#3 Dr. Brent Hogarth- Flow, Mindfulness, and Self-Control

0 (4s): Okay. 1 (4s): Hello everybody. You're listening to Chatting with Candice. I'm your host Candice Horbacz. Before we get started, if you want to support the podcast, you can go to Chatting with candice.com and sign up for our Patrion account. You get early access to episodes, bonus content, and you get to be a part of our AMA episode. Every month. This week, I'm really excited for our guest. We have doctor Brent Hogarth. He is a sports and clinical psychologist and expert in training flow States, mindfulness and self control for both sports and corporate athletes. Brett has provided performance enhancing training to Olympic athletes, professional athletes, us military, computer engineers, authors, hedge fund managers, serial entrepreneurs, and more. 1 (54s): We will unpack what a flow state is, how they relate to performing better later on in the show, in a nutshell, Flow is a state of consciousness where you perform your best, feel your best and live your best life. Brent is the head coach at the Flow research Collective whose mission is to understand the science behind ultimate human performance, and to use it to train individuals and organizations. My husband, Eric will be joining us for this episode. He signed up for the zero to dangerous program at the Flow Research Collective. So he has some pretty interesting insight. Brent was actually Eric's coach while he took the course at the Flow Research Collective. So that's how everybody met. 1 (1m 35s): If you want to learn more about doctor Brent Hogarth, you can go to Brent hogarth.com. He actually has an ebook coming out this week. He's also launching his own podcast, which I highly encourage you to listen to. You can also sign up for your free assessment with him on his website. Brent hogarth.com. And again, I will link everything below. So without further ado, doctor Brent Hogarth 0 (2m 4s): Okay. 1 (2m 5s): Okay. Well, for today's episode, we have doctor Brent Hogarth. Thank you. Hogarth thank you for correcting me. I had someone else on and I butchered their name and they let me do it. So yeah, that to get away with that. No, I appreciate it. I have to do it all the time too, with his last name, coz it's a very difficult as well. So you are a clinical psychologists. You have your doctor, you're a doctorate in that. And then you went to school for your master's for sports psychology. 0 (2m 37s): Yes. Let me, I'll tell you a little bit about life, kind of my educational path here, if it's not a traditional path. So I grew up in Vancouver, Canada, kind of a big back country, skier national gymnast played a lot of sports and I was also kind of an outer Control youth, big graffiti artists. And that was in and out of court. You know, I, people are surprised to hear it these days, but yeah, I had quite a chip on my shoulder growing up. And so I was sent away to a military school and just outside Toronto, before I went to Western, which is a university in Toronto for a kinesiology. So I stay the human body in support and movement. And that was at that point, I was working in the fitness industry and I recognize myself and my clients wanted a lot more than just physical training. 0 (3m 20s): And so I was super privileged to be able to go over to India, spend some time in some Buddhist monasteries out there. And it was at that point that I recognized, you know, I I was in sport my whole life and I never got introduced to mental and emotional training. So I kind of dedicated myself at that point to take the path, to become a sport in a clinical psychologist. You know? And I'll, I know you're interested in mysticism a one out a little bit. So I'll share with you what was the really changing point for me on that trip was, you know, I think I went to that trip seeking self acceptance in some ways. And I recognize in meditation and through Buddhist philosophy that, that Self I was trying to accept was just an illusion. It was just an idea of belief, my ego in a sense. 0 (4m 0s): And so in meditation, being able to distance myself from that just a little bit, I gained so much flexibility in my life that I was able to take a new path. So from there I went to San Francisco. I did, like you said, a master's in a sport and clinical and a doctor and clinical psych, you guys might find this cool. I lived in a 25 person hippie collective in the heart of hae Nash Barre. And so that was pretty, pretty wicked. And the, yeah, that's been part of my path and I did my postdoc and pre doc work with division ones too, and athletes at different universities throughout the States. Oh, wow. That is really interesting. So, 1 (4m 36s): Well first, how does someone who has like said chip on their shoulder, like go from that and being a little bit out of control or angry or, you know, these things that you see a lot, especially right now in like social media to self-improvement and having the sense of like, no, Self like, that's like a huge leap. It's almost probably like a different person. Okay. 0 (4m 56s): Yeah, absolutely. You know, its always interesting when people, when I tell them about my past, they can never imagine that I was charged with assault twice with a weapon causing bodily harm, you know, and, and out of court, it's a quite a shift that I, that I took my life. And I think ultimately for me it was about no, once I recognized that that Self, again, was something I had created in my mind that was a conditioned through society. And I could see it as the observer of it that created the flexibility again to say, okay, is this serving me right now or not? And a lot of the, you know, stepping away going on travelling as I'm sure you're all our, where is it gives us us a new chance to reassess the rules and the roles that we play in our life. 0 (5m 41s): And so stepping away from my social network, stepping away from the, the, the rules and roles that is typically played, just gave me that, that inflection point to, to take a shift. And you know, I think when it comes to dealing with the violence and or the, the tragedies that we're all experiencing right now in our own way, it comes down to recognizing what's within our control for me, what was within my control was managing my own emotions, managing, you know, where I moved my hands and feet and, and picking a because that I can make an impact in and just focusing on that single cause. And that's, that's how I tend to live my life, trying to focus on really what's within my control. 1 (6m 23s): So how, what would you say? Like the steps are for people to like maybe have like that actualization? Cause I feel like there's that who said it, that it's only 10% of people can access. Flow like, that's like one belief that some people have. And then like I was listening to mapping cloud nine and where he was kind of arguing that, saying that no, like almost anyone can access it with the proper protocols. And then was a niche that was saying 10%, only 10% of people can access it. Would you agree? That is limited. 0 (6m 55s): Well, that's a miss pessimistic individuals. So I'm quite an optimistic person. That's probably a lot of part of what's helped me in my, in my life. You know, I would say that we've all experienced flow States and we've all been able to get absorbed in moments in our life that, you know, time seems to slow down or speed up. We feel a sense of effortless action and we feel that sense of joy, of really performing and feeling at our best. And I guess just for your audience to know, I do a work with a Flow Research Collective my focus these days is really peak performance training with the executives, professional athletes, those in the military. And we all, all, we are all about Flow strengths, how to get into the zone. So to answer your question, I do think everyone's capable of, of getting into the zone, but it's often those environmental factors and those internal factors that can hold us back. 0 (7m 44s): So environmentally distractions, things that are just clutter and, and chaos that helps and makes it more difficult to be present in the moment because that's really what Flow is. Flow is the ability to quiet the frontal cortex be present in the moment they engaged in a specific goal where we can get absorbed and, and kind of taken away from it. So it's dealing with those external chaos, as well as the internal chaos. And for me, what that has looked like Candice and Eric is, has always been learning to regulate my emotions more effectively. What causes us the difficulty of compensating. Our goals is when we prioritize ultimately feeling better overtaking actions towards what's most important and our life. 0 (8m 26s): And so learning to regulate my emotions, you know, when as an angry guy, when I was a kid, I would think I would need to express that anger in a way so that I could dissipate it. But now I've learned through a meditation and through my training that we're able to, you know, our own emotions can't hurt us. You know, my own anger can't hurt me for my sadness can hurt me. My anxiety can hurt me and I'm able to accept that and have, when I'm able to open up to that and not struggle with it. I can again, take action towards what I care about and goes away on itself. The anxiety, the depression, the anger, it will subside it, but it's a, so I don't get caught up in that kind of never ending battle of trying to manage my emotions anymore. 