Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Manage Your Nerves, Unlock Your Mind & Find Your Power | AMA Vol. 18 w/ Dr. Michael Gervais

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

Explore powerful strategies to conquer public speaking anxiety with Dr. Michael Gervais and O'Neil Cespedes in this insightful AMA episode, delving into personal growth, purpose-based identity, and the untapped potential of the human mind.We also explore topics like:Practical insights for managing anxiety and nervesHow to be your own tuning fork of excellenceCreating space in your life for experimentation and exploration Putting yourself in positions of power in your own lifeHow to shift from a performance-based to a purpose-based identity.And so much more…Thank you for the great questions, and... stay curious! If you have any questions for the next AMA's, email [e-mail] you an epic week._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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my breathing changed, and all of a sudden, all of my thinking changed. From this is amazing to I'm gonna blow it. Most of my philosophy and my first principles in life are to be connected and put myself in the most powerful position I can. I'm sorry, please say that again. That was fucking wonderful.

What the fuck did you just say? Welcome back. We're welcome to another Ask Me Anything on Finding Mastery. I am your host, Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training, a high-performance psychologist. Now, the purpose behind these conversations, behind these AMAs, is to hear from you, to explore the topics and questions that you've been wrestling with on your path to becoming. So in this latest conversation, O'Neill and I tackle a common yet formidable challenge that many of us face, the fear of public speaking. It's a real one now. We unpack strategies to overcome this fear, emphasizing the power of calibration, reflection, and the critical role that relationships play in our own personal

growth. We also explore topics like practical insights for managing anxiousness and nerves, how to be your own tuning fork of excellence, creating space in your life for experimentation and exploration, putting yourself in positions of power in your own life, how to shift from a performance-based to a purpose-based identity, and of course, so much more. And as always, I have so much fun during these AMAs. I really relish in them. And my hope is that it provides insights and tools for you as you look to push boundaries, as you look to explore your potential and to thrive within the complexities of our modern

world. So with that, let's dive right into volume 18 of Finding Masteries, Ask Me Anything. AMA 18. Damn, AMA 18. That's wild time flies it does it really does

and the way it feels to do this with you I love it I look forward to it this is a highlight for me and I appreciate that

yeah I really appreciate how it goes how it feels to do this with you yeah one of my hopes is that the person listening is also having

that same type of connection to themselves because you're asking questions, the audience is asking questions, and we're wrestling them down. the question, even maybe answering it, maybe even pausing after the question comes up and wrestles with it themselves and then calibrates how you or I might answer it. That is one of the ways I really enjoy going through these types of experiences as a listener is calibrating first. And I don't know if people are doing that, but that would be at least my recommendation. You know, I think calibration is happening. Cause I'm gonna be honest with you.

I didn't have any idea of, I mean, of course I knew who you were, but I didn't have any idea of how effective, at least from my end, it would be, and I certainly didn't expect people to reach out to me at all, at all. That's happening to you right now. And that's happening to me.

And I'm like, whoa. Yeah, yeah. Calibration is happening. And I mean, and honestly, it feels good. It really, man, I almost said this. I'm going to sound corny. I got to stop saying that because it's okay to sound corny. It is okay.

This is the corny corner. This is the corny corner. It's okay to be in the corny corner. This is the corny corner. It's okay to be in the corny corner. But it's so dope when people reach out to you who don't know you and tell you like, oh, man, I really enjoyed what you were saying. That helped open my eyes on something. I don't know, man, for lack of a better word, just people telling you that you made them feel good feels good. It does. It just feels dope. Yeah.

Yeah. And our community is really strong. Yeah. you that you made them feel good feels good it does just feels dope so yeah yeah yeah and our community is really strong yeah you know there are there are not only decision makers as the bulk of our community but they're thoughtful um the intelligence i i assume that because we can't measure intelligence across the community but based on the questions based on my interaction with people this is a really smart group that is compassionate, purpose-based, want to be their very best. And at the same time,

are working between that tension between what is my very best and what is my true self? What is my best self? What is my true self? And really navigating that space in a high stress world that we're in right now. So I appreciate our community.

Yeah, yeah, I do as well. I really appreciate them. You know, it's funny because when you were just talking, I was thinking to myself and you're like, what is my best self? What is my true self? I've often had times where, you know, when I was younger, and even now, even now, when I'll go in the bathroom and I'll do the whole Rocky thing.

