Is Beating Yourself Up To Go Harder Effective? | Elite Performance Podcast #25

John Ainsworth 0:00
I would tell people that I was fundamentally lazy. If I didn't really push myself and beat myself up. The reason I was doing it was because that's what I felt I needed to do in order to achieve excellence. And my desire for excellence was bigger than my desire for feeling peace and calm and happiness.

Itamar Marani 0:21
Today, I'm here with John Ainsworth, John Ainsworth is the founder of data driven marketing, they're pretty much the best in the game and helping people with online courses, two to 5x their income and helping them become millionaires. And on top of that, John is a very intense student in some ways. He's very, very adamant about achieving excellence. And mediocrity really pisses him off, in his own words. And John is also an alumni of both the arena program and the one on one coaching. He was actually one of the very first who are the client number two that I've ever worked with. And since then, we took some pause after that, then he joined the arena. And I'm really happy to have him on board, we're going to be talking about some very interesting things today, all the way from why self loathing and trying to push yourself harder and kind of beat yourself up actually isn't helpful. What enables some people to let go of that, and why knowing what to do is only 10% of actually being able to succeed. So with that said, appreciate you being here. John, welcome.

John Ainsworth 1:18
Thanks very much. Glad to be here.

Itamar Marani 1:20
Cool. So in your own words, man, I'd love for you to say like before the coaching in the arena, after the arena was the result and what you could share with the people obviously?

John Ainsworth 1:29
Yeah, so there's a number of things that I'd struggled with for quite a long time. And a lot of them were things that it's it's not just that it was an issue, it's that I was almost deliberately causing the issue because of beliefs I had about the way the world should be. So I had this total belief, like absolute certainty. And I tell people, this is like, you know, in a joking manner, because it's like, Oh, isn't this ridiculous, but it's definitely true. I would tell people that I was fundamentally lazy if I didn't really push myself and beat myself up. And that's why I did it. And so I had a lot of friends who were like, Why are you so hard on yourself like this is really aggressive, and unpleasant and nasty, and it's not making you happy. And I would still do it. Because the reason they had for wanting me to not do it was because they didn't like me being nasty to myself. But the reason I was doing it was because that's what I felt I needed to do in order to achieve excellence. And my desire for excellence was bigger than my desire for feeling peace and calm and happiness. And one of the things that I got out of this was realizing that first of all, I actually wasn't fundamentally lazy. This was built on just a false series of like, things that remembered that you could have looked at a different way you could have like, just not seen it that way. But I just had, I just kind of built this into myself and the way it started. I never really worked hard at school. And then I but I really always really wanted to succeed, but I just like, couldn't bring myself to ever work hard, it's gone, I kind of didn't really know exactly why. And then I started doing this job working out in the states selling books door to door. And it's a brutally hard job, like you work 80 hours a week, minimum, and commission only you like they give you all the training, but there's no guaranteed money from it. Door to door sales very hard job to do. And at that time, somewhere in there from somebody, I picked up this ability to, like motivate myself by by really focusing on the fear of regret. And so being like, if you don't do this thing, then you're gonna really be pissed off at yourself afterwards. And so I would just I kind of learned somewhere in there, this approach that seemed to work in terms of increasing motivation to do stuff. And so I was just like, wow, that's what I need. That kind of that at that moment, like that got baked into my head of like, this is the way that you do it. Anytime that you don't reach the standard that you want to reach. You give yourself just intense and unbelievable amounts of shit about it. Until eventually you're like, alright, I'll fucking do it, you know. And what I eventually realized was I wasn't fundamentally lazy because fundamentally lazy people don't start doing 80 hours a week. And there's tons of shit done before that was like, you know, I used to do I was already doing marathons in my spare time at that point. And I was like, would you know, and I was working in jobs, I would work really hard. The stuff with school I realized afterwards and university was, I was just bored. It was, it was too easy. And I knew that if I just worked for, like, I worked for three months, worked hard for three months before my GCSE, it's like the exam during that when you're 16 and got straight A's. And then I didn't work hard again until the last year of university, and then got first which is the top right here. So I kind of had just, I just knew that I could get by with that. And so somewhere in there, I'd kind of baked this thing in. And that caused two problems. One was that the self regression was, it was just the nastiness of it. So that was unneeded, that wasn't helpful. But the second thing was that I realized as well as the actually it was harmful. And so I was, I was actually making myself less able to succeed by doing the nasty thing, in order to cause myself to succeed more. And then that crossed over into other parts of life as well. So personal life as well, I would just like constantly think back to like, what was it I did before, that wasn't good enough that I didn't do well enough, and give myself shut about it in order to cause motivation. And it stopped me from thinking, Well, what am I going to do better now? How am I going to improve this? And how am I going to do better and actually getting into a better kind of flow state as well. So that's the that was the biggest thing that that came out of the whole process. There are others as well, we can talk to if you want. But

