Forging Resilience
Join us as we explore experiences and stories to help gain fresh insights into the art of resilience and the true meaning of success.
Whether you're seeking to overcome personal challenges, enhance your leadership skills, or simply navigate life's twists and turns, "Forging Resilience" offers a unique and inspiring perspective for you to apply in your own life.
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Forging Resilience
25 Tom Foxley: "I was cycling home from school one day and my heart just stopped"!
Our latest episode features Tom Foxley, an inspiring former Royal Marine who redefined himself as a coach for elite athletes and entrepreneurs. His gripping tale weaves through childhood adversities and physical challenges, emerging into a profound understanding of mental fortitude and leadership.
As Tom shares his experiences, we discover the powerful synergy between sensitivity and strength and how it shapes transformative leadership.
We venture into the world of personal development with him, dissecting the paradox of imposter syndrome and complacency.
As we close the conversation, Tom takes us into the communal and introspective journey within CrossFit and his entrepreneurial ventures. Each story is a brushstroke in the portrait of a life lived intentionally, highlighting the tools and strategies—from breathwork to the psychological understanding of our vagus nerve—that can profoundly alter our life's trajectory.
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Welcome to Forging Resilience, exploring for a different perspective on strength and leadership. Join me as we discuss experiences and stories with guests to help gain fresh insights around challenge, success and leadership.
Speaker 2:Tom welcome to Forging Resilience buddy. Thank you so much for having me. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. No worries, mate.
Speaker 1:Tom, you've reached out to me. You're an ex-fellow Royal Marine and now you're helping entrepreneurs create total freedom to do more cool shit.
Speaker 2:That sounds like quite an interesting statement, mate. How did you get to that? It's a long journey, one that involves a heart condition, involves psychological problems as a kid, yeah, the Royal Marines, and then eventually to where I am now coaching some elite crossfit athletes. There's a lot in there, but I kind of. If you want to dive into any of those areas, we can do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely, mate, definitely. So, for people that might not know, you give us a bit of your background, sure man.
Speaker 2:So I think it is kind of useful to share that process. So as a kid I was very anxious, very like I was heavily bullied as a kid, like not in a great place mentally and emotionally. Around 14 or 15 years old, I was cycling home from school one day and my heart just stopped and I was like lying on the side of the road thinking this is it, this is the end of whatever's going to happen. Were you aware you had a heart condition up at this point? Okay, nope, it was just. I was a normal kid, a bit anxious, but stressed out, um, and kind of not particularly happy, but that was what was going.
Speaker 2:Going on time my heart just stopped, like I just felt this swelling pressure on my chest and, weirdly enough, I was right next to my grandchild's.
Speaker 2:So I just put my bike down and lay on the side of the road with all these cars going past and it was probably like the movies, with consciousness fading in and it was like, well, maybe this is it. And at that point my heart just clicked back in but went to 240, 250, 260 beats a minute, which, if anyone knows anything about heart rate, that usually isn't a good sign. You're meant to be 220 minus. Your age is meant to be your maximum. So it was well above that. Well above that and, as in the same kind of process, as soon as I was like whoa, this is crazy, I think I'm having a heart attack, it stopped again and it was that again, like the movies, like a, and I'm back, cycled home, got home and that started a long investigation as to what was happening with my health Going to cardiologists, running on treadmills with electrodes all over you, seeing live beating scans of your heart which is the coolest thing ever but like it's kind of worrying at the moment.
Speaker 2:I was temporarily diagnosed with the least positive prognosis ever, which is sudden death syndrome. It's like, okay, we're worried, you've got sudden death syndrome. The look on my mom's face was obviously not what you want to be told about your 14 year old and favorite son. So there's, that was a challenging time. It turns out well, a year later or so, they're like we don't know, there's nothing physiologically wrong with your heart. Like we've looked, every chamber is functioning it should be, every valve is functioning as it should be. The electrical like signals are exactly as it should be. We don't know what's going on. Looking back at it, it's so obvious it was psychosomatic. So the amount of anxiety I was experiencing was having this physiological impact on literally the way my heartbeat and was causing kind of some significant problems. Interestingly, though, that triggered my interest in what is it that makes us do what we do? How does, like this anxiety and stress and mental state affect our physiology and vice versa? So it's a blessing and a curse thing. Yeah, well, I, I guess it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your mindset and it's how you look at that situation, or how you choose to see it, isn't it?
Speaker 2:I guess you now get to look at it through that lens and you want to use that to help other people. But what, what, what do?
Speaker 1:you think led to to kids picking on you or bullying you, tom, if you could.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's a good question. I was like I was always told I was too sensitive. It was like you're too quiet, you're too sensitive, you just need to be tougher. And I think honestly I'm just a deep thinker and I am very sensitive which kind of goes against, I think, most people's expectations of people who have been in the military albeit for a very short time for me, but it was still like, I think goes against expectations as well and also what's societally valued at the moment and seen as tough, especially like 90s kid yeah, well, I think, yeah, we, we made, we'd made the assumption that that sensitive is is weak and and yeah, I probably slot into the same boat as you there and maybe not the same deep thinker, but I the ability to feel, I I choose to see it now as something that I'll recognize things before most people do.
Speaker 1:Did you?
Speaker 2:try and turn that down for a bit. Did you try and like ignore that?
Speaker 1:I joined the SAS, mate, yeah. Yeah, of course I did Find masculinity yeah, trying to play into the tough lad and, yeah, ironman rugby, yeah, and anything I could to prove myself to the to the world, yeah, definitely. But I.
