Shift Your Limiting Beliefs with Mandy Evill

Hello.

So my guest today has been working in the self-development world for over 20 years. She now teaches people how to shift their limiting beliefs and create success in any area of their life with a simple process of mindset. Success and achievement is a system, not hard work. Uh, welcome to the show, Mandy Aville.

Well, thank you very much. It's great to be here, John. Um, yeah, thank you.

You're very welcome. Um, pleasure to have you. That was obviously a very brief introduction to yourself. If you could tell the listeners a bit more about yourself, what you do and how you help.

I sure can. So yeah, absolutely. I've been around personal development for over 20 years and I started off really because my life was in a mess. I mean, it's pretty much like most people, most coaches and mentors out there, um, have been through the, been through the mill and that's why we teach and support, you know, that's just how it was 20-odd years ago. And, um, I started my journey then, um, really going through quite a few different modalities like NLP and hypnotherapy and cognitive behavioral coaching and, uh, turned my life around, turned my relationships around, turned everything around totally. But it was interesting because I actually still ended up about 15 years later getting stuck. Which didn't figure. It's like I was very successful. I've got my own business. It was very successful, but I still knew I could do more. I still knew, you know, like often people, you get that feeling that it's like, I know I can do more than this and have more than this.

Yeah.

Um, and so I kind of got stuck, which didn't make sense to me because, um, yeah, I'd just done a lot of, a lot of personal development and, um, I got so stuck. I kind of really fell into the trap that a lot of people fall in, which is trying harder. So I tried harder and harder and harder, and in the end I burnt out. So it— because trying harder is never sustainable. I burnt out.

You always do more.

Yeah, you know, it— and, you know, and it's such a trap that, that people fall into. Um, and so I quit my business. I closed it down and said, enough's enough. I can't do this. And for a little while I wasn't quite sure what to do. And then I came across my mentor that was my mentor until he passed last year. In fact, he passed a year ago today, bless him, which is Bob Proctor.

Okay.

Yeah. And I was very fortunate to be able to work literally side by side with him and teach his material. For me, it was the missing jigsaw piece. I really got to understand why I'd achieved so much in the first place, which I didn't really understand. I thought it was just by luck kind of thing.

Okay.

Um, and then really understood how my mind works and it, everything is, you know, comes from how we think and what our beliefs are. So, um, understood it and now I teach it and that's exactly what I do and I love it.

Can you, before we come back to that, I want to try and understand a little bit more about you there with that thing about getting stuck. So if you don't mind, I'd like to come back to that. But what do you do now then to help people in their lives? What kind of things do you do to help them? Like you said, you've learned this to help yourself. What kind of things do you pass on to others?

Okay. So I, I, um, I mentor people through a very specific program. Um, and it's based on Bob's work. It's actually Bob's work. Um, and it's a 6-month program, which really begins to bridge the gap between where people are and where they want to be. Because there's always a gap there, you know, it's like, I'm here, but I want to be there. So why aren't I there? And how do I get there? Even though here is usually an okay place, but We usually feel it's not. It's, it's like if we're not happy with something externally in our life, we want to be over there. And the process, it's just a process because I think in the introduction we said, you know, it's a system. It's not hard work. It doesn't have to be hard work. And that's why I say it's a system. Then that's what I did. That's what I do. We take people through understanding where they want to go. That's the first thing. Because if you don't know where you want to go, how the hell are you ever going to get there?

Yeah.

Okay. And, and I, I'm shocked at how many people that I speak to that don't know where they want to go. They know what they don't want, but they actually don't know what they do want.

Yeah, exactly. I work a lot like that with my clients with the relationship stuff. They say they know a lot about what they don't want in a relationship. Yeah, but I'd say 90% of them don't really consider what they do want.

Exactly. And then what happens then is that if they know what they don't want, that people start to focus on what they don't want. And then when you're focusing on what you don't want, you begin to create more of what you don't want, because wherever we put our So, um, yeah, it's really important to know what you want. And we, it's like I said, it's a, it's a process of, um, understanding how our mind works. Because I think if we understand how our mind works and it's not complicated, really isn't complicated, then we can have some control over how we use our mind, you know? And it's something, uh, John, that we're never taught at schools.

You know, we're just never taught about it.

Not taught about it. I'm not sure if we're taught about it.

We're not, you know, we're not.

I saw a great post on, on, um, Facebook today which said, why was I taught algebra at, uh, at school when actually that doesn't help me with my tax returns?

Yeah.

