S1E26 · Daniel Aitchison and Ed Wischer

Hey guys, welcome to the Virtus Performance Podcast. This is week 26. We were lucky enough to sit down today with Daniel Acheson, one of my longest serving friends, and Edward Wisher of the Human Happiness Project and of sales at Cadbury. And we were able to talk for a little while about a bunch of random topics that consisted of happiness. We spoke about the school system for about 15 seconds at the end. We spoke about purpose a lot. We spoke about growth and mindfulness and gratitude and the difference between motivation and discipline and I guess why

we all spend our time doing what we do and why we're all so different and why accepting that we're all so different is so important. So this was a lot of fun for me. This is the first one we've done without any questions to start off with and we've just kind of rolled with it and it's a bit of a... to use the adventure fit radio podcast as a bit of a something to work off. It's a bit of a shoot the shit. Let's see what happens. Let's see what we talk about. So I really enjoyed it.

I hope you guys enjoy it. If you did love it, then let me know and I'll do a few more of this kind of podcast. If you didn't love it, stop listening now because you're gonna hate the next like hour and 40 minutes. But I hope you enjoy it. If you do love the podcast and do enjoy the podcast, please share it. Please subscribe and review and pump it up and get it out there to all of the social media so that we can start getting a few more people listening and watching if you want to watch a bunch of soundbars on YouTube as it's all ways up there.

So info@verdasperformance.com if you want to email us. www.verdasperformance.com if you want to have a look at what we do and why we do it. If you have any feedback, please let us know. Please enjoy the podcast. My personal and business goal is to be just a little bit better every day. I believe everyone, especially normal people, have a story to tell. The Virtus podcast exists to help us all find small ways of consistent improvement by discussing the journey and experiences of each of our guests. Please welcome to the podcast week 26. How are we doing? Very well.

Excellent. Good evening. Good to have you boys here. So we've got a ring in for the first time ever. Daniel Aitchison, welcome. Hello. And we've got Ed Wisher back for round two after chatting to him very early on in the podcast. First of all, Daniel, introduce yourself to the people. My name's Daniel Aitchison. I've never listened to a podcast in my life. I've heard a lot about these and yeah, I kind of just found myself sitting here and I do like to have a chat and talk about interesting things. Good. What are you doing right now?

I am by trade, I'm a teacher. I haven't done a lot of that in the last 12 months or in the summer anyway. I spend the majority of my year in the mountains following the snow around the world and yeah, I spent a lot of time in Mount Hotham in Victoria and Japan and Canada overseas and yeah, just trying to follow the snow around the world and teach and earn money and keep a roof over my head. What's it like living that nomadic lifestyle where you kind of, you know where you are next season but you won't necessarily know where you are the season after or the season after that?

At the time, it feels like the best thing in the world. It's very enjoyable. Surrounded by like-minded people and having a really, really good time and then every time you come to the end of a season or every time you come to the end of, I guess, a little episode, it can be quite stressful and that's something that I've discovered in the last, probably in the last two years and I've got a lot of friends that sort of feel the same. It's been recognising just how much of a stressful way it is to live. Is there like a time frame where you can probably do it for and then you've got to settle down?

Yeah, it's an interesting question. It seems to be different for absolutely everyone. I mean, I have friends that I work with that have turned their lives or been able to establish a whole 12 months of their lives up on the mountain and you know, very, very happy and found their place but that's for not a great majority of people. Most people will stick around and kind of ride and party for a couple of years and then I suppose find themselves back into what we would traditionally call the real world. But yeah, I'm not too sure which way I'll go yet.

Awesome. What about you, Ed? What do you do? I work in sales. I work in sales. So you two could not be surface level, could not be any different? No. And I was actually just thinking that sort of lifestyle schedule. I'm neurotic so like I need that sort of, I need to know where I'm going to be next year. I need to know that I'm going to have a roof over my head. I can like props you because I always think that's a really cool way to live but that's schedule. In theory. Yeah. It sounds really cool then like if it came to do it I'd be like, I'm probably just going to be selling chocolate bars.

So besides that. How is the gig with a large chocolate manufacturer going? Yeah, good. It's a bit of fun. Like I'm going to be honest, I don't work that hard. I hope my boss doesn't listen to this but it's easy. It's people skills. Sales isn't that hard when you've got a brand like Cadbury in Australia backing you so it's not the most difficult job in the world but I have a lot of fun. I enjoy it. It keeps me on my feet. I was dreading going into an office because as much as I don't think I can go full nomad, like down here, I don't know if I could be in an office all day every day.

Well, you're kind of somewhere in the middle being sales and driving around and hanging out with different people all day. Yeah, it's good. It's a very high energy job which is good but obviously not where my passion lies but you know, it's immense to an end which serves its purpose in itself. Where does your passion lie? Talking to people about life. So the last time we spoke about the Human Happiness Project at length. Yeah. Still rolling? Yeah. Still going. Teething a little bit with a new sort of direction which is just sort of teaching myself how to film properly and doing all that sort of stuff which is good.

So as I'm sure you know, lucky to grow your business in a different way and sort of taking a new sort of stride gives you a little bit more zest for it and a little bit more motivation. So yeah, it's just cool. I'm just sort of capping what we touched on last time. Just talk to people about their happiness in their life and lessons they've learned and sort of journey they've taken and put it out there in the internet so people can learn something from it. Has much changed since we had the last set of chat in terms of what people are saying or what people are doing or what problems people are being hit with?

No, I think it's more honed. Like it's sort of come down to this sort of, when I say honed as I've narrowed it down to about 28 different values which are countless off the top of my head to what people sort of find central to their own happiness. The five biggest ones that I have to say would be purpose, growth, hard work, mindfulness and gratitude. Which like that's not going to be any surprise to everyone but it's just very interesting I find to see how people sort of either use those values or don't use those values.

But generally the people that I know that are the happiest or at least the most motivated or have the highest sort of life satisfaction employ those sorts of values daily to a degree. Do you think, and this dives real deep real quick, but do you think the happiest people are the ones that don't think that deeply about what the fuck's going on in the world? It depends, that's hard. Like I was talking about just before we started recording, ignorance can be bliss but I think if you're too ignorant it holds you back. Like if you're

not looking at the things that might be sort of slowing you down, whether that might be a bad friendship group or a shitty relationship or something like that you can get caught sort of wondering why you're not moving forward. And then sort of, so I think you can dwell on the shit bits like just to do with like how much reach we have and how much information we get in our day to day lives you can like dwell too much on the shit bits. Like you're probably not going to hear about 50 years ago you wouldn't have heard about it shooting in a school in America but now you'll hear about it 15 minutes after it's happened in Melbourne.

So if you dwell on that and go wow the world's a really shitty place then you're kind of gonna pull up short on the whole happiness front. But again it comes in perspective like you go that's really shit or you could go oh you know someone held the tram doors open for me on the way to work this morning. It's not all that bad. Yeah what do you really want to look at and what really affects you so perspective is it being one of the other ones that sort of comes into it so it depends what you want to look at.

Ruby Dan what's happiness to you? Happiness. That's my question mate. Dan what's happiness to you? I'm happy to answer it for you. Just back to Cadbury and chocolate. I really really enjoy chocolate I'm a bit of a sweet kid so that's part of happiness. How many times do we need to say Cadbury to get a box of chocolate delivered? Oh by the way guys this podcast is sponsored by Cadbury. Use my coupon on the way out and eat at Cadbury 20 for 5% off. Oh geez I think that's a deep and difficult question and I'm wondering how people answer that question when you ask me.

There's a lot of fumbling. Yeah there would be. It's something that I've definitely thought about for a little while now and I feel like I'm making progress in my own head and I think just moving is I suppose part of my nomadic lifestyle I guess. Doing something and feeling like I'm doing something productive with myself is pretty high on I guess the scale for my own happiness. I like that. Yeah I don't know it's something I've only really thought about you know in the last little while. When you look at the times that you are

down or you look at the times that you are sort of flying high I guess I can connect those better and happier times when I'm moving forward getting things done whatever those things are and I guess that feeling of fulfilment that sort of that links pretty heavily up to happiness. Do you think that achievement needs to be like big goals big things or can it be like little things like making the bed or holding the train doors open for summer? No way I had one of the most productive days today that I've had in a

long time and one of the reasons it was most productive was because I had a list of a heap of little annoying jobs I had to do and I was able to take one turn on my street and go to the strip of shops on Heatherhill Road which I've never been to before and I found a pharmacy a post office and the ATM and three of my stops were done and I actually felt really good ticked a hole in my boxers. Mate that sense of achievement on doing little things and like we had a really

cool chat at our staff meeting the other day about whether we were all busy because we had shit to do or whether we were busy because we wanted to be busy and I think being able to identify well these are the 15 things I need to do today and if I fumble and tell myself that I've got heaps of shit to do and don't do anything for three hours and then go oh shit I've still got heaps of stuff to do you're gonna be anxious and annoyed and frustrated and upset but if you actually go

