2024 Recap – Guilt & Shame, Showing Up and a Military Grade Mindset | Elite Performance Podcast #63

00:00:00:02 - 00:00:18:03
Itamar Marani
The guilt. It never ends. People like me, the guys that can't be in reserve duty right now, that they feel guilty about not being in reserve duty. The guys in Gaza feel guilty about not being active on October 7th. Guilt and shame in and of themselves, just feeling without doing something about it - it's not helpful. It's just a cycle that keeps going.

00:00:18:05 - 00:00:38:06
Itamar Marani
Welcome to the final podcast of 2024. Today, what we're going to be covering is the top ten of 2024 debrief. I'm going to be sharing my three main lessons. The three things I'm excited about for 2025. One fitness hack that I found that is very simple but very impactful. And I'm going to be leaving you with three questions to help you achieve more in 2025.

00:00:38:08 - 00:00:56:21
Itamar Marani
So first off, we're going to get started with the three main lessons. So for me, this year was a challenging one. There was obviously everything going on back home, but there was also my ability to deal with it. This year was very challenging as far as the fact that it shook up my identity a lot, that there was a war going on back home.

00:00:56:21 - 00:01:16:22
Itamar Marani
And as someone who's an ex special ops person and also built the brand about it and talks about it a lot, I wasn't able to contribute in the way that I'm used to contributing. I was no longer eligible for reserve duty because of age and because of inactivity, and it was a very, very difficult thing to wrap my head around that this was going on.

00:01:16:22 - 00:01:34:18
Itamar Marani
And yet for whatever reason, I wasn't able to do what I thought I was supposed to be doing. And it was very hard. And I felt a lot of guilt and a lot of shame around it. And the lesson that I want to share is, first off, that guilt and shame are just very unhelpful. They don't do anything positive.

00:01:34:18 - 00:01:54:06
Itamar Marani
They don't drive action unless they obviously they can. But guilt and shame in and of themselves as feeling or without doing something about it, it's not helpful. And I think it's about having it as kind of a raise of is this driving some sort of positive action? Okay, if not, then it's time to let it go because it doesn't help you and it definitely doesn't help everyone else.

00:01:54:08 - 00:02:13:09
Itamar Marani
And I think there is a kind of human pattern where sometimes we feel that other people are suffering. So the way we can help them is by showing that we're hurting too. And while that may help, it doesn't really do much. It doesn't have a lot of impact. It just causes everybody to get down instead of thinking positive.

00:02:13:14 - 00:02:31:08
Itamar Marani
For me, the biggest thing that helped me turn the corner on this was actually a conversation with my mentor. So I was in Israel in July and I got to speak with him. My mentor is the former Mossad head of psychology, and he's now also the person who's in charge of the whole hostage situation in Israel as far as the psychological aspect.

00:02:31:08 - 00:02:52:05
Itamar Marani
So when hostages get taken back, whether through deals or whether through operations, he's their first point of contact to help them debrief both psychologically and to gather information. So it's a wealth of information around that. And me and him had a very deep and insightful chat over at his place. And the main thing he told me was that the guilt.

00:02:52:05 - 00:03:17:14
Itamar Marani
It never ends. And I think I'm going to be speaking again to consider what's going on in Israel right now. But it's it's true for everybody. It's part of the human condition that there's always levels to more guilt. So he was saying that people like me, the guys that can be in reserve duty right now that feel like they're fighters, that they feel guilty about not being in reserve duty, The guys that are in reserve duty but not in active right now in Gaza or in the north, they feel guilty about that.

00:03:17:16 - 00:03:41:09
Itamar Marani
The guys that are active right now feel guilty about not being active. October 7th, the guys that were actually fighting in firefights in October 7th, they feel guilty. There were only two firefights instead of three. The guys that were in eight firefights feel guilty that they weren't in nine and the guys that were in nine firefights feel guilty that they only got shot in the leg while their friend got shot in the chest.