I look in the mirror like, who are you? Like, who are you? And I'm looking in the mirror, you know, I'm trying to figure out who I am. And for the longest, I always was under the impression that only I will be able to figure out who I am. Right. And to some extent, I think that's true, right? But listening to people that have had experiences, that have shared similar experiences,

listening to you talk, break things down the way you break them down, that helps with the discovery. It does. Oh, I think 100%. Like one, a first principle for me is no one does it alone. We need each other. And even if it's uh what you're

suggesting is as a reflection or a mirror yeah um this is why like truth tellers are really important and people that just hold up a mirror they don't need to offer an opinion they don't need to do anything other than just hold up a mirror and when that takes place and we see our reflection um that in of itself is really powerful. So the relationships carry us. The second axiom for me is that through relationships we become. And it starts with your relationship with yourself,

with other people, with mother nature, with experience in and of itself, and through relationships we become. Well, I guess with that being said, thank you, Dr. Mike, for carrying me in this relationship. Yeah, right. Yeah, ditto. I appreciate you.

Let's get to the questions then. Let's do it. So Sarah says, or she asks, what advice do you have for people to help overcome the fear of public speaking? There are many resources out there, but are there any approaches that you think are particularly

impactful? Public speaking is one of the great fears, one of the greatest fears for people. So the question is noted. It's not that the environment is not the thing that's dangerous. So when you walk up those five steps to get onto a podium, to get onto a stage, high rise or low rise, whatever it might be. And sometimes the public speaking is in front of 12 people that you know. It's at a boardroom or a meeting.

So it can be a grand audience, a small audience, or something quite intimate. And it is considered one of the great fears for people. But why would that be the case? The experience that I am most connected to in this is that I was right out of grad school and I was selected to be able to present at an international conference. And I was like, oh, this is something now. It was in Greece. And I was really excited. I was going to add to or maybe even challenge a theory that was well established in the field. And I'm as green as you can get. I'm as wet behind the ears. I am the one that doesn't recognize that they're the newbie in the room.

And I'm backstage and I'm feeling great. There's that particular buzz in the room where you can hear a ballroom filling up. All of a sudden, it hit me. There's a trigger that took place. My buddy nudges me and goes, hey, you know that theory that you're challenging? Look in the front row. I looked down and it was him. It was the author of the theory. He looked like he was 12 feet tall

i mean he looked like and he looked kind of like you are cross cross-armed right now you know the like i thought he was giving me the glare of death yeah and i hadn't walked out yet but he he caught my eye on um side stage and so i was as nervous all of of a sudden, bam, zero to two seconds, I was flooded. My hands were shaking. My heart was pounding. My breathing changed. And all of a sudden, all of my thinking changed. From this is amazing to I'm going to blow it.

And so I really understand the intensity of what that feeling is. And the place that I want to get to with the question is you have to understand what are the tripwires for you. So it's not the audience that's dangerous. It's what they represent to you and what they represent to us. To me in that moment was that I was going to be found out that I didn't really understand it the way that they might understand it. I had done some work now. I really did some good work on this theory. And I thought a lot, but I didn't have any reference points. I didn't have any calibrations.

It wasn't hardened. It was very fresh and new and green sprouts, if you will. And so instantly I went to, they know more than I do. And they're going to think that or they're going to find out that I don't have the goods so to speak the threat is that they will judge us critique us that they will see us for something other than we hope they will see us and so there's this propping up that we tend to do in a response to the fear of being seen. And it's a funny thing because we really do want to be seen.

And so here we are trying to present a certain way to be seen, but seen as smart, seen as capable, seen as funny, whatever, cool, whatever. But there's this deep craving to be okay without having to wear the mask or having to wear the shiny armor or having to pretend a certain way. So that's the conflict that happens when you walk up the four or five steps onto a, or you raise your hand to speak, is am I going to be critiqued and judged? And if I come up short in their eyes, am I going to be pushed out? The strategies to deal with that are first to take a look at your identity. That is a big, there's a big rock to get in the container. I could, hold on, let me go small rocks and then big rocks. Okay. So small rocks first, when you feel that activation in your nervous system kick on and you feel all of that fight,

flight, freeze mechanism start to take place, breathe. Recognize that your body's getting ready. So take care of yourself by framing it like, oh, my body's turning on, it's getting ready, as opposed to, uh-oh, oh no, they're gonna find out. So first frame it that this is an opportunity, this is productive, and then breathe. I got the ordering wrong. So in the type of breathing is actually very specific

in that case, is it's longer exhales than inhales. So if you breathe in for four seconds, you want to exhale for eight seconds. There's another technique on breathing. When you breathe in at the top of the breath, if you were to squeeze all of your muscles at around 80%. So you breathe in at the top of the breath, you would hold and you'd squeeze your

muscles, your back, your chest, your glutes, your hams, your toes, everything, your abs at about 80%. And if you're one of those folks that can go into muscle spasm where we've got some injuries, back it down to 60%. But you're creating tension. And then as you exhale, you release all of that physical tension with it. So there's the two types of breath, the long exhales, which is a calming mechanism after about 12 long exhales. There's some research that suggests that we trigger our rest and digest system there. The second is that inhale tension with muscles and then exhale and let it all go. The third thing that you can do is

actually there's some technologies that can that can help prior to going into those environments is to help down regulate by activating your parasympathetic nervous system apollo neural a friend of both of ours has created a you know a nice technology to help regulate that as well. I am, in all, to avoid conflict, I am not financially or economically involved with them. They do sponsor the podcast, but I just think they're great. I think what they're doing is really special. So those are a couple of small things to get in the bucket. Again, frame it as an opportunity.

