THE NEW MASCULINITY OF COACHING Craig White

Most teams don’t lose because they lack information. They lose because pressure hijacks attention, connection, and decision making. Craig White joins us to unpack a simple truth that too many coaches miss: your team feels your nervous system before they hear your message, and what you model becomes the culture.

We dig into conscious leadership and the difference between regulated and dysregulated coaching. Craig breaks down the “to me, by me, through me, as me” framework, why victim language spreads fast in staff rooms, and how a grounded coach can deliver hard feedback without becoming unsafe. We also talk brotherhood and connection as the foundation for high performance, not a soft extra. When people feel safe, they challenge each other, learn faster, and play freer.

From there we take it off the field. Many high achievers are visible at home but not present, chasing results because they think validation must be earned. Craig shares how to train presence like a skill, build relational fitness, set boundaries that protect family time, and use master regulators like sleep and nature to reset the nervous system. We finish with attention and intention, and why focused awareness changes outcomes in the gym, rehab, and leadership itself.

If you want practical tools for coaching culture, emotional safety, and leadership under pressure, listen through and share this with a coach who needs it. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us: where do you most want to be more present this week?

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Transcript

Model The Mood You Want

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I always say to coaches I'm working with, if you want your team to be a joyful team, you have to model joy. If you want your team to be playful, you have to model being silly and playful. If you want your team to sometimes be stoic and unstoppable, you've gotta model that. As men, we're being called into presence more than ever before. People don't need our financial provision and our protection as much as they used to, that they're just dying for a presence. I wasn't that bothered about physiology and developing the energy systems. I mean, it's all nonsense anyway. I was more interested in brotherhood and using the medium of physical training to do all to also develop emotional capacity. Energy flow is where attention goes. You get what you focus on, he's totally present with his rage and disappointment. And that is received by the team as fucking hell, this guy cares about us. Versus a coach who thores a tantrum, the team think, oh fucking hell, not this again.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Welcome to Coaching Culture, the podcast about cultivating culture and leadership. I'm Ben Herring and I've been loving this side of the game for bloody ages. Today's guest is Craig White, a former elite strength and conditioning coach and high performance consultant, attributed to revolutionising how athletes train. He led rugby programs for Wasps and Leicester and national programs for Ireland, Wales, Uruguay, and the British and Irish Lions, and worked 14 years for world rugby. In a life pivot, he moved his own self from a hypermasculinity to a more emotionally arranged and balanced man. And now mentors world-class leaders, specifically helping men navigate vulnerability, emotional health, and masculinity. For this audience, this has never been more applicable. And an area of modern coaching, which we really need to get a better understanding of. Joining us today from Ecuador. Whitey, welcome to the Coaching Culture Podcast.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Mate, what an introduction. I mean, I love the introduction. And then that little imposter comes in. You're just you're just a little lad from Wigan. But uh no, mate, it's good to see you. Uh we obviously connected when I was working at Leicester Tigers. I remember you well. Dogged, hardworking, tough, but also lovable and laughable and gentle on the inside. I I I do have memories of you. And uh it's good to be on your podcast, mate. I'm I've listened to uh some of your podcasts and I'm looking forward to bringing, I guess, my flavour of how I show up today as a leader in the world and what I do with with leaders and teams in the world.

SPEAKER_01 2:36

Yeah, mate. Well, just certainly having that experience with you way back when we're we're talking isn't it funny when you talk about 20 years ago? Yeah. And that's uh that's about what it was.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Yeah, yeah. It must have been 2006, was it? 2004 Yeah. Something like that, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:53

Something like that. The the numbers sort of blur into one, but mate, likewise, I I I came from uh the Hurricanes, Rugby, New Zealand, and then came to Leicester and you were running the program there, and I was blown away by just the difference, and it was remarkable, and I became a way better athlete uh at the sort of midpoint of my career coming and experiencing the way you approach things, it was it was remarkable, mate, like just your approach to it. I know a lot of people big you up around what you've done for the profession, but mate, you you were ahead of your time, weren't you?

SPEAKER_00 3:24

I don't know. Um what what what I do know looking back is I got into rugby really as an SC coach in 1995, so I was there right at the cusps of professionalism in Europe and uh nobody knew what they were doing, and I just didn't want to follow the norm. I I everybody was running athletic programmes from athletics and it just didn't fit with me, probably because I'd played rugby at a decent level as an amateur, and uh I just looked at it through the lens of of of rugby league and contact and more than anything, it wasn't conscious, but looking back, the more the the biggest determining factor to the way I programmed was the development of brotherhood. I wasn't that bothered about physiol physiology and developing the energy systems. I mean, it's it's all nonsense anyway. I was more interested in brotherhood

From S And C To Brotherhood

SPEAKER_00 4:17

and using the medium of physical training to do all to also develop emotional capacity, mental strength, strength, connection, love even, and ultimately brotherhood. So that's what fascinated me. And it still fascinates me, Ben. I I stopped working full-time in rugby about 15 years ago, and then I ended up running retreats for men, and it's all about brotherhood, and the world for me, the world for me needs more brotherhood, whether that's friendships or teamships. But uh yeah, the people are crying out for brotherhood more than ever before. What is brotherhood? Well, how well how do you define brotherhood? I don't really define it, but I've experienced it, and because I've experienced it, I want to share it. I remember running a retreat, and uh Jonathan Thomas, who used to play for Wales number eight, was on the retreat, actually. It was a five-day men's retreat, and I remember him saying at the end, why it's in five days, what we've created here in the sense of connection and trust and and and bond with this group of men is far, far deeper than I've ever experienced in 25 years as a player and ten years as a coach. It's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's a feeling. It's it's a feeling of ins invincibility. It can transcend our humanness, it can transcend in into oneness. You know, when I speak about leadership, I often talk about three stages that I take my my clients and teams on. Stage one is self-leadership, which is the biggest piece and almost all of it. And then stage two is leading others, which is really learning to coach. And then stage three is leading the team, which is somehow trying to create the the spirit of the team, this this kind of shift from developing individuals to developing into connectivity within the team of individuals to kind of transcending to this oneness. And and I'm sure the all blacks have been there in the past, in the peak years, and for sure you can you can see it within the spring box that they they they sometimes transcend the humanness and there's this entity, this oneness, this spirit of the team that for me is an underlying reason why they're the best in the world right now, and I think Rasi gets that. Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

