Take Control and Dream Big by Designing Your Life
"Designing your life" intentionally uses design thinking principles to create a fulfilling and meaningful life. The idea is to approach life as a design problem and use the same tools and techniques designers use to create products or services to create a life well-suited to your goals, interests, and values.
Become a member here:
Some of the critical benefits of designing your life include the following:
Clarifying your goals and values: By taking a deliberate approach to designing your life, you will gain a clearer understanding of what is important to you, what you want to achieve, and what you want your life to look like.
Increasing creativity and innovation: Design thinking encourages experimentation and iteration, which can help you generate more creative and innovative ideas for your life.
Improving decision-making: By taking a structured approach to decision-making, you can make more informed and effective choices that align with your goals and values.
Enhancing resilience and adaptability: Design thinking emphasizes flexibility and adaptability, which can help you cope with unexpected challenges and setbacks in life.
Creating a sense of purpose and fulfilment: By designing a life that aligns with your values and goals, you can develop a sense of purpose and satisfaction that can lead to greater happiness and well-being.
RUNSHEET
Author Dave Evans, whose book shows you how to create a meaningful, joyful, and fulfilling life
Design Thinking your life (2m07)Jim Rohn on how designing our lives starts by considering your habits today
An undesigned life (57s)Simon Sinek on how our WHY is who you are at your natural best
Friends test (2m04)Aurelius Tjin talks about the practical value of making small improvements to our lives to make a positive difference, based on Robert Maurer’s The Spirit of Kaizen
One percent better a day_PN (3m03)Jen Sincero and Michael Neimand (Network Marketing) call us out and tell us to stop worrying and start doing
Disappointment is a short experience_PN (2m01)Joseph Murphy closes the episode with a call to action: own the life you want to live
Whatever You Give Attention To The Subconscious Magnifies_PN (3m47)
TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Mike Parsons: Hello, and welcome to the Moonshots Master Series. It's episode 21. I'm your co-host, Mike Parsons. And as always, I'm joined by Mark Pearson Freeland. Good morning. Good morning,
[00:00:12] Mark Pearson Freeland: Mike. Good morning, listeners, subscribers and members. Boy, what an action packed turning of age episode 21. We have in store for all of you subscribers today as part of the master series.
[00:00:26] Mike Parsons: Mark, I think this is all about, that famous saying m seizing of the day. I think that is the moment we have come to. So why don't you set up this master series? That's
[00:00:38] Mark Pearson Freeland: right. We are launching into an entire episode and show dedicated to the concept and idea. Of designing your life. Now, some of our subscribers may be familiar with the book by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans on Designing Your Life, where we've really taken an inspiration from that book as well as our recent series, delving into happiness, empowerment, the idea of taking control over your life, as well as the elements that are within it.
[00:01:07] Mark Pearson Freeland: Sometimes as we're gonna find out on the show, and certainly for me, You feel a little bit like you lose control occasionally, and you start to think. Who can I point this finger at ? I think today we're gonna find out through the concept and idea and the introduction of designing your life, that there's a lot more that we can do when it comes to taking control as well as empowerment and ownership within our lives.
[00:01:32] Mike Parsons: Yeah. So if you are feeling some moments of uncertainty, doubt, or maybe you're just downright bummed and you are fed up with things, we all know that there's a temptation mark that you might want to blame the circumstances or blame others. I've certainly been victim of that. How about you? Oh,
[00:01:52] Mark Pearson Freeland: for sure.
[00:01:52] Mark Pearson Freeland: There's been many times. Unfortunately, if I have to o admit it on Mike, for everybody to hear that. There have been times in my life when it just feels a little bit easier to turn the mirror around at somebody else and say, oh, it didn't work for me. Or, you know whose fault that is? Yeah.
[00:02:10] Mark Pearson Freeland: And really what? Started to discover, particularly on all of the individuals and the books and the shows that we've done on the Moonshot Show, as well as the master series, is that it doesn't have to be like that. You don't have to fall into that temptation. And that desire to turn it around and point towards somebody else, I think there's so much we can learn from these individuals that it's all down to us, isn't it?
[00:02:36] Mark Pearson Freeland: Nothing
[00:02:36] Mike Parsons: good comes of blaming others. If you think about the technical thing, if I was to blame you for my unhappiness I, there is no resolution to that process that is gonna help me because in the end, I need to have the courage to turn the lens towards myself and say where I am now. Is on me and nobody else.
[00:03:03] Mike Parsons: My circumstances, my results are on me. Nobody else, and it's, what's really interesting is these guys from Stanford Burnett and Evans are in violent agreements. So here you've got super smart professorial types from Stanford who are telling us the same story as the stoics come to the modern day.
[00:03:25] Mike Parsons: Think about guys in a totally different space. Willing Navy Seal, David Goggins, strongest man, craziest man on the planet. In the end, the theme of all of those people is it is on you and the quicker you are to accept that, you are able to move through it and beyond it. If you don't take that ownership or what Yako willing would say, extreme ownership, if you don't do that, Then you will continue to be in the quagmire.
[00:03:58] Mike Parsons: You'll be in the quicksand of, I'm not feeling great, I'm not happy. Work's not great. Relationships aren't awesome. If you take that level of ownership and accountability, the beautiful thing is at some point, mark, we ask ourselves well. What should we do? What's next? What? How do I get outta this?
[00:04:19] Mike Parsons: And the answer is design your life. And Mark, we've got a great clip to launch into, so why don't you
[00:04:28] Mark Pearson Freeland: set it up. We've got a great clip to all launch into from the author, one of the authors of Design in your Life with Dave Evans who's gonna kick off our Master series episode today, Mike. So why don't we jump straight in and understand a little bit more about design thinking your.
[00:04:44] Mark Pearson Freeland: Is it really
[00:04:45] Dave Evans: true? It's never too late. Yes, it really is. So build your way forward by designing your life. Now what does that mean? The secret sauce is this design thinking. So very briefly, design thinking is one of a number of ways of thinking, way of engineering thinking. Engineering thinking solves problems, way well understand.
[00:05:00] Dave Evans: That's great. Good way to build a bridge, build it today. It works. Build it tomorrow. It works. Fine. You know that's a great solution. We got business. In business, you're never right. You're never done. You never have enough profitability or enough customer satisfaction, but you can optimize. You can have figures of marriage.
