"The SECRET To Achieving High Performance IS THIS!" (Ultimate Success Habits) | John Gucci Foley

So those are the scenes that me and my teammates are in. In fact, that opening scene, you've probably seen it where, you know, you get catapulted off the carrier. You know, you see the steam coming off the catapult and myself and my teammates salute the catapult officer and bam, they hit the button. And you get, you get launched. You go from 0 to 200 miles per hour in 1.8 seconds.

Oh, my gosh. It's unbelievable. Welcome to Stuck to Unstoppable, where we interview the world's foremost thought leaders to, to break things down in order to help you get past your hurts, habits and hangups and finally level up and move forward. I'm your host, Stephen Scoggins. Now let's go ahead and get into today's guest and our featured conversation. You're not going to want to miss it. Do you think you can fly a fighter jet at 500 miles an hour and only be 18 inches away from another jet? Well, that's exactly what you get from a Blue Angels pilot. Now take that same peak performance and cross it with one of the world's most elite pilots in the world with a huge heart and a man on a mission. And you get my good friend John Gucci Foley sharing his proprietary and highly sought after high performance formula called Glad to Be here. John Gucci Foley has traveled all over the world speaking of thousands of organizations about what it takes to achieve extreme levels of performance with organizations like Cisco, Mercedes Benz, BMW, Goodyear, Chevron, Million Dollar Roundtable and others, just to name a few. Guys, help me welcome my good friend, John Gucci Foley. John. Dude, what's going on, man?

How you doing? Hey, I'm just loving life and I start every day with this glad to be here mindset. And I got to tell you, Steven, I am so grateful to be with you right now and your audience here.

Oh, man, I tell you what, I was excited to get to talk to you. Not many people can fly an airplane at 500 miles an hour, 18 inches apart from another airplane, not to mention do that with changing your crew out every year you get three new, three new pilots or something when you were flying.

Yeah. Well, first off, I think you understand what it's like to have speed and stress in your life because look at, we both look the same with our heads. Yeah, I used to have a lot of hair when I flew with the Blue Angels. But yeah, it's an incredible experience and it's a real team. And you're absolutely right. It's one thing to Reach a level of excellence. But how do you sustain that excellence under change, especially when half your pilots are new? A third of my support teams new every year, so. So we have a culture that allows us to do that.

Yeah, well, and it's imperative that people, if they're going to have a successful life or business, they're going to have to get to a place where they accept change. Why do you think that most of the marketplace, if you will, meaning lives and businesses, why do you think most people have such a hard time with change?

Well, I think it's deep in our upbringing. You know, I was part of a military family. My dad moved around every three years. I was born in Germany. And I actually enjoy that change. I enjoy it. I see it as opportunity, not as a threat. And I think that's probably important in how you view the world. Is change an opportunity or a threat?

You know what, I think that that's, that's pretty pivotal. That's pretty pivotal. You know, one of the things that we try to teach people out of crisis moments when they're in the crisis moment is to just stop what you're doing and hold space. And hold space long enough to identify whether or not there's realistic opportunities in the stress or if you're legitimately going through that fight or flight response kind of scenario. So I think that's, I think that's a very valuable thing when it comes to change, for sure. I gotta ask a silly question. I'll get back on topic in a second. All right. Call sign, Gucci. How'd you get Gucci?

Well, let me give you first clue. All right? All fighter pilots, we get call signs, but you don't get to pick it. And if you like it, it doesn't stick.

Okay? Okay.

So what happened to me is, you know, everyone wants a cool call sign. They want something like Viper, Iceman, Maverick. Right? But you got to earn it. So I was in training. Fallon, Nevada, that's where Top Gun is right now. And we're going through training and after six days a week, you know, we're flying twice a day. Someone says, hey, let's take a break and let's go into town. And so I show up in the, it's called the boq, the Bachelor officer quarters. I show up with a pair of slacks on, a black button down shirt. But here's what killed me. I had a thin black leather tie. Okay, yeah, Steven, that wasn't even cool in the 80s, right? Right. And my, my friends, my fighter pilots are looking at me. They Go, what is that, man? That's Gucci. And I'm like, no, you know, don't. And it just, it just stuck. Now, it didn't help that I was living on a sailboat and driving an Alfa Romeo at the time too.