1 (9m 6s): So would you say that like E Q and Flow go hand in hand, like someone that has a higher IQ can maybe like tap into Flow easier and then someone who has a lower IQ might like only experience it in fleeting moments. 0 (9m 19s): Yeah. Good. Really good question. And you know, there's a lot of nuance to this. What I would say is it's important to recognize that, you know, what we're talking about here is yes, flow state, but we're also talking about kind of self regulation. That's the bigger picture. So our ability to accomplish longterm goals and Flow is one aspect of that. It brings the accelerated learning creativity, et cetera, but we can also find Flow in things that aren't in line with our longterm goals, no drugs, sex rock, and roll, taking huge risks. We, all we can get into Flow doing that is as well as the antisocial behavior, but the act of killing someone, someone is typically in a flow state when their doing that, they're completely focused in the moment they're absorbed in it. 0 (9m 59s): So if someone is not able to regulate their emotions, what I would be curious about is perhaps they're getting into Flow and areas that are leading towards the ultimate higher kind of purpose. And, and so they can maybe still get Flow, but is it the dark side of Flow or is it Flow that's bringing them towards what's most important, right? 1 (10m 19s): You said that you're an optimist. So like what made an optimist do like a dissertation on the dark side of things? 0 (10m 25s): Well, you know, I recognize, again, looking back on my life that my greatest peak moments in, in Flow growing up was yes, it was skiing. It was in sports, but really it was in street fights or painting trains and billboards as a graffiti artist. It was those really high risk activities that I felt, you know, completely absorbed in a moment, really a hit a heightened sense of control and, and power. And that is addictive. We know, and we're in flow state, we get hit with no a really powerful cocktail of neurochemicals that make us want to experience it over and over again. And so when I look back on my life, I think part of what my journey has been is kind of changing my relationship to Flow in recognizing that it does have this potential dark side. 0 (11m 11s): And it's not only that we can experience the flow and behaviors that, or maybe our antisocial, there's a lot of research on Flow and addiction, whether it's video games, social media, internet use Flow, and it decreases our risk perception. So we become more vulnerable, but we take on bigger risks when we're in Flow. And then there's also this aspect of, again, antisocial behavior or the down that we come from from going from these huge HIEs. And Flow when we just feel on top of the world to these lows where the rest of life can feel mundane. And so if we're not in a, you know, playing a sport or a really, you know, an empowered situation, our business, the rest of life can feel like it doesn't quite have the joy. 0 (11m 54s): So learning, you know, in meditation and my studies in Buddhism to find a philosophy of life that helps me incorporate those peak moments into my day to day living has been kind of an ongoing journey and something that I'm continuing to try to experience. Cause again, it's not all about Flow is about self regulation and Flow is just a kind of one piece within that. 1 (12m 14s): So with incorporating mindfulness into Flow to kind of like balance out what can be like the dark side of Flow like the depression or the extreme risk taking, I was reading in your dissertation, that's the difference between Eastern society and Western society when it comes to Flow. So how does that work if like the whole concept of like oneness, if I recall properly like that kind of like hinders flow a little bit, or it's like less intense. So I guess is that, is that problematic ever? Like, can you ever practice like too much meditation or mindfulness to where you're not getting that edge from Flow of, you really are losing like the sense of self 0 (12m 58s): Candice I'm impressed you read through some of my dissertation there. So what we're talking about here is when, when we look at the cultural factors with Flow, we recognize that Flow as a concept is created mostly in the West and the West by the West. I mean, in North America, we're referring too well. We are a very independent culture. We're a very autonomous culture. We really strive to kind of pull oneself up by the back bootstraps, kind of take on this path of life on our own. And so Flow has a really understood through that lens, but when we try to apply a Flow to more Eastern cultures, so, and then my dissertation, I looked at studies in Japan and China where its more of a collectivist culture, right? 0 (13m 41s): Their flow state is more in regards to creating social harmony. So when we talk about Flow, there's no our clear goals, immediate challenge, feedback, and challenge skills balance, that's the golden rule of flow. And so the challenge skill balance, and the goals for those that are coming from more Eastern cultures might look a little bit different than those in Western cultures. And certainly there's more crossover than not. There's more similarities than that and there's outliers on both sides. But I think to answer your question, that relationship between Mindfulness and Flow is a tricky one, sew in a lot of studies Mindfulness has, has been shown to increase Flow because really the, of the key principle Flow is being present in the moment and flow follows focus with that said, one of the components that worked kind of gets us to the dark side of Flow is that we lose a sense of self consciousness when we're fully engaged in the moment and in flow. 0 (14m 36s): And when we're mindful, alternatively, we, our self aware we are, so we are more conscious, so, and Mindfulness can increase Flow, but that one concept of losing a sense of self, it can actually hinder that one component of Flow. So it's a tricky balance where I think it's, you know, to combine Mindfulness and Flow is about using Mindfulness to choose when is this the appropriate situation to jump into Flow, you know, diving right in and then being able to reflect again and say, okay, is this leading me towards my goals or my values or is this potentially taking me to too big of a risk or a place that I don't want to go? Right. So you mentioned the challenge skills balance. And I think, ah, for the sake of listeners, we should probably unpack that just a little bit. 0 (15m 18s): There's a lot of definitions for the challenge skills balance that relate to Flow. And I think that the way that the Flow of research Collective that you're a part of had explained it in the program was a really easy and awesome way to get it across, to like the lame person. So would you mind jumping into that a little bit? Yeah, no, absolutely. So again, the challenge skill balance is considered the golden rule of flow. And the reason why is because within a challenge to go balance, we also have a clear goal and we have immediate feedback and those are the three principles antecedents to get into Flow. And so what we understand, but the challenge is to go balance his, that there's a sweet spot when our skills are a Hi and our challenges are Hi that's when we have to give all of ourselves over to the task at hand. 0 (16m 1s): And that's when we Flow five Flow. If the challenge is too low in our skills or Hi, we tend to be, some of my board are apathetic. If the challenge is too great and our skills are too low, we tend to be a little bit anxious or overwhelmed. And so finding that sweet spot as important, and the one piece I would just share that's really fascinating around this principle is we can only find Flow in action in taking action towards a goal. So there has to be a challenge, you know, when we lay on the beach, it feels great, which is a great recovery. If you know, we, we enjoy it, but we don't experience Flow on that because again, Flow has an action oriented date. So that's a, is a key to kinda recognize and appreciate about Flow is that it leads to personal growth. 