Episode 6 - Robbie Swale - Die Before You Die So That You Can Really Live - The Secret Resume

Episode Transcript
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Melody Moore (00:04):
Good morning. Good afternoon and good evening.
Welcome to the Secret Resume podcast hosted by me Melody
Moore. In this podcast weexplore the people, places and
experiences that have shaped myguests. Those which have
influenced who they are aspeople and where they are in
their work life today. You canlisten in as we have a rich

(00:26):
exploration of often unexaminedand undiscussed, but very
important aspects of theirlives, or as I like to call it,
their secret resume.
My guest today is Robbie Swale.Robbie is a leadership coach,
author and podcaster, whose workfocuses on creativity, leading

(00:48):
with honour and the craft ofcoaching. He is the host of two
podcasts, the Coach's Journeypodcast, and the 12 Minute
method podcast, and the authorof the 12 Minute method series
of books, including how to startwhen you're stuck, and how to
create the conditions for greatwork. So Robbie Swale welcome to

(01:12):
the secret resume Podcast. I'mabsolutely delighted to have you
here.

Robbie Swale (01:16):
It's a pleasure. Thanks for having me and
inviting me to do this slightlyunusual thing and thinking about
my life in new ways. It's beenreally lovely,

Brilliant, and Robbie sent me a picture of his
I think it's a picture of yourinside of your brain, isn't it?

That is a little bit but although I feel like my
brain is even messier than thebig flip chart paper that I sent
you.

I got the sanitised version. Yeah. So,
Robbie, let's start with who areyou? What is it that you do? And
then we're gonna go right backto the beginning and talk about
some of the things that haveinfluenced you over your life.

Yeah, so Well, the way that I introduced myself
these days, like, the list getslonger, because I keep doing new
things, which is very nervewracking, often while doing
them, and then fun sometimes toreflect on. So most of my work
is a leadership coach. But I'malso these days podcaster, I
have two podcasts and an authorof four books that have been
published. The last the mostrecent of which was published in

(02:11):
late 2022. And when I talk aboutmy work, which does it does is
related to the things we'regoing to talk about, I think in
this conversation, I usuallytalk about kind of three things
that I'm interested in. So I'minterested in what I think about
these days is leading withhonour or leadership with honour
and leadership, you know, thework that I do, there is mostly
where my coaching happens, it'swhere a lot of my kind of

(02:33):
already call it incomegenerating parts of my business
happen. And what I mean by thatleading with honour we might get
into, but really, you know, it'soften people other people were
talking about it as values ledor like, it's all that values
work. It's, you know, there willbe clients that don't one of the
times I had that thought wasit'd be clients, series of
clients coming to me. And reallywhat we'd be talking about is
how do you succeed? How do I getto the next level of success

(02:54):
without having to compromise whoI am just kept having different
ways that thing and for reasonswe might get to that that word
honour came to me, I'm reallyassisted in the craft of
coaching. So I do work withother coaches, I think that
coaching as a leadership skillas a kind of craft of a
profession has a huge amount tooffer lots of the challenges
that we all face in the worldand the world faces. And so I do

(03:16):
some work supporting othercoaches. That's why one of my
podcasts that coaches journeycomes in, I have a community of
coaches that that I work with,to support them with their
businesses and their lives. Andthen I'm interested in
creativity. And that's where mybooks come in the 12 Minute
method series. And the ideathere is I'm really interested
in why do we sometimes havethese things that we want to do
for a long time? And we don't dothem? How do we help people
bridge that gap? And that'syeah, like I say, the series of

(03:37):
books, and also there's a 12minute method podcast as well.
And that's mostly how I talkabout my work these days.

I've just started reading your books, as I said,
and I'm feeling like that's agreat big kick up the ass
actually.

In fact, if you could, if you could add some
Amazon reviews that say, just tosay, this book feels like a
great big kick up the ass that'slike perfect because that's
exactly what I would hopehappens because some of the
books that have had a big impacton me have felt exactly like
that. And it is like when youread so so often we aspire to be
the things we admire indifferent ways and getting that
book that you know is so starkand in my face that I have to

(04:14):
change how I am for the betterthen that's like a wonderful
thing. Not always fun at thetime but to look back on always
a wonderful thing.

No, it gets to the sort of for me anyway the guilt
and but also there is that kindof his someone who's done this
in a very practical way. Whydon't I just do it in a very
practical way and it's like thathow do you eat an elephant a
teaspoon at a time they feellike teaspoons what you're
talking about? Yeah, it was notjust as it was a carrot and

(04:42):
stick let's say experience sofar. Perfect. Okay, brilliant.
Thank you. I'm really interestedin what you do actually. I'm
interested in that coaching sowould you describe yourself as
well as coaches coach?

Yeah, I mean, I'd say that the the reason I said I
think when I introduce myselfthere are usually do a
Leadership Coach because that'swhere most of my coaching
happens. But what happened to mewas I wrote an article about how
I grow my coaching business. Andit went mini viral. Like, for
me, it's still the most readarticle, I've written 10, over
10,000 clicks or whatever,across various platforms, I'm

(05:16):
sure I haven't checked thatrecently. But I'm sure it's
something like that. And itbecause it went really viral, I
ended up with a following. Andthen because I'm so interested
in coaching, I kept writing andthen in the end podcasting about
coaching. And so it kind ofhappened a little by accident.
But I love conversations aboutthe craft of coaching. When I'm
running, coaching, training, Ilove it. When I'm doing
supervision. I love it. Yeah,when we have these absolutely
wonderful calls as part of thecoaches journey community, which

(05:38):
is the community for coachesthat I run, where I am a coach
of coaches, and they're justwonderful calls are some of the
absolute most beautiful timesthat I have in my month. Because
there's something about thepeople with those commitments to
the things that the coaches atleast that I'm working with,
have have commitments to andability to reflect and grow
together and connection as agroup. And so I love that work.

(05:58):
Although I would say it's kindof it's not the centre of my
business. It's something that Idon't know, especially having
heard myself just describe it,then I don't think it's anything
I'm going to knock on the headanytime soon.

Brilliant. Thank you. Right, let's start with on
your secret resume journey, yourfirst thing that you can talk
about is your family and theenvironment that you grew up in
over to you.

Yeah, so what was interesting to do this exercise,
and I, like I said before, I wasreally interested to be prompted
by you, ahead of coming on theshow to think about this, to
think about the secret resume.And what I did, actually, the
picture of my brain that I sentyou was I kind of plotted my
life up to this point. And Itried to follow those three
threads the leading with on athread, the creativity thread

(06:41):
and the coaching thread andfind, you know, where were the
places are the things we'regoing to talk about really in
the end. So how do you choosefive key moments from a life
because I know that all themoments of a life have the
potential to be the key moments.And some of its just
storytelling, and some of it, ofcourse, is impact. And there are
some not all, not all momentsare equal. And I imagined that I
was I really wanted to come upwith a series of things that

(07:02):
that weren't the obvious things.But in a way, one's family
upbringing is the obvious thing.And yet, when I slow down with
those three things, it'simpossible for me not to think
about those first years of mylife. And in some ways, for me,
this goes on a little longerthan for other people would
because I was home educatorsuntil I was nine. So it means
that my family upbringing reallyextends that long, it's a nine

(07:25):
year period for me were my mumand dad, and later, my sister
when she was born and my halfbrother who lived somewhere
else, but visited us a lot anduncles and aunts. And these
people, they were the kind ofgrand grandparents, they were
the they were like, you know, avery formative piece of life for
me, without some of thedilution, that say going into

