What To Believe
Most of what we believe was never actually chosen — we just find ourselves with it, then defend it to the death. In other words, we don't defend ideas because they're true; we defend them because they're ours. What to Believe is where former journalist turned master coach Neil Bierbaum exposes the bug in the human operating system — a bug that makes it hard for us to face the truth about ourselves, and keeps us believing and chasing things that are not real and don’t matter. He offers a method for looking at oneself and life more objectively, to find signal within the noise, and deal with what’s real and what matters.
Fans of Stoicism will find their next level here in the form of ontological coaching, the field in which Neil spent a four-year apprenticeship, and which he has spent two decades — more than 10,000 hours — practicing and teaching. It’s a method for looking at oneself and life more objectively, to find signal within the noise, and deal with what’s real and what matters.
Neil offers a solid foundation drawn from more than 20 years of coaching, 10 years before that as a journalist, and decades of contemplative practice running through both. (Neil also has an academic master’s degree, out of which he won a research award and published a peer-reviewed paper on executive coaching methods.) His methodology integrates ontological coaching, neuroscience-backed mindfulness, and evidence-based psychology.
Three formats: solo deep dives, listener Q&A, and live coaching conversations.
New episodes Sunday mornings. Come skeptical. Stay curious.
What To Believe
Why More Knowledge Isn't Helping
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You can read everything there is to read about a bicycle and still not be able to ride one.
Episode 3 of What to Believe. In the first two episodes I exposed two of the automatic mechanistic ego reactions that run our lives — the need to be right, and the need to look good. This week I lift the hood and show you the approach itself.
Why seeing is different from thinking. Why all the information in the world won't shift your behaviour unless you can see the mechanism in operation. Why staring at a car that won't start and Googling "Toyota" instead of checking the petrol is most of what therapy does for the things this method is designed to address.
I work through the four words that underpin the whole series — automatic, mechanistic, phenomenon, seeing — and extend the bicycle analogy: awareness is to thinking what balance is to bicycle. With detours through Saul Bellow on intellectual man as an explaining creature, Lao Tzu on knowing oneself, why academics are often hopeless presenters, and Antonio Damasio's case of Elliot on what pure thinking does to decision-making.
Hosted by Neil Bierbaum — former investigative journalist, master coach (ICF MCC), MPhil Leadership Coaching (cum laude), faculty member at Stellenbosch Business School. New episodes Sunday mornings.
Come sceptical. Stay curious.
Chapter markers: 00:00 — Introduction 01:18 — Recap: the need to be right, the need to look good 03:00 — The four key words 03:30 — Automatic 05:17 — Mechanistic 07:51 — Phenomenon 09:08 — Saul Bellow on the explaining creature 11:13 — The bicycle revisited 14:37 — Awareness is to thinking what balance is to bicycle 15:57 — Why academics can be hopeless presenters 17:22 — Lao Tzu and the Eastern sages 20:11 — The practice of seeing 22:44 — Summary: seeing vs thinking 23:24 — Some links to the science 24:01 — What's next
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