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00:00:01
The Answer
82 Plays5 years ago
How do you answer the questions you ask yourself? When do you 'know' what the answer is? K and I discuss the 2 categories of answers that accompany big questions. To be clear: this episode will not tell you the what the answer is, but hopefully helps you when you ask yourself the most important questions along your Path.
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Transcript
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello. Hello. What are we talking about today? Beat me to the punch. Beat me to the punch.
Introduction to Purpose and Actions
00:00:10
Speaker
We're going to talk about the answer today. That's going to be the topic. It's going to be the theme. And we do a lot of questioning through
00:00:22
Speaker
All of our stuff. Like this whole thing is just one giant question and not to boil it all down, but I think a interesting question to ask ourselves. An interesting question. Yes. Thank you. Like what's the point of it all? And I think many of the things that we do, be it between the ears,
00:00:43
Speaker
Fitment like whatever it is anything that we do in some way shape or form it Kind of boils down to answering the question of what's the point? What's the meaning behind what we do?
The Journey of Self-Awareness
00:00:56
Speaker
When you step along the path towards When you step along the path that is self-awareness
00:01:05
Speaker
I would say that's a continuing thing. I don't think that's the distant horizon that I'm not sure we ever truly reach or those who have reached it have this kind of enlightenment or whatever. Yeah, and I was thinking about that the other day, like asking questions or self-reflection. We had a conversation maybe yesterday
00:01:28
Speaker
that got into like started with something and down the rabbit hole we went and I was thinking a little bit about that like when will it ever end and not in a bad way like but once you have sort of put on that those put on those glasses or looking through that lens like you kind of can't undo it and so in a positive way you're always
00:01:55
Speaker
seeking more introspection and asking more questions and and that's really cool because you do kind of drill down into I do think you even though it's a never ending path you do start to drill down into like what is really important and knowing yourself better and like all these things that do help you
00:02:15
Speaker
in your life. I mean, I would imagine most of us, some of us, or one of the points of life is to like, really make the most of it and enjoy it and have fulfillment. And so I think that's definitely a byproduct of that.
Understanding Personal Significance
00:02:30
Speaker
Yeah. And that I think
00:02:36
Speaker
Like that's the answer. So when we refer to the answer, not a specific answer, but when we look at like connecting with and discovering or rediscovering the meaning of what we're doing, why it's important at a deeper level, we also, I think see how
00:02:56
Speaker
challenging some of the landscape can be with the messaging on fairly surface level things. And that kind of speaks to the post I put up earlier about my social dilemma. And just some of the pitfalls with it all. Anyway. But today's post, so why don't you talk about what that post was?
00:03:18
Speaker
Yeah. So the gym has been open for four weeks now. This is week four and spend years coming a long time coming. And I've gotten people interested, you know, wanting to come by, check it out, learn more.
00:03:37
Speaker
as well as people being very nice and complimentary and saying, wow, it looks awesome. It's like really cool and all positive things. You know, I mean, there's negative things, but I haven't been privy to all of them. Why are you looking at me like that? What do you mean? You're so cryptic. Just,
00:03:58
Speaker
Nevermind. It doesn't matter.
Beyond the Surface: Personal Experiences
00:04:00
Speaker
Anyway. Skipping right along. Skipping along. We'll edit that out. No, it won't. That would be professional. Yeah. Okay. So yes, the gym has been open. So the gym has been open and I want to be clear about, and maybe this is for my own processing and my own whatever. What you see is
00:04:22
Speaker
The very surface and a fraction of the total picture by way of like breadth and depth as well. And the gym is beautiful. The equipment is new and it's kind of shiny and clean.
00:04:39
Speaker
But don't let I don't want that to to to lead people to think that it was just this automatic thing or This no-brainer. And so I put the post up today saying that three years ago when I was coaching way more at the gym and More involved and had a lot of interaction with more interaction with more people across at Morristown
00:05:04
Speaker
I had done a handful, probably about a dozen Between the Ears events at this point and said, hey, I'm gonna start doing some personal training with people. Now, frankly, if you came and said, hey, I wanna get better at my muscle up, I probably would have not, that would not have been the thing. And so the offering of the service was physical and mental fitness via movement and a combination of the philosophy and approaches of Between the Ears.
