Greg Voisen
Welcome back to Inside Personal Growth. This is Greg Voisen, the host of Inside Personal Growth. And Steve, as I say to all my listeners, they don't need to know any more about me what this is about is you. And we are profiling a new book today called Shocked the World by Steve Mellor. And it's a competitors guide to realizing your potential. He was referred to me by Luke Depron, who's been on the show before. And Steve is here as a result of that. And before we get going, I want to let our listeners know a tad about you. But I want you to talk about you as well. Because that's one of my first questions as we get at the back here. Since the age of seven, Steve has been competing to stay today, Steve's most recognized associate head swimming coach at Louisiana State University, and spring of 2018, he realized that he was seeing so many of his athletes move into the real world, without the same confidence and competitiveness that they had within their sport career. He wants to share his thoughts with our listeners today in this episode, and you can reach Steve at Steve at career competitor.com. You also can go to his website at career competitor.com to get more about it. And we'll put a link to the book on Amazon as well. Well, Steve, that was pretty brief. But it's also I want to hear it kind of in your own words, you know, you speak about your journey. Why did you really write this book? And what do you want the listeners to know about reaching human potential? Having been a coach, having swam competitively yourself? Having trained some pretty high end athletes? What do you want people to know?

Steve Mellor
Yeah, well, firstly, Greg, thank you so much. For this opportunity. I've become an avid fan of the podcast in the last month or so since we first connected. I've been binging, binge listening, binge listening to the show up. So really, really enjoying and the content and certainly very thankful to be here. And just a little bit more about me, straightaway, it's important to know I'm from the UK. And so with that, if any listeners are wondering what the accent is, that's where it's from. But in addition to that, in the last 12 or 13 months, I started my own business, which is that of Korea competitor. And that was born out of my podcast from back in 2018. And suddenly, over the course of about four and a half year period of having these podcasts, I continually found myself being introduced to more and more people that came from the water business executives, etc. Business owners, and they kept asking me a similar question it just like Is this what you do for a living and I needed them to be a bit more specific. And they would say, Well, you have this beer, you have this ability to hear things and say things and maybe even take a perspective that they share and reframe it in a way to be better understood. And before I knew it, I was very much executive coaching through my podcast. And that's when I suddenly got that itch. as I as I allude to within the within the book, even though I was able to put an athlete, when I was coaching back at Louisiana State University, on the US Olympic team last year, even in that moment, I realized this just this isn't the mountain that I thought I wanted it to be climbing. And so there I was at the top of this mountain, and I made a decision to hop off and, and start this executive coaching company that I have today, which has been a whirlwind but a wonderful whirlwind in that. And in terms of the story itself, for me, that's where initially the book was born is this journey, I went on with this athlete over a two and a half year period to put him historically in a position that very few, if any, would have expected him to be. But as I was going through the writing process, Greg, I started to realize that this book is so much about me more so than I even realized so much of my life story, so much of the conversations that I'd had with people on my show, I realized in that moment through the writing process, that my greatest gift, my version of my optimal self is helping others realize their potential that is very much what my life story has been. Firstly, specific to me. And then secondly, in terms of how I've served that, both through sport and now through executive coaching, so very much where the book was born. And as it started to evolve, that's really what it became about and very excited as well now just to have opportunities to talk about it more because every time I do I discover more and more things that I continue to learn is very much at the heart of the book.

Greg Voisen
Well, as you know, Steve, the world is on a journey, a trajectory toward everybody wanting to kind of understand more about their human potential. You know, they In the personal growth industry has been expanding for years and years and it has not contracted, it just keeps getting bigger and bigger. And that's because more and more people are experiencing the opportunity to a lot of them, they want to hack it. I don't know if there's any way to really hack, personal growth, to be honest with you, after having done this show for 15 years and been in this industry. But what I do realize is, there's things you can learn that, if you like, from people, like yourself, can make the journey a little bit easier, a little bit easier that trajectory. In other words, this is where I'm going. And that's saying, if you would speak about the three shocks, you know, this has shocked the world as the book as you refer to them how to impact your internal growth. So personal growth, how to impact your process, and how to impact the actions that you take. And I think the last one is really can be the most important. It's changing stuck, tiny, you know, we've had BJ Fogg on here, we've had all kinds of people, tiny habits, changing behavior, you know, it really is, once you get in the mindset, you're going to want to change a behavior, which isn't serving you and as a coach, that's what you're getting people realizing they need to do. And then you're inspiring them to do it, because they can then see the change. So speak about those three and tell our listeners, how you would have them look at how they would shock the world in those three areas.

