Next Level University
Confidence, mindset, relationships, limiting beliefs, family, goals, consistency, self-worth, and success are at the core of hosts Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros' heart-driven, no-nonsense approach to holistic self-improvement. This transformative, 7 day per week podcast is focused on helping dream chasers who have been struggling to achieve their goals and are seeking community, consistency and answers. If you've ever asked yourself "How do I get to the next level in my life", we're here for you!
Our goal at NLU is to help you uncover the habits to build unshakable confidence, cultivate a powerful mindset, nurture meaningful relationships, overcome limiting beliefs, create an amazing family life, set and achieve transformative goals, embrace consistency, recognize your self-worth, and ultimately create the fulfillment and success you desire. Let's level up your health, wealth and love!
Next Level University
#1602 - 1 New Awareness Can Change EVERYTHING
The essence of personal growth often lies in the moments we allow ourselves to be self-aware, demonstrate courage and vulnerability, and consciously embrace knowledge with curiosity for self-improvement. These concepts, when practiced, can transform our relationships and lead to emotional maturity that profoundly shapes the quality of our lives. In today’s episode, Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros delve deep into these topics, offering a heartfelt session that extends beyond mere discussions and touches the core of personal transformation. This thought-provoking notion is essential for anyone seeking to navigate the complexities of life and emerge with a greater sense of wisdom and emotional maturity.
Links mentioned:
Next Level Nation - https://www.facebook.com/groups/459320958216700
Next Level Live - Saturday, March 23rd, 2024 (10:00 am to 4:30 pm) https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/next-level-live/
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NLU is far more than just a podcast, and we have so many more resources to help you achieve your goals and dreams.
For more information, please check out our website at the link below. 👇
Website 💻 http://www.nextleveluniverse.com
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Any of these communities or resources are FREE to join and consume
Next Level Nation - https://www.facebook.com/groups/459320958216700
Next Level 5 To Thrive (free course) - https://bit.ly/3xffver
Next Level U Book Club - https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/next-level-book-club/
Next Level Monthly Meetup: https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/monthly-meetups/
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We love connecting with you guys! Reach out on Instagram, Facebook, or via email.
Instagram 📷
Kevin: https://www.instagram.com/neverquitkid/
Alan: https://www.instagram.com/alazaros88/
Facebook ✍
Alan: https://www.facebook.com/alan.lazaros
Kevin: https://www.facebook.com/kevin.palmieri.90/
Email 💬
Kevin@nextleveluniverse.com
Alan@nextleveluniverse.com
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Show notes:
(2:24) Not knowing to knowing is the best
(3:45) The power of understanding the concepts
(6:47) Can you intentionally improve and practice?
(8:58) It will change your world
(10:50) Awareness is an opportunity
(12:42) The intricate dance of learning and unlearning
(14:08) Meet like-minded people and jumpstart your journey to achieving your dreams while optimizing your life. Join Next Level Group Coaching.
(16:38) The concept of emotional maturity age
(19:45) You just haven't learned yet
(21:21) Personal growth is the answer
(24:55) Outro
Next level nation. Welcome back to another episode of Next Level University where we help you level up your life, your love, your health. Andrew Will, we hope you enjoyed yesterday's episode, episode number 1601, who convinced you. Asking for help is bad, heavy episode, but again, sometimes the episodes that are closest to the heart also are the ones that are the heaviest. Today, for episode number 1602, one new awareness can change everything we had, so we're recording this. On Friday, yesterday, thursday night, we had our 26th monthly meetup and it was three words you need to know to have a next level relationship.
Alan:Mm-hmm wrong one.
Kevin:Thank you so much. And one of the words, spoiler alert. Let's guess there isn't a spoiler alert, because if you weren't there you can't know because it's not recorded or anything. One of the words was vulnerability, and there was a lot of conversation going on in the chat about how, for some people, one of the questions was I think it was on a scale of one to 10, how vulnerable are you or have you been with your partner? And some of the people in there put two, but going up Vulnerability is something that's very new to me.
