#123: Alfie Robertson: When AI Destroys Money… What’s Left?

28:57So it wouldn't have made sense day one for me to be like, here's how you stop drinking alcohol or here's how to improve your life. It was more like, here's day one of documenting a 75 day hard challenge where I plan not to drink for the next 75 days. So he's changing the positioning and maybe people who were still going out Friday, Saturday got to live vicariously through and be like, oh, that's what it would be like to wake up Saturday morning, not hung over or Sunday morning, not hung over, because I can see this guy is going running along sunrise. They could live vicariously through that if they weren't willing to take that step yet.

29:28And that's the beautiful thing about documentation. You're highly relatable and someone can actually live through you, live vicariously and get a little taste of what that may be like. Yeah. And then all your friends started to post their content of them partying and then working out as well. It's another way to do it. It's another way to do it. I would say Seb's more of an authority at partying and working out. Yes. What about authenticity? Where does this play a role? Because I think another element where people might go wrong is starting out and then just trying to be someone else. And then And they're just going to be in that shadow of that other person.

30:04Whereas when we look at the uniqueness of people that succeed, it's day and night. And you can see why they've succeeded as well. Where do you think uniqueness and authenticity plays a role? And yeah, what are you guys doing to teach that in the work you do? Yeah. So the first thing we do with every client is understand what's called a USP. And that's your unique selling proposition. And for a lot of people, depending when you're coming in, You're early in that documentation. You may not have things that you're like, oh, I'm really, really good at this. Or I'm like excellent at this. And that's part of it.

30:38And that's absolutely fine. But you will have things that you enjoy. You will have things that you've naturally gravitated towards. And identifying those things for people is part of our job. When we have this thesis of be paid for who you are, there's two components. It's actually discovering who you are first. And that's a real difficult challenge for a lot of people. And that's why I have a lot of respect for people like Tony Robbins, because across fitness, across business, across content coaching, everything I've done, a lot of the time it adheres to life coaching. Michael Smoke puts it best, helping people get out of their own way.

31:11And a lot of people have these limiting beliefs, mental blockers, whatever it is, they're dealing with a whole bunch of deep inner psyche demons that they need to overcome at some point to really unlock who they are. And once people are being honest with themselves that this is actually who I am and what I really stand for, what I'm willing to stand for and against what I'm willing to die on the hill for. Once I have that, the job's easy because now it's just turning those ideas into content. But until you have that, it's very hard to create anything because you don't have any ideas. You've got no engine that you're creating from.

31:46You're sort of coming at it with a purely blank canvas. whereas at least we can arm them with paints and we can understand what colors they're going to paint in and maybe what they're going to paint when we start discovering who they are and for a lot of the people that come in they just haven't asked themselves these questions so we put them through quite a rigorous process of being like who are you what do you stand for what do you stand against what has shaped you what's your expertise what have you lent on who's influenced you in life who do you look to as northern stars what are you running away from what are you running to once I can discover that my job becomes incredibly easy because the skills, the hard skill of creating content is simple to teach.

32:23The soft skills of understanding who you are is very difficult. Yeah. I think there's also an element of execution that needs to be done to find out who you are because you need to find out who you're not as well. Right. And, and, and the actual doing of the thing is the most important thing in my eyes. Like you can plan about doing all of that stuff and think you know who you are, but until you actually get in the weeds and do it, you're not really going to know if that thing's for you or not. You're not going to know if that really aligns with you. Like I think there's a feeling that might be hard to quantify, but you just know that when you're doing something that is aligned with you, you can feel it.

33:07And it feels a lot different than when you're doing something that kind of drains you that isn't really feeling right. And so there's this key element here of actually acting on what you've discovered. Okay, figure out what you like, do all of the things that you're explaining, like figure out your passions, figure out who you are, what your experiences are, but then actually go and do the thing, like get the information that you've now onboarded and then implement it. I think that implementation piece is massive. And that's probably where most people would drop off. They can become aware of the thing, but then actually having the courage to act on it is another whole thing in itself.

33:42100%. I also think probably the things that we speak about, fitness, travel, lifestyle, hanging out with, like everyone loves that stuff, of course. But finding people that are truly passionate about it is important as well. And there's like surface level enjoyment of something. And then there's truly, truly loving it. I don't think you truly, truly need to love it, but it needs to be very close to who you are. And a lot of people try to mirror other people. They may like certain fitness influences. They may like, you know, they may like, for example, Chris Williamson. They may like his content.

34:17They may enjoy consuming his content and think he's got interesting perspectives. But to become Chris Williamson, you have to do the work of reading the quantity of books that Chris Williamson consumes. you have to be you have to have a thirst for information that is parallel to chris williamson which is super rare right and you can tell he has done the hours and i think for a lot of people that haven't done those hours and that's fine again go back to the lens of are you in the doing or the have done but the key there is you may like the outcome you may like the idea of standing on stage influencing millions of people but i'm sure chris william would be the first to tell you that His life's quite lonely.

