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Chaos: A Catalyst for Change

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Chaos is a catalyst for change. You are the inhibitor of that change if you let yourself miss out on the opportunity to be uncomfortable. Our lives have changed dramatically over the past few weeks. Our work, our interactions, our daily routine… it has all changed. The situation around us is incredibly serious and it is everyone’s duty to do their part in keeping themselves and the ones around them safe and healthy. Keep them moving forward. With that being said, I am a firm believer that every moment we have a decision. We have a decision to define the moment or let the moment define us. How can you define this moment for yourself instead of letting this chaotic moment define you?

The way that I imagine the majority of people go through life is like a fully completed puzzle. I am sure after reading that sentence you may have a “puzzled” look on your face but stick with me here for a moment. We have every piece of our life that comes together to create the picture of our life. We have our family, our friends, our work, our health, and our personal well-being to name a few that come together to create the life that you are living. We all want to grow and develop and better the “pieces of our puzzle.” Our growth and development seems to never be at the pace that we desire. Why is that? It takes a lot of energy to remove a piece of our puzzle, change it, and put it back in place. It is a meticulous task. A task that requires a plan and dedicated action to change a piece of our life. It can often seem daunting when we have multiple pieces of “our” puzzle that we want to change. We have to carefully remove one piece, make adjustments, and put the piece back in place, without disturbing any of the other pieces. Then do the same thing for another area of our life. This requires a great deal of energy and can often seem daunting.

Let’s look at going to the gym as an example to really set in place the puzzle analogy. The piece of your life that you want to work on is going to the gym. Now, you barely go to the gym. Whether it is what you want it to be, that piece of your life is a piece of the puzzle. You want to start going to the gym in the morning before work. It was difficult to make this happen because you were not willing to get up early enough to go before work because changing the “going to the gym” piece of your puzzle would be disturbing another piece of your puzzle which is getting enough sleep on work days. If you change when you wake up on a work day then you must change when you go to sleep to keep the same amount of sleep, thus disturbing another piece. When our puzzle of life is complete, and we want to change a single piece, it often disturbs many other pieces of our puzzle. 

Why is “chaos” the secret here? Why is it the catalyst for change that so many of us could leverage as the momentum we need? When chaos hits our lives, whether it slowly creeps in or hits us all at once, our “puzzle” is no longer put together. It is as if we are starting the puzzle over again. You grab the box and you dump the puzzle on the table and the pieces are everywhere. Some are upside down, some even fell off the table, but the important thing here is they are easy to move around. They are easy to change. They are not all attached to other puzzle pieces. What does this mean for us? Chaos created the time to make the changes to the pieces of our puzzles that we have so desperately wanted to change. Now this is exaggerated compared to many of our situations of course. Some of  us have pieces of our puzzle that are still connected together, but some of them have been shaken up. Use this time now to make the changes to those pieces you have always wanted. If you don’t have to commute to work now, use that extra time to make the meal at home you have been wanting to make. Do you have less school work? Double down on connecting with the relationships you have let slide. Chaos has jumbled up the pieces of our puzzle. When things get closer to the normal we were accustomed to, are your pieces going to look the exact same and fall into the same place? Is the puzzle of your life going to be the same finished picture? Or are you going to let this be the catalyst for change you need. Are you going to define this moment for yourself or let this chaotic moment define you? The choice is yours.

The Suffering Letterman

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“…sometimes you can’t resist throwing on that old worn out no-good set of beliefs about yourself before you leave the house.”

What keeps you from moving forward?

One of the most important lessons that I’ve learned from my mistakes is that they are mine. They belong to me. I guess it is deeper than that though. Not quite as simple. Ownership is more of a process than just talking to yourself in the mirror like everyone wants to tell you. 

I want to talk about the dark side of ownership. Celebrating failure proves there is a bad way to own our failures and carry them around with us. You know the feeling. Think about that person at an event or a bar or party with that negative sort of energy… usually a fearful insecurity. Think about when you have been in places where you’ve noticed it in yourself. 

