Automatically transcribed, so expect the odd wrong name or word.
Hey Legends, welcome to the Virtus Performance podcast, we're at another week of the show, another episode, another week closer to the goal of 52 weeks in a row. Before we get stuck into today, I'd like to thank all you guys who have been listening, who have been sticking by us, who have been sharing and talking to your friends and family. It's an incredible gift to have people that I have never met message me and email me and talk to me about the conversations we're having and the things we're talking about, hearing that people are implementing
some of the things that we talk about and some of the things that we discuss is an excellent feeling, so thank you very much for that. I want to paint the picture a little bit for today's episode, I'm sitting here with my good friend James Longhurst, you might remember James from I think episode 3, he's from Voyager Screen Printing, when this episode comes out and you guys start listening to this, we'll be a day off heading away to South America for a little over 6 weeks, 44 days. So the plan for today's podcast is we're
about a week out now, a week and a half out now, so we're coming to you from the past, but the plan of today's podcast is have a little discussion, a little chat around our intention for the trip, around why we booked it in the first place, what I guess forced or what desires caused to business owners who are still pretty fresh into their businesses to book a 44 day trip to the other side of the world, it's a little crazy when you think about it that way. How we kind of got here, what are
the sacrifices and what are the things we've put into the businesses and into what we're doing over the last 5, 10 years, what our expectations are, what we want to get out of the trip, but also what our expectations are and how excited we are for our teams to be running the businesses as well where abroad, the day to day stuff obviously can't be touched by us. We are both pretty stoked with the teams we've got around us and how, I guess, dedicated and driven all of our staff members are to do the job without us.
That's today's podcast. It's a little bit different, a little bit of a different format. There won't be so much interviewing, it'll just be a discussion, having a chat and seeing where we're at, enjoy. 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. James, Voyager, welcome back. Thanks. Long time no podcast. Mate, it's been a long time.
When this comes out, it'll be about 40 weeks since we did the first one. Oh yeah? Who's counting? Well, you are. I'm counting because I need to have a fair idea which episode we're up to. Yeah. What's changed since then? Jesus. I'm gonna just bust right in with getting shingles. So get rid of them as well. For those that can't see James right now, he's been known to become a little bit stressed, a little bit overwhelmed sometimes with the ... He's the man at the helm of the Voyager ship. He's taken too much on, mate. And he's just taken too much on over the last couple of months and he's given himself shingles ...
Talk us through the shingles. Oh yeah, I just got a headache and stinging eyes. How long ago? A couple weeks? A week ago. A week ago, yeah. Well, two weeks ago now. Yeah. Yeah. I had my mate Pinno there. He's always going to the doctors so he encouraged me, "Just go, man." And I never go. I'm just always winging it. Anyway, so I've never had anything life-threatening or serious like this so lucky enough, he was around. Yeah. But yeah, you know- Otherwise, you would've just stuck back into work and- Yeah. You would've just stuck back into all that stuff?
Yeah, dealt with it. I don't know. To be honest, it was pretty serious. I felt like I had a spider bite, yeah? Yeah. Like I'd been bitten by a spider and my head was swelling up and I was just feeling really uncomfortable and I would've gone. Let's be honest. I would've gone. At some point. It's crazy. I like to think crazy but I don't always act that way. So yeah, got to run around with the doctors but eventually one lined me up and was just like, "Yeah, you've got shingles." And you're glossing over that story a little bit because there were a couple of days there where you were a little bit unsure as to what was going on.
Yeah, yeah. Well, I just had a headache and felt like there was something in my eye, just sort of normal. Yeah. But- What did one of the doctors say? Yeah, so one of them said there was a brain infection. Maybe. He said possibly. But when someone says possibly, you probably don't think possibly. You think, "Holy fuck, I'm going to die." Right? Yeah. What was your mindset like for that? 12 hours or 24 hours, however long it was. My good mate, Church, he's been through quite a bit with his cancer, his brain cancer. So I was sort of like in spirit with him just like, "I'll get through this, whatever it is.
You're confronting it." But look, I don't usually look after myself like, "Well, I go to the doctors and stuff." So for me, it was like, "Okay, yep. Just here you go. You're going to go and just sort of do what these people tell you." And whatever. Got a bunch of eye drops, put in my eyes regularly and walked out there just blinded by the sun one day. It was crazy. It was a pretty hectic few days because one day he told me, "Yeah, I think I've got shingles." The next day I was, "I might have a brain infection."
It was just like, "Wait, how do we get to that?" Oh, no, it was no good. I don't want to tell a story. I've told the story two times, like four or five times, and it's just annoying. But the GP you have a good relationship with kind of set you on the right path and ... Well, she's the one that just said, "You've got shingles." And I'm like, "What is this?" And they're like, "It's stress. It's due to stress." Yeah. And I'm like, "Holy shit." So I had a chat with some good friends and one in particular put it quite appropriately.
"You've been wearing too many hats." And that is so fucking true, man. A problem that a lot of business owners have to deal with. Yeah, yeah. So my immune system weakened and yeah, got these shingles. But let me tell you, I've smashed them out of the park, man. Yeah. It's been a week. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Well, they've cleared up. They're not irritated. There's no eye irritations. They've got no headache. And I haven't died. Well, that's the bonus. I'm good. I'm good. I'm fine. I'm going to chill. I've been chilling out. Yeah. I've been just thinking positively.
You've been chilling out for three days. You need to keep chilling out. That's where we need to go. Yeah. What are the areas that you feel as though you let yourself down in terms of weakening that immune system? Because I guess the way our body deals with stress, like from a physiological point of view and a psychological point of view, it isn't just, "Oh, I'm stressed because of work." It's a bunch of other stuff that add up and can eventually... Okay, so for me, as we know, I have been spending a lot of time at that factory in...
That's one way to put it. It is one way to put it, yeah. And for me, when I moved into that shop, I set up a little space to stay there temporarily/permanently. And a lot of the time, when five o'clock comes around, you just don't switch off. Imagine staying at work. And it was practical, and I wanted to get it done, so it was practical and productive at first. And you just turn... Things that should matter to you don't matter to you because you're just committed to doing the work. Yep. And... It's hard, right? Because you need to succeed.
I'm a big believer that to succeed in anything, you need to dial in and throw everything at it. Yeah, that was me. But at the same time, you've got to... It's almost that paradox where you've got to look after yourself and you've got to fill your cup a little bit. Or get out, just too much of anything is not good for you. So anyway, I just drove it too hard into the ground, man. To be honest, the workload was too much. With the workforce that I've got, one of my boys left last Chrissy, and he was in charge of a certain...
So you had to jump back on those responsibilities? Yeah. So... Yeah. So we're a week away, you're ready to rock. What's your intention for the trip? Why are you doing this trip? It's such a direct question. It's intentional. Yeah, so look, man, I've just dedicated so much of my time and so much of my life to this business, the last two, three years now. And... Big flat chat. Oh, just only that. I've done only that. Nothing else. You know, and yeah, I thought, you know, I've built it up enough, maybe I can take a little trip.
