The Sevan Podcast - #15 - Ben Bergeron

Episode Date: November 13, 2020

Author of Chasing Excellence - with 1600+ 5 star reviews on Audible - Confidence - Being the Best YOU - Victim Mindset The Sevan Podcast is sponsored by http://www.barbelljobs.com Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/therealsevanpodcast/ Sevan's Stuff: https://www.instagram.com/sevanmatossian/?hl=en https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/3-playing-brothers Support the show Partners: https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATION https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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No, but I'm excited to find out why. Because you have confidence. No, it's because you have confidence. Well, no, it's cause you have, you have a system. You have a, you're a professional. No, I'm hiding my face. Then go ahead. I, how long do these, I just want to like, I have an 11 o'clock my time. So I have an hour. That's awesome. I appreciate that time.

Yeah. Right before I, right before I do, um, one of these podcasts. So, so the thought pops in my head, Hey, wouldn't that be cool to interview Ben Bergeron? And then why, why do you interview people? But then I just let that one pass. And then I get super excited about the podcast. I get super excited about the podcast. And then about 10 minutes before my feet start tingling and I'm like, why are you doing this? Like, and I get all this anxiety. Really? Yeah. Every single podcast, whether I'm being the interviewer, whether I'm, um, being interviewed, I'm just like, Hey, wouldn't it be just fun just to go in the backyard and drink coffee and like throw rocks and hang out

with the kids. But, but then, but I guess everything is kind of like that in my life. You know why you get like that that like five minutes before you come on are you like jesus christ why did i why did i accept this i should be i should be hanging out with heather uh okay so um i do get that for certain for most things um i think that i think that's awesome that you that you're you're weighing and measuring your life decisions like that down to the minutes. I think that's really rare. I think most people just kind of go through the motions of daily experiences. That's cool, man.

The fact that you're weighing it not against should I know i thought where you were going to go with that is you get tingly because you get nervous um and nervousness is like you know we talk about this i mean i know you're aware that you've been around high level sports for a long time it's um it's it's preparation it's your body telling you you're about to do something kind of important so you get to decide whether that's nerves or your body readying itself. And it's the same physiological response, pupils dilating, blood leaving your extremities to kind of help out with, uh, or actually the opposite. The digestive process stops. You got to get this butterflies in your stomach. It's because you're about to do something that matters to you. So that's the only part of that. Um, so

I think it's really cool that you get it before a podcast because this obviously this means something to you. It's important, but then you're even better to me is I know you're such a, you're so, you put a lot of value on parenting is that you're weighing it, measuring it against going out in the backyard and throwing rocks at your kids. Like that's really cool. It's not, should I be doing this or should I be, um, writing a blog post? Should I be doing this or, um, trying to balance the books? Should I be doing this or, um, trying to be some other creative endeavor, which I don't, you know, you're super creative. That's awesome, man. That's super cool. Um, I, I, I would like to think that I'm at that level, but I think what I do is I,

I've, maybe I'm just on a different spot. I check out at a certain time. Like I know when I'm at work, I'm at work and I make all the decisions based off of work things. And then when I go home, I try to make all the decisions based off of home things. and then when I go home I try to make all the decisions based off of home things so at home it's I try to I put my phone up in my bedroom and I try not to check it until the next morning you know that type of thing and just like hard fast rules and so I can be in the backyard throwing rocks my kids when I work I'm not really having that discussion it's should I take this podcast with Siobhan or should I work with and try to develop one of my coaches? And that's a hard decision. That was really helpful. What you

said, it's preparation. I guess really that is what it is. My nerves always right before I get this fight or flight. And since I don't really have too much fight, I just embrace the flight. It's freeze or flight. It's like, that'd be the deer in the headlights or should I run away? Um, actually I think it's, I read, I heard something recently. I think humans actually, so we always talk about, um, fight or flight. I think there's actually, um, four things. It's not just fight or flight.

And that was really easily. It's a memorable, it, it, um It describes the autonomic nervous system really well in terms of, you know, what happens when you get pulled out of rest and digest into this kind of like, ah, this high stress thing. actually four things that you potentially could go through when presented with something that could otherwise be called fight or flight and it's fight flight, um, freeze or friend. As human beings, we have the, like, I'm not going to run away from you. I'm not going to fight you, but I'm going to try and make friends with you. I'm going to be, it's the people that are like, people pleasers, people that avoid confrontation and they avoid it in a different way other than running away from it. Like most humans actually don't do that. And most scenarios, if someone pulls out a knife, I get it. But if someone goes like, so Vaughn, we have to have a really hard conversation.

Most people go, it's like, are you like, yeah, bring it on. Like, I'm ready for this. Like, are you a confrontational type of person? Um, do you fight? Like, do you fight it? Or are you the type of person like that tries to like gloss it over? Like, oh yeah, sure. So I'd, I'd be happy to talk. Um, you look great today. I'm trying to like appease from the onset. That's interesting. Uh, when I, um, that I think you're that you nailed me. If someone wants to talk to me and I know it's going to be really intense, I kind of embrace it. I really look forward to the awkward situation. If I'm the one who has to go up in front of a room and speak,

I literally have the thoughts, hey, the door is right there. Just grab your shit and run. I like literally like when I have to do public speaking, I literally get like that. I do too. Just grab your shit and run. So I'm much better with like this type of scenario where it's like question and answer and I can be off the cuff and I don't have to have anything scripted. If it's the type of situation where I have to have something scripted, um, right. I get that feeling. I I'm, I'm the same thing. Like, right. Even if it's your own script.