[00:05:14] Dave Evans: You can learn how to think in an optimization, awaken into a research like we do at the university. Start with a hypothesis dependent, independent variables, a whole series of steps to get down to the critical question. It's a wonderful analytic approach. So I can solve my way forward. I can optimize my way forward it, I can analyze my way forward it.
[00:05:29] Dave Evans: But all those tame problem solutions, bounded, understood problem solutions don't solve wicked problems when you don't know what you're looking for until you find it like your own life. And that's when you have to build your way forward. And design thinking is a way to build your way forward and solve a wicked problem.
[00:05:43] Dave Evans: It does two, has two descriptions of process and a set of mindsets. The process says five. You start with empathy, really understand what's going on, then define your point of view. Then have some ideas, try them out and go test them before you hit the world. And before you do any of that, don't forget to accept reality the way it is, because trust me, it goes through a place that looks just like today.
[00:06:03] Dave Evans: No matter where you are, you're starting the right place. The mindsets, the way a designer kinda looks at things are pretty simple, , we start with curiosity. Ooh, that's interesting. Which is gonna cause us to go talk to a whole bunch of people. Though radical collaboration doesn't mean radical ideas.
[00:06:15] Dave Evans: It means radically talk to everybody. And in so doing, I'm probably gonna get a new point of view. I'm gonna reframe the way I think about some things. I'm gonna keep the process steps in mind, so I get neither ahead of nor behind myself. And eventually, when and out do something, quit thinking and analyzing.
[00:06:29] Dave Evans: Go do stuff. We build and we do to think. So what is this designing a life? What? What do you guys actually talk about? It's a whole bunch of stuff. It. That's way too much. Okay, so could you have simplified that Dave could, you're not looking down?
[00:06:41] Mike Parsons: Yeah, there's three
[00:06:41] Dave Evans: things. Get curious,
[00:06:44] Mark Pearson Freeland: talk to people,
[00:06:45] Mike Parsons: try stuff, get curious.
[00:06:48] Mike Parsons: It's really the first thing you need to do when you are experiencing doubt, uncertainty, fight, or. And you're just a bit bummed with the world. Get curious and ask yourself, how might I live? How might I do things that feel closer to the real person that I am? How do I feel more satisfied and fulfilled? Dave sounded like he had a lot of espresso when he was talking to Mark
[00:07:21] Mike Parsons: He covered a lot of ground in a couple of minutes. Curiosity how do we start with that curiosity, mark? I think
[00:07:28] Mark Pearson Freeland: the curiosity for me when I hear Dave talking is he's speaking to the part of me that is around the growth mindset concept. So what I mean by that is there have been times in my career and maybe even.
[00:07:45] Mark Pearson Freeland: Personal or social life and career life that I have ignored the ability or the opportunity to learn something new or to, as Dave says, get curious about something that is maybe how I'm feeling, maybe how I'm collaborating with the team. Maybe a point of view from somebody else in the room and this idea.
[00:08:08] Mark Pearson Freeland: So get curious. First of all is pretty broad, isn't it? The way that I'm interpreting it though is maintain a focus in your life and a desire to learn something new and not think that you are the smartest person in the room, not think that you know all the answers. Instead, if you can take a step back and say, okay, this has just happened.
[00:08:29] Mark Pearson Freeland: Instead of freaking out, I'm gonna get curious. Yeah. Why did this happen? What could I learn and change next time so that, maybe I respond a bit better, maybe I manage my team a little bit more firmly. Maybe it's something that has happened in my life where now I'm just. A little bit more curious to go out and maybe run a little bit further.
[00:08:49] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yeah, I think back deck, curious is a life lesson really, isn't
[00:08:52] Mike Parsons: it? It is. It is. There's a lot of sayings, isn't there? That the day you stop learning is the day you die, right? Yeah. That theme, obviously, super growth mindset. So check out our show on Carol D's book mindset. Huge shout out.
[00:09:07] Mike Parsons: Huge hugely influential in my own life. What a great book. I can't believe how many times I've recommended this as a book to folks. But back to the curiosity thing, I think it's if you know what is happening around you, you simply need to start asking more about how did that happen and why did that happen?
[00:09:27] Mike Parsons: That's a really simple framework. Oh, I see what happened, but how and why? That's the beginning of the story. I, what I love is the build that we get from Dave Evans there through his haze of Caffeination. . Beyond curiosity is talking to people, trying stuff and telling your story. These are just some fundamental steps for us to take and do you know what's interesting, mark is.
[00:09:56] Mike Parsons: Talking to people is one thing, but I think there's also an invitation in when you talk to people to maybe say, Hey, I'm not sure if I'm doing the right thing. Yeah, I'm not sure if I'm on the right path because I think it's a bit tempting to say when people say housework and you say, ah, that's pretty good.
[00:10:15] Mike Parsons: No, it's fine. But actually you are sitting there going, I don't even know if I'm in the right career and the right industry in the right role. There's all these going. I think it's really important to explore that by being vulnerable. I think if you say, Hey, I'm really feeling uncertain. And then saying what do you think?
[00:10:33] Mike Parsons: And particularly with your good friends, colleagues, I think that's the start. If you're curious am I on track asking people for their feedback? I think that leads you to trying stuff and getting out there and telling your story. That, that's whole full circle. How do you, how would you encourage your friends and colleagues to have these sorts of conversations beyond the classic Oh yeah, no, it works.
[00:10:57] Mike Parsons: Life's good. How's your relationship? Oh, yeah, we're doing well. The
[00:11:01] Mark Pearson Freeland: small the small talk, I suppose you could call it. I think first of all, what's interesting is this idea of talking to people. It's not necessarily the first time we've run into this concept. We, I remember Jordan Peterson, for example, was, Would recommend that you hold yourself accountable by sharing your business dreams or your desire to go and do something with others, and then they can hold you accountable.
[00:11:26] Mark Pearson Freeland: So I think there's, first of all, an insight within that.
[00:11:30] Mike Parsons: Oh, which I think that's great. That's even the classic diet and exercise thing, the, like the social accountability. Once you've told people you're running a marathon,
[00:11:41] Mark Pearson Freeland: Something. Run it. . Yeah. I don't wanna lose face. I better go and run it, but I But to your insight, Mike.
