drugs, you know, having sex, watching porn, you know, and there's consequences to all the different ways we get woo. And ah, yeah. I get in cold plunges almost daily, and because when I get out, I feel better, but getting in is like, ah, yeah. But the woo that comes out of it sure is worth doing.

Yeah.

And so the challenge is, is when the, you know, you have a pained existence, but you're patterns, your reward system, your identity is attached to that. And so. Yeah. And I mean, because. How would you describe the learning? Because one of the things I say, and this is my interpretation of it, through having been in recovery for two decades from drug addiction, sex addiction, workaholism, is that unlearning is more important than learning. Because I'm constantly trying to learn stuff. Yeah. And at the same time, I'm trying to unlearn things that my brain has convinced me this is the right way to say things. This is the right way to think about stuff when, no, that actually isn't serving me. And that's not really helpful at all.

Yeah.

And how would you look at unlearning versus learning?

So, like, my frame for my world is peak performance is more a process of subtraction, removal and deletion. Right. So, like, someone comes to me and they say, okay, well, that's where I want to go. I want to climb that mountain or I want to get up that hill, or that's my next hurdle to go over top of. And then I kind of take a peek in their backpack and I'm like, oof, you're carrying a. Why do you have a washing machine on your back? That seems kind of unnecessary for this trip. So you're. I'm constantly looking at. No, you. We can remove this. We can. We don't need to do this anymore. And some of that's because we're so close to our own self that. Well, let's use business as the example because this is the, you know, probably very popular podcast amongst people who are in business and entrepreneurship. So the, the, the way that most of us had to get started is we had to hustle our faces off and we were doing a lot of stuff ourselves. You know, it's the chief bottle washer and, you know, mop pusher in the, in the, in the office, as well as Sales and marketing and finance or whatever. And most of them were doing terrible and. But a couple of them were pretty good at. And so then we get our business to a certain level. Let's just say we're at a million dollars and we got a few team members now and we. But we get into this now routine and habit of lots of stuff we got to do lots of stuff like that's, you know, in order for us to keep on surviving, which is really the nature of zero to about $300,000 a year in business. There's a lot of studies that are done on this. That's kind of the phase of hustle your face off to figure out what's working, find your right market or niche or whatever. But then in all of that paint that you just threw against the wall, there's a kind of small little picture that's there that is going to be where you're going to focus your attention on to get you to the next milestone of like say $3 million. And so what now the process is, is we need to unshackle from the hustle preneur or the founder that started there. And now we need to move into creating security and stability. So it's less projects, projects, projects, more systems and refinement and optimizing things. And that's a different identity. That's a CEOing type identity. And that also demands. Both of them demand discipline and consistency of showing up, especially consistency. Now it's the discipline of run your plays that you've created. Yeah, run your plays and refine those plays. Get better at running those plays. And so I say that because when people come to me and I'm looking in their backpack and I'm like, oh, you know what we need to throw out? It's you, right? It's this identity. Because this isn't just who you are. Like me. We'll talk about this in a bit. This is gonna be the Easter egg for people. Or it's the open loop of talking about uniforms and totems and artifacts. So stay till the end, everyone. I just wanted to get my radio voice in once.

No, no, that was good.

Yeah. But you know, so I've got a pair of glasses on right now. These are my. This is just part of my work uniform. These are non prescription glasses, everybody. I've been them since 1997 when I first started and I had to build out my.

Not those same pair.

No, no, no, no.

That's pretty damn good.

It would be really good. But as my mother knows, I'm very good at leaving glasses behind.

So you have a whole bunch of them.

Yeah, I've donated Ray Bans and Maui gyms around the world, so I should sign them from now on. So. But in the nature of the work that I do, Joe, I'm working with high achieving people. And I don't just do coaching because I have group mentoring and then I create training programs and I'm also CEO of the company and stuff like that, although my wife is taking over, thankfully. But is that me showing up being a challenger with big personalities? Is that really who I am? It's not really who I am. It's not all of me. Let's say it's a useful identity for me to bring to that role that I have as a coach for these people. And it could be so easy for me to believe that that's who I am because that's the muscle that I flex every single day for eight hours or 10 hours some days and have been doing it since 1997. But is that challenger Persona really going to help me be a good dad? It's not because kids have more willpower than parents. They will keep on fighting you and breaking you down. And so I'm very much more inspired with that role in my life to be more like my father and Mr. Rogers. And so before Molly was born in 2013, I would, I rewatched a lot of Mr. Rogers stuff. And if you watch him, you'll see how anytime he's communicating with a kid, he always gets down on their level. And he's always, a lot of times got his hands, you know, resting on his knee, very passive stance, very welcoming stance, or body language that's there because he doesn't want it to be confrontational.

Right.

And it's pretty hard to argue with the fact that, you know, the man left a pretty indelible mark on at least American culture. Right?

Oh, yeah. And I remember early on how many people when I was a kid would make fun of him and think he's goofy and all that sort of stuff. And now you look back and you just see how effective and respected that guy was.

Yeah. Tom Hanks even said when he was playing him in the interview with Jimmy Kimmel, I play it when I'm keynoting. You know, when I got asked to play this role, I thought, he's weird. He's like, I never really grew up around Mr. Rogers. I, you know, I saw, I saw him, but I was like, he's just a weirder guy. And then like any good character I got to do my research. So he watched, I think it was 78 episodes of Won't you be my neighbor. And, you know, Mr. Rogers, he's got his uniform come in, take off his outdoor shoes, put on his blue sneakers, and he'd put on that cardigan, right. And. And he kind of said a few more nice words about Mr. Rogers. And then he said to Jimmy Kimmel, when you put on that red sweater and those blue shoes, you feel powerful. And Jimmy Kimmel says, really? He's like, yeah, it's like putting on Batman's cape and cowl. You feel powerful. And that goes into, like, one of the alter ego. Well, that's. That's. That's one element of the method that I developed around why it's so important to use a uniform, a totem, an artifact, to help you ritualize this identity. Because we have this natural occurring phenomenon inside of our minds called in clothed cognition, which is that we as human beings attribute story and meaning to the artifacts and the clothing that we all wear. So what happens, though, is if you were to put on a doctor's coat, you will actually, without you even having to even specifically think about this, you will enclose your mind in the cognitive traits and abilities of the meaning of that white coat.

Right.

Which means most people in our culture attribute being detailed, methodical, smart, successful to someone wearing a white doctor's coat. Okay, for the most part, other people might not, but that's kind of the. For the most part. So what happens then is when you put on the white coat, if you were to do an activity that demands being detailed, smart, and methodical, you will actually improve your performance without you going to a class, without you working on it. So when Tom Hanks. If Tom Hanks put on that red sweater and blue shoes before he watched those 78 episodes, would he have felt powerful? No, he would have felt like a goof.

Right.

Because that was his association to Mr. Rogers. Red sweater, blue shoes, goofball changed his meaning of it. Now, when he put it on, I felt powerful. And he started to live through the traits and abilities and qualities of the man that he saw on that tv. So coming back to me, that's how I wanted to be around my kids. Now, does that make me successful every single second of it? No. But if I can improve myself 20% of the time, that's a pretty damn big impact to my three little kids, which is the most important role I could ever play in my life.