Oh yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love how you start your, I realize now that we're in the podcast. I love how you start your podcast, by the way. Thank you. You just kind of like, we're in it. Got it. And someone said, hey, have you ever thought about getting counseling? And he said, no, like this pathology that I don't want a counselor to heal this pathology of mine. Like it's what makes me a killer. And one of the athletes that was most interesting to watch right before they would go out would be Matt Fraser because he would start to get this gag reflex. And he would always just be there like, but he was so comfortable with vomiting or or having the sensation of vomiting and i would always ask him hey what are you doing he goes oh i'm this is i'm just i forget these are my words not his but he would basically be i'm overwhelmed and nervous

and this is part of he didn't say preparation but now he was so comfortable with it he was so he was so comfortable with whatever he was feeling even though it looked horrible to me and you just nailed it. He must have known on some level that, hey, that's him. That's him easing into complacency. Like all of a sudden it doesn't matter that much. I got this one. Like if those feelings go away, that should be the red light. That's, Oh my God. It looks like a coyote in the back. You're there. You're your dog. Oh yeah. Yeah. Old meshy. Right. So like that's, that's that, um, those signals, um, are just that they're nothing more than signals and how you interpret them goes a long way. And if Matt tells himself like, Oh God, if he, if he allowed himself to get freaked out by those triggers, um, that would be a bad situation. I'm throwing up what's wrong with me, all this. But if he just goes like part of, as you said, he's so nonchalant and he realizes part of

the process of preparing, getting ready for something that matters. It's actually something that he sees as a necessity and a benefit other than a hindrance or a crutch. Right. I need to embrace that. So it's a good thing that I get nervous and want to run away before every podcast. As long as you interpret it the right way. Right. Yeah. If you interpret it as like, where is the door? Like, no, like literally, literally, where is the door? Like I need to get out of here. That might not be the best story we

want to tell ourselves, but if it's a matter of like, uh, here's this feeling, I feel it coming on. Okay. I know what this means. This is all good stuff. Like I'm going to be, um, it's kind of like, uh, you know, they say, um, caffeine can be a performance enhancer. Yeah. It's the same thing. Like caffeine is like getting you more in that, like, um, your heightened state. That's all that that's happening before public speaking, asking someone out on a date, a big athletic events, asking for a promotion, whatever it is one of these things that like are kind of meaningful moments in your life.

How long have you been married? 10 years. 10 years. You don't know that. 11 years. You don't know any, 11 years you don't know any anything about asking anyone out on a date no i don't you're absolutely 963 um five-star reviews on amazon 1675 five-star reviews on audible and thank you for audible um i don't even know you're talking about

it first yeah yeah that's for that's for your book that's awesome chasing excellence cool um and i'm shocked at that by the audible one by the way like i am uh my biggest fear growing up was not public speaking, was public reading. I have dyslexia. I could not read out loud at all until about four or five years ago. Yeah, probably about six, seven years ago. And the reason that I was able to kind of start being able to do it was when I started reading out loud to my kids at night and starting with like children's books and being able to be like, um, go dogs, go like, see, go to the tree, dogs, go to the tree. Like it was literally like building up from there.

So I'm still incredibly self-conscious of my, um, public reading. Um, and the fact that audible has, I'm still horrified by it. Like I, it's one of those things that I'll probably end up never doing, but it's on my bucket list is to redo that because you learn so much the first time you do it. And I feel like I read it so poorly. I would love to go back. And I literally like even last night reading my kids at bed, I was like, Whoa, I, this is how, this is the cadence I should have used in the audible book. Like literally last time I recorded that four years ago. I thought we started the podcast with saying you have your work mindset and your family mindset.

It looks like your work mindset creeped into your family mindset. Yeah, I lied to you. There's no, there's no, there's no. No, that's the, that's the bigger circle. That's the always bettering yourself mindset that, that where the other two reside, right? Yeah. That's the big bucket. That's the always bettering yourself mindset where the other two reside, right? Yeah. That's the big bucket. Yeah, but you're right.

I should have been just totally absorbed and present in that moment of reading my kids, but I was reading really well to them and I was like, damn, this is good. And it was literally like, good night, good night, construction site was the book. I love it. How many kids do you have? Four. I have two that are my own and I have two stepkids. So a big gap between them. And how many wives do you have? Currently? Yeah. Just one right now. Just one. Heather's going to kill me if she hears that now. I've only ever had just one wife. I want to go back to confidence.

I'm looking at my notes and I'm trying to think where that word popped up. Hold on. It was either on your website or on your CompTrain website. People traits. Excuse me. Sorry, my notes are a little sloppy here because there's so many of them. The fact that we have notes for your podcast is like 10 levels above my podcast. Grit, resilience, accountability, confidence, optimism, perseverance, humility, and passion. What is confidence? What? Yeah. Um, so it's funny you hearing you say those,

those have changed over the years. So some of those things have morphed in different stuff, but the confidence one has not, um, confidence I think is, is really misunderstood. It was misunderstood by me when I was an athlete and having seen the 10,000 foot view that coaches are provided and you get to like step out of it and actually see what's going on. Um, I've actually been able to redefine it, I think a little bit more, um, tangibly and, um, within the grasp of people. And within the grasp of people, I'm going to start by defining what it's not, realizing that defining what something is not is not very helpful. Like I am not drinking shampoo. Like I get it.

It doesn't say what it is, but I think so many people have this understanding of what confidence is that's misplaced. And most people believe that confidence is the belief that you can win. And that's not what confidence is. If that, if confidence is knowing that you can win in the CrossFit world, one person's allowed to have confidence, Matt Fraser, two people, Matt and Tia, no one else can have confidence because no one else thinks that knows that they can win and they know that they can't. So it has to be something else. If, cause people do walk on the floor with confidence to me, um, confidence is knowing that you can give your best effort regardless of the circumstances that are presented to you.