[00:11:47] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think the way that I would encourage as let's put myself in a people leader perspective, or even just a colleague somebody who, or the same level, or maybe it's a friend or a partner, what I would encourage them to do, Is to go into more detail through quite simple little prompts. So for example, if the question was, Hey, we just finished that really difficult project, how was it?
[00:12:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: And their response, let's say was, oh yeah, it's good. It was fine. I'm glad to be done with it. I think what I would try and encourage myself to do is, again, going back to Dave's points, get curious and say, okay, why did you say that? Why? Do you feel this? And try to encourage more of an a lens of observation from the individual who I'm talking to, to reflect, to consider, maybe even encourage them down the line.
[00:12:42] Mark Pearson Freeland: Write it down, reflect on it, play it back to me. Yeah. Yeah. I think initially it's just encouraging them to stay curious as well, rather than
[00:12:50] Mike Parsons: shutting down. So if we look at things that have happened, the what happened? Great exercises are of huge constraint. So you say, okay, so we just did a project together.
[00:13:01] Mike Parsons: What if you could just change only one thing about how you. , what would you change? , right? . These sort of exercises start to reveal to you a little bit more understanding because it, I think it's also really important to acknowledge that it is incredibly natural and to be expected that throughout your life there will be huge moments of indecision and uncertainty.
[00:13:27] Mike Parsons: This idea of designing your life, this idea of. Stepping forward of getting curious and talking to people. Even if you get curious, talk to a bunch of people and results in very little change. It only affirms. What you are doing well, hey, that's a great feeling to know you are doing what you were designed to do as a human being.
[00:13:53] Mike Parsons: You're living the life that is as close as you can to what you dream of. If it only serves as a confirmation, that is actually the worst result you could think of, and it's only upside from there. Now, surely if you are doing something and you have a huge awakening and you go, oh my gosh, I'm in to, in the totally wrong position wow, this is a process to get it done now.
[00:14:16] Mike Parsons: So we've got pretty fired up. We've drunk a espresso just like Dave Evans. However, there is a flip side to all of this and the great author. Jim Ron, who's done so much great work. We have to do a show on Jim, by the way. We've pulled in a clip from Jim who basically provides us the choice.
[00:14:38] Mike Parsons: We've talked a lot about making this active choice to design your life. He's gonna look on the other side and he's gonna challenge us with. What are you really gonna do? This is for
[00:14:48] Jen Sincero: mature people. Now, if you keep up your present disciplines and keep up the present pace that you're on, where will you be in five years?
[00:14:55] Jen Sincero: Oh, it's easy to say, Hey, I haven't really thought about that. So now make this note. In five years, here's the probability. You will either arrive at a well designed destination or an undesigned destination, well designed or undesigned. And I promise you, five years or now you really don't want to arrive at an un.
[00:15:15] Jen Sincero: Destination. Cause you may very well wind up wearing what you don't want wear and driving what you don't wanna drive, living where you don't wanna live. Maybe doing what you don't wanna do simply because you didn't design a better destination. Key. Praise upfront, the decisions are easy now, sometimes after we've lived a few years now to repair our mistakes and get back on track.
[00:15:38] Jen Sincero: Seems like a tough job. If you've messed up your health for 10 years. I'm telling you it takes more than 10 days to get it
[00:15:44] Mark Pearson Freeland: back. Mike I love this breakdown from the legend, Jim. I think what a kind of appetizer entree that we've got for today's master series, with Dave, followed by Jim, because I think the insight that they're both calling us out on is twofold.
[00:16:02] Mark Pearson Freeland: One, as Dave was calling out, stay curious or get curious, talk to people and try stuff and so on. And then the flip side, Which is Jim, who I would say is reflecting, enabling us to reflect back on the life that we could have had, had. We have followed, Dave's advice about getting KIS and so on is frontloading the work that we do on our lives, our careers, and ourselves as early as possible as he can in your life.
[00:16:28] Mark Pearson Freeland: Because we know how hard it is to create habits, adapt existing habits, maybe even remove a previous habit. Instead where I think. I'm really learning and appreciating what Jim's calling out is. He's saying, yeah, it's never too late, but you might as well start today and start to make those small little incremental changes.
[00:16:52] Mark Pearson Freeland: Focus on creating a designed life because by not designing it, and physically what we're talking about with design is I think taking ownership. Controlling how you respond to situations. Controlling what you spend your time on the habits that you have, because if you allow those. Go haywire,
[00:17:09] Mark Pearson Freeland: , we, yeah. If you lose priority, then we are a product of our monkey mind. And just imagine
[00:17:14] Mike Parsons: circumstance and circumstance. And you know what Jim says? Mark says, if you don't arrive at the destination you design, you are by default arriving at a destination that others have designed for you.
[00:17:25] Mike Parsons: And nobody is prioritizing you like you. So it's chances are it's not gonna serve you. And I think. This is a huge lesson. Get curious, continuously calibrate and iterate about what you're doing, how you're doing it, why you're doing it, and to make a sharp point of it. If you do not make that decision, you are invariably gonna feel less satisfied and less fulfilled.
[00:17:50] Mike Parsons: But I tell you, there's a group of people, mark. And they have made a very active decision. They are designing their life. They are fine tuning. They are calibrating to operate on the highest level. And that is our members.
[00:18:02] Mark Pearson Freeland: Mark. These members, Mike, we, maybe we should just do a heartfelt episode just calling out the members because at some point we're gonna reach a time when it takes longer for me to read out our growing membership list than the show itself.
[00:18:16] Mark Pearson Freeland: So please, without further ado, Or maybe I should get a real trumpet when we do. Our next stage, Mike, and that's with Bob, John Terry Maral and Ken Dimar, Marja and Connor, Lisa, Sid, Mr. Bonjour and Paul Berg, Kaman, David, Joe Crystal, and Ivo, our annual members. Congratulations and extra for all of you guys, but as usual, That list will not stay static and hot on their heels.
[00:18:45] Mark Pearson Freeland: Include Christian, Sam, Kelly and Barbara, Andre, Matthew, Eric and Abby, Chris, Deborah Lase, Steve Craig, Daniel Andrew, and Ravi eVet, Karen Raul, PJ Niko. Ola, Ingram and Duck. Emily, Harry Karthik and Vanatta. Marco Suns Jet. Pablo Roger, Steph Ga, Anna Raw Nien James, as well as our brand new members, Eric and Diana.
