I think a great transition and foundation is to talk about the particular activating system. The RA we've talked about neuroplasticity a lot on the show. We've had John ASRA on and Dr. Caroline leaf. And we've talked a bit about this, but I'd love to hear it from your perspective. So what is the reticular activating system and how do things like stepping into your dream?

Activate the system. You're one of my favorite interviews ever seriously. So res is chapter two in my book. I cover it. I called the matrix in the book, but here's what it is. It's the filter that reveals to you, everything that matters to you in your life, that's important. And it proves to you that you're right.

It's the prove keeps you sane too. Otherwise you'd be thinking about all the stimulus blood, the blood and your right air going right now, you're breathing, right? So you have to stay sane. So it reveals to you. What's most important to you. I'll give you an example. I just bought a Tesla about a week ago. I like what Alon Musk is doing.

I call my team. I go, Hey, get me one of these Teslas. I wanna start driving the guy's car next day. Tesla's in my. And I'm driving it all of a sudden. Now I'm like seeing freaking Teslas everywhere, babe red one. There's no white one the other day. I'm like there's three in a row. Well, you gotta be kidding.

I'm on the freeway. Three lanes over the other direction going the other way, babe. There's a black Tesla. I see 'em everywhere now. Weren't they always there they were. Yeah. But I didn't see them before because they weren't a part of my RAs. They weren't programmed in my filter. When you go into a crowded room, I go into a crowded room.

There could be 500 people in the room. Audibly. Doesn't have to say it loud. Someone says, ed, if I hear that name, I can hear it audibly over why it's important to me. So the key thing in life is that programming your mind, that the Teslas become the relationships, the meetings, the thoughts, the breakthroughs you have to have in your life.

They were always there. They are there, right? But you're not seeing them because they're not programmed into your RAs. They're not programmed. Like the Tesla is how do you program? I teach you in the book, but I'll give you one thing. Repeated hyper visualizations of your dreams and your imagination and what you want.

I have a chapter in the book where I say become an impossibility thinker and a possibility achiever. And here's the deal in your life. You operate out of either two frames of thinking 99% of the people operate once they're an adult out of history and. They operate out of it. They have patterns of thoughts, patterns of behaviors.

They operate out of this and they reinforce it with different people, different circumstances, same life. 1% of the people operate out of imagination and dream. That's what they did when they were a child. The reason you were happier when you were a little girl or a little boy, one, you were closer to God, cuz you had just left there two, you had no history in memory to operate out of.

You operate out of imagination, sort of flip that in your life. You start imagining and dreaming. When you have a thought an actual. It creates a space in your world that did not exist prior to that thought being created. And now your mind goes to work on filling it up with references and proof. So if you worry about your anxieties, your fears, your worries, your past, you constantly find the Teslas that reinforce that mm-hmm

If you've created a thought that's about the future and an imagination and a dream, and you go touch it once in a while and you repeatedly visualize it over and over again, very simple. I teach you how to do it in the book. You're doing it anyway. You're repeatedly visualizing and thinking about what you're worried about, what you fear all the time.

I'm just flipping it into imagination. Then you'll begin to see those Teslas of your life, the meetings, the people, the places, the things, and by the way, you're one podcast away. One decision away, one meeting, one relationship away from changing your life. That's the power of one more. Yeah. And so with the RA, you could actually program it in a bad way.

You could be thinking about bad things, talk, saying bad things about yourself, and then you perceive the world with all these bad things that you don't want. So can you talk to us about how to make sure that we program it in the right way, programming in the right way is repeated thoughts, visualizations, it's associating with people that also can reinforce those beliefs and thoughts.

If you wanna know how powerful our, our RAs. Let's go back to the drug addict or alcoholic example. Mm-hmm , you will find a way to get what you're obsessed with in your life. So if you're obsessed with your worries and your fears, you'll find a way to get 'em. You'll get 'em every week you'll get 'em no matter how good life is, you'll get that depression.

You'll get that anxiety. You'll get that anger. You'll get that worry. Cuz it's familiar. Caroline leaf has a really interesting thing where she, she talks about like a lot of times, like our emotions aren't good or bad, they just are. And so whatever they are, you're gonna get. That drug addict though. Think about this for a minute.