Frame it as your body's getting ready, as opposed to a threat and you're going to fall apart so the way you see it is important and then there's at least three strategies one being technology two being breathing to help down regulate the point that i want to make here though is the the small things that you do are just band-aids at that moment because you've got adrenaline and cortisol thrown flowing your system. And those are agitating. They're not going to leave quickly. So you can make it a little bit better, but it's not like all of a sudden you're going to go, those 12 breaths. Amazing. I'm good now. You'll just be less agitated than when you first started, which is fine. It's cool. It gives you a little bit better

advantage, a little competitive advantage to be able to think clearly or more critically, maybe creatively. So then the big rock to get in the container, I'll make this really short, is to take a look at your identity. Because if you're walking into a public setting and seeing that moment as a threat to yourself, it's likely that your identity is fully engrossed and commingled and enmeshed in your performance. And ultimately, what you would want to do is be purpose-driven rather than performance-based. So the purpose-driven is when I have the opportunity to speak about something that really matters to me, it is about the mission. It's about the purpose.

It's about helping people be part of something bigger than all of us. So I'm in service of something as opposed to, look how smart I am. Don't kick me out. I just hope you like me. I hope I'm good enough for you. That's what the type of thinking that supports the performance-based identity. Performance-based identity is marked by I am what I do, how well I do it, and especially how well I do it in your eyes and relative to other people. That's a performance-based identity. And so the big rock they get in the container is to go from a performance-based identity and crosswalk that over to a purpose-based identity. And that changes everything. Finding Mastery is brought to you by

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to start building stronger relationships that actually convert, try LinkedIn Sales Navigator for free for 60 days at linkedin.com slash deal. That's linkedin.com slash deal for two full months for free. Terms and conditions apply. Finding Mastery is brought to you by David Protein. I'm pretty intentional about what I eat, and the majority of my nutrition comes from whole foods. And when I'm traveling or in between meals on a demanding day, certainly I need something quick that will support the way that I feel and think and perform. And that's why I've been leaning on David protein bars. And so has the team here at Finding Mastery. In fact, our GM, Stuart, he loves them so much. I just want to kind of quickly put them on the spot.

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So if you're trying to hit your daily protein goals with something seamless, I'd love for you to go check them out. Get a free variety pack, a $25 value, and 10% off for life when you head to davidprotein.com slash findingmastery. That's David, D-A-V-I-D, protein, P-R-O-T-E-I-N.com finding mastery. Dr. Mike, you just dropped a whole bunch of jewels and gems right there. Performance-based, purpose-based, you know, how people perceive you, us wanting to be seen, all these wonderful, intellectually brilliant things that people can get in touch with. But being that I'm O'Neill

and I'm a carnal being. You're a what being? Carnal and aggressive. All I could hear with all the gems that you dropped was the breathing and the contracting muscles. So I was thinking like, okay, so I'm going to do some motherfucking, I'm going to do some pushups before I go speak and all that stuff. Because I've seen people do that before. And I've've wondered like what are you doing what why are you doing

that now obviously that's an extreme example but no no it's not a it's not that's a cool remedy as well really no yeah so you're expressing some of that energy that's pent up you're also um you're activating your body in a different way so you if your fight, flight, freeze mechanisms that get ready to go do something big is taking place and you're trying to just contain it all, it can feel like out of whack. Jumping jacks, pushups, fill in the blank, that type of stuff, a brisk walk. All of that is cool as long as you don't break a sweat right before you're about to go out. And so it does start to regulate your body in a different way. And yeah, that's a tactic. I didn't bring it up, but it's a really good one. But you want to do that in a way that, again, it's really important that let's say you're in a suit or you're in something that

you don't want to find yourself in a place where you're now compromised because your heart rate has gone so high. Yeah. Okay. So it's more about expressing some of the pent-up energy. You're a performer. How does that show up for you or how have you worked through it? Whether I'm doing theater or whether I'm doing improv or whether I'm speaking, I search for a kindred spirit in the audience. I look for them and I try to find them through humor.

