Letter to Younger Self

you know when you introduce this topic to me the other day i just loved it like famheartet right away and like this is gold um jim i love you to introduce this week topic because yeah i i think it's going to be a fun fun topic to discuss

yeah yeah yeah yeah well i had the idea that we could write a letter or communicate a letter to our younger self so with the advantage and the wisdom and the experience of time and maturity what would if we could be telleported back to a certain age what would we be what would we say you know if anybody watched the back of the future trilogy which of favorite trilogies and i'm not going to spoil it but you

yeah

it's effectively about time travel and you know where you're going back in time and forward in time and and i just had this idea that you know what would i say to myself if i could meet myself in the street in a much younger version knowing how life panned out to help me through some of those challenging times

yeah i say invest in testa know there says company that's coming up right now than now is not going to be around for another ten more years but

yeah yeah if we had that that sporting elmina from yeah that's what i want that's what i want man like i just go

yeah yeah that's right that's right place your bets on this one don't bother with don't bother with this team just all right don't seriousness i think that's a great question i think it's you know if you have to write a letter to young yourself like what would you put in that letter m ll let you start i like where would what's the what's the first kind of like the s on and i'm sure this would be randomotor but what would you what do you think is one of the most important elements okay actually before you tell us exactly about the co

yeah what yeah

tent let's kind of describe like what kind of frame of mind do you need to what are you thinking about before you write this letter like what do you want what do you want like how is the mind set what's the concept what the concept like let's talk about that piece before we actually get into the exact content

yeah yeah yeah sure well i think there's i sat with you know what would be the age group that you're talking about if you're writing it to yourself you could pick a hypothetical age for yourself but for me it would be i think for me i was writing this letter to the younger self it would be just at the point where i graduated from car practice you know i'm just about to take on the world metaphorically speaking i've got

true

whole career ahead of us we've got bettina and i we don't have kids where really we've got a blank canvas and the world is our oyster

yeah for context what how old were you then

i would have been twenty three

okay so this is really good i think you know maybe we can go into this in this podcast is like maybe like pick two maybe three if that's too much like of what you would say in the different age because i think you're absolutely right absolutely right so for context i didn't graduate til it twenty seven so which is you know four years later i think yeah what i would tell myself at twenty three versus twenty seven is probably two different things interestingly enough okay

yep yeah yep actually i'm correcting twenty five sorry because i forgot i forgot twentyfive apologize i did since for a couple of yeah just deed to do to do a science course for a couple of years i just love it said twenty five rather than twenty seven or twenty three twenty five

you failed a couple o years right and i'm just joking i'm joking joking yeah and the reason why people are asking me why why did you graduate on because i fail four years no no i'm just ring i had to do it for your degree before i went to ride so had two degrees that's why okay yea so i think let's pick two stages okay let's thank you say just i think around like twenty five like mid twenties okay mid twenties and then the other younger self i think would be worth while talking about is probably in your teens i would say around seventeen like you know just before our hood just maybe at the end of high school i think that would probably be a good time all right so let's let's choose those two okay so that's good so the fir

uh twenty five twenty five yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah great yeh yeh

and we will consider like okay which younger self we actually want to make influence actually let's ask you this while we talk about this which one if you had to choose only one right either like the seventeen years version or like the mid twenty version which one if you can only choose one which one would you choose and that would make the bigger impact in the in the life to directory do you think

yeah i think going back to sixteen seventeen would be the case because i have to have gone through sixteen to get to twenty five and if i can basically in still that wisdom there the earlier then like it's probably you know for simplicity i'd probably just go listen i'm just going to talk to that that version of myself because if the tags on that wisdom then hopefully at twenty five is pick it up anyway so you know i'd go what about you

true yet yeah yeah interesting yeah you know i'm just sitting there as i asked you that question and yeah the logical answer is that but i think i'm gonna chose the other one just to kind of you know ad some content here but the reason why i choose the other ones because and this is context for me only okay because obviously i thought at seventeen eighteen i was just on this path of just academic knowledge i kind of just wanted the study and study study whereas when i was graduing at twenty seven like you know all the studies done i've just literally spent how to calculate this twenty what twenty

yep yeah yeah

what twenty two years straight of education i didn't stop went straight an't take any time off didn't have one of those you know gap years or anything i went twenty two years of straight studying and now i get to live my life in a way and i think you know i think the greatest influence was that moment and the reason why i would say that was because that was also the moment when i decided to leave canada and go to australia and that changed the directory of my life so i think if i was to give that advice to make sure guiding that for me

yeah yeah right

um would have would be more helpful knowing that i was already going to go though the university path anyway so i'm scared that if i did say what i'm going to say to find seventeen that they might not actually going through the university math

yep yeah okay okay i hope because that's because that's the first question that goes to me it's like okay will the sixteen seventeen year old version of myself taken that advice on or will i just bring yeah thanks o man i got this covered thanks anyway

yes exactly yeah exactly like i don't know if they would have actually listened and i don't know if i had the maturity at that time to absorb the information and yeah you know

m so we've got to hypothetically look at this and say assuming that you just happened to have this conversation and the sixteen or the twenty five year old version of you was open and receptive to take information on um what would we do say or what we communicate because there's a lot of assumption so we've just got to we've got to basically as you said put context around that and just give it something

yes yeah yes yes so what would you like well what would be the big you know areas that you would want to cover without going into the content just you like what are some of areas that you think will make the most influence

yeah okay so the biggest part you know whenever we work with people in a coach in capacity we always look at different areas of life and so you know you look at health relationship wealth career friendships all those kind of things and so to me i want to be able to cover at least some guidance around that that's fer seven areas we do twenty four areas when we look at things in the