Yeah, that. I can, I can, I can see how that could get confusing. So. But yeah, for sure. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, going to Top Gun for a second, but you actually had a guest starring appearance kind of in Top Gun that maybe nobody really knows about.

Well, I wouldn't call it a guest starring appearance. I happened to be in the movie, but I just was in the right place at the right time when they filmed the original, by the way. I can't wait. You know, next year you're going to see Top Gun Maverick. And the camera work in that movie is phenomenal. But it even was back in 86 when we filmed the original Top Gun. And I just happened to be on the aircraft carriers called the Enterprise, flying jets on and off that carrier. And Hollywood showed up one day and they're like, hey, let's just film. I gotta be honest with you. It was normal operations, all right? We didn't do anything special, but we flew a little bit over the water. And so those are the scenes that me and my teammates are in. In fact, that opening scene, you've probably seen it where, you know, you get catapulted off the carrier. You know, you see the steam coming off the catapult and myself and my teammates salute the catapult officer and bam, they hit the button. And you get, you get launched. You go from 0 to 200 miles per hour in 1.8 seconds.

Oh, my gosh. It's unbelievable. You know, I was in Colorado not long ago, just strange, fun fact. And I test drove the Tesla. I forgot what Tesla model was, but it has something called a ludicrous speed. Okay. All right, so you go from zero to 60 in just under two seconds. I thought I was gonna pass out. So I don't know how you guys actually do that. Well, pressure on my brain, like, it was weird.

I love that acceleration. You gotta get ready for it. And, you know, here's a secret I didn't tell most people. I screamed going off the catapult. I would lean forward, I'd be going, yeah, because it's like, it's just, it's a rush. You know, you're Getting slung, a 40,000 pound airplane slung off that Dec, and you gotta lean into it. It's like football, man. You gotta lean into It, Right. And I loved it. I still do.

Well, dude, I mean, you've had a crazy successful career in a variety of different ways. I'm excited. We could literally talk about all kinds of different stuff. What I thought maybe we start off with a little bit. Obviously we had changed a little bit, but is this idea of basically tripling, quadrupling, going to 300% of your performance value, how have you been able to essentially get more performance? I mean, no offense, but there's fighter pilots, right? There's can't, you know, there's. There's Top Gun pilots both in and out of the movie, and then there's the Blue Angels that fly so tight together and so, so much formation. That precision is by far one of the most important things you got to do. So I assume that starting with the Blue Angels took you to a whole nother level and then teaching up your fellow pilots, etc. So I assume that this idea of ultra performance is something that's not a new concept to you at all.

Well, you know, it's a path. Right. And in my journey, I think you nailed it pretty well. You know, my first goal was just to, just to become a pilot. I mean, my dad was an army officer and an engineer and I loved my dad. I wanted to be just like him. But then he took me to air shows someday and I remember this. I was 12 years old. I look up in the sky and I see these six magnificent blue jets. I said, dad, I'm going to do that. And I think what's significant about that comment was I didn't say I hope to do that. Oh, it'd be kind of cool to do that. I said, I'm going to do that. And I actually believed it in my heart, not just my head. Now there's a path to get there and it's hard and there's lots of obstacles. I mean, you know this better than anybody, right? And so the idea of having that resilience and overcoming and so the first thing was just get a shot. I remember when I played college football, I walked up to the coach, I said, just give me the pads, man. I just want a shot. I might not look, you know, as big or strong as the other guys, but just give me a shot. So that's kind of how it works. The Navy, you get your shot as a, as first off a pilot and then, you know, you go through training and usually the top get to pick and typically fighters is what you want to get into this tactical fighter jet. Then you start flying jets off Aircraft carriers. And that's a whole amazing experience. After your first tour on the carriers, then you actually usually the best go to become instructor pilots. And instructor pilots, not just in the training command, but more like Top Gun, or they call it the replacement air group. And you teach others how to fight the airplane, not just fly it. Right. And out of that group is where we pick the blue angel pilots. And then from there, you're right. I mean, when I showed up, I mean, I was odd. I walked into that briefing room and I'm like, holy crap. Because I realized this team is operating at a whole new level, and I needed to. To raise my game exactly that 300%. And they basically said, you got 90 days Gucci to do it in, but we're going to help you. And that. It was amazing.

That's good.

Yeah, yeah.

