#96 My awesome guest this week is my good friend Shaun O’Gorman. He is a human behavior and performance consultant, author and also the founder of The Strong-Life Project.
Being an ex-police officer and part of the K9 dog squad, Shaun has seen it all. He’s seen more trauma and violence in one 8-hour shift than most people see their entire lifetime. This led to PTSD, clinical depression and a battle with suicide. After climbing out of the darkness, he now shares his life’s lessons and wisdom with others. Shaun believes anything is possible if you are willing to put in the work. Enjoy!
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About Shaun: Shaun O’Gorman is a highly accomplished and recognised Retired Police Officer and former member of the Queensland Police Dog Squad, or K9 Unit. After joining the force at the tender age of 19, Shaun worked his way up to the K9 unit at just age 22.
Shaun went on to establish “The Strong Life Project” which includes mentoring, workshops, keynote speeches, books, daily podcasts and blogs focused on providing tools and strategies to empower people to overcome difficulties, conquer challenges, manage stress and live happy and enjoyable lives.
Shaun’s purpose in life is to help people and make a difference by delivering practical, real-world strategies to deal with stress and build resilience. He wants to end emotional pain and suffering for Alpha personalities by helping break down the stigma surrounding mental health.
►Audio Version:
Links & Resources For Shaun O’Gorman:
www.shaunogorman.com
thestronglifeproject.mykajabi.com
TRANSCRIPT
Guy: Hi, I’m Guy Lawrence and you are listening to the Guy Lawrence podcast. If you’re enjoying this content and you want to find out more and join me and come further down the rabbit hole, make sure you head back to the guylawrence.com.au. Awesome guys. Enjoy the show.
Guy: Shaun, welcome to the podcast.
Shaun: Thanks Guy for having me.
Guy: Now you’ve been on the show before. It’s been a while back and I’m very excited to come back on and come down to our home and be here and I’m gonna ask you the same question as I was asking everyone on the show.
Shaun: Sure.
Guy: And if a stranger stops you on the street and asks you what you did for a living, what would you say?
Shaun: So these days. I’ll say I’m human behavior and performance consultant and to me that just um, then the next question is normally what’s that? And then I explained that inside base I do anything that has anything to do with people’s human behavior, performance, fears, doubts, insecurities, anything about how we think and how we operate. And then that’s normally, how did you get into that?
Shaun: And obviously we’ll touch on that, but it’s predominantly for me just about helping people be their best in their life without letting their fear have that insecurity getting their way.
Guy: You must be very busy by then cause I think there’s a lot of fear that insecurity. Absolutely. And we might ask them, you know what, so I’m, I’m really curious as well. When do people generally come to see you or what stage?
Shaun: Yeah, it’s normally when things have gone back and that’s, and that’s, and it’s still like, I can still very much get people out of that. But there’s a lot, I’ve got a new push in my business now towards one of my mentoring, which I do on online content because I really want to help people get in front of the wave before it all goes back, before it all goes to shit.
Shaun: Because at the moment they are find people when their marriage is a fall apart, and they’ve got the strange children, they’ve got some other significant conflict, a lot of places in military people that deal with, with PTSD and in a stretch from combat, different things. So it’s often people who have already hit their hurdle that I deal with and I really and I love doing that. But I really want to focus on helping people build the resilience and tools to deal with stuff before it happens.
Guy: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And, uh, and you know, obviously
Guy: my work’s very different to you and what I’m doing and, but I’m thinking of the same way. How do I get the work to people before the, you know, the crunch time. Would it be much harder to come back from that as opposed to staying in front of the way? Why do you think we’d wait
Shaun: Pain because we’re driven by painted version. So human beings as a species, uh, and most species are driven by pain version. So you think if I’m in a relationship that doesn’t work or a business or financial situation, my health and fitness, whatever it is, and I use health and fitness is a really simple one. People who are five kilos overweight normally do very little about it. People who are 35 kilos overweight might have had a heart attack, might have been diagnosed with type two diabetes and then they start to start act because until then the pain of doing the thing, exercising, eating well, whatever it might be is more than the pain of where they are. But once that balance shifts, once we’re more pain because of the situation, then the things that make them uncomfortable to rectify it become less painful so they’ll do the more painful thing.
Guy: Okay.
Shaun: And I think as a, as opposed to a lot of the old psychology was were driven by a pleasure. I don’t actually think that’s true. I think we’re driven by pain. So I certainly work out, or in my business, if I’m in having cashflows stressors, I’ll put more effort into my relationship. If I feel like we’re not getting on as well, I’ll put more effort into my health and fitness if I notice that I’m not as as healthy and fit as I normally am these days, I’ve trained myself to be more proactive. But I think 99% of people it’s pain.
Guy: Pain. Yeah, I agree. I mean that’s where it took me this not to look at.
Shaun: Yeah me too, absolutely.
Guy: Well, let’s just touch on that for a moment as well. And like what kind of pain were you in before you had to really look.
Shaun: Yeah, there’s two critical, um, pits I guess.
Shaun: And then like two critical points that drove me out of that. And the first one was I was a police officer for 13 years in a police dog squad for nine. So a lot of violence, sort of domestic violence, um, shootings, car chases, fights. So I was in probably two or three spots a week at times. A lot of deaths.
Guy: with the police.
Shaun: Yeah. Yeah, so with offenders and so I’d go and I worked really hard. I loved that the police was all I wanted to do. My dad was a couple of years, so I drove really hard at that. So every domestic situation that was going. I go to anything violent because I didn’t do paperwork and the dog squad, so it’s only you and a German shepherd and you go job to job to handle most violent things. So over a short period of time, 13 years when a lot of police do 30 years or 35 years in the job, I got to the point where that impacted me dramatically.
Shaun: And I knew it had, but I hadn’t done anything about it. So I was medicating with alcohol. I mean just functioning relationships had conflict in my own, in my personal life. So I had physical, violent conflict in my work life. I didn’t have that in my private life, but I certainly had emotional conflict and, and um, a lot of, like a lot of conflict and didn’t realize I was a common denominated. It was just a random by a lot of shit people. And got to the format of PTSD, diagnosis, PTSD, depression and lying in bed was a Glock in my hand to kill myself. And then stood outside the 26th floor balcony on the gold coast. Again going to jump at a party and I might get a hit to data about paradise things cause that isn’t really the important part of it I guess.
Shaun: But that pit drove me out of the place and that was out of fear of being judged as a cow and thinking that people would think I was weak. So there was a whole lot of fear, insecurity and, and I had a couple of years with a fairly, a heavy involved in cocaine and ecstasy and, and self medicating, reestablish myself in a new career in corporate world. Then my daughter was born in 2005 and that turned it. So she literally got handed to me in the birthing suite and um, she had to be taken away. She had a blocked area and have their airway suction cleared. So when she was born, I cut the cord. They took her away and by the time they came back with her, they are attending to my, to my ex wife now, but to the girls man in the next stage of birthing.