Isn't it incredible. Think of someone, you know, maybe that's had a drug problem. Mm-hmm  they could literally be living on the street. No resources, no job, no money, no nothing. Somehow every day they find a way to get those drugs. Don't they? How do they, maybe they gotta do something illegal, whatever they gotta do.

They get those drugs. They get 'em no with no resources, no preparation, no nothing. So what if those drugs became your dreams? The fact that you have no preparation, the fact that you have no resources is inconsequential. People prove it every day with the negative stuff in their life. Don't they, but you can prove it with the positive stuff in your life and the way you do it is repeatedly visualizing it.

Now you're superhuman. Now you've transformed yourself. And so that's the standard that changes our life. And that's how we begin to reprogram our RA.

How would we begin to start to put the law of attraction into practice? Like if for somebody who's never done this before, what are some simple ways where we can start to change our daily lives so that we put this into practice? Love it. Well, you first have to start off with clarity of a vision. So if you, if you were an Archer, what's the thing that you have to learn.

If you're an Archer. Well, first you have to learn on how to focus on the bulls. Right, whatever it is that you're trying to hit, you have to learn how to block out everything else because all of your attention needs to go on the target. So first you have to start off with, what is the vision that you have?

Like, what do you see? Is it clear or is it confusing? Is it organized or is it chaotic? So first you start off with a vision for the target. And that's step one. Step number two is what are some goals that you can have on your way to achieving the vision? That's two number three is what do you need to believe about yourself or about.

The vision that you want to achieve, write that down. Mm. What emotions do you need to activate in order to be in a positive, constructive emotion, energy in motion to help you achieve those goals and that vision that's number three, number four, what habits do you think would help you achieve the goals that you.

What habits. So what daily habits, weekly habits, maybe hourly habits would you need to have that would make those goals really be more probable instead of possible, probable instead of possible. Right? So that's part, you know, that's the, the first part of it. And then the question is this, and I want everybody to pay close attention to what I'm about to share.

if you're thinking of any goal that you have, whether it's spiritual health and wellbeing, whether it's emotional, mental, physical, whether it's a business goal or career goal, whether it, any goal that we have in health, wealth, relationships, career, business, fun, or experiences, the how to already exists, right?

Mm. The how to, how to do X or Y already exists unless you're trying to colonize Mars.  most people who are listening right now, don't really need to be innovative. Yeah. So all of the, how to the strategies, the tactics, all, all of that exists already. So your lack of knowledge or skill is the least of your concerns right now, because all of that already exists.

You can read about it, you can buy a blueprint for it. You can get coach for it. You can watch a YouTube video, you can Google it and you can get all the, how. So let's take care of what has to happen before the how to, so let's get our beliefs in line. Let's get our emotions in line. Let's get our habits in line mm-hmm  and that is really the precursor to all of it.

And we can get the alignment, the coherence between all of it. That's when we activate the law of attract. I think it's really important. So people really understand this to get a sense of the difference between our conscious and subconscious brains and really what happens when they become unaligned.

And to also understand that most of what happens in our brain happens at the subconscious level, like 95 to 95% of brain activity actually happens at the subconscious level. Uh, that is correct. So, you know, if we were to take a look. What does our brain do? And how does it work? Well, our conscious brain, as you mentioned, is, uh, responsible for imagination.

It's responsible for choosing this or that it's responsible to give things meanings. It's responsible for us being able to tell ourself we're tired. Let's go to. Et cetera, but our subconscious brain is keeping your DNA intact right now. It's digesting your food. It's allowing you to see and delete or distort anything you don't need, but only pay attention to what you do need.

It is the power grid, the power center of you and.  and yet, most people don't know how to operate it. Mm. And like I said, we have a brain, but we haven't been given the user's manual for it. And I've been studying this for over 40 years now. And what is the user's manual? So I can use the conscious part of my brain properly and the subconscious part of my brain properly.

And once you start to realize that you have a lot more control than you ever had. You're not your brain. This is the most, you know, incredible thing to think about is I have a brain, but I'm not my brain. It's like you have a heart, but you're not your heart. You have hands, but you're not your hands. You can start to use the tools better.