All by yourself.

No, no, no. It's a team, and that's the only way you can do it.

Love it, man. Love it. You know, I think. I think it's so instrumental that people understand that everything is, you know, there is a path to everything. You know, when you begin, whether it's my transformation or your transformation or in the people that we've had a chance to communicate with and hopefully inspire and motivate ourselves, one of the things that most people underestimate is the. The. This origin story moment and this transformation moment that you would find in, like, the hero's journey, right? The hero's journey. Yeah. I mean, the hero's journey, if you will, is the reason it has been so successful is because no matter if you're reading the Bible or any other book in the planet, it's like you can see that there's a transformation that occurs. Yes. You know, and that transformation starts with the very first step over and over again. You know, keep going.

No, no, you go one of the way.

What did you say? I was just gonna say, you know, one of the things I was really excited about is this belief method that you have. This. The glad to be here moment. Yeah, right. That's become like your. That was. It's at least coming across, you know, diving into your content and enjoying everything that I was watching and seeing and reading was this glad to be here concept became. It seems like it's the first step in an ultimate transformation.

Well, it's the secret sauce. I think if you can make it the first step, that's a power man. And that's what I'm trying to do is share it with people so that they don't have to go through all the missteps I make. Right. Or struggles. Right. But yeah, it's the secret sauce. I like to say glad to be here is a mindset. It's an ethos, it's a way you live your life. It's the way you perceive the world and actually changes the way the world perceives you. But you got to combine that with operational excellence. So to me, it's two sides of the same coin.

Right.

Too many people, I think, focus just on the operational excellence side or maybe they focus on.

The belief side. But you got to have both. You got to have them both come together. And that is, that's what glad to be here really means.

Yeah. And thought without action is not going to give you the result. Right.

I love it.

Perfect. You know what I'm saying? So I definitely hear you on that. Now.

One of the pieces that I had to, I had to watch it a couple times was a TED Talk you did about, I think it was like right at two years ago that everybody should check out, by the way, for a variety of different things. But you actually break down kind of the operational and the thought side in pretty exclusive detail with the dynamics. How do you use the dynamics now to kind of keep yourself moving forward? And I mean, you've spoken all over the place. Thousands of companies, all of them incredibly well known businesses, all of them come to you as a peak performance guy. Right. They all come to you for this knowledge and like merging those two together. How do you merge the two together?

Well, I think the first thing you got to understand is who's your customer? Right? I mean, who's in the audience.

And what are they trying to achieve? I found one of the other secret sauces. Is this purpose larger than self? And that's the glad to be here too. It's not about you, it's about how or us. And this is what I love about you, Steven. You're helping others, man. You're making a difference people's lives. And that's the key. You know, that's what I call a center point.

Right.

So what's your focus? To make an impact. To make a difference in people's lives. Then you go, okay, well how am I going to go about doing that? So what I ended up doing, and I basically just reversed engineered what not only worked for me on the Blue Angels, but after that I fortunate I went to Stanford Business School, I worked in venture capital. And all of a sudden I started to see the difference or the similarities between what worked at the highest levels in the Military, whether it's Blue Angels, Top gun, the elite forces, and what either is working or not working in the civilian world. And that was the key.

Right.

Because there's a lot that transfers, but there's a lot that doesn't. And what I eventually broke it down to was the old vision plan. Execute feedback loop. I remember hearing that. And I said, okay, that makes a lot of sense, but it's not going to get you to the most elite levels. And what I realized was it's not about vision. Vision's important, but what it really is about is commitment and buy into vision. How do you get people? How do you get a team? How do you get yourself clear on what, what it is you want to do and get committed to do it? That's the starting point of this framework that I can, I'm happy to take you through. But I think the key is that starting point is the beliefs.

Absolutely. You know, it's.

Gosh, there's so many different directions I can go. I'm so excited here. All right, so you got the customary feedback loop. Right. So, you know, we would, we would say we want you to set up a clear outcome and you want to have a purpose bigger than self.

Yep.

Talk to the person who's. Who's a stay at home parent. How does a stay at home parent change their visualization approach or change their alcohol approach to find a purpose bigger than self? Because most people that stay at home, they think, well, all I do is stay at home and I do laundry. I do this, like, let's break it all the way down to someone who doesn't see themselves making an impact.

