Shadowing Practice: 8 Mindsets Destroying Your Potential (And HOW to Rewire Them NOW) - Learn English Speaking with Video
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There are certain ways of thinking that are often default in our minds
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that are crippling or blocking us creating our dream life.
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And if we don't bring some awareness to them, they subconsciously are keeping us from achieving what we want.
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So today what I want to do is identify eight of those mindsets
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that are blocking us from achieving our dream life and offer you a replace a thought.
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Now the reason I want to offer you a replace a thought is often we think, okay, there's this mindset that I've got, I just want to remove it and stop thinking that way, right?
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But it's just like having a habit.
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If you try and stop a bad habit, but you don't replace it with something, your brain or your mind will just go on autopilot and go on to what it knows best.
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And the problem is when these habits or these mindsets or these thoughts, when they have been a pattern of ours for so many years and they're subconsciously so strong in our mind,
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we can't just remove them, right?
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It takes a lot of effort and time to replace them.
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But with a lot of consistent effort, you can slowly start to change the narrative, but you have to replace it with something because if you just have this gap, your brain is gonna go on autopilot.
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If you notice any of these mindsets or thoughts coming up, you're gonna have a really strong replacer that's very actionable for you to implement
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that you can start doing straight after this episode.
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Now, what I would strongly recommend is that you take note of two
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or three of the strongest thoughts that you feel apply to you right now.
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The reason I say that is if we try and change so many thoughts all in one go, it becomes very hard to sustain that, right?
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Because we're kind of unplugging all these things that have and maybe been autopilot for us for so long.
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So as we go through, start to take notes of your top two or three, and they're the ones you start working on first.
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So the first of the eight mindsets that are blocking you from your reality changing is this fear of failure.
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It's this idea that you're so afraid of failing that you feel like failing would be the end.
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It would be the ruining of you.
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It would mean you're stuck where you are because you failed.
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This fear of failure is so normal.
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It's something we all experience.
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And it's something that actually prevents us from starting what we want to do a lot of the time.
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Maybe this is something you're experiencing right now.
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But a reframe I want to offer you is
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that you will fail and you're going to fail over
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and over again as long as you're trying new things
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and you're pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone you have to expect failure
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but what that failure means is not the end
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and it's not a reflection
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that you're stuck where you are it's actually a natural part of the process
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and if you look at anyone that's achieved anything they have failed
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and that just means that they tried one thing
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and it didn't work out the way they want but
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that experience taught them something which was valuable for the next thing they tried
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and maybe that thing didn't work out but then
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that those two experiences combined gave them enough lessons to move forward
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and try the next thing right so failing actually builds blocks of experience and lessons
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that eventually take you to where you're supposed to be that's the reframe I want to offer you
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if you're currently scared of trying something new because you're fearing this failure
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or you're scared to push yourself beyond what you've already achieved just know
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that with that experimentation with that effort will come a lesson
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or a blessing and it will prepare you for what's to come next
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and you will fail just accept
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that the second mindset that's keeping us stuck is imposter syndrome
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now for those of you who watched our last solo episode
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we basically dedicated the entire episode to discussing this topic
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because for me it's been a huge one
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that I've had to work through to really change the way I think about things
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so basically in a nutshell Imposter syndrome is you feeling like you're not worthy of the things you've achieved
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or you feel like a little bit of a fraud when you're showing up in your reality, when you're showing up every day to do what you're set out to do.
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But the truth is, and what we learned in that episode, which I'll put now on the screen if you're watching YouTube, otherwise the link is going to be in the show notes.
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The reframe here or the replacer is that your imposter syndrome is not based on reality.
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It's not based on the truth of the situation.
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It's actually based on your self-perception.
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So what you need to do, and we walk you through this in that episode dedicated purely to imposter syndrome, is you have to work out what is your self-perception
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and what is the reality and ground the truth in the reality of the situation.
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Very, very quick example.