So, why did you take it with you?

Whether it’s a networking event, a business proposal, a date, a bar, a party… Many of us wear our best clothes, we smell great, wear some nice shoes, pack the classic phone, wallet, and keys. But sometimes? We can’t resist throwing on that old worn out no-good set of beliefs about ourselves before we leave the house. I call this the “Suffering Letterman”. 

When we face failure, our brains are wired to remember it. Our amygdala and hippocampus are closely linked. Fear and memory, memory and fear, back and forth. Helps us recognize that guy from the news that’s wanted for murder, the music from that horror movie we hated, or that smell of food we got sick from that one time. But does this primal wiring control our lives?

If you let it. Sure? But it doesn’t have to. 

Gordon Willard Allport, one of the first American psychologists to take a look at personality, took a biological approach to our behavior. Challenging Freudian concepts, he believed we are not ruled by our unconscious forces. He argued, if we choose, we are not slaves to our past at all. That we are NOT prisoners of childhood conflicts and past experiences.

Instead he proved over and over again, we are inclined to be hyper-focused on the present. We are oriented towards growth and opportunity. It is really the undealt-with fears and insecurities we choose to retrieve from our past that hinder our growth. 

Why we choose to throw this suffering on ourselves has a lot of philosophical speculation. Why we bask in the suffering might be plain attention-seeking, brain chemistry, ignorance, an attempt at creating an identity and so on. But I know one thing, this practice doesn’t serve anyone. 

So I ask you, what unfinished business do you have on the inside that’s holding you back from bolstering your business out here? Do the grudges, regrets, grief, insecurities, or fears that you can patch on mean more to you than winning? I doubt it! Take that jacket off.

Own those fears and insecurities and start accelerating your vision today.

Aspire to Inspire Greatness.

Using People

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Being a good individual is important to all of us. 

Being unique, authentic, “one of a kind”. 

But how original can any of us actually become?

Now, we all know the more cynical line, “There are no original ideas”. However, I argue that maybe what we are really saying is that there are no original words or phrases to describe something. We have reinvented the way we use timeless knowledge for thousands of years. 

Musicians, scientists, philosophers and other artists struggle the most, finding a balance between using the weight of their influences and discovering their own style. It is hard to escape the what is and the what has and to step into the realm of what if and what else. But every innovator, groundbreaker, and pioneer can easily list off who helped them, inspired them, educated them, mentored them over their lifetime. 

Steve Jobs would have told you that it was Bill Cambell who coached him through his time at Apple. Using his expertise to create phenomenal company culture and driving ambition.

John Mayer might list off a variety of blues artists like Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix, and BB King, Eric Clapton. Some of which he was able to directly learn from and derive his modern phrasing of blues and even performance technique.

Ryan Holiday, owner of the Daily Stoic and renowned author, is notorious for his distillation of past stoic writings and stories from the autobiographies of this world’s most influential people. 

They were all honest about where their inspiration, technique and writing came from. Yet it doesn’t seem to dull their glow as brilliant artists and creators. 

My point is, if you look around you and you are looking for it, these people are not tapping into some mythical land of creativity. They are innovating, however brilliantly, old dusty ideas. They are studying and emulating the past behind closed doors and then presenting a sometimes unrecognizable modern product. 

“Successful people get credit for the work they do behind closed doors”- Tony Robbins

Whatever you are trying to achieve, it has been done before. The process of tapping into that part of yourself, the planning, the strategy, perhaps even the exact timetable and half hour itinerary. So how do we find it? Books, podcasts, friends, here with us at Kykeon ;). 

But seriously, anyone, anywhere, with anything. Use the infinite knowledge that is surrounding us and start putting it into action. And most importantly, find someone that has failed and succeeded at whatever endeavor you are about to start. 

Aspire to Inspire Greatness.

Be Their Mirror

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The way that I have been able to relate and apply this information means a lot to me because I have a newfound respect for the people that have held me accountable in my life. The brave people that made me into an honest man. That have, essentially, been my mirror. 

