April 1, 2024 • 51 mins
In this eye-opening episode of the Wise World Podcast, renowned psychologist Dr. Jo Perkins discusses the importance of psychological understanding to enhance professional and personal performance. Covering the concept of psychological optimisation and how it influences adaptable behaviour, Dr. Perkins provides transformative insights drawn from evidence-based research in human behaviour and psychology.
The episode centers around Dr. Perkins' unique approach offering a confidential environment for open discussions, enabling individuals to get a better grasp of their thoughts and feelings. Examining the matter from real-life experiences, Samuel Leach provides a sincere narrative on the meaning of success and the journey towards self-growth and fulfilment.
Beyond traditional business coaching, the episode delves into groundbreaking concepts of success, demonstrating the contrast between external accomplishments and internal satisfaction. Shedding light on the paradigm shifts and evolving interpretations of success, it explores the pursuit of fulfilment beyond mainstream standards and material gain.
Furthermore, the episode discusses the utility of the 'Pocket Psychologist' application for promoting resilience and self-belief while revealing insights into the neuroscience of sleep and its importance for maintaining emotional control. Tune in to this insightful episode to redefine your idea of success, enhance your potential, and embrace personal growth.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the Wise World Podcast, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us.
Big news, we hit the top 100 podcasts within the UK and Singapore for investments.
So thanks, everybody, for listening in.
We've got a very exciting guest on the show today. And we've got Dr. Jo Perkins.
I'm going to let her introduce herself. And I'm really looking forward to getting
(00:20):
this conversation started. So over to you.
Hi, Sam. Thanks for having me. It's great to be here today. So I'm a chartered
psychologist and I work with my clients who are primarily in business of all
kinds of sizes and sectors and models to help them tap into their potential,
(00:42):
accelerate performance.
Really achieve psychological optimization.
And what I mean when I'm saying psychological optimization, it's really helping
them understand what their internal sort of psychological resources are.
So identifying them as well as their external resources and really knowing how
to leverage them to the max at all times.
(01:03):
And obviously adapting that to wherever they're at in their professional and personal journey.
So it's really helping them to do that. And I do that as a chartered psychologist
through the application of evidence-based research Research insights,
tools, strategies, and models and frameworks.
(01:24):
So it works. But I think as well, another key element is that it's providing
that very sort of unique, safe environment.
Professional relationship for my clients no matter
how successful someone is no matter what we present
to the world we've all got life happening and no
(01:46):
matter how bright we are or how determined we are we're navigating multiple
things at any one time it can be very isolating but also we we all need a space
where we can just step back talk in confidence and of course the more senior
or the the more powerful and successful sort of quote-unquote someone is,
that pool of people can be quite tricky to find because inevitably people always
(02:09):
have agendas, no matter how healthy they are.
So that unique, safe, confidential setting to actually really brainstorm and
work with someone that's just there without any other agenda than doing,
for me, my best job that I can.
It's really important for the clients that I work with.
It's it's safe and it gives regular jump off
(02:30):
points for them to kind of clarify their thinking be challenged in
a way that maybe other people aren't doing but
for a host of reasons so it has multiple layers
to it there's the learning as well as the experience
of it fine i find i find that
very interesting we briefly spoke before about how
i have my father as a mindset coach but i think
(02:52):
that dynamic actually is quite difficult for me because i
have a family relationship there as well even though
he's very professional when he helps a large amount
of our traders at samuel co yeah i find that dynamic very difficult from from
a talking perspective i would say as well i think for me what you do is probably
(03:13):
one of the biggest aspects that i focus on constantly is my mindset.
I find it interesting because I'm always, I think when you talk about these
sort of topics, and I won't throw you into the mix of it, but when you're talking
about hypnotherapy and these different things, it's always like, does it work?
Is there a part to it? So when you said scientific evidence behind it,
(03:37):
what sort of evidence do you mean?
Just an example. example well it's going
to be hard to answer that one in a nutshell and i think that i'm
going to caveat that also the research that i'd be using obviously i'm trained
charter psychologist did seven years of training to qualify
as a doctor of psychology so through the course of
that process you are working and learning about as
(03:57):
well as becoming a practitioner you're learning what the
different psychological models are you're learning things about how the
brain works how our physiology works how
habits form how our
environments influence that nature nurture
debate so it's evidence from the
science of of humans and human behavior and also then it's about the evidence
(04:23):
from practices and techniques that work and in what situation so i think that
one of the key things that that i've learned through through my training and
now also when i'm working with my my clients,
is that something may be shown to work, but under particular conditions.
And that knowledge is really critical because what I'm helping my clients do is have a broad toolbox.
(04:44):
Not every model or every framework or every strategy is going to work in every
situation for every person.
So I have to be very skilled and knowledgeable about what the different options
are, what options they may work in and where they wouldn't be relevant to use.
And I help my clients build up that awareness and practice by setting them up
(05:05):
to use them in the right way.
So what might seem like quite a simple technique, set some goals.
Yeah, well, you can read about that. But actually, the real magic happens when
I really encourage people to set goals that work for them.
So there will be the general rules and then saying, okay, knowing you,
if I've got the privilege of knowing them on a one-to-one basis,
how are we going to adapt that?
So I'll know how to question, question, how to get the motivation to do certain things.
(05:31):
So it's the evidence of all the kind of aspects of the science of psychology,
human behavior, and then applying it in a real-world kind of way.
And seeing what works. A lot of it is very experimental.
So I will be very honest with my clients when they come at the beginning.
There isn't a one-size-fits-all. It's not a manualized process.
So when I first meet a client, they'll tell me what they're wanting to work
(05:53):
on and what What are the challenges they're experiencing in their life across the board?
What does good look like? So again, tailoring it to where they're at,
because everyone has different ideas of what success looks like.
I might have to do a bit of expectation management at that point.
But then it's about saying, look, we'll treat the sessions like a lab where you come, we talk and...
(06:15):
That is very much a fact-finding and feeling what's going on,
understanding the client, then saying, right, these are the things that I'm
going to recommend you might do between sessions.
Whether that's developing some insights into how they might respond in certain
situations that are causing them sleepless nights or anxiety.
(06:37):
When they bring that back, I can then understand, ah, it's that that's happening here.
Perhaps we challenge it in session. and then I'll set them up with some things
that they can practice outside to gather more evidence.
So we start to really fine-tune some of that.
So it's stuff that I will know will work in January, but then my job is to fine-tune
it for each individual so it really works for them and they're the data.
(07:00):
I don't know if that… Yeah, no, that makes sense.
I think it's a very interesting idea and it's something, you know,
maybe I need to come and have a sit-down with you.
Please do. maybe i do it's i think
you know for for me and i'll be
interested to know just from a i don't want to generalize but
(07:20):
would you say that your typical clients are sort of like 50 plus
actually no now i
think there's been a shift i don't think i know over the last 20 years so i've
been in practice for 20 years and seen a lot of of world change in that time
obviously cultural workplace place changes and also the range and breadth of
(07:41):
kind of sectors and business models and ideas in that time.
It's changed really rapidly, particularly over the last decade, I'd say.
I think early on in my career, it would definitely have been older.
And I'd probably have said, you know, it would be historically senior leader.
So inevitably, you're going to be of more mature age, 35 plus because of the seniority.
(08:06):
Also, I think at that point, that would have been the financial ability to access
a dedicated coaching psychologist to your business or the business that's paying
for the coaching for you.
Nowadays, it's much broader. Yes, clearly there are still people that are 50
plus, and I've got clients in their 70s and 80s because they're still loving
(08:29):
life and doing it. But equally, I work with people's teams.
I might work with a very young set of entrepreneurs, startups,
where they're much younger and in their 20s.
And there are certain commonalities that being in business and the sort of psychological
as well as practical challenges they're ageless but there will also be some
(08:51):
different things that are more relevant
and important depending on where someone's at so yeah it's a broad,
age group yeah very interesting because i think for someone like myself i'm 33.
And i built up multiple companies yeah i to be honest with you from a from a
going out into the workforce.
(09:12):
I worked at Sohor & Co private bank and I worked there for, I'm going to say
18 months. I didn't even work there long.
I got a bit of a glimmer of what it was like to work for a boss,
what it was worth to work in an old establishment that's been around since the 1600s.
Loved the place and my ambitions drove me past that.
(09:33):
But now I think what my biggest issue was, I suppose within this space was I
think I actually achieved what I wanted.
I always planned on being in the situation that I'm in now, accrue a good large sum of wealth,
accrue businesses and my personal wish and it'd be very interesting to know
(09:58):
whether or not other individuals have experiences.
But at 33, I'm very young but I also then have in my head, Yet I have an issue
where I find it very difficult to listen to somebody else to tell me,
what i should be doing yeah then they're not
(10:19):
in my position they're not at my age and
they haven't built what i've built and i find that very
complicated because i think there's a lot and arguably that's why a lot of my
friends i would say are late 40s 50s 60s and i'm 33 and in there they've done
it they got the t-shirt however their mindset is a bit more old school a bit bit more traditional.
(10:44):
And so for me to try to go out and go, right, how do I now grow from where I am now?
Who can I talk to? Who can I network with?
Who can I bounce ideas off of?
And I can bounce ideas off a lot of people, but not from the same background.
And that's not me being judgmental, but I would much rather take advice from
a 33-year-old that has done what I've done, built companies similar to me and in similar situations.
(11:10):
But that demographic, when you you google it i think it's
like below 0.1 percent and it's like right okay
well i'm going to hide into nothing yeah yeah and
i think you know what you're describing there sam and
i don't know if this does give you comfort but it's that
loneliness and isolation of being very you know
much in in the tiny minority of having
(11:33):
achieved what you've achieved and there being no
kind of peers as it were and even if
there are peers they may have very different business models sectors
insights and and thinking styles so
yeah it's what i do with
my clients and this is maybe the distinction between being a chartered psychologist
and maybe a kind of business coach in the more additional sort
(11:55):
of ex-ceo or ex-business owner
sense of which that is absolutely a role and that is not
my area of expertise i mean i've worked with people in business and
know a terrible amount out but I've not run as a
CEO I work with CEOs and the
thing that I'm doing is I my it's a bit like a sports psychologist for a professional
athlete they're not the golfer or the tennis player or the footballer what they're
(12:20):
doing is meeting you where you're at so I know Sam from talking to my clients
who are in that isolated sort of position you might not feel that lonely but it's like.
