24 May, 2022

Pete Cohen  0:00

Happy beautiful. Day. It's Pete Cohen. It's the Future Self podcast. Today's podcast is called The Path to Mastery. I will see you after the theme tune

Pete Cohen  1:10

Welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for being here. We're definitely talking about one of the subjects I'm really really really passionate about. Want to know what it is? And I've already told you it's the path to mastery

Pete Cohen  1:36

I really want to kind of lay out a few things for you guys today in this podcast to really give you a different perspective. We know that people don't change when we tell them what to do we know that we change when our perspective changes. And that's what I love to do. I'd love to give people that. I've never thought of it like that. And that's really what I want to share with you today. Because ultimately, what is life? What's it all about? And of course, if you ask people that question, you could get any manner of different answers right? You can literally people will tell you so many different things. What's right, what's wrong. For me as a coach, I think I believe there only is one way and that way, is your way. And this is how I look at things. This is me, this is just my map of the world that I believe when I was born, a seed was planted, maybe it was even planted before I was born. And that was the unique expression of me. And it was there and it was a part of me that really just wanted to come out and grow and express have fun, learn evolve, just something within me. And I think it's a hidden force. It's a hidden force. That often when we when we're growing up, parents, people around us, you know, you should be seen you shouldn't be heard this. Basically, it's the unique expression of being you. It's this force that is within you and I and I'm genuinely always curious as to whether people think that that actually is true, because ultimately there only is one truth You know, it's the force

Pete Cohen  3:20

and having just watched the eight of the nine films in the while the there's 11 in the in the trilogy, I'm sure there are more trilogy that doesn't make sense. There's going to be more films coming out. But for those of you that don't know what this music is, yes, ultimately, it is Star Wars. The force is strong in you and I I believe that there is this force inside of us this expression, this unique force, that is just it wants to come out. It really, really wants to come out. But I think we grow up in a world where we're kind of discouraged. This couraged and what's the opposite of discouraged? Well, I think it's having the courage to own that to then this is a word you might want to write this down your own leanness, your own leanness. The only Ness the thing that only you and no one else can do. Because there's only one of you and it's very interesting. It's fascinating, where people ignore that force. And I think it's one of the greatest reasons people struggle with sadness, depression, anxiety, because they know that they have not assigned themselves fully to their life's task. And this is something I would love you to think about. What is your life task? What is your vocation in the oil in your life? What do you actually think you're being called to do? Because that is one force but the other force is the weakness the social giving into social pressure to conform to basically fit in to society. And basically at all costs. You must avoid tapping into that seed that seed within you that you know that it was there as a child. And you know, it was just wanted to come out but you know, you had to fit in you fit it into a world how many of you were told as children, don't talk to strangers, money that doesn't grow on trees, and one thing you must never do is copy. And those three things for so many people has massively messed them up, massively messed them up because they still don't want to talk to train strangers. They still believe that money is the root of all they still want to conform, they still want to fit in. They still want to be accepted. And I've been really privy to the whole thing of mastery. Look, I don't know, as a child, the only thing I was really interested in was in mastering was was a sport. You know, this is a story I've never really never really never really told. I had a lot of self doubt as a child and I wanted to be accepted. I wanted to be accepted by my friends. I wanted to be accepted by my teachers. by my parents. I was looking for acceptance. I was looking for the world to tell me I was enough. I was good enough. And I didn't really get too much of that to be honest. So the other thing I look to really get better at was sport. You know, I love sport. I love playing sport. I was very self conscious. I've never ever have been as good as I could have been if I'd known. If I'd known then what I know now it would have been a different story because I now have developed the skills and understanding of what it takes to master anything. I mean, that's what I've been doing for all these years. I'm a Master of Teaching mastery and I am a master of mastering, you know, that's why I'm probably one of the most consistent people you'll ever meet in your entire life even though the odds of me being consistent are extremely unlikely because I was labeled as someone who can't keep his attention and anything labeled dyslexic labored or with attention deficit disorder. I'm very hyperactive. But boy have I learned to channel and I know what the seed that has to grow within me. But that seed needs constant cultivation. And this is the fascinating thing about mastering. We launched the stop one start one challenge and I really want to talk to you about whether you get involved with our challenge or not. I want to talk about the starting of mastery. And when does that when does mastery need to start? Well, every single day, every single day, the master walks the path of mastering and this might seem