So, and this is really powerful. Like if you're going to walk on the floor and, um, regardless of this is a wheelhouse workout, and I realize I'm talking in terms of CrossFit, but that's, that's my profession and my jam. And if you're an elite athlete working on the floor and regardless of it being at Atlanta, where you have never done it before, it's probably gonna be the hardest work you've ever done. If you, if you think that I

can kill this workout and have it, no one knows if they can kill it. No, nobody, including Matt and Tia have any idea what this workout is going to feel like. So it can't be this, this confidence in projecting the future. It can't be that, especially if it's results oriented, totally outside your control. But what is inside your control is, it sounds cliche, I get it. And it's very, you know, but it is, can I can, can I give my best effort regardless of what's in front of me, regardless of the 300 pull-ups, regardless of the weight vest, regardless of my hands, tearing, regardless of a judge calling no rep, regardless of it being nine degrees, regardless of it being the 12th or 13th workout over three days, no matter what happens,

do I feel like I can still give my very best effort at this moment? And if you can do that, if you can give your best effort, what else is there? And if there's not much else, because everything else, by the way, is already been passed. It's preparation. It's been done. And I do understand that confidence is earned through preparation. So the more preparation you give, the more potential you have for confidence in that moment. If you're totally unprepared, you walk on the floor and you're not going to have confidence because you're like, I'm not going to be able to do this. Like I'm not. Yeah. So it's the two things. Do you know that you can overcome any sort of adversity that's

going to be presented to you? And have you done the work to earn that confidence? All the other confidence is fake. People give the big pep talk beforehand and they walk in with a big, like imagine before a football game, before the Superbowl, you get this big pep talk from your coach. You're like, yeah, yeah. This extrinsic motivation, which is not real. You go out. What was the word you used? What was the word you used? Extrinsic, like outside of yourself.

Okay. You go out there and then four minutes into the game, you're down by three scores, 21, nothing. Like, where's the confidence? Like you're going to get, it's going to just get pulled. It evaporates immediately. Where's the confidence? Like you're going to get, it's going to just get pulled. It evaporates immediately. But if you are ultimately prepared and prepared to face that situation, a good coach would get you ready for that. A good coach goes like, Hey, listen, we're in the Superbowl. This

other team's really good. We're going to try and come up with our best, but there's chances. There is a chance that they come out and we lay a fart in the first quarter and we're down by three scores. If that's the case, here's what we're going to do. Whatever it might be. We're going to revamp our game plan. We're going to stick to our game plan. We're going to pull the quarterback, whatever it might be. And you have a plan for that. All of a sudden now the players go like, yeah, this is, we talked about this. We're ready to go. Like there's a, you're prepared. And regardless of the scoreboard, you can still bust your ass. Like that's confidence. That's, and it's available to all of us. As long as you're willing to prepare.

I took everything you said and I translated it in my head. I started like feeling examples of how to deal with kids and how to deal with relationships. Right. So you and your wife have the same argument once a week about the same thing. And finally, one morning you wake up and you're like, Hey, I need to prepare a different approach to this because we're just, this is the same outcome. This is like a book that I just keep reading the same three pages over and over and over. And then you're right. And then I have a plan B in case I do react and I do make the same mistake, which in that plan B is usually just to suck it up and be as humble as you can. But, but that's interesting that, yeah,

that's, that can be applied to anything that you said. I would, I would think so. Um, you tell the kids to go to the car and they, and they throw a temper tantrum and every single time at some point you have to be like, okay, I need to try something else. Not that might not be confidence to me. That might be more of a humility. So to me, humility is a lot of things. I think what, again, I think people kind of mislabel it as not caring so much about yourself, caring so much about other people, even like shyness gets equated to humility. And to me, humility, the number one characteristic of humility is, um, a growth mindset and realizing you don't have all the answers and, um, you're coachable and you're looking for ways to get better. Like there's no matter how much you've achieved or how little you've achieved, um, betterment is accessible if only you are willing and accepting of outside ideas. If that's the case, that's a really powerful combination,

right? If you're humble and willing to work hard enough to be confident, that's why humble and hungry is such a tagline. Those two things together are really, really powerful regardless of business, relationships, family, sports, athletics, arts, whatever it might be. Sorry, since I failed the test and I tried to tell you what confidence was, repeat it back to you and I failed. Let me take another stab at it. Let me ask another question. Can people feel confidence? I ask because I don't ever feel confident. I don't ever feel, um, no, I don't, I don't, um, it's like, it's almost like, um, and jealousy, like there's these words that people use and I just don't feel them. And a lot of, and I feel like maybe I should feel like I don't have jealousy. I don't have confidence. They're the words in my life, and I think I can see them, but I don't experience them. I don't ever feel like I walk into a room confident. Maybe my ideas around confidence is that it's fake. By fake, I mean not in a bad way. I know that has a negative connotation, but confidence is something you, it's an air. Yeah. Or you,

maybe like you fake it till you make it or you it's just interesting. It's not something to have a firm grasp on. Yeah. No, I think if we, if we take a different, look at something I have a firm grasp on. Most people would look at the word confidence and say like confidence is like an optimist. Like I'm going to crush this. This is going to be amazing. I'm going to nail this podcast. I'm going to nail this public speaking event. I'm a great dad, like whatever it might be.

And to me, there's kind of three different – I've kind of laid out a few different levels of mindset. And to me, let me expand this beyond this. So the worst mindset to me is the victim mindset. And I don't think that you're saying you're, I don't think you're there when you're saying like, you're not confident, but victim mindset is like, the world is out to get to me. This sucks. Things are actually set up and roadblocks are purposely put in place for me. The next one would be, I have zero of that. Yeah. Perfect. So the next one's the pessimist, which is like, um, I'm not that great at this. This is going to be tough. Um, and, um, this, this, I don't want to say this sucks, but that, that, that shading towards that.