Shaun: So they sort of gave it to me and I was left to my own devices and I sat in the corner of the room with this little baby and I looked at her and just thought, Holy shit, I burst into tears. I thought, now I’ve got to get my life together. So the pain of the PTSD and all that, and then the fear of, well, what if I don’t get it together now someone else other than like my wife or my parents or my friends, they can handle that. They lots but this little person realizing something beyond yourself. Absolutely. Yeah. I didn’t ask you as well. So why do you think as as a male as well, there’s a fear of being judged. Yeah, I know when you go, especially when you go through what you’re doing. Absolutely. But I think most people don’t understand.
Shaun: Yeah, they already as Matt, yes. But beach and we touch on alpha mile soon that the stereotypical logical alpha male as being hard as nails, no emotion, don’t let things get to you. Boys don’t cry. That’s very much so this was, I joined in 1999 so it was a nineties in 2001 so it’s, it’s very much the dark ages from an emotional awareness and self awareness perspective compared to to them. So I was just scared that everybody would think I was a care with, my whole identity was placing. And then the other side of that was I didn’t know anybody who’d been through significant challenge with that sort of stuff because at that point for police and military, there’d been no real conversations around posttraumatic stress disorder. It was only people who had been to Vietnam and the Vietnam veterans would come back. And my only interaction with those people were the ones who were really challenged in, you know, where it had seizures and a fantasy just for domestic violence or something else.
Shaun: So for me to have been diagnosed with that, I’m like, Oh Holy shit. My lifesaver essentially. And as the wheels are coming off and I knew I was being badly impacted. I didn’t want to admit there was an issue. And when I looked at everybody else around me and especially all the other men that also, and we’ll touch on this, the alpha personalities, the other women in the place or super strong personalities deal with conflict on a regular basis and learn how to wear a mask. Like there’s nothing going wrong. So my world’s falling apart. I’m looking at all the people around me who I want to be like and I think I’m like, and they’re all, Oh no, I’m good. Even though it was all bullshit. Yeah. So you don’t even realize. Yeah. So it’s that fear of vulnerability, that fear of weakness that stops us all engaging in interacting.
Shaun: Totally. And I see that now, like I do workshops at least once a month or even more. And there is a huge fear in revealing any aspect of ourselves. Of course there is full stop man said doing this interview with you and we’ve known each other for a long time and I trust you implicitly still natural notes kicking. And that’s a physiological fall of flight response to a fear of being judged. So still, and as I’m driving here, I’m not nervous anymore. It doesn’t worry me. I’ve done heaps of interviews that are heaps of podcasts. I’ve a natural narcissistic tendency to want to talk about myself. So that’s kind of it. But it really is still the fear. So everybody has it. I’ve been doing this work for 15 years, full on probably 17 years total. And still I have that fear. How does someone in their general life who’s never delved into any of this sort of personal development and self-awareness have a freaking clue what to do?
Shaun: Yeah. Hence why I do what I do when you do with you. Yeah. Yeah. So another question when I asked you then with the people that you deal with today, is that people coming in, that’s like almost a version of where you were at Oh sure. Point where you were ready to end it all. Oh yeah, yup. You know, and obviously you can have a lot of empathy for somebody like that that because you can fully relate. You’re, you’re, you’ve been there, you know, and, and quite often I think until we walk the shoot the path ourselves, we could, it’s very difficult to relate to something isn’t it Matt? That’s where I think a lot of my um, skill or impact comes now is their lived experience part because, you know, my mom and dad got divorced as a seven placement who was full on and later got diagnosed with PTSD place myself, PTSD, depression, myself.
Shaun: They’re in a very dysfunctional marriage. Out of the back of me being that broken human when we met and married, then divorce, then, you know, I’ve been separated now seven or divorce, whatever, seven years. But after five and a bit years, my daughters, I’d see them five nights a fortnight for that whole time. And then I didn’t see them at all. We had an 18 month court battle family court that cleaned up about four or five months ago. So when I look at, you know, I spent 15 years in the corporate world in a job I hated because it full psychopaths, so many things in my life that I’ve engaged in that I have created to be super difficult. And I don’t blame anyone for any of those scenarios. They’re all my choices that are nearly 50 now to be able to go the first 50 years of my life I’ve managed to fuck a lot of things up.
Shaun: Now I sort of have a lot of, when when I speak to people about pretty much anything I can have an empathy, doesn’t mean I’ve walked that path. Doesn’t mean I get where they’re at. But there will be something in my life because I’ve, I have a credit quality mulch was existence myself for many years that all be able to understand their version of what they’re going through and that’s what we need is that human connection. Cause the isolation is what really misses with us. Yeah. Right. And I hear that. A great quote. I think Joe Dispenza said it, I’m not a hundred percent sure grip and memory without the emotional charge is called wisdom. Absolutely. And once we have that with them within this, we can then really learn from past lessons. I don’t even look at them as mistakes through that. Can you give us an example and of what you might’ve experienced within the police force?
Shaun: Sure, sure. So the job that I always use as the example is the, um, most people would see as the worst job for me. It was the best job in the sense of a, that’s what I joined the police to do. But we were in, you get excited by it. I loved it, but it really damage me. Yeah. Um, with like as an accumulative effect. But I was in 11 o’clock on a Monday night in fortitude Valley in Brisbane and there was a vehicle pursuit started by detectives and two individuals in between care. Um, four drive, huge. They got chase and they immediately started firing shots at the rifle. At the brochure you placed. I got into the chase when I was about seven or eight police cars in it. And um, they, we ended up at the very short version of the, of the story.
Shaun: We end up behind them on Brunswick street heading towards the mall. There’s people on the mall. I’ve just driven through there on the way to this job. Lots and signs. And this, uh, the passenger was sitting on the window sill of their vehicle with a two, four, three rifle on the route, 40 shots back at us and not overtaken six or seven cars and got second in the chest. And I was trying to get around the first cattle, ran them off the road and could end the video in front of me. Had 24 rant. They shot dozens and dozens of rounds at us bulletins. So there’s 24 boards in the vegan in front of me. There was a male police officer driving and female passenger. She had ducked down into the footwell and was looking over the dashboard, calling the chats, so calling locations and speeds and those things.
Shaun: And one of the bullets had gone through the windscreen, took the headrest out where she was wished she was sitting, situate you killed obviously so that we’re very lucky to survive. Nobody got it, no police, but it was a miracle and these guys crashed at the top of the pedestrian mall, got out with the, with the rifle and started running down the mall. The first police car got through in a big light pole fell and my car got jammed up on that. So I ended up on chasing them on foot with my pistol and I left my place. Dove in the pal should have taken people to it and I’m running down the mall with a suppose turnaround point in the rifle at me. I’m, there’s only myself and the two other police that were, had all the bullets in the car and they kept pointing.
