Being An Imposter

Welcome to WabiSabi. Today we have a pretty interesting topic and I think is a topic that we all, everyone, I can identify with at some point in their life. It is the topic of being an imposter, wearing a mask, feeling insecure, fearing something, the feeling of just not belonging or you're doing something or being someone that you feel, I don't know, like you're faking it somehow. And I don't know about you, Jim, like when we've, I'm sure you've heard this many times. I'm sure, you know, it's repeated. I've said it, which is like, you know, fake it till you make it. And to a point, I think that's important. We'll probably address that at some point in this today's podcast, but let's talk, let's start with the fact of have you felt imposter syndrome, say in the last three months?

Mmm. In the last three months, no, not in the last three months, certainly over my life, 100%.

Okay, interesting, love it. Okay, so that's really cool. So we're gonna have to adjust that. So let's talk about imposter syndrome. Jim, what is imposter syndrome to you?

Well, imposter syndrome to me is one of those situations where you wake up and you're going through the motions of something, you're getting, you're in a position. For example, you may have, I'll give you the context of the explanation I have, but you'd actually don't feel like you belong in that situation. You might have a title, you may have a position, but you feel like, hey, at any one moment, someone's gonna work this out and work out that I'm actually not this right person, I'm not that good. and consequently everything will fall over. That to me is the practical essence of an imposter syndrome.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, so my question is is that why do we why do most people feel? Listen posture syndrome like what like I mean we I mean, I'm sure you dealt with clients. I've dealt with clients I felt it through my lifetime of being an imposter, you know several occasions and Why do we feel that like what what's the impetus of that creates that feeling?

Yeah, I think sometimes the what I've seen, particularly working with clients, I know myself too, is that quite often the identity doesn't match up with the reality or the circumstances. So how you may perceive yourself may not match this current situation. So consequently, that's creating that that incongruency or that disconnect between fact and fiction. And consequently, that is what starts creating that unsettled feeling with. Let me say that again, an unsettled feeling within someone.

Hmm. So tell me like when's the last time, like when's the time, giving this example when you have felt impossible to just be, you know, we can, the audience can relate to, you know, what you might've went through.

Okay, well, look, I'm gonna trace it back to the most vivid example that I have. And everybody who's been listening up until this time will know that we've got a background in healthcare and both as chiropractors. And so there's a particular responsibility and identity that you have the moment that you graduate and you're responsible for the health and wellbeing of someone. And so you're, you know, you've got a doctor title. And if you haven't gotten to terms with that immediately.

hehe

There's sometimes that scenario where you feel, okay, you know, I've got that in total, but I don't feel like I'm personifying it or embodying it. So to me, I think in the first couple of months of practice, particularly where I just hadn't transitioned, I hadn't had the identity upgrade into what being a doctor of co-practice, being responsible for people was like. And that to me felt like an imposter. I had this recurring dream that I was going to wake up.

Hmm.

Sorry, I had this recurring dream that I was going to have my first year anatomy lecturer call me up and say, actually, listen, we've just made a mistake. We've realized that you actually didn't go as well as we thought you did in first year. So consequently, you've got to come back. And that to me was, it was playing out in my subconscious and in my dreams, because I didn't feel like I was ready or I was worthy of the responsibility at that time. So consequently, that's what was showing up for me.

Hmm. Yeah, interesting, interesting. And that's the thing, like these imposter syndromes actually occur in our heads. And we kind of, sometimes we create it and it's a story we tell ourselves or it's the insecurities that we might actually have. But the consequence of them is that it actually starts to play out on our actions and behaviors and decisions that you actually make based on this imposter of the feeling that we actually get. But let's dive deeper into this because

Yep.

You know, the challenge of naming it is interesting, I find. I read a post somewhere, I think a friend of mine, Todd Herman was talking about this and posture like, he was just like, you know, naming it as a syndrome, you know, it's interesting as a syndrome. It's like, okay, well, that makes it okay. You know, that, oh, okay, well, that's everybody. And I don't know, I'm not sure, I'm still kind of torn between like, whether or not that's an okay thing or not, but like, it's good to have a common language so we can actually talk about it.

Yep. Yeah. Thank you.

but it's the feeling that we actually have around that, right, so the imposter syndrome, like this, it's something like, I don't think, I think we gotta be careful around the word syndrome because it's almost like it's a disease or something that we can't fix. I think the imposter part is important because I think we can all identify the imposter part, that we're in a situation where we have this feeling of insecurity, we have a feeling that we don't belong, we have a feeling that we are not enough. And that can lead into

Yeah.

of many decisions that, you know, rightly or wrongly can, you know, really change the course of your life. And I think that's the crux that we wanna deal with because that's what we wanna talk about, right? So it's so important to think about from that perspective. So that's why I feel like if we discuss it, we can actually have, you know, when does it show up? Why does it show up? What circumstances have to show up? For me, I think it shows up a lot. It's depending on the room you're in, like, or the environment that you're in.

Mm-hmm.

And so in one instance, I might be in one room that there is no imposter because I feel adequate in myself or who I am. But in another room, because all of a sudden the circumstances changes, the environment changed, the people in the room changed, and all of a sudden I'm lost. And both don't, the only difference between the two is how I see myself amongst the peers or how I compare, quote unquote, to those people in the room. And so if I was in a class, let's say I was in a room with a bunch of students,

Yeah.

right, who is younger than me and in a, in a, in a, you know, what we'll call a chiropractic or healthcare, um, in a healthcare field. Then, you know, I would feel okay in that, in that situation. However, if I was in a room with a bunch of chiropractors that are, you know, that I know are, have been in practice for 10 or 20 years, you know, more than I more experienced than me, you know, and, and they're lecturers and they have more knowledge and they're medical doctor, like what, they have more experience and knowledge. in a room that has information that I wouldn't have yet, then all of a sudden, like those two situations, I'm still the same person, the only difference is my comparison or what I think of myself compared to those people. So comparison, I think, is one of the most important things, or one of the key elements that creates this imposter feeling that most of us have.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, and I remember reading some information about this a while ago that it's something that more women experience than men. So yeah, I actually read this somewhere that there was more women who experience imposter syndrome than men. And it's all these, it's actually, it's really, it's funny because there's all these statistics when they talk about men in trading, you know, like men tend to overestimate their competence and women tend to underestimate their competence.

