The Dr. Josh Axe Show - Secrets to LASTING CHANGE That Will SKYROCKET Your Success | Shadé Zahrai

Episode Date: April 4, 2024

Do you find yourself stuck in a cycle of self-doubt and unfulfilled goals? According to researcher Shadé Zahrai, you might be trapped in a "mindpit" - and she's here to show you how to break free! On this transformative episode of The Dr. Josh Axe Show, we're joined by Shadé Zahrai, the brilliant behavioral strategist renowned for turning complex psychology into actionable steps for positive change. Shadé is on a mission to help people cultivate a "becoming mindset" - an empowering shift that fuels personal growth by focusing on the journey, not just the destination.  You'll discover: The scientific secrets to breaking bad habits and installing new positive ones How writing things down can supercharge your memory (hint: it's more powerful than typing!) Proven strategies to overcome self-doubt, imposter syndrome, and the "victim mentality" Practical ways to use the "3-day rule" for accelerated learning The exercise-intelligence connection and how to get moving for a brainpower boost How to gracefully receive feedback and advice without getting defensive Whether you're feeling stuck or simply want to level-up your personal growth, this is an episode you can't afford to miss. Shadé's hard-hitting insights, combined with Dr. Josh Axe's expert guidance will shift your mindset and equip you with powerful tools to start becoming your best self today. Tune in for an immersive masterclass on mindset mastery. You'll walk away inspired and equipped to start your transformative journey! Don't miss this powerful conversation. Want more of The Dr. Josh Axe Show? Subscribe to the YouTube channel. Follow Dr. Josh Axe Instagram Twitter Facebook Tik-Tok Follow Shade Zahrai Instagram Tik-Tok Facebook YouTube Follow Leaders Instagram Twitter Facebook Email Newsletter ------  Links:  Check out what Shadé is up to → https://www.shadezahrai.com/  Interested in learning more about the 3 mindpits Shadé shared? Head over to https://www.shadezahrai.com/mindpits  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Now, our second area where people get stuck, the second mind pit is what we call treading water. And treading water, I use this analogy, because I'll never forget when I was 15, we had swimming classes as part of our physical education. And part of it is we had to bring a big jacket and a beanie and big, you know, what are they called? Tracksuit pants and sneakers and jump in the water. And we had to spend 60 minutes just treading water, staying in the same spot. And the reason why I think this is a great analogy is, when you're in this pit, you are exhausting yourself, keeping your head above water, but you're actually not making progress, you're not making any meaningful progress, just like if you're in a pool, the goal is to actually just stay

on the same spot. You're not getting to a destination. So this pit is for people who tend to keep starting things and they never finish. They sign up for that wonderful professional development course and then they stop after the first lesson. They buy another self-help book and they get into the first chapter and they don't finish. They have all of these half-completed goals and they keep switching between them. And there's again a few reasons for this.

One of them is that when we've started something, the beginning is fun. We get a shot of dopamine. The end is fun. We get a shot of dopamine. The middle bit is where we get bored because we don't have this dopamine hit that's keeping us going. We have this almost dopamine deficiency and because we live in a society where we crave that so much and technology has done this to us.

It's terrible. We get bored and then we see that boredom as a sign, okay, well, maybe this isn't what I should be doing. Hey, everyone, Dr. Josh Axe here. Welcome the show. Remember each and every week we uncover the science behind how to grow yourself, your health, your wealth, and take your career and your relationships to the next level.

On today's episode, I'll be interviewing Shaday Zahrahi. And I'm really excited because Shaday is somebody I followed for a long time. You need to check out her YouTube, her Instagram channels. She is a behavioral strategist. And also, she's an expert both in neuroscience and psychology. And one of the things I've been so impressed with is she's been able to take really complex topics around clinical studies in psychology and neuroscience and turn them into really bite-sized understandable practices that we can implement in our own lives. And we're going to be getting into secrets today about how to overcome self-deafes.

out worthiness, mindset shifts, and a whole lot more. Should I welcome the show. Thank you, Josh. It's wonderful to be here. I am so excited. Well, great. Well, hey, I want to dive right in and just have you share a little bit more about yourself. You know, when I, when I stumbled across your channel, I was just really impressed

because I'm a big lover of psychology and also leadership. I went to John Hopkins and got a master's in leadership there, and I know you've got your Ph.D. in leadership as well. And so I was really impressed with just. Just you being able to really dive into the research and share how we can transform ourselves in a really powerful way. But I also read that you were an ex-lawyer before. Tell me a little bit about how you got into the psychology and leadership space and why you left a career in law.

Yeah, why I left a career in law. Gosh, there's a book in that for sure. So I like to think when I reflect on my life and where I've been, the overarching theme is that I used to be someone who didn't really know who I was. And I let other people dictate who I should be and what I should be. And so for that reason, I didn't really know what my passions were. I did know I was passionate about people. So I did psychology in addition to law, but I really just went along with what other people were saying that I could be good at. And I think that's a ticket to a very unhappy and a fulfilling career. I'll say that right now. But I went down that route, again, unsure of what I should be doing

and very quickly learned that that is not for me. I think one of the biggest, elements of life is really discovering what's not for us and where our strengths don't lend themselves. And I discover that really quickly, working in the commercial law environment. Then I, what did I do? I transitioned to into a different industry. It was banking and finance, which is not very much aligned with my strengths, which I find are all around people, helping get the most out of people, empowering them to achieve what they wish to achieve. But at least it was a step out of the law. I was willing to take anything at that point. So I transitioned over a lot of questions. around why did you spend so long becoming a lawyer only to then leave. So of course, I had to deal with

all of that. But I knew that I would not be happy. I would not be happy if I stayed. So moved into this new industry and really thought that by starting something fresh, I could reinvent myself. The self-doubt would disappear, the imposter syndrome would go, and I could just go in there fresh and learn what I needed to. Now, of course, that's not how it works. It just comes right along with you. So all of that self-doubt, all of the anxiety that I was experienced, experiencing in the other industry came with me because I still hadn't figured out who I am and how to really tap into what lights my spark. So I spent seven years in that industry. Towards the end, though, I started really discovering or rather tapping into the things that

really lit me up. And it was around coaching people. And it was around driving performance in people by tapping into culture and what really motivates. And so again, that love of humans, behavior, how we think, how we act, that was coming through. And I found ways in all of my roles as I was moving up the ladder, found ways to really center around that, even if it was outside of my day job. So then I discovered, okay, this is my calling. This is what I need to be doing. So I decided to leave. By that point, I'd met and married, met and married my wonderful husband, Faisal. And again, I had all these people telling me, why are you leaving? You've just spent seven years in this career, it was the banking and finance industry. You've done really well.

you've got this amazing career ahead of you, why are you throwing it all away? So they were bringing their risk aversion to me and telling me what they thought I should be doing. But of course, by that point, I knew who I was, I knew what I was passionate about. And it is so easy to say yes to your path, when you know what the path should be. You've got the deeper yes burning inside of you. So then we transition and there's this whole story about how it happened because we just decided to go all in in our business. We'd been running it in the last few years that I was in the corporate space and the business is essentially working with organizations around the world, helping their people to improve their performance,

to boost their collective cultures, to improve their leadership. So ultimately everyone is happy and more fulfilled in the work that they do. We were doing that. The pandemic happened, and it coincided with me leaving my corporate career. So then we found ourselves in this position of not knowing what to do. We'd put almost all the eggs in one basket in terms of going and expanse, our business, working with clients, and then the whole world was in lockdown. So that's how the social media world started.

We thought, if we can't reach people because we can't go to companies and we're not able to fly around the world, what do we do? How do we reach them? Well, where are they? A lot of them are at home because they're in lockdown, probably on their devices. So let's start creating content to help them, content around mindset and confidence and navigating this challenging turbulent time. And so we did it just with a desire to help.

We had no idea what would happen. We just wanted to help. And it was amazing the journey that we've been on, because that was the beginning of taking our business global and allowing us to serve so many people in so many different continents. I mean, it's amazing. You know, I think it was a couple years ago. I discovered your page.