(07:46):
school at a speech marks normalage would have would have given
to that. And they wereabsolutely full of those three,
when I slow down, I think aboutit of those three, those three
things. The coaching was therein some time in like, not
obvious ways, in some ways, butstill quite obvious ways. Both
my parents at different times intheir life had done
psychotherapy, training my mum,not at that period, but at the

(08:07):
end of that period. And from theend of that period till her
retirement worked as acounsellor. And so I was
surrounded really by that bypresence by open questions by
encouraging of curiosity fromthem. And as time goes on, you
know, for example, I went to myone of my uncle's died recently,
I went to his funeral. And atthat funeral, one of his kind of
mentees gave a speech and talksabout the the absolute coaching

(08:30):
that he had done with her in away that I wouldn't have
spotted, necessarily, I didn'tknow that part of him. In fact,
it's fun. It's from the funthings about the funeral is that
you get to learn sometimes newthings about somebody who's you
know, who you thought you knewquite well,

you don't hear that phrase very often. One of
the fun things about funeral,

I guess. I mean, it was fun is probably a strange
way to say it. But it was fun.And well, it was exciting. And
it was very touching to have. Soso my Uncle Martin and I just
tell this story, because it's sonew to us. So I knew he'd worked
in transport his whole life.Since he was a little boy, he
was fascinated by buses. And heended up working for stagecoach,
Did that change? When you wentinto mainstream school? How was
the big UK bus company amongstothers, he would write until his

(09:06):
near his death, he wasconsulting at the EU about
transport and things like that,kind of knew that but never
really thought about that hemight have been impactful at his
funeral, this woman who now isthe CEO of travel line, and
people can look up to see whatthat does what they do. But it's
really interesting, gave thisspeech and one of the things she
said is that another colleagueof theirs once walked into the
office of the CEO of stagecoachat the time, who was in there

(09:27):
with my Uncle Martin, dreamingup a new branch of their
business, which became Mega Bus,which is like a staple thing for
students in the UK. So it's likethese things that you just don't
know, people were doing butMartin also really supported
encouraged challenged this womanand many other people around him
quietly. They talked about himas the unsung hero of of like
British Transport or if the busin the bus industry in the UK,

(09:48):
and that's a coach, right? It'sthe unsung hero behind the
scenes who doesn't take theglory, but he does all this
facilitative work. So I didn'tknow that about him until until
like two weeks ago, but it'slike there's some more of it.
And my brother once pointed out,or my mom or my family, you
know, around us were thesepeople who did this kind of
thing. My grandma wrote,essentially, I mean kind of bit

(10:10):
more spiritual than this, butshe wrote some basically self
help books and she's calledDorothy Lewis people can look
her up on on Amazon, reallylovely book of visualisations
that she wrote my granddad on mydad's side was who I never knew
but whose personality definitelycame out through His son was a
leading Navy physical traininginstructor until he died very
it different?
young. So he was developingpeople at that time. My other

(10:30):
grandfather was a was a vicar,essentially, vicars were the
coaches of their communities.Maybe one of the reasons we need
coaching so much now is no onetalk to their vicar anymore. But
so I had all these people aroundme with that coaching feel. So
that was happening, creativitywas really encouraged. And
people like Martin, who Imentioned were around, he made a
lot of music in his life thatwas happening in different ways
Well, it was was very, veryhard. That's the first thing I'd

(10:50):
through my through my parents,and different very much invited
for us. And the things I wasinterested in through that time.
A lot of it had to do with thisconcept of honour. Like I would
read books about King Arthurabout Robin Hood, it moved into
his I got towards the end ofthat period, superheroes started
to emerge as a theme. Andthat's, you know, that's those
those classic, the classicSpider Man see, right is that he

(11:13):
let somebody go by when he couldhave stopped them, and he
doesn't. And he let us live withthe consequences of that. That's
that that was, you know, in themoment, that's not the right
thing to do. And the moral ofthe story, and the whole Spider
Man's arc comes from thatmoment. So there was these
stories were there. And thecreativity was there. And that
space to think and be curiousand follow interest. Was there

(11:36):
too.
say I think it's been doing somelearning recently about you as a
model of child development, andjust how I think actually, you
know, that's, and I watch itwith my got a two year old
daughter, right, I have to bereally careful with her. And the
way I think about her and goinginto nursery, for example,

(11:58):
because I can't help but thinkof how hard it was for a nine
year old to go into formalschooling, age nine, when
everyone else had been inschool, since they were four or
five, that's really different toa two year old going off to play
around in a nursery. And yeah,it has brings back a lot of the
same a lot of the pain that Ihad then now. So it was
difficult. Now, there were somegreat things that came with it,

(12:18):
because I thrived in education.In the end, although, and I
definitely I always thrived init. And that wasn't really the
problem. But socially andemotionally, I found it very
hard, you know, and in the end,it's one of the formative
experiences of my life, becauseI learned to how do you fit it?
And it's like, you know, thereason you have to do that when
you're nine is because if youdon't get picked on, but that's
a useful thing to be able toconnect with people. That's how

(12:40):
I learned that really. And yeah,but that when I look back on
that time, I of course, I lookedback on it deliberately. And
there were reasons that it cameto an end, and we didn't have
much money. And we didn't seeeach other all the time. And
there were all these thingsgoing on. But it did have that
for the from the point of viewof allowing me to flourish. The
others, when I look back doesfeel pretty idyllic. And yeah,

(13:01):
there were there were practicalchallenges. And some of those
things were less, I guess theywere less in evidence in formal
education in the same way, youknow, they think much more
education has much of a coachingspirit to it. Now, in my
experience, albeit somewonderful teachers, you know,
fly in the face of that, and Ihad some absolutely wonderful
teachers, and they did indifferent ways encourage

(13:22):
creativity, I had this memory, Ithink it was I think it was from
from thinking about this, thisconversation that actually, you
know, so for example, at somepoint, maybe we maybe many of us
have this, I think, you know,the sociologist Brene Brown
would say that we almost all ofus end up with this creativity
story, from our early education,the story being you are not
created from someone's throwawayremark. And I definitely had

(13:43):
that story from a teacher calledMrs. Ramsey. And there's a funny
bit in my first book about how Irealised that I had
misremembered quite badly, someof the things she had said, but
I also remember one of thosereally early days at school,
when it was just emotionally waytoo much for me to take. And I
was so sad. And she just let mesit in the little cupboard, at
the corner of the classroom anddraw. And so there were these
moments like that. And you know,it's easy. It's a funny thing to

(14:05):
think that when she asked me,What do I like to do, I said,
draw, because I certainly by thetime I was, I don't know 12
would have said that the drawingand visual art and that kind of
things, that least of mytalents.

I'm interested in quite a lot of the people who've
been on the podcast have whattheir parents thought they
should do for a living hasplayed an important part either
conforming to that or rebellingagainst it. And I'm curious for
you how that played out for you.

