Breaking the Blocks
Hi!
Thanks for stopping by! Life is tough, and I think this podcast might offer you some relief. My aim? To inspire you to overcome some of your own blocks through the inspirational, honest, and at times, downright raw conversations with some wonderful guests, not huge celebrities, regular people like you and I. Let’s see how they have overcome the difficulties in their lives and offer you some advice and more importantly hope.
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Breaking the Blocks
From TV Sets to Setting Intentions, Life Coach, Elliot Moscow's Path to Inner Peace
Join us on a heartening journey with my friend and life coach Elliot Moscow as we traverse the transformative world of personal growth. Elliot, transitioning from the bustling set of Argos TV to the tranquil space of life coaching, shares with us his profound insights on shattering psychological barriers and fostering positive habits. Together, we reflect on the shared experiences that have shaped us and discuss embracing the rollercoaster of life's highs and lows with self-compassion, patience, and a touch of humor about the everyday struggles we all face.
Elliot imparts strategies to quieten the ego's chatter and amplify our truest voice. He underscores the significance of processing emotions fully, highlighting how hypnotherapy can facilitate this journey toward authenticity and genuine fulfillment. We draw back the curtain on the personal growth of a life coach, revealing the continuous work on self-development that parallels the challenges faced by clients.
Wrapping up our heartfelt exchange, we contemplate the importance of aligning our actions with our core values and the liberating effect this alignment brings to our lives and careers. I invite you to reach out with your reflections at rachel@breakingtheblocks.com, and if our explorations into the realms of self-discovery have struck a chord, consider sharing this episode with someone who might find equal inspiration in Elliot's wisdom and our candid conversation.
You can find elliot here:
@elliot_moscow_coaching
https://www.elliotmoscow.com/
Well, hello and welcome back to another episode of Breaking the Blocks. I'm your host, rachel Pym, and lovely to have your company. If you've watched any of our previous episodes of Breaking the Blocks or, of course, listened on the podcast platforms, you'll have heard lots of lovely, creative people talking about how creativity has helped them in their journeys, but more so about the difficulties that they face in their lives and how they're overcoming them. I thought this episode would be a great bonus episode for you, with some practical solutions to perhaps help you if you're going through some similar issues. So I decided to talk to a friend of mine, elliot Mosco, who is also a qualified life coach.
Speaker 2:In this episode, I think Elliot has given us some great words of wisdom.
Speaker 2:I certainly found it interesting just ways to look at things differently or perhaps create better habits and get rid of old, previous habits that no longer serve us. It was a really fantastic chat, but, of course, me being me and this being this podcast, I had to delve a little into Elliot as well and ask him about his own blocks and how he'd overcome them. So if you listen to the whole episode, you'll find out exactly what he's gone through and how he makes his way through his life, but also, as I say, you may find some things that will help you in your journey. If you do like anything you hear, please drop a comment below, because I'm sure other people would like to know the kinds of things that we're talking about in this episode. So sit back, relax, enjoy, listen and maybe learn a thing or two. It is so nice to have you in my studio and, of course, the last time that you and I were in a studio together was many years ago for that well-known TV channel, argos TV.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness rest in peace.
Speaker 2:Can I tell you, the most bizarre thing just about that, elliot, is that I worked for Argos TV as a presenter. Obviously, you were working there we'll come to that in a second and then when I left there, I did voiceovers for them for about a year and a half and then, about five years later, my daughter just said to me oh, I'm going for a Saturday job, so can you just run me in? And I said, yeah, where are you applying? And she said Argos. And she got the job and she's worked with them for three years. So Argos have actually paid our livings for some time. So thank you, argos. Whenever I see their vans with the big smile on the side, I was like, yes, I smile back at Argos fondly. You obviously were my presentation manager. We used to have many little chats on the desk, didn't we, about the goings on at Argos TV. But life has changed hugely for us now and, of course, you are now living in the States. I've got one question for you, with you being in the States.
Speaker 1:Americans call you Elliot Moscow. They do, they do. They say Moscow, um, when they can hear it. Uh, because I do have to repeat it quite often because it's such an unusual surname and so, yeah, they get there, but they do, they.
Speaker 2:It's a hard cow for sure anyway, elliot, I just know you as lovely Elliot because you were always so lovely to me. You were a very nice man and it's really interesting now with what you're doing, because the reason I brought you on Breaking the Blocks is you are a life coach, fully trained. I will just say to people, it's not like he's left Argos yesterday and just decided to do this. You have been doing this for some time now, but when I chatted to you a few weeks ago and I said I'd like to get you on because obviously we're talking about breaking the blocks, and I thought it would be a great angle for people to understand, perhaps a bit more, kind of psychologically, what's going on when we have these blocks.
Speaker 2:But I did say to you that I can absolutely see how you have slipped into this new life as a life coach, because when you were in that TV environment with me and it was a sales TV environment you were always a little bit different. You were very calm, you were very considered, you were very approachable. I felt that you were really trustworthy, but you were just always a safe haven in that building. So it's really interesting that you've you've gone into life coaching. Well, how did you make that transition then? Because did you always feel that that was within you, even in those early days? Because we're talking what was it 10 years ago, 10, 10 or so years ago?
Speaker 1:yeah, easily a decade. Yeah, well, I mean, first of all, thank you so much for having me on your on your podcast, because, uh, yeah, I have very fond memories of us working together, um, and I was very excited when you offered to have a conversation and so, yeah, this is really exciting for me. I don't often get to go on podcasts, uh, but yeah, it was, uh, it was a long time ago. I started my career in shopping television. I was in shopping television for a very long time. I studied at QVC before I was at Argos, but before that I studied psychology at university, and so I was always really interested in how we tick, mostly because I wanted to know how I ticked.
Speaker 1:I suffered terribly with social anxiety and general anxiety and all those sorts of things, and so I was desperate to know, and I just came away from it with more questions than answers. I thought about therapy, going into therapy, being a therapist, and I thought, well, if I can't handle my own problems, how am I going to be able to handle those of other people as well? And so I loved entertainment and, funnily enough, my dad was a guest presenter on QVC. He was known as Mr Christmas. He was selling all of the Christmas products and he said why not see if there is a job you'd like here? So that's what I did.
Speaker 1:I started off working with the guests, just showing them onto the studio floor and all that sort of stuff, and then I worked through to a point where I working with the guests, just showing them onto the studio floor and all that sort of stuff, and then I worked through to a point where I was helping the guests to hone and perfect their television presentations.