As we know, there are a lot of ways that we can interact with other people in a way that can make profound differences in their lives. And oftentimes, that works both ways in mentorship. I will start by briefly explaining how we function at a very basic level without going into scrutinous detail. Simply put, people’s minds are like the layers of an onion and we have to help each other break through to that vulnerability to be creative and motivate progressive change. 

From Socrates to stand-up comedy, mankind benefits and enjoys stripping those layers away and playing around a bit, cutting through them. Challenging structures of thoughts and beliefs. 

I want to talk about a revolutionary scientist that changed the way we have studied and interpreted the brain and human behavior. Neuroscientist, Paul D. Maclean. In the 1950’s and 60’s, he split our great onion-like brains into three main layers:

  1. The Reptilian Brain/ Primal Brain
  2. The Paleomammalian Brain/ Emotional Brain
  3. The Mammalian Brain/ Rational Brain

Let’s go over why this random academia is applicable. 

When we are asked a hard question? Our primal thought level will deflect or shoot off a quick answer. The emotional brain will interact with it and may show in your body language. And rational thought may try to guess at a best answer for the person to which you are speaking. 

Any answers is a combination of the lateral thought through ALL of these layers and sublayers, so I ask you, how do we know we are getting the truth? How do we judge vulnerability?

We don’t. We can’t. 

Unfortunately in a world of nuclear and quantum level technology we still can’t exactly read a person’s unconscious thought in a way that we can understand practically. But, thanks to our friend Socrates, we know how to ask questions ad nauseum. We can merely create environments and conversations where that relationship can thrive. 

So what does an effective version of that look like? 

This may seem unrelated, but upon looking in a mirror, what do you see?

Mirrors tell you every pimple, scar, out of place hair, wrinkle, or reluctant roll of fat. And, what more? It doesn’t care how you feel about it. Many of us aren’t confrontational people, but I challenge you– Be more like a mirror for the people you interact with. It will help you break through those layers and interact in a way that is honest and real. 

So, how do we know we are getting the truth? We have to keep people talking and thinking and out of their old patterns of thought. Challenging them to take that step into emotional or well-contemplated discoveries. By being relentlessly reflective. Being their mirror. 

Here is an example of a mentor/ mentee conversation:

Mentor: What is on your mind? 

Mentee: I suck at managing time.

Mentor: Anything in particular that is stressing you?

Mentee: I just suck at managing time!

Mentor: Oh, you’re fine. How do you spend your time?

Mentee: I am always busy, I just can’t figure out how to stay motivated and I get distracted.

Mentor: You’ll be okay. Don’t worry, I’ll help. 

Here is alternative conversation: 

Mentor: What is on your mind? 

Mentee: I suck at managing time.

Mentor: Yeah you probably do suck at managing time.

Mentee: How do I get better?

Mentor: How do you get better?

Mentee: I could buy a planner…?

Mentor: You should buy a planner! That is a great idea.

Mentee: I always use those things for a month and then forget about it.

Mentor: So you expect to quit on yourself? You’re a quitter now?

Mentee: Well… no.

Mentor: So let’s get started!

Both are conversations I have been apart of (I was the mentee). But can you tell the difference? There are key small, yet crucial differences.

First conversation stagnates at the end with plain sympathy. It is nice and reassuring, but if the goal is progress, none was made. The second, however, moves towards action. Sympathy is a remarkable skill, but action is what’s needed to change a bad situation into good. The first conversation allows each person to be comfortable in shallow communication. The second however forces the mentee to open up, and peel some layers back while staying affirmed.  “You probably do suck” and “You’re a quitter now?” are aptly paired with “Great idea” and “Let’s get started!” Challenging the mentee’s thought and ego while affirming hope, specifically hope that good things are to come. 

Like a sommelier pairs wines skillfully with someone’s steak at a restaurant, a mentor combines sympathy with very accountable questioning and tough loving critique. 