Maybe I can go for two weeks. And there's you. I remember the day, it was a Sunday, I think, and I... Your arm was twisted so easily. You messaged me, okay, let's go to Everest. Yeah. Remember? Yeah. I'm like, man, I can't go to Everest. That's September, super busy for the beers. It's not going to work out. And then we chatted, you tried to twist me arm, and I'm like, no, man, I'm going to South America next year. Yeah. And you just go, I'll come with you. And I go, sick. Sick. Like, I'd love for you to come.
That would be sick. There's a little bit more conversation than that, because like, a little backstory. My plan last year for everyone listening was, I've always been someone that, like, I love adventure. I love mountains. I love, like, I love smashing myself physically to get that little tiny little bit of joy at the top of a mountain and things like that. And the plan was, after footy season last year, 2017, to jump on a plane and go to Everest for a month in November. My dog. However, about two days after I decided that this was
going to happen, and I was, the night before our footy game that week, I was very close to booking the trip and just kind of went, oh, I know, I'll do it tomorrow night. Next day, my footy just skated my shoulder. So two minutes left in the game, one of those innocuous tackles just got landed on, shoulder didn't have any other option but to pop out, and it wasn't a pop out, pop back in. It was a pop out, stay out for 10 minutes, managed to get it back in. And yeah, I was sitting on the couch that night and going, shit, I'm going to probably have to have surgery and all this kind of stuff.
And I went, wait, I was going to go to Everest, I was going to get Everest next month. And kind of sat there and I go, probably can't come to Everest anymore. So I'd already talked to you about going to Everest, one of my other mates was already thinking about possibly coming with me. And I'm just going to go. Why would you take me to Everest? I don't know, what the fuck? I'm not that fit. Well, I was going to go. I was going to go. And I'm... It was legend. It was a legendary gesture. As Tommy T would say, I'm a connector.
I like to bring people along for the ride. Like if I'm doing something cool, I'm like, I want everyone to come with me. I was stoked for the invite, but I was gutted I couldn't come. And that's why when you said I'll come to South America, I was like, fuck yeah, two weeks, sweet. Let's go for a month. Get to Flight Center. Turns out to be six weeks. Yeah, well, the next during the week we're talking about, because there was maybe a day or two where I was naive enough to think that, you know what, I could probably do both.
And naive. We're both so naive. Yeah, but life's fun when you're naive, right? Yeah. Well, it's entertaining. Yeah, entertaining, fun, same thing. But then like, yeah, we were talking about it and then you said two weeks. I'm like, mate, you can't go to South America for two weeks. I can go on my own for two weeks. It's so... Yeah, it's so... You're always going to do the wedding and then match pitch and come home. Yeah, it's so far away. It's so many things to do there. Flights aren't the cheapest flights to jump in on. So I was like, you know, let's go a month.
And then I was thinking, yeah, I could leave work for a month in March. And because obviously that was where the wedding was, right? So when the wedding was, so that's why we decided to do it in the first place. And then, yeah, we're talking about it in like, far out months, probably not long enough if we want to do this and this and this and this and this. And then we had a look and we kind of like, well, six weeks and ended up being 44 days from leave to get back. So a little more than six weeks, but we've got a lot to do.
Is this podcast number 44? Imagine that. It actually is close. It might be a little early, but anyway, it's not over there. We'll spend 42 days over there, so I think it's number 42. But talk the people listening through what the plan is. What's the plan? We've got the first four or five days sorted and we're going to wing it after that. It's very much one of those trips where, like, mum asked me the other day, she's like, have you got your itinerary booked? I'm like, to be honest, mum, here's my itinerary. And it's, we fly to Santiago, we jump, we hang out there for a couple of days, cruise down to Picholimu for the wedding for a few days.
Two hours, two, three hours outside of Santiago. My mate from high school, Gaffi, is getting married, she's a Chilean fiancée, yeah Gaffi. And yeah, he sent us an invite for the wedding, yeah, I reckon I can go, let's go, there we go. We're going, we're down there. And then a couple of days after the wedding, get over that hangover, up we go to Lima. Up to Lima. And so we just, from there, we do Peru, we do Bolivia, we do Paraguay, we do Argentina, Patagonia at some point. Patagonia's been shoved into the final week. We
ditched Brazil for Patagonia, even though I'm annoyed, frustrated, disappointed, maybe that I can't go to Brazil, I think Brazil will tack on to the end of the US trip at some point. Yeah. Or something like that. But, Patagonia. What are you missing in Brazil? I mentioned it, oh so much stuff. But I mentioned at the start, focus on the stuff we're doing, not what we're missing, eh? Fair call, yeah. I love mountains, and they're just, mountains make me happy, there's three things in the world that make me happy, connection, KP, and mountains. And yeah, I'll get two or three out of this on this trip, unfortunately KP isn't coming.
But yeah, that's our itinerary. We go from Peru to Patagonia and fly home, we've just got 30 something days to do it, and who knows what'll happen. Who knows, who knows, it's pretty exciting. It's exciting. We deserve it, that's the thing. We deserve it. We deserve it, we've gone hard. I've seen you grow, smashing it, that's all we've got in common. Just our drive to grow our business, chase our dream and let nothing get in the way. And like me personally, I've been in a nutshell, just in a box, in a box for three years,
just building this business, I'm super proud of it, and like any consequences, there's one dude who's been popping over lately to help us do some printing and just keep saying it's going to damage the business and you're going to sink. And it's just like, mate, you're giving me more fuel for enjoyment on the trip. Just tell me once more that the ship's going to sink. I deserve it, mate. Just treating myself this year, fourth year, take a couple of trips and like six weeks is a long way to be away from the business, but I tell you the good thing, we're five hours ahead, so we can get up, do a couple of emails.
That is the most optimistic view of being on the other side of the world, if anything goes wrong, we just get home five hours early. We'll talk a little bit about the journey to get here, because I think a lot of people are like, oh shit, what are you going to do with the business while you're away? How do you leave? Well, that's it. I think a lot of people look at the situation we're in and go, oh, you're just picking up and leaving? No, since I started being a coach and more specifically the last
two and a half years of being at Virtus, that's a lot of groundwork and a lot of hours and a lot of time put in to get it to this point. Yeah, to get it to a point where you can trust it or you can leave it on its own. It's a business as a whole, being a living, breathing organisation, but it's the teams we've got around us. Those teams, funnily enough, don't just magically appear. We've got to find out what works, what doesn't work and try to benefit on the strengths rather than... Give us a really quick rundown of, I guess, because we first hit it off because we had a shared story a little bit.
We both started in a shed, so give us a rundown of from shed to now, like really quickly. Really quickly. Because I did it for about two hours, one hour last time. Yeah, you did. Talk me through the steps from getting to shed to now, including when you hire staff. You don't have to go through any big fuck-ups. No, okay. Well, I was always ahead of myself and I don't mind being ahead of myself. That's not the worst problem to have. No. So, anyways, taking on a little too much, trying to balance it out, but okay, so...
I have a theory around taking on too much, but I have a theory, something that was shown to me during the week. I don't know. It says bite off more than you can chew, and chew like hell. Yeah, I like that. I like that. It's around... I'll go quickly so you can keep talking. I interrupted you after like eight seconds, so I apologise, but it's called positive pressure, right? Yeah. So positive pressure is basically where you bite off more than you can chew because you know that there's a top of the mountain to get to to enjoy, right?