0 (16m 43s): And that's really where the dark side can come in is that the challenge scale balance is not static. It's always changing. So we are always needed to increase our, our skill level and increase our challenges. And that's how it leads to growth and personal development. But that's how it could also lead to this never ending path of never arriving at a place perhaps where one has content and at peace and the moment. And so there's that balance as well. 1 (17m 8s): Felix, this is probably one of your quotes. I did a terrible job notetaking, but it said that the ability to find joy in challenges is, is essential to individual development. And then that was kind of explaining that you need to kind of enjoy a little bit of the challenge in order to grow. And personally speaking, I find that like my most difficult times in my life or where I kind of like evolve as a person and I like became a better person in like any area of my life, but it took a while for me to kind of like lean into that pain and like accept it and then try to like overcome it and become better on the other end. 1 (17m 49s): I think a of people, when they have discomfort or face a challenge, it's like very easy to just like throw your hands up and say never mind because we do want to be comfortable. So I guess when you have somebody, when you're coaching somebody, how do you kind of shift their mindset to like lean into the discomfort rather than like running away from it? 0 (18m 8s): Yeah. Great, great question. And that's well, first of all, I appreciate you sharing your experience. A I can relate to that for me. You know, again, Flow research suggests that the most men are memorable and meaningful times and our life is often when we look back and see that we accomplished a task that really stretched us, you know? And so just knowing that has certainly served me in my increased willingness to move towards difficult challenges with that said also, you know, maybe I'll share a diagram with you that might kind of help yourself and your, your audience kind of understand how I help people relate to their, to their emotions in the struggle of that shows up in life. 0 (18m 48s): So we'll do a little bit of art class here. So I'm going to do two squares here. So this square Candace and Eric represents our sense of who we are, our sense of self and, and so everything within this square represents our thoughts, our feelings, our internal experience, those challenges and struggles really that you're identifying. So let's just take one. For instance, for instance of anxiety, we often experienced anxiety in life, moving towards what's most important, unfortunately, because we typically don't want to experience anxiety. We suffer from this phenomenon called experiential avoidance. So this is a tendency for us to all a Control avoid get rid of these suffering. 0 (19m 29s): And that's what often catches us up and life. So to describe that I'm going to do some arrows pointing inward. So again, we focus on controlling getting rid of, or avoiding this, but what happens now is our sense of who we are, can shrink right around that struggle, that depression, that anxiety. So when we struggle with anxiety, we become more fused with it. And now it's not just anxiety, it's anxiety of our anxiety. It's guilt that, you know, my anxiety is taking me out of my life. It's shame. So when we struggle and don't accept our emotions, they become stickier. They're there they're become secondary emotions. So it's a lot harder to move through it. 0 (20m 9s): And a lot of this is fueled by what we call rule governed behavior. And what that really means is we have these unconscious rules in our lives that tell us no I shouldn't experience anxiety exempt again. And so I need to avoid it. And typically, you know, we come by these naturally, typically it's not beneficial to experience anxiety or fear. You know, we've evolved as a species by protecting ourselves and, and others. So we have to overcome this rule, governed behavior that suggests no, we don't want to experience these things. And so what this other side of the diagram will show is exactly that. So if we have the same anxiety within here, this again is our sense of we are, as opposed to the arrows pointing inward, I'm going to draw some arrows pointing outward and what these arrows are now pointing to is our values. 0 (20m 57s): I'll do some stars out here. These are our values. So things that in the present moment, we can move to that, give us a sense of living in alignment with our authentic self. And when we do that, by first accepting the anxiety, not struggling with it, not turning on that struggle, switch in our head and refocusing on our values. Now our a sense of self can grow this box as opposed to shrink your on the anxiety can grow. And so that anxiety becomes something that becomes less consuming of who we are and we have the flexibility and the willingness to move towards our values and to experience the anxiety because we know we're moving towards something we really care about. And so this is a lot of my work is developing what we call kind of psychological flexibility, the ability to allow our emotions, to run their course and stay engaged in what we call the value driven behavior. 0 (21m 48s): And so that's a lot of like the work as a clinician, I help individuals kind of lead into any questions about that. Are, is that, is this relatable, I'm curious in your own experience. 1 (21m 57s): No, to me, that makes a lot of sense. And the book that I'm thinking about, did you ever read the untethered soul? 0 (22m 3s): I've been recommended at many times recently? I haven't read it yet. 1 (22m 6s): So the second box makes me think about his principles, which is essentially like no emotion is a bad emotion and you shouldn't judge any of the emotions, whether it's like anger, fear, anxiety, even on the opposite end, like love and happiness and joy and you experience it, but you let it go and holding onto those things is kind of where you create like a blockage of energy. And then that just kind of like shifts and shapes your reality. So it's, that's a very good, like a visual for that. 0 (22m 37s): Most of that. So then are you training people to take those? Let's say the anxiety, which a lot of people would identify as a weakness in that training. You, you called it rule govern behavior behavior. Okay. So in your training, are you trying to identify that anxiety as more of a strength and pointed towards the values? Or can you try to help me understand a little bit of what's going on in the mindset of, of the client? Yeah, no, absolutely great question. So we think we were talking just before this, about avoidance, right? So it's the things that we avoid that, that persistence, so that anxiety by continuing to live a rule governed that life is that anxiety becomes worse because we will avoid it temporarily through distractions or whatnot, but it'll keep showing up. 0 (23m 27s): And every time it shows up, it will take us out of our life and into our own internal experience to try to manage it. So we think we're managing it by not experiencing it, but our life becomes run by this constant tendency to avoid it through distractions and whatnot. So my work with clients is, I don't know if it looking at a strength, but looking at it as certainly an opportunity in that moment to, you know, like Candice is saying open up to the anxiety, recognize that it's there and let that be an, an inflection point to redirect towards what's most important. And again, I think that the thing with rule governed behaviors, it typically works. So we come by this tendency to want to avoid anxiety because it is usually facilitative, but, you know, just like after I go for a workout and I cracked my stray and put it into my protein shake, sometimes that ice tray doesn't have ice on it, but I'll still throw it in the, in, into the freezer. 0 (24m 19s): Right. So we have to refill that ice tray and, and that's where the flexibility of Mindfulness can really support us. So mindfulness being the ability to be open and receptive, having an open heart too, and our internal experience to redirect us to our purpose and, and so anxiety and emotions that really only lasts 90 seconds and less, we get caught up in the story of them. And so I don't know if it's a strength, but I think either you're onto something there because our life experiences and the challenges that we go through, they develop strengths within us. So if there's any, if there is an underlying anxiety that we've maybe experienced through a rough childhood or whatnot, there's strengths that we've learned to cope with, that, that we can double down on and lean into. 0 (24m 60s): And then, so perhaps there's something to play off that 2 (25m 3s): Cause they, I mean, I guess the idea is that they might have served you once. Like if you were a child and you develop some sort of anxiety or some sort of fear around something, they had served you when you were a child. Sure. But as an adult, they just don't serve you anymore. So the idea, I guess, then is to rewrite them somehow. Okay. 0 (25m 18s): Well, Eric, I really appreciate the perspective you're bringing in here. And I think that's why a lot of work as a clinician is about validating people's experiences. Because again, if we don't validate our own emotions and we recognize that we've come by them naturally, we're again struggling with him and we're going to get more caught up with them. And so when I'm working with clients, whatever their experience is and their emotions are me just saying, you know, it's, it's understandable that you're having that experience, gives them the opportunity to accept that, to open up to it and to redirect towards, you know, what we want to move towards. And so funny, you know, the Carl Rogers had this quote, as soon as we can accept ourselves for who we are, then we're able to change. 