00:03:41:11 - 00:04:13:08
Itamar Marani
And how there's just this never ending cycle of guilt and shame and that it's just a cycle that keeps going. Now, the reason that was so interesting for me is that a lot of times we feel guilt or shame. We think there's a valid reason for this because I'm not doing X, therefore I should feel what. And when you hear these kind of stories that are not logical, that if you just got shot in the leg, you should feel guilty, that you getting shot in the chest, it all of a sudden bring something to light that maybe this isn't a logical thing.

00:04:13:08 - 00:04:36:22
Itamar Marani
It's just a feeling that we all have. It's basically it's not that you have a specific issue that it's valid for you to feel guilty around, but it's just the issue that we as humans, we feel guilt and we feel shame sometimes around certain things. And for whatever reason, for me, understanding it from that perspective that, you know what, I would have felt guilt and shame around this no matter what, unless I have basically been shot in the chest as well.

00:04:37:00 - 00:04:58:06
Itamar Marani
It allows me to release a lot of that. And it was a big lesson for me because I recognize that this is one of those things that I think for me was the first time really dealing with feelings of guilt and shame my life at that level. That is also something that doesn't help. And that was a way for me to let go of it in a way to recognize that it's not my issue is not a specific, valid reason.

00:04:58:06 - 00:05:18:07
Itamar Marani
I should feel guilty or shame, but it just how everybody feels. And therefore it probably means that I'm not doing something wrong. It's just part of the reality so we can move past it. So that was lesson number one, that guilt and shame aren't helpful and a lot of times a way to get over them is just understanding if you're actually doing something wrong or if it's just part of the human condition that sort of speak.

00:05:18:07 - 00:05:39:05
Itamar Marani
It's not your issue, not your specific problem, but it's the issue. We all go through it and therefore maybe you can let yourself slide that you're not doing something wrong here. That was lesson number one. Now, with that, this year was I felt like a winter in a lot of ways with everything going on back home. We also had a lot of JV partners in the business, decided not to work with us because of that.

00:05:39:05 - 00:05:56:00
Itamar Marani
They just didn't want to touch anything that could be mildly considered political. Even if we didn't talk about politics, is the fact that I'm enjoying the brand. And while that is a reality that I accepted when I took on this brand, it was also pinched. There's no way around it. And what was weird is that we had the biggest year in the business.

00:05:56:03 - 00:06:14:03
Itamar Marani
We crushed a lot of records. We had a six figure one on clients coming in, which was a dream when I just started this business, the book project was rolling really well. We really upgraded the arena and got amazing client results in the past in-person event for Arena alumni or something we hosted for free for people that have graduate program.

00:06:14:03 - 00:06:36:18
Itamar Marani
We had 40 people come in from all over the world and attend the event. There's lots of big wins all around, from even going to conferences and to my surprise, having speakers put my picture up on their slides saying that I really helped them. We had a lot of really good things happen that when you look from the outside and you think, well, those are really big wins, I must have been really excited and the reality is they didn't.

00:06:36:20 - 00:06:59:12
Itamar Marani
And I think that's a part of life that sometimes you're going to have these winter seasons that happen for a variety of reasons to you and your personal life and things that should feel good don't. But the reality is you can still have certain ways of approaching this. And I think this is lesson number two, that you can still show up regardless of how it feels.

00:06:59:14 - 00:07:14:14
Itamar Marani
There are two ways I look at it to deal with winter times. One, you can give yourself the space to heal and you don't claim that you're burnt out and just completely let it go and say, okay, I don't have to do any of this. I'm off the hook, so to speak, because I feel a certain way. It's option one.

00:07:14:16 - 00:07:35:03
Itamar Marani
An option, too, is to take breaks as you need to recover, but keep chipping away and showing up regardless of the emotions, regardless of how you feel. Now, the reason I choose number two is that I strongly believe that the feelings will eventually subside, but you'll have the situation that you either did or didn't put in the work to create.

00:07:35:06 - 00:07:55:12
Itamar Marani
Regardless, you're going to wake up at a certain point when those feelings aren't there and you're going to have a certain reality in your life. And if you showed up, so to speak, just like carried wood, carried water, chop wood, so to speak, you can get a lot done. And that was something that I kept in my head a lot of times this year when things didn't feel great.