I think I was lucky. I don't think I had it in
the way that some people reallyhave it. There were little
echoes of it. Like I had thisvery strange, like very strange
memory like in my late 20s Ifound myself very, like quite
jealous and feeling quitestrangely, like well out of
proportion, intense feelingsabout this guy that I'd met who
was moving into coaching and hadbeen a kind of big shot

(14:54):
barrister and I couldn't workout what that was and then I
realised that I had this memoryof my mum saying Hang on, you're
so good at arguing, Robbie, youshould be a lawyer. Or you could
be a lawyer, which is like, insome ways is a wonderfully
encouraging thing to say. But Icaught just to echo what you're
saying I think many of us have,it's really hard as a parent
sort of terrifying thing tothink, as a parent that almost
without doubt, I'm going to saysome things to my daughter at

(15:16):
some point that she's gonnaremember in her late 20s, or
30s. And go, oh, this is why Imessed up in some way. It's
dad's fault. You know. So Ithink that's true. So there are
echoes like that. I mean, mybrother, sister, and I all had
periods, mine was, in some ways,the shortest of pursuing careers
in the traditional arts. And soI didn't think that my mum or

(15:36):
dad ever said, You should be anartist. But that tells me
something about what wasencouraged and admired in our
family. And so there's that, butI didn't have the thing, that
must be a doctor or somethinglike that. And I guess the other
thing that I that I get, wemight get to it a little bit
later on, I think probably, butsomehow, more by the way, my

(15:58):
parents lived, I learned somelessons. So they lived, they
they chose, they made choicesthat told me that work wasn't
everything. Money wasn'teverything, possessions weren't
everything, and that there wereother things that were
meaningful. And and I think theytaught me, some from somewhere,
I got some sense of idealismabout what work could be, or

(16:19):
what life could be, you know,that it shouldn't be. This is
one of the themes, I think thatthat comes out of this, for me
out of this, this work that thatI've been thinking about ahead
of this core is that that mustmust have been seated there
somehow, although I can'tremember anything explicit about
that. Because they made, I guesswhat they did is they, they
constantly showed me that youcan make choices that aren't the
expected choices, you know,which is to very smart people

(16:42):
choosing to not have bigcorporate careers, you know,
choosing not to choosing tohome, educate their children, my
dad lived in a commune for awhile, like they did all these
things. You know, my mom didmost of a PhD and then stopped
it. You know, it's like,there's, there's all these
stories that showed me that,yeah, it doesn't have to be the
the thing that everyone does,you don't have to do it. And
that's, that's interesting.

I love that. I love I've always felt that about
myself, actually, that I've notnecessarily felt the need to
come for. But I don't know wherethat's coming from, because I
don't think it's come from myfamily. But yeah, I've never
really felt that need to do whateveryone else is doing.

I think it's good to have that like, I mean, we
need some people like that.Otherwise, nothing will change.
To some extent, right, we'll alljust do the normal thing the
whole time. I had a clientrecently, I'm not gonna be able
to do it justice, it's better inhis language. But one of the
commitments that he was workingtowards was, I want to sometimes
purposefully do things thatdisrupt the normal way life
would go. That was one of thekinds of things that felt really

(17:37):
important to him. And I loveevery time he we talk about that
I love it, because it's like,yes, it just gives you that just
gives a imagine for him.Certainly, if it was missing
that in those moments where youget the choice that might be
the, you know, what is it the isit frost the road less
travelled, you know, it's likeyou get the choice between the
way that things would normallygo. And this little part of you
that saying maybe it should gothe other way, and do this crazy

(17:59):
thing over here. And you justget that from that kind of
commitment that the client made.It's like, Ah, maybe this time,
I'll just go there. I'll go theother way.

Nice. I love that. So let's move to your second
thing, which is a person who hasinspired you tell me about him.

I've always been careful listener. So strange,
strange things we're gonna talkabout Frank Turner, the English
singer songwriter have a strangeend to the story is that Frank
got married to one of my wife'sfriends from university, like
not someone that we know verywell, but at some point, in that
I realised it's like, I have tobe a bit careful, because I
might end up it's very, it'spretty unlikely because they've
moved to like Essex somewhere.And we've moved to the West

(18:38):
Midlands, but I might end upactually hanging out with him.
So I have to be a bit carefulnot to be too, fanboy. I wish
there wasn't as much FrankTurner stuff up on my walls as
they used to be. Yeah, I mean,but when I was thinking about
it, in a way it was, when I'mthinking about those, again,
those three themes were aproduct of the people we
surround ourselves with, to someextent, and we get a choice

(18:59):
about that. And it will comeback to that again, a little bit
later. And especially true ofthe novelist David Gemmell, for
me as well. Yes. So in about2007, my friend Steve made me a
CD. And it was a good CD withone song I just kept listening
to it, which is kind of shoutyacoustic man with an English
accent called Frank Turner, whohad been the singer in a punk

(19:21):
band, but my friend Steve reallyloved called million dead. And
then that band had gone to bits,and he had started a different
thing. And there were just somany parts of the Wi Fi and then
I listened to Frank Turner, likea lot for a long time. You know,
for probably what, 10 yearsafter that, maybe a little
longer, maybe kind of 12 would12 years of like a lot of

(19:46):
listening. I would get haven'ttotaled it for a while. I guess
I've been to 30 cm slide 30 plustimes, which is easier for him
than for some people becausehe's always on tour. And there
are a few things. So there are afew things so I think that like
there was one thing which was hewas kind I have been exactly the
singer songwriter that if I hadbeen a singer songwriter, I
would have wanted to be, andthat didn't have the effect that

(20:07):
it's those kinds of thingssometimes have, which is like
the gutting of someone else'sdone it, it was just inspiring
because it was like it was thissense for me still is that
actually, I was never going todo it as in this way, as well as
he did write the lyrics that hewas writing, which is, which is
way beyond any of the lyricsI've ever written. Because I've
done some I've done somesongwriting, and it was just

(20:28):
something that he had. Now Idon't know if that's actually
true, but it was this was kindof admiration more than anything
else. And he did the thing thatmany great lyricist do, which
has made you feel like he'swriting about you somehow hold
kind of big enough soul to allowall of us into the into the
music. And you could tell thatI'm not the only one because

(20:48):
we're because if you go to a gigat you know, anywhere as big as
Wembley Arena is probably thebiggest place I've seen him and
tiny little places like I wentonce went to a gig of his in
Lancaster library. Now, this isnot a pub called the library.
This is the actual library inLancaster right near where I
grew up, there was some kind ofthere was some kind of council
initiative, and Frank's deal atthe time was when he was

(21:09):
starting out was I will playanywhere, as long as I get 50
pounds or more, in some waysasleep. And there was this
commitment, right, which, whichwas, I will, which is
essentially I will keep showingup. And I will keep doing this
as well as I possibly can,because I love it because it's
the right way to be. And becauseI know deep in me that it's the
right is the thing that I shouldbe doing. And then I will

(21:31):
essentially trust the universeafter that. And so and I was
with him through that wholetime, basically not quite from
the start because it was justbefore his second album came
out. But Steve gave me the thingfor it. And we first went to
watch him live. But essentially,then I was with him through to,
you know, I remember being a gigin Shepherds Bush where he said,
I once made a deal. My manageronce promised me that if we ever
played I can't remember it's2000 or 3000 persons show he do

(21:52):
a stage dive. And this is thefirst 2000 or 3000 person show.
And then in Dave's the managerand I was there when he played
at the oh two, which is again,like an anon thought of scale
when you've watched him inLancaster library. So there was
that there was the sense therewas the sense of control what I
can control, do what I know tobe the right thing. Keep doing
it. That was there.

What is it about him and his lyrics that really
speak to you?