So it might be, I want to buy a house. Sorry guys, James is pouring gin out of the bottle. He's being a butcher. He's not measuring how much. I'm going to eat chalk. So then he doesn't know how much tonic to put in. Anyway. Oh, that's how it works. Sorry. So it's called positive pressure, right? So if you want to build a house, then you're probably going to work like how to be able to build a house. But your positive pressure might be putting a deposit on a block of land. So holy shit. I have to pay it.
At this point in time, you have to pay it, right? Absolutely have to do it. It might be signing the lease on a facility when you're not really sure if it's going to work. Like that's positive pressure. It might be like for us, it's booking a trip where we booked this trip in, like I said before September, October. I can't remember exactly when it was. Forced to do it. But yeah, we just kind of forced ourselves to do it. And like I'll talk about my steps together, but I'm sure you've done a lot of things differently between then and now than you would have done if you hadn't booked the trip, right?
Yeah, probably. Yeah. Talk me through those steps. If you've got positive pressure, if you want to achieve something, make sure something rides on it. Otherwise, if you fail, it doesn't really matter, right? Yeah, you won't do it. I don't know, man. I'm just... Oh, you're in the shed, then. I was in the shed, yeah, and I knew it was going to take a couple of years of pretty much not taking a wage and having a lot of sacrifices. And that's a big one. Couple of years down the track. You've kind of blown off not taking a wage, right?
Like, how many people would go to work and not get paid? Yeah. Very, very few people. Not too many. To me, it's normal. For me, it's normal because it's just like there's a magic in it, man. You're... Not about big chunks of time. It's the same thing. Yeah, dude. So, yeah. Gate in the garage. Cool. Yeah. I was rocking out, printing shirts in there, and I could have stayed in there, but I wanted to go big. So, I jumped into a factory, got in a bunch of debt, got the factory equipment, forced myself to pay it off.
But I understood that I need the amount of work to pay it off that I would need the staff, so it just kept going hand in hand. And then, you know, finding out that the factory next door is becoming available, okay, well, let's sign those papers over because, you know. Why not? And then it'll force me to take on more work. But to grow my staff as well, you know, to grow the team because I guess basically, I don't know, in a way, I sort of, I knew it was gonna take two years, but I didn't think it was gonna take three for me to maybe start pulling a wage.
And you know, you want to be a business owner and control things because you sort of want the freedom to do things easier than how it would be for others or how it would have been for you in the past as an employee, yeah. So, for me to go, okay, I'm going for six weeks, buy it, an employer would just be like, "Really? You're sacked." - Exactly. - And so, you need people to take over some of the roles of doing things. - Definitely. - So, like, you know, whatever areas in the business it might be.
So, like I said before, one of our dudes in graphic design, he bailed before Chrissie and you know, we were busy in this February, we were as busy as we were in November, which is peak and he was gone. So, I was losing my shit in November and then again, I thought, cool, Christmas here, yeah, so I had a break and chill out. Fucking February comes along and it's just as busy as November and I just got smashed, man. I got cooked. But I got through it, my team got through it as well. - You had a really good bunch of guys there, right?
- Yeah, I do. They need more time and nurturing to grow their skills and I'm understanding about that, patient about that, but what I'm trying to grow there is a culture and, you know, just sow them seeds rather than, I don't know how else to put that, but. - Do you think you going away will help or hinder that culture? - Yeah, dude, yeah. Oh, like I said, this one dude who's like, you know, your ship's gonna sink, I told the guys that. So, I'm very open with the team about how things are and if even like custom needs to be called, hey, jump on the phone and tell them about that print and so they'll do it.
So, I bring them right in and they, because it gives them the emotion in the business, it gives them that love for the business and the strength of here, I put my part in and hey, it's gonna be valuable, yeah? So I'll say, oh, this dude, he don't think it's gonna work and they're just like, whatever, that guy's just, mate, we got this and regularly, so with my team, I've been regularly just getting reassurance for myself and off them, like guys, you're right with that, are you right to do that? You sure you're okay on your own?
And then over the last couple of weeks, you sure you guys are gonna take this on because basically there's no turning back, you guys have decided that you're gonna be here and so are you sure 'cause there's no turning back, so yeah, they go, we're all good, man, we're gonna be cool. Yeah, like they want it, they actually want it, like you say, I've got a great team, yeah, everyone says that to me, you've got a great team, you've got a great team and day in, day out, I don't know what's there, it's back and
forth, but-- - Well, you deal, you roll with punches, right, you deal with the little spot fires and put them out as they come, but I think the awesome thing about your team and my team, I can see them going from strength to strength is they understand the importance of the process, like we're both in what you effectively call startups, like we're startup businesses where systems and processes aren't there like they are, like places that have been around for 10, 20 years, so it takes time, right, it's a process. - I feel like my business
is in its infancy for sure, so if I keep the guys that I've got, then they're gonna be in charge/managers and they're gonna know the heart and the flame of the business when they start to become responsible and whatever. - My big quote, I say this every podcast, but one of my favorite quotes at the moment, and I say that because I read new stuff and I listen to new stuff and I look at new articles every week and the one that really resonated with me during the week was people never wanna be part of the process, but they wanna be part of the outcome.
The process is where you figure out who's worth being part of the outcome. And that for me just shows when you're creating a team, when you're creating a culture and creating the environment where you need buy-in, you need planning, you need processes, but more than anything you just need effort and emotion. - Emotion, emotionally involved. - Yeah, if you put the right people in there, then you just watch it go strength to strength. - There's a huge responsibility on the business owner, the manager, the boss, yeah, like you have to separate. Every single liability, every single single responsibility is on you from a initial point of view.
But then you start delegating some of those responsibilities and things like that. - When you were an employee, what was your job before you took this on? I can't remember. - What was my job before? I was-- - You were on Jets, weren't you? - Yeah, yeah, I was. Back in 2011, I was at Jets as a normal PT for a little while, spent eight years at Rebel Sport. So if your boss gave you the shits, you were just flipping the bird and just turn the corner and be like, "Five o'clock, man, I'm out of here."
- Well, yeah, that's it. - So you-- - Well, you don't have the ability to stop at five o'clock and go, "You know, I don't think about work anymore." - But what we gotta do is stop that flipping the bird at us. So you gotta stop, we're in control. So what I was gonna say is our responsibility as business owners, bosses of staff, is that we've got to be careful not to negatively impact the team. So the stress, try to, and I'm quite bad at it, I've gotta keep it, I've gotta keep my mouth shut. - What have you done-- - Keep quiet, keep centered, so whatever happens, the office stays in the office.
- What have you done to improve that, or improve your ability to do that? 'Cause I identified my communication with my staff as one of my weak points. - Me too. - So if I was vulnerable enough and aware enough to identify that, what have you done to improve it since you kind of realized, 'cause it's really easy for you as a workaholic, someone that wants to just go, go, go, go, like the horror James, as it's been called in the past. It's really-- - No, but that's expanding. - But that's it, but it's really easy to get you into that mindset, and I'm the same.