I think you even quoted something previously about medicine as the group container. And and I love that phrase. I heard you say that, and I and that's and men particularly, more maybe more so than than women, enjoy team team settings and group settings, that group container. It makes a difference, doesn't it? Like being part of something like that.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

100%. And and look, in terms of high performance rugby, various stages happen, and this phase is in the evolution of professional rugby. I remember in the beginning, everybody was training people like endurance athletes, and then there was a sprint phase, and then contact and conditioning and combat and wrestling, and then there was the analysis and GPS and then leadership, mental skills. And for me, a lot of teams now that they're talking about connection as the foundation, and I think it is a foundation of high performance. You know, what when the when there's a connection between a deep connection between individuals within an organization, that's the kind of the first rung of the pyramid. Then people within that organization feel safer. If they feel safer, they're more likely to support each other fearlessly, but also challenge each other fearlessly, and then you get learning and then you move toward moving, expanding the window of potential. But connection takes effort, it's not easy. Everybody thinks, oh no, our team it takes a lot of effort and it takes a lot of courage to connect with human beings, especially if there's people in the organization, as a coach, for example, who are different to you or who trigger you, who

What Brotherhood Feels Like

SPEAKER_00 7:58

piss you off, who reflect something back at you that you don't like to look at in yourself. It's it's not every team are connected. It looks like they are on the outside, but for teams to be connected, it takes a lot of work and a lot of skill and facilitation. I do some work with Wigan Warriors predominantly through the coaches, especially the head coach Matty P, and uh they are definitely a team who are connected. But it's because of the way Matty leads, and it's because of how connected his staff are. You know, that the coaches model how to connect with each other and the team uh the team benefit from that. But yeah, connection takes effort, it's not a given.

SPEAKER_01 8:40

Yeah, well I just on that connection, I I remember, and you probably won't remember this, but I remembered it because uh it it struck me as as really different at the time when you were in the gym and a guy called Tom Croft came in and he wasn't feeling great, he was but uh and you told him, and I remember thinking, Oh, it was you said, mate, go off, go grab some McDonald's up the road and don't come back here till ten o'clock. And I remember and he loved it. And like you read, I think, particularly well, that he was a very good trainer, great skin falls, really strong and all that stuff, and you knew him well enough to know that right then and there, forcing him to come into the gym because it was the compulsory session, and I just I remember thinking that's a that's a master stroke there of understanding a bloke in a team. He's not taking the piss, he's not marking about, he's a true champion, and he just needed a little bit of time and that connection that you had with him to to just understand that man, yeah, this this guy needs something different here. And I and I I just in in a high performance world, because we you were you're very professional, and I've and I just remember going, wow, that's a that's a lovely little piece you've just done there, understanding someone and and having that little connection point.

SPEAKER_00 9:46

Is that something I think you sort of yeah? I mean I think I think that we all have natural talents as leaders, don't we? And uh I think naturally I did that. I mean I don't understand GPS, mate. If you put a spreadsheet of numbers in front of me, my nervous system goes into fight or flight. But I don't know. I I uh I I just look at a team through a lens of individuals,

Connection As The Performance Base

SPEAKER_00 10:07

and every individual's different. And and uh for me it's it's about attuning to those individuals, but to be able to attune to individuals you have to be able to attune to yourself. Hopefully we'll we can talk about that later on.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Hmm. Well mate, let's let's just start it, mate. Like, so how do you like what is your like have you got a concise definition of like this sort of leadership you're talking of? And no, not really.

SPEAKER_00 10:30

I don't have a concise definition, but I do but I do have a few models that I that I use that really, really help me. Yeah. The first model is called the States of Conscious Leadership. And I think it was created by a guy called Michael Bernard Beckwith, and I love it, and I like how he's he's brought kind of spiritual terminology into leadership. And I think they talk about this in the book. One of the best books I've ever read on leadership is called The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership. I think they talk about it in that, and and it's very useful. I use it at the start of a journey with leaders, especially one-on-ones, and there's four states. The first state is the to me state of conscious leadership. And if I think the world is happening to me, I'm more likely to be a victim. I'm more likely to be living in fear, activating fight or flight, and most of my behaviours are uh will be below the line, fear-driven behaviors, defensiveness, reactivity, avoidance, and so on and so on and so on, dysregulation. Uh poor me. Everything that happens to me is outside of me. I have no control. So that's victimhood, and everybody has to go through that somehow. And then the second state is the buy me state. So for me, I remember having some kind of a revolution when I was kind of in my, I guess, late 30s, some kind of an awakening to a deeper truth that hang on a minute. This rule book was given to me by my mum and dad, and where I grew up, it's not my rule book. I'm gonna take responsibility. So what what the to what the buy me state fosters is responsibility. It's like I'm the creator, okay? I'm gonna create my own map, I'm gonna create my own rule book. It's a higher level of consciousness, but it can still be very, very controlling. And then the third state of conscious leadership is through me. For me, I went to, I was working for Wales as full-time as head of physical performance. We were doing quite well, it was a prestigious job, life was alright. But I went on a Lions tour in 2009 and I hated it, and I was like, what the fuck am I doing? And after that, my wife at the time begged me to go on a yoga retreat to Thailand. So I went on this yoga retreat to Thailand and uh I spent a month there and it it opened me up like never before. If you know anything about yoga, it's a practice that forces you to be still and present and feel and become embodied. So I was fidgeting for two weeks and then something happened in week three. I touched something, my consciousness expanded. On one side, I felt in my body bliss, happiness, joy, peace, magic. It's like, wow, what is this fucking world that we're living in? And on the other hand, the polarized side, which I felt was darkness, fear, anxiety, rage, what happened with my brother when I was a kid, why did I not respect my dad? Was my mum as good as what she thought she was? Why did I get bullied in school? Why why have I disrespected women all these years? It

