002 The Four Desires of What’s Next

Trish Blain is a serial entrepreneur, facilitator, and expert in non-ordinary skills and states of consciousness. An explorer at the evolving edge of what it means to be human, Trish is deeply committed to creating a world where we all thrive.

She is passionate about helping entrepreneurs, change-makers, and leaders amplify their impact by aligning with life and each other.

She is the developer of the Four Forces Framework which is the foundation of NonOrdinary.com, a skill-based community of positive impact collaborators and creators.

Links:
www.nonordinary.com
blain.trish@gmail.com

Transcript
Unknown Speaker  4:35  

Welcome, everyone to another edition of The exciting unknown podcast. I’m Laura Sanchez, and this is my co presenter, Stephen Christopher. And we’re so excited today to have with us Trish Blaine. I’m not sure what I can say about Trish other than she’s always been a woman ahead of the times. You know, she tried to start an internet cafe. And people said she was crazy. They’re like, What? Why would we need that? She attempted to create one of the first co working spaces in the country. And again, people are like, why would we need that? That’s crazy. You know, she’s always been an entrepreneur at heart. She’s built numerous successful businesses, including hosting and producing a TV show. She also created a whole health Expo that had thousands of attendees. But like many of us, and many of you listening today, she knew there was something more. And that has led her now to becoming the CEO at non ordinary. She’s also the creator of something called four forces framework, which I know we’re going to hear a lot about today. So with that Trish, welcome, so welcome.

Unknown Speaker  5:54  

And we’re so happy to have you. Thank you. I’m just absolutely delighted to be with you today.

Unknown Speaker  6:00  

You know, when I read that, and I was preparing for this, and I thought about all of these things is, where you were and where you are now. How did you know that there was something more tough to talk to us about what that feeling was?

Unknown Speaker  6:16  

Well, you know, it’s even since I was really little, there was a lot of suffering in my family. And it just didn’t make sense to me. Even my family was very religious. And growing up, it just felt like why is there just so much pain and suffering in the world. And then in the early 90s, late 1980s, I’m dating myself a bit here, but my very first entrepreneurial project was an environmental store, again, a little bit ahead of its time. But what I was noticing was I think a lot of people were saying, Oh, yeah, a better world. We need to make some changes. They were already talking about climate change, although back then it was called global warming. And I was really noticing too, that like, everybody had all these different versions. what that would look like. And I started really thinking about, well, how are we ever going to sort of have some improvements? If, if we can’t even agree what that what that looks like? And I’d say that there’s been, you know, there’s been a spiritual journey of trying to make sense of like, why are we here? What’s the point? So there’s just been this ongoing feeling of like, it doesn’t have to, it doesn’t have to be suffering, it doesn’t have to be this way. And also, then even through my work, and being an entrepreneur, really, how do you galvanize people to get on that same page so that we can have more leverage and more, more impact more synergy with all of us? I know, that’s one of those catchphrase, crazy catchphrase words, synergy, but there’s truth in it, like how do we create more together than we can by ourselves?

Unknown Speaker  7:51  

So that led you on your journey to where you’re at now?

Unknown Speaker  7:57  

Yeah, I’m back. When I had the invite. I had an invite Mental store it was selling things like recycled toilet paper, which my dad was horrified by, you

Unknown Speaker  8:06  

know that that

Stephen Christopher  8:09  

was his whole thing was

Unknown Speaker  8:13  

you know, recycled paper the papers before people were thinking like in terms of all these, you know, part of the product now, but even, you know, compact fluorescent light bulbs for $38 each people were like, why would I want this weird thing in my, you know, in my lamp, and yet now they’re obsolete actually, you know, so now LEDs and other things are replacing them. But but in the context of that there was there was this, this deep desire to figure it out, like to figure out why, like, I can sell these products but if it doesn’t really land if people aren’t able to really understand why we’re doing this, then sort of what’s the point of it? So there was this bigger journey and that’s where I started asking this question. Like, why Can we all actually agree on? What are the things that we can actually all agree on?

