E229: My 10 Unbroken Rules for life | CPTSD and Trauma Healing Podcast

If you don't stand for anything, you will fall for everything. I don't know who said that quote, I tried to Google it. I couldn't find it.

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What's up Unbroken Nation! Hope that you're doing well my friends.

Today I want to talk to you about my Ten Unbroken rules for life. I think very frequently, that's how we're going to start this episode. Sorry, kind of brain-dead today, to be honest with you because it's been a very intense day with a lot of different things happening in my life and I have to keep my commitments as I always say, and we said, we're going to do three hundred sixty-five episodes this year, so we're doing 365 episodes. And even if that means that I'm a little bit tired, today, we're going to get it in. And so bear with me, please, I appreciate it.

I wrote 10 rules for my life. And these rules are rules that I decided to implement into my life that I read every single day. They're on this piece of paper. You're watching online, you can see it, but if you're not there on a piece of paper. And I wrote them down because I believe very much so and vehemently in that the things that you write come to fruition. I also believe that when you write things down in the same way that I talk about writing down your goals multiple times a day that you have to bring it back to your attention, you have to look at and read these things. And one of the things I teach clients when they come through, Think Unbroken coaching, whether it's the one-on-one coaching or group coaching, or whatever, it may be, or even the app, which you can download if you go to the App Store, it's the think unbroken app. You can learn about why I teach people this, and the reason is because I think it's without question kind of the Cornerstone to kind of building these pillars in The foundations of think unbroken, because if we are in this position in which we understand, and we can look at what we create every single day, as our life, then that puts his in this beautiful ability to create massive momentum going forward. And I've talked about momentum before on the show. I think it's everything, right? Momentum is going to get you to where you want to go. And you're going to have hard days, you're going to have in between days, but I remember, so I guess I would have wrote my first set of rules probably in 2019 and they were pretty loose, they kind of, So, if you've ever done the think unbroken coaching, then you know that they kind of fall into the six principles of healing trauma.

In a couple of years ago, I think it was late 2019 or maybe even early 2020, when I was getting coached by Tom Bilyeu, he was telling me about his rules for life and I was like, “well, I kind of have some” and he said “well you can't Really kind of have these things, you either have them or you don't”. And I was like, “okay cool”. So I need to actually think about whether or not I actually have roles and I realized actually like by looking at them. They were really rules as much as they were kind of General statements, and in that and recognizing that I made a decision to sit down to write out my roles and to get very clear on exactly what it is, that are the agreements that I have with myself. And I think that in order for you to find success in your life, you're going to have to build out agreements with yourself and you can read all the books on trauma, you can listen all these podcast, you can go to all the courses, but I still believe that you need these rules for your life because they're going to govern the change that happens. Now, I think ultimately rules are going to change. They are meant to be changed, this is a living breathing document to me, and I went through these a few years ago on the show, may have been a couple years ago on the show and some have changed, some of stayed the same. And what I want you to think about in your life is, what kind of rules do you need to be able to prosper to be able to continue to move forward and to can you continue to grow and heal? And so, when I think about rules from my life, I think about them as positives. I don't think about them necessarily as I'm taking away. But instead I'm giving too, because I think we spend so much time having things taken away from us that I only make sense that we give things to ourselves.

And so I'm going to go through my rules with you and we'll dive in.

Rule number one, I do not get overwhelmed. Like I don't allow myself to get overwhelmed that doesn't mean there's not a lot on my plate, that doesn't mean I can't be tired like I am today, that doesn't mean that I can't have a million things that are vying for my attention, but I don't allow myself the any capacity of feeling overwhelmed. People ask me the like “man, you run three businesses, you’re coaching all the time, you have a podcast or always traveling, you're writing books, how do you not get overwhelmed?

Twofold, one, I don't waste time doing stupid shit. Now, stupid shit is defined by me as stupid shit, so that's wasting time on things that don't bring value to my life. Now, that's not to say and of course you guys know this on the occasional, I'll hang out, I'll play video games, but that's once every six weeks to two months. Generally speaking, I'm pretty forward momentum moving. So, when I think about getting overwhelmed, I think that it's an emotional reaction to stimulus. And so I really just try to break down things into what needs to be done today.