Absolutely. I want to make this distinction here just for people that have not read the book because you cover this. You know, the glasses thing. Were you wearing glasses? Inspired. You write about this in a book by Martin Luther King?

So, no, I did not know about Martin Luther King. So the story for Martin is. I was doing. And it's great because you know George Raveling.

No.

So George Raveling in the movie about Nike, when they're trying to get Michael Jordan to sign, they famously go down to, I think it's la, and they meet with George Raveling, who's an absolute legend in the world of basketball. Like, he's been basically Nike's basketball ambassador for the last 40 years.

Okay. So I think I know the character.

Okay. Yeah. And I'd be surprised if you didn't come across George. Amazing man. He stood right behind Martin Luther King when he delivered the I have a Dream speech.

Okay.

And when MLK got done the speech, he handed it to George. And George was a basketball player at Villanova at the time. I believe he was a basketball player or is the assistant coach one of the two. And. And so he had it. He still has it. So it's insured and all these kinds of things. But when I told this story to George, he was like, no way. That's not true. And here's the story. So I was doing a speech in San Antonio, Texas, in 2004 at this leadership event. And I talked about. It was about. My talk was about developing this new crop of leaders, millennials, at the time, because I had had so much experience doing some, like, mental game coaching with these people. So I had some different points of view and insights. But I shared on stage about the power of developing an identity. And I talked about. When I first started my business, I was deeply insecure about how young I looked. I looked like I was 12, even though I was 21. And here I am talking about the game and mental toughness. But I don't have four bestselling books, Joe, and I don't have seven letters behind my name. You know, we all place these rules in our head about when. When can we become a authority or something on talking about a topic. Right. And I didn't really position myself as an authority. I just wanted to get a message out to people, which was how to develop the triune athlete, the mentally, emotionally and physically tough athlete. And when you align all three of those things together, you can unpack performance onto that field of play, whatever that might be. Ice court, whatever. But I wasn't making the calls, Joe. I would go to bed every night. I'm Going to make seven phone calls tomorrow and book me some speeches or something. And I would end that day, and I wouldn't have made those speeches. And I would beat the out of myself and judge myself and feel so much shame over, like, do you even want this, Todd? Like, you know, you say that this is so important, but you're not doing it. And I watched an episode of Oprah as I was procrastinating the next day, and it turned out it's Oprah's favorite episode. And it's this episode with Johnny jocks. And this lady stands up in the audience. And what happens is Johnny recounts the story of Oprah doing one of her auctions of all of her clothing. And Johnny talks about how she couldn't afford any of Oprah's stuff other than a pair of shoes. So she bought a pair of Oprah's shoes, and she was going through a very hard time. And she placed Oprah's shoes in the corner of her room. And whenever she felt like she maybe couldn't make it through that day, she would go and stand in Oprah's shoes. And I thought to myself, in that moment, wait. I used an alter ego when I played football. It was Geronimo, and it was the composite of Walter Payton and Ronnie Lott, my two heroes in football and five Native American warriors. Where I grew up, farm and ranch in Alberta, Canada. It's kind of rich with some Native American history. And so I've always been deeply connected to that world. And that was. I took Geronimo on that field. You thought you were playing against the scrawny little 17, number 17, but no, you were coming up against my tribe of eight. That's what I called it. Me and my seven. And, man, I played way better than I could have if I was doing it on my own. Now, Geronimo, though, wasn't custom built to help me win in business. And so I built Super Richard. Super Richard was Superman, Joseph Campbell, and Benjamin Franklin, those three people, specifically because I wanted Superman's decisiveness, because I was not being decisive. I was a man of inaction, not the man of action. And I fell in love with Joseph Campbell when he was on Bill Moyer's PBS special talking about the hero's journey. And I just, you know, I was 13 at the time, I think, and I fell in love with how this man articulated himself.

Right.

You know, and so I wanted to be more articulate because I was talking about a message. And I think I said 14,000 words before I said the seven words that were really the value proposition of what I was doing. And then I wanted to be more like Benjamin Franklin because I just felt like he was one of the most confident humans that ever lived because he had like eight legendary careers in one lifetime, right? And so I wanted to be more confident because I was not confident. I was so insecure. And then I went to LensCrafters, which is like an eye optometry store in Canada. I went to West Edmonton mall, which was the largest mall in the world at the time, and I bought a pair of non prescription glasses. I had to convince the lady to sell them to me because back then everyone was getting Lasik eye surgery, right? No one was getting glasses to like, for like Warby Parker sells nowadays. And so finally I got these glasses and I went home and I did my reverse Clark Kent. I put on the glasses just like he would take off the glasses to, you know, put on the cape, essentially, right? And so I became Super Richard. And Super Richard was built to be the advocate for my stuff. And now when you think about the other eye or trusted friend within, there was all this stuff wasn't very explicit at the time. I was just, I was doing anything that I could to just try and get to my next goal, right? Like, I mean, this business wasn't going to go anywhere at 75 bucks for a package of three sessions. And I wanted to get on stages. I wanted to, you know, talk to young kids about, you know, developing their mental toughness. And I, Super Richard, was hired specifically to be my sales guy and to get out there and be my advocate. And so when I put on those glasses, I was not Todd. I was Super Richard. And Super Richard was very confident in selling Todd's stuff because he believed in Todd. And I say that because that, that absolutely saved me because, you know, I come from a traumatic past where I had some very deep wounds from some stuff that happened to me as a kid. And I had a hard time believing in Todd because of the stuff that happened. And Super Richard came along.

What's the difference between fake it till you make it versus adopting an alteration?

You go, I just think that there's less meat on the bone on the, on the term really. Like, there's no place for people to go with fake it till you make it. So if they want to apply fake it till you make it and then go and read my book. Go read ahead. I mean, I don't know. I think it's that people are, you know, words matter, you know, this in, you know, all of Your work and fake it till you make it just doesn't have the right, you know, tone or message for people for the most part.

But, yeah, it sounds like you're making shit up. Well, let me. And by the way, what I'm discussing with you in real time is, for me, with things that I grapple with. And one of the things I've been telling the story of Stone Soup and Jeff Hayes, one of my genius network members, we're having this discussion and I'd heard the story before, but we were talking about startups. And so I've made some investments in startups. At this stage in my life, unless I'm absolutely blown away, I'm not going to be funding or investing in any more startups because most of them, they usually don't go anywhere. And there's a. And what? So Dan Sullivan, who's a good buddy of mine. Yeah, known him for years, we do a podcast together and, you know, he has this term make it up and make it Real. So entrepreneurs, they make stuff up and then they have to make it real in order to create a business. You're going through the stages of, you know, I wanted what you were coaching and teaching people $75 for your first paid gig. You're making it up and then you make it real. Right? And the making it real is you produce results. So in spite of what someone's aspirations are, there are, you know, at this stage, we can call ourselves result leaders if we want to, and that could sound egotistical or whatever, but we can point to lots of success and people that have dry. And there's a lot of people that have none of that, but they have a pitch, right? And they. And something hasn't come to fruition yet. So. And I respect the driven, aspirational entrepreneur because God knows the world advances because of people just trying to figure out how to innovate and, yeah. Crate and put it into the marketplace. And, you know, there's. I always often tell young entrepreneurs, jokingly, is if I wouldn't have known being successful is this much work, I would have stuck with being a loser.

