How to be Self-Aware and Improve Your Life | CPTSD and Trauma Healing Coach

HOW POWER OF LOVE CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE WITH CALEB KIDD COY

Michael: Talk to us about this journey for you to go from this place where you're barely surviving, you're going out you're living on tithing and donations, life is hard and you made a shift. What was that journey like?

Caleb: Yeah, absolutely, Michael. Well, you know, began with the era of the mindset that I was supposed to suffer, right? That it was good for me to continually suffer and scrape by, but then the reality hits you, right? It comes crashing down on your head that you're ultimately limited in so many ways and capacities from reaching more people, because of those limitations that you have placed on yourself. So, going, you know, the self-rescuing process and again, nobody can do this for you guys, right? At the end of the day, it doesn't matter how many good mentors and leaders, and trainers that you have around you. If you are not willing to take the necessary steps to free yourself. If you're not willing to put in the work and yes, mindset is a huge part of that.

So, you know, coming out of that and beginning to, build a legacy it was just so extraordinary, Michael because it was I remember back in the days of doing, you know, the outreach and working with all the nonprofits and here I am taking donations, living on donations scraping by to pay the bills, but in my heart, I was like – man, I want to get to the place where I host and pay for my own conferences, right? Where I bring in speakers where I can do this, I mean, it was always in my heart, I'll never forget the first vehicle I gave away. It was this, a minivan that I was using for campus Outreach when I lived in Carrollton, Georgia, and we were doing stuff on the campus and University, I drove around this van, I had the big magnet logo, Outreach on the side of the minivan, was a cool, little white Minivan, and it got to a point where I didn't need that anymore. And I was able to give that away to someone who really needed a car, who just really needed a vehicle, and no, it wasn't a Porsche, it wasn't a Ferrari, it wasn't a Lamborghini, but it was something that made me feel so good inside and I was just like, you know what, I was born to do this. I was born to be able to give more to serve more and to do more and so little things like that, right? That were just those pivotal moments in my journey that recognition that caused a spark and said, okay, you know, if I can give away a minivan, I can give away a lot more than that. And so, you know, again, I think there's this aspect of arctic goes back to our character, Michael and ultimately, what are we going to do when we start to have money? Your example is Perfect, Dude, right? Because most people are not prepared for it, we say, well, if I won the lottery tomorrow, I give half of it away and you know, I donate to all these remarkable charitable causes and then we see right? The reality of human nature and who we are within ultimately will come out.

So just like, pressure, you'll have money, wealth, influence, fame, fortune. Whatever it is, is ultimately going to bring out who you already are within. And so, I think there's this element to our journey where we are being forged in the fires of adversity and affliction if you will, that we are embracing the fact that our character is being honed to be a good and faithful steward in the little things because if you're not being faithful in the little things, how can you expect yourself to be entrusted with so much more and I think the universe is watching and looking and I was just like – you know what? There's this realization that it wasn't the right time, I think of, you know, early failed investments where I took a massive loss, right?

There was an oil and gas investment early on and I went in on it with one of my life coaching clients who were heir to the Hershey's chocolate family and it had the potential to do very very well for us, and it did for about a year and a half. And then, there was someone involved with the accompany that got busted for fraud, SEC got involved and boom, all sudden overnight, right? It's gone and I was just reeling, right? I mean, I remember the tears that I shed the heartfelt cries of looking up and going, you know, God Universe, why did this happen? Right? And so at that moment, there was again an opportunity in my life. Will I allow fear to dictate to me in the future that I'll be afraid to invest that I'll be afraid to take risks or will I recognize this as an opportunity that the Universe was trying to teach me something embrace it, and grow from it? And thankfully, I did the second part of that. And so it cultivated within me, this courage to confront and to overcome these fears, and we all have them, right? It's part of human nature, putting yourself out there, right? Just like we did in Dallas and putting it on the line, right? To do this speaking, to share our story, in our messages is not always easy like not everybody is born a natural public speaker, but there are those areas in our lives where we each have deep-seated and deep-rooted fears that we have to confront. And if we don't confront those, I'm convinced we'll continue to go around that mountain and the kind of things that we are believing in will not necessarily manifest in our lives until our character has been forged to that degree.