Steve Mellor
Yeah, it was a very, it was a very deliberate decision to not only break it down into these three areas of focus, and internally the process and then also action, but then I took it one step further, instead of just saying, Well, the first third of the book is going to be internally focused. And then the middle third will be processed. And then the final third will be action. What is it, what I did is I rotated because that is very much the story of human growth, human development is as we start to take on more, and we start to accomplish more, we then hit New adversities, we then hit New moments where we maybe have to reassess. And we need to go back through a similar process. But now we're just doing it at a higher level, this is something I deal with leaders all the time is leadership, every single time you get a promotion, you're very much going through what it is that you've previously gone through, you're just doing it with highest stakes now with maybe more people. So there's processes there that we can go back and appreciate and still incorporate, but that for whatever reason, the stakes are higher. And that's why I did it this way within the book where we rotate every three chapters, we go through this process of the internal focus the process and in the actions. And for me internally, it's about that familiarity that you have with yourself, you know, are you willing to make the time to learn to love yourself? Do you understand the influences that you have on you each and every single day? And, and this one's a big one, in terms of what we're talking about here is what are the limitations? What are the limitations that we maybe have within ourselves that, for whatever reason, so far have prevented us from maximizing optimizing?

Greg Voisen
Who? So are you making reference to like limiting beliefs self-talk, I think obviously, athletes, you know, it's like, okay, let's, let's rally ourselves around positive self-talk, you know, we can do this, we can achieve this. And limiting self-talk is obviously the opposite. That's the one that takes you down the path of depression and all kinds of things. I speak with our listeners about that, because being a coach and somebody's you know, coaching, swimming athletes, people that are swimming and competitively swimming, that's a, that's a big deal. When you look at the discipline that it takes to wake up early in the morning, swim laps do the kind of things that you've got to do. That's why there's such a small number of people that actually I think, stay in it.

Steve Mellor
Right? Yeah. Yeah. And that's a great point. And it's partly why I use this word resistance within the book too, is because I think resistance gives it that ability, then to make it more specific to the individual. Because as you alluded to, sometimes we can go into those darker places actually talk a little bit about my own. My own journey, going into some dark places within the book is depression can be a version of resistance, but so can just, for whatever reason, performance anxiety, maybe it's not something like depression, maybe it's something slightly smaller in terms of the grand scale of life, but in those specific moments, that performance anxiety is the resistance that's preventing you from reaching that optimal performance. And that is an internal thing. That is something that as the human being, you have so much control over and then your willingness to truly deal with it, how you handle it. It's on you. It's a decision that you have to make, do I want to invest in myself? Do I want to get to the heart of why this thing keeps coming up? and preventing me from maybe making that final step in some cases. But in some cases, as you've already alluded to Greg, just getting started just getting started on this pursuit of what it means to be optimal performer or someone that is achieving their goals, whatever specific world it is that you're, you're existing within. So it's such a great point that you made, because for me, that scale is so wide, but respectfully, it impacts everybody in a very great way pertaining to their specific world, like, what is it about their world that this limiting belief, as you put it, is preventing them from optimizing their truest self?

Greg Voisen
Well, you know, they're, you know, there's an old saying that I had went through it got a master's degree in spiritual psychology. And it's like, you don't have to believe everything you think. And so what really happens is, you know, we think about something, we make something up. And I remember Byron, Katie, I had a couple interviews with her, and she would say, is it true? Is it really true? In other words, are you really asking yourself what is true? You make stuff up all the time, because you hear it from somewhere, then you start to believe it. And then it starts to become part of what you think is your truth. Right, which can then be a limiting belief. You know, it's one of those things that holds you back from doing something. Oh, why can't because, and then it's something in the outside world, you say you can't do because it's never what's internal. Because if it was internal, you could overcome it. It's you being influenced by the outside world. That's most of the time what's holding you back. Okay. You know, even all the way down to your self-esteem, right? Because somebody said something that said, Well, you look weird. Or you could never do that, or you never be a comedian or stand up. Whatever. Right? We see that all the time. And you tell the story about Ray de Paola. Is that how you say, departure? Well, yeah, Raymond was an amazing swimmer. But because he had such high standards, and was so competitive, he was miserable, doing what he was doing, you know, I'm kind of skipping through some of the story. Can you tell his story and how people find themselves and transition to what they love doing, which he ultimately did? Right? It just took a while. Also speak about the realization exercises you have in the book because it all throughout this book and boxed squares for my listeners, are these realization exercises in questions. So if you would talk about Ray his story, how he became so miserable, and how he broke free from that. Yeah, absolutely.