I mean, on some level, it's a courageous,
vulnerable description of thehuman experience. We were
talking just before we switchedon the recording about some
lyrics from a song called is itcalled telltale signs, I think,
which is this absolutely rawopening of the heart. And one of
the one of my favourite all timesongs, but he's also a writer of

(22:40):
you also captured a moment forme. And this is really where he
belongs on this list. Hecaptured a moment of and then I
was able to follow him my withmy trajectory, following
alongside very closely from justjust a vision, just an
idealistic vision that if IFrank, show up, keep playing and
keep doing the best that I can.That's the right thing to do.

(23:00):
There's a song calledphotosynthesis. I remember
sharing it with a friend. Andshe was like, about a week
later, she emailed back andsaid, at first I just thought it
was a bit dull. And I was like,why have you sent this and then
I listened to the words. And nowI can't stop listening to it.
And photosynthesis is aboutagainst capturing that theme of
work can be something morethere's a verse which is no
one's yet it's no one's yetexplained to me exactly what's

(23:20):
so great about slaving 50 yearsaway on something that you hate
about meekly shuffling down thepath of mediocrity, if that's
your road and take it, but it'snot the road for me, capturing
that age to what 25 As I was, atthe time, something like that,
still interested in acting atthe time. So it's like, this is
like a hard thing that I mightbe going to try and do
professionally. You know, andthat wasn't the path in the end

(23:40):
for me, but this is and whereI've ended up is here. But
having that telltale signs andthe album that that came out was
was like, is an incrediblebreakup album. And it happened
to me, just as my relationshipwith my university of girlfriend
had ended. And so I was able tokind of be in that space of like
life being destroyed because of,you know, feeling destroyed
because of a relationship endingwith that, and, and many other

(24:04):
things. But he also has a kindof, well, maybe there's two more
parts of it. So there's also anundoubted optimism, another
great song for people to checkout would be get better, which
is a song about the darkesttimes but remembering there's
still hope in those times. Andalso, I mean, maybe this is
maybe this is slipping a littleaway from the lyrics and a

(24:26):
little more into what's createdin the live shows. It became
very aware of what he was doing,he became aware that it was
something really special. Maybehe always knew this but once it
started to really happen onceeverybody started to learn the
words and sing He became reallyaware of how special it is to
have 2000 3000 10,000 peopletogether singing songs about

(24:46):
meaningful living a meaningfullife and what makes life
important. And so in 2016 when Idon't know if anyone remembers
the world went weird. Hereleased an album called be more
kind. And when just after COVIDWhen I went to the gigs he did
at the Roundhouse in in LA I'mdoing the kind of first gig
back, it's kind of stressful. Ihad to I got so claustrophobic
and acute for the bar, I had togo outside because we'd been

(25:06):
locked down and out of crowdsfor so long. And yet, when we
all sang in a world that hasdecided that it's going to lose
its mind, be more kind, myfriends tried to be more kind,
like, you know, I could see hewas in tears, there was this
amazing moment, right? It's atranscendent moment, those kinds
of things. And so it is thepoetry. And it's but it's also
the sense that we can cometogether in those moments and

(25:26):
speak about the Open Heart, theoptimism, the idealism. And
it's, it's quite something

that really touches me that idea of singing,
you know, I'm not at allreligious, but I absolutely can
see how singing hymns togetheris such a transformational
experience for people I oncewent on it as this was in
Glastonbury, not the festival,the place went to us, like a
sound healing workshop, but itwas singing and I can't sing

(25:53):
despite being called melody. I'minappropriately named. But it
was amazing to be in a room. Itwas the first time I'd ever been
in a room apart from at a gigwith a bunch of people singing,
and kind of the I don't know,like the energy that's created
between people who I didn't knowthem. It was all a bunch of
hippies basically wasincredible. I it was a long time

(26:14):
ago, and it still really, reallysticks in my mind. It's
something that I did that wasutterly random that I went for
this weekend to do it. But learnsomething about the joy of of
that kind of collective makingof noise.

Yeah, was to tell you, I mean, it might have also
been because it was that thatgig in 2021, I think at the
Roundhouse actually, it mighthave been because it was also
our first night, the first timethe first way we'd ever been, I
think, from our daughter, but itwas also because we were in a
room with 3000 people singingthe songs together. And my wife
and I were like, it was it was ahigh right to do that. And, you
know, there's lots more I couldsay about Frank Turner, and I

(26:49):
will Yeah, just invite peoplelike, I used to think that like,
you know, I would try and shareit with people and and for like,
I don't know what it is 19 outof 20 people that hear me say
all this stuff and go and listento Frank, there'll be like, What
is he on about what is this likeshouty you know, doll guitar
music, and then one in 20 Mightjust might have their life

(27:09):
changed. So it's worth it'sworth saying. But one of the
things I was remembering on thewhen I was thinking about this,
as well as it was actually at afrank gig and his wife, Jess was
whose Emma's my wife and hisfriend was supporting that gig.
It was between their set I waswhen I looked around the room,
and we had gone to the bar orthe bathroom. And and I had the
thought to myself, I rememberwriting it in emails myself,

(27:29):
let's This is a note for me,let's probably let's make
something that gets peoplecreating. And so in a way, like
the 12 Minute method books wereon the way at that point, but
they in a way, that was themoment as well. So that has
quite a because that moment wasquite important. I think it was
in a way for me a flag in thesand of like, even though lots
of other people have done this,including Frank Wright and some
of his songs, encouraging peopleto do the thing that they can

(27:52):
do, you know, to make artbecause it matters was a flag in
sand for me to do that, as well.Because it you know, part of the
reason again, we admire otherpeople is because they they do
things that we believe into,

well, we will be project parts of ourselves onto
the right let's move to yournext thing, which is waking up
in the workplace.

It's a bit of a gear change in some ways. So
like my bike, like I said, I hada half brother. And so we have
this wonderful relationship,which is we were never on top of
each other as kids enough tofight like basically never
fought. And we were greatfriends. And we're now we've
rekindled that by in the lastfew years. We're talking as much
now as we ever have, even thoughhe lives in the Netherlands and
I was a bit absent from thisweird work that he was doing.

(28:32):
Because he'd quite interested hewas always interested in
slightly weird off piste thingsagain, as you might expect from
somebody with weird off pistefamily, and he was doing some
weird stuff I didn't reallyunderstand about a philosopher
called Ken Wilber and theseother things, but he then even
then his friends made this thingwhich was waking up the
workplace. And it was aninterview series before everyone
was making interview series.Like maybe there were some other

(28:53):
people doing it, but I'd nevercut you know, now you get an
email every week saying calm andsign up for my free interview
series. It'll change your life.And it's kind of mailing list.
It's like a like one of thoseannoying things that people get
taught is how you build amailing list, which probably is
but they made this before thatwas a thing. And I didn't listen
to and then it ratherembarrassingly, I was I was in
Amsterdam with you and some ofhis friends, including one of
the friends that made this withand they were talking about it

(29:14):
and like a year after it comeout. And I hadn't listened. And
I was embarrassed at that point.Like I was like, why is this and
you know, it has that has kindof become a thing for me. It's
like how do you usually I wasactively supportive of the
people I cared about. Andsomehow this is just totally
passed me by. So I listened toit in the car I was driving to
and from the art centre that Iwas managing at the time. I'm
across Yorkshire and I had anhour each way every day pretty