My life would be so much easier if I was just running my own team without anyone else. - Well, that's what I said before, I could have stayed in the garage. - Yeah, well you could have, but you didn't. So what are the things that you're doing to make sure that you, those troubles that you can-- - Okay, well look, especially since I cooked myself too long in the toaster last week. Like, okay, yeah, so I've lived a real, a sustainable life for the last three years in the way that there's my one address, that's
where everything's gonna work, I'm gonna work with what I've got, it hasn't quite worked in the way of my mental health, it's actually been really poor in certain times throughout the last few years, really poor. So I have to now go, right, you gotta get a place somewhere separate, and go, you've gotta separate, you know. - Yeah, just saying, from work and life. - Work and life, you've gotta invest more in life, 'cause like, you know my story, before I rocked up to Melbourne, I just had a wagon and a surfboard, so. When I found Voyager, I was like, just going, going hard.
- For you guys who haven't heard this story, squeeze back to podcast number three. - Go now. - And he talked-- - And then come back now. - Well don't go now, go after, and have a listen, 'cause it's actually, like it's really interesting to go from where you, more or less, you had, your responsibility was on you surviving. - Yeah, just-- - And now it's on your business and your staff surviving. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - And the responsibility's growing, right, so now like, you've, you're effectively responsible, as are each of your staff members responsible, they're responsible for their, you're responsible for their wage, and they're responsible for their wage.
And you've taken steps over the last couple of months to get better at managing, right? And to put on more staff, and to grow your team. What have been the big things that's taught you over the last couple of months? - What's that, sorry? - What's been, that was a really long question. What's been the biggest things you've learnt about managing and leading over the last couple of months? - Oh, nothing much has changed, just constant encouragement and empowerment, you know? You do all you can, everyone's different, you know, you, everyone's gonna have a certain way of absorbing encouragement, or amounts of absorbing encouragement.
- Yep. - You know, how much they can absorb, certain people are gonna be different with that. Certain people are gonna display the way they've absorbed encouragement, or even be different in the way that they absorb criticism, yeah, so you just stand back and just keep encouraging, I guess. I don't know. - Mate, that's fair, I can't do interviews. That word you use, empowerment, is incredibly important, right? - Yeah, man. - For me, I set two goals, two goals at the start of this year, and this isn't to say I was bad at these things, but it's two things that I feel as though there was significant room for improvement.
I'm someone that, if I suck at something, I want someone to tell me so I can get better. I don't want to be that person that can't deal with negative feedback. I want, negative feedback, pardon me, negative feedback should be that thing we look at as incredibly important and really valuable, because it's what allows us to evolve and transcend our former self, right? Like, if I'm good at this stuff and then in six months I get a bunch of negative feedback and improve it all, then in six months I'll have transcended my former self, and I'll have added all those things I was good at, I'll have just added another layer of icing on the cake.
And the two things I set myself this year was, one, to connect with my staff better, and two, to really dive into what I sucked at, what holes I had, what areas I needed to improve, and I'm starting to do that. I'm on the voyage to be able to do that, like, it's reading books, it's talking to mentors, it's getting feedback from my staff, it's, you know, like, I was an hour late to catch up with you today because we were doing a personal development session with some of our staff about becoming a better public speaker and being able to communicate.
And one of the things that Greg, our physio - shout out pal - has taught us is that communication, the goal of communication is to induce, so to bring out, a change of behaviour in the people around you. Communication isn't to tell someone what you think, or it's not to make someone feel good, it's to induce a change of behaviour. It's scientific, man, that's deep, mate. It's scientific. Fucking deep. But it's hard, right? Yeah, it is. Communication sucks. No, it rules. Communication is amazing, but it's hard, yeah? Sucks is probably even better. It's a constant
education, man, you know, like, everyone's going to be different, you're going to have to just find your own - I reckon being humble is the way to go, because if you just be peaceful in the way that you speak, there's much is possible. And there's no ego. There's no ego. You know? No. And I think that ability to take that feedback, if you can go, you know what, I'm going to be humble, I'm going to put my ego on the hook. Well, you've been saying that quote lately, 90% of - what life is, 90% - 10% what happens to you, 90%.
How you react to it, yeah. It's profound, man. I don't know, it's a simple quote. It is. I've been hearing you say it's special. So you've been listening. Good. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Because like, I don't know. You've been putting yourself out there lately, mate. It's awesome. That's been intentional. I'm seeing you grow. Smashing. Yeah. And I put myself out there. If you go home and talk to the same people and go to work and talk to the same people and do the same things day in and day out, then in five years, you're going to be the same person.
It won't be so much expansion. Yeah. The spirit and the psychology. Yeah. I don't know, I don't know if it's my biggest fear, but that's something that scares the shit out of me. If I stop learning tomorrow and in five years I look back and I was having exactly the same fucking conversations we're having now, I would hate myself. What you were getting at, mate, was being able to stop and take these, like you said, this year, your goals were to do a couple of things, but a couple of years ago you weren't able to do it, were you?
No. Because you're super busy. Yeah. Same as me. I'm in my fourth year of business and for me it's like I'm happy to just go and treat myself. That's good. Whatever consequences I deal with. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's one way to look at it. You grow it so much so that it can cop a bit of minor damage. Yeah. Yeah. I'm really- It's the same as it's all going to fall apart. Of course. It's not going to. I genuinely think that our business, that Virtus has almost gotten past the point where it just needs me.
I think it's going to grow without me and that's what I'm most excited for. Well, I think this trip's an opportunity for it to have a crack, to do that, what you just said. It seems like you've grown a little further than what I have, I think, in maturity of business. I think this trip, while I'm away, is a good chance for these guys and the whole thing itself. I think it's the life form of Virtus to grow organically. Yeah. I know you reckon five hours away is just like a good get out of jail free card.
That is such a good get out of jail free card. Listen, right? Okay. Justify it to me. While I'm away, for me, it's just the logistics of running the shop while I'm away. For me, it's great because there's a bunch of long weekends there. There's Easter. There's really, out of the six weeks that we're gone, there's three- Four weeks. ... weeks that are in full, whatever, in full that they have to work. So the way I see it, it's great timing and being five hours ahead, we get to go be tourists, come back for lunch,
sit at our laptops, and then set them for, I don't know, because I need to be with my team in communications while things are happening quite often. What's your ... We've talked a little bit about this, but what's your plan for working while you're away? I have a very- You need another one of them. Laptop? Yeah, another MacBook. Yeah. Because this one needs to be at the shop, so I'll have to buy one of those. Before you go? Yeah. Yes, I will. So you need another MacBook, but what work do you want to get done while you're away?
Not only- I was talking to my business coach the other day and I was like, "What stuff can I focus on while I'm away?" Because it was really ... I've asked a couple of my mentors this, I've asked my staff this, because we're not the kind of people that can switch off from work for an extended period of time. I know I'm not. I'm definitely not, so what's your focus going to be while you're on the other side of the world? Dude, just have a fucking good time. No shit. So just if work comes up, it comes up.