I look for that laugh. And when I get that laugh, that in turn is like reciprocation. It gives me energy and confirmation that, hey, we fuck with you. You're all right with us. You're okay. And then my confidence grows.

But initially I step on petrified, nervous, much like many people looking for that validation, thinking they're going to out me and expose me. But I just cling on to that one person or two or three people that, and I'll toss a little joke out there or something. And when I hear that chuckle, my power level goes up. And then when I hear it, and then usually my power level

goes up and then the more chuckles I get, the more confident I get. And by the time the whole room is laughing or confident with me or responding to me, I'm just floating on waves. But I search for that. I look for it, I think about it before I go on stage. Like, okay, I just need to get that one.

I just need to get that one. It reminds me of a heavyweight boxer I spent some time with, and he's like, look, I just gotta get out there and just get a couple hits in. And I was like, oh, okay, so that gets you into the mix. Now, the problem with heavyweight boxing is that one punch could end a fight.

Yeah, yeah. So same framing to you is what happens if you don't get that response that you're looking for and you're scanning and you don't see it and there's not somebody that gives you information back that you're okay. Yeah. What happens?

A bomb. You bomb. It's only happened one time in my life where I got that whole, looking out like, okay, this is it. I'm just going under. But usually, usually Dr. Mike, I find it. I find it.

It's an interesting scenario that you're putting yourself in. And one is you're probably finding're, you're probably finding it because you're looking for it, which is cool. Cause that you're saying, okay, once I get that information, then I'm going to be okay. And I will map, I'll map it one more way and see if you're open for an idea is that I'm going to go basketball right now. Once I get a couple shots and like, I get a couple of buckets, like I a couple buckets like i'm good so once something outside of me takes place favorably then inside of me i'm okay i find that to be dangerous i hate

the way you word damn you yeah yeah i guess when you put it that way yeah well yeah i the reason i see it, I can say it clearly is because that's how I lived for a long time. Yeah. Yeah. And I wonder if there's a way that, did you say you're petrified when you go up? I'm extremely nervous, yeah.

And then that nervousness, there's two types. Is it cognitive thinking or is it more physical somatic? Is it more in your body? Definitely cognitive. So your body, if I were to measure you physiologically, your heart is slightly elevated but not pounding. Well, hold on. I would say it's damn near both.

Yeah, okay. So you've got both. And you can have both. Yeah. Okay. So you've got both and you can have both. Yeah. Yeah. So cognitive and somatic are, those are the two ways we think about like an anxiousness or a readiness. Okay.

So if it's too much, we call it an anxiousness. If it's just right, it's like a readiness to go out there. Yeah. And obviously it's the bigger, the, the bigger,

the event too, that affects it. Right. No, no, that's for you. That's not, that's not how it was. Damn. Right. damn right yeah well so this goes back to another core framing is um are the olympics if you were to

be in the olympic games is it the biggest games or is it another games is the super bowl another the biggest game or another game is the opportunity to go in front of people, you know, is this the big show or just another show? You're looking at me like. Man, you're making me think about just performance anxiety. What do you mean? From listening to you talk about this and you questioning me, just, yeah, I think it isn't just another game.

I don't view things like that. If's a huge thing the pressure the nervousness the all that because in my mind and maybe some people feel the same way as well in my mind this is my chance this is my opportunity especially if it's something huge this is the i don't want to mess this up. And the more you think about not messing it up, the more you put all your money into it and the stakes are high, the more nervous it is. Yeah, you're describing like a perfect soup for being deleveraged. So most of my philosophy and my first principles in life are to be connected

and put myself in the most powerful position I can. So all of my philosophies, if we were to lay them out and deconstruct them, you'd see they're driving for me to be in a position that allows me to express artistically. And to do that, I have to be grounded and present and clear and I have to be in command to my best ability and love the edges where the unfolding unknown is exciting. Please say that again. That was fucking wonderful. I'm serious.

I'll never stop you. Say that again. What the fuck did you just say? To make you express your artistic ability? Yeah, so that's what all of my first principles are designed for that, which is to put me in the position, basically the shorthand of it is to put me in a position

where I feel powerful. And even when I'm at the frontier of of my abilities like I'm at that emotional edge that physical edge that mental edge where I don't know how it's going to go I still want to be in love with that unfolding experience as well so it's it's kind of like this I was I'll go back to a heavyweight boxer no this was a UFC fighter And we're talking about the importance of the weigh-ins. And so there's that stare down moment that takes place as you're intimately familiar with. And he says, look, I asked him, so how are you going to weigh-ins? How do you go into weigh-ins?