Unknown Speaker  9:03  

Is that the basis then of the four forces?

Unknown Speaker  9:06  

It is? It is. So that was over 30 years ago and really looking at what are the common denominators that we can all agree on? What are the things that we can all say yes to. And what I found was there was just four things, actually, that when I really distilled it down as to why we want money, why we want the things we want, like what are we really striving for and trying to get I found that it really it just came down to four things period.

Unknown Speaker  9:33  

And as we were going to share those four things you’re gonna hold this is like a teaser to get up to.

Unknown Speaker  9:39  

So the four are the ones very obvious. I think we’re the first one that people when I say what are the four one is connection. So we want to love and be loved and belong. And you know, as much as we are, we want to belong we also want to be unique. We want to be separate. We want to be heard and seen for our voice for us. specialness and I call that expression. And then the third one was this idea of wanting to contribute in some way to be part of the greater good of also making sense and meaning out of the world. And that when I called purpose, I called purpose. and forth. The final one is, um, as much as we want sort of meaning and structure of purpose. We also want the exciting unknown, we want growth, we want tomorrow to be better than today. And those four when I started really working with them, I found that our, our ways of trying to get those four things right at the heart of all the place, all the suffering, all the confusion, all of the like, why aren’t I getting what actually want because, in essence, we’re not actually taught how to get those four things. So you know, people say love is the answer in the world, but we haven’t actually taught we’re not taught how to love like how to like if I say okay, right now, love your enemy. Like, how do you do that? Like it’s a it’s a very arbitrary thing in the way that we talk about them. And

Unknown Speaker  11:05  

certainly depending upon our upbringing, right, we make love is one thing. However, our parents showed us that love and whether we felt it from them or not, we either can turn around and share that with someone else the exact same way or try and do the opposite, right? But all of that may not really be the epitome of showing love.

Unknown Speaker  11:28  

Right or, or the confusion around. Love being even love being an act certainly being loving is an act. But how do you feel love to begin with, like we we so one of the confusions that I found around connection and love is this idea that we have to actually create it. So it’s either there we either have to create it or it’s there or not there. So so if we meet somebody, and we say, Oh, I felt a real connection with them, and then we meet somebody else and we say, Oh, I didn’t feel any connection right or we wait to find out In love with somebody. And then when we fall in love, what does that mean? Right? Like, we suddenly start behaving differently, because now we love that person. But I’ve actually found that all of that is actually a skill that you can, you can fall in love with anybody. You can connect with anybody because we are actually connected.

Unknown Speaker  12:18  

So it’s just, it’s somewhat of a choice and then having the skills to know how to fulfill that make,

Unknown Speaker  12:24  

right? And, and there’s all sorts of ways that we ended up you know, we hold back ourselves because we want to belong and we’d so we don’t express ourselves, we don’t share who we really are. We want to we want to, we might hold back. So that’s expression connection, sort of confusion, even in the bigger worlds like we’re very focused on when you’re focused on growth. And this idea of creating what you want in the world, no matter what, like, you know, there’s a lot of sort of reward for being out there for being successful, right, but what’s the definition of successful After a while, like a lot of I’m imagining, like myself, and even a lot of the people that are watching here, right part of that feeling of more is Alright, I’ve now checked all the boxes of what it means to be successful. And I have all those things and I’m still not satisfied. Like there’s still this deep knowing of more.

Unknown Speaker  13:19  

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, talking to one of our guests on another episode, Chris cow. And one of the first things we talked about was this concept of looking at him externally. People would say, Oh, my gosh, so successful, built a very large company, hundreds of employees, you know, had all of the external identifications of success. You know, toys he traveled, he did amazing things. He had a great company. But yet, internally he, his comment was I never even felt like I was successful number one, and then that led him Ultimately to say, Okay, you know what, this company isn’t fulfilling for me any longer looking for Okay, something different?