Speaker 1:So, as you know, working in television, working in shopping television, you've got no feedback from your audience, so you've got to be able to connect with them without knowing in real time how well you're doing that. So something I did with them, something that we worked on together as well, was how to do that, how to create that engagement, how to create that trust and all that sort of stuff. And so it was again, my the psychology was really interesting to me about how to do that, working with the presenters, because it's a high pressure job, so understanding you guys, understanding the audience and all that sort of stuff flash forward. So I thought what can I do? What can I use from what I had already, and that was coaching, and so I professionally certified as a coach in 2018 and been loving it ever since, and now we we're in the United States. That's what I'm doing here.
Speaker 2:I think it's really interesting that you say actually you mentioned there about the therapy, thinking about being a therapist, but then you went down to life coaching. So what is the difference for people who are listening between having a therapist and a life coach?
Speaker 1:That's such a good question and actually one of the most challenging things for any life coach to do is to define what we do, because it can sound a little bit woo-woo and it can sound a little bit eh, what are you talking about? And so it is good to compare it to other disciplines. So, first of all, to answer your question, the main difference between therapy and life coaching is that, in general terms, therapy looks to the past to solve past trauma, past issues, past experiences, and once you're able to do that, once you heal the past, you can potentially move forward. But the role of the therapist mainly is to help you heal in the past. There are disciplines outside of that and that's why there are crossovers with what life coaching does as well.
Speaker 1:So life coaching isn't therapy so much as it is about using the past to understand where we've come from, to be able to then propel ourselves forward. What we do is to help people to fulfill themselves in life, to reach their goals, to achieve whatever it is that they want to achieve in life, to reach their goals, to achieve whatever it is that they want to achieve by helping them to overcome the blocks that they experience that stop them from doing so. Similarly to sports coaching, the practice of sport coaching is take somebody who already has talent and to propel them into achieving greatness through their sports by understanding the things that they don't do so well, to giving them techniques around doing things better and giving them that awareness. Life coaching is similar in the terms of helping us to understand, as you do through your podcast, what are the blocks that we experience that hold us back.
Speaker 2:You just reminded me there, elliot, when you said about the sports people. It's the same kind of coaching. I've seen some fantastic interviews with the sadly departed Kobe Bryant. He came across as such a lovely, calm, very biggest block, the biggest problem, is not how good you are on a track or how good you are at football or how good you are at basketball. It's resilience, it's staying the course, it's staying the distance. You have to keep trying every day.
Speaker 2:I remember many, many years ago that somebody told me about a story I think they'd met Daley Thompson or they'd interviewed him, or something. They said when you train, and he said every single day of the year. And they said, apart from Christmas day. And he said no, I train on Christmas day as well. And they said why? And he said because I know my competitors aren't training on Christmas day, so I do, because I'm one step ahead, I get an extra day. And I just thought, wow, that is such an attitude.
Speaker 2:But that's a thing that we don't see. Do we that constant effort, that consistency in doing whatever it is that you do? That's a really big key thing which, as you say, is the same sort of thing with sports and life coaching, that link I would imagine that's what you're saying to people is you have to be consistent, you have to keep showing up for yourself that's exactly right, and it it's, it's also to do with we've spent our entire lives with stories that we tell ourselves, going around and around, and we probably haven't taken a break from those stories for most of the time that we've been living.
Speaker 1:And so if we're going to try and introduce something new, then we have to repeat it in order for it to replace what has happened before. And so for a lot of athletes that's the same thing. You know, if you have let's take a tennis player, for example if they have something in one of their strokes, their forehand for example, that they have built a bad habit into, they've got to practice the new habit in order for it to replace the old habit. And so it's exactly the same in life.
Speaker 1:It's also you probably remember in the 80s and forever probably the idea of positive affirmations right, and so you know it's easy to push back against positive affirmations and say you know, just by saying something isn't going to make a difference, and I feel very strange about saying it and I'd say it once and didn't do anything. So that's that's where I let it go and the the challenge with the difference is that if you bring it into your conscious mind and you repeat it constantly, even if you don't believe it at first. Your brain hears it, your mind hears it, and so it starts to create a change. Mindfulness has become so popular and so effective because we've moved away from this idea of just saying positive things makes a difference to a point of being more aware of what's happening in the moment, helps you to break the cycle of the things you were saying to yourself previously yeah, I heard uh, was it mel robbins recently?
Speaker 2:don't ever talk about yourself in a negative way. Don't ever put that out there, because your brain is hearing what you're saying and it's thinking it's real or it's thinking that's what you really think of yourself and it's interesting because, like you say, when we get a bit woo woo because we talk about, you know, putting intentions out there and manifesting things, and then people sit there and go. Well, how can that be possible? And I did a breakdown recently on my Instagram of a Buddhist practice that I'd read and I translated it and he was brilliant, this Buddhist, because he said you literally manifest your life in front of you. Now, so many people will go. Well, how is that possible? Now, I'm not saying you can manifest a lottery win, it's ridiculous. But he said it all begins with your thoughts, because your thoughts become then what you say, and what you say becomes a habit and what you have is your behavior. And then your behavior is what you you know. You surround yourself with people with like behaviors and then it becomes part of your life and then your life becomes your destiny. And if you start with negative thoughts, that's where everything continues to go wrong. But I think this is something I'm going to say now, so many of our lovely listeners will have this problem You're going with the flow of life.
Speaker 2:I had this amazing three or four week period where people kept popping up in my Instagram feed that I thought were amazing. I contacted them. They said, yes, we've done podcast interviews, they're doing classes with me. I was getting bookings. I was doing it was like whoa, what is happening? And I don't know when that stopped. But now this week has been horrible for me. I've had three days of feeling like I've been stuck in a bowl of jelly and not pleasant, not a pleasant jelly that you want to eat with ice cream just stuck. I did it yesterday. I was talking to a friend yesterday and saying all these negative things. Sometimes then you can almost worry and think, oh, I've put bad things out in the universe, now only bad things are going to come in. You see how the brain works. You go crazy. So tell us about this flow of life and what we do to not chastise ourselves. And is that normal?
Speaker 1:It is entirely normal. It is entirely what it is to be a person. You know, if you go all the way back when we were sort of first coming into consciousness, living in our caves, trying to get from one moment to the next not get eaten by wild animals, um, protecting ourselves with a, maybe a spear or a stone hammer, you know, it was all about survival, and so the way that we have evolved since then is that we've always maintained that survival instinct. Our biggest fear as a species is our mortality, our fear of death. Ok, and so it sounds a bit morbid, but at our core, that's the thing that we're most scared of, and so what we want to be able to do is control everything. Able to do is control everything.