He was a very seasoned fighter. And he said, oh, it's pretty easy easy i go in and i look him in the eyes and if he if he looks away i got him i got him so what if he doesn't look away he goes oh i got him there too because he can't handle me and he's going to look into me he's going to see something he doesn't want to see so i got him there if we make eye contact too. I said, so wait a minute, if he looks away and if he looks at you, either way you're winning? He goes, yep. So I just, it was his framing. If he looks in my eyes, he's going to see something he doesn't want to see. He's in trouble. And if he looks away, I got him there too. That type of idea holds up for me is that no matter what the external experience is,

I want to be able to capture my very best in it. And so all of my philosophy, first principles are designed for that. So your orientation is to look outside of you to see if you're okay and, and to see something as being really big. What if you flip the script just a little bit and you are able to know the, just the quote unquote right thoughts for you to feel the way that you want to feel when you are on the concrete. And when you walk up the five steps to get onto the hardwood platform. What if those five steps didn't change anything and you knew how to be exactly the human you wanted to be so you could artistically express the ideas and there was a purpose that was underneath of it that was far bigger than you?

This is going to sound like this is going to be a really shallow response um my my thinking as flawed as it is is if i execute everything the way i'm supposed to execute it properly supposed supposed to or going to going to going to going to okay and it's executed well and i don't get the gosh gosh, the validation or the response or the applause, metaphorically speaking, there's some part of me that's going to go backstage and be like, man, you know, I don't care if my, the people backstage, that was wonderful. You hit every bullet point.

You said you did everything. I'm like, I don't care. They didn't give me what I was looking for. Okay. How far do you want to go on this, O'Neal? I don't know if I want to go that far. I saw you pulling your hat down at this moment. I saw you back up.

I'm like, let's go to the next question. Yeah, I really understand it. And the challenge though, that you're presenting in life is that again, something outside of me is allowing me to be okay. And there's an Olympian that I spent some time with. Actually, I'll tell you a better story. I don't know.

I'd never worked with this athlete. It was Bodie Miller, one of the great downhill skiers. You and i might have talked about bode before he always puts it on edge and so much so that he's never won an olympic up until this point he's never podiumed at the olympics but because he puts it on edge now if he just played it safer he probably podium yeah he's like that's not how i'm doing my life yeah Okay. I'm making, I'm taking some liberties in the story because I don't know him. This is all secondhand. And so he gets down to the bottom of, uh, I'm pretty sure it was the Vancouver run and he takes a moment, uh, the Vancouver Olympics and he takes a moment and you see him, the puff of smoke goes up in the air. Um, and that sounded like, no, Both smoke went up in the air.

No, all the snow kind of kicks up because he's flying down and skids into that little end of race moment. And you see the cameras catch him within himself like nodding. So his head is nodding, but you can see his attention is almost replaying a couple corners

that he wanted to put it on edge. He's like, yeah, I did it. And then he looks up to the scoreboard to see what his time was. And he was in first place. So that type of ordering speaks volumes to me for mastery. And you can practice this in small ways. I'll give you a very small way to practice practice it is to be your own tuning fork. At Finding Mastery, we hire Olympians

and sports psychologists to work with corporate athletes and corporations to help them switch on their culture, to help their people be their very best by training their mind. And when the Olympians come out from the first couple of sessions, like, okay, Mike, what'd you think? Like if I'm in the back of the room watching or something, what'd you think? And I go, tell me what you thought. Okay. So I'm not playing the game, right? Tell me what you

think. And then, so they look and they go, well, did you see that? Like, I don't know. I think people like, they really liked it. So the tuning fork is now tuned to what other people think of the performance or the experience. And what I want to help them do is to first have a tuning fork is now tuned to what other people think of the performance or the experience and what i want to help them do is to first have a tuning fork of personal excellence not acceptance by others but personal excellence and so i think with your craft with your skills o'neill with your sensibilities of humor and the whole kind of craft that you've created there that you would be able to know if you are on time, if you are free, if you are able to contour your words in a way that had shape and meaning and the spacing was right and it was

funny to you. And I bet that you could walk off stage at the end of that and be like, that was awesome. And to not need them to say, you're my hero. You're my guy. You're one of us. You're okay. I bet that there's a version of that in there. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentous. When it comes to high performance, whether you're leading a team, raising a family, pushing

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I've experienced that where I use my own tuning fork or I was my own tuning fork. I understood. And from my viewpoint, it seemed like they didn't get it. And I've stepped off and I've been like, I hit, I was, I was killing it.

