Shot By Brock

There can only be room for one winner. Success means first place on the podium, and second or third are simply consolation prizes for the best of the losers. This zero sum notion that in order for someone to win, someone else most lose is a cultural cornerstone of western society. It is hammered home in school sports lessons, in contests such as spelling bees, debating societies, and even in performance tier groups in school. But what’s worse is that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Losers get chosen last, and sent to the bottom where they get no special attention, whereas winners get more and more support and before long they’re miles ahead of the pack, and there’s no way for anyone to catch up. But what if it didn’t have to be this way? Motivational speaker Jim Rohn famously stated that “you are the average of the five people you surround yourself with.” And with this podcast I’ve be surrounding myself with amazing, inspiring, wise and wonderful people who all have a take on how to live life, make it

Yoga. Not really a sport, not really a form of exercise, more just a series of contortions and stretches, some of which look easy and some of which look really quite painful. It’s fair to say, I’ve never really got it. But for many it’s essential. And testament to this is the number of people who regularly practice it. According to the Economic Times of India there are more than 300 million yogis who have adopted it as part of their lifestyle, 50 percent of whom live in India, and 37 million in the United States alone. Not bad for a bit of stretching. So why? What is it that makes it so alluring? Patanjali, who compiled the definitive text on Yoga – The Yoga Sutras – sometime between 500 BCE and 400 AD (experts can’t seem to agree when exactly the great book was written) is quoted as saying: “Yoga is the settling of the mind into silence. When the mind has settled, we are established in our essential nature, which is unbounded consciousness. Our essential nature is usually overshadowed by the activity of the

It's the last day of the year. This episode is just me rambling randomly, as I look back over themes from the last year's episodes, and some of the things we can take into the year ahead. Happy New Year www.conversationsonliving.com

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favourable.” So said stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca. And certainly, if we all knew what we wanted to be, we’d all either be there by now, or at ease we’d be well on our way there. When we were kids it’s easy to get excited about being an astronaut, a movie star, a scientist, or lumberjack. But for many of us, with growing up came a dulling of these lofty ambitions until, rather than a seat on rocket ship, most of us end up settling for a comfy chair and a widescreen TV to take the edge off another hard day at the office. Zadie Smith seemed to capture it well when she observed: “What modest dreamers we have become.” We focus so much on the being – the end result – that all too often we lose sight of the doing. It is the doing, the action, that leads to the being, after all. We’ve all heard the saying, fall in love with the process, but we rarely stop to think what the process looks like. The idea of being a brain surgeon, highly revered, w

What does it mean to be a consumer? It often feels that this is an interchangeable term - another way of saying “the public”, when framed in terms of the economy. We are not humans but consumers – buyers of things. Fodder for the capitalist machine. Wikipedia, that great bastion of absolute truth, defines a consumer as “a person or a group who intends to order, orders, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs” It then goes on to quote President John F. Kennedy: “Consumers, by definition, include us all.” It’s true. We must consume. We must nourish ourselves. We must fuel our cells and muscles so that we can live. And if we’re to continue up Maslow’s pyramid, we must also be consumers of those material things that keep us safe, dry, and warm. We consume the attention of those most important to us to satisfy our need for love and approval. And there are our material needs that make us feel validated, that reinforce a sense of status, self

“The universe is made of stories, not atoms.” So said poet and activist Muriel Rukeyser. And despite the science, despite the particle physics, despite the mathematical equations and the philosophy and the religion and the spirituality – or maybe inspite of all these things – I challenge anyone to prove her wrong. That’s because we can only see the universe from a human perspective – our unique and individual human perspective. And that itself, is a story. From our past to our future, to the way we interact with the world, to the way we identify as ourselves, everything about our human experience is made up of stories. But all too often, we give up authorship of these stories – our stories – to things outside of us. People. Circumstances. Fears and doubts. Cultural norms. Expectations. Trends. Fashions. Opinion. Tribes. Rather than becoming the heroes in our stories, we become 2-dimensional supporting characters, to our past, to our baggage, to other people’s stories, and stories of our own creation which don

Competition. Winners and losers. Zero sum. Here in the west it’s part of our bread and butter. We’ve been brought up with it, whether it’s in the structure of our education system, on the playing field, in the markets, or in the workplace, there’s a notion of that in order for us to get ahead, it means that we have to get ahead of someone else. It’s so ingrained in our collective cultural identity, that we project it onto everything and everyone else. We assume it’s a law of nature, because it’s a framework that defines our way of life. In order for there to be a winner, there has to be a loser. It’s no surprise, then, that it’s so easy to feel like a loser, if we aren’t constantly winning. But what if it isn’t natural at all? What if we redefine what winning actually is? What if, rather than winning at the expense of someone or something else, we win based on what we can give to someone or something else? What if winning means helping others to win too? What if winning means bringing people together, deliver