It's like, you know, we're not, we're not taught how to be, like you say, we're not taught how to be effective humans, you know, outside of the morals and the values and all of that, you know, how do we Effectively use ourselves, use the inner resources and the inner gifts, I like to call them, that we have innately in us. How do we bring those, more of that to the surface to be a really effective human being? Yeah. And we need to understand how our mind works. The mind, in my world, our mind is the, is the beginning of that, is, is, is where it all stems from.

So how do you, how do you do that with a geek? Because you say like it's easy kind of to understand yourself.

Yep.

I, I've, I've, within the work that I do, it's, it's about exactly the same thing. It's understanding how you've got yourself into the relationship space you've got yourself into, which means that your relationships aren't great.

Yeah.

Well, that's a really kind of, it can be quite an in-depth process to kind of understand what's happened in the past and how your brain's kind of perceived all of that information and made up the mechanisms in which we use now to, to function in the relationships that we've got.

Yeah.

How do you sort of look at it from your point of view with what you do to help people to understand themselves in that way?

So the first thing to understand is, is to understand is that we have a mind and that mind that we are able to use. And when we understand it, we can use it better. Um, but we need to accept, I mean, the first thing is as well is accepting that, um, new ideas, because we can become very conditioned. We become very conditioned in how we think, we become very conditioned in our behavior, and it becomes very much automatic. I think it's, you know, if you look at some studies, it's between 95% and 98% of our behavior in any one day. It's just automatic pilot. So this conditioning that we have, um, it's, it's teaching people how to become aware of that. So showing people some tools and understanding of seeing where they're, where they're just conditioning, they're just reacting rather than responding.

Right.

And our mind is, is fairly, you know, when I teach them this material, It's, I teach it very basic that, you know, there's just 2 parts of our mind. We have, you know, I'm sure psychologists will say there's a whole bunch of parts of our mind, but I teach there's 2 parts of our mind, a conscious and a subconscious. And the conscious has, is very discerning. It can discern, it can accept, it can reject. And our subconscious will always take anything that our conscious puts into it. Um, and so it's not discerning. So when you begin to have that realization, it's like, okay, so I've got a bunch of stuff in my, my subconscious mind, which is part of my conditioning.

Yeah.

And I'm still putting stuff in it that reinforces. And I think just as you said, with relationships reinforcing that, and therefore we can see in different areas of our life and relationships, a beautiful one, how we can, uh, money is another great one. Okay, how we can go round in cycles. And it's like, why has this happened? Because this happened to me 2 years ago and now it's happening again. And in fact, when, if people look back, there's, I call it a vicious circle, that there are cycles that we just keep going and going round and round. Because on a, on an unconscious level, we don't do it consciously, but on an unconscious level, we want to kind of prove ourselves right.

Hmm.

Whatever that belief is that, oh, I've paradigms. We want to prove it. The paradigm wants to prove itself right. So we attract vibrationally everything that's going to match that. And, um, that's the, that's the condition and that's what we need to escape. And that's the information that I didn't get in 15 years of personal development. And that's what's changed my whole, uh, life around.

Yeah, that's a really interesting point. You know, a couple of points you made there, like where your energy kind of Your energy goes to where you focus, right? So if you're focusing on everything that you're trying to avoid, you just keep finding everything you're trying to avoid. And then that, that thing about the truths, I like, I like to sort of think of it that your brain has its own set of truths. So these beliefs that it believes are real and that's their truth.

Yeah.

That's your truth. And if your truths don't exist, you then try and create your truths. And if you've got a, a negative set of limiting beliefs or a negative core belief, then you're gonna keep manifesting the, the truth that reminds you of all the things that are you're never going to get, or you can't have, or how you see yourself, or what relationships are like, what your money beliefs might be. And you're just going to keep finding yourself in the same spaces all the time.

That's 100%. That's the vicious circle. That's 100%. Because fundamentally, those truths, we do believe them as true. You know, I say we believe them as truths. They're, they're as real as, you know, the pen in my hand and the microphone we're talking into. They, we consider them to be that real, but actually they're, they're more illusional, but they're not. They're not illusional. We don't feel that they are.

No.

Um, so, so we feel like they're facts and they're real. Um, so yeah, I absolutely, yet at the very beginning, we didn't put those, we didn't, you know, as babies, if you think about babies, babies are born with their consciousness wide open. We know that, okay, that their consciousness is wider. They don't have a cognitive mind up until around about between 5 and 7, around about 7. I think it's, it's, it's considered that a child is, is then pretty much as cognitive that still They still get more cognitive, but they've got that cognitive mind at that point. So, uh, so babies, when they're born, they're, they're like a sponge.