Unknown Speaker  14:09  

Yeah, and I think that’s the case for for all sorts of ways that we have these goals and we think that’s going to help us to feel a certain way and then we get there and we’re like, oh, that that didn’t doesn’t feel the way I thought it was gonna feel me. Yeah, in our, in our businesses and in our you know, there’s this kind of a common story where people successful, they’re very successful, they make a lot of money and then they, they look for meaning and become you know, and become philanthropists and wanting to give back and, and the ideal is to how do you do these four now deeply at the same time, like how do you make money while having a positive impact and contributing to the greater good when you put them together then life becomes much more of a flow feeling and and, and deeply satisfying, rather than it having to be one or the other. That’s often what we also do is I can either make money or I can benefit of the planet or world in some way, and be charitable, right? I don’t have to make the money first. So then I can be charitable but then in the meantime, we’re not. We’re not enjoying life the way we could we’re not feeling that deep sense of satisfaction along the way.

Unknown Speaker  15:15  

Steven, does that bring into anything for you?

Stephen Christopher  15:17  

So I want to give clarity to something. So Trish said, the question is, how can you basically how can I find fulfilment and potentially make money and so I want to make sure that this point is driven home that it is possible, it is possible to do this. So a lot of what Trisha is work is and you know, one of the things that I don’t remember if we mentioned or not, but Chris is actually a coach to both of us, right? And because I really enjoy this stuff, and I love bringing it in. I’ll also bring in that you know, Trisha is a highly skilled, intuitive, and has a lot of these other cool gifts that you might consider woowoo type stuff, but this is this whole new paradigm shift. If that were all of this stuff is coming together as humans, we have these massive, massive capabilities to learn and use these skills. And Tricia is extremely skilled in that. And I mean, I know I’ve learned a ton so far. And one of the things that that I’m working on with her specifically is learning how to do that fulfillment. And I guess Trish, I guess I’ll call it kind of success based on you know, what the outside world looks at it as in creating this much deeper, richer life, all now. And I think that they’re, I think the paradigm shift is moving towards people being like, wait, okay, there’s got to be a way, but maybe 10 or 20 years ago, it was like, okay, nope, become successful. And then right, and now it’s moving way more towards like, Alright, I know there’s a way but I have no clue what it is. But it’s that pre emptive like knowing and feeling like All right, come on. There’s gotta be, there’s gotta be something. There’s got to be some way. Right?

Unknown Speaker  16:59  

Right. Right. Absolutely.

Unknown Speaker  17:01  

And so given that, how do how would one go about saying, All right, let’s just say that you’re in your career, and you’re at a point where you’re like, Okay, you know, I’m not fulfilled any longer this, you know, maybe I’ve been successful, or maybe I don’t even feel like I’m successful where I’m at, but I don’t want to keep doing it the same way. What what, you know, you talked about, we don’t have the skills, what are some of those skills that need to be working on? Yeah, well, if if,

Unknown Speaker  17:31  

you know, first of all, I’m honored to be working with both of you. And I see it as this part of the big part of the exciting unknown is this idea that we are in fact, shifting the way that we need to be able to collaborate and work with each other period. Like it’s not just for an individual we are at this much bigger point where what you know, I think all of us can say what used to work just isn’t working anymore. You can name a whole bunch of reasons why that’s not working. So one of the pieces is to really feel the truth of you, as a leader, you as an entrepreneur, you know, the people watching your podcast, that there is this choice point about being willing to be a leader in the sense of, Oh, this is a completely different way of being in the world. That still takes all the skills that I know, I think one of the confusions about being in the unknown, is that you’re sort of starting over and there’s nothing there and you’re not, you’re always you’re always at the edge, you always have everything that you’ve already learned at that evolving edge. And that evolving edge, you get to bring those gifts and the thing that we’re really needing to do, for example is to is to transcend the idea of polarity. So one of the tools one of the skills you can do as much as it’s learning the four forces but it’s also learning how to Pat your head and Rub your tummy at the same time. Okay, let’s try it. Oh,

