Ever found yourself meticulously perfecting a breakfast biscuit, only to have it spark dreams of your own eatery? That's exactly where our conversation starts in our latest episode, as we whisk you away on a gastronomic and philosophical quest, revealing the simple joys and aspirations that can arise from the kitchen. Join us as we sip on the curiosity of a root beer-flavored ancient mushroom elixir and muse over the significance of hydration in our daily lives—because every dreamer needs to stay quenched.
Struggling with motivation can feel like an endless battle, but we're here to navigate these choppy waters together. Our chat meanders from eco-conscious choices like going straw-free to the siren call of French fries, sharing laughs and confessions along the way. We lay bare the challenges of staying driven, whether it's the year-end blues or the daunting leap to decaf. Through stories and insights, we aim to offer comfort and strategies for those feeling stuck in the same rut.
As our episode unfolds, we explore the transformative powers of habit formation and the subtle art of patience in personal growth. Our journey isn't just about reaching the destination—it's also about embracing the small, daily actions that culminate in triumphs over time. So tune in, as we extend an invitation to continue this exploration in future episodes, with the promise of uncovering more strategies to fuel your drive and keep you moving forward.
Ever found yourself meticulously perfecting a breakfast biscuit, only to have it spark dreams of your own eatery? That's exactly where our conversation starts in our latest episode, as we whisk you away on a gastronomic and philosophical quest, revealing the simple joys and aspirations that can arise from the kitchen. Join us as we sip on the curiosity of a root beer-flavored ancient mushroom elixir and muse over the significance of hydration in our daily lives—because every dreamer needs to stay quenched.
Struggling with motivation can feel like an endless battle, but we're here to navigate these choppy waters together. Our chat meanders from eco-conscious choices like going straw-free to the siren call of French fries, sharing laughs and confessions along the way. We lay bare the challenges of staying driven, whether it's the year-end blues or the daunting leap to decaf. Through stories and insights, we aim to offer comfort and strategies for those feeling stuck in the same rut.
As our episode unfolds, we explore the transformative powers of habit formation and the subtle art of patience in personal growth. Our journey isn't just about reaching the destination—it's also about embracing the small, daily actions that culminate in triumphs over time. So tune in, as we extend an invitation to continue this exploration in future episodes, with the promise of uncovering more strategies to fuel your drive and keep you moving forward.
You come to help yourself Food and philosophy with Brian and Nick. I'm Nick and I'm Brian. You know I was going to come up with something to say, but eh. What you eating, Brian.
Speaker 3:Couldn't, just couldn't, just couldn't find the motivation. You know what am I eating? So this morning for breakfast I made a on this unread or on this redacted day. I made or my wife made biscuits. So fresh biscuits out of the oven. We had some yeah, we had some frozen turkey sausage and there's a lot of leftover food from the holidays, so we have some shredded sharp cheddar cheese and so I made my own special biscuits with cheese and sausage, or cheese and sausage biscuits. And so here's the thing that I found out about myself is more recently I've been thinking about it is the process. I like the process of doing something and I try to perfect the process of like what's the best way to do this? And so first I took the biscuits, cut them in half, a little bit of butter on them.
Speaker 1:You cut them in half sideways or cut down.
Speaker 3:Sideways. Yeah, so horizontally my first picture Horizontally.
Speaker 1:Like why would you cut them in half? What are you doing?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so horizontally I cut them in half, put some a little bit of butter on them and then put them under the broiler in the oven so they got a little toasty, melted, the butter, you know all that stuff, so all that good stuff. Then while that was happening, I was heating up the frozen sausage, so getting that sort of thawed out ready to go. And then when the biscuits came out and they were a little bit crispy around the edges and things, I put the sausage on there on one side and then I put cheese on both sides, put them back under the broiler and let that melt the cheese down and then I made them into little biscuit sandwiches and yeah, it was really really good. It turned out that my I don't know if I've ever shared my fantasy on this podcast of not that kind of fantasy.
Speaker 1:Whoa Just claim her.
Speaker 3:Of my fantasy of opening a breakfast restaurant. And so I have all these breakfast restaurant ideas that in my head I'm like, wow, I make this and it's really, really good, and I've never seen this on a menu at a breakfast restaurant. So either that means it's a horrible idea and people have already tried it and they're like, yeah, no, we're not doing that, or it just isn't. It's a good idea and nobody's ever gotten it before right, and so that's one of those. This is one of those ideas of like I know other people make sausage cheese biscuits, but making them in a certain way, with a certain kind of cheese, with a certain kind of sausage, things like that. I feel like you know, that's sort of my ideal kind of I think I could be successful at it, which is me lying to myself, really. But no.
Speaker 3:Well, it's the same we know what it is.
Speaker 3:You're in a dialogue of the Enneagram type nine, because I've never worked in the restaurant industry in my life and I think I know what I'm talking about when I really don't Sure. But anyway, the biscuits were really good and I like doing that on especially days where I get to have a little bit of extra time in the morning so that I can enjoy a little bit and not have to. I gotta just wolf something down so I gotta get to the next thing and allowing that, you know the tide to take you where it may. So that's what basically I ate. Just a little while ago and Brian's beverage corner. I have actually a regular bottle of water. I don't even have my normal actual metal bottle that I usually. I know it's a little bit crazy.
Speaker 1:I don't bring too many bad memories because I know that that bottle was specifically bought and measured, all but designed to fit into your dream truck that was.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1:Was a nightmare truck.
Speaker 3:Well, it still fits perfectly into my EDC backpack. So I've got a pocket that it specifically fits into, and but the color and everything, yeah, I was. I had purchased that to like match my truck that I had for a hot minute and had to get rid of it, which is a story from another, for another time. But so I have water, because when you're public speaking, hydration is important. I heard that from somebody super smart, that's Mr Nick Sager.
Speaker 1:And you do, idealizing others again.