00:05:32
Speaker
and put that up on personal account, on the Jim's account, saying if you're interested, limit a number of clients, because that's kind of how this stuff goes. Reach out. How many people reach out? None. Nobody.
00:05:51
Speaker
Not even like, Hey, I wanted like not, there was not even anyone reaching out to say, Hey, I'm interested. Can you tell me more? What does the mental fitness mean? Like it was crickets. There was not a single person who expressed any interest. And yeah, that's a tough pill to swallow.
00:06:10
Speaker
So pause for a second. You're, you're not saying that. And obviously like people, I think knowing you know, you're not saying that for sympathy or, or to say like, no, or, Hey, like Motown, like that's fucked up. No, of course not. Nobody wanted, you know, so that's not a casting of blame or begging. So what is, so for you though, that I feel like that's sort of like you're at a crossroads, like, and what,
00:06:40
Speaker
while we know that social media isn't everything, in many ways it is a platform where you're putting yourself out there and you're kind of opening yourself up and then just nobody takes the, you know, takes interest. So for you, what was that post about? Like that, today's post. Yeah. That moment where nobody, three years later we're sitting in a beautiful facility.
00:07:06
Speaker
that could give the appearance of, air quotes, success, smooth sailing, awesome. It's just build exponential growth and like, let me be the first to throw the bullshit flag and say, no, that's not what you see is not what you get. And the pitfalls of social media is you take a fragment of information in your extrapolate to make a picture.
00:07:31
Speaker
And we do it all the time. It's natural, but like that's not. I mean, you've had a lot of people with, you know, because we do know obviously each other's struggles and our insecurities and our, you know, the time it takes to build things and, um,
00:07:49
Speaker
we've had people who aren't local reach out and just say like, wow, between the ears in times in the past, it looks like it's just booming. Yeah. You know? And so that is now not to like get on the social media posts, but you know, for a lot of people who see that to your point, you're just leaping to conclusions and then, you know, like you don't know. And, and, and we try, I think we pledge to be transparent, authentic, honest,
00:08:18
Speaker
But even in doing so, like you don't know. And there's always gonna be how something is received by someone else. And then they're going to come up with something. And look, I mean, whatever. That's obviously the way it is. But the purpose of the post was to say, was to speak
Navigating Doubt and Belief
00:08:34
Speaker
more to what that post and offering three years ago
00:08:38
Speaker
Triggered as far as my path right and that did contribute to additional movement down the path of self-discovery and Looking within and confronting myself
00:08:54
Speaker
And, you know, it's, I would love to say, I just rolled off my water off my back. Like that's not what happened, you know? And so there was a lot of questioning and doubt and personal judgment and just anger and what the fuck am I going to do? And just all, I should have stayed in, I should have went back, I should have this, should have that.
00:09:14
Speaker
The the I think the very natural range of human emotions was brought about by this but it also provided opportunities to say to question the path and to double down on the path and so
00:09:29
Speaker
It was the question that I asked and I've asked before is how strong do you believe and really like are you a true believer and that is there's there's a great piece of literature about it as it relates to the warfighter and
00:09:48
Speaker
being a true believer and knowing like you know we we have very good equipment and you know rucks and we know how far they are how heavy they are and like the true believer referring to our enemy is like it the ruck weighs what it weighs they fight until the job is done like then there's a whole thing with that but as it relates to this like how strong do I believe in this and that is being questioned and
00:10:13
Speaker
the answer or an answer could have been like this is a failure. This is a catastrophic failure. The external and the external answer from polling people is no one is interested. Yeah. I said, Hey, does anybody want to train? Does anybody want to employ me for my services and
00:10:37
Speaker
The perception of it was everybody said no. Yeah, and it's like what the fuck man? Like then I am insert, you know self-deprecation. So three years later Guess what? It's not like the masses were you know Putting pressure on you to say you gotta open. No, there's no wait list. There's less than there's there's a literally one handful of in-person members and There's not this like
00:11:06
Speaker
Basically this justification or this guarantee or this known that like oh, well, yeah like that's gonna happen So that got me thinking as it relates to this and last week to have like the answers. What is the answer? What is the answer you're looking for? How does the answer?