00:07:55:14 - 00:08:14:04
Itamar Marani
I was like, I'm just going to put my head down and I'm going to keep doing the work. And when this subsides, I'm going to have a great result and I can at least be very happy about that and I can feel a sense of accomplishment. And the reality is that this year, despite it being so tough, we're heading to 2025 in much better shape than we were heading to 2024.

00:08:14:06 - 00:08:31:18
Itamar Marani
And regardless of the past, you're not feeling good. I feel really good about that. And it gives me a sense of accomplishment and a sense of fulfillment and also a sense of pride that I was able to push through and just keep an effective mindset of not always thinking, how do I feel, but just saying what needs to get done?

00:08:31:19 - 00:08:47:22
Itamar Marani
How can I get it done? And if I need to, when do I need to take a break to honestly decompress, recharge and then get going back in? Because it's been a challenging one. So I think that's lesson number two, that when you're faced with a season, when things are hard, when things don't feel good, you have two options.

00:08:48:00 - 00:09:05:20
Itamar Marani
You can either just decide, you know what, I'm having a hard time, put your hands up or you can still show up while also taking breaks, decompress and recharge. And I think if you choose number two, you'll be much happier with the outcome that you create for yourself in the long run. So that's lesson number two. You can always show up.

00:09:06:01 - 00:09:26:09
Itamar Marani
Just take the breaks and make sure you decompress and recharge so you can get things done. So the third lesson that's added into that is one that I learned during one of those breaks that for me, I kind of lost. I fell out of love with jujitsu at a certain point. Too many skin infections, too many injuries, a lot of things that come with it.

00:09:26:11 - 00:09:46:07
Itamar Marani
And I was looking for something to and one of those breaks, we were in Hawaii and I just found surfing. And it was an amazing, amazing thing for me. And I think finding something that's physical, that's both physically challenging, it gets you going is outdoors, is mentally challenging, learning a new skill and has a social element in it.

00:09:46:09 - 00:10:09:01
Itamar Marani
If that's something you can find and especially if it's something you can do long term and it doesn't mess up your body, it's such an amazing asset for performance. A big part of performance is just being able to stay levelheaded. Now, while there's amazing tools to make sure that your emotions are in check, that you stay calm. One of the biggest ones is to actually be physically active and preemptively get a lot of that energy out of you.

00:10:09:03 - 00:10:39:07
Itamar Marani
One of my big lessons for this year was to honestly say, unless have surfed in the past couple of days, don't believe anything is true. It's amazing what having just a long, challenging session out in the sun. What it can do as far as your mental clarity is getting a lot of emotional debris out of your way. And I think a lot of people, they look at like performance and they think about all these people that are early performers and they're in really good shape and they feel themselves, Oh, this is just one more thing they have to do in order to get into great performance.

00:10:39:07 - 00:10:57:05
Itamar Marani
Oh, man, I have to start a workout routine now. I have to start this now. I have to do that. It's actually the opposite. If you don't have some kind of physical routine, you're actually playing life on hard mode. And I think it's a big thing to understand that unless you're constantly working out, you're just making life more difficult on yourself.

00:10:57:10 - 00:11:14:19
Itamar Marani
Now, if you can find a way that's really enjoyable for you, such as surfing, such as jujitsu, such as a group class of any kinds of sort, whatever it may be, that's actually going to be a giant leg up for your performance. It's not going to be another thing that you have to do. Another burden for the performance is actually the opposite.

00:11:14:21 - 00:11:39:08
Itamar Marani
Like, I really the people who don't work out and are still achieving a lot, my hat's off to them because they're playing life on hard mode. So those are my three main lessons. One, that guilt and shame aren't helpful and sometimes recognizing that it's not your problem, but it's the problem, it's part of the human condition, relieves a lot of the guilt and shame too, is that you can still show up regardless if things feel hard.