Steve Mellor
And you know, what's so funny is coming from the world of college athletics, which I was very much in for, you know, 15 years, I would say both as an athlete as a coach, you see athletes transition all the time as they leave, and then maybe a couple of years later, they come back and you get their perspective, their version of what how that transition is going. And, frankly, the majority of the time, the transition wouldn't go very well. Because the transition of leaving that life of that identity, which is very much at the heart of Raymond's story, that identity of being an athlete, is so hard to move on. Because up until that point in their life, that's very much what they knew to be themselves. And so they're now having to discover who that person is, once they leave that world. And in res case, he bounced around all these larger companies. And he joked with me that, you know, he chose these, these high performing companies so that he could just associate himself with a successful company, he didn't care about the position that he was in, it was about being competitive to in terms of what he was representing, as opposed to who he truly was. And he learned that over about three or four year period that this wasn't going to go anywhere. And that deep down, he was actually an entrepreneur at heart deep down, he was a self-starter. And once he really got to the heart of that it's incredible how he actually doubled, tripled, quadrupled in some places, his work ethic, his time he was putting into his work, because as I alluded to in the book, and it's so cliche, but we know it's so true, is that you never work a day in your life when you're doing something that you love. And so for him, he's suddenly now recognize that hey, by starting these companies of my own down in Jacksonville, Florida, I'm able to immerse me my identity, my personality, my true self into my work, I can still hold on to this work ethic that made me who I was as an athlete, and certainly made me some success as I started to started that journey Outside of athletics. But that transition is something that really doesn't have a timeline and just to sort of build upon that to transitions are everywhere every single day. We are presented with a version of the transition, if you will, and you have an opportunity to say okay, am I going to step toward my truest self in this transition, or am I going to step away from it? yourself in this transition. And those transitions can be so small that we don't even recognize them at times. But that's also why I put these just to be kind of bring this all full circle. It's why I put these realization exercises within the book too, is that I'm hoping as readers read this book, there's certain transitions that are taking place throughout the book as they start to think about and consider. The question is, in those realization exercises, are they realizing the content that they've read? And also, are they realizing their willingness to potentially apply it to? Because in filling these exercises out, you get to see that information right smack there in front of you. And you get to look at it and say, Does this seem like something I can sign up for? Does this seem like it's a representation of what I'm getting so far from this book? And so for me, I think they're very effective if the if they're used in that way. Let's,

Greg Voisen
let's refer in for a second, because Ray's story has a little bit of similarity to Michael Phelps. No, Phelps has been, if not, he is the greatest gold medalist that we've had in swimming. And yet he's on TELL US television that was more frequently talking about the depression app that was out there. Now, I haven't read his recent book. But the reality is, you know, he's, he's very authentic about his, his challenges that he's that he's had with depression. And I think that's a good thing, because that's how he's going to overcome it, you know, come out to the public, don't hide it. And I think this sport in particular has been one where people have kind of masked, the, the suffering and pain that they were dealing with, and the depression, they were dealing with many athletes to deal with this, if you would, you know, speak about that. And address the issue of what's really happening, you know, with somebody like Michael Phelps, who is just this huge, strong achiever, you talk about competitor probably couldn't be a greater competitor, or, and or his body was really built very well for doing what he did. Right. It was like, the ideal situation. And I think it's important, because our listeners out there all know, and have seen him on TV, talking about his depression. Right? And Ray had the same thing, maybe not to the degree of Michael Phelps. But talk about that, if you would, because the sport in itself seems to be indicative of that kind of ultimate challenge.