Speaker 3:And then the second thing is this is a cool thing. I've actually been holding on to this for a while and haven't had a chance to use it on or use it or drink it on the podcast. I've been saving it to share it with the audience. I found this thing. I think I bought this at Sprouts Market. Like Sprouts, which is for people that don't know, that's like sort of like a Whole Foods kind of organic kind of you can find some interesting things there.
Speaker 1:So it's healthy. Expensive versions of standard groceries.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and so this is not standard. This is GT's Alive Ancient Mushroom Elixir. Yeah, I know it sounds weird, right, but it's root beer flavored.
Speaker 1:It's from a video game.
Speaker 3:It does it sounds like a you need to, you need to. It sounds like something you would buy in, like you know Fantasyland, or like you know Frontierland and Disneyland, or something like oh, come drink this ancient mushroom elixir. You know to be confused with snake oil, Right, Exactly. So I did this sort of in the vein of trying different kinds of kombucha and things like that. This is. It was just interesting to me because I thought I've never seen anything like that and this is root beer flavored, which is the other thing I was like. Okay, I like root beer, and so I was trying to see how that would be. So this says it has a macro dose of mushroom magic, and so it's.
Speaker 1:it's saying that it has tested by the FDA, right?
Speaker 3:No, so it's. It talks about the fruiting, the fruiting body of three powerful, antioxidant, rich, adaptogen mushrooms. Right, it just defend yourself from free radicals. Blah, blah, blah. All that stuff. Right, so it makes you healthier. So the three mushrooms are Reishi mushrooms, chaga mushrooms and turkey tail mushrooms. So all of our mushroom heads out there, I'm sure they're like oh my gosh, turkey tail mushrooms. Those are awesome. So we've got the powerful trio. But then it says at the bottom to help people like me who are not mushroom heads says what is a fruiting body? It says the fruiting body is the whole mushroom, a fully formed cap and stem, which is the best way to maximize its nutritional benefits. So anyway, it's got these trio of powerful mushrooms in it. It has almost no calories 20 calories for the whole bottle. Doesn't have really anything else in it no fat, no carbs. Actually, take it, it does have some carbs in it and no protein. And it does have raw apple cider vinegar in it as well, which Wow.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And is that towards the end of the ingredient list or?
Speaker 3:middle. Let's see here. So the first thing is adaptogen mushroom infusion, and then something called P? U dash, e, r, h T, pure tea, I guess, and then raw apple cider vinegar. All of these things have asterisks, by the way, and they all say organically produced. It also has dark amber maple in it, and then root beer spices. It also has stevia and erythritol, which are the two, you know, sweeteners in this.
Speaker 1:Right, what is it? The new vote? Fake sweeteners with a fake sugar.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 1:That's in. You know, zero calorie soft drinks and all that, Right.
Speaker 3:Right. But here's the thing, here's what I like about this. Besides, it tastes pretty good. It has a you can because of those root beer spices, you can actually. It does taste like root beer. It's not a you couldn't like. If you really like root beer, you couldn't like replace root beer with this but it gives you like enough of a taste where you're like, oh yeah, I could taste root beer in that. What I like about it is I love companies that like lean completely into their marketing. So like I've talked about you know liquid death, and like they just lean completely into it. Right, so I'll hold this up the camera. They can't see it out there, but okay, so see, look at the font, okay.
Speaker 3:The font looks all like old timey, but look at the top of the label. The top of the label looks like it's like burnt off or like torn off like a piece of parchment. Yeah, ancient paper.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:Like ancient paper and has little divots in the top and the bottom. So like the bottom. Even they so like they lean completely into that. That is the turkey tail mushroom right there. On the front it looks like a turkey tail right, but then even on the back it has like a little saying I'll let you read it. Can you read that?
Speaker 1:Eat thy food, be thy medicine. That's a paraphrase of Edison right, oh, is it? Okay? I think so. He's not. He's not that time period.
Speaker 3:So well, so that, like I said, some cardinal from ancient times. So I just commend them on actually going full in, like all in, on what they're trying to do, Like yeah, they aren't, like you know they're. They're really trying to like put it in there like, hey, the ancient mushroom, if you're going to use the word elixir on your drink, you better do something like this, right yeah?
Speaker 3:So, anyway, I'm going to be sipping on that, for that's all I know. That's only two beverages, which is a tiny Brian's beverage corner, but be sipping on both of those.
Speaker 1:Also, it does have a little bit of caffeine, which you which you, which you lost in quantity, you made up in quality. Yes, Well.
Speaker 3:So here's the thing. I didn't realize this. I actually took started drinking this because I was like, oh good, it'll be something I can drink that doesn't have any caffeine in it. And then, as I was reading the ingredients, it does actually have caffeine in it.
Speaker 1:So it's got about 75 milligrams.
Speaker 3:So it's about. It's not quite. It's stronger than a cup of tea, but not quite as strong as a cup of coffee.
Speaker 1:So I thought a cup of coffee was like a hundred 15 milligrams.
Speaker 3:No, it's like a hundred to 120, depending.
Speaker 1:It's Google convention, fact fact check us, fact check us.
Speaker 3:That's a different thing altogether. So, anyway, we're getting ready to slip. That's what. That's what I'm eating and drinking. What about you?
Speaker 1:I'm eating, okay, well, it's great minds think alike in terms of eating the leftovers and how to go about it. I too had a kind of breakfast biscuit of sorts. Did it for for lunch, but I'm having it for lunch, but it's dinner rolls to dinner rolls and cut them horizontally in half. Take some of the Christmas slices, of the Christmas ham yes, put that in there and a little bit of thin layers of mayo on both of the insides of oh you had me at Mayo, no.
Speaker 1:And then the unconventional bit right, because it has to be a ham, egg and cheese sandwich at the right. So I took real mac and cheese, not craft, but like real cheese and real macaroni. That was a.