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If you've achieved a massive milestone and you start having thoughts like this was a fluke, this was just good luck, that is your self-perception of the situation.
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But what's the reality?
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Maybe you're getting amazing feedback from your colleagues, from your staff members, from your subscribers who are telling you how valuable your work is.
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Maybe you've put in years to get to that point or months, right?
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It hasn't just happened overnight.
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So the reality is very different to your self-perception and working
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that out is essential for this mindset not to block you creating your dream reality.
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Again, if this is something that's really ringing true for you, I highly, highly recommend checking out that episode we did a couple of weeks ago.
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The third mindset keeping us from creating our dream life is a fear of judgment.
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This feeling of worrying what other people are going to think about us.
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And there's this classic thing and I know I felt this, especially at the beginning of my podcasting journey,
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where you care like what people you went to school with are going to think about if you start posting content online, if you start, I don't know,
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if you want to start like a fashion blogging Instagram or a cooking Instagram, you start having all these thoughts of like, what are people going to think of me?
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And often it's actually people we know, people in our family, extended family, people in our extended circles, like people that we know, we have this fear of judgment.
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And it's a really strange experience, right?
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Because I remember reading this quote where it was like, why do you care what someone would think of you if they're not someone you would ask for advice from?
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And I was like, that's a really good point
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because a lot of these people that I'm fearing their judgment or what they would think, I would never ask them for advice on because they're not doing anything that I'm kind of striving for, right?
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We're just on completely different paths.
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But the replacer here, and this is really, really interesting, is you have an opportunity whenever you have this fear of judgment coming up.
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So say you are worried that people are going to judge you for creating content.
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I want you to look within you, do some soul searching, some sister soul searching within you and ask yourself, is that because you actually have that judgment on others?
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So if somebody else was to start creating content, what would your thought be?
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Right.
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What are the thoughts you have about them?
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Who are they to start content?
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Maybe because you know them personally, you're like, oh, they're not really the kind of person that should be doing this or whatever thoughts you have.
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Right.
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Don't judge yourself.
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but use your fear of judgment to understand if you actually have that judgment on others.
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And what this does is it highlights for us the thoughts that we have that are actually limiting ourselves.
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This is a big one that can really illuminate things for you in ways you probably haven't thought about before, because when we're thinking about other people judging us,
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we're not thinking about how does that reflect what we think inside.
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But our external world is a reflection of our internal world.
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So get curious on this one and I promise you it will illuminate some things that identify your own limitations and blocks.
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The fourth mindset that's blocking you creating your dream reality is a victim mentality.
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This is the kind of thinking where you feel life happens to you and not for you, right?
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Things are just not going your way.
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It seems like the world is against you and that really prevents you taking ownership of your circumstances.
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Now I don't want to downplay the fact that people go through really tough situations, right?
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Really unimaginable, difficult circumstances.
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This point is not to detract from the heaviness or the weight of what we go through.
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But I do want to offer you a replacer.
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It's kind of like an idea that I thought of last year.
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And it's just put things into a different perspective for me.
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So imagine before you came into this world you sat down
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with the creator god the universe whatever you believe in in
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terms of how you came to be in this world you sat down with them
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and you had a conversation
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and it went something like this what do i want to
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learn who do i want to be who do i want to become in this life experience
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and you both sat down and you said okay well
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if you want to become this person
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if you want to learn these things these are all the events
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and situations you have to go through in order to get there.
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Imagine you had that conversation and now put that into context or perspective of what you're going through right now.
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No matter how tough it is, no matter how heavy the circumstance feels, imagine you opted into that experience for the purpose of you becoming
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or learning or growing into whoever and whatever you're supposed to become in this life.
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For me, this has offered the most incredible reframe to the things I go through in life.