Itamar Marani 6:41
yeah, I want to dig into that. But before before we dive into is to give people I love to give people a synopsis of what's possible, versus anything because we're going to dig in, we're gonna say, this is not gonna be the easiest thing to do. But it can actually give you amazing results. Then it kind of like tangible results that you're willing to care for people to show like, this is what happened to me, because it seems like it's a cheap way to let go that to some people can say this is what's on the other side.

John Ainsworth 7:03
Yeah. Well, one of the things that I've been able to do because of that, and because of letting go of that aggression is I'm able to work in a much more

John Ainsworth 7:19
much more kind of in alignment with what my actual strengths are. So I've got more focus more energy when I'm working. Because I've not got this kind of just exhaustion from the self aggression. There's definitely like, on a personal level, there's a lot more peace and calm, and it's a lot less unpleasant. Just being myself, you know, which was, which was a kind of a constant feeling. And one of the things I've seen, like, from a work point of view, one of the things I'm really good at, that I maybe didn't focus on enough, because I felt like it wasn't, I didn't know, what's the right way of explaining it. It almost felt like there's, you know, there's certain things that you really get out, like the whole zone of genius concept, right? The things that really we're good at, and they feel sometimes like cheating, because it's like, well, of course I can do that that's easy, you know? Yeah, I have to be because I'm beating myself up so much. I'm like, I need to go do whatever is difficult. And the thing that I would see that other people would do is do a lot of tasks get really busy achieve a lot of stuff themselves. So I have people starting businesses and I would see that they would that when people start a business like that, and we know lots of people who kind of fit that mold, they would tend to move forward very quickly. And I would feel like I should be doing more of that I should be doing that because that's that's the thing that that's how it's that's like the harder thing that's less comfortable for me and and I know that that would move things forward like immediately if I did more things

Itamar Marani 9:03
so I wanted to say I hope you're here with me saying this I would love is there any tangible results you can tell like the business was first here and then it got to there Yes. So yeah, because what you said is that the you were able to let go of that and not just because it made you feel better because that's what other people wanted and you didn't buy into it. But because it actually gives you better results and that's what I think most people are afraid to let go of this kind of like their self like beating themselves up or whatever it may be because this is actually going to get me a better external result and that's what I'm more focused on right now because that's the right thing to focus on or not yeah and what I would really appreciate it if you'd be willing to share that I think that would dissipate a lot of that for some people be like okay, it actually can get you better also external results.

John Ainsworth 9:46
Yeah, I mean, so I'll give some really specific details and then like overall business kind of numbers so for the last four months now so I a part of this process was me letting go of doing sales, which was some One thing that I had done for many years for the business, I didn't want to do it. But I felt like oh, that's what your job is you have to do that. And I handed that over to somebody in my team. And I started letting go of the needing to do the difficult things and started getting more into the flow of how I work in terms of helping improve systems. And as a result of that, I'm, firstly I'm out of sales, which is great. But secondly, the person who's running it is running it way better than I was, like, she's following the system where I wouldn't, I would never fucking follow the system because I was too too smart or something, you know, whatever. And I worked with her part of the process of what I'm really good at is working on like refining, refining, refining processes. And so I've worked with her on refining that and she's closed, our conversion rate on sales used to be 44%. And it's been 100%, close rate for four months now. Well, and I'm not doing it. So that's a big move forward. We also had record months. November, December, January, and February looks to be like it probably what we want as well. We've made we made more profit in the first two months of this year than we made like, after all my wages and everything. Like I wasn't like I wasn't paying myself, but are for that more profits in the first two months of this year that we made in the whole of last year. So

Itamar Marani 11:27
that's alright, first off, congrats. That's awesome. First off, and I, but I hope everybody's listening. That's what's possible when you do this, kind of encapsulate a lot of what John was saying is that, and I heard you use the word should I tell you what I should be doing. And we shouldn't be doing it. A lot of times, it's not a logical, it's not the rational thing that that we're supposed to be doing. This is insecurity that we're trying to feed that we're trying to fight like, oh, I should do this, because that's the hard thing. But if that's a smart thing, and when we have these insecurities pulling at us, we're not able to employ our logic, they overpower them sometimes. And emotionally, like the actions we do they actually serve the kind of emotional gap that we have inside us, instead of actually serving the outcomes that we say we want, because we're more actually connected to those insecurities. And that's really what I would love for everybody from this podcast to get because it's such a beautiful example of like, what you didn't know you've been able to accomplish this month, month after month after month since then, but when you let go that that's where it can go, and you enjoy life more, which is a really nice cherry on top.