Speaker 1:Made Special like flavored with some onion to. Took that leftovers and plopped that in there and had like to only two of those sandwiches and that got me through, you know, until now and probably, yeah, through till didn't like Because it's so filling. It's not all the Hollow ingredients that you might get right end up having a blood sugar crash and you need to eat something before you freak out. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Before I freak out up to you use I statements so it's, it's super tasty. I mean it like when I was having the food fresh right, when, when I was at the Christmas dinner with my family yeah, and join the Mac and enjoying the dinner rolls, like you know what this needs to be a sandwich. It was nice to have that experience so that I hypothesis validated as an experience. It was really good. I Don't think it would have worked if I'd used the powdered cheese.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah you know? For if yeah, so I think that richness, the richness of a real homemade Mac and cheese, has to be there, you know. The the cream and the cheese and the butter and everything else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I wanted to ask you like what would you say the flavor profile was of that mushroom drink? Was there like, was it more, more sweet or more umami?
Speaker 3:No, it's something else. It's slightly sweet, it's not. It's not like drinking a soft drink. It's not even like drinking a, one of our nitro cold brews with like sweet cream in it. It's probably not even that sweet. The front part of it like that. The first thing you taste is the Root beer and then the aftertaste is just sort of like.
Speaker 3:I Don't say I don't want to say it's neutral, but it's like. It doesn't taste like mushrooms at all. By the way, like I mean my experience of mushrooms, I like mushrooms and it doesn't. It doesn't have any Feeling of like wow, I'm drinking like ground-up mushrooms in this, you know, and so you know, but I would say slightly sweet. It's a little bit like because of the apple cider vinegar in it. It's a little bit like drinking a, a kombucha or something like that. Where you got a, you got a little bit of that vinegary kind of that kind of flavor profile on the backside. The first first thing you taste is root beer and then the aftertaste is the apple cider vinegar and everything else, but it's not overpowering. It's not like drinking straight apple cider vinegar or something like that. So sure, yeah, so.
Speaker 3:I'll actually get some more there. They had some other flavors, but I just was in a root beer mood I've been in a root beer kick recently and and so I got that because I was like I want to see what that tastes like and it'll be good for the podcast, so yeah.
Speaker 1:Nice, let's see. So for beverages I have water mm-hmm my towel bill Right bottle glass bottle, I think and I'm still taught Straw-free. I think it was on record when I said that I'm you know what, right here now I'm gonna throw the straw away. Yeah, and so that it's not. Every sip is plastic-free and it's wonderful. The only downside is now I kind of to rinse it out more often, since yeah, my back wash is touching the same brim.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, yeah yeah, I've actually toyed with the idea of getting a different bottle, not because I'm sad, because it matched my truck or anything, but I'm. There's a couple of ones that I don't like drinking out of a straw as much, just like you. You know just the reason you were saying, and there's a couple now that my kids have that are you can either hold it upright and sip it like a straw or and it's a weird kind of mechanism that they patent, you know patented probably or you can just literally put your mouth around it and drink it like an actual Like right out of the bottle. And so I'm toying with I'd have getting a new, a New thing, rewarding myself maybe with a new, a new bottle for the new year or something you know.
Speaker 1:You go oh, it could work. And then I also have an iced americano decaf with as Little sweet cream as they can put into it.
Speaker 3:I'm picturing a Starbucks employee with like a dropper, like. You're like I want.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't think it's that scant right.
Speaker 3:Yeah it's.
Speaker 1:It's like, yeah, add sweet cream, but the smallest splash you can ring up right. So that that's where I'm at with that. I've been at the time this record 14, 15 days. Into my, Do the math, maybe it's 13 days.
Speaker 3:Decaf Coffee oh, I have any coffee at all. It's decaf only so completely decaf all at all caffeine just not like.
Speaker 1:No, just just decaf coffee, it's kind of just a cap rise like yeah, I'll have. Since then I've only had like three sodas. So, yeah, it's not. It's definitely a caffeine reduction. Yeah and Was it a thing it would be. It would be like what 28 days if I hadn't splurged Midway through my birthday, I went ahead and had a, a nitro, you know yeah, but it's my birthday, you know.
Speaker 3:Well, on that note, I still actually have. I should play this on the on the podcast someday. I Still actually have, if I can get the audio. I don't know how I'd get the audio, but I have Somewhere on my phone. I thought I had. I'm looking for it right now. Oh yeah, december 20th 2021. We just passed it. I have the message from when you broke the french fry the last time you broke the French I, so I'm keeping track like this mark is stay on your calendar.
Speaker 2:For those of you who haven't listened to the podcast for a long time.
Speaker 3:Nick left me a message when he broke his rule of I don't have any French fries, and it was a couple of years ago now, so Thanks, maxby's.
Speaker 1:Yeah For including fries with your food right driving and just mindlessly yeah what's left in my plate and like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:Immediately. I need to call Brian. Alright, well, do you want to get into our topic today? We've talked about food for a little while, as per usual.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't mean it's a very organic process that we have for coming up with our topics. We're like yes. We're coming up on the new year, you want to do something about New Year's and we're like Motivated about that kind of stuff, and right, oh, let's talk about that. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 3:So let's talk about not feeling motivated, or well, just yeah, when we were when we were texting and you were saying like do you have any ideas for topics? And then you threw out like motivation, because I'm lacking it. And I was like immediately I'm like yes, we need to talk about that. Yes, that absolutely has to be our topic, because I mean yeah, we call this help yourself, for a reason right and if both need you to get out of whatever funk we're in.
Speaker 1:Let's help ourselves to that well, and also I think smothers along the way.
Speaker 3:I think the time of year too you know, we're recording this at the end of the year and, as I said before, when we were talking about before, before we recorded is you know this, and we've done other episodes on this but like sort of this artificial thing that everyone does at the end of any given calendar year and Just saying, okay, next year I'm gonna do this. You know, this is what I want to Accomplish, this is what I want. Well, the then you have to back up from. That is like well, why haven't you already done that?