you know what I'm just gonna tick off number one and then I'm gonna tick off number two and then I'm gonna tick off number three even if you don't get all 15 things done you get to the end of the day and you're like cheat something today I move forward. That was the exact opposite of my day yesterday. Just like literally like watching Netflix in bed and I was like geez I've got a lot to do. But I was like fuck I'm a piece of shit. The other piece of shit well that's an interesting one

because it's like it's your like it's up to you whether you do it or not but because you're telling yourself that you should be doing it and you're not doing it you feel even shit up like you just go you know what today I'm just gonna sit here and I'm gonna chill the fuck out for two hours and relax and watch Netflix. You can take a deep breath out you don't have to think about it. But because you're telling yourself why do you do it to yourself mate why do you traumatize yourself like that? I

get caught up in the whole like entrepreneur trap and I'm sure you would have held this at the start like you know I'm gonna have 60 regulars in I don't know a month sort of thing and then you've only got 40 and you're like well I could have worked harder I could have done this I could have done that. It's just the trap it's like perspective trap you go I could have had this or I do have this. So I'm thinking to myself while I'm watching Netflix going like I could be working right now but

realistically I know myself well enough that I know that I'm not super lazy so I'm not just gonna like sit there and watch it for the set like obviously I needed that and I felt good. Worked out this morning super motivated and I did lots of work you know smashed out the gym at 5am then just worked for about six hours and then it's just kind of like well then you know that sort of I'm feeling good about myself today but then it's sort of recognising the fact that you don't need to work hard all

the time like you were saying before you had like a relaxing week and it feels good I think it's really easy when you're sort of doing something I'm sure you have it when you're doing your snow seasons as well you sort of like feel the need to sort of push everything together and do something all the time and stay busy. I'll use three like there's three things that I always come back to and I'm someone that gets really frustrated with lack of progress sometimes and some people from an outside will be like why everything's moving

along and it's like because you only look at today and yesterday and tomorrow you don't feel as though you're moving and improving the three things that I remind myself of and I've gotten a lot better at this over the last like six months is good shit takes time. Sometimes you just need to stop take a deep breath and realise how far you've come and then you're actually able to kind of stop refill your cup allow yourself to like because you know all of us are in it in a in a part of life or part

of the world where we help other people or talk to other people so we need that energy to give to other people sometimes but if you don't have the energy of yourself you can't give it to everyone else yeah and if I come back to those three things then like I'm happy for lack of a better term because I know that yes things are going to take a while yes I just need to breathe and you know where I was I was working out of a shed as Dan can attest to I was working out

of a shed that was like small and like I was working out of an area that was smaller than this office like five years ago so you know all this stuff moves and it happens and you're going to move forward but sometimes you need to be okay with just being where you are oh it's super easy to fall into that trap and like I'm sure you might even feel it Dan even though you're a bit of a nomad like you'd go like oh there was people like when you're in you're like oh I know when

you're in your fifth year like some of my friends graduated last year yeah or like oh I could be settling down and buying a house right now if I've been more diligent and I get that because I still rent and things like that and it's really easy don't buy houses trap I was already on that page not about it mainly for the money but I like to say it's my choice yeah it's really easy to fall into that trap of looking around and going like everyone else is doing this this and this and going you

know like he works way harder than me or Dan's it's true that way more yeah 100% but uh then I could go Dan's got like a way that a lifestyle means you go skiing for like half the year every year and just it's like you know people will probably look at my life and go like oh it's got this this chocolate whatever he wants not at all there's so much trouble all the time but that but that's like that trap of for you to shit like you always want what you can't have kind of dealio

which Harrison's evil yeah you want to watch your favorite quote no it's not my favorite quote anymore but would you like to say that quote because it's probably been said it probably was said on our last podcast yeah Harrison is the thief of joy the most perfect quote ever because as soon as you start to I guess chase what other people have and tell yourself you want that then you kind of you kind of cook yourself because you get stuck in that constantly chasing buying shit like oh what was that quote you're always buying shit

you don't want buying shit you don't need with money you don't have to impress people you don't like yeah perfect quote absolutely perfect quote and one of the things we're doing our goal setting with like our life like kind of more lifestyle like long-term life goal setting with our clients is we the first thing we say is your goals and this is a great great day quote so thank you to greg for all of his wisdom it's your great dad five percent of checking five percent off physio or something um it's your goals should be

shaped by your desires and that like your is highlighted yeah because if because so many people chase things because they think they want it but really their mum wants it for them or their dad wants it for them or their girlfriend wants it for them or their friends want it for them I think they that's what they want but when you actually kind of dive in and sit there and go what what do I actually want you start to allow yourself to have those little movements where you can move forward where it's it's amazing that

you can critically think about things that way where did you learn to think that way a lot of trial and error and talking to people it's actually funny that you should say it like that because the second part of that thing that we do at the start of the goal setting your goal should be shaped by your desires and I'm not taking the piss because it's on the wall right there and supported by your allies so allies being the people around you and the people that already have the things you want to achieve so the

the reason I'm able to think critically like that is because I've allowed myself to surround myself with people who and this podcast has been a big helper in that and big driver in that people who are already achieving the things I want to achieve so they're already helping a significantly number of more people than I am and that's one of one of my goals is is to be able to help more people and spread the message of what I do so I think if you allow yourself to be supported by your allies and and that

my staff at work a lot of my allies in terms of my goal setting and Greg's one of them and you know the people that I haven't necessarily met like your Joe Rogan's and your Tim Ferriss's and your Malcolm Gladwell's and people who I look up to Simon Sinek's a big one lately reading all his books and listening to all his books they're the people that I'm able to I guess listen to and talk to without actually having to meet and I find that ability to listen to what they've done and I'm big on finding

people that have done things that I want to do and just listening to how they've done it like we all kind of think we have to reinvent the wheel and and find the magic pill and the magic thing to get to wherever we want to get to but we're probably never gonna like most of us are never gonna achieve a goal that no one that someone else hasn't already achieved so my kind of way of looking at it is that that's okay it's a you don't have to be different all the time but if you

can kind of latch on to those people and listen to them then you can kind of forge your own path in that way I think I think people sort of have a tendency to think like unless you're literally changing the world you're not making a difference and that again comes back to social media where you see these people like Gary Vaynerchuk or whoever it might be or even Joe Rogan you know he has his massive influence he reaches millions of people he listened to him talking like about when it was 1992 and he was you

know trying to make it as a comedian like good shit takes time oh that was 20% five 25 years ago I was born in 92 there you go 25 like 25 years like like I've completely grown up in 25 years I can imagine what could happen the next 25 but too many people get stuck in the what happens next week or what happens next month yeah ideal I think it's also a really really weird time to be alive in terms of the I think it's actually let's get pretty deep there's a really archaic sort of

value system that's hanging around in terms of your life progression that doesn't quite fit the mold of this sort of internet age in terms of go to school go to you get a job sit at a desk have a family die 30 years ago you'd be married might have a kid on the way to kp yeah or like 30 years ago if I was still working a part-time job at 26 and renting it would be like well there's something wrong with that guy or like yeah you'd be thought of a bit of a loser that's

not that's not uncommon at all like that's that's the norm now yeah but there's also like and that's quite pessimistic but I'm not like the more optimistic side like there's never been the sort of opportunities for an individual to evolve personally than there has been before yeah and your access to information so like damn when you're doing your ski season stuff like that you might be offered like whistle or you might be kind of wherever it might be you could still like things that couldn't happen before can happen now like you could run a business

from a laptop if you wanted to about like blogging about skiing and stuff like that and Gary Vaynerchuk talks about all the time there's a dude in New York who blogs about cats and makes eight thousand US dollars a year like there was some just weird dude like 30 years ago writing out letters about cats and just sent him out in the post I don't think it would go anywhere that's a really cool way to think about it is a really weird time to be alive like yeah I think it's been like 10 years since

the iPhone or 11 years or something like that since the iPhone yeah like think about how big of a like technological advance and like technological advance it wasn't that fresh of an idea but it was but it put together all of the things and they packaged it to make it sexy so that it was mass consumed but it's been 11 years since or whatever it is since the iPhone like none of us could live without it now most 12 to 12 year up couldn't live without it now but in 11 years ago everyone was able

to live without it so I think that kind of like you spot on the the speed at which we're able to I guess progress for lack of a better term some people who think would think we've regressed in certain certain areas but from a technological point of view we're able to progress so quickly and you know every basically every uni degree if you for college degree that you want to consume you can sit there online find a free one and and learn it yeah we spend yeah well that's exactly it like I just read a

book called the personal MBA it cost me nine dollars and like it's like it's basically the whole like structure of the man I read that too it was a guy that taught MBAs somewhere for like 20 years and he's like and he just put in a book so the ability to consume knowledge is there but we don't put the same value on it like we once would have I don't think which is just your take Dan because you obviously with that nomadic lifestyle I find usually people and they're traveling that sort of stuff and they're