John Ainsworth 12:29
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I've been focusing, like I tried to before on the enjoying life more, I just, I just knew it wasn't, I think I've heard you'd say something similar as well. It's like, if you, you thought the letting go of the chip on your shoulder was going to stop you from succeeding. So you're like, Well, I'm going to hold on to it, then. It's like, well, I want this, like, I need that. Like, I can't just go through life and not be a good sight, like I need it more than I need happiness.

Itamar Marani 13:01
And I think it's the way I look at it, that you hold different values in some people. Like I know, some of the people that you mentioned, that told you like John, we really like to see you just be more happy. They hold different values. And like one of the key things that you're connected to the most is achieving excellence. That's one that's really important for you. And and it's not just coming from a place of trying to make up for something else. It's not that just that's your natural level of ambition. And some of those people I know who you're speaking of it, that's not their core value. So therefore, they were telling you Listen, give up one of your core values, which is achieving excellence and having a chip on his shoulder was the vehicle to that, give that up and then join our club. But they weren't actually speaking to what you want it was to achieve excellence. And that's why I think when the Rena and remember, there was one call, when I said like, John, you do recommend you're actually going to achieve more if you'd like, go, this is how they have to give this up. And then you have to get to go play in the flower garden or whatever it may be. But it's actually helped me achieve more. They were like, well, then, okay, I'm open to it. If that's

John Ainsworth 14:03
we're going to have this discussion. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I, it's, it was a there was a point where I was like, Okay, I'm open to the concept that that could be true. But I don't know that I actually believe it. Because that just seems like that would be too good. Life can't be that good. You know, that would be great. I'd love it. If I could do the things that I might naturally good at and like use the skills that I've got and not beat myself up and succeed more. That would be awesome.

Itamar Marani 14:33
Cool. So our I'd love to dig into that. So what do you think? So you said that you had resistance because that was too good to be true. So what actually enabled you to break that shell so to speak, what was the process that for you it made it click and enable you okay, I'm gonna let go of this or at least I'm going to try to let go of this experiment and see how it goes.

John Ainsworth 14:53
I think a lot of it was just Well, I mean, the thing that's starting to convince me that it's true is the is the trying it actually just see what how does that work? If I do that, what is that? Like? I definitely had concerns about what certain people might think of me. If I, if I was like doing less, day to day work in the business and focusing more on just the things that I was good at. And so I went and had conversations with those people and was like, what would you think? Do you agree with this? And they were like, I don't even know what you're talking about. You're fine. One of them, I talked to him. And I said to him, you know, one of my concerns is that you'd think I was being lazy and not doing enough if I was bait if I'm doing work in this kind of way, because it might look like I'm not not bothered about it, or when actually what I'm doing is trying to I think this is where it can have the biggest impact. And it's like, oh, if I thought you were lazy, I just tell you, you were lazy. I just don't need to have a conversation about it. I just tell you, you know, it's fine.

Itamar Marani 16:03
Yeah. Cool. So was it really just a matter of concern about others opinions? You said, Okay, I can make

John Ainsworth 16:10
one part of it. Yeah. And then it was like your head? What is it true? Like, because if I, if I do it, and it's true, but then this is other people's opinions as well. And that's kind of another another part of it. So I've been I've been doing it, you know, I've been getting rid of tasks from on my list and handing them over to other people. Every time pretty much every time that I do a task. In the business, I do it with someone in the business, one of my team members, and I shoot and I get them to do it. And I teach them how to do it, which takes longer, but then it's off my plate. And I love doing that. I love it. It's way it takes less time for me to go do the thing, that I don't want to do it. I want to show somebody else. And long term, it works that way better. And so I've been trying that out and being like, Okay, this seems to keep making progress, it seems to keep working, it works well in sales. Okay, where else is that kind of work well, as well. And so that's a part of it. And I've had conversations with others about it, who've maybe moved further along that kind of spectrum to see like, well, what, what's it like when you're not doing all the tasks, you're getting other people to do stuff? And got feedback from them that yes, this is this is valid, this works. This is a, you know, an approach that is effective is more effective. And so it's a combination of a first a certain amount of trust of just going well, let's at least give this a go. And then trying it and getting feedback and letting go of the concern around other people's opinions as well.