34:58He's on the road a lot. And he spends so much time internally. You know, he's a very, from what I understand, a very introspective person. And does a lot of work on himself to get to where he is. And you can tell when he speaks that it's coming from a place of a lot of knowledge. And a lot of people aren't willing to do the work to get to the top of the mountain, but they like the view. And it's like, everyone likes the view. No one likes the climb. and it's understanding, okay, if I like the view, what is the climb to get there? Because you can't appreciate the view if you don't also appreciate the climb.

35:33But for a lot of people, we don't get to see the climb and we just see the end outcome, which is the view. Yeah. I wonder what is the main thing that discourages us and gets people off their path? Because like... Just fear of judgment. yeah at the end of the day that's like the biggest thing that's going to stop anyone from doing anything we're told from such a young age as kids we can't do that can't do this gotta wear this can't wear that like we are it's pushed on us from a super young age that we must act a certain way and we must be normal and we need to fit in and most parents the only thing they want for their kids i just pray my kid's normal i just hope he fits in and has friends it is or he or she fits and has friends, like all of those things, which is understandable, right?

36:23Like there's nothing worse than a lonely, isolated child, but some of the greatest minds out there today, and probably the minds that we look up to and revere were the most isolated and the most lonely as children because they weren't normal and they were different and they took a different path. And that is what makes them so exceptional later on. So for a lot of people, it's just fear and judgment and wanting to fit in. How's that polarity? So the most successful people and the people that have achieved the things that we want have lived a life that we don't want. Correct. It's kind of like this.

37:01You got to get there to figure that out though. That's the problem. Everyone tells you, but you've got to get there to figure it out. Yeah. You can only say that once embarked on the journey and achieve the thing because without achieving the thing, it's like, okay, well, like what's the alternative? Like, what are you like, what are you going to do? Just nothing. And like, talk about the people that have succeeded. Like, no, like you've got to actually embark on it. Like of the, how like 4 million people that follow Homozi, those 4 million people, there is probably less than 50 that actually want Homozi's life.

37:35homozy's life is working so ridiculously hard continuously from such a young age putting so much stress and pressure on himself on himself to succeed locking himself in a closet for like 12 to 13 hours like his workspace is this narrow hallway with a computer at the end he could probably count on his hand the days of holidays he set off if any yet we obviously look guinness world record $100 million book sales. We look at all of that and we go, wow, the view from that top of that mountain must be epic. And I'm sure it is. But it's a long climb and it's a hard climb and it's not going to be easy and you're going to be alone and you're going to isolate.

38:18And in the process, you're going to push away nearly everyone you love and care about. And that is the sacrifice to get to the very, very top. And for some people, that's fine. And if you are okay with that and you're willing to take that opportunity cost of if I'm going to go and exceed and achieve something exceptional, I'm going to trade that off. But you need to have that conversation with yourself because so many people just plow in headfirst thinking it's going to be flowers and roses all the way to the top. They think there's going to be some escalator or conveyor belt that is just going to take them all the way to the top and they're going to experience the view without any of the scars.

38:54And that's just not how life works. Yeah. You've got people like Hormozy who are very open about their work and their work ethic and what it takes. And whether you onboard that or not and go, oh, he's doing great. I feel like most people would look at Homo's life and not want Homo's life. I feel like he's an exception to the rule because you just see how ridiculous and how extreme the life is. But we still admire him. We still admire him. We still achieving something great. Correct. Um, I struggle, I struggle when, when I don't see someone that's holistically great. Like I, I'm sure he's holistically great.

39:40He's fit and he's in, in, in shape and all of this, but like, there's this element of, of inspiration I get from someone that has a strong family union that, um, you know, has kids and has like all the things that I want, I guess there's an element of me where I go achieving one thing is something, but being able to achieve all the pillars is one other thing. And I'm really interested in those people. But then you've also got these people that maybe don't document their life as much as Hormozy. They just document the wins and then they show like an extreme highlight reel. And then maybe people get delusional of what it takes to get there.

40:24so then they embark on this journey and and they kind of like see someone that they see online and they go yeah i would love that life and so then they maybe like try and do it not realizing how hard it is and then they drop off because they go oh this is fucked like this is this is quite hard i'm just fascinated by this pillar of like what are the motives for people if we remove the fear of failure what are the actual and the fear of being perceived i guess like what are the things that are actually holding people back? Like what are the things that are like, like stopping people from achieving the lives that they want, I guess.