So for me, it was recognizing that each and every failure, if you will, every adversity, every mistake that I made was an opportunity to learn and to grow from it and to be a good steward and be trusted with more things.

And so, you know, now I'm doing that as more abundance is coming and I'm going, where do I want to put this? What do I want to do with it? Just getting past that selfish mindset, right? Michael, would, this was you experience this? You got all this money, all of a sudden I'm gonna go out and spend it on myself, right? I'm going to go buy this, I'm going to do that, there's a lot of discipline to be cultivated in there so that when people do start stepping into abundance, they don't blow it and start spending it on themselves.

HOW TO USE STORYTELLING TO CHANGE THE WORLD WITH NICK NANTON

Michael: You don't know until you know, and that means you have to put out the work. And one of the things I think about frequently as you know, we're always on this journey of this trajectory of constantly failing and I think people don't necessarily wrap their mind around that in order to build your dream, you are going to have to fell about 10 bazillion times and I heard you say something, fascinating man, and it stuck with me for a while since I heard you say it and you were like, your first project should never be your best. And that to me was like – damn, that's so smart, man. What does that really mean? Can you break that down for me?

Nick: Yeah. I try to get so people are always like worried starting as the hardest thing, right? And anything like starting a podcast, starting like just turning on that video camera and speaking to it. I mean, we all hit these challenges daily, like it's funny. I'm working on building my YouTube channel because it's one of the only places in the world that you could put a video and you get paid for it, like there's it's so simple yet I never really focused on this and so I should. So the guy who's helped me build my YouTube channels, like, hey, man, you need to do some clips in front of a camera like just sharing some of your like thought, leadership and knowledge. I'm like, how do I do that? Like, you know, just even me I when I do this stuff all the time I speak to people I knew if I got do interviews, but it's just out of my comfort zone because I don't do a lot of it, it's like, okay. I got to figure that out, so the hardest part is starting. So what I reason I talk about, you know, I basically say, I know that you're not sure where to start and every time I get an email from a new script writer or a new photographer or a songwriter, typically, I get a lot of songs like people like, hey, check this out, what do you think and certainly starting early in my career and I get it.

And what I typically, they weren't where they needed to be, I mean, it's just most of the world isn't, most things are not Blockbusters or number one heads, and that's okay because it the only way to learn how is by doing like process will give you progress, you got to keep going, you got to work with people better than you, you got to just do a lot of it. And so, my way of inspiring people is like, look if I told you that song, you just sent me that painting, you just sent me or that documentary just sent me was the best one you ever were going to make, would you be excited or depressed? And it takes him a second to think about it? Because like first of all, I got excited as you like, but no it is that the last one you ever want to do or do you want to get, do you intend to refine this craft and get better? And inevitably the answers like, no, no, this is I'm just starting out and so exactly, so let me give you feedback of, don't worry about it, you're only going to get better from here. Your first one is going to suck, and let's just keep moving and just focus on constant movement generally getting better.

So that's sort of why I started talking about that concept of like making people think about like, hey, if the thing you just sent me was the best you were ever going to do, you're never going to do better than that in your life.

You be depressed or happy and it reframes people thinking about oh, this is a journey, I do have to start, I'm not going to be offended if I have room to grow and so that's really sort of where that concept came from.

WHY TALKING TO YOURSELF IS GOOD FOR YOUR MENTAL HEALTH WITH KEVIN PALMIERI 

Michael: I asked a lot of people this question, how are you speaking to yourself? What was your internal dialogue like before and after that moment?

Kevin: Before it was victim, like not enough, not good enough, scarcity, no hope for a brighter future, it just a lot of negative self-talk, a lot of limiting beliefs and I still have my limiting beliefs and I always admit that I think it's important to be honest about that, not a bright future, very little hope. Now it's interesting Michael because it's like in a weird way, I know that I'll be as successful as I want eventually and that's just a strange existence for me it feels like I'm breathing thin air more often than not but now myself talk I guess the best way to put it before I had a very very fixed mindset and now my growth mindset is the thing that I lean on more often than not.