Speaker 1:It's our ego, if you like, that is always watchful for that moment where we're going to get ourselves in trouble, and through evolution, that ego has taken control of our personality, and so it's the first voice that we hear. We hear, you know, as soon as we perceive something bad to be happening, our ego goes trouble, trouble, trouble. Existence is on the line, and it's really not. It's just that we feel that we're out of control, and so the first thing to do is to be just aware of how life changes. Life is not an easy flow that we control at every moment. Life is generally something that happens to us, and so just be aware of that ebbing and flowing of life and being aware of when something bad does happen it doesn't necessarily mean it's the end of the world and then being able to accept that.
Speaker 2:I was going to say, and it doesn't mean it's going to continue, it's accepting that bad things will happen. I mean, yesterday I was talking to someone and she said to me the thing with life is and she was 75, so the thing with life is, and she was 75,. So the thing with life, rachel, is it can't always be good, it won't always be bad. You'll have amazing times and you'll have some boring times, and that's life. And it's so simple, that's so true. And actually I think that we learn the most when things are difficult. So, in a way, we have to keep being put in these challenging situations in order to learn, don't we? So we have to reframe the thinking about those situations.
Speaker 1:And absolutely, and reframing is one of the most powerful tools that we have. I think it's also important to put it into context, because there'll be people who are listening, who think themselves well, you know, there are some terrible things that happen and there are terrible inequalities in the world. We only have to look at the news currently and you know there is a lot of bad news out there and a lot of bad things happening to good people, and so it's important to remember that yes, there are some terrible things that happen. People do experience trauma, and that's not to say that life coaching, for example, would be able to help somebody work through that, and that's why we have things like therapy, community support groups, etc. Community support groups, etc. For extreme situations and experiences. It's important to remember that we're not just saying, oh, you know, you can view it as neither good nor bad. It's just something that happens and says, yeah, well, you know, like this, many people died or I don't feel like I can ever recover from that. So it's accepting that there are negative consequences that happen. What we can't necessarily say is what the ultimate consequence will be for that, and let's bring it away from politics or world issues. Let's talk about individuals, right? So there's a bit of the Buddhist idea that there is no such thing as good or bad. There are only experiences, and how you perceive those experiences or how you're able to let go of those experiences will determine what happens next.
Speaker 1:Who may be feeling like they are painting the best painting they have ever created. They make a stroke or they get knocked and paint goes all over the canvas. It's a disaster and you could perceive it as a disaster, but for that artist, it may be that somebody comes along and says, oh my God, that is an incredible piece of work, I absolutely love it. Right, I would like to take it. Or the artist says to themselves what did I to your point?
Speaker 1:What did I learn from that experience? What will I change to either make sure it doesn't happen again or wait a minute? That's created an effect that I've been looking for or didn't know I was looking for and I want to use again. It's about the context and the perception, if you like, and then being able to reflect on it non-judgmentally and then use what you learn to do something else, or do the same thing if it worked for you in the future. The question that I generally ask my clients when I'm working with them, when they describe any situation, is how would you see that differently if you weren't judging yourself, the other person or the situation, or how did this situation serve you and how did it not serve you? Let's be clear about that and then make a decision about what you want to do next.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's such a good question to ask someone about how you would perceive it if it wasn't you. I said this, actually, in one of my YouTube Tea Time tutorials with Gary. We do a little bit of mindfulness at the beginning before we do a creative exercise. And I remember saying to him that I had said I was going to start the gym at the beginning of the year and I think I did, and then I didn't go for like the next three days and I told myself I was going to go and I wasn't feeling very well because I get a lot of migraines and I was feeling a bit pre-migraine-y, and so I didn't go.
Speaker 2:And then on the Friday morning I woke up and my first thought was, oh, I should have gone, I should have gone, I should have gone. And I said to Gary you know, if my friend said to me oh, I didn't get to the gym this week, rachel, you know I said I was going to go and I didn't get there. I didn't feel very well, had a bit of a headache I would say to her it doesn't matter, go tomorrow, go on Monday, you know you'll start, you'll get into it. When it starts feeling right, it'll work for you. I wouldn't turn around to him and go well, you have just ruined everything, haven't you? You spoiled it. You're never going to get fit now. And these are the things that we say to ourselves. We have to treat ourselves like we are treating a friend.
Speaker 1:If it were a child, how would you react to that child? And so if a child falls over, you don't berate them. If they don't do something. Well, maybe you do, but you know we still come back to the the love of our children, right? And so there is always this idea behind everything that we do, everything that we feel for our children, this idea of love, compassion, empathy.
Speaker 1:So if we can show and the difficulty is that we see the things that we do and especially the things that we don't do, as an impediment on our character, yeah, they. We say, oh, yeah, that's another black mark for me. And then we hold on to it and we, that's it. We carry that. We build this, this bank account of black marks. You know you want to use the bank of rachel and you bank of Rachel and you don't want to put bad stuff in there. You want to put good stuff in there so that when you need to take it out again, you can look at it and say, yes, look at me, I'm amazing.
Speaker 1:It's not easily done. These are lifelong practices and, as I said to begin with, we spent our entire lives building up to this moment. We are the person. We are based on everything that's happened to us, everything that we've done, everything we've experienced and our perception of it, and so that takes some time to come through. It takes some time to become aware of and to start to scoop out and replace with something else, something else that's going to serve us. So, yeah, you, yeah, it's not easily done.
Speaker 1:If I may, I'll just give some context around that as well, from a crafting perspective. If you were starting quilting, or if you were starting sewing or anything like that, then for some people, the basic principles are really tough and some people just grab it immediately and they get it and they move on to the next point at some time. In everybody's experience, whatever they're doing, if it takes development to get good at it, you will hit a wall at some point, okay, and so it's about recognizing that. That is just where we are in our experience. We will get through it, but it's very much about how we approach it and how we think about it. That will enable us to do it apart from putting contact lenses in elliot.
Speaker 2:I tried that today and I gave up. I nearly cried. I nearly cried. I got one eye in. It took me ages to get the second one in. The guy was brilliant. He was like take your time, take your time.