(29:36):
much and I listened to itprobably over the space of a
month. And it had a huge impact.And the frame of the interview
series was about consciousbusiness, which was something
I'd never really heard aboutbefore there was there was a
conscious capitalism movement atthat time. It was inspired by
John Mackey of Whole Foods andsome others and the name calling
that phrase conscious businesshad been taken from a book by
Fred Kaufman, who again won'tcome back to essentially it was

(29:58):
what if business can be about upmore than just profit. And what
came out of I don't think theysaid this they may have was,
well what if work? Actually,they would they would start
every interview asking what iswork to you. And you know,
really it was what if work canbe. And business is not just a
thing you have to do to makemoney. But is can be a full
expression of who you are andwhat you have to give and be the

(30:19):
way that you make a differencein the world. So it's it's the
lyrics and photosynthesis, rightagain, in a different frame and
space. So there are a few thingsgoing on there. One of them was
it was the first time I heardthe word coach in the way that
it's talked about now. Becauseall the people asking the
questions were coaches, and Iwas like, why? Who are coaches?
And what are they? And why arethey asking questions? I found
it quite annoying. I definitelydidn't make me want to be a
coach. So that was all going on.It was a thing that my brother

(30:40):
had made. And again, it's likean under underrate like a thing
that I forget is I wassurrounded. Throughout my life.
I've been surrounded by familymembers making things and I was
one of those but particularly mybrother, my dad at different
times, like I said, My UncleMartin, My other uncle John,
like my mom, my aunt, we havelots and lots of people making
things, but this is the thingthat you and his friends had

(31:01):
made. And it was cool. That wasone part of it. Like they were
talking to some amazing people Ididn't I've never heard of any
of these people. I have heardfrom quite a lot of them quite a
lot more now. But so that washappening. And it was this idea
that what if what could be thatthing could be more or could be
meaningful in that way. Like andI knew that right? I was working
in that. And I was working inthe charity sector, essentially,

(31:21):
because that was what felthonourable. To me. That was
where the goodies were, as faras I was concerned. And
businesses were the baddies wereand I know that sounds semi
ridiculous, but that's exactlywhat I thought it was. So black
and white. It's embarrassing,right? But it's definitely what
I thought and then waking up theworkplace happened. And there
were these people on there whowere obviously thoughtful,
insightful, wise people. Andsome of them were saying not

(31:42):
only this was interesting to me,not only could business be a
place where you could make adifference in the world, but in
some ways, it was the, the wayto make the biggest impact in
the world. You know, and you canmake that argument lots of ways,
but one way is purely scale.Like if you're a leader in, you
know, actually a medium sizedorganisation, you know, I was

(32:02):
slapped thing is like when youhave like WhatsApp, you know,
I'm filling in a form that mybusiness, it's like, what size
business to use small to mediumis like, you know, 1000 to
50,000 people. And I'm like,well, it's me, and some
freelancers, you know, but it'slike, you know that that
business can be the place wherethere's this enormous
possibility for impact. So allof that together made quite an
impact on me, and I think reallydid plant the seeds for leading

(32:25):
with honour now. Because I whenI, when I moved, I went, I did
then have this kind of break,like I said, when I had had this
breakup, and then shortly afterthat, and was listening to Frank
being miserable, and beingmiserable myself, and as I came
back from that into work again,in a different place, I was
looking for conscious businessesto work and not really finding.
And you know, in the end, Ithink, because that move, that

(32:47):
movement didn't move as fast asI thought it would. But it is
moving now. And I think it'salso it's like, it's a part of
what part of what I aspire to bea part of, really, I was

coaching a senior leader in a very well known
global brands the other day, andhe was saying, you know, we're
talking about diversity, andsome of the challenges around
diversity and inclusion. And hesaid, Oh, you know, we can make
a difference in our ownorganisation. But you know,
these people have experiencesthat are outside of the
organisation, I don't think wecan do anything about that. And
I just said, I disagree. I said,I think your brand has the

(33:19):
ability to change the world, youknow, they're a global well
known brand, they, theyabsolutely can and should be
looking to, to influence the waythat people think and behave and
treat each other.

That makes me think of one of my mentors, man
who inspires me very much,Robert Holden, he has you can
find that he's done a lot ofwork with Dove. And he's often
he loves to tell a story andit's a very inspiring the real
beauty campaign at Darfur peoplecan go look that up, watch some
of the videos, but it's like,it's and you know, he does work
these days, I've heard him talkabout working on environmental
things with, you know, data andthose companies as well. And
it's, it's, it is possible, andsome people take that really

(33:54):
bold position. Now it's noteasy. You know, and I've worked
with lots of leaders andorganisations and being a leader
of small organisations myself,and I know that make doing those
things is not easy. And I thinkthat's the leading with honour
thing. So sometimes if peopleask me, What's definition of
honourable it's doing the rightthing, even when it's hard.

I think it's particularly difficult when you
have shareholders and reportingto the market and all of that I,
you know, that's been myexperience of working both in,
you know, listed and not listedcompanies is the listed
companies. They're so aware ofthat the shareholders and the
analysts and the market and, andit drives a particular risk

(34:33):
averse behaviour, I would say,

yeah. And I think, you know, what's interesting is
what I remember, and again, I'mnot an expert on this, I think
you've been a lot closer to itthan I have. And although I've
had some clients that are it's,it's not often I've been in
these conversations with peopleat the very top of those kinds
of organisations, if if everactually, but I think what I
remember about waking up theworkplace again, it's that
idealism is interesting, isn'tit? It's like, well, what do you

(34:55):
do about that? If you're theperson in that place? What do
you do? Is it really possibleHave a bit like you challenge
the person is it really truethat even under those pressures,
people can't be stepping in theright direction, instead of
letting things slip in the wrongdirection. It's like, I remember
somebody telling me that thestory of Enron wasn't like
everybody setting out to behugely corrupt. It's just

(35:16):
everybody compromising, like,their integrity, you know, 1% of
the time until the whole thingis sustained on fraud. So what
it takes is everybody to notcompromise their integrity would
be my hypothesis. And if you'rea leader of a multinational
corporation, and want to hire meto test that out, that will be
fun. Let's do

this brilliant. Anything else on the is it
waking up in the workplace orwaking up the workplace?

Waking up the workplace? Okay, all those both?
I think that was the play onwords, right? It's like, you
know, how do we wake up theworkplace for so that we can
wake up in it, but also, how dowe wake it up so that it's
something new? Anything else onthat? I mean, just that one of
the thoughts I've had recently,and again, I haven't the leading
with anything, it's not reallyin my branding, it's not really
a business thing that's outthere. It's just a way that I

(36:01):
think about my business now. ButI think when I listened to it,
and at the workplace, I wantedsomebody to already be have
listened to that running anorganisation that I could step
into and be part of somethinglike that. I just didn't really
find it, I found a few. But theyweren't the people like it,
there wasn't a way into it forme. And what's ended up
happening is me taking lots ofthe ideas from people who were
on in those interviews and moreand using that in my work. So

(36:24):
that the way I didn't end upworking in a conscious business,
but in a way I am working inconscious business, because I'm
talking about the ideas of youknow, I'm still reading Tammy
Simon's newsletter sometimes.And I'm still talking about the
ideas that Tony Schwartz or FredKaufman talked about in the
interviews on on that show, andstill remember remembering those
things. The weird thing is thatpeople won't listen to anything
at the workplace. Actually, I'mspeaking to my brother directly

(36:44):
after this, maybe I'll have I'llhave a go about it. But you have
to kind of download mp3 Solisten to it. It's not on iTunes
or anywhere. So it's likebecause it was because it
because it predates Applepodcasts. It predates, you know,
Spotify, you know, reallybecause it was as a certainly as
a podcast platform. Yeah, so itis pretty old school.