Really? Wow, okay.

So women traditionally are much better at trading stock market than men are, because men will overcompensate or feel that they're better than they really are. So the flip of that for a lot of women is that they'll experience a lot more imposter syndrome where they'll develop and get into situations where they find themselves externally in a role that they may not quite be comfortable in because they have that feeling of insecurity within themselves.

Hmm, interesting.

But yeah, I actually had read that. So I'm not sure if that empirically something that you found because I guess a bit of background and context to our talk today, because we both came with two topics and we went with this one and you had a hit on this one. So I'd really love you to lead here and go, okay, well, what was the impetus in terms of really talking about this? If it may be that, you know, we don't necessarily talk about the specifics of a case, but what was the essence of the, you know, what we're talking about?

Interesting.

impossible today.

Well, I think it's an important topic because I feel like it's, you know, in the discussion of what we're trying to do in Wabi Sabi in terms of, you know, the art of imperfection and we're talking about, you know, the highlight of, or highlight in low life of our lives or at least we progress through this and what we learn from it. I feel like it's one of those things that occurs in most people. At some point in another, I feel like if, you know, even in kids, I can see it in them, right? You can see it in them and how they approach life. And it's... It's important discussion around that. And it came up several times over the last couple of days as we were deciding on what we're to talk about this week. And one of them was, I was listening to a podcast and someone kind of mentioned it. And then another time, it was just actually this morning after I was at the CrossFit and one of the expat guys just kind of came up to me and goes, hey Lawrence, you do some coaching, right? Like who do you coach? And I said, well, small business, and owners and entrepreneurs is what I kind of work with. And I work with mostly with mindset.

Alright, okay.

And he was like, oh, like, you know, and he was going through his, like, you know, the, the difficulties he's going through with business right now. And I'm like, and you know, one of the things he said, um, was the nature of work, I won't describe it to, so that, you know, just kind of keep it a bit private. But he was, he was talking about just being an imposter, you know, like just not, not being in the same, um, element to the clients he's trying to, trying to sell to, I guess, or influence to. Um, and, you know, cause most of the clients that he worked with are usually typically more like.

Hmm.

you know, multi-millionaire and billionaires, right? Cause that's the type of nature of his work. And he has that sense and I can see that, like why that would be the case. But you know, you can see like, it's not a strategy problem. It's really mostly around how you approach that and the mindset around that. So I thought like, wow, like this is, this occurs in everybody. And one of the things that was key, the reason why I wanted to talk about this was because he said, you know, I'll think, think like, you know, cause I share some of my feelings around that, you know.

Mm.

and my difficulties in life in terms of some of the things I went through in my business. And he was, oh, thank you so sharing it because I thought I was alone. I'm like, no, dude, like everyone feels this way. You just don't realize because no one talks about it. No one actually goes out there and say like, here, I need help, or I'm in trouble, or like I'm thinking these thoughts or I'm having these feelings. And a lot of times it's like, it's, I'm not saying the only thing, but one of the major things is this imposter feeling. like this imposter of feeling like I am not adequate enough to service, you know, service people where I've seen some really successful entrepreneurs who don't listen, I think they have it, but they've somehow overwritten it somehow. Like they've been able to adapt. Like I mentioned to you, like you just said, Hey, you haven't felt it in three months. Like, so we're going to talk about some of those strategies. How do we get ourselves into a position where it doesn't affect us into what in terms of our decision, it doesn't. It. you don't want to allow it to creep in because that's the problem, right? When it creeps in, it starts to affect your decision. So how do you block it out? How do you navigate through it? How do you move forward with it? Because that is one of the key elements to do that. So that's why I really want to talk about it. So for me, you know, I think there's such a huge thing like this last week, we've finally launched this podcast. So I know you're listening to this. I don't know what number it is, but way down the track. But when we first launched this project, there was a sense not.

Yep. Okay.

you know, like a sense of going, well, is anybody going to actually listen? Does anybody care? You know? And so I mean, I didn't actually have any imposter syndrome, like we were not good enough to kind of go through, but I know like we have evolved since the very first episodes we ever released and it's getting, you know, it's going to continue to get better and better. But there's that sense of anybody launching any new thing, that feeling imposter is that you have to override that when you launch something, right? It could be a video that you want to, you know, put out there in the world. It could be a blog post. It could be, Um, you know, a new business, like you have everybody who's done that has to override that, that, that voice inside your head that tells you, are you sure about that? Like, are you sure? You know, who are you? Like, who are you to be the one who's shooting this video, doing this podcast, launching this product, launching this business, or selling this particular product, like who are you? And that's the voice that we have to override. And I think that's part of the imposter, right? And it's things, the protection mechanism.

Yeah.

Like where does it come from? Well, I think it comes from, typically it's coming from the monkey brain, right? The monkey brain inside your body that says, it's trying to protect you, right? To protect you from every safety mechanism to go, don't go there. Like I'm trying to make you stay comfortable because I'm not trying to risk anything here, right? Where your human brain says, or you know what Jeff says talks about is like the champion's brain, like that part of you is gonna say like, no, you. You are great. You are amazing. You have the ability, but it's that monkey brain that runs that programming. It hijacks it. And so that's the imposter, I think. Your thoughts on that?

Hmm. Yep. Yeah. Look, there's a strong correlation between perfectionism and imposter syndrome. So a lot of the times people, it's great that the YB-Sabi podcast is about the art of imperfection because effectively the gateway or the freedom from imposter syndrome caught off in is embracing imperfection because a lot of the times people will have a connection to perfectionism. And as a result of that, if they're not perfect or they're not perfect in that role, and their mind's perception is not perfect, they're consequently going, I don't belong here, I don't deserve this. And it cascades that whole imposter syndrome playing out in that public, you're kind of going down the rabbit hole as a result of that. So a lot of the strategies that are around freeing up the imposter syndrome is about embracing the imperfection and being comfortable with excellence as opposed to perfectionism. Because fundamentally, You know, perfectionists, it's a rigid model and it's not a sustainable model because you're either perfect or you're not. Whereas someone who embraces excellence says, you know what, I showed up, I did the best I could. I took the whack, I took the feedback, I got better. Same thing with our podcast. We knew from the outset, we had recording issues and I was always comfortable with just starting the process because, and I think you shared that recently. Lawrence, I think must've been the last couple of days, which was exactly what I was thinking. You know, the 10, 10, 80 rule, where, you know, and I'll let you share it because you put a post about it, but to me, I'm okay taking that first step. And I don't care what pushback I get, because in my mind, the biggest resistance is that first step. And so to me, if I take that first step, no matter how scary that seven seconds of courage, we all have to embrace. That to me is the catalyst that gets momentum going that moves and I'm good to go. But if I stay stuck in the rigidity of, is it perfect or not? Then the narrative, the monkey brain, the story, all those kinds of things just feed in and suddenly you're then going, who am I to? So everything you outlined is the pathway. So do you want to just share that 10, 10.80 because I think that's really helpful and important for people to understand this, which will make great context in this.