Speaker 2:But I hadn't eaten, I had a headache, I hadn't gone best prepared, and then I got them in. They weren't amazing for my eyes just because I've got a lazy eye, and then I had to get them out. I couldn't get the second one out earlier. So then we had to get an optician and then she was like you haven't got a lens in there, I to have, and it was tucked right at the top and I that's it, that's it, get me my glasses. I, I know. So. No, I'm not going to apply those principles with contact lenses, but yes, with quilting.
Speaker 2:I think, like you say anything like that, you have to keep going and you have to take your time and that's the biggest thing. And in my classes you know people, there's an expert teaching who's been doing it for 15 years and the times, elliot, that people hold up their work and she's having a look and they go. Well, here you are. Oh, it's nothing like yours, I mean, and the times I've said why would it be? You've just spent two hours doing this that Kathy has been doing for 15 years. How could it possibly be like hers? But it's still beautiful because you've created something.
Speaker 2:And I always say to Elliot, to people when they come on the classes at the end and I genuinely mean it, I mean my regular clients are probably sick. It's like listening to the aerostats. Every time you get on, a plane Exits to the rear and the left. But I say it at the end of the class I say you should all be so proud of yourselves because you are investing in your hobby. You're getting some money together, you're paying for a lesson, you're investing in your hobby and in your time and it doesn't matter what you make. You should be proud of the fact that you are looking after yourself and treating yourself in this way.
Speaker 1:And that's so true. Well, isn't life hard enough? Again, a lot of the the work that a life coach does is to help, uh, our clients to find the right balance, right. So balance is important because we do have to take care of our basic necessities, right, we need to clothe house and feed ourselves, yeah, and our families, right. But for some reason, uh and certainly in the us there's this society of work, work, work, yeah. If you're not working, you're not achieving, and this creates this incredible imbalance between providing for others and your basic needs and also what you need at your core.
Speaker 1:What I love about crafting is that it fulfills so many things. It's fulfilling number one. If you love it, people are passionate about it. It's skill-based, it's craft-based, it's artistry. There's so much of it that is empowering and fulfilling and absorbing and all of those things.
Speaker 1:But if you're sitting there doing it and you're feeling guilty because you think that you should be doing something else, then you're losing so much of the experience and the reason that you're there, and we could say that about any aspect of our life right, we could say that about anything that we enjoy or anything that you know.
Speaker 1:The person who to be aware that this isn't going to last forever and you know the guilt is there to remind you that this could just change for you and you need to do something else about it. It's like no, if you're in the moment, then anything can be an experience that you can gain something from. One of my favorite films as a kid was Mary Poppins, and I love Mary Poppins because of her attitude towards life. Even tidying up can be made a game. Even taking medicine can be turned into something a little bit pleasurable, and the core message of a story like that is this idea of you can take control of how you feel and what you do and what you think, and by doing so it doesn't make everything better, but it does allow you to decide how you want to feel and what you're going to do next I've got a spoonful of sugar running through my head now, just a spoonful of sugar.
Speaker 2:As you know, I used to break out in song all the time. I probably cost them millions of pounds. You know, in licensing, right, I always used to only sing six seconds. I would go that's it, six seconds, six seconds, we're all right. I made that up in my head. I don't know if it was six seconds. Anyway, no, that's very true, that's very true.
Speaker 2:She did have that wonderful kind of joyful look at life and, like you say, try making those things enjoyable. I do that. When I tidy, I actually put music on on my headphones so I'm moving and dancing and tidying, if you just kind of looked at it in a drudgery way, you know. But if you think right, it's not great. If I'm tidying I'm not sat in front of my computer. That means I can listen to music and I can play it really loud, and when I'm running around the house and tidying I'm listening to my favorite music.
Speaker 2:So, as you say, it's a reframe. It's interesting because we're talking a lot about the ego and I think you know you and I have talked about the ego and the soul, no-transcript, and fear really is the ego? Isn't it Trying to protect us? So because I know, years ago when I read books about the ego, I thought that was just like oh, you look in the mirror too much if you're an egotist. No, it's not about that. The ego is about trying to protect us, keep us safe, but that keeps us actually restrained and that stops us from doing things that our souls really want to do. So I'm thinking that when clients come to you, that must be one of their biggest problems is fear 100%.
Speaker 1:It's the thing that holds people back in, whatever context you want to put it. I talked about anxiety earlier. That's part of fear. You know. I talked about anxiety earlier. That's part of fear. Stress, that's a part of fear. Again, depending on how it manifests itself and depending on how chronic it is, meaning how it affects one or more parts of your experience and life then you know there are lots of ways to approach it, and therapy is an enormously helpful one.
Speaker 1:I'm a massive supporter of therapy. I've been through therapy myself. I don't think it's a one and done. I think there's always opportunities to do that. I'm also a big supporter, in the right context, of pharmacology, psychiatry and medication, and sometimes things are so bad chemically that the only way to be able to solve it is through medicines, and I'm, again, a massive supporter, in the right context, of that as well.
Speaker 1:But to answer your question, fear is a huge thing and, again, each person is different and the way they experience it is different and the way it manifests itself is different, if you like. The ego is the big voice in our head. There's also a little voice in our head that wants to be heard, that wants to be bigger but isn't, is drowned out by the ego, and it's that part of us that we again, individually, sometimes people, some people experience more than others. Where we hear it and something just makes sense, it connects with who we are, at our core, and so what we're doing in our sessions is helping our clients to uncover it, to get a better sense of what they are hearing and to be able to hear it more often. And so when we've got that ego voice inside us that's telling us that the world is about to end, in whatever context, that is a good way to think about. It is like this when we're fighting that impulse to put it into negative terms or to create fear for ourselves around it negative terms or to create, to create fear for ourselves around it is that if you put, for example, if you put, your hand on a hot stove, how long would you keep it there for? Okay, so most people be like okay, as soon as I feel it burning, I take my hand away. In the same way, when we're having those thoughts that generate fear, that generate anxiety and stress, if we keep replaying them, then it's like keeping your hand on that hot stove.
Speaker 1:So what we're trying to do, first of all, as I think I mentioned earlier, is creating awareness around those thoughts and stories and dramas and bringing our non-judgmental awareness to them, because our ego loves that, our ego wants us to do that. Our ego says, okay, so you've heard it. Now you know what I'm doing, but, um, that's just who you are, so you're just going to keep doing it. And we go oh goodness, so that's who I am, is it? No, that's not who you are. That's just your safety mechanism coming into play. Okay, so I hear you. Um, uh, I can hear what you're saying. You're not helping me, so I'd like to be able to focus on something else. Okay, so recognizing that that is happening and then saying to ourselves, each time that we hear a negative thought or feeling, I'm going to take control of it and decide to focus on something else.
