The Bridge of Courage with Jim Cathcart

Good morning, everyone, and happy Friday the 13th. And we've got special guest, the legendary Jim Cathcart, back. Jim was with me on February 13th, Friday the 13th. So we've got back-to-back superstition kind of things going on here. And I know, Jim, you shared some interesting facts about hotels around the world that don't have 13 floors and Things like that. In fact, I was just in 2 high-rises, one in Denver and one in West Palm Beach, no 13th floor. And so that triggers a lot of fear in people's minds. But a little bit more about Jim, if you're not familiar with his work, and I invite you to connect with Jim and he can give us more information on the best way to do that. But Jim is a fellow Fuel instructor with myself and he's got an AI bot that he can tell you about a little bit too, where— And I do as well, where you can interact with our bots and 24/7 all over the world. Jim's written 27 books and Hall of Fame speaker. He's the founder of the Cathcart Institute. He could share just a little bit about that. And basically an entrepreneur. And any entrepreneur like myself faces worry and fear, and it requires courage to bust through that. And I like to call it the Bridge of Courage. So, that's the theme for our day today. And Jim's also got a podcast called the Professional Experts Podcast. He can tell you just a little bit more about that. So, he's been speaking all over the world for decades and it's just a fantastic opportunity for all of us to learn some deep insights and tips and strategies on courage. All right. So, welcome, Jim, to Fearless.

Yes. Great to be back, John. Thank you. And gee, Friday the 13th compounded. Who knows what we've unleashed, right? You know what's so fascinating about that is almost all fear is irrational, right? That one is clearly irrational. A building that's 20 stories high and doesn't have a 13th floor has a 13th floor. Hello. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. You know, there's got to be one or the top would crash down onto the other part and then you'd have a new 13th floor. So the point of it all is you're not avoiding anything. You're just denying reality, you know? And that's absurd. And the same thing tends to be true with most of our fears. You know, fear, it's kind of like quicksand. And I was in a seminar years ago in Tulsa, and the guy leading the seminar, he said, all fear is fear of death. And I said, what? He said, yeah. Someone says, I'm afraid of walking across a busy street, even with a traffic light. You know, why are you afraid? Well, you know, I could get hit by a car. And what would happen if you got hit by a car? I could be killed.

Well, or—

Well, or injured. And if I was injured, then I'd be disabled. And if I was disabled, I might not be able to work again. If I couldn't work again, then I'd be starving and I'd have to go on public welfare and then that would run out and there would be nobody and I'd be all alone and I would die. You know, in other words, everything comes back to, you know, hey, we're out of milk. Oh my God, you know, we're going to die. No, you're not. You're just out of milk. For heaven's sakes, you know, whatever it is you're afraid of, realize it's irrational.

Yeah.

Assessment of reality. Fear is, is an indulgence of an emotion, and the emotion is rooted in self-preservation. So it's natural before you go on stage in front of a big audience that you want to impress to feel afraid. But that fear is simply your body generating the extra energy needed to do your job well. So change your focus from the thing you fear to the thing you're trying to create or the thing you want. You know, it's, it really is like you've often said, mindset, mindset, mindset, mindset, for heaven's sakes. Because fear is quicksand. And the fear, I call it the fear cascade, starts with, I'm afraid if we bring that up, the conversation in the meeting will go in the wrong direction, and then we'll lose the contract. And if we lose the contract, then we're not going to have— not going to meet our goals. And then the boss is going to hate us, and we're going to get criticized, and we'll probably be demoted. And then we'll stop. We'll get fired, actually. And then we'll go home, and we'll starve, and we'll die. Here we go again, right? Same stupid fear cycles. And people say, yeah, but what if— And excuse me, get thee behind me, Satan. What? What if? When people say, but what if? It is usually your fears activating some ugly possibility. What if we get stuck in traffic? We get stuck in traffic. What if we run out of gas? What if nobody's there? What if we're the last to arrive? What if we're the first to? What if they cancel the meeting and nobody knows? What if, what if, what if? Excuse me. Here's my suggestion to everyone that ever says, but what if? Answer the blinking question. What if we get stuck in traffic? Then we will be delayed and we'll call ahead and say, sorry, we're stuck in traffic. Or we could leave early and if we're stuck in traffic, still make it on time. Well, what if we run out of gas? Answer the question. You know, what if, what if? Answer the question. Because when you answer the question, We realize, oh, well, we can handle that. And you go on with life.

