When you crash (and what do you learn?)

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Welcome to Mindset, Mood and Movement.

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A systemic approach to human

behaviour, performance and wellbeing.

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Sal: I want to share a story.

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I'm driving fast.

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I'm on a motorway.

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I've come back from lunch.

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I've had a busy week.

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I've got lots going on and

I'm a successful photographer.

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I'm booked out and life

is busy, really busy.

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There's a lot to contend with.

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And as I'm going on the motorway, I'm

within the speed limit, but I'm going

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quickly cause there's a lot to do, right?

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You've always got to maximize

time and my mind is full.

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There's so much going on.

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Life is busy and all of a sudden,

Somebody pulls out into the lane

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in front of me, going very slowly.

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I hit the brakes.

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I skid.

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The next thing I know

I'm turning sideways.

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I'm careering off into a bush, hedgerow.

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There's jarring bangs.

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I find an impact and suddenly I start

to barrel roll and time slows down.

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And then I crash.

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Now, thankfully, dear listener,

Although the car was destroyed,

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physically, I was fine.

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I was a girlfriend at the

time, and we were both fine.

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It was chaos.

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The car was literally destroyed.

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And unbuckled the seatbelt, got

out, and it was just carnage.

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the whole road had stopped, people had

stopped, and a very shocking situation.

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Now this isn't a story about

a car accident, per se.

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This is a story about when you really

crash, because actually, whether it's

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a car crash, a health crash, a life

crash, something will tell you you

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are going too fast, as it told me.

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So, fast forward, a couple of days

later, I'm doing a shoot, back in the

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car, driving off to do a shoot, and

I was really, of course, reflective

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on, wow, I may not have been alive.

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Had I not got lucky, we didn't make

impact with anything particularly

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solid like a tree or lamppost and just

rolled and I'm so thankful for this.

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I'm full of gratitude.

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I'm still a bit stunned by the whole

thing and I finished the shoot.

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I get home.

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And that's it.

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I put everything down.

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I'm done.

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I'm done with his mindset.

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I'm done with his attitude.

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And the next day I'm like,

I'm taking the week off.

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And I was lucky because it was a really

sunny week and there I was sitting in

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the garden at this magnolia tree and

it was starting to come to full bloom.

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The sun was cascading through.

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It was just magical.

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And for the first time in years,

I felt a deep sense of peace.

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You know that, if you've ever had

it, even if it's not been around

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for a while, that absolute peace.

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And I was like, Oh, this

is what I was working for.

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This is why I was doing all the hard

work and the striving, because I

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believed if my business was such a

success and financially successful

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and had loads of stuff going on,

then I would have that feeling.

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But of course I was greatly mistaken.

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And the world has shown me

a very, very clear message.

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If you go too fast, literally

and figuratively, you may crash.

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And what do you do after that?

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And that is the lesson for today

that I really want to share.

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So I work with lots of wonderful

people, clever people, smart

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people, hardworking people, and

I'd say there's a lot of people I

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work with are strivers or seekers.

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Now this might resonate with you, and it

resonates with me, because I've always

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been seeking and striving, it's a nature

of mine, it's a personality aspect.

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And those of us that work really

hard, we'll graft in our work, in our

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businesses, and put in long hours.

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And it's not just the hours,

it's the attention, the energy.

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How much time you're

always thinking about work.

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But the problem we have is

that we are selling our time.

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And that means you're selling your

life and you can't get a refund.

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There are no exchanges in time.

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You can't go back.

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And what worries me, in my own

experience, was If I had kept

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going, where would I have been?

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Burnt out, and by the way, I got

there at some point later as well.

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But, if you don't check that whole,

what am I doing this for question,

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and slow down for a period of

time, you may well crash too.

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Now, I work with a guy called, John.

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And John was a fantastic guy.

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Super high energy, anxious, very

clever and he was building this, music

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company and it was going really well

and of course the parallels with his

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story like mine were very striking,

drafting, driving hard, a lot of work,

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not putting so much time into exercise

or family time and he crashed as well.

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He didn't crash physically in

a car, he crashed, emotionally.

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which most of us call a burnout and he was

working with me not too long after because

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he was like, what am I doing with my life?

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What am I doing with my business?

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How do I get this together?

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And we did a really nice piece of

work over some time where we got

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him to look at the why question.

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Why are you doing this?

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Why work so hard?

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Because if you don't stop and ask

why, as in what's the purpose?

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What's the end goal?

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But what's the feeling?

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Then it becomes this, you know, the

hedonic treadmill or the hamster

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wheel metaphor, you may have heard.

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And we're just whizzing along and trying

harder and harder, and the faster you

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run, the faster it slips away from you.

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So with John and I, we worked

on this deeper level of okay,

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I want success, that's okay.

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Let's define it.

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What numerical value do you need?

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What lifestyle?

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What amount of hours do you work?

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Who do you see?

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How fit are you?

