Outwitting The Ego - Transforming Fear Into Power with Ryan Clarkin: An EOFire Classic from 2021

0:01Boom! Shake the room, Fire Nation. JLD here and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire. Brought to you by the HubSpot.

0:30entrepreneurs, influencers, and leaders how to unlock their potential and unleash their world changing impact. And today at Fire Nation, we'll talk about how your ego's main mission is to keep you safe. You can effectively bypass your ego by elevating your emotional state. We'll talk about that and so much more. And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Ryan and our sponsors. One of my favorite conferences to attend each year is HubSpot's annual Inbound Conference and is coming up fast. Join us in Boston from September 5th to the 8th, 2023 for an event like no other. Inbound brings together leaders across the business space, including sales, marketing, customer success, and operations teams.

1:12The goal at Inbound to help you discover all the latest trends and tactics you can implement in your business right now. Learn, be inspired, and walk away with practical tips to help you tackle your next challenge. supercharge your sales and marketing and ignite your customer service. Inbound is featuring many must-see speakers this year, including Reese Witherspoon, Guy Raz, and Neil Patel, just to name a few. Whether you choose a general admission ticket or go the VIP route, you're sure to leave Boston feeling on fire. Visit inbound.com to get your tickets today. Ryan, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something interesting about yourself that most people don't know.

1:58What's going on, Fire Nation? I'm Ryan, and something interesting about me that most people don't know is I'm highly sensitive to energy. And it's kind of a gift. It's a blessing and a curse, but more of a blessing in the work that I do. And I'm very sensitive to energy to the point where it's like sometimes when I'm in a workshop or a training, I can feel somebody's emotion from across the room. And sometimes I even ask myself, I'm like, is this really happening right now? And then I talk to them and ask them how they're feeling and it's confirmed. So I've been really sensitive to energy from a really young age.

2:34Some people call it empathic. And most people don't know it about me, but it's definitely something that I found interesting. And I think people would probably find interesting. Now, obviously, we don't have to use any names or specific circumstances, but can you kind of give us a more specific example of a time where that happened to you and you're like, wow, this is kind of interesting. The biggest way that it's interesting is like when I have a client calling in a coaching client, sometimes I just know immediately when they're calling what tone or what mood they're going to be in. It's very strange.

3:05And I think it's because I've just been in this work for quite a while in terms of like just immersing myself and making a difference with people. And I'm just tuned in. Sometimes I can feel I just like tune into my clients and I feel that they're off this week. And you might have experienced something similar yourself, or many people might relate, or maybe they have a feeling or a hunch where someone that they know, something's off with them, and then they call and they found out that it's true. And I've just honed this ability, and it's been a natural gift. Now, have you ever answered the phone with something along the lines of, what's the problem today?

3:43Getting in front of that, or do you just let it unfold naturally? I just kind of let it unfold naturally because I'm always open to being wrong about it. Like I'm not like intoxicated with like the idea of like, oh, I have this energy superpower. Like I'm like, okay, like this is what I'm picking up on and let's see if it's actually true. Well, that actually fits our topic perfectly today because we're talking about outwitting the ego fire nation, transforming fear into power. And obviously Ryan's found a lot of ways to outwit his ego. But before we dive into the specifics, what is the ego, Ryan?

4:20Yeah, so the ego is our false self. And it's really the part of us that's programmed for survival. And I like to say it's a mixture between our inner caveman or cavewoman and our inner child. It's like a mixture between our wounded inner child and that inner caveman or cavewoman that just wants to survive. Ego stops entrepreneurs from succeeding before they even start at times. So break it down for us. How does that ego actually stop Fire Nation, our listeners, entrepreneurs from succeeding at both business and life? Yeah, so our ego's main mission is to keep us safe. And its motto is life as usual.

5:02It wants us to live life as usual. And my good friend Joe Henderson, he says, our ego really wants us under the bed, eating a Snickers bar in the dark, not venturing out, because it just wants to keep us safe. And that's the reality. I mean, not all entrepreneurs are into Snickers. It might be Reese's. I love Snickers. I don't know what it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're so good. But it wants to keep us safe. And there's this myth that, you know, only people who are arrogant or egotistical have an ego. We all have an ego. It's just the inner part of us that especially entrepreneurs, especially game changers come up against.