No, I love it. I mean, you know, that's. I think the key is that you and I, we want to impact individuals too, not just these big corporations. Right. How do you change people's lives? And I would say the very first thing I do, and I do this every morning. And I would do this for a stay at home mom. A stay at home person doesn't matter. I wake up with a practice of gratitude. And I start my day with what I call my glad to be here wake up. And I did it this morning. I do it every morning. I'll take you through it real quick. The very first thing I do when my eyes open up is I just have trained my brain to wake up happy.

Right.

And I say, well, what am I grateful for? And I always start in the present moment. Right. And for today, I am in Laguna Beach. My wife and I, we rented a house for a month and I am sitting here going, you know, I am just grateful to be here. It is just a beautiful opportunity. And I said, you know, I am healthy, I am strong, I am with my wife, I am trying to support her. And those were the first words that thoughts that came to my mind. But then here is the key. I always go back, I go back to yesterday, I just go back 24 hours and I say, what happened yesterday? That I have something to be grateful for. And for me, I was fortunate enough to give two presentations. You know, Virtual now has allowed us to do amazing things, right? And I thought about the people's faces, I thought about the smile that I just saw on you, like you'll be in my glad to be here, wake up tomorrow, right? And I sit there and I go, I just bask in that joy of something that you did, like as a stay at home mom, taking care of the kids, making lunch, doing something for another human being. And then here's the last step. So there's only three steps in the present moment, what are you grateful for? A little bit in the past and then go forward. And in the forward I look for other people and say, how can I support them? And that's when you came up. You were my first thought. I said, you know, I'm going to be getting rich. Privilege to speak with Steven today and anything I can do to support you in the audience, and that's what I do every day, I guarantee you, you do that, you will start to find what really motivates you and your purpose.

I love that. I love that. By the way, the privilege is all mine, sir. I'm enjoying this. I like, I love to learn, let's put it that way. So I appreciate it for sure. Would you. I'd like to, if it's cool with you, I want to stay at the stay at home person. Do you think it would help them.

To understand? One of the things that I feel like we can add to value to people, especially if they, if they're a stay at home parent or maybe, maybe they're, you know, during this Covid season, maybe they lost their gig, they lost their job, they're trying to figure out the financial stuff like that. Yeah, I find that one of the things that I think that maybe could help them take another step is actually visualizing what the ultimate outcome would be. So for example, if a mother or father is not raising a child well, that child may not be remotely successful. Right. However, if the mother or father is raising the child well and sees themselves as raising a Leader, that person could easily become a global leader. Yeah. So teaching the importance of character and integrity and things of that nature. So while they get why you can get lost in washing the clothes and washing the dishes and making the meal and power washing the deck or whatever those things are, ultimately, the stewardship of the little always gives you the wealth of a lot. Right?

Oh, I love that. Yes. Yes. I think.

You just clicked a thought for me. There's this famous quote, and it says.

Put your faith in the small things, because that's where your strength comes from. Are you familiar with that quote, by the way?

Who said, I agree with that quote, but I love it.

So it's Mother Teresa, right?

Yeah.

And when I read that and heard that, I said, that's exactly, Stephen, what you're talking about. The little things matter. It matters raising a child, it matters in a relationship. It matters in trust. You know, whether it's flying a jet 18 inches from another jet, or raising a child at home or being at home and overcoming the adversity of, hey, I got to reinvent myself. Small things matter and little steps every day. So that's what. When you were talking, that's what came to my mind.

Absolutely. Did you find, as part of your process? I find that leaders in general, or people who are what I refer to as developing leaders. Right. I think we all have the capacity to lead or be, or to at least be a person of light in any given circumstance. Yes. But I also find that people who actually successfully become great leaders and great people and lights, if you will, in any space, typically have to go through a level of a crushing or a level of a refining by fire kind of scenario. Did you have to face anything like that along the way, obviously, in this ultimate performance environment?

Oh, absolutely. And many times in my life, I'll just share a couple of them because I think that is very critical, is we all have struggles. Right. And I agree with you that I think David and I were talking about this. And you know, David.

Well.

