G'day leaders. In this episode we talk about how we do New Year's Eve differently.
We're calling it New You Eve. Instead of New Year's resolutions, we have a two-step process. Enjoy.
Why did it count backwards? Oh no, we're now recording.
What? Hello captain.
What do I say? Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly.
What are we going to talk about? I don't know. So, leadership, life and everything else.
And we're live, on air. We're on air, not we're recording.
But the sign says on air. It does, it does. We've got a new neon sign in the studio that says on air, gifted to us by my gorgeous little son.
Yes. We're professional now. Yeah we are, we have a sign that says we're on air. Live, on air.
Hi Michelle. Hi Guy. And why do they call you captain? Because you're an hour-long captain.
I thought that was a trick question. No. And Guy Newman the clown, why? Yes, I was a clown in a circus.
Yes, yes, we know that. So, first episode, if people don't know who we are, why we're captain and the clown, we recommend our very first episode.
Who are captain and the clown, that's right. I'm finding out who we are and why we keep calling out Bollinger.
Yeah. So our last podcast of 2023. Yes, yes, feeling excited. Yeah, me too, me too. It's been a great year.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And we're calling this podcast New You Eve. New You Eve. Happy New You. Yes, yes. It's a play on words.
It is a play on words because we've got quite strong opinions about New Year's resolutions and stuff.
We do, we do. So typically a New Year's resolution is a projection of goals moving forward, how you want to be...
Resolving to be or think or do something different. That's right. So we looked it up. A resolution in the dictionary is a decision to do or not to do.
Sounds easy. Yeah. But I saw a report or a story by ABC News, they've got their facts from somewhere, that 80% of people...
I've heard something similar. Yeah. Fail. Fail to achieve their resolution and with most of those people actually failing by mid February.
Mid February. I think many years ago I think I failed in January. January the 1st. This year I'm going to quit drinking. Cheers. No, I'm kidding.
Yeah, no, a lot of people fail their resolutions and we've discussed a few times why people fail their resolutions, haven't we?
Yeah. So it's all about the goal setting, etc. So we do things differently.
We do and we do... how we do it is we sit down and we do this all through the year actually. Yeah, we do actually.
So we review. Review. Yep. So instead of thinking about who we want to be in the future, we review the previous year.
That's right. What's happened. Yeah, take stock. Actually take a breath, pause and yeah, even list on paper the things that we've done.
We do two things. We do. Yeah, we celebrate. Yes. And then we collect our learnings. Yeah.
It's a much better way to do it. So rather than New Year's Eve with a glass of champagne in your hand thinking, all right, what am I going to do now?
I'm going to get fit. I'm going to lose weight. Quit drinking. Cheers. Cheers. Yeah, it's better to look back first.
Yeah. And I think, well, from my own personal experience, I tend to... I've done something and it's almost like I don't even acknowledge the fact that it's completed or finished or achieved because I'm on to the next thing.
Yeah. Always looking forward. Yeah. And whereas children, if they accomplish something, we give them huge credit and kudos and celebrate them.
And we don't do that enough for ourselves. Take stock and celebrate. Yeah. That's right. It's good to get back through the year and celebrate what you've achieved and then look at what you've learned from that year before you decide what you're going to do next year.
And so, well, we've been talking about this before that. So as far as collecting our learnings, and I mentioned failure and you said, well, you can't learn from failure. So failure means that you haven't learnt.
Yeah. Failure is when you haven't learnt. Yes. Yeah. Learned. Americans say learned. We say learnt.
And so if it's something that you didn't achieve or didn't work that time, it's actually a lesson, not a failure. You found out what didn't work.
Yeah. And for people who feel like they haven't achieved anything in the last year. That's not true. No, they're still here. Yeah. And they've learned maybe what didn't work.
Yeah. Yeah. But we always start with a celebration. So let's do a bit of that. Yeah. Yeah. So we've had a great year. We've actually, this is something we can both celebrate and learn from.