5:37And it uses fear and resistance and procrastination and also negative self-talk to as a force to push us back into our comfort zone and to keep us stuck if we let it. So Fire Nation, I did just share that I love Snickers and I do. but please don't send me any because, you know, I'm trying to outwit my ego here. I'm not trying to feed my ego under my bed at night. And that is the thing too, Ryan, that I really wanted to dive into is that the ego, I mean, man, it really stops entrepreneurs from succeeding. And a lot of times there's some tricks that the ego uses to actually sabotage us. So let's dive into that specifically.

6:15And then I'd love an example or two. One of the tricks is subtle, limiting beliefs. So there's those obvious limiting beliefs that our ego will put up in the air, which is like, I'm not good enough. And a lot of times, this is actually the ego's biggest trick. I'm going to backtrack a little bit. It tricks you into thinking that it's you, meaning a lot of people struggle with ego identification, which they're like, I'm afraid. I'm not confident. I'm not good enough. And last time I checked, when you were born, it doesn't say I'm not good enough on your birth certificate. Your name is there. So the first shift that we need to make is recognize you are not your ego.

6:57You are the witness. You are the observer. You are the experiencer of your ego. And be very careful because our egos are very sneaky. And don't be afraid of your ego, but just be aware. And my intention is that we share some tools on this podcast that will support you in really gaining your awareness around your ego and how it works. Yeah, I want to do that for sure because I look back to 2012. I mean, my ego was telling me I wasn't good enough at interviewing to become a podcast host when I mean, the reality is my ego, it was trying to protect me in a way because I really wasn't good enough. I'd never done it before.

7:31So of course I wasn't good. And my ego knew that I was going to potentially get, you know, talked down to or I was going to get slammed online or this or that was going to happen. and somebody was going to tell me they didn't enjoy it or it was going to hurt me. It was going to hurt. And the ego wants to protect you from that. So I really want to keep moving forward because we have some real cool specific things, Fire Nation, in store for you around all of this. The next thing that I want to move into is the actual outwitting part, the actual bypassing of your ego. What does that look like, Ryan?

8:04So a lot of people dive into personal development work and working on themselves. And that's an incredible venture to go about doing it. What I've really found is an effective way to bypass your ego, no matter how many negative conversations that you have going on, they live in a certain frequency and they live in a certain state of mind. And I found through coaching many people and working with a lot of people and also studying and researching myself that our negative thoughts live in a low energy when we're in a low energy state of mind. So low energy state of mind equals low quality thoughts.

8:40And when we elevate our emotional state and when we empower ourselves and when we motivate ourselves, then our ego gets quieter and quieter and quieter. And so one of the ways that you can outwit your ego is by taking responsibility over your state of mind and really taking your power back over your mindset and saying, you know what? This voice in my head isn't going to call the shots. shots I'm going to call the shots and I'm going to do the things do the rituals on a daily basis that will empower me and that will get me in an empowered state of mind and one of the things that I do that's tangible is I mix swimming high intensity swimming with visualization and so mixing those factors of getting my energy up moving my body and then focusing from a place of complete belief and it takes practice to go here but focusing on my vision on my outcomes from a place of complete belief, that's where the energy and the empowerment unlocks for me.

9:38And I've noticed it unlocks for many people. And if you're not visual, you could do a similar thing as well with affirmation runs or even journaling to get your energy up high so that your ego can't touch you from that place. What does an affirmation run look like? It looks like being a crazy person. So basically you're running and like, I think it would be awesome to see videos of people doing this, but you're running and you're screaming affirmations about yourself. You're saying, I'm confident, I'm powerful, I'm destined for success. And Entrepreneur on Fire was my affirmations. I would actually listen to Entrepreneur on Fire and do affirmations at the same time at the beginning of my journey.