Shaun: The raffle man hit me because I was on foot and there’s nowhere to really hide and I’m screaming and got the gun. We’d run around the corner and there’s a lot of other place guns would come around the block and when we, and we pretty much boxed them into this unrewarding on a foot path and they both shoot themselves like the first guy texts gun and puts under his throat and pulls it, pulls the trigger. And he’s probably maybe five, five to 10 minutes from being like, he’s pretty close, probably a little bit further actually. And then as we’re moving on, the second guy, he bends down and picks up the rifle, puts in his mouth and shoots himself and he’s only like, took me about two seconds to get to a Monte child himself so that I only ever had one of those types of jobs.
Shaun: And uh, I love that because that’s, that’s where you learn who you are, right? That sort of, that’s where you look. And I was terrified the whole time. Absolutely. Shooting yourself, wanting to quit, but just kept driving because one, my focus was to try and stop them for the hurt someone. But I’ve had guns pulled on me, number times people tried to stab me, heaps of fights, heaps of high-speed pursuits, heaps of domestic, like the simplicity of going to a domestic situation where predominantly males assaulted a female and you know, you get there in the mouse, they’re either, what the hell, my opinion, they’re all carrots. But there are the very writable, very passive. So while we turn up often on my iPhone, I’ll get there faster than other place, not with up. I wouldn’t take my dog. So I’d walk in on my own, knock on the door and they’d be, you know, be my, him and the garden, either one fight or would give up and often they’d want to fight.
Shaun: So I would end up in fist fights with him before the other police got there, that that would only be maybe a minute or two behind me. But it’s a long time when you’re in, when you’re in a full on fist fight and often you’d be fighting then. And then the, the, the female who’s been assaulted turns on you. So you wind up fighting the offender of end falling the victim. So there’s all that sort of stuff that police go through that I don’t think people understand and they say places heavy handed and they see all those things. And that’s not what I want to talk about that that’s super important to me. Cause you’ve gotta understand police, military, paramedics, whoever you’re dealing with, they’re people before they that profession and they were impacted and they’d scared and all sorts of things. So that to me is really, um, where a lot of the impact was for me. But there was also stuff, my dad wasn’t around magic mum and dad would have all sorts of challenges in that I chose in my personal life around relationships. So all of the two cumulative, it’s not just policing that caused it. Yeah. Okay. But that was the, um,
Guy: but it’d be hard, like what would happen, like let’s say the, the shooting incident, you, you go and you witnessed that, right? I don’t remember. I remember sitting in the car. It was Linda, my wife. Yep. And the car around us from behind the like years ago. Right. And my head, I was sitting waiting for the red light. Just I’m a lovely conversation. Yep. And the car hits me from behind my head. It’s the, um, the wheel, you know, and I’m just like [inaudible]
Shaun: sure.
Guy: But it took me days, you know, like I’m still shaking. I said, no, I’m fine. You know, I’m, I’m kind of a relaxed guy, but there was just moments all the time, just like the L and yet when you add absorbs experiences day in and day out, week in, week out, like what happened? Did you just go to work the next day and just carry on?
Shaun: Yeah mate, that, that job I did. Um, so we finished that. Like that job probably finished on nine, 1130 at night. It wasn’t long after, it was before midnight. I was supposed to finish working midnight and I ended up working all the way through till 11:00 AM cause because then there’s homicide squad interviews as to what happened at pizza altogether, whatever. Um, and then I went home at 11 in the morning, didn’t know, couldn’t sleep, obviously pretty, pretty amped up and pretty stressed. Rang my dad, who was a police officer who’d had to shoot and kill someone many years ago in a similar scenario. And I said, ain’t like hell, you deal with it. And he goes, his words against fuck diviner so it’s not like there was any advice even from people who no one knew how to do it. Most places drink. And then I went back to work at two o’clock that afternoon.
Shaun: Now I probably didn’t have to like I could have gone, I went back to our office and my boss was there, cause you’re waiting to take the dog and Karen down home. And his reaction was like, what are you doing here? I said, I’ve just been in a job in the Valley. He said, what job? That’s a job when they trouble shoot and kill us all. And he goes, didn’t hear about it. Who authorized your overtime? So his, he’s concerned what school throws the appetite out. And I get it from his point of view, he doesn’t understand it. He’s a guy who’s probably now, Oh he would be 80 years of age or something. So he’s probably 30 years older than me. So of course he didn’t have the emotional awareness or anything to deal with it. And I think especially as men or women have a different version, which is just as destructive.
Shaun: But especially as men, we go, well, I’ve been through shit and I’m okay, he must have his arm so you should just deal with it. Yeah. Amazing. It’s, yeah, it’s scary. So what do you think then? It just blows my mind with, you know, the transformation is itself, obviously it’s a process. Yeah, absolutely. And it’s forever evolving. But like looking back that took you from that person that wanted to end everything that you to like you say, having a child and you have, and then things are standard catalysts and chains. What do you think were the key ingredients to allow you to move through that and be able to look at the past was wisdom as opposed to being able to keep reenacting the emotion. Everything being the victim. Um, education and self-awareness and patience, self-awareness, self-awareness, 100% and then patients. And then there’s a really nice dose of being willing to do the work.
Shaun: And you and I’ve talked about this so many times up. So the self awareness for me came over many years and still does like every on a period of time, six months, 12 months. I’ll look back at a scenario or situation I was in and if I go back now, this time last year, I was in the middle of this family court battle, which was pretty horrific. And by this stage last year I was always fairly, was very self aware with it. I’d actually got to a point of deciding in my life I wanted to learn my lessons in the moment or proactively. So instead of what my life’s always been, which is a massive nuclear explosion, huge fallout, great amount of damage. And then years later I look back and go, Oh wow, I see how I created that. These days I’m focused on going, I can see something’s going bad.
Shaun: What am I doing to create it? How can I change that behavior and how can I learn the lesson of the nuclear explosion without having to have it? And I think it’s a pretty unique way of thinking and a pretty unique perspective now, but I’ve learned that night through 15 or 17 years of education and that’s like your it, the stuff that I did with the stuff that you and I have talked about, like the of Spencer and Bruce Lipton, our fan [inaudible] you heard us went down that rabbit hole as far as I could go or in neuro chemistry, you know neurology, how we operate. Like the physiology of, Oh that’s why when something happens I think like this. That’s why I feel like that I’m not broken. It’s actually just the response of the machine that is my body and mind. Yeah. Then also seeing one of the things I love is seeing other people who’ve been through tragedy and trauma might be different to mine who come out.
Shaun: So one of the things I live by now and I talk to all my clients, I get if anybody has ever been where you are and come out and been happy, you can do it. And if anybody’s ever been where you are and hasn’t come in and been happy, you can still do it. It’s just going to be hard cause you don’t have a path to follow or reference point. So it’s all just education. Like, and I’m like this morning I went to the beach and walked the dog and, and um, went grocery shopping and I’m listening to a Bernay Brown, daring greatly one of her audio books because everywhere I go I try to be learning. Yeah. And I’ve got an addictive obsessive personality, which I’m very, that’s my, my self awareness part. So instead of drinking alcohol and taking cocaine these days, I’ll get up drinking and get on taking drugs for years and years. Now it’s about personal development being a better man, being a better dad, being a better partner. And the purpose of humility takes vulnerability and humility.