Oh yeah, what you just— yeah, go ahead. Sorry.

No, I was just—

what you just—

years ago, Tony Alessandra and I became partners. And when we became partners, Tony is a specialist and he was a marketing professor at the University of California. I mean, University of San Diego. And I had moved to San Diego and we became best friends and business partners. And we were both doing a lot of sales training. And he said we should write a book. And I said, I agree. So we found a publisher that was interested and we started writing a book. And I took the lead on the book. And the focus of it was not just a sales book. But it was this: Be Your Own Sales Manager. Strategies and tactics for managing accounts, territory, and yourself. And Be Your Own Sales Manager. Why did I choose that title? Because I had had a bad sales manager. He was a good guy, but he was not a good sales manager. He taught me to memorize a sales talk and go out and give it again and again and again until the people bought. And if I didn't give enough presentations, the problem was me. Not the way I was selling, not the calling on the wrong people, not offering the wrong product first. It was me, right? So Jim, if you don't succeed, we know this sales talk works. So if you do it and it doesn't work, problem's you, dude. So I've Ended up quitting my job after a year and a half of struggling and not making enough to meet my expenses. And I thought, well, I just don't know how to sell and I'm not able to. I don't have a sell gene in me, right? And so I took that personally. And then years later, I got back into sales with better guidance and I learned to be my own sales manager. I learned to motivate myself. I learned to organize my files, my focus and everything. And so when we wrote that book, Be Your Own Sales Manager, ironically and poetically, Tony came into our office in La Jolla, California one day and he said, Jim, I just sold 1,000 books. I said, whoa, 1,000 to whom? He said, to Investors Diversified Services in Minneapolis. I said, that's the company I worked for where I failed because I didn't have a good sales manager. Unbelievable. The company I had left in shame and misery, right, had bought 1,000 copies of my book to guide their people in how to manage themselves. So there is a poetic justice in the world.

But synchronicity. Yeah, synchronicity.

That's the thing. We've got to be our own courage source. And if we don't have it in us yet, then we look to a John Murphy, or we look to, as I did, Earl Nightingale on audio, or to, you know, Norman Vincent Peale in a book, or somebody. We look to an outside mentor. We go to fuel.com— myfuel.io, excuse me, myfuel.io. And we enroll there so that we have access to John Murphy and Jim Cathcart and Todd Duncan and all the other faculty members there, and we go in and literally interact with their AI. And this is astounding. Give me just a brief moment on this, and then I want to hear your comments. Um, FUEL took all of my books and uploaded them into the AI. They took hundreds and hundreds of articles I had written, uploaded them, videos I had produced, Uploaded them. Audio programs that I had published all over the world, uploaded it. And then all of that became the knowledge base for my personal AI in the fuel realm. And so a person can go in there and come up with some kind of a random question like, hey, Jim, I've got 3 new employees, and one of them came from a completely different field. The other 2 have been lifelong—

Fuel.

committed to this field. How do I bring those 3 people together in a more cohesive way and make them feel like colleagues, not, not like 2 insiders and 1 outsider? Now, I just made that up, John, as we were talking. But you could ask that random a question of my AI or yours. And it would say, here's a suggestion. And it would literally draw from all our wealth of published knowledge and give them suggestions. Wow. Now, if that doesn't lessen your fear, I don't know what will.

Oh, it's a true wow, Jim. And one of the ways I explain it to people is that let's just say you're giving a keynote to 1,000 people, and 1,000 people have 1,000 different questions for you as a follow-up. How long would they have to wait in line to get to you to ask their question in the— let's just call it old days, even the new day, the current days? But now with the AI bots, 1,000 people can ask you 1,000 different questions instantaneously and get an answer. And I find that just fascinating. I don't know if you've had a—

And the thing is, they can all ask it at the same time.