Unknown Speaker  18:58  

you know, so sorry. kinda

Unknown Speaker  19:02  

you know, and I think that’s where, um, there’s a, a different way of thinking about the skills and it’s, it’s a simple analogy that I would use is the way that in the world right now that we’ve, we’ve been sort of taught how things work. If you think of it more like an orchestra where there’s a hierarchy, and you’re trying to get to the top, you’re trying to become the conductor, so that you can pick the song, right, and you can get everybody to go along with your version of what you want life to look like in the world face to look like. But in the meantime, everybody else is also trying to get their song played. And there’s a lot of, you know, anybody that’s been been in a room or a group, you know, with a bunch of really strong leaders, and, you know, there’s a lot of a lot of challenge around collaborating, right? Even in in our relationships, too, right. So, and the the shift that we’re talking about, it’s hard to not sound cliche about shift in paradigm and all that but it really is a different mindset. It’s a way of Engaging, that’s different. Instead of an orchestra, sort of analogy, I think of it instead is this jazz improv or music jamming, sort of analogy. And for that each person has to show up, there’s a common intention, oh, we’re coming together to do this thing or we’re working together, we’re collaborating, that would be purpose, having an intention and meaning there. Each person comes with their unique instruments. So you get to show up in your fullness, your your uniqueness, your expression. There’s a but there’s, instead of a song you’re leaning in, you still have music in the structure, that you’re leaning into purpose, but you’re leaning in also to what wants to happen. Like what’s a song that’s greater than any song that you could do by yourself or you could have thought of beforehand. And that’s what the world’s needing right now is that ability to be able to lean into something that transcends our own individual and create something that’s even greater. The confusion is also that we think Think well, that will be just like sameness and socialism and all that kind of pushback, we’re getting a lot in the world in general. But this isn’t even different than that. This is where you get to be fully in your gifts and fully in your expression of your who you are. But you also have to learn how to lean in and, and since and follow the other players and when is it time to support somebody else’s solo and in service of the music? And the thing you know, I’m actually not I use this analogy a lot. And I’m actually not a real great jazz fan for the music itself. But I actually love to go and listen to jazz music because I love watching the performers.

Unknown Speaker  21:39  

I was just going to say one of the parts that I enjoy is watching because two things strike for me is number one, they’re so into it, right? Like you know, you can just tell they are they feel everything that’s happening. And I’m always amazed at like when does somebody else know when to jump in? And where’s the handoff? Because in my right Brain stance of life, I tend to look for, you know, there’s a sign, right you know, they go like this or or a head nod or something. And it’s no you’re rare where that you see that right? And that is amazing to me is like, okay, when do they know how do they do that?

Unknown Speaker  22:14  

Right and and there’s no mistakes on the, you know, there’s a wonderful video, perhaps we could put a link to it down below. But this idea that there’s there around, there’s no mistakes on the bandstand like that when you’re a jazz improv player. The only mistake is when you reject what the other person’s playing instead of like, letting it impact you and inform you. So some of those skills are things like intuition, and we put those in the category of woowoo. But in fact, they’re just a connection skill. They’re our ability to be able to sense and feel and be impacted by the world around us. And and the skills of expression are what’s moving in you not what do you think you should do or what’s right Right or wrong, but rather, what’s moving in you that is connected and fitting in with what’s happening. And there really is a lot of the stuff that’s been categorized as woowoo. More and more people are having experiences, whether through sacred medicines, or meditation, or Tantra, or there’s all sorts of stuff happening around that those feelings where we break open or feel a common field, a common sense of communion, or union with people even on the dance floor you ever have. you’re at a party or a wedding and the whole room just feels like Oh, man, we’re all one and rollin. This, this, you know, Joy together that sense, like being able to cultivate that and feel that and that’s not woowoo that’s actually every day. So when you talk to people about these sort of peak experiences, we’re tapping in to these non ordinary states, these these things that a lot of times are categorized as woowoo. But we need to do that in order to be able to create at the level and at the Speed that we need to really address a lot of the problems that are in the world. And when you’re a leader when you’re an entrepreneur, the world is completely. There’s a term for it vuca, volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. It’s a military term, but it’s it’s like how do you navigate that? And the logical brain, the linear thinking alone, it’s not throwing the baby out with the bathwater. But doing that alone doesn’t doesn’t work anymore. You can’t plan that way. You have to be able to move and be in that improv with life. Look at what’s happened between, you know, just in the last few months between COVID and you know, the riots and in and the protesting and all of that there’s like so much happening. You have to be able to be in that. How do I move with this?