Right.

Because there's like a lot of shit you got to do. And so there's a story of Stone Soup, and there's different versions. People can do a search online and read. But in a nutshell, it's like the story that I like the most, the version is based in medieval times and there's a couple of guys that are starving and they come upon a village. They need to eat. They're Knocking on doors, asking if anyone could feed them. Everyone's scared of them not opening the doors. And they're like, we got to come up with something. We're starving here. And the guy says, I would like to make stone soup for the village. If we can get a big kettle and some water and a fire, I will make delicious stone soup for everybody. And so someone opens the door and is like, what do you need? I need a big kettle. So all that gets put together, the villagers come out and they build a fire and they start boiling water. And the guy reaches in his pocket and he throws in a stone into the big kettle and stirs it and it starts heating up and boiling. He takes a sip. He's like, yeah, this is really good, but it would taste better if there was a carrot. So someone goes and gets some carrots and then like, well, this is good, but we need some potatoes and then celery and then onions and then some beef and chicken or whatever else. Throw in stuff. And then pretty soon they've manage to get everyone to collaborate and they get to eat and they feed everybody. Now that's the happy ending to the story. The thing that I've been grappling with is like, it seems like everybody is selling stone soup. But the difference though is some people fully intend to put forth the effort and actually produce something. Where a lot of people, like, a lot of startups I've learned, their method of making money is convincing people to buy, to give them money. They have. That's it. They don't know how to turn anything into anything. And in many of them, they don't even care. You know, it's like the Fire Festival, dude, you know, I mean, that guy doesn't give a, you know, a about ethics, right? He just, you know, and some people are just wired to like, let's just sell stone soup, even though if, you know, we never deliver anything. And so, you know, when does the alter ego become, you know, you adopt this because you went through your journey. When does this, the substance, when does the empowerment actually, like, I'd love to have you walk us through, here's the process for doing it. Because I'm not suggesting. Because I know you. You're not suggesting to anyone to make shit up. You're not suggesting.

No, I'm not saying that, you know, you should put on a white coat and now call yourself a maxill facial reconstructive surgeon.

Right?

Right. That's not it. But if you're a maxill facial reconstructive surgeon and you're going in to talk at the. The career fair, and you're so nervous about getting up on stage and talking, then I'm saying that maybe there is a character that we can put you in so that you can inspire that youth that's sitting in front of you with a rollicking story, or at least a palatably entertaining story about what life is like as a maxill facial reconstructive surgeon so that you don't shy away from it and you don't even show up for it. And now we have nothing but people who want to be just famous.

Yes.

Online.

Yep, Exactly.

Okay, so I'll. There's kind of like the five main steps or parts of building the alter ego is first, we need to define what's the role that we're gonna. Like, which role is it in your life or which field of play are you struggling with? Is it being a CEO? Is it being a father? Like, I've spoken to YPO groups, there's billionaires in the room, and the moment I start talking about, you know, my. My dad and Mr. Rogers, all three goes. And this is what I say to them. Like, most of you don't need to crush it anymore in business, but you might be under indexing at home, and probably it's. It's very much close to 90%. Every single one is inspired to, like, maybe show up a little bit differently at home with their kids. Because the. The common vernacular is Joe, I have a really hard time turning it off when I get home, Todd. You know, like, that's just what people will say. Like, okay, that just sounds to me like you haven't been intentional about who that guy or girl is that's going to walk through that door and what's that next purpose for you? And so what's the role? So just who is that person that we want to be reformulating? And then what is it about that. That. What is it about that person and the way they're showing up that you're frustrated with? And there's a key there for people. If there is something tactically that you could learn to do better in the way that you talk to yourself and even describe yourself to yourself, it's to talk to yourself in the third person. Because that art of intentional disassociation can help you to kind of objectify yourself and see yourself a little bit more like a sculpture that you can continue to mold and shape. So when I say, what is it about Joe that. That guy that shows up in the office as the CEO and leader that you're troubled by if that was the person. Right, right. And you go, oh, you know, like, I'm, you know, all over the place, or I give too many directions or there's too many projects, like, whatever it is. Or if it's the. It's the dad. I come home and I'm. I kind of bark at people and I micromanage them, just like I do at the office. And I'm very good at that stuff at the office. And I end up doing the exact same role when I get home. I'm like, okay, so now we know where some of the points of frustration are. Like, in the way that you're showing up and the traits and qualities that you're bringing there. Well, what's the flip of that? Now we're getting into crossing this chasm into what would be called the source code. And so there's. There's kind of a. A branch here. We can go the route of, well, what are these traits? How do you want to be showing up? Just like, I was very frustrated with being indecisive, and I was not confident, and I was not articulate. Those are my three big ones. So just take the flip of those things. I want to be more confident, more articulate, more decisive. Or someone might already have the idea in their mind of who it is that they'd like to show, like, who they're so inspired by. Like, I want to be more like that person over there. Insert the name of whoever that might be. Or I want to be more like a tiger. Or I want to be more like a. Insert name of an animal. So it doesn't. There's no rules on this. It can be sourced from characters in movies, characters from your favorite book. It can be historical figures. It could be someone that you know. Oddly enough, probably the number one quality of alter egos for people is actually grandmothers or someone like that in their family. Because the key there is I need you to be emotionally engaged with whoever your source code of inspiration is. Because we're triune beings, mentally, emotionally, and physical. We live in the physical world.

You talk about Beyonce, you talk about different people in the beginning, but give an example of real life. People that have adopted an alter ego because it helped them. And you don't have to go like.