Exactly.

So it's not a bandwidth problem.

Have you had a conversation with your own bot yet?

Yeah, a short one. I'm looking forward to a longer one. I want to see how wise it is.

I did too. And I think it's fascinating. You know, in my space, a lot of people will ask my bot, you know, I'm stressing out about something, John. I'm really concerned. I'm anxious about something. I've got this fear issue. And, you know, what should I do? And the bots come back with some really interesting insights. Like you said, downloaded with, you know, my 20 books and all my interviews and speeches and things like that. It's pretty fascinating. So, to our audience, you know, check out myfuel.io. Check out Jim and my bots and the other bots that are available for some of the faculty members. And it's just fascinating. And I'll offer this too. If people ask me, What's one of the most significant factors in your success as an entrepreneur? My business turns 38 years old this year. What would it be? And I would say just exactly what Jim just said, surround yourself with brilliant minds. And they don't even have to be living anymore.

No.

I mean, we're talking about Earl Nightingales and things like that, legendary, brilliant people. and get into that field of energy. It's all about energy. And one of the things that Einstein said, I quote him all the time, is the field is the sole governing agency of the particle. Now, he's talking quantum physics, but the field is the culture you work in, the environment you surround yourself with, and it is effective. And we live in a culture of fear. It's all over the news. It's everything. And those what-ifs that Jim was talking about, you know, what if something goes wrong? I remind people that fear is an illusion. It's an illusion because what scares a lot of people getting up on stage to give a speech, you can do it in your sleep, you know, so can I.

In fact, I try to create more opportunities to be on stage. If I can help, if I can help, because if I'm not relevant, then I fear being on stage because I got no business being there.

Yeah, exactly. And so if we're projecting something into the future that could go wrong, it's an assumption I might screw up. If that's what's going on, you use the word mindset, and Infuel's got a great show on Mondays called Mindset Matters that I host as well with a couple of other instructors. It's all about mindset. And if our mindset is tuned into the negative, the what could go wrong, but I could really screw up and eventually die, of course, that's going to trigger hormones in your body, the stress hormones, the cortisol, the adrenaline, and it's going to prepare your body to fight or flight, right? And the amygdala in the brain's going crazy. And so, it feels real, right? It feels real that I should be afraid. It does feel real.

Yeah.

when all I've done is projected something would go wrong. So, I like to— and you use the term, before you can become fearless, you have to fear less.

Yeah.

So, how can I fear less versus just completely delete it at first? How can I do that? And this brings us to that bridge of courage. We have to be willing to let go of the ideas. The ego mindset really is the root cause of all of it. Let go of ego across that bridge of courage into inspiration or in spirit. Spirit's fearless. So, we have to face it. I like to say even have a conversation with the fear because it's telling us something. Hey, you ought to be careful. Wait till the light's green before you go through the intersection.

Yeah.

So, listen to it and then think about it. Do what I call a failure mode and effect analysis, a little risk analysis. What could go wrong and what can I do to avoid it? And then say, excuse me, fear, I got a job to do.

I got something.

I got to get up on stage.

Right?

So, let's talk about the bridge of courage because, Jim, I know you have a literal story about crossing a bridge of courage that I'd like people to hear.

Absolutely.

And I'd also like to invite the audience to think about what is one of the most courageous things you ever did and what was the impact of that where you actually did what we're talking about? some form of fear or anxiety. You got up on stage and gave a speech. You went into an interview that you were concerned about, and you actually, you know, maybe even failed, but you learned something from it and you did better in the next interview, whatever. So, think about that and put it in the chat if you like, and we'll address those questions. But, Jim, tell us about this bridge of courage, this literal bridge that you crossed.