I'm definitely gonna go and listen to this.
Right. Let's move on to yournext one, which is creating the
wisdom of David Gemmell website.

Yeah. I mean, there's so much in this this is
like, this is the true geekyside of me. So right if King
Arthur and Robin Hood startedthose that that honour
storytelling, and then SpiderMan and the X Men and Batman
took that over, there was apoint where it moved into
reading fantasy novels, indifferent ways. And absolutely,
this is so funny, I think aboutthis a lot. A fundamentally key

(37:32):
moment in my life is to rememberon the back of things like the
Radio Times, there used to bethese book clubs advertised.
Remember this, where it's like,really cheap books on the back.
And then it was because you hadto keep buying from the book
club after those cheap books.But basically, the offer on the
back of one of these ones was sogood. For a really amazing
edition of Lord of the Rings. Itwas like two pounds for a book

(37:52):
that was only 40 pounds, that wesigned up for it, me and my mom.
And we got that and we got a 50P beautiful version of The
Hobbit. And then we had to getsome other things over the next
few months. And one of thethings we got was for books by a
British novelist called DavidGemmell. And it is no small, it
is no exaggeration to say again,another creator who absolutely

(38:12):
changed my life. And I read themand thought they were great. And
then I kept reading them overthe next over many years. And at
some point, I had this thoughtit was actually about something
else. But a bit like I wassaying about, you know, we
become who we're surrounded by.In fact, the thought I had was
Why do I never celebrate successvery well, why don't we always
move on to the next thing, and Iwondered if it's because I was a

(38:32):
Manchester United fan. And I'vewatched Sir Alex Ferguson be
interviewed so many times. Andyou know, he famous I can't
remember getting a bit wrong. Hefamously said, someone said, you
know, how long are you going to,you're going to savour this
moment, a European cup of wine,how long are you going to savour
this European Cup, when and howlong before you start thinking
about the next one, he says,I'll savour it for about five
minutes, something like that.And that's, that's why he won
more trophies than anybody elseever. But is that you know, I

(38:54):
was like, I've been surroundedby that. Maybe that's why I have
that attitude somewhat. And Ithought, Who else have I been
surrounded by for a long time,and I realised that read, I
probably read all of DavidGamble's books, three times some
of the more by this point, I waslike, that's a lot. And one of
the things you'll find, if youread a lot of David Reynolds
books is there are a lot ofrepeating motifs. So he doesn't
even have you know, if you'veseen an interview with him where

(39:15):
he doesn't even have any, he'snot even worried remotely about
that. He's totally happy. Thatthat's that's how it is because
it's, you know, he used to lovereading cowboy books where it
was essentially the same story,but that didn't stop them being
great. And so there were a lotof there were a lot of these
repeating motifs and ideas. Andyou know, a lot of them were,
you know, because he had astepfather in his life who was
very impactful on him. A lot ofthem were these kind of

(39:36):
surrogate father, to surrogateson relationships, old man to
young man relationships,teaching the young man how to
live and how to live with honouressentially, how to do the right
thing, what really matters andthe I think if you, if you
follow fantasy, that's oftenwhat the stories are about.
They're often about, you know,they're afraid about the hero's

(39:58):
journey, they're often aboutpersonal transformation. And in
quite explicit ways there thatmetaphor, you know that they're
often heavy metaphordeliberately or otherwise by the
authors. You know, I think,again, David Gemmell had no. He
died in 2006. But he I don'tthink he had any qualms about
saying, look, I think again,I've seen him say, if there was
one thing that could come frommy books is that more people
would act like heroes. So it'slike, you know, even knew it,

(40:19):
but they're brilliant readsright? If you like, you know,
that page turners, one of my exgirlfriends, in a fantastically
sort of backhanded way, said,Robbie just gave me this
incredibly trashy, brilliantbook, which is kind of a great
way to describe gave a gamblewhen you're, you know, although
I probably hurt by it at thetime. And so then this other
thing had happened, right, whichis that this is like, by then

(40:40):
I've had this idea for a while.Now, let's say this is in
2012 2013 20. Actually, by thetime the website is created,
probably 2050 to had this ideafor maybe five years at this
point, which is you could makeyou could pull out all the
wisdom from these books. Andit'd be a cool little book, you
could have something like that.You get like the little book of
Dalai Lama wisdom, you couldhave a little book of David
Gemmell wisdom, and I donenothing about it. And I'd also

(41:02):
seen it this wasn't the onlylike, speech marks in my view,
great idea that I'd had. But I'dsee the two others disappear.
I'd let them go. There's a greatwe're talking a little bit about
Liz Gilbert earlier on. And shehas this amazing bit in Big
Magic, she talks about how theidea if you don't snatch the
idea when it's there, it'll goon to somebody else. And they'll
do it. And I have these two.Absolutely. I mean, it's it's
mind blowing what happened,right. And this idea of a book

(41:25):
about a computer game, it was agreat idea for a book and I let
myself get talked out of it by afriend of a friend who said, I
like the game, but I'd never buythe book. And I let myself that
I let that stop me completely.The reason I know it's a great
idea for a book is somebody elsewrote it, got it published, and
it was very, very successful. Soit's like a great idea that I'd
like. And then I had this otheridea of our website, website
business idea. I didn't knowthis when I was creating the

(41:47):
wisdom of David gamble, but Ilet it go again, I kind of
looked it up online, and someonehad done something a bit
similar. And I decided that wasenough to stop it. Later on. My
friend introduced me to the CEOof the company that I had
dreamed up. So again, the Macthe idea had gone on to
something else. And I kind ofknew that these ideas had gone
up. But I but there's the reasonthis story is really important
for me is the first time Ireally beat what Steven

(42:08):
Pressfield calls resistance. SoI had this bizarre story going
on. I was like, I don't want todo anything with this. Because
if I do, someone might steal theidea, I might lose it again,
when in fact not doing anythingabout the ideas was why I'd lost
those other two. And and I hadthis conversation with my friend
anger coaching session, really aworkshop that we went to the
first time we've met and nowwe're we're still in touch years

(42:29):
later, and in your asked me thisgreat question, which is because
I had all these excuses for notmaking the website, you know, by
this point, it could be awebsite could be a book,
whatever. And she said, Look,how many people would need to
have an impact with this wouldneed to, like be invited to the
same impact that this had on youby your website for it to be
worth you making it? Becausethat was like, Well, no one will

(42:49):
read it was one of the manyexcuses for not doing it. And
then she really turned the knifebecause she said, because I've
got a 14 year old son, somethinglike that at home. And like it's
speaking to me as though itmight speak to him. Of course,
that's the real knife turnedbecause for me at that point, I
know the only the I don't leadby sundown, but it's like the
only answer to that question isone person, right? If one person
like the amount of impact thatthat that work had on me, only

(43:11):
one person needs to only oneperson needs to feel even a
fraction of that for it to beworth me making a website. And
so I made that website in theend. And I made it using
essentially what became the 12Minute method. You know, it's
you know, I didn't call it thatat the time. And it was before
my blog, which is where the 12Minute method came from. But it
was I'm overwhelmed by thisbecause I had like, over these
five years I had on my nextreread of David Reynolds books,