Speaker 2:I now recognize I can do both. So, yeah, do you reckon that was so? I always think about this as we're either trying to kind of shut that down, shut that kind of I see it as the, the feminine, so the yin to the yang, like we're going to shut that down, I'm not going to look at it at all, or I'm going to try and build the masculine. And I think there was like this voice in my head saying you've got to build that party, the grit, the determination, the mental toughness, the fortitude, like basically everything that's on on the royal marines kind of ethos, yeah, and just like you build that and like that's going to be a fantastic way.
Speaker 2:But I got it mixed up. I think I originally thought I had to shut that part of me down in order to build the other part. I couldn't have both. Yeah, yeah, it's interesting you say that, I think because I always felt I was different, but I never knew that was okay. You know, I always thought I had to fit a very, it's just the way life shaped my perspective of who I was.
Speaker 1:I don't think anything had gone wrong. As I've said many times, it's just the way that I, young Aaron, young Ron, got to see the way that things were going on. Um so, in terms of your heart condition, mate, so how does, how did?
Speaker 2:that develop then from from getting that diagnosis as a young 14-year-old lad to having sudden death syndrome. Yeah, so I was. Eventually, I said it's probably not sudden death syndrome because you're not dead, yeah.
Speaker 2:And they're like well, thanks, doc. Cheers to that, I appreciate it. And at that point I was very fit, like running was my thing, cricket was my fit, like running was my thing, cricket was my thing, football was my thing, like basically any quintessentially english sport. I did it and that was a big part of my life. But I lost that, I lost my confidence, I lost kind of who I was at that point and I just kind of turned inward for about three, four years until I met a bootneck called bear, and you might have met him at some point if you spent any time. Um, dan paul, um, he knows cy pretty well.
Speaker 1:Okay, no, I don't, I don't know him you might know of him.
Speaker 2:But yeah, um, the stories I've heard of him are just him clearing compounds, hip firing a gpmg, um, so that's like his kind of standard, his standard if he's got one. So, um, yeah, I met him. Lucky enough, he was doing some gardening, landscaping for my parents and he was back from afghan for um, I think it was r&r at that time or something. I don't know how he got back there, um, but I was kind of infatuated because at that point it was like, oh, there's the masculine, he's also essence, he's a really good looking bloke, um, so you're like, oh, man, like that's the masculine, he ran everywhere and that's like, that's strange.
Speaker 2:That was my first kind of introduction to the military and at the same time I read a book called bounce by matthew sayed, which introduced the 10 000 hour rule, and that showed me that I was in control of who I wanted to become if I was deliberate and intentional, with 10,000 hours worth of practice. So really it was a question of hey, I can become who I want to become here, I don't have to be this, this kid, and those two things coalesce together and eventually made me go well, maybe I could do, I couldn't do. There's no way I could do that. You do the stand things and look at all the the kind of the marketing that's essentially out there to make you do the stand things. And look at all the the kind of the marketing that's essentially out there to make you join the marines and you go maybe I could, why couldn't I? And that was a big turning point in my life, like, hey, I remember sitting there in front of my computer and going like, huh, why couldn't I do this? That's a different way of looking at it, and I think that was the first real mindset shift I had in my life intentional anyway, yeah. And and how did you? How did you find joining up and training? Yeah, so I was a reservist as well, so that's one thing to think of. So it's a funny thing.
Speaker 2:I went down to to limston and did my regular application process past what was the prmc back then, um, and got offered a place. And while someone was down there they went. You know there's something called the reserves and they shouldn't have told me that Cause I was like, wait, I can stay. I had a girlfriend. He's now my wife, so it was. I was pretty serious and I was like stay with the like, I can be home a little bit more, I can still pursue this personal training and I can get a green lid. It's like, well, yeah, I'm going to do that. And now, looking back at it, you obviously can't reach the same standard of performance. I don't think there's any doubt there. But you do all the same kind of stuff and you have the same-ish final tests, like the command tests are exactly the same. Final X, I think, is a little bit different just because you have to sandwich it into two weeks. But it was that kind of appeal that led me down the reserves and sort of full time and training itself.
Speaker 2:The most difficult thing about training was on a friday morning personal training, sally at 6 am in the morning and going okay, right tonight I've got to go into, can't go on a bus and essentially snap into. I'm a pretend war for three days or two days, two and a half days, and I'm not going to sleep from that personal training session with Sally at 6 am ona Friday morning all the way through to when I see Sally again on Monday morning 6 am. And then you're going to turn up and you've got camcreen all in your face still and you're just gawping. You haven't slept.
Speaker 2:That's the hard thing was, I think in isolation training is pretty difficult. But it's the context switching between regular life going to bed with my then girlfriend at the time on like on the thursday morning, thinking I'm going to see you again on sunday night and I'm just going to be exhausted and I'm just going to be broken and then snapping back into real life and I think each obviously has their challenges. As a reservist in full time, but it's the context switching that's hard. For me, yeah, so did that scratch the itch then? For you, yes, I think so. I also have a few regrets about leaving because I only stayed in for four years and part of me I, I think, wanted the camaraderie piece a little bit more, but being a reservist you don't get that as much. And then being in a satellite detachment cambridge which is great blokes, but it's 20 blokes at a time you don't really get that, that closeness, and I just saw everyone in my troop in my like in cambridge as well, just drop off.