If it doesn't, it doesn't. Man, I can't print T-shirts while I'm over there. Correct. Correct. And I can't shoot screens. Yeah. I can't see a customer. I can talk to one. They know how to do all that, so I'm going to be doing some quoting and some emails, and that's about it. I'm not going to sacrifice this trip to run the shop if an order doesn't come through, because worst case scenario, an order doesn't come through and we miss out on the profits. But like you can see here on the right-hand side of my head- Little bit of shingles for those that remember the start of the conversation.
The profits, they're not worth the contribution to your health. Yeah, spot on. For a little while there, I balanced it. Yeah. Went over the edge a little bit over the last couple of months. Went over the edge, yeah. Not surprised. It's okay. I'm a freight train out of control. Yeah. No longer. I have to rebuild it. But no, I'm just going to jump on and chuck a few emails and get on the Skype, hey, how's everything going in the shop? You're all sweet, so don't need to talk to you today. Cool. I'm out of here. Just hang up the phone.
To be honest, I hope I don't have to send a single email while I'm gone. I want to have a rad trip, because you know, you might think I'm the world's greatest - well, world's worst traveler, but I haven't done it all, but I haven't. This trip for me is a little different going with you. You can conquer most mountains out there, hiking, so you're going to be taking me along, that's going to be cool. New and open experiences, but I've got a key, and I'm coming back somewhere, and I've got to open the door.
I can leave, lock it up, and then go, and then come back, and I've got to - I've got the same job, yeah, I've got the same car, yeah, and all those same things, whereas in the past, all through my 20s, I was just roaming through places. Just seeing what's next, yeah. Seeing what's next, seeing what's next, so here it is, we've got six weeks, and we have to get as much as possible out of that, whether it be, you know, like, physically, mentally, spiritually, let's just go and do it, so I'm just - I'm
just - I'm stoked to be doing it with you, because I look up to you, man, in certain ways, so it's good that we're rocking up for a wedding. I'm going to be comfortable seeing my friends over there. I'm going to make some new ones. Yeah. Yeah, we've got the first week sorted, we've got five weeks ahead to just - we've looked at some stuff, I've sent you some YouTube, you've sent me some YouTube, that place looks sick. Peru, we're going to probably - mate, if we stay there for a couple of weeks, it's looking good.
Mate. Probably not the worst place in the world to hang out. But do you know what? Like, I don't even really know everything we're going to be doing, like, because there's no itinerary. I'm super excited, I'm super open-minded, and I'm up for the challenge, I'm up for the challenge of these crazy hikes. You said Patagonia, and I'm like, I think I'm going to send him down to Patagonia on his own. I'm okay with that. No, no, but then I thought, wow, that would not be great. You think - you're saying that because you can't go hiking, well, fuck that.
Learn how to go hiking. Learn how to go hiking. Keep up. I'll give you a crash course. Mental strength, physical strength, just have a go, the dude's not going to leave you behind. Maybe. I'm going to do a get back, fucking Cam Jacobs, sorry boys, James. He's frozen. James is sitting on top of a mountain in Peru, he wouldn't hurry up, so I left. Well, yeah, and that's fair, because, like, I can't do relaxing holidays, but we are not going to have a relaxing holiday. I think there's going to be a lot of falling asleep in strange places, trying to get to the next place.
Well, I trust you, man. I've never been there, so we'll see what happens, but all I want is just - my goal is just adventure and growth. Adventure. Adventure and growth. Definitely. I want to do cool stuff. I want to learn about myself. I want to learn about my business, things that I couldn't learn about my business and my team while I'm not there. Because if I can't be there, then I have full faith in my team, and I have an incredible team. Quick question, mate. Are the guys telling you to just switch off, man? Like, don't think about work?
We had a little chat last meeting and a little laugh about how excited they were for me to just finally fuck off, and just for them to be able to do their thing, because, you know, I've been very - I don't know if I've got luck, but I've been very fortunate to create a team of, first of all, amazing people, people that I want to spend my life with, and second of all, amazing professionals. They're people that make the world a better place every day because they give a fuck about their clients and about what they do, so my team - what was your question?
I got excited talking about this. Can you just switch off, mate? Can I switch off? No, I'm not going to switch off, and I don't want to switch off. You're going to have to find balance there, man. Oh, yeah. I have a problem with the word balance because I like going - I'm a full steamhead kind of person. That's my pattern. That's what we've got in common, man. I'm the one that's go, go, go, go, go, and then I sleep for a couple of days, and then I wake up and go, go, go, go. You get shingles, bro.
No, mate. I eat meat and stuff. Oh, gross. That was a stab at your veganism. Fucked. Not important, but I think that even though I go way overboard in terms of how hard I work and what I do, I do also go way towards the recovery, and I think my understanding of physiology and psychology helps a little bit in terms of what I need to do to get me back to that equilibrium. There we go. I'm going to use the word equilibrium rather than balance. It's semantics, but play on. But here's my - this is something I've thought about a fair bit over the last couple of months.
Here's my plan while I'm away. My team will focus on the day-to-day, on the projects, the tasks, the goals that they need to do to keep us moving forward in the direction we want, and I'll focus on the vision. Oh, fantastic. Yeah, me too. I'll focus on the three-year, five-year, where we want to be, and then - because the long-term vision, for anyone that doesn't know, the long-term vision for Virtus is really simple. We want to make the world a better place. We want to create an environment where people can come and, one, be part of a community, and two, improve as people and as athletes, all those kind of things.
So that's really simple. But I want to keep building that vision and building the strategy around that vision in terms of, well, okay, what does that look like? Where do we - if we're in Virtus HQ now, in 12 months, where are we? In 24 months, where are we? In 2022, what does Virtus look like? And what are the goals that we need to hit, and what are the projects that we need to do to hit those goals? And I think that's my focus, or that's going to be where my head's at work-wise while I'm away.
It's not going to be thinking about work every day, but if we get on Wi-Fi, I'll jump on and talk to the crew. Like, if we don't get on Wi-Fi for a week, doesn't matter, I'll have my notebook out, and I'll have a couple of books out to read and to learn and to figure that stuff out. I think it might have made me realise our age gap, because for me, if, like, you're ticking over, thinking, thinking, thinking, Virtus, Virtus, Virtus, I'm like thinking, thinking, thinking. Holiday. No, no, like, where am I going to be? Because I'm 32, so in five years' time, I'm past my mid-30s, so I'm like - Mate, 40s and you're 30, you know that, right?
I hope I feel better than I do today. No shit. But, like, I've got a good business. It's going on. I'm never going to give up. I just hope that I can do other things, and I sort of see the next couple of years how they're going to go for Voyager, and I know what it's going to take, and I know who's going to be involved. So as long as I just keep doing what I'm told to myself, as long as we just keep behaving ourselves. You keep holding yourself to those standards. The trip for me, you know, if you're ticking over, thinking, that's great, man, we're both like mentally stimulated and motivated dudes.
I'm more driven to like - like, how can I grow personally? Yeah. Over there, yeah. Yeah, well, yeah, yeah. Like, where am I going to go next on a trip, or like, if I'm to buy a house, when might be the right time, because, you know, where am I at in my life, or why have I been affected by these things in the past, and they've affected today? Yeah. And because, you know, you - yeah. It's cool, because we're - you know what I'm saying? I know what you're saying, because we're in different parts of our life, but at the same time, we both - we both want to evolve and we want to grow, right?