A lot of us answer questions in a way that avoids being real. We expect others to coddle us and tell us everything is going to be okay, even when it isn’t. We tell people “it’s okay” or “you’re fine” or “you’ll figure it out” when it isn’t the case. 

We can celebrate success without downplaying failure. 

As mentors, we have to reflectively listen to the people we care about. Being positive and supportive is a good thing. But being real is more important. Being real helps us interact vulnerably, peeling away those layers, and creating complex positive thoughts.  

Be as accountable to your people as a mirror is for you.  

Persistence

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Chances are that you have taken on some new strategies for the New Year. Be it a diet, workout plan, financial goal, or perhaps a relationship. I sincerely hope that you haven’t given up on them yet. Either way, stay tuned. Maybe this will come as a story of hope. Hopefully it will at least make you think.

This is a renewing time of year. You are probably incorporating a new daily behavior or attempting to develop a mindset that is better. And I wish you luck because that motivation is much harder to come by after the 1st, 2nd or 3rd quarter of the year. But whether it is meditating or selling more products– there are going to be pressures that knock you off your path. The practice is persistence. Constant readjustments, and recalibration. Because these goals are moving targets. You are growing older, experiencing more, working differently, and the weather is changing. The past fades and the future creeps on in. Always. Our goals are for a person that doesn’t exist yet. You are creating you, so don’t scrap it yet. 

“Without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist” – Stephen Hawking 

Outside of your mindset, I want to talk about a major force that is molding it… other people. The truth is that people will not support you all the time. I know, how mean? Those dumb pesky inherently evil people (he says sarcastically setting himself up for his next point)… Like it or not, we live in unavoidable competition with the people around us despite whether we are fully aware of it. And all your critics? They are as imperfect as you. I may even argue critics are severely more flawed. Because unlike the others trying their hardest, they are sitting back and judging. I think Hank Williams said it best, 

“Mindin’ other people’s business seems to be high-toned, I got all that I can do just to mind my own, why don’t you mind your own business, (mind your own business), if you mind your own business, you’ll stay busy all the time.”

I think in a perfect world, we would mind our own business, but humans are highly intelligent social creatures. Now I know what you’re thinking, “you obviously haven’t met my cousin ‘so and so’”. Even them. Yes, even them. We, as humans, are constantly comparing and contrasting ourselves with others. It used to keep us alive to mirror or avoid behavior. Like “maybe I shouldn’t go in the opaque swamp with that weird lizard thing”. But as the primal environment has changed to modern, we now do this to a point of paralysis. The comparison has become “the thief of joy” as Teddy Roosevelt famously said. It no longer serves in the same capacity it did for our more ape like ancestors.

We no longer use this skill set to gauge whether we are threatened by the misery and obstacles of the environment. Instead we threaten each other with our ambition or the emotional state we live in. Coworkers, friends, family, significant others, teammates– could all be threatened or challenged by your mindset. Challenged to rise to a different level and keep up with your new standard. This challenge to match the highest energy in a room feels like a threat. Why do some people react to your goals like you just slapped them? I think because courage in others scares us more than any alligator in a swamp could. It inspires massive internal change, change many are often unprepared to ask of themselves. This type of change doesn’t just call for a step over a crack or to throw on another layer of clothes. It sits within us until we fix it or bury it. If you’re wondering why maybe others may scoff, critique or even try to disintegrate your goals, it just boils down to the insecurity arising from comparison.

David Goggins, ex Navy SEAL and famed Ultra Marathon runner, has words on this insecurity: “Our light reflects off all the walls they built around them. Your light allows them to see the contours of their own prison, their own self limitations.” (Can’t Hurt Me)

We have all felt this. I am sure you can recall bullshitting a reason or playing devil’s advocate for someone when they shared their goals. And I am also sure others have done the same to you at one point and you’ve begun to learn. It is okay. We compete naturally and it isn’t always as pretty as the olympics when we do. Sometimes competition brings war and death and poverty. In other times, it brings justice to a courtroom, love into a marriage or a sea of gold medals to a humble freak like Michael Phelps. Competition manifests itself in beautiful ways as often as it does in tragic ones. So let it drive you in the direction you need to go.