00:11:22
Speaker
present in your life to where you really know. And rationally, there's two types of answers, I would say. Like there's the rational answer and then there's the emotional answer or the intuitive answer. There's the analytics and the data, the numbers and the analysis and there's all of that. And then there's the, it feels right. No, I know it to be true. Like, wow, really? And you had this 13 years ago where you opened up a gym that was this obscure name no one ever heard about.
00:11:53
Speaker
And it was just happened to be CrossFit. And, but you knew what you were doing was right for you at that time when people rationally provided you an answer that sounded like, no, don't do it. And so for us, just raising our awareness of like, what is the answer we're looking for and understanding that when we ask these questions.
00:12:17
Speaker
I guess we want to be clear of like, you know, there's two types, there's, there's multiple forms of the answer. And when we come to accept some of these answers, like emotionally, like I, I believe this gym, this model, this pursuit is absolutely positive, valuable, and will serve people. I believe that.
00:12:46
Speaker
is how many people then is enough for me to say it's doing that. Right, whereas what about the data to tell you like check that. Yeah. Well, and what's interesting about that is when you, when you start to look only at the data and I guess the rational side, right? I mean, Morristown at one point had like 400 members and it does not have 400 members anymore.
Entrepreneurship: Belief vs. Data
00:13:12
Speaker
Yeah. And it's like, so does that, and I've asked myself that, like, does that mean I'm failing now because I went backwards in members? Right. Yeah. And it's tempting because the rational side is like, well, look at the data. I had this many. Now we have this many by the standard of success. That is less. Yeah. And that's the thing I think with, with looking at that for ourselves, like what, like, what does it take for you to know?
00:13:40
Speaker
Like, and that's, that's the answer. Like when you answer this, like in the moment, because if you're waiting around for the guaranteed known,
00:13:50
Speaker
Life's gonna kick your ass. And so much value, so much opportunity and experience and growth happens when we enter into the unknown aggressively and with our fucking eyes open. And I think that's where we find the answer. And that's where we connect to the answer. And that answer, again, in my experience, is the shit that makes the analysis models wrong. And that's the beauty of it.
00:14:20
Speaker
And that's that growth beyond measure. Yeah, that I think when we look at what we're doing, we're along this path, collectively, whatever that path is for you. You know, here's the beauty of the rational answers to let's just say I have this picture in my mind of like a dirt path windy path through the through the woods, whatever, you know, opens up and along the way along the side of the path, there's signs, right? Like those trail signs, hey, half mile here, half mile there.
00:14:52
Speaker
whatever your destination is that you want to move towards. The rational answer could say, and you know, you have a picture of this in your mind. You have a sensation and a feeling and an emotion that accompanies when you're there and along the side of the road or along the side of the path. Let's just say whatever happiness joy is the answer you seek in the path you're traveling along.
00:15:19
Speaker
And along the side of the, of the path is a sign, beautiful sign that says, welcome to joy. You are here. And you're like, I don't even fucking know. Like I'm not there, but the sign is telling you joy. And you have a home, family, cars, job, this, that, but yet there's some level of unfulfillment. Right. On paper, that is what people who are happy and joyful, like that, they have those things and it's like,
00:15:46
Speaker
you can have the things on paper and not experience the emotion. Yeah. And it's like, well, who put that sign there? Has the path, has the landscape changed? The second you embark down that path, it changes and the sign is telling you and it's like, yeah, but I don't, that's the answer that I am looking for cannot be told to me through this sign saying, welcome to joy.