When I was in the Army in basic training, we had Obstacle course, but we didn't call it the obstacle course. It was called the confidence course. And the reason they called it that is because you'd be faced with obstacles that you had to overcome to get to the other end, to the finish line. And they were almost all scary, you know, walking on a log on top of 2 other logs without anything to hold on to, you know, and getting to the other end. And then climbing a wall that was way taller than you and having to get somebody else to boost you up. And then, you know, hand over hand on a rope or whatever it happened to be. But all these things were kind of scary. Well, at the end of that course, you look back and you saw, I did that. That was scary. That was hard, but I pulled it off. I could do it again. Well, if anybody with normal human capacity could do it, You could too, because the vast majority of the work to be done in the world, like 98% of all the work in the world, is just fundamental work. It's not thinking work. It's, it's not intellectual capacity work. It's just follow the process until it's completed. Get it done. Brushing your teeth, you know, just follow the routine. Your teeth will become cleaner. Driving your car, anything else. You know, it was scary first time you got behind the wheel. So years ago, I was a teenager and my good friend Bobby Robertson and I wanted to go visit his girlfriend in North Little Rock. I lived in Little Rock, Arkansas. She lived in North Little Rock, and Bobby had come over to my house and there was ice and snow everywhere, and it was about 8 or 10 degrees outside. I mean, just really, really bitter cold. And so we couldn't drive safely to North Little Rock because it was about 10 miles from our place to her place. So we decided we'd walk. I mean, we were teenagers and didn't have a lick of sense, so why, why not? So we put on a whole bunch of clothes, you know, gloves and stocking caps and all that, and we head out. And we go all the way to North Little Rock and we hang out at Betty's house for a little while, and then we decide to go home. And we're going home and we're freezing our buns off and we come to the railroad bridge across the Arkansas River between downtown North Little Rock and Little Rock. And we start across this bridge on the catwalk, the little narrow walkway, and we're looking down at the completely frozen river below us and thinking, wow, hope we don't slip on this thing. And we're walking along carefully and suddenly— We noticed 4 guys coming toward us. They were walking to North Little Rock. We're walking from it. And one of them yells out, get off our bridge! Gulp. Now, neither Bobby nor I were badasses. We were not, you know, fighters. We were not the kind of people to be worried about in a Scrap. So we're looking at this and looking at each other and thinking, oh no. And they said, jump off the bridge. Well, we're not going to jump into the river because that's certain death. Yeah, I guess we could go back to North Little Rock, but we're more than halfway onto the bridge. So Bobby says, let's just keep going. I said, okay. So I'm afraid and he's afraid, but we keep going and we get up to these 4 guys and they have now gone 4 abreast. So they're a wall that we've got to get through. And as we approached them, I turned sideways so that I could slide between the 2 on my side, and they let me. Bob decides this is a challenge to his manhood, so he gives them this with both elbows and knocks the other 2 guys on the ground. Well, I wasn't going to engage. But he's in full engagement, and they pull him down to the ground, and 2 of them are beating on him, and the other guys are looking at me, and I've walked several steps on ahead, and one of the guys that was looking at me has a wrench in his hand that he wants to use to end my life, and I'm, you know, I've got a choice. Do I keep on walking? Because I'm safe, I'm far enough away, I can get away. Or do I go back and try to save my friend and probably get beaten to a pulp in the process, maybe even thrown off the bridge? Boy, John, that was one of the hardest decisions of my entire life. I mean, it seemed like it took forever, but I didn't hesitate very long. And I said, okay, I'm going back. And I went back, oh, and all the way back, like, I don't know, 15 steps or whatever it was. I am thinking, I am going to die. It is over. This is it. Gee, well, it has been fun. And so as I approach them, they are back on their feet and they have batted Bobby around a little bit and roughed him up. And they yell some ugly things at both of us and tell us in the future, stay out of North Little Rock. And they let us go.

Oh!

There is a God, you know, and then they think, well, one last insult, and they reach over and they grab Bobby's hat off of his head and they say, we're taking that with us. So, and it's 8 degrees outside, so it's, it's bitter, bitter cold, and we've got like 6 miles left to go to home. So we get— we walk along and we decide, you know, thank heavens that we made it, but We take turns wearing the hat to keep our heads warm enough that we don't die, and we get to my house and it's all over. Well, if I had that to do over again, I'd do the same thing.