Yeah.

You know, they're wide open and everything is going into their subconscious. So whatever's said to them from parents, carers, siblings, community, it's all going into their subconscious mind. But the thing about it is there's no, uh, level of being able to spit it back out. That's not useful. I don't want that. But the other thing, John, I think is really important is vibrationally, because we are vibrational beings. So vibrationally it comes into babies. And then before you know it, we have an identity that we think that this is who we are. This is what the reality is. You know, again, with relationships, you know, um, because you've experienced maybe some abuse between parents or whatever, that women are weak or men are strong or men are abusers or whatever it is, not cognitively, nothing's cognitive at that time, but whatever it is, I mean, they're very stereotypical, but Whatever it is that we've absorbed as children, we start to, uh, as you said quite rightly, we start to, because it's vibrational in us, we start to attract those things to us and experience to us that we will confirm it.

Mm-hmm.

And every time we confirm it and we validate it, it becomes stronger and stronger and stronger. And I sort of refer to them like they're the real anchors that are Holding us to the seabed. You know, we might have a goal over there that we want to go to, but actually you're anchored to the seabed and we've got to cut that off in order to be able to go to the port that you want to, as a, as an analogy. So yeah.

Yeah, definitely. I agree. It's something that can really keep us, like you said, anchored to these old ways of thinking, old ways of believing, and keep us stuck in that same spot all over and over again.

I was just going to say that because, you know, it's It goes beyond the thoughts and the beliefs because again, I was never aware of this. I didn't realize this, that actually how we, what we believe, these paradigms and our belief system actually control our body. They control our habitual behaviors. So, so it's like, I always used to think, no, no, no, no, I know what I'm doing. You know, I know what I'm doing. It's like, we don't, you know, most of the time we're going on like with a screen over us because it's our subconscious that is really in the driving seat of our behaviors and our actions, as well as feeding the thoughts for us as well. So sorry.

That's fine. It's like, it's that, it's really being conscious then, isn't it? And bringing all, really living in a conscious way.

I think the more, um, awareness that, you know, there's no end to awareness. There is no end to it. It's not like, oh, I'm suddenly aware now everything's, you know, Everything's better. I've got that. I've got the. I've got this now. You know, I've got the hang of it because awareness is forever expanding. So just like we're forever expanding, universe is forever expanding. We're part of a one unit. Okay. So we awareness is always expanding. You know, our awareness has expanded from today from from yesterday. So it's an ever evolving and seeing and being aware of of how we are because we've always limited. We'll always be limited. We're although. You know, fundamentally, however you, you know, you or your listeners might look at it, we, there's a something inside us, which would you call whatever, whatever, whatever you want to call it, spirit, source, whatever, universe, that doesn't matter what name you give it, but that is within us and is always looking for further expression. So it's always expanding. So we're, because we're not in isolation in this universe and on this planet. So it's, we're always looking to expand and that's so exciting. I love that. I love to think that tomorrow I could understand something greater than I do today because I just, I just find that an adventure. I really do.

I think, yeah, I mean, I've had many discussions about this in the past about how we as humans have this. I mean, we wouldn't be in the space that we were, that we are now as human beings if we hadn't needed that expansion, if we didn't need to move and we didn't need to create and we didn't need to do all the things That purposefully drive us forwards.

Yeah.

But again, when we're, we're looking at people that, and I want to come back to your getting stuck bit now.

Yeah.

Yeah. So when we get stuck, it's, it's when we're not looking forwards. It's not, we're not looking purposefully. We're not looking to expand ourselves. We're not looking for something else. And when we get stuck in that space where we are just maybe lost a little bit in our own minds and we are not able to to live in that conscious way, to express ourselves in the way we want to. Did you think something like that might have happened when you got stuck? Because it's interesting, you said that it was when you started working with a proctor that you started to recognize how you can shift your paradigms.

Yeah.

Um, but you were doing so well and then all of a sudden you just needed to stop.

Yep. Well, interestingly, how I like to explain it is if people, people do get stuck and it's because People say, I'm stuck. You know, people say either I don't know or I'm stuck, you know, and yet we're never stuck and we always know. Okay. But that's the most common answer. I don't know, or I'm stuck. Um, and that stuckness is, um, can manifest for myself. I was so frustrated. I just got frustrated that there's an, like I say, there's an innate feeling. for most of us to know that we want more. There is more. We— I, I can be more, you know. I, I suppose, um, and I think it's in everybody, but I think we turn different ways. I think there's different ways that we turn as human beings.