And I'm trying to remember if it was a conversation with Amy Porterfield or somebody. But again, you know, I saw your page. And it's fantastic. And so you guys have done a really amazing job. with your Instagram and YouTube and just educating people on some of these complex topics. You know, one of the things you, one of the first things you really got into here was talking a little bit about you discovering sort of an identity. Do you have any tips for anybody who's saying, I don't know exactly who I am, I don't know

what I'm called to do, how do I strengthen or discover my identity in life? Yeah, identity is such an important element of how we experience our lives. And yet the reality is not that many of us. really know who we are. And what I mean by that is there's lots of research around how we think we know, we think we're really self-aware. I mean, in the research space, also one thing I need to mention is I haven't actually finished the PhD yet. I mean, the final year, so I'm still in the thick of the research, getting there, getting there. But one of the biggest pieces that I've learned through the journey is recognizing, you know, when you're bringing in these large

populations of people to be part of your research, and you're speaking to them and you're interviewing them. And then you get other people to also do assessments based on them. So you might get a supervisor to rate their performance. You might get a loved one to rate their emotional intelligence. How people think they are and what they think they're good at and what they think their strengths are is often very, very different to what other people are recognizing in them. And so there is this massive gap between our awareness of ourselves or what we think it is and what it really is. And so when we start talking about the realm of identity, there is so much much in this space. I'm going to try and just filter it down to what I think would be most

relevant for the reader. I want to go back to the 1960s. And some of the listeners, you know, you might have heard of this before, but Maxwell Maltz was a surgeon at the time. He was a plastic surgeon. And he was noticing something very interesting with all the patients that were coming to him. They were coming to him because they believed they had some kind of a physical flaw in, you know, on their, on their face, on their bodies. And many of them genuinely believed that once that flaw was fixed, that their life would be easier. They would be more successful. They'd get the person of their dreams. All of their challenges would just melt away. Yet what he was finding is that this theory was not holding up, because for most of them, they would come, they would

go through whatever they needed to. The flaw would be physically gone, yet it didn't change anything. They were still acting and thinking and feeling in the same way as they did previously. And so what that led him to discover or recognize is that we have this self-image that we hold in our heads, in our minds about who we are, the type of person that we are. And that influences how we think, how we feel, and what we end up doing. And he was seeing that consistently with the patients that were coming to him. Now, if we think about that in our lives, and if I reflect on my own life and even the work that we do with our clients, we have this vision of who we think we are capable of being, who we are today, who we believe we can be in

the future. And also what research has discovered is there's also a view of our past self. So there are these three selves that we have, right? Present self, past self, future self. The really interesting thing is how they all interact. So what we've typically found based on a temporal approach to selves and identity is that our past self, this is the self that has been through, you know, our childhood, our upbringing, our schooling and all the challenges and traumas we may have been through, that past self is often recounting a particular story. a narrative, it's called narrative identity, that past self is constantly telling that story. Now, our future self is listening intently to that story and taking notes about who it can

become and what is possible. And then our present self, who we are, here we are right now, we're listening and watching this going on and we feel like we don't have a say in it. So our past self is almost dictating who our future self believes we can be. And then we just respond to that. It's being scripted without our, knowledge without our awareness, we just are passengers. And this is how a lot of people feel. I am who I am. I am a product of my past. I can't change it. And then they're repeating these narratives. It could be as simple as if you've had experiences in the past where when you were a child, I mean, developmental psychology comes into this so much, how we developed in our earliest years.

If you were a child who was praised for achievement, you might come to learn or, in turn, a belief that I am worthy when I achieve. And I'll admit, I was one of these kids. I had a wonderful upbringing. I had loving, supportive parents who, I believe, did everything right in terms of, you know, by the book, providing me with a nurturing environment with so much support. Yet, even in that environment, I developed this belief that I am only worthy when I'm achieving, when I'm performing. Then I'm worthy of love. And so I've internalized that, and it's become this ongoing challenge where I'm so attached to my work and deliverables and achievements, because my past self is repeating that story. My future self is saying, okay, you're only worthy of your

achievements. My present self then says, okay, I need to keep achieving. What's next? Get the masters, get the PhD, write the book, and it's not a way to live. And a lot of people experience this. So it takes this bird's eye view where we need to lift ourselves up and recognize how ourselves, our identity is playing out so that we can start to question, not accept, but question what's really going on. Do I need to accept this story that's being told? Can I change the story? Can I rewrite it? And fascinatingly, when we look at some of the research in the narrative identity space, what researchers have found, so Dr. Dan McAdams is the prime researcher, pioneering researcher in this space, they found that we can actually go in and edit our story. Now that doesn't

mean we deny what happened to us. We're not ignorant to the facts. We're constrained by the facts, but we rewrite the story to focus on the growth that that challenging situation gave us. The character building that that horrible relationship allowed us to experience. And so we actively go in and redefine these things as being opportunities for growth. And then our future self starts to recognize, hey, we're capable of growth. We're capable of not repeating. the challenges of the past and we're capable of writing a new future and then present self suddenly feels more hopeful and more empowered. I personally find that idea of the past self, present self, future self fascinating because I actually wasn't even aware of it two or three months ago.

I came across this through some of the research I was doing with my PhD and it just, things just really fell into place. Is that something that resonates with you and your experience? Yeah, it does. I'm thinking of, and by the way, so when I, growing up, I wasn't allowed to watch the TV show The Simpsons. So my parents said, yeah, you can't watch that. Bart doesn't behave well and whatever. But there's this great clip at The Simpsons where Marge, and I was watching this on the psychology lecture.

And she says, he's about to drink like a bottle of vodka. And she says, Homer, she said, you know, why don't you go play with the kids? You're going to feel terrible tomorrow. And he said, you know what? That's a problem for future Homer. And so, you know, the idea. idea there is, is like, you want to be good to your future self. You want to think about who you can become rather than what you accomplish. And so what you're saying, I think, resonates so

much with me. And I, and I've, I've read a lot of the research, too. It's amazing. I mean, and I just came across it a year ago on the future self, Marcus Nurious, there's some other great researchers and what they've put out. So this really resonates with me. You know, the other thing when I've discussed identity, I talk a lot about, you know, having your roles and responsibilities and attaching the greatest level of meaning to those things. Like so for me as a dad, it could be, that's one of my roles. That's part of my identity. I could think of, well, my whole job as a dad is just to, you know, be around or just, I mean, very, very, very basic of like, you know, have sex and then have the kid that I can be gone, but I'm still a dad versus no, I, you know, my, my,

my greatest level of meaning as a dad is creating world-changing kids that are virtuous who want to contribute to society and a number of things. And so, but my whole point there's, I, I, I love what you're sharing because I think that a lot of people do struggle with their identity. You know, I've really noticed that I've spent most of my career in the health health realm. And so, you know, I've always noticed how cancer and heart disease diabetes, those have been the leading issues regarding health problems historically. But in the last 10 years, it's been mental health disorders. It's been depression, anxiety, loneliness, people not knowing who they are identity issues. And so my point there is I just think, you know, identity, we're going to continue.

to see that be such an important topic and people discovering, hey, here's who I really am. And so last question regarding identity, how can people, and by the way, I love the practice you mentioned because I think it's so powerful, retelling your narrative and your story, because many people are retelling their story as the victim versus you could sort of switch it and say, well, what are more of the heroic qualities in terms of, you know, me being the Harry Potter or whoever of the situation and over. overcoming the, you know, the obstacles in life. So I think that's so powerful. So what are, that's obviously one practical way, right, to sort of switch the identity is taking time,

maybe writing it, writing that down. Absolutely. There's a few others that I found are particularly helpful. So one of them is what I call the to be list. Now, let's start with to do list. I don't know about you, but I love to do lists. In fact, I have one right here. I've actually changed it to a two done list. I don't know if, you know, the listeners can't hear it, but I make it now a too done, which encourages me to get them done. But to-do lists have a time and place. They help us stay focused. And then you've got people like Neil Iyer, who are encouraging other modes of getting things done. In any case, I found that using the same principle as a to-do list, we create a two-be list. And a two-be list is all about the qualities and the attributes that we

want to embody the type of person that we want to be. We write it down so it's really, really clear. And then we think about what kind of behaviors do I need to be embodying today to help me be that kind of person. And it can be a really empowering experience because, again, it takes us away from the role, the title, the outcome, and it's about the behavior. And I love it because it ties into what Adam Grant has talked a lot about in his most recent book. hidden potential, which I highly recommend. He talks about the importance of character strengths, moving away from hard strengths and really tapping into these strengths of character, these strengths of virtue in all of us, patience, love, kindness, service, integrity. And when we're

really clear on that, it allows us, it gives us a bit of a criteria point to guide our decisions and our behavior. We just come back to that, have I done this? And a practice that Faisal and I will use is to bring ourselves to account each day. At the end of every day, we reflect on our life. We reflect on the day. Did I make someone smile? Is there something I could have done better? And the fact is, yes, there's always something you could have done better. But it means you're constantly focusing on improvement. So that's really valuable. Now, the third tip I'll share is a lot of people ask, you know, how do I change my identity? And when they are asking that question, sometimes it comes from the perspective of how do I figure out what I'm passionate about?