Stephen Christopher  24:53  

We were just talking about that, actually, before we started this episode, because right now, in addition to those things, You mentioned, you know, at least in my life, right now we have a very sick mother in law. We’ve been in Florida for the past 45 days, we’re, you know, starting a podcast, we’re doing all of this stuff out of out of the normal element. And one of the things that I told Laura this morning is, I’m really learning through the work that you and I are doing Trish and being able to implement it and say, okay, like, this stuff is all not like, perfectly structured, but it’s okay. It doesn’t have to be stressful. It can just be what it is. And it’s actually made it so much easier. And it’s leaning into that exciting, unknown, like, Okay, what could all of this lead to? And maybe when I look back at it, I’ll be able to see how all the dots connected and like, oh, if I hadn’t gone here, this wouldn’t happen and hadn’t had done this and hadn’t done this. And so I’m leaning into it way more, and it’s actually not. It’s not stressful. It’s just allowing it and it actually starts to become more fun. But my whole entrepreneur type business leader brain, as you know, as I was trained for 15 years reading every frickin book in the world. It’s like, Oh, no, you’ve got to have structure. And you’ve got to have this and you’ve got to have this. And you actually Trish, one thing you talked about it, maybe maybe this will come into play is kind of making that container, right. So kind of jazz improv. There’s some sort of a container that you’re making, that you get to like play within. So there is some structure, but it’s a lot looser and bigger. And, I don’t know more undefined than maybe we’re used to, especially in the business world

Unknown Speaker  26:42  

kick kick. Yeah, maybe you could talk about that in the context of, you know, a lot of our audience are entrepreneurs and they are maybe trying to figure out what’s next. What’s that next mountain, but yet, they don’t really have a direction and they’re not quite sure you know, giving up what you have for someone The unknown, or Yo,

Stephen Christopher  27:02  

I want to add one thing here that that may be that may resonate with listeners that comes up often for me is, as entrepreneurs, you know, a lot of times, we think, okay, we do this, and then we do that. And then we can do this next thing. So basically, what that generally looks like from people I’ve talked to, as you start a business, you run it, you work yourself to the bone, then you sell that business, then you can take a breath, and then you can go do something, but you alluded to it in the beginning, like, you can do all of it. And I know I’ve gone through this right with a couple businesses, I’ll run one and it goes really well. And then something happens. I’m like, Oh, my gosh, when I can just get out of that, that, you know, I got a partnership that wasn’t working. I was like, Oh, I can just get out of this, then I can do something else. But I continue to run into those same feelings and things around the same timeframe. So I keep saying, okay, there’s got to be a better way. Yeah. And I just know a lot of people are like, Okay, well, you know, I’m just gonna sell this business, right, like, I’m just gonna get out of it. You’re still unfulfilled?