[00:19:13] Mark Pearson Freeland: Welcome, Eric and Diana, as well as welcome to all of our members of the Master series. Thank you so much for being with us. Week in, week out, month in, month out, and we hope that you're having a wonderful time with all of the extra goodies that you get as being members of the Moonshots Master Series.
[00:19:31] Mike Parsons: Yes, big thanks to all of you members, and I hope that you are designing your lives and you are getting after it, and you are getting curious.
[00:19:41] Mike Parsons: And don't let others design it for you. Take control, take full ownership, and you'll be on your way to the moon now. Let's imagine, mark, that you've got the courage you are going to push and challenge yourself to be the best version of yourself. To whom might you turn first? Some might say they're friends.
[00:20:02] Mike Parsons: Some might say Simon Sinek. And the good news is we can do them both with this clip. There's no such
[00:20:08] Simon Sinek: thing as changing your why. Your why is something objective. It's who you. It's who you are at your natural best. You, we were all fully formed when we were young. We are products of our upbringing.
[00:20:20] Simon Sinek: And we can make tactical changes, but fundamentally, who we are is who we are. And putting your why into words is putting that into words. Once it's written, you can tweak the language for sure and find nuance, but there's no changing it. So if you're changing it every year, it's probably not your why.
[00:20:34] Simon Sinek: But I can tell you a fun little. If you want to learn your why I call it the friends test. Call a friend who you love, someone who you could call 'em at three o'clock in the morning or they could call you at three o'clock in the morning and you would absolutely take the call. Do not do this with a spouse or a sibling.
[00:20:49] Simon Sinek: Those relationships are too close cuz they know you too. Do well. Do it a best friend and ask them this simple question. Why are we friends? And they're gonna look at you like you're crazy. Because you're asking 'em to put into words something that exists in the emotional part of their brain, the Olympic brain, but that part of the brain doesn't control language, the neocortex.
[00:21:08] Simon Sinek: And so they're gonna say, I don't know. Why are you asking me? And you say, come on just humor me. And then weirdly, you stop asking the question why you ask the question, what? Itll elicits better answers. Come on. What specifically is it about me that I know that you would be there for me no matter.
[00:21:22] Simon Sinek: And they'll start describing you, I don't know. I can trust you. You're smart, you're funny, and you play devil's advocate. Great. That's a lot of friends. What specifically is it about me? And they're gonna go through a few rounds of hemming and hawing, and eventually they'll give up and eventually they'll give up and start describing themselves.
[00:21:39] Simon Sinek: And this is what my friend said to me. I don't know Simon. All I know is I can just sit in a room with you. I don't even have to talk to you. And I feel inspired, and I got goosebumps. In fact, I'm getting them right now. And if you do this with multiple friends, you'll get very similar, if not the exact same answer, because what they're articulating is your value you have in the world, which is your why.
[00:21:58] Simon Sinek: So it's a fun way to get at it if that's
[00:22:00] Mark Pearson Freeland: if you're interested in it. My what an interesting fun. It's classic Sinek, isn't it? It comes at the seemingly. Challenging problems in a way that is fresh and fun. And the first thing I want to do is call my friend at 2:00 AM and give it a go.
[00:22:16] Mike Parsons: Yeah. Hello, mate. Could you tell me why we're friends? What do you like about me, ? And immediately the
[00:22:20] Mark Pearson Freeland: response is, we're not anymore. You've called me at 2:00 AM . No, I think in all seriousness, this is a wonderful demonstration. First of all, the challenge that some of us find when defining. Our whys and who we are.
[00:22:37] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think it's, it is intrinsically as we've run into in our assignments and next shows and in our framework shows, it is quite challenging sometimes to figure out exactly why I am the way I am. And naturally, certainly in the earlier stages of my life, I looked at, upbringings, school circumstances, reactions that I had that then made me believe.
[00:23:01] Mark Pearson Freeland: That that's just me. I'm always gonna be like this. I'm a product of my upbringing. And going back to what we heard from Dave at the start of today's show and the case that we're making, I think with this entire episode, Mike, and what Simon's really calling out in that clip is everything is flexible.
[00:23:20] Mark Pearson Freeland: We can choose to be in different ways if we wanna work hard at it. And to Simon's point in trying to uncover at least. Initial stages of why we have colleagues or friends that are close to us. I think this is quite an interesting little exercise because I think quite quite quickly you're gonna realize that there's gonna be insights that you may not have considered before.
[00:23:46] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yes. Things that you are providing your friends that maybe you weren't even aware of. Maybe levels of support or maturity perhaps, that you just take for granted.
[00:23:55] Mike Parsons: Yeah. So sometimes you might. Take for granted a skill or a talent or a characteristic that you have others think is just like fantastic and you almost gloss over it.
[00:24:09] Mike Parsons: So it's very powerful to hear it back. Oh no, I really love how you do X, Y, and Z. The other thing that's very related this, that we can do is we can jump online and do the 16 personalities test, which is free, or you could do something more advanced like strength finder. There's many different sort of diagnostic tools, whether the, the counterparty is an application or a friend, it doesn't really matter.
[00:24:35] Mike Parsons: I think searching for that feedback to sometimes remind you or perhaps provide you with whole new like aha moment oh my gosh. I had no idea. So I think that's a, that's an invaluable part of designing your life is when you have made that decision, is to create that underlying. Foundational work of who am I?
[00:24:58] Mike Parsons: What do people like, what do I enjoy doing? Like coming to terms with those things. And I think if we were to be very moons shotty for a moment, mark, it would be write that stuff down, get out your pen and paper and go for it. Ladies and gentlemen, really. Really write and explore and ask tough questions of yourself with friends, family, people that know you, ask tough questions of them to go deeper because that self-discovery will set you on the path to trying.
[00:25:33] Mike Parsons: It doesn't end at the curiosity, it doesn't end at the talking to people. As Dave Evans said, man, you've gotta go try stuff. And one of my favorite YouTube. And his name is Aurelius Ty, and you gotta check him out because he is such a down to earth smart guy. And he has really taken one of these great ideas of compound interest of.