Well, no, let's just finish off the Martin Luther King story, because, again, fantastic. Open loop. And now let's close up that guy. Okay, so I'm doing this talk, and I get done talking to the group, and this lady comes up to me afterwards, she says, I love your talk, but I loved the story where you shared about you wearing a pair of fake glasses and still do, because Martin did the exact same thing. And I look down at her name tag and it's coretta Scott King, MLK's wife. And I said, really? And she said, yes. Martin felt like he was leading such an important movement and he didn't want his ego to get in the way. So every time he would go to write his speech, he would put on a pair of fake glasses to step into what he would call a, his distinguished self so he could channel the ideas from a higher source of inspiration. There's no photos of MLK doing and delivering his speeches that way. That's why when I shared that with George, George was like, no, he didn't need glasses. He had perfect eyesight. I said, no, he did. So if you go to the Atlanta Hartsfield Airport, in their main terminal there is a shrine area dedicated to Martin Luther King. And in it is a window box with his glasses that he wore on loan from the foundation. And it says on there, Martin Luther King would wear these to step into his distinguished self. Almost verbatim closely to the story that Coretta told me. It just, that leaves out the reason why he was doing it. Coretta knew it, you know, which was the personal, of course, the history of. He just really felt like he was, he was leading a, a group of people to non violent action. He did not want his ego to get in the way of that really important mission that was so critical for him that he did not want his ego to get in the way of that particular thing. So that's an example of someone. Now here's the role, which is the writer role, not the speaker role. So the writer role, the guy who writes these speeches, well, he needs to be channeling some pure words, pure energy, so that when the guy goes out and delivers it, it can inspire people. And then he employed an artifact that told him now he was, you know, channeling something higher, most likely without me knowing, because I didn't talk to him about this, obviously was maybe God source or maybe Jesus or something else like that. So that's, that's one example. Another one, you know, because it's someone that everyone would know is Beyonce. And you know, Beyonce, here she is, she's a gospel singing child in Houston, Texas, and standing at the front of the congregation with this big loud voice that's just. People would come from, you know, miles around to listen to her. And so she's growing up in an environment, and she's through osmosis, you know, being shaped into singing these kinds of words in a very modest Sunday dress, most likely as well. Right. Well, her dad sees her talent, puts her in Solange into an act in Houston with seven other girls. There was eight of them. And now she's asked to, you know, maybe do some moves on stage that make her uncomfortable because she wasn't doing those moves in front of the congregation. And now she's singing lyrics that are a little bit different than the ones that are in Sunday church. And those things make her uncomfortable. But she likes the attention. She likes being up on that stage. And so Beyonce naturally builds Sasha Fierce to help her move through the emotional challenge of not being able to see Beyonce do it. Because Beyonce was the girl at the front of the congregation. Beyonce was not the girl on that stage. Like, it just creates this friction. So she creates Sasha Fierce. And then what happens is just like Cary Grant, the. The great Hollywood golden era actor said at the near the end of his career when he was giving an interview, and here he was, he's a guy from Bristol, England, who grew up poor with a single mother, changed his name to Cary Grant. That's not his given name. And. But had aspirations of being something, being someone. And he moves to Hollywood and says at the end of his career to someone. And he battled depression for a good chunk of his life and mental health. And he says, I created somebody I wanted to be, and I finally became that person. Or he became me. But at some point, we met. Beyonce famously retires Sasha Ferris in 2008 in her I Am Sasha Fierce album. And she didn't. She didn't need her anymore, but it got her to a place. So think of it like a two circle Venn diagram. This is who I am right now. And I see where I want to go. And so I build the person that can automatically do that. And then at some point in time, we meet. We don't know when that happens. And so we embody the characteristics. There's nothing fake in that. What could be fake about that? Right. Because who do you. If you think you know all that you are right now, you're trapped. You've just now wrapped yourself up into a nice little candy coated shell. That's not human beings. We get to shift in shape. We're not a tree. Right? An acorn will always be an oak tree. We can always transform. And so I say that not to be a platitude to people, but to say, and that's why I worked my hardest to build a methodology that mapped to a our superpower, which is something I think you're very gifted with, which is our creative imagination. Nothing else on the planet has a creative imagination like human beings do, but we stop using it at the age of seven, when we no longer stay embracing that theta brainwave state of creative self that's there. And so I'm just simply trying to invite people into what something is. What is something that they already know, which is the former self that you used to be, which is far more creative, far more playful. And then use this to help transform yourself far more quickly. Because like I said before, Joe, human beings will always act through whatever they associate themselves with. Your identity shapes your reality. So if I can get you to act through a new idea of who and what you think you are, using all the other methodology that I talk about in the book Totems and Artifacts, and putting on something, whether it's a coat, a tie, a pair of socks, a belt, you know, a hat, red lipstick is something that a lot of women would use. Or. Or maybe you. I mean, I'm not making any adjustments. Maybe you do. Yeah, once in a while. Not shocking, but you use this. And now we're creating a ritual. It's because in this moment, when I put on this bracelet, it's so important to me that I show up playful for my kids. And it's so important that I show up patient for them. And it's so important that I'm kind and caring and I'm thoughtful and that I make them feel safe and secure that they can share with me so that at 18, when they're going through really difficult challenges, they can come to me. Because their challenges at 7, 8, 9, 10 are things I can deal with. But once they get to older ages, I'm simply trying to create the safety net right now so that when they are older, they know that they can come to dad.

Right?

And that's the mission of why that fricking bracelet goes on and why I want to stay committed to being that guy. Inspired by my own father and Mr. Rogers.

You know, it's really interesting. I have a whole nother perspective now, just even talking with you about it, since reading your book, of the extreme leverage and possibility that this could create. Because I don't want to. It ultimately is how one engages, interacts with it. And also the belief. I mean, there is this part where, like, if you think it's corny, you're going to figure out a way to Discount it. But if you can really step into that role, this is a really powerful methodology.

Yeah.

And there was. William Glassner was a famous psychiatrist. Most people today, you know, unless they've studied, may not know who he is. But I met him when he was 84 years old and he had gone, I believe his entire career with not ever prescribing a drug. And he wrote a few books and there was one he wrote in 1968 called Reality Therapy. Yeah, I think it's reality therapy. But basically one of the things my interpretation of from him was if you go to therapy without a goal, you will get marred and you could get mired in your past. And you know, I've done a lot of therapy because through addiction recovery and everything I've spent, you know, I've done 30 day treatment, rehab, you know, I mean, you name it. I've sat through many groups, I mean hundreds, maybe even a thousand. But basically one of the things I often think of with people's pursuit of trying to fix things where they feel they need to be fixed or how to optimize themselves, you know, most of the self help for the longest time, over the last few decades has been, you know, here's what's wrong with you and how to fix it versus here's what's right with you and how to enhance it, which I think is a much better approach. And the, the thing with, there's only been a handful of people I've sat down, be it business coaches or be it therapists, personally, professionally, where they're like, you know, let's define what a win would be. You know, when I start Genius Network, I have tools where we do our best to have people identify what's going to be a win. Yeah, you know, where do you want to go? You know, where are you? Where do you want to go? How are you going to get there? And to help people get to a better place. Some people like to set goals. Some people are not goal setters, they're problem solvers. So if you have someone that has a hard time setting goals, then the other approach is, do you like solving problems? Yeah. Like what are some problems that you do? What are things that pisses you off that you just want, you know, so there's always. But the thing is with, as I think about what you're saying is if you take this methodology and you apply it towards a pursuit of something, because who knows? You know, I've never spoken with Martin Luther King, obviously. I mean, this is a very inspired individual. There are people and there are people that are very inspired if you agree with them or not, but they literally are. And there's, you know, I've been talking about this quite a bit, and I want to get your take on it. You met Tommy Mello earlier, right? And Tommy's one of my friends and clients. And Tommy is running a huge service business. You know, the guy's company's valued at right under a billion dollars right now. And I just spoke to his big group and one of the things I asked the audience, there's like 750 people there, and I was like, you know, how many of you care about your family? A bunch of hands? How many you care about your business? How many of you care about your clients? And they're all raising their hands. How many of you care about your kids and your family? So I said, everyone cares. You don't care about your health. You're all going to say you care about your family and your business and your clients and making money, but how many of you are committed to doing anything about it? There's a big difference between caring and commitment. So for someone that's watching or listening to this, there's all kinds of things that they wouldn't be reading a book called the Alter Ego Effect or listening something if they didn't want something. So they certainly care. How does one. You kind of alluded to it earlier. Getting your body to do the things that your mouth and brain are telling it to do are two different things. We can sit and be like, I want to get in better shape, I want to work out. And you can be saying this in your own mind, you can be verbalizing it. You can go post on social media that this is the year I'm going to get in shape. And then you don't. And then there's others that do. And so what the hell is going on? And how does one take caring and turn it into commitment? And I think you have provided a methodology here of really giving yourself leverage.