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least seven areas of life that i'd love to be able to assist and help out so that to me would be the key part of it and if you could dissect it down to one or two would be i guess the ones that mean the most to me have been my biggest learnings over life i'd hopefully be able to transfer at that and that'd be around relationship that would be around the career and that would also be around know character and identity that would be probably the three big areas at lunch

right hm

this one

interesting i think for me it would be if i had to narrow down i couldn't narrow down to one i was gonacualyou ike what's the one thing i could narwdownto one myself so yeah like for me it would be mind set i think having the right mind set and approach to life if i had to choose one it would be that simply because i feel like the mind set of having the right mind set you know would really change will actually be the one core element that is consistent across

yeah yeah stroke strain right

your physical mentality your know your financial mentality your career mentalities and in so i have to choose one building a strong mindset like a like a mindset of like you know of abundance or a mindset of just like strength and tenacity and discipline all those things i think that will be the one thing i have to choose but that's one area the second area i think will be financial i think having ell dive into that i'm sure you know now in your background just the financial that what you would say to that you know my younger self around

yeh yeh yes

financial um definitely relationship and i would say also um ah i think those three actually i didn't pick career mostly because i feel like the career is usually an expression of the mind that you have in the financial the goals that you're trying to strive for relation epic physical i would talk about physical to like i would actually you know talk because i'm way fitter now at forty seven years old than at any point in my life

yeah yeah yeah

and i kind of wish i had this physique no physique like just like the the mobility the strength and the will at when i was in twenty i would been tiptop ship you know because you know i know i can't grow muscles and be strong at forty seven compared to what what i did back in my my twenties but yeah if i wish i kind of would have gone back to kind of focus a little bit more of that you know yah

that's awesome yeah yeah yeah okay okay okay let's let's start with so did you want to ask me that question again because i've forgotten

sure let's let's start with let's talk about mind set first i think that's a one crucial thing i think at kind o what kind of lessons what would you put in that letter around mind set do you think will be key to your younger self

okay so around sixteen seventeen i was you know i could have i was in a professional athlete mind set i was training seven days a week six seven days a week with my martial arts football and the whole life and so i had a very strong mind set very disciplined mind set that propelled me and helped me achieve some phenomenal things very early on what i probably have learned over time is that it was probably developed it's more of a growth mindset as opposed to effect minded because i was so focused on this it was either you win or you lose and i was so locked on to an outcome that i couldn't understand the difference between progressive improvement or excellence s opposed to perfection ism and that created a lot of stress a lot of you know i loaded the basis on myself and to me like i said that worked exceptionally well up until the

m m

i realized it was an unsustainable model so i wish i could go back and get clearer on using the element that serving me well and also adopt more of a growth inset so it's a case of going he that set back that's not that doesn't define you that's not the build end or that's not just because you lost or took it you know it here does not mean that this is how that will be so how do you use this and i eventually developed that which was really great but yeah the earlier i would have known that the better

yeah it's funny isn't it like we we have a tendency to i don't know it's a young thing but i'm sure a lot of people do that too but we kind of make one small thing so much bigger than it actually was is when we're younger like i see that with my daughter and you know it's like she just takes one test you know it's like it's the end of the world but you know i got to remind myself like you know she's only been on this earth for fourteen years so it is a big deal for her but we have a bit more years under our belt that that test in university that i might have failed really doesn't mean that

yeah yeah yeah yeah

you know but at the time it felt like it was the worst thing in the world so i definitely get that for me it's actually you know i would definitely tell my younger self about you know actually at any age would be to take more risk and the reason why for context was i was very i was not a risky person at all i didn't take any risk whatsoever i didn't take chances in life i didn't take many opportunities i was scared you know i was scared

yeah yeah yeah m hm

told the line um i didn't jump at opportunities i still remember a story i remembember when i was a kid i can't remember how old i was probably about eleven or twelve years old i remember there was like a fire truck and my dad my parents were showing me this fire truck and it was like you know the fireman were out there and and the fireman is like hey do you want to come in you know when i jump on jump in and remember saying no no thank you i was scared and you know and i look back at that and i was like man kid come on like you got this opportunity like why don't you take it like it's silly but that was that was me at the time you know like those opportunities just were like there was tons of those examples in my life that i just never took and you know but then again look at my life now and probably you compensate for a lot of those things you know jumping opportunities and that is why you know

m m yeah m oh

in hindsight when you look back in my life in your career and it's like yeah i definitely take a lot of big swings in my life and i think it's because of that thing that i felt lack of when i was younger so but yeah take more risk and you know because i think you and you and i agree both agree that when you're younger those risks when you fail there actually great learning lessons and they don't break you you know as much as it would if you're a little older