So it's this desire to discover what they're passionate about because they believe that will help them figure out who they are. And it's a big question. How do we figure out what we're passionate about? One of the best pieces of guidance I've come across, and I can't remember who said it. But it's to pay attention to what you pay attention to. Pay attention to what you pay attention to. What do you naturally lean into? What conversations do you naturally find more engaging?

What YouTube videos do you find yourself watching? What pieces of information peak your interest? And this can be a really easier way to approach this very big question of find out what your passion is. It's just pay attention to those moments, those little sparks. And then start to pick up on when the spark is happening, spend more time there, nurture that spark till it becomes a flame, and you might have just discovered something you can be really passionate about. I think that's a useful piece of guidance because that can also help tie into your identity, because our identity is often closely linked to the person we want to be, which is tied to the things

that we're passionate about, which is linked to what we think is possible for us. So all these things really just interconnect. They are. They're also related. I think another thing that's highly related to this I've seen you speak on is this idea around self-doubt. You know, I think that oftentimes people don't even get started. started because they just doubt themselves. And so maybe they'll even try to restrengthen and create a stronger identity or find their purpose or go for that thing that's been in their heart for years. And so how do people overcome self-doubt? That is a very big question.

And I'm glad you're asking it. So part of my research is looking at, it's not looking at doubt specifically, but it's looking at the things that lead us to experience doubt. And so what the research has collectively, well, one area of the research has collectively agreed on is that there are generally these four pillars that lead us to doubt ourselves. And it comes down, fascinatingly, it comes down to how we see ourselves. So it comes down to our self-image, our self-perception. And that's why this idea of identity is so important. The four questions. So before I get into them, we need to distinguish self-doubt, where we are doubting ourselves versus doubt more broadly. I don't know if the car is going to sell on the market.

I don't know what, I don't know how much the groceries are going to cost. You know, that's also doubt. It's not knowing what the future is going to hold. But when we come to doubt ourselves, our abilities, our worthiness, this is self-doubt. And these four pillars, fascinatingly, are actually things that we're all very familiar with. The first reason why we might experience self-doubt is because we do not feel worthy. We do not feel worthy. We don't accept ourselves for whatever reason. Again, might have originated in childhood, might have been a toxic relationship we were in, a horrible work environment that leads us to doubt our value. That's the first pillar. The second one relates to our belief in our ability to achieve

our goals. So I don't believe I have what it takes. I don't believe I have the skills or the know-how or the resources to do it. The third pillar is a really fascinating one and it's where you actually mentioned it, Josh, this idea of becoming the victim. When we become the victim, we disempower ourselves. Because when you are feeling victimized, when you play into that, there's no empowerment to do anything because you've convinced yourself, what's the point? Nothing's going to change. So the third one is playing the victim. Now, when we're also the victim, we don't focus on things that we can control. What do we do? We tend to focus on things that we can't control, which leads us to feel even more powerless and experience more self-doubt. Then the fourth,

fourth pillar relates to something that also fuels the other three. And it's to do with, do I believe that I can manage my emotions in response to whatever happens? This is a fascinating one and one that we often don't think links to self-doubt. If I don't believe I'm going to be able to handle the pain of failing, the anxiety that comes with failing, I'm not going to try. So I'm going to doubt myself. So I don't take action because then I'm safe. If I, doubt that I can handle the stress that's going to come with that amazing promotion, then I'm not going to take it. I'm going to doubt myself and hold myself back.

So the ability to emotionally self-regulate is considered one of the pillars of how we see ourselves, which then influences whether we experience doubt or not. Now, really quickly, I think it would be a... It's so interesting, I was just going to say real quick, it's so interesting because the last two, I mean, they're really connected to comfort, not wanting to get uncomfortable. It's just, but, because I hadn't heard the... before this is great. Please keep going. No, of course. And the idea of comfort, it's so true because it all comes back to how our

brain is wired. And our brain is wired to prefer certainty because of it keeps us safe. And there was a function for that. But of course, in our lives, there is not a lot of certainty. I mean, here's a question. Do you think you would ever experience self-doubt if you were certain of the outcome of something? If you knew that you're going to get up on this stage and actually not do very well, would you experience a lot of stuff? self-doubt or might it be something else? It's generally going to be something else. The doubt comes because we don't know. And what a lot of the research suggests, in fact, there was this really fun study in 2016 where they brought together a bunch of people to play essentially like

a video game where they were playing this game on the computer. And they had to guess which rocks had snakes underneath. And there were some rocks that would always have a snake. So they learned, okay, I have a certainty that this rock is going to have a snake. Now, there was a catch where every time there's a snake, they get an electric shock. So it's really about anticipating an electric shock. I should share that as part of the study design. Then there were some where they didn't know if there was going to be a shock. And then there were others where there was definitely no snake hidden. So basically, they've designed this study to test how do people respond when they know there's going to be an electric shock, when they know there's not going to be a shock, or when

they don't know if they'll get shocked. Now, in which state do you think they were most stressed? Well, you know, you would think it'd be the shock, but I almost care. I mean, it's got to be the, you know, you don't know. Exactly. And so we prefer the certainty of inevitable pain than the uncertainty of not knowing, which I think is such an interesting insight into how we're wired as humans. Well, I think when you think about, you know, the whole field of psychology, so much of it is things that haven't happened. Like when we're worrying about things or people have anxiety, it's something that hasn't even happened yet. So it's a very, yeah, I get that. Wow. And we do it because we think that by worrying, it allows us to prepare. We're going to be more prepared if

that thing happens. But actually, again, what we know from a lot of the research and probably our own experience, it doesn't actually help. And when you're in a state of worry and rumination, you're not preparing. You're just blowing things out of proportion. You were catastrophes. you're feeling it in and on your body. Preparation is important, but worrying in and of itself is actually not. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is something that I think, you know, a lot of, it's just so easy to do. Again, you kind of go to the worst case scenario.

I think it'll be much more painful than you do versus, you know, knowing where it's at. And so I think that's, yeah, I love that you're sharing this. Let me ask you this personally for yourself. Have you dealt with any of these four and which one have you had to overcome in your own life? For me, I have struggled with, especially early in my career, the first one, am I worthy? Do I belong here? Do I have anything valuable to contribute? It really comes down to self-esteem.

When I was in the legal industry, I was so riddled with self-doubt, and it's because I didn't believe I belonged. I didn't believe that I was good enough to be there. I didn't believe that I had anything to say, and I would literally hide behind my, this was before we had open plan. You know, I would hide behind my cubicle because if people didn't know I was there, they couldn't give me tasks, and then I couldn't prove to them that I didn't belong there. So I'd literally hide. I felt safest when I was in the discovery room, which was a room with no windows, full of documents, because no one was there, no one could see me. That's not a great place to be. It wasn't, it didn't feel great at all. It continually undermined my sense of confidence.