Pete Cohen  7:41

like it's mission impossible because most people don't they give into temptation. They get distracted. And as we've mentioned before, on on our podcast, the work of near Iran who talks about being in distractible, he talks about it being the indestructible force that humans have your ability to have the opposite of distraction. Which is wha its traction. And that word coming from the Latin word for hero which means to be pulled and what's pulling you are you being pulled by the force of conformity of giving into social pressure of comparison or are you being pulled by the force within you the hidden force of your own unique expression? And how do you express yourself when it can be your voice, your words can even be a dancing the question is are you ready? Are you ready to dive into the real path of mastery like never before? Because you know what? I said something it's bloody boring for a lot of people. And if you think about it, we live in a world with kind of mastery is founded upon you know if you if all of a sudden let's say you decided to get up tomorrow morning at five o'clock and you spent the first hour of your day meditating, keeping a gratitude journal and then exercising. How long would it be until even in your own head? You're going What the hell am I doing? This is not me. And how many other people would go what are you doing? And if you told people that I'm not doing this, or even if you have people that you normally drink with, if you say you know what, I'll just have a glass of water. How long will it take and people go, what are you doing? That's not the person that I know. And we give back into social pressure and I really want to give you today a few different perspectives of what it really really, really takes. Look, when I grew up. I had a number of heroes, the area that I learned to master I'll just finish the story off really insecure about sport, but when we left about myself, I would literally the dialogue in my head, the narrative and this is why when we talk about the stopping first if you want to change your life, just stop. And let's look at how you are right now. Let's not judge it. Let's not criticize it. Let's just wake up to the fact because the path of mastery always starts off with how do you feel about where you are right now. And just to be curious about you made it you made it you made it to this day in your life and I am so proud of you for getting to this point in your life. You did something truly amazing. The question is, let's get ready to rumble let's get ready to rumble. Let's get ready to mind. Let's get ready. Let's get ready to mind the gap. Right the gap between where you are and where you want to be. You know? Are you ready for that? Is that something you want to do? Because I'm calling you up I'm calling you up right? I'm calling you and asking you if you want to take the path to mastery

Pete Cohen  11:01

it's annoying isn't it? But the phone is ringing and you're being called What are you being called to do? See, I don't know you, but I believe you are being called to something. And if you want to be called to that there's a cultivation to make that seed really come to life. And when I left school, I was friendly with one of the greatest people in the whole school at sport. And we had 100 meter race him and me and a couple of other people and I beat him by such a distance but I just didn't believe in myself. And I wasn't encouraged by the teachers at school. They didn't see the talent in me. But that's okay. It doesn't matter. But I just remember thinking wow look, all those years I didn't believe in myself and I have just raised the fastest kid in the school yet to hit the record. And he was still fit and I just completely ran past him. And I look back like Usain Bolt. I just had a little smile at him. And I thought to myself, Oh my God. I'm really quite fast. And it was fascinating it was this is massive wake up call but the only area that was really interested in mastering was my physical body and fitness after After leaving school. It was something I really got into into acting. I loved acting, but it was when I really decided who I wanted to be. You know, and I am I am the people's coach. That's who I am. Pete Cohen is the people's coach Pete Cohen is the people's performance coach. I'm just obsessed with you and helping you perform better and helping you stick to the path of mastery but it question is whether you want to earn your stripes because the stripes of success come from a lot of diligent patient practice and the past the path to mastery is the first step is definitely you've got to go inwards. You've got to look at yourself. And we know that a lot of people would rather face an electric shock than actually look at themselves and look at the experience of being themselves. The second part second step is you've got to clear away the interference. You've got to recognize what is not serving you. You know who are the people around you the naysayers, the people that just do not fit you. They don't they don't support you. That's why we created Mi365 Elite Pro, which is the elite group of people that I work with, because that's an environment of support. That's an environment of mastery. But you got to do the mastery. And then the third step is to look at that seed within you the seed within you my seed within me is to is definitely to be a source of inspiration to people, you know, and as a child or when I was about 19 I became obsessed with Michael Jordan and many people know that I remember watching him on tape I didn't even know who he was. I wasn't interested in basketball. But basketball was on television in the UK. And my friend who loved Michael Jordan said, watch this. And I watched Jordan and I became obsessed with him and I've read everything I could find. I've got every DVD I've got every shirt that he ever wore every shirt I've got every shirt from being in University of school in North Carolina, sorry, no, but before that North Carolina, the USA Basketball shirt. I've got the wizard shirt, every ball shirt I've got the 20 threes the 40 fives, that must, might mean nothing to you but he was someone that I wanted to just look at what he was doing right now I'm wearing a Jordan show I will only ever work pretty much my own brand of Mi365 or I wear something Jordan. But what's really interesting is the impact that Jordan had on Kobe Bryant. Some of you maybe don't even know who Kobe Bryant is but Kobe who's no longer with us. Unfortunately, he lost his life in a tragic accident. I want you just to listen to what Covey says about mastery. Like I would watch magic play