00:11:39:08 - 00:12:08:14
Itamar Marani
Just take breaks, decompress and recharge. And if you do that and show up and so to speak, carry water, chop wood, just do your thing, put your head down. You'll be happy with the result you have at the end of that season. And three, that surfing is amazing that if you can find some kind of outlet like that for your energy to get yourself going every day, it can do a lot, not just for your mental state and your well-being, but tactically, for your performance, for your ability to stay calm and make better decisions under pressure.

00:12:08:16 - 00:12:28:09
Itamar Marani
Those are the three lessons now and the three things I'm excited about. The first big one is the book that's going to be coming out. It's legitimately great. I'm very excited about it and I genuinely think that it's something that's going to help push the whole conversation of what elite performance is really about and how to avoid the main pitfalls of it forward.

00:12:28:09 - 00:12:48:20
Itamar Marani
And it's going to make a sizable imprint on this whole field. Let's call it a performance mindset, whatever it may be. And a main theme we're going to be talking about is how fear can create a sense of pressure in us because we have these primal fears that we think that everything is a primal threat to our existence and how that makes us feel a certain sense of pressure.

00:12:48:22 - 00:13:10:15
Itamar Marani
And that when we feel a certain sense of pressure, we actually start underperforming. That pressure isn't just this pressure makes diamonds nonsense, but there's actually a bell curve when too much pressure becomes something that actually hurts our performance and how that pressure manifests in three main ways and various entrepreneurs and achievers that I've really help these past couple of years and how to conquer that because you can win big.

00:13:10:17 - 00:13:31:13
Itamar Marani
So as a little snippet, I do actually want to share little bits and pieces of the three ways I've seen it really manifest in most of the entrepreneurs, the poker players, the hedge fund managers, all the people that have helped. So the three main ways there's two main it's all three main archetypes of the people. There is the go harder guy who responds to pressure by just wanting to go harder.

00:13:31:15 - 00:13:48:16
Itamar Marani
There is the people pleasing guy who responds to any pressure but is wanting to kind of diffuse the situation, make sure everyone's happy. And then there's a person that whenever they feel a sense of pressure, they feel like they have to prove something. So let's break these down. And this is kind of a preview of what we have going on in the book.

00:13:48:18 - 00:14:12:21
Itamar Marani
So they go harder, guy. They go hard. A guy is all gas, no breaks. Every time there's tension or discomfort. His only solution is to push harder. People around him call him things like intense, but he doesn't see himself that way. He thinks he's only slightly above average, despite working relentlessly with tireless focus. As a result, he burns out himself and his employees by pushing at an unsustainable pace.

00:14:12:23 - 00:14:32:08
Itamar Marani
All while thinking This is easy. This is not an issue his body usually pays a price to. Injuries pile up going to Harvard Sports without ever slowing down. Now you got to think of it like a race car. Yes, you need power. That's your drive and your work ethic, but you also need precision and control. For the gas pedal through every turn.

00:14:32:08 - 00:14:55:17
Itamar Marani
Isn't just inefficient, it's dangerous. And eventually something breaks. Performing at your best isn't about constant maximum effort. It's about applying the right force at the right time. They go. Hardest fatal flaw isn't lack of capability. It's the belief that constant maximum effort is the only path to success. So when pressure builds, they default to excitement and force instead of calm strategic thinking.

00:14:55:19 - 00:15:18:11
Itamar Marani
Ironically, they end up achieving less. By trying to do more. They burn out their teams, they burn other relationships, and they injure their bodies. Now, the solution isn't working more. It's working smarter. It's understanding that thinking time isn't wasted. Time and recovery isn't about weakness, but about strategy. It's knowing that your drive is a tool to be wielded precisely, not a weapon to be fired constantly.

00:15:18:12 - 00:15:35:15
Itamar Marani
Now, if you're one of these, go harder guys, very much like I was when I was younger. You're probably thinking, Itamar, going hard is what got me here. If I ease up even slightly, everything I've built will collapse. So I want to be clear. You're partly right. The ability to outwork others, to push when others quit is valuable.

00:15:35:17 - 00:15:57:04
Itamar Marani
It might have been the superpower that got you this far, but there's a crucial difference between working hard and crushing yourself needlessly. Working hard is a choice. It's a strategy. Constant internal pressure is a fear response from the thought of everything will collapse if I don't keep pushing. And it creates a ton of internal pressure, and that pressure leads you to push yourself and others past the point of effectiveness.