So that was something that I really had to work on. When I moved into the other industry, how it manifested was I became an over-apologizer and a chronic people-pleaser. So I would apologize for everything, even things that were completely out of my control. I would just happily take responsibility. And then I would say yes to everything. I think part of that was also a bit of fomo. I thought, oh, I don't want to miss out. But also, I wanted to be the person everyone could rely on,

which I think is a, it comes from a good place, but it meant I was burning myself out. I was working weekends. I was often the last person to leave. I set an expectation that I was basically on call all the time. And so I received a call at 4 a.m. one morning from my manager who was overseas and I was the contact person because I put my hand up to be. You know, the things that we do. So there, that was the challenge I had was really that worthiness. The other one, though, that I'm finding now just with just the natural stressors of daily life and doing research and running the business and writing a book. is my ability to emotionally self-regulate.

It's something that I work on every day, and I have noticed that there are times when it's probably actually a combination of focusing on things outside of my control and the emotional self-regulation piece, where I'll feel the anxiety wave come, and I'll feel the tightness in my chest. And because I had done so much reading around what it looks like, what it feels like,

I was actually very curious when it was happening to me, And I remember saying to Faisal in the middle of this, I would call it an anxiety attack. I'm lying horizontally. My body is sort of convulsing. And I said to him, wow, is this what it feels like while I'm in that state? So I'm very aware of how my body responds to things. And obviously I take steps to manage that and also prevent that from happening. But I think what it demonstrates is you can even know all of this intellectually.

And it doesn't make you immune. And that's why there are so many people who were passionate about personal development. and empowering themselves and others. And yet they have a lot of challenges. Either they're not applying what they're learning, or there's no solution. It's just about applying what you have when you have it and dealing with things as they arise. Well, you know, it's so interesting you say that in the self-health space. Like I wrote my last book because, in part, because I had a spinal infection.

I didn't walk for almost a year. And it was like, I wrote a book on mindset. And so anyway, all that being saying, you know, it's just, I think there's a lot of people. And I got into the health space because there's a crisis in my own family and my mom. And so I think a lot of times when people are writing books or creating content, it's for themselves first, right? And I had somebody telling me, they said, if you write a book, right, for the Josh from 10 years ago, right,

that you can help and navigate along the way. And so there's a lot of ideas there. So I'm excited. I know you're going to be working on a book. What are you going to be writing? You don't have to share the title or anything like that. But what are some of the concepts that you're excited to write and teach on? Well, conveniently, it's actually on doubt.

So it is looking at self-doubt. It's looking at these pillars. It's looking at how they impact us, where they developed in our lives, where they came from, how they're continually reinforced as adults, and then how we can become more aware of what we call our doubt profile. So based on where you are on each of these four pillars, it forms your doubt profile. And then once you know what your doubt profile is, so this self-awareness piece, you can then learn where you need to focus. What's going to give you the greatest gain by investing the time and energy there, rather than focusing on everything. So I'm in the thick of writing that as we speak, and that's why I'm really passionate about this topic.

So I'm glad that it came up because you didn't even know that. You didn't know that it was on the topic of doubt. No. You know, one of the things we get into in my book in the first chapter, chapters, limiting beliefs. And what in, I put limiting beliefs in three buckets about self, about others, about the world. You know, I think this idea around self-doubt really can be, can be tied to these limiting beliefs around self. Share with me your thoughts around limiting beliefs and how we might be able to break through, or one become aware of, but also break through

the limiting beliefs we have about ourself. Limiting beliefs are such a pervasive component of our lives. I like to think of, Beliefs, limiting beliefs as these persistent patterns of thought. And I like to think of them as thoughts, even though we know their beliefs, because obviously the term says it, limiting belief, and they originate from a very deep place. What I found helpful for me and what a lot of our clients resonate with is this idea of thinking that, well, essentially it's a habitual way of thinking. And if you think of it as a habitual way of thinking, then it means that you can unlearn that

habit, just like any bad habit, and then relearn a healthier habit around your thinking patterns. And for some of them, they have this aha moment, because when we were talking about it as a belief, they sometimes get stuck in this, oh, it's just who I am. I can't change it. It's a belief. It becomes this excuse almost. And so I like to think of it as a habit of thought. Now, as you said, awareness, if you're not aware of these limiting habitual thoughts, you're always going to be, I don't want to use the word, a victim to it, but you're going to be a passenger to them. They're going to lead the way they're scripting your life.

So how do you become aware of it? And this is where self-awareness is so important. But of course, as we know, we're not very self-aware, even if we think we are. So I actually encourage people to ask others, people that you trust, people that know you, do you trust them, and you would be willing to be vulnerable and to hear whatever they have to say. And you actually ask them, have you noticed any instances where I may have expressed a limiting thought?

Or I may have acted in a way that might have reflected something that was limiting, where I may have held myself back, or I may have held you back or someone else. I would love to hear from you. And you actually facilitate an open conversation. It requires a lot of courage and humility to do that. But I think you can get such beauty back. Because when you allow other people to share with you, it's not like where you're getting negative feedback.

It's very different to that. You're actually getting instances where you have limited yourself or someone else, which again, if you think about the thought as a habit, it means you can then take steps to start to unlearn that thinking, but you have to become aware of it. So from the awareness front, asking for input can be really helpful. The other thing is to really think about how your body response, to particular situations.

Our bodies, our emotions, and Josh you would know this very well, give us so much data. And often we just try and escape the data, or forget about the data, or find a way to mute the data. Really listening to it can give us so much value. When are you feeling your best? What are you doing? When are you struggling with some kind of an emotional state? Is there a resistance that you're feeling toward doing something?

A simple example that I like to give is, is when I used to work in the corporate space, I would have a regular weekly catch-up with a friend. And then I started paying attention to how I felt whenever I was with that friend or even immediately before it. And I realized that I didn't feel very empowered. And then when I was sitting with that friend, I realized the reason why I didn't feel very empowered is because that friend had a tendency to back a bite about everybody else, to just talk really negatively about all these other people and I was sitting there listening and I didn't have the courage at the time to change the conversation. And so I was just absorbing all of this and my body was telling me,

perhaps this is not the person you want to be associating with, but I wasn't listening to it. I was just disregarding it and going along, doing the doing. So that's a little example of how tuning into yourself means you're able to create an environment around you where you are feeling your best, you're around people who make you want to be better. And again, can help you start to become aware of the things that you might be doing that could be holding you back. So let's talk about self-awareness because I think this is such an important part. You know, I think when I think about culture today and I think about this personal growth, self-development, even leadership space, there's a lot regarding goal setting of, hey, I want to get here.

But a lot of people don't know where they're at now, right? And I think of that as awareness. And so what are some ways that people can become more self-aware? Are there any interesting studies you've come across over the years that have really share the importance of self-awareness and what that means for, you know, somebody thriving in life. Absolutely. Well, what I'd like to share is actually a framework that can be really valuable in terms of identifying where you might be getting stuck, especially in the context of goals or where we want to be, our intention. We all have an intention to be someone, to do something. Not a lot of us are actually

there yet. And this framework can help us determine where we're getting stuck. We call it the mind pits. So there are three mind pits because they're mind created, and we call them pits because when you're in it, it's like you've literally fallen into a pit. You can't see reality anymore, and often your actions just keep you digging yourself further and further into the pit. So there's a reason for the analogy.

Now, the first mind pit we call failure to launch. And this is where you have the desire, you have the goal, you have the intention. But you just can't get started. you keep reading and preparing and doing the research and getting everything you need but you never feel ready and you're waiting to feel ready before you take action you're waiting to feel confident before you do the thing so you're stuck in what jones and burglas called the manana fantasy tomorrow i'll do it tomorrow i'll feel ready tomorrow and then you never get started and one of the reasons why this happens a lot if we go back to self-doubt because so much of this is linked to self-doubt

a lot of the time that happens because we are comparing ourselves to other people who are ahead of us and we think I need to wait till I'm 100% ready because I'm not where they are yet but we forget that they started where we were at some point and they took action so there's this comparison that we do we will often benchmark other people which can be a really healthy thing when we use that as inspiration but when we use that as a sign of inadequacy not helpful so that's our first mind pit, failure to launch, you're just not getting started. And we see a lot of people here. If you're not starting, you're taking yourself out of the race before it's even begun. Now, our second area where people get stuck, the second mind pit is what we call treading water.

