Comfort Is Slowly Killing You

0:00Alex Chisnall:What stops founders from building something meaningful isn't the lack of ideas, it's the fear of getting started. I'm Alex Chisnall and this is Screw It Just Do It. A podcast for people who are ready to stop waiting, take action and make things happen. If you're not already, do hard things. It doesn't have to be epic. You don't have to traverse Antarctica. But you can get out of bed every morning and go running in the darkness. Anyone can do that and it's hard. But if you do that enough, it becomes a habit. And what you start doing is acclimatising yourself to discomfort. Over the course of what became the night from hell, the cold weather injuries that start presenting themselves up on top of the mountains, which we had no ability to do anything about other than just keep on going.

0:50Feeling sensations in their toes and their fingers, you know, the tips of noses starting to stop playing. and you know there you are in darkness you know with this maelstrom blowing around you

1:02Alex Chisnall:and that's all you could do is keep going ultimately yeah just going and not stopping me steve and you know 150 blokes up into the mountains across the plateau heading from a to b and as we progressed effectively beyond the point of no return and beyond what could have been feasible escape routes the temperature just plummeted the wind picked up the the temperature probably would have been somewhere in the region of minus 25 minus 30 something like that um you know which which is workable with with the correct kit but if you add if you add wind yeah the wind just exacerbates the cold and just makes it so much colder and so much harder to operate and it's the middle of the night you know it's two o 'clock in the morning you can't see anything at all the winds howling is absolutely freezing and steve and i we've both been out to to norway quite a few times before as had the vast bulk of the guys who are up there with us but of course some some of the younger lads who never had been before this was their first time and over the course of what became the night from hell just the the cold weather injuries that start presenting themselves up on top of the mountains which we had no ability to do anything about other than just keep on going just started to to present and you know it was ultimately a situation that you know we you know we stayed in control of and brought it to a safe conclusion but it was a night not without a degree of concern just because of how isolated and exposed we were in the elements away from help or rescue should we have actually needed it.

2:55Alex Chisnall:And you're talking like frostbite and things like that. Yeah, those sorts of things. The telltale signs of that is guys stopping, feeling sensations in their toes and their fingers, the tips of noses starting to stop playing. And all we could do was keep going, which is what we did. But it very much felt like being past the point of no return, fully committed with the responsibility, of course, of everybody that was with us. And you got full kit on. Oh, yeah, full kit on. So, you know, big, big skis, big rucksacks. And when I say big, I mean big, big, big things. Because of all of the kit that you end up carrying in environments like that, you know, the weight really, really adds up.

3:56Yeah, 100, 120 pounds is not uncommon. Okay. And, you know, there you are in darkness with this maelstrom blowing around you just on a compass bearing. This was pre-smartphone and got an app for that type days. This was just a compass bearing with a vague luminous point at the tip of it and just having faith that your map reading was on point. And just going and not stopping.

4:32Alex Chisnall:And how did that experience, you know, over a good decade ultimately prepare you for starting, scaling, growing a business? Yeah. So I think what it did was just continued on in a turbocharged kind of a way. the path that I think I had been and my brother and sister, Lauren and Paddy, set on as kids. Get out there into the world. Go and do hard things. And the Marines for me was 10 years of doing hard things and finding ways of becoming comfortable with those. it was also 10 years of you know really developing a sense of self-reliance personal resilience initiative I don't know what you would call it you know I often think that you know the word entrepreneurialism is very loosely defined and has been widely hijacked you know I always see it's just been more of a spirit you know a sense of a sense of spirit something about you know an indomitable nature an ability to be punched in the face and just keep coming back and not losing your cool and not losing your composure you know retaining your your fighting spirit your your your optimism bias which is definitely a necessity for starting a business you need to believe that tomorrow is going to be better than today this increasing inability to to concentrate to to focus i could feel my creativity just diminishing my my motivation diminishing my what had always been this real love for the company just starting to starting to erode and i was conscious of it i just thought it was a phase is it just um like harder to get out of bed in the morning for example to get excited about what you're doing that i suppose that's one way of putting it um you know i wasn't jumping out of bed with with zeal good word But I then started noticing all of these physical symptoms starting to present themselves.

7:11Initially, not particularly worried. I could feel, I've always been fit and healthy and I haven't been particularly bothered by illnesses or injury or anything throughout my life. But I could feel what felt like, as a non-arthritis sufferer, what felt like arthritis starting to develop in my body. you my joints would stiffen up and become painful um i could then start feeling this incredible tightness almost on a minute-to-minute basis developing across my my chest i was losing the ability to to sleep compounding all of all of these things you know looked like absolute shit As I say, I'd lost the ability to focus, to think creatively, and start feeling these really unfamiliar feelings of uncertainty, of feel my self-confidence eroding in a way that I wasn't familiar with at all.

8:11It was all really strange. And it all came to a head, really, when I walked into the office one Monday morning for the usual Monday morning team meeting and pretty much turned around and walked back out again and said to Steve, Steve I think I'm done. And it wasn't something that I chose or something that I even thought about or something that I even suspected was going to happen. I think what happened now with the hindsight of almost 12 months was that all of these symptoms, these physical symptoms that have been building up you might i'd ignored the psychological ones and i just and i just ground on through the physical ones just went fella stop yeah enough it was just the body saying stop it and as i say i had no choice or control over this whatsoever and you didn't go in with a plan to say i'm done no absolutely not it just came from somewhere it It came from somewhere, but it very much needed to come.

9:18And it was absolutely the right thing to do. And without exaggeration, I think, had I not, then I would have found myself in a very, very bad place.

9:31Alex Chisnall:What was the one thing you needed to do to screw it, just do it and get from where you were, maybe climbing in Chamonix, to where you are now with Jotna, given what we've just talked about has happened in the last 12 months? Yeah. lots of small ones, but I suppose the big one is leaving the Marines. Yeah. A career and organization that meant so much to me. A guaranteed future up until the age of 55 with a nice, comfortable pension. Yeah. Deciding without knowledge of actually what I wanted to do. I effectively, artificially created the conditions of chaos by putting my notice in and resigning.

10:14I love that such that I could bring out that side of me that I thought would take me to where I needed to go

10:22Alex Chisnall:that's a really good answer we covered are you currently where you want to be next one would be what piece of advice would you give anybody else who's listening or watching to help them get from where they are to where they want to be difficult because there's a million things you could say but what would one thing said it a few times if you're not already do hard things it doesn't have to be epic you don't have to traverse Antarctica but you can get out of bed every morning at six o 'clock and put your running shoes on and go running in the darkness anyone can do that and it's hard but if you do that enough it becomes a habit and what you start doing is acclimatizing yourself to discomfort you become more able to sit with the emotions fear for example that come along with hard things and far less likely i think to become a passenger to your emotions which is such a great derailer of ambition and dreams being derailed by your ambitions so acclimatize yourself to the path ahead go running in the mornings jump in a cold bath go swimming in the sea like you, whatever it is, just do hard things and make a habit of them.

11:48Alex Chisnall:If this conversation resonated with you, don't just sit there, act on it. Make sure you follow or subscribe for more game-changing conversations. And remember, the only thing standing between you and your business breakthrough is the decision to screw it and just do it.