40:58So I'm intrigued to understand this because you're working with thousands of creators of people that are joining these programs, wanting the outcome, but then maybe not following through on the actual process. Yeah, but it comes down to like desire and sacrifice. Like if your why is big enough, you're going to get out of bed in the morning. It's hard to get out of bed in the morning, but if your back is against the wall and your wire is big enough your sacrifice will increase enough to succeed that desire right and that's like we see this time and time again like waking up at 4 a.m every single morning is difficult for a lot of people but if you have to wake up 4 a.m because you're required to be a job at 5 a.m to put food on the table for your family you are going to get up at 4 a.m no matter what and it's that whole you know i think andy elliott said it where he's like, if your kids were hostage and they had a gun to their head, like, you know, obviously an incredibly extreme example of like sales, but you're going to get the job done is the point.

41:55So it's either reduce your desire or increase your sacrifice. And those are really the options that you have. But I think it's also a pendulum of what does that look like and how much am I willing to sacrifice? So I think for me, over time, I've learned that there are things that I won't compromise on. I will still look after my health. I will still make time for Brie, for my family. There's some core things in me that I'm actually like, if that means I'm not as great as I set out to be and not one of the greats or don't like, I have no ambition to be a billionaire at all. And I may sound stupid for a lot of people listening and go, well, the chances were slim and they are, but I have no ambition to get to that level of wealth.

42:34I do not need billions of dollars, 50, a hundred million. Fantastic. That is awesome. But I'm not willing to make the additional sacrifice to put an extra zero, a couple extra zeros in my bank account, because there's no real upside for that. The desire is not there. So the sacrifice won't come with that either. So this is really understanding the pendulum of where you sit. In regards to the coaching and helping other creators, coaches, entrepreneurs build brands, what I've realized is in the hierarchy of my job as a coach, a lot of it comes down to accountability. These people, the people we work with sometimes either haven't been able to calculate how much sacrifice it will take or aren't willing to sacrifice enough out of their day.

43:20So either we help them work out what they are willing to sacrifice because a lot of people say, oh, I don't have time for this. I don't have time for that. And when you actually put someone's time down over a week of how they're spending each 24 hours, nearly everyone says, oh, I've actually got time for that. The other side is how do we, from an Atomic Habits James Clear principle, build systems around someone to make it really easy for them to be successful? So something we now do is we dashboard everyone who comes in and we scrape their entire Instagram and we know when they stop posting. When they stop posting, we build workflows and automations off that.

43:55So we can see number of posts versus when they started and we see all the follower growth, the likes, the comments, pretty much everything on their page. When they stop posting, we can build workflows on that. So we can essentially build like a safety net and being a great coach, that is your job, is to build a safety net. Same if it's fitness. If someone falls off and doesn't and misses a workout, your job as a coach is to be the safety net of accountability. Because if you're paying for a coach, a lot of the time, you're either paying for the information that you want some specific piece of information that they have that you haven't been able to find.

44:28But in reality, nearly everything is available on the internet. just ask chat gpt like it's going to give you a pretty good answer the information is available free or at a very low cost whatever chat gpt subscription is the real thing you pay for is accountability and that accountability is that hey i'm going to be honest i'm not ready to hold myself accountable to hit that finish goal or to build this business the way that i want to to work hard enough on it so i'm going to pay you a sum of money that when the going gets tough you'll remind me on my why. You're essentially going to come and wake me up at 4am and say, hey, buddy, time to get out of bed.

45:02Time to go to work. I know you don't want to. I know that you'd rather roll over and go to sleep, but that's why you paid me to get you out of bed. So that's sort of our job. Yeah. There's this fascination I have here about your no desire to be a billionaire. Why do I need a billion dollars? You've also in your whole YouTube series at the start, you say life design matters more than$100 million. But then I think there was one time I saw you say something around like life design matters more than$100 million, but you can achieve both or something like this. Yeah, we're getting pretty close at changing the way.

45:43I mean, we're having a bit of a shift fundamentally in the company right now. So I run an education company, right? And we're transitioning that into a SaaS software business where, as I said, we're building dashboards, operating systems for creators and coaches to make sure that they don't fall off, to make sure that they have the right information available to them. So it's been a whole redesign of the product. Problem with education systems and where 99 % of education systems go wrong is they give you 100 % of the information. Whereas if you look at your phone, you don't use 100 % of that phones as a product.

46:15Use 5%. But the 5 % is so good that the other 95 % does not matter at all. You don't care that you don't see the other 95%. Why would you? The 5 % that you use is amazing. And that's the great thing about a great product, right? And the problem is in education businesses, a lot of the time, they don't look at it as a product business. They look at it as a service. And in a service, you're like, hey, I'm a Swiss army knife. Use me however you want. I'll give you 100 % of anything. But a Swiss army knife is useless if you needed a very specific tool because you're going to be fumbling around finding which part of the Swiss army knife to use.