Mm-hmm.

But I'd probably feel the same fear.

Yeah.

However, now I have the courage of knowing that doing the right thing, like you've said, made all the difference. Because what would my life be like if I hadn't done that? If I had to live in shame knowing my friend had been beaten or killed at a time when I could have helped?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think that Bridge of Courage helps anybody on the planet avoid 2 of the lowest energy frequencies measurable, and those frequencies are shame And guilt and people who go through life feeling ashamed or guilty because they didn't do something that they could have. They, you know.

And by the way, I've got a couple of those that continually visit me, but I don't give them a seat. There you go. You know, I don't say, hey, come on in. I just acknowledge their presence and say an apologetic prayer and get on with living.

Yeah, I like— and you've heard me use this Zen teaching— let them in the front, let it in the front door and out the back door, but don't invite it for tea. And that's profound because what a lot of people do is they lock the front door. They fight the grief or the guilt, and they pretend like they're not afraid, but the truth is they are.

Yeah.

The more you lock the front door and the more you resist anything, the stronger you make it energetically. So, you don't want to resist it. You want to let it go. And crossing that bridge of courage, what do you have to let go of? The past, the shame, the guilt, the ideas in your mind that something's going to go wrong. If I turn around and go back to help my friend, they're going to beat me up, maybe throw me off the bridge. Those are all projections, right? And they trigger the fear. And I think what's important, and I shared this story with you, Jim, when you think about what's one of the most courageous things you've ever done, In my case, it's, well, it's a couple of things. It's one, starting my company 38 years ago at 28 years old, not really knowing what I was doing. But I faced it.

That could have been insanity, foolishness, or courage.

Yeah, right.

Right.

But I made lots of mistakes along the way, but I've learned from them and I would never go back. But the one that really strikes me, and this is a lesson from over 40 years ago that I carry to this day. And that is in high school, after winning a state championship in football and being elected captain, I had a lawn business with some friends and I ran my foot through a lawnmower and really messed it up. Oh my God. And 10 hours of surgery, multiple surgeries, a week in the hospital. I was told by a renowned surgeon I'd never walk again without limping. And my football days were over. Now, if I believed that, I mean, here's an expert, a doctor, surgeon. Of course, you have to believe the doctor.

Physical reality, right? Yeah.

But, but here's the truth. That was an assumption, not a fact. And the reason I know it was an assumption is because 2 years later, I walked on the Notre Dame football team, made the team, earned my varsity letter. And that took courage. So, my point is, if I don't do something I feel compelled or passionate about, I will live with that grief and that, you know, what if I—

Yeah.

You know, what if I took the chance? What if I did it? And to this day, I teach how important it is to challenge assumptions. Because we all make them.

Yep.

And if they're negative, it's going to get in our way and it's going to screw us up. So, if you're going to assume anything about what's coming, what's in the future, try positivity. That's right. You know what? I'm going to get up there and I'm going to nail this thing. You know, when a baseball player steps up to the plate, they better not be thinking, I'm going to strike out. What if I miss the ball? What if I, you know, what if I get hit in the face with the ball? No, I'm going to hit this ball out of the park. You know, maybe I will, maybe I won't, but I am not going to sit there and worry about— because you'll never make it in any sport if you think that.

My friend John Mitchell, who wrote The Missing Secret, a book about the Think and Grow Rich missing secret, John Mitchell says, look, the world's hard enough on you already without you piling on. So give yourself a break, for heaven's sakes.

Yeah.

And if you've got guilt or shame or fear, acknowledge it. Say your apologies or whatever prayers. Make it right to the extent you can, and then let it go because there's nothing else you could do about it. And there's no— Yeah, it's like the— —around to say, yeah, I really am a bad guy. Look at this. You know, I've still got it in my pocket in case I need to feel bad.

