Modern Wisdom - #143 - John Assaraf - Understand Your Emotions & Take Control Of Your Life

Episode Date: February 17, 2020

John Assaraf is an author, entrepreneur and mindset expert. Our brains are the most complex organisms in the known universe, but they don't come with an instruction manual. Today John takes us through some of the key principles to harness our brains to work for us, not against us. Expect to learn... What are the primary emotions which affect us every day? How can we overcome anxiety and fear? Why is precision with our speech so important? Which habit has had the most positive impact on John's life? What is John's issue with The Secret? And much more. Get Surfshark VPN - https://surfshark.deals/MODERNWISDOM (Enter Promo Code MODERNWISDOM for 83% off & One Extra Month Free) Extra Stuff: Follow John on Twitter - https://twitter.com/johnassaraf Buy Innercise - https://amzn.to/2uFqdxf Check out John's Website - https://www.myneurogym.com/ Take a break from alcohol and upgrade your life - https://6monthssober.com/podcast Check out everything I recommend from books to products - https://www.amazon.co.uk/shop/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Join the discussion with me and other like minded listeners in the episode comments on the MW YouTube Channel or message me... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ModernWisdomPodcast Email: https://www.chriswillx.com/contact Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oh yes, hello friends, welcome back to Modern Wisdom. My guest today is none other than John Azaraph. Start in the secret, he is literally one of the leading mindset and behavior experts on the planet. It's been a Larry King live, Anderson Cooper, LNG Generous Show, and now he's on Modern Wisdom. How would you look at that? We go through how you can overcome your fears, what fear actually does to the brain, anxiety, all of the different emotions and how they operate. Some practices that you can take away two day that will affect the way that your body responds when you perceive a threat, how we can take control of our life by controlling our thoughts and our actions.

It was so good. John, you're a legend man. Thank you so much for coming on. And now please welcome the wise and wonderful John Asuraff. Do you want to ask a rough in the building? How are you, man? In the building here, I am going great. We're separated by C, but we're all connected, right? That's absolutely true.

I'm super, super excited to speak to you today. So people might see you on the secret or know you as best as an author or, you know, endlessly successful entrepreneur with multiple projects and stuff like that. Do you think that you were naturally gifted to be successful in this many domains? Is this kind of what you thought you were going to end up doing when you were younger? No, I was voted most likely to fail in life by my grade 11 students and my basketball

team that I excelled in basketball. When I was a kid, every thought I was going to be a jock, an athlete of some sort, they used to say he's brilliant on the basketball court, but he's dumber than a doorknob in the classroom. And so I never thought I would be doing what I do today. I never believed that I could. I thought I was way too dumb. I was hungry, but I just felt like I wasn't as smart as the other kids. I grew up in a family with, you know, hard working parents who wanted to put food on the table for their kids.

We lived in moderate, moderate, moderate, you know, means. You know, I had a bedroom with my brother, my sister had a bedroom. We had an apartment. There was always arguments and fights around the lack of money. My father was a gambler and an alcoholic, I believe he hasn't drank in probably 50 years. But so a lot of struggles. And then I didn't have the environment that really fostered me even thinking about achieving success until I had one chance encounter with

one man when I was 19 years old who asked me one question and the answer to that question changed my life. But up until the age of 19, I thought I was going to work in a factory, making minimum wage, living in an average place, struggling for money, struggling to make a great life for myself. The only great life that I ever had in my imagination was from watching television. I suppose when you don't have that role model, there's a lot of people now who might not have that close to them. Especially, I think, the generational gap that has occurred within the last 50 years

is really different, you know, when you think about the sort of opportunities that became available to you and are now available to the people that are listening at a young age. Unbelievable. Worlds apart, right? And sometimes we might get a little bit resentful of our parents. I know that you've mentioned in previous interviews that you had a little bit of resentment towards not being given the tools necessarily to do what you wanted to do.