So our subconscious brain doesn't know the difference between something real or imagined your conscious brain does, but your subconscious brain doesn't. So if you can impress a new belief into your subconscious mind, if you can impress a vision into your subconscious mind, whether it's a vision of you being.

You know, healthier, you being in a great relationship, you earning more money, you having the job of your dreams. If you can envision it and impress that into the subconscious mind, not one time mm-hmm , but hundreds of times, then you can start to create that neural networking pattern. And then your subconscious mind then goes to.

At making that a reality and something that I like to use as a visual. So people understand this even better is imagine if we're sitting in a movie theater and we're watching a movie and there's some, you know, some things happening on the screen that we don't like, does it make sense for us to get up, go to the screen and spray paint the screen to eliminate what we don't.

Yeah, of course not. It would make sense if we don't like what's on the screen to go back up to the projection room, to get the, whether the D V D or whatever the movie's playing through and change the script on the D V D. So that the projection would be different. That's exactly how our brains work. We don't see the world as it is.

We see the world as we are conditioned to see the we're projecting our beliefs and our experiences and our values onto the canvas and screen of the world. And it's a, it's a very odd shift that people have to make to understand reality that. Yes. And so we achieve the results that we are conditioned and wired to achieve, not what we're capable of achieving mm-hmm

So we don't earn what we are capable of achieving. We earn what we are conditioned to earn.

Something really popular you have is a morning ritual and getting into peak state. Can you describe that to our listeners? Yeah, absolutely. So basically the idea is really simple. You know, first thing in the morning, you don't want to be. Distracted and reactive to the addictions and the environment such as smartphones and things like that.

You actually wanna give yourself space to think about what, what you wanna do that day, who you wanna be, what you wanna do, big picture and long term. And so most people, their day is a repeat of the past. They wake up, they get caught into their subconscious loops, whether that be through smartphones or through just the foods they eat or through their schedule and their routine.

And they just, they live a pretty predictable life. But if you want to create a life from your future, rather than from your past, you have to give yourself the space to actually think about that. And so that's, I think in my opinion, the core reason for having a morning routine, the idea of getting yourself into a peak state is, is really connected to this idea.

And self-improvement called be then do then have, and basically what it means is, is that in order to.  have something you have to first be that thing you have to be, and then you have to do, and then you have to act. And so you wanna give yourself space. And in, in the book, I talk a lot about journaling.

You know, obviously there's a lot written to the idea of writing down your goals, but writing down your goals and visualizing them has to also include really, truly experiencing the emotion of what it would be like and feel like to have achieved those goals. Like that's, that's what true being feels like.

You actually want to assume. Assume the feeling of your wish fulfilled. Basically you want to ponder meditate, write about what you're trying to accomplish, and you want to feel, feel gratitude, feel powerful emotions about what, what it would actually be like to have that, and then believe it. And what's cool is, is that your brain, you know, doesn't actually know the difference between true experience versus visualized and emotional imagination.

Albert Einstein. Said that imagination is more important than knowledge. It's far more powerful than knowledge and it can stimulate your brain the same way. And so when you give yourself space in the morning to write about your goals, you know, and you can obviously work out and you put yourself into the emotional place of the future you wanna create, then you act from that future, you be, and then you do, you start acting from the future you want to have versus acting the same way you did yesterday.

That creates. What I would call peak state because you're in this flow where you're living intentionally and you're living on purpose. And it just, it feels a lot better than just doing what you're doing, because that's how things have been done.

Okay. So I wanna talk about another book that you wrote called the garden and in it, you had a story about James Gill. And he ran six double iron mans when he was 59 years old. And he did that by ignoring his negative self chatter. Instead of listening to himself, he talked to himself. Can you share that story with us?

My favorite advice of all time, he is the only person on the planet to complete six double iron man triathlons. And he was asked how he did it. He said, this I've learned to talk to myself instead of listen to myself. He said, if I listen, I hear all the negative, the fear, the doubt, all the reasons why I can't finish this race.