Teasing out how to find your own answers you know
them but actually it's navigating how do you keep getting
motivated what are your stretch for
the next motivations for the next stage sometimes there
(12:42):
isn't anything and that would be like well you don't need to see anyone then
and it's about adding something rather than and and sort of deepening the thinking
yeah and rather than this is how you build the business because frankly my clients
know way more about their their field, their sector, and their role than I will.
My expertise is more about what are the challenges you're noticing within yourself?
(13:04):
Where are your own glass ceilings psychologically?
What are your doubts? What are your buttons that get pressed in these situations?
When do you feel exposed and how do you behave in those situations?
How do you feel more confident in those situations? Because I see a lot of people,
you could have it all on paper.
You're still you behind the scenes. and you may have a great view
(13:27):
of yourself yeah I think maybe as well
I'm probably a bit of an old head on a on a young shoulders
in in in that sense because I sort of thought I took
a step back and was like you know you've achieved all
of this but you're actually never at home you have no time for
family you have no time for family activities and is
that is that what success looks like and I
(13:48):
think that was a big meaning for me and that's when I moved
away from London moved to the countryside side and more
time in my own zone in my own
bubble trying to work out because i actually felt
like i was lied to you know i felt like the the
belief of success was to have x amount of
money in the bank to have a beautiful car to have all of these things and then
(14:11):
actually when i got there i was like this isn't this isn't what what i wanted
this isn't what i thought it was good what it was going going to feel like and
I think you know that emotionally it was quite a difficult,
sort of kick up the bar i think because then i needed to start working out what is my drive.
(14:33):
And that was a big struggle because it was like my drive
was to get there i got there so now what you
arrived at your destination and you didn't again it's
a really fascinating thing i mean i think that there's that's a
very common experience sam and again
how it affects people at what point in people's lives they
hit that point and sometimes
(14:55):
people meet it multiple times so what
I'm always trying to do is depending on when
I meet someone and when I start working with them it's always thinking
strategically both in the short to medium term on
the business and for me very clearly linking
that to personal life growth motivations
which because a lot of the time they're separated but of
(15:17):
course they're not because it's us but also thinking
one one eye on the next decade or whatever the time
frame that's relevant because we do arrive if
we're the right things and then what and we're not as humans designed to just
come to a shuddering we want longevity yeah yeah it's very very true and i think
(15:40):
that side is is an area that i'm I'm interested to explore on,
on this podcast is sort of like, well,
how does someone, how does someone that's, you know, hitting a hurdle,
how do they, how do they get more motivated?
You know, I'm happy. I would love to explore that because I think I've experienced
that and I'm sure lots of listeners have explored.
(16:00):
And I think for me internally, how I dealt with that was moving away from the
situation, trying to move into a lot more of a low pressure situation,
situation, more homely feeling, more countryside, more fresh air by the beach.
And actually went and done something completely out of my comfort zone.
I think this must be coming up seven, eight months ago, joined RNLI.
(16:24):
So I tried to give back to the community and really invested in that community
side because my background, all I ever did was from 17, 18 was look at a chart to trade.
And next thing you know, I'm 33 and I've got no other skills other than this.
And that's all people would ever talk to me about is, Sam, what should I be
buying in the stock market?
(16:44):
Sam, what's the next big thing to move?
Sam, where's this? And I was like so downbeat about the conversation because
it was constant what I was studying every single day.
It actually be quite nice. What did you think about Netflix series?
But in public, what I would then get asked is, what's your next supercar?
And I sort of thought for someone that's trying to attain growth in their own
(17:07):
life, it's such a dead question to not utilize my time a lot more efficiently.
Of you know if you was to start i would be asking questions like if you was
to start your journey again what would you do differently like i would be trying
to really sort of nail those questions down of where i can avoid mistakes but
it wasn't it was like what football team do you support,
(17:27):
what's your next car you're gonna get and i thought these are
it was very hard to engage in the conversation because it
was such like a dead-end conversation for me and i thought
you leave no benefit to this i leave
with no benefit to this conversation what was the point in
the time of the conversation and maybe i'm a bit blunt
on that aspect but at least if i could have left that conversation
(17:47):
been like do you know what i may well have been able to help that person avoid
a couple of mistakes and set them off on the right foot that's great but i don't
when it's those sort of questions so joining something like rnli was very different
because no one there i don't think anyone there actually even knows my job no
one's ever asked me no one cares about what what I do.
It's more about the situation that we're in, the training for RLNI,
(18:09):
a different environment.
It takes me from desk to seat, and that is completely different.
And I think that for me was a nice wake-up shift.
But even still, I don't have the motivation that I used to have, which I find very...
I was under, you know, in my head, I was like, if I can't socialize with successful
people, then I need to study successful people.
(18:30):
So I was like, you know, you look at Elon Musk, multiple businesses.
Billionaire, in the eyes of the public, very successful.
That's all things that people don't see behind closed doors
is poor personal life or no
sacrifices got plenty of kids of which he barely doesn't even
know and he has to take drugs to sustain his
high high system and you know
(18:52):
people don't see that stuff behind closed doors
of what they think it looks like but at the time
for me all i took from that was most people work a
40 hour work week sam if you do a hundred hour work week
what you do in 10 years is what people would achieve
in 25 years and that's exactly what i did burnt myself
out got completely ill and then had
(19:15):
to make this big shift and so yeah now
i'm in that situation of like i i doddle along
i do a good i do a good sort of 10
hours but it's not the drive that i
i once had so very keen to hear what you would say to
individuals listening about how do they find their motivation
and this might be for someone that's sat at home actually in
(19:35):
a dead-end job that they don't enjoy doing and then how do they get that motivation
once they get home to then continue that passion and study when they've got
their own personal life what sort of advice would you give them yeah well there's
a few different things so in response to i'll come back to the person that's
doing the day job and and then coming back tapping into that motivation i think that.
(19:56):
What you're describing, Sam, is really not unusual, as I'm sure you may already
know, but that you kind of were hugely motivated around what you defined as
success and you achieved it.
And then again, it's this really flat feeling when you reach it,
because you think it's all going to be great when you get to that point.
And it's a huge anticlimax, but also there can be, you're not saying this,
(20:18):
so I'm not suggesting that's the case, but there can be a huge void,
both emotionally and intellectually.
Intellectually and energy wise and it feels
very alien and sometimes it can be hard to
replicate that kind of early motivation you know
the sort of you know the immediate early goals
were in your case as they were so some of the recommendations i might be working
(20:42):
with a client is going what does motivation look like for where you are right
now and that does get more nuanced as we progress and and succeed in life some
people will automatically go i want to start again and i I love that bit.
I love those early stages where it was the hustle and the struggle,
depending on what the business was, if it's replicable and the skills are transferable.
(21:03):
Other people go, do you know what? The motivation was developing people or helping
people or providing solutions.
So we look at alternative ways that, hey, is that still going to potentially
be a motivator? Or have you done that one? Do we need to look for other things?
So again, it's that lab type thinking. What is going to excite you now?
What really matters? so a bit stretching that but accepting
(21:23):
that it may not feel exactly the same as
the the one that you had in the first part of
your career but also it's then
making sure the questions that you get asked for example i mean that's some
people are just not taught how to ask curious open-minded questions which i
think is a real limiting factor in terms of help educating our young people
(21:45):
we need critical thinking more than ever and we need to be able to ask open
curious questions for a a whole host of reasons.
But actually, I think it also speaks to the fact that people think that you
may have the formula by tapping into what you want next, which again is totally
missing the psychological point.
As you said, you didn't give any big reveals.
You're not giving any lessons there and you're not getting something.
(22:08):
And I think people want, imagine there's a formula to success.
If you want something, it's as simple as that and you will be motivated by it.
And there's a lot missing.
So for me, it's about making sure that you own your own version of of what success
looks like and not what someone else is telling you. Yeah.
Because we look at the world outside and go, that's success.
It might be the flashy car, the private jet. It might be looking a particular
(22:31):
way or living in a particular place or having a certain kind of lifestyle.
And we take that on unconsciously without even verifying and being kind of intrigued by it.
Do I actually want that? What about that life?
Is that really me? or can i
(22:52):
think nothing worse than being dressed up every day going to a party
every night yeah on show and certainly
highly successful people that i've worked with go i didn't
think through those bits yeah and i agree that's
exactly that's that sort of feeling was
you know when you're young you see a ferrari drive
(23:12):
past and you go wow i want to do
that right so then when i went and got that
I then knew other people with supercars but then actually some
of those guys with supercars at the end of the month were asking to borrow money
from me and I thought what do you mean you're living month to month and you've
got that car blew my mind in the sense of you're not successful you've just
(23:32):
got high income to high outgoings and that really then affected me in the sense
of actually what I thought was successful isn't successful and I wasn't in that
that situation when I was living month to month ever.
However, it was an eye-opener for that.
And then when I was in my Ferrari, and I'll give a prime example,
and I'm sure some listeners will like this.
I had the roof down. I was going to a podcast in London and I must've got called
(23:57):
like wanker six to eight times with my roof down in the summer by pass of by,
you know, dad's money, all of this stuff.
And I thought, wow, my dad works for me.
Like this is such a horrible horrible situation that I'm just trying to enjoy
a nice car, nice drive to London.
And everybody's sort of like hating on, on the fact that you're young and you have this car.
(24:20):
And then I was like, did I went home and I was like, did I enjoy that drive?
Yeah, I enjoyed the car, but I didn't enjoy the attention and negative attention
that you got from driving them. And that was a weird eye opener.
I left my car and it.
I ended up not putting it on charge. Like I've got to put a 488 on charge and the battery died.
(24:42):
And now I can't start the car. It's a 600 pound call out cost to try to get down. What?
And so there's all these small things that I was like, I just do not enjoy the
maintenance, the running this. I never saw any of this side of things.
And then when I look at the benefit, do I really enjoy this?
And that for me was then that wake up of what is that?
So I think the belief of what success was, was a big issue for me because when
(25:06):
I then achieved it, I didn't enjoy it.
And then I listened to a great podcast with a guy called Dan Balzerian.