We had planned to record a lot more podcasts than what we actually did. And then to release them. And release them instead of sitting on them.
Yes. And so we always set big goals, but we didn't achieve necessarily the number of podcast episodes that we wanted. We certainly achieved a lot though.
We did. And so we both can celebrate the fact that we did release a lot of podcasts. And thank you to all of our listeners for all your feedback. It's been awesome.
I know. It's good. And it's even when we meet some of those people and they say they may not have visually celebrated us or commented or anything, but then when they speak to us, they say, I've been using this technique that you mentioned in that podcast.
The curiosity one. Yeah. Yeah. That was your idea. That was a great podcast. Yes. So I'll be using more of that going forward into the new year. That's my part of mine, but we'll discuss that in a bit. But the podcasts and then meeting all new people.
So many people and from a wide variety of sectors and interactions and situations. So we can certainly celebrate that. What else have you achieved this year, Michelle?
Traveling for work. Yeah. We got to work in Malaysia. We did. That was amazing. We went up to Darwin quite a few times. Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne. You went over to Perth. Yeah, Perth a few times. Yep. So celebrating the fact that we get to see this beautiful country and travel around the world doing what we love doing.
Well, as some of the amazing people I met, well, we both met doing keynotes. Yeah. Yeah. Such a fun thing when you've got a huge audience and afterwards they come up to you and say, oh, that bit of the keynote really resonated. That's always fun.
Yeah. Well, I learn more from people who come up to comment on what they've taken away from it because it's from their perspective. I hadn't actually thought of that. I find that in every workshop that you learn from the students because they're putting what you're teaching into their own story, like you often say, in their perspective.
And then when they relay that to you, it gives you a new perspective of what it is that you're teaching. I love that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Released a book. A children's book. Yes. Yes. And so we'll do more of that next year. Yeah. I'm working on my book is so close.
Yes. Actually, we're shopping for a publisher right now. Yes. Yes. That one's exciting. If anyone knows of a publisher. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The clown.com. Absolutely. And yeah, just what else? Yes. Yes. Lots of lots of good health habits this year. Yeah. So not feeling it with the tight hamstrings at the moment after shoveling.
Yeah. We're shoveling 1.5 tonne of rocks the other day. People are going, why would you do that? Gardening. Gardening. So and then so the learnings. Yeah. So the first step is celebrating and then second step is to take your learnings.
So what did you learn this year? Oh, I had a lot quite a few learnings. One that I have been able to act upon after a few times. It's like hitting me on the head because I didn't get it. Hadn't got it for a long time.
Is that when I have a an outcome that wasn't quite what I wanted, there's some disappointment, frustration, I start to feel a bit low. I need to drink a glass of water. So as we discuss in workshops, the as far as the the brain and you get a dump. So you get cortisol and
the adrenaline. The four adrenal. Adrenal corticotropic hormones. That's it. The precursor. Yes. Yes. Yes. So and then the 90 seconds and it's a chemical release and we can control this and I explain it in workshops.
And I talk people through it. How to do it. And so you're now applying it to yourself. I am applying it to myself. Yeah. For those in those situations. So I know that the circuit breaker for me to stop this is a glass of water.
So when when something happens and you get a release of adrenal corticotropic hormone, you're going into final flight. Yes. And we've spoken about this before. You those emotional chemicals then last for 90 seconds in your body. Thank you, Dr. Jill Bolte-Taylor. Yeah. And if you just sit with the emotions for 90 seconds, they'll go away. But you're saying that one of the things that helps you is just to drink a glass of water. That's right. It's a it's I've attached it to it now that as soon as I start to feel it and go down, I need to drink water.
I need to have water. So soon I'll be like one of those or like my teenage daughter who had carries around a huge Frank Green to sip.
She wasn't going to let us continue with that without getting that Frank Green. What is it with Frank Green? Here we are promoting it. Huge lump of a drink bottle. It's just a water bottle.