Speaker 2:So it's kind of a little bit not alone in the process, but it would have been nice to have like a few people there with me I think one of the reasons I left is just because I was like I wasn't really getting that, but also I wish I'd stayed in a bit more to show a little bit more grit and to have a more of a career development in there, cause I think I kind of passed that training, did the same exercises for two years and then went there's something else, whereas I think if I'd had a guiding, like if I'd been a bit wise myself, or maybe a bit of guidance to say, stop looking a month down the road and look three years down the road, I think that would have been useful for me at the time yeah, I do wonder as a question coming up I can't quite put it into words yet around that and I just wonder would you have got what you needed, even if you stayed for three years
Speaker 2:and progressed a little bit. I, I do sometimes wonder yeah, I really don't know. I really don't know, because it's also there's a lot of people still in that I know, obviously, and they're always telling me. They're always saying they're gonna leave. They're always saying like I, I'd like, I give it another year, I'll be out, me. It's like, well, you were saying that when I was in. Still, yeah, so I, I don't know there's it's really got its teeth into you once you're in. So I don't, I don't know whether I needed to expand.
Speaker 2:Maybe it did give me what I needed. Maybe it gave me from a personal development point of view. Maybe it showed me this is who I can become and I've not ticked the box, because there's never a box-ticking exercise for me, but maybe I've proved to myself that I'm not weak and I've proved to myself that I'm not weak and I've proved to myself that I can. Did you prove to yourself then, being there, that you weren't weak? Yes, although there's always a little bit of imposter syndrome, but I think it was a little bit of a helpful. A small amount of imposter syndrome is exactly what you need to keep pushing, and I think it was that amount. Maybe a touch more, but I definitely I can look back at that and that and go oh, I'm sat at my desk now having a tough day coaching and yeah, sure, it's 16 hours worth of work, but at least I'm not in a wet hole like it could be a lot worse.
Speaker 1:I read something recently, or yeah, about imposter syndrome.
Speaker 2:I know what you mean. It's not something I, it's not a phrase I like particularly much. I used to use it when I talked about myself. A it's not something I. It's not a phrase I like particularly much. I used to use it when I talked about myself a lot at the beginning. I've changed my relationship with how I see myself, but it was like, yeah, if you're going to use it, it's like don't run from being an imposter, get good at it. It means you're about to level up, you know, or you're with people that are slightly ahead of you and you can learn from them well if you choose to, as, as you know.
Speaker 2:In terms of that sensitivity that you talked about at the beginning, mate, how's that developed then from from being a young lad, heart condition, joining up personal training and and eventually setting up your own business and coaching? I think I shut it out for about a decade, maybe more. When were you aware that you were a sensitive lad? I wonder that. Oh, I knew it the whole time, like I was secretly yearning to get back to something that was a little bit more authentic. Okay, as like I, you know, when you can, just yeah, but as a, as a 14 year old, as a 16 year old, we probably wouldn't have used language like that.
Speaker 1:So what would it? And I know we've got the experience to look back at it and say that now.
Speaker 2:But what would that actually look like when you're a young lad? When I was 14, 15, 16, all the way to 20 probably I I think I viewed myself as weak I think that's the the word that had because I wasn't that image of steely-eyed deliverer of death and destruction. That's what I wasn't. It's funny as well, because when you're a reservist, especially being in London, you're surrounded by blokes who are lawyers and bankers and doxers, and you're all a bit like that. You're all probably a little bit more of an intellectualizer than your average nod. So you're looking around, you're going like I think we're all a bit different here, like I think we've got something going on. It's a little bit different. So yeah, I think I viewed myself as weak until that point, but it's only really been four years, five years, since I've looked back and gone. Actually, I'm going to lean into this a bit more and that is an attribute that I can develop.
Speaker 2:Carl Jung talked about developing the mother archetype and that's really a kind of a nurturing, creative and deep way of thinking. And I don't mean deep as in profound or brilliant, I mean deep as in just looking beyond the surface level and kind of questioning why a little bit more, and I think that's really what I've been yearning to develop alongside the masculine. What initiated that change four years ago? To to want to look back in and explore that. It was initially. It was halfway through, when we lived in canada. My wife and I then girlfriend and I moved out to to canada and I found the mountains and got really into skiing, ski mountaineering, ski touring that was my jam. But I also found the closest knit group of friends that I could have and we. It was like in a, in a sitcom, because we all lived within like this three block radius, so you'd be walking around, you'd bump into people the whole time, like oh it's Lewis, it's Harry, like, and you see each other's girlfriends all around.
Speaker 2:You'd go down to the beach together and a bit of like, um, you go down and do your morning swims and then you go ski touring in the like, sometimes in the evenings or the mornings before work, or you'd go on a big weekend mission, sleep in a snow cave and cool stuff like that, and that. I think that gave me a it's, it's funny, the the two different languages that I'm using here between like bootnecks, and then this. I think it gave me the safety to be authentic and I think it gave me the almost like be authentic. And I think it gave me the almost like, the permission of like, hey, we love you for who you are and you kind of like you offer a part of you up and then you go.
Speaker 2:Oh, you know what I wasn't. I didn't have the shit kicked out of me for that, so maybe that's a, maybe that's a part of me that I can actually accept myself. I need a little bit more and do a little bit more and a little bit more, and eventually you go. Yeah, I think that was a part of me that I can embody now. Yeah.
Speaker 1:What else might you attribute that change to?