I don't know if you know him, but he lives a high-flying lifestyle.
And for him, he's hit a realization a lot much further than me in life.
He's probably 100 million plus.
And he says, the problem when you get to that scale of wealth.
(25:29):
The satisfaction level of what you expect goes up and it's not enjoyable.
And so I sometimes times wonder in life is the guy that's like you go to a day
job who enjoys their job and goes home to a happy family at five o'clock.
I think that there's the chance that they could possibly be happier than the
ultra wealthy where they have these expectations that have to be me or they're not satisfied.
(25:52):
And that's a small scenario. I realize that sometimes in myself and I think, shut up, Sam.
For example, I've got a sauna at my house. I have eucalyptus oil.
What if I fly to somewhere to go on holiday and there's
a sauna there that's great i go in there and it's like there's no eucalyptus oil
i was like jeez i've got this at home and then i'm like shut up sam
(26:13):
that is so snobbish you need to just forget
about but when you have expectations it's like i didn't i just have that at
home it's not like i'm being i am being a snob i suppose in that sense but the
the thought process of then having to match that expectation continuously it
can get tiring and And sometimes I think, you know...
(26:34):
The average person at home maybe doesn't realise that you have these expectations.
And I find it fascinating because I can look at it from an outwards perspective
as well as being in the present, but it still doesn't fix my problem.
It doesn't fix your problem, but I think that what it does do is,
again, the tip would be that really be careful what you wish for,
(26:55):
not in terms of the wealth and the setup because I can't speak for you,
but I would imagine you wouldn't change necessarily, But it's more when people
think that's what I want because that's what I'm being told success is.
And they'll be different in different families, environments,
workplaces, what success is.
And there are wildly differing versions of success culturally as well as geographically.
(27:20):
So be curious about what you really genuinely think success is.
But then also, don't believe the sort of sheen of it. I mean,
I've got clients whose lives have become so unbelievably complicated and stressful.
And again, I think it can often be perceived that people with ultra high net
(27:41):
worth, no money worries in the traditional sense that we think of.
They don't live a blessed life. Yes, they have one thing in the extreme that
many would want, they think they would want. But actually, there are many complications.
And not to have money worries about not being able to pay the bills doesn't
mean to say there aren't money worries.
(28:02):
I certainly talk to people where they're worrying about how they allocate that wealth fairly.
How do you do that across different children? How do you do that across different structures?
How do you do that whilst you've got a very sort of strong social conscience
how do you be responsible.
And the burden and you're often carrying depending
(28:24):
on the situation a number of people both naturally
on your payroll perhaps but also in your
personal life yeah and you are
propping it all up and again what i will often be
able to support my client with behind closed doors when they're having
that bad day they're human we all have life
going on you know my clients are maybe going through messy divorces
(28:47):
ill children bereavements personal illnesses
challenges i mean quite often the path to success is not nice and linear it
will challenge our very core identity of ourselves we think we are a particular
way and then that can be shattered by certain things not going our way we don't want want the world.
(29:08):
We don't want to be seen as being vulnerable or a failure.
We have complicated dynamics.
Again, success that we think is going to give us everything we want and no worries
if we don't really scrutinize it, doesn't mean that we're not with our families.
We don't have healthy relationships, perhaps.
We are not healthy. We're not going to the gym. We're not doing any of our hobbies.
(29:29):
We've got no interests outside work.
We get asked those questions when a mirror out about our job and we become out
of touch with ourselves and that creates huge anxiety and dissatisfaction.
Yeah. So...
Avoiding that is is great if i work with someone young enough
and at various points because we don't hit that point it's not people get anxiety
(29:49):
but you go okay we've got a place to deal with it but also
if i am working somewhere where they're in that zone we
can navigate through but a lot of people don't have anyone that they
can safely share that stuff with and even if they do is that
person equipped professionally to to usher them
through that in a useful responsible ethical
way you know the sort of practitioner skills
(30:12):
yeah i think it's um i
think to be honest with most people like i'm now we're talking to hundreds if
not thousands of people i'm very open with how i feel and
how i go through it because i don't feel that anything that
i'm going through is actually anything that someone can turn around and
say you're an idiot you know it's i think some of
the stuff that i'm discussing i think a lot of people go
(30:32):
through but maybe just don't talk about but i think you
know in my life trying to define now if you
said to me sam i want you to sit down and write on a.
Piece of paper what does success look like for you right now
okay and and
what is your future motivation i couldn't i
couldn't tell you even if i sat down for weeks because
(30:55):
it was so ingrained into me of what what it should
be so at that moment you know
to give you an idea i think think having
my dad as a mindset coach very early on
in life set this pathway of I put
a check and I wrote one million pounds on it so your
leech and I put it above my bed and every morning I'd wake up I would see a
(31:15):
million pounds check and I knew that I was going to make a million pounds I
knew I was going to no matter what I was going to do I was going to make it
so I think I had that sort of like chase of money ingrained but then I think
I also used to do a practice of.
Writing a letter to my future self. And then I would say stuff like,
(31:35):
well done, Sam, if you've hit this milestone, you've clearly put in a lot of time and effort.
Now I know from your perspective that you've probably never given yourself a
pat on the back during this next stage.
So give yourself a pat on the back and enjoy a couple of days off,
something along those lines.
And even with that, I was still like, it was everything I ever achieved was always underwhelming.
It was crazy. Crazy. Prime example, we was paying like £240,000 a year rent
(32:01):
for an office, which could sit, I think about 60, 70 people and COVID hit.
And I was like, we're going to go buy our own office.
Office prices have come down, you know, and we bought a nice office and it spent
the best part of two years refurbishing it. It had a cinema,
it had a gym, it had a training room, it had a meditation room.
And even when it was all built, there's a photo of me,
(32:25):
it's quite an interesting in one i can't remember who took it it's me
mopping the floors upstairs as in
i was like the floors look dirty i'm going to mop them and even
at that point i still couldn't pat myself on the
back and say well done you're 30 how
many years ago was that we've been there probably three or four years you know
i was 31 32 and built my
(32:47):
dream offices i owned it there was it was not
leased it was it's my building we've got
a cinema room we've got all this fantastic gym the gym has
all our branding on and i'd walk around it and there
was not an ounce of satisfaction and i was like why is that why can it not be
that there's a simple pat on the back stand or just a well done a good feel
(33:07):
factor that you've done it and achieved it but it never happened and i can't
tell you why i was never down about it i was never depressed about it but for
some reason it never ticked the the boxes of satisfaction.
And that's in my head all the time. And that's when I started looking outwards
at community side of things.
Exactly. To see if I could get that feeling. But it's a daily battle that I
(33:29):
go through. It is. I find it constant.
And I think that, you know, you've described a few different things that,
again, highly successful people would have.
You know, you set the goal. You obviously had various techniques that you used
that really kept you on track with that and engage with them emotionally every single day.
That million pound check on your bedroom ceiling, the letters,
(33:49):
all of those things create that emotional engagement and also a very key component
of success, whatever that success is,
is that self-efficacy, which, you know, from a kind of psychological perspective,
is that self-belief you you believed you could do it and
there were lots of things feeding that belief and bolstering
it over a long period of time so some of that
(34:10):
lack of motivation would have been or energy and sense of achievement
would have been well I kind of it's an I knew
I was going to be here and you know I've talked to people that kind of
reached higher than anyone else may have thought but
when they've always known they'd be on that stage or in that arena or at that
position and they go it's not a surprise to me it's kind of like I knew I was
(34:30):
coming and it sounds out of context maybe you know vain or big-headed but it's
absolutely not there's a deep knowledge and everything they've ever done has
been directed to that point but,
it doesn't go deeper so that's the bit now that goes deeper and we know from
research that we we are happier and more rounded when we do connect with community
(34:50):
whatever that community might be for us at any given time that we do give get
to a point where we want to give something back,
and that fulfilment will come in different forms.
Once we've achieved those early needs and our version of success.
So there are many components, but if we were sitting in a room,
I'd be working out that and kind of really pushing you in that.
(35:13):
And it could take, as it has done with many of my clients, a lot of excavating
of understanding what you're feeling and thinking to get to that point.
But also we may hit upon the point that sometimes.
We've got to reshape what motivation looks like and energy that goes with it
at this point in your life and knowing yourself better because a lot of the
(35:33):
time we can train ourselves to do certain things great when we're successful
and it happens some people can do the same.
Work on themselves but for different reasons not quite make
it when they would like to or they're in different
sectors and it hasn't happened and it's
about managing yourself yourself along the way
and that's where that again that deep in insight psychologically
(35:55):
and we derail some people are very trained that
you're trained and you do some people will derail along
the way and they'll have more boom bust cycles and
they go further away so it's again helping people stay on track and
stay motivated around that tailored goal but
for you it'd be it's probably going to be quite different now i think yeah
so i suppose what what advice would you give to someone that's
(36:17):
listening to this that goes i don't know
what my motivation is and maybe sam
has just completely ruined what success initially looked
like for me after hearing his story so
how do i go about defining that like what what could someone
take away and and learn from that well i
would i'm i'm you know and as a psychologist for
(36:39):
me what's really important is getting to know yourself which can sound a bit
woolly and cheesy i i mentioned to you earlier and i've created a an app called
the pocket psychologist that's got over i think 120 mini coaching sessions now
many of them under five minutes some of the longer sort of more visual.
Visualing kind of techniques you know 10-15 minutes they're
(37:01):
slightly longer exercises so i would really be
dedicating myself to going i really want to understand myself
yeah really spend time thinking
about what actually gives me joy what actually energizes
me not putting pressure on carving out
a very clear picture right now a lot of the time people do not have a very clear
(37:22):
goal so spend time working out what's going to make you happy like genuinely
happy what do you visualize what do you want why so it's the what you want then
it's why is that important because that's the bit that people skip.
A lot of people work out the what but when you get to the why you refine the what.
So I would say what is it that you want and why does that matter to you?
(37:44):
What do you think it's going to be when you get there? What's that going to
give you that you don't have right now?
Then you go into the how. But if you don't have the what really linked to your why.
You will likely fail and you won't do all the hard stuff like the discipline,
the time management and the prioritization and the grit doing things now for
(38:05):
long-term reward rather than the instant gratification.
So you've got to get that right and spend time on it.