Steve Mellor
Yeah. And it's, you know, I love this this topic, right, because for me, it speaks to analogy that I give a lot in the work that I do today is that, you know, everyone has their own version of an Olympic final, everyone has their own version of being the greatest gold medalist to have ever walked the planet. And in Phelps his case, you know, that documentary that he did is the weight of gold, you know that that title in itself speaks so much to what it is we're talking about here, because again, we all as individuals, we put that weight on ourselves very, very, very rarely does somebody else put that weight on ourselves. Now, what I've seen in sport over the years is parents can tend to be a great influence on that sort of things. But over time, the individual in that type of scenario, they just slowly just dismiss the importance of it. And they actually disassociate themselves from that weight, so to speak, that, you know that that expectation that the parent maybe might be putting on them. But these great competitors, they create that way, from within, they say to themselves, this is as big as it gets, this is as important as it gets. And over time, when you tell yourself something like that, it can bury you it can, it can just slowly bury you and put you further and further down. And again, to that transitional element. I think it's a big part as to why Phelps chose to speak about this post swimming is that as he's removed himself more and more from those tendencies from those experiences, he's been able to see clearly what was going on. And that message is so important to now be shared across all sport, because I think athletes can tell when they are feeling that weight that they put on themselves, whatever their version is, of an Olympic final, let's say whatever that might be, they are putting that on themselves so often. And sadly, in the world of sports, sometimes coaches can add to that they can add to that way they can not necessarily remove that weight. And I think that is where the sport of swimming and all sports for that matter. That's the next step. How can coaches actually survive

Greg Voisen
even some of ours had gotten out and talked about that heavy weight? And I think you're seeing more and more people speak about it. Whereas before within the Olympics, or people that got to that step. Sure, it wasn't talked about, you know, it was just it was this hidden thing. And I did an interview recently for a book called the precipice of life that I co-authored about mountain climbers. And we interviewed all kinds of athletes. And it's interesting that much of the strife to climb Everest or all the highest, Seven Summits, or you look at NIMS, or any of these people that are trying to achieve these, these huge goals, they're coming from something. First, I'm gonna say that they're trying to prove to somebody else, because there was some love missing a father, a mother, a channel, I mean, I got deep down into it, there's a lot of psychological stuff going on in that area. And the second was in then improved to themselves, which you just said, like, hey, now I, this is this big, this is what I'm going to do. In your chapter on shock, the mindset you discuss our reactions to the world we live in, and that we need to gain control over those reactions. This is exactly what we're talking about here. Can you speak with us about controlling are extreme reactions to the world? And what limiting factors exist in the world that we plan to shock? That we should shock? And when I look at shock, I've been looking at your book, it's like, yeah, we got a break, we got to break a pattern. Yeah, we got a break a pattern, that if we don't shock the system, we may never get out of that.

Steve Mellor
Yeah. And it's why it's why actually, metaphorically, I have this shattered glass on the cover of the page. Because once you, once you break a pane of glass, there's no repairing it, you know, it's it is what it is, you're never going to find every shot of glass that comes off. And, for me, that's what I want those shots to feel like is once I've made the sharp like, that's it. That's it, there's no going back, so to speak. And so with the idea of the mindset, you know, reactions versus responses is really where I'm getting to the heart to with this chapter. Because I think, especially in a lot of the work that I do today, when I speak with business owners, it's so easy for them when they're working with many, many employees, for instance, to pinpoint a very specific moment and react to that moment, as opposed to sort of absorbing the moment and responding to it accordingly. And that very finite difference is really what we're talking about here. If you can go back to that example, with Phelps. And that weight of gold, when you think back to 2012, he actually didn't perform very well. And then he got over some stuff in 2016. He's he swam much better if that Olympic Games. And I would have to assume during that time that there was a lot of things that maybe had been reactionary up to that point in his career that he would now started to develop some sort of feedback loop where he was like, okay, I can respond accordingly to this, as I get to know myself better as I get to work on myself better, as I also get to understand what is expected of me more than I can start to respond to it accordingly. And suddenly, now our mindset is becoming something that we are truly in control of. And the situation, the more we start to focus on the situation is, the more we actually remove our sense of self when that when that when the situation itself becomes the focus. That is when we're more likely to become reactionary, if you will, as opposed to inserting ourselves into the situation and asking, you know, what's going on here? Why, why am I sensing what I'm sensing? Why am I feeling the way I feel I joke about it in the book about road rage, and how I myself actually deal with that. And it's always so funny in those situations, it's usually when you're in a rush, or you're having a bad day, that the situation of road rage overcomes you. Whereas when you're not in a rush, and when things are going pretty good. And you're feeling good about yourself, and you see something on the road that would typically spark a fuse, you just sort of laugh it off and carry on with the rest of your drive. And something as simple as that. Like, that's the finite difference we're talking about here in terms of reaction versus maybe responding.