Speaker 2:I mean, was there any introspection that you did or was there any help or was it just a self-realization? I've done a lot of mindset work. Until that point I think I had some awareness, but I think I was trying to be too conscious with it and create something that wasn't me. For that point I'd done. I'd studied under sports, um sports psychologists and licensed counselors and I've been coaching cross for athletes. At that time I'd worked with guys and girls at the crossfit games on their, their mentality, and I'd seen that really develop and that was all pushing, creating, and I think I'd done a very good job of like saying we're going to forge you into this type of person. But I hadn't quite yet learned to help people to look inwards, to discover what was already there and lean into their individuality. I think I was trying to create something. So I think it was.
Speaker 2:It was no realization, it was a slow, gradual thing and I did a few experiences, um, tried some psychedelics as well. That was a definite eye-opening experience for me and a really interesting experience of maybe life isn't as simple as we think but also maybe I'm not the type of person I I think I am. That was one just really deep conversations with with good friends. That was part of it. Some struggle along the way as well. Giving up my old business, um and starting this new process that was. That was a big process, but I think it's almost. It's almost like I'm accepting, and still probably accepting the realization that I am that kind of person that I am. That's what I enjoy with with speaking to individuals yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's incredible when we've got that ability to look within, or somebody holds that space for us to look within the answers that we find and how much it benefits others because we can do it for them. I don't know, maybe not authentically, but we've. We've lived it.
Speaker 2:We understand it and, like you said, rather than trying to forge with what we think is good for them, we let them find that themselves. And how much more powerful that is when it comes, it's a slower process it is yeah, yeah, but I think it's more original and truer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd say less blemished, I think it's, it's, it's, there's, yeah, and often I'm aware with when I speak with people like you, tell me, it can sound quite abstract.
Speaker 2:So that's why I pull it back, because not, and not everybody thinks and talks like we do. So, yeah, that's that's why I try and yeah, unravel it definitely sensible because I would talk in the abstract for eternity.
Speaker 1:Oh, me too. Mate me too. I love it um. How did um once you came back from canada? How did crossfit fit in?
Speaker 2:to to your life. That was about the point that I was losing love with crossfit. So I I originally started crossfit to train for the marines because, okay, I realized that it was probably more effective to do a 20-25 minute workout with some step-ups and some and a weights vest and spend four hours yomping and just breaking my knees because there's like more intensity there and you got better demands and I was watching everyone else train at the same time, thinking you're all getting injured and there's a better way to do this. So, because you're in charge of most of your own training as a reservist, so it's a different kind of process there. So I found it through that. I started coaching. I tried to set up a gym. That failed, lost a bunch of money, but that's part of the kind of business that's. That's part of your first four into business, when you take out a big loan to set up something but you don't know what you're doing.
Speaker 2:Um, but I was personal training at the time and I started having conversations with individuals and realized that you know what.
Speaker 2:It's not the sets of reps that are changing who you are, it's the conversations between, and the expansion of this is who you could be and this is what you believe about yourself.
Speaker 2:So I was constantly running into people saying like, oh man, just like I can't train that much, or I because I've got this going on in my life, or I don't think I can push very hard, or my limit is in my head.
Speaker 2:That's the question I heard the whole time. I'm limited mentally, not physically. I never get to that, that true pushing point, and it's something I'd experienced myself and it's also something I was kind of working on through joining the marines, but also, um, working with the sports psychologist and licensed counselor at the same time, like I was really in a deep mentorship with them and learning as much as I could. So I basically started talking about that kind of stuff and those conversations helped way more than here's your sets and reps. This is the workout for today and that just sparks an interest of you know what these kind of conversations, that they're important, but there's there's more to do here, and part of me saw a business opportunity and part of me saw an opportunity to follow a path that was more meaningful for me, because I didn't really care about squat forms or olympic lifting as much as why are you the person you are?
Speaker 1:yeah, so what? What did you? What was your like? The pillars of your business or the, the teaching in terms of mindset for, for crossfit athletes, or yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So most of the people that worked with me were regular joes and janes, who competed in crossfit the weekends, because that's most of the people who do crossfit, not the elite performers. I've worked with a few elite performers. That's a bit different, but it's essentially there's three levels to this. Firstly, regulating your nervous system. This still applies to who I work with today as well. Regulating your nervous system. So if we are unregulated and we are not optimized, our body freaks out a bit and we get things like palpitations or apparent sudden death syndrome or we just can't approach challenge in the way that we want to. We retreat from it. So that's a big piece and no one, especially at the time, was touching that. So that looks like a lot of breath work, sleep hygiene, something called non-sleep deep rest, which I didn't use at the time because it wasn't a thing, but now it's the thing that I go to for that. Um, light exposure, kind of your good daily habits watching alcohol, intake, water, so like just really basics. Then you look at rewiring. So what's the story? You believe we started to extract that and go what do you actually believe about yourself? Not what you think you believe, but what do you do and we learn far more by looking at what we do rather than what we say. So it's like if you were observing yourself, what would you think you believed for just from the way you acted, what you're acting at, what story you're acting out, and we'd pull that out and we'd go. Well, let's address that. There's more to it now that I add to it, but that's the basic.
Speaker 2:And then performance. So what do we actually do for, like, pre-lift routines? How do you talk to yourself and work out? How do you manage your kind of state in a workout? And do you have effort goals rather than outcome goals, like how do you want to perform this? And that's where everyone starts. Usually it's like give me a pre-lift routine, I'll solve everything. But those first two pieces are like the chains that hold you back, and until you snip those chains, the vehicle can't go anywhere. So there's no point putting your foot on the gas. Yeah, and I guess it's not just when you're in the gym for that hour or hour and a half, is it? It's it's the other 22 and a bit hours that count as well.