Yeah, I think the main lesson I want to make sure I kind of put some words to the wisdom that you just shared around that, you know, is that you one of the ways you fought through the imperfection or the imposter is actually through action and focusing on the action rather than the feeling of the hindrance in your brain. So override the monkey brain is that you just take control instead of let the monkey take control of yourself. And there's a great saying, and I really wish I can give credit to who said that, but I don't know who said it, but I've heard it so many times and I use it a lot.

Yep.

which is implement faster than your disbelief. You know, when you can implement faster than your disbelief that allows you to widget the monkey brain, then you're going to override that more times than not. And so I think that's really important. That's the key lesson that I think that everybody needs to hear. So going back to the 10-10-80 rule, the 10-10-80 rules, I was listening to that. Again, I can't really give the credit to who the person said it. And I wish I did, because that video was done probably about two months ago. And I think it just came back up in our post. So the 10-10-80 rule is that know, 10%, no matter what you do in life, 10% are of people or your audience that listen to you or here's what you see or see what you post up or do what you know, see or experience what you do, will always hate you. And there's really 10% of people that will love you and love everything that you do, no matter what you do or what you say. And then there's the 80%. The other 80% of people are just sort of in the middle, like there's a sort of like dependent on whether or not what you do in any given moment or behavior or product or service that you. promoting or what you're doing is aligned with their values and they're going to judge based on that. The key element is that the 10% of people who love you will always love you no matter what you do. And we have seen that in society where, you know, whatever singer, you know, we have those, you know, we'll talk about maybe an actor or an actress or maybe like a band, no matter what, like we'll say, you know, Jim, I know you like Taylor Swift, for example, every time Taylor Swift comes on, you're going to love whatever song she puts out like no matter what. Right. So

Good.

You know, I know you're Swiftie by heart and so so you're gonna buy every album by every song that she puts out and so therefore it's it you're gonna love it no matter even if it's a terrible song. But then there's always going to be the haters right we always have haters that's going to people who comments and no matter what you do, they're going to hate you and we see that a lot in society as well we see that in you know, especially polarizing people like you know whether you know anytime say Elon must post something no matter what.

Yeah, I'm saying, every album.

good or bad, good in the world he might be doing, there's always going to be a hater who hates everything that he does says. Could be maybe a sportscaster or maybe a uh, an actor or whatever movie they put like, I always hate, you know, uh, Keanu Reeves movies or whatever like, you know, someone will say something like that. And then, so those haters and lovers are, aren't really deciders on your life because they're going to love or hate you no matter what. And so really they're not, they're, they shouldn't really dictate, you know, how you should behave.

Yeah.

And what you're talking about is taking action on things and putting stuff out there and let your stuff, let your action and the impact of the actions you take, get the, let the 80% decide. Let the majority decide on how that happens. That's what you were talking about in the con.

Yeah, yeah, along that, along that essence and fundamentally they're the people who will warm to you if you're adding value. So if you're in a role where people have may have a preconceived idea of what it is that you do, what service you have, et cetera, et cetera, you're, you're then it's the outcome and the results and the value of bringing to people's life and world that will determine whether they're going to be interested in what you're, you're saying. So going back to what you're saying to me. I find that it's really important for me to just launch and get moving. Momentum is the quickest avenue for me to override any fear I fear. So consequently, I'm prepared to be lousy in that first step because to me, so many brilliant people never get out of first base. They get onto first base, I should say, because they're not prepared to be lousy. And that's what happens with perfectionists.

Hmm. Hmm.

And that's what happens ultimately with people stuck in imposter syndrome. So to me, I've rewired my brain to go, it's okay, man, it's all good. Don't worry. Your first rep is never going to be your best one. As long as you take the feedback from that, when you load up and come back again, it's going to get better and better and better. So I've wired my brain up not to expect that the first iteration of anything that I do is going to be brilliant. It's going to be draft. And as a result of that, that then allows me to, to move forward.

Yeah. Well... Well, I think that that takes a lot of experience for you to be able to do that. You know, and it's, I know I'll say this out, you know, to the public, which is like, I really appreciate it, you know, being partnered with Jim here, because Jim has been the one who's been pushing on the side to like, let's get this going. Let's move this along. And I'm like, yeah, man, but you know, but you know, there was like, there's this hesitation because I mean, you know, I was just one long story with all the, the Airbnbs I've been in all the moves. I was just like.

Hmm.

wasn't there and he's always been the one who's like, just let's just get this going. Let's just record. And you know, I appreciate that. And I think that's, there's a lesson in there, which is surround yourself with people who, you know, sometimes believe in you more than you believe in yourself. Right. And I think that's so important. And, and that's why in partnerships, I think that's really where the partnership really shines, where you find people who can push you to find the boundaries where you're uncomfortable and you do it anyways, because it's a lot easier.

Yeah. Yeah.

for me to be accountable to Jim than it is to be accountable to myself. You know, if it was left to my own, do my own podcast, I would just be sitting here waiting and six months later, I'm still kinda contemplating on whether I should or shouldn't. And, but having Jim and knowing that there's, I'm accountable to someone else, it makes it a lot easier and better to, cause now I'm not on myself, cause I can always let myself down, but to let Jim down, I don't wanna do that. And so therefore it was like that push. And that's where partnerships lift each other

Hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

you know, the other person is not, may not be ready and then vice versa will happen. And so I think that's where the, you know, so in business, I think that's the same thing. Like you gotta put yourself in a situation where you're either surrounded by coaches or business partners or friends and family to support you and find that support when you're feeling the feelings that you have because you can't control the imposter. You can't control the feelings because they're gonna happen. But what do you do with that feeling, right? That's the important element here of decision-making.