Speaker 3:And I think most of the time, a lot of times, it's some type of lack of motivation, like what? Why are you not motivated to do that? Because the thing is, you do things that you want to do. You do things that like, if you really want something, you do something for about it. Um, I know there's barriers to it, but then the question is, if it is something that you really want, then why are you not doing it? Why are you not doing something to? And I'm not saying that as an insult to the audience, I'm not saying like, why aren't you doing something? It's like no, I'm talking to myself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly yeah. I'm saying yeah.
Speaker 1:Why are you not doing something about it?
Speaker 3:You know, like, if you want to change. I mean this it's so funny because this topic Probably cuts across Not horizontally on the biscuit, but vertically on the biscuit, cuts across A lot of different subjects We've already talked about in the past, right, um, we, you know, motivation cuts across, like you know you're basically your feelings about yourself. It cuts across, like all of the personality. It cuts across your habits. It cuts across I mean, it cuts across so many things. I basically you could look at this episode or this, this group of episodes, as a cross section of, in essence, what we've talked about the last three years on this podcast, because it almost touches no pressure. I know exactly. Yeah, this is a culmination of three. We're here.
Speaker 1:Right, exactly but it.
Speaker 3:But it really does, though, because it's, I mean it's. I mean that's probably a testament to the fact that it's a super broad subject that we're trying to address here. But yeah at the same time.
Speaker 1:One, I think, another just to inject this before we do the past. Why I talk about this?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I could be projecting the usual caveats that I could be projecting, but I feel like I've seen a lack of motivation and others to hear recently. Like you know, in Toastmasters, not just all people aren't signing up for roles, yep, as like they used to. I feel like this past Christmas people kind of phoned it in. You know, it was all Gift cards and books or what was exactly on your list. There wasn't as much, even less thought put into it. Yeah, I was sort of like hey, let's get it over with, let's let's jump through the go through the motions, right, and and I feel like I'm in that boat too, like again, I'm projecting a bit here, but I also seemed to see it and others. It may be timely.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think I think it. I think the lack of motivation Is pervasive. I think it it bleeds into every part. So it's not like you're. I'm really lack of motive. I'm really lacking motivation in my you know, in my work life. But I have motivation everywhere else in my life. It typically it doesn't. I don't think it works like that. I think it's if you're feeling a lack of motivation, it's a over overriding To you're bringing that to everything that you're doing or you're not bringing it to everything you're doing.
Speaker 3:I should say so, so same thing with Toastmasters is I think you know if You're feeling that another and I think a lot of people are exactly what you said I think a lot of people are feeling a I mean just the state of America over the last few years, especially like coming out of Covid.
Speaker 3:I know this is like a tired subject, but you know the last, like the last three or four years of our American life, has been the strangest thing in the war and it's been completely out of our control and it's something that we did never thought. You know, things that we never thought would happen or anything like that. You know, I Happened and so we're all, we're all living that common experience and everyone's dealing with it in different ways. But I think there's a lot of negativity and a lot of people that are just like Wow, like taking a deep breath and going, okay, what's next, what's gonna happen next? And so, anyway, I I did pull up a couple things. This might help our one. Oh, go ahead, one of the little bit of preamble.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think one of the ways in which we you and I are well qualified to discuss this subject Is because we're type 9 peacemakers on the yes yeah, that, while Procrastination is not unique to any one personality type right like nines and probably some others, but Nines have perfected the art and the craft. Yeah, avoidance of delay, of yep. Seeking peace at any price and going along so like putting things off, setting things aside.
Speaker 1:Yeah the greater good Becomes a habit, right? So anybody of any personality type who's struggling with these kinds of things. Well, we've suffered this experience so much that we we have some conscious we can make some of this unconscious stuff conscious. Yeah, I had to think about it longer and sooner in our life than maybe some others.
Speaker 3:Yes, well, it's a good, that's a good point, considering that obviously your personality type Not necessarily enneagram, but just like the type of personality you have in a more general sense Is gonna play into how things affect you. You know how the world affects you, how everything else affects you and, as you said, us as self identifying as Nine you know nine on the enneagram scale Certainly plays into this, and I feel like nines probably have a more pre, more of a predisposition to a Few things that are. You know that that lead to lack of motivation, because I think lack of motivation is a symptom, it's not the thing, it's a symptom of something else. So the question is, what are those other things? But I did pull up a list of causes.
Speaker 3:You know basic causes of lack of motivation and the interesting thing is that if and you, you tell me if you think the same thing. But most of these things for somebody who would be like a number nine are, you know, they lead right into it. They're probably even actually in the description of nine For some of these so so the first one is fear of failure.
Speaker 3:Second one is overwhelm, so feeling overloaded or having too many tasks. Number three unclear goals, so not having clear achievable goals. Burnout, so prolonged stress and over exertion. Right perfectionism lack of interest, so if the tasks, their goals, aren't aligned with your personal interests or values. Mental health is health issues, which is a big thing I think people are dealing with in, at least in America. I think a lot of people are dealing with depression, anxiety or other some level of that, and it's not doesn't necessarily mean it's debilitating, but Most people have some level of anxiety in their life at some point. And then external factors, so lack of support, negative environments or discouragement from others. And so I just thought it was interesting because when I read that I was like okay, one of the things in the description of a nine is that you're too much of a perfectionist like you are, you know you want to get things just so, especially if you're a nine wing one Bitch, which many times nine nines are a wing one and then fear of failure, overwhelming.
Speaker 1:I think fear of failure also is from overthinking, which is another nine characteristic overthinking everything so Type 5 is the analyst and yeah and yeah, but yeah, I think, yeah, that's a great list. I'm not so familiar with the problem to be able to say if they missed one, yeah. But I think if we go through each of those one by one, kind of unpack each and explore each, yeah, well, and I think I don't think this is exhaustive, it might emerge, yeah, and I don't think that was exhaustive.