In my experience, a lot of people don't know what really is.
They'll come up with labels or versions of what they think success and their
desires are and you go, well, you scratch a bit and you go, that hasn't got
any substance. substance.
Tell me what you want and why for you that's important.
(38:27):
And getting deep with that is what I would recommend.
There's sessions on the app that can help people do that if they can't do that
just kind of on their own, but it's like, what deeply drives you?
And if that's financial security, why?
Why do you need that safety? What is it that's really going to make a difference?
And then look at the how. Because then when you're doing it and you're seeing
the results, who do you need to surround yourself with?
(38:50):
How do you step off while you're on it to make sure you stay fresh,
creative, and emotionally engaged with it. Otherwise, it gets really super dull.
Super dull. No professional, let's say, athlete, if they're a runner,
they don't just run all day, every day. They'll be a one-hit wonder.
They might be the fastest, most talented person in the world.
(39:11):
But if all you do is run, their training regime requires many different elements
to make sure they stay peak psychological as well as physical fitness,
and then we're out for more than one or two Olympics.
Burn out if you get bored and you've
done it it's longevity that i would always recommend
and i've got to be flexible to do that do
(39:33):
you believe that you can hit a point in your career as a successful individual
where you have no need for anything in the material sense absolutely in in the
sense of trying to prove to yourself and the world you can do certain things absolutely.
But we are born to actualize and
(39:55):
in the psychological sense that is to to grow we don't stop
but that's where it starts to become much
more about giving back rather than the individualistic so absolutely you can
kind of go do you know what i'm done here i proved to the world i proved to
myself that that's the driver initially i definitely don't need any more stuff
and actually what i often find and you're kind of describing some of this in
(40:16):
some ways sam i don't I don't know how much it actually plays out in your life.
I'll find people shedding a lot of those material things, like going and getting that car.
When you can't afford it and that's on your goal list, you want it.
Actually, drive off the forecourt is a proper buzz a lot of the time.
And then there's the anti-climax thing. People go...
(40:37):
It's not what I thought it would be. So you'll find that people do shed,
actually. I've done all of that.
Yeah. I got rid of all of the cars and I worked out how much money did I lose on these?
Where could I have actually utilised that fund more specifically for,
you know, something that I'm focusing more on now is generational wealth.
Like how can I create longevity to create the next generation of my bloodline
(41:01):
for success in a way that they don't turn out to be snobs?
And you know i used to wear a load of
designer clothes got rid of all of that as well used
to wear nice fancy watches and i just didn't feel the
need for any of it or the want for it and
you know i found that very interesting that
(41:21):
that was a case and because actually quite a lot of people that i would say
that look up to you don't understand that they don't why would he be selling
his stuff oh he must be going through difficulties no i just i can't i can't think i don't think well.
Wearing that because i feel like you're trying to approve
(41:43):
something and i don't feel that there's anything that needs to
be proved to anybody maybe i did
in the early days but there definitely don't in in the
days where i'm at now so i drive around in a nice simple truck
and live live my life happily in
in my in my home you know
that's it and it's interesting because i do think it's and
(42:05):
then there's it is not as simple as this sam so i don't
want to reduce it to a binary thing of this but of course when we don't have
the success whatever again that might be for us we a have certain criteria that
we think suggests it so that will often be the labels the car the the brands
or or whatever the image is,
(42:26):
we all know that that actually isn't always the case or true because they're
props for a lot of people.
Some people genuinely love luxurious things, but not all of the things that
they do. But actually...
There's a sense that that will give us the confidence when we can get to that
point and we're wearing them.
Obviously, it doesn't. And then we think, well, maybe when I get to the actual
next level of finance or success, I will then feel the confidence.
(42:48):
But it's only when you actually do it really truly, feel satisfied that you
have achieved certain things that you go, oh, I don't need those props anymore.
You might choose to keep some if you are particularly into your cars or watches
or the engineering behind something.
But generally, you'll find they cease to have any value
to you psychologically because you don't
(43:11):
need the labels or the props or the sort of armory that that
tells people that you're successful and you are confident enough to
not have to play the game either yeah yeah yeah
that's an unusual one i felt like maybe
for me when i was younger and in my 20s i
felt that maybe to open the social circle doorways
of the 40s there's a a big difference between
(43:34):
a 20 year old turning up in a truck to a 20 year
old turning up in a ferrari and then them going wow how
did this guy get this and it was a good door opener whereas
being in established in those circles it's not why would class as a requirement
so i found it very interesting and what's the app as in what's the app called
i'm assuming it's on the app store i'd love to download it is it's the pocket
(43:56):
psychologist so pocket psychologist and you You can use it in different ways.
There are sessions in there to help you build resilience. All the tools that
all my clients have brought to me, obviously with more generalized language,
but there'll be everything that my clients have brought to me over the last
20 years and continue in some way on there.
So there's exercises that you can do to build resilience, things like the ability
(44:21):
to have have self-belief, maintain perspective, not be in mercy of your emotions.
So you can have the discipline and the routine and the structure that you need.
So you've got some quick fixes on there.
So if you're feeling overwhelmed, if you've had a setback, there's some kind
of quick fix sessions, but there are more curated ones that you can do every
(44:44):
Monday morning to set you up for your week.
So you are absolutely setting with intention exactly what you need to do,
making sure you're setting your work environment up so you've got rid of all your distractions,
when you're having a moment of self-doubt really understanding your psychology
so helping you understand how your thoughts influence your behaviors and influence
you know your physiological aspects and how they're all interacting so everything you kind of need,
(45:07):
whether it's the habit forming things the kind of self-awareness and insights,
there's a session on there for it.
Over there's meditations on there there's yeah lots
i'll get you set up sam so you can um check it out yeah i'd
love that i'm uh i've downloaded it just now and
i'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this i i personally i either sleep
(45:31):
very well or i don't sleep so i you know i could sleep maybe six seven hours
and i will just i can't do anything but work it has to be work and i'll just
go for hours now so that's probably because what's been done for the last 10 15 years years,
but I started using an app, it's called Luminate.
Have you heard of it? It's called psychedelic meditation. And it's basically,
(45:52):
it's quite interesting where for me to actually sit there and meditate,
I find it very difficult to turn my brain off.
Whereas with this, it sounds crazy, but the eye actually flashes constant light
like this and your eyes are closed
and it's just just like it's constantly doing it in a certain rhythm.
And you can't think or fathom anything other than your eyes closed and seeing
(46:17):
the light patterns and the flashes whilst the music's going on.
And it forces you to sort of turn off.
And it is like a psychic. It's literally known as psychedelic because you're
using your phone light and it sort of like puts you in a semi-psychedelic state
and you just see crazy colours whilst doing it.
(46:38):
And I've actually found that to be quite interesting. I don't know,
people listening, you may want to find a semi-psychedelic to try out.
But yeah, I found it very interesting because when you see it,
it's just your eyes can't.
For me, when I meditate, I either fall asleep or I can't truly actually get
into a meditative state. And then I get frustrated.
(47:00):
So that's great. And it's interesting because a lot of the stuff I do with my
clients are on sleep and the science of sleep.
And so for me, one of the things I always prescribe is no phones in any bedrooms.
It's kind of like, you know, like one of my golden rules and share again the
kind of real sort of risks associated with the longevity and performance and
(47:24):
focus and discipline and the ability to emotionally regulate,
all of which are just key life skills.
But they're muscles that we
can build up and highly successful people absolutely have those abilities.
Abilities but we must must must prioritize our sleep to boost motivation and
all of the things and that's a whole other topic very happy to talk about that
(47:46):
on another occasion but um,
yeah if someone's listening to this and they're in a hard place what sort of
advice would you give to them as a sort of final sign off,
I think that reach out to your network.
If you're in a position, definitely reach out to find yourself a qualified,
verified coach, coaching psychologist, therapist, whatever it is that the challenge
(48:11):
is that you are. Know that you are absolutely not alone.
It can feel very isolating, particularly in those higher kind of net worth circles
where the facade is very real and people are not showing the sort of vulnerable
side in quite quite the way that you might do behind closed doors with people.
And there is an answer. So do not feel like you need to do it alone.
(48:34):
And don't ignore it. A lot of people I work with have been feeling not great
for a while. And that's not because they're depressed. I mean,
sometimes it will be that.
Something's not sitting right. Address it. Lean into it. Work it out. Be curious.
Give yourself permission to explore it and potentially make the changes that
you need to live the life that you want to live. and live and lead.
(48:57):
Because I think a lot of people just get stuck going, well, this is who I am. This is how I need to be.
And it doesn't even enter their psyche that they can do something differently.
And also just being able to step back and doing that with someone,
whoever that might be, it might be someone in your personal life or someone more professional.
It just gives perspective and allows you to think more creatively and you will find the solutions.
(49:22):
But if it's not working what you're doing right now
change it which can feel really hard when you're going through a
tough spot so i'd say be honest
with yourself a lot of people ignore the flags think it's going
to get if it's not do something about it and
know there are a number of resources out there but it won't
happen by accident i think i think on that
(49:42):
as well there's actually a famous steve jobs said
if you wake up each morning and you look
in the mirror and you're not happy or excited about what
you're about to do and you maintain that for
four weeks that same feeling then you need to change and
it was something along those lines it was very similar to what you just
said it's courage and that confronting
(50:03):
we hold a lot of beliefs in our mind and that's a lot of the stuff that i'm
dismantling and working with and understanding with my clients what are you
telling yourself your life rules are how you need to be in the world again a
bit like the kind of motivation and what success looks like be curious about
that where does that rule come from is it it really relevant in your life now?
Is it serving you? Is it not?
(50:23):
Give yourself permission to at least modify it or track it up depending on what
it is be curious and the more experienced we are and the more complex our lives are the more,
kind of nuance we need to be we've done all the basics we know ourselves it's
really kind of doing that extra bit of work and not being surprised if it doesn't
come easily but doesn't mean it's possible yeah everyone listening don't fear
(50:47):
change it's the only way you're going to get what you want in life courageous
be courageous because arguably most people are courageous in different ways.
They just aren't necessarily in those areas that they're struggling with right now.
And if someone wants to reach out to you to find out more about your services,
what's the best place that they can find you?
My website, www.drjoeperkins.com.