The Four States Of Leadership

SPEAKER_00 13:36

just opened me up to a greater kind of level of consciousness. And and on the back of that, I just I just had this realisation that, you know, I can be a channel. I can be a channel for something greater than me. Something greater than me is actually moving through me and it cultivates more presence in me. And then the fourth state, and I haven't met anybody that's permanently in this state, even though the gurus would say it's possible, is the as me state of conscious leadership. And in the as me state of conscious leadership, there's a perception that everything is interconnected, it's wholeness, it's oneness, there's no separation, there's no individual me. And even even though I've not, you know, I don't claim to be in that state, I remember I used to do retreats in the UK, five-day retreats for men. I did a lot of them. And in those retreats, I had a taste of that. It's like the something came through me, it was coming through me at the end of the retreat. It's like, I don't know what just happened though. Magic just happened, there was no Craig, there was no individual me. And it was it was an experience, I guess, of this as me conscious state. No, though they're not stages, Ben. We we we dip in and out of them, but a conscious leader spends more time in the through me and and the buy me, the buy me responsibility and the through me state of consciousness, which is presence, embodied presence. So that's a little model that I that I that I like to use, and I have a scorecard that helps leaders to kind of get a little bit of objectivity around where they spend the most time, and it can be different as well. Sometimes you might be in the buy-me at work, and then you go on to your missus, and then everything is triggers you and you you end up being a victim again. So it's fascinating, but it's a beautiful model that all leaders should research.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

I think it's a really good one for coaches too, because like the amount of coaches you hear uh talking about referees and everything they've done to me, like most coaches after a game will say, Oh, the ref did this and this and cost us this. Well, the rest's not. Like you're thinking you're a victim, but the rest's doing the same for both sides. I haven't met a referee that's actually biased. It's just the impr uh the impression, and because you're in that state, right, and you think it's all happening to you.

SPEAKER_00 15:59

Yeah, I remember I remember consulting for a premiership team, I don't know how many years ago it was, and I just left in the end. It wasn't my environment. I I was sick of hearing it's his fault, and I'm sick of telling him and he's an idiot and he's an idiot, and it just it just for me, it wasn't it wasn't uh a measure of conscious leadership compared to my time at Wasps and my time at Leicester Tigers, for example. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:21

When you're talking about conscious, it's conscious is just another word for like being hyper-aware of of yourself. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 16:28

Like, yeah, I mean there's lot yeah, for sure. There's there's loads of ways to to phrase it, mate. You know, I actually like I like to, I mean, in the book, The Fifteen Commitments of Conscious Leadership, they talk about conscious is above the line and unconscious behavior leadership is below the line. But I I I also like, which is another way of saying it, regulation and dysregulation. I'll and I'll tell you why. Because when when one's nervous system is dysregulated, right, you're in fight or flight. It might be very, very subtle, but you're in fight or flight. And when you're in fight or flight, you're driven by fear and you're always looking for a threat, and you're more inclined to be in the victimhood. You there's there's a slight dysregulation, which could be related to trauma or it could be related to life conditioning, but it's driven by fear. And when you're in that state of consciousness, it activates the reptilian part of your brain, and it's like on-off. And you often, especially in periods of pressure or conflict, you react. You react that's based on a pattern that you learned from childhood. Let's say somebody provokes you and there's a reaction, there's a fight, there's aggression, or you check out and you avoid. When you're the more regulated you are, and and you can practice as a coach to be more regulated. I have a lot of practices that I do with coaches to develop regulation/slash presence, which is another way of saying I have a lot of practices to help coaches reclaim their attention and become more embodied. There's a ton of stuff you can do. When the regulated state is more embodied, you're less reactive, you speak your truth more, you don't hide from responsibility, and uh crucially it activates the executive centre of your brain, which means you have more awareness and choice. So a more regulated coach, for example, sees things as they are, sees the reality in front of him, can respond to what he sees in front of him and make decisions based on that. A dysregulated coach doesn't see reality as it is in the moment. He's constantly in past or future. If he's in the past, he's often depressed. If he's in the future, he's often anxious, and he's never home. He looks like he's leading, but he's never home and he's not emotionally safe, he's not present, he's not grounded, and those are the guys that are not really respected by the team.

SPEAKER_01 19:12

And do you and do you think those sort of coaches, when you've got that lens up, like you talked about there, that it filters the way you see things. So you're in that fight or flight. So when something happens, you you inter you interpret it a certain way and you're angry about that. Whereas if you're regulated, you see it for what it is, it's just a comment, it doesn't make a big deal. But if you're in the other space, it it it sparks a reaction from you. And a lot of coaches, that is the case. It's actually a a coaching commonality where this happens a lot, where coaches rear up uh around things which don't seem for sure.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

A dysregulated head coach will create a dysregulated coaching team and a dysregulated set of players. You know, a regulated coach will create a regulated set of staff and a regulated set of players, it filters down. And what's important to say here, Ben, is that a coach can still lose his fucking top. He can still blow his top, but and and if you watch some clips of Rassi Erasmus, he fucking does this to a T, right? He can blow off his top, right, and accuse the players of not uh showing up. But if you look at his body language, he's grounded, he's not throwing a tantrum, he's he's facing them, he's making direct eye contact, he's using gestures to make sure it's it's it's landed, and he's he's he's not dysregulated, he's breathing, he's totally present with his rage and disappointment, and that is received by the team as fucking hell, this guy cares about us versus a coach who throws a tantrum, and the team think, oh fucking hell, not this again. Andy Farrell is is it is in my opinion, a regulated coach, is the same. If you watch him throw a bullet, it's received, it's regulated. Matty Pete, one of my clients, the head coach at Wigan Rugby, he's the same. On the flip side, let's say, for example, Matty Pete, the coach who I work with at Wigan, we've been in a coaching relationship now for three or four years. I've seen him cry in front of a team, but he doesn't collapse. He cries like a man. He's vertical, he's embodied. He's embodied in that in that vulnerability, and that breeds trust and emotional safety in others. Wow, mate. That is, when you throw a bullet, you've got to throw it right, right? Yeah, I mate. I did a lot of work myself with a he's dead now, bless him, with a famous therapist in uh the US called Dr. Robert Masters. Therapist for 40 odd years, in his 70s, I got him at at the pinnacle of his career. And his big thing was was in terms of emotions, just learning to be intimate with it all. So I do sessions with him where it my anger came up, and instead of projecting it on someone else or running away from it. Or swallowing it, I'd I'd learned how to be intimate with it. And when you can be, it's it's a physical practice, it's an embodied, it's a somatic physical practice, and when you can learn to be intimate with those so-called tricky emotions, you become safe in your own skin. And then and then you can own it when you get angry in front of a group, you don't spray people with it, it's coming from your heart. So there's loads of somatic exercises that I do with coaches that are not normal in in the coaching world.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

Mate, I think that's absolute gold. Be intimate with your emotions, especially the tricky ones. Like and don't run away from them, right? As a coach, like or shy away from them or hide, because they can be the most powerful things you've got as a coach, and you just talk to a Maddie Pete crying in front of his team, how it's done done authentically, that that can be an absolute galvanizer for a team when they see their leader being prepared to do that and

Regulated Coaches Versus Reactive Coaches

SPEAKER_01 22:59

how much that looks like care and and you could hide away and say, Oh shh man, what a idiot for doing that, I and get down on yourself. But yeah, if you're regulated and it's conscious and you're you're intimate with that what's happened, it is a powerful thing for anyone leading groups of people.