Is this idea of you actually learn more from your failures than you do from your successes or from your setbacks or obstacles? I know I did. So, you know, I'll give you one real quick. So 2000. So I happened to be starting a company called Centerpoint Entertainment. It was going to be the NASCAR of aviation. You know what? NASCAR is going to roll the air show industry. I had. You had any marketing. I had the performers. And I'm in New York closing a deal with ESPN on a day that became very infamous. And that is 9 11. All right. Yeah. So I'm in New York at 9 11. I see the jets hit the tower and the towers come down. And my reaction was to run towards the towers, not away. That's just how I'm trained. And I did, you know, I was actually in Midtown at the time, and, you know, got down there, and it was just, you know, surreal. What had happened that day. Well, that. That business deal went away. That deal, it just blew up. But lives really changed that day. So that was a big setback. I was $367,000 in debt, by the way, all mine. I didn't take any people's money. Right. And. And then two weeks later, my relationship blows up. She dumped me, you know, and the girl.

Yeah.

So, I mean, here's my life, you know, I'm in debt, 367,000. My business has just blown up. I have no job. My relationship dumps me, and I'm like, okay, well, what are you going to do? Well, just suck it up and let's get back to work. Let's. Let's get that. The money didn't bother me. I knew I could figure that out. It was the, you know, it was the personal pain of a relationship that hurt more. And, you know, it took me about a year. I'll be honest with you. It took me out a year to dig myself out of that hole. But in that process, I went to an event on personal growth. You know, the things that you and I like to talk about. And it's a guy named Lou Tice at the time, I don't know if you remember Lou back in Seattle, and there was a video he was using on visualization. It's funny we go back to that comment you made earlier, because I agree that visualization is a powerful tool that as an individual you can use, or even as a team. And he actually was showing a video of me and my team in the briefing room when we were visualizing the outcomes of this flight. And there's so much power in that. And he said, you know, John, would you mind saying a few words about it? And I went up there, and instead of just talking about the psychology around visualization, I said, here's how we used it, and here's how you can use it. Just tried to make it real, right? Well, when I got off that stage, I had a light bulb moment. People came up to me and go, john, you know, do you do this for a living? And I was like, you know, I don't, but I think I have something I Can share. And that changed my whole life because it started. The journey that we're on is this ability to unpack some of that in a way that's meaningful to others. And so through that adversity, I've actually am now at a higher purpose. And I think that's probably true in your life and in everyone's life.

Yeah, I love it. One reason I wanted to bring that up is because I feel like, you know, it's.

People historically. Right. Just American culture is you overvalue the success side of things and you undervalue the struggle side of things. Not realizing that if you're facing a struggle right now, you're going through a process of refinement and things of that nature. The thought process shouldn't be how do I escape it? The thought process should be how do I move through it? What can I learn from it? Kind of thing. And, you know, I just. All the ultra performers. It doesn't matter if you're in business, if you're. If you are flying airplanes at 18 inches apart, 500 miles an hour, which is just still insane. Still boggles my mind that's even possible. Right? Or, you know, you're leading teams or you're leading your family. It doesn't matter. It's all the same thing. So no matter. One of my beliefs is no matter what you're facing.

The trick is, or the secret is the technique is to look at that situation as a way to. How can I use this to better myself moving forward? Because, like. Like you and I share, you know, I'm. I think the terminology I typically use is trying to. Trying to find or decide or point out or discover the legacy that outlives you. Right. You know, and at the end of the day, the only way that you can go back and do that is to actually do take advantage of this specific purpose. And that's the greatest purpose in life you'll ever have, is serving the person you used to. To be.

I love that.

Right.

I just saw that, by the way, on YouTube and that you did. And I just. That stuck in my head. I was like, you nailed it, defined it.

It's. I've discovered a long time ago there's really three great purposes in life. Serving the person used to be serving the person you once loved or serving the person you want that you either couldn't save or help. Right. You look at Susan B. Coleman, you look at Mothers Against Drunk Driving. You look at all these massive nonprofits that are incredibly successful, all of those successful organizations that now help Millions of people. Thousands, you know, thousands, millions, hundreds, Right? All of them started out of a place of pain, you and I. I'm sitting here in this chair right now because I started out of a place of pain. Right? You're sitting in the chair you've done is because you moved from a place of basically personal growth and went through this, what I referred to as the fiery inferno, so to speak. Right? And as a result, it's not that you get to teach. You've earned the right to teach the things that you've been teaching. Right? You've earned the right to actually talk about the different strategies and the theologies and the things that emerging the, you know, the lifestyle with, you know, with the military training, with the acumen from the, you know, from the entrepreneur side of the business. I mean, it's all awesome, dude. I love it. I love it.