And treading water, I use this analogy, because I'll never forget when I was 15. We had swimming classes as part of our physical education. And part of it is we had to bring a big jacket and a beanie and big, you know, what are they called? Tracksuit pants and sneakers and jump in the water. And we had to spend 60 minutes just treading water, staying in the same spot. And the reason why I think this is a great analogy is when you're in this pit, you are exhausting yourself,

keeping your head above water, but you're actually not making progress. You're not making any meaningful progress, just like if you're in a pool, the goal is to actually just stay on the same spot. You're not getting to a destination. So this pit is for people who tend to keep starting things and they never finish. They sign up for that wonderful professional development

course and then they stop after the first lesson. They buy another self-help book and they get into the first chapter and they don't finish it. They have all of these half-completed goals and they keep switching between them. And there's, again, a few reasons for this. One of them is that when we've started something, the beginning is fun. We get a shot of dopamine. The end is fun. We get a shot of dopamine. the middle bit is where we get bored because we don't have this dopamine hit that's keeping us going. We have this almost dopamine deficiency

and because we live in a society where we crave that so much and technology has done this to us, it's terrible. We get bored and then we see that boredom as a sign, okay, well maybe this isn't what I should be doing. And we do something else. We multitask. So boredom is a big piece and Dr. Maya Shankar talks more about this.

The other piece is that when we get to that point where we experience some agitation or some resistance. Let's say you've been working on something, Josh, and then you go away and do something else, and you come back to it, and you're just experiencing that initial hesitation or the resistance.

Andrew Huberman, Dr. Andrew Huberman talks about this a lot. That is actually the stress pathway that is being activated. And it's just a gate that we have to get through until we can get into a focus zone. But some people will listen to that as a sign to stop and do something else. And so they're just never finishing. And that can feel very unfulfilling.

Why am I not moving forward? I'm doing everything right. Why can't I finish? Why are they so far ahead? Why am I stuck here? So again, we can get into that negative self-talk. A big reason why a lot of people get stuck here, and it goes back to something you shared, we need to know the reason why we're doing something.

Beyond the end goal, beyond the achievement. What is the reason why? And it doesn't even have to be our broad purpose for existing. It can be something as simple as just giving the task meaning. So you touched on this and there's this really simple model called action identification, developed by researchers Valature and Wagner. And they suggested that at any moment, there are a number of different layers of meaning that we can imbue. What is the most disempowering or unmotivating, demotivating explanation or description for what you're doing right now? Well, I'm just, you know, I'm just doing this to make a living.

I mean, something like that is pretty disempowering. Absolutely. And even more, you could say, I'm just sitting, staring at a screen so I can make a living. You know, it's very descriptive, absolutely not motivating. Whereas if you start to tap into, okay, well, what is the meaning behind what I'm doing? How is this contributing to something that's helping me get closer to somewhere? suddenly it takes on a very, very different meaning. There's this really sweet little story.

When I was doing positive psychology, a specialization in that area, one of the participants, we were introduced to this concept of action identification. And then the next morning she wanted to share with us because she was so excited. She said, you know, I applied this to hanging the socks last night. She said, I have, I think she had four teenage sons. And she said, the amount of socks I'm having to wash each week, it is ridiculous. and I loathe having to hang the socks. But last night I got home and I wanted to apply this principle.

So as I was picking up each sock, rather than saying to myself, ugh, another sock, I actually looked at the sock and I reminded myself, who does this sock belong to? This is Elijah's sock. And as I hung it, I said, Elijah, may you be joyful, may you be happy, may you be healthy. And then the next one, this is Samuel. Samuel, may you be this. And she said, it transformed her experience. It also made her much more mindful.

So a little example of how when we get stuck in the middle, where we're just not finishing things, sometimes we need to remind ourselves why we're doing it and then anticipate it's going to be a little uncomfortable at first. Power through that, get through that friction, that discomfort, and then you'll start to find the momentum. Now, the third category or the mind pit, I won't spend a lot of time here because I think we resonate with this one, and I think many would resonate with this one. it's where we set a goal and then we achieve that goal

and then we look around and think well okay this isn't what I thought it would be let me say yeah where's the next one and then the next one and we're constantly telling ourselves even if we're not aware of it I will be happy and fulfilled when I get there then I can rest then I'll feel like I've achieved something but it never comes it's what Yale management lecturer Emma Sopala calls the never stop accomplishing floor and then behavioral scientist as Tal Ben Shahar, coined it as the arrival fallacy. It's this fallacy that when we get there,

everything will fall into place. Then we'll have time to be with our families. Then we can take our foot off the brakes, but it never comes. And so we're on this hedonic treadmill of thinking that achieving the next goal, the next thing, that amount of money, that business, that book, getting the New York Times bestseller, whatever it is, that's going to be the pinnacle. And it never is. And why this is a really interesting one when we think about goals, when we think about self-doubt. If we think back to those four pillars, a lot of the time we're driven to be in this pit, this mind pit.

We call it destination obsession. You're obsessed with the destination, but there never is a destination. It's always just the next one and the next one. A lot of the time we're here because we're in the first, we're affected by the first pillar, which was around worthiness. We feel like we will be worthy and someone of value when we achieve that thing. for ourselves and other people.

But it never comes. Because if there's something in you that's telling you you are not worthy, then no amount of accolade, no title, no amount of money is ever going to make you feel that way. And then the second reason, or the second pillar, is some of us may, it's a really interesting piece. So the second pillar, if you recall, was around believing in your capability to achieve something.

And people who were in the destination of, session mind pit, they don't doubt that they can achieve things and that's why they keep doing it. But they feel like they have to keep doing more and being better and my skills, I know I can do it, but I need my skills to be even better and even sharper and keep up with that person and be like that person. So it's not that you don't believe you can do it, it's that you just don't believe it's enough and you're just perpetually chasing. So that's a challenging one to be in and a lot of the time we don't realize it links to self-doubt. We doubt our worthiness. we doubt if we're enough beyond all of this.

And that's where it comes back to what you said, Josh, about you and being a dad. What is it to you to be a dad? Why is that so important to you? And what is the bigger impact that you're having? And when we can make it less about the thing, the end goal, the title, and more about the impact that we're having, it gives us a different lens to approach our lives, to approach our goals, to approach everything that we do, because that becomes our filter point. That becomes our compass.

And then we can realize that actually my value comes from the impact that I'm having, not ticking the next item off the list. That's so good. Yeah, I think everybody would really resonate with this. I think especially high achievers, people that really, you know, are, you know, type A really want to go after. And I know I really resonate with this. And I think this is something everybody struggles with is sort of balancing out this thing of like, should my identity be based on my accomplishments or should it be based on who I become?

I think we both would agree it's on who we become and our character and using the unique gifts God's given us to help contribute and add value to the world. And so that's, you know, that was a message, I think, for myself that I've really resonated with is, and you were the first person I saw who shared this is having a to be list, not a to-do list. Am I, you know, can I be generous today? Can I be compassionate towards others rather than did I, accomplish this task or this errand or whatever it is. And so it's a really, really, really powerful

concept. You know, one of the other things I wanted to ask you about, by the way, I have like a hundred, I have a hundred things. But, you know, but one of, you had a great video recently and you talked about the words we speak, right? And I think, I think about this even from a, from a biblical perspective, like life and death is in the power of the tongue. But you talk about this, I can versus I can't and some other words. And I'm trying to remember the other one, maybe not yet. That might have been something in the video. But I'd love for here you to share that a little bit about sort of the power of our words and in some of the phrases that people need to be careful of using and what they can use instead. This is, you're so right, the power of our words and we forget. We absolutely

forget how much power they hold over us and also how other people respond to us, which then shapes or reinforces our sense of identity. There are a number of phrases or terms that we tend to use or we might default to using that we don't realize are hurting us. And it's funny because I remember being aware of this when I used to work in corporate and when I would say certain things that would just make me feel even worse. I didn't know there was any signs behind it. And now, of course, I've come across a lot of the research. So it's like, ah, it's validated. Okay, wonderful. So the first area that I'll touch on actually relate to over-apologizing. And this was me, early in my career. I still have to catch myself out sometimes. But,