SPEAKER_00 23:19

Mate, these these young men and these young women within the I mean, we're talking about Ruby Army because we knew we were from that background, but they don't learn so well by listening and watching videos. They learn by watching human beings. They learn by watching older men and women and how they show up and how they relate to their thoughts and their feelings and their body and their breath and their emotions. I always say to coaches I'm working with, if you want your team to be a joyful team, you have to model joy. If you want your team to be playful, you have to model being silly and playful. If you want your team to sometimes be stoic and unstoppable, you've got to model that. If you want your team to embrace sadness sometimes, let's say one of the players loses his mum, you want to embrace that and use the energy of that. You've got to model that to your team. If you want your team to stand up and say, guys, I'm scared now, but I'm still gonna fucking smash this. You've got to model that. You and I know loads of teams, right? If you can think about your career, were I I've spoken to a lot of players and time and time again, they've said to me, fuck, I was shit scared of that game, really scared, and I didn't share it. If I'd have shared it just before kickoff and and let it out of my body, I would have fucking played so much better. So being vulnerable involves sharing all of these emotions and all of this vulnerability, otherwise, it just lives inside of our body and affects skill and decision making.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

Mate, that's that's that's a cool thing, man. I actually takes me back to an example I have of when I took took a young group of students, 14-year-olds, to New Zealand to play some uh big teams over there. And before we weren't a big team, and we played some very big teams, and the first game that we played, I actually said to the team, is anybody scared today? And the whole team put up their hand. And I remember thinking, and maybe because I'm a d from a different generation, I was like, Oh, that's what's going on here? Like, I never would have ever said that as a young kid that I'm scared, but it sort of highlighted to me afterwards when I reflected on it, like, this is modern young men, this these were boys, how prepared they were to actually put up their hand and say that. And it's a new generation coming through. And I just I learned a lot from those 14-year-olds. And we asked it every game. We played like four or five games on tour, and what I loved was hands slowly started to come down because they weren't scared, because they were learning they got two legs, we can tackle them and they're good. But that whole process from just being prepared to put up your hand and own it, like young kids, and how much I learned from young young men around that was phenomenal.

SPEAKER_00 25:54

And it yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:55

If I'm learning that from 14-year-olds, I can only imagine what it'd be like getting mentored by people that actually teach this stuff, right? And and and come up with little practices, but I guess it comes back to that conscious, regulated coach statement.

SPEAKER_00 26:09

And set and safety, you know, the coach is safe. We speak about safety an awful lot, don't we? It's like emotional safety and corporate safety and group safety, and ultimately it it's about let's talk about a head coach. Developing emotional safety is about the that head coach practicing and learning to be safe in his own felt experience. So anxiety comes up, it feels safe. Fear comes up, it feels safe. Sadness is coming, it feels safe. Joy comes up, it feels safe to show it. But it takes work, mate. It sometimes can take therapy or coaching or some kind of meditative practice, or but it it takes it takes a lot of work to reclaim your attention and bring it back and bring it back and bring it back so you realize that your body is a place you can hang out in and be present with. You don't have to check out of. And those guys become the best listeners in the world. The best listeners in the world are the guys that don't lose their attention on themselves when they're with another one. They split it 50-50 because they're comfortable in their own skin.

SPEAKER_01 27:20

And and you don't have to associate anything to those feelings in yourself, too, either, right? You just acknowledge that they're there. You don't have to you don't have to sign good or bad to it.

SPEAKER_00 27:29

You just you don't even have to give it a name. I mean, imagine in school if we had a module in nursery school and they said, right, you've got seven emotions and they're all superheroes. You know? Sadness is the doorway to a new beginning and a new version of yourself. Let go of the old. Fear is the doorway to courage and commitment. Anger is the doorway to protecting yourself and looking after each other. You know, shame is the doorway to being accepted. It it life would be different, wouldn't it? You know? Life would be different. Every every emotion has wisdom in it.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

It does actually. It does. But you've you've got to be in tune to actually feel and be one with that emotion, right?

SPEAKER_00 28:18

And you have to feel them all to authentically be able to feel the so-called good ones. You're not gonna experience authentic joy if you've not processed repressed sadness. You might experience on the piss, or if you have an ecstasy pill, but you will not experience authentic joy in your body if you've not processed grief. You can chase it through stimulants and porn and movies, but that subtle right of every human being to really feel the authentic joy to be alive and and and to be in this magical fucking universe. We can only really authentically feel that without an external source when we've processed sadness and grief.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

How do you know when a leader is actually leading from that place, like the fear rather than from how do how do they work that out? Like, how do you get that consciousness to know you're leading from fear rather than a few years?

SPEAKER_00 29:14

Well, I well I well I would just I would watch, I would listen, and I would feel. You know, I would I would use my intelligence that comes from my body, seeing, listening, feeling. I could I could I could see if he's coming from that place by his body language, by his capacity to lean in and be vulnerable, by his capacity to listen without un interrupting people, by his warmth, by his capacity to connect. You know, I I I I could see and I could feel it. Yeah, I I I walk into a room, if I if I go to a new team with World Rugby, let's say they send me to a new organization, I can go into a team meeting and I can just feel what's going on. You know, I went when I went back to Chile, for example, I I was helping Chile at the World Cup, and I'm actually going to be helping them at the next World Cup, I'm I'm doing some consultancy work with them now. I'm going to be there next week. They've got a few games, but I didn't go there for about a year and a half. And when I went back after the last World Cup for the first time, and I sat in a meeting, I could tell it was off. You know, guys weren't sat in a circle, guys were sitting behind a desk because it protected them. The laptop was open, the phone was on, they were distracted, there was a bit of conflict between two guys in the group, and it was a team that was a coaching team that wasn't built on trust and it wasn't built on connection. But I I I can pick I can just pick up on that through the intelligence of what I can see and hear and feel. But you don't need to give them a questionnaire.