10:21And go louder when people are walking past you because it's a breakthrough in fear of judgment. Oh, man, I love that. I mean, there's so many cool things about this. I mean, it kind of brings me back. This is semi-related, but, you know, back in the day, I had Noah Kagan on the show, and he challenged people in Fire Nation to walk into a Starbucks and to ask for 10 % off. Like, for no reason, just to ask for 10 % off, because you just need to kind of get over the fact that people might look at you weird, that people might, like, question what you're doing, because it's like, why do we want to live in that world?

10:50We want to live in a world where we're high energy, because I love how you put that, Ryan. Low energy equals low-quality thoughts. So when we're living in a low energy world, we're living in a low quality of thoughts world. And Fire Nation, you're not going to get to where you want to be. Financial freedom, location freedom, lifestyle freedom with low quality thoughts. So don't live in that world. And I mean, Ryan, where can Fire Nation email you a video of themselves doing an affirmation run? I want at least one person to take you up on this challenge and have somebody take a video of them doing an affirmation run and send it to you.

11:29Where do they send it? Gosh, that'd be epic. Yeah, you can tag me on Instagram or on Facebook. That'd be cool. So Instagram, at Ryan Clarkin, or even Facebook. And here's the thing. If you do that, I want to give you a gift because it takes courage to do that. Courage? If you, if you, yeah, if you do that and you dive in, I'll gift you one of my courses, just tag me and I'll gift you one of my courses to support you in your journey. Fire Nation, go have some fun, you know, go grab one of your friends and go do an affirmation run, have them record it, tag Ryan Clark and on either Facebook or Instagram, that's Clark N C L A R K I N, tag him on Instagram, tag him on Facebook, get one of his free courses just for doing something that you should honestly do for no reason, because it's going to get you in that high energy to get you high quality thoughts.

12:19So I challenge you, Fire Nation, make me proud. Make yourself proud. Okay. Let's talk about transforming negative thoughts into positive thoughts, because let's be honest, we're not going to always be in this world where everything's positive and happy and exciting. I mean, we're going to have negative thoughts from time to time. How do we transform those into positivity? Yeah, so the first thing that you've got to be willing to do, because that's a really great point, John, is you've got to give yourself grace. There's going to be times where you're feeling great and you're feeling on top of the world.

12:50And then there's going to be times where it's tough. You're not getting the results that you want. You might feel stuck. And the downward spiral a lot of people fall into when they go into that state is they have those negative thoughts. And then they start judging themselves. And I always tell to the leadership groups that I train, you cannot beat yourself up. Nobody has ever been successful at beating themselves up, but they've been really successful at beating themselves down. And so you got to give yourself grace and allow yourself. We have ups and downs throughout the journey, and it doesn't serve you to resist in that state.

13:28So number one, give yourself grace. Number two is ask yourself what you need. When I notice that I'm feeling a little bit disempowered, sometimes I need a nap. Sometimes I just need food and a nap. Or a Snickers bar. Or a Snickers bar, yeah. My blood sugar might be low. And so just ask yourself what you need. And that first thought that comes up might be, I don't know what I need. And that's a great place to start. That's not a place to end. It's a great place to start. Well, what do I need? Maybe I need to go for a workout. Maybe I need to call a friend. Or maybe I need to just rest. There's a lot of this pressure that entrepreneurs put on themselves to be grinding and rocking it 24-7.

14:10And that is an unfair perspective and expectation to put on yourself if you're most people. Give yourself grace, Fire Nation, and then ask yourself what you need. I mean, believe me, you deserve it. So Fire Nation, if you think we're even close to being done with these value bombs, you've got more things coming. Because we're gonna be talking about the number one mindset challenge that entrepreneurs face, the most effective way to move beyond fear. I mean, fear is within us all, Fire Nation. And so much more when we get back from thanking our sponsors. The Product Boss, hosted by Jacqueline Snyder and Mina Kunlo-Citep, is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.