Yeah, I mean, I feel like I am a caretaker in some ways for the idea, but I've seen people take the method that I talk about in the book and translate it in a brand new way that I didn't even think about, which is a part of the brilliant and creative part of the human experience.

So.

The one thing I would just say to the person who has tried maybe many things and they keep on getting stopped up is maybe the tool that you're bringing to that job isn't the right tool. And the tool in this case may be the identity that you currently have. And now that's not a judgment on you. Again, going back to the fixing thing, I agree with you so much. Like, I literally, in the onboarding of many of our, like, our clientele programs is, I'm not here to fix you. I think there's so much that's right about you because you couldn't even be watching this video if there wasn't a lot right about you because you made some sort of investment to be here. Boy, is that ever a vote somewhere internally within you that there is a different opportunity for you in the future. So I'm not saying it again because of the language that I use of people. It's like, I'm not. You're bad. No, there is this creation that's somehow been formed. Maybe it's from past, Maybe it's from people that you didn't even know were influencing you. And you're like, who is this person that's showing up? Because I have this kernel of a want within here. And it. I don't know how it got planted, but it's there. But the person that's trying to get this thing out there, there's some blockage that's there. And all I'm saying to people is, maybe we retire that person or maybe we hire a new person to do it. And I'm telling people it can be literally that simple. Because all we have on Alter Ego effect website is examples of people who have never worked out a day in their life and hired an athlete kind of thing. They built an athlete version of themselves and damn it if six months later ran a half marathon in Sydney, Australia.

Yeah.

When they had never worked out before, they're like. And so many of the times, Joe, people will be like, I don't even know how this thing worked, Todd. But I just believed in the method. Or I saw it. Like, I just was sick and tired of. Again, going back to what you were saying before, there's pain and pleasure that motivates people growth and fixed mindset. You know, in my world, in the studies that we did, it was. We called it ow and wow. You know, there's an ow and then there's a wow, you know, new possibility for me kind of thing. And so I would just say, don't doubt what's available and nested inside of that creative imagination that we have. And so I would just invite people to go there whether they create the alter ego or not. You can actually create using the method. You can actually use the method to create the identity that you'd really like to have. And then whether or not you source an inspirational source for yourself, like Kobe did and I helped him with. With the Black Mamba, or Martin Luther King did with the Distinguished Self, or I did with Super Richard, or I did with Geronimo, or I did with Hugh. When I went on the Today show, my wife was giving me a hard time because I was doing a bunch of media stuff. And she's like, I like that kind of serious Todd that you take out there with the glasses and stuff. But it's the Today show, so maybe we'd be a little bit more fun. And let's leave the blazer, because I always typically would be wearing a blazer with my pocket square and sharply dressed, and so let's leave that at home. And I was like, oh, that's really good. And then I thought, well, who shows up on daytime interviews that's kind of playful? And I really like. And I had an answer immediately. Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman. So I watched a few of their interviews and, you know, like, just their posture and stuff. I'm like, oh, I can do all that stuff. And so I'm doing what Epictetus said, modeling the mannerisms and characteristics of them. And I would practice that because, you know, this is what people don't get. You just don't show up to interviews and be your best.

Right.

Like the. The best people you prep.

Yeah.

And so I spent a lot of hours prepping with the associate producer on the Today Show. And that was. And I have a great relationship with Today Show. I can go back whenever I want because that particular segment crushed for them. Myself and Jenna Bush and two guest hosts, and it was Jennifer Nettles, the lead singer of Sugarland was there. Her and I connected over 4H, because I'm a 4H kid. And she was the spokesperson for 4H and then Holly Robinson Pete. But when I rewatch it, I'm like, oh, I see Hugh. So that was my alter ego, Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds.

That's great.

And so it should be more playful. Like, I mean, once you have the skill, you can shape shift so quickly. And there's nothing that's false in that, because these characteristics live within us, these attributes live within us. They just have blockage. There's no pipeline to get them out there. And I'm just simply driving the pipe.

Let me ask you about. Because this is a. This is kind of what's going through my head. So, as you know, I spend a lot of time in the world of addiction Recovery. I've written two books on addiction recovery. I have a foundation, geniusrecovery.org the tagline is I want to change the global conversation about how people view and treat addicts with compassion instead of judgment and find the best forms of treatment that have efficacy and share that with the world. What are your thoughts on alter ego as it relates to recovery? You have someone that keeps relapsing they feel and look as an addict. I had the most difficult thing in my life was getting sober. Drug addiction was very, very difficult, extraordinarily difficult. There was a time in my life where I would wake up to get high and I would get high to go to bed and. And one was uppers, one was downers. The downers were alcohol and different various things to just bring you down. And the uppers were speed and cocaine and amphetamines. But it was like smoking pot all day, consuming stuff in my worst states. And that was when I was really young. When I was 18 years old was the worst of my addiction with drugs. And at one point I weighed 105 pounds because I had not eaten for like a week. And I was averaging about 120lbs was my average weight. But there was one week that I got down to 105 because I'd literally gone the entire week. And when you're a male and you're 5 10, that's pretty freaking skinny, right? So I was a total wreck. I mean, I nearly killed myself. And so that was extraordinarily difficult. And when I had gotten sober from that for six months, I was headaches and just, I mean, the craziness of it. But if I think back of the identity of how I felt of myself, I mean, there was no self esteem, there was no self worth. It was just bathed in shame and being just a lost human. And then I became successful in business. A few years later, I started figuring, I learned marketing, right? I was a carpet cleaner and I first started as a Deborah carpet cleaner. I learned marketing because I needed to survive. But along the ways, I had the sexual addiction that came from being raped and molested as a kid. And so I never had this model of love as an intimate act of love and oneness. And so addiction is a connection disorder and sexual addiction is an intimacy disorder, right? And so the. And there's a lot of sex addicts. And it's one of these words where it immediately evokes an interpretation of shame or pervert or someone that has some insatiable sexual appetite or Porn addict or whatever. And there's a lot of sex addicts. And when they learn about it or they hear me talk about it, a lot of women will say that one more lands with me. There's love addiction, but there's sexual anorexia where you can't be sexual because almost every form of addiction is binging and purging. It's excess or deprivation. So a lot of the addiction is the inability to be connected or to be loved because you've had such trauma or some exposure or abandonment. And so therefore, it's very hard to be, you know, in relationship, be it sexual or otherwise, at an intimate level. And since I'm talking about this, I always want to. My favorite definition of intimacy is. Intimacy is a mutual exploration of a shared safe place. Abuse is anything that takes away the safe place. And addictions are what we do to make ourselves feel good when we don't have a safe place. So if someone doesn't feel safe in the world, they're going to look for a way to scratch the itch. It could be work, it could be gambling, it could be food. It could be sex. It could be a variety of things. So the reason I'm saying all of that is that it took me so many years and so much therapy and so much work to start esteeming myself. Because even when I knew that I was damaging and destroying my life, I was conscious of it. I still didn't have the ability to resource myself to stop. And the difficult thing, it's really hard to take care of and come to your own assistance when you don't even like yourself, when you view yourself as, like, a worthless piece of shit or you view yourself as a loser. And all of the things that were just hammered into my head by people that abused me and by upbringing and all kinds of stuff. So it took a tremendous amount of work. And I'm sitting there thinking, you know, if I would have known what we're talking about, then I think it would have dramatically changed the way I interacted with my identity, the way I interpreted my worldview, the way I thought of myself. And I think I would try to borrow from people I admired or people I respected or superheroes. But I never. You've actually really created a methodology about this and teach people really what to do and kind of how to do it. So how have you seen this work with people that they're. I don't know if you've ever worked with people with the alter ego, with addiction or.