Unknown Speaker  28:03  

Right? Well there’s there’s a way of framing things. So when you’re talking about, you know, being in that exciting, unknown and having having things be looser, it’s it’s a paradox but here’s part of the Pat your head Rub your tummy part of this right? Ultimately, you actually want to do four things. So it’s like a one man band, right? That’s, I’m impressed. I have a good job. It’s like structure when structure is done well, it actually allows for more creativity. The problem is the way we do structure is trying to define it in a way that then puts us in a box and limits our experience or even the way that we think about what we do. So the the way of framing it can actually change your experience of it. I had a an experience of a client who was a plumber actually, and he was really fed up. He’s a very, he’s very conscious and also like a showman and doing all these other stuff. And he’s like, I want I was talking to him about what do you really want? And he’s like, I want to restore flow to to the world. And I was like, well, that’s what you I said, I started laughing because I’m like, that’s actually what you do. And you’re adding jobs, right? Like, yeah, and that that shift was like, he was like, Oh, my God, you’re right, like, so. And he’s like, and he started talking about the moment that he turns the water back on and feels that the house and that’s like, his greatest joy that he loves is that’s the part of the job he loves. So there was it was still both and of him saying, well, I want to move my life towards this other vision of what I will look like but he started to really enjoy restoring flow in people’s homes through his work as a plumber. So there’s this way that we can frame things makes a huge difference and how they how it happens. And one of those two is when you look at your business agenda or intention. We’re really talking about purpose. is here as a structure as structure in meaning and intention? How do you set that up in such a way that it allows for creativity and allows for something new and bigger to emerge while you’re holding the structure? So one of the ways you can do that is by instead of saying, I mean, instead of even naming a goal that’s really, really specific. Again, it’s about both and you want to have goals and but the bigger frame needs to be this intention. So having something like how can we like how, how can we help more people through this product or through this service? How can we help even more people is a very different question than how can I sell more how can we sell more of this product? Right, both are going to actually get you the same result which is selling more product. But but that frame difference really makes a difference about how the business feels to the people that are doing it, including you as the entrepreneur as the leader.

Unknown Speaker  31:00  

Make sense?

Unknown Speaker  31:02  

So there’s a lot of ways that people think that they have to give up their current business to start something new to be satisfied. And I would even say, start practicing the skills while you’re in the current work that you’re doing or in that transition. And that will open up the direction and the feeling of what’s next. What where’s that leading you? Or how do you take the both end of the desire that you have? Right? Like, oh, I want to restore flow to the world, right? But how can I do that right now in my in my business without having to wait without having to do something different. And that’s going to transform the world in even other surprising ways. Because it because we need we need this more that everybody is sensing and feeling we needed at every level. We needed an every place in our society and in our lives. There is more we all know it, we can feel it.

Unknown Speaker  31:57  

So at least a lot of it again, going back to the forum four forces are the four desires. And and

Unknown Speaker  32:05  

can you talk a little bit about?

Unknown Speaker  32:09  

We all want all four of them? And do we all innately have them all? Or do we focus on one more than the other? How does that really play out in terms of the day to day what we experience?