Itamar Marani 17:37
So it was like a feedback, the kind of snowballed in positive direction.

John Ainsworth 17:41
Yeah, I tried to one of the things that I've been trying to work on for the last, I don't know, a year or so is speeding up the OODA Loop. I'm guessing with a military background, you know that term, but I didn't

Itamar Marani 17:55
lie. Okay, so my American backgrounds in Hebrew as well.

John Ainsworth 18:01
So it's somebody from the American Air Force, who was like their top pilot for many, many years was like, by far the best pilot they had. And they were trying to figure out like, he was trying to figure out how to explain to people what it was, he was doing differently. And after he was the best pilot, he then went on to become the best general or somebody. And one of the things he did is this, this OODA Loop, it's the observe, orient, decide act. So it's how quickly can you look at the world, figure out what's going on, adapt the way that you're working, like, you know, the way that you view the world and understand how it is decide what you're going to do, and then make an action in that direction, and then go back and notice again, how are things? And his point was, how quickly can you go through these, these OODA Loops? How quickly can you manage when you're flying or when you're running business or whatever it is, to, to reorient to the way things actually are? And so that's part of why I've been trying to use in this it's like, okay, well, let me try doing this. Did it work? If it did work? Let me refine based on that, and then go again.

Itamar Marani 19:08
I'd love to touch on this, because there's something very interesting here, because what I saw from my let's call it my vantage point, because I was your in your process, I was able to kind of see it from a distance. Is that the first part of that? Is it his observation? Most people do not see they're not they're not able to observe the reality for what it actually is. They have these kinds of tinted glass because of their past experiences because of these beliefs that they form. And regardless if sometimes they know these glasses might not be true, they're at least comfortable for them. Because it's familiar. It provides a level of certainty. And I think for you for a while there because I know you've had people around you to said like from also from a pragmatic perspective, this isn't helpful. You should let go these things and like you said, I know I shouldn't be doing my zone of genius. But you had a fear of changing those glasses and then seeing the world are different reality observing different realities? And I would love to dive into that. What made you from when you're experiencing this? What do you think and able to say, Okay, this is scary to say, Okay, I think this is what I really want to succeed. And this chip on my shoulder is enabling that. And it's going to be scary to let go of that. But what enabled you to make that kind of courage that even though it was scary, you recognize I might not be seeing reality for what it is. I'm going to do it anyway.

John Ainsworth 20:27
Well, I mean, that's the point of the arena, right is like taking you through what all of those steps are. So I think it was the, the process of, first of all, identifying that that was an issue was a great starting point. But it's not enough because just knowing it doesn't allow you to let go of it. Like you've if you've spent 22 years holding on to this belief, you can't just go oh, okay, cool, well, let go. It's not and that's not an easy thing to do. So then what we've done was then work through, why do I believe that? What is it that's causing me to believe that this is true? And is that thing that I'm is that thing that stopped me from believing something different? Is that Is that true? Like actually digging into it and being like, does this actually exist? Is this really how the world is? What? What evidence? Is there one way or the other? How can I look at if that's if that's true, or if that's false? That was emotionally very difficult. That process because like my that I wrote out the belief for myself, of what I what I thought and it said, John is lazy. And as he punishes himself with internal pain and suffering. And it's like to actually stare that in the face and think about that as like, Oh, that makes me feel sick. I remember, as we were going through the arena, I'd sometimes be like, just start laughing. And you're like, what's funny, I'm like, it's just hurts so much.

John Ainsworth 22:06
It's like, that's, that's how I that's how I sometimes sometimes react that way releasing the pain. You know?

John Ainsworth 22:13
Like, if you ever do heavy squats in the gym, and then you hear yourself like, I don't know if you make this noise. But I sometimes just go like, Oh,

John Ainsworth 22:24
I just love.

John Ainsworth 22:26
Like, come on. Like this, this pain will go away. Don't worry about it. But it still hurts. You know? Yeah.