yep yeah yeah yeah thank you for sharing that too because that's i guess what we're also doing is this is a vulnerable process for both of us to suddenly go home and i'm going back to a point where okay you're seeing now the more mature more polished more experienced version of me but that wasn't always the case were a work in progress and were still so for you to share that i really felt great connection and empathy to as you're sharing that story so the curious

m hm

and he just said so when did a switch when what was at the fining moment where you said i can't keep doing this this way

yeah that's great question i think i didn't there was not one single singular moment um it all started with like small little things right it's like i think one of them would have been you know probably going to university and you know in canada we tend to go to you know we have university toronto and there's about two or three universities actually in toronto where i'm from but i got a scholarship

yeah hm

thousand dollars and i took that one because over another school because they gave me a thousand dollars i'm like all right i'm going to that one i went to university of waterloo which was about an hour drive but i had to live away from home and you know be at eighteen going away and living away from home honestly was the best thing that i ever did to my for my life like it just it taught me to be an adult like right off the bat and you know for me although like as being a father now you kind o look at your kids and like oh man i hope they

uh uh yeah yeah

go away but at the same time i just know that that was the best moment in my life and i had to let them go like that would literally change my life and my wife would agree with me with her with her life too as well and living away from home is honestly the best experience you kind of need at that age to to kind of grow up um and yeah so i think that was like that kind of making like a decision like that and then experiencing it and go oh okay like i can it's not that bad and then doing more and more

yeah yeah yeah yeah

and more of it you know obviously you know you get to a point of you know choosing your partner you know i'm not caring at twenty one and like you know the things that i had to go through to to win a date over for her you know like things like that you know taking chances and those things like they add up and then you put rings on your belt just like you know it's just like digits or marcia it's like or you know wait so like the more you try it the more you fail but you you start to have to it more confidence in something and you just get better out of then then you take big swings like you know let's go to australia boom you know and then that changes your directory your life and then you know i think that's so it's not any moment in time to answer your question but it's a gradual moment and its smaller decisions they all add up so i think this is really good because i think you know for for anyone watching and listening it's like yeah take take some swing it doesn't have to be the biggest swing in the world you don't have to go from like zero to hero and in a moment it's like take minor swings because those little decisions that you make realizing that it

yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

not that big of a deal and you can it's okay to make those little small little moments count

and that and that and that's the whole essence of the book of tomic habits little habits that that build momentum and then they get bigger and bigger and they have great great impact over time the same thing with decisions is the same thing with leaning into your courage doing something scary every day or whatever that is builds that fortitude within you to say i've got this i've got this covered on i'm a person who makes these decisions and after time that becomes so locked into your identity

yes

that that becomes a normal

yeah i think it's also that like the decisions are based remember the decision how big of a risk because we're talking about risk is really relative to your relative to your risk level so you know it's not health it's not that important about what i did to make those it's more about like what is scary for you to take the next risk like to make the next decision that's risky for you i think that's the most important because i mean we know people that are just you know

yeah yeah yeah

they're just like you know they're taking big swings but they didn't get there just like that right most of the time they've got there because they've been able to put themselves in positions that you know and i think that's that's why i think it's been born for us to kind of pull back and just go realize the risk is always relative to you and what you've done in the past our goal is always to grow so which means just to you know take the risk just above where you need to be

yeah yeah and also and also there's a big distinction between risk and recklessness as well so so it's all well and good i mean we know someone mutually who jumps out of perfectly good blanks and you know that that you know most people go oh my gosh i can't imagine doing that but the due diligence that goes into that process mitigates the risks so it's the same thing you know you don't you don't take a step you don't invest somewhere

yes yeh yeah yep yep

least if you're sophisticated over time without doing your diligence

well have a saying it's three things which is fail fast like we kind of understand that which make make mistakes take risk faster fail forward so any time you goin to fail like at least make sure you fail forward in a way that you're goin to learn from it so you're not going backwards in life and fail firm and meaning that you if you're going to fail you're better land with you you know with your feet intact and your body intact because you need to be able to live another day to fight and play the game don't fail where you gonna die risk yourself where you know your gonna lose everything and then it's

yep yeah yeah yep

game over like that's not the point you know you got to think like a video game where you're willing is the same thing in video games you're willing to take certain risk because you know you're goin to come back right right that's right yeah exactly so therefore like you should attack like like that but know that you should only take risk that that you know that you can come back from things that you know you're gonna and this is the story to relate back to this which was

yeh yeh there's no repecutions right there's no there's no effect it's like yeah man of course i'll jump out of it so i course i'll do that yep yep

um you know have you watched free solo um with he climbed a capitan so alex hana one of the greatest free climbers in the world is a sensational film and it's a documentary he basically is the first man i think or the quickest man who freesoloed mon capitan on in san francisco and yosemite park and free means like no ropes he free climbed the whole thing right and you know mountain columbus are always fascinate a know i don't climb myself but

no no ye yeah that's

these climbers you know free to lie no robes and you know there's a moment in that film and he learned this from someone else before which is like they climb and then you get to a point everybody has to make a jump right like there's certain points you just you just have to take a leap of faith you have to leap at it there's no way you can climb it and you know there's every moment of a climber just goes okay i'm gonna have to take a leap and they go no not today and they come back down right they got up there and they came back down and the reason why they