[00:26:02] Mike Parsons: How to get better every single day because what we heard right at the beginning from one of the authors of Design Your Life is this is a continuous and iterative process. So let's listen now to Aurelius and find out what it takes to be continuous and iterated. When you
[00:26:19] Aurelius Tijn: start a new venture trying to learn a new skill or perhaps improve on an area of your life, it's quite exciting thinking about the big picture and the big goals and ambitions that you have.
[00:26:30] Aurelius Tijn: However, this can backfire because when we don't get there, we get discouraged, and then we end up giving up. So in this video, I wanna share with you a simple technique that's going to help you reach your goals without feeling burnt out, overwhelmed, and discouraged. An advice you've probably heard of is to have big audacious goals and to think big.
[00:26:50] Aurelius Tijn: Although there's nothing wrong with this and you should have, a big dream and that North Star to always head for. But in order to get to our ultimate goal, we need to make small steps. There's a Japanese term called kaizen, which simply means continuous improvement. The Kaiser method can be used in all aspects of your life, including your finances, your relationships, business or work, and of course, your.
[00:27:12] Aurelius Tijn: The theory goes, if you make 1% improvements every day for a year, you'll get 37 times better at that skill or whatever it is that you are trying to improve on. To give you an example, I started calisthenics, which is a form of exercise that involves using your body weight only. My goal was to be able to do a muscle up, which is simply a chin up, and as you are up on the bar, you push yourself up.
[00:27:35] Aurelius Tijn: Of course, at first I failed and I failed many times, and weeks had gone by and I simply couldn't even do one muscle up. So what I did instead is to make incremental steps. Towards doing a muscle up in Calisthenic. This is called progression. So before you even attempt to do muscle up, you have to first get the basics down.
[00:27:54] Aurelius Tijn: This means being able to do some tune-ups and dips and other exercises that play a role in a muscle up. Once I had the basics down, I was finally able to do my first muscle up. To give you another example, when I started my YouTube channel, I had no idea what I was doing When I compare one of my first videos to one of the latest videos, I can see all those incremental changes that I've made towards making better video.
[00:28:17] Aurelius Tijn: The camera, audio and lighting is one thing, but also being able to speak in front of a camera was another skill to learn. Instead of overwhelming myself with all these things that I had to learn. I just try to improve with every video that I put out. This could be a small tweak with the camera audio or lighting, or even the angle of where I'm sitting.
[00:28:37] Aurelius Tijn: If you're trying to get into the habit of reading, it may be overwhelming trying to aim for, let's say, two books a month. Instead of doing that, why not aim just to read a chapter a week or a chapter a day, depending how much time you've got, instead of putting so much pressure on yourself trying to finish that book.
[00:28:54] Aurelius Tijn: Why not really dive yourself into that chapter or that page? The reason why many people fail and give up is because they're looking for that quick fix. They want to go straight to the good stuff without going through the necessary steps and processes to attain success. So remember, if you're ever feeling overwhelmed with the thought of reaching this big goal, instead what you should do and refer to is a Kaizen method.
[00:29:17] Aurelius Tijn: It's a small, incremental and continuous steps that you take that produce big results.
[00:29:22] Mark Pearson Freeland: Mike, how. Spot on Aureli is going in this clip with how we have uncovered and how we continually learn about product discovery, about creating work that feels right for either our own customers. Maybe even ourselves or our colleagues.
[00:29:43] Mark Pearson Freeland: It feels like a slam dunk when I'm reflecting on the type of work that we are trying to do day in, day out. It's just those small little improvements. However the insight that comes to my mind when I hear that great breakdown is the times in my life when I have not wanted to do the 1% better every day.
[00:30:02] Mark Pearson Freeland: And those are the times when I am sitting there. Maybe something has come across my desk. Or maybe it's the idea of starting something brand new, let's call it a marathon. Or maybe it's just learning a new skill for your job, maybe taking a bit more ownership over a particular project. And the natural response that I've probably run into in my life is that fight or flight response.
[00:30:27] Mark Pearson Freeland: Do I want to? Do all this. Do I wanna be exposed to people looking at me and knowing that I don't know something, maybe that's a little bit of a weakness. Maybe I'm not so good at this. Do I wanna expose myself and, lose face or lose respect? Maybe not. So in which case you shut it down and the idea suddenly goes out the window instead.
[00:30:48] Mark Pearson Freeland: What I think Aurelius is really making the case for there, and I'm reminded of a lot of the work that we did. We on Robert Maurer's book on Kaizen, as well as the work that we did with Marty Kagan and Colin Brier and Bill Car where we delve into Apple and Amazon and so on, is this idea that everything can be.
[00:31:08] Mark Pearson Freeland: No matter what situation you're in, nothing is out of your remit. You might not be able to learn French from one day to the next. You might not have the six pack abs overnight, but everything is possible if you give yourself enough patience to begin. You have the mindset to give it a go. And not to lose enthusiasm and you just stay the cause.
[00:31:32] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think that's 1% better. It really speaks to patience,
[00:31:34] Mike Parsons: doesn't it? It does. It's almost like something that you can wrap around. Growth mindset, isn't it? Just keep, yeah. Growing and saying, Hey, that didn't work. Awesome. Now I've learned something extra. Great. Move on. I think the biggest call out here is.
[00:31:50] Mike Parsons: Here's the technique that I think Aurelius is touching upon and I want to expand on a bit with you. Is you can dream. That's, he's not saying that's like a bad thing. What he's saying is I think, is that we best saw in Albert Einstein who famously coined, 99% perspiration, only 1% inspiration.
[00:32:11] Mike Parsons: As soon as you have that vision of who you want to become, your. Imagination. Your dreaming, your mindset and focus should be on taking the next step. Like it's a bit of a trick. It's almost let's say I wanna climb the mountain, look up at the peak, and you go, yep, that's where I'm going. And then you're like, put it all away and say I'm just gonna take the next step and the next step.
[00:32:36] Mike Parsons: And. Reason that we give up on our dreams is that we take one or two steps and go and we look back up at the mountain and go, my God, it's still miles away . Oh yeah. . And we're like, ah this is gonna be awful. Yeah. So here's the one technique that in studying Goggins in particular that I learned is that your visualizations should not.