living that sort of like the first thing you told well I thought when you said that you'd live for the scope snow season sort of stuff is you're a wonder junkie the person that sort of chases a high in the sense of like sort of freedom of living that nomadic lifestyle because it's very different to what lucky and I do yeah so like obviously lucky can't disappear for six months because vertice goes down the drain yeah so what what's your sort of are you being a nice thing that Mitch and Jess and Cameron Katie and

the rest of the crew would have it yeah they're awful yeah they are pretty yeah I love them all can we edit that out no that'll stay oh shit your sort of take on it because I find there's like there's two different fields there's people like me and I'm I'm a pessimist unfortunately we know yeah sorry guys but like you've obviously live this sort of this more or less free lifestyle so what do you think is it is it like is technology good and especially social media because that's probably the most prevalent technology in the

day-to-day life people that are listening in our lives I think I've never I haven't really thought about it that deeply before word vomit go for it but uh I guess to a large degree I kind of feel like what I've fallen into and the way that I followed things around it's kind of happened by accident so I wouldn't say like what did you use the word wonder wonder junkie yeah can you can you explain that I've never heard one expression wonder junkies of paper that sort of chase a high not not in the sense of

like I'm just gonna go smoke a bong out the back in terms of like when you're standing on top of it I'm sure you've had this more times than most people both of us yeah you're standing on top of a mountain the sun's rising in the snow everywhere and you're just sitting there and just like there's this extreme sense of awe yeah that you get like we've all experienced at some point in our life it's those sort of moments that strike you and just fill you with this sort of like well or is the only

way I can really put it so you sort of get very grounded through those experiences and you sort of just you just take I wouldn't say chasing that because that's sort of you put yourself in position to it yeah like that that's that's to have it yeah happen off exactly like you're living a lifestyle it's safe for the majority of people I don't know how old you I'm assuming you're around our age but you sort of putting yourself in the position just a little bit older happy birthday for the other day thank you yeah as

old as I need to be yeah wonder junkie is just someone who loves that lifestyle on this they continue living it and you know I guess they're unapologetic about it they just chase that sort of sense of wonder and awe that is in life and I think the easiest example is through you know exploring nature and exploring different places in the world because the sort of life we lead the modern lifestyle isn't really conducive to that yeah absolutely that's that whole you know I'm a traveler I'm traveling the world kind of attitude I suppose I

am I definitely think I'm gonna be honest is probably a part of my personality my character that does chase that a little bit but at the same time I'll be real and say that in those times I try to be appreciative and go actually this is motivating me to just get more of what I'm doing done so that I can keep enjoying this you know I a lot of people sort of I'm not I want to say that it kind of shits me a little bit but it doesn't at the same time when people turn

around and go you know all right you know you follow the snow around you live up in the mountains rather like you know you just on a holiday all the time right okay I do work for very very long weeks and in the last four weeks I've just taken a four-week holiday and it's the first time I've done in seven years I know that and I'm you know I don't care for telling everyone else you know all the people close you know that yeah and like having worked with like I met you it works having

worked with you over a long period of time I see how hard you do work but then you kind of almost get to enjoy the other stuff just as hard on the outside like yeah whether it's like boarding all day or yeah whatever it is yeah I think yeah my passion and my drive to work hard for people for myself or for a purpose is that there's something fulfilling about what I've done you know so if I was living up in the mountains and working seven days a week and not snowboarding I wouldn't be doing

it I simply wouldn't be doing it but there's also that question of are you doing it for yourself are you doing for others are you doing it for extrinsic or intrinsic motivations like can you answer that if I said what like why do you do what you do could you answer it without like without sitting down and really philosophical and thinking about it I mean I suppose I can try I don't really have a choice here do it real quick just ask me the question again why do you do what you do why do I

do what I do yeah because at the present time it allows me to live and play in places that I seem to love at the moment and continue to meet new and different people and it has honestly just kept opening itself up to opportunities that I've gone sweet I'm going to follow that I'm going to do that you know and it it'll you know I can trace it all back to you know the first time that I ever went to the snow when I was like you know 17 or 18 years old yeah and how

it kind of funneled on from that you know then moving away to university and meeting a particular person and then you know something random happened and I happened to go on a trip with him to Japan and I met a bunch of people that lived at Mount Hoffman Falls Creek and you know they encouraged me to get a job at Hotham and then I went up and to be a snowboarding instructor and decided oh hey this isn't gonna work because I've only got a month of uni holidays yeah walked into a rental shop and and

met my now current boss my offsider she's amazing back and uh you know that month turned into three months and uni sort of took a little backseat and you know then I met more people and more opportunities opened up and I'm a bit of a yes person which has been my detriment sometimes but that just kept giving you all those opportunities no no um and I'm so appreciative all the opportunities that I've had but I think you know there's a certain level of you know luck and coincidence with it as well but I think all

the time that I've said yes and just giving stuff a crack um it's just they've kept leading on from one to another so I certainly never sat down and went yeah I'm gonna go live in the snow for the next ten years you know and the first year was like yeah this is cool I'll probably just go and yeah but it's just like taking each three six month period at a time yeah but with that said lately I have been thinking about that whole idea of not getting stuck in that wonder wonder junkie sort of

you know setting because admittedly I do I have a lot of close friends and I do live with a lot of people that um you know have done that for a long period of time and super super happy and such but a lot of people do go hey this is enough I've done this for a few years now I'm going to move on you know I've got to go and live that regular lifestyle because there are you know it's it does hold you back in certain aspects um so I've been trying to be a little

bit critical lately and say well hey I need to set myself some stoppers here and if you know if in the next 12 months I'm genuinely not moving forward whether that be through into a new role through you know having any more money or you know getting promotion or things like that or if all of a sudden I'm not doing new things or I suppose achieving more you know will I will I pull a pin will I go back to you know my teaching will I look for a full-time teaching job and it's difficult you

could become an Ed sorry you could become an Ed you don't want that shop with happiness yeah exactly I think that's really interesting because that's one of the things I touched on in my pro in my project is progress and growth and I think there's a sort of basal need as a human being whoever you are to grow in some aspect of your life I'm sure you guys have realized that at this point in your life that there's when you are stagnant and you're not moving anywhere it doesn't matter what sort of field it's in

like if you're not growing in some way you feel really lost I think that's where depression and anxiety and those sort of things sort of flare up so it's really interesting that you'd say that because I'm sure people look at you and go like oh Dan's really careful you go blah blah he's got you know like you were saying oh he's on holiday all the time where the reality is it's not like yeah that's a holiday for you and you've got your four weeks off a year from your office job you might go skiing for

two weeks in you know the middle of July but that's not the reality to it and I think people I think growth is a really interesting aspect because like you were saying like I interviewed Lockie earlier this week for my project and he was saying that he grows more now that he's older and I think that's I think that's a thing that doesn't tend to happen too much with people it's really easy to sort of think like alright well now that I've got my job and like for me especially like Lockie I know you have

to work hard all the time I know that I'm in a in a big company more or less I'm going to sort of float to the top if I stick with it long enough because it's you know it's the biggest confectionary company in Australia so it's just sort of like it's a big company it's ticking all the boxes in terms of career progression but yeah I know within myself it's not something I want long term but I think that this sort of aspect of growth and progression is a really interesting one because people and again

it comes back to the sort of thing we're talking about like perspective and stuff like that it's sort of people go like I want this and I want that and they're usually something that you need to work towards and that's the missing factor that work yeah but like I think and I've only just had this thought now but I like whenever I talk about football or sport with a lot of my athletes or a lot of the like having played a semi-elite brand of football for a long period of time I have this I had

this theory that everyone's gonna level so everyone's gonna level with footy whether it's you know local twos or local ones or VFL or AFL where you'll get to see those players that are amazing VFL players like they're just a level above but can't make it in AFL and I've got this theory that everyone's got their level and like mine was a very average VFL player but I can go back to local and get a kick because I'm like that my level's kind of somewhere in the middle I think after hearing you say that I reckon

everyone's got their level with work and with what they want to do some people are happy kind of and you know Dan and I have worked in retail together some people are like stoked and super happy with just being a and I don't mean just but being a manager at a retail store whereas or being a salesperson or being an accountant just working for someone else whereas some people are just like I'm going to like my mindset is that would that would kill me I don't think that'd be the worst thing in the world for

me I want to run my own show and do my own thing even if I like I have to work an extra 20 hours a week like I'm okay with that because that's my that's like my level and I'm not saying levels are up or down but they're different areas I need to work on this theory when it comes to work because you don't want to make people feel like shit but yeah whether people want to be a teacher or want to be an assistant principal or want to be a principal in a school everyone's

kind of got their level where they want where they're going to end up at and unless you and some people will get to that level and then stay at that level and be happy and kind of float around that level and then go you know what I want to go to the next level in terms of potential level like obviously doesn't there's a certain point where it doesn't matter how hard you work as an AFL player you're not going to go above VFL whereas see that's that's how I look at it because if you work

really hard you can get to that level but you could also be semi-laced and skip a training session a week and then you're only going to be that local level yeah well if we use that like if we use that AFL VFL kind of system it's a really simple one because some you get some like tack up players that like want to make it they will do every little thing possible and they'll end up playing local because they're just not good enough and that's like that's okay and then you'll get some players that will make