Unknown Speaker  32:23  

Yeah, and a lot of what we talk about ends up can be mapped out on the four forces. So the idea of, there’s a common split between expression and growth as one access of the four forces is like an X, and one leg of the X is expression and growth are in that axis. And, and connection and purpose. So a lot of times it’s like I’m gonna make money make it happen, expression, desire, and then purpose and connection come in. So expression, growth, and then connection and purpose I’ll do later when at once I have money. I’ll spend time with my family. Then once I’ve made My money, I will help people and be, you know, part of purposeful once I’ve made my money, right. But in the meantime, you end up feeling, you know, split you feel not fulfilled, right? So everybody actually has what I found is that we have these strategies based on these four things. So depending on what, what you really want, we also then have a desire, I’m sorry, what you really want, we also then have a strategy of how to get that. So we might really, really want connection, but our strategy is to be a lone wolf because we don’t want to get hurt. Or we can write or we can really really want connection and our strategy could be I’m going to be really useful and help people and be sacrificed myself purpose in order for people to love me. Yeah, right. Or our focus and our desire could be connection, but I’m going to make lots of money so that I can have a you know, that is a cliche, but it’s true in our world of like, I’m going to be really successful so I can get that partner that woman that I want. Right, like so. Right. So that’s my strategy in order to be able to make money to take care of my family in connection. But ultimately, what I found is when you put all four together, then you get those flow states. And so the ideal is How do you do? How do you untangle that strategy? Because there’s a reason why you’ve developed that lone wolf strategy. For example, we’ve been hurt. You know, and here’s a piece that is, I think, becoming very common in the conversation, but is, can be sometimes hard to talk about in the context of businesses, but we hold a lot of trauma, we hold a lot of past experiences that actually are impacting our nervous system. We’re seeing it play out collectively to in the protests that are happening. There’s and there’s reason for that, like, it’s justified. It’s not just like, Oh, I’m making up stuff, you know, so but those places we’ve created these strategies and ways of doing one or two of the forces really well. Because we’ve had some kind of trauma or we’ve tried to get love, but we don’t we, we feel like we can’t or we’re not enough. So we have to prove we’re really good. So we’re gonna have an expression strategy being really powerful and get what we want and and then people will love us or then we won’t care if people like us, like there’s so many different variations. But the ideal I found is we want to untangle them and actually get all four. We all want all four. We just don’t know how to do it. And it feels in our current world, like it’s an impossibility, because in our current world, it kind of is, like, there we were given all these choices, rather than like, no, how do we do them at the same time? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  35:39  

And I think too, for like, for me, one of the things that I’ve learned through working with you and began to recognize is that, you know, what I really seek most in life is connection. And I didn’t know how to do that. I think I tried to do it several times early in my life and I was hurt. I didn’t get what I I was looking for and so I decided to really focus on growth. And then I began to substitute and said, Oh, well, look, I have these connections that I have acquired as a result of my growth and building of my business and being successful. And oh, look, I have these friends. But I thought that that was enough. I thought that was okay. In reality, they weren’t really true connections. They were just my way of saying, Well, I don’t really need that. I have this and this is good enough. And this is all you can get. Right?

Unknown Speaker  36:38  

Yeah. Right. Exactly. And I think that’s a really common, a common approach. You know, and I’d say that one of the one of the biggest desires for I think, underneath all of it for people, if I were to look at the four forces and say, what’s one of the most common sort of combinations? I think we we want to be able to be fully ourselves be seen and recognized as unique and still be loved and belong. And that’s putting expression and connection together. And those are often in our society very separate things. Yeah, we can have one or the other. Right? We can get what we want be successful, but we have to manipulate people, we have to convince them we have to, like how do we or we have to put on a certain we have to look a certain way so that people will like us, but what we’re really longing for underneath is we want to just be able to be ourselves, be fully seen and belong and still be loved, still be liked. You know, and and what’s happening in our culture on a bigger in a bigger level is we’re becoming more and more polarized because we’re, we’re attracting or we’re going into groups that think like we do, more and more. That’s what this polarity is right? I want to be around people like me, so that I can be myself and be feel justified in that. But then but then it’s causing all this real problems of splits of not being able to actually be in conversation with somebody who’s not the same as you. Yeah. And really,

Stephen Christopher  38:05  

if I kind of hear you correctly from earlier, ultimately, we are all the same. Right? I mean, at some at some level, we are all very we are all interconnected, we are all similar. We’re all going for the same kind of things. We just we’re all going about it in these different ways.