[00:33:06] Mike Parsons: Preoccupied with being at the peak of the mountain. But actually, and this is the key thing, is you visualize yourself grinding it out. You visualize yourself getting up at 6:00 AM whatever it is, not hit hitting snooze. So I think this is the real moment. That we can actually make a change. I think we obsess way too much about six pack abs, cutting away, running the marathon, climbing the mountain, and we don't give sufficient attention to the visualization of when I'm out there running and training for the marathon.
[00:33:51] Mike Parsons: It's gonna feel hard. I'm gonna be tired. I'm gonna wish I was on the sofa. You need to visualize yourself running despite feeling tired. This should be the overwhelming preoccupation, but we spend too much time dreaming of the end result, but not dreaming of the hard work that it's gonna take. So when the hard work comes, we stop.
[00:34:12] Mike Parsons: We're not prepared.
[00:34:14] Mark Pearson Freeland: Definitely. I definitely agree. And another key lesson that we've learned from Goggins as well as the more hardcore, shall we say endurance athletes that we've done on the show. It's this idea of enjoying the journey. Rather than that destination. Yeah. So you're totally right.
[00:34:33] Mark Pearson Freeland: Reflecting on your progress so far. Oh wow. I can't believe that I'm going to eventually reach the top, but just the journey that I've done so far has been fantastic. I've enjoyed the drive, so to speak. I remember each of those rocks I had to climb over in that first hundred meters or so. Maybe it's just that first kilometer that you're training for in that marathon.
[00:34:56] Mark Pearson Freeland: I've done it. Wow. And celebrate that moment. Recognize it, reflect on it. Maybe it's journaling. How do you feel?
[00:35:04] Mike Parsons: And if it all is absolutely sucking in the moment, there is one last place you can go. Like you can go through like everything for like motivational purposes. You can go to. The base level, which is at least I'm running.
[00:35:23] Mike Parsons: It may suck. I might be running slow, but I'm still running. I'm still, even if it is a minuscule fractionally, better, I'm still doing it. And do you know what? There's even one level below that. I'm alive. I'm taking a breath and I'm moving and I'm gonna love the present. I'm gonna love the now.
[00:35:45] Mike Parsons: . That is like the furthest point from dreaming of the mountain, just saying, I'm running. It feels good. And so it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you are failing, not living up to your standards or you're just feeling gutted, disappointed it doesn't matter. And this brings us now Mark, to this kind of last home run stretch that we have around growth mindset.
[00:36:13] Mike Parsons: So we've found the courage to ask ourselves, to be curious, to get on track. We've made a very conscious decision, I believe, to really find out who we are and who we wanna be, and we're getting 1% better every day. But here is the truth on the habits that we need. If there's one thing we can give to our audience, to our listeners, to our members, Is, stop worrying about where you are versus the top of the mountain.
[00:36:45] Mike Parsons: Don't worry about your failures, because the challenge is all part of it. So let's have a listen now to Jen Sinero really helping us frame. Disappointment along that path. You, they
[00:36:58] Jen Sincero: just do it. Yeah. Is it okay to make some mistakes? No. You have to be perfect. Oh man. . But I think that's what people worry about.
[00:37:07] Jen Sincero: People worry about I, I have to take this. Step. , what if it's the wrong step, then it will let you know that it's the wrong step, so that then you will know what the right step looks like. Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes, again, it's it's amazing because it's just I don't know I always think back to I don't know, elementary school or middle schooler, or the first time you're gonna ask.
[00:37:26] Jen Sincero: The girl for me, ask a girl out. It's like you just think that the result, whatever the result is, it's going to be crushing. I know. And and based on personal experience, it is no , but ,
[00:37:39] Mark Pearson Freeland: but no
[00:37:40] Jen Sincero: The reality is that crushing, this lasts about 30 seconds. And then you go on, And we will not let ourselves do things that we would love to do because we don't wanna experience that 30 seconds.
[00:37:53] Jen Sincero: Don't wanna risk that 30 seconds. Yeah. And it's there's lots of, slogans when you're in this industry, you have all these buzzwords and people would say go for No. And, try to find as many nose as you want. But I think the real answer is just keep taking steps forward.
[00:38:07] Jen Sincero: Taking steps forward and do, do exactly what you just did, get specific about your fears. This is the awareness thing again. So what are, oh, so let's say sales, like I'm scared of being pushy. This is a huge one in sales, right? . Okay. So let's say worst case scenario, you're totally pushy.
[00:38:22] Jen Sincero: The person you're trying to sell things, you're the most selly, irritant on earth. Then what? , they don't buy from you. Then what? You go out and get another customer. , but. You will never have gotten that next customer if you hadn't taken the first step through the scary part. So I think again, specifics are the keys to freedom.
[00:38:41] Mark Pearson Freeland: Specifics are the keys to Freedom. Mike and Jensen Sheros, you Are A Badass, was a great book. I really enjoyed, yeah, diving into that and. To be honest, it was quite a long time ago for us now, but it was still so valuable and something I remember reflecting on so much because what I think Jen's speaking about there, this insecurity, this lack of desire to expose ourselves to, to difficulties and disappointment is the fact that it can start to combat our.
[00:39:11] Mark Pearson Freeland: We'll start to question who we are in the foundation that we build around ourselves. So for example, if I'm worried in Jen's case study there, if I'm in a sales role and I'm worried about seeming pushy, that's because I'm worried about how people think about me. And instead, what I think Jen's inviting us to consider is someone.
[00:39:31] Mark Pearson Freeland: Perhaps in line with some of the insights that we've learned from other moonshot individuals, again, maybe even Peterson, the idea of not comparing yourself to other people, and instead comparing yourself to who you are. If you can compare yourself to who you are and think about the journey that you are going on, the experience that you are getting from each positive as well as negative.
[00:39:51] Mark Pearson Freeland: Situation in your life and you can appreciate the growth that you are doing in each moment of those, specifically with Jen disappointment, how much growth have you guard? And I got from the times when our jobs weren't that easy when something didn't quite go right. I learned so much more than when things are an easy, smooth ride
[00:40:12] Mike Parsons: to the finish.
[00:40:13] Mike Parsons: Yeah. So there's so many themes she touched on. One is just don't stop. Keep going. If you know you are on the path to climbing that mountain just cuz it's hard or you stumble, don't stop. I think it's very tempting to stop and one technique that works really well there is that you can say Think about the cumulative effort that I've put, and I've taken this many steps now, it'd be crazy to stop, right?