Speaker 1:Um, exactly, exactly the way you see the benefit yeah, yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 2:No, you can said it better. Yeah, that's what that comes to me to, to interpretate that, but in in your own experience then.
Speaker 2:How did you start integrating those sort of philosophies that you came up with there in terms of regulating nervous system rewiring and performance? Yeah, own personal experiences working with those that counselor and sports psychologist, brian grasso and carrie campbell their husband and wife's team. They had an awesome little business and I got introduced them through a podcast and they just started talking to me about journaling techniques and it wasn't just free flow writing in a journal, it was we've got a purpose with this and this is sets and reps, and that really appealed to me. So they talked about counting your wins. Because I love a pun and because I did a bit of crossfit, I call it an amwap as many wins as possible. So you spend three minutes at the end of the day writing down. This is what I did. Well, and as you're doing that, you are firing that neural circuitry that says I, I can change who I am, but also I'm doing the right things. Exercise like that.
Speaker 2:I can't remember what they called the original. I think it was called learn your language or something like that. But just free journaling, almost like Freud had people do, reclining on a chaise longue and just spewing what came to mind. I would give people prompts to kind of nudge out what was happening within the crossfit world. But, like for myself, that was like looking at usually, like why am I like I am, why can't I make this work? What's the frustration in my life, what's what the problems? And I'd start free journaling and just spewing out whatever came to mind, just real, like almost not quite verbal diarrhea, but like that kind of thing. And then you'd pick up phrases and you go what does that mean? You'd look back and go a I'm mad and I need to, I need to be put in an institute because that is not sane. And b oh, this phrase comes up a lot. I need to watch that in my own language. What does that mean? And start to pull out that side of things. So that was really my introduction into rewiring. We talked about conscious versus unconscious and we talked about stories and we talked about the archetypes a little bit at that time. But I'm way more into that detail. So that was my introduction to that.
Speaker 2:In the regulation stuff that came in later when I started realizing just the effect of how awful I was feeling, sat in front of a computer for 16 hours a day, and I was like what's different? And a few things came along at the time which allowed me to go. Well, breath work I'm going to start playing around with that oh, I feel different from consciously breathing. I feel different and my experience of life is different. So what's happening here?
Speaker 2:And that led me down the pathway of going okay, well, what's the role of the vagus nerve, like, how does that work? And I'm still I'm not a neuroscientist, I'm I'm not a kind of an expert in that, but I do understand a bit about it. And it's like well, what, what triggers do we have? What buttons can we press that we know have an impact. So, breath work, cold exposure, heat exposure, natural light is the biggest one movement quality, and that gave me an insight to that. And then the perform stuff is just kind of it's obvious, it's logical, it's like the equivalent of that. For most people, listening will be like how do you plan your days? What's your focus? Who do you want to be in this? Like that's the obvious place we start. It's very conscious, but the first two are the, the real drivers, and it's the thing that people don't want to look at because it's a little bit, um, uncomfortable yeah, I guess so.
Speaker 2:And also, you don't win win prizes or points for that and nobody gets to see it, do they? Whereas if you're directly sweating, yeah, or immediately, yeah, but if you're sweating and grunting and dropping bars in the gym I might add all the sweating and grunting then then people see that they assume effort and you get your little. You get your little. Um, performance, yeah, yeah, so I, I can completely performative. Yeah, yeah, so I can completely understand, I can completely relate as well, and when I'm busy, it's usually the basics that drop off, which leads me further down that spiral of getting stuck in busy work or being short with the kids. And oh, yeah, let's come back to the basics. Like you said, sleep, hydration, deregulation and getting out of my own head is, yeah, big things for me, absolutely right what?
Speaker 1:what led you?
Speaker 2:to to set up um your own business, mate, and and talk to us about, well, I'm a shit employee.
Speaker 1:That's part of it.
Speaker 2:I've worked as a person trainer for yeah, well, I think it's also true. Like I just I, I would always question why we're doing things, and I think a more forward-thinking company that would probably be encouraged. I'm not that good at taking orders that. I think that's bullshit, like that's. That's a stupid way to do this, and I was kind of and I wasn't um, I didn't articulate that to people, but it was more the attitude that I took from that, so that wasn't ideal.
Speaker 2:I also love freedom. Freedom is and I don't mean freedom in the kind of hoorah freedom, I mean freedom. What's freedom from? Freedom is choices of how you spend your time and what, what you do when you do it. So it's having choices essentially, and I mean freedom from my own limitations. That's big one time freedom, geographical freedom and monetary freedom, and I wasn't going to get that in a standard job like I want to be in control of how I spend my time and do that. Um, yeah, that's's what life is about for me. So it's really that pursuit of freedom. It's evolved as I've gone on.
Speaker 2:I think for me now it's a chance to really pursue meaningful work and contribute something, but initially it was about me. Ironically, when you start thinking about making a contribution. That's when you got rewarded a little bit better, but initially, yeah, it's a little bit more about pursuing my own freedom and also, I had no qualifications. Really, like sure, people look at your cv and go, hey, you're in the marines, that's. That's pretty cool. You must be mentally tough. But it doesn't really translate to can you help me with this particular job role? Yeah, how would you define success now? Do you mean for me personally?
Speaker 1:or as a generic no for you personally.