But if you're struggling with self-acceptance, if you feel like your credibility is in question, if you struggle with confidence generally, you might tend to apologize. Oh, sorry, sorry about that, sorry I'm late, sorry if this is a silly idea, sorry, we just say a lot of sorries. And we're doing it because we want to be collaborative and create an environment of harmony where everyone is happy. what we don't realize is that to us, we might be reinforcing this belief of I'm not worthy. I'm not worthy of time. My idea is not worthy. And that's not healthy. So what I encourage you,

if you're in a position where you over-apologize, try and just remove the apology, or I love this, flip it to gratitude. So sorry I'm late. Look, if you're a few minutes late, say thank you so much for your patience. If you're an hour late and you wasted everyone's time, of course, apologize, absolutely warranted. We're not saying that apologies are never warranted, but it's all about degree. And I think when you flip it from a sorry I'm late to thank you so much for your patience, you're making it about the other person, you're expressing gratitude, which is a beautiful thing. You're not making it about you, sorry, I'm late. Rather than, sorry if this is a silly idea, you just share the idea. So that's one area. It's the sort of over-apologizing.

prefacing, not being certain of what we're saying. When we move into the realm of goals and achieving what we want to achieve, a lot of the time what gets in our way is temptation. I'm really tempted to check social media, so I'm just going to go and have a one hour scrolling break. I'm really tempted to have that Snickers bar when I know that I'm trying to get fit and healthy. And we'll give in to temptation. Now, one of the words that has been found to be really effective in research. Actually, first I'll tell you what's not effective. When we say, I can't, I can't have that piece of cake, I can't do that, I can't. We use the word I can't to ourselves and to other people. And it's found that this is not particularly effective because when we say, I can't, there's a part of us that feels like we are being compelled to do something or obligated to do something a little bit against our will. Like we don't really buy it, but I can't. It's against the rules. If we change that to I don't, I don't eat cake. I'm focusing on getting healthy. I don't check social media when I'm working because I prioritize my time and getting done what I need to get done. It changes how we feel. And there was a study that was done on this and they found that people who used I don't over I can't were better able to manage their temptation. So that's a really great one to think about if there is something that is in your mind where you're saying, oh, I can't, flip it to I don't. Or I found another one which is helpful is I choose not. not to, which again brings the onus back to you. I choose not to have that cake because I'm

focusing on getting fit. I choose not to stay out late because sleeping a full eight hours is really important to my health so that I have vitality the next day. Really simple. I'll share the fourth one and then maybe the third one will come back to me. And Josh, you touched on it. It's this idea of yet. So many of your listeners, many of the people who are tuning in will have heard of a growth mindset. And a growth mindset is a belief that you're in. intelligence is not fixed. You can learn, you can develop, and it is critical for your growth and for your success. Now, a simple reframe that you can make, and this is great because we were talking about limiting beliefs earlier, if you have a limiting belief, like, I can't do that.

If you plop a three-letter word at the end of it, you can flip it into a growth mindset statement. I can't do that yet. Y-E-T-Y-T-yet is a powerful three-letter word. If you plop this on to the end of it, of any limiting statement, you're telling yourself, okay, I can't do it now, but I can do it in the future if I apply the time, the energy, the effort, get the support, find the resources. I don't know how to code yet. I don't know how to play basketball yet, and it can be really empowering. And that's actually from Barbara Frederick, from Carol Dweck, who developed the concept of growth mindset. She discovered it in her research. She recommends that three-letter word. Now the fourth, I think I've forgotten it.

So I'll see if I can remember it before we wrap up. But hopefully those three are helpful and you can actually apply them immediately. So good. It's so good. You know, I, you know, it's so interesting. Almost every of these conversations, they're all interrelated, you know, identity, limiting beliefs, who we become, you know, the language we use. I want to go back one time to this becoming mindset versus accomplishing mindset. And so you have this great task here to do a to become list, right?

A daily, you know, sort of rather than the to-do or alongside it to become list. Well, are there any other things that people can do or any other research or insights you've had on really this focus on becoming somebody that is, you know, on who we want to become? And also, is there a faster way to become a certain type of person? Like, like, what are some? And how does somebody know what to become? There's another kind of interesting question. Now, I think this might tie into you, say, things you're passionate about, right? Or there's things that you gravitate towards those conversations.

So maybe that's one of those. But, you know, those don't necessarily apply to, let's say, character, for instance. And so I'm curious if you have any other thoughts or insights on, you know, becoming these people that are, you know, that we were designed to be. Beautifully said, how do we become who we were designed to be? And that's a beautiful way to think about it because it takes it away from what we want for ourselves and prompts us to think about who are we meant to be, who are we designed to be? There is a bigger picture here and how can I really align myself to that? But it is a question that we need to ask.

How do you know who you're meant to be? How do you figure that out? So one of them, as I mentioned before, is tune into what you tune into. Another one, which is the opposite of that, is, in fact, there's a little anecdote. I think John Cleese, back in the 1970s, so he's comedian, and he was, I think he was recounting a story of how someone was given a big block of stone and asked to chisel out an elephant. And then he was sharing, you know, people would go up to the sculptor and say, how did you do this? How did you know how to do it? And the sculptor said, well, I looked at the stone and I carved away anything that wasn't the elephant. So rather than focusing on the elephant, he focused on everything.

that wasn't the elephant. And this can sometimes be a helpful mindset to have where if you don't know who you want to be, start thinking about who do you not want to be? That's sometimes an easier place to start. Once you're really clear on who you don't want to be, it's actually valuable because you can make sure that you do not become that through everything that you do and say and act. So that might be a useful starting point. What can be really helpful though is also to look at, so I'll share a few little strategies. The first one is to look at the people around you who either you know or you're inspired by. Now, importantly, you want them to have the same values as you. It's important to find that values connect and look at how they live and see if you can draw inspiration from that. That's one way.

So it's actually to benchmark people positively and to look to emulate what they do. The second one is if you do have a vision of the type of person you want to be, a lot of coaches and gurus, and goal-setting experts will say, visualize the future that you want. Visualize that outcome. And while there is absolutely merit to that, it's actually not as effective as we initially thought. Some research has found that when you are visualizing

in this desired future, it can actually sap your energy and it's been found to lead to poorer performance. So you actually don't perform as well when you're constantly visualizing who you want to be, which sounds really counterintuitive. So when we look a little bit deep, we find that what's missing is one really important piece. It's acknowledging that, okay, we need to

be clear on the person we want to be and why we want to be that and have it very clearly in our mind as a visualization. But the important missing piece is the in the middle bit. How are you going to get there? You need to visualize that. You need to visualize yourself doing the work, the daily work, taking on the behaviors, the daily behaviors, facing the challenges day by day. What obstacle are you likely to face and how are you going to overcome them? You're developing a coping strategy. It's Peter Golwitzer's work. He's a pioneer and a fantastic researcher in the space of goal setting and goal attainment. James Clear, he's been able to really synthesize this research very well. What you're doing is developing an implementation intention, which simply means you actually

want to be really clear on, okay, there's where I want to be. These are the things that could get in my way. and if I face them, here is what I'm going to do. So you become very pragmatic about knowing what your coping strategy is going to be. Fascinatingly, the research has found that when you do this, you are less surprised if that thing happens and more likely to successfully overcome it because you've basically mentally visualized yourself doing it. So I find that fascinating because a lot of people say

don't focus on what could go wrong because you'll will it into existence. But in this case, it's really pragmatic. says, no, no, acknowledge what could go wrong, and then think about how you're going to overcome it. And I love that because I'm a big pragmatist. I think it's wonderful. So that's another tip. Now, the other final strategy I'll share comes down to what's called self-distancing. If you're trying to figure out who to be and you might have something in mind, let's say there's someone you really look up to in your community, in your faith, in your business, whatever it is, they don't have to be someone that you know personally as well. It can be someone from a distance.