yeah yeah

that's because they know if they make the leap and they don't feel it and they miss it that's game over it's done there are no tomorrows right they rather go because they're smart enough even though he had risked massibristakers but they're smart enough to go you know i think today i'm going to come back down i'm going to just do this again tomorrow because the whole goal is to play again right

yeah yeah yeah and that's that comes with experience and time you don't know that when your fifteen sixteen seventeen or even twenty five because you haven't added enough to know that correct so that's it so i think that's a really good one you know the risk and you know qualified risks are definitely important in there as well so let's go let's go another option in terms of m i'm really curious about the area like

that's right and plus you haven't developed the brain yet yeah

for me the advice i would have given to myself is for the same reason you know you were talking about fear i had a shyness that actually didn't like drawing attention to myself and so even though i like yeah always was forever basically trying to fly under the raider right and i don't know whether it was because you know being a migrant kid i just wanted to fit in with everybody else so i didn't want to do anything that was different if i showed somebody up

that's me yeah

you know this is where the mind set for me was that if i'm shining too much you're going to like me less i'm just going a dumb this down i'm just going to dim my own light to make you feel better about yourself right and so for the longest time i realize that that's what i was doing you know you know have a skill set i worked exceptionally hard at achieving an outcome and yet i just trvialize it and down plane go yeah it's no big deal or yards

m whereabout

lucky and i didn't and i think it took the tole on me for a long time because it made me never really acknowledge you know the sense of you know encouraging we always look at the fact is that affect people quite up on level of worthiness where they feel good enough whether they feel loved or lovable and for me it was always good enough it was like i had this compelling narrative around is no matter what i did no matter how like it wasn't good enough and even if it was good

m

to just keep it quiet so the journey for me was really about getting comfortable in my own skin and being okay with that because eventually i got to their realization and understanding of people who appreciate you love you care fully going to love you for who you are authentically and ere the ones you want and the old saying of the people that mind don't matter and the people that matter don't mind really was something i wish i could take back to the younger

hm

version myself and just go just be after you know all gonna work out for you

yeah yeah interesting you for sure like i'm very similar to that i was definitely shy and i was like where brought me this is all god bring back old memories and painful memories but now like i was i was a shy kid as well i was i was the geekiest think of like an asian geek kid like the nervy geek who wasn't actually smart but he was ready looking yeah that was me right

yeah yeah yeah

i was smart but i wasn't like i wasn't that smart like so you know i looked the part but i didn't i was cal without the brains o man i was i was brutal and i was like you know i was thinking myself i'm like man like i have literally probably burnt or removed or thrown away all high school photos of myself and i don't know if there is i'm sure there were s one somewhere out there that i'm going to be haunted by at some point in my life and have

yeah yeah yeah yeah tip yeah yeah

i'm found yeah i think it's probably somewhere in my my my my dad's basement somewhere in canada i'm going to have to go to canada and throw it this way but really like i was so bad and i remember thinking about like this from you know from a partner's perspective and finding a girl friend i'm like if i had to go back to my younger self in my teenage years and like it's gonna be all okay like i just to tell it's going to be all okay dude like you'll be find you you just have to be a late mature and you'll figure out so don't trust in yourself i think that so advice

yeah so when yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

would give sort of similar to which is like trusting yourself don't settle and that was actually at something i actually did tell myself when i was younger okay and i don't know why this is the thought as i hope hope that is okay but there was one moment time like i said i was really geek uh you didn't have the looks or the body or anything like that right and but i've always felt that i deserved to be with an amazing woman right and

yeah yep

but i was like but i look at myself in the r like how it is like that's the first thing like how but i just remember i'm like okay so have two choices here right i lower my standard and just accept whatever that you know that i can you know feel like i can be matched at that point or keep my standard because i'm a freak nice guy you know like that's why like like i know with myself i have a good heart and i'm a good person that i should deserve you know someone spectacular and i had to make that

yeah m yeah

i'm not an i have to make choice but remember i had to at the talk to my head like was probably like sixteen fifteen sixteen at that time and i'm like no like dude like use the people resonate with you they just may not like you like from the attraction point of view from a physical point of view but like you figure this out and i remember okay i'm gonna keep the standard high of who i imagine my perfect you know partner girlfriend wife will be just kept it and i maintained it and obviously i matured changed and stuff an

yeah yeah

and i grew and you figured out fashion on all the stuff my parents weren't fashionable and i'm so glad that that's one of the things i did i actually just told my daughter that the it was kind of funny because it's like you know sometimes like you always have you know always you can lower standards but i said sometimes it's more easier to lie lower expectations but always maintain your standards you know because that's what's most important because our standards is what you're trying to live up to you know expectations what destroys you because there

m m yeah

no the podcast elsewhere but expectation is what destroy because you call constantly comparing yourself to your expectations but standards got to be high kind of maintain them so yeah that's that's what i would give you know that younger version

yeah yeah that's that's a really interesting one because i think what happens for people when you're making big decisions and big life decisions you've got this it's kind of like a sliding doors moment in the movie with paltry where you could go one way and it takes you on one trajectory or you go into another train and it takes you on another one and you've got that that point of if you can have reverence and and clarity in those important moments and you know hindsight you can go back and go it was that moment it was that