(43:34):
I'd collected all the quotes, Ialready had the spreadsheet at
this point, I just hadn't takenany action was wrapped in
procrastination, all thesethings. And what I did in the
end was I I just have to do oneat a time. I'll do one at a time
for now, then at least it'll bestarted. And I've just sheduled
weekly wisdom email number 360Something so 360 Odd weeks, I

(43:56):
did in the middle of a housemove and some family stuff last
year, I did miss quite a fewweeks. But you know, accepting
those weeks like somethingsomething of the order of the
last 360 Something weeks,someone has received an email
with a with a David Gemmellquote. And there's a website
with many, many on it. And itexists now. And so that's
important because I got somecoaching on it. It's one of the
first real impacts of coachingon me. And it's important

(44:16):
because I made a thing, despiteall the procrastination despite
all of the reasons that we don'tmake things which were
definitely present in thatpeople want kind of long
division of that story they cancheck out. There's an episode of
the 12 Minute method podcastwhere I talk about it, you know,
and it's like, it's abouthonour. So the reason that
leading with honour later cameto me was because I was
thinking, How do I make my workcontain all the things that I'm

(44:37):
about? Right? Because in theend, if I'm going to do the
absolute best work and have thebiggest impact that I can, I'm
going to want all parts of me tobe part of it. And I realised
two things. I never talked aboutthe wisdom of David Gemmell when
I was talking about my work everand I had some values that
really mattered to me, and Italked about three of them a
while and the fourth one honourI never mentioned, and it's
like, well, that's got to stophasn't. So at that point in that

(45:00):
Whether for the first timethat's when the seeds of what if
leading with honour was a thingfor me

emerged? So it sounds like it's true. It's
multiple things, isn't it? It'sthe content of this honour being
central, but unspoken, to thatpoint. And then also this just
you applying this, what becamethe 12 Minute method and using
that and that sort of antiprocrastination thing? That's a

(45:26):
core part of what you talkedabout as well.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think that bit, that
second part is can't beunderstated, really, it's not
that it was the first thing I'dever made. But in this phase of
my life, as an adult, you know,I think my friend, Joe Hunter,
who's a real inspiration to meinsurance company called 64
million artists who I do somework with now, and which is
about catalysing creativity forbusinesses. For individuals. She

(45:51):
talks about it too aboutsometimes, you know, a creative
child stops, being creativeadult runs into stories about
perfectionism has these all thisstuff that locks them up and
traps them and holds them backfrom creativity, through
perfectionism through all thesekinds of fears and ways that we
get in our own way. And in a waythat the wisdom of David Gemmell
was my first almost, I mean,maybe starting my business was

(46:12):
and the career change. But thiswas a really explicit creating
just for the sake of creatingjust because it's the right
thing to do, not knowing how itwill go not knowing where it
will land or what it's for.Because creating a thing is a
thing we can do in the 21stcentury and make it reach people
because of the internet. Andbecause the right you know, I'm
really, really being called tocreate it. So that kind of

(46:32):
thing, really, the treatment ofFFPs beating procrastination,
finally doing the things we'vebeen meaning to do. That really
captured all that for me.

Thank you. Right, final one. I love this. It's
time for you to tie.

Yeah, it was an article. So by this point. So
about a year after I started waswith David Gemmell, I started my
blog, which people don't know,just really quickly, it was
about me procrastinating andfeeling like every time I shared
something, it was agonising. Andme and my coach designed a
practice where I'd write on thetrain at first later for 12
minutes with a timer, write anarticle while the trains moving
on China's going stop when itstops proofread it once posted

(47:08):
online as a way to practice justmaking something and sharing it.
And about one of the things Isay in my third book, How to
create the conditions for greatwork is which of which it's time
for you to die, which is a is achapter of is that feels really
important because it was areally it was a piece of great
work. Like I can really see thatlooking back. And I could feel

(47:29):
it in the moment, actually. Butit came two years into
practising writing articles inthat way. So it's like
practising is does matter is apart of the story. That's a part
of why this matters.Essentially, I'd been reading a
book by Fred Kaufman, who'd beena guest on waking up the
workplace, he'd written the bookconscious business, and then his
next book had come out, which iscalled the meaning revolution,
which I still think is one ofthe most complete leadership

(47:50):
books that I've come across,incredibly practical, but also
deep, I'd recommend it. Like ifI'd worked in an organisation
like a big organisation, that'sthe book I'd want to read to
help me cope better and leadbetter. And I'd read that and
one of the chapters is calleddie before you die, which is
from, I think, an old Zenproverb maybe die before you
die, so that you can truly live.And I've read that and has been

(48:13):
reading about that. And then Ifound myself with a coaching
client, one of the thingsKaufman says in one of those
chapters in that chapter in thatbook is he direct tries to
remember that before everycoaching session that he does,
because that means he stopped,like he started to think well,
what if this is the last time Iever speak to this client, like,
I don't want to be holding back,I don't want to be risking that
I don't get the chance to saythe important thing or reflect

(48:34):
the important thing to them. AndI went into a coaching session
with one of my clients havingread that, and it absolutely
reinvigorated that that coachingengagement. It was a very, very
powerful call that the two of ushad. And I came out of that. And
I sat and I needed to write a 12minute article. And so I sat
down and I set my timer for 12minutes only rotate about that
idea that we have to die beforewe die so that we can truly live

(48:56):
and there's so much in that somany like it wasn't just drawing
on Kaufman's influence it was itwas other people too. And and in
that was, you know, Kaufmanquotes Braveheart? Excellent. So
there's an element of the youknow, and one of the things
William Wallace says he says inBraveheart is, what do you say
says every man dies, but notevery man lives? Right? It's
like, you know, in Braveheartagain, is that is that same

(49:18):
thing, right? You can take ourlives, but not our freedom. It's
the same ideas. It's like, weactually, we can do the right
thing, even though we're goingto lose. And so I wrote this
piece, and I and then somethinginteresting happened, which is
that my friend Jacinta, whoworks at a coaching company that
I work for, knows Fred Kaufman,and she saw the article and she
sent it to Fred. And so by theend of that day, Fred had

(49:41):
commented on the article andshared it and it had got was
already getting hundreds ofreads and it's now assigned
reading on Fred Kaufman'sconscious business coaching
course. They share that articlethat I wrote in 12 minutes one
afternoon in Battersea with withpeople who are learning about it
because it really captured himand that's me. He calls me
because, you know, I mean, what,seven years earlier I was

(50:03):
listening six years earlier, Iwas listening to waking up the
workplace thinking about thisstrange Argentinian man who
lives in America who'd written abook and was being interviewed
on on some presumed zoom.Without video, I'm sure by my
brother and his friends had nowread and shared one of my
articles and not like and saidit was a beautiful article,
which had been written in 12minutes, which is also slightly
nuts. Right. And so there was somuch about that. But when I look

(50:25):
back on it, it's also one ofthese absolutely, it's a
principle that changes mecompletely to die before you die
to do the kind of exercises thatthat he talks about in that art
that he talks about, that Italked about in the article,
both the ones from from Kauffmanand from other people that day,
I think having written thearticle, I, one of the things he
says in his, in his workshops,when he's talking about that

(50:46):
principle is he'll ask people,you know, if you only had three
minutes to live, who would youcall them? What would you say?
And he invites people to thinkabout that. And then he reminds
them, but you won't know, almostcertainly you won't. Most of us
don't know when we've only gotthree minutes left to live. And
he says in the break after that,whenever there's the next break,
there's always people on thephone, right. And I was thinking