Yeah, I can't say that I've explicitly worked with people with addiction because typically if someone came to me and they said that that was their thing again, I'm trying to stay in my lane. Right. And even when sometimes people are coming to you, you know, there's a veneer around that you don't know how much pain or just how close they are to an edge as well. And I want to make sure that I handle that stuff with like the proper, you know, kit gloves that need to be there. Having said all that though, because the book then being out there, it's an accessible thing and I think it's one of the, the, the great myths of whether it's personal development world or something, that people will only come to personal development when they, you know, kind of get past some of the really desperate dark times. And that hasn't been fulfilled with my book. I've seen. There's been a lot of DMs that I get on Instagram, especially from people that were either suicidal and they just heard my story about whether it was trauma or whatever, and they said, well, a thank you so much for just sharing that. It's why I like you sharing it. When someone can actually see a model of someone that they might look up to that's actually a, a male that looks like we do, whether it's middle aged or whatever and appearing healthy. And you're talking about the abuse that you had when you were a kid. Right. It's just that shame that's been out there for a long time. And I think that's one of the, the great things that's happened in the last five years is more people kind of coming out and just openly saying like, hey, this happened to me and I'm not a horrible person and you don't have to judge me for it because that's how I think about it. But the, the DMS that I've had from people is saying like, I was, I was desperate and I was looking for anything because I've tried it all. And just this one idea of thinking that I could, like, maybe I could disassociate from this self that I describe myself as. And even if it's for 20 minutes of the day, I could pretend to be someone else because that's the other thing people try to catch me with. Like, oh, is this just pretending? And I'm like, yeah, so what if it is? Like, what if you approached me and you pretended for that interaction, Joe, to be a really kind person? And then I walk away and I have this experience of You. Because that's my only experience of you. I'm a Starbucks person, or whoever it is, and I have. I feel good about that interaction. I'm okay with that. Like I personally am. Now, if someone. Because you and I both know this, we do know some people that put on a massive facade for the world, and behind the scenes are some of the most nefarious, you know, crooks that are out there. Well, that's the whole. Fake it till you make it and keep on faking it right for the world. That's not something that I'm advocating for, because even in the book, in chapter three, I talk about what creates a trapped self versus a heroic self. And people can really read through that distinction about why this approach ends up creating this more heroic feeling of who you are, because you're deciding how you want to show up in that. Like, it makes me feel at the end of a day when I lay my head on the pillow at night when I was with my kids and I said, yes, I nailed how I want to be as a father tonight. I nailed it. Let's do it again tomorrow. Let's do it again tomorrow. So people have reached out, and they have gotten great wins. And what I encourage those people to do is you don't even need to worry about doing steps number 1, 2, 3, 4. Find a uniform that represents an artifact. It could be, whether it's the Five Steps bracelet or, like, whatever's out there, and the moment you feel yourself slipping, take it off. You can't wear that. Because I talk about the importance of, like, you know, shifting in that moment. And, like, so if I'm. If Super Richard was here and he started being articulate and confident in himself, okay, well, I can't wear the glasses because that's simply dishonoring the memory of Joseph Campbell, Superman, and Benjamin Franklin. That's a part of my method. People talk about alter egos, but then I have my method. And part of my method is making sure that whoever you're using as your source code of inspiration, we as human beings understand the importance of honoring, whether it's our family heritage or something, whatever's meaningful to you. That's why I can't sell an alter ego off of a shelf, because I need you to resonate with it. It needs to be meaningful for you. And so you make that state change, and then you can put those glasses back on or you can put that bracelet back on. And just for someone who's in addiction, having that little act, that's just like, a state Change for them of taking it off, taking a breath. Let's just, let's. Let's get through the next 15 minutes because I know what that's like for people. And Joe, like, we've got a story that's going to be coming out soon. Lady came up to me at my book signing at the Traffic and Conversion Summit back in 2019, and she just heard me on podcasts and then started skimming through the chapter one that I was giving away before my book even came out. She had a nephew who was severely autistic, Nonverbal. He was 5 years old, never spoken before, but she knew that he liked superheroes. So they got him a Spider man outfit and got on the Spider man outfit, put it on, and he started talking. Wow. They built out his entire bedroom to be Spider Man's lair. And that's where he does all of his schoolwork. He's 10 years old now. It's been five years since then. And he is now going to regular school. All because he changed how he associated with themselves. Now. He used to have to go wearing the Spider man costume. Now he doesn't need to do that anymore. He became the person he wanted to become. He evolved. He also. This is the other thing I talk about in the book, is naming the enemy. So, you know, Asperger's, autism, whatever, there can be things that can be very triggering for them. And his is the Hulk. He comes out now, he has a useful frame that he can give to his mom and his aunt because they live together. Is the Hulk is here today. And so they know what to do. No music in the car, because the music in the car triggers the Hulk. And so he's like, I'll keep the green guy. I'll keep the green guy down today. Like, I mean, I get. That's probably one of my favorite stories because I'm like, that is a 10 year old kid. And that wasn't who my target market was with my. With my book. But I just know that this concept has made a massive impact in my own life, in the lives of my clients, in the history that I've other people's characters. Because I didn't build Sasha Fierce, right? Like, I'm not claiming that one. I didn't claim Distinguished Self, you know, and the thousands and thousands of other incredible alter egos that are out there. But I know that when the concept is introduced to kids and others, they get it naturally because they're still really close to that creative imagination. And I mean, if I can light a few sparks in the 25 million people that are gonna watch this episode, then that's at least 25 million. Yeah. You never know.