Itamar Marani 22:35
Can add a ripple to that? Yeah. What's really important? I remember, I workshop with you once when we were in Mexico, about this stuff. And you were in Mexico. So we did a zoom call. And you asked me sir, like, are we going to go over my limiting beliefs? And I'm like, No, we're not doing any of that nonsense, limiting beliefs, or it's your these are the things that we said, there's a different distortions of reality. If you know that this is a limiting belief of yours, you kind of already aware of it. And it's probably not going to be impactful what we did, instead of it, we just flushed out and said, How do you think about the world? What are certain beliefs that you hold? Yeah. Then you said, Oh, if I don't beat myself up, then I'm lazy. And then we didn't ask, wait, is this limiting you? Is this holding you back? Would you like to change this into a more positive belief? We just said, Wait, is this true or not? are very black and white perspective? Is this true? Or is it not? Because once we said that this is false, it's not true, then it's like damn, okay, I have to change my perspective on reality. I have to we entirely recalibrate how I see the world. That's why as you said it was tiring. That's why is all of a sudden, you have to rewire how your brain sees reality. And recognize that I can live a lie, but because now I know it's a lie. Or I must adjust to reality. And once you're able to make that adjustment to reality for what it is not for how you felt it was, that's when you will make able to make those OODA Loops. OODA Loops much, much faster. Because you were actually orient able to orient to the actual reality, not just your perception. Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah. And that was it was hard for me. Okay. So once you were able to do that, and obviously once you saw reality for what it is, just get better results.

John Ainsworth 24:17
Yeah. Yeah. And so the next step after kind of noticing that that was an issue that that was something that was causing problems was was identifying that it was the top one. So I had a whole bunch of things that like, okay, there's loads of stuff that I've got that actually is getting in the way, but we can't deal with everything all at once. So it was boiling it down to like, okay, there's there's two or three things that are a really big deal that we're going to focus on that and so that was the next step and boiling it down to that. So that really helped and then was noticing, well, what is it that's actually how can I tell when I'm getting into that state? Because it's really easy to have noticed it When you're in a workshop and you're discussing it, not easy, but it's, it's much harder to have that awareness on an every day basis, like to notice that you're falling into this pattern again, or like going, you know, beating myself up, give myself a hard time, that was I would find just the most my brain would find the most interesting and creative ways of doing it. Like I would block one, you know, like, at a tactical level, I'd be like, damn, ah, this is a time when I, when I beat myself up that isn't useful. I'm gonna stop doing that call work on that. And I'd actually if I'd be effective at that, like, it's not like I've not worked on this stuff over the years. But that was not the root cause of it. And so what would then happen was another what my brain would invent a new way to do it. Like, subconsciously, I'd be working on it all, I found a new way to let this belief out, you know?

Itamar Marani 25:58
Yeah. And it's interesting that you use that word, because I actually wanted to chime in, you were saying, I had to boil it down. That was the top. It wasn't the top one was actually the very foundation one, it was the root. And that was the thing from that root, there were a lot of different ways it manifested itself, this thing or this thing, but the whole thing, we tried to figure it out in that process? What is the one lead domino so to speak? What is the thing that if you were able to dissipate, everything else would be easier? And that's why I like how you keep saying, we have to peel the onion pill No, to get to that one and say, Okay, this is really it. This is a one, that if we were to resolve this one, everything else will be easier, because it's all stemming from here. No, I think it's a big thing for like, anybody out there says, I have a lot on my plate. I don't know what I should work on. What's the root? Cause? What's the lead Domino, the one that is where to fall? Everything else would kind of irrelevant, or at least very, very weakened. Because yeah, you like everybody else. Me, we all have other stuff as well. But when we can resolve the root things that are really powerful, we have the ability to deal with other things. But if it's the root thing that's so powerful, and there's also the other stuff, that's when we can really fall. Does that make sense?

John Ainsworth 27:08
Yeah. Yeah. And in order to get there, it wasn't like an a direct path. To to that insight, in the first place I'd worked with as we were going through the arena, I was also working with a therapist, I worked with her for probably about a year total. And this was, this was probably one of the top things that I got from working with her was that she just said one day to me, you keep saying this, I don't think you're actually lazy. And I was just like, oh, well, this feels like a big deal. You know, and then along and like we discussed that in the arena, and then that you you've kind of unpicked it some more, and then I got to talk to other people about it as well. Like, this was just one of the things I think with the arena that's like, the difficult parts of it, like it's not very long, right? You know, it's whatever it is six weeks or something, right, and you do two sessions a week, and they're like an hour, hour and a half, something like that. It's not a lot of time, but then it's the in between, there's all of the emotional dealing with the out from it. And then like, I would also do a lot of talking to other people about it and trying to unpick it and make sense of it and be like, where is this? And what is this? And what is the lead Domino? What is the center of the onion and then like, oh, shit, if I just spent 22 years, deliberately doing something that's been holding me back, because I could let go of that junk, okay? In the past.