They didn't get it but then some deep dark voice inside me is like what do you mean they didn't get it they didn't laugh you didn't get it you know you oh i yeah i also think that if you when you are really on it yeah everyone's with you i think that that response does happen but it's secondary it's kind of like the skier he calibrated that he put it on edge and of course if he puts it on edge he'll have one of the fastest times in the world so when you are when you are you're tuning fork and you know if you are with it with your if you are on time with the unfolding present moment that's what i mean by it if you yeah if you are on time with the unfolding present moment that's what i mean by it if you yeah if you are on time with the unfolding present moment because the moment keeps moving

and so if you can be syncopated with it and you're shaping the jokes the way you want to shape with the right space and like they're of course of course that's a byproduct of course they're going to be like oh oh my God, that was amazing. Yeah. So there's a directionality. Yeah. And a, yeah, we'll just keep it there. There's a directionality I think that would be fun for you to play with.

Well, thank you, Sarah. Thank you for getting me exposed. I hope you got your question answered. Oh no, when's the next time, do you have something lined up where you might have a public event? No, I don't. But Dr. Mike, I don't know if I want to tell you. Yeah, right. I want to come backstage and then I'll run backstage and be like, what'd you think?

You better know what you think. I knew you were going to say that. Good man. All right, next question from Alex. Hi, Dr. Mike. I'm a career counselor in a gifted and talented school. We call these selective schools in Sydney, Australia. Some of my students have difficulty thinking about what they want because all that's ever mattered is getting good academic results.

Many seem to default to studying medicine because it's what their parents want them to do, or they view it's what their parents want them to do, or they view it as a safe option. If you were working with high achieving academic students, what would be your advice to students who are afraid to do what's really important to them? What does that mean? That how would you help them

who are afraid to do what's important to them? I guess what they really want to do as opposed to be a doctor or, you know, the safe, the safe. Yeah. I think, um,

we've got to hold space for them. One of the things that is really important for adults and parents to do is to be an adult and to help guide, you know, that's, there's a great responsibility to be an adult and to help guide. There's a great responsibility to be an adult parent. And part of that is to hold space that we don't have to thread the needle.

Our kids don't have to thread the needle to be okay, to explore, to run an experiment, to try something out, to iterate, to try again, to fall down and get back up. All of that is such an important part of life that if we can hold space for them and to help them experiment in ways that are dangerous, but not catastrophic, that are risky, but not fatal, and help them run the experiments to try on as many different hats as they can possibly imagine trying on. If they can try punk rock and rock and roll and country and jazz, whatever it might be, just to try it on, that is rad. And if we don't run experiments, if our adults in our environment don't create the space for us to try, then we end up falling right into the slipstream of what

our culture wants or values as opposed to what we want or value. And the only way we really know what we want and what matters to us is the influence from others is hopefully secondary to the love of way it feels to be doing something. So that's the intrinsic piece. Intrinsic and extrinsic are two different things, right? So this intrinsic love of unlocking something, figuring something out, the strain that comes with getting to the messy edge and going, oh, I got it. Whether it's a

chord on a guitar, whether it's a contour of a joke, whether it's like a triangle choke, you're trying to figure out whatever it might be be that if you can fall in love with the way it feels to unlock and to figure something out or put something new together, that's awesome. But we need some space to do that because the world is like, go, go, go, go figure it out. As soon as you reach, I don't know, 22 years old, you're supposed to have your life in order.

I mean, that's kind of a joke in modern times. Although, I don't know, Jesus was like 32 and changed the calendar forever. Caesar was pretty young too. We're a little soft. Let's just call it what it is. You're like Jesus and Caesar. So I think I'll just be really concrete is for adults to hold the space so that

the young people can experiment. And when they do that and they iterate and they figure things out, they shed, they, they intimately know that that's not what they want. There's something else maybe. And maybe it is a doctor or attorney, whatever it might be, But not until they've said no to a bunch of other things to get to that, I think, is there's an idea, not until you can fully say no, can you completely say yes. So not until you can say, no, no, no, that's not, trust me, that's because you've tried it out, you know. Can you fully say yes to something else? No, wow.

This feels like another one of those super, super loaded questions because I was just having a conversation with a mutual friend of ours about this very same thing. And they were saying how about being practical with children and being practical with your kids and you tell them what's impractical you know what could never be and then if they decide to push that envelope and go beyond those boundaries give them the support system that they need but just let them know hey this is the way the world is and you might not get here because the world set it up like this but if you decide that you want to get to that door and knock on that door i'm supporting you's cool. And I was playing devil's advocate like I often do.

And it was like, well, you know, I don't think it makes sense to tell them or set that parameter and say, hey, this is what it is. You're going to make this amount of money or you should get this job and be this doctor. If you think you want to grow wings out of your back and fly, grow wings out of your back and fly. Now, obviously I'm being extreme with all of that. But I've always been of the mindset where I'm like, man, just listen. If you have some fantastical idea or career that you want to pursue, man, go pursue that fantastical career. And if you fall short and then say, you know what, man, I guess I'm just going to be a doctor or a lawyer.