The next one is, I will do anything within my value system and the law to obtain my goals. This is so important to me, because as someone who's probably, I'm sure I'm past any statute of limitations, I probably have at least 30 felonies. I'm not joking. I know people are going to be like, what the fuck? Yes, I do. Because when I was a teenager, I was a psycho because I didn't know any better and I was running with the wrong kids, we were involved in a lot of illegal activities, we heard a lot of people, we sold a lot of drugs, broken a lot of houses, stole a lot of cars, but it is what it is. I'm not going to lie. And so from me, operating in my value system, but also the law is incredibly important, and I want to reach my goals. And so, you know, my values honesty, kindness leadership, self-actualization and no excuses. So if I can leverage those two things then I can, I honestly feel like I can reach any goal. But there are foundational and then I don't allow trauma to determine my self-worth value, or my beliefs and what that means is recognizing that “yes. I am the sum total of all of my experiences leading up to this moment, but I do not, I do not have to be defined by those experiences, instead they can inform me, I can learn from them, I can grow from them, I can use them to better my life, the world, my relationships, my community, but I will not allow them to determine my self-worth. Now, that doesn't mean I don't struggle at times and intimate relationships and friendships and business and career in this because I do, but that means that there's an opportunity to learn and grow through that.

Number four, I put honesty above everything and you know honesty is my number one value and it's hard as fuck to be honest all the time. It's hard to tell people you know, I don't know why I said that, I just lied. It's hard to tell people, I let you down, I didn't do the thing I said I was going to do, it's hard to tell people, I lied, cheat, stole, whatever it is, right? And so with that, one of the things I've come to know about honesty is, there delicate ways to deliver it and I have not always been the most delicate and so a caveat that I'm adding to this is that I'm going to put honesty above everything except for kindness, because I think that one of the things I've done poorly in my life is to be able to leverage honesty while also being kind and empathetic. So, I'm constantly trying to grow into that a little bit deeper.

Number five, I will learn whatever I must to understand to what I don't know. You've heard me say this before, you've heard other people say this before, the quality of your questions, determines the quality of your life. And so I'm willing to be victim to public ridicule, shame, judgment, guilt, humiliation, I don't care, because as long as I'm learning like, I do not care about the byproduct of asking the question and raising the hand and in that, I'm fearless. So for me, like learning and being willing to understand is worth raising the hand and if you're, I will say this, I don't want to embed rules on people, but I will say, you may want to consider making a rule your willingness to learn no matter what. Because if you're willing to learn, no matter what, you will learn, I promise you because sometimes I'm with people, I'm in, I'm being coached I’m with, you know, amazing human beings on this planet and they will say things and I'll be like, “what? Can you break that down for me?” And they will, and it's really incredible.

I put healthy food into my body. So number six, the consummate battle, this is probably the biggest one in my life. I've gotten better with it over the years so I read David Sinclair's book lifespan and holy shit, did that change the way I think about the food I eat, and I've watched the documentaries, I've seen them all the food documentaries, all the diet documentaries, but it was reading that book that really became profound for me and also doing a lot of Health work recently through a company and I'm not associated with any of this through 10x Health Systems and through Biohm, I did a sequencing through Biohm and I was like, “oh shit, the thing I'm eating every day is actually making me sick according to my gut microbiome. You talk about a mind-blowing moment, I was like, “wow, holy crap, I cannot believe that”. So now I think about healthy food, I have a list on my phone of all the food I can eat that, I cannot eat and then that I can eat sometimes. So on the list of my, can't eat foods, are some of my Favorite foods, and I, you know, there's something to be said about the willingness to not sacrifice your physical well-being for a few moments of mouth pleasure. And that Sensation that you get from whatever it might be.

Number seven, I'll ask for help when I need it. This comes back to that raising the hand idea except a little bit more in depth. I'm willing to ask for help, I'm willing to reach out to people and say, hey, I don't get this, I'm willing to say hey, I need somebody else on the team. I'm willing to say I can't carry this on my own. I'm willing to ask for help. I spent a long time, not asking for help and so when I think about the way that that role plays a role in my life, it's about understanding that it's okay to have vulnerability.