You have them in mind. What can be really valuable is when you're facing a decision, a challenge, a struggle, you exercise what's called self-distancing, where you say, what would this person do? How would this person handle this? How would this person act? What would they say? And so you always take on a different persona in that moment, a persona of someone who you aspire to be like. And it's been found that this can really help you first create some emotional distance between whatever you're feeling. So this is particularly helpful if you're feeling a lot of stress or anxiety or uncertainty. You create some distance, but it also gives you this lens of objectivity to start to associate with that person you want to be and all the qualities you want to become. And so you'll probably

persist for longer, apply the right types of behaviors. And that's a really valuable one that a lot of us don't even think about, what would this person do? How can I emulate that? And what we found is that when people do this, especially when they're struggling with confidence, we find, you know, they're about to get up on stage or deliver a pitch to a VC company or present to the board, whatever it is. We encourage them to take on this persona of someone else. In fact, Beyonce does this. Beyonce talks about how she has a persona called Sasha Fierce. And she says she often experiences anxiety before she performs. So she takes on this persona of Sasha Fierce, which is her confident, fierce persona. And then she does and acts and says whatever Sasha Fierce would do and say

an act like. And she's found it immensely helpful. And it's the same principle. So we can use inspiration from other people in the moments that really matter. I love this. You shared so many just, I mean, powerful gems there. And, you know, one of the thing it also makes me think about, And you're going back to, I don't want to say you're busting a myth, but basically sort of, you know, showing the reality of visualization. I'm a big fan of visualization. But as you said, there's steps beyond that that you really have to go through. You know, I had a real honor of being able to work with some Olympic swimmers. And I remember an interview with Michael Phelps, and they asked him what he's doing before he's in that.

He'll pull his hood up and he'll just be staring into, you know, just staring at something. And they said, hey, what are you doing when you're staring off? he goes, I'm visualizing. And I think that the person asked him in the interview, are you visualizing yourself winning on the podium? He goes, yeah, but no, I'm visualizing every single part of my race. I'm visualizing every stroke, every turn, every moment of the entire thing. Like my plan, my strategy, I'm visualizing every single part of it and planning and thinking

that out. And I think that's the part that a lot of people miss with visualization is. And I think a lot of times, you know, I remember this, there was a movie years ago, called The Secret. And I think a lot of times think, if I visualize or think or believe it, it's going to manifest. But I think the reality is a lot of times your neurological system doesn't believe you. And so that's the thing about the strategy and what you're saying is even thinking about the obstacles, because I think if you really think about practically, here's how I could really accomplish this. This is how this can happen. Your subconscious actually

starts to believe you, starts moving towards doing those things. And so I love that. I want to mention one other thing I think is so powerful too. you know, when I, oftentimes as well, I think in the literature, people said, well, think about who you become. I remember there's a book out called Your Futureselves, which is fantastic. But I think one of the things when I read, I read a couple articles on this, I thought to myself, yeah, I think that's hard for people just to visualize who they could become. I think it's easier for them to visualize and think about somebody they admire and becoming like that. You know, it's really even tied to the world of like virtue ethics. When you look at what I believe is the best way to know how to be virtuous is not to say,

here's what I think. It's to say, what would Mother Teresa do in this exact situation, right? And that's how I know what actually being virtuous is. Or how do I know how to be a good investor. What does Warren Buffett do? That's what I need to do. So my point, and it's like, I got a three-year-old daughter now. And she learns through, she's not sitting there thinking, what would, you know, what does future Arwin do?

She's sitting there like, I'm going to model and exactly do what mommy does, daddy, grandma, grandpa, you know, and that sort of thing. And so I do think, just to just to kind of reemphasize your point, I think there's a lot to say about this path of sort of modeling and why mentorship is so powerful and that sort of way in terms of for us to become, you know, the greatest version of ourselves. Absolutely. What a beautiful story about Michael Phelps as well about how it's not. I think the power of that, not focusing on the end goal, but the doing each step of the way,

it also, I mean, I'm kind of extending that and thinking it probably also detaches you a little bit from the end goal, so that if the end goal isn't achieved, you still achieved your goal, which was to get in there and do what you needed to do. And just on the note of Olympics and old sports and swimming, and there was this really fascinating study done in 1995, and then replicate. I think in maybe 2021. I'm not sure, but it was pretty recently. And they found that Olympic swimmers, or not swimmers, Olympic competitors in individual competitions,

so not in team sports, but in individual competitions, they found that bronze medalists were actually happier than silver medalists. And it's because of where their focus was, where their mindset was. A bronze medalist was engaging in something called downward counterfactual thinking. Look at where I am. placed. I'm so happy. Whereas those who were placing second, getting the second, the silver medal, were looking up. Oh, I was so close. I wish I did this. I should have been faster off the podium. And they were talking themselves out of what had just happened. And why I love that is that it really

highlights how our mindset and what we choose to focus on influences how we feel, how happy we are, whether we're satisfied with something. And it ties so much of what we've talked about together where our attention lies, that determines essentially the quality of our life, both in the current moment and in the long term. Wow. You know, one of the things is I was, you know,

watching some of your videos online is I saw that you were a professional, and I'm not sure if it's salsa dancer, but right, I mean, you were a professional dancer. Yeah. To tell us a little bit about, you know, Yeah, what sort of dancing was it? It was, so I did, I did all different dance styles, but I was, I did Batchata. So Bacchata was the style that I did.

It's a style from the Dominican Republic. And we won three Australian Latin dance championships while I was dancing, and I was doing that while I was at university. Because I think, actually, now that I reflect on it, so I'm studying law and psychology, but the law was hard. I think doing that on the side was my outlet. And it allowed me to forget about the fact that I'm not passionate. about what I'm studying about, but it was a really fun time in my life. But did that teach you anything about success, about growth, about any of these things in terms of your time as winning the Latin Dance Championship?

There were two lessons that I took from that experience. The first was related to playing to your strengths. So at the level that we were playing out, there were a lot of tricks and splits and aerial moves and these flashy big pieces that are very exciting and judges love them. Now, my partner, my dance partner and I, his name was Juan Ruiz from Tropical Soul Dance Studio in Sydney, Australia. We knew very early on that I'm not particularly flexible and I didn't have the time to invest in that.

If I wanted to, I would be able to, but I didn't. I was focusing on other things. So we thought, let's not try and beat the others at the things that they're really good at. What are we really good at? let's just focus on that and turn patterns were his sort of specialty. So we really honed in rather than trying to compete with everybody else and they were trying to one up each other. We just did something completely different, something that we enjoyed. So by doing that, we became people who were known for these really intricate turn patterns.

And we were still able to win championships as a result of just focusing on that and not trying to compete with everybody else. So the lesson from that is all around how you don't need to, you know, we've talked a lot about emulating other people and what would they do, which is so important. At the same time, you don't need to mimic. You don't need to be exactly like somebody else. Everybody is different. Everyone has their own unique strengths and their unique take on things. Find a way to tap into what you do well, what you enjoy, and bring that to life. So that was my first lesson, and I think it's a great one. I wish I learned that earlier in my career. The second one was that when it comes to competition, and this is the same in any space, you spend a very, very, very, very, very long time training. Now, in our space, it's not like an elite sport. So it's not, you're not spending 10,000 hours, but you are spending many, many months training and honing your craft to perform a two-minute routine on a stage.