Guy: Yeah. Right. Like, and I’ll give an example. You know, I was, I run a workshop that we gave a model in Brisbane, but I could see there were certain people in the audience that were behaving like the noodle and untrue that it was blocking any, any kind of new information to go in and, and allowing themselves to, to see this with an open mind or beginner’s mind. And actually just take that onboard and have a, have a curiosity about something and then take what you want and leave, you know, at the end and do what you will with it, you know? But if fascinates me, like from all the people that you’ve been working with,
Shaun: why do you think we,
Guy: I always that closed offs and trying to get information in and we actually behave like it’s not our fault. Almost like we don’t take a hundred percent responsibility then we have this persona and I know I was that person a short minute. Like I’m not, you know, I’m not
Shaun: native, not judging it. Yeah. That’s a very, very simple thing. We can be happier. We can be right. Rarely cause it’d be both. Yeah. And I actually think never can you be both. So I would suggest those people in that scenario in your workshop and haven’t been to that workshop. I learned so much in others and the long way down the path of mine, personal development, right? But I’m like anywhere I go, I have the humility to go, well, I’m not here to prove anything. Whereas I spent 35 40 44 like I’m 49 47 48 49 years in some respects of my life. Tried to prove things to myself and other people and they still ego. There’s still, I still do things and say things sometimes and I’m like, Oh wow, that’s interesting. Or I’ll have a social media comment from someone that’s negative and I go my initial responses of a sector and then I go, Oh, well that’s interesting then several that I know I can make a comment sitting behind the computer in their mom’s basement and it can affect me.
Shaun: Yeah, that’s a weird thing for me to understand, but because we want to be right and we want to be right because there’s a safety in that. So if you think when, if you’re in a crowd of people, and it’s ironic when you’re the presenter, right? And we both had a lot of experience in this. Now I’ve been doing a lot of stuff recently with Australia and they’ve got a soldier recovery center and I’ve, I’ve done two IB courses represent for two hour workshops on each course for young soldiers and they’re either transitioning out of military or back to the units. They are physically, mentally or emotionally injured. And um, I go pretty hard on them and I still notice when it, whether it’s it I’ve done, you know, over a hundred of those are wishes place and corporates and different things whenever I’m at the front of the room or, um, or I’m holding caught in that for want of a better term, what you’re going to, people’s reactions really, I’m very mindful of and how often people will do or say something and might even just be a look or might be whatever, where I’m like, they’re challenging me or they don’t believe me or whatever.
Shaun: And my initial feeling is, do you want to prove to them on right immediately. Then I catch it and go, they probably don’t even feel them out. This is probably nothing to do with me, but we’re putting our stuff on them then. Right. Exactly. Islands because I want to be right. You want to be right in every conversation. Somebody wants to win instead of being happy because when if you and I haven’t, if we’re having this discussion and you say to me, yeah, that recommends it, I don’t reckon it’s happy verse. Right. I think it’s something else. Yeah. Then I literally want to go, no it is because I know it is because of this, this and this. Then you go, I know it’s not because of this, this and this, but who’s to say which of those answers are correct and it’s all just an exploration to go, well what’s, what’s these days?
Shaun: I certainly, my focus is to go, well why do you recommend drop? Cause I go, I’d rather learn from you than try and bash you in the face with what I believe. Yeah. Cause there’s no winning that. But most people want to be right, and that precludes us from being happy and siblings every month. If you put in a relationship example, if you were to come home to a beautiful Lynch or made a ride, she come home to your partner and you know, whatever, and this doesn’t happen. Their relationship at all. If I was to come home and she was to say, how did you bring your milk? I’m like that for go better. I was super busy SHA handle. I’ve asked you three times to get it. Then normally that will just escalate because you’ve both got approve your out, right? So I’d be like, well, what would stop you go in and get it.
Shaun: I’ve been super busy doing this and we would have this, which we really don’t, but we would have this discussion. It would end up in, in a form of disagreement instead of being like, Oh wow, I’m really sorry I should’ve got that because I sort of would, it’s no excuse. Okay, I get it now. Or she goes, actually don’t worry about it. You’ve had a massive day. I’ll just jump in the car and go and get it. It’s not a big issue that’s been focused on being happy instead of being right. And the very simple way to understand when you are or not is whether you are trying to find blind in the situation or you are trying to take responsibility. If you’re finding blame, you want to be right. If you’re taking responsibility, you want to be happy. Yeah.
Guy: So now this is where, um, the other thing I love where you touched upon earlier as well, where self-awareness comes in because if you’re not aware and you just run it from the unconscious place constantly and then you wonder why things are reenacting the way they are and it continues to feed itself, you know what? And do you think that’s where pain starts to really start to come in and where the pain is actually bringing people into awareness of maybe,
Shaun: yeah, I do. Yeah. But it takes a long time and it takes a long time because people self-medicate to Della pay. So with alcohol, drugs, whatever, the simple ones, sex, pornography, gambling of all ones. We all know about social media, but then exactly. Then you go to social media, then you go to TV too, you know my kitchen rules or or the battle or something. Then you go to online shopping or I used to be the King of researching things like cars or motorbikes or housings or whatever and it was all just distraction. Yeah. Which is a self medication because you want to distract yourself away or dial the pipe. So if you’re not focused on it, it does. And if you literally do things to get short term hits of happiness or [inaudible], which is you can be online gaming, but there’s so many examples of it, then you become dumped to the pack because we still would rather avoid it if we can look up.
Shaun: I still do like if there’s certain situations in my life more recently rubber drawing hard and strong enough in my business about doing online content and I’ve been doing a lot of education around how to tell my story more effectively, how to do better sales videos, how to do stuff because marketing and sales for my business isn’t my favorite thing. This is what I love helping people’s while a lot of, but then I don’t live in a world of fairs and unicorns where someone turns up every day with a wheelbarrow full of cash and goes and they just do whatever you what I’ve got to do this stuff I stood out really like, which is I’m super happy to be vulnerable in this sort of interview for me to speak to a camera, to a group of people to convince them that they should work with me and Piney for that is less comfortable.
Shaun: Yes. Which is a natural thing also, so I go, well, if I avoid the pain of doing that, for me personally, there’s an impact, but there’s also an impact, as cliche as it sounds, that if I don’t get off my ass and put myself out there, then who are the people that I’m letting them because I can’t help them. You know, there’s so, it’s an ever evolving thing and I don’t think we ever beat it, but it’s about being away to the simplicity of if I go to the fridge and I’m like, Oh, well, should I drink? Like should I have a glass of sparkling water or should I have a can of Coke? The self awareness has come over, drink Coke and get fat. Yeah. There’s an emotional, spiritual version of that.
