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Tell me about your vision. Well, my vision is comes around from my own issues that I was struggling

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with when I was a kid, mainly in teenage years and in my 20s. And I struggle a lot with depression

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and anxiety. And while I spent time trying to manage it, I guess, deal with it, it gets to a

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point where you just think, oh, this is the way it's supposed to be because this is how you feel.

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How would you know any different? Sort of like trying to explain the color blue to a blind person.

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It's like, well, if you've never experienced color, how do you really experience it? If you've never

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really experienced anything but this kind of melancholy, why would you expect anything different?

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And it was really with the birth of my son in 2000 that I thought, okay, well, I don't want to

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pass this along to him. Or if he ends up having to deal with the same issues,

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what could be done about it? And so I really started researching and looking into what could

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be done to it. Can you actually change the way your brain works within the world around you?

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And what I discovered over years of working on myself in various ways was there are tools,

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there are techniques and strategies, skills you can learn that you can literally change

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your brain chemistry. You can change the way you feel in your body. And this actually led me to

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becoming a hypnotherapist down the line because that was one of the things I was using for myself,

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using the power of my own subconscious mind to create healing and just feel better within myself.

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And I guess the vision I have is that I like to reach as many people as possible and let them

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know you have the power within you to feel better, to create the life that you want.

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I don't mean in terms of riches and yachts and sports cars and things, but how you want to feel

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within your body. I think we all have a desire to feel good, to feel whatever you want to call it,

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happiness or joy or bliss or whatever. And by learning certain skills and strategies

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and techniques, you can actually do that. It's sort of like though going to the gym.

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You don't get to go to the gym just twice and then you get to be ripped and look like a

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Marvel superhero. You have to keep going to the gym. I mean, the Dalai Lama still meditates every

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day. The man's 89 years old and he still practices loving kindness and compassion meditation every

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day. And you read his books, he talks about the anger and the sorrow and the despair of what's

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going on in Tibet. The Chinese government is still bulldozing down his monasteries. They're so

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arresting his monks, torturing his monks. So of course he's a human being. He's going to feel

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despair and sorrow. I mean, he was exiled out of Tibet in 1958 or 1957 and something like that.

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But every day he practices loving kindness and compassion. If anybody was to have it down by now,

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you think it'd be that guy. I mean, the guy's not married, the guy has no kids. He has a staff of

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people to meet his every need and want. And every day he's practicing loving kindness and compassion.

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So if you look at anybody who has mastered anything, whether it's an instrument, athletics,

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or something like the Dalai Lama in terms of spirituality, mastering something like loving

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kindness and compassion, you notice there's one common denominator and they keep working at it.

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And so my vision, and this is probably a super long answer to a short question, but

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the vision I have is to let people know that you can have what you want,

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but just take some effort. There's a certain amount of relentlessness to this. And just like

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the Dalai Lama, or look at anybody who has mastered anything like Yo-Yo Ma, considered the greatest

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cello player alive. And the guy still practices three to four hours every day. The guy's 67 years

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old. Again, if anybody was to kick back and put their feet up and just phone it in and play

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Carnegie Hall and play Mozart night after night, it'd be that guy. But again, he wants to master

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this music, wants to master this instrument. And so he practices every day. Dalai Lama practices

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every day. And so what do you want in your life? Do you want happiness? You want joy? You want

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confidence? You want to feel successful? You want to feel like you're worthy? You can have that,

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but it does take some effort on your part to practice that. Otherwise, what are you practicing?

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You're practicing anxiety, you're practicing depression. That's what I was doing. And I got

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really good at it. But when you realize you can practice something else, you realize that the

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world opens up to you. Again, kind of a long answer to a short question, but it comes down to,

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you can be the person you want to be, but it does take some effort on your part to do it.

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That's incredible. Yeah, I love that vision. And sharing it in parts, because I have, starting up

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my own company and trying to get out there and trying to talk to people, I have anxiety when it

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comes to walking in, knocking on doors, making phone calls to people, because I don't want to

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sell what I am or who I am or sell myself to other people just feels weird. But it's a step in the

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process you have to push through. So you just, I've always said that I put on a mask and I keep

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pushing through it. Yeah, eventually I'll get more comfortable with that kind of step in the

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process. But it isn't, it's never an easy thing. And so I think that's the thing.

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It's never an easy thing. You want to get good at something, you just keep pushing for it.

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Absolutely. But you just had a really great point. You mentioned, you know, put on a mask and that's

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a great skill to learn. Just pretend you are that person. Even if you aren't that person yet.

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And it's that whole fake it till you make it. And I know that's kind of cliched at this point. But

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if you could pretend to be that person, you'll actually start wiring that into your brain. And

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they've done studies to show that. The piano player study they did back in the 1990s when they

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wanted to watch the brain learn something new. And they had the people practicing piano, they had a

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control group who didn't do anything. They had a group who pretended to play the piano, not touch

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it at all. And what they found is, of course, the people practicing piano actually developed new

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neural network in the part of the brain for music, of course, because they're learning music, they're

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playing music. But what's interesting is that people who only pretended, who only with their imagination

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pretended to play piano also developed the same neural network in the same part of the brain.

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They actually wired their brain so it looked like they were learning how to play piano.

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And so you can literally become the person. Like I was just saying a minute ago, you can become the

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person you want, literally wire that into your system. But it does take some effort. They did

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spend some time every day pretending, closing their, you know, sitting recliner on a couch,

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closing their eyes and pretending to play piano. But it literally wired that into their brain and

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changed who they were. So again, you can become who you are. And if you need to wear that mask

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in order to do it, why not? You know, and you look at any masterful person like Tony Robbins,

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he was probably God awful back in 1980 when he was speaking in front of three or four people.

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And, you know, but he practiced and he kept going and he pretended he was the person he wanted to

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become. And I think that works with pretty much anything.