Number eight is, I do not judge myself. That, again, we talked about this all the time mindset, what you think, becomes what you speak, what you speak, become your actions, your actions become your reality. I could make the most massive fuckup on planet Earth, and I'm going to not judge myself. I'm going to instead look at it and say, “Okay, what do I need to do here, what did I learn here, how do I need to show up, what do I need to take away from this?” Because when you're judging yourself, and it gets deep, right? Because it get into shame and you get guilt and you get all the things that are the byproduct of that and you don't learn anything. So my thought was like, ‘okay cool, can I fuck up and learn?” And so ask yourself that like as a rule of your life, can you fuck up and learn, like that, that might be what I change the rule to like the role as I'm allowed to fuck up and learn because I refuse to judge myself, I refuse to have guilt or shame for anything I do. And maybe that's a weird way of looking at it, and I know people are like, “you know, maybe you should have guilt and shame for Or some things” and I go, “maybe” but also I'm learning and I normally if I fuck something up it's because I never been in that situation before. So, you know, I think you know, the old adage is the first time, you know, it's a mistake the second time, you're learning the third time, you're making a decision, and I think that for a lot of what's been happening in my life, it's just been a lot of learning, it's been a lot of figuring it out.

Number 9, I will always risk making mistake over questioning what if. So, this comes down to that idea of the deathbed being willing to find myself on my deathbed as a successful person, and that to me means putting myself in situations of risk of, jumping off the diving board or heading out of the plane with the parachute or maybe without, I don't know, we'll see what happens. But also being willing to put myself in a situation to be successful and that comes to that team mentality, right? Time, effort, energy, money, T-E-E-M, time, effort, energy money, what am I willing to risk to get what I want out of it and that's what I often think about because that what-if scenario that regret scenario’s fucking terrifying to me. And then finally, I am patient and willing to sacrifice to make my dreams a reality. Patience is not a virtue. I hate that people say that like it drives me crazy like sure, 2000 years ago, it made sense, right. And 400 AD, 500 BC, whatever it made sense, fine, patience is a fucking skill, you've got to learn patience, you have to develop patience, you have to ingrain patience in yourself, like patience is not, is not as simple as it being a virtue. There are very, there are so many virtuous people who are not patient, right? And I've had to learn patience over the course of my life and it's played huge dividends. This is why, so, you guys always hear me say my goals are 37 years away and even in five years, my goals will be still be 37 years away, that's because of this idea of patience. And so what I want you to think about is can patience be a rule that plays a role in your life. Now, these are just my rules, these are the way that I show up. I put, I write these, I look at them, they're on my desk, I read them every single day when I start my day, just as a reminder of who I'm going to be today, reminder of how I want to show up and how I want to live in the world and so if you’re not in this place in your life where you've created rules, I challenge you to just sit down for a little bit and write out even three just say “I'm the kind of person that does this” and see how that intertwines into your life, and if you can get up to 10, like I really think that's where you start to solidify a further and deeper understanding of yourself because we have arbitrary rules growing up, like one of the things that piss me off more than anything is you're being a little kid and be like, I have to raise my hand to go to the bathroom, that's the dumbest shit on planet Earth. I get it because it's like you don't want the kids leaving the classroom, but at the same time I'm like, let me be a human being and figure it out or you know, when you have to call into the office because you're four minutes late, like that's so dumb to be so arbitrary. And so I thought to myself instead of living life and rules that I think are dumb an arbitrary and people may think that they're brilliant and necessary, so everybody thinks differently, but ultimately what I what I want you to think about is what are the rules that you need in your life that are going to help you prosper? Better help you go to what is next in your life, and just grab a pen and a piece of paper and write them down because I promise you, it's going to be incredibly beneficial.

Unbroken Nation, thank you so much for listening.

I appreciate you.

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And Until Next Time.

My friends, Be Unbroken.

-I'll see you!