Like, I'm fortunate enough to have an incredible partner KP who's - I was talking to her the other night, and I realised - like, I've known this for a while, but she's one of the most patient and supportive people in the world, like, she's dealt with - like, we've been together almost nine years. When this podcast comes out, it'll be very close to nine years. She's not ten. We wouldn't be going. Yeah, who knows? But like, we've been together nine years, and Virtus has been a big chunk of that, and holiday's been a big part of that, and most of the holidays we've gone together.
There's been a couple of week or two weeks where she's gone somewhere or I've gone somewhere, but to realise that we can go away for 44 days at a time and not necessarily have to be together I think is pretty cool, and I'm really - I don't know, I've got like eight different emotions running through my head when I think about not being with her on this trip. Like, I'm excited that I'm able to - that I have a strong enough relationship where we're able to experience shit like this by ourselves. I'm excited that she's able to be at our home, our house where you purchase together while I'm away.
I'm excited that - You should be proud that you've built that, man. Yeah, it's cool. It's really easy to look back on nine years of being in a relationship and go, "Oh, nothing's changed." But when you dive in, you realise how much - we've basically spent our whole adult life growing as individuals and as a partnership and as a team, and it's really exciting to be able to acknowledge that now, whereas three or four years ago, when I wasn't as introspective or I wasn't as reflective on who I am, I might not have been able to do that, but I'm going to miss a whole heap.
I'm going to miss Virtus a whole heap, I'm going to miss all my clients a whole heap, but at the end of the day - Comic folk a whole heap. Yeah, I'm going to miss comic folk a lot. Go on. I'm going to miss good coffee. I'm taking an AeroPress, by the way, and I'll take a couple of bags of beans, so that hopefully if we can get a hold of water a couple of days, we'll make some good coffee. But yeah, I don't know. You're right. It's a different trip for both of us, but at the same time, we're going to experience a lot of the same things.
The reason why, I think maybe I might have been wrong, the whole age gap thing, but for my business, if it expands any further than what it's going to in 12 months, just take over the shop next door and blow up. If I get any bigger than that, it's very vulnerable to failure. It's too many staff, too many overheads. It depends how you do it. It's a great game. Okay. Different industry, right? Very different industry. So that's how different our industries are. So I'm on a fucking wicked page at the moment, man. I'm so stoked that I've worked so hard for the last three years doing what I'm doing.
Got to the point where I can do what I'm doing now, including this trip. And I reckon when I come back, yep. Put the foot on the gas a bit longer, have another break. And then next year is a year for me to do what I said I was going to do. And I may never just be maintenance after that because it's sort of like, I just want to blow up the bubble and then stop. So you have that, I guess, end point. Fuck yeah. Yeah. It's really interesting. 24 months time. Well, yeah. Yeah. There's
where we're a little bit different in terms of like, you've got that stop line where you're like, this is where we want to get to. Christmas, we want to shut down for two weeks, rebuild the shop, and then all we're going to do is maintain it. Yeah. I think that's important to be able to identify that, right? If you want to grow the business and get bigger and bigger and bigger, you need to know that too big, too many staff, too many overheads, too risk of failure. That's what I've always known because I've seen them, I've worked for them, seen the small guys and I've seen the giant guys and I'm like, look at you.
This is where you want it. And you know where you want to be. I know how big I want to be, mate. I know how far off it is. That's really interesting because I'm like, I've been through a similar thought process in terms of, well, here's where we are. I don't know where I want to be. I don't know where we want to be. I don't know. You take charge of that. You ripped on me last time. Disrespecting. I don't know where necessarily I want to get to, but that's where I'm confident enough to go. You know what?
I just need to go back to our vision, right? Our vision is to make the world a better place, to help as many people as possible. And if that looks like one gym in Mornington pumping, running a bunch of education stuff elsewhere, coaching coaches, whatever, then that's what it looks like. But if that looks like a gym in every major city in Australia, if that looks like gyms all over the world, if that looks like three gyms in Victoria. You should drain high. I know. You should just drain high. But as long as he's, and I don't know what that drain looks like.
And that's the fun, like I find, I don't know, I find it exciting. It's like when I was at uni and I thought, holy shit, I don't know what I want to do. I got to a mindset where I was like, you know what? If I don't know what I want to do, that's awesome because it means I can do whatever the fuck I want. Yeah. So now with Virtus, it's like, well, I don't know where we want to get to, but how exciting is that? Like I can take it wherever I want. So in terms of, yeah, the options are like plentiful.
The options are huge, but, and like I like what you said about the small businesses and the big businesses because it completely depends on how I manage it, which way it goes and how we manage it as a team and how I use the word empower before, how I empower my 12 out of 10 team, like those guys are exceptional at what they do. So how I empower that team to grow, what PDs we do, what we learn, what our focuses are, because that'll ultimately determine how we go. I think the problem that a lot
of businesses maybe have, and this is me talking from a totally naive being in business, like three years point of view, is one, they lose sight of why they started in the first place. Yeah, man. And then they start seeing that cash. Yeah, exactly. And two, they, because they forget that, they forget about why they're actually there, which is their clients or their, you know, their why. Like for me, it's, I want to create an environment where the Virtus family can one, feel comfortable, but two, be challenged to grow and adapt and to become better at whatever they want to be better at.
So if we can keep coming back to that and keep building a team where people don't mind taking criticism, like negative criticism, because they know it's going to help them be better and ultimately help them help their clients, which is why we're all there. And it's going to help create a team where, you know, whether you're at the top of the tree or if you're an intern or if you're a new coach, that you're able to give and take, you're able to give and take feedback and you're going to be able to teach everyone what you know, because that's going to make everyone else better.
So yeah, I don't know, it's an interesting one. You've got your, I guess, ceiling, for lack of a better term, where you want to get to. And I've put it there on purpose. Will that change? Could that change? Yeah. Yeah. But right now that's where it is. Yeah, cool. Seeing how it can change and I'm not going to strive for it. Yeah. I'm going to be forced into it. Yeah, because it's just, I don't know how to explain it, I don't know the difference. It's just for me. That's fair. Yeah. That's where you're at. I'm happy with it.
It's going to be a beautiful print shop. You wait. Palm trees in the car park. Are you going to make it look, so you want to make it that aesthetically pleasing, like I want to go in there all the time, it's a print shop. And it's going to have to be for the first 18 months or so. Yeah, that's cool. Because I'm going to be there all the time. Yeah. Aesthetically pleasing, yeah, it's all about feng shui, right? Well, that's about feng shui, right? Yeah. Like I was sitting there the other day thinking about, well, shit, like two years ago when we started, two and a half years ago when we started, it was just me and Jesse.