SPEAKER_01 30:42

You're one step removed though, aren't you, as opposed to the coach who's in it? Yeah, sometimes that's where you need someone like yourself, right? Because an external pair of eyes, it's not in the in the nuts and bolts of the thing, right?

SPEAKER_00 30:55

That's not in the mess, because you're right, when you're in the mess, you know, I can't even remember I think it's called social contagion. When you're in the mess, you know, if you if the if the three main leaders act in a certain way, the rest of the group will will be contagious to that and everybody ends up in the mess then. So yeah, it's difficult to it's difficult to see when you're actually in it.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

And and that's probably an example where the the head coach needs to be almost like an external, right, to be able to see that bigger picture, not to be caught in the mess because you are the most contagious person in the room, right? And if your head's in the swirl of just the nuts and bolts and what's all happening there, you're missing the other bit, right? Yeah, there's an argument for that for sure. I love it, man.

SPEAKER_00 31:37

Unless unless the head coach is super self-aware, super radically responsible, emotionally safe, and and he's not in flight or fight, and he can detach himself from that.

SPEAKER_01 31:50

That mate. Hey, well, uh off there, you talked a little bit about your tier two experience, mate. Like, and and you are doing a lot of consulting for tier two countries, and you you shared the joy of of being able to go in as a consultant to some less established countries and and work with them. What's the what's been the learning for you around that stuff and and why has it changed you as a person?

SPEAKER_00 32:09

Yeah. I remember when I started working for world rugby about 14 years ago, I'd I'd had I had what I call my midlife crisis after the yoga retreat that I went on, and then I went back to Wales. It was like, fucking hell, what am I doing? And I ended up I ended up I had a guts full, I ended up falling out with rugby for a while until I made peace with myself. So I left Wales, I went living in Thailand, and I was studying yoga intensively with my ex-wife for six months, and we'd we we were going to live there for longer than that, but then I got a call from World Rugby saying, Will I support Namibia in the preparation for the World Cup? And I needed the money. So I did it. And for a few years, for the first few years of working for World Rugby, it was sending me all over the world, and I wasn't really enjoying it, I was just doing it for the money, and it it paid for yoga practice. I became a yoga teacher, it paid for leadership courses. But then I started to like it, especially when they sent me to South America. So I've been going in and out of South America on and off now for about since 2015 when I held Uruguay prepared for the World Cup. And that continent has changed me. I'm so grateful. It's softened me, it's made me more sensual, it's made me more playful, it's it's deepened my capacity to feel. So there's been a lot of those benefits. I love the culture, it's very open culture. And I was I I was very open, you know. You know the English alike. I was a typical English guy, and it's really helped me to grow more range, really. And but coming back to your question, what's been great about working for World Rugby with Two Two Nations is that nobody's pigeonholed me and nobody's said you're this, so you have to do that, and you can only do that. I've had once I've developed respect, and I developed respect quite quickly in those early years, I just went in with a blank canvas. I didn't even give myself a title. And I could just assess what was going on and and and filled where I thought I could bring the biggest bang for my book. Sometimes it was SNC, sometimes it was giving workshops, sometimes it was mentoring certain coaches, other times it was connection and leadership and leadership profiling. It it changed. Sometimes it was combat because that's what was what I loved as a conditioning coach. But over the last uh, I guess, since 2000 and maybe maybe 2019 with Uruguay. Before I went to the World Cup with Uruguay, we did a lot of stuff on team building and connection, and we beat Fiji, which was a famous win, and then I helped Chile to prepare for the World Cup when they miraculously beat the US in that two-leg tournament and qualified, and they've qualified again. I'm I think I've kind of developed this reputation as this leadership guy, connection guy, mental skills. Although I don't like the word mental skills, what I've done with Chile this time round is I've introduced a concept to them called the inner game. So we've we've we've stopped calling it mental skills. So a player has an outer game, which is obviously the robotic

The Inner Game And Real Presence

SPEAKER_00 35:09

side of preparation that you've experienced. You go in, you do your trading, you get your stats, you get your results, you get your skin folds, you do your tactics. I've developed this concept of the inner game, which is what they manage, you know, with everything that's going on inside of themselves, the self-awareness, the radical responsibility, the emotional intelligence, presence, self-regulation, dealing with pressure and how it feels inside of the body. And so we've created a little bit of a model around that, and we're just trialing that at the moment. So, in essence, what I'm trying to say is with the world rugby, I've just experimented and I've loved it, and it's made me a better coach and a better consultant. And I'm just feel more comfortable in the world of leadership now because it encapsulates everything. It encapsulates the physical, the mental, the emotional. It's it's all encompassing, and it and I tend to steer away from the word performance, unless I'm working with teams, sports teams, because for me it's more about presence, especially with the individual coaches that I work with and the individual CEOs and sportsmen that I work with. It's all about presence, mate. You asked me a question, uh, you typed a question out to me before the podcast, and one of them was, what have these guys got in common, these high-profile leaders? And they've got a few things in common. The first thing is that they can't switch off because they've learned very early on in life that to get validated you have to perform. So it's hard to break that cycle. They can't switch off. Some of them can't switch off because of repressed trauma. The second one, which is really ironic in every single man I work with, is they they realize they've been visible at home, but they've not been present. And the wives have told them over and over again, and or or they might have had a letter from the kids saying, Daddy, daddy, I hate it when you're away. Uh please be home more often. Something happens and they realise, oh shit. I've been chasing performance and I've just not been present. I've been in the house, but I've not been home. And that is a reflection of the world today, really. As men, we're being called into presence more than ever before. People don't, you know, people don't need our financial provision and our protection as much as they used to. That they're just dying for our presence. That's where men can bring safety in presence. That's where coaches can bring safety in presence. That's why Andy Farrell could probably stay in that job for 20 years. Matty Pete could probably stay in his job at Wiggins for 20 years because they've got it. Rasi Erasmus, look at him. He could be in there for another three World Cups. People's presence.

SPEAKER_01 37:51

Mate, uh like just that con that's a amazing concept, like a lot of coaches, particularly visible, not present. And you talked about off the field in your home life, you're still chasing performance, and you're chasing performance because this concept that underlines it that to get validation, you must perform that belief, that unconscious thing in you, and all coaches probably have it to a degree, is that your identity revolves a lot around, in in theory, around the results on the field. You win, you're a good coach. If you lose, you're a bad coach. And that is the pressure on a coach, right? But that's also the big work to be done underneath to not let that stuff dictate how you are and how you hold yourself as a human. And you talked about players are watching human beings, and you as the central human being are embodying how how all this manifests in them. They're looking to you as their their guiding light, right? And this is that's so big, it's it's that big.