But from a much more compassionate side, it's a total different operating system now, right? Like the rules that controlled the old world don't really, it's a lot harder for our parents to think about how to apply those to what's going on now. Yeah, you know, I remember I used to live in this neighborhood and in between the neighborhood that I lived in and the other affluent neighborhood, there was a community center. And so some of the kids in my neighborhood, you know, couldn't afford to be members of

the community center, even though it wasn't very expensive. And then there were other kids on the other side of the street that their parents had a little bit more money, nicer cars, nicer homes. And I used to meet these kids at the community center and I used to go over to their house. And I remember, you know, used to feel like I wish my, you know, specifically my father, because back in those days, moms were mostly stay at home, took care of the kids, and maybe they worked, which my mother did. But I used to remember feeling like I wish my father

was as smart as his father or her father. And I wish that we were able to go on vacations and to buy nice clothes instead of the ratty jeans and the ratty coats that I always felt were less than the other kids. And what I realized as I got older was, my parents just did the best they could. My father went to grade three or four.

My mother also grade three or four. Then they went to work at 15, 16 years old to try and make ends nature in the war. So they didn't have an education. They didn't have a chance to do anything other than survive. They didn't know that they could do more. They just believed they were born in this environment, that they were victims of that environment, that they had to make ends meet and struggle and there was scarcity and that the rich people, they

either didn't illegally or they had these belief systems that were just disempowering them and they didn't know that they were disempowered. Back then, if you want to learn, you either go to school, read books, listen to the radio. And today, the least of our concerns is knowing how do I do X? How do I achieve Y? If you want to be healthy, if you want to be happy, if you want to make more money, if you want to build a business, you want to write a book, you want to fill in the blank, I want to blank, you can Google it. And in less than three minutes, you can have a step-by-step blueprint of exactly what to do. Today's problem isn't that the how-to doesn't exist. It's all of the internal bullshit that people are dealing with that holds them back. They're fears of failure, fears

of what will people think of me on social media if I try and I fail or I disappoint them? You know, what will people feel if I'm not doing this or doing that? So there's a much bigger internal game going on right now around fears and self-image and limiting beliefs that most people are totally unaware is happening. And that is really causing them to be stuck in this limited cycle and self-fulfilling prophecies that cause them to achieve way less than their capable of achieving. Do you think that that's the primary issue that people are coming up against, self-limiting beliefs? We've got the how it's that, is that the main roadblock people need to get over? There's only four. There's only four. So, from a purely neuroscience,

neuropsychology perspective, what we know about the brain, is there are 50 different types of fears that hold most people back, but there's a common seven or so. So fear of failure, fear of succeeding and failing, fear of trying my best and disappointing myself or others, fear of being

embarrassed, ashamed, ridiculed or judged. All of these fears have to do with our self-image, self-esteem and self-worth, and what will I think of me or what will others think of me if I don't succeed or if I do and fail. That's number one. So fears are naturally occurring phenomenons in our subconscious mind as a safety and protective mechanism to keep us away from any danger or real or imagined pain or suffering. And so it's just an automatic trigger in the subconscious mind and fear happens to be one of our six core emotions. Now, the problem is not fear. The problem is that most people don't understand that fear is the equivalent of driving your car and a dash light popping up on

your dash. It's just a signal. It's a highly sensitive signal and mechanism in the brain, but the ramifications of not understanding what fear does is the problem. So when fear activates in the brain, it releases cortisol, epinephrine, anorepinephrine. It takes blood away from the thinking part of the brain into the motor cortex and the reactive part of the brain. And the untrained person will react over and over of fear, may not cause the same reaction, let's say a Navy seal or an astronaut, who is used to understanding that feeling and they know how to control it,

so they can respond instead of react. So fear is number one. Number two is limiting beliefs. I'm too young to do that. I'm too old to do that. I'm too Asian or too Caucasian. I only went to grade blank in school, therefore I'm not smart enough do that. I'm too old to do that. I'm too Asian or too Caucasian. You know what? I only went to grade blank in school. Therefore, I'm not smart enough, not good enough, not worth it. So all of these limiting beliefs actually formulate the lens

by which our brain sees the world, but more importantly than that, the limiting belief sets up what we will do or don't do. So it affects behaviors. So we had fears number one, two limiting beliefs. Then three, let's say somebody's watching, they have a vision or a goal. It doesn't make a difference. You know, what kind of vision or a goal it is. But let's say that at the conscious level, I want that. I see me having that being that doing that. But if at the subconscious level, there is an opposing belief, an implicit belief, or a self-image that says,

but I'm not good enough, I'm not smart enough, I'm not worthy of that yet or now, then our subconscious self-image will recalibrate what we do or don't do. So that's the third thing. And then the fourth thing, which is a little bit more real, is when we don't have the knowledge or the skill, currently, to achieve the goal that we want, then we set off a circuit in the brain, which is the doubt-surfit, the uncertainty circuit. It triggers the self-image circuit and the brain, which is the doubt, surfeit, the uncertainty circuit.