Speaker 1:Now, by that simple awareness and by continually bringing that simple awareness, the ego becomes quieter and then we can start to hear the other part of ourselves.
Speaker 1:A couple of things that I do, and a lot of life coaches do, is that we do mission statements. Mission statement works with our clients, which again helps them to be able to hear that hear their core self, because we ask them questions that they give some answers to, that we then can pull together for them to get a sense of what they're saying to themselves at their core. That's something else. Another thing we do is the whole purpose is to ask questions so that that little voice can hear us rather than the ego, and then when the client answers those questions, they are answering it from that place rather than from the other place. And another thing that can help a lot is mindfulness, mindfulness, mindfulness practice whether that is meditation, whether that is yoga or mindfulness practices, such as paying attention to sounds around you, paying attention to what you're feeling. Any sensation that you focus on stops the continual flow of the ego talking and being able to quieten it so that we can hear more from that other side of ourselves.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's about breaking those patterns. Isn't it so easy to fall into those patterns of behaviour that have kept you in that place and probably a wrong place, particularly if it's come from trauma, you know from childhood? You end up in these behavioral patterns to protect yourself, but actually what you're doing is you're just keeping yourself locked in a box and the real you is not getting a chance to come out. And those behavioral patterns, of course, can be destructive as well, particularly if you're so fearful that you can't develop a, so fearful that you, you know you. You can't develop a, you know, a closer relationship with someone. Or you can't go into a class because you're terrified, or you can't change that job because your ego says you know it'll go wrong, always goes wrong. So you end up locked in and that's that's really sad yeah.
Speaker 1:So you know, we talk. We talk about, um, like a gremlin. People often talk about the monkey on the shoulder or the parrot that's always telling us these negative things. We also talk about them in terms of gremlins and, to your point, we create the gremlin, or the gremlin is created in our formative years, usually around the age of two or four. Something happens at that time that creates a trauma in us that the ego or the gremlin then protects us from. Yeah, so then we we don't engage in it again to make sure that we don't feel embarrassed or worthless or hopeless or hurt. Yeah, and that just proceeds through the whole of our life.
Speaker 1:And so, you know, one of the things I was touching on was the idea that we speak directly to the gremlin. We name it, we look at it and we say thank you, but now I don't need protection from that. So give me something else, give me a different message. We work out what that message is going to be. So when we hear the old gremlin message, we say thank you, no, thank you. What's the new message? That?
Speaker 2:you have to tell me. Yeah, do you know? It's interesting. There's a crossover, I think, with hypnotherapy as well with what you're doing with life coaching, because I'm like you, I've had therapy, had it for five years when I met my husband because he had a little boy and it brought up all sorts of childhood divorce issues. For me, therapy was brilliant, but I then developed anxiety. Funny enough, you know, elliot, it was after Argos had finished and I think I had a nervous breakdown because I'd been travelling to London for two years up and down that motorway in my little MX-5. Do you remember that? Do you remember that guy who brought in the cleaner and stripped the back paint off the boot?
Speaker 1:Fabulous product.
Speaker 2:Yeah, fabulous product. He insisted it was my car. I was like it was perfectly shining when I came in today. Now it's got no paint Anyway, but I think it did.
Speaker 2:When that finished you know that job and I'd been doing all that traveling and obviously the stress of because we all lost our jobs, let's be honest, we didn't choose to leave the channel shut down, but I think it was the traveling, the tiredness, but the fear, the anxiety, everything kicked in and I had to go to see a hypnotherapist because I developed insomnia. And I said to Tony you know I I've got this terrible, you know insomnia and anxiety. And the panic attack started. And my, you know, whatever it was that was telling me you're going to die, you're going to die, you're going to die, you have to see, you know. And it was awful. And he said the worst thing you can do with a panic attack and the worst thing people can say to you when you're having a panic attack, by the way, is just be quiet, You're fine, you're fine, you're fine, because what that says to the voice which is what you were just talking about is we're not listening to you. And he said and what you have to do, you have to talk to that voice and go.
Speaker 2:Thank you for trying to protect me. I guess it's the ego. Again, thank you for trying to protect me. I know you think we're in danger, but I'm listening to you, but we're okay, we're not in danger, but I am listening to you and you're very important and thank you. And it seemed bizarre to me, but I thought I'd try it, after doing sessions with him as well, where I did go on to hypnotherapy. It was brilliant, elliot. It was so brilliant because that's all you have to do. And, like you say, that ego is just like listen to me, and when you go, I'm listening to you. It kind of goes oh, all right, then you know, and quietens down. But when you're trying to rally against it, you know by, I'm not listening, I'm not listening, which is what I always talk about running away from things. I'm not listening. No, pushing it down, pushing it down, push, nope, pushing it down, pushing it down. Push the feelings down. Don't have feelings. Nope, push them down. They're just going to get louder until you explode.
Speaker 1:Or, in my case, I think I had a nervous breakdown because I was pushing everything down. Yeah, and these are big experiences, you know, and they are traumatic and because they impact not just you, your family and everything like that, and so these are understandable, very normal human experiences that if we don't deal with them, then they continue to have an impact. And you know, I talked about putting your hand on the hot stove. I talked about putting your hand on the hot stove. Some people may think all right, you know, if I suffer a traumatic event, are you saying that I just have to let that go, because you know I just need to take my hand on the hot stove?
Speaker 1:It is important to go through the process of feeling and experiencing. Yes, of course that's not what we're talking about here. You know, the part we're talking about is that, for example, to to experience the, the death of a loved one, which is possibly one of the hardest things for anybody to to experience and to be able to deal with. If you don't go through that period of mourning, of really feeling and understanding and accepting the impact of that person's life on you and how that is coming out emotionally, then, as you say, if you try and compartmentalize that and push it down, it tends to leak out, and it leaks out at the time you least need it, and the general impact it has is so great that it takes a while to get back to a feeling of sense of normality, whereas by being able to experience it, be aware of it, accept it, allow it to be and then, once you've done that, to think about what comes next, that tends to be a more productive way of dealing with very strong, intense emotions.
Speaker 2:Now here's the big question that I think a lot of people are shouting out right now or saying to themselves and people will come to you with this question, which is Elliot, I don't know what I want to do with my life. I'm not happy, I'm in a job I don't like, but I don't know what I want to do.