Guy: Yeah, totally. And it’s then coming back to the responsibility we talked about absolutely a hundred percent responsibility. No, I can relate to everything you just said that because I’m constantly having to go again. I’ll just come for a day. And we were like, now we’re like, we were in a room with cameras and filming right before it used to be just on zoom, even though I’m still doing zoom calls on the internet. But I was only saying the other day that made me feel like a musician because I used to play with a guitar as well, but the guitar was my protection for sure. So the online bit was my protection [inaudible] and it’d be easy just to sit back. But it’s nice to lean into these ideas and explore because you learn more and more about yourself daily. Right.
Shaun: That’s the, your your, I love your leaning, um, terminology. And I know you use it a lot. Yeah. Because to me it’s whatever’s painful. Lean into it. Yeah. That’s again, back to the physical fitness thing. If you’re training in a Hertz, right? Obviously you can be injured so they use common sense. But if your, if you’re running or doing whatever you’re doing and you’re out of breath and that’s painful. Keep pushing cause you’re in the right space. If you’re in a relationship or you’re really uncomfortable and feeling like you, you’re pushing the levels of vulnerability you want to shut down, then that’s probably where it’s magic is. And there’s common sits around all of it. But if you’re really comfortable in every area of your life and not challenged, you’re probably living in very mediocre, safe life. That’s my opinion.
Guy: 100%. And we avoid challenges. Absolutely. And we see them as threat. And once we assume that stress with not making for your best decisions and we’re coming from the wrong place and then, and then we were constricting ourselves, so whatever potential and it could be doing, you know, I wanted to touch on one other thing before moving on. A few more questions when I asked you, but that was offer humans. Yes. And I’m, I’m intrigued by what you said with that. Cause I’m always just thinking alpha male.
Shaun: Yeah. Yeah. And I think that it comes back to, um, just the, our cake, uh, sexism or whatever can men compared to women. To me, I go when, when I was in the police and in so many areas like Rachel, my partner is 100% in half a FEMA, but an alpha personality. To me it’s not a gender specific thing. I think that lead a protector, um, natural sort of leave the cave and kill the food and bring it back and fight warrior taught physiology. That’s the basis of our humanity is more predominantly a masculine thing. But there’s so many that that are the sec similar to you have men that are more feminine, they and those, it’s not a, it’s not a question of sexuality too. It’s a question of personality where they can be quite feminine and not as super strong, aggressive male. It’s not black or white either way.
Shaun: So for me, the whole alpha personality, my version of what a good alpha Miley’s but an alpha personalities is 95% of the time loving, connected and powerful leaders in their life. That’s what they do. They nurture people, they look after them, they lead, they’re strong, but they lead from the back in the sense of they making sure everyone else is okay. They’re not driving out in front, leaving people behind, that’s male or female. And then 5% of the time they do whatever needs to be done to protect other people. Yeah. So when you put it in a policing sense, so I get into not fight willing be 5% but it’s that, you know, 95 five for me now is the greatest majority of my life now for years. I’m super loving, connected, and vulnerable and emotional. Are you enjoying life more like, Oh, I love it.
Shaun: Absolutely love it, Matt. And the irony is, guy, I’m stronger. I’m tough. I have less fear now than I did then. So a lot of my need to demonstrate myself as a strong, willing to enact violence, male. And obviously it was, it was a career. My career was unfortunately a lot about that. But these days, and I use a simple analogy, right? So when I was really broken, I was really angry because I was set. There was so much sadness, but I was too scared of the sadness or have demonstrated as anger, which is a variable human thing, but especially a male thing. So I’d be driving demonstrate and just be amazed at how many idiots who were in the traffic, like in road rage. And I’d be in my calorie yelling and giving people a bird. Like I was just angry and are these days and I would be always waiting for conflict and I would always find it.
Shaun: Now these days I go, someone cuts me off from the traffic and I rarely have any sort of reaction. The only thing that if I’m driving in the right lane on the highway, people don’t move over. I get frustrated, but I catch myself and go, who cares, man? So you going to be 30 seconds later to destination, who cares? But because I’m more loving connected these days, I’m far less fearful of confrontation. So I don’t create it in my life. And if I get to the point I had done a few months ago now and when I was, I’d left a a a full day of interviews for our family court process. So I wasn’t in a fantastic mood and I was waiting to catch a ferry in Brisbane and uh, there was a few people, probably 20 people, men and women and I heard someone walking down towards the very stop and they were just swearing FNC carrying karaoke, pretty obviously aggressive.
Shaun: And I looked and it was a guy probably mid to late thirties, fairly solid individual covered in text. They’re obviously done in jail at Joe has debt on it, obviously he’s a couple, I’ve got this guy’s done a lot of time and he’s obviously off his head on something pretty aggressive. So I haven’t studies, I might have kept ’em just to quietly to see what he would do. And he walked past me one of the very set on the ferry stuff. So I’m like, right, so what do I do? I’d go go. Because he’s obviously pretty aggressive. And he walked past a couple of other guys and he didn’t say it to me cause he’s obviously picked up the wrong camera. He’s not scared of me. And he walks past these other guys and he goes, what are you looking at, you know, squares in them and they duck their head and I’m level is fake check.
Shaun: This could go, could get violent. Yeah. So I took my phone and my wallet and my pocket put in my backpack cause I’m thinking there’s a fair chance if we get in a fight, one of us will end up in the river. And he, yeah, he walks over to these two young backpacker, um, girls who probably 18 or 19 look like the Scandinavian taught girls who very, very attractive and he’s just very like lyrically speaking to them and they’re obviously super uncomfortable. So I went over and stood just to beside them or Sheldon, Sheldon, he’s in front of me and I still have my sunglasses on and backpack and he goes, what are you looking at? Cowboy is it called me down with the reason. And, and I said, not much. Chip, what are you looking at in, in prison? Vernacular. Champions. Not uh, some of your, some of your people might know, most probably won’t, but chairs are very derogatory term and I like to say why, but it’s a super derogatory term.
Shaun: And in Jarvin Acura, which I’ve forgotten so I just said checks then and he absolutely lost his mind. You guys all I can kill you. I’m going to stab you or like for about probably 10 or 12 seconds. So it really going off his head and I was a year really calm, like I had an address, adrenaline response, but I was super calm cause I was like, well if, if this, he’s so angry, if we start fighting, the reality is probably I can just wrap him up enough. No, a little bit of technique just to be able to control him, not have to punch it in or get him to supervisor altercation and he might deserve and then stops. And he looks at me and I said, well whenever you’re ready man. And very quiet and very calm. He goes, what’d you say? So you the top of his voice.