Kobe Bryant 14:53

and watch Michael play. And I will see them do these unbelievable things and I say no and then get to that level. Oh no, but let's find out

Pete Cohen  15:16

so you know what? level and what are you prepared to pay to just find out how great you can be? You know? And why do I get up every day at four o'clock every day? Pretty much maybe six out of seven days. But that's me. Why? Because I want to master something. I want to just see how good I can be. I want to see how great a speaker I can be. I want to see how great a coach I can be. I want to see how great a partner I can be to my wife. I want to see how healthy I can be. What about you? I'm obsessed with who I am becoming. And there is no and I this is what I believe I believe one of the biggest reasons why people are depressed and worried and anxious is they haven't committed themselves to mastery. They've committed themselves and it's an easy trap to fall in to just being like everybody else to social pressure. You when you learn to play a game that's bigger than you when you learn to play a game which is about you making a difference by by being the difference just as Ghandi said to be the change that you want to see in this world. If that's the road and the path that you want to walk down. Then there's something called work and it's this diligent patient practice you know, there's so many people over the years that I've had the great fortune to work with. And the reason I'm so aware of this is because when I started working in the world of sport and working with some of the greatest athletes in the world, I just observed how they lived their life. And many of them were completely obsessed with just performing every day and they would want the results so much I remember working for two years with six times Nuka World Champion Ronnie O'Sullivan and the conversations around what it what it takes. And I never forget saying to him when he told me actually some of you heard this story before on other podcasts that when he came to see me, he had an appointment for two hours he kept for three days, stayed at my house for three days. And we watched loads of Michael Jordan videos, you know, literally just it was videos, you know, DVDs just come out. We were watching this and he was obsessed and I could just see him relating to someone like Jordan. I can remember him just relating to hard work because he was a hard worker. But he had to pay the price of realizing it wasn't about working hard. It was about working better. And for most people it is both working hard and working better working smarter. getting really good at recognizing what is my unique gift, what is it I want to excel at? Because that's where the magic is right? But it's a challenge for people to do that in your life. Let's hear from another one of my heroes. Talking about mastery

Michael Jordan  17:56

easy to be no Denzel Washington. So keep working. Keep striving never give up fall down seven times get up a EES is a greater threat to progress than hardship. II he uses a greater threat to progress than hardship. So keep moving, keep growing keep learning. So yeah, work.

Pete Cohen  18:27

You see see you at work. You want to come to work with me. You want to come to work with me. I mean, you don't have to. You don't have to do anything. That's the funny thing. Right about life. You don't have to do anything. But you could. Many of you know last year when we launched our 30 Day Program, over 8000 people the greatest piece of work I've ever put together. You know, yesterday I spoke to a woman who just finished it. And you know what, it was fascinating. And I said to her tell me, tell me what you got out of the program and I couldn't believe what she said. She said a brother was really going through a difficult time. Really, really difficult time and she did the program with a brother every single day for 30 days. The same time they got on Zoom they did it together. And she said the impact this has had on him is unbelievable. I was going wow that's amazing. I I was like shocked. And the you know the 2.8% of people that have completed that program. So many people their lives will never ever be the same. Now you could look at that. And you can feel disappointed and feel like you know what? I'm like that. I've started so many things in my life. And you know what? I haven't finished them. But that's okay. That's okay. That's the story of humanity. Man's giving into temptation, Lord, lead us not into temptation. Do not eat fruit from the forbidden tree. Start things and don't finish them. You think you're the only one that's ever done that in your life? See, the path to mastery is definitely to start off where you are and think this is where I am. This is this is great. I've got I've got a place to start. And when we think about starting maybe we should just think about grounding ourselves in where we are. I want to give you another example of another one of my heroes. This is a lady that I started watching when I was probably 19. And I was mesmerized by her and I was mesmerized by her TV show, which she did for 25 years. And she introduced people to me that gave me such a different perspective from Dr. Phil. To the guy who wrote men are from Mars Women are from Venus to so many other people. Wayne Dyer, other listen to what Oprah says.