[00:40:43] Mike Parsons: , just every failure means you're a little bit closer to success. So it's, what's really crazy is when people go quite far, And they're not that far from the mountaintop, and then they give up and then you're like, ah, you were so close. ,
[00:40:59] Mark Pearson Freeland: pick you up a little
[00:40:59] Mike Parsons: bit further. . But sometimes, you can't really see the peak and it can be just around the corner.
[00:41:04] Mike Parsons: Yeah. I think the second thing is fear of failure. The greatest war that we are in is against life itself. It is the toughest competitor. As David Goggin says. Two, it's always gonna go not to. So your ability to adapt and to take the hits is never gonna be idyllic. Even though I wish I could sleep eight hours every night, even though I wish I could stretch and meditate and breathe and journal every single day, it is impossible, right?
[00:41:33] Mike Parsons: Yeah, how you gonna adapt and how are you just going to get comfortable being uncomfortable? And another thing is if you are really struck with worry, How things might go and that you have a fear of failure is the technique that we discovered in the Del Carnegie book. How to Stop Wearing. He just says, ask yourself what is the worst thing that can really happen?
[00:42:00] Mike Parsons: You write it down, you admit the worst, get nasty and evil on and this is how bad it could be. And what you'll often find in that exercise, writing it out and just expressing your. Is a huge step. . Secondly, if you have the capacity, you can start to mitigate this by saying, what steps can I take to limit the worst that could happen?
[00:42:25] Mike Parsons: And then you can take a strange sense of calm and satisfaction and that you said, okay. I started on that process. I didn't finish it, but I started rectifying some of the risk here and mitigating some of that risk. And I'm actually. In not bad shape. I can't control everything, but at least I can go to sleep knowing that I did the best I can.
[00:42:47] Mike Parsons: And before you know it, the chance of the very worst happening is so low, statistically low, right? Like it is so incredibly low that's gonna happen, that you just fight your way to improving upon the worst that can happen. And what's interesting is when you've said, I'm gonna think about the worst that could happen if I try and be the best version of myself.
[00:43:10] Mike Parsons: The funny thing is as soon as you start using that as your baseline, everything feels better after this, right? Because. You've said, look, here's the worst can happen. I'm actually a long way from that. Things aren't too bad. It's not perfect. And that's the real trick of asking yourself what's the worst can happen?
[00:43:29] Mike Parsons: Yeah.
[00:43:29] Mark Pearson Freeland: The idea of combating that perfection, because secretly we all want everything to be perfect. Don't we want life to be easy. We want to land on a abs overnight, , we wanna be driving whatever we want. But you are right Mike, and I think that this is, Quite a substantial takeaway for me when I've tried to, write down the worst case scenario and the way that I've re responded to it is very similar to what you've just described.
[00:43:56] Mark Pearson Freeland: You get a feeling of much more calmness, you feel a little bit more prepared, but at the same time, it's certainly cathartic, yes. It's an amazing way. And we've spoken a lot about journaling both in the run holiday shows and in others, and particularly even calling to mind Matthew McConaughey and the work that he did specifically around running into a very challenging moment in his life.
[00:44:19] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yes. Where he had to decide whether to do that specific role in a romantic comedy or try to eek out a corner within a more, should we call it mature type of actor. And I believe that. Grounding that he found by just writing it down, putting probably his fears. About being forgotten about not having the financial security anymore.
[00:44:42] Mark Pearson Freeland: What are people gonna think of him? Was beneficial and useful because it got it out of his mind and therefore that monkey mind, that fear of flying away and running from the problem was addressed. And I think that's the main call out that I'm starting to see between all of the clips that we've already heard on today's master series.
[00:45:03] Mark Pearson Freeland: It's about ownership and taking control, wrestling back from those feelings of insecurity. Those fears of failure. Instead just thinking don't worry. Disappointment as Jen Centara has just told us is short. 30 minutes, 30 days even, is a very short period of time in the rest of your life. And if you can unlock that opportunity and see it as something that will benefit you in the long run.
[00:45:27] Mark Pearson Freeland: Similar to again, McConaughey reflect even if he hadn't of secured an Oscar-winning role in the following job that he did. Instead just that whole act of putting in his practice, seeing how he responded to being removed from the limelight and reflecting upon it would've been so incredibly useful and probably beneficial for him as an individual because he was going against that inner fear Yes.
[00:45:51] Mark Pearson Freeland: That we all have, which is not doing the work that we want do to equality that we're happy
[00:45:55] Mike Parsons: with. So what we've really seen is like this is a story of resilience. And knowing your true self and continually calibrating against those two things. So what we're gonna play now is the last clip for this show from heavyweight Joseph Murphy, and he is gonna really help us find the North Star.
[00:46:24] Mike Parsons: He's gonna find us. What I would say is that little itch of who you want to be, he's gonna help us. Discover how we can shoot for the moon. Give
[00:46:36] to
[00:46:36] Joseph Murphy: the world the best you have and the best will come back to you. Give love and love to your heart will flow, has strengthened your have. Faith in a score of hearts will show their faith in your word.
[00:46:49] Joseph Murphy: Indeed, for life is the mirror of king and the beggar. It is just what you are and do. Then give to the world the best you have and the best will come back to you to justice. Adapt, accommodate regularly to put in working order, in order to adjust to life. It is necessary that you become a channel to which the life principle flows freely, harmoniously, joyously, lovingly the solution to all your.
[00:47:18] Joseph Murphy: Problem is to get acquainted with and use the divine presence and power in your life. Quaint now thyself with him and be at peace and good shall come on the I suggest that E, each person established a definite method of working, that he practice it regularly and systematically every day. What example, determine for yourself what is the most troublesome problem you have decide to solve this problem now by realizing that.
[00:47:48] Joseph Murphy: Intelligence within you knows the way out it's nature is to respond to you. It knows only the answer and the nature of infinite intelligence is responsiveness. That is your answer is a certain as the rising of the moon tonight, one young man in our audience had experienced a poverty complex for many years and had received no answers to his prayers.