Speaker 2:So it's having control of my time. Uh, that is the big piece. In a very practical term, it is spending a month or so a year in big mountain environments. It is a house full of love. I think that is the foundation I missed for a long time. It is being the type of person that I want to be day in, day out, consistently, like we're never going to maximize that I don't think we'll ever hit that a hundred percent, but we like moving closer to it and it's growth. Growth is a big drive for me. Like I kind of conceptualize it as a success for me is living a life of growth, adventure and freedom and helping facilitate that in other people. That's really what I'm, what I'm about.
Speaker 2:So when you're working with clients, how do you, how do you start getting them to to lead their own version of the success and freedom which I guess would look in some ways similar, but it may be different activities or words, but yeah, well it's. It's actually some real similarities. Growth they're into self-mastery. That's they, they're. Everyone who works with me is thinking I'm not everything I could be and I want to really delve into that. So they've used stoicism or kind of very the more obvious starts for it and it hasn't quite worked, they haven't quite stuck. Freedom they usually want some sort of independence and financial freedom. Then they're not after kind of your bog standard life. They want a bit more from life.
Speaker 2:And then adventure. This is where it different, uh differentiates a little bit. So adventure is whatever adventure looks like for them, and that could be being the best father that they want to be. It could be base jumping, like a few people are like in the, in the group, but it's usually just something that is adventurous to them and it's like that's what sparks that hero's journey in in my mind. So they really like start with something like that and then the process is they've been, they've usually tried a few things, they've won, they've used.
Speaker 2:Willpower is usually the process. So well, if I want this enough, if I align myself to my passions, I will get there. But they've usually got a very kind of a baseline. It's not necessarily anxiety, but it's like an angst, it's like a I just wish I was a bit more. And their nervous system regulation is probably all over the place. So they're lacking calm. They haven't trained their character and I really mean like trained, put the sets and reps into developing yeah, give us an example of that, I think that's interesting, interesting statement there.
Speaker 2:He says, okay, water, he's holding up the glass, sure, sure statement yeah yeah, what?
Speaker 2:what would that look like in training character? There's a few ways to look at this, but the most useful one of the lenses you can use is okay, I want to become more disciplined. Well, be more disciplined is the standard approach. Right, but really, if we look at that through a Stoicism lens, it's got four components to it and the Stoics talked about four virtues. Wisdom was the overarching one, and we can redefine that a little bit because they said, acting in accordance to nature. I think there's a more personal way to look at that, but that's for an individual to look at. Courage is the second one. We know what courage is. It's kind of valorized and stays wild.
Speaker 2:Um, temperance is one that means self-regulation. Okay, so it's self-regulation. That's the main thing that we're looking at when we're really talking about discipline. Discipline to stay off our phones, discipline to stick to our nutritional plan. Strengthening your go and no-go muscle is the way to look at that. And then justice, and what they mean by justice is basically doing what's right for the community, and marcus aurelius talked about what's right for the beehive is also right for the bee, and so he's kind of walking those four things simultaneously. So if we think about training, character training are.
Speaker 2:I always view this, as you know, fifa, how you've got like shooting out of a hundred, passing out of a hundred, speed out of a hundred. Where are you at? On that, roughly, let's say temperance is the thing, self-regulation is a thing. That's quite low. Well, let's look at putting together a sets and reps program to strengthen that, to strain it. And most people they go way too hard. This, they're looking for execution and they're also they have the belief that it should be effortless and that they should go. Well, if I'm supposed to be disciplined and discipline looks like not suffering whilst I'm doing it, but I flip that and I say well, every time you look at your phone and go to pick it up and then you put it down and you feel that mental strain and you feel that childish pull of I just want to be numb and I feel that kind of need for distraction and that yearning to not feel what I'm feeling of need for distraction and that yearning to not feel what I'm feeling putting the phone down. That's a, that's a rep. So can we find reps and can we create them? It might be okay.
Speaker 2:You're going to do something like cold water exposure daily. It's not for the benefits of the cold water exposure, although that's very useful. It's to strengthen that go muscle or to strengthen the no-go muscle, if I'm not going to dick around. So, having that consistent practice in there, like let's look at the sets and reps and we start, we almost like build out someone's own. You know, 75 hard, yeah, 75 days of two workouts a day and we kind of build that out, but slowly. People don't do 75 hard because they go all in at once and they don't take into consideration where they are. This is the same as going. Well, I'm going to follow.
Speaker 2:An olympians training program doesn't work. Too much volume, too much intensity will not work for you. Let's start where you're at and build and like. When we do that consistently, you build this kind of um. There's a phrase in climbing called um. I think it's called critical force, which is the amount of force that you can um, that you can expend from your muscles indefinitely. And we do that with, like, the mental muscle, like, can we get, can we increase that baseline, that critical force, what's the indefinite amount of willpower that you can have? And if we train that and we go above the threshold and rest, and above the threshold and rest, and above the threshold and rest, then we just creep up that level of um, of baseline. It looks like willpower, but it's temperance. So and then how does this manifest itself, once you've been working on these things into business, in terms of how does that work when I'm coaching clients or how does it work for me individually?
Speaker 1:or for the clients, once they start managing to integrate these systems and strengthening their character. What, what were some of the benefits that they experience?
Speaker 2:good question. So they don't use their phone as much, so they're more present with the family. That's usually the big one. They're more intentional with their time, even their leisure time, they're intentional with it. So, even if it's like one of the problems with one guy that I was working with was I was spending way too much time on my playing games I think it's like xbox or something like that and it's like he really enjoyed it, but he felt guilty every time he was doing it. So for him, that was we're going to actually just intentionally give you an hour of that time and you're going to be deliberate and intentional with it and you're actually going to enjoy it more. So he does that and he's actually more present because he's not thinking I shouldn't be doing this the whole time. I'm not actually enjoying it.