If you blink, the time is over, you know, and you always get to the end. of a two-minute performance or a competition piece and you think, oh, I wish I could do it again, I wasn't present. So the first lesson is just being so present. But the second one is, if we were doing it all just for those two minutes, it would not be worth it. It absolutely would not be worth it. So the win has to be in the work that you're doing. The satisfaction has to come from the process, not the end result, because there are no guarantees. And there were sometimes when I would be on a stage and we'd be performing and something would go wrong and I wouldn't, you know, he wouldn't catch me or I'd kick him in the head or these things happen. And if the end goal was purely,

we must deliver a flawless performance, we would be really disappointed. We made it about the enjoyment, the fun, the growth. And I loved the process of creation that came week by week and trying something and struggling and then seeing it become muscle memory. It was the most beautiful thing. So that was the other lesson, which I think applies. to anybody in the sports space, competitive space, but also in life. The end goal is never what we think it's going to be. It's always a little bit of a letdown, you know, because we build it up in our minds. We think that when we get there, it'll be, you know, the best. And then like anything, the emotions come back down and the day-to-day happens. So that, they were my biggest lessons from

that time. Oh, wow. It's so good. Well, I have a couple more questions for you. You know, one of the things I've discovered is I've interviewed just a lot of amazing people is, is that amazing people tend to have spent some time with other amazing people. And so what is the best piece of advice that you've ever received? The best piece of advice I've ever received actually comes from an incredibly amazing person in my life, who is my mother. She has shaped me into the person I've become. And so much of what she was instilling in me when I was a kid,

I'm now discovering through the research. She was actually very much scientifically validated, but of course she didn't know that. I didn't know that. So I'm really fortunate to have been brought up in an environment where I've been exposed to so many of these concepts. I remember when I was 14, she was saying to me, I used to play netball, terrible for the knees, but I loved it. She was saying, visualize yourself, you know, getting the shot in the ring and visualize yourself getting there, not just the end goal. So she was even really on the, you know, on ball with all of these things, pun intended. But she used to just have one very short piece of advice.

And it was, if you want it, go get it. And I love the simplicity of this, because what she was talking to was, funny enough, one of the aspects of my research I'm looking at, which is called action orientation. Now, when she was telling it to me, she was saying things like, if you want a job, go and ask for it. If you want an opportunity, go and ask for it. If you want to marry that man, go and ask for it. And I did. I was the one who asked Faisal to marry me. I asked him out for our first dinner.

So it really helped me in my life. And now I'm realizing how powerful that mindset is. Don't wait, just do. Now, it's not about overconfidence. Of course, do the research that you need to, make sure you have what you need to, but don't allow your limiting belief to hold you back from doing something.

Just ask, just try. Richard Branson has this quote that I love. It said, if someone comes and offers you an amazing opportunity, say yes, even if you don't know how to do it, and then figure the rest out later. And I'm such a proponent of that, because there are opportunities that come, and we convince ourselves that we're not ready, we're not worthy, we need more time, the timing's not right, and we hold ourselves back.

If we all had that mentality of, if I want it, I'm going to go and get it, I think so many more people would be living lives that are more aligned. with who they wanted to be and where they wanted to end up. That's so good. What about you, Josh? Do you have, you've probably shared this at some point, but if there is a piece of advice that really resonated with you, what would it be?

Oh, wow. Well, mine is going to be very faith-driven, but I would say, and it's going to be tied to identity, I would say, you know, I really think that you need to discover who you are spiritually and who you're connected to and building a relationship with God. And I say that is I think everything else flows from that. There's a, there's a quote from A.W. Tozer, and he said,

what you believe about God is the most important thing about you. And that's interesting to think that the most important thing about you isn't about you. It's about someone else. And I've really found that, you know, because I think this really ties into how we live our lives here. There's another quote by C.S. Lewis. And he says, you know, the people that did the most in this life are the people that thought about most about the next life. And so you think about Mother Teresa's or Martin Luther King Jr.

or some of these people. They really had life as more of the ultimate, like not immediate, but eternal perspective, very, very long-term perspective. And so for me, I really believe that when we know who we are and building a strong identity, identity then feeds your purpose. Your purpose then feeds your individual mission in life. And that feeds the way you think and your beliefs, and then what comes out of your mouth and the actions you take. And so I really see this as sort of a funnel and how it flows down. And so I think this is one of the reasons I wanted to ask. you some of these questions around identity because I know that you've been an expert in this. I've seen you just speak so much wisdom in life about the power of knowing who we are in our

identity. So again, I would say my, my, you know, my, in terms of getting advice for for others, I would say it's very much, you know, go and build a really rock, rock solid identity. And I think so much will flow from that. And, and then last question for you here is, is that when you think, about, again, obviously you got that piece of advice. A lot of people here on this, on this, on this, on this podcast, or listening to this book, they, they want to experience a breakthrough. You know, they're very growth-minded. They want to, they want to become who they were born to be. And you've talked about so many amazing concepts today. But what is maybe the one thing today that they could go and do the one piece of advice that could help them change the, you know, really that could allow them to experience the biggest change in their life potentially? I would say there are three things, so I'm going to expand it. There's not one. I'm going to share three. I see these as being intertwined.

The first one is to spend just an extra minute every morning being grateful for what you have, expressing thanks. It might be in the form of a prayer. It might be in the form of meditation. It might just be closing your eyes and saying, I am grateful for. And just three things. They can be the same things every day. when we get into a habit of expressing gratitude, you know, on a spiritual level,

I really believe that it connects us more to what's good in this world. But in addition to that, there's also evidence that shows that it can, because of how the brain is wired, where we magnify what we focus on, it makes us more likely to notice other things to be grateful for. And this simple practice can actually transform your life.

Not objectively speaking, your life is the same, but how you experience it, fundamentally shifts. That's the first one. The second one, and this links Josh some of what you've shared, try and do one active service for somebody every single day, whether that's a family member, a neighbor, someone on social media, whatever it is, just something where you're not thinking about you. You're being selflessly of service without any desire to get anything back. This is incredibly powerful for creating ripples of positivity, for creating ripples of connection, And then again, we know from research that this helps you feel far more connected.

You get the shot of oxytocin. It can help with your well-being. So, you know, a win-win on both sides. Now, the third one is to really embody that mindset of if you want it, go and do it. For everyone who's listening, if there's one thing you've been waiting on, I encourage you to take one step. It doesn't have to be huge. It's one baby step. What is going to get you one step further?

If you're in the failure to launch Mind Pit, where you are struggling to get started, take the first step. Reach out to that person, apply for that job, share that social media video, start that new health kick. Whatever it is, just take that first step. If you're in the middle pit where you just cannot finish things, set a timer and say, I'm going to work on this for five more minutes. You will find that once the five minutes finishes, you'll probably set the timer again because you've created your momentum. get through that initial friction period. And if you're stuck in destination obsession, where you just keep going and going and going,

your, if you want it, just go get it, is going to be take a break. Take a break. It's all going to be there when you come back. Leave your devices. Go and be present with your family, your loved ones, your pets, God, whatever it is. Go and take a break and be with the important people.

Because life is too short, and at the same time, it's too long. It's too long not to do these things. So they would be my pieces of guidance. Now, on that, I just wanted to mention, for anyone who's been listening and is interested in learning more about the mind pits, we actually do have a resource that we've created with a little self-assessment of nine questions. I think it's nine questions. Might be 15.

I'm not sure. Somewhere between nine and 15, you ask yourself those questions, and then you calculate which mind pit you are in most. And then we give you some tangible tools that you can use to actually pull yourself out. So if you're interested in accessing that one, you can get it at shadae zari.com slash mindpits. So that's S-H-A-H-R-A-I-com slash mind pits, which is, as it sounds, M-I-D-P-I-T-S, and you can download it there and get that little diagnostic for yourself. But they would be my three tips.

Gratitude, service, take action. That's so good. Well, thanks so much for the wisdom today. Again, I learned a lot. I'm sure everybody learned a lot. And also, I want to encourage everybody to check out today's Instagram page and her YouTube page. They're absolutely awesome. You'll learn so much by following her. And I want to encourage you to take the assessment. You know, I have gone through a lot of your and looked at a lot of your content. And it's just, I think it's a 10 out of 10. I think when I look at people putting out really, really powerful content, it's really

practical. That's the other thing. I think a lot of times people speak more abstractly about things, but you've done such a great job of putting it in a way or creating content that allows people to really take action, knowing how to implement it in order to change their life. And so I want to say, thanks so much for all the incredible things you've put out there. And hey, if you are watching this on YouTube, I want to encourage you, let us know your biggest takeaway from the wisdom that should have shared with us today. I know that I've got a lot of nuggets. We'd love to hear from you, your biggest takeaway from this. And hey, if you're not subscribe, make sure to subscribe to the podcast. We've got a lot of other great content coming out here in the future. And again,

thanks so much to Shaday for sharing her wisdom today. Thanks, everybody, for listening. Thanks so much, Dr. Ax. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thanks again.