Right.

For example, like there's addictions. I think, you know, I think we get addicted to being stuck because it's a pattern. It becomes a pattern and we can get addicted to an external stimuli that we think will help us out. You know, whether that's, you know, maybe excessive, sometimes excessive exercise or maybe shopping or something that can be like, I get some pleasure out of this, or, but although it's just short-lived because that's an addiction.

Mm-hmm.

So we try to ex— and we try to express Who we are, but it's not always healthy and it's not always, doesn't always end up where we want to be, but we then become, we settle for it. You know, it's, it's interesting. There's a lot of people out there. It's like, um, names are eluding me right now, but I'll come to them. Would be saying that we, um, we settle for second best because we then, we know what we're dealing with. So people can be unhappy. You could like just in relationships or with money, just those 2 things are probably the most significant things for people, maybe career as well, or business, right? But we settle because we are almost addicted to the pain of the settling because it's familiar. So we stay there and we stay there and we stay there.

Yeah.

Even though we don't want to be there, even though we don't like it. How many people overeat even though they want to be losing weight? You know, it's, it's so addictive. And those, those little intricacies, if you, if you like, of how we operate with our mind and our behavior, there are solutions out there for that. There really are solutions out there for, and I, and I believe that one of them is to understand yourself more. And when you can understand yourself more and understand how you, you might not need to know how you got it there in the first place, but actually. You wanna make a new model. That's what I, that's what Bob always taught me. He said, you know, if make the old model obsolete and just make a new model, right? You know, that's all you need to do. So, yeah.

I guess you just now have to have that awareness that you are stuck in the old model, don't you?

You do. And, and, and, and if you, you've gotta know you're in prison. That's the first thing.

Yeah. I guess you also need to have that. Uh, within you to say, okay, now I've, I'm, I need to change this. I go, well, that, that's kind of what hit me about relationships. You, when you talk about addictions, I was addicted to brand new relationships. So I was like a serial monogamist. I would go from one person to the next person to try and get my fix, to get my hit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Of that new feeling of the possibility of a relationship and what it all could be. And I could lose myself in that space for a certain amount of time. And then something in my brain would shut me off and I go, okay, this is enough now. And you need to go and find something else to And again, to get this hit. And then it got me to a point where I thought, actually, I'm not going to do this anymore. And I needed to sit and sit with that space and go, what am I doing? Because this is just one catastrophe after another. And I know that I'm playing a substantial role in all of this. And I need this to stop. What do you do when you don't, if you just keep going there and you don't realize that you need to stop?

Well, some people never know. Some people never make it. Some people never get to that point. And I feel very blessed and thank you, very, very grateful that I, that I had a certain amount of awareness to say enough's enough. Okay. And then see the opportunity because that's the other thing. You might not have said enough's enough, but the opportunity to see that might arise. And in fact, it probably comes to you many times.

Hundreds of times, probably. Yeah.

Probably. But you're never, you just don't see it because you're not in that frequency. But then maybe just one time. time when you've just peeked into that frequency and there's this opportunity and it's like, that's it, that's where I'm going. And, and on that basis, like, enough is enough, you know, I'm done. I was, I was talking to, um, somebody in fact this week, and that's exactly where they were, you know. They had done a lot of introspection, they'd done a lot of, a lot of things, and they weren't operating Where they wanted to be, and that's what they said. I'm done. It's like right, great stuff. Let let now we can work. Now you're open to learn some new ideas and new ways of doing things, and willing to take a different route because that's one of the other things that I that I find, John, is that a lot of everyone's able to make a shift and a change. Everyone everyone is able to, and but not everybody is willing. You know consciously everyone says yeah, of course I'll do it. Of course I'll I'll do whatever you tell me to do. I just don't want this anymore, you know.

Yeah.

But actually it went back to actually I'm addicted to my comfort zone. I'm addicted to the way I always do things. And actually when there's, there's the presentation of doing something very different, like opposite to what you might do previously, it's like, whoa, I'll do everything, but I'm not gonna do that because it feels threatening to the very core. And, and it, it's scary. It can be Very much so.

Yeah. It's one of the things I cover in my coaching program, which is resistance.

Yeah.

When we hit that point where we're all ready to go and we're doing these things to try and make ourselves feel better and create the life that we're looking for. And then all of a sudden our brain says, I don't want to do this anymore.

No, thank you.

I want to go back to what I know because like you said, it's that comfort zone that we get so familiar with that our brain loves to stay in.