But yeah, I have water with me. So that's one of your learnings. Daddy's one of my learnings. Yeah. My big one for this year is that I don't set goals for myself. I establish rules. And we'll talk about this when we talk about new you Eve, the rules.
And so these instead of saying I want to do this, I want to do that. This is the new rule. This is this is my rule. This is how I operate. This is what I do. It's a it's a rule. So I set a rule. For example, my rule is that I drink a glass of lemon water, a big glass of lemon water every morning.
It's a rule. My day like that. It's not like I'm going to try and do that. I want to do that. It's not that's the rule. That's that's the way I live life. And I'm starting to apply a lot of rules. And we'll talk more about that when we get to the new new you Eve bit of this podcast.
Yeah, learning learning that. And I've always thought this that there's no such thing as failure. There's only failure to learn. And one of the things I'm moving towards is what I call radical acceptance. And I'm going to be talking about that in the second part of this podcast as well. And that's going to be a new rule for me just accepting what is.
Yeah, well, we talk about anti fragility a lot in workshops and keynotes. And as far as collecting your learnings where it's not always winning those things that you haven't that haven't worked yet.
Future proofing yourself because you have tried things that haven't worked to the outcome that you wanted. So you know, I don't if I do that, it's not going to give me the outcome that I want. Yeah. So future proofing building in redundancy trying things pushing boundaries. Okay, they may not work.
But, you know, for next time, not to go that path. So you try something else. Yeah, no, exactly. So if people rather than go straight to a new year's resolution, sit down and they celebrate their wins for the year.
Obviously, they're going to feel good. They're going to get that hit of dopamine serotonin and then go through the year and think, all right, what didn't go the way that I'd planned and don't see it as failure. See it as an opportunity to learn something. What did you learn? What did you get out of that experience? If, if you get to the end of the year and you think of yourself, I've achieved nothing. Well, that's not correct. What you've achieved is a lesson in what doesn't work.
And if you can reframe anything that happened to you during the year as an opportunity to learn, you're becoming anti-fragile, which is the big, the big message in your keynote that we, whatever adversity we face makes us stronger. We can pull lessons out of it no matter what it is. I know that's easier said than done.
But just going back through the year and thinking, okay, what didn't go the way I planned? I didn't lose that. However many kilos I didn't get to run five. Yeah. Or my relationship didn't work out, whatever it is. You've got an opportunity at the end of the year, instead of sitting there going, oh, well, it was me. I'll try again.
Yeah. Is to think to yourself, okay, so what did I learn? What was the gift that that experience gave me? And it is a gift because without that gift, you aren't a stronger person in the future.
So yeah, setting the goal or setting the resolution that you're going to get up at 5am every morning and go for a one kilometer, two kilometer run. It may not work if you don't get to bed until 11 or 12. So you may need to just tweak it. So you know that getting up at 5am doesn't work for you currently.
Yeah. So think about why it didn't work rather than, oh, I failed. Yeah, what's the lesson? Yeah. So we're going to be doing that this afternoon. Yes, because today is the last day of 2023. Yeah. So celebrating your wins, everyone celebrate what you've achieved this year.
And then just go back and find out what did you learn? Yeah, it's not failure. It's learning. It's only failure if you don't learn. And a child, you wouldn't berate for, you know, not being able to do something if it's their first time or you can see that it doesn't work for them that way.
But because you're outside, it's not you personally, it's often easier to see for other people than it is for yourself. So maybe take a step back from yourself and have a look and assess as if you're your best friend. Yeah. Have you heard that? Yes, I have. And you should be. Yeah, I need to do that.
I need to do that. Yes. So yeah, look at look at your life as if you are giving yourself advice as your best friend. If your best friend was looking at what happened to you in the last year, what would they be celebrating? And what would they be showing you that you've learned? Yeah. I like that.
I like that.
So part two of this process is then the new you. So I tonight when the clock strikes 12, I'm planning on next year being as successful as this year, because I'll be taking my lessons from this year and previous years into into next year.