I don't have any of that either. Okay. So maybe you're in between. Oh, this is looking good. This is looking good. Yeah, it's doing good. So the next one is the next one's the optimist, believe it or not. The optimist is better than a pessimist because people in a positive state perform better than people in a negative state, whether you're trying to do classical violin typing or whatever it might be, or an ER surgeon. It doesn't matter if you're in a positive frame of mind, you're going to do better. So the next one's an optimist, which is like, I got this, I can do this. But as we talked about, like optimism can be shattered in a second. The next one is the realist. I think that's probably where you are. You're probably a realist.

Like it's hard to have ultimate confidence when you're a realist and you are aware of your shortcomings. You know, I think that as much as people look at Katrin and she's always smiling, I think that she's actually not an optimist. I think early in her career, she was, I think she's a realist now, which is like, Hey, there's a real likely scenario. I don't make the games this year. And because of that, she has to bust her ass to realize she's going up against a lot of really, really talented girls that are equally working as hard as her. It's in your situation of playing with your kids or going to podcasts, like, Hey, I prepared for this, but like, there's still some things that could go wrong. And man, I, I know there's more I could have done to prepare for this.

That's just the facts of being a realist. And it's equated to like the Stockdale paradox of, you know, people being in prison camps and the optimists are the first to die. The ones are like, we're going to get out by Christmas. And they don't get up at Christmas to die of a broken heart. The pessimists say like, um, this sucks, this sucks, we're never getting out and they die of, they eat themselves alive, not literally. And then the realists live the longest. The ones are like, hey, we might not get out of this thing for years, but let's make the best of this moment that we have right in front of us. To me, the highest level though, is what I call like the curious competitor, which is really that truth growth

mindset, which is like, Hey, I realize their shortcomings. I'm so curious what it is that it could take to get to that next level. And what would it, um, where are my shortcomings? And this might be where you are, because as you said before, like you love the conversations when someone's like, Hey, Siobhan, we got to chat. You're kind of like, Ooh, cool. Bring it on. Like, what can I learn from this? You might be so, um, elevated in your mindset and that it's, it's once you realize it's the people that feel like they don't know anything. It's kind of the levels of expertise. Like in the beginning, you're the novice

and you feel like, you know, a ton, that's the most dangerous, but actually that's not, you realize how much there is to know. There's this huge gap between what you actually know and what you think you know. And you realize it. If I was to start hang gliding, I would realize I don't know much about hang gliding. And then there's the dangerous spot, which is like the intermediate. And they don't know what they don't know. So they feel like they're an expert. And then there is the true expert, which realizes how much they don't know. And the gap goes the other way. Like they are actually, they know quite a bit. It'd be kind of, um, um, like EC, you know, EC, EC with nutrition. Like she knows more about nutrition than I will ever know. Like,

uh, you know, molecular biology level of stuff that like, I hear her talk in my mind just kind of goes into jumbles because she's so crazy impressive. She's crazy impressive. But you, but you talk to her and she's like, listen, I don't know the first thing about nutrition. That's kind of like, that might be where you are with a lot of these things. Like parenting, you get to with your kids and you're like, oh my God, like there's so much, I don't know. Am I doing this right? That to me is that, or you truly are just the novice. I, I've, as I, as I stumble, as I stumble around and, and do this parenting thing,

it's so funny because people want to tell you, oh my God, you know so much, but the a hundred percent truth is everything that I preach. I most need to learn myself. I mean, I know it sounds cliche, but it's like, it's like spot on. And I see that in the world around me too. All the people who are preaching like certain things on their social media or this stuff, you know, that's all out there in this tumultuous fun world we're in now. Um, I, I don't think that they know that they're exposing themselves, that they're the ones who really need to learn what they're saying. And those of us who aren't talking about that, we are, we already got it. It's not, it's not even in our, um, world interesting though yeah it's um if you talk about something

often at least for me it's i'm the one i'm i'm the one who needs to learn about it but but you think they're projecting onto you that you're some sort of expert but actually no i just took a few deep breaths and i'm talking to myself yeah well i think that if we use like social media, for an example, it, or any, any sort of platform or this, this platform, the podcast being included, what we usually speak to is what we're interested in. Right. And what we're interested in is what we'd like to learn more about. And the level that we, that anyone ascribes themselves to as an expert is just totally relative. And it's not even a discussion. It's like, it doesn't mean anything. It's like a super who would win Superman versus Batman type discussion. It's just not what level of an expert are you versus somebody else? It's just not even a, to me, it's not a worthwhile discussion. Um, so I don't. How about your athletes though? Aren't they as sort of a validation that you're an expert, the people that you've trained, the people that you,

no, I mean, I could just be a really good recruiter and just be getting really good athletes. And, um, you know, there's, there's plenty of coaches that get, that have athletes at a high level that aren't good coaches.'m not necessarily saying necessarily in our sport but certainly in other sports i mean that's all over the place if you have michael jordan scotty pippen and dennis rodman on your team um you can be an average coach and probably make you could be a terrible coach and you're going to make the playoffs i loved it how you put dennis rodman in there. I loved him. Yeah. He's yeah. Well, I just, I'm reading 11 rings right now by Phil Jackson. So I do think he's a good coach, but that's where that's top of mind. And I, and then I can only reference a basketball from the eighties and

nineties. Cause I have no idea. I couldn't even tell you besides LeBron James who's in the NBA right now. I I've noticed that I'm a, one of, one of the things that i find i really enjoy in life is um time lapse photography right where they where they show even though i don't do it they show a flower you know as a little kid they show a flower and it grows right before your eyes and um when i grow plants i just love going outside um watching, especially in the, when is that? Winter, spring, in the spring when the plants are blooming. I love like looking at a branch and the next day it has buds on it.

And you're like, what? Where did those come from? I'm with you. Yeah. And I'm addicted to, to, um, addicted, obsessed, fascinated. One second, Siobhan, one second. Yep. Please.