Well, I appreciate that. And I think what's cool is that it's all about serving others. And that's where in your three purposes, that having that purpose larger than self, serving others is, to me, the key. Hey, I'll share with you something real quick. So a good friend of mine, Michael Roach, taught me this, and he said there are four steps to get whatever you want. And I thought this would be kind of cool for your audience, people at home. The first is, what we've been talking about is, first is define clearly what do you want? Right? And that's hard. Sometimes that's the hardest step. And can you even get that down to one sentence? But what is it that I want in life? And I'm thinking about the mom at home right now. And then the second step, and this is where.

It goes away from your usual, well, just work hard and execute. And then, by the way, that feedback loop of the debrief, I teach all the time, which is critical, right? You got to learn. But here's what he said. He said, you know, find somebody else who is trying to do something similar. And in fact, maybe, you know, find someone that's actually been successful at it. That's why before we jumped on this podcast, I want to thank you. You were giving me such great information about how you're building your business in the company. I want to thank you for that. And that's the key, is find someone else who is trying to do it. And then the third step is help them. And I think that's so critical. You know, you're helping someone else, like as a mentor. And then the fourth one, and this is the most critical, that is the Least done is rejoice. Rejoice over the goodness that you're doing. And that's, to me, the essence of the glad to be here. It's rejoicing. And I do this every night, and I'll do it again tonight. I'll rejoice over our interaction right here.

Right.

And to me, those four steps are part of what I teach to organizations, let alone individuals.

I love it. I love it. I find that, you know, I'm glad you brought that up, especially that last point, because I can tell you from just personal experience, I have a hard time from time to time, not necessarily being grateful, but being aware of the small thing that happened.

Oh, nice.

Right. You know, so it's that whole stop and smell the roses kind of scenario, whatever. Like, you know, you know, for example, I've got the luxury and the privilege of hanging out with you today. Right. That's a joy. Right? And either I can just go, okay, well, Keena had a great interview. I've got this meeting and that meeting, and just completely blow by it. Or I can say, man, I just really had a great time. That was so good kind of thing. And I feel like that American culture as a whole, we're taught to look at the next thing rather than enjoy the current thing. And I don't think there's anything wrong with having higher aspirations or pursuits. But I can tell you that I have to be reminded, just as you just did for me just a minute ago, that sometimes I just need to slow down.

Yes, just slow down and appreciate. And that awareness. Right? I love you use the word awareness, because I think that's one of the critical skills you can teach people, right, Is how to become aware.

Even in fighter pilots, there's a famous thing called the OODA loop. Observe, orient, decide, act. But it starts with observe. You know, become aware, then orient yourself. We call that situational awareness. Then decide on your course of action and then take the action. You know, and that's a lot of people sometimes don't do that last step, but it starts with awareness. I love that. And, you know, here's the other thing. As you were talking, I thought about the beauty of what we just talked about is you can do that quickly. You know, you can still. Okay, like, we both got next meetings and all this kind of stuff, but I am going to take a moment right after this, and I am just going to breathe in and say, this was a blessing. This was a great use of our time. Right? And just rejoice on the goodness that we are Doing. And then I will do it again tonight. And so that is the other thing is you can rejoice multiple times. And what we have learned is that actually it is not just a nice thing to do. It's changes the way you're. The neurology works in your brain. We actually can rewire ourselves to where that becomes more of a habit, more of a common occurrence.

Cool. Absolutely. I was actually. So I do a lot of. A lot of work with uso. Thank you. Locally that now is now going to become globally because obviously USO is everywhere. Yeah. And they have a program called Warrior Reset.

Oh, nice.

I used to get so frustrated because these are. These are, you know, essentially active duty people, some in special forces, some in non special forces, but they're active duty people who have served the country, who've given their very best. Right. Who are transitioning out of the military and they have to re. Acclimate and go into civilian life. Right. Many of them have what the. I guess the military or the.