Speaker 2:So it makes you just live a more meaningful life, and I know that's very like just live a more meaningful life. But like makes you live a more meaningful life, makes you enjoy your life more. It makes you more the person that you're meant to be in every single moment, and I feel like we have this vision somewhere in the back of our mind. Like this is who I'm meant to be. This is the actualized version of myself and it allows us to take a step toward that version of ourself. So if we're developing our character, that's part of it. Okay, like that kind of image somewhere, like are we matching that?
Speaker 2:yeah, what's coming to me is like the image of being chiseled to to the shape and form that we're meant to be, rather than the, the blob, because we don't realize the and I don't mean that in a physical sense rather than let society, um, or better said, outside influences, scrolling, doom, scrolling being one form, us and lead us in certain ways we're able to do that ourselves, and that's the image that comes to me is chiseling our character to how we want it, or forging resilience forging, oh well look at that not even planned.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, definitely mate. Um, yeah, as, as, as well as, yeah, getting in touch with ourselves rather than having the noise that is generated by life, families, distractions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's intentionality. Yeah, there's. We are born with a low resolution image of who we can be and we often turn away from that yeah, or it's often beaten out of us as well. I think uh unintentionally.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely. But I also think those looking back at them are the opportunities to find who you want to be the negative emotion we would not have from an evolutionary perspective, we would not have kept negative emotion if it didn't serve a purpose. So it's telling you something. So it's telling you something. And I mentioned stoicism back then. But my disagreement of stoicism is the idea that we're trying to get rid of negative emotion and we're trying not to feel it because there's no way you can't. And also, to put it kind of romantically, that's the beauty of life. Like life would be so miserable, if. Is it Dostoevsky who said that if we had nothing to do but fornicate and eat cakes would smash it up within a minute. It's like you want something, like you can't just be pleasure your whole life. It needs to be something to push against or strive against. And that's like that is the beauty in life. It's that that you can get your teeth into it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it comes back what the other point I was trying to make there but took so much effort to explain is like the discomfort we get to choose whether that's discomfort of being stuck or discomfort of working on ourselves, isn't it?
Speaker 2:And that because there's always going to be slight discomfort. I was speaking to a client just the other day. He said I thought when I started coaching everything would become easy, but it doesn't, does it? Your, your capacity to to feel, to live, grows, but it's your ability to process and or at least in this guy's case, to how quickly he can move himself gently on rather than staying right yeah, um, what potentially one or two bits of advice would you give somebody who, who has resonated with your message there, and how can they can start implementing some tools into their own life?
Speaker 2:yeah, you know, I always, I always struggle with this, um, because I'd love to be able to give some sort of snappy answer like these are the five tools you need yeah, because here's that I'll let you off the hook.
Speaker 1:It's like I know there's not one, I know there's not one, so it's what? What comes to you in that?
Speaker 2:moment or what has been most beneficial for you as a way of yeah, thanks for getting me around. That it depends. It's the worst ones for us. Um, okay, what are the go-tos from almost everyone?
Speaker 2:I find that non-sleep deep rest is a tool that really helps people. So yoga nidra is another way of putting it, and it's basically nidra means sleep in Sanskrit, I think. So that is basically relaxing, that's all. It is just a relaxation process I'm just going to. It's very similar to is it shavasana in yoga, where you just lie there and you just it's the corpse pose, chill out, but it's intentional and it's guided.
Speaker 2:That's really useful for people, because most of us spend all day doing, doing striving, forcing, and no time resting and no time re-energizing. So that's the go-to on the physiological front in terms of in terms of the psychological side of things, I think developing the capacity to sit with your emotions. So when I've been working with quite a few people on developing discipline recently, which is what we've been talking about quite a lot here and what they they're constantly straining that muscle, they're constantly working like. They come to me with the idea of like, well, discipline is a muscle to be strengthened, right and yet? Yes, but you also need to recover and use other parts of it, and what we discuss is that you're undisciplined.
Speaker 2:In a lot of cases, you're picking up the phone because you're scared of what might happen. If you just sit with the emotional state that you're feeling and you do not want to see that this is a personal story. Actually, you're incredibly fucking sad if you just sit there and feel it and that's a really scary thing and there's lots of things that you regret and there's lots of things that you dislike and you know what like that. That's something you've got to learn to sit with, but the distraction piece is just anything or the lack of discipline, apparently is anything to not feel that yeah, but the interesting thing is that once you get the courage, to go in.
Speaker 2:There's often. There's often treasure in there, isn't there?
Speaker 2:so there's something to be learned yeah yeah, you view it like the way I always talk about it is like imagine you've got an orchestra in front of you and you've got the brass section represent, um, that masculine kind of aggressive, assertive energy, and then the strings they represent the feminine, the calm, and then you've got like trickster mentality and they've got all these different like sub personalities within you and ideally you're the perfect conductor who just sits there and goes okay, I want you to play a little bit louder. I'm going to keep time, I'm just going to watch what's happening. But that isn't what happens in real life. What happens in real life is the brass section are just blasting it and they're just hammering at home. They're deafening everyone else and you want to go just shut up. They're not going to listen to you.
Speaker 2:I'm just going to turn around, focus on the other stuff. That's pretty and like nice and like I can block that out, but it's still playing really loud and it's smashing you. So what you've got to do is turn and face the brass and go okay, right, let's have a conversation here, let's let's get to know. And then nietzsche had this idea of once you feel that negative emotion and once you get into that state, it's like learning to love a song for the first time, you know.