Speaker 3:I think it was just a you know, a good sort of overview, but. But I think I'll say like fear of failure.
Speaker 3:Well, we need to start at the top of fear of failure. I Think that's always. That's number one on the list and it's number one on this list. It's also number one on the list of number nines. All the time is, I think number nines are Always thinking that they're gonna disappoint someone, that they're gonna disappoint themselves, that they're gonna you know. So they're always thinking about how, how is this, how are other people gonna react to this, or things like that, and I think fear of failure plays right into that.
Speaker 1:Where you're one and pausing for a moment like that's. That's the definition, often times, of failure for that personality type. Yes.
Speaker 3:I'm someone yeah.
Speaker 1:I'd like say for you know, and other personalities, it's Failure to accomplish the goal. Yeah right or failure to yeah, I'm escaping be a failure to help others. So it's. It varies, but yes but it's still that's true, right that the true is a maze fear of failure. Yeah, I'm failure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and this, this, this definition on here is anxiety about not meeting expectations or fear of making mistakes Can hinder motivation so yeah, perfectionists fear making mistakes. Yeah, well, not meeting expectations. It's like, who, whose expectations? Well, there's only two there's either your expectations or someone else's right right.
Speaker 1:The challengers worried about missing their expectation.
Speaker 3:They're on that's right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the nine is worried about you, sorry. Yeah, this isn't necessarily an intergram episode, it just yeah, it's a useful framework we can. I'll drift away from it if I can yeah.
Speaker 3:So the next one is overwhelmed. So feeling overloaded or having too many tasks can lead to paralysis or lack of motivation to start anything at all. Which sort of the people pleaser we were talking about this earlier, which is saying yes. You know, people pleaser says yes to a lot of things, even things that they in their back of their head or like. While they're saying the words yes or like, why am I saying yes to this? And they're right and they're like what are you doing? Why are you saying yes, stop, no, what do you know? Why are you saying yes, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're, and even if, like, they're not always that present of mind, they can also be saying yes because they're answering the question. You know, could I do it? Yeah? I might, yes, I might do that, or yes, I could do that, or yes, I can. Like, I have the capability of doing it. But the question is will they do it? And yeah, they're not saying yes to they will, they're saying yes to they can, and there's a two different Questions, right, right?
Speaker 3:right.
Speaker 1:I'm answer, but different results.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is another one that we've talked about in the. You know, going back to the cross section is having unclear goals. So not having a clear achievable goal can make it challenging to stay motivated because there's no specific target to work toward.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and, and I can't remember if this was part of the list or not but it's not just what you're trying to achieve, but also why yeah like you know, okay, I've got a clear goal.
Speaker 1:Get the ball in the hoop? Yeah, yeah, but what is? What does that do for me? Like who cares? Yeah, yeah, it'd be cool to be neat to see if I can do it. And, you know, try. But Once I do it, like, why do it again? Like what right? Like oh, because it gets me points. Well, why don't want points? Yeah like oh, cuz I'm trying to win the game, well, why don't want to game? Because competition is fun. Yeah. Oh well, they never mind, I'm out, I'm not, I'm not motivated about competition.
Speaker 3:Right no. Yeah, but someone else might be, and that's okay, yeah, okay. So then, and then burnout. So prolonged stress or overexertion, which honestly is, I think, another number two being overwhelm, I think burnout is just that's the next level of once you're overwhelmed and you're overloaded, then eventually that leads to burnout, unless you do something about it, unless you try to figure out something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, burnout is definitely a symptom. I have how to say. I don't think I've revealed who my employer is by name, but we do these employee engagement surveys and one of the questions is something along the lines, using your own definition of burnout, how burnt out? Would you say that you are Right? And then there's little descriptions of I have some symptoms of burnout, but I'm you know it's manageable or I am burnt out. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, and there's definitely been, at least in my microcosm, an increase of burnout by that standard Right, but do you do phrasing?
Speaker 3:as being like a team leader. Do you get to see things like that, not anonymously? Do you get to see like the results from your team?
Speaker 1:I get to be. The way that works is five. If the manager has five or more people in their order, they get to see the scores Got it so the number result as from the how strongly they agreed or disagreed. Yeah, and then leaders who have 10 or more people in their org get to see the anonymous comments. Okay, so many new comments were made. You know, right, so that I won't reveal what I got in that regard, but that's for my organization how that happens.
Speaker 3:Got it.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm sure everybody was different, of course.
Speaker 3:Well, I was just wondering in terms of the not necessarily specifically to you, but just like how an organization deals with that if they're actually sending them out. Like what is that that? Obviously the data has to be used for something not necessarily used for something, but it at least looked at and evaluated.
Speaker 1:So it does. It does create some interesting ironic moments when trying to get more or come up with actionable things to address some of this stuff. Because, yeah, like one of the questions is, I feel comfortable, what? Is it? You know they again strongly agree, strongly disagree and in between, but it's like I feel comfortable expressing honest opinions. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so if I'm trying to ask my people like, hey, tell me more about this. Well, if they strongly disagreed with that statement, how am I supposed to get them to express their honest Right, why they don't feel comfortable expressing their honest opinion?
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:You can't. There's a it's funny a lot of results you can't address directly, one for maintain their I'm going off on a tangent here, I'll really know, but it's a you kind of have to just observe, listen, you know, talk around it and honor the anonymity. Yeah, and again the point. What bears out as burnout is more of a symptom. Yeah, it can become like it can perpetuate or or exasperate causes. Right, it's piling on. It's been gasoline on that fire. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it didn't start the fire right. There has to be sparks, whatever that may be, and it can vary from person to person or, you know, cultural context to cultural context.