I'm going to do something practical. Then I'm like, okay, there you go. But rather to tell them and to set that parameter ahead, some people don't overachieve or overthink and over, some people are like, oh really? That's as far as I can go? Well, if I can only run a four minute mile, I'm just, I guess that's what I'll be running.

Most people accept the parameters that you set for them. Right? If I'm, tell me if I'm mistaken. I think that boundaries are, and limits are a real thing. You know, they're designed to keep us safe to, it's a, there's a shortcut to know what's possible. What's not is to see what the edges look like. And they keep us safe. Like, oh, that's, if I'm gonna push past that recognized boundary, now I'm in a dangerous zone, you know, relative to other humans.

So there's a purpose for them. And we need the dreamers. We need the ones that are, you know, not gonna follow the rules. They show us how. The way you said that was, I gotta say this, the way you said that was, bless say this the way you said that was bless their hearts no there's no southern in me no no there was not that that is not bless their

little hearts bless the little dreamers hearts yeah but some of my family members just they they've taught me about that so no no no i'm not i i'm not saying I have incredible respect and awe for the dreamers that push as far as their imagination will allow them. I mean, look, spending time with Felix Baumgartner, who jumped from 128,000 feet, where the brightest minds in aerospace said, we're not sure if you're going to make it as your body goes through, if it goes through a transonic experience. When you travel the speed of sound, you don't know if your arms and legs are going to stay intact. Those, when I say dreamers, that's who I'm speaking to. Luke Akins, who says, Mike, I got a new project. I want to jump from 30,000 feet from an airliner into a 16 story net that my friends and I are going to build without a parachute.

That's just next level, man. It's, those are the projects and the people that I, um, I lose sleep because of the love I have for the human. And, and I'm inspired by the love they have for life.

And so we need, when I say we need the dreamers, those are the ones I'm talking about yeah yeah you just put me in my place i'll stay no i'm glad you're glad i'm glad i was probably sharing sharing it in a flippant way but like carrie walsh jennings one of the greatest volleyball players ever beach volleyball player she she's got three kids and after her third gold medal she says i want to do this differently now i think i'm i still have what it takes to be the best in the world i need to commit to being the greatest mom and the greatest athlete i can be and i want to run an experiment to see over the next four years if we can win another gold. Like those folks that are like,

they seem extraordinary because of all of their achievements, but when you drill it down, they're working to be their very best and to manage their life in their best way. And they've fundamentally committed to the idea of what they think they're capable of doing. That alone-based work, where you dive in to use your imagination to feel and see what

you believe you're capable of is a radical commitment to the good life. And I'm inspired by them every time that I get the chance to work with them. So let me ask you this. Do you think, Dr. Mike, do you really think as time goes on somewhere in the future, near or distant, we're going to just keep making discoveries about how limitless our capabilities really are? Because all these things that we were told that we couldn't do way back in the days in the past, we're doing right. We're doing right now physically, mentally, you know, we're just We just keep pushing boundaries and discovering new things. Yesterday, a friend of mine was like, somebody's going to break, some high schooler is going to go beyond breaking the four-minute mile. Some football player is going to run a four flat one day.

These things are just going to keep happening because we keep seeing human potential be pushed and pushed yeah there's there's a there's definitely a diminishing curve that takes place from a physical or physiological standpoint like we don't however however whatever the limits are that we know them to be right now they will not be those same limits in six months, a year. So our potential is relatively untapped for one reason that I point to is that writ large as a race, we are not well sophisticated with how to use our minds. The most powerful quote unquote machinery, computer, muscle whatever whatever you want to put in there the most powerful processing on the planet we are we have not cultivated properly and so it's this raw engine

that um has governed what we think our limits are today and so i'm excited because psychology is having a moment you know like I'm not talking about intelligence. We studied intelligence. That's cool. Okay. That's like the raw horsepower. But how do you maximize the engine that you have? You're your most complicated processor ever that the planet has ever seen. And we don't train it. We don't raise it. We don't take care of it. We don't know how to be calm and confident and be in the present moment to allow that potential, that full potential to be expressed. So we're just getting going. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why