But if I talk to myself, I could feed myself with the words and the encouragement that I need to keep on moving. Okay, let's talk about this for a second. So often we have negative thoughts that come in and I ask people all the time when I speak to professional athletes. Hey, do your negative thoughts come from you?

They're always like, yeah, of course. Through my head. Here's my next question. Really? Who would ever choose to have a negative thought? Would you choose a negative thought?  no, I wouldn't. Would you ever choose a thought that sabotages you, we have the imposter syndrome. So many of us, would you choose to have the imposter syndrome?

No. So where are those thoughts coming from? They come from consciousness. When you're sleeping, dreaming, having a nightmare. Are you choosing those dreams? Are you choosing those thoughts? When you're walking down the street, an idea comes to you. Did you choose it or you're in the shower? No. When that negative thought pops in that says you're not gonna make.

He, or she's not gonna like you, you're not enough. Those thoughts are not coming from you. You would never choose them. They come in so fast from consciousness, from a spiritual place and they're in your head. So you think they're from you, you believe it. You reinforce it, you now speak it out loud and then you feel guilt and shame or pessimism for having those thoughts in the first place.

The key is just because you have a negative thought doesn't mean you have to believe it don't believe the lies that they tell. Instead, you wanna speak truth to those lies as Dr. James gills. Did right. The lie comes in. You're not enough. Yes, I am. You don't have what it takes. I am here to do great things.

I always ask people, do you wanna be great? Everyone says, yes, I've never had anyone say, I wanna be average. Why do we wanna be great? Because deep down we know there's greatness within us. And so we have a desire to do great things, but we have these voices that say we're not great. And that is the battle of the mind.

That is what the garden is all about. It's the battle of the mind every day, negative thought. Speaking truth to those lies, right? So here's what you do on a piece of paper on the left side of a piece of paper, you write down all your negative thoughts, your negative patterns. We do this in our leadership training, right, right here.

So they're getting some leadership training right here on your left side. Write down all your negative thoughts that come to you. You know, which ones come to you, right? Holly, you have yours. I'm not gonna ask you to share. I have mine. They always come in, write 'em down on the right side, write down the words of encourage.

That you would share and speak to yourself when those negative thoughts come in truth. Right? Truth. I am enough. I am here to do something great. I do have my gifts and I have my talents. There is a plan for me. There is a future for me, whatever it is for you, you write those down and anytime those negative thoughts come in, you start speaking truth.

It's gonna feel weird at first, right? But you keep doing it over time. Eventually you will walk in that truth. You will walk in that power. And you reshape your perspective and the way you think, and this was my journey. I want people to know. I was so unworthy when I first started, I wanna be honest. I was so unworthy.

Who am I to be sharing this? Who am I to be doing this work? When the energy bus came out. And I started speaking in front of people, like, I just didn't feel worthy. Like why should they listen in they? And then I started to say to myself, you are. Like not on your own, but you're worthy cuz you're here to make a difference.

It's not about you. It's about impacting others and your purpose is greater than your challenges. So focus on your purpose, make a difference. So I would literally talk to myself each time and over time, eventually I started to feel worthy. My purpose started to drive me and I was like, okay, I am here to do this.

And there's a reason for it. And that drove me even more. Do I still get down? Do I still get nervous before it talks? You bet. I've given. Several thousand talks. I still get nervous. Sometimes I still look in the crowd and go, oh, that person's yawning over there. Maybe that is, they're not interested. And I have to remind myself, keep sharing the message, keep doing the work.

And so it's this battle that we face every day. And you have to understand that you are in a battle cuz these negative thoughts are trying to sabotage you, but you can overcome with this plan, Dr. James Gill gave us a blueprint and I'm just sharing it right here. And it's really powerful when you.  that is super powerful.

And I want everybody to pay attention because basically what you're saying is don't just listen to your negative thoughts, combat them with positive thoughts that you think of yourself, not just like letting your mind just go like on pilot mode. You know, you wanna actually proactively think of positive things and, and tell yourself positive things.

So James gills, when he was running these races, his mind was saying I'm old, I'm 59 years old. I shouldn't be doing this. And then he would tell himself, no, I'm healthy. I'm doing great. I'm in the lead, whatever it was to just help him keep going. So I think in high stake situations, guys, remember that when you're in a job interview and you have negative thoughts, tell yourself positive things like in these high stake situations, that's when you need to remember it.