0 (26m 0s): And it's because when we extend ourselves, we no longer feel like s**t about ourselves. And when we don't feel like s**t, we can take a lot of change and, and be a lot more productive. So I think you're onto something with that. And again, it comes back to that ice tray analogy. It works typically, but not always right. And, and we're on time right now where we're all feeling overwhelmed and having to pivot and adjust. So I, I appreciate you bringing that in. 2 (26m 22s): Yeah. That guilt is just so immensely powerful if you allow it to sink in. Right. I would have. 0 (26m 29s): Okay. And so I've worked at a couple universities in the counseling center and they would come in often with a frustration of procrastination. Right. And I would say, okay, just when you go to do your work, just sit down at your desk before we even open anything up, just sit and allow whatever emotions to arise too, and just be present to them. Don't do any work, just sit and allow the guilt, the shame, the anxiety, to just be there and not get stuck into it, allow it to pass and then jump into your work because what as an oar or they're just working to avoid or control that. And then they'll pull out of their work too easy. And it's actually kinda going on in that mindfulness or meditation angle. It's important for us to also use meditation as not another way to avoid our internal experience. 0 (27m 14s): So a lot of people can go into a meditation thinking I need to feel great after this, or I need to quiet my thoughts. And that again, is kind of looking at that smaller box away to take control or a void, as opposed to really the heart of meditation's becoming familiar with what our internal experiences. And so I always know people are in that avoidance trap when they're coming out a meditation saying, I can't do meditation or like, you know, I'm not calm. Yeah. 2 (27m 40s): Well, I mean, you worked a lot with extreme sports athletes, Olympic athletes, Renegade, Entrepreneurs a, you work with people that literally put themselves on purpose way outside. Their comfort zone is way outside the social norm social constructs, and they have to operate on these levels, I guess. How does that whole tie in, do you have any stories or anything that can help us better understand exactly some of the tools and tactics that people like this can use to live a more high performance life? 0 (28m 8s): No, absolutely. So when we looked at that, this box, again, these things that we try to control or a void often, those are the things when we open up to, they bring us into Flow. So a lot of Flow training is about changing our relationship to fear. Often fear is something we avoid and try to mitigate, but we know that when we move towards something, we're fearful where we have to be vulnerable, we pay f*****g attention and therefore we get Flow. And so helping people open up to have the increase, willingness to live a valued of a life, to take action towards what they most fear, knowing that it on the back end of that they're going to often get into a peak performance state is a lot of the kind of groundwork, you know, and, and, you know, Eric and, you know, through our zero, the dangerous course with Flow Research Collective we focus on a lot of aspects of positive psychology basics. 0 (28m 58s): So we wanna be able to essentially help people move through the Flow cycle effectively. And, and so for your listeners to, no, we don't think of Flow is just an on and off switch. We consider their four stages of Flow that we need to be, that we need to do well at. So we need the struggle. Well, we need to, you know, if it's waking up in the morning and taking on that hardest task, first, we wanna kind of lean into that. And then what are we doing to release the second stage of Flow? How do we change our neurobiology so that what we can come back into our Flow activity, where ready to be locked in? So its we go from struggle to release, which can be an act of walk would be breathwork could be taking a quick, a bath or watching some humor comedy, and then coming back into our Flow blog and then really recovery on the back end, whether that's yoga, taking a nap, a eating food. 0 (29m 47s): So we wanna, first of all, was to work with clients is to build their lifestyle around the Flow cycle. So it's not just, okay, I need to enter it right now. And then, you know, I can do whatever I want and the rest of the day, it's like, no, we need to struggle. Well, recognize that struggling is not an option in a high performance. So that struggle, well first that's prioritized our release in that and recovery and then we're not going to be able to get into Flow more. And so I'd say that's the first tool to recognize that Flow is a cycle and there's a lot of other's and we know all the Flow triggers, which will go through South of them now or what they do again is they Dr our attention and the present moment and the reduced the amount of thinking or our cognitive load, the flow triggers are some of those first three principles. 0 (30m 28s): I said earlier, clear goals, immediate feedback, and a challenge to go balance. Also novelty. We know that when we're in a novelist place, such as travelling, we get him with a dopamine norepinephrine that focuses us on the present moment. So novelty is a great Flow trigger, but we can talk about risk, whether its a social risk and emotional risk with creative risk, for sure, a physical risk, we all know if we've ever been in a car accident or played extreme sports. When we're in danger, we pay attention. We get Flow. So using risk is a flow triggers is a great, I wouldn't recommend write off about using physical danger as the window. And we know that gratitude is a flow trigger. So we were gratitude where we were grateful sari, we connect two, a sense of humility. 0 (31m 10s): And I think that's a big piece we can maybe riff on a bit is when we're talking about Flow we're talking about shifting from the conscious explicit mind to the unconscious and when we're egomaniacs, when we're stuck in our, our ego or our emotions, which are often fueled by our ego. So when we practice gratitude, it quiets down. That's what a lot of people love psychedelics because it kinda connects us to a sense of a small self and a sense of awe. And so that again helps us just be present and get a lot more flowing in that way. So I don't know if there's an angle there that you guys want to jump on, but I can go through a lot of other Flow triggers. 2 (31m 43s): We can't help, but notice that there is such a, such an incredible link between the esoteric way of thinking about it. And then the actual flow States, for example, and Flow there is You you call the dark side of the Flow where there is inevitably. Well, so there's two things, one the dark side of Flow, which is You leaning into something that's really going to kill you. Right. And then some other things. And then also like there's the recovery phase. So you, you are in a flow state, you're pumped with all these neurochemicals that are just making me feel amazing. The endorphins a what is it? A dopamine. Okay. 0 (32m 16s): Dopamine, norepinephrine, serotonin and oxytocin. And the end of mine was endocannabinoid. Yeah. All the good stuff. Right? 2 (32m 22s): So all these amazing chemicals that is going through your mind and then afterwards, if you don't recover properly, You you literally lose all of that and you can slip into negative self-talk self doubt, all of these things that can really be a detriment to whatever the goal is that your working on. So recovery is such a huge thing. Now I know that when people, I don't, I haven't really experienced too much of this, but I do know that when you're, let's say in like a shamonic journey type of situation, if you travel into what they call the shadow Self and all these dark deep, the places, it almost releases the same kind of anxieties or the same self-doubts of as like a post Flow state or they can travel you upwards to this like higher self and this more creative realm of whatever. 2 (33m 13s): There's a lot of places where they intertwined. I feel like where Flow seems to be more spiritual at times when you're in those States and sometimes spirituality and itself can kind of pull you out of the dark places. Have you experienced anything like that? I'm not exactly sure 0 (33m 33s): For sure. Which angle, there's a few angles that you brought up one angle that you're mentioning its kind of maybe the shadow being confronted with our shadow Self in like a psychedelic or a shamanic journey. And we know that often, you know, we talked about in Flow is that ability to move towards fear. It's often that shadow self that says f*****g go for it. You know, it's that it's that relentless site. And so, you know, in psychedelic Richemont and experiences, or even in psychotherapy learning to accept that we have a darker side to us, it often opens us up to have a increased relentlessness to take action towards fearful activities. M that's one angle. It is kind of thinking about the other angle was I'm not sure to be honest about the difference between those shamonic experiences and Flow being a bit more spiritual kind of path, what I would share. 0 (34m 24s): And I know you, I think you've mentioned listening to the mapping cloud nine is that when we are on a high performance path with forever stuck, there is often a spiritual solution. And when we're on the spiritual path and we're kind of stuck, there's often a high performance solution. I really think that's a important thing to take away from our talk today that, you know, when we talk about Flow, we're talking often about a high performance path, we're talking about how to get accelerated learning creativity decision-making et cetera. And Mindfulness, and in my view at least is more of a spiritual path. So it's about, you know, when that high performance path forward gain that come down from Flow, you know, that's when being open and receptive to our experienced using Mindfulness can really be facilitative. 