Kevin:Oh, interesting, okay, and Alan and I were talking. He said what did you learn from the event? And I said I don't know if this is gonna make any sense at all. Could we do an episode on it? Maybe, I don't know. Going from not knowing something at all to never practicing it, to having almost no familiarity with it, to understanding that it exists and how it's affecting you, is more valuable than understanding something at a level nine and then understanding it at a level 10. That's my thesis. My thesis is being brought to complete awareness of something for the first time is more valuable than revealing more light on it, and that's kind of my thought and that's why it's appropriately named. One new awareness can change everything, because you can't get great at vulnerability until you realize vulnerability exists. You can't experience something until you know it's possible to experience. I guess, in a way, go ahead, sir.
Alan:It's interesting because you can be good at vulnerability without knowing that vulnerability exists, but you can't proactively and intentionally get better at it until you know.
Alan:It's a thing. I was talking to Kevin. He asked me what I thought the title of this episode should be, and it was something along the lines of one concept that can change your life, or one concept can change your life. No, it wasn't concept, it was distinction, distinction. And then I said concept. After that, I think. But that's one thing I've been thinking a lot about lately, because I'll give you an example there's a concept called the flywheel. It's essentially the compound effect, and I'm not gonna, that's not what this episode's about, but if you've ever heard me talk about the compound, that's a book, but it's also a principle.
Kevin:It's a concept. I've never heard you. What is that? What is that though?
Alan:So it's when you small, seemingly insignificant choices, yeah, okay. So long-term listeners, you'll know the joke of that, because I basically talk about the compound effect. I'll always find a way to talk about it.
Alan:Yes, yeah, nobody has sold more copies of the compound effect than Alan Lazarus, the author included and the book is behind me, by the way, just in case anyone wanted to know that. But it's a concept and what I think is really important about this episode in particular, it's not about vulnerability, it's not about the compound effect, it's not about the flywheel, it's about concepts. It's about how can you intentionally improve something if you don't understand the concept. And you and I used to have a podcast called the Hyper Conscious Podcast. Change the way you think, change the way you act, change the way you live. In a nutshell, what we did in that podcast is talk about concepts constantly. Change the way you think. What does that even mean? It means change the way you think about the world, change the way you think about yourself, change the way you think about other people, change the way you think about you know.
Alan:Communication, vulnerability, humility. I mean even at the event last night. The first word is humility. The second one is courage. The third one is vulnerability and on the last episode, if you heard yesterday's episode, I would say I tried to demonstrate. I tried to demonstrate all three of those and it got a little intense, but courage I've talked about being my challenge. We opened the event with the humility. This is so ironic. The first words humility, and Kevin and I opened the event saying I'm not even sure we know what it means. Yeah, and then we asked go ahead.
Kevin:It's hard to define, it's a hard word to define beyond the definition. That doesn't really explain To have humbleness, thank you. What does humble mean? To practice humility. Ok, we're out of kind of a crossroads here, aren't we OK?
Alan:We looked up several definitions and we had the listeners type in the chat their definition and we talked about what does it feel like when someone's humble? It's an energy, you know. That kind of thing we contemplated for a while. But on this episode, can you intentionally improve your humility if you don't really know what it is? Can you intentionally improve your courage if you don't even really know what it is, what it looks like when you need it, when you don't need it? Can you intentionally practice vulnerability if you don't know what it is? I didn't know what vulnerability was until you brought that to my awareness. Back in the hyperconscious days you and Taryn had listened to a or watched a documentary on Netflix with Brené.
Kevin:Brown.
Alan:And she's the one who's most attributed with bringing the word vulnerability to the world, and she has an audio program called the power of vulnerability. That's six hours of just magic. So good. I've frequented, I've listened to that probably a dozen times at this stage. So good. So if you haven't, I highly recommend it. And it's free. I think it's free. I think it's on one of those Audible has great choice or something that is free.
Alan:I could be wrong. I think I might have paid for it, but I think it's free now. Correct me if I'm wrong on that, but here's my point. I didn't know what vulnerability was until my late 20s, but in hindsight I don't necessarily think I wasn't a vulnerable man and I've been contemplating that a lot lately. But what I do know for sure is that you cannot intentionally, proactively, consciously practice getting better at something until you understand what it is. And we had a mentor one time that Kev had trouble with because it was all deeper understanding and no tactics and strategies. And Kevin's like I'm broke, how do I make more money? And he's like don't worry about that.