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I no longer look at them as these terrible things happen
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to me I'm going through these shitty circumstances it's actually a case of I'm going through this
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because it's my character development it's necessary for me to overcome
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to learn to become the person I'm here to become and
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when I start thinking about it as a proactive choice an
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opt-in a necessary part of my growth it completely changes everything
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so I'd love to hear this reframe or this story or this way of thinking
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something you've heard before or not and whether it's something
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that you're keen to adopt because of all the eight this has been one
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that has been really really profound for me probably this
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and the imposter syndrome one
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but i'd love to hear your thoughts on it drop a
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comment below the fifth mindset that's keeping you small is a scarcity mentality many of you probably heard of scarcity
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and abundance right scarcity basically you don't think there's enough to go around you are essentially focusing on lack
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and making decisions out of fear right you're making decisions based off the fact that there's not enough for everyone.
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If somebody else achieves or has something, that's taking away from you and your experience.
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And this 125,000% will limit your ability to create the life you want, which often is filled with abundance of things, right?
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Whether it's freedom, wealth, finances, opportunities, experiences.
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If you are stuck in a scarcity mentality, you are blocking yourself from achieving all the things that you're striving to achieve.
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So a reframe or a replace I want to offer you is obviously anchored in an abundance mentality,
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but specifically that you will always and have always had more than enough than what you need.
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Whether it's money, shelter, food, experiences, everything is in abundance.
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And up until this point in your life, you have had an abundance of all those things and you will continue to have an abundance of all those things.
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When you anchor yourself in that is my default position, I've always had enough and I will always have enough.
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And you really start to work on that abundance mentality.
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Things start to change.
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And one thing I just want to add here is notice where you feel resistance. So
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if you're like the thought of having an infinite amount of money all the time freaks you out a bit
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or you're like, no, that just feels wrong for me.
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I don't need that much money.
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or maybe you fill that with traveling experiences.
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You know, if you have any resistance towards anything you feel scarcity towards, again, it's an opportunity for you to unlock where your limitations are.
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Do you have some limiting beliefs about generating a lot of money
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or a lot of wealth or a lot of experiences or a lot of freedom?
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You know, I personally felt this when I stopped working in a law firm
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and I started doing law on a consulting basis.
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I thought, who am I to have all this freedom and make more money than what I did in a salary.
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Because I had these limiting beliefs around you have to work really hard
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and for someone else to make a lot of money
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because that's a stable way to do it and that's the way it's been tried and tested, right?
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So who am I to kind of work less and make more?
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That made me feel really bad like I was cheating the system or something.
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So I had to really work through that belief
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that you have to slave and work overtime and so many hours to create wealth for yourself.
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I had to really shift that belief.
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So any limitations you have
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that are rooted in scarcity as an opportunity again for you to understand where are your limiting beliefs
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and these will block your ability to create success or your dream life.
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So it's really important you pay attention to this one.
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All right, number six, one of my favorites because it's plagued me for a long time too, perfectionism.
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It's this mindset where you're just waiting for the right time.
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You're waiting for all the details to fall into place.
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You're waiting until you know enough, right?
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Until you have enough experience, until you have prepared enough to start or do that thing.
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This will keep you stuck in inaction and will paralyze any progress or momentum you want to create.
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Now, quick aside, I appreciate and acknowledge that with starting anything, it's not just open your laptop and start a podcast, right?
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There is a little bit of groundwork research you need to do before you do anything, right?
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You want to feel prepared, but there is a limit on being prepared.
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and there's a line between being prepared and it being perfect.
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And that level of perfectionism will never exist.
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You are never going to be prepared enough for something you've never done before.
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How can you be prepared for something you've never done before?
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Half of the preparedness comes from doing.
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So do what you need to do to understand the basics, the mechanics of what you need to do, but then just start the action.
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Because if you prepare yourself and then wait, you're going to be waiting forever.
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You're never, ever going to start.
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I promise you that much.
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You have to just bite the bullet and accept that a part of being prepared is just getting going.
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So that reframe is there's never a right time.
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The right time is now.
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Do your baseline preparation and then just start.