14:51Take your physical product sales and strategy to the next level to create your dream life with hosts Jacqueline and Mina as they deliver a workshop-style, hour-long episode filled with social media and marketing strategies so you can up-level as the boss of your business. A recent episode covered the ins and outs of whether you can have a successful product business as a side hustle. Listen to The Product Boss wherever you get your podcasts. When Kate and I bought our home in Puerto Rico, one of the major selling points was the pool. With that Puerto Rico heat, nothing beats an afternoon dip in our own backyard.

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15:59The Seagull Pro does the dirty work of sucking all that up so you can enjoy your pool instead of wasting time cleaning it. The Seagull Pro is available right now for$899.99 at aper.com. And when you use code EOFIRE200 at checkout, you'll receive$200 off. That's A-I-P-E-R.com and use code EOFIRE200 for$200 off. Ryan, we're back, and I want to start with talking about transforming a belief. What does that look like? Let's dive deep. And really, why would you want to transform a belief? Well, you want to transform a belief that might be getting in your way or a belief that might be stopping you. And I want to actually support anyone on here right now that has a belief that's stopping them around fear.

16:51And we're going to dive, of course, a little bit deeper into fear. But a lot of people are afraid of failure because they're not afraid of failure, but they're afraid that they will be a failure. There's actually a limiting belief under that fear that says, if I fail, then I am a failure. And nobody wants to become a failure. So the first thing you have to do is identify the beliefs that are getting in your way. And so the first belief that we're going to use as an example is, I will be a failure if I fail. And a lot of people fear that. And then the second key after you've identified that belief that you want to shift and transform is you've got to unpack the belief, meaning you have to ask yourself, where did this start?

17:34Where does this come from? Where does this originate? And you think back to how did I learn this? Because when you were born and you came out of the womb, you weren't like, I'm afraid of being a failure. You didn't even know what failure was. You didn't even know it existed. But we learn maybe it was from a parent that said, you're going to be a failure one day. or a teacher, or maybe it was even from the school system. You saw a kid who got an F, and he was tormented by all his classmates, and you're like, that's never going to be me. And so you look back at those events, and then the next step is you need to invalidate the belief or really collapse the belief.

18:16And something that I learned from studying Tony Robbins is that beliefs are built on evidence. And if you could think of them, he has this in his book, you can think about them as there's a table and then there's legs coming down from the table and each leg is a piece of evidence. And in order to collapse the belief, you've got to swipe the legs out from under the table. And how do you do that? Well, you ask yourself, is this really true? You know, is it really true that if I fail, I will be a failure? And you start actually thinking and reflecting and journaling can be great for going deeper in this.

18:51And you might discover, well, actually, I'm not going to be, who has the power to say I'm a failure? Failure is actually a lesson and that's where you replace the belief. So you choose a new empowering perspective and you might decide, you know what, I'm going to let go of failure and replace it with lesson or replace it with feedback. Failure is feedback or failure is a lesson because you can only fail for so long until you figure it out. And so then after you replace the belief, this is the most important part. You've got to reinforce that belief and really build that belief up by looking at people who are modeling that belief, who are owning that, who are sharing about failure being feedback and failure being a lesson in reinforcing, gain more evidence to support that belief.

19:40And then also test it out, test it out and be willing to fail so that you can see how much you can learn and that you can actually see that failure isn't this big, scary thing that you're afraid of. In fact, it's a really amazing resource if you have an empowered perspective around it. So number one, identify the belief. Number two, unpack the belief. Number three, invalidate the belief or collapse the belief. Number four, replace the belief. And number five, reinforce the belief. I mean, Fire Nation, do you think I'm a failure? Because I failed. Does that make me a failure? Does it make Tony Robbins a failure?

20:13Who's failed? Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos, like Mark Zuckerberg. I mean, every single human being who you look at and admire and who's achieved greatness, they've all failed. So how is you failing making you a failure? It makes no sense. It's just the wrong correlation. And we face a lot of mindset challenges, Ryan, but what do you see as the number one mindset challenge entrepreneurs face? Yeah, I think the number one mindset challenge that entrepreneurs face is the sheer resistance of getting from where they are to where they want to be. And for some reason, a lot of entrepreneurs, when they first start off, they don't see it.