00:16:12
Speaker
Yeah. And I had a discussion with someone today about, you know, ideas for businesses and, um, and there's been a couple of people reach out to you or me about like, Hey, starting a business or entrepreneurship. And, you know, sometimes I think you sell yourself short about not being an entrepreneur, a true entrepreneur, which, you know, when I look at my journey and how you describe the,
00:16:39
Speaker
you know, the answer like, I don't think I knew what that was at the time of like belief, like true believing. But I think that's really what distinguishes people from being like what it is to be an entrepreneur to truly have that belief that it doesn't matter what the rational
00:16:57
Speaker
Numbers and data and whatever it is. It's like you're willing to take that action on that belief and you will figure out The data and the rational stuff to accompany the belief but the belief is far stronger. I mean that's That's evidenced by everybody probably knows somebody that you know, they did the market research I mean, honestly, I never I never did market research Never like what are the demographics? What about this? What about that? It was like
00:17:25
Speaker
No, like this is really something valuable. I believe in it. I'm going to work as hard as I need to to make it happen. So I think we all know there's probably businesses everywhere that have failed, even though everything was right. I don't get it. Like there was no bagel shop in this town and, and I made bagels and like, well, what was it that was missing? Well, I don't know, but like, it doesn't matter that just the data is right. So, you know, I think that those, um,
00:17:52
Speaker
Yeah, just an interesting thing. And I think the emotional piece does, it is a, it is a balance between the two. Like obviously you can't just be just a lunatic and, and we talk about this like acting from emotions or acting from your rational side. Yeah. But I think the awareness as we keep coming back to you so that you can see like, okay, this is an emotional decision or
00:18:19
Speaker
And it's appropriately so, or this is I'm kind of neglecting the emotional and making this all in the rational or that kind of stuff. But yeah, for people, if you're looking for the data to support why you shouldn't do anything or, and that's with everything, like you will find it. I mean, and I had to just, that's my discussion today was someone who has an idea that I think is a great idea, but they had all the reasons why
00:18:45
Speaker
It wasn't going to work yet. They have a passion for it. And it's like, that's that fork in the road where it's like.
00:18:51
Speaker
Okay, that's your choice, but having that conviction and belief and being able to pursue it. And there's a couple things that I teach through the seminar and coaching with people, more so in the seminar fashion and working on having this be a little bit more generally consumable versus how the model has been in the past, but these lenses through which we
00:19:17
Speaker
view ourselves, our experiences, this and that. And one of them is the internal and the external. Say no more. We get it. Everybody kind of gets that. You just overlay on that. Well, rational, emotional, like, ah, you start to see now there's some things that link and some themes and the.
00:19:37
Speaker
Asking whoever this person was and I don't I can't wait to hear about this because I always learn something from you Actually when you tell me about these things with others, so I'm actually looking forward to this but Tell me like if they're telling you all the reasons and again, this isn't perfect, but if they're telling you all the reasons why it would fail and
00:20:00
Speaker
My suspicion, and tell me if I'm right or wrong, is that their answers, the general theme of those answers, are rationally based about external things that are not related to them. Right. Is that accurate? Yeah, yeah. Now, here's the thing though. I think that the connection there though can often be, on the emotional side,
Connecting Emotions and Actions
00:20:29
Speaker
maybe you're just like we all do, your doubt is a little bit bigger than your belief because you have some self doubt. Totally. So then that's where it's like, the self doubts there, then you look to the rational and then it supports it and then it makes you doubt more and it's kind of just about you. And there's a lot of inner personal work that you can do to move forward in that. But then the other question is, okay, I've heard about all of the reasons why this
00:20:54
Speaker
Could or should fail right? Tell me all the reasons why it will succeed not why you think it will succeed why it will succeed and What I have found with coaching people and different things perhaps nutrition, or you know whatever? Special operations like people who've gone in and been successful so
00:21:14
Speaker
They don't tell you about anything other than how fucking strong they are, and how much they believe it, and how much they want it, and what they're willing to do for it. Right, when it's about why it will work, it's not about the data. It's not about the data. It's not about the data. It's not. It's about you. And when you are in a challenging situation, the energy source that you have to tap into is you, not the external. When shit hits the fan,
00:21:43
Speaker
all of the reasoning and the data to support it. Like, no, like that's where you dig in. That's where you connect to who you are. And you allow that to drive what you do. And that is the internal and that is an emotional thing. There is an emotional, truly an emotional connection, both physiologically as well as psychologically when you're connected to
00:22:13
Speaker
who you are, how you'll be, and what you'll do. And that's, I think, that's the answer. Yeah, and it's applicable not just to be very clear. We happen to be talking about this as it relates to business or pursuits like that, but you can apply that to quite literally everything in your life. And I had a client,
00:22:43
Speaker
an online client who's doing this work overseas. And she had an example, she had an experience, which was great, like when you have these experiences that shine a light on this. Like if you don't ever, I don't mean mess it up, but if you don't ever not get it, like how are you gonna get it? So in the world of fitness and doing the self assessment that, you know, between the ears puts out.