It triggers the self-image circuit and the fear circuit as well. So they're all interconnected. So if we don't have the knowledge or skill and we feel doubtful, then doubtful actually activates these other circuits, saying, hold on, if you're doubtful, if you're uncertain, put the brakes on, don't put your foot on the gas. So what I do and what my company does, we study the mechanisms by which all of these things are turned on or off. All these triggers are turned on or off, that drives the behavior, that causes the results.

So I never focus on the results themselves. I always focus on what's driving the behaviors, that cause me to take action or not take action. And that's really the work that I do and why I wrote, you know, my book, InnerSize, which I know you're familiar with and so on my other stuff, is let's get into the neuro psychology of what's happening in there. How that's a framework. Yeah, I mean, it's incredibly simple when you look at it like that, but it's so messy, right? We're living in our heads. We have all of these signals going on. We have all of these very, their notions, you know, they're not inputs and outputs. The way that we consciously experience our own day-to-day

life is real, ephemeral, difficult to define stuff, right? So how can we break through that noise? What are some of the strategies that we can use to bring a little bit of order to that chaos? Well, I think first we have to understand that, you know, we are the most advanced, you know, biological, neurological, you know, coalesce group of cells and atoms in the known universe. The only thing more advanced than we are is the actual universe itself and what it does. So if it's true that I have a brain, I'm not my brain, but I have a brain, then the next question is, is it possible for me to use my brain better? If my brain is processing 400 billion bits of information per second without me being aware of it, is it possible for me to be able to

direct my brain to look for things that are more aligned with what it is that I want to achieve, do, or become? Yes, it is possible. Is it possible to understand that I was not born and nobody listening or watching was born with one belief, one perspective, one habit, one self-image, not one person was born with any of those, which means that somehow the constructs that I have within my brain, the patterns within my brain were created either by my parents, my teachers, my experiences, what I read, what I wrote, what I watched, what I felt, is it possible that all our brain is a network of reinforced patterns that we can learn how to be aware of a limiting belief and let it go and create a new empowering belief. Is it possible that the habits that are constructive and empower me, we can reinforce and the habits that are nothing more than automatic

patterns in my brain that were created, the ones that are disempowering me, is it possible that I could learn the anatomy of a habit, which is a trigger, a behavior, and a reward, trigger behavior reward. If I could learn the anatomy of that, then can I let go of disempowering habits and create empowering ones? Yes. Can I create constructive habits that become my keystone habits that allow me to grow, right, and evolve in a way that empowers me in my life versus one that disempowers me in my life? one that disempowers me in my life.

And the answer is yes. So anybody who's watching what I really want them to understand is you are not a victim of your circumstance or your conditions. The only way you're a victim of your circumstances or conditions or past is if you take that role on as part of your identity versus saying regardless of my current circumstances, my knowledge, my skills, my beliefs, I can change and now I can learn how to use the most powerful tool that I already own called my brain. I love it. I want to pick up on some of the terminology views there. I know that you like to be very precise with your speech and you like to lead with terminology, which I think is something I've worked on very hard over the last few years and I absolutely

love the way that you do it too. You've chosen to use the term disempower and empower habits rather than good and bad. Why? It's not binary. It's not positive or negative. It's a frame. As soon as I say the word negative, everybody has a connotation that that word means something bad. And I just look at it as it just is. And the question is, can I frame things in a way that lifts me up as a human being instead of puts me down like something is wrong. And we're used to this positive negative good bad. What about it just is, is this thought process going to help me achieve my goal or move me away from it?