(51:07):
about it a lot. And I think Iposted the article, and then I,
I thought about it. And so Iphoned my wife. And it was it
was surreal. Like I can rememberit like absolute crystal
clarity. It felt like you know,in a movie where somebody's kind
of got to fly the nuclear bombinto the volcano or whatever.
And they call somebody at thelast minute, they don't say like
my wife was leaving her desk togo to like lunchtime yoga in her

(51:28):
office or something. I couldn'tsay at that point. I'm doing
this exercise about who I wouldcall with three minutes to live
for exactly the same reason thatthey don't tell them on the
phone to their wife, or kids orhusband or kids, whatever, when
they're flying the plane is thevolcano. It's like, there's just
this, you know, had tearsstreaming down my face. And yet
the whole day was intechnicolour. After that, I
remember walking to meet her andinvites that same, you know,

(51:50):
that same live in the moment, dothe right thing attitude that I
think if we get back Frank livesthat that ideal isn't from
childhood, it invites all thosesame things. And it had this
amazing, and it's a part of the12 Minute method. It's a part of
now of that third book as well.

I'm just writing those notes. Actually, I'm just
gonna be on Google. I'd said toyou before, I don't know what I
do without Google. Now you'vejust given me more things to
Google.

Thank you. Yeah. And I did warn you that I would
be name checking many, manythings, because that's how I
that's how I think right now, Istorytelling, I try and draw
things together for myself.

And what I'll do is I'll add some links in the
notes from the episode as wellso that people can access things
if they don't love Google justquite as much as I do. What's
next for you?

It's a great question, really. So I published
four books in the space of justover a year, last year ending at
the end of 2022. And I had aproject to appear on lots of
podcasts, which is also why Iended up talking to you. So
thank you so much for being partof that. So what's interesting
is the work I'm doing with mycoach at the moment is, is to
really step away fromessentially goal setting. So

(52:49):
part of the way that I foundthat I had to the things that I
needed to do to beatprocrastination and do projects
off the scale of publishingthose books, was to be
incredibly focused on what isimportant, the tasks, the goal,
the thing that is most importantto me here and say no to a lot
of other things. And actually,I'm out of energy for that. So
my coach, he likes the polarityof love and will. And so I've

(53:10):
used up like all my will,getting all these things out,
and I need to really relax intothe love energy instead. So for
these six months, this firsthalf of 2023, my most important
task is to follow what's followwhat I'm interested in, and to
see what emerges. So I don'treally know what's next. I mean,
I'm playing with it's a coupleof interesting things, I'm
interested in about marketingthe books and doing a few other

(53:30):
things my coaching business hasgrown, actually, in that time
thing, it's just now it's gotspace, or because the books are
out. And they're a goodmarketing tool for some things
that's going on. But in terms ofa big thing. I mean, I guess
talking about it today, I thinkthere'll be some kind of leading
with honour business thing thathappens in my business at some
point, I don't quite know whatthat'll be. So, and it's nice to
be in that place as a real wasdefinitely a massive is very

(53:53):
important. I think for people ifthey especially kind of run
their own business to be able touse the will and have the
polarity to really carefullyavoid distractions and get
things done. But sometimes it'salso good to open to the other
things to the more intuitivepiece, which of course,
interestingly, the 12 MinuteWriting Practice does both
right, it sets aside structurevery structured time to like, I

(54:14):
will write an article this week.And then in that I get to let
intuition run wild, which meansthat sometimes I write a piece,
which I'm super proud of, like,it's time for you to die. It's
like planned spontaneity,absolutely. You have to have the
container around something. Andthat's what coaching is, as
well. It's like create acontainer in which someone's
best thinking can happen. Andcreative practices is a great
way to do that.

I was actually just having that conversation
with my coach slash therapist.And I was saying that, for me in
the sort of quiet times I do alot of gathering of information
and reading and all of the restof it, but what actually causes
it to kind of coalesce, Isuppose is the pressure of a
deadline or, you know, and Ithink if I didn't have those,

(54:58):
the ideas wouldn't ever come tome. because they would just all
swim around in my mind but Butwhat causes the great stuff to
come out is some pressure and agoal and a focus yeah definitely
completely agree love it greatadvice to your younger self,
your younger self can be any agewhat would your advice be?

Well as like as well as people can imagine, as
well as a fantasy nerd. I alsolike impartial some science
fiction. So I've got to saymelody. I'm wearing this
question always. I have a very Ilove my life. I don't want to
disrupt the space time continuumtoo much.

Okay. It's dangerous, is it?

She does a slightly disturb it's quite
funny like working title typefilm with Bill Nighy. And I
forgot what it's called. Butmaybe it's called Flex something
a bit felt like it's about timewhere a time traveller
accidentally, like changes hischild Yes, by changing something
in the past. So he comes backand rather terrifying. He has a
different baby, which Yeah, wedon't want that. So what would I
say? I think the thing that Iget pangs of regret about is I

(55:54):
just didn't really believe theidea of practice. Like I didn't
go to I like sport a lot. Whydid I not play for any clubs?
Really? I played for school.It's different sports. But I was
thinking last night, why did Inever like play cricket. I
really loved watching cricket.And the reason is I thought
cricket clubs of people who aregood at cricket, which in a way

(56:15):
they were, but I didn't knowthat if you went to Cricket
Club, you might become good atcricket. And it's the most
obvious thing in the world. Butit's taken me it took me like 35
years or something about when Iwas 35. I read bounced around
that side. And it finally it wasa final nail in the in the
practice versus talent coffin tomix some metaphors there for me,
so I think I would if I couldhelp my younger self be a bit
more relaxed about being bad atthings and find ways to learn

(56:38):
and enjoy learning, you know,even one or two years earlier to
have that insight and absorb it.I wish I would take that for
sure.

Definitely. Brilliant. Thank you. And my
last question is strap line ortitle for your secret restroom.
I

found a quote Frank Turner lyrics, but I think
I like I think it shouldprobably be, it's just such a
powerful thing to really trulyface our mortality. So let's I
think that the strap line isprobably die before you die, so
that you can really live.

I love it. So thank you, Robbie, I have
thoroughly enjoyed today ourconversation. It's been a roller
coaster of I've literally beenwriting so many nights as we've
been talking. So thank you somuch.

It's been an absolute pleasure and excellent
therapy and coaching from you.You're welcome.

You probably can tell that I could have talked to
Robbie for hours, I loved ourdiscussion about conscious
business and if work could bemeaningful, and not just a way
to make money. And I think it'ssomething that Robbie and I both
share a passion for. And alsothat ability of businesses and
big brands to have an enormousimpact in the world not just in

(57:51):
making lots of money and sellinglots of things but actually
changing the way that peoplethink and the way that they
behave towards each other. He'sthe first of my guests to talk
about how music has influencedhim and certainly song lyrics
and his talking about FrankTurner and and that message of
kindness really reminded me ofthat quote, and I don't know

(58:13):
where it's from. In a worldwhere you can be anything. Be
kind. I hope you enjoyed thisepisode of The Secret resume. If
you did, remember to Like,Share, Comment, and Subscribe.
As that helps people like youfind people like us.

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Episode 6 - Robbie Swale - Die Before You Die So That You Can Really Live

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 6 - Robbie Swale - Die Before You Die So That You Can Really Live