00:15:57:06 - 00:16:18:04
Itamar Marani
You end up working harder instead of working smarter, burning out both yourself and your team in the process, you end up forcing everything when easing off would actually get you there faster, sometimes in a more strategic crop. So basically as far as to go harder guy when it comes to results, working hard in strategic bursts, strategic bursts is better than constantly pushing through exhaustion.

00:16:18:06 - 00:16:39:03
Itamar Marani
That's to go harder. Guy Then we got the people pleasing guy, the people pleasing guy is all accommodations, no boundaries. Every time there's tension or discomfort, his only solution is to ease off and accommodate. People say he's so generous or so helpful and he doesn't see how it's hurting him. He thinks he's just building relationships, despite chronically under charging and over delivering.

00:16:39:05 - 00:16:58:12
Itamar Marani
As a result, he drains himself by trying to please everyone at an unsustainable pace while thinking, Oh, once they see the value, I can ask for more. His business usually pays a price as well. Profits stay low from keeping underperforming employees around because quote unquote, they're like family and seeking permission to do things he should just execute on.

00:16:58:14 - 00:17:20:12
Itamar Marani
Think of it like being a negotiator. Yes, you need to build rapport. That's your relationship skill, but you also need to stand your ground. Always giving in isn't just inefficient, it's unsustainable. And eventually something breaks constant people pleasing isn't the path to optimal results. Balancing care with boundaries is the people pleasing. Guy's fatal flaw isn't lack of capability either.

00:17:20:14 - 00:17:41:01
Itamar Marani
It's the belief that being liked is more important than being effective. So when pressure builds, they default to avoiding conflict instead of having unnecessary conversations. And ironically, they end up helping fewer people by playing small, they drain their energy, they uncharged their worth, and they keep the wrong people around. Now, if you're a people pleasing guy, you might be thinking item.

00:17:41:01 - 00:18:02:07
Itamar Marani
Our building relationship is what got me here. If I start setting those hard boundaries, I'm concerned that everything might collapse. And let me be clear, you're partly right. The ability to connect with people and deliver above and beyond is very valuable. You might have been the superpower that got you this far, but there's a crucial difference between being helpful and being a people pleaser.

00:18:02:09 - 00:18:21:02
Itamar Marani
Being helpful is a choice. It's a strategy concern. People pleasing comes from a fear response of what other people think of me or will they not like me or will approve of me if I don't do this? And that fear creates a ton of internal pressure that leads you to sacrifice yourself and your success. Trying to please everyone.

00:18:21:04 - 00:18:48:18
Itamar Marani
You end up helping less by trying to help more draining both yourself and your potential in the process. You're not playing smaller when standing firm would actually earn you more respect and get you better results. So when it comes to people pleasing and results, basically helping others while helping yourself is more important than being liked. And finally we have the something to prove Guy The something to prove guy filters everything through the lens of proving his worth.

00:18:48:20 - 00:19:19:07
Itamar Marani
So while he's incredibly talented, he makes choices based on what will demonstrate his capabilities rather than what will actually work best. He builds elaborate systems when simple ones would do. He takes the hardest path to every goal and prioritize vanity metrics over results and exalts himself, trying to prove points that don't need proving. He often thinks to himself This will prove how capable and and his results are as you pay the price to progress stalls for optimizing for things that will feed his ego instead of getting actual results.

00:19:19:09 - 00:19:42:01
Itamar Marani
Something to prove Guy's fatal flaw isn't lack of ability. These are often the most talented people in the room. But the problem is focus. You make everything harder than necessary just to prove a point. And when pressure builds, that chip on their shoulder kicks in and the overcomplicate things just to demonstrate their capabilities. So if you're a something to prove guy, you might be thinking, but that chip on my shoulder is what drives me.