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Like I always say to people when they ask me about starting a podcast or a YouTube channel,
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like I promise you, you are always going to look back at that first video and cringe.
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Like I still do it today because that's the worst you're ever going to be.
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every single time you record after that it's only going to get better
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and better like where i am now in terms of the
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way i record the way i can show up on camera is leaps
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and bounds from that first video i ever did
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which was at home on my iphone
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so many cuts i was in a blazer like very kind of uptight it's different
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and there is no level of theoretical preparedness i could have
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done to get me to this point other than tried
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and tested hours of experimenting of trying different studios of changing
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my microphone of learning different things like i always try
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and change one thing every time i record
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and that's just how i've built the one percent every time
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so moral of the story there's never going to be a right time you're always going to learn
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and improve from when you get going so do your baseline preparation
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and just start that's a message to anyone listening who is
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waiting for the right time take this as your sign the time is now the seventh mindset
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that is blocking you from achieving or creating a life you want is all
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or nothing thinking it's this belief that you have to go all in
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or not to achieve your goals
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and what happens is this stops you actually making incremental steps
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or changes of progress towards the life you want right
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because you think
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if i can't go all in right now there's no point
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even starting this is a massive reason why i started this podcast
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so the name the balance theory comes from the concept of
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reframing the way we look at balance i was in this very interested
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or curious position where i thought if i want to have success
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if i want to achieve all these things i want in
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my life from a financial point of view from an experience
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point of view from an achievement point of view i have to go all in on what i'm doing
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but that's not true i started the podcast while i worked full-time and that's been And since I started now, I'm still doing that combination, right?
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If I had waited until I can start the podcast and do only the podcast,
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I probably never would have gotten going because no one starts a podcast on a full-time salary unless it's like, I don't know produced by a studio
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or something like it's quite a rare occurrence most people will make money through other offshoots of the podcast
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and then eventually through the show as well effectively I felt
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that I couldn't have some sort of sustainability as I was working towards my goals
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and I think a lot of people are stuck in this kind of hustle culture mentality where they feel
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will have to cut back on socializing and the gym
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and all these things in order to achieve what I want to achieve.
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Now, of course, there are compromises in starting things and putting more time towards things you love,
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but you don't have to dedicate 100% of yourself to one thing.
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And I'm actually very, very against that.
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The whole balance theory concept is you have to actually work out what your priorities are in your health, in your relationships and in your work or your fulfillment
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and you have to balance those priorities because if
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if I can get my sleep
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and move every day the quality of work I'm going to do
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that day is going to be leaps and bounds better than
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if I didn't have those things so you don't have to fall into this all
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or nothing thinking and
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if this is a concept you're interested in how to more sustainably manage your time
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which by the way
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that doesn't mean you're not working 12 hour days you can work as much as you want
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when you have your priorities in check because those things will fuel you to actually show up exactly how you want.
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So this is something that's interesting to you
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and you want to have a little bit more of a deeper think about how to structure your time
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and maybe have a little bit more balance while you're working on these ambitious goals.
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Again, having balance just means prioritizing your priorities, making the most important things the most important things.
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I'm going to link a free workshop I did on exactly this.
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It will literally take you through how to find your priorities and structure your time to effectively create your own balance.
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And this is a really beautiful way to not fall into
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that all or nothing thinking because life is more than our goals, right?
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Than our work, than our business.
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It's a lot more than that.
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It's a fuller experience, at least for me anyway.
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So if that's something you're interested in, check it out, the link's in the show notes.
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If you're watching on YouTube, it's on the screen now.
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Lastly, the final mindset that's blocking you achieving your dream life is the comparison trap.
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If you are constantly comparing yourself to others, either consciously or subconsciously.
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You know, it could just be as simple as you're scrolling online and then you feel bad about yourself.
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That's a comparison trap.
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Or maybe you're physically talking to or about someone that's a bit more conscious, right?
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Comparison trap.
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That is going to blind you to your unique path and progress because if you look hard enough, there's always someone who's achieved more than you.