Oprah  20:50

So but what I realized is through the whole process because I'm grounded in my own self that although I could have more shoes, my feet stayed on the ground although I was wearing better shoes today. So I could keep my feet on the ground even though I could get more shoes, and I could understand I could understand that it really was because I was grounded. I've done the was doing and continue to this day to do the consciousness work. I work at staying awake. And being awakened is just another word for spirituality but spirituality throws people off and they think you mean religion. When I was hiring people for my company for own looking for presidents. When people would come in I'd say tell me what is your spiritual practice? And literally with throat people go well put your eye Well, I'm not religious, or I said I didn't ask you about your religion. I asked you what your spiritual practice

Pete Cohen  21:51

you practice. The practice the path to mastery is some sort of daily practice some sort of daily operation. Right now as I'm recording this podcast. You know, I've been up for two and a half hours. What have I done? Well, for the first hour, you know, I practice I'm in the practice of mastery, I assign myself to learning I love to learn. And I revisit this this morning I was revisiting the work of Robert Greene mastery. I've read that book five times. I just went back and looked at my notes. And then I exercise and the exercise I do is pretty ridiculous because it's called Tobacco where I literally just spend I did it three times but four minutes of 20 seconds. Really, really hard. 10 seconds rest. You know what, I did not feel like doing that. But you know how much better I feel for doing it. Again, it's so important. If you really want to get on that path of mastery. be weary if you come off it because if you come off it and you're not disciplined, and you don't it will never equal the type of freedom that most people are looking for. Which ultimately is to feel that you are in control of your life. You are the master that you have been looking for. In everything that we do when we created stock one stock one, the whole idea of that you know what the whole idea of that was a continual mastery. As a coach, I'm only interested in one thing I'm interested in your success. That's it. That's what I'm interested in. What is the success that you're looking for? And hopefully that can be grounded in some form of growth, some form of contribution to yourself into this is what I'm interested in. So what's it going to take? What's it going to take? What has to happen? And I can tell you in most cases most of the time, some form of mastery, some sort of practice diligent patient practice over an extended period of time. That is where the magic is. That's where the secret sauces. I could give you countless more examples, but I want to talk about you. What is your sense of destiny? What is it that you feel connected to? What is it you feel that you're here to do? This is what you're here to do. Just like Maslow you think about Abraham Maslow for those of you don't know him, you know his book, the forefather of popular psychology, modern psychology, and I love what he says if you plan on being anything less capable than what you are, then you'll be unhappy for the rest of your life. And I do actually believe that I see one of the greatest, I see more and more people who are just drifting and Napoleon Hill wrote about that, you know, 2% And then I thought you know what, I want to make a difference to 2% so great. We went from 2% to point 8%. You know, if the 1000s of books that I've loved the 1000s of the 20 books I've written and the 1000s of book sales, I don't know how many people have bought the book and read it from cover to cover. I don't think very many is Napoleon as Tony Robbins said, you know 10% of people who buy our self help book read past the first chapter. I've done that before of you Isn't that fascinating? Who would you be if you really chose the path to mastery? Who would you be so of those 8000 people in the 2.8% of people that finished? I was like, hang on we can't we have to do something about this. We all want to turn that 2.8 into 30%. That's what I'm up for. That's what gets me up every single day improvement, my own improvement but the improvement of what we do professionally in our business. And that's why we launched the stock one start one that's why we launched it. Why well to get those odds back 30% And really all we're asking people to do as they all we're asking people to do is to identify with their future self identify with who you want to be because What Got You Here Won't Get You There, you know, to help you start building empathy for your future self to help you. Decide the person that you want to follow for you to become your own hero is Matthew magani. He said and I've played this so many times, but for the one person who hasn't listened to this before. This is you who are you pursuing? Who are you chasing? Who are you running down

Matthew McConaughey  26:09

and to my hero. That's who I chase. Now when I was 15 years old, at a very important person, my life come to me and say who's your hero? And I said, I'm not going to think about that. Give me a couple of weeks. I come back two weeks later, this person comes up says who's your hero? I said I thought about it. You know who it is. I said it's me in 10 years. So I turned 2510 years later that same person comes bingo so you're a hero and I was like not even close. No, no. She said why? I said because my heroes me at 35 So he's he every day every week, every month and every year of my life. My heroes always 10 years away, I'm never going to be my hero. I'm not going to pain that I know I'm not and that's just fine with me because that keeps me with somebody to keep on Chase. So any of us whatever those things are, whatever it is we look up to whatever it is we look forward to and whoever it is we're chasing to that I say amen. to that. I say all right, all right. All right.