Itamar Marani 28:39
But it's a very common one, the the fear of being lazy amongst entrepreneurs. It's like, the reality is to succeed in entrepreneurship, you probably don't need a great rote memory. And that shouldn't be your fascination. But that's what schools value some of us are able, like Carrie said, like, I was the same way. I just wouldn't study all year. And then just the day before the big test, I pick up a textbook, we did it all night, and then I would ace it. And then I thought it was lazy. And for me, it was the same thing. Somebody told me at a certain point, oh, you're just a really passionate individual. Like, if you care about something, you go all out, but if you don't you don't. That's uh huh. That's interesting. I never thought about myself, I just thought I was lazy is outside the same thing as you are like I saw a lot of my experience and the experience that you were going through as well. It's a very common thing for so many entrepreneurs. To see it all around. People are trying to be hard on themselves, because they're afraid they're lazy. And if they don't push themselves, they're going to fail, because you're taking their experience from school or from other kind of work or job that they were completely uninterested in and not bought into emotionally. And they're attaching that this is just how they are. But this is just how they are in that context. You put them in another context. Suddenly they actually care about how you said though, to the enth degree that run marathons, whatever it may be. I think the context of how we form these things is crucial. It's crucial to understand

John Ainsworth 30:00
I found that super helpful. We had that workshop the other day. And I had the breakout room with two other entrepreneurs. And both of them said they had the same experience that they thought they were lazy. And I was just like, Oh, when I thought this was just my thing. I was like, that feels like a big deal. When I'm like, Oh, it's just a thing. It's just this is just the thing that's out there. It's not my fear. It's the fear. It's like, I can deal with that. If everybody has it, then it? I don't know exactly why it's not a camaraderie thing. It's more like, oh, this, this is surmountable. Because if everybody's going through, it's like the resistance right? Once you know the resistance exists, then it's it's something you can be aware of, and you can deal with, when you think it's just that you are whatever lady or something wrong with you, then that's, like tricky to, to emotionally kind of cope with.

Itamar Marani 30:53
You think it's just like an inherent flaw that you have, not something that everybody deals with, you can deal with as well and overcome.

John Ainsworth 30:58
Yeah, I remember when you gave me that book, The Gates of Fire Gator fan I was reading about, you know, these Spartan warriors dealing with fear. And it's like, they're the toughest warriors in the world. And they're like, afraid all the time, but they just deal with it better. And they laugh about talking about. Yeah,

Itamar Marani 31:17
the owner. That's like, that's the fascinating thing.

John Ainsworth 31:22
Yeah, and that was like, oh, okay, you're allowed to feel this. You don't have to try and deny this emotion. It doesn't mean that you're a weak person. Overall, something's wrong. It's like, no, that's just that's the thing. That's like, and then you deal with Oh, all right, then isn't that

Itamar Marani 31:39
it's got the it's called the weakness paradox. That basically by being willing to again, right time, right place, being able to expose a weakness of yours and be willing to work on it and own it, that actually makes you stronger. Where most people that's not inherent, that doesn't inherently feel normal or safe or desirable, to be vulnerable, expose a weakness, whatever it may be. But the people, if you never expose that weakness, you never give yourself the opportunity actually work on it and falsify it. Like how you said, like that was using exposing this is something that feels really uncomfortable to look at that I have this belief that I'm lazy, unless I really beat myself up and ascend mean to myself, but you being able to expose that that's what gives you the opportunity to be really powerful, because you can share it. Most of us don't do that.

John Ainsworth 32:26
Yeah, nowadays, like I think about it every week, like I go through, I've got the tracker from the arena, and I check in with, with our friend Jody, every week on it. I'm just like, okay, how am I doing against that? Am I do it Did I beat myself up that much this week, and it's, it's not just gone away. But it's easier to deal with it when I know it's not true and useful. And I keep an eye on it. And I talk about it and think about it and work on it. And it's like all of those things helped make it into something that you can can deal with.

Itamar Marani 33:01
Yeah, it's awesome. Cool. I wanna, I don't want to stretch the pot too long. But I do want to move into a couple other things. So yeah, cool. One thing you've said is that knowing what to do is only a 10th of the actual job is a 10th of the work for you to expand upon that. What you mean by that? What are your thoughts are?