46:50so for us it's how do we go into creating a specific tool that served at the right time so i've redesigned the whole product to be like how can i give you five percent that is really useful and then yes the other 95 is there but it's only going to be there when you need it i'm not going to overwhelm you and if i go back to other education systems like tertiary education university i just recently spoke at the university of texas if a student is in the back of class talking to his mate on his laptop, not arriving to class, is that a bad student or a bad teacher? Well, for me, that's a bad system.

47:26So for us, our job as coaches is identifying that student that's at the back of class, is disengaged with the program, and it's dragging them. And the next lesson, they're at the front of class. And that is why parents pay so much for private education, right? Because they know that they are going to get a better sense of care, a better level of due diligence from teachers that are paid more because this education system is run under a private organization that can afford more attentive students and probably smaller class sizes as well. So we take the same approach. It's about building a system around people.

48:00And we're also transitioning from an education business, which has very small multiples to an operating system, which is SAS, which can give you a very high multiple. So then suddenly we take the revenue we're doing today, when we put that into a SaaS, suddenly our valuation's getting pretty close to that$100 billion. I'm fascinated to know about the transition in mindset from maybe early days in business to being a little bit more established and the desires that you have because you see this element of like, once you climb one mountain, you look up and there's another big one staring at you and it's just the goalposts keep seeming to get further and further.

48:44And at lunch yesterday, you were explaining how like your ability to change when priorities change and maybe, you know, when you want to be a father, the best thing you can do to be a father is not be working all day. And you were saying it in a lens that I hadn't heard you say it before because I think I'd known you more in this like go, go, go business nature. And I thought you might've resonated more with maybe like the homosies or the people where they're like working till their eyeballs bleed. And it was quite a refreshing lens that you were explaining yesterday around just your perspective on priorities and where your focus goes.

49:29Has there been a transition in your mindset and your outlook on how you're approaching business and life over the past 12 months or so? Or has it been like this the whole time? Like looking at a mirror, day on day, you're not going to see the change. But if I zoom out and look over six months or 12 months, I think that has. It's the realization that the more money you make doesn't really change anything. I have a lack of expensive taste, a lack of expensive desire. I don't even own a car. So for me, earning the difference between earning$50 ,000 to$500 ,000 a month doesn't really change anything.

50:05I can still go and do all the things that I want to do. I can still go travel. I can look after my family. I can look after Bree. That really are my priorities and the things that I need to fulfill at the base level. If I have a roof over my head, maybe it's a slightly nicer roof than when we first started. But if I have food on the table, still eating the same food because I always prioritize that. If I can still go and train at 10 a.m., which I could do before, I'm very happy. It doesn't take much to fulfill me. Building the gym, which people may look at that gym and be like, oh, it's not like a fancy gym.

50:36Building a gym that has a pull-up bar nailed to a brick wall and has a free weight rack gives me more fulfillment than any Ferrari, any fast car ever will. Every time I walk past that gym and I see Amplify's gym, I see the big kangaroo that we've got on there, it puts a smile ear to ear because I know that from the very beginning, that is all Jake and I wanted. It's just our own space where we could train topless and be barefoot. And we have that now. And it makes me so happy. It brings me so much joy, almost childish joy to be just lying in there, bathing in my own glory of a place. And I'm just so happy for that.

51:17And I think if you can allow things like that, that yes, it took a bit of money to put together and we had to put the turf in, but relative to the things that other people spend their money on, it's not very expensive. But if that can give you joy and happiness, you're going to be in such a good place because you're not operating from scarcity and you're not constantly chasing of, oh, what do they have over there? It's like, they don't have this. This is what it's all about. And also knowing what that is going to represent in terms of having people around, being able to host, have people. You know, we used to run Coffee and Chill where we brought people together.

51:51We had to stop running it because it was so difficult to find venues. We've now got a venue. We can have people around for saunas, ice baths. People can use the gym. Like that for me to have a space where people are welcomed in to train, to move freely and to connect with each other. I cannot wait for all the amazing conversations that are going to be had in that sauna. Makes me happy. I think if we tie into this authenticity piece, I think this is the superpower because you've identify what makes you happy and you're okay if people don't align with it it's like this is me it's who i am i don't need the fancy car i don't need this and this is me and that would be quite a liberating place to arrive at because i mean make make good money be fit and healthy have connection in your life, a loving partner, great friends.

52:55You can't ask for too much more, right? Like you've arrived in a state that is like the pinnacle in a sense. Do you feel that? Yeah, it feels amazing. I'm incredibly happy. I think it took a while to get here. And there was still hard work, right? At the end of the day, I had to go through the trials and tribulations. I love, I'm reading the creative act by Rick Rubin. And it says the art has a profound impact on people. And through art and through the connection of art, the artist and the audience both have the ability to heal. And I love that. And when I read that page, I just reflected on my own journey.