00:19:42:01 - 00:19:59:14
Itamar Marani
It's my fuel. Without it, I might lose my aggression, my tenacity and my drive. It's my edge. So I want to be clear about that as well. You're partly right here. Having something to prove can be rocket fuel when you need it. That burning desire to show people that they underestimate you. It's powerful and it can launch you out of some very dark places.

00:19:59:16 - 00:20:22:17
Itamar Marani
But there's a trap there that a rocket fuel can also send you in the wrong direction. When unless I can do X they were right comes your compass about how to think about decisions. You stop making strategic ones and start making emotional ones. So the solution isn't to lose your drive, it's about to direct it strategically. It's understanding that taking the simple path isn't weakness, it's wisdom.

00:20:22:19 - 00:20:42:00
Itamar Marani
That effectiveness trumps complexity, that your determination is a tool to be aimed precisely, not a burden forcing you to take the hardest path. The real power comes when you can say, I'm not doing this to prove anyone wrong or anything to anyone, but I'm simply doing this because this is what works best. That's when you stop being reactive and start being strategic.

00:20:42:02 - 00:20:59:22
Itamar Marani
So when it comes to results for something to prove, Guy all the people out there with a chip on the shoulder. The reality is that once you've gotten out of the the dark place you were at, having just average drive with the lead focus will actually get you better results and having a strong drive with the wrong focus.

00:21:00:00 - 00:21:19:23
Itamar Marani
While it might be very impressive to be running twice as fast in the right direction, it doesn't actually get you anywhere. So that's a little snippet of the book, a little preview I'm very excited about. Again, I just haven't seen anything out there as practical, say this is what's going on. This is a concept of why this is happening to you, why you're not performing at your best.

00:21:20:01 - 00:21:38:13
Itamar Marani
And on top of that, here's the exact way to fix that. With everything included, nothing held back. So I'm very excited about that. That's number one. The first thing I'm excited about is the book coming out, and just the important thing is going to have on the whole industry as far as daily performance. That's number one. And number two, as a part of that, we are moving to the states.

00:21:38:13 - 00:21:53:06
Itamar Marani
We're going to move to Austin, Texas next year and I'm very excited about that. And it came from a simple kind of framework that I use that when I wanted to get really good in jujitsu, I moved to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and I went to the best gym I could find and to surround myself with black belts.

00:21:53:08 - 00:22:22:00
Itamar Marani
And it was pretty much inevitable all that by me surrounding myself with black belts that are world champions, or at least in a world class level, so that I would become one as well. And that's what happened. And it's the same thing with Austin. When I look at people building my kinds of businesses, trying to do the things that I'm trying to do as far as influence the narrative of what works and what doesn't work in a specific field, it seems like that's the epicenter right there, and I'm very excited to go to Austin, play a big game, put myself in the right position to win.

00:22:22:01 - 00:22:37:01
Itamar Marani
And I feel like once we make the move to go there, you get all the visas and sort of kind of fight that uphill battle to get there from there. It's going to be more of a downhill battle and I'm very excited about that. And finally, the third thing I'm very excited about is to actually lean in and play the game.

00:22:37:01 - 00:22:59:15
Itamar Marani
So I had a conversation with two friends of mine a couple months back and they were basically telling me, you know, you need to start playing the game more. I know you want to do things in a certain way, but you just need to get over it and you need to lean into your background. You need to lean into what's working for other people and do that as well and stop trying to avoid it.

00:22:59:17 - 00:23:14:03
Itamar Marani
And it was a good wake up call and I very much appreciated that and I'm very much looking forward to playing the game. The title of the book is probably going to be a military grade mindset. It's something going to be about anything about performance that I want or how to solve it. But just what do people want?

00:23:14:03 - 00:23:39:20
Itamar Marani
What is working in the industry? What is working the world? What is working for other people? Just do that as well. And I'm very excited about to lean into that. Calling the book about how a great mindset, leaning into it with a lot of the concepts of how to conquer your mind and using a more called Special Forces vernacular to clear up everything and just to go for it to really, like not hold anything back, not feel any discomfort about using this term or that term because it's cheesy, but just go for it.