Psychological community would call post traumatic stress disorder. I used to get so mad because the speaker that would come up before me and speak was. He was the post traumatic guy. Right. And he would always say, well, this is what it is. This is how it's formed. These are the symptoms. And by the way, it's irreversible. Now if you're sitting there. As a military service member who's been actively diagnosed with something like that.

I watched a young man go. He was into it. And then he went, right. His whole body language, head sunk down the middle of his chest, totally lost countenance. And I stood up after that for my own thing and said, well, here's my belief about post traumatic stress. Nice. Okay, here's my belief. My belief is it's not a death sentence. My belief is not a permanent. It doesn't have to be permanent. It will take enormous amount of work to get the rewiring done. Through neuroplasticity, you're gonna have to be actively managing your thoughts. I believe that this can be worked on. So I would call it post traumatic struggle. Nice. Not disorder. Right, Disorder. Too many times we hear the word disorder and we think, okay, well, this is who I am. This is now part of my identity. Right. And then you can't move forward. So neuroplasticity and all that stuff is crazy important. Break down some of the rewiring just a little bit further, if you don't mind.

Yeah, absolutely. First off, thanks for what you're doing with the uso. I Work with higher ground in Sun Valley. That's where we live. And it does exactly take care of veterans. I was just with the Wounded Warrior project last week, just with some veterans, and you're absolutely dead on. It's not permanent. You know, it's a challenge. And there's ways to do that. And it starts with beliefs. And I think that's what's really critical is, you know, what do we listen to? What information do you absorb and bring in. In that belief section there? But I just wanted to say thank you first and then. What was your question again? Because I just forgot it.

Yeah, I mean, just, you know, one of the things that. This neuroplasticity, this rewiring your brain, you know, one of the things that I've heard you discuss before is a repetition that's needed. The 40 to 60 reps, essentially, to get that.

Yeah.

That new groove in place. So I was thinking maybe just break it down more for someone who's not familiar with neuroplasticity or rewiring.

Yeah, it's basically. And by the way, we really don't know. Is it 40, is it 60, is it 21? You know, no one really knows. How long does it take to rewire your brain or to form a habit? I had one neurosurgeon I was working with in Mayo, and he said. When I asked him that question, he said, john, you're actually asking the wrong question. And I said, oh, that's good. He said, you need to ask what are you trying to do? Because it'll vary.

Right.

But the point is, it's beautiful, is that we do know you can rewire your brain. There's a thing called Hebb's Law that says neurons that wire together from fire together. Okay. So it's just very. Gets down to simply, what do we think about? What do we. What's our habituation? Right. That's why this glad to be here. Wake up that I do, or this glad to be here is so important, because what you're trying to do is wire gratitude, appreciation, positivity into your brain. And the more you do that, the pathways actually become stronger. Right. But it works the other way, too. And that's why I'm so glad that you were. You stood up after this person and said, you know, I believe differently. Because if you just keep reinforcing the pain in your life, that's going to get stronger too. Right. So I think the key is to find something that pulls you into more of where you're trying to go, not where you are right. And I call that the high performance zone. The gap between where you are and where you're trying to go. We do know this, and this is one thing. I'll tell you the area of your brain where.

When you're in a grateful state of mind, also an appreciative state of mind, the area of your brain that lights up is the same area of your brain where perceptions come from. So how you perceive the world, do you perceive a threat or an opportunity? Is the glass half empty or glass full? That's very wired into you by the gratefulness and appreciation you have in life. So the more grateful you are, the more positivity you'll see in the world, the more you'll see a glass is half full. But here's what's really cool. The other thing is generosity. I know you give back. I started the Glad to Be youe foundation. It's real important to give back to the world. That area of your brain that lights up is the area of your brain where self esteem comes from. So your confidence level. So the more generous you are, the more confident you are. Now here's the cool part. Connect the dots. When you're in a grateful state of mind and a generous state of mind, you'll see things others don't see. And you'll have the confidence to take the action that is unstoppable. That's unstuckness. That's creativity. That's changing the world.

Love it. I love it. Yeah. I mean, I've always said that being stuck is nothing more than not making progress. And becoming unstoppable is always making progress. And you just walked everybody. Exactly. How to always make progress. Like, it's awesome. I really feel like people can be set free. And this is worthy of rewinding and rewatching the last two or three minutes. For sure. For sure. You know, this one other thing, I actually heard you break it down when you were on a show recently with our friend David. And that was this element. I hadn't heard this before, so I wanted. I thought it would bear repeating. Is the five attributes of an Angel.