53:40Because for me, content creation is an art form. Creating content, creating real, sharing that with your audience is an art form. And there's a connection and a bond between that. And through that, not only did it inspire other people, hopefully help them to heal in their own lives or change their lives. It also helped me heal. And there's this beautiful mutual benefit that came from putting my life out online. What's nice is it's only the beginning. For me now, it's in the stage of taking what we have learned and building amazing systems and technology around what we're doing. because I think for everything, I sort of see technology as like this highest unlock in terms of scale and removing, again, bad student, bad teacher relationship because if you build a really good system around that, it doesn't matter.

54:32Even if someone comes in and struggles to learn or struggles to commit themselves, if you've built amazing infrastructure around that, you can still help that person and help them succeed. And I took the same approach when I was doing fitness coaching. It's the same philosophy. It's not, No one is ever unhealthy because they have, no one ever eats bad food because they have McDonald's in front of them and a steak. It's that the steak was never there. So then you've got to ask, well, why wasn't the steak there? So, well, it wasn't in the fridge. So why was it on the fridge? Well, it wasn't in the grocery list.

55:04And where was the McDonald's? I was on the drive home from work and it was incredibly accessible. So it comes down to when you want to create change and that's really what we're trying to do. We're trying to help people create change in their life by creating content and making it easier for people, or we're trying to help people get fit by access. It's a behavioral change. And to drive behavioral change, they need to become the person that behaves in the right way. So the person that's healthy is always going to have steak in the fridge. Probably some vegetables as well, but they're going to have steak in the fridge.

55:36The person that's a great creator is going to have a tripod in their gym bag, and they're always going to bring it to the gym. And there's going to be a tripod set up in their house. is going to be so easy and accessible that making content is easy. And when I think about making content, it's like, well, what would a great creator do? Well, a great creator would post every day, they'd engage with their community and then respond to their comments. So it's like, okay, well, how do we get to posting every day? Well, they'd have something to post. How do we have something to post? Well, they'd have ideas on what to create and they'd allocate time in their calendar to edit.

56:09And if you start working backwards and go, oh, it's just like a time scheduling thing. They just never put enough time in their calendar and they leave it till the end of the day. It's like, cool, well, let's fix that. And once we've locked in that time, brilliant. Now we've set them up for success. Can't expect someone to be successful if all of their systems, infrastructure, everything around them is pushing them in the wrong direction. Yeah. It's this root cause and using common sense and logic. Which is rare these days. Unfortunately. But common sense and logic goes a long way when you think about these things.

56:46It's funny how when you actually break things down with common sense and logic, you can get to the answer pretty easily. You can really understand why pretty easily. Okay, you're not eating McDonald's over the steak, particularly because you like the McDonald's more. It's just the fact that they're not both there presented to you. Okay, so why not? Which is why if you do actually look at, say, obesity and more major macro-level health problems, it does come down to access. And it's a socioeconomic divide because of access and availability, which is a really hard thing to tackle. But I'm bullish that AI will solve a lot of these problems.

57:30Why do you think in-person connection is so important? you've been constantly since the get-go trying to create an omni-channel presence where you can bring the people from the online realm into the physical realm everything you do online is reflective of what you do offline so you can't have a great online presence if you're not doing things offline and again it's also to do with that internal work piece kind of great external appearance if you haven't done the internal work offline for me is that really important pillar that a lot of people don't address and don't build around because it's hard and it's difficult and it's not scalable.

58:06But doing that, one, is a point of difference. But also, it's what feeds everything else. That's the stuff that then you put online. They're incredibly, they're amazing content moments. And people understand this. You know, big brands understand this. That's why they invest so much in these PR events. It's why run clubs have taken off so much because so many brands have identified that as an amazing way to engage in community and then it built on top of that as well. I also think in the next five years, we are in potentially what I believe to be the end of offline experience. I think over the next five years, we have a short window before VR and virtual reality gets so immersive that why would we go to the effort of setting up the lights, putting this table, dragging this table down here to Bondi when we could click our fingers and be in a virtual reality world, similar to Mark Zuckerberg and Lex Friedman on their podcast, where it is completely virtual.

59:06We can smell the salt. We can feel the breeze in our hair. It feels like I'm here. We've got full, you know, suits on us, hazmat, hazmatics, whatever you'd call them, where, you know, when I shake your hand, I can feel, I can feel the touch. I can feel the calluses on your hand. Everything is so identical. cool. Why would we go to the effort, right? Of course we wouldn't. You'd probably still be over in the US. There's no need for you to come here. And then it's like, okay, well, why go to the Great Wall of China when you could go and you could step on the cobblestones? Not only that, you could look over the edge and you could see the Mongolian empire coming up over the hill.