Greg Voisen
Well, it's also mindfulness, right? I mean, I think that, you know, many athletes meditate, meaning athletes practice mindfulness. We know the power of the mind, but then sometimes, you can reach your limits. I've had Steven Kotler on here, who wrote rise, abundance, the rise of Superman, all of those books, he's been on the show, like six times, he's a good friend. You know, we we've spoken so much about extreme athletes, and the mindset, and we look at the boundaries that they push, you know, even Michael Phelps, let's face it, everything he did, he was pushing boundaries, trying to get faster trying to overcome all the obstacles associated with winning gold, because that was the ultimate was to win gold. But it took its toll. And I think that toll is taken on a lot of people, whether it's in business, you were talking about, you know, people doing that there is a Dalai Lama says a middle way. Okay? And I think it's so important to keep in mind and you tell a great story about deciding to marry the woman you're now married to. I remember reading you were on the sofa, and she was gone on a trip someplace. And, you know, you, you decided in that moment, I'm gonna go buy a ring. And you said shock, the approach that's in the chapter shop, the approach, you mentioned to shock, the approach is to take the first step toward our goals. And I said earlier, that it's the action. Spear, Steve gets off the sofa, goes down, finds a ring that decides all of a sudden, this is the person speak with the listeners about shocking approach and committed. Here's the key word I'm gonna underline put in parentheses, committing to something like what you did when you decided to marry your wife, who's now your wife?

Steve Mellor
Yeah, absolutely. She certainly appreciated me, including that story in the book. And so for, for people listening, you know, I like to make it really clear when it comes to actions is the first one's always the hardest, the first one is always going to be the hardest. And then because I'm such an advocate for momentum, I talk about momentum probably, in some way, shape, or form with every single client in every single session. Because once it's felt, once it's felt that you know that the likelihood of further action is just continually increased in so for me that initial step, that initial commitment, like you said, underline it, bold it the whole thing, that is where these actions can really start to turn into the types of habits we eventually want. And so for me, what I always like to allude to, is this, this notion of saying, Okay, who are you going to tell? Or how are you going to announce this? Or how are you going to make an investment that is so great, that there's, to a certain extent, no, going back. And so for me, I've never made an individual investment like I did in the engagement ring that I bought my wife. And you know, the fact of the matter is, I knew her tastes. So I knew it was always going to be an expensive commitment whenever I decided to make the commitment. But for me, personally, I think something is something as simple as that is to say what size of a commitment is this needs to be, where I will actually create enough momentum where I won't look back. And I like giving examples of like, in this day and age, you look at things like social media, if you do announce something on social media, Hey, I've made this decision that I'm going to do what you see on things like LinkedIn all the time, I've decided to leave this job and I'm moving into this job, that's a big commitment. That's a big statement that you're putting out there about who it is you are, what your mindset is towards your work, and the commitment that you're now willing to make towards your career in pursuit of what I would like to believe there's a greater version of yourself. So that type of public statement, that type of personal investment, if it's great enough, then again, to that work, commitment, the commitment will therefore be great enough, and you will be willing to hold yourself accountable to that commitment at the same time.

Greg Voisen
So important. And while you were speaking, you know, I get these intuitive hits a lot. And I said, Okay, I'm gonna look up the quote from, from John Wolfgang von Goethe. And it was whatever you think you can do, or believe you can do begin it, action has magic, grace and power in it. You know, that's the short version, there's a longer version. But my, my point there is, is the word probably should be action has magic, grace and power in it. And it does. And you have four step process called the approach to action. And let's look at that, can you discuss the steps, and why they are important to helping the listeners act on a goal. So this is, as you just said, a second ago, this is probably one of the most challenging things you caught said momentum, you know, to get the momentum going. Actually, sometimes the inertia, the pre momentum stage is the place that has to be shocked. Right? And I know that's what you're doing here with this book is shocking this inertia in people to actually take action to do something if you would talk about your, the your step process, and why you think it works. Probably better than many of the others that people think.