[00:48:15] Joseph Murphy: He had prayed for prosper. Him, but the fear of poverty continuously weighed on his mind. Naturally, he attracted more lack and limitation. Your subconscious mind accepts the dominant of two ideas. This is a law. After talking with him, he learned to pray his follows, I know there is only one source, the life principle from which all things flow.
[00:48:42] Joseph Murphy: It created the universe and all things are in contain. I'm a focal point of the divine presence. My mind is open and receptive. I am a free flowing channel for harmony, beauty, guidance, wealth, and the riches of the infinite. I know that wealth, health, prosperity, and success are released from within and appear on the.
[00:49:07] Joseph Murphy: I am now in harmony with the infinite supply, and just as I would adjust an instrument in my laboratory, I am now mentally adjusting my focused attention on the eternal source of all blessings.
[00:49:22] Mike Parsons: I
[00:49:23] Joseph Murphy: wish for everyone, all the blessings of life. I am open and receptive to God's riches, spiritual, mental, and material, and they flow to me in avalanches of abundance.
[00:49:36] Joseph Murphy: This young man changed his attitude of mine and focused on divine riches rather than poverty, and made it a special point not to deny what he affirmed. In a month's time, his whole life was transformed. He affirmed the boat crudes morning and evening for about 10 minutes, knowing that he was actually writing down these truths in his subconscious mind, causing the ladder to be activated and to release the hidden treasures.
[00:50:06] Joseph Murphy: Whatever you impress on your subconscious mind is expressed on the screen of space, and your conscious mind is the pen, p e n, the thinker, and what you think and feel comes
[00:50:18] Mike Parsons: to pass. Mike,
[00:50:20] Mark Pearson Freeland: that's a big clip to end this master series on, isn't it? We are delving into the work of Joseph Murphy, the idea of, and the power of the subconscious, the piece that's really standing out to me when I look back at the work that we've uncovered in today's episode, the work that we've obviously done on the Moonshot Show as well, is this idea of giving.
[00:50:47] Mark Pearson Freeland: And giving challenges as well as opportunities, the best you can do because you owe it to yourself as well as those around you. And what I mean by that is what if the idea and the concept and the insight that we're under understanding and uncovering with the approach of designing your life is that you can take control.
[00:51:07] Mark Pearson Freeland: I think where Joseph is helping us end the. Is on the fact that we owe it to others because we can then be that best version of ourselves. Yes, we can control those insecurities. Maybe frustrations, maybe what we were talking about earlier. Oh, the tempting finger point. It's somebody else's fault, not mine.
[00:51:27] Mark Pearson Freeland: I'm going to work on trying to be that. Better little bit more manageable, little bit more constructive with others because then I can help them be the best version of themselves as well. And it all starts with yourself, doesn't it? You have to reflect on yourself. Yes. Get your house in order first.
[00:51:46] Mike Parsons: Yeah. The funny thing is I got a little bit more I went a little bit deeper in a different way, which was this the role of listening to what is deep inside you about who you want to be about, like you get these snapshots in life. We talk about, being the best version of yourself, mark, but we get these fleeting glimpses of what that looks like or feels like, either directly or indirectly.
[00:52:19] Mike Parsons: Like you might see someone something and you're like, Ooh, that's what I want to do, right? , now, What I feel he's doing is saying, hold onto the moments where your destiny is revealing itself, and then use things such as positive affirmations, visualization, mental imagery to enforce to.
[00:52:44] Mike Parsons: Empower that thought. Hold onto it like, like a vice-like grip. Don't let your dreams and that could who you really could be just floating past you and you're like, Ooh, ooh, I don't wanna touch that. He's go out and grab your subconscious. And enforce the very best nature of your dreams and your imagination so that they become a reality.
[00:53:06] Mike Parsons: So that you don't give up in the face of fire, so that you don't give up when the snooze button comes up that you take like a goggins like attitude and you just, you can't hurt me. I am never done. I am never finished. I will be resilient. If you. Soldiering through a step after step, you will get so much from life, and particularly when you've designed your life to be going in the right direction.
[00:53:34] Mike Parsons: What a show, what a master series Mark blind
[00:53:38] Mark Pearson Freeland: me. I dunno, Mike, whether I, and you're totally right. This idea of really delving into that subconscious as Joseph calls it. I'm not sure where I'm particularly leaning towards today with regards to a kind of key insight that I'm gonna take away, but I think think maybe it's Joseph.
[00:53:56] Mike Parsons: This is the thing, isn't it? There is there's two parts to the designing your life, the courage to go and find your dreams. And the resilience to stay with them.
[00:54:07] Mark Pearson Freeland: Yeah. Exactly and that's the challenge I think that faces us all, isn't it? So it's just uncovering what motivations exist, as well as what habits or techniques for you and I think it's certainly true that writing stuff down, but also hearing in that first clip from Dave about talking to each other, I think these are gonna be the key steps to help me stay true to my ultimate ambition.
[00:54:33] Mark Pearson Freeland: An objective in my life, I think. I think this has been a pretty. Pretty illuminating
[00:54:39] Mike Parsons: episode. Mike. I have to agree. So you are gonna go deep. I mean I love this idea of tapping into the subconscious to priming yourself for success equally. It's a dead set draw. I love the grind. And cuz I tell you what, When I look at my younger self, I neither listen to my subconscious, nor did I get busy with the grind.
[00:55:01] Mike Parsons: So I'm making up for lost time here, man, . But I wanna thank you for joining me on this journey into a life design, this 21st episode of the Moonshots Master Series. And we do it all for you, our members. And today we started with Dave Evans. IMP applaud us to get curious, talk to people, try stuff and tell your story because on the other side of that, Jim Ron said, Hey, be careful for an undesigned life.
[00:55:32] Mike Parsons: So you're ready to get after it. And the first thing you can do is the friends test. And make sure that you really focus on that 1% better every single day. And don't worry about the monster. The fear of failure because disappointment is a short experience. Do this. Give your attention to your subconscious and to your greatest dreams and make them a priority.
[00:55:58] Mike Parsons: Really tap into that positive version of yourself, the best version of yourself as. Murphy would have you do these things together with us here at the Moonshots Podcast. You can learn out loud and you are for sure gonna climb that mountain. You are for sure on the way to being the very best version of yourself, and that's what we're all about here on the Moonshots Podcast, on this master series.
[00:56:23] Mike Parsons: In fact, that's a wrap.