It's very, um, What's the word? Luring. It's very, very, very luring. It's, you know, it really is the, uh, it's very sneaky and it sneaks up on us. You know, I can sometimes for myself, you know, you know, um, I'm always learning, always, always learning. I've, I haven't got it sussed at all, you know. Um, so I'm sometimes, you know, cheerfully going along and then, and then it's a Napoleon, in one of Napoleon Hill's books, in fact, Think and Grow, um, no, Outwitting the Devil. He talks about drift and how we drift.

Mm-hmm.

Okay, and sometimes it's like I'm going along and da da da, and and suddenly I'm thinking, hang on a minute, Mandy. You know, when's the last time you got uncomfortable? You know, like hang on a minute. You say you know, and it's like walk your talk. It's like ah okay. I've shrunk back into an older version of myself, if you like. So this again, that's one of the things that that I show people how to create that newer version of yourself. So something I'm always doing, and uh. You know, going along and then sometimes people, we shrink back, we just shrink back again. So it's, um, it's very sneaky. It's very sneaky. It sneaks up on you. It's like, whoa, I need to take the, take the risks again and put myself out there again and become vulnerable and go further again. And it's, and it's, yeah. And it's like that.

Yeah, it is. It's about, like you said, that awareness that what you're doing to yourself and how you are interacting with yourself and how that's now manifesting in your life.

Absolutely. Wasn't that a great thing? I love that. How you're interacting with, that's just beautiful. That is how you're interacting with yourself. And given, of course, you're a relationship coach. So, hey, you know, you've got to be, if you're not interacting, if you haven't got the great relationship with yourself, how the hell are you going to go out there and have great relationships with other people? Yeah. So, and, and, and you know what, it's really, you know, one of the things that, um, you know, I do a lot of, um, coaching, uh, not just the program that I do, but I do other coaching. Um, you know, I do weekly coaching, live coaching for, for people that want to jump on.

Okay.

And one of them is around money. I often do a lot of things around money. Um, and it's like we have a relationship with everything, not just about a relationship with other people, but it's a relationship with money. It's a relationship with your business. It's a relationship with your career, relationship with your work, you know, relationship with the kettle that you put on every morning for your cup of coffee, you know, and, and the relationship that you have with yourself. Has to be fundamental to creating something greater for yourself out there.

I think that's, that is your 24/7 relationship, isn't it? So if, like you said, if that's not in a good space, then it's going to influence everything else that goes on in your life. Because if you're not in a good space within yourself or enjoying kind of being with you in a relationship, then it's going, you're going to struggle in so many different areas, including everything you've already, you've mentioned there, all those other things will Well, they, you know, will permeate from that, won't it?

Yeah. It's the very core of, of, of us really, isn't it?

You know, it's self-awareness is hugely, hugely.

Absolutely. I mean, it starts with us and it ends with us. So, um, one of the things that I learned from Bob at a very, very early on was like, he said, I remember saying to me, you're the only problem you've got, Mandy, and you're your only solution. And it's so true. It's so true. It's so true. We are, we are our own solution. And, and, and some of the work, I guess really the work that I do Is showing not people the solution, but how they tap into their own solutions because we are our own solutions. But we're so closed, we get so closed off to that, that we don't, don't know how to open that bottle again or open that cupboard to go in and say, oh no, I forgot I got that in there. That whole, look at all that big pile of confidence in there. I'd forgotten about that. Let me get some of that back out. You know, I thought I got it.

Yeah. That's the beautiful thing about coaching is, is I'm helping people to unlock their own capabilities and beliefs, uh, self-belief that they can, like you said, find their own way and understand that all of what they need is inside of them. They just may be not able to see it at this moment.

Absolutely. I just feel like, you know, we're, we're just all, all we do is point, point the direction in there. And it's, I think often actually the work that you do and probably, and I certainly do, it's, it's more about asking the right questions. So asking the right questions, because if you've got an empowering question, because most people ask when they talk to themselves, because hey, come on, we all talk to ourselves, don't we? So when most people talk to themselves, it's, they'll say things like, why the hell did I do that? And, um, I got that wrong again. And they'll come with a question that is disempowering for them rather than, oh, okay. How could I do that differently? What's the best way for me, for me to do that? Because the best way for me to do something might not be your best way. So it's like we do have our, our own solutions and it's asking ourselves far more empowering questions that help us move forward rather than keep us where we are. How many people do you know, they say, what's wrong with me?