Alan:Yeah, don't even worry about it, don't even worry about it, and what he was trying to say to Kev is what matters is you know, what is money?
Alan:What's your relationship with money? Why does money matter? And, again, we can philosophize all day, and Kevin and I luckily have each other, because he's more tactical, more strategic, more. What do I do, though? And I'm much more philosophical, deeper understanding, and obviously we're both both, but at the end of the day, you do need both, and Concepts will change your world, and if there's a concept that you don't understand, you're not gonna practice it, you're not gonna get better and you're not gonna have the life of your dream, because when I say I have an 18 year old client and I'm teaching this 18 year old things that I wish I knew, what I'm really saying is I'm giving you concepts, mental frameworks, understandings that I never had. Why there was no one around to teach me, even though I was curious, and if I had known what he knows now, I could have made different choices, and if I made different choices, my life would have been more, bigger, better and brighter, and that's the facts. If you make better choices, your life will probabilistically, statistically, get better.
Kevin:Awareness is everything I remember for most of my, let's say, late teens. Through my mid twenties, I used to say I didn't care. I remember saying this I don't care if my dad is dead, I don't care if he's alive, I don't care, I don't care. I used to hear often through the grapevine that he was dead. That would happen pretty often, like oh, he had cancer and he passed away. It's like all right, I don't care whatever. When I found a message from my dad when I was 20, when I found a message from my dad when I was 27 and my Facebook, facebook Messenger, there was a special folder for people who messaged you that weren't friends with you. I think it's still set up that way today.
Alan:I didn't know that.
Kevin:I had no idea that was a thing. I didn't know that was a thing. I mean this was in 2017 or 2018. This was a minute ago. Facebook's changed a lot over the last six, seven years. The hardest thing for me was the awareness that I knew he was alive and that I might actually have to face all the things I said about somebody that I never thought I'd have the opportunity to see or desire to see. That was the hardest thing for me the realization of oh my goodness, all that stuff I said, thinking that I was never gonna see him, I might have to face, if I actually do wanna see him. And I ended up seeing him and it went surprisingly well. But the awareness is usually the heaviest thing. What is what can I help you with?
Alan:Nothing, your stories are funny. I got some cool stories. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that story.
Kevin:Did he give me a bushel of weed to take home? Yes, he did the first time I the first time.
Alan:That's why I was smiling. I cannot.
Kevin:The first time meeting my father at 27 years of age. I go down to his house. Oh no, this is the second time, sorry. First time we met for lunch. Second time I go down to his house and he shows me around his house and I was ripping his four-wheeler through the woods just left for like an hour. I'm gonna take this for a ride. I love four-wheelers. Now I'm getting ready to leave and he says you smoke weed. And I was like yeah, love it, huge fan. He said oh, let me get you some. I said oh, and he gave me a bushel of weed to take home, a literal bushel, it was a bushel of weed. So I've never in my life received a Christmas present from my father, to my understanding, but I did get a bushel of weed from him as a young man.
Alan:And that is a fact. What?
Kevin:an interesting life man. That is a fact. But the awareness was the hardest piece. When you go from not believing something to now, you got me giggling. When you go from not believing something or not being aware of something to knowing it's a possibility, that's heavy, that is super heavy, and not knowing about vulnerability keep it lock it up. Not knowing about vulnerability and then realizing, oh my goodness, everything would be different if I could practice this one thing. I think that is the most valuable thing in the world. I'm pivoting.
Kevin:I used to think unlearning was more important than learning. Now I'm in a phase of I don't know. I think unlearning is pretty important, but I also think learning and awareness might be more important, and I'm sure, five years from today, I'll say they're of equal importance depending on the person. But I still believe awareness is everything. Awareness is an opportunity.