VFL and just kind of kick around and then not like be a really good footballer player AFL and play 30 40 50 60 games whatever then you get the players that are just freaks and that work really hard and you get both of them and they're the two 300 game players at AFL and I think if you you need to be and this self-awareness for me has only happened like the last three or four years like if you asked me maybe when I was like 21 22 why I'm not playing AFL would have thought of

a list of excuses right you asked me now I wasn't good enough like it's as simple as that like I can go that I was short I can go that I was unlucky the wrong people weren't looking at me and all these kind of things but at the end of the day like it's on me I wasn't good enough and whether I could have been better if I trained differently or tried harder or was it a different club or whatever who knows that's part of the unknown but I think if you bring that back to

how everyone deals with like life and work and family and relationships in general then as soon as you're a layback you're able to self-reflect and critique what you're doing and why you're doing it and whether you are actually good enough or whether you should be doing that you're able to have that growth because it you might not always move up but you might move sideways or you might move into something different and when Dan realizes that you know what I don't want to be as he so eloquently put it a snow bum professional snow bum

and you and you want to go back to teaching like then it's time for you to like slide across and move to that different thing I try to whether I'm trying to make myself you know whether I'm trying to make a justification or make myself feel better I don't know but uh especially with the teaching side of things I think that the good teachers that I remember the memorable teachers the ones that connected made things meaningful and relevant to me were the teachers that are had stories with the teachers that I could relate to with

the teachers that have done things with their life that were doing things with their life yeah and you could you know you could maybe see yourself being them you know you're a kid you're looking for something to aspire to you looking for something to be and for me in high school that was my PE teachers and my outdoor ed teachers and that's a pretty a pretty standard thing yeah because that's what you ended up doing yeah exactly um but I don't want to be a physical education teacher and I've realized that now that was what

I want to do when I left school when study did everything I was like that's not what I want to do anymore and I'm completely completely fine with that but the more that I sort of the different things that I do the different experiences I have I'd like to think that that's going to make me a better educator and a better teacher down the track because I can hopefully enable people to I can relate and give meaning my favorite quote like and you told me like I've got a lot of favorite quotes anyone that knows

me I've got a shitload of favorite quotes anyone that has listened to more than one episode of this podcast this is the least top 25 knows that this is top hundred quotes but like one of the ones that comes back all the time is you can't give what you haven't got you can't share what you haven't experienced and I think that's so like like that's exactly what you're saying as soon as you like if all these experiences you have if you go back to teaching man you're gonna be such so much better like equipped to

teach than you would have been if you just went bam uni done teacher for life yep which is some people's journey and that's the cool thing about like life is you've got how many people on the planet now seven billion people all kind of doing their own thing and working their own way but you're being able to and you're currently able to experience all these different things that the teacher that went straight from uni to work isn't able to or isn't able to unless they uproot themselves and go and try that but I think that

makes you a better teacher that's yeah I mean that's I suppose hopefully the plan I wanted to I just wanted to touch on what you said about not playing AFL and the idea that everyone's got a level and those sorts of things I definitely see what you're saying I think that that level is forever changing though so every day you know we get presented with different opportunities and different choices and our values change and the way we go about things changes and that can forever be changing that level so yeah maybe you might have played

AFL if you you know took away the community that you have to your family the fact that you you're in a very loving community relationship with a lovely lady that you were building that you were building you know you're building a business as well you didn't need to be doing that yeah you had you had a roof over your head you know you could have just we could have just kept working away at Rebel you know no responsibilities really you know paying the bills and you probably could have put away more time into your football

yeah and maybe you would have played AFL but you wouldn't have been playing AFL until you were 60 years old yeah but instead while you were playing VFL and getting a really really good experience and about learning heaps about your own self everyone that you got to compete with and importantly like the I suppose the sporting industry you were you know putting a heap of other ducks in a row in your life and I don't think that you would I don't think that you could even think that you would have the same level of success

or you know be able to track the way that you are now if you have if your life is purely AFL I don't want anything else in my life it's only gonna be an AFL yeah you might have then spilled over into what you're doing now and that comes down to your values were I want to you know want to be successful in you know a number of different ways and I want to achieve in a number of different ways and I find that a little bit interesting in the way that people can there's I

suppose different patterns in the way that people live their lives and then the way that they set an example down to their children and their children again you know let's say for example family business you know and this goes back you know 50 years ago it was different 20 years ago it's different now it's different you know the family business someone's working 80 hours a week and you know building an empire and and doing everything they can to I guess provide for their family but and leaving behind you know like business and a lot of

money and things like that is that more successful and a better I suppose I can't think of the word a better a better thing to leave behind for your family and to offer your family or are you better to cut that in half spend time with be half as successful and and and do all those meaningful things you know not work those four weeks holidays you know go on camping trips with your family or or make sure that every weekend you're down at your son's football game yeah shout out to Rob and those sorts of

things maybe you're not gonna you know you're not gonna make the same amount of money you're not gonna have the same progress with your business or whatever it might be but which is more successful and then there is no answer yeah there is no right answer the answer like is completely individual dependent and value dependent like I look at like my values now are heavily influenced by my parents my family and the people around me and all of like like my kind of number one value to just kind of wing it and think about what

it might be would probably be like think like being able to create relationships but then that having that hard work to be able to work towards it whatever that thing is it that's I guess my crazy dream at that point in time and for a couple of years yeah it was AFL but you were like a pop reflection you're probably spot on like I did start putting other ducks in a row to work out what I actually wanted and now that like if you if you asked me three years ago if I was gonna like

quit footy I failed to play it to just work and that I genuinely enjoyed and this this speaks for how much I enjoy work rather than how much I don't enjoy footy like I genuinely enjoy my week at work more than I enjoy footy and anyone that knows me knows how much I love football so I'm able to go to work every day with the passion that I used to show to football which allows me to know that no matter what happens no matter how many times I fuck up no matter what external factors influence

me that I'm going to be successful and that success for me will be completely dependent on what values I hold at the time of me going am I successful or am I not successful and I think that ability which will grow as I get older and as I work more that ability to kind of go well what is success to me and actually like kind of unpack that question and it's gonna it's gonna change like for me success at the moment is knowing that I'm able to I'm able to support myself and my staff with

what we're building and know that I'm able to come home to KP and know that the gym is gonna be open tomorrow like that's success for me at the moment but in six months in twelve months in you know early Jan it might change who knows but that's something that I'm able to I don't know reflect on now because I have these conversations and I sit down and think about and like I have the conversation with you about what happiness is and what I actually want to achieve but so many people don't have those thoughts

because they've never I guess presented with it and there's a thing and that's half the reason why so what I do these things are sort of learning in the background we also know that they're like thinking about like what brings you purpose what brings you happiness what success is to you like they're there because you're sort of showing different versions of success as you go through life but I think you sort of sit there and you just you know you see you showing all these different ideas of it but I don't know if you really

sell fucking this is what we're talking about before we start recording like how much self-reflection you need to sort of know where exactly where you going I think like and I'm sure you'd have sort of a good sort of two cents with this being going through like teaching and stuff I personally think the current school system doesn't really work that well in terms of like I remember going through year twelve and going shit I've got to decide what I want to do for the rest of my life in terms of picking a union degree you

know I'm going to do accounting then I'm going to be an accountant and that's what I was thinking about before these sort of overarching values of like these arcade values in terms of you know you got to pick what you want to do in year twelve because it used to be you get that job you work for 50 years you retire it like mid to late 60s you're getting a watch not anymore just get chocolate bars which kind of sucks significant amount of chocolate bars surely not 10 grand worth but uh yeah I don't know

it's really it's really weird and like I was I was like because obviously this is what I heard I wasn't saying much when you guys told me that was I find that really interesting because I actually don't know what my definition of success is I honestly don't I know what I think I want now which might be which is the project that I'm doing being my career and going around talking to people but at the same time I've conflicting issues with that in terms of my biggest thing that I despise is over-flated egos which is

me being heavily involved in social media there's no short supply of them yeah and um and one of the things I was thinking that sort of put a smile on my face as well is you were talking about you need to have experience to teach to talk about your experiences and I deal with a lot of life coaches and there's been a few that I've met that have been uh I got uh sort of asked to do a speech very early on um with these people and I remember reading I met one of the ladies

and she was sweet as can be but she was 22 and a business mentor yeah like oh what's your experience with business I've never started one yeah okay and um so what do you do for work I work part-time at this retail store so oh is that all you've done yep okay probably not gonna be the greatest like it's not a business mentor I'm gonna say no so but it's um I just find it really weird how six like again what is success to you because obviously there's a sort of like overarching themes of financial