Speaker 1:The one thing that we would be doing that you would be doing yourself but may take longer is peeling away all of the stuff that's in the way of you being able to be clear with yourself, if that makes sense. There's a difference between being happy and being fulfilled. So being happy is an emotion and being fulfilled is a way of being OK. So the difference is that there are many things that can make us happy. Yeah, and happy is a sort of a transitional mood and feeling that occurs as the result of experiencing something. Okay, fulfillment is a way of being. We can be fulfilled if fulfilled, even in things that we don't particularly like doing, right. So, for example, you were talking about earlier about when you have to do the tidying. You like to listen to music. Okay, the music makes you feel happy. You get fulfilled from the whole experience because you're doing something that makes you feel happy and you're getting something done. You feel value, you feel like you've achieved something. The deeper sense of fulfillment is when you're really doing something that you're passionate about. Passion is the source of fulfillment, whereas something nice and a nice experience is the source of happy. To take the next part, you feel that what you're doing now is quite significantly different to what you were doing before, but there's still an aspect of what you were doing before, but there's still an aspect of what you were doing before and what you're doing now. Okay, and so part of what we would do is to uncover those things. What are the things that fulfill you, the things that you want to do, rather than you feel like you should or need to do, what are the things that you're passionate about? Because without passionate energy, we can't achieve anything.
Speaker 1:Another thing that is absolutely key to this key to fulfillment that is can only be found at our absolute core is our values, and so by understanding what our values actually are, we can employ those into whatever we're doing. So simple idea is, especially your audience is that I want to have fun and I want to feel creative. So those are two really good indicators for what somebody should do next, if they have those two values. What's important? To identify the difference between what your value is and the values that you've been given. Ok, so we learn a huge number of our values through our parents, through our teachers, through our peers, again in our formative years.
Speaker 1:So we say to ourselves well, you know, I should be, I should be more giving and I should help others and I should do this, and I should do that. Every time we use the word should, it generally indicates something that has come from somewhere else that we don't actually want for ourselves. As soon as somebody says, yeah, I want that, or I like that, or this is important to me, let's discuss that, let's explore that and then when we get to a key list of, let's say, an arbitrary five or 10 values that are really important to that person, that are essential, authentic values to that core person, then we're getting somewhere. Their guide, as well as their passions, as well as their skills and whatever it is that they want to bring into that, that cauldron mix, decide on on on their next move.
Speaker 2:I love the way you're explaining things, elliot, but the way you're explaining all the ways you would, you know, help someone in their life is brilliant, and I can see why apps it works like. For me, therapy did like hypnotherapy did. That's the same with my hypnotherapist. He peeled off all the layers.
Speaker 1:It is very rewarding and, you know, ultimately all the work is done by the client. The work is not done by the coach In terms of you know, our role is to listen, to ask exploratory questions, uh, and to hold a space where there is no judgment. But apart from that, the insights that each person gains is is is through their own work, and then how they use that is entirely up to them. So we're being rewarded for you doing all of your work.
Speaker 1:Having said that, for a therapist or a coach, a mentor, a consultant, anybody who is bringing a level of expertise, and especially where therapy is concerned, and life coaching as well is that where you are dealing with massive experiences that have far-reaching emotional reactions to them, it's being in somebody who has the skill and the training to be able to hold that space for you. So it's safe for you to experience those extreme emotions and then be able to come back to who you are and walk out of that session feeling like you can move forward. Often, when we try and deal with those experiences and emotions on our own, then it can be overwhelming and it can be too much, and so if you are the sort of person who feels like you are experiencing something traumatic and extreme, then it's always a wise decision to search out help yeah, definitely 100, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Talk to someone. Well, here's the word that we haven't used yet, and I did read this the other day, um elliot, that it was one of these huge guru guys who was saying if you have a passion, brilliant, but in order to make it really successful, it has to be a purpose. You have to find your purpose. Now, what's your feeling on that? Because I've heard you talking about finding your passions to get fulfillment. But what about finding? Because to me, that's a big word.
Speaker 1:Little P Purpose doesn't need to be anything wild or or significant or world changing right. That's our ego talking again. That's this fear of our mortality speaking again. It's saying you know, what did you achieve in your life? At the end of your life, when you're on your deathbed, you're lying there and you're saying to yourself oh, my goodness, what did I actually do? What am I? What's my legacy? That's your ego saying I don't want to go, I want to be here forever and have my impact and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1:So, in order to get through the day, just think about what's your little p purpose, what's the? What's your guiding light, what's the thing that at the end of the day, you can say I did this against that and I feel good about it. That's all you need to have. You know it could be. I want to delight people with my cooking. Did the kids come in? Did my spouse come in? Whoever it is? Did I make something today that I was proud of and somebody enjoyed eating? That's a lovely little p purpose.
Speaker 1:Big p purpose. Let's leave that for, you know, uh, the gurus, and for the and for the, the people who feel like they. You know they can actually make a difference in the world. You know, I, I again, it's big p purpose is again comes out of the ego, uh, and ultimately can be very destructive to how we experience each moment of our life. So my, my advice to myself and I'm not suggesting this for you or for your audience is that I leave big p purpose alone. It's not, it's not essential to me. And if it's, if one day I have a enlightened moment where I suddenly have this message from wherever inside, internally or externally, that says go forth and do, then maybe I'll follow it. But until then I'm going to focus on the balance in my life between giving for me and giving for others I like that, elliot.
Speaker 2:Do you know what else that big P stands for as well? Purpose, pressure, pressure. You're putting pressure on yourself by asking that big question. I love what you said there about if your purpose that day is to delight your family with a really lovely meal that they enjoy, how nice is that Then you've achieved your purpose that day.
Speaker 1:How nice is that Then you've achieved your purpose that day, break it down into days, break the blocks Exactly and to your point. You know. Again, some people's perception is that, working with a life coach, you know you go away from each session and you've got this massive task that you've got to do, and the thing is that sometimes you walk away and you have no action to do. The insight that you've gained from the session and the thing is that sometimes you walk away and you have no action to do the insight that you've gained from the session has been powerful, or what tends to happen is that people gain insights outside of the session and then they decide what they're going to do. But we also talk about baby steps, always baby steps. What is the thing that you can get done today that's going to make a difference? If all it is is this smallest thing, it doesn't matter, and just know it's going to take a little bit longer, and so timeline is important, and so for you, using your example, whether it's the five workshops in the year, that's still the big goal. That's where I want to be, but I'm not going to just throw myself at it. I'm going to do it in a way that makes sense for me, but within the time that I have available to me, and so take all the time you need. Just know that it's going to take time to do it, and that's also. That's also really key, because really coaching is about as it is in sports coaching as well, it's about raising confidence, and so if your confidence is not rising as you're doing this stuff, then there's no point in doing it, because it doesn't get you anywhere, doesn't? It's just very short term. So it should be about okay, if I did, I've done that and actually I feel better about it. I'm going to bank that, I'm going to use that when I do my next thing, and then the next and next thing, and suddenly I feel more confident in other areas of my life as well.