Shaun: I said, whenever you’re ready. And he was just like, didn’t know what to do. Now if I had of gone to a level of anger that I used to have out of fear, and it would have been just driven out of fear and go, Oh, can we look back in? We would have been punched on for short, not nothing short. He ended up walking on the ferry and carried on for, for the next probably 10 minutes and was digging in his behind. I thought he might be trying to find a knife, like he was punching the wall. He was still pretty over the top and everybody else on that farriers terrified. And I was, and I sat so I could see him and so I could see what he was doing. And I thought, well, if it goes bad, the 5% part of me needs to be willing to do whatever it takes to look after the other people of you that escape.
Shaun: So the 95% loving connected guys go, you know what? I’m not gonna start a fight with them, but the 5% go as if he comes up to with a knife or he goes to hurt someone else, then I will do whatever I have to do to hurt him including violence, including whatever, and it’s not a popular or opinion and it’s not something that I think most people are comfortable with, but that 95 five alpha personality, alpha male, whatever, if you don’t have that 5% willingness to step up for people who can’t look after themselves, then the people who are the really shouldn’t members of our society who are violent and predators and want to hurt other people. Nobody regulates that, but the key to it is 95% of that alpha personality is loving.
Guy: Hmm. That makes sense. Yeah, totally is true. Are shown true emotional intelligence. Like for me, what, where I was thinking then when you were saying that is it’s almost like a metaphor for all our circumstances in terms of like if we come from that loving connected place, we receive that with the lens of life in a certain bias, which I think is great. At in every human being, but also we’re going to be regulated enough from the hormones of stress and we’re going to see things more for what they are and not how we perceive them to be when we’re in a stress response. Definitely. But then at the same time when we do have a fearful situation coming up, like we don’t need to have somebody yelling profanity to feel that emotion inside with a certain situation. If we want to avoid maybe embarrassment or if we want to avoid something, um, shame or whatever, whatever, unworthiness, whatever emotion starts to come up.
Guy: But then we start to escalate it ourselves. What can be going on in any given situation by our own staff that we start compiling and we still come from a place of fear. Yes. And then we still come from a place of stress or whatever. And then that actually affects us a lot. And for me like these things can then affect our, obviously our choices, which compound shaped the direction of our life. Like it’s so important. So I don’t, I’m a tree. I got to get you your thought and this cause everything that you see, you’d talk about that. And what I’m noticing from myself going out there with the work, like I’ll give you an example now for, we got retreats coming up in January right now, the second retreat. We still haven’t had the, it’s two thirds booked and we still have another mail book in here.
Shaun: Yeah. Right.
Guy: And I’m thinking, what’s going on? Yeah. You know, and is it, is it the, is it just not a connection or is it that there’s a fear that they might have to be a little bit vulnerable?
Shaun: Definitely that definitely. And the thing is Mike, because also I do like all my one on one clients. I’d say probably 80% are men, probably 20% women. And I’ll work with either. But I think for me, if you look at, um, you and eyes as how we’re perceived, I perceive you as a very loving connected at men, which I think is amazing. It’s beautiful. I think people would perceive me when they see my social media content or whatever. I’m super loving, connected and vulnerable. But they would see a different version, like an X car, Piney state, blah, blah, blah going, Oh, he’s, he’s at more angry. All these, and people are like, uh, not often, but I sometimes get as people go, Oh, I just wish you weren’t such still so angry. And I’m like, no, I’m not. I’m passionate. Like I’m Mexican and angry at all.
Shaun: But it’s that perception. I think you go, why do I get a lot of men and not women? It’s probably because men would look at me and go, Oh, he’s like me. Yeah, we’re be, could you, I think you and I have very similar personalities and have similar levels of emotional awareness and stuff, whatever, but the perception of people might be, if they worked with me, they’ve, it’s going to be a blokey experience for one of a better term. Maybe I, I hear you and I might be looking at you and because of the work you do with Matt with sound and, and meditation and all those things which are freaking amazing, they, they’re going to be like, Oh, that’s weird. Like am I going to have to help people? Is it going to be, are they just gonna talk about love and it’s going freak me out.
Shaun: Like, which would is all about right. And the already is, when I work with these people one on one, it’s all about love. It’s all about vulnerability of, I’ve got a guy who is a about my auntie’s full yet and I’ve done some work with his wife, his son and his daughter in the last 12 months. And he was a very, for me, his own admission and very emotionally stunted individual. And every time I would go to see it, um, he worked, I worked for a son with his son for probably about three months and his wife would sit on, on like conversations and I’m very raw ambassador in his language and blah, blah. Every time I’d go to the house, this guy would run, I’d see him and he’d be like, Oh, hi. Yeah, yeah. And then he’d run and we’d be in another room with a TV up loud so he couldn’t hear it.
Shaun: I’ll say it was so funny. And then they got to a point where their marriage ended certain, the wife actually went on, I’m done. And he rang me on a Sunday morning. So I messaged me and said, Hey, I really want to talk to you this weekend. And I called him that morning, which you wouldn’t normally do. And he goes, Oh, you didn’t have to ring me today if I get you now. I’m never going to get cause you go back in your shop. And he said, this happened. And I said, yo, I knew that was coming. She told me that. And he’s like, Oh right. And he said, can you help me? I said, yeah, of course I can, but you’ve got to get off your fucking ass and do the work. And everything we talked to it was vulnerability, love connection. Every time I see my husband and he hates it, you know, he’s weird.
Shaun: Like he thinks it’s weird, but the first step through the door for him and because he’d seen me over a period of time in Sydney, sun’s changed dramatically. So he’s wife changed dramatically to the point that you want to be married. Which wasn’t great for him, but great for her. Now I went to their place, which I really do. I’ve had dinner with them all. They have the night. It was amazing. They’re all connected. They’re doing gratitude things after dinner, like stuff that’s fantastic. But he would have perceived me as a harvest. Yeah. And I think that’s where, um, men are really difficult to pull out of their comfort zone. When I started doing this work, I don’t know about you. I was terrified. Oh yeah, totally. Well that’s a thing. And it was interesting. I just want to touch on some fruit for me. One is that uh, Brenton we bought yeah. Came to the retreat. Yeah. And you know what a beautiful human being. [inaudible]
Guy: but without giving anything, cause we keep everyone in the unknown every day. But there was a moment where we actually, we all come back and connect together each day and we saw a set. So we all come back together as one. And, and he said I’d been in the boxing ring of boxing over a hundred times hard hash police force. And he said this was the toughest circle, every Travis ringer they’ve ever had to harness that [inaudible] too. And I was like, wow, you know, it’s,
Shaun: and he would be. So he obviously found your work throughout kind of through your name. And I am an incentive for ego, but the connection was policing. And now I didn’t know him in a place, but we had mutual friends and we met maybe only months ago, a good mutual friend who has died unfortunately. And at that funeral we went to the wake and another good man who’s a mutual friend said, Hey, do you know I was like, Oh no, no, no, no. So we didn’t, and for the time that were in the place, the personalities, we were both pretty full on. It was weird. We didn’t know each other. And then, um, I gave him my cards, he goes, what do you do now? So this blah blah and we’ll cut up that coffee. And, and then him and I did a bit of work together and then he said to me, I’m going to go and do guy stuff.