Speaker 3:Are you just like bringing up like, like song lyrics like, yeah, we didn't start the fire and no, you are Brian, no. I see what you're saying but I also think that creating a safe space again, I'm furthering the tangent here, but creating a safe space is the big thing, and I can tie that back to Toastmasters, because Toastmasters is what I consider the safe space to learn how to Speak, public speak or, you know, get over your fears or other things, whatever that might be for you. Or at least it's supposed to be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and reeling it back in towards motivation and talk about burnout and my situation. I guess there's who would lead. Others must first lead himself, and of course that applies to the hearse and the themselves. So another reason why this topic so relevant to me, right, is my results were also pretty low on that burnout standard and the stress standard, and you know I need to help myself before I help others.
Speaker 1:Yeah and I see the need to help others, but I'm not even helping myself. So I'm very happy to be exploring this topic For selfish and altruistic reasons.
Speaker 3:I just did a quick search while you were talking about that and the, the quote, sort of quote that you just talked about, I exit. It sort of rang a bell for me. But Aristotle said he who cannot be a good follower cannot be a good leader. So it's sort of in the opposite of. What you sort of said is like, hey, you need to know yourself. Oops, I kind of defeated your point. I think knowing yourself is you know that. I think it plays into all right, I'm not even going to try to justify it. It's fine, it was a good quote no, it works.
Speaker 1:If, if I can't follow my own directions to myself, right, I'm going to expect others to follow directions, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's. It's a less literal interpretation of being a follower, because you can consider yourself a follower of what your brain is telling you to do, if that makes sense. So anyway.
Speaker 1:I sit in what's the book where they talk about the elephant and the rider. It was that drive, or am I mixing that with something else?
Speaker 3:Elephant and the rider. Yeah, I do not know.
Speaker 1:There's other metaphors similar. There's the horse and the rider. But Like you're subconscious, is your animal brain right? It's the elephant or the horse or whatever. It is the rider's riding. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And then there's the rider, who's the more conscious prefrontal cortex person trying to steer the ship right. But you've got two brains in the same boat, and one's more emotional, the other's more rational, and there has to be a negotiation, right? It's like why should the horse listen to the rider? What's in it for them, right? Negotiate with yourself, lead yourself to whatever goal you have, you know, to the water to drink, right. Mix metaphors. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think that's the other question. That's part of what makes it challenging for us. Coming back to motivation, is that I think we have mixed motives. Yeah Right, the animal part of us just wants to feel good, we just want emotional equilibrium, and then the rational part of us knows that it's not all about emotion. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But if we're going to influence our emotional side, we've got to quote speak in their terms. Mm hmm that. So it's like I remember I'm having a call back now or recollection of a tactic. Say, give it by way of example, say you don't want to get out of bed in the morning, right, you're just not feeling it. One one tactic is this yeah, I'd like I don't want to get out of bed this morning.
Speaker 1:And then the second part of that is but if I do, I get to, or I can, or you know, or I will get I will earn with the respect of my clients, or I'll keep the respect of my spouse, or I will earn a living to keep the bed I'm in and enjoy right now. Like, right, having that, giving yourself that perspective of, yes, admitting how you feel and also recognizing the reality or other perspectives related or surrounding that feeling or that the situation I should say so it's that, it's that pattern of I don't feel like doing what I know I should do, right, fill in that blank and then listing off, but if I do, yeah, all the benefits of doing the thing I don't want to do, and you sort of have that remind yourself the benefit of that sacrifice, right? Otherwise, yeah, I'm sure Come making a bigger call back to. You know Christian religion, I'm sure Jesus and his human perspective was like I don't want to die, but if I do, yeah, you know it means savior or salvation for all of mankind, like OK.
Speaker 1:You know that's some pretty good calculus. It's a. That's a very high ROI on that unpleasant experience.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:Right yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, so we were talking about burnout, right? Did that start out with burnout? Maybe, anyway.
Speaker 1:Burnout was a symptom and, yeah, we probably touched on some other topics. So then, Micro rant you're welcome, that's okay.
Speaker 3:So the next one is perfectionism, and you know, basically, you know this says striving for perfection can sometimes backfire, causing individuals to avoid tasks for fear of not meeting impossibly high standards, which I can say for me.
Speaker 3:I wish I had more of my wife's ability to actually do. You know, do an action, like an action that is less than perfect or less than your perception of what is perfect, is better than no action at all. And in my mind I do that a lot of times I'm like well, if I can't, you know, if I can't do this exactly the way that I want to, with exactly the tools and exactly everything else, then I don't know if it's worth doing. And you know, every single motivational person that I talk to or self-help person is like, you know, an unplanned or some other kind of action is better than no action at all. Like, the way you work yourself out of this is by through some kind of action, like physical action, like go take a walk, go get your clothes on to go to the gym, go, you know, meal prep for the week or go whatever that action is. Just go do the action, don't think about it. Go do the action and that's better than not doing any action at all.
Speaker 1:So yeah, there's a. Well, definitely, I'll get you the link to this YouTube video. It's one of the best things I've ever seen or heard or read about procrastination in terms of conciseness and completeness. I think it's Ryan Doris.
Speaker 1:This is the channel name, and he talks about this and one of the way he, in that video, describes or defines procrastination. It's actually the situation where you have high motivation and low action. It's where you want to do something, you have reason to do something, but you can't bring yourself to do it Right, and so it's touching on what you're saying, and a lot of his tactics and perspectives is about ways to go ahead and do the action anyway, or moments where you're more likely recognizing and leveraging, moments where you're more likely to be open to doing the action, taking advantage of that, whereas instead of others it's really effective, and I'll probably be making other callbacks to it as we talk.
Speaker 3:Well and I'll make the reference to my the thing that I've done well in 2023, which is forcing myself to go to the gym five days a week, and that is something that I was very, you know, lacking a lot of motivation. I was very inconsistent with it and so, zeroing in on one thing of again, sort of talking about the perfectionism but you know, I was. You know. Now my attitude is I just go to the gym, I don't. I tell myself, it doesn't matter what I do at the gym, it doesn't matter Like, you're going to go there, you're going to move around a little bit, you're going to break a sweat and you're going to leave, and that's it.
