8 Nov, 2022

Pete Cohen  00:01

Happy, beautiful, amazing day. It's Pete Cohen it is the Future Self Podcast. Today's podcast is called, Is My Personality Fixed? I'll see you after the theme. Cheers

Pete Cohen  00:39

Good morning to you Happy beautiful, amazing days. Pete Cohen here is the Future Self Podcast. Thank you so much. We we are having some great things going on in the world right now. We've had a record amount of people who are listening to the podcast has been going for six years. And just before we recorded, I was just discussing how we started having conversations with people in January 2021 And we started having conversations about your future, right so you know when people come together there are many things people can talk about. They can talk about what they did, they can talk about what they're doing, but also we can talk about what we're going to do, right. What are the most inspirational conversations? Well, I suppose it could be any one of those things right? You hear someone's story, someone tell you about what's happened to them, things that I've been through. That is incredibly inspiring for so many people. If I told you my story, I'm sure you'd be inspired. If I sat and listened to you, I'm sure there'd be parts of your story that I resonate with how you overcome some sort of challenges, and you are who you are because of what you went through. We could talk about what we're doing now. And I'm sure many of you are doing great things right now listening to this podcast, you. You might be traveling to work, you might be working on something you might be asleep. I mean, I don't know what you're doing. But you could be doing some great things or you could be exercising, you could be meditating. You could be keeping a gratitude journal, you could be doing so many things that are investments into your future because ultimately, what I've observed and this is a bold statement to make I think a lot of people today are living futures that they don't want with one of the groups I work with a hospital here in the UK, Southampton hospital working with the executive team. I talked to the Chief Medical Officer I'm really interested in health, right? For me, it's, it's the foremost of everything right without health without energy life is very difficult. It's challenging. So I said to him when we were walking the wards and having a conversation, I said, How many people do you think in this hospital are here because of lifestyle choices that they've made? And this probably won't come as a surprise to you or maybe it will. He said, about 75% of people? Now in my mind, I was thinking I think it's more but I don't know, I don't have the evidence. It's just that what a lot of people are doing today is doing what they know. They're doing, what they've practiced, and who they think they are. Is who they're going to be in the future. It's absolutely fascinating. Our relationship to the future. So what about you? Do you think you're living a future that you want? Do you think you're living a future that one day, you'll get there? And you're thinking, Oh, well, I've got regrets. I wish I'd said this I wish I'd done that. And I think it's such an interesting area. But when we started having these conversations with people about the future, how to create your fantastic future, how to be better. It was really interesting because people really struggled to talk about that. People really struggle to tell you what the future look like for them. Now, is it the be all and end all to do this? I don't know. But I think it's quite important. And I think more than ever, there is an appetite for people. They want to get better. They're sick and tired of starting things and not finishing them. They're sick and tired of making excuses and procrastinating and ruminating and getting distracted. So everything that we do with this podcast is really just about helping people have the opposite of distraction. What's the opposite of distraction? It's traction. That's what it is. They come from the same word distraction traction Tahira, which is means you're being pulled towards something. What are you being pulled towards? Because what we've observed is that people are being pushed, people are pushed to move to things and I think a lot of people do need to push pushing. Do you not think we were most people were pushed into the world, and most people will push to tidy their rooms or push to go to school or push to exercise that little bit more. Most people need a bit of pushing. Most people need a bit of coaching. Most people need a trusted person or people that will guide them to move forwards in life because without that, life is very difficult. Right. Many of us have started things