But I'm not going to be setting resolutions. I'm going to be creating some rules for myself. And I'm going to be starting small with a couple of them because they're new things that I want to start bringing into my life. Can you share? Yeah, like one of the things that I implemented or started to implement this year was stretching.
Because as I age my ligaments and muscles and everything seemed to be tightening up. And so we started to do it together actually and had a plan to do it every couple of days and failed. Yes. Well, it wasn't failure. I learned something.
It was that we hadn't actually set a trigger for that a rule around it. And so I'm going to be creating a rule that on particular days at particular times after a particular event, we stretch, I stretch. And if you want to join me, please feel free to do that.
So it's not so much about a goal that I'm going to set for myself to be able to do the splits or be able to touch my toes eventually. It's more what is the rule that's going to create a behavior which inevitably will achieve the outcome at the end.
Who is it that rolls out of bed and does 10 push ups?
Batman.
Isn't Batman?
It is Batman. It was Christian Bale. So Alfred walks into his room with a tray of breakfast. He stands up and he falls forward as if he's falling out of his face, but he falls to the ground and he's doing push ups.
Yeah. So that's the trigger. That's the wake up means 10 push ups.
Yeah. Same as for me. Wake up means like a glass of lemon water.
Yeah.
So I like that.
What about yourself? What's your rule for next year?
Okay. To get more curious in life. We did a podcast on it and I consider myself quite curious and I've been making myself do that, but it is a conscious effort to be even more curious on life.
So my rule, I've created a strategy around that, how to do it, is to stop when I meet somebody or there's a situation to stop, pause, take a breath, which are all things that we learnt, you know, emergency handling, etc. and aircraft.
So sit on your hands and just take stock.
Let go of the control panel.
Well, yeah, kind of let go of my preconceptions and then think to myself and whether I ask it verbally or just in my mind, why.
So no bias or release my bias and look at it from somebody else's point of view or a different method or technique to what I would normally do.
Okay.
So you've told a story about a person who you were doing a workshop and they had the lectern or a table set up and you couldn't move it.
So you stood in front of it, which frustrated the person who had set up the room because they would have gone behind the desk, which I've seen you in many workshops and you have a lot of movement and energy and so that would have caged you.
Yeah, that's right.
So and that worked for you, but because it wasn't the technique or the process she would have used, she got angry.
Yeah, frustrated.
And then potentially couldn't actually even hear the workshop.
She was in her own head, I could tell.
And I know I'm guilty of that if somebody's doing something in a different way to how I would have done it, sometimes I get so caught up in a little mini discussion in my head about how I would do this or what I'd like to say to this person that I'm missing what they're talking about.
So you're not curious.
No.
So I'm, yeah, I'm actively, my goal is actively getting curious.
Active curiosity.
Yes.
I like it.
I've got one that relates to that.
My new rule for 2024 is what I'm calling radical acceptance.
It's radical.
It sounds like a sports drink or something.
It does.
Radical acceptance brought to you by...
Bollinger.
Where are you Bollinger?
So I found this year, so whenever I feel frustrated, whenever anyone feels frustrated, it's based on a few things.
It's mainly that your expectations aren't being met.
So our frustration is often triggered by you expecting something to happen or something to not happen and then the opposite is happening.
And so every time that happens, you obviously get stressed, your brain releases adrenocortico-tropic hormone, which was spoken about so many times.
And then you have to battle yourself back to normality and get back to the norm.
So I'm going to prime my brain every morning and every night.
So every night I'm going to prepare for the next day of radical acceptance and every morning when I wake up, I'm going to set that intention for the day of radical acceptance.
What I mean by that is I'm not going to try and control what I cannot control.
So expectations not being met when you get frustrated, you're focusing something you can't control.
It's already happened.
So what I'm going to do is just accept what has happened and then immediately go to what can I do in this situation?
What's within my control? Is there anything within my control?
And if there's nothing within my control, just ignore it, just stop thinking about it.
But if there's something within my control, plan what it is and just do it.