(51:07):
That's J-O-P-E-R-K-I-N-S as opposed to with an E. So that's www.drjoeperkins.com.
My mobile's on there. My email's on there. Visit my website.
There's also the Pocket Psychologist. Download that and start Start practicing
the sessions, but also I'm available for one-to-one team and corporate kind
of style coaching, depending on the brief and public speaking, whatever works.
(51:32):
Amazing. Thank you so much for joining me. It was absolutely fascinating to
have you on the podcast and hopefully we can bring you back on in a year's time
or something and find out a little bit more.
Yeah. Thanks so much. Thank you, Samuel. Take care.
Welcome to the Wise World Podcast, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us.
Big news, we hit the top 100 podcasts within the UK and Singapore for investments.
So thanks, everybody, for listening in.
We've got a very exciting guest on the show today. And we've got Dr. Jo Perkins.
I'm going to let her introduce herself. And I'm really looking forward to getting
(00:20):
this conversation started. So over to you.
Hi, Sam. Thanks for having me. It's great to be here today. So I'm a chartered
psychologist and I work with my clients who are primarily in business of all
kinds of sizes and sectors and models to help them tap into their potential,
(00:42):
accelerate performance.
Really achieve psychological optimization.
And what I mean when I'm saying psychological optimization, it's really helping
them understand what their internal sort of psychological resources are.
So identifying them as well as their external resources and really knowing how
to leverage them to the max at all times.
(01:03):
And obviously adapting that to wherever they're at in their professional and personal journey.
So it's really helping them to do that. And I do that as a chartered psychologist
through the application of evidence-based research Research insights,
tools, strategies, and models and frameworks.
(01:24):
So it works. But I think as well, another key element is that it's providing
that very sort of unique, safe environment.
Professional relationship for my clients no matter
how successful someone is no matter what we present
to the world we've all got life happening and no
(01:46):
matter how bright we are or how determined we are we're navigating multiple
things at any one time it can be very isolating but also we we all need a space
where we can just step back talk in confidence and of course the more senior
or the the more powerful and successful sort of quote-unquote someone is,
that pool of people can be quite tricky to find because inevitably people always
(02:09):
have agendas, no matter how healthy they are.
So that unique, safe, confidential setting to actually really brainstorm and
work with someone that's just there without any other agenda than doing,
for me, my best job that I can.
It's really important for the clients that I work with.
It's it's safe and it gives regular jump off
(02:30):
points for them to kind of clarify their thinking be challenged in
a way that maybe other people aren't doing but
for a host of reasons so it has multiple layers
to it there's the learning as well as the experience
of it fine i find i find that
very interesting we briefly spoke before about how
i have my father as a mindset coach but i think
(02:52):
that dynamic actually is quite difficult for me because i
have a family relationship there as well even though
he's very professional when he helps a large amount
of our traders at samuel co yeah i find that dynamic very difficult from from
a talking perspective i would say as well i think for me what you do is probably
(03:13):
one of the biggest aspects that i focus on constantly is my mindset.
I find it interesting because I'm always, I think when you talk about these
sort of topics, and I won't throw you into the mix of it, but when you're talking
about hypnotherapy and these different things, it's always like, does it work?
Is there a part to it? So when you said scientific evidence behind it,
(03:37):
what sort of evidence do you mean?
Just an example. example well it's going
to be hard to answer that one in a nutshell and i think that i'm
going to caveat that also the research that i'd be using obviously i'm trained
charter psychologist did seven years of training to qualify
as a doctor of psychology so through the course of
that process you are working and learning about as
(03:57):
well as becoming a practitioner you're learning what the
different psychological models are you're learning things about how the
brain works how our physiology works how
habits form how our
environments influence that nature nurture
debate so it's evidence from the
science of of humans and human behavior and also then it's about the evidence
(04:23):
from practices and techniques that work and in what situation so i think that
one of the key things that that i've learned through through my training and
now also when i'm working with my my clients,
is that something may be shown to work, but under particular conditions.
And that knowledge is really critical because what I'm helping my clients do is have a broad toolbox.
(04:44):
Not every model or every framework or every strategy is going to work in every
situation for every person.
So I have to be very skilled and knowledgeable about what the different options
are, what options they may work in and where they wouldn't be relevant to use.
And I help my clients build up that awareness and practice by setting them up
(05:05):
to use them in the right way.
So what might seem like quite a simple technique, set some goals.
Yeah, well, you can read about that. But actually, the real magic happens when
I really encourage people to set goals that work for them.
So there will be the general rules and then saying, okay, knowing you,
if I've got the privilege of knowing them on a one-to-one basis,
how are we going to adapt that?
So I'll know how to question, question, how to get the motivation to do certain things.
(05:31):
So it's the evidence of all the kind of aspects of the science of psychology,
human behavior, and then applying it in a real-world kind of way.
And seeing what works. A lot of it is very experimental.
So I will be very honest with my clients when they come at the beginning.
There isn't a one-size-fits-all. It's not a manualized process.
So when I first meet a client, they'll tell me what they're wanting to work
(05:53):
on and what What are the challenges they're experiencing in their life across the board?
What does good look like? So again, tailoring it to where they're at,
because everyone has different ideas of what success looks like.
I might have to do a bit of expectation management at that point.
But then it's about saying, look, we'll treat the sessions like a lab where you come, we talk and...
(06:15):
That is very much a fact-finding and feeling what's going on,
understanding the client, then saying, right, these are the things that I'm
going to recommend you might do between sessions.
Whether that's developing some insights into how they might respond in certain
situations that are causing them sleepless nights or anxiety.
(06:37):
When they bring that back, I can then understand, ah, it's that that's happening here.
Perhaps we challenge it in session. and then I'll set them up with some things
that they can practice outside to gather more evidence.
So we start to really fine-tune some of that.
So it's stuff that I will know will work in January, but then my job is to fine-tune
it for each individual so it really works for them and they're the data.
(07:00):
I don't know if that… Yeah, no, that makes sense.
I think it's a very interesting idea and it's something, you know,
maybe I need to come and have a sit-down with you.
Please do. maybe i do it's i think
you know for for me and i'll be
interested to know just from a i don't want to generalize but
(07:20):
would you say that your typical clients are sort of like 50 plus
actually no now i
think there's been a shift i don't think i know over the last 20 years so i've
been in practice for 20 years and seen a lot of of world change in that time
obviously cultural workplace place changes and also the range and breadth of
(07:41):
kind of sectors and business models and ideas in that time.
It's changed really rapidly, particularly over the last decade, I'd say.
I think early on in my career, it would definitely have been older.
And I'd probably have said, you know, it would be historically senior leader.
So inevitably, you're going to be of more mature age, 35 plus because of the seniority.
(08:06):
Also, I think at that point, that would have been the financial ability to access
a dedicated coaching psychologist to your business or the business that's paying
for the coaching for you.
Nowadays, it's much broader. Yes, clearly there are still people that are 50
plus, and I've got clients in their 70s and 80s because they're still loving
(08:29):
life and doing it. But equally, I work with people's teams.
I might work with a very young set of entrepreneurs, startups,
where they're much younger and in their 20s.
And there are certain commonalities that being in business and the sort of psychological
as well as practical challenges they're ageless but there will also be some
(08:51):
different things that are more relevant
and important depending on where someone's at so yeah it's a broad,
age group yeah very interesting because i think for someone like myself i'm 33.
And i built up multiple companies yeah i to be honest with you from a from a
going out into the workforce.
(09:12):
I worked at Sohor & Co private bank and I worked there for, I'm going to say
18 months. I didn't even work there long.
I got a bit of a glimmer of what it was like to work for a boss,
what it was worth to work in an old establishment that's been around since the 1600s.
Loved the place and my ambitions drove me past that.
(09:33):
But now I think what my biggest issue was, I suppose within this space was I
think I actually achieved what I wanted.
I always planned on being in the situation that I'm in now, accrue a good large sum of wealth,
accrue businesses and my personal wish and it'd be very interesting to know
(09:58):
whether or not other individuals have experiences.
But at 33, I'm very young but I also then have in my head, Yet I have an issue
where I find it very difficult to listen to somebody else to tell me,
what i should be doing yeah then they're not
(10:19):
in my position they're not at my age and
they haven't built what i've built and i find that very
complicated because i think there's a lot and arguably that's why a lot of my
friends i would say are late 40s 50s 60s and i'm 33 and in there they've done
it they got the t-shirt however their mindset is a bit more old school a bit bit more traditional.
(10:44):
And so for me to try to go out and go, right, how do I now grow from where I am now?
Who can I talk to? Who can I network with?
Who can I bounce ideas off of?
And I can bounce ideas off a lot of people, but not from the same background.
And that's not me being judgmental, but I would much rather take advice from
a 33-year-old that has done what I've done, built companies similar to me and in similar situations.
(11:10):
But that demographic, when you you google it i think it's
like below 0.1 percent and it's like right okay
well i'm going to hide into nothing yeah yeah and
i think you know what you're describing there sam and
i don't know if this does give you comfort but it's that
loneliness and isolation of being very you know
much in in the tiny minority of having
(11:33):
achieved what you've achieved and there being no
kind of peers as it were and even if
there are peers they may have very different business models sectors
insights and and thinking styles so
yeah it's what i do with
my clients and this is maybe the distinction between being a chartered psychologist
and maybe a kind of business coach in the more additional sort
(11:55):
of ex-ceo or ex-business owner
sense of which that is absolutely a role and that is not
my area of expertise i mean i've worked with people in business and
know a terrible amount out but I've not run as a
CEO I work with CEOs and the
thing that I'm doing is I my it's a bit like a sports psychologist for a professional
athlete they're not the golfer or the tennis player or the footballer what they're
(12:20):
doing is meeting you where you're at so I know Sam from talking to my clients
who are in that isolated sort of position you might not feel that lonely but it's like.
Teasing out how to find your own answers you know
them but actually it's navigating how do you keep getting
motivated what are your stretch for
the next motivations for the next stage sometimes there
(12:42):
isn't anything and that would be like well you don't need to see anyone then
and it's about adding something rather than and and sort of deepening the thinking
yeah and rather than this is how you build the business because frankly my clients
know way more about their their field, their sector, and their role than I will.
My expertise is more about what are the challenges you're noticing within yourself?