59:41The experience of online is going to get so good, so immersive. It is going to be better than what we are doing offline. And for me, that's very risky for humanity because we will be consumed by that and i reckon the next five years we're going to be in that fully probably less and i think there will be a decline completely of doing anything offline because why would you if you think world travel we're causing so much issue so many issues with the quantity of planes that are flying all around all the pollution etc etc why not just make travel available to everyone inside their VR world. And they can go travel anywhere in the world.

1:00:21Are you optimistic about that? I'm not optimistic on the outcome, but I'm optimistic it's going to happen. Because I think there's this calling and this pull back to nature. You feel that because we're old now. We are a generation that's going to be left behind. Yeah. The new generations that are coming through, we have a calling back to that because that's how we were raised. But the generation coming through is going to be raised on VR headsets. If you want your kid to stop crying, a bit like we put them in front of iPads today, they will be in VR headsets. It's a scary thought, but it's going to happen.

1:01:07They're going to be fully consumed. You're going to watch movies in 3D. you know you you were going to be able to move around movie sets like an open map they are going to be amazing it is going to be incredible and it's going to be so much better than real life we're going to know that real life deep down is better because part of us is going something's not right here but i don't think they're going to have the privilege if you have a three-year-old or even younger from day dot consumed in vr they're going to have a distorted view on what reality is their reality is probably going to be a digital world I wonder the only way if this could work would have to be if it aligns with biology and it actually works.

1:01:50Like if they can mirror, you know, us, the effects our body gets when we hit sun. They've already done this. They've already done this. In terms of they'll put you, Huberman has it in his laboratory. He put David Goggins in it. And it's like a full immersive VR and you go in And it's like you're inside a great white shark tank, you know, where you're in one of those barred up great white shark tanks and the physiological change, people get the adrenaline like they're actually in the tank, like a great white shark is there. And they've noted the physiological change on their skin, their heart rate increases.

1:02:32Like it's scary. You know, like when you're watching a horror movie, you get scared, right? We believe that it's real. we can't delineate between what and that's on a screen imagine when you're in a vr headset of course you're going to think it's real if something jump scares you on your phone you get scared imagine you're in this world you are going to believe it's real a hundred percent and then also with the the way that i believe it will look i'm sort of imagining a world where we get in these suits or maybe it's a bit more like avatar i don't know the ways that it's going to be I'm not sure, but it's definitely going to be real and our bodies will react as if it is real.

1:03:13100%. Yeah. See, for me, I wonder, the question then becomes, and I'm intrigued to even unpack this and just go, if we know that and we want to resort back to nature and we want to be a part of nature, then we have kids surely the way we would parent them would be to try and keep them into nature and maybe refrain from them having screens and ipads and all this stuff but then would that be doing them a disservice because then they wouldn't fit in because if everyone else is doing it and then like do we need to accept just like the internet and like ai and all that like do we need to accept it in order for everyone moving forward to be able to function in in the society because like it's like we can't deny that it's going to happen and so maybe just like how our parents are being safe with us and telling us to do a certain thing because they don't understand the new information and the new opportunity that we have would we be those same parents in a different realm I'm refraining.

1:04:23Yeah, it's been like restraining social media until people are 16 or 17, whatever it is in Australia. It's been like parents restraining laptop usage. You know, I didn't get Facebook until I was 15 or whatever it was. I can't remember. Again, it's like, how much do you want your child to be behind? Like, do you let your child play video games? Do you not? You know, this is an age-old argument that's gone on for a long time, whenever there's innovation. But it's a bit like, When you were a kid, do you remember feeling like, oh, my parents don't understand, like they don't understand the technology.

1:04:58They don't understand social media. And I remember being like that as a kid and just thinking in my head, oh, when I'm a parent, I'm going to be so up with the times. I'm going to like, you know, I'm always going to be in the know. And it's like, even now, like I'm, I'm outdated. Like things that 14, 15, 16 year olds are consuming and understand about even things around blockchain. and nfts and all of that rise like they are far more knowledgeable than us so we do fall out of touch we're probably the final generation that will be really connected to nature and really push for the importance of offline because we've lived in an era where the online doesn't mirror you know we would do this on zoom today it's not going to be as good right it's not going to be as enjoyable it's not going to be as engaging the conversation won't be as good the feeling won't be there but i'm talking about a future where the online experience will far surpass the offline why would we go to the effort that you've gone to today when we can get the perfect lighting the perfect sunrise the perfect ocean breeze the perfect table set up at the snap of our fingers.