SPEAKER_00 38:50

That's why every team needs a head coach. It's that big, it's such a huge responsibility. How you are being yeah, man. And and the world the world of sport can change society. It's a platform for social change, but only if the head coaches and the big influences are are are conscious.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

Sport is a platform for social change as long as the head coach particular is a good conduit of that. For sure.

SPEAKER_00 39:20

Is a good conscious is a good conduit of conscious leadership.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

Yeah, man, because coaches and rugby team too, like the the the um as opposed to other sports, you are at a minimum probably inf infecting 23 players as a minimum.

SPEAKER_00 39:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

And you would say half a dozen staff, but in reality it's more like probably 40 to 50 people in one person. So for you as a coach to understand that you have a platform for a deeper, wider social change is a responsibility, a radical ex responsibility, as you have mentioned, but it's also one that you don't want to put pressure on yourself, you want to again just embody these good traits, right?

SPEAKER_00 40:03

Yeah, I I I I think we're moving into I think we're evolving into times though, Ben, where and again let's talk about coaches again, where eventually coaches will have no choice. If you go back 25 years, you know, you could get an edge by doing this course, doing your level four, reading these shitload of books, going to visit tacticians, analysis, da da da da da. There's so much information out there. AI, we we're in the age of AI. For me, coaches are going to be drawn this way. Fuck. I think the only way I can get an edge right now is this way, because I've exhausted everything this way. And I think it's a beautiful evolution that we have no choice over. I think life is is is working for us actually by forcing us inwards to look at ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 40:53

AI gives the information, but coaches need to work on the soul aspect, the the day.

SPEAKER_00 40:59

Whatever you want to call it, heart, soul, emotions, feelings, presence, whatever you want to call it. Felt sense.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

And are you noticing in well, we'll talk men specifically, but are you uh did you feel like in today's modern man, and we'll talk men because it's your speciality, there's a difference in in in what they need in what they and why is there a difference in a in a search for something more in today's modern man and certainly the younger athletes and boys coming through? W wh why is it why is this coming up and and and how do we help this?

SPEAKER_00 41:33

It's coming up because for years and years and years, if not generations, you know, men and some of it's some of it's conditioning, but some of it is actually a need. If you look at all the times in society when there's been a a war outbreak or there's been a famine, you know, by default, a natural intelligence, women had to look out after the kids and do the relational piece, and men had to go and fight, protect, and provide, you know, that and and build. So that worked for a while, but also within that model, men kind of became superior. You could call it patriarchy if you want, you know, and and a lot of us downloaded a model of to lead as a man means you dominate, you come out on top, you always win arguments, you create I win, you lose, you command, you and and and I I I definitely downloaded that growing up in Wigan, you know, on the streets in Wigan on a council estate. Relationships and intimacy, for me, it it I was afraid of it. I repressed it growing up. And then I realize more than ever before, especially with my clients right now, and what they come to me with, guys are okay. Now I'm talking about my clients, Ben, it's a bit, it's a bit biased because my clients tend to be financially successful and don't performance related and incorporate or inhalite sport. But they can do all the drive, goals, achievements, getting things manifestation. What they don't have is the relational fitness or the relational intimate skills. And the world more than ever before is calling for men to provide, to add an add an extra layer to the what they provide, and that is presence, emotional safety, vulnerability, the capacity to be the calm in the storm, not the fixer or the solver. That's where every man that I work with has his greatest challenge, but it's also the window of the greatest fulfillment. Because these men realize they're not being fulfilled by chasing the next million. But when they go home and they've worked on their presence with me, and the dad the kids look them in the eye and say, Daddy, daddy, daddy, I love when you're around. Thanks for playing with me. It brings a tear to their eyes. Or when the wife says to them, Thanks, I can finally feel you. Yeah. Or when they go to the mum and they're not triggered anymore and they realise that they love the mother and they they they they have the capacity to tell them directly, it's a it's a game changer. So the relational piece is what brings the juice to life for me. But nobody told us taught us how to do it. We used to think it was the domain of women, which is ludicrous. We used to think that women did emotions but men didn't do emotions. It's ludicrous. It's not about men and women this, it's about men in in my field becoming more whole, reclaiming what they couldn't show when they were kids because it wasn't safe to show. You know, it it it leadership, healing, call it what

Relational Fitness For Modern Men

SPEAKER_00 44:42

you want. For me, it's it's a reclamation.

SPEAKER_01 44:44

Well mate, you you talk about Rick uh relationship, relationship fitness. And that's so appropriate for coaches because coaching is a relationship occupation. And you you actually said something I I got a quote from you which you you've I've heard you say is you're referring to your strength and conditioning, but fitness is a skill. And you've also quoted fatigue makes cowards of us all. And I kind of think it's the same with the relationship fitness, it's a skill, right? Like that you've got to practice. And yeah, and instead of fatigue making cowards of us all, it's almost the apathy to to have a crack at relationships that makes us cowards as I I would say dysregulation makes cowards of us all.

SPEAKER_00 45:27

Yeah. Because if I've got if I if if I've got a dysregulated nervous system, right, I'm driving home from work, already my body's so dysregulated, my heart rate's up, I'm contracted, I'm already running a narrative that when I open that door, my wife's gonna be nagging at me, my kids are gonna be causing chaos. I've already set the scene. But if I know how to regulate, like for example, for for one of my clients, I created a a 10-minute meditation that he does in his car before he goes home, and it's to down regulate him and get him into a state of presence, and then and then he and then he expands his capacity and he has a mantra at the end saying, Whatever happens when I walk through this door, I can hold it. I have no idea what's going to happen, but I'm regulated, I'm vertical, my breath's relaxed, I can hold it, and I'm gonna respond, not react. It's a game changer, but it takes practice, mate. It's it takes training. What I do is not therapy, it's not it's training. My my clients have training programs. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:31

Well, mate, that you've actually just sparked. I remember we had to sit down and do this, my wife and I, and I I like to think we we we are very good at talking with each other and we've got better as we've gone on 20 years of marriage. But like we had a philosophy called the orange door from from rugby, which was our home had an orange door and we lived in Japan, and this concept that every time I crossed that orange door back into home, I would be back and really present with who I was. I was dad, I was husband, I was all that stuff. And if a few hard rules around that, like my compl wouldn't come out of my bag. So it I would put the bag at the door and it would not leave. And that meaning I couldn't leave the office, rugby office, until I'd done all the analysis and stuff that I needed to do. And once I went in the bag, once I hit that orange door, it didn't come out. And if it did, for whatever reason, I wasn't allowed to open it at home and I had to walk to Starbucks up the road. So it created barriers that actually prevented me from not being present with who I was at home. And sometimes when you put in hard as a coach, particularly when you really put a line in the sand and say, these are my boundaries, this is what I'm gonna do. It and when you put something physical in there like that, I I I found it a game changer because it just I think as as coaches, we understand a rule and we go, right oh, I'm gonna ahead of that. And I've made that rule, so I'm gonna stick to it. And yeah, just putting ones in place, I found game changing.