Steve Mellor
Yeah, I'll put it up against anyone right. You know, to that point of inertia, you know, that's why working on the self and working on the mindset before you take that initial approach is so important. That's what you're talking about. You know that that is that inner momentum, if you will, of almost certainty that you're making that right first. Tap. And you have

Greg Voisen
to do you believe this? Let me ask you this. Do you believe that discomfort and or pain, whether emotionally, physically, whatever it might be, is now and I know social biologists, one's called on the verge, and the other one's the watchman's rattle. And Rebecca Kosta. She says, you know, if you look at our brain and how we're wired, and how the amygdala works, and she's talking about all the processes as a species, we are kind of the last to actually react, or to act. Right? If this was the case, where are we doing more about global warming? Probably good example. Right? So what are we waiting for? Right. But as a species, we've been wired this way. Right. And I think it's so important for people to understand that you're breaking a system, which is 1000s of years old, which you're wired to do, which is either to postpone or go to the comfort, I don't like discomfort. And I had a guy in here, and he said, the more discomfort you have, the more change you're gonna make.

Steve Mellor
Absolutely. And so for me, something that I've really started to highlight behind the mission of this book is to say, Okay, this, there's probably four or five examples of why not to do something out there, as opposed to why to do something out there. And that's what is difference between we as a species versus just about anybody else on this planet, is that we can access that information, we can go and find four or five reasons not to do it, as opposed to focusing on the one reason why we should do it. And again, if you are willing to do that work on yourself, if you are willing to truly shock your mindset in terms of what is going to be capable, what are you going to need to be capable of, when you make this initial approach, when you take this initial step, if you're convinced that you've done the work in that area, there's no reason to pay attention to the four or five reasons not to do it, you should only be focused on the one reason why you are going to do it. And that's what I love about these particular four steps in this initial approach is that when you discuss it with others to begin with, that's step one. And in that you're gonna get your first ever example of feedback. So you have a decision, right? That you're going to listen to the feedback because you might get four or five reasons not to do it when you discuss it with someone else.

Greg Voisen
That's gonna be discussing with others, but you didn't say put it out on social media,

Steve Mellor
correct? Correct. Right. So we're not at that point. We're not at that point yet with a difference. Big difference. Big difference. And we're not at that point. Yeah.

Greg Voisen
Well, we need listeners to say is, you know, this isn't about you making a declaration on social media yet.

Steve Mellor
Right. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, that's important. And because for me, when you do that more private version to begin with, you will, you will truly be challenged face to face, potentially with someone or over the phone with someone, when you're having that conversation. And you put it out there. This is my intention, this is what I want to do. And if you get hit back with Have you thought this through this seems kind of crazy, this seems like a big step, you have a decision in that moment, are you going to listen to that content? Or are you just simply letting people know, because you feel so passionate about it, and you're actually looking for some maybe some form of affirmation, or maybe just for them to respect your decision, maybe just respect your decision, especially when we talk about things like changing a Korea, that's not necessarily something that most people resonate with or understand. So you got to be really careful about the people you go to, you know, if you go to a parent, if you go to a spouse, it's gonna be a very different conversation to maybe someone who's already a specialist in the field that you're considering to move into. So little, little things like that. That is why that is step one. And then two, is once you announced that decision, and that's exactly what you're saying here, Greg is that notion of putting it on social media, however you want to do it. And then step three is so important to me, because investing in some way, putting some skin in the game saying that I have made this investment now to some people through things like the great resignation, that was walking into your office or virtually walking into your office and just saying, I'm out, I'm done. That's it. Now, you don’t necessarily need to be that rash. But at the same time, there is versions of investments that you can meet to show that you put some skin in the game. And then finally, step four is commit to a deadline, put some sort of parameter on this, it says, I'm starting this as of right now. But not only just saying like, Okay, I'm gonna give myself a week. Why only give yourself a week? Why only give yourself a month, whatever that length of time is? There's got to be a real reason way of defining that to truly cement. That makes sense. That's why I'm giving myself this much time to actually put this into fruition and get this momentum started.

Greg Voisen
Yeah, I think when you give it a date, I agree. With everything, I would just add that proximal goals. You know, you've got a goal, but there's got to be proximal goals. Now, what I wouldn't recommend is that you get so lofty on a goal. Everybody says set on achievable goals. Okay, so maybe it is unachievable right now, but what are the steps in the process to get there, we had an Olympic athlete on here, Marcus bar, it was interesting, it was sailing. And he created a piece of software called goal scape. And I'm going to plug it. And the reason I'm going to plug it is because it's it works in a circular Go, go check it out for all my listeners goal scape, you literally fill the circles in based on the time and the priority. And you know, we've only got so many hours in the day, we still got a family, we still got to do our personal grooming staff, we've got to exercise, we've got to do all these kinds of things, to reach this goal. So you have to know how much time you're going to commit to that goal on a regular basis. Right? So in your chapter on shock, the truth, you state that it's normal to encounter perceived problems in the midst of a process with a lot at stake, to simply respond in the moment. Just like you said, Well, maybe your road rage isn't your, your best example there. But what is that we react instead of Act, right? And you're in that's where you get emotional about something, you state that the truth can only be hidden, and tamed for so long. Yeah. The truth is, whatever it is that I'm doing, like gray, I'm pissed off, I'm angry. I This isn't what I wanted to do. And so I'm either depressed, I'm anger, whatever emotions you want to call it. How do we find the truth? And live it daily?