hm

it was that but you don't necessarily know it as you're going through it other than to just go do what you're basically said is just elevate and see the worth and the beauty and the what you deserve in yourself and making a choice to go i choose to to level the hell up in myself and because of that then i'll attract the person who who basically i want to be with as opposed to just settling for what's convenient or like i'm not talking about a relationship necessarily but but it's a really big factor it's a really big fact that so many times people you know that i've worked with come in and say i'm looking for my idol partner i've defined all these characteristics of exactly what this person looks like i got great awesome and what would that person be looking for and they go what i mean i go well to two sided thing you know so who would you need to be to attract that kind of person and by extension that's pretty much what you've actually outlined so you've got to do as much of a list of who

yep yeah yeah

i need to be in who i need to show up to attract that person into my life and world

exactly that that's that's this exact same advice i gave to one of my clients today you know we're just using as an example and i god you know like he s he s a younger guy and i was like i go do you have a list of like who your perfect partners because yeah give me a second i actually wrote it i'm like how long did it take you like three minutes i'm like okay great and i'm like i didn't ask him to read it to me go but if you read if you read the list i'm like that's great that's something you would want to someone but what are you doing like at the first two questions one is if that person did show up to your door right now

yeah yeah

would they be attracted to you in this moment of time and the chances are usually know right and then to the second question if that's the answer is no then like what are you doing every day to becoming better to be that person to even attract someone like that in your life right and that's exactly what you're ay that's i think from a relationship point of view it's like yeah like it will come and that's why i said you now be patient stick to you know trust yourself like you know believe yourself and you know things will good things will always come

yeah yeah yes yeah yeah yeah yeah i guess another thing that i was going to look at as well to sometimes when things don't go the way you plan and this is the one what i was thinking about you know what my talk about just in the lead up to a podcast i was thinking about i'm not sure what your music gen references florence minds very contemporary got a very broad range of music i listen to right

yeah

but there's a country music song that i heard years ago by gaff brooks gar brooks and

car yes there was a period of time where there was one song or so what song is it

unanswered prayers have you actually heard that it's a brilliant song right yeah yeah laurence you know here's the funny but this is the only country song that i know and probably the only one that you know it happened to be the same song but yeah but i used to play that because a lot of the time the essence of it and do something i ever go listen to get out of your own way if you don't like country just listen to the goddam

yeah i love that song that's yeah one i know i hate to say that i met to it like i like in country but like that that was one country song that i actually did like yeah i know that song well yeah yeah

because there's magic in that and it's basically talking about sometimes you know life doesn't work out the way you want because there's probably a bigger plan there's something else there and thank goodness things didn't work out the way that you wanted because it left you open for something even better right and so to to me that's what i love about that song that's the only gafbrookson i don't know how it came that i got to hear that song but yeah so listen

yeah yeah absolutely m hm

about that you know like have there been times where if you had gotten what you thought you wanted your whole life would have been different

yeah there's definitely moments where i think you know if i got it i think my whole life tradictory would have changed a lot you know and i mean it's kind of strange the first thing can think of is like certain like relationships like i had you know a couple of relationships where if it went a certain way it went really well like and then if it if it went a certain way i don't know if my life

yep

i know that my life would nowhere be as close as where it is right now and that would have been disaster you know and and so it's yeah you're you're absolutely right so that's that's the first thing i can think of relationship be one relationship with a couple of relationship where it's just like it could have gone that way and it would have definitely changed a directory of my life actually right away so we're just talking about universities i applied to go to umerciy toronto for physio therapy and

m yep yeah

out of high school and you were able to do that at the time and i didn't get in you needed like a ninety six per cent out of high school i had like a ninety one and i couldn't qualify and end up going to university they rejected me and ended up going to waterloo for kennsnology that in itself change a directory of my life that's a sladingdor moment for sure because that's where i m you know discovered you know kirpraticand went to see carter there and spent four years just trying to find myself and that's also the same town where karen was living in she didn't go to waterloo he went to magill but yeah so you know like that's like that's what i mean like those slow movents if i and you know that's face it like you know not the physiotherapist or bad a bad thing but i think if i went down that road there's no way i would have i don't think i would ever end up in a practice right so it's sort of and carrat has also given me an amazing career path

yeah yeah

and sort of where i'm leading up to now what about you

actually very interesting it must be a university thing so i also i finished a twelve and i always wanted to study practice for as long as i remember and i didn't get in after year twelve but just missed the cut out because back in the time when we studied there were fifty people in australia and new zealand that could get into the course and i didn't get in i just missed out so i was pretty bumbedout by that so i went and went to university went to my university for the first year and

m m

just really didn't bring my right attitude i marked around i was really dejected it was something that i wanted to do and i just didn't get in there and i failed every subject in first year but not badly enough that i failed the year badly enough that i had to repeat all my exams in summer it was what called peat to part to be too far which is forty five to fifty so i had to study for the whole year the summer got through my exams i went this is not how i want to go to life again i'm no closer to get into cobracif i keep this game up so i studied a lot and nailed a second year and then i was tratransferred o practice but the interesting thing is tina also finished year twelve the same year i did and she went off to be an exchange student in brazil for twelve months and when she came back she also the scenario she also didn't get into co practice and so she had to do a year of science and she did exceptionally well in that year and the two years that we both were going off doing other things i am clear that life was just waiting for us to just get our acts together so that we could meet and we met in the course so i can look at it and say yeah we could have met we would have met each other whatever but for the romantic part of megas