Kevin:You and I used to say this all the time. Well, we didn't say this all the time. This was your thing. You used to say knowledge is power. I said no, no, no, knowledge is not power, knowledge is potential. Knowledge is potential. I think awareness is very similar. When you get a new awareness, you have this door to potential that opens that sometimes you don't know what to do and it can be very, very, very heavy. Or it can be very, very, very empowering. If you've never been able to practice vulnerability, just to stick with the story that we started here with and all your relationships have ended in similar fashion and you get the awareness of, oh my goodness, that's what vulnerability looks like. If I just had that in my past four relationships, I would have been way more successful. That's just a heavy. It's a heavy thing to learn, but it's also one of the most valuable things you can learn in the moment.
Alan:Yep, that's the duality, that's the monologue, that's the duality. I think that was powerful, powerful monologue.
Alan:I appreciate that very much. Isn't that the game of the life? You learn something new and now you have a new opportunity, but you now realize that you made some mistakes and or bad choices, or ignorant choices, or naive choices. I often you've heard me do this a dozen times Kev will be on stage or will be on the virtual stage and meet up or whatever, and I'll say everyone think of something really dumb they did in high school, really unintelligent, I think is what I said, and everyone's like yep, got it Not hard to think of that. A bunch of them yeah, there's several, right? And why is that? Why is it so easy to think of something unintelligent you did in high school? Because when you're in high school, you don't know anything. Right, all high schoolers are ignorant. They don't know it, but they're ignorant. And this podcast personal growth, vulnerability, humility, courage, everything we're teaching, everything we're talking about, everything we're philosophizing about, everything we're contemplating, every concept is. I just think it's the constant, persistent, never ending pursuit of knowledge, skills, awareness that empower you to have a bigger, better, brighter future, but force you to face the truth of your past.
Alan:I didn't know what emotional maturity was. This is a perfect example. Emilia and I did a relationship talks virtual event probably 15 plus people there and it was on emotional maturity and I remember during the event I just said listen, I gotta call myself out here. I'm not trying to teach any of you this right now. I'll try to help these concepts land, but I'm new to all this too. Said I didn't have a ton of emotional maturity. I don't consider myself a super emotionally mature person. It wasn't until my 30s that I feel like I started to really proactively work on that. I didn't even know what it was Like. What does it mean to be emotionally immature? Right, and for our listeners this will be a little side tangent, but it's super valuable.
Alan:I no longer look at people's age, I look at their emotional maturity age and it has changed a mild life, because I know someone who's 45, who their emotional maturity is 14, and I have someone else who's 24, whose emotional maturity is 87. Shout out to Jesse unbelievable. And again 87. In a wise just a wise soul. But Without that concept emotional maturity, without the concept of vulnerability, without the concept of humility and contemplating what that is can you really make good choices about who to spend time with and who not, to, what career to go down. It's like a GPS without an address and a current location and without the terrain, you're going to drive off a bridge on accident into a lake because you don't have the data. And so when I said knowledge is power, what I meant is awareness. Awareness is potential power. But yeah, you do. You have to have the courage to do something with it, and it is. It's nothing short of exhausting.
Kevin:I just imagine the first person who built a boat and they put it on the water and they're like holy shit, it floats. Oh my god, it floats. Imagine that Everything's different now. The whole world just changed. This thing is metal and it floats. I mean the first person to build the boat? I'm guessing it probably wasn't metal, it was most likely wood. But you ever see a cruise ship, son? I don't know how those things float. That does not make any sense. Water displacement I understand what it is. Well, look at it. No, I know.
Alan:It's a city on water and I quote from the Titanic movie of this ship can't sink. It's made of iron, sure, sure, it's made of iron, sir. I assure you it can and it will.
Kevin:One of the best movies ever made. I was singing Celine Dion right before we recorded this.
Alan:Well, it's all for a reason, my friend.
Kevin:Singing it. Well, what's your next level nugget? My next level nugget is imagine the person who built the first boat and said holy shit, it floats. That's it.
Alan:That's my first Aren't you glad you tuned into next level university today how to get to the next level of your boat that floats you boat that floats through the moat. No, what's your real next level nugget?
Kevin:That's it.
Alan:I have a next level nugget that I need to write in my dream lander tomorrow. Yeah, we got and I can't write that.
Kevin:Oh no, no, no, no, no, a real one, a real one.