John Ainsworth 33:23
Yeah, so most people, if you go work with a coach in most areas, let's say a fitness coach, right? Or nutrition coach, something like that. And they tell you, right, if you want to lose weight, or bulk up or whatever, here's what you need to do. You've got so let's say for me, so at the moment, I'm working on bulking up, and it's like, you need to eat this many calories, this much protein every day. It's like, great. That's nice and straightforward. Except for the fact that there's an entire reality that doesn't want to fit with that, you know, it's like, okay, how am I going to do that? How many meals does that mean? I'm having, but what times? What if I, it comes time to eat one of the meals and I just really don't feel like eating? What do I do, then? How am I going to make this into something that's actually that I am going to manage? What if I go out? And everybody's drinking loads of cocktails that evening? How does that fit with it? What's going to happen the next day when I feel like oh, crap, I fell off the wagon a little bit there. And I didn't hit the target. What about and it's like just 1000 things right? In reality, or if you're losing, if you're trying to lose weight. It's like, what if I really love donuts? What if there's somebody that you know, buys pizza, and that what do I do in that situation? What you know, like, there's all this all of this is the actual work of making the change? And like figuring out how are you going to deal with all of that and most people who are giving advice or coaching, just ignore all of that, as if that stuff is just like, well, that's your that's just do it. That's just like, oh, just do it. Great.

John Ainsworth 34:55
Yeah.

John Ainsworth 34:56
Why didn't I think of that? You know, why did everybody think of that as an issue? You So if you're working with somebody on site, I used to work in behavior change. So I used to help people from hard to reach groups, cancer patients, over 65 disabled people get into physical activity, and my entire job was based around, how do you do that? What support do people need? And not just at a logical level, you know, so for example, they need to know what activities if they want to get into activity, they need to know what activity they're gonna go to, but also some practical stuff. Okay, well, how are they going to get there? What time is it, how they're going to feel when they get there. So we will introduce them to the instructor, and we will introduce the instructor to them, we give them a free first session so they could attend. If they don't like it, we'd find them something else to do, then we would work with them on the behavior change side of things. Okay, what's your motivation for doing it? What's your fears and your concerns? And we'd address those? What habits do you need to like all of this stuff, is an entire field of work, and, and is vitally important, and nearly everybody just act as if it doesn't matter, as if it doesn't exist? And they go, Well, why didn't you just do, it's just willpower. It's just determination. It's like, it's not to be ridiculous.

John Ainsworth 36:07
It's like, of course, those

John Ainsworth 36:08
things help. But it's like that. It's just not the case. And it's like, so I work out, always, and I've got friends who they struggle, and sometimes they work out. And sometimes they don't, it's like, okay, what I've done is I've created a situation for myself where it's easier to work out. So I, when I used to go to the gym, I would always choose a gym that was between my office and my home. So I couldn't go home without passing the gym. And I would pack the gym kit the night before, you've got the gym kit with you in your passenger just like it's much easier to go to the gym, when you're walking past it, you feel like oh crap, I better go in than it is if you go home first, and then you've got to go out again. And it's easier if you know people there and it's friendly. And it's easier if it's doing an activity that you like. And so all of these things. And most people just like get upset with themselves because they didn't go do the thing. And then they beat themselves up. And it's like they don't have that kind of structure around it. And

Itamar Marani 37:01
experience. Sorry, good there. But I think you were about to say I was about to ask that.

John Ainsworth 37:05
The point with the arena is you have gone through this in so much detail. It's like, I just think it's

John Ainsworth 37:13
better to

John Ainsworth 37:15
give you a topic or a compliment here. So everyone listening, Itamar, and my relationship is based around giving each other shit constantly.

John Ainsworth 37:24
So

John Ainsworth 37:27
I just think it's a total work of genius, because it's like, it's you start with overall, what is it you're trying to achieve? And then you break it down into okay, what is it that you that you currently believe that is stopping you from achieving it? And then you go down? And like, which of those are the most important? And then let's break it down into is that true? Or is that not true? And then okay, what's the issues that come up? What's the triggers that you have that cause that allow you to notice when that's going on? And then you dig down into like, Okay, well, what was it? What would the world be like, if you keep believing this thing? And you go down that route? Or what if you don't, if you believe the opposite, and you actually change your behavior, in order to increase your motivation allows you to visualize the future, both directions? And then you're getting down into like tracking everyday, like, what is that every week? How are you staying on track with that? And how is that going, and this is effective. And it's all of these nuanced details to it, that allow you by the end of it to be like, oh, yeah, I could do these small individual things. And if I do that, the whole thing lines up, in order to allow me to achieve the outcome that I'm after. And then you change your view of who you are, as you work on changing our view of who you are as a person, in order to allow you to not have that, you know, internal resistance to it as well. There's like all of these different angles and aspects to it, that by the end of it, it's not easy, but it's now practical and manageable, which allows you to actually

Itamar Marani 38:44
system basis, that thing, it's not like a boost of motivation, but it's consistent, because there's less friction to go through.