Exactly. I mean, self-talk can be demoralizing and just stop you from doing anything, can't it? It's interesting what you said. One of the things I really love about my clients Is when I say something to them and I'll put a suggestion maybe out there, and then they'll come back the following week and they'll say, John, what you said last week was wrong. It's this. And I love that.

Yeah.

They say, I don't want to, like, and people would think, oh, maybe you don't like to be told that you, you got it wrong. I love it when I get it wrong. So it's when they come back and say, you got it wrong. It's actually, this is what's the issue, or this is how I feel. This is, and I love that because it's, they've gone back and they've connected something and then they've, they can now for themselves Correct. Found their own answer so they know exactly what it is that's going on and they can do something with it.

I love that. That's like, um, that's like you just cracked a little bit there. You just open that little bit and then they've got— then they've gone in and found it. Yeah. Yeah. Love it. Love it. Love it. That's so good. Yeah, completely.

So when it comes to kind of relationships, let's have a little thing for yourself. What, what kind of— how do you see relationships? What's kind of The biggest influences on you as far as relationship is concerned? What's helped, maybe hindered? Uh, how are relationships significant in your life?

Well, I think all relationships are significant because that's how we, like I said, we don't operate in isolation, do we? Um, you know, whether it's a relationship, you know, we're in a relationship right now, just, just having this conversation. So I think for me, one of the things that, um, I always look at is how, what is my attitude? So my attitude to anything is a measure of who I'm being. That's what I say. That's how I, I like to continue to build and live my life and expand my life. So my attitudes, and an attitude is, you know, our thoughts, our feelings, and our actions. So I'm always looking to see, well, what's my attitude? And certainly to situations. So that I'm always wanting to look, because We're natural judges, you know, we can't help it. We learned it as children. They, we got judged, so we judged people. So we're natural judges. So I'm always looking to, uh, improve my attitude and my, my attitude. So my outlooks and my, and it's my vibration. So what's my vibration in this, in this relationship? You know, if it's with somebody else, it's like, where's my attitude? What am I looking for in this person? Am I looking for their good? Am I looking for their greatness?

Yeah.

Am I in a space for, for them? Or am I judging? Am I judging me in comparison to them? So, oh, they're better than me. Or am I judging them? It's like, oh, so you look like that. So that must mean blah, blah, blah, something like that.

Yeah.

So we are so natural judges, you know, we just so, so are. And so I think for me, in my relationships, It's— we talked about awareness. It's becoming more aware. And I do that by looking at my attitude. So what am I saying? What am I feeling? Am I giving out, um, kindness? Am I giving out openness? Am I ready to receive, like, whatever it is? That's how I approach— I like to think I approach. I don't know. That's how, you know, I don't know what's right, you know, right and wrong, but I just do what's right for me, like we just said. So that's how I tend to approach relationships rather Um, a lot of people go into relationships like, what's in it for me?

Yeah.

What can I get out of this? So it's very transactional, you know, for me, that doesn't work, especially in business and a lot of business people, it's all about the transaction. That's one of the very precious lessons that I learned from Bob. So I try to pull back from transactional. Do I do it all the time? Of course I bloody don't.

Like everyone else. Relationships where you are just really gonna be going in and saying, what can I get from this? Because that's the purpose of the relationship, right?

Correct.

There are going to be relationships where that's all it's about is how are we going to, how am I, how can you help me? Or how can I?

Well, how can I help you? So it's really interesting, isn't it? Because there's some relationships that don't need to be. And then there's some relationships, like you say, um, especially if I talk to somebody, it's like, well, I can help you if you come into my program. So that becomes transactional. But what I, what for me in the beginning, it's like, let me listen to you. Let me, let me, let me hear what's going on for you. And I'm sure you're the same. Let me hear what's going on for you, um, and let's see if I can help you.

Yeah.

Um, and then I can help you more when you're, when you're in, and then there's a transaction of money and services. So that is business.

Yeah.

And it's an attitude. There's an attitude there of, I want you in, I want you as a client because I want the money in the bank, you know. And, and some people do operate like that. So that's how it is for some people. So I try to be more mindful in terms Most definitely.

Yeah. I mean, there's plenty of clients in the past when I first probably started doing this that I would have just worked with regardless because I wanted to earn some money. Whereas now I'm a little bit more discerning about the people that I work with because I think, actually, can I work with you? Are we a good fit? Am I going to be able to help you in the right way? And if not, then I would say that this is not the right kind of relationship for us to be trying to enter into.

Absolutely. Um, and not everybody does that, but I think that's the way to get into it.