success but like and I was really like thinking quite deeply about my sort of life because you were talking about the difference between being super successful and working 80 hours a week which is my dad down to a T versus um spending more time with family because I didn't see dad very much at all when I was growing up and but at the same time vicariously learning through him and knowing that he worked 16 hour days like not exaggerating at all he'd leave home at 4am and get home at 10pm and he'd drive up to

the city because he knew my mum wanted to live down here on the Warring yeah so like and now I see that and go like you know I'm seven hours into a day and I'm like geez this is shit then I go I can't you know back to the day dad would never be halfway through his day so and I want those things I want I don't necessarily need to be as successful as my dad is in the financial respect but I do want to provide for my family that I do want yeah and it's

really interesting to think like how different people react to success like the people that their success is I want to go up to Byron Bay and work 14 hours a week so I can pay rent and just get fucking high yeah all the time and if you are genuinely happy this is my basic premise if you're genuinely happy and you're not hurting anyone around you fucking that's it you're done you've won life like really some people are happy having a job that's nice and safe they you know they might be a receptionist or just like

a low level accountant a big firm and they make their 65k a year and they go home and they rather than thinking I want to work that for extra four hours like Lockie does basically every day that he's at work or all those sorts of things you know they go and they they go home and they enjoy Netflix with a glass of wine with their partner or yeah with their friends have a you know a nice dinner like it's it's it's very it's you know it's just different strokes of different people it's um yeah it's

a really interesting concept because the there is the overarching concepts of what success is and people always think like success is always money based and like that's probably why people have told you and whether or not they admitted it like they're probably jealous of the lifestyle you'd live when they when they like talk to you probably run into someone who goes like oh but they say that like they see the highlights so like that's not in a negative way they're probably the people that would talk down to you about the fact that you've done this

and stuff absolutely yeah but I think from that would be more of a reflection of them they're probably at a shoe day in the office and they're coming out and then seeing this guy who seems to be living the absolute dream which you said is obviously again they're just seeing the highlight reel of your life yeah but they think all he does is like they might be never scared and they go but I've also got to spend 48 weeks of the year in my office so I can go skiing for four weeks of the year

but this guy does it for six months a year so yeah it's again it comes down to perception yeah so yeah can I answer your what is happiness to me question again again you've done that two words growth and achievement but here's the thing that's my answer and your answer and Dan's answer is going to be completely different like yeah I think to me yeah yeah and I think the thing that like one of the things that Greg has been able to teach me and I guess I subscribe to his belief around that is that

success it's kind of that external validation around what you do and the achievement is that sense of ticking the boxes like you with your list today like you've just gone and gone to the ATM gone to the post office gone to the pharmacy but you feel good and like even if like some of my like I try and write down and then behind you guys at the moment like I try and write down the things that I need to do in December to make myself feel as though I've achieved this month and that that that

word achievement is the thing that I come I try and come back to you to make sure well have I achieved have I grown have I moved forward and if I have what's your version of external achievement external validation or whatever you said because I think that's it for me personally it's a very dangerous trap I guess for me when I hear external I think that's achieving things for the sake of others yeah it's a very quick way to go well and one to have people place expectations on you which is dangerous in itself especially

if they're unrealistic so if I go like lucky I want you to rock up to work tomorrow that's all well and good because I know that's going to happen but like you know if I go like lucky I want you to have you know eight vertices by January next year yeah but but they're not like they're my things that I'm that I want to achieve and like like on the wall the cool like this little podcast office for those that are currently listening on their iPhone or car or whatever you can't see the office but

I put all the shit on the walls that I am working towards or that I want to see daily or whatever and behind you guys is like what our why is and why we actually is that the old lady yeah that's the old lady above the old lady was all good baby baby that's a snake that's a snake hole piece for the boys but it's all around why I'm doing what I'm doing and like those you'll see that the things that I want to tick off in December if I take those things off I am

moving towards the things that are above it which is the why and I didn't do that triangle intentionally but I guess it kind of all points towards what I'm trying to create and that division probably needs to be flipped with what my wife and what my why actually is but I don't and I could be wrong but I don't think I look for external validation I am self-aware enough to know the things that I want to achieve and if and yes I like to be liked and I like to be that person that people go

to for help and things like that but if people want me to achieve something I'll only want to achieve it if it's something that I want to do and I don't know whether whether I'm wrong with that assumption or not I feel as though everything I do like everything I do is because I want to do it and it's not I don't tend to and KP is gonna be the first person to agree with this statement but I don't tend to do things I don't want to do unless I feel obliged to for whatever reason

so you know I'll do things because it might make other people happy but the majority of what I'm going to do is going to be because I want it and I like to think that the majority of what I want is going to make other people's lives better which I guess you know that whole wanting to be altruistic and wanting to help other people it's always starts from a selfish point I think and you might see differently. Do you think it would be fair to give someone a piece of advice that is go away be happy you can go and do what you want provided that it's what you want to be doing?

Is that a general question? It's as simple as that yeah for both of you boys as long as you're doing what you want to be doing then that's okay but if it doesn't hurt anyone else then go nuts. If he's like I don't want to do if that he or she is like I want to do heroin and I'm like well you got three kids so let's probably not go down that path. No I don't think so I think you got to be practical about it as well like you know like he could have just

bought a house he's like and he might be a really good PT making 80k a year out of another gym and he goes I want to start this place called Burs. But if I pay my mortgage you don't care. Yeah maybe actually like hypothetical situation KB he's got a kid on the way he's just paid a mortgage and he's paid like the absolute minimum. Go silly. Not that that will happen any time this year. Either way or a hypothetical person we'll call him Wachlan Lollis, beautiful girlfriend kid on the way mortgage on a house and

he says I want to start a business right now and he's got he's just bought a house I go like maybe that's not a good idea but like because maybe that's what's going to make him really happy and that's what he wants to do but there's you got to I think you have to be practical about it as well. Yeah but you got to like what was going to make you happy now and on the long term so if I went what's going to have to make me happy now what's going to make me happy

now is drinking another 15 beers tonight what's going to make me happy in the long term is stopping at this beer and doing my first triathlon on Sunday. Oh shit that's insane. So it's like you're spot on you need to check yourself and kind of go well what is what does future Wachlan Lollis want and what what is going to be best for future let's say me or you or Dan what are the things that are going to do that because you're spot on like like I've got a six-week trip to South America book for

next year and if I kind of go you know what'll make me happy doing fuck all at work for the next four months if I do that I know that Virtus won't be be running and if it is it'll be running at a big loss if I don't keep working and keep putting systems and processes in place over the next four or five months before I go away for that six weeks I know that like work's gonna be pretty cooked and I'm not I'm gonna come back to a company or a business with probably a

lot of pissed off employees and probably a lot of pissed off clients so like you spot on the fact that you've got to check yourself and kind of go well we need to look at how my decisions affect everyone else. I think there's a huge tendency to look at the short term and go that's what I want right now but then people's tentatively get that your short term very quickly becomes your long term sorry your long term very quickly becomes your short term yeah so you could go like what's going to make me happy right

now for me is if I quit my job being a salesman and then I just go 100% full my project but then I'm going like well I haven't figured out a way to make a decent income and be able to maintain my lifestyle which I enjoy in my life and keep a roof over my head while doing that so like I'd say if someone said that to me that would be poor advice but devil's advocate sometimes you need to take that kind of big leap 100% and to make that magic happen 100% yeah but this

is what I was talking about and this is more of a reflection of my character what you've done with Virtus and what you do Dan living your life scares the shit out of me I need that comfort 100% I'm a neurotic person I need that sense of control yeah so I know that you know if my project isn't it you know whatever it might be the sort of goal that I set for followers or for revenue or whatever it is by mid-way next year that I still have that full back I need that safety net

yeah I've never been good with that sort of stuff yeah so I think you gotta take into account one person that you that you're talking to yeah and like it sounds good if you go like go chase your dreams chase your passion just change passions like I really like mushrooms I don't want to go I don't know I just want to look at them all day like look you know that's probably not gonna make you a huge amount of money dude if a guy can can make 80k a year writing about cats there's got to

be a like at least a 40k mushroom gig floating around somewhere probably the same guy yeah mushroom cats there you go 120k right there man that's perfect but yeah like you're like you're right we've got to take the like real life is going to happen around us regardless of whether we want to see them look at mushrooms all day well I hate mushrooms absolutely disgusting they don't belong in any food ever if you roast mushrooms you don't need to be in my life just get out anyway too personal carry on no I don't know like

it sounds really good and this is my gripe and this is why I'm so pessimistic because I involve myself so heavily in social media with what I do it's just you see all these quotes and just be you and you should be authentic to yourself but you can't deny the fact that it doesn't matter what sort of really like down for you down I literally met at 7 p.m tonight yeah and it's and it's now 8 19 and we've been recording for about an hour so let's go for two waffle your that's okay it's good

stuff carry on I'm guaranteeing we're changing lives right here hashtag Tony Robbins so like I didn't know Dan before and I'm like I put it on a bit of a like I wouldn't say bravado but like you whenever you meet someone you sort of you have your guard up and stuff like that so just like be you fit like to use that specific example doesn't work and these like you know just take it as it comes but like these broad sweeping statements that you see in social media they don't work in real life you need