I was on a call yesterday with a potential client, you know, we're talking 20, 30, 40 thousand dollars a year and it didn't go the way I wanted it to. I got off the call and reflected and talk to Alan and I talked to my girlfriend and it was with the growth mindset of what can I learn from this? What is the lesson here? How can I take this into the future with me? Back in the day, if something goes wrong today, life is terrible and I have no way of recovering from that. So, I think it's just give me this, it's level of certainty that it might not seem like it might everything's crashing but you have the ability to change the future, to change your own future, to change your trajectory because you work so hard on yourself. Back then I had never read a book other than in school but you know, I only read what they force me to, I didn't know anything about self-improvement, I didn't know we were malleable as human beings and we could change our thoughts, I didn't understand the power of learning. So I don't think I had enough life experience to shift my thinking and then, like – after a rock bottom moment it's almost like in a weird way this stuff that you go through, on the way down to rock bottom is the same stuff that allows you to climb up from it. Now, if I took my life, obviously that wouldn't be the case and I'm gratefully here, but I think the stuff I felt on the way down is the same stuff I was capable using to crawl out of that. I think that's why rock bottom can really, multiply your journey, rock-bottom can keep the gasoline in your tank that you might not have others, it's an interesting place to order.

Michael: Yeah, and I love that you said that and you brought up this idea about turning the education. You know, recently I had John Lee Dumas on the show and he was talking about the idea that when he was at his rock bottom, a guy who's built multi Million Dollar business, who has probably arguably the number one business podcast on planet Earth, who all of these things he has in common with the same thing as people have brought on the show like Jordan Harbinger, people I brought the show like you or Alan or name anyone who's been on here where we have all turned to education as this source, as this flame for creating the massive change for what's next in our life. And for me, it was when I looked and I turned towards his personal development, here's what's really funny, man, I used to make fun of personal development. Who the fuck does those guys think jumping up and down, are you out of your mind? Now, I will say this, you see me out of conference, I'm going to tell you right now Kevin, I'm not jumping up and down, not my vibe, but I will be there with a notebook. Why did that shift for you? Like was it for me, it felt like fucking desperation, I was like, I don't know what else to do, right? What was it that shift? Because I know someone listening right now is in this position where they have ordered the book or they've never listen to the podcast and they just cannot quite wrap their head around, why personal development is actually so important?

Kevin: Yeah, it’s a great point. My favorite quote, the biggest difference between the person you are and the person you want to be is your habits. The reason you have the results in your life is because you either don't know enough to do something different or you're not doing what, you know, you should be. And for me, Michael, it was simple, I remember this is very, very, you know, singed in my mind. I would see somebody drive by me in a Corvette, or a Mercedes or a really nice truck and my natural reaction was always to say, it must be nice, it must be nice, it must be nice. And I think I realized very quickly that like, they are just doing something different than I am, they're just running a different algorithm, they're just playing a different game, maybe they did get lucky but they're doing something.

So it's easy to say it must be nice but what if I get curious about how they got it? That for me was a very empowering thing of I never felt like I knew enough in any regard like that's my kryptonite is lack of enoughness always and it still is. We're interviewing amazing people like you and it's like am I good enough to be in this room, that's something I still struggle with. Seven hundred episodes, you know a multi six-figure business from our Podcast, I still struggle with that, but I had to get curious about what are people actually doing to get the results? Because what I thought was going to work for me didn't. So I either do what I just did and expect a different result or I go get some more information and I'm the same as you. I remember thinking, Tony Robbins was a cult leader, I said, that's Alan I was like, I'm not going to read this book like I just have to feel good and things will happen because that was the story I was telling myself, like – self-improvement? What do you mean? Like, how is that going to make me more money? Then when I started listening, I started to hear these commonalities and it was like, interesting. So that's what these people did? Okay, and then I started to see more patterns. And for me it was going from the victim of it must be nice, the scarcity of it must be nice, to the abundance of like will let me ask this person, how they actually did it and then take those lessons. Books are like the wildest thing in the world, you know, it could be somebody's year, it could be somebody's life and it's a three to six hour read, and you can take somebody's entire existence, all of their lessons, all of their experiences into yourself figure out what works for you and then kick the rest. But like it's such an interesting thing, it's such an interesting opportunity that you can read a book and encapsulate, somebody's entire life and then use that for your own good. You know, I didn't go to college, so learning wasn't valuable to me, I think that's the thing at the end of the day Michael, I didn't value intelligence, I didn't value knowledge, I didn't value education when I realized that what I was doing wasn't working and I wasn't getting what I valued, I realized it was probably time to look elsewhere and that's what I did to get here.