SPEAKER_00 47:52

Yeah, I love that. I love that. It's not so easy as well. No, especially if you if you're dry driving and you think, oh fucking hell, if I watch two more videos, it's gonna be make me better. Or if we watch three more videos, if I do add some more analysis, we might get a result. It's it's hard, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 48:07

But but the the the joy, I reckon, like what you're talking about here is w when my relationships at at home got better and I worked on them, it actually translated to my relationships back, the profession getting better too. So it wasn't like I was sacrificing something. I was actually by connecting with my wife and actually having really deep, vulnerable conversations on the dinner table because I got more time because I'm not on my laptop where we go for a walk around the block and just chew the fat about life and theories and stuff like that. What I pick up out of that, the amount of times some of those conversations were there are then repeated at rugby to a rugby player because I could offer a little bit of perspective because of the thing we just talked about last night was phenomenal. And it's not a it's not a chore and a sacrifice to go, I've got to do that over there and and begrudgingly sit at the dinner table and chew the fat.

SPEAKER_00 48:56

It's it's it's all part of this relational relationship fitness that you talk about, I really for sure, for sure. A lot of men I mean, by default of being a man, you know, and what we've downloaded, a lot of men fear intimacy, mate. They fear intimacy, intimacy with intimacy with their own body and their own feelings, intimacy with another. And if you f if you've got a lot of fear around intimacy, you'll make excuses, you'll stay at work longer, you'll open your laptop, you'll switch on your phone, you'll blame your office, you'll blame the boss. And a lot of it is fear of intimacy, which is a fucking shame. If you can't be intimate, and but it's also I'm not having to go at these men. It's it's hard. They may have had a tough upbringing, it it's they may have had to dissociate growing up, and but surely that man will do his work in order to feel more intimacy with his wife and kids. Because that for me is is how are you going to judge yourself at death? I mean, we're getting a deep get a bit I'm getting a bit deep, aren't I? But that's good. I'll I'll I'll look at Pep Guadiola and I think when he when he die if he dies when he's 75, will he will he go back and think, oh, I'm I'm I'm happy we won all those trovers at Mancester? I don't think he will. I think he'll assess himself based on how he loved.

SPEAKER_01 50:13

Absolutely right, mate, fire out. Well, I th I think it's it's it's such an important thing to to just put everything in perspective. And like it even in this game that we're talking about, the the rugby, which is a lot of the audience here, is is just remembering it is a game too, right? And and everything that you should play a game with is joy and and embracing the love of it and the camaraderie and the brotherhood of playing a game, all this stuff is often lost in that swirl that you talked about, that dysregulated aspect of life.

SPEAKER_00 50:43

Yeah, yeah. I mean, even f even fun. We spoke earlier about the different emotions and having a relationship with them. And I'm gonna use my client again, Matty P. Like if you watch him, he's very precise when he speaks, but mate, he's silly. There's an archetype within him, the silly one, he's really fucking silly and goofy and playful. And he models that to the players so they feel free. They can do the same thing, you know.

SPEAKER_01 51:10

Actually, um talking about just making yourself free is uh I've I've heard you quote too, one of the biggest things that you recommend for leaders that you mentor is just to make sure you have time and nature, like as a as something which is a massive thing for your own health and like coaches particularly, like half the time you actually are are outside. Your occupation is out on the grass, yeah, for one, right? Like how how important is time and nature for your well-being.

SPEAKER_00 51:37

It's the master regulator. I mean, we've spoken about regulation and signs of dysregulation, the signs of regulation, and when you're regulated, you're in the moment, there's no problems, you're with reality. And uh it's the master regulator. The two master regulators are sleep and nature, even without meditating, even without doing your breathing, even without doing your journaling, whatever it is that you do to come back to balance, if if you have great sleep and you connect with nature without your phone, but the thing is, Ben, I can be in nature and dis be disconnected from it. If if I'm in nature and I'm receiving nature, I have to have an intent to receive. And I receive through my sense organs, I have to be have a connection through my eyes, through my ears, through my body. If if I'm open to receive, I'll I'll regulate my nervous system. But I can be in nature and and be at that be in in someday's match. There's one thing about being in nature, there's another thing about receiving nature. There's one thing about listening to beautiful music, but the thing is receiving it. There's one thing about being present in the gym, but most people are not present in the gym. They're just distracting themselves. So whatever it is you choose to do in life, they'll you'll you'll you'll be more in the moment when you're attentive and receptive to what it is that you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 52:56

I've got a I've got a question because I've got a theory on this because I've seen it, haven't it? And and I and I want from your strength and conditioning background, like about that being really present. And and I'll talk about the gym because I've I've seen a few players that do a lot of gym and they turn up and they and they just they're not like I often think if you're going to the gym that much, you should be crushing it, you should be the strongest person on the planet, but they're not. And I I'm I would suspect this because they're just going and they're just medium in terms of focus and presence. Do you think like and taking your SNC background, you have to be super dialed into the gym? And if you are when you're lifting weights, there's a difference between just lifting the weight, even if it's the same weight, and being really present about this is what it's doing, it's growing me, it's ripping that muscle. If you're really into it, you're dialed in, you're locked in, even if someone's doing the same weight, you're gonna have better physical benefit. Do you think is that something which is in your mind?