John Ainsworth 38:50
Yeah, yeah, I appreciate it.

Itamar Marani 38:55
Appreciate the rare compliment, John, by the kind of high level, like, that's what I've seen that most programs, it's how you look at you have to clarify the goal, then, for example, what you need to do it, but then that's where they leave you. And if we were computers, that'd be great. But we have to take account into the into account the human factor. And that's why I call it the emotional fortitude. If you can have the period in which you want the game plan to achieve it, and you have the emotional fortitude to actually act on it and see the world for what it is. That's when it all comes together and you can win. And that's why I think this stuff is so important to be truthful. If I didn't have to do the first two parts, and I could just get into the emotional fortitude, that'd be awesome. But what I found this really helpful for most people, is that they first have to get clear on what they want, then reverse engineer a game plan because then it really flush it out. What's the constraint? What emotional or mental block is actually going to stop you from doing what you want to get to where you want to get to and that's how you also like touch on therapy. That's why it's different. Because we're not just going all over the place for 10 years, or saying this is something you want to achieve is the life you want to have. Okay, this is the business you need to build. Okay, these are the facts means you need to take what's going to be stopping you from doing these things, because that's the only 20 That'll give you that happy life, happy business and so on. But again, I appreciate the compliment.

John Ainsworth 40:10
It's not like I never say anything nice. But I just realized that was a very like, oh, you know, very

Itamar Marani 40:15
appreciate it, I appreciate it. Is there anything else that you want to cover for today, anything that you want to say, this is something that really helped me maybe if somebody's listening, and they're going through this kind of thing, they should do this, it would really help them. And kind of the process is things that you want to share.

John Ainsworth 40:37
One thing is, it's very easy when you're stressed to get into the belief that there's two options. Either I go and I, you know, for in my case, you know, beat myself up in order to work really hard, or I'm a failure. Like, it's very easy to kind of get into that mindset primary. And there's always 100 options, there's always different ways of looking at it and different approaches. And it's hard to see those things necessarily on your own. But if you work on it, and you go through the process, and you think about it, and you get input from other people in New, you know, whether you go through to Mars or in a program, or you go work with friends and Masterminds, whatever I'm trying to figure this kind of stuff out, it's like that always is different way to doing it. I think that's one part. Another thing for me is really starting to understand this, the importance of this concept of like Zona genius from Dan Sullivan, the what is your way of doing things that is going to get much better results is it's really massive, but it's not a small project to start to kind of uncover this with a certain ways that you can work or certain ways that you can do things or certain business models that work for you. That will just be it's not that it's a bit better, it's going to be way, way better. And really, once you start to understand that there is this potential, there are other options, and some of them will be incredible. And you could actually get a huge amount out of it. It's almost like having that perspective then allows you to go well, let me go look for it, that's actually worth going to try and find it. And I feel like I'm still on this journey. And I'll go back through this again, many times, I'm sure. But it's, it's very freeing. And it's, it's yeah, it's awesome.

Itamar Marani 42:26
I want to say this, I think what you're saying as far as there's more than one than two options, either beat yourself up, or do this. I'll say like this, I think it's the easier, more available option to just say this is how reality is let me work through that, through that lens. What's more difficult and more challenging is to say, Wait, do I have an obstructed view of reality? Is there a reason why I'm not able to complete those OODA Loops very fast is because I can't even orient myself correctly. That requires people to have the courage to take a step back also, and say, Wait, could this not be true? It's suddenly going to have to change about how I view the world and how things are? And I think that would be the biggest question that I pose to listeners is, are you trying to beat yourself up? To just go harder? And just go through how you currently view the world? Or are you willing to actually use that effort you're gonna use anyway, to perhaps challenge your lens of how you view the world and how you orient yourself, because that's gonna give you a lot longer term results and more sustainable. It's not like you pushing yourself and then you get exhausted. But you just create an internal environment, as John said, with less friction inside of it. So you can succeed more on a consistent basis. But that'd be a good takeaway, John. Second, how

John Ainsworth 43:39
you feel 100%? Yeah.

Itamar Marani 43:42
Awesome. Cool. So aside from that, guys, want to thank John again for doing this for being on. It's awesome seeing your success, man, super happy for you. And yeah, appreciate you doing this man. And I will see you guys next week.