Yeah, thank you, Lawrence. I really appreciate that. And in full transparency too, like I, I, I that's a strength that I have in getting started, I can go from getting started to end point. I can visualize it. I can see it very quickly. Where I get unstuck is in the middle. That's the part that I get things derailed because I haven't built systems and haven't thought about the methodology. So for me, it's essential. And we've got a team that helps us with all these things because we could have recorded 85 podcasts. I wouldn't have known what to do with them because that to me, so that's, you know, like the complimentary parts of that basically support each other in that process. But to me, yeah, my biggest obstacle has always been, holy smoke, this went faster than I thought it was gonna go. What do we do now? And I haven't thought about, so I've sometimes confused activity and progress. Right? And that, so that to me is an important component, but as I said, that's a strategy that I've had was like, if I'm moving, I'll work it out. And that's probably movement stimulates my brain and I kind of think of it all the way. But sometimes I don't know what I don't know, which is someone who has systems thinking that can actually look at this and go, hey, here's the raw element of what you're doing. Like even with the work that Bettina and I do, I quite often come up with the concept and idea.

Yeah, it's true. Yeah.

And she will dress it up and form. I go, wow, that's amazing. How did you do that? She goes, it's actually everything that you said, but I've just packaged it in a way that was palatable that we could scale it, we could do that. And I went, I had no idea. If you'd relied on me to do that, it wouldn't have gotten done. So it's really interesting. And in full transparency, we've just let everybody know that we're not highlighting all the great things that we do, because like we all have strengths, but we've just gone, hey, here's us. Here's the part, the messy bit

Yeah. Yeah.

we struggle with, what's yours? You know, where do you get unstuck? Where do you basically have challenges?

Yeah, well, I think that, you know, from the podcast perspective of the imposter, I guess it's almost like we just basically recorded on the background and we recorded for almost six months before we actually did anything with it. You know, so it's not like, and I don't know, we can maybe call it imposter or, but it's like, it's mostly like, it wasn't good. Like we didn't know who we could call on rely on to kind of carve it up to make sure it looked, you know, not happy perfect, but good enough to be in the, you know, in the podcast circles at the moments is perfect.

Hmm. Yep. Yep.

no, hell no. And this is a good shout out to Cherry and Maui for doing great work in terms of putting out the snaps and all the little promotion stuff that goes along with it. But the thing is, is that we, we just recorded because that's what we knew best. So that's a lesson in there too, as well. We did things that we knew best, which is just record. What to do with that stuff, like that took a little longer to figure out, but it didn't stop us from starting. That's the

Yeah.

that's the key, right? It didn't stop us from starting. And I think we started and then we had we got so much in the bank in terms of podcasts, that we go, Jim, we got to do something with this, right? Now we got like, we have this all these episodes, what are we gonna do with it? How do we get it out there? And it forces the thing, because it's getting full now, we got to get this out there. And so that's why that's sort of what happening in behind the scenes and it forces that imposter go

Lawrence, I just thought we were recording our conversations. That's really, I thought we were talking about the last six months. Well, it has, it has, because fundamentally that that was really, you know, the overarching perspective has definitely been that like in talking through what's going on and we've been, we've taken people along the ride to go, Hey, listen, these are the things that we've been living through. And even with everything that we know, and we support people to do it. Even when, when the, the light shines on us, we suddenly go, okay.

It's therapy, man. It's therapy.

He's what we're dealing with. And I found that really helpful in just talking it through, finding strategies, getting insights, all those kinds of things, because whenever around people who are committed to growth and improving, it's gotta rub off. You can't just sit around and talk about the problems without an outcome or a solution or a strategy to move forward. And that's fundamentally what we've been doing over the last six months.

Well, I think a lot of people forget that, you know, we are always constantly, one of the ways an imposter comes around is because we're comparing ourselves to someone else, right? And it's only heightened due to the fact of social media because we're, like, before, back before social media, you know, when we were young, when we were kids, when we were, you know, even teenagers, Jim, I know we're dating ourselves now, but when we're in teenagers, Our exposure to the world in terms of who we compare ourselves to are really just probably from two fronts. The people in our school, right? The kids you kind of hang out with and like, so basically kids in your community and maybe the people on television. Like that's about it, right? We didn't know, but now when you think of, we didn't know what was happening to someone in Ohio. We don't know what was happening to someone in, you know, China.

Hmm.

you know, unless you watch the news, like really, you had nothing to compare yourself to, or at least didn't have the same exponential access that we have now. Now, you can compare yourself to everyone in the world, almost, you know what I mean? To the corners of Iceland, to, you know, Finland, to someone in Brazil, in Argentina. Like, you know, it's not exposure social media, although it has connected us, but it also has created more like, oh, you know, you can imagine a kid.

Nie.

I just forwarded this video to my son the other day. He was a couple years ago really into Rubik's Cube and solving stuff and he solves Rubik's Cube really fast. This kid is nine years old and solved the Rubik's Cube with Guinness Book of Records in five seconds. You can imagine, right? You look at that and you're like, well, why do I have a chance at it? So anyway, go back to Impostor. We're constantly comparing ourselves to the next.

All right. Mm-hmm.

podcast, you know, whatever podcast are you listening to or the next YouTuber you're listening to or whatever, in whatever endeavor you're in, you're always comparing. And so that comparison creates this shadow self of you and like, Oh, who am I? And it makes that worse. It exponentially makes that worse. And I feel like until we kind of handle that beast inside of us until we kind of like stop worrying about like, not allowing the comparison that you are just doing your own project, you're doing your own thing. quiet the noise around you around that. It's okay to strive for excellence, but if you're nowhere, okay, that's what my point was, was that you've forgotten when Gary V started the very first episode. You didn't know about when, you know, whoever you're listening to their very first episode, you know, on YouTube channel, and they don't talk about that. but it's documented if you want to look for it. And so like when we get started, like this is a documentation that hopefully that you will be able to see the progression in five years from now. You look back and go, yeah, Lawrence and Jim was talking about this type of thing. And look how like, look how the crappy little background they had back then, you know, now we have this, you know, I'm sure we'll have this beautiful studio on these beautiful mics and stuff, but that's the progression. We all have to start somewhere and we don't have to have the perfect camera mics.