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What do you feel like?

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And the more we got into the experiential

side of the feeling, how would he feel?

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Then we got into some fantastic stuff

and this is one of the other lessons

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I want to share today is that actually

if you've had a crash of any nature,

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anything that slowed you down massively.

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Then getting back to that quality

of aligning your mind and your body,

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your thinking, and your feeling.

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Because if we stick in thinking alone,

such as, if business goes 10x, or I can

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sell a million eBit, or whatever the

growth patterns are, or the things that

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you're aiming to do, then I'll be happy.

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Now there's nothing wrong with growing

a business, and I work with people all

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the time that grow fantastic businesses.

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I would say it's the how is where.

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We often need to do the work because

if you show up with energy, passion,

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interest and are healthy and balanced,

your business will grow and so will you.

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But if you go in and give it all and you

are, let's say, what's the old expression?

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Putting all of your eggs in one basket.

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There's very easy to drop that

basket and then they all crash

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and the whole house comes down.

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So looking at how you're thinking.

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And how you're feeling.

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And this will be a little lesson

you can play with right now.

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So take one example

that's going on for you.

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And it might be that you're trying to get

somewhere with your work or your business,

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or perhaps it's in your personal life.

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That one goal, to hold that in your mind.

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What is the thought that

you're having around that?

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What do you believe?

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What are your expectations?

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What do you say about it, such as it will

be great when I get to this level, or I'll

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feel successful when I have this amount

of money, or I'll feel really fulfilled

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when I've grown the company into, a

national or global brand, and that's fine.

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Now dial into the feeling

that goes with that thought.

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What emotion comes up?

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Is it positive, negative?

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Is it is?

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Is it a feeling you can name or

is it a multitude of feelings?

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Again, just sit with

that for a moment, right?

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What feeling comes out when I say

I could achieve the thing I want?

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Now, if there's a sweet spot

here, you'll have a thought and

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a feeling, which is in coherence.

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Yeah, so it's like in the same

level, same kinda harmony.

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So coherent.

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If it's incoherent, such as there's

still a bit of anxiety about being a

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millionaire or there's still a bit of

fear about being a globally successful

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brand, then we've got a disconnect here

and we got some dissonance going on.

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So my invitation for you in this little

exercise and story that I'm sharing

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today is to write down, articulate

the thoughts you are having about

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the success point you're chasing.

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And when you've got that clear,

tune into the feeling that comes

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up when you think about it.

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And if for any reason they are not

coherent, such as if you feel successful,

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there might be a feeling of joy or peace.

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or you might be smiling.

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I'm smiling now as I say this.

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But if you're thinking when I'm

successful, I'll be like, maybe I

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should be a bit more successful.

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Then you're on a ruse.

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You're on a, you're in a mind,

spiral, which is always chasing

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the thing you can't have.

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So here's the thing.

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If you're able to feel.

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What you want now.

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So if you might feel, for me, peace

of mind is very important as is joy.

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So if I can feel that now, then as I

think about my ambitions, my goals and

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things that love to do in my business

and my life, I'm already connected

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to it as opposed to disconnected.

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And I say this because when I

remember that, traveling in that

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car that day, I was disconnected.

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I was trying so hard.

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I had to get somewhere quickly.

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I've got more shoots to do.

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I've got to get back for editing.

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it was.

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The hamster on the wheel running faster,

and there was no good feeling there.

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And of course you see it so well when

you look in the rear view mirror.

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Car pun intended, by the way.

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When you look in that rear view

mirror, you go, ah, okay, I see.

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better to look ahead.

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Let's summarize.

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If you're chasing a big goal, great.

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Ask yourself, why?

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Get clear on what that you believe

that'll get you and then tuning.

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Can you get a feeling with that now?

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And is it coherent?

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If it isn't, that's the time

to do some work on this.

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If it is coherent.

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Then spend time feeling that

feeling because it will help bolster

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your actions and your thinking.

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And it's a very powerful

way to move forward.

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So my dear listener, I trust the story

of Crash to Awaken has helped you.

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And as always, you can

reach me on the socials.

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Any platform you found this

on, you can reach on Instagram

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and LinkedIn in particular.

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And of course, there are details

following this in the outro to

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say, catch me via my website.

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So do reach out and let me

know your experience of this

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and share your stories too.

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Until the next time, take care.

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Outro: Thank you so much for listening.

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If you enjoyed the

episode, please subscribe.

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And if a friend would benefit from hearing

this, do send it on to them as well.

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If you would like to get in touch

yourself, then you can go to my website.

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Which is Sal Jeffries dot com,

spelt S A L J E F F E R I E S.

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Sal Jeffries dot com.

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Hit the get in touch link and there

you can send me a direct message.

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If you'd like to go one step further

and learn whether coaching can help

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you overcome a challenge or a block

in your life, then do reach out and

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I offer a call where we can discuss

how this may be able to help you.

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Until the next time, take care.