Is this habit moved me towards what I want or away from what I want? Is this person, is this strategy, is this tactic, is this emotion one that empowers me or disempowers me? Okay, if it disempowers you, if it's not to your taste, you are at choice. You see, the greatest gift we have as a species is awareness. We can have a thought and we could be aware and know that we have a thought.

It's going a little bit deeper than the norm, right? So we are not just self-aware, but we could be aware that we're self-aware. So if I understand that I'm not my thoughts, I'm not my emotions, I'm not my feelings, I'm not my sensations, I'm not my emotions, I'm not my feelings, I'm not my sensations, I'm not my behaviors, I'm not my results, I have those. Then the question is, well, if I have them, can I choose ones that are better for me for what I want to achieve and become and do and have? And the answer is, apps are fucking lootly. That's your power.

And so as soon as you give away your power, you're a victim. And so, you know, if you study any human beings who have, you know, failed, they will all tell you that, yes, I failed. Yes, I was in a state of pain, panic, suffering, etc. And it was one of the best things in my life because I used it and I framed it in a way that empowered me instead of disempowered me. So we have that ability to take things and give them meanings that lift us up versus tear us down. And so what if we've started that with ourselves and then what if we did that with each other? It would be a much better world than what, right?

And so, but it starts with self, right? Because the more I could be aware of, you know, what's happening within me. The more I can have control, the more I can respond instead of react. The more I can be deliberate versus reacting automatically. And it all begins with awareness. It all begins with awareness of the gifts that you already possess. It's already owned the greatest gift in the known universe.

But the lack of skill of how do I use it is really the biggest challenge people have. And so the work that I do is all around re-empowering people to say, okay, I have the ability to do what I choose now. How do I do that? Is the reason that we err toward fear and negativity. Is it purely fitness enhancing? Is it purely an evolutionary bar product? That's it. Yeah. So the number one responsibility of our brain, Homo erectus has been walking around this earth for about two and a half billion years, two and a half million, excuse me, two and a half million years. So the evolution of our species is survival above all else, right? So every living organism's number one priorities, biologically wired into us for survival. So the mechanisms of

evolution have created a brain that is nothing more than electromagnetic switching station, right? So light comes in through our eyes, sound comes in through our ears, signals come in through our senses, whether it's olfactory, sense of smell or hands tactile. And it is being processed in the brain, and the number one algorithm is, is there real danger here that could cause me to die? Number two, is there any potential danger here, where I can get mentally, emotionally, physically, financially hurt? That's number two. Number three is energy conservation so that number one and two can happen.

So the processing mechanism of our brain, I know that you're looking at me through the camera and I'm looking at you and we see this physical body with eyes and a nose and a mouth and a ears, stripped that away. And what are you? You're this brain with the nervous system that is processing all of this information for survival, right? For avoidance of pain, for end-to-conservation, oh yeah, by the way, if we can get some pleasure via sex or food or play with our telephones or playing games, we'll do that once, one,

two, and three are met. So we have been evolving for two and a half million years to make sure that that happens. Now, throughout our lives and maybe even at a cellular level, we have memories of things that have caused us or our parents or our teachers or our brother or our sister, pain, suffering, death or whatever the case is. And our brain is processing this information. So all of the incoming thoughts or ideas, you know, that we've seen the outside world, or even our own thoughts of achieving X, Y, or Z, it's all processed through these algorithms to say, okay, in the memory bank of your life,

and maybe even your DNA, is there anything in that loop that could potentially be affecting your survival or cause you pain or suffering? So as soon as there's a match inside our brain through the neural networks, a signal is sent in a billionth of a second called fear. That's that's the signal. It's just it we call it fear, but just a signal of pay attention. Stop put the brakes on what's going on right and what most people don't understand is fear is just a signal and in many cases it doesn't mean stop it just means be aware and then make a choice in a decision. But most people have never been taught how to be aware of this feeling and frame it in a way that there's nothing wrong.