That's right. It's like the title of your book, Be Your Own Sales Manager, be your own boss. I like to think of the mind as the kingdom and the true I, the I that says I changed my mind, is the king or queen of that kingdom. So I'm not going to let the mind run my life or control me. I'm going to control the mind. I have the power to do that.

So I think that's a vital distinction for how to think about this. A kingdom, most people think about that superficially and they think of it as real estate. You know, this is your kingdom. No, a kingdom is a state of control or mastery by the king. And your kingdom is not your real estate. It's what your mind takes ownership of and asserts direction, control, and management of. So if you let enemies onto your— into your kingdom, enemies like fear and doubt and guilt and shame, if you give them time, like John was saying a moment ago, when you push back, You're pushing your energy into them, giving the the thing you fear or or feel ashamed of. You're giving it more strength. Stop it. Answer the question. But what if da da da da da? Answer the question. We'll do such and such instead. Okay. Yeah, when you stop and think about it, shameful about X, Y, and Z, and and rightly so. So say your apologies and get on with living, because you can't go back and correct that.

That's right. You can't change the past, but you— and the only thing you actually can change is your own mind. You can't change anything external. So if you're worrying about what's going on externally that you have no control over, you're living in fear, you're living in doubt. If when you learn to control your mind, your kingdom, which is thousands and thousands of thoughts and choices per day thousands of choices per day, and every choice has a consequence. That's karmic law. So, if you're choosing something that's, I should worry, or you're around people who commiserate about how messed up everything is in the world, that negativity, the field is the sole governing agency of the particle. So, we got to make sure that's not going to be part of our belief system.

Yeah.

Because you think something long enough, it becomes a belief. And if you believe it long enough, it becomes a habit. And what Dr. Joe Dispenza talks about is what fires together wires together. So, we're talking now about neurons in the brain. When we think something, those neurons are firing. And if we do it long enough, they become habitual and deep in the subconscious mind.

Yeah.

Yeah. Jim, we could go on and on. I mean, this is— I absolutely love having you on as a guest and we'll do this again. And so, we've got in the chat how you can reach Jim and his website. Then again, look for Jim on myfuel.io, to talk to his bot, which is fascinating. Next Friday, I've got Craig Davis, and we're going to talk about making shift happen, the shift in mindset. I was recently a guest on Craig's podcast, and we had a phenomenal discussion around this topic. So, we've got him coming on. And then, I have a couple of very special guests coming up after that, including 2 outside people from Fuel who are global authorities on their topic. So, we're going to have some fun with that. So with that, Jim, any closing comments?

I would say if anyone wants more from you or me, Fuel, of course, myfuel.io is, is the best resource. If you want to find out about me or contact me, just look me up. Jim Cathcart. Cathcart.com is my website. jim@cathcart.com is my email. You know, I'm on name it, you know, YouTube, everything else as Jim Cathcart. So, I'm not hiding. Come see me.

Definitely. And I highly recommend that to everybody. And the other thing I recommend and ask is that these are streamed live. These recordings are streamed live on YouTube and then recorded for sharing. If you got benefit from this, share it. Share it with your family and friends and coworkers. And then tune in every Friday to get more of these.

And send questions in. Yeah, that's the thing. John and I are both activated by problems to solve, right? Give us a question and we can give a direct, focused answer that may reveal something we hadn't even thought through fully in recent years.

Absolutely. Yeah. And then it also helps me bring on guests, uh, to address a lot of those questions, people who've really been through some amazing events in their lives Yeah. And, you know, I won't give away too many secrets, but we're talking about Olympian athletes. We're talking about founders of major corporations and businesses, some pretty significant people who've stepped through fear, crossed that bridge of courage to do what they've done. So, again, reach out to Jim and I, reach out to the Fuel instructors, do everything you can to surround yourself with brilliant ideas. You want to be successful, study people who've been successful and follow, you know, follow the lead, if you will. So, I'm John Murphy tuning out for now. Friday the 13th. Have a great weekend, and I hope to see you next Friday. All right, let's.