Steve Mellor
Yeah, for me, for me, one of my favorite questions to ask is what is going on right now? What is happening here? You know, when we look at a situation, and we can just easily respond to the situation, or we can look at the bigger picture and say, what is happening right now? Why is this come about? Why have we gotten to this point? How have we gotten to this point, in some cases, it can be that feeling of just not enjoying what it is we do or for whatever reason feeling is that we're missing out on something else that we could be doing, you know, there's always an opportunity to stop and say, what's happening here? Why, why am I in this situation? How has this may become about? And as we start to go down that rabbit hole of asking those types of curious questions, which is a huge part of this when it comes to revealing truth? How curious are you in nature, because the heightened curiosity is always going to lead to the likelihood of revealing truth. So for me, if you are curious enough, you're going to stay on that path, you're going to stay on that line of questioning where you continue to examine why something is happening, or how something keeps happening. And then you're going to start to get to the result of why that keeps happening to and in that resort. There are some truths. It's, it's something I speak frequently about with clients now is, hey, Okay, listen, if this is a reoccurring issue, we can either focus on the issue or the results, or we can get back to the steps in this process, which is why the truth is in that process category, we can get back to the steps in this process and try to identify maybe a reoccurring truth that keeps putting us in this situation. Because so often, as you alluded to there that I mentioned in the book, Greg, like, it's just too easy for us to say, Listen, I, I see that that's a truth right there. But I'm going to stay on this road over here. And I'm going to hopefully figure it out, despite knowing that over here is the truth that I'm just not willing to necessarily acknowledge or embrace, because, as I say, in the book, like, and it's true, it's a cliche, but the truth will set you free when you actually identify with that truth. I personally believe when we identify an associate and embrace the truth, we actually gain control over that truth in the process as well, we actually gain control over that part of our process, which for whatever reason, up until this point, we've not had as much control over because we've been ignoring the truth.

Greg Voisen
Well, you know, I recently did an interview with Seth Goldenberg, about a book he wrote called Radical curiosity. And he said, you know, you studied all these people on probably one of the most curious people that was profiled with Steve Jobs. And, you know, you look at people there, there's people with different personalities, Steve, some, I would call myself pretty radically curious. I've done almost 1000 podcasts. I enjoy doing this. I love learning all the time. I'm always exploring something. On the one hand, that's a blessing because I'm always learning. On the other hand, it creates this conundrum around When are you ever content are satisfied. Okay. And I think it's important for the listeners to know is, if you can try and find that balance. You know, I mean, Steve was an incredible inventor always going after something new, always inventing something different to change the world was going to change the world. That's what he was going to do. And, you know, I've asked many people about contentment. And when you talk with a lot of CEOs, who've built companies or numerous companies or have 10 degrees, they have all this stuff. And you say, Are you content? Are you happy? And a lot of them will say, No, not content. Because it's this constant strife or something. And I and there is a balance there, Steven, I know where it is. But in your chapter on shock, the habits you tell the listeners about the habits that you formed as a competitive athlete, and I think many of these have become habitual, to people that are radically curious. They get a endorphin rush from doing this kind of stuff. And it's what excites their system. I mean, you know more about physiology than I do. But many of the listeners know about the importance of changing the habit that are not serving them. How do you approach creating new habits and incorporating them into somebody's life, because you're of all people look, competitive athletes, it's all about a new habit, a little different in the stroke, a little different than turn, you're going to hit the wall, you know, right on time and turn around, and you know, make your turn. Those are such minut little changes in somebody's behavior that has to be practiced and learned and become very repetitive. What would you say about this?