(13:04):
Where are your own glass ceilings psychologically?
What are your doubts? What are your buttons that get pressed in these situations?
When do you feel exposed and how do you behave in those situations?
How do you feel more confident in those situations? Because I see a lot of people,
you could have it all on paper.
You're still you behind the scenes. and you may have a great view
(13:27):
of yourself yeah I think maybe as well
I'm probably a bit of an old head on a on a young shoulders
in in in that sense because I sort of thought I took
a step back and was like you know you've achieved all
of this but you're actually never at home you have no time for
family you have no time for family activities and is
that is that what success looks like and I
(13:48):
think that was a big meaning for me and that's when I moved
away from London moved to the countryside side and more
time in my own zone in my own
bubble trying to work out because i actually felt
like i was lied to you know i felt like the the
belief of success was to have x amount of
money in the bank to have a beautiful car to have all of these things and then
(14:11):
actually when i got there i was like this isn't this isn't what what i wanted
this isn't what i thought it was good what it was going going to feel like and
I think you know that emotionally it was quite a difficult,
sort of kick up the bar i think because then i needed to start working out what is my drive.
(14:33):
And that was a big struggle because it was like my drive
was to get there i got there so now what you
arrived at your destination and you didn't again it's
a really fascinating thing i mean i think that there's that's a
very common experience sam and again
how it affects people at what point in people's lives they
hit that point and sometimes
(14:55):
people meet it multiple times so what
I'm always trying to do is depending on when
I meet someone and when I start working with them it's always thinking
strategically both in the short to medium term on
the business and for me very clearly linking
that to personal life growth motivations
which because a lot of the time they're separated but of
(15:17):
course they're not because it's us but also thinking
one one eye on the next decade or whatever the time
frame that's relevant because we do arrive if
we're the right things and then what and we're not as humans designed to just
come to a shuddering we want longevity yeah yeah it's very very true and i think
(15:40):
that side is is an area that i'm I'm interested to explore on,
on this podcast is sort of like, well,
how does someone, how does someone that's, you know, hitting a hurdle,
how do they, how do they get more motivated?
You know, I'm happy. I would love to explore that because I think I've experienced
that and I'm sure lots of listeners have explored.
(16:00):
And I think for me internally, how I dealt with that was moving away from the
situation, trying to move into a lot more of a low pressure situation,
situation, more homely feeling, more countryside, more fresh air by the beach.
And actually went and done something completely out of my comfort zone.
I think this must be coming up seven, eight months ago, joined RNLI.
(16:24):
So I tried to give back to the community and really invested in that community
side because my background, all I ever did was from 17, 18 was look at a chart to trade.
And next thing you know, I'm 33 and I've got no other skills other than this.
And that's all people would ever talk to me about is, Sam, what should I be
buying in the stock market?
(16:44):
Sam, what's the next big thing to move?
Sam, where's this? And I was like so downbeat about the conversation because
it was constant what I was studying every single day.
It actually be quite nice. What did you think about Netflix series?
But in public, what I would then get asked is, what's your next supercar?
And I sort of thought for someone that's trying to attain growth in their own
(17:07):
life, it's such a dead question to not utilize my time a lot more efficiently.
Of you know if you was to start i would be asking questions like if you was
to start your journey again what would you do differently like i would be trying
to really sort of nail those questions down of where i can avoid mistakes but
it wasn't it was like what football team do you support,
(17:27):
what's your next car you're gonna get and i thought these are
it was very hard to engage in the conversation because it
was such like a dead-end conversation for me and i thought
you leave no benefit to this i leave
with no benefit to this conversation what was the point in
the time of the conversation and maybe i'm a bit blunt
on that aspect but at least if i could have left that conversation
(17:47):
been like do you know what i may well have been able to help that person avoid
a couple of mistakes and set them off on the right foot that's great but i don't
when it's those sort of questions so joining something like rnli was very different
because no one there i don't think anyone there actually even knows my job no
one's ever asked me no one cares about what what I do.
It's more about the situation that we're in, the training for RLNI,
(18:09):
a different environment.
It takes me from desk to seat, and that is completely different.
And I think that for me was a nice wake-up shift.
But even still, I don't have the motivation that I used to have, which I find very...
I was under, you know, in my head, I was like, if I can't socialize with successful
people, then I need to study successful people.
(18:30):
So I was like, you know, you look at Elon Musk, multiple businesses.
Billionaire, in the eyes of the public, very successful.
That's all things that people don't see behind closed doors
is poor personal life or no
sacrifices got plenty of kids of which he barely doesn't even
know and he has to take drugs to sustain his
high high system and you know
(18:52):
people don't see that stuff behind closed doors
of what they think it looks like but at the time
for me all i took from that was most people work a
40 hour work week sam if you do a hundred hour work week
what you do in 10 years is what people would achieve
in 25 years and that's exactly what i did burnt myself
out got completely ill and then had
(19:15):
to make this big shift and so yeah now
i'm in that situation of like i i doddle along
i do a good i do a good sort of 10
hours but it's not the drive that i
i once had so very keen to hear what you would say to
individuals listening about how do they find their motivation
and this might be for someone that's sat at home actually in
(19:35):
a dead-end job that they don't enjoy doing and then how do they get that motivation
once they get home to then continue that passion and study when they've got
their own personal life what sort of advice would you give them yeah well there's
a few different things so in response to i'll come back to the person that's
doing the day job and and then coming back tapping into that motivation i think that.
(19:56):
What you're describing, Sam, is really not unusual, as I'm sure you may already
know, but that you kind of were hugely motivated around what you defined as
success and you achieved it.
And then again, it's this really flat feeling when you reach it,
because you think it's all going to be great when you get to that point.
And it's a huge anticlimax, but also there can be, you're not saying this,
(20:18):
so I'm not suggesting that's the case, but there can be a huge void,
both emotionally and intellectually.
Intellectually and energy wise and it feels
very alien and sometimes it can be hard to
replicate that kind of early motivation you know
the sort of you know the immediate early goals
were in your case as they were so some of the recommendations i might be working
(20:42):
with a client is going what does motivation look like for where you are right
now and that does get more nuanced as we progress and and succeed in life some
people will automatically go i want to start again and i I love that bit.
I love those early stages where it was the hustle and the struggle,
depending on what the business was, if it's replicable and the skills are transferable.
(21:03):
Other people go, do you know what? The motivation was developing people or helping
people or providing solutions.
So we look at alternative ways that, hey, is that still going to potentially
be a motivator? Or have you done that one? Do we need to look for other things?
So again, it's that lab type thinking. What is going to excite you now?
What really matters? so a bit stretching that but accepting
(21:23):
that it may not feel exactly the same as
the the one that you had in the first part of
your career but also it's then
making sure the questions that you get asked for example i mean that's some
people are just not taught how to ask curious open-minded questions which i
think is a real limiting factor in terms of help educating our young people
(21:45):
we need critical thinking more than ever and we need to be able to ask open
curious questions for a a whole host of reasons.
But actually, I think it also speaks to the fact that people think that you
may have the formula by tapping into what you want next, which again is totally
missing the psychological point.
As you said, you didn't give any big reveals.
You're not giving any lessons there and you're not getting something.
(22:08):
And I think people want, imagine there's a formula to success.
If you want something, it's as simple as that and you will be motivated by it.
And there's a lot missing.
So for me, it's about making sure that you own your own version of of what success
looks like and not what someone else is telling you. Yeah.
Because we look at the world outside and go, that's success.
It might be the flashy car, the private jet. It might be looking a particular
(22:31):
way or living in a particular place or having a certain kind of lifestyle.
And we take that on unconsciously without even verifying and being kind of intrigued by it.
Do I actually want that? What about that life?
Is that really me? or can i
(22:52):
think nothing worse than being dressed up every day going to a party
every night yeah on show and certainly
highly successful people that i've worked with go i didn't
think through those bits yeah and i agree that's
exactly that's that sort of feeling was
you know when you're young you see a ferrari drive
(23:12):
past and you go wow i want to do
that right so then when i went and got that
I then knew other people with supercars but then actually some
of those guys with supercars at the end of the month were asking to borrow money
from me and I thought what do you mean you're living month to month and you've
got that car blew my mind in the sense of you're not successful you've just
(23:32):
got high income to high outgoings and that really then affected me in the sense
of actually what I thought was successful isn't successful and I wasn't in that
that situation when I was living month to month ever.
However, it was an eye-opener for that.
And then when I was in my Ferrari, and I'll give a prime example,
and I'm sure some listeners will like this.
I had the roof down. I was going to a podcast in London and I must've got called
(23:57):
like wanker six to eight times with my roof down in the summer by pass of by,
you know, dad's money, all of this stuff.
And I thought, wow, my dad works for me.
Like this is such a horrible horrible situation that I'm just trying to enjoy
a nice car, nice drive to London.
And everybody's sort of like hating on, on the fact that you're young and you have this car.
(24:20):
And then I was like, did I went home and I was like, did I enjoy that drive?
Yeah, I enjoyed the car, but I didn't enjoy the attention and negative attention
that you got from driving them. And that was a weird eye opener.
I left my car and it.
I ended up not putting it on charge. Like I've got to put a 488 on charge and the battery died.
(24:42):
And now I can't start the car. It's a 600 pound call out cost to try to get down. What?
And so there's all these small things that I was like, I just do not enjoy the
maintenance, the running this. I never saw any of this side of things.
And then when I look at the benefit, do I really enjoy this?
And that for me was then that wake up of what is that?
So I think the belief of what success was, was a big issue for me because when
(25:06):
I then achieved it, I didn't enjoy it.
And then I listened to a great podcast with a guy called Dan Balzerian.
I don't know if you know him, but he lives a high-flying lifestyle.
And for him, he's hit a realization a lot much further than me in life.
He's probably 100 million plus.
And he says, the problem when you get to that scale of wealth.
(25:29):
The satisfaction level of what you expect goes up and it's not enjoyable.
And so I sometimes times wonder in life is the guy that's like you go to a day
job who enjoys their job and goes home to a happy family at five o'clock.
I think that there's the chance that they could possibly be happier than the
ultra wealthy where they have these expectations that have to be me or they're not satisfied.
(25:52):
And that's a small scenario. I realize that sometimes in myself and I think, shut up, Sam.