Still here. Come on in. Join the show. Yeah. Yeah. I, I love watching things develop and grow. And with my kids, it's like, it's, it's, it's, it's like every single day. I'm just like, part of it is, of course, I want to give them a ton of opportunity, but I know that everything I put in front of them, they just grow, right? So you play James Taylor one morning, the next day they're singing it. You know what I mean? You take them to ballet class, the next day you see them doing tendus in the living room. I mean, it's just nuts.

Do you, does any of that resonate with you? And what are you doing what is what's keeping you um i i know that you talk about making people the best that the big view is making people the best version of themselves that's that's all over your work but on a closer level what keeps you fascinated moment to moment? Is it also that watching people grow? Um, yeah. And selfishly it's probably myself first and foremost. It's I'm, I'm most interested in, um, what I can tap out of my own potential. And that's not like, can I do 15 muscle ups? I'm broken. I could care less about that. It's more about how close can I get to

fulfillment? Fulfillment is my favorite word. I think passion is like purpose. All those things are misconstrued, happiness, joy, misconst. Um, but fulfillment to me is when you're lying on your deathbed and you look back at your life, you're like, yes, did it like, yup, that was it. And what does that exist? I hope so. Um, I, yeah, I hope, I hope so. Um, and I think that the way to get there is to what you're doing, which is constantly putting a, uh, a measure on the way you're spending your time. Cause time is the only non-renewable resource, right? It's the only thing we don't get back. If you spend a hundred dollars, you can make a hundred dollars back.

If you, um, if your house burns down, you can get another house. If you lose your job, you get another job. It's, um, there it's the, you know, if you lose burns down, you can get another house. If you lose your job, you get another job. It's, um, there it's the, you know, if you lose a relationship, you gain another relationship. It's the only non-renewable resources time. So to me, the, and this is me just like, I don't know the answers. I mean, I'm just taking my best guess at this thing that when I, I'm, I'm guessing that when I am about to kick it, that I'm going to look back and say, did I spend my time well? And to me, when you, when you ask yourself that question,

and I know you're doing that because of the way we start off this podcast, you know, should I be on the podcast or should I be throwing rocks at my kids? To me, what is the most important thing I should be doing with my time right now is the number one question we should all be asking ourselves on a continual basis. And that's what I'm most interested in is what is that thing right now? And I struggle with it all the time because I'm trying to grow a business. I'm, um, trying to get athletes to be the best in the world at something. And I'm trying to be a really damn good dad, like, and how I balance those things. And I'm trying to take care of my own health, which I think has carry over to all three of those different things. Um, so how I balance those three, four or five things is the eternal struggle.

What I fell into, what I believe is that, um, balance. I am a balanced person. I am a person that believes in balance mostly because I want to hedge my bets. I want to diversify so that when I get to be a hundred, I am the rare case that goes like, damn, I should have spent more time in the office. Like they say, you know, no one ever says that on like, damn, I should have spent more time in the office. Like they say, you know, no one ever says that on their deathbed. They should have spent more time in the office. What if I am that person?

I don't think I will be, but like, I want to, I want to be, um, feel like I, I, I achieved what I was possible to achieve in the business world. And then what about, um, coaching and that aspect? I want to be able to say I did that. Now, I think other people could probably debate that it's not five things, it's two things, or it's one thing. I think Kobe Bryant would have said, no, it's about being the best basketball player in the world for the opportunity that's presented in front of you. And then when you're done with that, you move on to the next thing. And it's phases of life. And then I'm going to be a great dad.

And then I'm going to be a great business owner. And then I'm going to be a great top to top. I just don't know. So my take on this is, I imagine life as a juggling act where you're trying to juggle five different balls and the balls are named work, relationships, health, your job or your work and spirituality or faith or whatever you want to call those. I believe that the goal is how well you juggle those things. And we have to realize is that all of those, I believe that those, the balls are made of glass where if you drop one, it, it could get cracked. It could get scuffed and you can't, you might not be able to repair those. Or if you do, it takes a long time.

So example would be like, I'm just going to kill it at work. I'm going to work 90 hour work weeks. I'm going to do, and you stop taking care of your health. And then all of a sudden you, because you take something to your health, you have a heart attack at age 41, or you get divorced at age 47 because you've destroyed your marriage, or now you have no relationship with your kids, or you have no enlightenment or spirituality because you've dropped the ball. My take is like, I want to keep balance across all of those and constantly be asking myself, am I doing that? Well, also underneath the understanding that one of those balls is not made of glass. One of those balls

actually is made of rubber. And if you drop it, it'll bounce right back. And that ball is named work. If, if you have a failure in work, you're totally fine. Actually, you might be even a benefit. You might learn a lot from it. If you run a small business and it goes under, yeah, it stings and it hurts in the moment, but like you recover from that and you can open up another small business. If you get fired from your job, it might've been the best thing that ever happened to you. That's very different to me than, um, your health deteriorating or losing your spirituality or losing relationships. So that are you are you are did you just say that because you know, I got fired? No, actually, I did not know you got fired. Yeah, I actually didn't know that. So

holy shit, this is supposed to be a podcast. It's a counseling free counseling session. Maybe it's not free. Maybe you're going to demand a Venmo payment from CrossFit. Yeah. Oh, wow, man. Well, there's lots of moving and shaking going on. So yeah, the, the ball bounced up high though. You're right. That's what I mean. It's like, that one's going to come back now. If now that's one of those balls, but now imagine if like your kids are like, dad, I want like, you got fired, dad. I want nothing to do with you for the rest of my life. Whoa. Like, whoa. So to me, it's like, keep all those balls in the air, but realize that the work one is priority number four or five. Not, not the top. I actually think it's really important to call it like a, an essential intent. Like what is the one? Like it's cool to have all these different things, but what is your one?