1:06:19Yeah, well, I wonder why people still buy real diamonds when there's fake ones that look even better and more perfect. Because they've been raised by parents that still believe in real diamonds. But what happens when that fades out? This is how traditions fade out over time. Synthetic diamonds have only been created relatively recently, the last five to ten years. So we're only just seeing it. And look at the adoption rate. that's a more scary figure look how many people have adopted non-real diamonds yeah so we spoke last on the pod start of this year i think it was jan or february what's changed in your life since since then has there been any pivots has there been any any changes in your life since since jan it's a massive year of travel really good reflection on what i want where i want to take I think in February, we were really just kicking off and it was starting to all move.

1:07:17Now we've solidified that movement, started really building. And the company's grown massively in terms of headcount as well. So I've brought people in. That transition from founder to CEO has meant removing myself operationally from a lot of the business and working out where I want to play and almost this full circle coming back to content creation being the most important part. and you found appreciation for Bondi the longer you leave this place the more you come back to it and appreciate it I know you experienced the same when you came here and just stronger connections and friendships was really fortunate to travel and meet great people in each city each location and have that privilege to connect with them and see them in their home environment which was really nice it's been good it's been a great year yeah i i wrote something yet i read it to you yesterday um i'll pull it up and the it kind of represent i was i was spitballing and just trying to understand the position that maybe i'm in at the moment living that very traveled life this year but not really having a home base to call home and not really having a I mean I haven't had the partner I haven't had the brie and then maybe like a friend group at home because I haven't had a home as well and so there's been like that one element missing and it was funny I was writing this thing and at the end of the thing I was like I think the only way out of this is a strong connection with a romantic relationship and some good brotherhood around you.

1:09:04I'll read it again. And it just made me think about your life and go, yeah, that's what you've done really well. And you've always done that really well, being able to keep the friends around you, regardless of the growth and the insane growth that you've had. it's not like a thing that a lot of people can relate to, but you've always found a way to relate and connect with all your friends and keep the friends. It's been really, really cool. But I'll read this again and then it'll help tie it in. I said, success has a strange duality. You work so hard to become someone people admire, only to realize the climb slowly disconnects you from the very people you wanted to feel seen by.

1:09:51You gain status, followers, momentum, yet lose the simple connection you once had. People assume you're too busy, so friends and family stop calling, and you drift further into isolation while everyone insists you're living the dream. The pursuit keeps pushing you away from being relatable until success starts to feel hollow. Some say religion is the answer. I'm not there yet. I believe to stop this connectionless pursuit to obtain success is to do it with others on the same mission. A few key brothers that live in close proximity and a wife by your side the whole way. Because without that, the journey to the top only gets lonelier the more you climb.

1:10:30And I'm just feeling this sense of the only way to unlock the wholeness, I guess. For me, I'm feeling is the connection piece of who I have around me and who I'm spending that with. And even just recently meeting someone that like I really, really like gives me this light into that of, oh shit, like this is what that, that's that piece that I feel like I'm, when my head hits the pillow, I may be lacking something. And it's not mission. It's not purpose. It's not like getting up and having something to strive towards. I think it's like this other connection element that I maybe lacked. And I feel like that's something that you've been able to do really well?

1:11:17Do you think that's been something that you've kind of always been able to maintain and keep in your life? Or has it only been recently? It depends where you operate out of. I think you have to operate out of some level of certainty in where you're going and what you're going to achieve with the balance of, I need to haul ass to achieve it. Yeah. And that's the difficulty is that the hauling ass to achieve it, you have no time for anyone else because you are just pushing, pushing so hard to make this dream a reality.

1:11:55It's a difficult thing to balance, but it comes with time. And I think it comes with being more secure in your position and where you are, which is hard when you're really steaming up that mountain. But I think finding people and finding a way to relate to people is incredibly important. I mean, you go around the world speaking to some of the top people, right? Exceptional, exceptional people. But because you are moving around so much, it's hard to connect with these people long term. And that's just part of it as well. If you put yourself in a position geographically and on a too short of a time horizon to really connect with people, it's going to be hard.

1:12:41So at some point, I think there's going to be a lot of benefit in your life to settle in one place, at least for some period of time. I'm still big on travel, still big on exploring, but having roots and a home base allows you to do that. And Bondi has always been that for me. Yeah. That conviction, confidence, clarity that you know where you're going is the key. and deep down I already know that all of those things are like it's all going to happen at some point you just get to this point where you just go like things feel fleeting are you focusing on the right things x y and z and I don't know I think for me I've just I've just constantly been trying to look well beyond just one pillar of life it's like I want to I want to understand how I get to peak performance in my health, in my relationships, in my business and career.