to have that bit of practicality because real life still happens like like exactly the perfect example is you and people how they go like oh he's in holidays for six months a year like no he works like 12-hour days like six months a year then he gets four weeks it off once every seven years if someone offered that to me like well yeah good yeah I'm pretty good thanks yeah so like I think people have the same gripes about teachers and like have the same gripes about someone that might you know the fly-in fly-out workers

that work two weeks on and two weeks off and I was having this conversation with a couple of boys like Nick Petro and Gratz about like they both live such different lifestyles like Nick say he's been on the podcast he's a stock trader what's that called again? Stock trader. Whatever he trades stock late at night and Gratz. Just call him the wolf of all straight. Yeah exactly exactly and Gratz pumps it at work for two weeks at a time and then has two weeks off like these could like similarly you guys are two completely different

lifestyles but they work for those two and like that's where they're at now and like you two are the same like and I guess I'm very similar to you in terms of rock hard to work every day spend all day at work go home. Your old days like 16 hours one's like seven and a half with an hour and a half coffee break. Yeah it's a bit different I drink a lot of coffee so it keeps me going but like Dan you're like your days. Use common folk 5 for 5% off check out. They genuinely

sponsor the podcast kind of they sponsor me so but like that like I think the like back to your question you ask so many different people it depends on the person so much that we try and look for that meaning of life or that answer for why everything happens and it's just everything's a little bit different I think if you can find what your what your why is and chase it and sometime some somehow monetize it to put a roof over your head whether it's you know Dan spending six months of the year at Hotham

and a couple of months in Japan and a couple of and a month or two with with all his mates that he leaves behind six months a year half kidding or whether it's like Ed pumping out through like three or four years being salesman so that he can get human happiness product off the ground or if it's me kind of going you know what I've gotten like when I was 23 and suddenly Virtus with Jesse we had like no risks like we were kind of just like well fuck what's the worst can happen like we

end up back where we are now with no gym so everyone's got to find their own spot and whether and I'm not naive enough to think that you know your mum of three has the same risks as a 19 year old coming out of high school or a 23 year old coming out of uni but I am probably one of the I guess romantics that think that if you follow what you love you'll eventually figure out then land on something that you want to do and like like to use someone that hopefully will listen to

the podcast and hopefully she'll enjoy this shout out like bridge to see her go from doing what's a job that she didn't love doing and like you know bridge pretty well it's been amazing what she's done yeah going from a job she didn't love doing and coming in like upset on a number of days and us talking about like what do you want to do and to see her go from like step one step two step three step four to be accepted into the like kind of what we she'd probably say was a dream uni

course she's followed the thing she loves but she doesn't have all that extra stuff to the reason why she's so it's so when I see that and it makes me so happy because bridge and I work together and I saw how she was at work yeah just see her actually make that step and that's the difference like people don't take that step and again it comes out that practicality it doesn't make me feel good about myself or about life in general to drop my current job and then chase my project full time yeah it doesn't

that doesn't line up with me but yeah you know it's just about sort of chasing down what you want I think there's you know you can get real anxiety with making a decision but it you sort of got to work out if that anxiety is like overwhelming you enough with the indecision because there can be anxiety with indecision 100 so it's it's yeah I don't know for the people that do go out and do it like fucking props to you but I honestly I could never do it like hi do you like and do you

think you could never do because you tell yourself you never do it or you just know yourself well enough to know that that's not for me it's conflicting goals as much as I'd like to say yeah I go around and talk to people because I do have goals about talking to young men about their role in society and you know talking to people about life and things like that because like coming back to this is one of the spheres that I involve myself so heavily in social media it's toxic it is one of the most

like amazing tools that we've come up with yeah but like I think a lot of people use it as a source of external validation and I think like the biggest battle that we have as individuals especially when we're sort of teething through a growth process is you want external validation and it's more to confirm the fact that you're going on the right path because whether you want to admit it or not like we are social creatures you can't get away from that um you know like you always want to be moving forward but at the

same time you can't get past the idea of whether it's you're moving forward in a way that people approve of friends family whoever it might be colleagues sort of thing like and to be able to um like whether they said it's your face or not I'm sure there's people that sort of said that opening a gym wasn't a good idea because there's 10,001 gyms in the peninsula itself yeah and there's all these big changes that you're coming up against but like like I've had plenty of people kind of say like I don't know how you

do what you do and then like my response to that and not necessarily directly like depends on the person who's like I don't know how you sit at a desk for eight hours a day and then go home and play xbox and watch netflix and then do it all against my own like but do they ask you that do they work are they passionate about their job because then they'll probably understand a lot of work they have 16 hour days a lot of people are breaking the day but your whole work day is 16 hours

or whatever yeah that break doesn't really exist anymore I just come out yeah and do what like people go like I don't know how you work but I don't feel like I'm working like and that's the I guess the magical thing that everyone's probably looking for is that feeling of being able to like I wake up in the morning and go to bed at night and yes I have good days and bad days but I genuinely do what I want to do in between like whether it's coaching whether it's business development stuff whether it's talking

to my staff whether it's you know going down the beach hanging out for a couple of hours or an hour or half an hour or getting you know 15 coffees a day at common folk shout out five percent off like it doesn't matter I use like a stent drink yeah like I'm gonna like tomorrow I'm gonna wake up probably super tired I'm gonna get up go coach our group training class in the morning I'm gonna go to common folk and have breakfast with 20 people who are incredibly important to me I'm gonna hang out with

KP from us today like yes it's a weekend but that's what I'm gonna do tomorrow and like you know Monday I'm gonna work for five or six hours in the morning like with people I want to be around in an environment I want to be in and then I'm probably gonna spend a couple of hours doing you know office work and doing the stuff that I know I don't necessarily love doing but I know I need to do to help us keep moving forward and then I'm gonna do the whole coaching thing again and then

I'm probably gonna go home and have dinner with KP and um the guys we live with and then I'm gonna wake up Tuesday morning do it all again tomorrow but I like do it all again then but like I genuinely and like this is what I love doing I love doing that like I get home seven nights after working those six-hour days and then you know they've become a little bit more prominent lately because I know I'm going away and I want to make sure that everything's rolling but and I just don't want to talk

and KP gets so annoyed because I'm just like like and I haven't been able to externally like validate or talk to her about what why that is but I get home and I was like I just want to talk I just want to hang out I just want to be with you and be next to you and like for me that's like that's happiness or that's because I'm doing the things I want to be doing regardless whether I'm tired regardless whether I'm you know working myself to the bone like so many people tell me you

need to take a day off and I guess I enjoy the feeling of working harder than I think I have to because that's but that's me like I love that feeling of you know most people are in bed and I'm sitting there writing something about work or most people are home from work and you know on a Friday night and we're sitting here recording a podcast which isn't necessarily for work this is more for my personal development and our personal development and the people around me but like every day I kind of I'm allowed I'm

able to wake up and do the things I want to do and like I think everyone should be working towards that but what those things that they want to do and what that looks like is completely different for everyone like it's going to be completely different for you two than it is for me. So if you have to pull one thing out of that like this whole conversation is so complex there's five thousand different measuring sticks yeah unpack it a little bit if you have to find if you want to try to find some kind

of consistency that you can sort of start to take a similar measuring stick to more people's lives you know yeah just the three of us in this room is also different to begin with but what gets you out of bed in the morning one gets out of bed in the morning one gets out of bed in the morning what means that instead of sitting on the couch and you know being complacent with not doing too much with the day you know we get up and go do things and all three of us have had days

where we've got no motivation to do anything and we don't want to go and do our job we don't want to get up and do that list of things we might have a list of things to do we don't go and do it anyway. I'm interested to know what your thoughts are on positive mental attitude and the part of that plays and is that something that can be you know how do you help how do we help each other slash help other people find their way back to that I guess position in the head where you have that positive mental attitude because and I kind of really wanted to ask you about that.