For example, I've got a sauna at my house. I have eucalyptus oil.
What if I fly to somewhere to go on holiday and there's
a sauna there that's great i go in there and it's like there's no eucalyptus oil
i was like jeez i've got this at home and then i'm like shut up sam
(26:13):
that is so snobbish you need to just forget
about but when you have expectations it's like i didn't i just have that at
home it's not like i'm being i am being a snob i suppose in that sense but the
the thought process of then having to match that expectation continuously it
can get tiring and And sometimes I think, you know...
(26:34):
The average person at home maybe doesn't realise that you have these expectations.
And I find it fascinating because I can look at it from an outwards perspective
as well as being in the present, but it still doesn't fix my problem.
It doesn't fix your problem, but I think that what it does do is,
again, the tip would be that really be careful what you wish for,
(26:55):
not in terms of the wealth and the setup because I can't speak for you,
but I would imagine you wouldn't change necessarily, But it's more when people
think that's what I want because that's what I'm being told success is.
And they'll be different in different families, environments,
workplaces, what success is.
And there are wildly differing versions of success culturally as well as geographically.
(27:20):
So be curious about what you really genuinely think success is.
But then also, don't believe the sort of sheen of it. I mean,
I've got clients whose lives have become so unbelievably complicated and stressful.
And again, I think it can often be perceived that people with ultra high net
(27:41):
worth, no money worries in the traditional sense that we think of.
They don't live a blessed life. Yes, they have one thing in the extreme that
many would want, they think they would want. But actually, there are many complications.
And not to have money worries about not being able to pay the bills doesn't
mean to say there aren't money worries.
(28:02):
I certainly talk to people where they're worrying about how they allocate that wealth fairly.
How do you do that across different children? How do you do that across different structures?
How do you do that whilst you've got a very sort of strong social conscience
how do you be responsible.
And the burden and you're often carrying depending
(28:24):
on the situation a number of people both naturally
on your payroll perhaps but also in your
personal life yeah and you are
propping it all up and again what i will often be
able to support my client with behind closed doors when they're having
that bad day they're human we all have life
going on you know my clients are maybe going through messy divorces
(28:47):
ill children bereavements personal illnesses
challenges i mean quite often the path to success is not nice and linear it
will challenge our very core identity of ourselves we think we are a particular
way and then that can be shattered by certain things not going our way we don't want want the world.
(29:08):
We don't want to be seen as being vulnerable or a failure.
We have complicated dynamics.
Again, success that we think is going to give us everything we want and no worries
if we don't really scrutinize it, doesn't mean that we're not with our families.
We don't have healthy relationships, perhaps.
We are not healthy. We're not going to the gym. We're not doing any of our hobbies.
(29:29):
We've got no interests outside work.
We get asked those questions when a mirror out about our job and we become out
of touch with ourselves and that creates huge anxiety and dissatisfaction.
Yeah. So...
Avoiding that is is great if i work with someone young enough
and at various points because we don't hit that point it's not people get anxiety
(29:49):
but you go okay we've got a place to deal with it but also
if i am working somewhere where they're in that zone we
can navigate through but a lot of people don't have anyone that they
can safely share that stuff with and even if they do is that
person equipped professionally to to usher them
through that in a useful responsible ethical
way you know the sort of practitioner skills
(30:12):
yeah i think it's um i
think to be honest with most people like i'm now we're talking to hundreds if
not thousands of people i'm very open with how i feel and
how i go through it because i don't feel that anything that
i'm going through is actually anything that someone can turn around and
say you're an idiot you know it's i think some of
the stuff that i'm discussing i think a lot of people go
(30:32):
through but maybe just don't talk about but i think you
know in my life trying to define now if you
said to me sam i want you to sit down and write on a.
Piece of paper what does success look like for you right now
okay and and
what is your future motivation i couldn't i
couldn't tell you even if i sat down for weeks because
(30:55):
it was so ingrained into me of what what it should
be so at that moment you know
to give you an idea i think think having
my dad as a mindset coach very early on
in life set this pathway of I put
a check and I wrote one million pounds on it so your
leech and I put it above my bed and every morning I'd wake up I would see a
(31:15):
million pounds check and I knew that I was going to make a million pounds I
knew I was going to no matter what I was going to do I was going to make it
so I think I had that sort of like chase of money ingrained but then I think
I also used to do a practice of.
Writing a letter to my future self. And then I would say stuff like,
(31:35):
well done, Sam, if you've hit this milestone, you've clearly put in a lot of time and effort.
Now I know from your perspective that you've probably never given yourself a
pat on the back during this next stage.
So give yourself a pat on the back and enjoy a couple of days off,
something along those lines.
And even with that, I was still like, it was everything I ever achieved was always underwhelming.
It was crazy. Crazy. Prime example, we was paying like £240,000 a year rent
(32:01):
for an office, which could sit, I think about 60, 70 people and COVID hit.
And I was like, we're going to go buy our own office.
Office prices have come down, you know, and we bought a nice office and it spent
the best part of two years refurbishing it. It had a cinema,
it had a gym, it had a training room, it had a meditation room.
And even when it was all built, there's a photo of me,
(32:25):
it's quite an interesting in one i can't remember who took it it's me
mopping the floors upstairs as in
i was like the floors look dirty i'm going to mop them and even
at that point i still couldn't pat myself on the
back and say well done you're 30 how
many years ago was that we've been there probably three or four years you know
i was 31 32 and built my
(32:47):
dream offices i owned it there was it was not
leased it was it's my building we've got
a cinema room we've got all this fantastic gym the gym has
all our branding on and i'd walk around it and there
was not an ounce of satisfaction and i was like why is that why can it not be
that there's a simple pat on the back stand or just a well done a good feel
(33:07):
factor that you've done it and achieved it but it never happened and i can't
tell you why i was never down about it i was never depressed about it but for
some reason it never ticked the the boxes of satisfaction.
And that's in my head all the time. And that's when I started looking outwards
at community side of things.
Exactly. To see if I could get that feeling. But it's a daily battle that I
(33:29):
go through. It is. I find it constant.
And I think that, you know, you've described a few different things that,
again, highly successful people would have.
You know, you set the goal. You obviously had various techniques that you used
that really kept you on track with that and engage with them emotionally every single day.
That million pound check on your bedroom ceiling, the letters,
(33:49):
all of those things create that emotional engagement and also a very key component
of success, whatever that success is,
is that self-efficacy, which, you know, from a kind of psychological perspective,
is that self-belief you you believed you could do it and
there were lots of things feeding that belief and bolstering
it over a long period of time so some of that
(34:10):
lack of motivation would have been or energy and sense of achievement
would have been well I kind of it's an I knew
I was going to be here and you know I've talked to people that kind of
reached higher than anyone else may have thought but
when they've always known they'd be on that stage or in that arena or at that
position and they go it's not a surprise to me it's kind of like I knew I was
(34:30):
coming and it sounds out of context maybe you know vain or big-headed but it's
absolutely not there's a deep knowledge and everything they've ever done has
been directed to that point but,
it doesn't go deeper so that's the bit now that goes deeper and we know from
research that we we are happier and more rounded when we do connect with community
(34:50):
whatever that community might be for us at any given time that we do give get
to a point where we want to give something back,
and that fulfilment will come in different forms.
Once we've achieved those early needs and our version of success.
So there are many components, but if we were sitting in a room,
I'd be working out that and kind of really pushing you in that.
(35:13):
And it could take, as it has done with many of my clients, a lot of excavating
of understanding what you're feeling and thinking to get to that point.
But also we may hit upon the point that sometimes.
We've got to reshape what motivation looks like and energy that goes with it
at this point in your life and knowing yourself better because a lot of the
(35:33):
time we can train ourselves to do certain things great when we're successful
and it happens some people can do the same.
Work on themselves but for different reasons not quite make
it when they would like to or they're in different
sectors and it hasn't happened and it's
about managing yourself yourself along the way
and that's where that again that deep in insight psychologically
(35:55):
and we derail some people are very trained that
you're trained and you do some people will derail along
the way and they'll have more boom bust cycles and
they go further away so it's again helping people stay on track and
stay motivated around that tailored goal but
for you it'd be it's probably going to be quite different now i think yeah
so i suppose what what advice would you give to someone that's
(36:17):
listening to this that goes i don't know
what my motivation is and maybe sam
has just completely ruined what success initially looked
like for me after hearing his story so
how do i go about defining that like what what could someone
take away and and learn from that well i
would i'm i'm you know and as a psychologist for
(36:39):
me what's really important is getting to know yourself which can sound a bit
woolly and cheesy i i mentioned to you earlier and i've created a an app called
the pocket psychologist that's got over i think 120 mini coaching sessions now
many of them under five minutes some of the longer sort of more visual.
Visualing kind of techniques you know 10-15 minutes they're
(37:01):
slightly longer exercises so i would really be
dedicating myself to going i really want to understand myself
yeah really spend time thinking
about what actually gives me joy what actually energizes
me not putting pressure on carving out
a very clear picture right now a lot of the time people do not have a very clear
(37:22):
goal so spend time working out what's going to make you happy like genuinely
happy what do you visualize what do you want why so it's the what you want then
it's why is that important because that's the bit that people skip.
A lot of people work out the what but when you get to the why you refine the what.
So I would say what is it that you want and why does that matter to you?
(37:44):
What do you think it's going to be when you get there? What's that going to
give you that you don't have right now?
Then you go into the how. But if you don't have the what really linked to your why.
You will likely fail and you won't do all the hard stuff like the discipline,
the time management and the prioritization and the grit doing things now for
(38:05):
long-term reward rather than the instant gratification.
So you've got to get that right and spend time on it.
In my experience, a lot of people don't know what really is.
They'll come up with labels or versions of what they think success and their
desires are and you go, well, you scratch a bit and you go, that hasn't got
any substance. substance.
Tell me what you want and why for you that's important.
(38:27):
And getting deep with that is what I would recommend.
There's sessions on the app that can help people do that if they can't do that
just kind of on their own, but it's like, what deeply drives you?
And if that's financial security, why?
Why do you need that safety? What is it that's really going to make a difference?
And then look at the how. Because then when you're doing it and you're seeing
the results, who do you need to surround yourself with?