Yeah. Yeah.

you know, set up at the beginning. Getting started is the hardest part. But we're always looking for, I remember people used to ask me, I used to do my vlogs and video vlogs and stuff, because man, the most common question I ask, gets asked for me, is what camera are you using? Right, it's like, as if the camera, okay, because listen, I understand the camera made me look good, but it's not the camera, right? It's not, like don't lose sight of it. It's not the camera, it's.

Yeah. in.

You know, it's the work behind the camera, the thing, the thought process, the process, and it's, you know, or they might listen to the podcast, like, oh, what mic are you using? It's not the mic, right? Sure, the certain mics that sound better or whatever, but it's not the mic. You know, it doesn't really matter. It's get good enough is good enough. And then obviously, can you king better? Of course. If I use the Joe Rogan mic, maybe, yeah, of course. Like maybe, but it would make it that much different? No. I think the work has to be in the process. The work has to be in the work you gotta put into it, right?

Yep. Yeah.

It's like when you go into the jiu-jitsu, it's like, I'm not gonna go and ask Jim, I'm like, hey, you're awesome. What kind of key do you wear? Where did you buy that? Right? Because that's not gonna make me a black belt.

Yeah, that's all. Well, yeah. No, for a couple of reasons, I practice no gay exclusively, no gay. So so number one, but there's a beautiful saying in martial arts that is it's it's basically very relevant here. And that is a black belt is really just a white belt who never gave up. He just keeps showing up. And that's what it essentially is, is not someone who suddenly have this skill set because you have taken that's.

R- R- Mmm, I love it. Love it.

And my old sensei used to say that it takes, and especially in Jiu-Jitsu, effectively you're simulating life and death situations because someone tapping is effectively saying, hey, you've got me now, I'm trapped. I potentially could get very seriously injured right now. But fundamentally the tap keeps the simulation realistic, but it also says, hey, I could die here. So that's pretty much what we're doing. And what amazes me is my sense I always said that it takes 10,000 submissions to get to a black belt. And a lot of the times, the most humbling thing about Jujitsu for me is that you think that I need to submit someone 10,000 times, but a lot of the times the other way around, you have to get submitted 10,000 times before you get to that pathway. So when we flip it, that's, you know, anytime that a lot of times I can't often get the feedback, how many, there's a lot of humility in what you do. How is it that you do that? I'll go, Oh, let me tell you, come with me four or five times a week. Watch my back get kicked or pushed to it and, and show me how you're not going to be humble. And so to me, it's a, it's a reality check that allows me not to fear I'm showing up because that to me, if I'm showing up, I'm getting better and I'm not worrying. And that's, and that's part of the, how I've been able to rewire it.

Hmm. Yep.

I very rarely get challenges outside of life, outside of the map harder than the ones that I get on there. So consequently to me, it's a perfect ground for me to actually learn the traits that I need to, to persist everywhere else in life.

What's the 10,000 hour rules, the 10,000 submission, the rule applies to everything in life, whether it be your video. We all know it takes, we'll just call it 10,000. I know that's not necessarily accurate, but let's call it 10,000. But the thing is, we all know it, but the key element is, are you going to be willing to take the first one hour? Are you willing to put in the first hour? Because what are we waiting for?

Yeah.

You know, this is like the same thing when it goes to like even investing, you know, like, oh, I know I need to invest, but I need to learn everything before I start investing. Well, sometimes you learn when you're actually investing, like you still got to put in the hours. Like, why not start? You know, like the videos, for example, you might look at someone like, oh, they're great on video or they're great on doing a podcast. He was, yeah, because they put in the hours. You're not going to be that good at the beginning. Like your first few videos are going to be pretty shitty. Like just the minute it's, you know, it's just, it's okay, but you might as well.

Yep. Yep. Yeah.

I always tell people like you rather do your crappy videos at the beginning when no one's watching then you know when you have like 10,000 people watching and all of a sudden you do this video. Like you don't want to learn in that environment because that could be crippling. You know so you got to put in the hours. You got to start somewhere. You might as well start at some point.

Yeah. Yep. Yeah. And so many times I always had an example. There was a kid that I played cricket with very early on, probably I must've been eight, nine, 10. And this kid was the best decked out kid in equipment you could ever imagine. And he couldn't play a shot to save his life. And so, but he looked the part. And to me that's always the analogy of someone who wants to make sure everything is perfect before they launch or do anything. I've got to have the right mic. I've got to have the right lighting. I've got to make sure the temperature in the room is exactly perfect. And it's like, I'll rearrange everything on my table. That's a procrastination measure because fundamentally there's a fear. And to me, it's acknowledging that we all feel them. We all experience them. And like I said, my strategy is just dive in, you know, dive in head first and lean into the fear and consequently you overcome that fear. And already you suddenly go on three, four, five, 10 episodes. You're like, Oh my gosh, how did I get here? Okay. I might as well keep going. And consequently that's the mechanism to, to clear a lot of that.

Yeah, I've always appreciate that about you like Jim, like that's something that I admire about you and your tenacity to just give things a go. And it's it's cool because it's it rubs off right by hanging out with you and just talking to you every single week it's like it definitely just rubs off and you can kind of see that energy and obviously you learned that through somewhere and I'll give you an example where imposter can really derail you know you there's this one situation I remember this one back maybe six seven years ago where I was invited to be part of a group. an entrepreneurial group. To be honest with you, I have no idea why I was invited. Only about 120 people get invited. And then the following year, they only invite 50% of them. Re-invite again. I've been in this group for four or five years. The very first time I showed up, I was looking around and meeting these people. They were literally bestselling authors, people you would know. Amazing speakers. then there's also people you don't know, but they have, you know, multimillion dollar businesses, you know, 10 million, a hundred million dollar businesses, you know, a couple of billionaires in the room and they're all attending. They're not speaking, they're attending. They're like, just like you and you sit on dinner with them and you have conversations with them. And I was out of my deathbed. Like I was like, what the hell am I doing here? Like, honestly, I don't know what they saw in me. And, but I'm here. I got invited and it's like, and I'm experiencing three days with these people. And, but I was scared, not scared, but I was, I felt I'm going back to the hotel room every day. We were just thinking, what am I doing? What am I doing here? Like how, I'm just so out of my depth. And what was really interesting over the years, and I call some of these, I'm one of my closest friends in the world over these years, and this group is amazing. And one of the key elements that keeps on coming up, like after, you know, after years, is that every single one of them that I known, did exactly the same thing. They all went into the rooms thinking, what am I doing here? Every single one of them going, I shouldn't be here. I don't know what's going on. And they like, they almost have to muster the energy to kind of go back to the room, like back into the group. They have to like collect themselves in the hotel room slash water in their face and go, okay, you know, I've got to find the energy to go back and engage back into that situation. And when you start hearing the stories, like, oh my God, I'm not alone in this.