HOW TO SHIFT YOUR IDENTITY - AND YOUR BELIEFS WITH JOEY BRAUN

Michael: What was there something like in this process in which you were reflecting on the past where you had to shift your identity and your beliefs about who you are?

Joey: Yes, it was a huge turning point for me. After I graduated from college that was my main goal to get through school, graduate from college. I went from Towson University here in Maryland all the way back to home in, New Jersey, I got a dog in college and needless to say, I got my dog for the wrong reasons, instead of and I had to take care of a dog, all by myself, back in New Jersey, living by myself and working. And since I went through a terrible breakup, right before I graduated, I was in a bad spot, a very depressed state. And when I look back on this, I realized why I had to go through that I feel like everything does happen for a reason, but I was so broken to the point where I was crying on my floor alone, not knowing what I wanted to do work in a job that I didn't like at all saying, okay, I keep having these thoughts and going down these mental patterns, and how I think about myself, and that moment on the floor I remember and this was after months, and months of the same thing it was this one moment I said, I can either flip to the next chapter of my book or throw this one out, a whole new one. And that was a powerful moment for me because I started to become open in that part of my life, listening to positive podcast, listening to or reading books and I started doing that slowly because I did that right away, I started to see a week after that, life doesn't have to be the way I thought, I think it does so I don't have to be my past, I don't have to be this identity of who I am because I realized like you said, from all that bullying, I put up this wall, I put up this shell and I just became essentially a robot. I didn't have emotionally intelligent conversations with people, I was never vulnerable, I was just always like, okay, I have two friends, that's great, and I'm moving forward. I'm just going to keep going, I don't trust people, I don't want to be vulnerable people because every time that I tried to either, I'd get bullied or the friend I would tell would tell everybody else and then I'd be hearing from that from other people in school, I didn't want to be open with people. I closed off from a social kid to an anti-social kid. My identity, completely flipped my personality flipped during that time period, between 12 and 22 however, I did realize in this moment alone, crying on the floor, that something told me I didn't have to be that identity anymore. I mean, the pass is going to be in the backseat, but they don't have to drive the car, right? You can drive or you wanna go, you can be who you want to be and when I realized that is when I started to make those changes and doing meditation, stretching, reading and implementing things into my life, that I'll help me move in the right direction and all those things helped tremendously.

Michael:  I think that we're often faced with what I'll call this juxtaposition of self in, which you have the ability to create massive change in your life in the way that you have or you have the ability to stay back exactly where you are and in that about was what were some of the first started to take because I think what happens is and this was my experience, you kind of have this idea this notion in the back of your head you sit with it for a bit, you go, okay, wait, maybe I don't actually have to be my past but often we get trapped and we get stuck there because we don't step into what's next.

What was really the Catalyst that maybe it's mindset, maybe it's action, I'm not sure for you but what was really the Catalyst that helps you actually step into what would ultimately become the change that you made in your life?

Joey: It was a step-by-step process for me. I knew in that moment that I'd had to take it literally hour by hour, day by day if I wanted to see change like I couldn't focus on a week or a year or even a day was a lot. The first thing, I did actually, the first thing I did was I think that morning I put I haven't run in years, I put my running shoes on a rant who miles, I didn't even know, I could run two miles. And on that run, I remember feeling exhausted and at the same time feeling free feeling like wow, I just did something I didn't think I could do in the spur of the moment after making a decision that I wanted to make a change in my life. That's what I started to see how malleable and plastic we are and how we can make changes in our life by a decision, right? And then I started running every single day and it wasn't two miles, I was pretty I think I did like a mile and also I started waking up early and making sure that I was up and ran that was the first thing I did now that I think about it I haven't even thought about that a long time.