And even do it before the high stake, like really start to practice this because you do build up resilience, you build up mental strength, mental muscle, the more you do this, it will become more automatic. You will have a go-to. So just like a baseball batter knows his routine. Deep breath. Let's go sea ball, hip ball.

You always talk about actually stepping into your dream, the need to actually experience your dream. I remember I heard you tell a story about you and your wife, like going to the Ritz Carlton and, and just doing that for one day to just feel like it's like what it's like to have valet parking and things like that today, you have a private jet that's insane.

You know, you've elevated yourself to a point. Bar anybody makes it to that point to be able to afford a private jet. Talk to us about the need to actually experience your dream. You should touch your dreams. And the reason is you belong in them, but you move towards what you're most familiar with in your life.

So if you're familiar all the time with your current thoughts and your current life, you'll constantly keep moving towards it. So every once in a while you gotta go touch your dreams. So like you said, when I was up and coming, I would set contests up with myself. If I didn't hit them, I wouldn't do. I'd say, babe, if I make 10 sales this month and I make eight grand, let's take 500 bucks.

Let's go down to the Ritz Carlton on Saturday night, we'll get the cheapest room there, but I would touch the dream. And so I'd get there like a big shot, you know, I'd flip my keys to the valet. I never done that crap before, you know, Hey, Mr. Mylet, they grab your bags. I used to be so cheaper. Like, no, we got our bags.

Cause I don't wanna give. The bellman four bucks.  now I'm like, nah, you get my bag, man. You walk up, you check in, Hey babe, let's get up into the room. You go get a massage, honey, I'm gonna go play some golf. I'll meet you at the pool later. Let's have a bottle of wine. And so for one day we would touch this dream.

We'd sit there and go, babe, we're gonna live like this all the time. Someday. We'd just take a taste. And then maybe six weeks later, we'd do it again. Eight weeks later, we go out to the LaQuinta resort, you know, do it again. And all of a sudden over time, I'm like, I'm kind of familiar with the Vale. I'm kind of familiar with the ocean front.

I'm kind of familiar with the golf course and I'm like, we belong here all of a sudden, the more familiar I became with it, then I start looking at the houses when I'm there. Right. Then I start playing the golf a little bit different mm-hmm  and over time, I'm like we belong here cuz I didn't grow up like that.

We used to walk on the beach I live on right now. We go to the Ritz. I, I can walk to the montage. That was the other place we would go after I got older. I'd walk right to the montage for breakfast. But we would come down this beach when we were kids, I'd say, babe, I'm gonna get us a house on this beach someday.

When we'd be taking these walks. No idea how I was gonna do it. She goes, you are honey. I'm like someday. Cause we're high school sweethearts. I'm like, yeah, someday we're gonna do it. And then I come home, I'd say to my dad, I'd say dad, who are these people? Who are these people that have these? He goes, dude, I have no idea who these freaking people I've never met any of them.

I have no, I've never met someone who lives ocean front. Yeah. And then I figured it out. They're the one see in every family, if you find a family, that's we. Or successful or happy, but you go all the way back in their lineage. At one point they weren't. And then the one shows up the one in that family rises.

Takes all the hits fights for that family. I'm the one in my family and they change that family forever. The world doesn't treat them. My lets like they used to no, one's got their thumb on my family anymore. We think different. We operate in the world different cuz the one showed up the one. And if you're listening to this, you're the one in your family.

You're the one. And over time of walking these beaches over time of going to the Ritz Carlton, I figured out I'm the freaking. I'm the one that's gonna do it now. I literally live on the beach. You go from that to how broke I once was in my life. I've had the water turned off in my apartment. I've been completely without power, without water, without a cell phone, I've gone to an ATM and prayed.

I had 21 bucks at the bank, so it would spit a 20 out cuz all it would spit was twentys and I got 14 bucks in there and I can't even get a $20 bill out of an ATM. I know what all that is, but I also know what it's like to touch my dreams. And now I know what it's like to live my dreams.