Kevin:Something good Something valuable, maybe some of the most powerful lessons that will change your life to the highest degree. You just haven't learned yet that there's things that I'm one day I'll learn that will change everything and it will make me reflect and everything will look differently. But you got to go look for that stuff. You got to go look for it because a lot of the, a lot of the stuff you're not going to find by accident Very rarely are you going to find stuff that changes your life in a positive way by accident. I think you got to be out looking for it. Looking for gold that would be my next level nugget.
Alan:Yeah, when you're trying to be better no-transcript, your brain will pick up on all the person's places, things and ideas to be better. Yeah, you know, and I remember after my car accident I had a really dark time and I saw stars that I had never seen before while in the dark. And the top five regrets of the dying is a book that I talk about, but of course, I almost died in a car accident. My father did pass away in a car accident and I'm in. All the regrets of my poor choices, my emotional immaturity, my traumas I haven't dealt with. And I find a book called the top five regrets of the dying. That's not a coincidence, it makes sense. My brain was looking for answers.
Alan:So my next level nugget is look for answers. The only wrong answer is to stop looking. You know, if you're looking to be better and it's from an honest, non-ego place, you're going to find ways to be better. You're going to find events. You're going to find podcasts, you're going to find books, you're going to find concepts that that can help you. And sometimes yeah, sometimes we wait until we're in the dark and the pain is great enough to go looking. But curiosity may have killed the cat, but it made the human being. And I would say my next level nugget is stay super curious about all the concepts that can change your life for the better, because when your life changes for the better, your family's life changes for the better, the community's life changes for the better, and then the world is better and you'll be more fulfilled. And, at the end of the day, what I say all the time on other podcasts is fulfilled people don't hurt people, and so what the world desperately needs more of is fulfilled people, and I think personal growth is the answer I do.
Kevin:I would second that Next level nation. If you are looking for a group of fulfilled human beings doing their thing every day and trying to get a little bit better and get a little bit closer to whatever that thing is, please join our private Facebook group, next Level Nation. I would argue that it's the most positive place on the internet.
Alan:So the Pacific, so the Pacific.
Kevin:No, it's a very positive place where you're going to get positive thoughts, positive conversation and the opportunity for awareness every day, and that's exactly what we want. So please join. Link will be in the show notes, as always.
Alan:I am currently looking up the days out from the event Hold on Next level, live 2024. This will be, I believe, our sixth in-person live event that we've ever done, and we're heading back to the Groton Inn. That's where we started and that's where we're finishing 2024 strong, and by finishing 2024, it's technically the beginning of the year, but whatever.
Kevin:We're starting 2024 strong.
Alan:That, thank you. Thank you for that. We're going to be back in 17 hours and 56 minutes. We are going to be together with other personally growth Wow, this is brutal Other growth-minded individuals from all over the world, both virtual and in-person. Lunch is included. You get a next level dreamliner with your ticket. The tickets are going faster than we expected.
Alan:March 23rd 2024. It's a Saturday. It's from 10 to 5. And again, we've been doing this every single year. We'll be there and there's going to be a live feed, virtually as well. We're doing 30 tickets in-person, 30 tickets virtual, so six teams of 10. There's breakout sessions. It's all of the very best of everything Kevin and I have learned condensed into one day. I promise you this you will leave this day more self-aware, more aware, and you're going to be able to make better choices. Your future will be bigger, better and brighter. For having gone this day, you will not regret it and if, for whatever reason, you absolutely despise it, somehow hate it I do not think that will ever happen, not if you're a listener of this show, but if, for whatever reason, you absolutely hate it, you can email me. I will give you your money back. So I don't think that will happen, but please book your ticket as soon as possible because we are only doing 30 in-person and 30 virtual. The link will be in the show notes.
Kevin:Yes, it will Tomorrow for episode number 1,603,. Why quitting your job is a mistake. I go on many podcasts. I've been going on far less. Alan has been going on more. But one of the things that happens when I tell my story is people are like oh my goodness, it's so awesome that you left your job to go all in on your thing. Let's pump the brakes on that a little bit. We'll just pump the brakes on that a little bit. So that's what we're going to talk about tomorrow for episode number 1,603. As always, we love you, we appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you, and at NLU we have fans, we have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow.
Alan:Stay curious, we'll get to you all later.