And so the reason why I'm doing this, I'm always, always, always looking to reduce stress and become more resilient and antifragile and all the things we speak about.
But I've noticed this year that there was a couple of moments where I got frustrated and I allowed myself to sit in that frustration for longer than what I typically want.
And it was based on the fact that I couldn't accept what happened and or what somebody had done or what somebody hadn't done.
So for me now, 2024, the new rule is radical acceptance.
And my rule is that I go to bed planning for it the next day.
And when I wake up, my intent for that day is radical acceptance.
So you're marinating in it during the night.
Yes, overnight and then bringing it into my conscious mind in the mornings.
Radical acceptance. Let's see how we go. 2024, bring it on.
Bring me all of those challenges that are going to challenge my ability to be radically accepting.
Yeah. I promise I'll put the lids on the glass containers.
I know that's been a frustration.
The fridge containers, yes, that expectation that I have. No, I accept it.
No, I just do it for you.
So, charging into the new year, new you.
New you Eve.
Yes.
Into the new year's Eve. We're going to call it new you Eve.
And you can do this any time, any day.
Oh, you can, can't you? It doesn't have to be at the end of December.
No.
So we're going to, I'm going to sit down this afternoon and I hope you join me and go back and just list off all the things that we've achieved in the year.
And it's, there's 365 days to celebrate.
Get some music happening. Feel good.
Maybe even have a glass of Bollinger to get prepared for the new you Eve.
Yes, whilst eating a lint ball.
Yes, lint, lint. And wearing a Bose headphones.
We're putting it out there.
Somebody come and sponsor us quick. We'll do this more often then.
Yeah, so I'm going to celebrate and then write down the lessons that I've learned from the year, because there is no failure if you learn.
That's it.
It's exciting.
And then, yeah, we've got our new you, our rules ready for the next year.
That's right. And releasing podcasts every Friday.
Every Friday?
Every Friday.
Okay, all right, that's the new rule.
Yes.
That's the new rule. We release podcasts every Friday.
That's right.
Our listeners have just heard that.
I am now accountable. Yes.
It's my role.
That's the rule.
That's my job.
The rule is to release every Friday.
Yes.
All right. So Bollinger, Bose, lint, reach out.
Where are you?
Yes.
Anyone else who wants to sponsor the podcast?
Oh, a big thank you. A big thank you.
Lots of thank yous actually.
Lots of thank yous to all of the people who bought our merch, our t-shirts, More Dogs t-shirts and caps.
I've seen a few walking around on the streets. It's good.
And a few people have sent photos into us and I need to put them up on social media.
I'm terrible at social media. I have been terrible at social media.
We're both terrible at social media because we don't like promoting ourselves effectively.
It's awful. Doesn't it feel horrible trying to promote yourself?
Yeah.
So how about I promote you, you promote me and then we'll go from so bad.
Okay, okay. Guy's amazing.
Michelle is awesome.
Thank you.
Yeah. So a big thank you to everyone who's commented and got in contact and bought the merch.
And people from workshops and keynotes that have become friends.
Yeah, following us online.
Yeah. And like we genuinely consider them not only friends but great examples in life of what to do
and just how they went through their lessons and their celebrations and their mentors.
Isn't that a brilliant part of the job after the workshop or the keynote when people come up and share their stories.
So please keep doing that every time you're on one of our workshops or in our keynote.
It's just a beautiful experience that Michelle and I both have when you come up and share your stories
about how you've implemented or how you will implement some of the things we teach.
Thank you to everyone who's working, keeping us safe on New Year's Eve, Christmas, this whole festive season.
Understand that some people aren't with family, aren't with friends and know that we're there.
We love you.
We do. We love you.
Michelle, thank you for an amazing year.
Thank you, Guy.
I hope you're having a great year, as well as the year 2024.
Standing in front of a microphone, chatting to you about different things.
That's right.
All right. Take care.
Bye.
Well, that was fun.
That was fun.
You're such a clown.
Lady captain.
And who's going to listen to us?
Maybe our mums.
I don't know.