Pete Cohen  27:05

So who are you chasing? Because if you're not chasing anyone, you're not pursuing anyone. It's very hard to stick to a path of mastery. The I know right now there's a person listening to this she's a very special lady. Her name is Jk. And I met her on clubhouse where I met so many people. She's one of the first people he remember. And I listened to her. She listened to me. She went through my 30 Day Program. She's one of the 2.8% of people. And then she joined our elite coaching program. And she's kind of just been on her own path, you know, because there only is one path right and that's yours. To walk your own path is the most beautiful thing on earth. And it's it's a challenge to do that because most of us want to walk a path that other people have walked, but then it's not ours. Or we want to walk a path that we've walked before. Rather than No, I'm going to take a completely different path. The story of King Arthur King author saying to his knights, I want you to enter the forest, but pick a path that hasn't been walked yet. Walk your own path where you find your own uniqueness, your own leanness only you only you can do, and to stand in your greatness and say, This is me. And she said something yesterday, which I thought was so profound, she goes I'm pursuing who I'm going to be tomorrow. You don't have to pursue who you're going to be next year or five years or 10 years. It's up to you. But just know this, that everything we do is for our future. Everything we do, it's very hard to pick the path of mastery. If you don't see where that path is going. If you don't see that there's some benefit to it. It's very hard to stick to it. You'll just get into temptation, you will get into lesser goals. You'll get distracted is that no who am I? Who am I actually committed to becoming? Who is Pete Cohen. He is the people's performance coach. He is the people's coach every day he gets up for the people, but he gets up for himself first and if you want to pick the path of mastery, you've got to have some form of empathy for the person that you're going to be. Because if you're not guided by who you'll be, whether it's tomorrow or next week, and if that person isn't better than you, isn't more experienced in you isn't wiser than you. It's typical. It's hard. It's tough. It's tough. enough as it is to pick a path of getting better, because that path isn't a straight line. That path is a is a jagged line. It's a it's a twist in term of the line. And you know what? As we begin to end this podcast I want to share with you you know, with Robert Greene and reviewing his work and he's the one who talked about one of the people that talked massively about the 10,000 hours of practice, which is a lot 10,000 hours How many people do know that what assign themselves to 10,000 hours of getting better at something. Roger Federer, Oprah Winfrey What about you? 10,000 hours have I assigned myself to 10,000 hours of coaching definitely have I signed myself to 10,000 hours of getting up every single day practicing my art and then sharing my art sharing what I do. Yeah, what about you? See for some people, even just the thought of that, just because that's just too boring for me. Are you ready? Right now like never before to step into who you're at your seat and to go on that stage, that apprentice phase, the apprentice, the apprentice part, where you're going into some form of deep observation, right, that's the first level, then you're going to learn some skills and then you're going to experiment that with those skills. We made a podcast a number of years ago about Da Vinci and divinity said that is all about mastery, mastery over self. So I'm not sure what your biggest takeaway is from what you've just heard here today. But I wanted to put this out there because you know what, I seriously believe in you. I believe in your potentiality I know that you have gifts that are just literally waiting to come out. It's just whether you want to walk that path. I want to thank you for listening to the podcast. I want to leave you with this. This was a dream come true for me of creating, putting my voice together with music this is now had a few 100,000 views. And I'm very proud of this because ultimately, this is all about becoming the leader that you want to follow. If you'd like this podcast and you want to help me take this podcast to the next level, then do me a favor take a picture of the podcast at tagged me in it and post it we just got back into the top 100 podcasts in the UK when like number one in some very strange countries been in Mauritius

Pete Cohen  32:03

but I want to get this out there to more people. I want more people to hear the perspectives around self mastery. Thanks for listening.