0 (35m 8s): I haven't done much of the shamonic journeys so I can speak personally. I've certainly done some psychedelics and correlate in the, in that way. But 2 (35m 15s): Yeah. Yeah. I read Michael Palin's book at a creative mind. I hadn't read that. Yeah. It's like some of the comments, some of the areas in his book, I just found like eerily familiar to the way that like in the Flow program, the zero to dangerous Flow program, that was a part of it. I just found that the way he talks about some of the psychedelic journeys that he's been on and his book as a journalist, we were just eerily similar to some of 0 (35m 38s): Like the experience you could have in a flow state. So when we, when I look, when I've looked at the Research on psychedelics, as far as like a subjective experience, what is occurring is that again, it connects us to a state of awe. So we kind of, you know, just in complete awe, just like when we're in nature and having like nature mysticism, and we look at these trees are nature mountains and just like so overwhelmed by the beauty of it. And as a result, we feel we connect to that Humboldt sense of self and therefore all of those emotions that are often a reflection of us kind of evaluating where we are in our life compared to where our ego wants us to be. All of that kind of shuts down and quiets down. And so we can get a lot more into, into the unconscious and move from there, with, with greater ease. 0 (36m 23s): So yeah, there's a lot of great research coming out on psychedelics mushrooms and whatnot. We'll see where the world goes here soon. 1 (36m 30s): So when it comes to Flow, is there a difference that you see between an athlete that's tapping into it versus a CEO that's tapping into it? That's like sadly maybe like in the financial sector versus someone who's trying to be a creative, like, are there different lanes if you will, of Flow and then is there like a recipe for creativity 0 (36m 54s): Billion dollar question? So I would say the cool thing about Flow is it was created by a guy named Mihai chick sent me Hi and how he developed the theory of Flow is he interviewed kind of the best of the best rock climbers, chess players, surgeons, athletes, and, and he found that there is these common, subjective experiences that they all had. So I would say the Flow experience is quite similar and, and doesn't depend on what context you're kind of moving through. So it's, again, you have this increased sense of body and mind emerging. So we feel that the dancer that is one with a dance, the writer is one with the words, there's a merging of body and inaction, there's an increased sense of time changing, slowing down, speeding up. 0 (37m 40s): There's an intrinsically motivating what we call an autotelic experience. So we do it for the sheer sake of doing it, which again, kind of leads to potential dark side of it. And so there's this objective experience of Flow is actually quite similar. The neurochemistry of it is quite similar. So to answer your question, I don't know if it would be much different depending on who the individual is. I think that, or what their kind of performance arena is with that said, it's a great question. And what do you think canvas? What comes up for you? 1 (38m 12s): For me, I would say like, I've feel like I can recognize moments when I've been in Flow like retrospect retrospectively. I don't know that I can just get into it when I want too. And I also wouldn't define myself as a creative person. Like I, it's just not my strong suit and it's something that I always tried to work on and improve. So I don't know. I guess that's why I'm, I'm curious. Cause I feel like Eric is pretty creative and we just out of the two of us and then I've heard that accessing Flow can inspire creativity. Also we have done like a lot of work that kind of like leaned, we thought it was going to be more sciencey and ended up being more mystical, which I loved. 1 (38m 56s): So we went to the scene called Biocybernaut and it was alpha brainwave training and they were kind of explaining that a lot of creativity happens like when you are in a Hi feta state. So Flow is primarily alpha correct or it's okay. 0 (39m 13s): Hi alpha and beta 1 (39m 14s): Combo combined. Okay. So I guess that would make sense then. Cause when we did it, I have a lot of like naturally occurring Delta and my alpha was like improving during that week, but I had almost no data. So I don't know if I'm just like not properly getting into Flow. I don't know. It's tough. Cause like I would, I would get into like these really good like mindful places. Cause like they kind of like stick you in a black box for an undetermined amount of hours and like you do like lose a sense of time and S and Self and you just know that you're in like a different place. I don't know. 0 (39m 53s): Well, I'd encourage you to maybe play with Candice. So we talk about in zero to dangerous, a lot of separating what we call a kind of divergent thinking from convergent thinking. So diverging his, that creativity that, that planning strategizing maybe a Korean content, whatnot. And so we want to separate that kind of mode of thinking from convergent thinking, which is really kind of executing on those goals that maybe you created in that a divergent thinking session. So I would give yourself an opportunity to, you know, it sounds like you're really great convergent thinker. You can execute quite well. It sounds like. And then as far as they create a place, like give yourself a scheduled times to open up and be more receptive to, to creativity. 0 (40m 35s): And some other tips that might help is reading novel material. So reading kind of literature, that's out of the norm for you. And you're going to kind of recognize some patterns and that that might spark some creativity as well as a team, as far as mindfulness or meditation. And a lot of meditation is like single pointed meditation. And so that's more that convergent thinking. And so I would encourage you if you want to get into more of a creative kind of the state of mind, du more kind of open body awareness meditation. So just observing what's occurring, not trying to shift your attention or awareness anywhere, just, just being completely receptive of what's a, what's a rising and that can help maybe open up some more of that kind of pattern recognition, those or a couple of things I would suggest. 0 (41m 18s): But I mean, I'd be curious to see if you really aren't a creative person is I believe we all have that within us. So Brent one of our last conversations you had mentioned some mindfulness retreats. These were, I think there was like a week long retreat where you meditate all day. I'm super interested in doing like that. Could you 2 (41m 34s): Help us understand a little bit more about the benefits of it and what actually happens in there? 3 (41m 38s): Yeah, for sure. So I did one in that way, 0 (41m 40s): Paul and I did one in India. So the one in India was a place called two-seater meditation center. It was just above where the Dalai Lama lives. And so, and I traveled throughout to India and you go to this one place called the MacLeod guns and its all monks out there and it's up in the Hills is a really beautiful spot. So this meditation center was really focused on teaching. What's called the Mahayana Buddhism. So this is what the Dalai Lama represents and, and my ENA and Buddhism it's there's to kind of Wing's to it. So if we can imagine enlightenment in their context, it takes two wings. So the wing of personal wisdom and then the wing of compassion. And so that's why when they meditate, its kind of the wing of wisdom, the wing of compassion built on to each other. 0 (42m 24s): And so in this retreat we, we learned a what's called the Lamrim. This is the whole teaching of Buddhist kind of philosophies and a lot of Buddhists kind of retreats or centres and different lineages. Don't teach a lot of as much philosophy as just let's say meditation practice. So we learned there's lectures, there's the baits. And then there's a lot of, a lot of meditation for sure, as well as a lot of use of kind of mantras throughout our day. I will tell you this one retreat I went to in Nepal, we, we were asked, I won't say I was great at it. Take OSA positive affirmations to the pet goats so that they would be reborn okay. 3 (43m 4s): And a better life. 0 (43m 6s): That was a way that the Tisha was a two week meditation center introduction to Buddhism. And then in Nepal, I went to this place called Copan monastery. They have an annual course called third November course, which was really the first trainings where Westerners came across to Nepal to learn from a Buddhist monks. And so this experience was really wild. There's about a thousand monks living there at the time when I was there. And again, similar experience we'd wake up. We would go into the, the gold pot, which is kind of a, the temple we do a morning prostrations which are kind of like a, like a burpee where you're kind of praying to these DDS and these DDS and on Buddhism has a lot of different, it's a, there's not a God. 0 (43m 49s): That's what outside of us that we're praying to. We're praying to no one. We see these images of Buddhas to a state of consciousness that's already within us. And we're just trying to open up too and kind of have Revere for that. So we start off the day with doing prostrations and we go right into a meditation, more food, his philosophy and more meditation, small little meals and then more like Dharma study. So studying Buddhist texts and a very simple life. I could tell you that something I'd love to go back there with you at any time. So keep me posted. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I find it 2 (44m 23s): Fascinating. So it's Flow, I mean Flow itself is a con it's a different state of consciousness, right? And it sounds like that you had these meditation, meditative practices put yourself in a different state of consciousness and there are all of these different States of consciousness. I have two questions. One of them is from your experience with Flow with a lot of this spiritual retreat you've had access or at least you've allowed your mind to access all these different States of consciousness. Can you help me understand? Maybe I don't want to say the difference between each one. Cause I know that's probably really hard to articulate, but maybe if we identify each one that maybe you've experienced and then maybe you can share a little bit about those States of consciousness. 2 (45m 6s): And the reason why I'm asking that question is because I want to know if, if you believe in reincarnation, you talked about goats and 0 (45m 16s): Well, that's a good at that one. 2 (45m 18s): And he talked about positive affirmations and to go so that they can be, you know, move on to their level. But a lot of that to me, ties back to different vibrations or different States of consciousness, the whole idea of Carl Sagan talking about the fifth dimension, the fourth dimension and all these and all of these things. I mean, we've, we've experienced some human beings that can say that they can access consciousness of the spirit world, all of these, all of these things. I would like to hear your take on all of that. 0 (45m 45s): Okay. Well I'm afraid I might not have a lot to say. 2 (45m 49s): Okay. So as far as the different States 0 (45m 51s): Consciousness that I've experienced. Yeah, it's, that's an, almost an impossible question to answer with that being said. I recognize that who I am as the observer of all these States of consciousness. So while on my body and my mind might be experiencing things from childhood of anger or frustration to peak moments, I try just over and over again to ground myself as the pure observer of my experience. And so when we talk about what do I believe in afterlife or whatnot? My personal belief is that consciousness is not my body and not my mind and consciousness is, is ever pervasive. So I'm curious to see what happens, but I think that that was one of the things when I talk about shifting my life from India, once I realized that, you know, I'm not my body and not my mind, I was no longer identifying with something that was ultimately going to die or is a, is, is in jeopardy. 0 (46m 46s): And that freed me again to lower my, my fears, my anxieties, my, my defensiveness. Cause you know, if I lose an arm, yes, I'm going to lose some of the things I can do, but I'm not going to lose my sense of who I am as the observer. And, and so I've always tried to ground myself since those experiences and identified with myself is just the observer of all my experience, all of those States of consciousness. So I've experienced them, but it's not who I am. That's just been a lot more easy of a way for me to move through through my life 2 (47m 17s): Is more like take on more experiential. I don't want to say passive. That's probably a wrong way to put it, but maybe surrender to the ideas of these consciousnesses and say, okay, cool. That was a cool state of being I'm observing. I appreciated it. Let's move on to the next one. 0 (47m 32s): We realize that when you experiment with some psychedelics that its a, its a bunch of neurochemicals that are flowing through you that are making you enter these different States or seeing things differently are perceiving them differently. And when you've consciously experience that through neurochemical or through psychedelic use, you recognize that it's all just neurochemicals that are, that are impacting the state of consciousness. So I don't, I'm just not as someone that, you know, I don't kind of have visions of angels. I don't speak to other people. I don't have any of that psychedelic or a kind of a psychic kind of experiences. It's not a realm that I live in it. My realm is quite grounded in, I just want to be in peace in this moment. 0 (48m 15s): And, and I don't go off into some of those others that others have some scale or a affinity towards that. 2 (48m 22s): Yeah. You and me both. 0 (48m 26s): I mean, I'm open to, we know when people will tell me they had, there's a lot of people that are really interested in, you know, the multiple layers of, I can't even name the difference kind of a people that they speak to or the different galaxies or what not. And its for me how I interpret that I don't dismiss it. But what I understand that is it's again like what we're talking about. It's different States of consciousness and it's not nothing for me is like a there's no God in the sky, there's no person, that's a state of consciousness are in this galaxy thats talking to us is just coming to a different subjective experience and we're interpreting it through this lens of these symbols and we can use whatever symbol is. 0 (49m 8s): We wanted to represent those. But yeah, I don't get too much into that. 2 (49m 13s): Yeah. And that the way I've always seen it is that 0 (49m 16s): Use even trying to think about it, to be honest. 2 (49m 18s): Yeah. It's, it's hard. The way I've always seen is that, you know, we've we have as a child, so we have a six month old child and to see a child orient themselves in the world, orient themselves in consciousness is just really interesting to think that all the stuff that we're teaching, all this stuff that we're like the reality that is being taught to a child all the time. These are the experiences that eventually add to who they are as the person, right? These experiences we talk about going back and maybe old anxieties or old fears exist to protect us from something or they served a purpose in some way. They started purpose a long time ago. But in the end I love how Michael, he, he has a really cool analogy about the human mind and the human brain being a software and hardware and how over time we are uploading all of these software programs into the brain, which is the hardware. 2 (50m 13s): The difficult part is to unright that, that software. But if you unright that software all the way back down to the beginning, you are essentially what could be interpreted as like pure consciousness, this blank slate, this, I like this creative potential palette in a way. So I would just find it really interesting to hear people's perspective on the human mind and consciousness and where it can go and different perspectives. Cause it's really hard to sit down and say that someone else's perception of reality is, is right or wrong. Right. Cause it's, it's there it's, it's real for them. You can't say it's not real, even though I haven't experienced, I don't see, I can't see ghosts, you know, but I think its cool and, and, and its own way, 0 (50m 58s): The mind is infinitely creative. And so I, I agree. I, you know, I don't, it's not the way that I've seen the world, but I'm totally open and receptive to and understand that it, it serves a purpose. You know, religion, spirituality at all helps us create structure in our consciousness. And that's what Flow is. You know, we can be completely overwhelmed by thinking or going in any different area are way of life. But if we have some sort of belief system, whether it's religion, spirituality, angels, or whatever, it may be, it gives us some structure and that's where we can move towards and then find flow in. And so, yeah, I love my Teresa analogy that you're saying Eric, and for me it, his emphasis on that, all we need is already within us and that kind of base awareness that we have the capacity to enter Flow and it's often, as Rumi says, you know it with love. 0 (51m 48s): We often just need to remove the obstacles from, from entering that. And that's a lot of those stories and beliefs that others have put onto us. So as you guys are young parents, I want to share one thing that I often really think about with young parents. And, and as we grow up is this aspect of conditioned love, right? So this, this phenomenon where we tend to reward our children or whatnot, when they do things that we want them to do and to kind of mold them and certainly there's a place for that, but it can also help or can lead to children developing like an, a, a persona, right? So I have this external persona now that I know mom and dad really like, so I'm going to keep kind of fueling that at what that can do is separate us from our authentic self and our intuition and our gut and all of that. 0 (52m 35s): We've kind of been focusing on today. So as you guys move throughout your life, his parents, I encourage you that as much as possible to try to stay away from that condition love. And I'm sure you already do this and we'll do this, but, and to reinforce the child taking a autonomy and a lot of those Flow triggers so that they can have a genuine connection to who they are. Right. And not who others think they should be. 2 (52m 59s): That's really interesting. So the, but now I got it. Now I need to get into that. So, so you're saying it kind of works both ways where the ego might be there to protect you and create these anxieties and fears. That's the way you want to put it. And, but there's also the grand juror side of it where you present them with a reward and it creates a persona around that reward saying, okay, this is the way I should 0 (53m 26s): Thinking externally vs. This is the way I should be. Cause this the way I feel in this way, I wanted to be. And so we end up living lives, you know, we've all had people who got into careers or relationships where we find ourselves saying, how the f**k did I end up here? Like this is not the path that I wanted to take. And often it's because we're living within that ego and that persona that was conditioned within us to be what's right. You know, the right thing to do. I know for me, the relationships is always a good a example. We get into these relationships and you know, the person might take off everything we think in our cognitive mind is what we want. But the actual experience of being what the person is like, well, wait a second, this doesn't feel great, but we stay in it because we're in that story. 