Pete Cohen  05:00

and not not followed through. How many of us had had literally had great intentions but our great intentions went out the window. So for us everything we do is about getting your mind right so your mind is mind mi nd my intentions now delivered. Let's help every single person that we can get their mind set right because when we look at the growth mindset, and again, this is really an honest conversation I'm having with you guys and hopefully you're up for this. You've all heard of a growth mindset, right versus the fixed mindset. But I think a lot of people are a little bit not delusional, as far as strong, misguided. Or they're ignorant. They don't understand that everything that we do as human beings is governed by our view of the future. Did you know that right? Everything we do right now you're listening to this because there's something you want to get out of it. Otherwise you can't do something else. And as soon as you feel there's nothing here for you, you'll go and find something else. And it's not that people lose sight of what's important. I think we all know deep down what's important, don't you? We all know that. Being a good conscious human being, being kind being considerate, looking after ourselves looking after others. We know that that's what being a human being is and we are what are known as Homo sapiens, but Homo sapiens. You know what I hope homosapien means it means a wise man. But human beings we're not really that wise are we? I mean, really, how why is a wait. There's a book called Homo prosperous, which was written by some of the most incredible forefathers of psychology. People like Martin Seligman, Roy Baumeister, whether you've heard of these people or not, I mean, these guys are geniuses. They are the godfathers of the field of positive psychology. And what they said is homo prosperous is that we're not that wise but we can be we can aspire to be healthy and that's all well or more productive or more successful, whatever it is that we're looking for, but we really need to wake up to, I believe, our personality. So what is personality? Can you change it? Well, this is what I think a personality is. It's basically it's your consistent, it's who you are consistently. It's your attitude. It's your behaviors. It's basically what you say yes. Right. That's what I that's what I wouldn't say my personality is what I'm agreeing to. It's what it's what I'm saying about myself, and that's on the surface. There's something beyond beyond behind personality. That's how I look at this and if you want to create a fantastic future, if you want to be better, it's so important just to stop put a big smile on your face, and realize that there is a different way. Because when you look at your personality, just take a moment for me take a moment and do me a favor, right? Look back in your life five years ago, and just see how different you are. Just take a moment. How different are you to who you were five years ago? Some people think that I don't know I haven't thought about no think about it. Think about it, go and get a picture of who you were five years ago, look at that picture and think, How am I different? You know, when I look back and listen to the podcasts that we did over six years ago now. I think, Wow, I'm not the same person. Guess what I am now. I'm better. I'm better physically, mentally, psychologically, emotionally. I am not who I was. But the difference between me and a lot of people is I consciously chose to do that. Look, when we look at who we are five years ago, it's estimated that humans have around 40,000 thoughts a day. It's it's it's kind of pointed out that perhaps 95% of those thoughts are just old thoughts. I remember listening to Dr. Joe Dispenza. Talking about by the time we're 35, that 95% of who we are. It's just a set of conditioned responses, beliefs, attitudes, behaviors. But when you look back and see who you were surely you see you're not who you were. And Daniel Gilbert, who's a Harvard professor, he talks about how easy is for us to recognize how far we've come and Even if you've forgotten if you actually took a moment, and you say, Look what you've done in the last five years, you might not have done everything you want to do. I mean, how many meals have you cooked I mean, how many walks Have you been on? How many conversations have you had, how many difficult things have you been through but if you took a moment here, so I am fundamentally different to the person I was just honestly just take them up to think about that. But what's even more

Pete Cohen  09:46

interesting is when we you probably underestimated it right. But even when people underestimate and then they realize wow, look what I've done. And then they talk about the future. They don't see their future self as a different person. They don't see that isn't that fascinating? And this is what seems to happen. And once we can get people's head around this and educate them and inspire them and create platforms for people to have a different perspective of things. Maybe people will start to realize I am fundamentally different to who I was. How did I do that? When I did that by being a bit of an animal. Like lots of other animals, animals just react to stimuli. yet but you and I have this incredible ability to do what psychologists called is called perception. We have to get ability to see multiple different futures. Right, that's what we have right now. You could be thinking about what you're doing today, thinking about multiple different things, but which one of the one is that you're going to choose? That's the thing I really find interesting. And when I was studying psychology, one of the things I found most interesting was something called longer term longitudinal research, which is where people were followed for long periods of time, 3040 5060 years and you could see that from this research that people had become different people, different values, different thoughts, they produce different results, different phases, different chapters, but the question I want to ask you is how do you feel about where you are right now, right now? If you look at your personality, and you believe that it's defined by basically what you're saying yes to and you look what you're saying to yes now, may be saying yes to reacting in certain ways saying yes to making certain decisions, saying yes to things you said yes. To even when you don't even want to say yes to you see, that, to me is what personality is but identity is behind that. And this is one of the things I would love you just to take a moment to consider identity what's the difference between identity and personality? Well, identity really is how you define yourself. If someone said what type of a person are you, what do you say? It's a it's a such a it's like when people say what do you do for a living? And people say while I'm an accountant or whatever people say, don't really define what you do. It's just a label, right? What are the labels we're giving ourselves? drives our personalities that's on the surface, our identity is that the core Do you not think that we have a choice that you and I have the choice of how we see ourselves and let's be let's be honest, right? Honesty is just my dad always just to say honesty is the is the best policy that the people that started Alcoholics Anonymous one of them said, Hey, come on. Let's start off with the truth. Let's start off with the truth. And what is the truth? Well, I don't know because it's your truth. But how do you feel about where you are? Have you still got something lived in the basement? Are there any changes you'd like to make in your life? areas of your life that you'd like to be better? Because I think I believe deep down we all want to get better. But we've been sold this illusion that hey, you don't have to do much to get better. Amazon will deliver it to you. And I love Amazon. Don't get me wrong. But Amazon aren't going to make me healthy. Amazon aren't going to get me up at four o'clock in the morning. Amazon aren't going to make me have a cold shower Amazon aren't going to make me do the things which will give me the future that I want what is the future that you want? What is the future that you want to see what makes a conscious human being is basically saying we want to create and we use our future to drive our current behavior. And this is so important if you just took a moment to think about this. If this was the only thing that you hear from the Future Self Podcast today it's this. Everything we do as human beings is governed by our view of the future. Everything we do is goal orientated everything. We are what the Greeks called teleological. You're listening to this podcast for a reason. The reason might be well, you've got nothing else to do. But there's something here for you. But what most people do is they lose sight. of things that are important. And they get hooked on short term goals, something which gives them something much quicker. We all know that. We all know it but when will be the time that you decide. Who do you actually want to be. We asked this question a lot on the Future Self Podcast what will be your greatest ever achievement when it might could it be who you become is that possible? And as we develop and we take our podcasts to the next level, and we interview more people, talk about the view of the future,