I leave you with this car-themed analogy: 

Imagine we are a car on a long road trip and set on a specific destination, or goal. People around us are much like the dotted lines on the highway. They don’t really restrict us, but they give us a sense of clarity that we are in one lane or the other. Other people’s lives are guiding lines and we can leverage their success, their failures, their strategies and mistakes to better understand where we are and where we need to go. But they do not hold us back unless we choose to let them. 

Likewise, good friends are like the seatbelts across our chest, the headlights on the road, and the gas in our tank. They keep us safe, focused and running. The people closest to us are constantly navigating us through our lives. It is important that we distinguish who are the shotgun riders and who are the nagging backseat drivers in our life. Take a pragmatic view to whom you spend the most time with, are they adding or subtracting value? Are they a source of direction, motivation, inspiration, knowledge? Or just a bunch of lousy potholes?

Surround yourself with love and remember to be someone others want around them too.

Check out my podcast, on Apple podcasts, “Plant Your Flag” or “Jon Salmen”. That’s me.

More exciting interviews coming up, be sure to check it out ASAP.

What Worked for Me

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There are practical ways to keep this year from being like the last one. I don’t know how your year went in 2019, but I know that it definitely could have been better. Today I will share the top things I recommend to anyone wanting to squeeze a little more out of their days, weeks and months this year. Behavior changes and actions that bolstered my health, happiness, and love in 2019. I plan on setting myself up for more personal records this year, but let me reflect.

Practice Fasting.

Fasting has picked up a lot of weird publicity in the 21st century and most of it is misguided. Fasting is not a fad, it is a strategy that has been implemented in the greatest minds, cultures, and spiritual practices this earth has ever seen. Fasting has been proven in some of our most prestigious universities, scientific industries, and special forces training in the US. From John Hopkins to the SEALs and all the way to Tibet, this stuff works.

I personally used IF (intermittent fasting) for roughly 4 months this year. I found it freeing and I achieved remarkable dietary discipline and an overall physical/ mental/ spiritual consistency. I looked better, thought better, and enjoyed a liberation from stress, anxiety or depressive mood swings (things had once been status quo for my average day). From July through October, I had a standard deviation of 1.2 lbs in body weight from my daily weight journal I kept. To simplify, my weight didn’t change or fluctuate more than a singular pound for 4 months. I gained strength and endurance in my daily workouts, I experienced limited distraction in my classes, and flow states became my, well, just my state. 

Find a fast that works for you. I did the half day essentially because it seemed easier to manage eating an actual meal just one hour out of the day. The discrepancy that I included was starting my day around 8 AM with one cold honeycrisp apple before I began my fast. Additionally, I would carry a large water bottle and I would put some mileage on her throughout a day, averaging at least a gallon before the afternoon hit. To maintain flexibility and a social life without impeding my rhythm on this, I would make sure to workout between 2-5PM and follow with a meal somewhere between 5-9PM. A heavy importance was placed around routine. Apple, work/ school, gym, meal, hang out/ homework, then sleep and repeat. 

To finish, I would like to commend my effort in 2019 of fasting not only food, but social media and other media forms as well. Our mind works better when we give it what it wants– silence. Check out this blog for more “https://www.kykeoncoaching.com/sweet-sweet-solitude/“

Silence breeds solidarity and we NEED that. Certainty and clarity in our thoughts is vital to our success and this calmness and consistency in the mind carries into our physical health and soundness of our spirit. We are what we eat as much as we are how we eat. Same goes for your cognition, what your mind consumes matters too. 

If you want a foot in the door to things like discipline, patience, and solitude. Fasting may be the thing.