Speaker 3:And when my alarm goes off, I most days I mean many days and towards the end of the year too, when, as it gets colder outside, I think you don't want to get out of a warm bed when it's cold, you know, 30 degrees outside but you know my alarm goes off. My alarm doesn't have a snooze button, which helps, because there's no way for me to turn it off and sleep for five more minutes. So I'm either going to get up or I'm going to sleep through it Like, or I'm going to turn it off. I'm going to go back to sleep. So I get up and I do. You know the little routine that I have. You know, just get my gym clothes on and I've got to be out the door by a certain time 10 minutes before the workout or whatever to get to the gym, and it's first thing in the morning.
Speaker 3:So it's you know, really the motivation is not necessarily motivation, but the, the voices, haven't taken over yet for the day, because it's like first thing in the morning you know and, and so you know I I will say that it's perfectionism sneaks into that, because I got sick a little while ago, as you know, and I couldn't go to the gym for a few days and I missed like three days and that was the first time that I was an unplanned I like like where I was actually here physically, I hadn't planned to be out and I had to miss, and so my so I told my coach, I said I was really actually sort of angry about doing that because I broke the streak and that's that and that's perfectionism. Right, there is the perfectionism is actually working in my favor. A little bit is like I don't want to break the streak. I'm 175 workouts in now.
Speaker 3:And there's a little thing in my head like no, just go, because it'll just be another. Now it's 176. And like, let's see how I, how I, how high I can get this thing. And so, like I said, it's working in my favor because it's almost a positive level of perfectionism, like, but it's also a very simple thing.
Speaker 3:It's a literally did you get out of bed and physically go to the gym? There's no like but yeah, but how high was your heart rate, or how many calories did you burn, or what? No, did you physically get out of bed and go to the gym? That's the only thing that matters. You get the check mark right and so, um, so I, but I can see how that, how that was working not in my favor. Before this is, I was like Well, if I can't be perfect in this, if I can't get to the gym and like work out really, really hard and do what all the other people at gym are doing, that I might as well not go, or I'm going to just try to go, but I'm going to try to go this week and maybe I'll get two days or maybe I'll get three. When I boiled it down to just a very simple thing, it was just, you know and also our agreement to which I don't know if we've ever told the audience about our agreement.
Speaker 1:It's been in place for a long time, but that's another way we were raised in necessity and leveraged your personality right Like, I think, any, any goals or things that any of us try to do. Yeah needs to.
Speaker 3:We need to latch to the things that resonate with yes, how we actually think and work and behave in the world, which is which is exactly what the another callback, another which is exactly the the. The theory behind strengths finders is let's find out what your five strengths are and now, now that you know what your five strengths are, you should work within those five strength. Don't even try to work in your weakest areas, like you need to put yourself in a position in your career, in your family and everything else that you're using those strengths to your maximum, because that's where you're going to be the most comfortable and the most successful and, you know, have the most motivation. Bringing it back to this episode is you're going to be like, yeah, I can do that, I can do that and I can do that consistently all day long, right? So?
Speaker 1:yeah, and that's so like in your situation. Again, callback to this episode would be peacemakers, not wanting to disappoint others.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:We raised a necessity for you, where I have consequences if you don't perform your action right right, and we don't have to get into the details of what but I get to give to a charity that I do not believe in that you're personally not aligned with.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yes, so there there are financial consequences for me if Brian fails not only his goal, but he fails me to right and that, and really I don't think that's what motivates you anymore, Like we haven't really talked about that or come up with it. Yeah, done our accounting. But it definitely moved your boulder, but it got in your favor, right.
Speaker 3:Oh, I was just going to say that is that it got me to the place where I was able to say, like I'm going to just do this for that reason. But now, like I said, I'm. It's been let's see March to December. So what is that? That's nine months, right? So nine months and 175 trips to the gym and not one. You know, it's literally now. It's just keep the streak alive.
Speaker 3:And also, the habit has, as we know, is talking about habits and James Clear and atomic habits and all the things we talk about all the time. It takes a certain amount of time for a habit to form and and that that habit is now just yeah, I'm, I don't really think about it anymore. I just think, if I also have, I've also learned or seen the other benefits that you get from just going to the gym, like getting up and going, which is, you know, some of which, I think, is actually fighting what we're talking about today, which is, you know, when you have lack of motivation and then you drop, you drop everything else off. I think physical activity helps you, as you know. Going back to our episode with Austin, you know physical activity helps you think clear. It helps you have less stress. It helps you, and.
Speaker 3:But it has to be consistent and over time. It's not just, oh, I did that once that week, it's now every day. I just sort of do this. It's like brushing my teeth, it's like, you know, taking a shower, it's like whatever that might be for you on a daily basis. You're doing that right. So, yeah, some people take showers on the daily basis.
Speaker 1:I was about to say. If you're like me and those habits have waned, then all the more reason that to be listening to a podcast episode about losing motivation.
Speaker 3:Right right. Well, so so a couple of so perfectionism. Lack of interest is the next one, which is if tasks and goals aren't aligned with your personal interests or values.
Speaker 1:Well, let's do a time check. Do we, do we need a pause and let this be a to be continued. No, I think we got in the list.
Speaker 3:We were on, we're on six and that's eight, and we've got eight on the list, so we should be able to get them in here as the causes and then maybe next time, on our next episode, we talk about okay, now that we know what's causing that or potentially causing that, how do we combat this? And we've already we already sort of dealt with that a little bit, but I think really hit hard. Yeah, but how? What are some actual things we can do to get yourself out? Get yourself out of the hole? And I think honestly, why won't go into it? We'll talk about in the next episode. Yeah, so let's keep on the case. Okay, so.
Speaker 3:So lack of interest I think that goes into what I was just talking about with strength finders. Even though this talks about, the goals or tasks are aligned with your personal interests or values. I also think that if they're not something that you're particularly strong at like it's not in your Bailey wick, is that a word? Is that a word? Isn't that? Isn't that a? We should use that for a word of the day in Toastmasters If it's not in your.