00:23:09
Speaker
She didn't do the self-assessment and she went into this workout and her, you know, she wasn't, she wasn't, she had energy physically, but she really wasn't like feeling good mentally and emotionally. And so the result was like she got it done. She was exhausted later and it was a real struggle for her. So it was kind of, I don't want to put it in like a win-lose, but like she would probably say it wasn't like
00:23:34
Speaker
it wasn't like a win. And so when we talked about it, it was like, well, yeah, physically. And I don't wanna say like physically is rationally, but like on paper, like, well, I have energy. Yeah, it's up great. I'm not tired. Like, okay. But that's why those two thirds of the assessment have nothing to do with physical, which is funny. But like when you start to look at those things and you're like, oh, okay, I didn't consider those things. And when you let the rational stuff
00:24:02
Speaker
Yeah, you disregard the feelings and the emotions like that really, it really does matter. And so it's cool to have the experience. We always, you know, one of the things in CrossFit and that I think, and I still believe in it's amazing is like what you can learn about yourself, you know, in the gym is really what's most important outside of the gym, obviously. Of course. And obviously with between the ears, that self-assessment for your workout,
00:24:31
Speaker
great practice for life. Yeah. So kind of applying it to something that's a little bit more contained like okay this is about this one hour how I'm gonna move my body. Right. Like that we can wrap our head around and it's still challenging for people. Totally. But getting those reps in with that so that then you can go out in your life and start to be like okay where am I
00:24:52
Speaker
how am I operating understanding because I think the emotional side people can't quite like what is that well there's also that element of and why the self-assessment
00:25:03
Speaker
strives to start to discover answers, there's different types of answers. And so if you're trying to articulate rationally what your emotional answer is, we're not to say this, but we're doing it wrong. You don't get it. And that's okay. Now it's time for you to learn how to answer this emotionally, which by the way, doesn't look like this clear, concise thing. And that's where it's like, well, why do you feel that your emotional energy is this or that?
00:25:33
Speaker
I don't know. It's like, well, the first thing is not your rational explanation. It's just that why I feel it. I know it. Right. And it's like, yeah, exactly. And it's almost like trying to describe a feeling in your body.
00:25:47
Speaker
So there's the thing about that, obviously, which is you have the ability to articulate language, to represent something, but the language is the representation.
The Power of Representation
00:25:58
Speaker
If the word changes or if the word has different meaning, does that change the actual thing there? Like it's a representation and that's just to kind of go on a wild random thing is like, I think that's what's
00:26:14
Speaker
That's what is one of the most powerful things about being on a team or an organization, your country, representing this entity that you really, really care about. And you can represent it in a poor way by your actions, by how you engage with people, by how polite you are. You can represent it in an honorable way, in an integrity way. And so there's a lot of that that I think
00:26:44
Speaker
with ourselves, remembering that language is a representation of something. It's not that thing. And we're limited because of the way we're structured and how emotions are. To get the language right. Yeah.
00:27:03
Speaker
and not to keep going away, but I have to say this. So remember when Dr. Perry was on the Motown community call? So Dr. Perry stopped chasing pain, really brilliant guy, does a lot with a lot of things, but it happened to be about the lymphatic system. That's something he was saying about the body that was like so obvious, but I never thought about it in that way. And it kind of, it reminds me of like what you're saying.