Hmm.

and that everybody feels that way. But the detriment of that was that I never fully, in that first year, and I think I would always say even the second year, it didn't. It took me about the third year before I actually got comfortable, okay? And the reason why I'm saying this is because I lost those two years. Not I didn't lose those two years, but I wish I could take back. I wish I could have gone back then time, so that I didn't have those...

Hmm.

those moments, you know, where I, because I guess what I'm trying to say is that because of that fear and because of that imposter feeling, what that did for me was that I didn't fully engage because I was so lost in my own head. I was so lost into what I was thinking of, like what, how I appear to people and what they were thinking about me. I didn't actually engage in a way that to

Yep.

to just not care about that, but to actually just engage and find out about these people. Because when you really kind of dig in, they're normal people. They're just people just like me. They have fears, they have, you know, maybe in different scales, but they're a human being. We're not here to talk about business. We're here to talk about engage in connection and relationships. And that's what it comes down to. And that can be, but I lost those moments because I was so caught up in my own head, you know, and I learned that.

Yeah. Yep.

you know years later to figure that out like you got to learn to let go and just engage because Otherwise, I wouldn't be here in the first place like you know you kind of losing that story in the loop somewhere Was like I was invited invited back there must be something like that season even if I don't see it Let's just go with it. You know and that's the attitude that you have that and it's awesome. You know to embrace that

Yeah. Others say that in you. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let me, let me tell you that that was, it had to be an overcompensation speak because the context for that and how I've gotten to that point is growing up as, as a kid who had nobody believing in him, I had to find it in myself. So consequently I had to block out any resistance. I had to find within me a belief that over, over sort of compensated for the lack of support accidentally because

Hmm, interesting.

Everywhere in my environment, I was told, what are you doing here? You don't belong here, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And for a while when I was buying into that, I was going, yeah, so there was, that was imposter, but I had to find within myself a way. Now to me, it was just stubbornness and, and, and ego that, you know, and we talk about ego, but to me, ego worked up until the point it didn't work, but in those formative years for me. It was like, I'll show you. And I had to use that as a tool to raise my feeling and sense of worthiness to go, I actually belong here. I actually belong here. I'm going to show you why. So that was the stubborn part of me that it worked in. And I got to a point though, and a really important part was doing some work with you know, John Demartini. Uh, I found really helpful when he, when he said, um, a couple of things. Number one is never look at anybody on a pedestal or in a pit.

Hmm.

So fundamentally is if you can find within you a way of connecting with people at all levels of life, and that's gonna help. And the other part is an exercise that I've done is called identifying the traits of the great. And so if there's someone that you look at, you look up to, you admire, there's a same quality that there's an undeveloped or unloved aspect of that trait that you have in yourself. And because you see it in somebody else, you've also got it in yourself, but you haven't harnessed it. So moment that I did that, I started doing all that work to go, I admire this about this person, great. Where else do I experience it? I do it here, here, here, here. And so that helped me raise that level of belief in self over and above the external circumstances. So even if the external circumstances didn't support that at all, I just went, yeah, but there's been one time in your life where you've had that, I hung onto that one for dear life. So that's been the pathway. It wasn't something that I had.

Hmm.

I really had to work hard to develop that.

Yeah, and I'll salt the other side of the pitfalls is too, is if you're someone you really dislike or hate, you know, there's also the shadow size of what you dislike about yourself. So I think want to complete that that circle there too. I loved about what you said about the you found this within yourself, Jim, and then thanks for sharing that because I think that's really important for people to kind of go through. And I see, I don't know if you think about this, but I also see that there's the opposite side of that, right? The opposite side of that is there's also people who who maybe was the complete opposite where they got a ton of support from their parents.

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

and their peer group and they also, but that could be, they need callable compensation there too because if you get all the support throughout your whole entire life, then you also like, well, then you can also get stuck in a position where you rely on other people's opinion in order for you to feel fulfilled. And so then now you're searching for that and you're not getting it, then you also got, if you're one of those, you still have to go through what Jim has to go through just in a different direction because you guys still got to find it with yourself. I think the key element, what you're saying is that

Yep. Yep.

We all have to find it within ourself to find the beauty, the perfection, and which all the goods and the bads about yourself. We have to do the work. You have to do the work to figure it out on your own to find the specialness around yourself. If you don't appreciate you, if you don't appreciate your own value that you have in the world, which comes with all the negative stuff that you see as negative. But if you can't embrace that, it's really difficult for you to be able to shed some of this imposter stuff. I think that's what you're saying, and now we'll...

Yep. Yeah, totally, totally. And understanding that life's there's a duality between support and challenge, which is a lot of what you're saying. So the kid who's getting total support from everybody to the point where they're not developing those elements in themselves either keeps looking for it or is constantly has to be externally referencing and needs to support that or is going to get bullied by somebody else who doesn't offer that. So life evens that out. And so to me. It was really helpful and cathartic almost to actually get to a point where you go, okay, if I'm really challenged here right now, where in my life am I getting support? And when you actually identify that you realize that it's not, we can't be addicted to just getting support or everything good happening. It's the seasons of life and seasons of the world where you're getting a time. Sometimes you're getting challenged, other times getting support. It's about how do I keep the dance and the duality of that going? to make sense and keep moving forward without getting restricted or stuck where I am.