It's just a really sensitive signal. Now let me use my higher cortical functions called the left prefrontal cortex and says it's real danger or is it imagined danger? Is it because of something that's happened in the past or is it something that's happening right in this moment that's really, really you know dangerous? And in that nanosecond of awareness and choice, we could learn how to make better decisions where fear can be turned into fuel because that little anxiety or stress that's the neurochemicals going through your bloodstream can actually be used to propel you forward

instead of causing you to retreat. What's a strategy that we can use to interject that process. So, in my book, Intersize, there's a variety of inner sizes, which are mental and emotional techniques to empower yourself. So, number one is when we are in a state of stress or fear or anxiety or panic, which is the highest state that that fear signal gets to. The first thing we could understand is when we're in that state of stress or anxiety or fear or lack of conference or self-doubt, our sympathetic nervous system has just been triggered.

So we have the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. So first to understand is I have these two types of nervous systems in my body. One is for flight flight or flight flight freeze or faint. And the other one is to be able to be calm and respond. So in the sympathetic nervous system when we're in a state of anxiety or stress or fear. We're not thinking properly. We're reacting based on our highest level of training. But what we can do very, very quickly is in a state of uncertainty or doubt or fear, we can just stop. Stop for just one second and do this simple inner size is called take six calm the circuits.

So take six calm the circuits is 60 breaths in through your nose. Slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly, and then you breathe out through your mouth like you're breathing out through a straw. As slow as you can. That's one. When we do six of those, we can show in FMRI machines blood flow changing and moving back to that left prefrontal cortex, which is our thinking brain. When we do those 60 breaths, we actually move from a sympathetic nervous system activation to a parasympathetic

system activation, which is a calm, so I can respond. So step one is take six calm, the circuits. Step two is called IA, which is AIA, and step two stands for awareness, awareness of my thoughts, feelings, emotions, sensations, and my behaviors. So stop. What am I thinking right now? What am I feeling So stop. What am I thinking right now? What am I feeling right now? What am I sensing right now?

What were my behaviors? Well, usually in the state of stress, we're contracted. Usually in the state of stress, we're breathing much more shallow. Usually in the state of stress, we have the foot on the brake, not the foot on the gas. So awareness, and whenever we're practicing awareness, what we want to do is practice

it without judgment, blame, shame, guilt or justification. Let me repeat. Without judgment, blame, shame, guilt or justification. Now why is that important? It's important because when you're starting to observe your own processes, you don't want to be in a state of labeling it anything. It's just pure awareness because it's the awareness that now gives you the choice.

So if I'm aware, then I can change in an unaware state I can. So awareness of my thoughts, emotions, feeling, sensations, behaviors, then you say, okay, what's my intention right now? Is my intention to walk across that room and meet that guy or meet that girl or to ask for the order, you know, or to ask for a raise? Is that my intention?

Yeah, that's my intention. And then the third or the second A is what's one little action step that I could take right now. And the action step has got to be small because you don't want to reactivate the stress or fear center. So if you take one little action step towards that, your brain feels safe. You feel safe because you are your brain, right? And so when we practice take six comms, the circuits first, practice IA, second AIA awareness intention action,

now we've just interrupted a pattern that may have been a destructive or disempowering pattern. Now I'm in control, I'm focused, I'm aware, and I create a positive pattern. Well, guess what happens? Do that for one day, do that for seven days, 30 days, six months, you all of a sudden are now in control of your thoughts, emotions, feelings, behaviors, sensations. And that is how you achieve your goals. If you're in control, you're directing. If you're out of control, you're reacting.

And so which is going to give you a much more empowered state. And of course, we both know the answer. So those are just two inner sizes. And there's many other inner sizes that I teach in my book and through my programs. But that is just the fundamental of a human being is awareness and choice. I love it. I've got a question here that I think might really help some people that are listening. So let's say someone who's listening is in a rut at the moment. They're really struggling to make a change in their life. How can someone get past that story that they tell themselves? What would you tell them to do? What's the first steps?

How do they instantiate their life in a new way? that life in a new way. Well, it depends, you know, how long they've been in a rut, right? So, there's a lot of work around the power of story, right? And so, you know, the story that goes on in our in our mind about who we are, why we are that way, what we believe, what we expect, what we think we can achieve or have or do or be. That's a story. So, the first thing that I share with my students, especially in our win-of-the-game of money programs that we have around brain retraining, is what would your new story, if you could write one out?