20:55There's this natural resistance that exists when it comes from getting from where you are to where you want to be and growing. and a lot of entrepreneurs, they feel that resistance and for some reason they turn it on them and then they decide either I'm not good enough or I'm not cut out for this when it's just the resistance and you cannot grow if there's not resistance there. It's supposed to be there and so I see such a huge opportunity for so many entrepreneurs to embrace the resistance, to embrace the challenge on the journey of creating whatever you believe success to be because that's the path.

21:31That's the path to growth. Fire Nation, we have resistance getting from where we are to where we want to be. And I mean, that's especially the case when you're under the bed with a Snickers bar, because again, that's going back to the ego. The ego is like, hey, I'm comfortable. It's cold. It's dark. I got a Snickers bar. Life is good. I probably have an iPad. I'm probably watching Game of Thrones for the fourth time right now. Life is good down here. Why do we want to go anywhere else? Let's resist going anywhere because here is good. But we need to move beyond that mindset. We need to move beyond this fear that's holding us back.

22:06So what's the most effective way that you found, Ryan, to move beyond fear? Four steps. Number one, you got to feel it. You got to feel the fear. And don't just feel the fear. Wear it as a badge of honor because few people are willing to step through the fear. And you're one of those few. So people who are creating amazing things in the world, they stand in the fire. They love fear. Of course, it's not comfortable, but they thrive in it. So don't be ashamed of the fear that you're feeling. Wear the fear as a badge of honor. And then second, embrace the fear, meaning receive it. Be like, wow, okay, I'm afraid of this.

22:46Don't resist it, which we just talked about, which is like, oh no, fear, I'm going to back up. Embrace it. Yeah, I'm afraid. I'm afraid. I'm nervous. Accept it and embrace it. And then three, respond to it. I remember when I first had this dream of becoming self-employed, I had all this fear. What have you failed? What have you failed? What have you failed? And I actually took a moment to respond to that question. Well, what if I do fail? Well, I'm only going to fail for so long until I get a hang of it. And I would rather look back on my life and know that I had the courage to go after my dreams.

23:20And I thought about it. I was like, I'm willing to fail for my entire life and look back on my life and say, I went for it, than to fail by default by not going for it at all. And so that response was enough for me to take step number four, which is step through it and just step into it. It takes courage. It takes strength. And every time you step through fear, you're building up your willpower. You're building up your confidence. You're building up your credibility with yourself and you're one step closer to the life of your dream. So feel it, embrace it, respond to it and step through it. Fire Nation, feel it, feel the fear.

23:54The number two, embrace that fear. I mean, give it a big old bear hug. And sometimes I literally like to just feel my fear and then embrace it with a bear hug and just kind of like say thank you. Because I'm like, this is exactly what's holding all of my competition back because they can't embrace this fear. And so because I am, I'm rising above. And then when you respond to it and you go for it, guess what? You're never gonna regret that. In fact, if you've never read the book, The Biggest Regrets of the Dying, you need to find an issue because that's the number one regret is that people didn't go for it and they regret it on their deathbed.

24:27And it's so sad. Don't be that person. And then, of course, step through it. Ryan, let's talk about transforming our mindsets to live in an empowered mindset, not just once in a while, but every day. How do we do that? It really starts with a lifelong commitment. That's where it starts. I don't really see another way of going about it. You have to have a commitment, a deep, strong commitment, a promise with yourself that I am going to become my best. And it's not about necessarily becoming the best, although if that's what you crave, awesome. It's about becoming your best. And a great place to start is saying, you know what, what do I want my mindset to be like?

25:14and to start creating a vision for the mindset that you want to live in. And I invite every single person listening to this to just pick three words that could describe an absolutely empowered mindset that you would love to have and start there with that commitment and then start seeking out resources. Do the best you can with what you have. I mean, I remember when I was 16 years old and I was mowing lawns and I knew I had a dream of being an entrepreneur, but I didn't have very much money. So what I did was I just literally flooded my consciousness with podcasts, with YouTube videos, and learned as much as I could until I got to that point where I could invest in coaches, go to seminars, and most importantly, start taking action.