Yeah. No, you're right. Well, here's the thing. When I first read the book, what I started looking at is the environment. I started taking environment more seriously, where I can actually set up a focus environment. I can set up a conducive environment. I mean, even my office here, I want it to be, you know, one of the things I teach people is easy, lucrative and fun. I know it feels elf when someone comes here. People say that all the time. I have sayings on the wall.

I have gaping void images, cartoons everywhere, you know, radical art, you know. Yeah.

And so I, I want it to evoke, you know, the Timothy Leary was the one that said it in the, in the 50s, you know, set and setting, you know, which a lot of people talk about with plant medicine journeys and stuff, which is true. You know, it is the mindset and it's the setting and there's a lot of things. You know, my friend, the copywriter, John Carlton, you know, I wrote the forward to John's book and he, you know, he has his copywriting hat. So when he needs to sit down and be a badass copywriter, he puts on the hat and he enters that. You know, my buddy Steven Pressfield does similar things.

Yeah.

You know, he's a great writer who's written.

If people see the videos that I, you know, do from my lair behind me over my. It'll be on the left hand side of your screen. Over my right shoulder is a working replica of Darth Vader's helmet. And I said to you, I've said to people all the time, my businesses need marketing, but I'm not. I don't identify as a marketer, but I need to write stuff for my team. Otherwise they yell at me in Slack and elsewhere about, you know, slowing down projects. And I put on Darth Vader's helmet full on. Changes my voice, everything when I'm. When I'm going to write marketing copy stuff. Wow. Because it's a. It's really hard to take yourself seriously. So I talk about removing the ego. Take yourself seriously when you're wearing Darth Vader's helmet. And also I just like to think that the guy sitting in the circular orb in the universe probably doesn't give two shits about whether or not someone likes his marketing copy too much. So it helps me transmute the energy that's within out and onto the page so that my team can continue to move projects along.

That's great.

And do I wear it for the entire 45 minutes? An hour? No, it's for about 15 minutes just to get me into the groove, and then I pop off the helmet or.

Whatever, and then boom.

But it's not there behind me. To anyone who's known, knows those videos that are there. It's not there behind me for prop. No, it's. It's being used.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's great. Well, you know, I, I mean, I, I, I say all the time and to myself and others is it's a lot easier to maintain momentum than it is to create it. And I think you, you come up with a way to create momentum.

Right.

You did. So you told me a story yesterday. We got, we got to share this.

We're going to end this way.

Well, we could. Or we can add.

Okay. Well, yeah.

So. So you, you were telling me about you had bought one of my marketing programs that I recorded at this stage almost 20 years ago.

Yeah.

And you applied it, and I was like, that's. You told me this whole story. I was like, this is so great. And it's a very tactical strategy that anyone could use to this day, but I love when people. And I had no idea, you know.

You had, you had a program that was for carpet cleaners, and I had purchased it. Didn't have a carpet cleaning company.

Yeah, the Nightingale Conant one.

Well, I bought that one, too. But you had another one.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah. So I bought Piranha Marketing, which is the Nightingale Conant one. But I had this other, you know, your carpet cleaning one.

Right.

And you talked in there about something that I didn't heard before, which is like lumpy mail. And it's not like you invented it, now that I know that, but it's like you're the first person I heard from. So here I am. I've got this fledgling little peak performance business, but I wanted to start working with pro athletes more. I now had a mentor, Harvey Dorfman, who wrote the book Coaching the Mental Game. It's like the bible of the mental game industry. He's known as the Yoda of baseball. Every great major league baseball player in the 80s, 90s and early 2000s points to Harvey as the guru of the mind. And I called outreach to him and managed to talk my way into spending 33 days with him at his home in North Carolina. I didn't stay with him because when he called me back, when I left this long voicemail for him, he's like, all right, kid, you don't want to live with me, do you? And I was like, no, no, no, no, no. I just. I want to come and help you, like, clean up your office or tidy up your paperwork or help you do research. I'm sure you've got another book you want to write and stuff. And so he said yes. So during the baseball off season, I went down in January of 2001 to spend with him. And he started funneling me clients after that, which was amazing of him to do that. He called me a peer, which I wasn't. But I got to sit on. On the number one mental game guy in the world, working with the greatest baseball players because they would do. They would always come and do an annual pilgrimage down one by one. He would spend a one day VIP day, basically with people. He didn't call it that. And I was, you know, so Roy Halliday, Craig bio, Andy Pettit, like the biggest names. And he let me sit on these sessions. So you talk about early in your career, if you could see, like, the number one guy working with. And I was like, you talk about taking your skill development to a completely different level. Like, I was like, oh, wait. All these things that I thought these pro athletes would have been worried about, broken. 80% of their issues are off the field stuff. It's relationships, it's managing, you know, family and all these other things because it's infiltrating their performance on the field. So, mental note, anyways, I come back and I want to grow this thing. And Harvey infuses me with a lot more confidence. And I pick up your marketing thing. All right, so lumpy mail, this is interesting. So I go to Canadian Tire, which is like Walmart in Canada, and I buy 14 hockey pucks. And I was gonna. I bought a hacksaw as well, went home, cut all the hockey pucks in half, and now I had 28. And I'm gonna mail out a letter to all of the teams in the Western Conference, 14 of them, and now I have 28. So I'm going to send one to the general manager of the team and the head coach. And I wrote this letter. It had a very classy photo of me arms folded into black. I had a black linen shirt on, short sleeved, leaning up against a tree. And the headline said, just like you can't play hockey with half a puck. You can't develop a complete player without the mental game. And then, hi, I'm Todd Herman. And it was like a sales letter, right? And it would have been terribly written. I think I still have it in my old Dropbox account. I should probably dig it up and send it to you.

Oh, I want to see this.

Yeah. And so there was a spot in the upper right hand corner. I got some cement glue and I put it on the back of the puck and I shoved it in that corner. So the half hockey puck was up in the upper right hand corner. And so actually I didn't tell you this, so I glued it onto the page. That's what I did. And then I went to mailboxes store and I mailed them out via FedEx overnight. And that cost me $967.36. I'll never forget because I only had a thousand dollar limit on my Scotiabank credit card because don't forget everyone. I was charging 75 bucks for a package of three sessions. I was not making a lot, but I had a lot of clients. I was busy and I was getting good and so I didn't expect people to call me back. So I waited another day. So two days later I was like, let me just start on the west coast and start calling people. So I start calling the Vancouver Canucks. Dave Nonis is the GM there and the head coach was Mark Crawford at the time. So I call and I said, hi, is Dave there? And the lady who answered, she's like, yeah, can I let him know he's calling? And in my head I'm like, holy shit. Like she actually is going to put me through. All right, it's, it's, it's Todd Herman calling. She's like, you're the half hockey puck guy. Hey, Dave, the half hockey puck guy's on the line and I hear him just faintly through the telephone line. Put him through. Oh my God. So she puts me through. He puts me on speakerphone and there's the coaching staff in there and the assistant gm and he's like, half hockey puck guy. That's the funniest letter anyone's ever sent. And it deflated me because I thought, mental game guy. Like I had some good content in there. I thought, and here they're making fun of me and laughing. And I was like, well, I wasn't really sending it to be the funniest letter. It was there to get your attention because I believe in the mental game stuff. And he's like, no, that's great. It's like, where'd you come up with this idea? And I was like, this Joe Polish guy told me how, but I was like, well, I'm just Grabbing, grasping at straws. You got to try and open a door somehow. And he said, anyways, long story short, he said, listen, we're working with a guy already, Saul Miller. And Saul Miller wrote a brilliant book called Hockey Tough. He's a legend in the hockey world. And he's from Vancouver, so he's like, you know, Saul Miller is our kind of mental game guy on the staff. But I know some people don't always resonate with the different, you know, support staff that we have. So I'll connect you with a few of the agents. And so that's what he did, connecting me with a few of the agents. And then through the agents, I started getting my. My first athletes in the NHL. Now I made the mistake, though, Joe, don't do what I did. Got momentum, and I didn't call the rest of this fucking teams in the NHL. Like, I had a great first call, right. And I didn't call everyone else.