Energy, isn't it? I think it's called you're in get energy rather than give energy that you're always looking to get. And, um, it's interesting because that's just popped in. I'm doing a series on narcissistic personalities at the moment, and that's a very transactional, what can I get out of this type space?

In it for me.

And it's always very— majority of the time, it's a massively unhealthy thing to enter any kind of relationship with.

Well, I, I think it is, um, but I, I think it's a lack of, you know, it's not about judging others for where they're at. We're all at our stage that we're at, do you know what I mean?

Mm-hmm.

And it's like some people would like to know what's open the door and have a look in there, and then some people don't want to. So I think we've sort of gone full circle because we've already said that. So it's like, well, if you want to open the door and have a little look in there, you might find something that's suitable for you in that door rather than, you know, here where you are. Um, and not everybody will do that. Not everybody wants to either.

No, they're very fixed, aren't they, in their space? Because that's their space.

Yeah, I'm really clear that it's okay for people to be wherever they— and I used to have a problem with that years ago. I'd have a problem with, with that. It's like, no, you can't be okay, I want to fix you. Or clients—

I sit with my clients sometimes and they go, but I don't get why they're doing that, and it's just It's not the right thing to do. And I'm like, but that's who they are. And then, yeah, completely from your point of view, that is not the right thing. And you can't understand that because it's not you. But it doesn't mean that what they're doing is necessarily wrong or it's a bad thing. It's just the way, the way that they do things. And it's about being open to say, okay, if that's how they work, how do I work with that? Or how do I stop it being an issue?

Yes. So what you're at, that's absolutely right. The thing about it is, is that we can't always— well, in fact, we don't. The only place that we actually have control is here. In here. Here. It's like—

Her head and her heart at the moment. Yeah.

Oh yeah, sorry. Our mind. Our mind. Yeah. It's the only place. And our conscious mind, to be fair, is the only place that we have control. We can think what we want. No one can make us think what we— anything. Although most people say, oh no, they made me do this and they made me do that. But we are actually in control of our thoughts. It's the only place in the whole universe where we have 100% control, and that is our thinking. 100% control we have over our thinking. So, so we're going back to saying, it's like, how do you— do you want to react to an external circumstance or a person, or do you want to respond? Now, once we react, we're giving our power away to being— allowing anything external to us to be in control of us. And that's just we give our power away. But actually, when we can begin to learn how to respond, and we're in control of us, we can respond in a way that is appropriate and and is is satisfies us, if you like, and keeps us on a on a equilibrium rather than he made me angry, she made me angry, this made me angry. What the hell is that going on? Blah blah blah blah blah blah. You know, but you don't have to. It doesn't, it doesn't have to be like that. And I tell you what, life is so much more peaceful when we, when you have control in your thinking. I won't point anymore. In your thinking, rather than giving the control out there to circumstances and situations. I mean, you see it all the time on—

I think you come back to what you said about not being taught as kids. When, because the thing, thing I talk about is that when you are growing up, it's what you said just now. You make me angry. You upset me. You did this. And we take We're given responsibility for the feelings, the behaviors. You made me do this type thing, and we're given the responsibility. And then we either then become one of these people that can just always take responsibility for how everybody else is. But then again, at the same time, we make people responsible for us at the same time, rather than being being told when we're younger that you are responsible for how you feel. You are responsible for what you do. No one is telling you to. Even if I'm telling you to do this, it doesn't mean that you have to do it. And you need you can own that. And I think that again, that's a massive lesson to learn when you're a lot younger. Yeah. I'm not responsible for how you feel. You are. I might do something you don't like or that you do like, which then elicits some kind of emotional response. But that's still your emotional response.

Yeah. It's like I can remember. Well, I'll tell you quite personal story, and the reason I pause there, so it's not. It's not a story I tell very often. In fact, I don't know, and this is quite public really, but I'll tell you. And it's a relationship story. So this is going back a long time, over 20 years. I was married and I had an affair. I told my then husband that I'd had an affair. And, um, so there's a bit of an upheaval at the time, a bit of a mess.

Mm-hmm.