Well it's so it's so like like for me that positive like finding that positive mental attitude as much as you can say it's external I think it comes from like within and consistently wanting to come back to like you being positive if I was trying to be there but if you want to be like if you want to be doing the things you want to be doing and you're constantly even the days where you're like like I wake up some mornings and it's been more prevalent lately because I've been working a little bit harder and

I'm not haven't been filling my cup as much but if you wake up some mornings it you know half an hour before you need to be at work and you're just like I'm so tired I feel like my eyes are gonna fly out of back my head my kind of go-to is just get up just get out of bed just get to work and then I like and there's extroverts and introverts I'm probably more towards the extrovert side sometimes I need my quiet time and me time but I'm more towards the extrovert side in that

I get a lot of energy from other people so if I'm you know like dragging myself out of bed eyes falling out of my head and I can get to work that's the battle kind of won for me because then I might have a coffee or I might have a glass of water. What's the quote like 9% of the battles are showing up. Yeah well that's exactly it and and then I am able to know that the you know the five six ten twelve fifteen seventeen people that are coming in for VGT or their group

training that morning they're going to expect someone that's full of energy and up and about and ready to go and even if I'm not that for the first five minutes their energy kind of fuels me and the mornings that I'm the tiredest I tend to you know look back at 7 a.m. after I've done my first hour of the day and be more energized than I am when I'm bounced out of bed and I find that I get my my energy from other people and my mantra like I'm obviously fairly big on self-reflection so I've

written a mantra for me that the days where I don't feel great I try to write it down at the start of the day it's show up smile and make a difference like it's just that like if I show up and I smile and I'm able to make a difference in someone's life between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. the whole day like I've got you know 12 14 15 more hours at work to be able to keep compounding on that and that ability to have that positive self-talk of just get out of bed and that

action drives motivation that's kind of what allows me to do that so like that underlying thing like for me that I really pops his head out there that I think you can draw a comparison between everyone regardless of where they are where they go you things like that in this like most simple form is just doing something yeah just that idea of doing something and if it can be something that that is maybe a little bit productive that's good too because that gives you fulfillment and then that links back to that whole happiness and sense

of achievement like you said before like going to the ATM going to the pharmacy going to the post office like how simple are those three things yeah one of my favorite like I'm big on YouTube in terms of motivation I'll ask you to about a question about motivation in a minute but it's it's someone in the Australian Defence Force talking about the importance of making a bet and the importance of like the first thing you do in the morning yeah yeah exactly it moves you towards whatever you want to achieve and it's like that whole

the way you do one thing is the way you do everything well it definitely has a phone effect and it's exactly the same if you're being lazy piece of shit like me yesterday watching Netflix if you're there I don't know we have like obviously the comfort zone is very very important like not important but it's very attractive because everyone's got their voice in their head to say go home don't go don't go to work or but it's an overriding overriding thing so I'm quite analytical in a way I think I need a breakdown psychology of

it all yeah just sort of make sure it's for it to make sense to me that's why motivation quotes and stuff like that don't really do it for me so my favorite person in the world at the moment is Jordan Peterson who's really good at breaking down the size of my he's so like he's ridiculous he hurts my brain sometimes I don't even understand what you say most of the time but yeah and it's it's a it's a really interesting motivation is a really interesting thing yeah and like you said I think people get that

the wrong way around there from that I'm pretty sure you put this in the group verse group or something like that I've seen it from you somewhere but that a lot of people think that motivation drives action but it's actually action that drives motivation that's written on our wall at the gym like that's where I've seen it but it's just you know and that's why the things like making your bed and that's actually something weirdly enough because for me for a long time I thought like what the fuck's the difference I'm just I'm gonna wake

up tomorrow morning and the bed's still gonna be messy but it doesn't make it there no there is like a weird sense of pride when you come home and your room's clean and your bed's made and stuff like that and weirdly enough I don't know if it's like a just a mental thing but like a doona that's laid there flat all day late and you know getting into feels better than yeah a doona that's just like kind of fucking can I just check in there for one moment it kind of breaks it kind of breaks

the that rule of doing things for other people because why why do we make our bed why did we actually make our bed because our bed was too that wasn't you know I don't know but I've just spoken about having making bed because it's part of your job with the no we haven't we haven't but like that and yes like for the people that are in the defense force and the navy and the you know marines and stuff like that like that's the first thing they have to do in the morning but I think but

the reason that's the first thing they have to do in the morning is because that sets up their whole day yeah and like here's a uh a shocker for you I don't actually make my bed in the morning because Kp is always still in it when I get up so what I do is I try and I try and make sure that I tuck it in on my side and then roll over to her like go around her side and tuck her in and give her a kiss goodbye like every morning I'll give her a

kiss goodbye and like as a like little thing like I try and always every now and again I try and kiss her goodbye because it always wakes her up regardless of whether she wants to run then I leave and then just before like as I walk out the door I stop I come back give her another kiss because it always makes her happy so little tidbit for you guys there try it give the old double double double penny relationship game changer game changer game changer yeah but like that I think like from a military point

of view like that's the reason why they do that and one of the books like I think the book I just finished reading was leaders eat last by Simon Sinek which you would have probably read and ate it it's uh it talks about how the and I think this is probably the most important thing and I've gone off track a little bit talking about being a leader but I think everyone's a leader in some aspect and the leaders eat last thing is talks about the um the marines that the all of the guys that are

at the top will will literally when they have lunch for the day or dinner or whatever they'll eat last they'll wait till everyone else has eaten until they eat and I think that really really simple premise of the people that you're trying to lead you put them before you at all times whether it's you know friends or staff or you know fellow people doing something or whether it's you know your family if you've got a couple little kids you put them before you then you make sure they're okay then you can look after yourself and

that in my head that system of looking after them ensures that you're gonna be able to look after yourself later because when you need their help for whatever it is whether it be kids or whether it be you know your partner or whether it be your friends or whether it be staff they're able to come like come back around and help you down the track and you know that everyone's gonna have everyone's back and I think that's I don't know what what tangent I just went on there but that's kind of like the the premise

for if I can help people around me and help people improve whatever they're doing then they're gonna come back to me with hey why don't you try this or why don't you do this we're just gonna improve my life which is the whole like for me that's the whole point energy flow yeah that's actually really interesting because if you think about that when you think about people that the difference between people investing time and effort into people and the people that don't is the people that don't can look at the past like well he didn't

do this for me or he didn't do that for me whereas you're looking at it as if I do this for them they might be able to help me not necessarily relying on that you go that they might need to help me I might need their help somewhere down the line that's really interesting like I was I literally just popped into my head in terms of like and again it's a positive versus negative sort of mindset like you thinking like oh you know what's his face didn't do this for me when I asked him to

so I'm not gonna help him now yeah yes well I'll pay you 20 bucks for doing this podcast and Dan goes what the fuck why didn't I get 20 bucks and then you haven't told Dan about that have you no I haven't and then afterwards you go hey Dan do you want to come out for burgers I got 20 bucks to play with like you're gonna look after me I don't know I don't know but that's like the simplest I don't know thought in terms of helping someone else that as soon as I think it's

a Louis CK quote which I don't know if I should be quoting the we see yeah yeah everything's happened the last couple of couple of weeks but quite a few things is maybe like you should never look into your like neighbor's bowl to see if they've got more than you you should always just look into your neighbor's bowl to see if they have enough yeah and like that's the really really simple quote I've said I don't know like 15 times in the last minute and a half but that's what you have I don't know that's

a really simple quote for me in terms of we never know everyone's story and we never know what's going on kind of behind the facade of social media or just talking to someone so if we can do something that helps the people around us daily and weekly and monthly or we can add a little bit of value to their lives then they can be better off for it and that flow on effect the flow of energy as Dan would explain is one of his theories on living you're able to create that positive growth throughout everyone

around you and then your tribe gets better and then they influence the people around them and then next thing you know the world's a better place which I don't know I'm sure you guys are probably similar that's like if you beat it down to it you keep asking yourself why you do what you do it's probably just to make the world a better place and to make me feel like I have the spot right yeah I think what's one thing to recognize is that the premise or the idea of doing something for someone else or

doing a task or doing a favor or that that you know that kind of sends energy out and it's going to come back to you the idea it can be that well walkie I'm going to I'm going to lift 10 boxes from here to there over a few and then in two weeks time I need help with something yeah you're then going to repay me for that it's not it doesn't need to be sort of pigeonholed into that you know in a task of doing something but it can also just be giving your time in

a completely different way and I think you mentioned to me earlier how yourself and Anne met and yeah one would think so the two of you went to university together is that correct yeah we did we did sorry yeah you know you could have studied together you could have we met 12 UDL's day two of uni games I think yeah so you made a relationship and a connection just through starting a fun friendship not doing anything that had any work purpose or career purpose you know you have all the all the hours and days that

you spent at university that you could have helped each other and done things for each other it was just in a social setting and giving that time and going hey I'm going to hang out with this person I'm going to you know have a good time with this person that's that's giving that's you know you gave that in some sense and you know now you're sitting here recording a podcast talking about really meaningful things but one of the most like basic things you can give someone is your time yeah and whether it's stop on the

side of the road to fix someone's tyre that's just punctured or whether it's you know spending 12 hours over 12 weeks with one person for an hour each week working on something they want to work towards because that's your job or whether it's you know whatever it is if you're able to have that passion around you know what my next hour yes it's incredibly valuable to me but I feel as I can add value to someone else then you're kicking goals like you've always been someone is very incredibly incredibly good with your time incredibly generous

with your time generous is what I was looking for there I apologize incredibly generous with your time and and that I think so many people don't value the importance of their time and the importance of other people's time I think as soon as you start valuing the time what time you spend like so many people think they don't have time we've got we've all got 168 hours in a week why are some people able to you know barely like struggle on 7 week payments and why are some people able to be able to create billions