That is.

So I stymied myself. But anyways, that was the, you know, it's. It's. That's what started. It was, you know, the lumpy mail thing, the half hockey puck thing, and.

Yeah, well, you know, here's the thing, too. And I would often tell my carpet upholstery cleaners, they would want to get, you know, commercial jobs, and they would be placing bids, and they were going through the normal channels that everyone would try to get in, and they're not. Most of the time, they're not talking to anyone. And so I said, well, first off, you know, people don't do business with a company. They do business with an individual. Even if the person is a big brand or the company is a big brand, you have to reach the individual. So one of the. I had many different things that I would teach, but one that I would tell this to, you know, 200 people, and you'd be lucky if one or two of them actually did it. But the ones that did it always got results. And what I would say is, you know, go out and get a pair of shoes, you know, like Nike or back. Back then, Reeboks were big. And I would say, you know, spend, you know, anywhere from 80 to 100 bucks.

Yeah.

And again, we're talking. This is going back to the mid-90s when I first started teaching this. Yeah. So. And then what you do is, I would say you. You have. You take one of the shoes, but what you do is you call and find out if you can attach it to an anniversary or holiday. Great. If not, just say, yeah, I want to send Mr. And Mrs. Bigwig something and I need to get their shoe size. So you get the assistant or the person on their side like we're going to send them a gift and so. And then you send it via uniform courier so they have to sign for it so it gets through. And you would send one shoe with a letter that said, you know, dear Mr. And Mrs. Bigwig, I've, you know, something valuable I want to share with you. I needed a way to get my foot in the door, so I figured I would send you a shoe. If you have any availability next Tuesday or Thursday at this time, I'd like to talk to you. I'll show up and I'll bring the other shoe. And you just send one shoe. And if you send 10 of those, you may get calls from two or three people, but they're going to call because the one thing that would happen all the time is they're like, no one in my company is this creative. Where the same thing you said, where'd you get this idea?

Yeah.

And if you follow up and say, yeah, you know, I sent you shoe, I want to send you the other shoe and they want the other shoe. It doesn't matter.

Yeah.

And I've had so many cleaners that would land, you know, ten thousand, twenty thousand dollar contract cleaning jobs by sending a freaking pair of shoes.

Yeah.

Where they have tried for years to get into some of these accounts.

Yeah.

And I would have them send coffee, all kinds of stuff.

So on that, sorry to stop you, but I did the same thing when I wanted to get this opportunity with Intuit. So Intuit's head office was also in my, they had their U.S. division, but then they, they bought a QuickBooks, which was a company in Canada originally. Yeah. And. Or Quicken, Quick Tax, one of the two. Anyways, they brought, I think both. Yeah, yeah. Bruce was the CEO and the founder up there and I wanted to get in for this one opportunity. And so I knew I wasn't though because I'm not a college graduate. And in their thing they said you have to be a college graduate. So I went to a buddies of mine clearance toy store that he had and I bought this plush fish, very bright, like in this kind of nice box, but there's a blue, and it had orange fins on it and like neon. And I wrote a letter on the front of it, hand wrote it and I stuffed my CV in it for the opportunity. And it was on the note though, I kind of stabbed it into the fish and it said just Like a fish out of water. I. I can't wait for you to. I can't wait for the opportunity to. To talk with you about this incredible opportunity. Whatever. So anyways, I knew that through my research that Bruce would show up early and walk through the mail room because I had a friend who worked there, and he's the CEO of the company. So I dropped it off right before closing time at their front desk so that it would be in the mail room the next day for their HR director, because that's who it was going to. And I followed up the next day, and he's like, no. He's like, we. You need a. See, you need a resume, kid. But Bruce walked through, saw the fish, and called down to the president of HR and said, whoever sent that thing, get them in here immediately because we need people like that inside this company. And that's how I got the gig. I actually won it. I got it.

Yeah, there you go.

Yeah, just creative thought processes.

Look, so. So the point in how that all ties together is, you know, marketing is important. Presenting yourself is important. If you've got the goods and you've got something to share, then you. You know, there's this sugar packet that I saw in a, like, cafe, small town, kind of like, you know, those. What do you call them? Trading post sort of places.

Yeah.

And it said, advertising was the caption. And it said. And I remember this in memory because it's so my brain remembers quotes and dirty jokes. So it said, he who has something to sell and whispers in a well is not as apt to make the shiny dollar as the guy that climbs a tree and hollers. And I was like that. So that was one of the things that you got to go out and tell people who it is you are. And if you're afraid, if you're scared, if you're worried, worried. Hence the alter ego effect. Right. So the fact is, you just demonstrate how you have gotten ahead and how you've used this methodology. So in order for someone to best utilize, obviously read the book the Alter Ego Effect. How do they follow you or find more from you? So they can.

Todherman me is my home base on the Internet, so, like, all the different worlds that I operate in can be found there. And then, you know, it's great if people, you know, whether they take a screenshot of our conversation and they tag us or tag me on social media, tag us both, hopefully. And I'm typically ToddHerman on, you know, Twitter and Instagram as well, and, you know, reach out. I mean, I love getting, you know, if there's some great takeaway that you got or if most likely what happens, someone says, you know, I've actually been doing something like this. I never thought of it this way, but I was, I've been doing something similar to this, and now it's just you've given me a name to this or a framework to it so that maybe you can do it more intentionally and have more power behind it. So, yeah, that's where they can find me. Awesome.

Yeah. And do get a copy of it. And it is a really valuable and a really useful book. And I think it'll be a perspective that, I mean, we just touched on some of it today, but when you read through the book, it'll make a lot of sense. And if you do deal with imposter syndrome, all of us have an identity. And if you want a way to improve how you engage with your own reality, as crazy as that sounds, if that makes any sense, I think if you read the book, it will be valuable to you. And there's probably people in your life that would be well served to watch this interview or listen to it or read the book. So as always, Todd, it's great hanging out with you. You're an awesome dude.

Thanks.

Appreciate it. And thank you.

Cheers.

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