Shaun: Cause he’d seen me interacting with it on social media. I said, yep, go for it. And the difference is him and 18 months, Mike, it was a a pretty, and if he will, I spoke to them, small, angry, um, pretty aggressive individual has touted in area, worked in the police and he’s been out a long time as well. But one of the toughest men. So to give you an idea, there was another guy, now he’s a detective who worked with him and they couldn’t get this guy to say a word and he was a super tough guy. He goes, if you don’t tell us what you need to know, we’re going to get Brett to come and talk to you on this guy. Like, Oh no, I can’t now I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you. So Rick was super tough and I wouldn’t know that there’s a loving and he, he’s a guy who could do physical damage to you that you could never dream of if whichever way he charged and was, but still same challenges, same things around who he was.
Shaun: His relationship wasn’t as good as he wanted a whole lot of things. And man, he’s such a loving guy. He rang me this morning about team something that he wanted a hand with. It wasn’t personal relevance or related related to mild commercial property life. And I said, what’s happening brother? You guys, you haven’t loving it. He goes, you know, Hey, you’re going good. We have this super emotionally connected conversation still through the filter of of men. Yes. So still, Hey, what the fuck’s happening? Like it’s still close. Like, yeah. And I think that’s a thing that men are terrified of, that they’re all of a sudden gonna come out of the work they do with me or the work they do with you or anyone else and have to shave their head and wear a caftan and lose their identity and all that stuff. But to me it concretes my identity as a man and as a strong man.
Shaun: But these days, mate, I feel invincible in my life in just about every year. Like I said, the debts and feeds look taken me wrong. But compared to the goal I was, if you, when you looked at the two men back then was fighting all the time, taking cans off people in your super vulnerable life, you would go, you’re much tougher there. But I’m much tougher is not the word, but a much more authentic now. And the authentic part of me still is I’m someone who’s got a reasonable amount of courage and belief in myself, but not in having a fight. People like if I had to fight someone, I would want it. But I’m, I’m reasonably comfortable in that. I’ve done that a lot. But I’m also just as comfortable now in delving into who I am as a man and more, my life doesn’t work in the vulnerability and the fear in, you know, digging to the bottom of the ship pit to see what I’m doing to create that back in my childhood.
Shaun: Start fun. And that’s the thing that I think people get so scared of in men especially, is if I open a door, how will I ever close it again? Yeah. But then I’m curious on your opinion, but I believe what happened yesterday back is fucking irrelevant. It’s good for context. It can be good for understanding of going right. So your dad looked from your phone, you never saw him begin. That’s impactful. Your mom was an alcoholic. That’s impactful. Your brother died of cancer at 11 that’s impactful. And that would have done this thing, but I don’t need the blah, blah, blah, or of 32 years of your story. I just need to go, what are the highlights of the most tragic things that happen in 15 minutes? Boom. Yet, got it. I know human behavior as you do or know about physiology or know about how we operate. So now I know why you do it. So then we go and start judging it. Yeah. And it’s actually a pretty simple process and it’s nowhere near as painful as people say. Yeah.
Guy: Well it is that, the thing that fascinates me is that we, the, you know, the body can’t tell whether it’s actually happening right now or we’re where we’re imagining seeing it. Right. So, so the, so from that point of view, we reenact things with a thousand times over and create the same feeling, which could be the same thoughts, which creates a certain perception, which is then we see a very bias lens on life daily. So, so a lot of the stuff I’m very interested now in because of my own experiences and what we didn’t see in other retreats is sematic work is where the body itself hold memory in some sense. Signals via the nervous system that’s creating a hormonal response continues to the repetition of that. So it’s like, well, what about if we could get that up to the body? Energy can be the bean or created nor destroyed.
Guy: It can only move from one form of the other. And at the end of the day, from what I can see, it doesn’t matter what caused the experience. Trauma is trauma. It goes into the body. The body holds it. Because we’re willing to go there and allow these emotions to move and allow this energy to transform from one form the other and come out and free it up. We can actually start allowing the body send a different signal and then we can actually start operating more from the hormones of joy, love, gratitude, appreciation, connection as opposed to stress, fear, doubt, negativity, guilt, shame, whatever that might be from how we’ve wired. And it’s
Shaun: neuroscience. And that’s the part, the two things that I talk to people about a lot that I love will learn from your work and going down the Bruce Lipton and, and Joe Dispenza home. I can’t remember which one said this. Um, I think it’s Joe to spins, but that birth to seven 95, yeah, 94% of their habits, bullish neuropathways opinions and everything are formed. And then for the rest of our lives, 90% of that 95% so still you going a significant, like I haven’t done a master, but let’s say 90% of our, but beliefs, habits and everything are operating subconsciously from what we like both to seven. And when you look at the practicality of most kids live birth to seven, that can be where a lot of the traumas, family breakdown, you know, violence with parents and what, whatever it is. So when I often when I deal with people I go, so if that’s true, would you let, um, I have someone recently I was dealing with and it was a woman and she was causing a lot of grief from the life and I said, so if you actually look at your behavior and emotionally right, could you see how you, you have tantrums and the way you act?
Shaun: And it makes sense. Like it’s like a six year old, the six year old and she’s like, huh? I said, well look it, when this particular thing happens, you do this, this and this is that rational now and this, this and this. None. I said, literally you’re operating out of that subconscious patterning that you like birth to setup. And she’s like, Oh wow. I said, so look at that. And that was huge for this, this one. And I look like my, my stuff, good Irish Catholic background, family, whole lot of of history to go. There was always stuff around money and and not wanting to stand out because I’m what are you fully yourself, all that, you know, relationships can’t be great and I’ll look at the societal things. It’s pretty large girl, but I looks decidedly for me at 50 my parents are mid seventies my grandparents were born in the 1910s teens, whatever.
Shaun: So they literally grew up through, my grandparents were a couple of world Wars through the depression epigenetically so on top of gen X, which you obviously understand that patterning of them birth to seven would’ve been horrific. 90% of their behaviors in their life operate out of that. Then my parents are born and get 90% of that birth to seven right off the end of world war two hollered of other challenge. No work, no anything. Then onboarding in 1970 you’d get 90% of that then to my kids. If I don’t have the self-awareness to change that patterning, then no wonder we have generations of families create the same shit generation, like country’s all sorts of things of conflict and war and black because we’re taught as kids. This is how you do laugh. And then as you know, Madam, we both know then 95% of it comes out of subconscious.