0 (54m 11s): We're in that persona. And that's what the persona was told is what's right. Or what, where we should move. And so coming back, you always, Lenny are our own experience in the present moment, inform us, is it of if this is working or not as well, I've had to learn through my life and my relationships, but yeah, that's interesting. So a very curious approach to parenting. Yes. There you go. Hmm. 1 (54m 36s): I'm reading that awareness book right now and it's like blowing my mind. I feel, I feel like I usually can absorb like spiritual books or like those kinds of abstract ways of thinking like pretty easy with this one. I have to keep rereading like almost every chapter because it's just so far away from where I am, I guess. So he, and I'm very, I'm like maybe it's my third time reading up to chapter three. I can do that. That's where I'm at right now with this book. But if I can remember properly, he was basically saying that you don't love anybody, but that is, that itself is like just like a human construct. 1 (55m 20s): Write that if you were to challenge that, you could say that like take your spouse for example. And you have to choose between happiness and your spouse. And almost every single time. If you think about choosing happiness, you feel guilty and you feel like you're supposed to choose your spouse. And then if you do choose happiness and you tell your spouse that more often than not, your spouse will be like, well, how dare you choose happiness over me? I would choose you over happiness. And now you have two people that chose each other over happiness. And now both people are unhappy like that. It's just like such a large concept to try to like break down into like an actual, like, to, I guess, like implement in this life. 1 (56m 2s): Right. And then he was explaining that through like, you know, childrearing and again, in romantic situations with like fidelity and infidelity and it's, I love you if and the trust exists. If so, it's like, you don't love the person. You love the idea of the person. And soon as they break that trust that you constructed in your head, it's just so much to unpack. But basically that the love isn't actually there for that person, like love exists, but it's all his conditional, right? 0 (56m 34s): In the sense of the way humans construct 1 (56m 37s): My idea of you. And soon as you break that idea of who you are to me than now, that becomes conditional. So my idea of you is to behave in such a way of like XYZ, right? Like to be my ideal version of a, of a husband slash partner have a father. Right. And then if you break those ideals that I have of who you are, not of who you have of who you are and that's where like that dissonance happens. It's a lot, 0 (57m 6s): No, We please say three more times, Candace. And then, okay. 1 (57m 10s): And why I've reread the sh I've re-read chapter one through three, like three times. Cause it's just so much 0 (57m 16s): Okay. What I'm getting from it and you did a great job articulating it is. I tend to try to think of love as kind of supporting someone with open palms that, that analogy as a post, like a closed poem, this is what I needed to do to how to be, or how to act like how do I just have unconditional love and acceptance for this person and to uplift them and support them. It's a, it's a very hard, a hard relationship. Relationships are hard. You know, one of the things that I learned when I was over in India and you know, this, you know, it doesn't always work, but the concept behind arranged marriages is really interesting. The way that it was described to me is people go into a partnership for the ultimate goal of supporting that other person to reach samadhi or enlightenment. 0 (58m 1s): And so whatever, you know, challenges come up in the relationship. If, if you guys, if, if you know, whomever have the altruistic wish that that person just reaches happiness, let's say then when we don't follow those scripts, there's a willingness to say, this person is going about their life in a way that they're believing is going to lead them to that happiness. And so there's an acceptance, but we were all ignorant and we all take bad paths of what we think will lead us to happiness and don't. But that was the, one of the biggest lessons to with, with my time over on the East was this concept of empathy. And to recognize that we're all seeking happiness and we go about it the best way we know how. 0 (58m 43s): And so when someone is doing something that's not causing us happiness, what we think is, you know, you're an idiot for doing that. If we just have the awareness that they're using that blueprint or that software that they think will lead them to them, to that happiness, it helps me relieve a lot of tension of, of trying to change our control or get upset with people. Cause I recognize, you know, we're all dealing with our own a journey to finding happiness the best way we know how right. 1 (59m 8s): I would say for like actionable steps, like for the average listener, like what would you suggest like that a day look like for them to be happier and to be in a space where that they can experience more often? 0 (59m 23s): Great question. Yeah. So think again, back to the Flow cycles. So Flow is a four stage cycle and we wanted to look at our data to see how we can go through this cycle, maybe two, maybe three times. And so again, the four stages, our struggle release Flow recovery. So for what that looks like in my life is we have a critical period to struggle well, right in the morning. Well, our self control, which is a muscle is fully replenished when we wake up. So that pivotal time we wake up for me, that's about five to seven it to do deep work. And you know, there's no distractions of the day that are going to come or already know on texting me, emailing me at that point. 0 (1h 0m 3s): So really prioritizing to take on the hardest tasks in your work or your profession right off the bat. And what people tend to experience is after maybe one hour of struggle work they've accomplished in that time is something that they've been pushing off because of all the fires they have to put out throughout their day. And, and so they've won the day already. So I really encourage your listeners too, to really prioritize that initial struggle phase. And that was a shift for me Candice and Eric, because I typically get up and work out right off the bat or do Mindfulness and now I'm jumping right into doing quick bit of work and using that release activity and that flow rate of activity as my Mindfulness and then my exercise and that reinforces the behavior kind of crushing in the morning. 0 (1h 0m 48s): And, and so there's a little bit of the science behind that is yes, one self control is fully replenished in the morning, but also when we're in sleep on Delta frequency. And so when we wake up, if we get engaged in other tasks, it can drop us down into beta. And so it's a harder leap to get back into Flow. But if we go write from a Delta or to take you on a task, we can get into that sweet spot of Hi alpha and theta right off the bat. So that's, that's one tip out encouraging to, to really do that effectively. It starts with obviously the night before. So making sure that, you know, when we get up in the morning to get from our bed to our desk, there's no other tasks we can jump in quickly and get a quick a reward for completing. 