Pete Cohen  14:35

where they're going and how we can help each other. Isn't that the greatest thing when someone says this is what I'm doing? When someone gets behind someone who's got a cause? You know, one of those greatest stories that people can think about is someone like Martin Luther King who basically found himself in a situation he had to reinvent himself. He had to become a different person. He went through a lot because he could see a future that he wanted to go out and create and people followed him. People need people to follow but you know what, you need someone to follow. And I think that person is a you continue to listen to this podcast. Everything we're going to do is going to be giving you inspiration giving you ideas, tools, techniques, other people's perspectives, but do not think that now is the time that there's never been a more important time for you to realize that you don't have to be who you are right now. That the greatest thing you'll ever do is how you reinvent yourself. Your identity comes from your view of the future. And if you don't see a future self that inspires you move and guess what you're just keep recreating who you are right now. And that is what identity really means. It means your repeated beingness it's fascinating to me, I've seen this for years and it fascinates me years ago when people describe themselves in certain ways. And I'd say is that really who you are? Is that not just how you've moved through the world and how you've dealt with things that have happened? Could you be more than that? Could you be a fundamentally a different person? Well, I'd say yes, what about you, but it has to be a choice. And that's what separates us from all other animals, right? The animals live they respond to stimuli and human beings we can and we do respond to stimuli and systems. But very few people are driven by a future self that they want to go out and bring into this world. Great companies do it when Steve Jobs went back to Apple after 11 years, you know, he was a changed. He was a different person, according to the people that knew him and he had to make a few fundamental changes. One of those changes was to get rid of 3000 people one of the changes was we're selling a whole lot of things that simplify the battlefield. Let's focus on where Apple will be in the future. And he focused on that future and people saw the future and the people Apple got people got behind him. And Apple has become well, a pretty big business. could think of other people that have done very similar things in life. They've decided on a future that they want to create. So as we start to wrap up this podcast, is your personality fixed, yes or no? Well, guess what? Whether you believe it is or whether you believe it isn't? I would say you're right. Ultimately, if you want to stay where you are, that's fine. It's none of my business. But if you want to grow, I think it's time to face one of the biggest truths of life. What is life? Well, if you look at the dictionary definition is the space between being born and dying. And life is what happens in between that space. And we do with that space. That's where the magic is right? And how much magic have you done in your life? See the magic. I would say is not just being alive and breathing. It's knowing that you can be better and every living cell lives for one reason to be better to express itself fully. It might not you know, because there's something called nature that happens. And sometimes it doesn't seem fair, it doesn't seem right. The Acorn all of the acorns, which one of those is going to be an oak tree perhaps it was one that someone kicked away from the tree and it was kicked down the road and then someone stepped on it and it pushed it into the ground. And you know what, it just sprouted up over time. And look what happened became something with such strong foundations. And that oak tree is there today. Most of us have been around and been through difficulties and challenges in our life but ultimately for us and everything we do is driven by your future and inspiring you to go out and make a better future. So today, maybe take a few moments and think about in your life what must be done. What must be done. Maybe it's things that we've got to pay the bills and we've got to feed the kids and all the things that must be done well what else must be done? What do you think that if it became a necessity everything would change he learned to put yourself first if you learn how to ship to your future in such a way where you think you know I want to be that person.

Pete Cohen  19:36

And we we've been doing this now for a few years where we've really helped people identify who they want to be. See the true magic of life, I believe is what you can create. And the word abracadabra We've mentioned this before. It comes from Hebrew, which means I create as I speak. So be able to say hey, this is me. This is who I'm creating. This is who I'm becoming. I mean if you told people that well have a go tell people who are you committed to becoming. I'm committed to building a better world for people who want to get them set right. My intention is now delivered. I'm committed to helping people get better. I'm committed to help people have hope to see something beyond where they are. But in order to do that most of us are just going to have to be different. Not like everybody else to create a new normal step away. Now's the time for something completely different, which is the reinvention of you. I'm not saying any of this is going to be easy. But that to me is the ultimate growth mindset. You choose who you become. You choose to be the difference that makes a difference. You choose to understand that all your personality is it's your behavior. What you say yes to you want to change your personality, change your identity decide to become a different human being and see that person as a different person. That is someone who's different but someone who you'd like to be. And as you build that relationship with that person, that's where the magic is, ladies and gentlemen. That's where the music is. That will be the greatest thing you'll ever achieve. And all of those things that are stuck inside your head. Let's help you get unstuck. Let's help you to stop procrastinating let's help you to stop putting your life on hold. And let's help you be the leader that you were put on this earth to be with life. It doesn't happen. By chance it happens by design. Now is the time to get better. Thank you for listening to the podcast and we'll see you next time.