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I'd love for you to check them out. Head to calderalab.com slash finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. Why have we neglected it? why haven't we trained it properly because of other factors that we're looking at other things that we i don't know like i've got i've got my experience and i've got a theory but my experience is that in high school or grade school they didn't teach me how to be confident they said be confident they didn't teach me how to be calm they said you need to relax and be calm they didn't teach me how to be calm. They said, you need to relax and be calm. They didn't teach me how to use my imagination for potential. They teach me to use my imagination for other things, for creativity. And I can go on and on on the practices to help cultivate a great mind,

primarily because it's invisible, primarily because, secondarily, because psychology was always shaped in the taboo framing that the mind was meant to be something studied of the dysfunction of humans, not the above the line, if you will, as a shorthand visual for the excellence of humans. And so it was always a bit taboo to talk about it. And so the studies of the research wasn't quite there either. It's there now. It's totally there. And we need the strong ones like you and heroes amongst us to say, the mind matters and the health of my mind matters and the strength of my mind matters and the duration of my focus and the ability to be agile in high pressure to high stress environments matters. How do I train it? There are relatively simple practices to do

in complicated environments with the most complex beings that we know, humans. So simple practices though. Well, you said two things really stuck out to me. Number one, it's invisible. And number two, that term psych, you've always used it as, man, you gotta get checked out, something wrong with you. I've always equated it to that.

Never to like, yeah, that's wild. Wow. Yep. This last thing here is that my first, my first professional experience in sport, I was excited, you know, I wanted to be part of the team and the coach says, okay, I got, I'm so happy you're here, Mike.

Like I got someone for you now. And if you can help this athlete, we just might win the championship. He's that good. And I was like, great. Now I didn't realize that this athlete was a bit of a coach killer, showed up flashes of brilliance, had, you you know coaches all bet on him because he he was brilliant in moments but then would kind of go away like there was zero consistency and people dubbed him quote-unquote i don't like this term at all but this is

as the story goes a head case and so i'm as i'm an eager beaver and I'm out there like okay you know I talked to the athletes like great love to have some conversation let's go and we're walking down the hallway and now what has happened is that the rest of the team says oh Gervais takes care of the head cases Gervais works with the head cases so just don't work with Gervais because now you're dubbed the head case. That was 20 some years ago. And so I instantly understood the trappings of that. But what's happening now is the best in the world, the strong alpha competitors that really inspire us all are saying, I want to be better. Where do I go how do i get it you know what are the best practices physically nutritionally psychologically technically um they all have a place in exploring potential and so now when i'm walking down the hallway it's like oh man o'neal's getting

an edge walking with gervais o'neal's getting an edge like how do i get part of that yeah so it's flipped the whole thing. That's amazing. For lack of a better word, it's cool. It is cool. It's cool. It's cool to go in. Yeah.

To do the work that is right at the center of the whole thing. Yeah. Pretending is whack. Yeah. I wouldn't know nothing about that. I don't pretend. We're for validation from audience members. Wow.

This was amazing. Listen, every time we talk, I'm like, I'm sure there's nothing that he's going to say to me that's going to reveal anything new. You know what I'm saying? This is the 18th one.

I've been around for a minute. But man, you never cease to amaze me. Thank you. Yeah. These questions are rich and they're complicated. Um, and so I enjoy it. I enjoy your responses. You make them real and I can get up in my head kind of quickly into theory and you bring me right back into like, wait, but how does that really work? So it's fun

for me too. It, this is not easy. This is, so my answers are resting on the shoulders of incredible research giants. And so in the background, I've got theory. I'm running through research in my mind, and then I'm making sure that there's experiences that will hold what I'm about to say up in a real locker room. So my, all of my answers are coming from like my calibrations are happening this way. Does it make sense to me on my life experiences and my research? Would my mentors, both in science and people that know me say, yeah, right, that's right. And then would the alpha competitors in some of the most alpha competitive environments say, yep, I see that too.

So I've got a council that's always happening in my head and I'm not looking for approval. It is what I'm doing is making sure that I'm not losing my way in a way that just conveniently makes sense for you and me. So it's resting on all of this theory, science, and practical wisdom that I'm trying to bring forward, which to me is maybe more than you wanted to know, but that's what's happening underneath the surface for me. No, you know, it's always better when I come through at the end of it, not when I'm in the middle of it. But you know, I mean, this is a dream job. How many people can come to the job and just discover things about themselves? That's cool. That's a

cool thing. Yeah, it's cool. I appreciate it. I appreciate all of your courage and bravery and vulnerability to go along with this madness. You hear that, everyone? I'm brave. No, you are. You're the, I wish I could do what you are doing

as gracefully as you're doing it. When I didn't know the things I know now, now I crave it myself. But I'm imagining when I was at the phase of, of psychology that you're at that, which look, you're a great performer and there's still more that you want to learn. I wish I had that,

what you have. And I didn't, I was still, I was still trying to pretend, you know, like that I I that I knew some stuff well let's be let's be honest Dr. Mike you don't you don't let me pretend man I want to pretend I want to pretend you won't let me we're in it together man we're in it together I appreciate you appreciate you too yeah thank you all right thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show,

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which we all need, one of the best things you can do is to talk to a licensed professional. So seek assistance from your healthcare providers. Again, a sincere thank you for listening. Until next episode, be well, think well, keep exploring.