Imagine you're a Hollywood actor, okay? And if you could write out a new script that's not even true right now, what would you write out for your life? So forget the story you have, if you had a blank sheet of paper and you could write out a story, what would you write out? And I share with all my students a process for doing this, and it always starts off like this, I'm so happy and grateful for the fact that. I'm so happy and grateful for the fact that. Now, why do I start off with that?

Well, what's 2 plus 2? 4. Is that a fact? Yes. What's 4 plus 4? 4. Is that a fact? Yes. What's 4 plus 4? 8. Is that a fact? Yes. Right. So, our brain tends to believe facts. So, when I start to write a story out, I'm so happy and grateful for the fact that I am now earning X. And now my physique is this. And my relationship is Y. And my, and my net worth is this. And I'm traveling worth is this. I'm traveling the world this. I'm driving this kind of car. Even though initially when you write it out, it's not true.

It's not true. And there's a party going this bullshit. Well, what happens, you know, when you repeat something two times, ten times, twenty times, a hundred times, what happens when you repeat it and emotionalize it? What happens when you repeat it and emotionalize? What happens when you repeat it and emotionalize? And take small action steps towards making that happen. And to prove my point, I want to share something with everybody that will show you how this works. Let's say somebody tapped you on the shoulder,

you know, tomorrow or today at a cafe or a restaurant or a bar, or wherever you go to work. The tapped on the shoulder, I said, hey, oh my God, I'm so and so in Hollywood. We just finished writing a script and you look like a person that is this script. Would you mind learning this script and if you learn it, we'll pay you a million dollars to perform it. If you do it really well and you win an Academy Award, you'll get $10 million plus a whole bunch of stuff.

Now, initially, you might be afraid to go, oh my God, I'm not an actor. I'm not an actress. I don't know how to do this. And what if the person who tapped on, says, oh, by the way, we'll give you an acting coach, we'll give you, you know, nutritionist. We'll give you an excise, go,

we'll teach you everything, and you would practice the role that we have on this sheet of paper, on this pad of paper. If you practice the role every day, every week, every month, for the next year, we're going to film in a year. Do you think you'd learn the script? Do you think you'd be able to memorize it? Do you think you'd be able to raise your voice or lower it based on the script?

Do you think you might hunch down a little bit this way if you learned how to do that, even though today you don't know how to act. You don't know how to remember lines. You don't know how to change your voice. Even if you don't know, could you get better at it in 12 months and then have a camera in front of you with other actors that have practiced for 10 or 12 months every day for 5, 6, 7, 8 hours a day. Could you remember that script and possibly act it? And the answer is, of course you could. Well, why not write your own script? Why not write the kind of body you want, the kind of energy you want, the amount of money you want,

the way you want to travel, the way you want to be, behave. Why did you write the script and then become the script over time? Because you became the script already that you believe right now and fear was there and fear is there now and limiting beliefs are there and limiting beliefs now. But when we take our most powerful precious tool, our brain, and we focus it on what we want and how we can versus what we don't want and why we can't, then we're not in control. So the key is to get in control, use the tool better, and prime your brain every single day with the beliefs that you want with the self-image you want with the use of fear so that it fuels you instead It holds you back. I love it thinking about

What we think about determining our actions and where we look determining where we go? I was stood outside of a nightclub, which is why do I fill nightclubs? That's my job I was stood outside of a nightclub, which is why I do our Phil nightclubs. That's my job. I stood outside on the front door and a cyclist came around, at 11 o'clock at night. I don't know why anyone's on the cyclist this time. Anyway, it comes blaring around the corner and you can see there's this car in front of him that he really doesn't want to hit.