Speaker 2:I don't know whether you've ever had a song where you just like, didn't really like it to come with, or an album, but you give it patience and you show I think he says good-heartedness and tenderness and you soften to it and you go hmm, you know there's beauty in that and then you learn to love it and then, when you do that, they stop playing so aggressively, because you've incorporated that into who you are. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And there's the learn piece there as well, isn't it? It doesn't just come naturally. There's a learning process there, yeah, and he. The big thing Nietzsche talks about is how uncomfortable it is, like you're going to really dislike that process and it's going to really be heavy and you're going to hate it. But it's showing that good heartedness is showing that, that you're going to hate it, but it's showing that good heartedness, it's showing that that love, I suppose, which is feels quite an antithesis from where to where we started this conversation yeah, yeah, no, definitely.
Speaker 1:And in terms of business, mate, the again one or two ideas that that you come to mind from a tactical perspective, then, in integrating those things into business yeah, I think the big thing that we're speaking about before is are you trading commodities or you're a craftsperson?
Speaker 2:and for me, I've realized I'm a craftsman I don't talk about that in the two minutes or offline before me.
Speaker 2:I think, yeah, yeah, so, yeah. So me trading commodities is, I've got a widget to sell and I'm going to focus on 0.1% better and I'm kind of focusing on the margins and what can extract for me. That appeals to some people. I know plenty of people. I think we know a lot of people who are doing a very good job of that. A lot of people who are doing a very good job of that and it's not about it's not necessarily about what, what the world can give them, but it's close. It's like I'm going to contribute, but enough to get remunerated and that's a fair. That's. That's a game to play. If you want to play that game, fantastic. But I think it's useful to contrast that with the craftsman mentality of I'm going to create something that really moves people and I'm going to focus on a small group of people and really lean into that and to kind of go yeah, I'm a craftsman and for me that's right. It depends on in terms of business. I think it's useful to know which one of those lenses you're going to go down, and then the other piece is probably looking after yourself before you try and crush yourself. It's very simple stuff but having some sort of down regulation time making sure I just record this incredible podcast with a guy called Heath Piper and he interviews the elderly. He might make good guests on this show as well.
Speaker 2:I've been recommending to everyone that I know who has a podcast he say anyone seventies, 80s, 90s, even as centurions. He interviews them and he does private. He's commissioned to do private two and a half three hour interviews with these people to discuss their life, what's worked for them, what hasn't worked for them. And he said almost every man looks back at their life and goes. Almost every man looks back at their life and goes. I missed it because I was working so hard. I missed those moments with my family. I missed my child growing up and then he used a phrase like they're doing second chance parenting with their grandchildren because they forgot to pay attention and they forgot to love those moments and I think that's what we miss it's about. There's a beautiful podcast extract. I just put up on the on my page about it, but it's really worth not missing the journey because you're so, oh, it's so trite, isn't it?
Speaker 2:because you're so keen on getting to the destination. But it's, it's been said so many times, but that podcast me just really hit home. Yeah, and but that's that's. You can't force that down somebody's throat until they're ready to to see that for themselves. Are you so no?
Speaker 1:yeah, which is that?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, I'm done with you. Um, yeah, which is why I'm so grateful for for coaching coming into my life and getting the opportunity to change my perspective, my behaviors, because I've got two young kids and I see the benefit. And I'm not perfect. I still make loads of mistakes, but I'm a lot more conscious, a lot more intentional and I know when I'm good, my little ones are good. Yeah, it's a knock-on effect and also even from looking at the nervous system regulation piece, if they feel safe because you feel stable and they feel loved, they're more optimized to go into the world and embrace challenge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's fantastic.
Speaker 2:A classic example I posted about this the other day on LinkedIn is I took my daughter to a gymnastics competition and I caught her downregulating breathing. I was asking how she's feeling. She breathes in and then breathes slower out, tracing the pattern of her hand, and I thought, wow, that's incredible. And I did. I'm not sure where we've got that from a book, probably, but that's, that's what's away, if they've got the awareness at seven and a tool at seven. And I again I don't claim to be super dad at all, far from it but wow, what, what, what a little skill she's got there, a little steady, yeah, that's really cool I love that it is brilliant tom mate um, thanks so much for your time.
Speaker 1:If people are interested in finding out a bit more, about you or reaching out or even working with you?
Speaker 2:where can they find your, your information, mate, and I'll put those links in the note. Well, firstly, thank you for having me really appreciate it um, yeah, really do appreciate it.
Speaker 2:So best place is probably my instagram, which which is Tom Foxley F-O-X-L-E-Y, and you'll find me there. My website also, tomfoxleyme, is the best place and, honestly, if you enjoyed this podcast, I'd love you to just reach out and have a chat. Sometimes with podcasting, it feels like you're kind of speaking into the void. I don't know whether you have noticed, but it's like it'd be lovely to get a message from someone if you enjoyed this, just to chat about it and just to not to thank me, because I'm not that arrogant, but just to go. Hey, I listened to it, I heard it. Awesome, brilliant, tom. Thank you very much, mate. Is there anything else you might want to add in that we've not covered? Or final message before we sign off? No, I think we're good. Thanks, man, that we've not covered. Or final message before we sign off? No, I think we're good. Thanks, man. Brilliant tom. Take it easy, mate. Thanks for your time and uh, really enjoyed your, your conversation and insights. Thank you, man.