Like to me, it's like that's really, really important to have the one because if two things come up against each other, you need to be able to go like no questions asked. I made a decision beforehand. I'm going this way. So for me, it's mainly. You mean of the five balls, if one of of them is demanding there's one that has a hierarchy so like you got work you got you want to go to the gym today take stay in shape you want to get good night's sleep to stay in healthy you want to like contact your friends to keep relationships up you want to do some sort of journaling or meditating because you're in this spirituality thing but a family member gets sick do you okay so what's the what do you do there like no sorry

family member. I got these other things. I'm gonna keep balancing. We go to the gym. And so to me, it's like, it's family first, like it's family first. So that one gets elevated. Then it's the other four, then it's work below that one. So emails and all that stuff always come last. And having that one is really important. So like an example would be, um, my father-in-law got sick, uh, two summers ago and, um, had a lot going on, but it was like, no questions asked, like, boom, we dropped it. I I'd even like, I'd even call work. I just started driving down to Connecticut from Massachusetts, um, and kind of figured it all out once we got

there. Cause it's like, it's family first. And if you, to me, that's just, it's a matter of principles and values and actually prioritizing the values. I think that's kind of a key step. Earlier you talked about victim. I think it was victim mindset. Yep.

What is that? What is victim mindset? Can you give me an example of that? Yeah, to me, the victim mindset is the most detrimental thing a human being could bring upon themselves. There is nothing that will hurt you more in this life. Einstein, I believe Einstein said it, but it's like, do you believe the number one question you have to ask yourself is do you live in a hostile or friendly world? If you believe you live in a hostile world, you are going to see everything that's placed in front of you as an obstacle, probably an insurmountable obstacle that was done on purpose and caused you to miss life. But Ben, the world really is hostile, but Ben, it's really dangerous. But Ben, there's dangers out there. Are you denying dangers?

But Ben, there's dangers out there. Are you denying dangers? Yes, I am. Yeah, I'm denying that this world is, it is not. That is recency bias. It's confirmation bias. And it is the connection age in which we live in. We have never, this is truth, not me. This is truth. We have never lived in a safer, more friendly, less violent times than right now today. This is the least violent times that we have ever lived in, in terms of humanity. In fact, historians are having a hard time explaining the last 50 years because it is so void of war now i get it there are there's the left and the right i get that but most of this is not um and i get that before before the covid and black lives and the latter movement black black lives matter movement we had another major issue which which we had these like public shooters. People kind of forgot about that.

But that was a thing. And before that, we had other issues going on. Even with all those things in place, this is the most safe times in the history of the world. And it comes into perspective when you, if you just look back through history and the violence that was the norm, even, even a couple hundred years ago, I read a couple of summers ago, Gates of Fire, Steven Pressfield's story of the 300 Spartan warriors and the 300, the battle of Thermopylae, I believe it is, is, is a part of the story for sure.

But the majority of it is just kind of like the times and how violent and horrific life of a human being was back then was hard to even fathom. So I am calling BS on this. We live in a hostile world type thing. It's you see more of what you pay attention to. And now the media latches on to all these things that we've never been in the connection world that we are now. So somebody, something happens to somebody across the world

and you know about it in minutes. Back 200 years ago, the fastest anything could travel was the speed of a horse. So how long? And if you're going to cross an ocean, it takes a long time. So how long before you heard about some horrific thing that happened across an ocean? It just, it's the rate at which information flows more so than the reality of our surroundings. I remember being in a car. I was a young kid and the radio said a school bus flips over in Peru and 27 children died. And I remember watching my

mom's reaction and I immediately thought, holy shit, what a small world, like something that we would never have known about this radio in this car is now telling my mom and she's having a reaction to it. She has to now process something that happened 8,000 miles away. I mean, it was, it was even as a young kid, I was like, Hmm, something's going on here. This is, have you seen, um, have you seen the social dilemma? I have not. So I've heard a lot of, I've heard a lot about it. You got to watch it. I realize it's a documentary. I realize that there can be massive biases in there. I realize that there's probably an agenda behind it. Realize it's just a few people's opinions on it. makes up social media right now. The job of social media and media now, not just social media,

but the news, whether it's the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News, the job is to keep you engaged, period. That's their job. And they spend billions and billions of dollars to map your psychology, not psychology of human beings, to map Savant's psychology of what can we do to keep him engaged on this device or on this platform or on the screen. And one of the things that they found was to send things that you're interested in. So the example they give is if you type in, um, you know how like you type into Google and it auto fills for you in the search bar. If you type in climate change is what you get after that might be, um, climate change

is, I don't know what's where you stand on this, but climate change is a hoax. Climate change is manufactured. Climate change is not real. Climate change is a conspiracy theory, whatever it is. So Google's trying to help me. That's so sweet of them. Yeah, exactly. And I get, or I'm just, I'm not saying this, someone else gets climate change is destroying

our world. Climate change is the most real danger present to our, all that. So they're trying to keep you engaged. And then the crazy part about this is the algorithm cannot decipher between fake news and real news. It can't decipher those two things. And the craziest thing is what they found is fake news trends six times faster than real news. So what this means is you're getting fed more and more and more information that re that reconfirms your already your, your already ingrained assumptions, hunches, and opinions. And someone else is getting the same thing, but the opposite fake news, fake news, fake news, that's reaffir opinions. And someone else is getting the same thing, but the opposite.