Speaker 1:The theme of your podcast is breaking blocks, our blocks. They can be external. They can be external. They can be external to us. So you know we could have an environmental block, right, so we're trying to get something done and there's like a we're next to a busy street and so you know the sound is distracting, and so that can be a block.
Speaker 1:The things that tend to hold us back on a continual basis are in internal blocks. So we talk about two main blocks, if you like, in um, in life coaching, and they are assumptions and expectations. So an expectation is that you expect something to happen because it's happened before. You know, if I try this, I'm just going to fail because that's what happened before. An assumption is a core belief about something that limits you because you believe it. For example, I should have started doing crafts when I was really young, because I'll never have the experience or skills to do it if I start now. So those are two examples of major blocks.
Speaker 1:If we really examine those without judgment and say to ourselves how true are those things that I'm saying to myself. You know, let's really explore the idea of you know, did all people who became good at crafting did they start when they were in their infancy? No, just because you didn't get this role, does that mean that you failed at every interview that you've ever had? No right? And so once we start to break that down again with, with fighting that ego, that's saying to us you know, this is what's going to happen.
Speaker 1:Watch out, something that I suggest and life coach only suggests we never tell our clients to do anything is to start a judgment journal, and what you do is as often as you can. You write in the journal all the negative thoughts that you have in the day, when they happen. If you can do it. Obviously we have lots of things happening to us during the day which maybe we can't, but at the end of the day, when they happen, if you can do it. Obviously we have lots of things happening to us during the day which maybe we can't, but at the end of the day, write them down.
Speaker 1:And then just take a look at the end of the day, non-judgmentally, not saying, oh, look at me, I, you know, I, I think terrible thoughts. Just look at it and say, look, these are the thoughts. Do I believe them? How? How are they true and do they serve me? Okay, and that awareness will start to reduce it because it will break the cycle. And then the next step is to go what would I prefer to believe? Even if you don't believe it, write it down this is not true, this doesn't serve me. I would prefer to believe this and break the cycle.
Speaker 2:That's so good in terms of how to break a cycle, because I do it, I get trapped in cycles. I get trapped in these thoughts that go around for like three or four days and then I get really stressed that I'm in a cycle that I'm never going to get out of it. Like I said, like I started the interview saying that I've had three bad days, and because I've had such an amazing run of weeks, I'm like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm grasping on because I'm like no, I can't slip down that hill again, because I've been down that hill. It's horrible.
Speaker 1:Make it a constant practice where you can, because, as we said, it's repetition. It takes time to uncover and scoop out the old and put in the new, and it's also to your point there. I love that because it's it's such a common experience. It's like I, you, everybody, a lot of people have heard this one. It's like when somebody says to you don't think of a pink elephant on a tricycle, and you're like, oh, my goodness, okay. Or like when somebody puts a tune in your head, right, and you're like, okay, I can't get rid of it. And the more you try, the harder it is.
Speaker 1:And so you know, what can we do about that? And and and what happens is is that with our thoughts, our negative stories, our dramas, they become so continuous that they become silent, but they're there all the time because we're not bringing our awareness to them, and so they're just in the background, going round and round and round, and what the judgment journal does is it brings it back up to the surface. And for you to just say, okay, today, actually, even though I thought that I only had negative thoughts, I don't. And actually the next day I've actually had less negative thoughts. And the next day and the next and actually the next day. I've actually had less negative thoughts and the next day and the next day and it can be different timeline for each person, but it just helps to break down those cycles so if you were just constantly thinking about an elephant now on a tricycle, that's gonna be sticking my head now a pink elephant on a tricycle.
Speaker 2:I'm so glad I recorded this because I can just keep playing this now as a constant session. It's fantastic. I'm going to buy myself a journal tomorrow, so great. We've talked about lots of other people and I know some people will be thinking, well, what about this guy? What blocks did he overcome? So let's just sort of wrap it up with. You know a couple of things about you, elliot. So, yes, what has been a very big block in your life that you've overcome and how did you overcome it?
Speaker 1:you know I'm going to be so honest with you here because it's really important. When I went into life coaching I I expected there's the expectations again. I expected to be working with all these incredibly enlightened, sort of richly positive, nothing can hurt, grounded, but completely human, completely normal people who suffer with all of the same fears, anxieties, troubles, worries that everybody else does. So, you know, just to put that into perspective, you know I have all of these tools. It's important as a coach that I work with a coach, because I'm constantly looking at my own self-development as well. So, but to answer your question, um, you know, as I think I was saying earlier, one of my biggest blocks was, uh, social anxiety. Um, and I, to this day, coaching, working with a coach, working with a therapist, working with these tools have been essential to it. Because what I did first of all was, I thought, a really good idea and I guess in a way it was was to do martial arts. And so I practiced martial arts for 10 years and I pushed myself out of my comfort zone, but without a proper safety net. If you do that, it can be at best. Best it doesn't do anything at all. At worst it can be really damaging. And so, you know, I realized that actually just pushing myself out of my comfort zone wasn't going to help. But by doing the internal work, by recognizing, um, the experiences that I've had as a child that had created that anxiety inside me, to utilize this self-awareness and self-acceptance and this banking of positivity around the great stuff that's happened in my life, the experiences that I've had, the times I've been in really pressured situations that have worked out great, and just using those as a foundation for going into social situations, going into presentation situations, work situations. Does it solve it? Not always, does it help Absolutely. Does it enable me to be on an even keel and to be able to be effective 100%? And you know, again, that's something else important to recognize is that some of these things can be helped by sort of working consciously through them. Other things can't be, other things need other interventions to be effective.