Speaker 1:It's not your forte.
Speaker 3:I think it is. Anyway, I think, you used it right. If it's not in your Bailey wick, yeah. Then you have a hard time getting motivated to do it because you think, oh, this is not at all what I'm designed to do, like, this is not at all what I, what I feel comfortable doing, what I can, what I feel like I'm going to do an excellent job at, and so so yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it has the same root as bailiff, but the second definition is the sphere in which one has superior knowledge or authority.
Speaker 3:There you go If it's not in your bailiwick. Yeah, man, that was a strong pull. We had to use that as a word of the day. So, okay, so do you want?
Speaker 3:so then seven go ahead Okay so seven is I didn't know if you had something to say about it. But seven is a big one which we touched upon before, which is mental health issues. So you know, depression, anxiety or other mental health conditions can significantly impact motivation levels. So obviously we're not psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, anything like that, but I think that there's. I think that everyone goes through periods of these things in their life. So and it could be a very, very slight amount of depression, not clinical where you have to go get medicated or have counseling or anything like that but really these are all just swings of the pendulum, for a regular human being is, at some point you're going to be just sort of melancholy about life and just sort of like ho hum, and I don't know why I'm bringing up all these like old timey words bailiwick, ho hum, melancholy, I don't know. Anyway, the vespers, you know what it is it's the elixir. The elixir is making me speaking old English terms.
Speaker 1:The time is in the language.
Speaker 3:What the heck this thing is making me talk like alive the ancient mushroom elixir. Hey, if it's not in your bailiwick, then make sure that you all right, sorry. So mental health issues.
Speaker 1:Oh, mental health. I would bring it like, that's say, depression. It's hard to know whether that's a cause or a symptom of your situation. Right, if you do have bouts of depression, that is clinical, or what's the word chronic then, yeah, that's going to be a cause of a lack of motivation, but it could be that depression is a response to prolonged stress.
Speaker 1:Like some people, I shouldn't say that I have a close association personally with burnout and depression. Like I think there's some kind of Venn diagram relationship there. That's all I really into it. I don't want to speak to specifics because I don't have those figured out for myself yet. Yeah. Well, I think, I think, yes it can be for sure, like a cause of lack of motivation.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and then the last one on the list is they just list as external factors and that's sort of a more sort of catch all I would think that's. They say lack of support, negative environments or discouragement from others can affect motivation. So have you ever heard of the? Well, I'm sure I know you've heard of it, but maybe in our audience you know you have that person in your life. That's the Debbie Downer.
Speaker 3:You know that's always and maybe not Debbie Downer about everything, but maybe they're. They're sort of discouraging to you, like for whatever reason, and that maybe that they're directly discouraging, like yeah, you can't do that, you're not, that's not in it for you, or it's just sort of like more you know, less direct than that, and just saying like well, I've heard that a lot of people fail when they try to do that kind of stuff that you're trying to do.
Speaker 3:I don't know, you know oh, you want to lose weight, yeah man, you know, hey, you know the statistics about people who lose weight. They all gain it back and you know, like that kind of a thing where?
Speaker 1:yeah, sorry, no, that that was it, I was just reminded of that, you become the average of the five people you spend the most time with. Yes, you are around more of the not depressive or discouraged or demotivated people. That's going to influence you. Yeah. And, I think, external factors. You mentioned the tired topic of COVID. Yeah. Just all of the new normals and people not yet having a habit, have good habits in place of that or a lay of the land and know what to expect. Yeah. That can be demotivating from people. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:And I think I think also that has to do with how you react to people.
Speaker 3:I think some people are more prone to taking Like well as an example, like I know that there are people in my life that I know of that if somebody tells them they can't do something, they're going to prove, they're going to go out and immediately go do that to prove that person wrong. And there are other people that somebody says you can't do something and that their answer is okay, you're right, I can't do that, and they just don't do it. And so it obviously this personality, how, who you are, how you are but again in our next episode, talking about what we can combat this, obviously that place plays a big role is what is your personality Like? How do you? Are you somebody that does that? And I've actually used that a little bit as a motivating factor for me of, but most of the time it's not other people telling me that I can't do something because, honestly, I have a very excellent support system in that. Most people in my life, I think, believe that I'm capable of way more than I believe myself to be capable of.
Speaker 1:Right, and so you have to do it to your strong inner critic.
Speaker 3:Yes, and so here's what I do in terms of that. You know what I'm answering, or what I'm trying to do is I tell myself, when I hear my inner voice telling me you can't do that or this is not going to be good, I actually answer back to myself and say, okay, I'm going to do it. Then I'm going to prove you wrong. I'm going to go do this right now, and part of it is the. You know, I talked about your lack of motivation bleeding into other things.
Speaker 3:Well, it works the other way also, and the fact that I've been just going to the gym like the quote unquote simple thing of getting out of bed, putting on some clothes, going to the gym, working out and then going back home, that has been bleeding out into other things in my life is like, well, if I can do that, then maybe I can do this, and if I can do those two things, then maybe I can do that third thing.
Speaker 3:Now that I'm doing these three things, maybe I can do this thing. So I think we'll talk maybe a little bit about that on our next episode as well, just because I think that's. I think a big factor of all this is patience with yourself and it's not a short term thing I think we've talked about or a short term or I think we've talked about it before is doing something small on a daily basis that can grow into something bigger, and I think that's. You know, that's maybe where we'll leave it for today, I guess, unless you have other things you want to talk about, but maybe we can pick it up there in the next episode.
Speaker 1:That pick it up there sounds good.
Speaker 3:If we're motivated, I mean if we, if we can find the motivation to record another episode.
Speaker 1:Let's just put it. Let's just put it off to the next one.
Speaker 3:All right, thanks people. Looking forward to you hearing the next one. Bye.