Fake news, fake news, fake news, that's reaffirming. And this is what's creating this divide right now. It's just the speed at which we get information and the gaps between what you're getting, what I'm getting. We're not getting the same information anymore. What's weird to me on that line is that people will choose their politics. Like they choose a football team. Like, you know, let's say like the Raiders. So no matter what happens, you're rooting for the Raiders, but politics shouldn't be like that. You should be assessing things one at a time, each argument, each bill, each like, but just because if you're a Democrat or Republican and your team's going that way, you go that way. I'm just like, wait, what? I actually had this conversation. This isn't football. This is life. What are you doing

rooting for your team? I had this conversation with my dad because the election was just last week and he voted for the party, not the person. And I was like, I couldn't even comprehend that made no sense whatsoever. Ben, you and I are having the same conversations with our parents. Hey, I'm glad that my parents, I'm glad that my parents, my mom will have the discussion with me. My mom and I can have the discussion. So many people can't even have a discussion. Yeah. Um, here's, here's the thing with the victim thing. I am 100% on board with you. You need to know, but it's like, um, um, you can be a victim. Talk to me about the distinction between a victim and a victim mindset. Like there are victims out there, right? But that's not what

you're talking about right you're talking about the victim mindset it's like hey if you being a victim is reality the victim mindset is arguing with reality right there's no out it is not the things that happen to us that shape our lives it's our in in it's our way we interpret them that shape our lives. So I realize that there are people that have gone through horrific hardships. I'll go back to the Stockdale paradox. It's named after Admiral Stockdale, who was a Vietnamese prisoner of war for four years. He was the highest ranking captured us, uh, military. So he carried a lot of weight. Um, when he was in prison, there was a lot of people that chose to be victims around him. And those people died really quickly. If you have a victim mindset, whether we're talking Stockdale or Viktor Frankl with the Holocaust, the people that put in

the worst victim situations to me is like, this is totally outside your control. It's not even like being abused by a spouse because you could move away from them. You are a captured. It's like being abused by a spouse because you could move away from them. You are a captured, you are, there's being abused by a parent. It's the worst possible situation, right? Yes. Right. It's abused by a parent that you cannot leave as a young child. That's a horrific situation, but how you interpret those, that the realities of those matters a lot. And, um, Viktor Frankl survived the Holocaust and became one of the most influential, um, philosophers, psychologists of our time by experiencing it in a different way than a lot of other people did, which, you know, he had his wife and his children ripped from his hands and sent to the furnace.

Like, it's just like, have you read that? Have you read Man's Search for Meaning? No. Oh, Sivan, it's insane, man. It's one of those books, I read it, I put it down, and I picked it back up and I read it again. Awesome. It's insane.

It's not a big book. Like, you can do that. Okay. You got to read it, man. It's crazy. Tell me the name of it again. Viktor Frankl. Viktor Frankor frankl it's a man's search it's right here i got so it's a man search for meaning okay um so but he's going through these horrific experiences, you know, not being fed, being abused, being put to work in the winter months. Emotionally devastated.

Huge. Like the worst, the worst. You can't imagine the realities that he's going through. And while he's there, he's choosing to see this as a learning experience. And he's trying to decipher what does this mean? What is, how is this shaping my life? What can I do? Can I serve others? What can I do to come out of this in a better person than I went in? And just the, I mean, he was, I'm not there. I'm certainly not where John Stockdale was. Stockdale. So the Vietnamese wanted to put him on camera. I know, I realize I'm bouncing around a little bit and I apologize for that. That's what we do here. Stockdale, um, the, the Vietnamese wanted to put him on camera to show that the prisoners of war were being treated fairly to kind of like get better sympathy from, um, the

U S and the world. And he realized he was going to be used for propaganda. So he shattered a piece of glass and cut his forehead open so that right before he went on, he would be bleeding across the face. So the Vietnamese saw that. They're like, okay, we can't put him on. We're going to clean him up. And they cleaned him up and actually he looked OK. So they were going to put him on again. He realized that that wasn't enough. So instead, he took a chair and beat his own face in to the point where he couldn't. So he could not be used for propaganda.

Wow. John McCain is the same thing. He was actually in the same prison at war camp, I believe. And he was a high-ranking officer. And they offered to send him home. And he said, I'm not going home. There are people that have been here longer than I have. I should not go home before them.

Like that is like, holy crap. That is, um, that's not the victim mindset. That is not the victim mindset. Exactly. And because of that, like these people are, they're getting, here's the, if you have a victim mindset, you're not gonna get much out of your life. That's kind of my, my, my take on this because it's a woe is me. And I don't know this for, I think that there's a, there's only a very few animals on this planet, humans being one of them that can actually even have the capacity to

feel sorry for themselves. And when you feel sorry for yourself, what you look for, you see more of. It's what happens. It's a frequency illusion. Like if I say, like, so on, have you seen any yellow cars today? You have seen no yellow cars. Now for the rest of the day, you see yellow cars everywhere. If you look for things that are negative in your life, you're going to see more of them. Regardless of the circumstances, there are people that have brick paved roads and have easy lives. There are people that have horrific situations. That's fixed.

That's the cards that have been dealt. Now, do you want to be the victim or do you want to play your cards? It's interesting. I think the people who have the victim mindset also, they have a blurred line between what the distinction between their situation and how they're going to get out of it. You don't make a wrong turn, pull over on the side of the road and start crying. I mean, that's, it's ridiculous, right? But I mean, it's a perfect analogy for what we see people do, right? They hit a speed bump in their life and they somehow think that blaming others or feeling

sorry for yourself, but, but even if everything you're feeling is accurate, there is, that's not now you've now you're now. Yeah, I'm not. Yeah. So it's not to say you're now embracing your your dilemma and your um your sorrow it's almost like it's like how a three-year-old is really i noticed that with my kids like like at three years old you just have this emotional response to everything yeah that's because yeah it's so cool um So yeah, just to reiterate, there are terrible things that happen to good people that three-year-old doesn't have the prefrontal

cortex of their brain developed yet the prefrontal cortex is logic decision making weighing it like putting meaning to things they're mostly going off of just the animalistic brain which is the amygdala which is all the emotional aspect my kid doesn't care that the power's out all he's is like it's movie night and the TV's not working and I'm screaming, turn any screaming, turn on the TV. Well, cause he's three. What do you guys do? How often do you, how often do you guys do movie night? Friday and Saturday night after the sun goes down, the kids can pretty much watch whatever they want. I love that. And what about during the week? Do they get screens?