yeah interesting

those two years had you gotten what you wanted it may not have turned out the way that it has and when i look at how blessed i am and i think that's what i hear in your voice as well too i look at it and go unanswered prayers i'm so glad it didn't work out the way that i did because i think it opened up and allowed me to experience a level of life and fulfillment and level that i may not have ever had so answer pres

yeah well exactly i mean i i met karen through a girl whose friends with her when they went to high school together who had a crush on and they were all at the same bar and then that girl decided just to ditch us and it was just me and karen talking and that's how we met so like it's no like bollman sliding to our moments are all around us every single day and it's it's amazing when you reflect back and look back and how um in retrospect of how important those moments were

yeah yeah yeah

and what what led to those moments even to even for those sincernicity to ocur is actually absolutely amazing so let's let's move to so we alkedabota lot about mind set we talked about you know like that let's move into another realm what do you want to check you want a check on physical you want to talk about finance career what do you want let's go let's go find an since you're you're you're you're a finance dude let's talk about finance what would what would you tell about you younger self

yeah that's cool yeah whichever whichever i'm happy i eber okay yeah

about brown finance and money

um the biggest the biggest thing for for me was always about understanding the laws of finance as opposed to i think that's that's really really important because what i've come to now understand is if you understand the the the machinations of wealth and wealth creation and how money is created um you would value the process more than the attaining of money as well so i think that a big thing that i love to ship back and in a large part i've actually done that where i always say always make decisions and choices based on your own true north as opposed to chasing chasing the money because that that to me is a zero sum game you'll get to a point where it's so short term ism that you will feel unfulfilled and for me i think

yeah

particular i'm now success and fulfilment are really important and wealth is to me it's the or the glue that allows that process so it's not about to me i very principle both so even when i live my life coach whatever i always rely on principles you know time lost principles that have stood the test of time and so when it comes to wealth i go understand the principles understand what compounding does understand that compound interest is lender of the world and understand that as a process and make really good decisions about financial discipline so that you're effectively controling money rather than money controlling you

yeah finance a discipline is definitely one thing i've probably teach my self a lot sooner and earlier i mean i've done well in terms of creating money creating wealth in terms of like the work habits that i put in and i've done well through some obviously investing in everything but even then i still feel like now that i'm a bit older i wish i invested earlier i wish i listened to like i wish i kind of

yeah

started a younger age um the reality s that there've been millions of dollars literally have gone through my hands like over the years think about how much money you've actually earned in your life there's millions that just come through and i've spent it come through and spent it and you know it's actually you know i mean to make this simplistic is like it's actually how much you keep this money is coming to last like there's far of like how much can you hold on to that that's actually going to keep

m yep yep yeah yeah yeah

make you wealthy at some time so here now this is a simple analogy but the reality is like if i just man if i just invested earlier but why didn't i so i think back and like the reason why i didn't and i hope that you know some younger people are listening to this is the reason why i didn't is because i was earning great money so i always thought that like whatever i'll just keep earning this amount over for like the remaining part of life i even i know that i would be better five years from now than i am now so like i don't need to worry but don't need to worry about saving i don't need to worry about investing because that's like a lie you know worring about retirement

yeah yeah

that's a later on decision it was e until like my actually the last few years where i'm going you know what i'm on this side of fifty like 'mliklikeyou know i'm like damn um when i'm on a start thinking about it so i wish like you know i started a lot younger you know like you said compounding is the main thing i just wish i understood that i think the second thing i wish i would have learned is the younger age is value like how do you what is actually money and my

yeah yeah yeah yeah

nation around money now it's actually just value is like how much value are you putting into the world is the value that you're actually getting in return and you know that's fundamental not chasing money like you said actually i do agree with that i don't chasing money s always been a bad call um for me but understanding value money as equaling value and looking for that how do i create value how to hold on to value how do i continue doing that and i think the money will just

yep yeah

follow i think that from a financial perspective that would be one of the major things that i would definitely want to go back to my younger self to teach

yeah yeah that's a great one and i think really how i think how important wealth is in terms of choice so i am grateful that i took some lessons along the way which has allowed me knew and our respective families have choice so highlights to me that's fundamentally what the biggest important thing about wealth is it creates choice and opportunities and to me you know you if something doesn't resonate well with you you're not bound to a like my mom and dad and i think it's really at times it hit home a lot because they were doing jobs i knew they did not want to do but they just didn't have choice they were starting an environment in order to provide you now unskilled without the training and the tools and resources they just had to basically

yeah

down to the credit i did exceptionally well considering that model but i saw the anguish that it took and the tale that it took on them and i just went i don't want that so to me i always had an idea of why wealth was important and i linked it to time with family and choice my dad worked seven days a week i never saw him and so to me that was really important and so for me it was going back and saying

m yeah

okay if there was one thing that i could say to myself as i understood that the value of it i wish i had gotten better at the multiplier effect as opposed to running myself at thirty per cent of my capacity i probably would have asked for help earlier and i probably would have leverage my efforts by recruiting people earlier rather than trying to do all by myself

