Weekly Recap
Hi friends…since we last spoke
Great week since last-time. Been training hard, setting some new process goals for 2024, reflecting, planning, re-prioritising etc.
Jack and 3 other boys ran a marathon with no training. I was running support crew and camera work. A small doco will be out on instagram within a week to showcase this. We raised $1500ish for Mental Health charity Black Dog. Plenty more positive initiatives to follow.
Jack and I also went to Karrinyup on Tuesday and handed out approx 30 written notes with positive affirmations to strangers. We captured a few reactions on and posted the video to instagram. A great experience.
2 Ideas from me
1. You don’t want your purpose to be fate.
I had a great conversation with Pete from Rec-Lab. Ripping bloke and future podcast guest and it inspired this insight. The amount of people who believe what they’re doing was destiny is incredible. The reason I don’t like the idea of that is simple.
If your current ‘purpose’ was meant to be (fate). Logically, that means it was pre-determined. So something in your life was always meant to happen. This means you did not have free will in making this choice. I don’t know about you but that scares me. Because if one thing was pre-determined and out of my control, how many other things are? Everything?
My current position on this. We select our purposes, most of the time they are circumstantial and justify it as fate because we love what we do. There’s nothing wrong with this. It’s just a scary thought to be saying major life decisions are fated. THIS MEANS YOU DIDN’T HAVE FREE WILL. Plus, purposes can change.
To me, there is just no benefit to saying major things in your life were meant to happen. It takes the shine off it. Zero benefits. And the down-side is you’re opening a can of worms for your free-will to be non-existent. I know what I am choosing.
2. The things you try to control but cannot shine a spotlight on your insecurities.
There are things we can control and things we can’t. Internal and external. Naturally, there are a lot of external things that we desire and thus put our attention in trying to change i.e, people’s opinions, amount of followers
If you can reflect on what external things you are trying to control, it will often highlight something you can work on.
Few of my examples to inspire you to reflect on your own.
I used to focus spot much on other people’s opinion of me because I wasn’t that confident in myself.
I used to try and control what happened in the past by writing a story that painted me as a the victim as a way to control who was responsible. My insecurity was that I wasn’t man enough to acknowledge my flaws, own them and actively work on them. Proud to say how far I have come and will continue to improve with a willingness to not always be right. Putting my ego aside. It’s not easy. But it’s essential for improvement.
The idea is that we focus on these things because we are so scared that someone will grab a big spotlight into our face and scream that they can see right through us and tell us we aren’t good enough and they know we are a fraud. Well at least that’s how I felt at times in previous years. From my experience with being secure in myself, it has always been the uncontrollables that dominated my attention primarily because I was trying so hard to protect my ego, knowingly or not.
The key: if you’re willing to be vulnerable with yourself and explore yourself: you can identify the things that will change the way you feel about yourself and that is an almighty powerful change with how you experience life.
1 Quote
“The opposite of belonging is fitting in”
Brene Brown
Just watched her documentary on Netflix called Brene Brown: The Call to Courage. Incredible. Loved hearing her insights into how to be courageous and what sits at the core of the human emotions. 80 min speech style. It’s funny, powerful and educative. You will not spend time much better than this. I GUARANTEE IT.
For this quote. If you’re moulding and shape-shifting yourself in order to be a part of a group, are you really belonging? No. If you have to put your core values to the backseat to try and force some sense of connection with other people, then it will never be a fulfilling sense of belonging.
The take-away: human connection is essential for us. But don’t sacrifice yourself in the process. There is plenty more like-minded people out there.
1% Tip
Healthy substitution:
It’s very hard to change our habits so let’s work with this. Instead of trying to remove behaviours, let’s implement healthier alternatives.
e.g, If you are in the habit of having a soft drink after every meal then change this to a flavoured mineral water/ cold water with electrolytes.
If you are in the habit of scrolling on your phone before bed, then wear blue light glasses to minimise the effect of night-time scrolling as you transition to a better routine.
In all cases, there is a lot of friction (resistance/difficulty) when we try to change our behaviours. So healthy substitution is a way to ease this process in whatever context you want.
Pod Summary
#59 – Bonus EP – Q + A from IG followers. Lots of answers about mindset including how to be grateful, why hard work is overrated, how to have successful mental health etc.
#60- Hannah Marshall – do’s and don’t’s of 2024 – why having alone time is necessary, how to make new friends, how to take more responsibility, confidence is best grown from outside your comfort zone + lots more
#61 – Brayden Ainsworth – 2023 life lessons – why self-growth is easier with the right people, why you need to take life on and stop waiting, why vulnerability is a super power and why life is about the journey + lots more