1:13:40But don't over optimize and under humanize. Humans aren't meant to be perfect. Humans aren't meant to be peak performance in everything. It's a lie. But defining peak performance, because I think for me, the way I would see peak performance is being able to actually feel like I'm doing something, I'm giving it my effort and I actually feel good about the thing too. Like I don't, I feel, I feel like I'm doing the right thing that serves me that feels good because like there's peak performance in something that you don't like. And yeah, we have to do things every now and then maybe that we don't like to do, but I I'm, I'm more like looking at assessing life and looking at life mastery and trying to apply what I'm doing towards that.

1:14:30Like I want to be able to, yeah, like I want to be able to be more holistic with my stuff. And I think the moment that I am too consumed by trying to show up in a certain way, I think, I think that it won't get me any closer to that. But look at who define mastery. Monks, right? Like top monks, you know, and look at their life. do you want the view of a master do you want the climb of a master that's what you have to ask yourself it's the acceptance that being good is okay and that's really hard to tell someone who is incredibly ambitious and i'm the same i want to be great i want to be exceptional sure but i've also realized good is okay as well and coming to terms with that has made me so much happier and that's where you hear it in my voice not having this like climb climb climb and maybe you do need to see a bit of the view and it's also looking up the mountain being like you know I could go further but I'm happy here yeah and that's fine and that's really rare in today's era because we celebrate just the dying on that hill climbing we would rather celebrate that than celebrate someone accepting the view of where they are, appreciating it, having a bite with a couple of mates at the halfway point, and then heading down and calling it a date because we call that mediocrity.

1:15:58But I call that happiness. Yeah. I defeated a guy, Luke, and he's like, he's like, do you need to climb Mount Everest in the one way and go through all of the pain that it takes to get to the top of Everest? Or is walking around Everest just as fulfilling? Like maybe you like go for a little walk and you do some hikes and you stop in the sun and lay down on the grass. And I like this frame of being able to see beyond the one thing that's commendable. I mean, even Chris Williamson, he talks about he's trying to spend more time appreciating small wins that, you know, small wins don't feel acceptable to appreciate because they're only a small win.

1:16:50So we brush them away like they're nothing. And we only need these massive trophies for us to actually get a tap on the, a pat on the back and, and appreciate the things that we have. Um, but maybe there's more power in being able to appreciate the small wins because then you don't feel like you need all this stuff in order to feel gratified and to feel good about what you're doing in your life. What about just appreciating? It doesn't have to be a win to appreciate it. That's the problem. If you try to appreciate small wins, you're still appreciating when you're moving forward. So you're still saying like, oh, I still need to take that first step up the mountain.

1:17:31That's what I'm going to appreciate. That I took the first step from where I was on the next climb. But what about where you are right now? Yeah. I think it, I think it, it potentially could be fleeting though. Like you can appreciate where you're at right now. And, and that's where we access every time back into late Hamilton. Like when we can be present, that's where we're most happy, but we're also not supposed to be stagnant. Like, I don't think we're stagnant beings. Like we're supposed to have something to strive towards in whatever realm that is. It doesn't maybe need to be success in business.

1:18:08We might be putting our focus towards family or whatever it is. And having some level of intention to progress in our life, I think is really important for that fulfillment piece. Because if we're stagnant for too long, I feel like we're going to be stuck in this place. I think maybe removing the progress solely from just like business external, that realm, and actually just assessing your whole life and seeing you progressing in any realm. And I think if we're curious enough and we are letting like the soul lead the way, naturally we will progress. But maybe it's just removing it from the things that maybe are deemed to be successful and looking more broadly and applying it to our life as a whole.

1:18:54Yeah, I'd agree with that. Yeah. Thank you for coming on, dude. My pleasure. Bondi, different set. Tried something new and put this together. Is there anything you want to say before we wrap up? No, I appreciate it. I've loved your journey. Obviously, going from living together, it feels like a very full circle moment, being here, sitting opposite each other with this beautiful backdrop. And yeah, I've enjoyed watching it and I'll enjoy continue watching it and seeing you grow it. Likewise, dude. I think there's a... For me, I look at certain people that I gain inspiration from and you know there's people that are more of a coach and they're an expert at one specific thing maybe and you go to them to get that one specific thing then there's then there's people that are more broad and they can kind of help you with overall life and give you perspective and I think you're one of those people for me it's just it's always interesting to soundboard, see what you're doing, get different perspectives.

1:19:59I would say that you're probably in the 97 percentile of disagreeableness. You're always willing to like go back and challenge each other. And so, yeah, I appreciate you for that. And yeah, thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Signing out. We'll see you guys very, very soon. Bye-bye. Most of us are one good deal away from finally replacing that worn out rug, fixing up the backyard, or getting the bedroom we actually want. Good news, that deal's almost here. Wayfair's Black Friday in July sale. Get up to 80 % off area rugs and up to 60 % off outdoor and bedroom furniture. Shop Wayfair's huge selection of styles and find the piece to fit your style, budget, and space.

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