yeah yeah i think it's also important to recognize like appreciate the advice i would give to my younger self in any area it's got to also appreciate where i was at that moment in time so it's well i guess what i'm saying is like we see enough gurus or experts to say you know and especially like you know nowadays is like to say listen don't chase money find your purpose you know like do what you love you know that type of realm right end

yeah yeah

but you also got to put in the context on who's saying that first right it's a lot easier for me to say that now then you know then i was when i was twenty years old when i was broke and like i had like less than ten thousand dollars in my you know between me and karen flying over to stra like when when you have no little money like yeah sure it's nice like a nice thing and a nice thing to go approach but when it's really important to recognize like no in that moment you know in my twenties when when it was just me and

yeah kind of a cent

and with like three thousan dollars in in our bank account go in australia it's like now you have to work your ass off here like this is where you got to put your you know really just got to go in there and earn as much you can because you got a good three to five years here if you work your but that's exactly what i told myself twenty seven and thirty two if i put my head down and just work my butt off i'll be in a position where i can figure things out and you know like you just said about freedom man like

yeah yeah yes

my advice to that was like go work your butt off like do whatever it takes to earn as much as you possibly can create much by creating as much value out there as possible because as sooner or later and i don't know how i just knew i just instinctively knew sooner or later you're going to get tired you might not lose the drive and the hunger but there's no guarantee right because right now you got all that hunger and drive like you might as well leverage it and then you have a choice you have a choice to then go maybe

m yeah yeah

go and meditate on a mountain right it's so much easier to do that but you can't really go meditate on the mountain and do those things when you're stressed about the next bill where i'm gonna how i'm going to pay my taxes or where the next meal is going to come and so you know this is like this is why i think the reason why i'm saying this because you know i got be careful my kids is to make sure like hey you live a great life here but at the same time like you got to work you know you got to work and and i've seen this so many times with so many people when i

yeah yeah exactly ye yeah yeah

obviously we're eating a ton of experts and they have the freedom to kind of live wherever we're living in portugal in spain and you're like man these guys like there's a lot of wealth like you know around the world and you go yeah they get to go and play paddle and tennis or whatever during the day is because they got to a point where they can do that but it's easy to go oh just do that no no like thy they pay their dues exactly and i think that's why you got to be careful the lessons that were when ye're younger listening to it like who are you listening to and are they giving the advice based on

yeah yep they played the jews they played the jews yet

their age right now and the situation right now or are they basing on putting your perfection where you are at and i think that's important so the same thing for us if you're listening to us you got to put in action the perspective i'm trying my barry best you can remind ourselves like when we're in that moment what would you do differently you know but certain things that wouldn't change

yep yep yeah yeah good point what about because we've covered obviously finance mind set career relationships prima relationship i think a really nice one would be your friends and the people you associate with so what would you say to the younger version of yourself who may as you said have been a kid who wasn't you know looked at self and went how

yeah

going to achieve business in this where i feel this about myself what would you say to yourself about the friends

interesting yeah similar to what i said earlier which is never compromise um you never compromise actually you your own values so i'll expand on that i think the most important person in your life is your partner and the fundantthe reason why fundamiold believe that is because you spent the most amount of time in your life with that person and if you don't choose the right partner

m

it could be your life is just not the same let's just let's say that right and i find like choosing the right partner and being patient to end to make sure and you're never going to be a hunpercentur but choosing the right partner and how a good that advice is like make sure you choose a partner that you know you can grow with not like just choose a partner based on who they are right now it's someone that you've got to be willing to grow with because you know i met karen in a twenty one so we've been together for twenty six years

yep yep yep m m

um who we were twenty six years ago is definitely not the same people as we are now nor we were ten years ago or fifteen years ago so and so forth so i think you know we have evolved together and there are certain sacrifices and consequences and stuff that we would have to give up to be with this person and choosing the right partner to grow with and want to grow with i think it's essential um so that would be fun but that translate just as much to your friend's group there are moments of time where you start to you know i've had friends come and go in my life

yeah

of course i'm sure everybody has but i've always tried to choose people based on um i resonate with them you know in terms of my values and how i see them whether however they show up they i want to make sure that i kind of surround myself with people i don't need a lot of people in my life but i do need certain people key people that i know i can lean on that you know even if i haven't spoken to you in five years but if i have a call and i need you i know you have my back like that's the type of people that

m yep

want to kind of surround myself with because one they obviously elevate you to they give you security but three they also kind of give you the feedback that you need and tell you the truth but for that i think they are the ones that um reflect back to you how important you are in this world i think we all need that i think we all need that security we all think we all need that vee back although you know we want to care less what people think but at the same time in your close circle of friends you kind of want

m m

you want to surround people with it's going to uplift you people are not going to just knock you down they're not gonna ake fun of you but they honestly they love you as a person i think those types of relationships are critical things and we've already had an podcast around this on the five closest friends and how they elevate you so you go back to that podcast but yeah this is this is how i would choose and the importance of that what about you

yeah yeah very similar very similar i always like you to i've got friends who i may ave spoken to for a long time i just picked up the phone and we started talking and it's like time has stood still so there they're the magical one here the ones that that elevate you by you know by virtue of someone's conversation or the company you just elevate feel better about yours more inspired so very much about those the five people that you spent the most time with i think going through high school there's a tendency to think you know people like people who like themselves so a lot of the times in order to fit in you were trying to do what everybody else did you weren't really being yourself you're not as authentic and i think what happens is