And I think that's one of the ways we were describing for the imposter is that whenever you have those imposter sin, the feeling that you have or the syndrome we'll be talking about is to kind of recognize that, you know, why do you feel that way? And then find the opposite support that, you know, that's in your world because you're just not seeing it. Because oftentimes if the imposter's feeling is there, it's usually because you override by the monkey brain telling you that you're not good enough. But there, if you look deep enough,

Yep.

there will be something in support to balance that. You're just not seeing it because you're getting stuck with the monkey brain. And that's really important. That could be another way to make sure that you can find ways to kind of overcome that imposter in you.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And the other thing too, Lawrence, I always found really helpful was the identity upgrade. So when I first started this conversation, I said to you, the first experience that I had about this was when I was a student and transitioning into the world of a professional doctor. And so consequently, I still took the identity of a student into that role. I hadn't actually fully integrated into that. So any time that I'm, you know, one of the exercises that I've had to

Hmm.

go through many, many times is say, okay, if I'm aspiring to this, and this is the work where you're aspiring to achieve an outcome, a goal, it's identifying and neuroassociating to the identity of the person who's achieving the outcome, not where you are right now. So if you've got a goal and you need to develop the skills, tools, attributes, it's much easier to envisage you achieving it, having all those attributes. and owning those attributes rather than thinking that you're where you are right now, catapulted or basically time traveled into the future with what you know now. Because that's going to be the disconnect. If you can develop and go, if I was the person who was achieving and doing this, this and this, what would I think? How would I walk? How would I dress? Who would I associate with? Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And that then creates a picture that you can hang your hat on.

I think the imposter also too, one of the overriding factors, caring about what other people think of you. We did this in the previous podcast, but that's one of the problems, the cause of that, right? Because the more you care about what other people think of you, that creates that feeling of being an imposter. Otherwise you wouldn't care, right? If you just didn't care what people thought of you, you wouldn't have the imposter because you're not. The only reason why you feel the imposter is because you worry about what they think of you, whether they're gonna find you out.

Yeah. Correct.

But if you don't care, then you're never gonna be found out. So that's another awareness that everybody needs to have is to kind of identify like, does it really matter what they think of you? And if you don't care or you care less, yeah, exactly, exactly.

Yeah, 10, 10, 80, 10, 10, 80, what you basically said. So, you know, if you're hanging up, if you're getting hung up on the 10%, that no matter what you do, no matter, like you said, there were people who we will put out a podcast, Lawrence, and we'll do the best we can. We'll, we know what our intention is. We know where we're coming from. So et cetera, but irrespective of that, there'd be a percentage of people who will hate on it for any reason, you know, they might not like my hairstyle. Who knows? I don't, I, I, I, I don't have control over that. And so fundamentally I've gotten to the point and you're right. It does get easier as time goes on because I get to the point where I go, listen, I've got a fine amount of time left on this world. Am I going to worry about what you think about what I do and what I do and I don't want to stop doing it because you're not going to like it or do I just get started because I actually like doing this and who knows somewhere along the line, some of my phone value in it, et cetera, et cetera, it might help. So.

Hmm. Mm.

That to me, I've gotten better and better at letting go of that 10% who no matter what I would do would hate on it anyway.

Well Seth Godin always has a great saying which I kind of stuck with me was I was like no one no one becomes a better writer By reading the one-star review You know and that's like it's so true like who like you know You don't become a better writers is because you got someone gave you one start like oh, you're a terrible writer You suck. It's like okay now. I'm better now right no one no one does that and Yeah, thank you very much and

Hahaha Yeah. Thank you. Yeah

So that's why it's reading comments and stuff. It's funny, you know, we get caught up in these things. You know, and you definitely get better at it over time. I remember, you know, Karen gets really sensitive when someone writes a comment about something I've done or, you know, and there's not many, you know, not many people do that, but there are times when people kind of make certain comments and she's like, she gets so riled up and it doesn't that bother you? I'm like, you know, at the beginning it did.

Hmm.

You know, definitely with beginning of my journey, but now it bothers me less. It doesn't, I'll still, it definitely affects me to a degree, but it doesn't affect me as much as it used to. And it is about just being comfortable with your own skin. Cause I'm like, yeah, that's not, you know, like you said, it's not, that was not my intention, you know, they read it wrong and that's, that's on them. That's not on me. Or if I, there's a better way for me to communicate that properly, then, you know, I will make that correction. Um, but I usually stand by, you know, what I say and people are going to disagree. You don't have to agree with everything I say or what we say in any podcast, we're just here to share our thoughts. And this is in if you know, second always talked about this too, is like, it's not if it's not for you, it's not for you. I'm not trying to convince you to like it or to love it. It's like, you know, we're talking to the people who actually are continuing to listen to us who love this.

Yeah.

and want to share with others, great. And that will be our tribe. And those are the people that will support us and love us based on what we're producing. And they'll tell us otherwise when you disagree with something, which I love, because I think that's important in life. We have to have healthy discussions. I don't expect everybody to agree with everything that we say, because this is just our opinion. Like, I mean, let's face it, Jim and I don't even agree on certain things at times.

Yep. Yep. Yeah. No.

you know, because simply for that reason, our goal is to kind of share our thoughts and have two different perspectives around any particular issue so that you can find you know, a path that might be suitable for you based on your personality and values.

Yeah. And you know, in training camps, leading up to major sporting events, you know, Boxers will go into a six week training camp where they'll isolate themselves from their normal day to day in part to get really, really focused on it, but also to basically protect them from all the distractions and noise of other people's opinions that may buy into what they think they're possible, etc, etc. So, and even, even, you know, some sporting teams, I've actually seen this, they, they, they go, listen, we don't read the media. We don't. Engage in it because what it does is it starts people start creating and verbalizing their doubts and so consequently you start going well Maybe I don't deserve to be here Maybe you know and that buys into the imposter syndrome, but i've seen a really great way of some sporting teams That dissolve that where they actually get the comments And they read them out loud to the group and and try and find the humor in them and they go Yeah, okay. Gee that was a good one. I liked it. And so it's disempowering that the toxicity in the comment by actually addressing it full on. So there's two strategies that people have. Number one, if you get a comment, you can find the humor in it and laugh it off and just go, okay, yeah, whatever. But also you can just basically immune yourself from it and stay away from that kind of an environment if you're in the incubation period of what you're doing, where you don't need to buy into other people's doubts and securities and opinions because it will stop you from doing what you want to do.

I think one of the most toxic things that opinion and voice that we need to manage is ourselves. I've, you know, I think there's, there's so much, you know, problems sometimes with our own little voice inside our head that, you know, if you, if we're able to record some of those, what people say to themselves, you know, you'd be, you know, I think people will be shocked. And I would, the question I would ask people is like, would you say that to a five year old kid? Would you say that to a 12 year old kid? And

Yep.