Oh.

I love that. Like, so I want to break those down because I actually originally I went to angelic behaviors and like, from a divine perspective. Then I went through. Well, it totally represents the Blue Angels, too. So interesting. So.

So here's how that whole thing came about. I was doing some research on wisdom. I'm always trying to not just learn. I got a new mantra. Learn, grow, gift. Right. And so I'm trying To learn about wisdom. And I came across a note, and it said, there's five qualities of an angel. And I thought, oh, that's pretty interesting. And it says this. It says, the first quality, an angel is a messenger. An angel gives guidance. An angel protects. An angel's a warrior. And then it said, above all else, an angel sings God's praises. I actually changed that to serves others just for myself. And I was going through that, and I said, you know, I'm not sure those are the only five qualities, but if they are, I'm in. And that's. That's become my personal mantra. That's my personal mission statement. Right. That I am an angel. And it's so funny that you connected it back to the Blue Angels, because that just so happens to be another thing that. Yeah, I happen to be Blue Angel. And you're right. The Blue Angels are all about this idea of being ambassadors of goodwill, is what we call ourselves, you know, messengers, guidance. So I found something, a word that resonates with me and gives me guidance, and that's something I like to teach others, too, is your own personal I am statement. You know, and the word you choose after I am becomes very powerful. But, yeah, I say that every day. And I actually have a physical routine that I did. I do as part of that angel essence. Yeah.

Love it, dude. In fact, I think you can add it. I think you're going to add a six. One. Okay. And here's. Here's what I think is Angels also can travel practically at the speed of light, so.

Nice.

Well, I've done. I've gone supersonic, and now I like your. I like your challenge. Let's get to the speed of light.

I love it. Well, dude, I had such a great time. I feel like we could probably sit here and talk for hours. Imagine us and David and a few other people sitting beside a campfire. That would be dangerous.

It would be precious. I'm learning so much from you.

Yeah, likewise. Goodness gracious. That would be an awesome experience.

Let's do it.

Yeah. Hey, we'll bring it. We are speaking into existence, David, if you are listening, we are thinking campfire, everybody hanging out together and just dropping wisdom after wisdom. Just give us some note takers because none of us are going to remember what we said.

Exactly. That's why we need a team around us. I love that idea, though.

Absolutely. Well, look, I've had a blast. I love hanging out with you today. It's been awesome. How can people learn more about what you're doing and what you're building. I know you're working on a lot of exciting projects, some of which you can talk about now, some of which you can't. So how can people get to know you better and learn more about you?

Well, I think that the easiest way is just go to my website, John Foley, Inc. I N C.

There'll be a pop up window and if you want to sign up on our list, please sign up. We send these impact videos like you're doing out once a week. Of course, social is always good too. John Foley, Inc. You know, on any of your social channels, I think the biggest part is just to continue to be aligned. You know, we got a book out there called Fearless Success, but I think it's more about giving than it is about receiving. So anyone who wants to contact me, you know, I'll give you my personal cell, 208-721-0975. Drop me a text, drop me an email, but above all else, just become part of the community and let's continue to impact people.

Let's.

Let's change some a billion lives together.

Oh, we can. Yeah. And I'm all down for it now. I will tell you. Just gave out your personal cell phone number here on air. Just so you know, some of our videos have done really, really well with view counts, so I'm throwing that out there saying that you might get inundated.

Let's get a couple texts going and then we'll figure it out. But my point is that this is about giving, right? This is about giving. So yeah, but social is awesome. We're trying to learn and grow that whole medium too. So check us out on YouTube and it'd be great. You're doing an amazing job, Steven.

Oh, thank you. And likewise, dude, again, I've had a blast and I can't wait to do it again.

Thank you.

Glad to be here, by the way.

All right, my friend, I'll see you later. Take care, buddy. See you.

Thanks, buddy.

Glad to be here. What can I tell you, John? Gucci Foley is a rock star. And I know you enjoyed that interview, which also means I know you're going to really like this one. So make sure you check it out. I also realized, Stephen, is that they had knocked me back into a second best version of myself. Okay.

I'd begun thinking, well, I'm not going.

To be first best Peter, so I guess I'm going to be this other guy.