In this week’s episode I speak with author, speaker and transformational leader Sue Stone, to talk about how we can tap into the near limitless power that we all have within ourselves, in order to take charge of our reality and shape it so that we don’t simply survive, but instead thrive in the best ways possible. Of course some of us are more privileged than others, some of us have better foundations for building a better life, some of us come from a more generous heritage than others. But for those of us who don’t have that step up to greatness ready and waiting for us, we don’t need to be stuck where we find ourselves. We can change our situation, and a large part of the work in doing this is changing ourselves, and our mindset. It was Plato who said “reality is created by the mind, and we can change our reality by changing our mind.” But is it really as simple as that? Is aligning ourselves mentally and emotionally with who we want to be, with where we want to be, and with the energy of the life we wish t

Everybody has a story. Whether it’s the story of our lives, the story of our heritage, or the stories we tell ourselves about who we are, that we hang our identities on, our whole world is made up of stories. And it’s not just our own stories that define our world. All you have to do is switch on the television, or take a walk outside, and whether it’s advertising billboards, the television news, the latest soap operas, or the cultural and societal rules and regulations that set out to bring order to the way we live our lives and go about our days, everything is made up of stories. Indeed, even the passing of the seasons, is a story that unfolds over and over again, right in front of our eyes. As Yuval Noah Harari said: “Humans think in stories, and we try to make sense of the world by telling stories.” This week we’re exploring the power of stories, about how the stories we tell ourselves and others can help us own our lives, unfurling it in front of us like a blossoming lotus flower, or they can keep us tra

Rilke said “the purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things.” This may sound a little, well, defeatist, but what he means is that in order to fulfil our potential, to see what we’re capable of, we need to face those challenges that seem insurmountable, and keep facing them until we overcome them. And then, with the grit that we have obtained from that challenge, we move on to the next, bigger challenge. And so on, and so on. This isn’t an easy philosophy to adopt, especially given the hardships of life, in this increasingly difficult and confusing world that we’ve created for ourselves. But how do we know who we really, or what we’re really capable of, unless we face life, face our challenges, and choose not to let them own us, but to keep pushing forward, to keep getting stronger and more determined, until we own them. Last week we spoke to professional ultra runner Kieran Alger, in the first of a two-part podcast about ultrarunning or, to be more specific, about how we can go ultra in ou

I love a good quote. There are few things that can be said today, that haven’t already been said by others – most of whom were wiser and more eloquent than me. A favourite of mine, and a repeat offender on this podcast, is Blaise Pascal, the 16th Century philosopher, who said: “All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”  It seems that being alone with ourselves, getting quiet and seeing what might come out of our own internal and dreaded lucky dip is something that we have collectively built a whole world around avoiding. Whether it’s our iPhones, our television news, the internet and social media, our daily gossip, our indulgence in the pleasures of instant gratification, or our latest political scandals, we have built impossibly high walls of distraction to protect ourselves from the uncomfortable messages that we might hear if we just took the time to listen to rushing waters that flow inside us.  As Nietzche said: “If you gaze for long into an abyss, th

In this episode of the podcast we meet Joanna Chanis. Joanna is an author and mentor, helping people taking ownership of their lives. After being diagnosed with and treated for breast cancer, going through a painful divorce and a lifetime of living out of alignment with who she really is, she had an epiphany. This led her to develop a practice based on gratitude and acceptance that asks us to stop fighting with what is, and instead work through our experience so that we can realise what could be. To find out more about Joanna and her work, visit www.joannachanis.com

Money is the root of all evil, and there is a nobility in struggling without it. Capitalism is a device of the patriarchy, the machinery of oppression, and along with its bedfellow, greed, leads to the innocent suffering while the undeserving rich get richer and richer and richer. Even the Bible, if that’s your tipple, says that it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. There’s no doubt about it, money is bad. But let’s be honest, most of us wouldn’t mind a little bit more of it. At the very least, we could put a roof over our head, keep the heating on, and feed our families. And just think how much better our lives would be if we could afford a bigger house, or get that thing fixed that’s been on our mind for the last six months. And perhaps a few new clothes in the wardrobes wouldn’t hurt. And we could finally book that holiday we’ve been wanting for all this time. As just think what we could do if we didn’t have to about money any

It’s got to be perfect, sang Eddi Reader, the lead singer of Fairground Attraction. And, in today’s material world of social media and personal brand building, it’s easy to assume that if you’re not perfect in all areas of your life, then you’re somehow falling short. As we digest yet another personal development craze, try to keep up with the latest diet craze, fitness craze, fashion craze, or technology craze, this push for perfection can even send us the other way.  Throwing our hands up in defeat before we’ve even begun to try, instead finding solace in all the things we’re supposed to be avoiding. So how do we know when the striving to become better, slimmer, wealthier, happier, is actually becoming an obstacle to our progress, forcing us, not to thrive, but to become stuck?  Perfectionism, the constant seeking to be better, to achieve more, to fulfil our potential, can actually prevent us from doing exactly that. It can lead to a fear of failure, a fear of not achieving what we set out to achi