00:27:29
Speaker
Like that the heart and the lungs don't know that they're called the heart and the lungs. Do you know what I mean? They don't know they're even separate entities. Your whole body has a job, but they don't live in these compartments or rooms with doors and like, oh, now you're entering the heart room and this is cut off from the rest of the things. It's just like one system, but we have applied these names and these functions and really compartmentalized all these units of the body.
00:28:00
Speaker
but like that's our language and that's our, we've put that on that. Yeah, it's like, and he has a thing like, you know, no system ever works alone. And it's like, right, because, and you think of, and you look at how, I guess society, whatever, you know, our culture, like it views the body like Mr. Potato face. Mr. Potato head. Oh my God. Anyway.
00:28:25
Speaker
is Mr. Potato Face. You had such a challenged childhood, didn't you? That's gonna be, that is our next episode. Oh my god. It's like Mr. Potato Face, who? Oh my god. Please, go on, tell us about him.
00:28:51
Speaker
Let me tell you something about Mr. Potato Face. Okay.
00:29:03
Speaker
What was I saying? I was I think you were probably gonna say something about his parts that you can stay on his face Yes, yes Which is why I mean do you think the face because it's right potato face and I was thinking of his face and like if you put the eyes Where the nose is right and it's like well, hold on a second, you know, I'm just gonna wrap up that
00:29:24
Speaker
Yeah, so anyway, I think when I think I think when we look at it and one of the things we always want to encourage with with this podcast and with any messaging whatever is like
Embracing Curiosity and Self-Discovery
00:29:35
Speaker
is seeking it and is looking, why are you just yawning all the time? Am I that boring? Good God, it's about the 15th yawn. Okay, we're losing it, we're losing it. All right, wrap it up, we got 90 seconds. Yeah, just in looking at being curious about the answer, there's a whole system of, if you're not able to be curious, there's a deep dark rabbit hole that is like, well, we can look at some things of why your system is preventing you from being curious. However,
00:30:03
Speaker
Being curious, applying curiosity, embracing that as it relates to the answer and that you have to find. Looking at the type of answer you're looking for is a way to raise your awareness and perhaps direct you towards another form of an answer to finish or to find. And me personally, with how I've lived,
00:30:33
Speaker
I mean, the military was really the biggest eye opener for answering, for finding that answer. Previously, it was all very rational. It was, it was conservative. It was, you know, more rational numbers, data, need to know, blah, blah, blah. You know, you can get, you can get into the whole, like, you know, trying to control and all of those issues, but.
00:30:56
Speaker
There was no rational answer. Like, you know what I mean? Coming out of it. And I'm not a, and I am by no means like a stud or a hero or anything like that. Like this was just my experience. And so for me, that's where I also feel very strongly about like, look, if I can do that, if I can break out of the chains of you need a rational, analytically secure guarantee, if I can break free from that, I know others can as well.
00:31:26
Speaker
with that being said, let's not mistake the fact that the path and the journey there is not going to be easy. And it's not going to be known. And then that is the unknown. Yeah. And it's not this moment where you say like, I'm going to follow my belief and then everything falls into place. There's a quite a delay on like outcome and like the practicing that and still having days and you've had them
00:31:54
Speaker
Recently was the other day like having the questions and we all do yeah So but yeah, I think that's um, it's really viable Cool
Current Projects and Promotions
00:32:08
Speaker
Um, we've got, what do we have? Vector project finishing up. That's going to be awesome. Probably going to do another one at some point. Another young people, another young, good God. You know, I was on film because I could yawn without people knowing. And now you're telling everybody, um, Oh yeah. So anyway, I got that, uh, between years fitness in person and online. If you haven't done the free week.
00:32:37
Speaker
Do it. Yeah, it's free. There's no credit card requirement. There's no weird thing of like, you know, when you like, and then they charge you if you don't cancel, like, no, no, no, none of that. Check it out. And I think that's it. That's good. So all right, Mr. Potato Face.