And then we got a couple of guys on board and since then Jesse's left. I love those days. Oh, mate. I miss those days for the simple, like if I go back further, like it was just me in my shed for like three years. Those days, don't ever forget those days, man. No, no. I love those days for the simplicity of it, but I love these days for the challenge and the growth and the evolution that you see. You see it on a micro level. You see it on a macro level by, well, we sit
here now and we go, well, like I'm in an office off site that I've created into a MySpace and the gym's up the road, but that itself is incredibly different to what it was 12 months ago. If we, on a macro level, I look back at the gym that I had at the start where it was like a big, it was genuinely smaller than this office right now. It's really cool. But I look on a micro level, I see my team and myself and our clients growing every day and some days it might, we might not be moving the needle the right direction, but we're aware of that and we're doing all the things we do to get there.
Like my team at the moment, we're like, we're 15 strong, like that's, for me, that's fucked up. Yeah, because when I met you, it was just you and Jesse. And then after that, I wasn't down here too much, then obviously there was Mitch and Cam. Yeah, we had, when we started, it was Jesse and I kind of leading the charge and Cam and Katie jumped on straight away and Soph jumped on and Bailey was on soon thereafter. And since then, obviously Jesse, Sophie and Bailey have left to do their own thing. But Cam and Katie have been on the journey since the start, have been big drivers of the culture and the vision.
And that's so good man, when they share the same vision that like we had a, we had a really cool team meeting the other day, which was just like, all right guys, why are you here? And it was cool to see everyone's answers and match them up with what I'd written as to why we do Virtus and they all matched up, like it's all the same stuff. In your head, you had an idea and then you, you put it out there in public on vulnerable yeah, and then someone's jumped in and gone, this seems okay, I'm going to have a go.
And even if it took some time, all good shit takes time, right? Your idea met theirs and then what you're putting in, they're putting in as well. And it matches up, right? When you've got someone with their foot on the gas in the same pedal, if they're on the same pedal then life's good, I hate to say that it's like a voyage, it fucking is, you always have to come back to that, every day I feel like I'm steering a ship, yeah, fair, you'd make a good pirate. Yeah, do you want to see a photo
of me as a pirate, I've got to, I wanted to, I brought some pictures in, yeah, no you can explain them, I'm not on a video podcast yet so, uh, maybe, maybe if this podcast gets big enough I'll add video and then people can see the office and see what's hanging, so basically, I'll put a picture of Longy up, he's got a proper pirate patch, because it was more comfortable than he was on the eyeball, he's got a proper eye patch, jesus, meatballs you love this one, yeah meatballs love it, you better chill out a
little bit, yeah I should, but I don't know, talking about like team and how appreciative I am of them, their ability to, Cam and Katie especially, to be loyal from the start is like, I don't know, I don't, I think loyalty is one of the most important traits people can have. And they were loyal from the start, Mitchie was loyal pretty quickly thereafter, Ash was exactly the same, you know, since then, Brooke, you know, we got fucking, I'm gonna go through the whole team, see if I remember everyone, you got Greg, Jess, Coop, Anna, Paige,
Ash, Maddie, said Mitch, Claire, Brooke, Katie obviously from the start with Cam, and Maddie number two, and Mum, like, I've got so many people that want to see Virta succeed but at the end of the day it's because they want to see clients get better, and it's a cool feeling to have. Pretty good formula man, yeah, that's, they're not saying, they're not all business people who are like, I want to see the profits, they're like, I want to see other humans get better, and that's so wholesome. Yeah, I'm trying to get a few of those
on, I'm trying to get a few, I'm trying to get a little bit more, like this is one of my weak points, I'm trying to feel like that numbers side of things, the profit and loss, the finances, like, not me, but having people who want to see the business succeed so that we can help more people from an organisational and financial side is incredibly important, like Coop and Jess have been monumental in that, Matt Church, Chris Ting, my other business coaches, Jayden and Drew have been immense in just figuring out, well, okay, here's where we
are now, where do we want to get to, and from there it's just like, you know, onwards and upwards, but in the meantime we get to spend six weeks in South America, just, charging, enjoying, filling our cup, yeah, exactly, hopefully we spend most of the time filling our cup and not taking away from it, we need to be mindful of that, you need to be mindful of that, yeah mate, I'm the other one with the shingles, a couple of questions for you before we wrap it up, what's the one thing you want to happen on
the trip, there's nothing I want, you're just ready to see what happens, I just want to feel good about myself, okay, yeah, I want to be proud, do you want to reflect a little bit on this trip, no, fuck reflecting, why, reflection is important mate, mate, I don't want to do too much of it, I'm going to be reflecting, good on you, I'll be listening to your reflections, all sweet man, I don't, I just want a break, yeah, fucker, I don't need to worry about my thing, yeah, yeah, no, but that's a cool difference in
mindset, yeah, yeah, we're mates who have decided, holy shit, are we actually going to take a trip to South America, and it was that day, I won't forget it, yeah, I was just chilling out and you rang, nah, not going to Everest, and you rang, I said, man, go to South America instead, yeah, and it happened, and for me, that was like, I could do that, and it would be a quick visit, and then you've come along and go, good idea, do you want company, I want to do that too, and let's force each other
to do it, because of how hard we've worked, we deserve it, definitely, I know right now is not the right time, but that sounds perfect, there is no right time, so let's go, yeah, but like, having that three months of positive pressure, like, we both put things in place that we wouldn't necessarily have if we hadn't decided it was the right time, yeah, here's what I, like, and I think the most important thing, and this goes beyond just a trip or whatever, but I think the most important thing people should do is, you should set
your intention for everything you do, should set your intention, if you go catch up with a mate for coffee, it should be, why am I doing this, I'm doing this to connect with a friend, like, why am I going to work at 5am every morning, well I'm doing it to, mindfulness, what do I want to get out of after I have a chat with this guy, what, you know, I might have even, someone you haven't seen in ages, and you're like, you just want to reconnect, yeah, you just want to reconnect, or like, if I
have a team meeting, I want to be like, okay, what's the one thing that I want my team to walk away from today, try it, try it, try it, keep trying, and at the end, great, like, best case scenario, you're at the end feeling that, okay, I did it, fantastic, I did that a lot, yeah, like, client comes in and wants some t-shirts, well what's your intention for it, your intention for it is to one, make some money so that you can keep running your business, well I was going to go there, so if a
customer walks in the door, you got to come down the stairs from the office and you got to remind yourself, doesn't matter about my ego, doesn't matter about how hard this person might make my day, or great, they might make my day, yeah, just got to go, at the end of it, I got to feel like voyage is doing well, and I've helped this person either not get their t-shirts, or I've organised for them to get their t-shirts, you know, yeah, and it's been pleasant, and, you know, cool to be able to look at it
from a day to day level like that, like if a client comes in like from an hour to hour level, like if a client comes in for a session, my intention is for us to move the needle, for them to move better when they walk out to when they walked in, or feel better, or be in less pain, or to be able to move quicker, or to be able to be a little bit stronger, if you set your intention, you're going to set your actions throughout that, so if you don't decide at, say I come
in for a session, here I am, Longy's here, cool, Locky's just like nah, I'm just busy, cool, alright man, do some stretches, we'll have a go, if you don't set the intention, you're just going to put me through a thing, and you know, you'll be distracted or something, and I'll leave, and I'll be like whoa, but if you set the intention, you'll be like this is what I've got to do, this is what I want to do, so I'm going to go blah blah blah blah blah, and at the end, see if it worked, hopefully it did.