The only time they get screens is, so I take them to jujitsu and the twins have a, my three year olds have a class and then the older kids have a class. And so what I do is, is I make you have to sit still and watch the warmup and then you get an iPad. Cool. But my older one has found a group of kids who skateboard now at in his class so instead of watching the ipad he'd rather go outside and skateboard yeah yeah i saw your i don't know um which child was but recently um hitting tennis balls at like age

six yeah that was super impressive i have i have i in, I'm, my kids are my experiment. All in, all in at what, what is, what is the end state all in? We say all in, what are you all in at? I know a lot of like, it's all movement based and you have this amazing garage gym with all the gymnastics stuff. And there's no such thing as you don't say no to them. You let them fall and nothing is too dangerous, But what is that? They are my Sistine. They are my Sistine chapel. I am going to input them with all the things and I'm going to encourage them and introduce them to all the things that I think will nurture them and grow

the same way, treat them no different than I do the plants in my garden. How do you make those decisions though? Like what nurtures them and makes them grow? And like, how, how are you doing that? Cause there's endless things, right? Right. Right. Finger painting. So you're, so a lot of it is, is just, I, I, I'm not sure if I'm using this word, right. It's just fortuitous, right? So like one of the other parents, he's in ballet.

And one of the other parents is like, oh, I take my kids to tennis. So I'm like, oh, when is that class? And so I take Avi there to tennis. And then I sign up for the clinic. And then I get a tennis ball machine. And now we're just doing tennis. Tennis. I was actually talking. I know you have to go in two minutes.

Really? I'm super curious about this, though. What I'm doing. People think that I'm building athletes and that I'm interested in the kids movement and all that stuff. And yes, I'm fascinated by that. But the real thing I'm doing by taking them out is I really love the fact that my kids get one-on-one attention from other adults who are professionals, who are focused and who are teaching them things. So it kind of doesn't even matter. The two things I care about are math and English, but outside of that, I don't really care about all the other sports actually don't do much for me.

Um, uh, I'm more like into like movement, like the, um, I don't know his name. Um, I don't know his work very well. So maybe I'm missing, I'm choosing the wrong person, but like the um i don't know his name uh um i don't know his work very well so maybe i'm miss i'm choosing the wrong person but like the the porto uh porto idol or he's he's the a bit big movement guy the monkey guy or something he has a monkey as his logo i i just want my kids to feel um super duper happy in their body and then outside of that i want them to be good mates. And by mates, I mean, not the way Australians use it, but the way we use it. How much time a day are you spending with this stuff? So tennis? All day. From the second they wake up to the second they go to bed.

And so it's basically- How much of that is play and how much of that is structured? So like I'm doing the podcast now now i'll finish the podcast with you the gymnastics coach will come here from nine to ten the second the gymnastics coach is done today's a pretty busy day i will throw them in the car and i'll take them to derby skate park the oldest skate park in the country they'll skate there for an hour then from there i'll find some something for for them to eat we'll stop and get. Then we'll come home and he'll have a piano lesson. Then after his piano lesson, he'll have two hours. And by then we'll have had enough of each other and he'll go in the yard and play.

He'll do Legos. He'll play magnets. Um, his mom might ask him to read and then the other, and then they do something called Kumon. Are you familiar with Kumon? Educational. Yeah. It's a Japanese guy invented it. There's 30,000 Kumon. Are you familiar with Kumon? Educational. Yeah. It's a Japanese guy invented it. There's 30,000 Kumon centers. It's basically CrossFit, but with math and reading. It's timed math and reading. So they do that for 10 or 15 minutes a day and then they'll just play. Then at 3.30, I'll take them to jujitsu. And then at 5.30, they'll come home and they can basically just party, do whatever they want. Um, and they usually have

like three or four dinners by then, you know, like they eat, we eat a dinner and then they go play and then they eat another dinner. Then they go play and then they eat another. It's crazy. They're eating machines, but I also leave the garage door open and I'll go in there. That's their kids gym. And if they come in there, I'll, I start, um, doing my best to encourage play. I, I, I, and I straight tell them, Hey, the IG is not going to feed itself. We need some content guys. Let's do some stuff. They'll be like, all right, set it up. Roger that. Roger that, sir. Let's go. Um, but, but in the end right now, I want to make good mates. I want them to be good husbands and good fathers. That's kind of like where I've hung my hat.

That's cool. Ben, I know you have to go. We didn't talk about Comtrain. We didn't talk about the blur between work and play. We didn't talk about your four kids. We didn't talk about why you shouldn't gossip. We didn't talk about why you don't watch the news. By the way, your list of 10 things not to do is so unexpected.

Like I thought it was going to be like don't eat bananas before you work. I mean, it was really unexpected. Better people, mental toughness, your 2016 games experience, why you started a baseball camp at the age of 13. The one for my personally that I want to call you back and talk to you is brand your business as a leader. That's awesome. I think a ton of people could learn from that. So maybe I can bug you again in the next month or two here. That sounds great. I would love to do that. All right, brother. I'm super curious about all the stuff you're doing with parenting kids. So I'm feeling around in the dark and telling

people what I need to learn my best. And they think I'm an expert, but I'm just, uh, I'm just, I'm just using my wife's like, you use your Instagram to, as, as a babysitter for you to make sure you don't fuck up. I go exactly. The camera is my best babysitter. Very cool. Tell Heather I said hi. Tell Maya I said hi. Will do. All right, man. Appreciate it, man. Thank you. Yep. Thank you.