that's right yeah

there's there's a there's thinking that i might both my kids experience that recently as well more recently than i have where the friendship that they had in fifteen ten seven and i thought yeah we're going to be friends and buddies forever gone because the thing that they had in common was proximity they were there at the school they saw each other at the time but other than that they may not necessarily have been the people who elevated them and allowed them and supporting them with their version of themselves so to me it's always like you along the line and there's a thread you know always hold yourself in high esteem and regard elevate your own sense of worth and identity and as a result of that the people that what i realize is the people who were waiting for that version of you to show up will show up in your life and world thu'rentgonna be intrusted to that version of yourself that may be in authentic or your true self or if they are the moment that you change suddenly there's going to be this conflict between that group hey i thought you were like this and you're not like that really so that i guess that the wisdom that i would pass on to myself would be the quicker you find out who you are and be yourself and be comfortable with that the quicker you will find the people that will love you for that version of you and you don't have to be anything other than that and that is you know that that's the journey that a lot of us have to go through on way looking to try and find a place where we connect and belong and someone we love and who loves us for us

yeah and i think in the same realms like with relationship with your partner like they tend to you want to evolve them together like obviously but but for me one of the lessons i learned in my life is that unfortunately and you know fortunately unfortunately like you grow out of friends friendship sometimes a friend becomes an acquaintance and sometimes acquaintance become closer friends and i'm okay with that i know it's sometimes a bit difficult but it's reality is as that we might be moving in different circles and or we have different interests now and and some

yeah yep yep yeah yeah

times it is is a proximate proximity thing and you know and you know and what what what you were like and all these things happen but it's being not being hung up on i have to like stay friends with this person i have to be in this circle i have to be that same because if you have to do anything all sudden you still then become like you actually get anchored to the old version of yourself which you may no longer resonate with you know and we got remember every single one of us is an individual who are growing at different speeds

yeah yeah yeah

you know and and some people are going faster and some people are going slower and there's nothing wrong with that it's not not about know who's trying to get there faster it's just like we're just moving in different circles and that just that reminder i think it's helpful to recognize that things people come and use your circles and people come out of circles and i think it's important to just be open that there's other there's probably friendships and friends that you haven't met yet that could really change the directory of your life and i think by by being open to it

yep m

will be a huge benefit

yeah i think we've covered a lot of areas and sub areas i'm just super curious about one thing lance that fifteen sixteen seven and version of yourself that same hair style back then all different

m no no no it was very it was kind of like long hair i had much longer hair terrible becase hair was like growing out of my side of my ears i wore glasses i didn't wear contact so probably like well in my thirties it was like greasy it was yeah it was brutal man it's brutal like if i can find a picture maybe i will share one day but it was brutal like i wouldn't even date me like it's

oh yeah yeah yeah right okay yeah yeah right right yeah yeah right

like it's just it's bad it is bad

well it was i it wasn't just put it on it was more just now i was thinking myself yea to my hair side hasn't changed it makes you feel any better the was a time where i had shoulder length hair lawrence and yeah i know that that takes a bit of imagining doesn't it especially when there's not a folligal on the head now but yeah that was that was being shoulder leg hair back there so

wow m yeah like sometimes it's just yeah i just it's funny isn't it like when you look back and you going like how on earth did my friends or my parents ever let me walk out of the door like that right so i was just lucky i actually went to an old boy school i just i was i was just lucky i went to an old boy school where i had to wear uniform for about five years so i didn't have to worry about too much about fashion styles but yeah yeah any last thing

because they loved you unconditionally that right that that all helps

thoughts of like what you you know what would be one more little advice that yo would give to you to your younger self before we go

no um enjoy the journey more you now enjoy the moment the good moments the tough moments it can't always be happy and exciting just appreciate that some of the hardest toughest moments of your life will quite often be the biggest learning the biggest lessons and things in highsight you may be most grateful for

m m m yeah i think for me it would be just be similar to that enjoy the journey is like i would just if i can only say one sentence or like just one short thing because it's just a moment of time because you can only go back for just one second i would just love to just go it's all going to be okay kid you know it's all gonna be okay and i think that i i think if i reflect back if i was young and i heard that and i knew that was my future self

yeah yeah yeah yeah

i can just trust that voice i think yeah i would do all those things i just said i'll probably have taken more risk and i would have done because you just know like you're on the right path and so before we leave this podcast i'd love to kind of post this question i mention this to you on the messenger but like post thisqustion don't have to answer because i feel like this would be a totally different another hour podcasting if we ever did this but i think i would be worth while for every listener viewer watching this on youtube or facebook or you know on our podcast channels or is to kind of think about like we've been aling about art

yeah yeah yeah yep

current self talking to our younger self what would happen if you were the person you your future self your older version of you is coming back to give you advice what kind of vice they would give you right so i ponder that i love you to think about because because and then the second part of that question part b would be what would you change you know in your current life right now what actually would you take or not take based on that advice so that's i hope that you enjoy this particular episode please share this with other other people that you feel will get it

m m m

a lot of benefit from the wabisabi podcast and until next time we'll see you on the next episode of wabisabi