Speaker 1:Another one of my blocks was that, at our core, the block that we all share is I'm not good enough, and that is an ego response, again, protection to stop us from doing anything that might injure us or affect us negatively. My, my one, was that, um, nobody thinks that I have any value, and so you can imagine how damaging that can be. And that's a very common um barrier and block. You know, when you look at the dramas or the, the storylines you're telling yourself, have a think about what did it, what? What is that? I'm not statement is behind that, and my a lot of the uh, the things that I was telling myself was because I felt I had no value and I thought that other people saw me as having no value, so I would just put all of myself into social, professional, personal situations without thinking about what I was getting back from it and it was exhausting. And so, again, recognizing that that was one of my sort of core self-fulfilling prophecies and being able to go, that doesn't help and it's not true.
Speaker 2:What can I say to myself instead is again was greatly impactful for me to to make a change people who normally have low self-worth will actually, I mean they might dip their toe into social situations or but as soon as they start feeling like you said you, you were exhausted by it, but as soon as people start feeling anything towards those situations, they will then run like the clappers the other way, because it's like I've got to avoid those feelings. So that's interesting that you kept throwing yourself in all the time and you didn't run, but yet you had these feelings of so low self-worth.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we're complicated beings. We really are, and we tend to overcomplicate ourselves as well. But at the same time, you know these aren't necessarily easily explainable ways of being. Let's say, you know, some people identify as being introverts, some people identify as being extroverts. When you look at the impact of the pandemic, that had deep impact on both types of personality in different ways, in different extreme ways. Interestingly, some people it's because they identify as one thing or another that they believe they are that way. But at their core, is there a level of comfort in which I can approach this situation? And if there isn't, then back away. But if you need to be in that situation because of you know, for your livelihood or whatever it is, what is a way that you can reframe it that helps you be there, while also acknowledging how you feel you are centrally, if that makes sense. I think I might be overcomplicating it, but I hope that makes sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it does. It does make sense. So you know, we were at Argos together then. Yes, did you have those feelings then that people would think you didn't have any value?
Speaker 1:yeah, and you know what it? It also tends to be a way that we um transfer it. So when I was saying that I didn't believe that other people felt I had value, it was, it was really myself saying it to myself. Right, I didn't feel like I had, but I feel like I have to prove myself. So, to answer your question, yes, yes, and it's uh, it's a, it's a constant feeling, but, uh, at the same time, for the reasons I've described, you know, that's how I uh have moved past that and now I you know, even though those thoughts and feelings still come up, I'm like I don't believe you because it doesn't serve me and I know where it's coming from, um, and so when they come up, I'm like, yeah, but that's, that's not true, and I can. I can find so many examples to tell me that it isn't true. But to answer a question, yeah, yeah, in in high pressure situations, I feel like if I feel like if I don't demonstrate that I have value, then nobody's going to think that I do.
Speaker 2:That's really interesting, elliot, because I can see that at Argos we shouldn't really talk about what happened in Argos TV land, because shopping tele channels are big, serious business. And I only realized that when I went to other channels, because when I was at Argos, I mean it was like it was run with loads of kids on the floor who'd never done any of this TV work or anything before. Some people had, but it was like a big, you know, youth club meeting sometimes and you know there was a lot of stuff that went on. That was just, you know, it was just silly. But you, you in particular, elliot, your emails, I remember they were like essays, but you know you really did, you were absolutely, you know, on it.
Speaker 2:You know this has to work, this is working, and you would send these long emails to people and you were quite serious you know, you put so much effort into it and now that makes sense, that you were kind of proving your value to yourself as well as to everybody else. But some people probably did see you as just been too much, too intense, but that's because they were just mocking about. I mean, it was extremes there, but you were very intense and you are way more relaxed now. But I suspect you've probably seen in me that I'm more relaxed now than I. I mean, I was like a coiled spring. I'll tell you something, elliot, not that it means anything when anybody else says it to you, because it only means it for five minutes and then your ego goes. Don't listen to her.
Speaker 2:You've added huge value in this podcast to people I know you have, because you've said so many amazing things and I've been, as we've just talked about, I've been in therapy, hypnotherapy. I consider myself one of those people who's always searching and yet you've said some things today that I've gone. Oh, ding-a-ling-a-ling, that's brilliant. You know some solid advice, physical things to do, mental challenges, understanding yourself. Honestly, you've been a brilliant, brilliant guest. So thank you so much for adding huge value to my podcast roster of guests.
Speaker 1:Thank you, I appreciate it. I appreciate it, yeah, and I hope that your listeners have enjoyed it and that they can draw something from it. And I'm very passionate about crafting as well. You know, we used to have these events, uh, where, uh, customers and the audience would be able to come in and we'd have these all-day events where they were crafting and I'd meet all these wonderful people who were just so passionate about what they were doing. So, you know, just that's always stayed with me as well. So it's been, it's been nice to be able to reach out to that audience again yeah, it's been.
Speaker 2:it's a lovely community. It's a lovely community of people. I think you know that it is an interesting word, community, and I do think the crafting community really is, you know, a great gathering of people. So I feel very lucky to be a part of it as well. But, yeah, well, do you know, elliot, as I was talking to you there, thinking about retreats, I mean I can see a retreat in the States where I have you with the life coaching. I've just met this amazing creative writer. He wants to do some creative writing workshops. I've got a great artist, tim. I can see it. This is going to be. We're going to sort people out on this retreat, I can see it.
Speaker 1:I'd be on it. I'd be on it.
Speaker 2:Well, it's been lovely reconnecting with you and we're not going to leave it another 10 years. I'll be on the phone to you next week, elliot. Just talk me through it. I just talked me through it. You were like we have to start charging you, rachel. Well, I will put all of your details as well, obviously, in the information below, because you never know, somebody might want to start working with you and find their passion and see what can make them happy. But thank you for making me happy today, and I know our listeners as well. So, yes, you are hugely valuable, elliot. I never forget it.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you, rachel, I really enjoyed being with you.
Speaker 2:Thank you Just before you go. Lovely listener, can I ask you a favour If you have a friend who you think would enjoy listening to this podcast, would you mind please telling them about it? It helps me to spread the word and you never know, they might get a life lesson out of it or, at the very least, just have a lovely 40 minutes of relaxing time for themselves. The second thing to say is that, if you have enjoyed this, it would really help me if you would give me a little quick like or a comment, especially if you're listening on one of the podcast platforms. It just means that when anybody lands on the page, they can see that people have reviewed it, they've liked it, enjoyed it and got something out of it. So if you wouldn't mind leaving me a review, that would be amazing. And the final thing to do is reach out to me, rachel at breakingtheblockscom. Thank you so much to everybody who's subscribing, listening, liking, leaving comments and just generally enjoying the podcast.