and billions of dollars of wealth from what they do because they spend their time doing different things I think if we're able to take that 160 hours we've got and put a chunk of it towards other people's happiness and improving the value that we give to other people then the world's gonna be a better place and I know we've kind of gone around in a circle but I think that's inherently why we all do what we do like that's like Ed is that why you do the human happiness project because you want to unpack it

and be rich what's that I just want to be really rich yeah me too yeah but no I don't think that's gonna make it make a difference in my happiness like I see some people that are incredibly wealthy that like look like seem miserable from the outside and I see some people that like barely scrape enough to put food on the table that seemingly are the happiest people that I know so does that like wealth is obviously the first thing that we're taught in a capitalist society and when it's the first thing that we're told

is this is what success is it's making you know 80k plus a year and making sure that we have two kids and a white pickup fence in the house and we're able to pay for all that but you know where does it stop doesn't does it that's the thing you always you always told them what more and I'm gonna totally segue this because as much as I'm in show I've been itching to ask Dan a question and this is one of the questions I asked in my interviews um what's purpose and meaning to you in

your life because I know like he's thinking we had a bit of a talk about what he does and what he obviously we all know it's the manifested every day in his life but what's purpose and meaning to you in your life purpose and meaning what brings me into life or gives you purpose well Dan thinks about this it's difficult right question it's difficult it's such a difficult question to answer uh without feeling like you're running the risk it's pumping your own tires pump mate have you heard likey this whole podcast pump that's the whole

point pump your tires so that you can drive somewhere to help someone else yeah you see how safe it wow that was good I don't want to say that was really well done uh puns puns don't hold the meaning in my life that's what they're doing um I I'm gonna bring that down to what gives me kicks in life because that's kind of what means things to me and that would be feeling fulfilled and feeling as though I'm doing something meaningful and it's fulfillment um I personally I'll chase this to the end of the earth

all right okay all right I'll give it a go um all right I'm I'm I'm I love I love putting a smile on someone's face um there we go because it puts a smile back on my face for you know every you know every selfish reason in the world I want to be happy and I want to be enjoying what I'm doing and you know we've only got X amount of days on this earth and I've spent enough of those days being you know down in the dumps as we all have or you know questioning

what you're doing or being down on it and uh that's just wasted time and if you if I can spend as many days as possible having a smile on my face how do I get that help other people have a smile on their face so I just get things done I move forward in some way shape or form maybe just maybe I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing but then also there's the aspect of that it's something I've thought about lately is that none of us know what we should be doing anyway um in

this room like we all think that we've got to you know we've got to stuff together you know maybe you guys no not at all you know like in our own ways like I'm yeah I get to I get to snowboard you know more days in a year than I ever dreamed that I would have and you know Loki's having a positive impact on so many different people in so many different ways and but also building his own success for himself and and he's eating a lot of chocolate you're you're building away I can't really

like exaggerate this enough and I get to eat any chocolate guys yeah don't become a sales rep because you're trapped but um I I don't think I don't know how many sales reps there would be that would also dedicate a big chunk of their life to trying to do something meaningful and purposeful uh to try and understand themselves but to try and help other people understand themselves as well and maybe and this is a big part of my philosophy in teaching and in life like it's that whole that whole big idea that oh man the

world's so big there's so many problems there's so many issues why even bother I'm only going to be a ripple in the water it's going to make no difference I'm I might as well not even bother yeah you're not going to go and make everyone in the world happy yeah I'm not going to educate you know I'm not going to put a brilliant attitude and brilliant mind and brilliant yeah set a brilliant course in every single kid's mind um but maybe there's a handful and that's that's a win on it yeah and that's exactly what

I was talking about before people get caught up with I want to be the next like Bill Gates or I want to be the next like whatever it is the biggest person in that sort of field they're looking to go into and then they go because of social media and stuff they want to reach like a billion people but you know the real I think the real effective change comes from changing one person's life in a genuine way rather than making a passing comment which is what most of social media is on one person every

day like I think if you can honestly sit down on your deathbed and go like I changed the life of one person in a genuine way then as far as I understand there's a life well lived mate that's spot on so like I don't think people get caught up in that trap they go like I want to you know I want to save the world but you know say it doesn't have to be the world it can just be your world so you don't need it you don't need to help 10,000 people you can you

can help 10 people that might be your immediate family yeah you know you can pull them out and that's where the validity of working 80 hours a week comes in you could you could pull your like my dad came a very very low class borderline middle class like very borderline middle class family and he sort of through his hard work and work ethic he's dragged the people that he cares most about into a lifestyle that most people will be very jealous of and that if you take the whole world into perspective like it's the top

one to say the world and like so you know it's it's not about affecting change in the whole world like I just said it's it's about affecting change in your world yeah that's huge to finish off I got a bunch of questions for you I usually ask certain questions but I've curated a few questions on the conversation we've had thus far here we go and I want a short answer and I'm going to alternate who starts so that you guys see each other's answers because I know you will first question practice do things happen for

a reason life is chaos so no I'm a scientific factually minded person so I believe in random good question two and this was uh sprouted by one of the things Dan said before but where do we go when we die um I need one short answer you need to choose your questions more wisely um I like short answers to deep questions yeah uh short answer if we get cremated we go into the ground if we get buried we go into the ground a little bit slower um and then we just join back in with the

uh energy energy process Edward street street christian okay no I don't really I I actually agree with that it's like sort of like the Buddhist ideal but taking through this type like the atoms that compose you join back into the universe and eventually they'll manifest into a different body good at some point because science says so I'm very very very similar to Edward what would you do with your life if money was no option I think I do what I do with the project because I like I don't know if you asked me five years

ago I'd probably buy a Lamborghini in a big house and try really fast yeah nothing like that um I wouldn't I wouldn't change a great deal I would um which is cool how many people would say that I would make a I'd use the time that I spend working for money to look after my life probably trying to implement implement a lot of the ideas and big changes I have in our education system cool what's the difference between motivation and discipline motivation discipline um motivation can you please add discipline is a foundation built on motivation

is fleeting do you think motivation will be used something positive like you mentioned Tony Robbins before and and I have a real love for that kind of motivation but at the same time I understand how fleeting it is I think it sounds good it has any practicality in real life there's literally they've done studies on the actual effectiveness of these things they dropped to about one percent after a year in terms of adherence to the goals of the people set that go to these seminars one year later one percent of them actually stuck to those

goals the things that get things done in real life and it doesn't you know you can see this everywhere like you if you do it's it's discipline that gets things done yeah and like anyone like from a business point of view or a goal setting point of view if you do the little things well every day then you're gonna get to where you ought to get to but like we spoke about before good shit takes time so like if you think something's gonna take six months it's a good chance it's gonna take 12 or 18

months like if we're able to bring ourselves back to the longer term you'll achieve all the shit you want last question if you have dinner with three people dead or alive who would they be and why this is all them first dinner with three people yeah um i'm very envious of people that have very close and tight families um i'd go my mum my dad and my brother awesome um yeah because i don't even need a producer that's just what yeah that's the first three people we've had perfect answer jordan peterson jason silver and neil

degrasse tyson who's jason silver he's a philosopher and he's a self-claimed wonder junkie and honestly check him out because he's the fucking greatest thing that's ever happened on youtube shots of all um he just talks about some of the same things that i talk about um and i met him a week ago for a surprise present from my mum for my birthday he's just fucking amazing talks about life to death oh yeah so that was the guy he went to the other one yeah and he's fucking i don't know he just has this amazing zest

for life that is so motivating and so it's just fun motivating motivation's fleeting man well it is because i see him i'm like wow that's really cool and then i go back to watching the punter on netflix do you guys have anything more to add uh something that i mean we clearly don't have time to talk about today um all the time in the world i think that tonight is quite late i don't know what it'd be that's a lie uh i would i would love to continue a conversation with you about what you've seen

in in the way that you've interviewed people um and your opinions uh on for my own sake and what i can implement in the future what schools could potentially be doing better to prepare people to look at their lives and go hey maybe i'll go in that direction hey maybe i'll go in that direction that's more up to date with the world we live in now you're like 100% right we're sitting here i was like yeah i want to talk about this but i deliberately didn't bring it up because it's like a conversation so i

think we can do a round two but we just like to for a really simple answer we need to have more options available and for them to be so socially accepted as options like if you want to go be a social media entrepreneur go nuts if you want to go do a trade when you're in year 10 go nuts if you want to like go to uni like we're told that we all have to go nuts like there's so many different ways to achieve and you look at all the successful people in the world and

i've got a i've got a list on my computer and like it's kind of a mind map where i write where i watch a lot of videos from certain people that i look up to and i write the things that make them successful none of it's because i sat there at uni for four years and listened to people that may not have necessarily experienced all this stuff that they're trying to teach so yeah i know that's my thought on it but i i feel as though that isn't a whole other podcast yep big time big

time boys thank you very much thank you thanks ed thanks for coming back on daniel thanks for uh popping your roped in very last podcast cherry very good offer me a meatball and i offered you a place on the podcast so cheers to you all that's going to say that it needs to be