Shaun: She’s not even aware of it tied into the right or be happy, then we want to be right about it. So when you said to me, Hey, come and do this interview, and um, at the end of it you like you say one thing that has me go, Oh he thought that was shit and I’m not worthy of it. And because I’m running it through the pattern of a five year old kid whose dad told me it was a shit soccer player or something, which is what happens. And then all of a sudden this whole thing fall apart. And then if fatally fractures their relationship, cause I go, a guy’s an asshole, he doesn’t support me. And then I find every bit of evidence I can to confirm that happens every day. I know it’s amazing. And then the beautiful part is flip it and I look at my life and go, well, everything happens for me. Nothing happens to me. And that’s what happens. It’s, it’s actually simple. It’s super powerful, but I don’t think people get it.
Guy: Yeah. No they don’t. And they don’t give it the time and it takes effort and work to cost us. I am, before I wrap up the podcast, I will ask you something that’s dropped in again then as well is, um, well do you have any rituals, habits, routines, genes
Shaun: that support everything that you’ve been spoken speaking right now and that you might do on that? Yeah, definitely. I’ll do five things. Um, sleep or good idea. I’ll sleep a night. That’s non-negotiable. Uh, nutritionally paleo or keto or super clean, like no processed foods or very few processed foods or you exercise or Meditech every day. So I do 15 minutes in the morning, God and meditation and I go to slate now with insight timers and that they’d have 92nd, 92nd 90 minute meditations that are actually planned Bluetooth speakers or fall asleep. Because as you fall through those brainwave States, it helps rewire subconscious. And then mental rehab is the big one for me. And while I, when I talk about that, it’s about podcasts, books, interviews, conversations, education, it’s about all the things in my life that contribute positively to my experience. So if you eat shit food, you feel like shit.
Shaun: If you listen and watch shit things you feel like shit. So if you spend your life in conversations that are full of drama and gossip and negativity, you feel like crap. If you surround yourself with amazing people, you feel amazing. And it’s the owl, you know, show me the five people you spend the most time with them. I’ll show you your laugh. So I’m super militant about who I hang out with now and I’ve distanced myself from a lot of people from my old life because they are still very dramatic. And there’s, you know, holler, conflict in different things. Um, I’m, I hold of impossibly high standard for people in my life, but I hold myself to a higher state. As a father. I’m super loving and connected as a partner. I am as a man, I am. And I’m so willing in every situation where something doesn’t work, I’ll look at how I’ve created it, that those five practical things.
Shaun: But that is key to me as I look for every reason. So if I drove ’em out of here and went to turn left out of your street and somebody ran into me, so if somebody ran up the back of me, right? So most people go, well that’s not your fault. Your stuff, that’s not nothing. Oh, stop and go. Well how did I cause that? Did I cause that because I wasn’t watching my revision mirror to be able to see that person coming in take action. Did I cause that? Because do I pull out in front of them too early? Like did I not leave them enough room? How did I possibly create that? Now, most people would go, well you didn’t, that’s not my fault. That’s their fault. But the minute I make something your fault, I have no power over. Yeah. And a top bill.
Shaun: You from impact theory. Yeah, totally. Yeah. I heard him say, I love this. He goes, my wife got killed by mediocre two tomorrow. He goes, I would take responsibility for that. And he said, because I know there’s a group of people who observe and track near earth objects. He goes, I’ve never helped him. I’ve never given him money. I’ve never told them they’re doing a great job. I’ve never educated myself on any of it. So if she got killed by media over, then that’s my fault cause I didn’t influence it. And I go, if you’ve got that level of responsibility, most people would get, well that’s ridiculous. But it brings an immense amount of ability to influence your life. Totally. Totally. Last question. Anything you would leave our listeners to ponder on from everything we covered today?
Shaun: Yeah. So many things. But it is ponder that self awareness and education piece, right? So I do courses and mentoring and blah, blah. You, you do your stuff right. We’ve both got products that people can get involved in. If it’s not mine, it’s not yours constantly. But to me, the big thing for us to ponder is everywhere in our life we go and find teachers or coaches or whatever, right? So I’ve got a eight year old son. Soccer teams have coaches or have people that influences. If I go to get my, you know, I don’t service my car because I have no idea, bad mechanics, I’d take it to them. We can’t, you know, if, if, um, something happens in my house electrically, I don’t go and start filling with wires and risk electrocuting myself because there’s people out there who know that you didn’t aren’t out.
Shaun: Okay. This work is exactly the same. And the thing that I’ve, that I find really funny in this, and I was certainly used to be the same. Like I spend quite a bit of money these days still an educating myself through other programs and, and whether it be now like marketing in different things or whatever. People don’t spend the time and money to actually increase and improve their lives like they should. And I want people to ponder. Why don’t they do that? So I’ll have people call me to talk about, um, mentoring for instance. And I’ll tell them the structure and how much it is. And some people go, I can fold that. I get cool no problems. That’s okay. And then they go, great. And then I will talk to someone like my, um, my client I was talking about before, whose marriage nearly ended.
Shaun: And I sat with him on the first time we caught up and we have very robust discussion about, uh, his attitude. And he said to me, um, he goes, this is a lot of money. You better be worth it. And I saw it might, if we get to the where you are married to Vos, is it worth the investment and it’s a few grand while I do have a figurate and he goes, Oh yeah. I say, cause what happens if your marriage about what’s second question? He goes, Oh yeah, $100,000 blah blah blah blah. But we don’t look at that investment in themselves. People don’t look at that as an important thing and it drives me mad because it’s the one area in our life where we feel as though we have the expertise to fucking organize ourselves, but it’s the one area in their life that infects every other area and it’s the one area in our life where we can do the most damage.
Shaun: I’d suggest you can do more damage trying to guide yourself through your life with that assistance. Then if you try to serve as your cup, but we wouldn’t you like serves your car, but we try to service their own life. It’s, it’s Christ and it’s people pond them for guys who listen, this podcast, why do you not value stuff enough? And then that flows into doing meditation, like all the other stuff,
Guy: all the other stuff that comes with.
Shaun: self-worth.
Guy: Couldn’t agree more, man. And where can we send them if they do want to check out more?
Shaun: So stronglifeproject.com is my website and all social media. So strong life project on Facebook and stuff. Podcasts. Yes Sure I go on and on LinkedIn. I do a lot on LinkedIn now. I’ve got some, I’ve done 1300 episodes on my podcast.
Guy: 1300.
Shaun: yeah.
Guy: Jesus.
Shaun: Yeah.
Guy: Five days a week?
Shaun: Seven,
Guy: seven days a week,
Shaun: seven days a week, 10 minutes a day. Wow. I’m so strong with project podcasts. My dark companion, my book I write.
Guy: Yeah.
Shaun: Uh, and if they just go to my Facebook or on Instagram and follow that, then they’ll get, they’ll get a lot of information.
Guy: Yeah, totally. Mate, thanks for coming on the show today Shaun.
Shaun: Thank you brother. I really appreciate them,
Guy: I really appreciate it.
Shaun: Good on thanks, Guy.
Guy: Thank you.