SPEAKER_00 53:57

A million percent. It's it's physics. It's physics. Energy goes where energy flow is where attention goes. You get what you focus on. Like this is a crude example, but it helps me to understand. If you've got imagine I go into the gym, right? There's two versions of me, right? They're exactly the same, and I do a six-month programme. This version of me does a six-month programme, and he's not really present in the gym, he just gets through it, right? This person does a six-month programme, exactly the same exercises, but he's aware that his attention is precious, right? And he pr primes himself before he goes in the gym, he makes sure that his awareness is on his body, he walks slowly between exercises, he goes on the bench press, he he feels the connection with the burr on his hands, he feels the muscle, it feels big, it feels big, he evokes from the inside

Sleep And Nature As Regulators

SPEAKER_00 54:51

out bigness and strength and he trains in that way, mate. The guy, this version of me is gonna be bigger, stronger, and more powerful because of intent, of where he places his awareness. It's the same with rehab. Two guys, imagine two versions of me, and I have an ACL, I'm out for seven months. If one version of me, me in every single rehab session has an intention on my muscle, sensing the muscle, imagining the muscle repairing itself, I will have better rehab because attention is our most prized commodities as human beings. Intention and attention is our prized commodities. And it can change someone's life. It can change someone's life. Attention removes tension. Tension removes tension. Check out the work of a guy called Idor Portal who used to train Conor McGregor. Fascinating.

SPEAKER_01 55:52

Well, mate, he he here's one which I went through personally, which I think did me wonders. I had I've got a middle knee, I had a knee replacement of 40. And I I this wonderful woman called Hazel Boot, uh, a friend of mine told me this psychology around the moment you wake up from the anesthetic, you need to be really attent and have intention about what you're going to become from there. So she told me, you need to wake up the moment your eyes open, you need to have alter ego. Who are you? And I want it to be, she told me, make it someone that's invincibly strong. And I came up with this alter ego of um Ben Jackman, like Hugh Jackman from the Wolverine. So when I woke up, I was full of titanium, which I had, and I was as healing as Wolverine, Ben Jackman, I call myself. And honestly, and the psychology was if you're that intent and that's your focus, you're gonna re you're just naturally gonna repeal uh heal better. And I flew through it, mate. In three weeks' time, I was back walking around, jogging around, and it was phenomenal. And I I actually do put it down to the intent I had from the moment I woke.

SPEAKER_00 56:58

Bang, been jacked up. People say the power of the mind, it's not, it's the power of your intention and your attention. Mate, one guy you should get on this podcast is Rhys Thomas, he used to play a prop for Wales, and he he's j he's just had a heart heart

Attention And Intention Change Results

SPEAKER_00 57:11

transplant after waiting 12 years. And mate, talk to him about consciousness and and visualization, it's fascinating. He woke up after the heart transplant, and he and what manifested was exactly what he'd visualized for about a year before he had the heart transplant. Fascinating guy. Fascinating story of inspiration. Fast the most inspirational story of transformation I've ever known in all my podcast guests, Reese Thomas.

SPEAKER_01 57:40

Freaking love that. Well, in light of that, mate, we uh mate, this this is we've just flown by. That's an hour already, buddy. And yeah, we've we've we've just jammed here and there, haven't we? We've just jammed it, mate. And and that that's what I love about you, mate. Yeah, as much as you have the detail and all that, you your ability to jam is a is a real joy, mate, and a pleasure. So, mate, I've got one more question for you. It's the one we finished with, and I'm gonna tweak it slightly for you. Is mate, what's one belief you hold about either leadership or masculinity or performance that you, Craig White, would completely disagree with a younger Craig White. So, what did you once believe about leadership, masculinity, performance that you wouldn't agree with now?

SPEAKER_00 58:21

Yeah, I thought of it this after you sent it through. It's quite simple for me. I used to believe that I I could do it all on my own. Now I believe that is absolute bullshit. And I can't I can't do it on my own. And collaboration and tribe is necessary and I'll have more impact in the world when I collaborate. So leadership is about collaboration, it's not about the solitary pursuit. Although it's that served me for a while, and I needed to go through that to realise that wasn't the way. Yeah. Any examples of that? Well, to be honest, mate, even when I was a successful SNC coach, I was I had my staff and stuff like that, but I was pretty f I was pretty solitary. Like it was my way or the highway, to be honest. I'm just not like that anymore. I've just got I just enjoy connecting with human beings and collaborating. It's the same in business. I'm looking forward to collaborating with Matty Pete at Wigan. I don't know what we'll do together, but we spoke about it a few times now. So yeah, collaboration is I'm still not I'm still not brilliant at it, if I'm being honest, Ben, but it's the next stage for me, collaboration.

SPEAKER_01 59:29

Craig White, what an absolute pleasure to have you on the coaching culture podcast today, mate, all the way from Ecuador, which is a first and a and a wonderful place to be. If I may, mate, I'd like to just sum up my three three takeaways I got from this very cool and very unique and different conversation, which I've absolutely loved, mate. And the first one is is this this concept around regulated coaches versus dysregulated coaches. And I think it's a a massively important thing for all coaches because what you are as a coach filters down. And what you have, the lens you see things, is how you see things. And if you're dysregulated, then everything that happens to you will be dysregulated, or at least appear to be. And you'll take on from your states of conscious leadership the to me victim mentality where everything that's coming at you in life is against you, from refereeing call to incidental things which happen outside of the game, from a parent on the sideline, or something that happens at home, or and it's all connected to that regulation versus dysregulation. I think it's a lovely concept. And further to that is people are watching you and learning by watching human beings, and you've got to model that regulated thing because you're the leader of a team. Number two is this concept you talked about relationship fitness, and what you talked about fitness is a skill, and I well I mentioned that for you, and I believe it is. And to be really visible, and a lot of coaches are visible but not present, and that have and they're chasing performance, and to get validation, they must perform. Well, that's the impression they've got, and that's the pressure of a coach. And what we need to do as a coach is try to separate that out a little bit and be really present in everything we

Collaboration And Final Takeaways

SPEAKER_01 1:01:13

do. Number three is attention and intention, and the energy goes where attention goes. The intent just makes such a difference to everything you do, whether that's a physical act or whether that's a relationship act. Your intention actually supersedes the thing you're doing. And I think it's a lovely one to remember in any context is that attention removes tension. And in the coaching profession, tension is something we do want to remove. So if we're intent and we're have attention, we've got best chance at that. Bingo, mate. Bingo. Craig White, what a pleasure to have you on the Coaching Culture podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:50

It's been a pleasure, mate. Um we we went deep, we didn't with us why I said yes to the podcast, and you're doing great work, mate, and it's good to reconnect again.