Steve Mellor
Yeah, absolutely. I think something that I implemented, I didn't take too much from my own swimming career, believe it or not, when I started to coach, I tried to almost, you know, re identify, if you will, who I was going to be when I started coaching, swimming, versus when I was an athlete, but one of the few things I did take was how I used to look at incorporating habits, because for me, if it wasn't something I can rely upon, it was something I would consider to be a problem. And it's easy to sort of say, well, this is a bad habit, this is a good habit, this is a bad habit, this is a good habit. But the beauty of that is that when you actually remove this idea of a bad habit and replace it with the word problem, it suddenly speaks with a lot more resonance, it really hits someone home, as opposed to saying, Oh, that person has a bad habit, let's say, you know, let's say smoking smoke, we know that smoking is not good for you, that's a bad habit that somebody has. Or you could look at it as a problem. And suddenly now it's something that every single time you go to the doctor, the doctor says, have you given up smoking yet? No, I've not done it yet. I'm still working on it. While it's a problem because of a, b, and c. And if you can get to the heart of that problem. In the heart, the beauty of a problem on the flip side of it, it has a solution. And in those solutions, habits can be revealed. And it all goes back to so much of what I speak about not just through the book, but what I what I've always kind of prided myself on is saying listen, if we can identify the problem, then we can immediately add the weight of the why behind why we need to create the habit in the first place. So for me, I think that can really speak to a listener potentially in the sense of if they have struggled with implementing a habit that they want to be able to rely upon and say, This is why I am moving in the direction I want to move, then they can maybe look back and say okay, as opposed to seeing these bad habits anymore. How can I maybe start to reframe these as problems and start to look at them as having solutions and see what type of habits come to mind off the back of the solutions.

Greg Voisen
Great perspective, especially taking and changing out the word habit for problem. And I think people do see that because everybody likes to solve problems. Most people like to solve problems. Whereas when you say habit, it's so amorphous. They don't actually know how to grab onto it, but they know how to grab onto a problem. So I think he did an excellent job. So like Steve, in wrapping up the interview, you know, the books filled with realization exercises, advice, your wisdom, the wisdom from stories you tell from other individuals that you've coached? What three things do you believe are the most important and that our listeners can leave the podcast with and apply to their lives like literally like as soon as we hang up here, boom, they listen to the podcast that they can take and implement and put into their life.

Steve Mellor
Yeah, firstly, it sounds just the way that I've structured the book. There are 1718 examples of other people shocking their world doing things Is that had they listened to maybe others or looked at other examples elsewhere, they wouldn't otherwise have actually achieved what it is they achieved. So that's number one is, is focus on the examples that show that you can, in fact, realize your potential to is so much of what we've spoken about here today in terms of just creating that momentum. So stop waiting for another reason or strongest sign to commit to realizing your potential. Just pay attention to the signs pay attention to the reasons that you've already identified that they are probably strong enough if you're willing to sit with them, and examine them for long enough. And then thirdly, the work you do the work that you're willing to do on yourself, it will always it will always pay off, it will always pay dividends, sometimes it can take a little bit longer than you would maybe like, but in that impatient, it's so important to rely on some of these habits that I've talked about within this book, and just stay true to that process. And understand that realizing that optimal self, it's worth the work in the long in the long term. Steve,

Greg Voisen
excellent interview, thanks for being on inside personal growth, shock the world competitors guide to realizing your potential, we'll have a link to this on Amazon Go out and get it. And like I said before, if you want to contact Steve, I'm going to give the website address here in one second, because I gotta bring it back up. It's career competitor.com, career competitor.com. And there, you'll see his podcast as well, he does a podcast, you can reach out to him and talk to him about potential coaching. The other thing is, don't get him mixed up with Stephen Miller, you'll see some big athlete with big muscles, very easy to do when you're out there searching, make sure that you go to career competitor, because that's where they you will find him a pleasure having you on inside personal growth, speaking with my listeners about some great opportunities to shift their mindset to shock their mindset to shock many different areas of their life that they could change the processes that they're going to go through. I think that's a very valuable book with as it relates to how they potentially could change things in their life, either incrementally, or just put them all at once. Because either how you will look at it you say break the glass and the pieces in the shards and never actually putting it back together again. That's the point the shock. Right. So the book will give you that, Steve, thanks a ton. Any final words?

Steve Mellor
Greg, I just appreciate the opportunity. And one thing I tell everybody is that you know your potential is not going anywhere. So whenever you're ready to commit to it, get started.

Greg Voisen
Yeah, don't be complacent about it. Namaste to you, man. Appreciate you. Bye.