There’s far more that we don’t know about the universe than we do know. Sure we have a basic understanding of physics, of biology, mathematics, and the big brains at CERN are working hard exploring the smallest building blocks of existence, from quarks to gluons, bosons, and leptons. But beyond the measurable, beyond that tangible knowledge that makes the light come on when we flick the switch, that makes the wheels turn when we get in our cars, there is the less tangible. There are near infinite unknowns that we have yet to even encounter in our exploration of existence, as well as other things that we are very aware of, which are very real, but which are less easy to quantify. The feelings stirred up by a piece of music. The sense of amazement at a beautiful sunrise. All the things that make us angry, make us happy, fill us with joy, with love, with frustration, or sadness. These more ethereal - more spiritual - facets of human existence, are nonetheless just as real as the quantifiable aspects of life and,

There are very few of us who would say that there is nothing we would change about ourselves or our lives, and of course a vital part of making change happen is taking action. And one of the simplest ways of taking action is to change the way we show up in the world.   One of the people who knew this very well, was the poet and performer, Leonard Cohen, who famously said:“Act the way you want to be and soon you’ll be the way you act.”   Call it “fake it 'til you make it” or “practice makes perfect” but if we want to step into a different version of ourselves – maybe one that’s more confident, more outgoing, more assertive – we need to start taking ownership of how we show up. We need to start acting as the person we wish to become, and soon we habitualise those traits and they become a reality.   It makes sense really. If we want to become a runner we need to get out and run. If we want to become a better speaker, we need to get out there and speak. Embodying the energy of the thing we wish to

Sometimes being human feels a bit like being a Katamari ball. Katamari is a video game where you basically move a big ball around, and everything it touches gets stuck to it, like it’s a big magnet, with the ball getting bigger and bigger and heavier and heavier, with all this junk attached to it as it trundles along. In much the same way, as we roll through life we pick up things that stick to us too. In the form of experiences, trauma, life lessons, cultural expectations, notions of right and wrong. All the things that rub off on us as we bump along, trying to figure out which way to turn next. Some of these things that attach themselves to us are useful are beneficial. Skills and learnings that make us better routefinders through the maze of life. Other things start to weigh us down like a big suit of armour made out of trash. Things like anger and resentment, bitterness, unhelpful biases and beliefs that hinder us, that get in the way of our contentment and happiness, distorting our world view, and harmin

Sometime in the 1600’s the French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote the word’s “all of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Indeed, you could argue that if we could collectively and objectively face the impact of our runaway egos – that is things like greed, division, inequality, war, climate change, destruction and exploitation of the natural world and so on – we might have avoided many of the global crises we now face. But as Pascal observed, we are just too distracted by the allure of all the things outside ourselves, to be able to spend any time looking within ourselves. And this is something that Tom Cronin wants to change. Tom is a world-renowned meditation teacher, a transformational coach, and the founder of the Stillness Project, which aims to inspire a billion people to meditate. And he’s also the producer of a new documentary film and an accompanying book, called The Portal, which posits that all of man’s problems could be solved if we could learn to meditate

Perhaps it’s part of the human condition, but most of us seem to have difficulty accepting the way things are. Instead, we find ourselves angered by what we see on the news, enraged by some enemy we are told is out to get us, disappointed by the quality of our lives, or the numbers on our bank balances, or the measurements on our waistbands. Constantly striving for more, and better. There always seems to be something to complain about, to be dissatisfied with, to feel aggrieved about, and always someone or something to blame. It’s almost as if we’ve become addicted to chaos and negativity, and that we have created a system that feeds off this addiction, requiring us to exist in a constant state of low level emotional trauma in order to sell us clicks, clothes and vacations. Requiring us to act and think and behave and identify in certain ways which, when examined closely, are not actually in alignment with who we really are. And it is when we are out of alignment with our authentic selves that we don’t realis

Of all the things we can do to nourish ourselves, sleep is perhaps the most vital. Alongside food and hydration, sleep is the thing that helps us to function at our best, with clarity and confidence. So vital is it, that lack of sleep can slow us down and make life harder. And severe tiredness can also begin to affect our decision-making abilities, our self-esteem, our courage, our grip on reality and our mental health. Getting enough rest, and good quality sleep, then, should be a crucial part of our toolkit if we are to live and act effectively, with conviction, and integrity. At our best, moving joyfully towards our potential. At its most fundamental, Yoga Nidra is the practice of sleep. As Tracee Stanley, the world-renowned practitioner of Yoga Nidra, states in her book, Radiant Rest: “rest is vital to thriving.” But there is more to Yoga Nidra than simply catching some good quality zees. Through deep relaxation we gain access to a deeper part of ourselves that is beyond the cognitive mind, beyond languag