Yeah, well my intention of this podcast was us to talk about what we wanted from the trip, why we actually booked, how we got here, what our expectations were, and what we're kind of, what mindset we're in, cool, we've ticked those, we've ticked those intentions, like if I came in here and said hey let's do a podcast and we didn't really have any intentions, we would have just talked a little bit more rubbish than what we talked at the moment. But I don't know. It would have been free reign. Let's wrap it up soon, but
if you had, and this is a question you have to answer, if you had advice for everyone listening in terms of what they should do or shouldn't do, or a mindset they could get themselves in, to get from point A to point B or something, to point B. Throw out some advice. Alright, well just remember why, remember why you wanted to leave, why do you want to go, remember why, there you go, and remember that it's never going to go to plan, you've got to work, oh, so, big part of my last three years is working with what you've got, okay, you've got to work with what you've got.
And what you didn't sign, you made? Some things, you say this, right, you control the controllables, you don't control the controllables. Me, yeah, things I can't move forward on, I don't move forward on. Some things keep me in one spot, like I can't advance that area, okay, so I just don't, so where else can I push forward, push forward, okay, so. The other thing is being fluid, being fluid like being tangible, yeah, you've got to be able to move with things, yeah. So... This is going to link in really nicely to what I was saying, it's good.
Yeah, so, don't forget why you left, obviously, because you just, there will be no purpose. And you, things aren't always going to go according to plan, so you have to adapt to what's happening to you, whether it be good and bad, don't get too excited, don't get too beat up or stressed out that it ain't working, because you've got to have faith, you've got to have blind faith, like Conor McGregor, what does he say, you've got to be a bit gone with it, gone, you know, a bit gone, that's been me, that's worked for me.
Yeah, you've got to be absolutely obsessed, but more than obsessed, and realise that the one thing that you want, there is nothing ever going to get in the way of that. There are things that aren't going to go according to plan, there are going to be things that you, in your way, can't control, or for me, things that you can't, well, it's not the same, you can't move with you, so you just put it where it is, and you keep moving in other areas, yeah? Yeah. Yeah, it's good. So, knowing where you're at, you doing you, and just, like, taking actions, just be, have so much faith in your choice, and go hard.
Back yourself in it. Yeah, back yourself, man, big time, you have big dreams, bigger dreams of what you think you can even pull off, and be adaptable, okay, so like, okay, don't think that just because, you know, you've built the shop, for my example, built the shop, it's got to be that way, you might need to change it. Camels say, every weekend I came in, the shop was different, well, it wasn't different, I just built a new table, but there were new things, because it needed to be done, yeah. You're adding in the evolving in here.
Things aren't, just because they're solid, doesn't mean that they are, like, still, and they're gonna stay that way, you've got to be able to, like, adapt to your environment, you have to adapt your environment to suit you as well, and what's the other thing, I guess that leads into just, like, be fluid yourself, be movable yourself, you're not always gonna lay in the same bed, you're not always gonna, this is gonna, this is gonna be what's going through my head when you're, when I'm following you, or you're following me up a mountain, yeah, and it's getting hard, or we're gonna have to lay down somewhere.
It'll get hard a lot. Yeah, it's not always going to be perfect, you have to be able to just be there, you know, so. I like that, that's good, that's good advice. I think I'm done. I think you're done. Right over. No, mate, play on. There'll be more ants. If you guys want to rewind that three minutes and play it in 0.5, the speed, so that you can actually hear him. No, no, go. Like, times two. Times two, and he'll talk through that in two minutes, in two seconds. My advice is kind of simple, but it's kind of something that the theory behind it has been, it's something that, I don't know, I'm gonna go back a little bit.
You know when you get taught something that you kind of agree with and you understand it but it takes you, like, being taught that same thing three or four times to actually apply it? Absolutely. It's a really simple thing that Greg, our physio, has shown me a bunch of times. Start playing an instrument. Yeah. You learn it, learn it. Yeah. Eventually you get it. Yeah. You have to stop halfway through, go back to the start. When you make it three quarters of the way through, go back to the start. And then you should do it again.
Then again and again. Three times. Yeah. So for me, like, it's a two pronged sword. Like, you need, I'm very heavily into growth and evolution and transcension and just getting better. Word of the day. Actually, I've got just another word of the day. But I'm also very big on being content with where I'm at. So right now, in this moment, I am fucking stoked with the person I am with where I'm at because all of my experiences in the past have led me to this space. All of my experiences that are coming up in the future will lead me to wherever I'm going.
But yeah, and you know, the similarities between the past and the future, they're both stories we tell ourselves to be, to feel either good or bad about who we are in the present. Right? So I want to feel good about who I am in the present because it's led me to here. And if I don't feel good, then a bunch of other bad stuff will happen. But I want to feel good about where I'm at now, but I also want to evolve. Greg's theory that he talks us through is about being in a constant state of flow and constantly moving and constantly improving.
And that's, we use the acronym the TEAR principle, T-E-A-R, right? So whenever you want to achieve something, whenever you want to get somewhere, use the TEAR principle. Here's the best thing. It's happening whether you like it or not. So we may as well be a little aware of it and be able to use it to our advantage. So the T is thoughts, right? I have a thought. I want to go to South America, right? The E is the emotions. What emotions do I feel? Does that make me feel, and there's three options for this. Does it make me feel good?
Does it make me feel bad? Does it make me feel indifferent, right? It made me feel good. Overwhelmingly good. Then it's the actions, right? The action can also lead to inaction, right? But inaction is kind of like the worst thing that can happen unless you want to stay where you are. So it's kind of an interesting one. So T-E-A, thoughts, emotions, actions. And then R is the results. You get to the results and you go, well, did I take the action of booking a trip? Yes. Am I going to South America? Yes. Cool. Or it could be, did I take the action of booking a trip to South America?
No, I didn't. Why not? Cool. You were ahead of where you were when you first had that thought, but you're not where you want to be. So you go through it again. And that happens on a day-to-day granular level of every little thing, like I want to get up and have breakfast. Cool. What's the emotions? I feel good about having breakfast. My action is I get up and have breakfast. And the result is I have breakfast and I get fed, or it could be on a-- my thought is I want to get vertices to a place where there's 20 gyms around the world.
What's my emotion? Fuck, that feels good. My action? OK, there's going to be a million actions between now and then. The result? Maybe we'll get there, maybe we won't. But we won't know for a long period of time. So I don't know. If you use the things where you want to be from where you are now to where you want to be, go from thoughts to emotions to actions and results and repeat over and over and over again. So that was a very long-winded piece of advice. No, I got it, man. Does that make sense? I absolutely got it.
You know where we're at? I got it and I relate to it big time. I've used it. Good. Very, very good. Mate, I think that's it. I think that's all we fucking need to talk about because we've got a big trip coming up. You wanted the photo. Really? Yeah, really. James just tried to take a photo and he counted down from 10 and he put himself out of the photo. Anyway. But yeah, I don't know. We've got... It's going to be a few days. We've got 44 days to experience a bunch of stuff, to do a bunch of stuff and to hopefully see our businesses grow and evolve all the way our way.
So, mate, let's do it. Let's do it. Let's do it.