And he could have easily missed it, but his eyes were just locked on this car. The back of this car sure enough where your eyes go is where the bike goes straight into the back of it. It was fine. When it was the embarrassment wasn't fine, but he walked away totally to eat. Yeah, absolutely. And so it all comes back down to learning, right? How to listen, at one point, right, when we're babies, you know, if anybody was watching inside, they had a brother or sister or had their baby of their own, at one point, you know, baby will look up and it's hand and realize, oh my God, that's my hand. And they realize that, you know, a movie, a movie, my hand, you know,

initially they look at you and maybe a ball or something in front of them, but then everybody's like, oh my God, that's mine. Well, I like to do that with people's brains. I want people to understand that, you know, you have this brain that maybe you haven't learned how to optimize yet. You haven't learned some of the hacking techniques to use the most powerful, it's the most powerful organism in the known, you know, not organ. It's an organism in the known universe. And the problem is we have operators that just are not trained. Yeah, there's no manual that comes with life unfortunately.

That's right. That's right. Well, now we're getting some of that manual, right? So now with the, you know, the advancements in technology and FMI technology, specs scan technology, PET scan technology, where we can actually start to see the circuits, the salience network, the executive

network, the default mode network in the brain, how they work, what triggers them, what turns them on, what turns them off, we're at a point in our evolution of our species, right? Where it's like, oh my God, this is just such a powerful understanding recognition that I can achieve a lot more than I thought I could. I could become more, I can have more, I can give more, and that's a really empowered state to be in. What habit would you say has had the most positive impact on your life over the last few years? Probably with I mean there's a couple of them

But probably without any hesitation meditation Which I've been doing for 30 plus years Really is the one meditation and mindfulness are very integrated. But let's you know meditation allows you to recognize and know that there's different states of consciousness that you know I have a body, I have organs, I have you know hands and feet and eyes and ears, but I'm not them that I'm really one with, in this energetic field that everybody else is in as well, that I could control my thoughts and my emotions and I could activate them or deactivate them at will

and that life is not happening to me, right? It's happening for me when I could be aware of the perfection of all of it. And so meditation would have to rank right up there with oxygen for me. Yeah, I get that. Have you read Kamal Ravikant? Love yourself like your life depends on it. He's got a wonderful bit in that where he talks about life happens to me, life happens for me, life happens through me. I absolutely love that.

He's a good friend. He was on not so long ago him and James Altichur and we're swimming in good waters. I want to talk about the difference between the law of attraction and the law of goya, because for a while the secret, the movie, huge blockbuster did real well, the book as well. And for me there was something that felt like it was missing and it's absolutely been identified in the law of goya. Would you be able to talk us through that? Yeah, when the movie The Secret came out, you know, the premise of the book was think, believe, and you'll achieve. And that's bullshit. It's not, that's not how it works. It's, you know,

the law of Goya, I learned if you, if you spell out the word attraction, law of attraction, the last six letters of the word attraction is action. And nobody talked about that in the movie. The law of Goya is the get off your ass law. And Newton's second law of motion says an object in motion tends to stain motion, object to rest tends to stay at rest. In the physical world, we live in this quantum field, but we also have this physical experience. And around health, wealth, relationships, career, business, finances, fun and experiences, etc.

There are behaviors that if you take this behavior, then x, y, or z will happen. And it's pretty predictable. The physical laws are so predictable. We can send a rocket ship to the moon in time within a fraction of a second. And so in the physical world, there is a behavior that you need to take. If you want to lose weight or gain weight, we know that weight is calories, it's energy. Right?

So, you know, one pound is 3,500 calories, you know, one gram of carbohydrates or one gram of fat, you know, carbohydrates for calories, fat is nine calories, that's energy. If you want to earn more money, money is a means of exchange between people, countries, et cetera. So if you want more money, you have to figure out, how do I exchange what I have product knowledge, service, companionship for that exchange? It's not rocket science, but it is a science.

And a lot of people misunderstand this law of attraction is some airy, fairy, think about it, sit there, meditate, and poof, you're gonna have this wealth. It's just like, where'd you get that idea? The law of attraction should be renamed to the law of resonance. So if you study Tesla's work, if you study Nikola Tesla's work around energy,

all the way to electricity and positrons and electrons, you understand that resonance. If you hit the A440 key on the piano, how is it that 10 feet away, the chandelier moves? That's resonance. So things that are in resonance are attracted to each other, not like a magnet, because if you take positive and positive and positive and a magnet, it repels. But if you understand that if you are in resonance with the people, the vision, the goals that you have, and you get your head, your heart, and your gut in alignment, in resonance, then you are basically doing with your brain the same thing that a radio dial does on a radio station. If you're at 90, let's say 5.5, that may be rock and roll. You're in resonance with that vibrational frequency. If you're at 95.6 that might be punk rock, 95.7 might be classical music. So the key for us humans is how do we