Um, but you know, we got on again and again and But the relationship never really got fixed. He, and, and he had some behaviors that I didn't like, and obviously I had some behaviors he didn't like. I can remember him saying, yeah, but you've hurt me. And I said, yeah, I know I have, but it's not my responsibility to make you better, you know. And that might sound very harsh for some people to hear. And I said, like, you know, if you go out and get shot, do you expect that shooter to make you better and heal you? And I said, whatever I do, it was like, whatever I do, Whatever I'm going to be responsible for myself. I do, you're never going to feel better because unless you get feel better for yourself, it's not me that's going to make you feel better. I just it wouldn't happen, and he didn't really get it at the time. But we separated very very amicable in the end, very very very amicably. And in fact, the story the story went how we separated. We separated about two years later when it really really wasn't working. Yeah, and he he used to like his his pint. And, um, so I'd nag him a bit around the pints. Okay. And I remember we sat down, uh, we sat down at the table and I said, okay, this is it. All right. Are you prepared to do whatever it takes to keep this marriage together? And, and he said, yes. So I said, well, I want you to stop drinking. And then I said, I'm going to ask myself the same question. Am I prepared to do whatever it takes? And he said, what do you want me to do? He said, stop nagging me about the drinking. I said, well, I ain't going to do that. And neither of us were prepared to do whatever it took. And it was— it actually, do you know what, John? It was very profound because it was suddenly we realized, oh my God, and we took responsibility for ourselves. Like, oh my God, this is broken. And, um, it was very emotional as well. Yeah, it was a 5-minute conversation. It was done and it was over. And then we had a very amicable divorce. So, um, it's not a story I tell very often. It's about taking responsibility and ownership, isn't it?

Most definitely. Thank you for sharing. And like you said, that may sound really harsh, but it's so true. You can only provide the conditions to show that they can trust you and that you won't do what you did again, but you can't heal what is, what is, what has been hurt inside of them. And that's, that's that inner work and self-reflection, everything else that we talked about earlier on that needs to be done.

Yeah.

It doesn't matter what you do. It's never really going to heal them until they decide to heal themselves.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Thanks again for sharing the story.

You're welcome.

Um, so if people would like to reach out to get in touch, how would they, how would they do that?

They can, yeah, they can go to, uh, well, there's 2 shoutouts. Can I give 2 shoutouts? Can I do 2 shoutouts?

Yeah, of course.

Okay, so my first shoutout is, uh, if you want to get in touch with me, great. Um, you can go to my website, which is theinfinitemindcompany.com, www, obviously, The Infinite Mind Company. Um, and if you want to talk to me, there's a little button on there. You can just book in a, in a call and we can have a chat. that. So that's easy. The other thing that I wanted to do a quick call out for, and I think I just mentioned it before we got into our conversation, was that, um, I do a— I have a foundation. And the foundation is that we take, uh, our mindset training, uh, in projects to young, um, young, uh, Africans in different, different countries in Africa between the ages of 18 and 25.

Right.

And, um, I would like to give that— if you're interested in the work that we do out there, um, then the website is africatcf.org. So if you want to check that out, we do that. It's quite— we're quite busy there at the moment. So there's 2 shoutouts.

Awesome. Thank you. Thank you, Mandy. So if you want to reach out to Mandy, the details are in the show notes. So you can again get in contact, uh, with Mandy and get on some kind of strategy call with her. And if you want to find out more about the project that she does in Africa, then please do visit the website. And if there's any way people can help with that, I guess they can get involved in some way.

They certainly can, and they can get involved on the website. So it's africatcf.org.

Awesome. Awesome. What a great worthy endeavor that is. I always like to ask my guests if they've got a kind of parting words of wisdom or a favorite favorite quote that they want to leave?

Yeah, and I have hundreds, but I came up with one, didn't I? Um, and I'm gonna go with Napoleon Hill. So Napoleon Hill was, um, his book Think and Grow Rich was the book that, um, Bob Proctor read every single day for, I think it was almost 60, 65 years. He read it every day, every day. So I want to give a quote from Napoleon Hill, and he says, no more effort is required to aim high in life than it does to aim low. So we wanna, we wanna go as high as we can. We want the best. So go for the best because the effort is internal. So if you, if you've got to go internal, you might as well go high than go low.

That's really interesting because this always reminds me of the thing where it takes less muscles to smile than it does to frown.

I know, that's exactly it. Same, same kind of, yeah, same kind of thing.

I guess he's saying it takes exactly the same kind of input if you want to aim high It takes exactly the same kind of capacity within you as if you want to go low. So remember that, people.

Absolutely.

Aim high. It's not going to take you any more energy. It's just a mindset thing, right?

Just a mindset thing.

Thanks so much for your time, Anne. It's been absolutely awesome talking to you.

Oh, and you, John. And I appreciate, thank you for asking me on and it's been, uh, it's been great here. Thank you so much.

You're very welcome.

Lovely to speak to you. Thank you.

I'll speak to you again soon.

Absolutely. Thank you, John. Bye for now.

Thank you.