Jeff

This is The No BS Coaching Advice Podcast, Episode 123. I'm your host Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter and Welcome to Monday! What a Game of Thrones building up to the big battle? And Billions. It seems like there's a battle on every week. But I digress. That isn't the purpose of the show, which is to talk with you about some element of life, the universe and everything.
And let me just start by saying you can listen to the show on anchor.fm. You can listen to it in Apple podcast. You can listen on YouTube, Spotify, wherever you listen to podcasts, this show is out and about.

SEGMENT 1. And let me just start by talking with you about optimism because I think a lot of us, myself included, tend to fixate on problems. In fixating on problems, I know I develop pessimism, What about you?
Do you start feeling as though things are going to, I don't wanna say crashing on you but there's always some problem that you're dealing with. That has been true for me for so many years. When I worked in recruiting, there was always something going on, that I needed to worry about. And, the truth is, there's really very little that I do now. That's not because I coach but because that's the nature of life, and I could worry about things. But most of the time, the things I worry about are really pretty unimportant.
My life isn't going to be any worse or actually any better for having worried about them. I can better serve by focusing on solutions than worrying about potential problems. How about you? Is that what happens with you? You focus on your worry and not on the solutions.
Optimism is like a muscle that needs exercise. And if we can practice being optimistic, then we can handle these situations that we face and, more often than not, we feel better all the way through by handling these problems, because we're not worried about failure, because that's really what happens when we worry. We're focused on solutions. And the fact that throughout most of our lives, I'm pretty good at coming up with solutions to our problems, right? So what are you worried about? What are you feeling pessimistic about? The data contradicts your mind here. Stop paying attention to your mind. All it's doing is getting you to worry about things that you'll be able to figure out.

SEGMENT 2. When I was a boy, I grew up in what I have now nicknamed, "The House of Secrets." My parents shared nothing with my brother and I (Or at least with me. I don't know about my brother) But clearly, I knew nothing of the difficulties that they were experiencing, the headaches that they had with their family, all the other stuff.
Understand these were people who met during World War II. They fled Nazis, they met in Siberia. This was "The House Of Secrets." Nothing was ever shared with me until my father's death bed and then I heard the story of how they met, how they fled, and all the other sorts of stuff. But it didn't teach me the stuff. I shouldn't say, "the stuff" but they didn't really spend time teaching me lessons about how to handle things. I've kind of learned that on my own and in growing up in this House of Secrets, I learned to contain a lot of things, myself, rather than opening up about them.
Now, some of you think that's an okay thing and it may be for you by just found the pressure and the burdens at times to be so overwhelming as to be painful. I've learned over the course of time when I open up and talk things through with people I know love, trust, respect and care about, that's what they feel for me. They get closer to me. They trust me more. And the result winds up being I feel better. And, at times, I get input. At times I just need to be heard and in opening up to us a quote that I heard from Robin Roberts from ABC, "by making my mess, my message, I'm able to effect the change within me and within others, that proves very helpful."
You have people close to you could be a wife, husband, partner, parent who you can talk with and share your lessons with. Your kids if if you have them, because they know we make mistakes. Lord knows, they judge us. Our children judge us from what they think our mistakes are, even if we haven't made them so let's at least acknowledge that we make them. Use them as teaching moments, and, best of all, feel better about ourselves and our lives. And that's that lesson, making your mess your message.

SEGMENT 3. "If you hear people from my past speak of me, keep in mind they're speaking of a person they don't know anymore." Great little meme I saw recently that reminds me of a relationship with a number of my friends who I've known for a long time, who, when I speak with them, who I, when I meet with them, I start off the conversation by asking, "how old are you now?" And I do that because I sometimes forget that a lot of time has passed from the time that I really knew them.
There is one friend. Married. Daughter, great man. I knew him when he was 30 and now is 50. He is a different man that I knew. I know that's true of many and how they see me even though I'm relatively public. I'll just simply say that for many folks, we live with individuals who've been frozen in time, that bear no resemblance to who they are today. Come on, folks. Give them a break. They deserve it just like you do.

SEGMENT 4. "All the world's a stage and all the men (and women) merely players, they have their exits and their entrances. And one man or woman in his time plays many parts."
How about the part of being the leading man or leading lady? Have you tried playing that part or have you barely been satisfied? Or have you really focused your efforts on being a player, a performer on the stage with no special qualities to you?
Come on, folks. Eventually life runs out. Don't you want to know what it's like to be a star? Come on. Seriously, Get out front. Show people what you've got! Stop playing small. Dream big. Dream big and do the things that will help you get there and often it's in the details. But, Heck, most of the time, most of us spend our time being bit players.
Let's get out in front and become stars. Leading men. Leading ladies. Being exceptional.