Practice Mentorship

This is really a top priority for anyone. Have a mentor. Your competition does, I can assure you that. And if they don’t? Get a step up now, that is no excuse for you to be lazy and mediocre too. Mentorship is key to your development and the realization and actualizing your full potential. As much as we would like to dream up a scenario in which we can simply rise from our own ashes like the mythical phoenix, everyone’s success that we see around us begins and ends with a trusted mentor/ coach/ trainer/ boss. There is really no such thing as a self made man when you get right down to it. 

Mentorship brought me a change of mindset, more money, more opportunity and I would venture to say that I have learned more in 2019 than the bulk of the preceding 20 years. I am more open minded, experienced, hardened, loving, generous, and well read than I have ever been in my life. And it feels like a drop in the bucket towards where I am headed. None of it would have ever seemed possible without my friend, brother, and boss, Greg Pestinger. 

Now, maybe none of what I just said seems actionable. You might work from home, you might think you are “too busy” (which means get a mentor ASAP), or you might be the only person in your whole town. Whatever the excuse is, I can assure you that you aren’t perfect. Take a look in the mirror, take a look at your bank account, take a look inside… there’s work to be done there. Gaps in our knowledge, lapses in our judgement, overdraft charges and debts, unfinished to-do lists, and depression or anxiety that might creep in. (A book can even be your mentor.)

Figure out where you’re falling short and find someone that is better than you to bring it up. 

Also, once you gain the proper footing in your life, it is time to give it all away and begin your career as a teacher. Okay, maybe not, but there is no greater joy than guiding someone through their life skillfully and bringing joy to others. An opportunity I had this year in many different ways. Now not everyone can skillfully mentor, and if you aren’t going to take the time to teach and give back and it’s not really in your tool set, I want to take this opportunity to reassure you that you can still be a living inspiration. Think, what do people think when they hear of me, work with me, see me out, read about me, watch me speak? We all have the opportunity to learn and teach and you should dedicate 2020 to this divine accountability that changes so many lives for the better.

Practice Discomfort.

Anytime you find yourself in cruise control, things feel just right, everything is good and life feels like a warm breeze… wake up Goldilocks, you’re failing. This comfort is deceiving you. The moment we start to accept living comfortably as an ultimate goal is the moment we begin our descent. 

People that are comfortable and unwilling to challenge themselves say dumb shit like “I don’t need to know any more”, “I think I am okay where I’m at”, or the classic “I’m fine”. Comfort helps you pass a class with a C or D, it gets you kind of in shape, kind of fit, kind of happy, into an okay relationship, surrounded by okay people, maybe even an okay job with okay work. Comfort gets you by, but it doesn’t get you what you really want. You know what you really want, you’ve wanted it your whole life I bet. We were told we could be whatever we wanted, live anywhere, do anything. 

And I am not here to say that is a myth or that there aren’t real obstacles to that, the question I am asking you is this: Is it impossible or have you quit? You know the answer phrased many other ways too: Is it your genetics or have you not cooked a good meal in three years? Are you not a “morning person” or are you always hungover and watching netflix till 3AM? Is everyone else wrong except you or are you the issue? Are you “big-boned” or unwilling to put in another set of reps? Are women mean and men are trash or do you have some undealt-with grief or insecurity that you’re projecting from the past?

We get comfortable in our ways, no matter how mediocre they prove to be for us and our goals. Make 2020 a year where you break the insane cycle. 

Fasting, mentorship, and being uncomfortable. Try it out, incorporate it into your current strategy, set more goals… you don’t have to wait until next year to do it. 

To finish, I want to provide a FocalPoint tool from Brian Tracy himself. The Grand SLAM formula. Simplify, Leverage, Accelerate, and Maximize. Simplify, figure out where you need to focus your energy and productivity. Leverage others to help you get there and use their mistakes and their success to learn. Accelerate the strategies that are working. And then Maximize this success and continue to gain momentum everywhere in your life. 

These are just things that worked for me and I carry an inevitable bias towards their practice as a result of my personal success. Find your formula that works for you.

We can help. Check out our landing page for our upcoming event: https://www.kykeoncoaching.com/product/personal-success-achieve-your-dreams/