(38:50):
How do you step off while you're on it to make sure you stay fresh,
creative, and emotionally engaged with it. Otherwise, it gets really super dull.
Super dull. No professional, let's say, athlete, if they're a runner,
they don't just run all day, every day. They'll be a one-hit wonder.
They might be the fastest, most talented person in the world.
(39:11):
But if all you do is run, their training regime requires many different elements
to make sure they stay peak psychological as well as physical fitness,
and then we're out for more than one or two Olympics.
Burn out if you get bored and you've
done it it's longevity that i would always recommend
and i've got to be flexible to do that do
(39:33):
you believe that you can hit a point in your career as a successful individual
where you have no need for anything in the material sense absolutely in in the
sense of trying to prove to yourself and the world you can do certain things absolutely.
But we are born to actualize and
(39:55):
in the psychological sense that is to to grow we don't stop
but that's where it starts to become much
more about giving back rather than the individualistic so absolutely you can
kind of go do you know what i'm done here i proved to the world i proved to
myself that that's the driver initially i definitely don't need any more stuff
and actually what i often find and you're kind of describing some of this in
(40:16):
some ways sam i don't I don't know how much it actually plays out in your life.
I'll find people shedding a lot of those material things, like going and getting that car.
When you can't afford it and that's on your goal list, you want it.
Actually, drive off the forecourt is a proper buzz a lot of the time.
And then there's the anti-climax thing. People go...
(40:37):
It's not what I thought it would be. So you'll find that people do shed,
actually. I've done all of that.
Yeah. I got rid of all of the cars and I worked out how much money did I lose on these?
Where could I have actually utilised that fund more specifically for,
you know, something that I'm focusing more on now is generational wealth.
Like how can I create longevity to create the next generation of my bloodline
(41:01):
for success in a way that they don't turn out to be snobs?
And you know i used to wear a load of
designer clothes got rid of all of that as well used
to wear nice fancy watches and i just didn't feel the
need for any of it or the want for it and
you know i found that very interesting that
(41:21):
that was a case and because actually quite a lot of people that i would say
that look up to you don't understand that they don't why would he be selling
his stuff oh he must be going through difficulties no i just i can't i can't think i don't think well.
Wearing that because i feel like you're trying to approve
(41:43):
something and i don't feel that there's anything that needs to
be proved to anybody maybe i did
in the early days but there definitely don't in in the
days where i'm at now so i drive around in a nice simple truck
and live live my life happily in
in my in my home you know
that's it and it's interesting because i do think it's and
(42:05):
then there's it is not as simple as this sam so i don't
want to reduce it to a binary thing of this but of course when we don't have
the success whatever again that might be for us we a have certain criteria that
we think suggests it so that will often be the labels the car the the brands
or or whatever the image is,
(42:26):
we all know that that actually isn't always the case or true because they're
props for a lot of people.
Some people genuinely love luxurious things, but not all of the things that
they do. But actually...
There's a sense that that will give us the confidence when we can get to that
point and we're wearing them.
Obviously, it doesn't. And then we think, well, maybe when I get to the actual
next level of finance or success, I will then feel the confidence.
(42:48):
But it's only when you actually do it really truly, feel satisfied that you
have achieved certain things that you go, oh, I don't need those props anymore.
You might choose to keep some if you are particularly into your cars or watches
or the engineering behind something.
But generally, you'll find they cease to have any value
to you psychologically because you don't
(43:11):
need the labels or the props or the sort of armory that that
tells people that you're successful and you are confident enough to
not have to play the game either yeah yeah yeah
that's an unusual one i felt like maybe
for me when i was younger and in my 20s i
felt that maybe to open the social circle doorways
of the 40s there's a a big difference between
(43:34):
a 20 year old turning up in a truck to a 20 year
old turning up in a ferrari and then them going wow how
did this guy get this and it was a good door opener whereas
being in established in those circles it's not why would class as a requirement
so i found it very interesting and what's the app as in what's the app called
i'm assuming it's on the app store i'd love to download it is it's the pocket
(43:56):
psychologist so pocket psychologist and you You can use it in different ways.
There are sessions in there to help you build resilience. All the tools that
all my clients have brought to me, obviously with more generalized language,
but there'll be everything that my clients have brought to me over the last
20 years and continue in some way on there.
So there's exercises that you can do to build resilience, things like the ability
(44:21):
to have have self-belief, maintain perspective, not be in mercy of your emotions.
So you can have the discipline and the routine and the structure that you need.
So you've got some quick fixes on there.
So if you're feeling overwhelmed, if you've had a setback, there's some kind
of quick fix sessions, but there are more curated ones that you can do every
(44:44):
Monday morning to set you up for your week.
So you are absolutely setting with intention exactly what you need to do,
making sure you're setting your work environment up so you've got rid of all your distractions,
when you're having a moment of self-doubt really understanding your psychology
so helping you understand how your thoughts influence your behaviors and influence
you know your physiological aspects and how they're all interacting so everything you kind of need,
(45:07):
whether it's the habit forming things the kind of self-awareness and insights,
there's a session on there for it.
Over there's meditations on there there's yeah lots
i'll get you set up sam so you can um check it out yeah i'd
love that i'm uh i've downloaded it just now and
i'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this i i personally i either sleep
(45:31):
very well or i don't sleep so i you know i could sleep maybe six seven hours
and i will just i can't do anything but work it has to be work and i'll just
go for hours now so that's probably because what's been done for the last 10 15 years years,
but I started using an app, it's called Luminate.
Have you heard of it? It's called psychedelic meditation. And it's basically,
(45:52):
it's quite interesting where for me to actually sit there and meditate,
I find it very difficult to turn my brain off.
Whereas with this, it sounds crazy, but the eye actually flashes constant light
like this and your eyes are closed
and it's just just like it's constantly doing it in a certain rhythm.
And you can't think or fathom anything other than your eyes closed and seeing
(46:17):
the light patterns and the flashes whilst the music's going on.
And it forces you to sort of turn off.
And it is like a psychic. It's literally known as psychedelic because you're
using your phone light and it sort of like puts you in a semi-psychedelic state
and you just see crazy colours whilst doing it.
(46:38):
And I've actually found that to be quite interesting. I don't know,
people listening, you may want to find a semi-psychedelic to try out.
But yeah, I found it very interesting because when you see it,
it's just your eyes can't.
For me, when I meditate, I either fall asleep or I can't truly actually get
into a meditative state. And then I get frustrated.
(47:00):
So that's great. And it's interesting because a lot of the stuff I do with my
clients are on sleep and the science of sleep.
And so for me, one of the things I always prescribe is no phones in any bedrooms.
It's kind of like, you know, like one of my golden rules and share again the
kind of real sort of risks associated with the longevity and performance and
(47:24):
focus and discipline and the ability to emotionally regulate,
all of which are just key life skills.
But they're muscles that we
can build up and highly successful people absolutely have those abilities.
Abilities but we must must must prioritize our sleep to boost motivation and
all of the things and that's a whole other topic very happy to talk about that
(47:46):
on another occasion but um,
yeah if someone's listening to this and they're in a hard place what sort of
advice would you give to them as a sort of final sign off,
I think that reach out to your network.
If you're in a position, definitely reach out to find yourself a qualified,
verified coach, coaching psychologist, therapist, whatever it is that the challenge
(48:11):
is that you are. Know that you are absolutely not alone.
It can feel very isolating, particularly in those higher kind of net worth circles
where the facade is very real and people are not showing the sort of vulnerable
side in quite quite the way that you might do behind closed doors with people.
And there is an answer. So do not feel like you need to do it alone.
(48:34):
And don't ignore it. A lot of people I work with have been feeling not great
for a while. And that's not because they're depressed. I mean,
sometimes it will be that.
Something's not sitting right. Address it. Lean into it. Work it out. Be curious.
Give yourself permission to explore it and potentially make the changes that
you need to live the life that you want to live. and live and lead.
(48:57):
Because I think a lot of people just get stuck going, well, this is who I am. This is how I need to be.
And it doesn't even enter their psyche that they can do something differently.
And also just being able to step back and doing that with someone,
whoever that might be, it might be someone in your personal life or someone more professional.
It just gives perspective and allows you to think more creatively and you will find the solutions.
(49:22):
But if it's not working what you're doing right now
change it which can feel really hard when you're going through a
tough spot so i'd say be honest
with yourself a lot of people ignore the flags think it's going
to get if it's not do something about it and
know there are a number of resources out there but it won't
happen by accident i think i think on that
(49:42):
as well there's actually a famous steve jobs said
if you wake up each morning and you look
in the mirror and you're not happy or excited about what
you're about to do and you maintain that for
four weeks that same feeling then you need to change and
it was something along those lines it was very similar to what you just
said it's courage and that confronting
(50:03):
we hold a lot of beliefs in our mind and that's a lot of the stuff that i'm
dismantling and working with and understanding with my clients what are you
telling yourself your life rules are how you need to be in the world again a
bit like the kind of motivation and what success looks like be curious about
that where does that rule come from is it it really relevant in your life now?
Is it serving you? Is it not?
(50:23):
Give yourself permission to at least modify it or track it up depending on what
it is be curious and the more experienced we are and the more complex our lives are the more,
kind of nuance we need to be we've done all the basics we know ourselves it's
really kind of doing that extra bit of work and not being surprised if it doesn't
come easily but doesn't mean it's possible yeah everyone listening don't fear
(50:47):
change it's the only way you're going to get what you want in life courageous
be courageous because arguably most people are courageous in different ways.
They just aren't necessarily in those areas that they're struggling with right now.
And if someone wants to reach out to you to find out more about your services,
what's the best place that they can find you?
My website, www.drjoeperkins.com.
(51:07):
That's J-O-P-E-R-K-I-N-S as opposed to with an E. So that's www.drjoeperkins.com.
My mobile's on there. My email's on there. Visit my website.
There's also the Pocket Psychologist. Download that and start Start practicing
the sessions, but also I'm available for one-to-one team and corporate kind
of style coaching, depending on the brief and public speaking, whatever works.
(51:32):
Amazing. Thank you so much for joining me. It was absolutely fascinating to
have you on the podcast and hopefully we can bring you back on in a year's time
or something and find out a little bit more.
Yeah. Thanks so much. Thank you, Samuel. Take care.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.