get into resonance with the frequencies of what it is that we want to achieve health, wealth, relationships, career, business. everything is energy in the universe. And that means that everything is amplified at a certain vibrational sequence. And if you get into alignment, into resonance, that's the law of attraction. It's not some magical, airy, fairy, pixie dust, you know, I think believe in you'll achieve. Get your head, your heart, your gut, and your behaviors aligned, and then you will be in residence and all of a sudden everything that you want is right there already. The action was the missing step for me. That was where I thought, I didn't

quite get it, but you totally correct. And as well, by leading with that action, it feeds back in all of these feed into each other, right? The way that you feel the way that you're good and your passions are with regards to what you're doing in life and then your actions feedback into that. So there's there's one other piece to it, though. And this is this is the piece that a lot of people just forget. There's nobody who's watching or listening to this right now, okay? That I believe, there might be, but very, very rare, that somebody's trying to figure out how to colonize Mars right now. So for everything else, for getting in great shape, for making more money, for starting business, for writing a book, for starting a podcast, for whatever you want, all the how-to-arty exists.

All the how-to, all the blueprint of do this, do this, do this. So what I was going to say is when we're thinking about taking action, you have to take the right actions in the right order at the right time. So one of the things that everybody is responsible for is to say, okay, before I act, what should I be doing? When should I be doing it? When should I be doing it? How should I be doing it?

And that is one of the other biggest mistakes most people make. They think that, well, I'm in action. Well, you could be in action doing the wrong damn things. So stop doing the wrong damn things and find out what should I be doing? And here's the beautiful thing. There are experts in everything that you and I want. And all of the books,

programs, CDs, courses, coaching, consulting is available, or YouTube video, or Google. So it's already available. So all you need to do is say, okay, what's my goal? What are, you know, what do I need to think? What do I need to feel? And then what do I need to do? Do that. And guess what? You'll be in resonance and you'll achieve your goals and dreams faster and easier than ever before. There's certainly a lot of people I know that I'm one of them. I have to work very hard at planning. So naturally, I would just do something. I would just start doing and taking that moment to consider and to lay out the plan.

I think it can make a huge difference. Perfect example, that's when I go on holiday. When you go on holiday, and if you've ever done it and not planned where you're going to be on particular days, and you can write it off as an excuse and you're like, well, I just want to kind of feel my way around the town. I don't want to be stuck to a rigid schedule.

I promise you, if you plan a holiday and you've got Tour on day one and a beach trip on day two and this and you're like, you get so much more out of your time, unbelievable holiday hacks, 101 there for you. So I want to finish up and ask about what you think, or where you would direct people if they want to find out a little bit more, or if there are some books in a size, I can't recommend it more highly. We'll be linked in the show notes below, of course. If there's, what else have you been struck by that you've consumed recently or over the last few years that you thought really of value?

Well listen, I know you've had my friend James Clearon before and so habits are really mastering habits. Whoever is watching this, listen to that podcast as well. He does a great job of dissecting podcast or the habit loop and the stuff in there. I think the stuff that I'm really fascinated with right now is consciousness and just understanding the nature of consciousness, the nature of why and how we make decisions and really leveling up our awareness to the magic of being human. And the gift that this is, it's just so mind-boggling, complex, and spectacular. And so yeah, if anybody likes this kind of stuff, and how do I become more and have more

and give more, follow my work. I'm all over social media on Instagram and on Facebook fanpage. I do trainings every week for free, and I have a little Facebook fanpage called Achieve Even More. That's a private community that I give free stuff away in as well. So read my books and follow some of my work. John, that's awesome. And thank you so much. I have to say I really absolutely love what you're doing. I think that you genuinely making a great change. It's been a total pleasure to get you on here. Like he said, all will be linked in the show notes below. If you want to follow John online, you know what to go. Show notes will have that in as well. Like, share and subscribe. But for now, thank you, John.

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