0 (1h 1m 28s): So no dishes, no laundry. And that's, you know, that's a big thing for me, if there's anything else, it will be an LP, a little anxious about it. We'll be all my cognitive load. And I want to take care of it. But if, but it's not leading me towards completing that first task. So winning the morning, winning the Knights and the other piece of belt winning the nights is we thought a little bit about the dark side of the Flow. We know, again, Self Control is a muscle. So it gets depleted by the end of the night. That's when most people fail with their diets, with abstinence, with self control and whatever that looks like for them. And so being protective of our evenings and recognizing that we're added increased jeopardy of falling off the wagon, so to speak is really key. 0 (1h 2m 9s): And, and so with that all said, I'd also encourage doing your, to do list at the end of your work case, that you can really crush that morning block. So having a clear plan for the morning, and for a lot of people working organizations, they can kind of start their day looking at emails tax, and then saying, okay, how do I wanna approach this day, have conversations with your colleagues and, and try to create that kind of system the night before so that you can just jump into that task. That's a needed to be kind of taken on before or without kind of reading and doing that divergent thinking of taking on all that information. Then the other aspects is let's prioritize release activities and recovery, active recovery can be anything from yoga and stretching a bath, a nap, whatever it is, all those, all what those do is replenish our self control and replenished that, that muscle so that we can have increased world power. 0 (1h 3m 3s): And so that those, or a few things that, that our chair right off the bat, then I'm happy to go more specific in any direction. Yeah, I've noticed a trend in, so take early two thousands, maybe pushing into 2010, social media has started become a social thing. The hustle culture was so prevalent where you need to work a hundred hours a week or 120 hours a week, or you're just not doing it right as an entrepreneur or as well. Is there a success? So, and I've noticed the shift, Michael Javez talks about at the Flow Research talks about it, how important recovery is and how important it is too, to own your schedule and own recovery. Can you talk a little bit more about recovery? Because I do think it is really important. 0 (1h 3m 46s): Yeah. So the key for us at Flow Research Collective is to have our neurobiology worked for us and not against us. And so if we're in that constant hustle mode, in a sense, you were dropped off then down into beta, a frequency and we get, we get flooded with cortisol. And as a result, we tend to make more decisions and that are more mistakes. And to have to go back and fix those mistakes, are we take action towards the things that aren't are top high priority. So its kind of a myth of, of hustling in having to rush. It can often, you know, impact our ability to be productive and go as high, as hard as goal's. And so yeah, we can see, we try to have our clients cap their work hours that are at 35 for weeks. 0 (1h 4m 26s): That's a seven hour Workday. And we really built in that recovery knowing that if we're able to step into Flow, we tend to be, or a study by McKinsey found that individuals are about 500 times more productive. So we know that if we recover well on the weekend, we come into Monday, we spend a significant amount of time and Flow what we can accomplish on that one day, what our study state peers might accomplish through the whole week. So it's a paradox much of life, his, but we recognize that when we step away, we can come back and be more effective and productive as is doing so Candice Eric, what do you guys do for recovery? 1 (1h 5m 3s): I've been really bad at it lately. I used to do yoga walks bath. Like those were all like my go tos and then having the baby. It's like, it's very hard to force yourself to have that time. 2 (1h 5m 18s): I started taking my sh hot showers and the evening that seems to help. It's a nice gap between if I get up from my desk and need to go and turn into like family, like dad mode, a shower, that gap between their and then walking the dog is a good one for me. And then I'll do a short stretches like mobility exercises or anything like that. Whenever I remember to do them and then weekly recovery, I try, I got into a really good habit. I haven't done about it a week or two, but I started doing these hour to two hour long yoga and meditation. Thing's on the weekends where I would break up, maybe do about 40 minutes of yoga and then an actual 40 minute long, 45 minute long meditation after that. 2 (1h 6m 4s): And I find that if I do those on the weekends, it's like, You you mentioned it before, how you pass things onto your subconscious mind and through Mindfulness like, it really helps you unpack those things. So for me, if I do those on the weekends and really let's just focus on the body through mobility and then the mind right afterwards through some meditative practice, I feel the stress of the week or whatever it was weighing on me, whatever it is sometimes just goes like out the door. And I can just focus on what I'm doing that weekend, which is usually family, family stuff. So that's, that's usually it right now, but we are working on building a house right now and we're putting in a infrared sauna cause, and that's what I learned from the Flow Research Collective and the zero to dangerous program is that infrared sauna is, is good stuff. 1 (1h 6m 53s): And trying to get him to take these yoga classes with me that the entire room is an infrared sauna essentially, and explained all of the health benefits and longevity that come from infrared sauna. And it takes him doing the zero to dangerous course for him to be like, Oh, have you heard about infrared saunas and how good they are for him? He was like, Oh, I had no idea. So now he's now he's in love with the idea. Someone else suggested it. 2 (1h 7m 19s): Yeah. It's hard to help our loved ones. You know, my psychologist can't work with their friend to many dual relationships. So we, he comes by naturally. We can take that personal. Can I have one last question? Okay. So if we have the time, so one, do you believe in destiny or do you believe in like an, a preordained path? And then before you had mentioned that you had followed a path of Euro and that leads to the impact that you're trying to make. And I'm curious as to what that impact is and what your tenure kind of plan on that. Great questions, big questions for a Saturday morning here. I appreciate it. 2 (1h 7m 60s): I do believe that ah, I believe in free will and I think, you know, once we start to believe in free, well, we can see that it exists. And once we have that perception that we do have an internal locus of control, we try to start to take action. I think often society 0 (1h 8m 16s): Can make us not recognize that it can make us feel like we're the victim of life and life is happening to us and that we're not making the impact. So I certainly believe in freewill. I love the expression, but we don't find ourselves. We create ourselves. So a lot of times when people are kind of telling me they're going to go find who they are and whatnot. Yeah. I went to India, myself. I wasn't defined myself as to create a new self of who I wanted to be. So I certainly believe in freewill in the, in that regard. And as far as my, my personal kind of destiny that I'm trying to live out here, you know, I kind of told you from the start, you know, I had a lot of anger as a kid. And so my journey these days has, has been over the last kind of 10 years too, try to enrich the professional journey with this gift of Mindfulness to one, help people live more non-violently towards themselves. 0 (1h 9m 5s): And also towards others. I really kind of got, I geeked out on Gandhi and Martin Luther King's kind of approach to nonviolence. And I recognized that in my own perspective, I feel that that aspect of not responding to the oppressor and how having them see the evilness of their doing through not responding can be applied to our own mind. So when I don't respond to my own judgements mound criticism, myself, there comes moments of insight. We're saying like, dude, like that's like, you don't want to listen to that. Like that's that's and it'll quiet down as a result of me not acting upon it. And so that's kind of my path. And for right now I am, I'm really excited to work with the Flow Research Collective as the head coach, I get to work with, you know, high performers all around the world. 0 (1h 9m 50s): Every day, I have a new ebook coming out next week on the dark side of Flow, which I'm really excited about and a podcast on the dark side of Flow as well, which is gonna go all into the neuroscience of self-regulation don't. So to try to jump into that and yeah, maybe we'll see some more a literature out of me in the future here. So I'm just super grateful to be where I am in my life. And it's been a long journey as a student to get here, but I'm very privileged and fortunate. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm excited to listen to Reed to educate these out. And I love to connect with your listeners. If you can follow me on Instagram nuance that just brent.com period or period T for Thomas period Hogarth or check on my website@brenthogarth.com and guys it's a, it's been a lot of fun. 0 (1h 10m 36s): Candice is really nice to meet you. Eric is very fortunate guy to have you as his partner and your, your child is very fortunate to have you both his parents. I'm sure you're doing an amazing job and I'm just fortunate to be friends with you guys. So thanks for the opportunity to chat with you this morning. 1 (1h 10m 57s): That's it for this week's episode. I hope you enjoyed it. If you have the time please rate and review and you can always hit subscribe to stay up to date with our latest episodes. I hope to have you back.