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But the problem is, and I've fallen into this myself, we compare our day one to someone's day 1,000.
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We actually don't even know what day some people are on.
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Sometimes they appear online and you've just seen them for the first time, but you don't know that they've been hustling and creating content for five years before that.
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We just make these assumptions and automatically compare ourselves to other people, which is the worst thing we can do for our own progress and creating our own life.
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No two people are made the same and none of us are supposed to have the same experience.
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Otherwise, we'd all look and feel, have the same DNA.
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Like we're all made different to have our own unique experiences.
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and so a really beautiful place i want to offer you here is instead of feeling threatened
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or small by what other people have achieved reframe that
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and look at it
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and think that's what's possible for me what this person has
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achieved what they're doing that's something that's possible for me too
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right so use other people as inspiration not as a way to belittle yourself
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or judge yourself on how far you have
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or haven't gone that's been a really nice way to reframe
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and if you can't do that and you feel your thoughts
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or you're triggered by somebody then that is a toxic relationship
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and it doesn't mean they're a bad person it just means the impact it has on you is toxic
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so unfollow mute them disconnect whatever you need to do to
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protect your energy it's really really important you want to follow people
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that empower you that inspire you
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that show you what's possible for you not reflect maybe what you haven't yet achieved
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which brings us back to scarcity right
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so doing a little bit of a detox or cleanse on the things you're consuming the accounts you're following
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is also a really good way to kind of lean into this one
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so those are the eight mindsets that are blocking you from achieving
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and creating the exact life you want i promise you
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that working through the top two or three at least
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that are really really ringing true for you right now will
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make a monumental difference in the way you see yourself
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and the world because i am the biggest advocate of the fact that the opportunities you get, the experience you have is a direct correlation with the way you feel about yourself.
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So working through these is a way for you to get to know yourself better
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and clear any limitations or blocks that you personally have, which is truthfully the only hurdles between you and the life you want.
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I'd love to hear which of the eight resonated with you guys most.
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Drop a comment below.
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It'd be really interesting to see if there's any commonality between
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which ones you guys are feeling the most strongly
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and maybe that's that's topics i can do future content on
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so make sure you drop some comments below that's it for
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today's episode i'll see you guys in the next one and until then stay balanced
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Overcoming Mental Blocks While Practicing English: A Real-Life Scenario
Imagine you’re eager to improve your English speaking skills but keep holding back. You avoid practicing shadow speech because you fear failing—worried your pronunciation isn’t "perfect" or that you’ll make mistakes. Or maybe you start a shadowing session but feel like an imposter, thinking, "Who am I to try this?" These mindsets, common in language learning, can stall progress. The video highlights how such thought patterns block potential, but it also offers solutions—perfect for English learners ready to break free.
Useful Chunks & Collocations to Boost Your Practice
- "Reframe your mindset": Shift from "I can’t do this" to "I’m learning with every try."
- "Push outside your comfort zone": Essential for improving English pronunciation—don’t let fear of errors stop you.
- "Build blocks of experience": Each shadowing attempt adds to your skills, even if it feels imperfect.
- "Replace the thought": When self-doubt hits, swap "I’m not good enough" with "I’m getting better daily."
Your Shadowing Challenge: Start Small, Think Big
Today, pick one short English clip (10-15 seconds) and use the shadowing technique. As you practice, notice if fear of failure or imposter syndrome creeps in. When it does, immediately replace the negative thought with a reframe: "Failing here means I’m trying, and trying builds skills." Repeat the clip 3-5 times, focusing on mimicking intonation and rhythm. This small, consistent effort trains your brain to embrace growth over perfection. Remember, shadowspeak isn’t about being flawless—it’s about progress. By rewiring your mindset and practicing daily, you’ll soon see your confidence and pronunciation soar.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if they're not someone you would ask |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have been · have failed · you've already achieved |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is not based · is filled · been tried |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | something which was · people, which is · have, which is |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.