00:23:39:20 - 00:23:57:17
Itamar Marani
Go all in. What works is what works. And to just do it. So those are the three things that I'm excited about. One, the book and what I share there about the three archetypes too, is moving to the States and just going to a place where you surround yourself with black belts and three, just playing the game and really going for it and going for big things.

00:23:57:19 - 00:24:34:23
Itamar Marani
Now moving on to the one little fitness hack that I found so in the arena I've had several people that are health coaches or with health coaching businesses come through. And basically the one thing that I've picked up from all of them is that nobody gets enough protein. And this year, despite me doing a lot more cardiovascular activity like surfing, like running, like hiking, I've actually put on about four kilos of lean mass, so about £9, nine, £10 of lean muscle mass without doing a lot anything different as far as my my strength and conditioning routines, by simply adding 60 grams of protein to my diet.

00:24:35:02 - 00:24:54:15
Itamar Marani
And what I do is very simple. When I wake up, one of the first things I do is I go to the fridge, I get the protein out and I just have two scoops of protein powder and a shake and that's it. And despite doing a lot of things that are catabolic, like all the surfing, the endurance things that I do, I've actually put on more mass without having to change anything.

00:24:54:17 - 00:25:13:15
Itamar Marani
So as a little fitness hack, if you're not getting enough protein and you probably aren't, when you actually look into things and look into your diet, just adding two scoops of protein, first thing when you wake up, it can make a massive difference. It has for me. So finally, to the three questions I want to leave you with to really cross 2025.

00:25:13:17 - 00:25:32:03
Itamar Marani
First off, is what kind of physical routine do you have in place to help you modulate stress? Because the reality is if you don't have one, you're fighting an uphill battle. So to really think about that, because if you can set that in place, it can go a really long way into you not having to deal with a lot of things and a lot of emotions because you're going to preemptively modulate them.

00:25:32:05 - 00:25:51:01
Itamar Marani
It's like rehab for your mind, too, is where do you need to be playing the game more and leaning into what works for others? So are there any areas in your business that you perhaps don't feel comfortable with or you feel perhaps feel a little self-conscious that you're avoiding when you see other people doing that and working really well for them?

00:25:51:03 - 00:26:15:08
Itamar Marani
If that's something that's holding you back, you should probably get over it. And finally, number three, what are you excited about in life or business? Because if you can't answer that very clearly where you're trying to head to and what's exciting about you can't expect yourself to perform at your best. You'll have nothing to pull you forward and everything is going to feel very bland and very meaningless because there is no future meaning for it.

00:26:15:10 - 00:26:41:13
Itamar Marani
You're just doing it for the sake of doing it, so to speak. But if you can have a vision of what's exciting to you about the next year or the next couple of years, where you're excited about what really makes you want to get up and do something, Where are you heading towards? What's the next growth point of yours that you want to get to go a long way in helping you overcome a lot of things, and that when even things don't feel good at the moment you're having perhaps a bit of a winter, you cannot be pushed through and just give you that mindset of I will put my head down, I will do

00:26:41:13 - 00:27:08:09
Itamar Marani
what's required. You know, I'll come out better on the other side. And on that note, I wanted to wish everybody a great 2025 and perhaps also a challenging one as well. A buddy of mine from the Israeli Navy SEALs used to sign up all his emails to me as I wish you things as sweet as salt. And it was an internal joke and a way for him to say, I wish you have hardships because I know you're capable of dealing with them and I hope you can use them to grow.

00:27:08:11 - 00:27:29:00
Itamar Marani
And if nothing else, if this year was challenging for you guys, I hope you find it a way to grow from it and to succeed a lot in the future, and to also just recognize that you can be the kind of people that deal with things and still move forward. And that's the real superpower that if you can say, I'm having a hard time having a challenging time, it's a wintertime, whatever it may be, but that doesn't mean I need to stop.

00:27:29:00 - 00:27:45:17
Itamar Marani
That doesn't mean we feel bad for myself about it, but I can just figure out a way to keep moving forward. That's willpower. And with that comes a true sense of confidence that regardless of what's going on outside, inside, I know I can still push through. Aside from that, I wish you guys a big 2025 day to do big things and go across.