You know, but yet you wouldn't say that to your own child, but yet you're saying it to yourself. And I think managing that voice, I think it's so important. It's, you know, and it could be so toxic and such and so abusive in a way to yourself. And you're gonna ask yourself, I'm like, where does that come from? You know, I think it's important to cut this and why the work needs to be done, which is to look at yourself and going, where's this coming from? And what's the truth? You know, asking, you know, what Brian Cady talks about is like, is that the truth? You know, is that true?

Hmm.

and then ask yourself again, is it true again? Like over and over again, until you actually start to realize, I'm like, it's a story I just said to myself, and this is like this repeated pattern. And that's another imposter, right? The imposter is yourself, the voice inside your head, who is like creating this energy around you. And if you've never had some enough support, you know, like Jim, you've been able to figure it out. Like you had to find and override that voice, but a lot of people would be challenged, you know, because they haven't had the support. They don't know how to, but. you know, we can guide you, there's coaches that can guide you, but the reality is that you have to dig in. Like you got to dig in, you got to be able to manage that voice. That voice is untamed, it's uncontrolled, but you can learn to not shut it down completely. That's not, I think that's the goal. It's more about lowering the strength that has on you, the grip it has on you. No different than what we talk about other people is that, you know, those, what you said about sports teams. affects you if you give it power, right? And you know, this old saying, it's not the snake bite that kills you, it's the poison that runs in your body that kills you at the end. So, you know, that's the whole thing. It's the poison that we continually loop in our head or whatever someone said to it. That's the bite, right? Someone says something to you, that's the bite. But it's only if you give it more power and you react or behave accordingly as if it's true, that's the poison.

Yep. Yep.

And I think we gotta do that for other people's voices just as much as our own internal voices.

Yeah. Um, I was going to say, I was going to finish off with just a scenario to basically say that anytime that you are looking to do great things or try different things or, or redefine yourself or take on a new challenge, you're going to feel like you're an imposter. You know, when you started going into Pat, you know, playing paddle, there was a part of you that would have gone, what am I doing here? And that's going to happen.

That was yesterday.

That was, okay, that's still going. Okay, me too. So embrace that, accept that. And it's gonna be, to me, it's like, if you're trying to do great things, you're gonna constantly be challenging yourself and you're gonna constantly be putting yourself in situations that you may not have been in before. And so you can't rely on, I've done this before so I know exactly what to do. Because sometimes you just gotta show up. Life's gonna show up and you go, I don't know exactly what to do, but you know what, I back myself in this moment. I don't know, I'll figure it out. I'll work it out. There's a difference between confidence and competence. And so I guess my finishing talk would be, expect that you're gonna be in scenarios where you don't know it all. You're not sure. You may have gotten accelerated by virtue of what you've done in the past that's put you in an area that's gonna challenge you. And it's a case of using what we talked about today to help you navigate those obstacles rather than starting sabotaging yourself by going, I don't deserve here and then starting expressing behaviors that make people doubt that that put you in the position in the first place because you're not exhibiting what they saw in you as well. So I think that the important part of anything is the personal growth that you do for yourself, which is what you're talking about, because unless you're doing that, you're gonna get to scenarios where you're gonna constantly keep bouncing up against them and you don't know what to do to get through.

I think sports always a great analogy because it's like, you know, when I was, you know, just use paddle for example, or you know, CrossFit or Jiu-Jitsu, any like any tennis or any game you're playing. You know when those times when you're just losing, it's not just like you losing a point or you're just losing like game after game. And when you're losing game after game, there's a part of you, and this is what I think the love the beauty of the sport. It's like, it's a lot of mindset. It's a mindset game. Cause you get to a point when you start to doubt yourself and you're just so defeated. Rather than just thinking, it's just the next point.

Yeah. Yep.

game resets, it starts from zero zero. But if you allow the previous game to affect your next game, you're gonna constantly, you know, and just constantly lose. And it's like the ability of champions, what I've seen, the reason why they're champions is because of them letting go of the last game, letting go of the last point, because the last point doesn't matter into the next point. It only matters if you allow it to. And I think that's really important, like, you know, the next match or the next, you know, thing, it's like, if you let it creep in,

Yep. Yeah.

and you can't reset, then that's the problem. And I've seen that, you know, in paddle, we play with partners all the time and you can see it. And it's really like, we could be down 40 love. And I always say to them at 40 love, it's like just one point at a time. Let's just get the next point. Don't worry about trying to win the game because we have to win three points, you know, to tie to get Deuce and then so on. Like, let's not worry about that. Let's just win the next point. Like just focus on one point and then it'll be like, yeah, and then it becomes 40, 15. It's like, okay.

Hmm. Chunk it down. Yeah.

I go, that's one, you know, getting to the 40th, that's two. Like I just focus in on the next point because that's all we can control. We can't control what happened. We can control the next point and not to worry about two points ahead. And I think it's like, you know, in sports always like one game at a time, you know, in the playoffs, like don't, let's not worry about, you know, getting to the Superbowl or whatever. It's like, let's just win this game. And when within the game, let's win this quarter. And it's like one match at a time and one.

I like that.

one play at a time. And I think that's so important to kind of get that in the eyes of the eyes, but it's very difficult. It's easy to say, but so difficult in the moment because you get caught up in the emotion and the ups and downs and it's your ability to reset. You know, reset the pain when you're in CrossFit, reset the pain, you know, in Jiu Jitsu, it's also like reset the moment of that point you lost or just had to tap out or whatever. Like it's ability to be able to reset and move on that what you've done previously, learn from it and move on. I think that's how one of the other ways

Yeah.

not letting the imposter creep in. And so guys, I hope this has been helpful, powerful enough to help you get through because I know this is a challenge for everyone. It's definitely a challenge for me. I'm still working on mine. Jim, same thing, like he just, you know, you can see he has different strategies than I do because you know, different values, different, you know, what strength he has. I hope that through between the two of us, we have shared some tactics and strategies and things that you can implement right away to tame the imposter. not to eliminate, but to tame it and to be able to navigate so that you can become more successful in your life and have a happier life. So I hope you enjoy this Wabi Sabi podcast episode. If you feel like this is a great one, please share with others. I think it's really important one to share and see us on all channels, Spotify, Facebook, YouTube, YouTube, whatever all the stuff that's out there and we'll see you in the next episode.