Unknown Speaker  38:24  

Yeah, we all want the, the and it’s not just wanting these desires I would say that these four forces the reason I called them forces was because they’re moving us whether we realize it or not, where they’re at sort of the fundamentals of of evolution, if you think about it, they do have ever increasing consciousness is sort of ultimately connection in the way that I I see connection as perception and awareness. And there’s ever more complexity like if you look at the way nature works, there’s always more variety and leaps of leaps of New sort of new quantum leaps of things happening or breakthroughs or right so so life is is with this is really the four forces are about us lining aligning with life and aligning with each other and and all four of those what’s really to get a little woowoo here for a moment if you think of when people say like oneness we go into meditation and you feel that sense of oneness, that’s deep connection, at the same time and from there, oneness is also not sameness, though. oneness is pure consciousness, it’s pure awareness. It’s that knowing of that we’re all connected. We can’t not be connected. But the other part of this is expression is this idea also that we’re a unique point of consciousness. So even though we’re having this conversation, people are hearing this conversation on the podcast. We’re in it together. Each one of us has a unique perspective expression, a unique way that they’re experiencing it. And so even though that we’re all the same and in wanting all for each person’s unique perspective, expression is completely different. So, so that’s where we need to hold both at the same time. And, you know, you say, Well, how does this impact business and, but but that’s part of that jazz improv to recognizing whether it’s employees or for yourself or your customers, like, people want both. They want to feel like they belong, but they also want to feel like they’re not just getting pushed in and the same as everybody else. Right? So when you can build that into your marketing and build that, and that’s why we’re having so much customization of everything, like, people want both of those. So if you’re creating a community or an organization, how do you cultivate Oh, each person has their unique instrument and their unique growth, or I’m sorry, unique gifts to offer. But at the same time, we’re a hole and how do we create something that we can’t do by ourselves? That’s this greater than us feeling and those are that’s where we do want all the same things, but we get to choose the kind of what that looks like. So when people say, well, what’s your version, you just want us to have your version of the better world, you know, trash and I say, Well, I don’t know what the better world’s gonna look like I’m excited to see what we create together. But I also know that we can’t do it unless we have the common denominator of these skills. So, you know, just inviting people into play jazz improv, if they’re an orchestra player isn’t or a conductor isn’t, you know, a roomful of conductors is not going to get you jazz improv.

Unknown Speaker  41:34  

It’s just not. It’s just not gonna work.

Unknown Speaker  41:38  

So that’s where it’s a shift and it’s hard I think, for leaders in particular and business people and myself and potentially you guys can relate to this too is there’s that both and of wanting to be you know, wanting to bring something new into the world that’s yours. And and having that sense of solid sense of, you know, leadership and something new and innovative or or yours, and it’s a both and that doesn’t go away, you still get to have that but also honoring that so does the other person and what then what do you create together?

Unknown Speaker  42:11  

I think that is one of the hardest concepts of this, at least for me is the because it is contrary to the both and is so different than that. Or, or the but, you know, or the right every both and I mean that is that really does take a different mind shift and a different perspective of how this is going to be.

Unknown Speaker  42:37  

Yeah, and it also really requires a deep sense of, of confidence at a really deeper level around your uniqueness and your value in the world. So if if you’re one of those conductors in a room of conductors, try you know if ego, the way I think of ego is not I don’t see ego as bad but when ego is coming from a place of innocence. Security or trying to prove that you’re better than or prove that you’re valuable. And it doesn’t even have to be conscious. There’s a lot of unconscious desires to prove that we’re valuable and lovable, right? Or that we’re powerful and that we can impact the world around us. But when if everybody in that room is trying to prove that they’re the ones that have the best idea, then it doesn’t, it ends up and just nothing happens. It ends up in conflict, it ends up everybody has to submit to somebody or else nothing gets done. versus when you really look at expert jazz, improv players playing together, they’re celebrating each other, they’re bringing out the best in each other. And they’re confident in themselves. They’re not worried about that. If they support somebody else’s music, that they’re going to be seen as less than or that they’re now subservient to that that person, right. But that’s a lot of how it gets set up in our organizations and our companies in the way we’re sort of approaching our lives. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Stephen Christopher  43:57  

So how do you start to How do you? How does somebody if they’re curious about this, learn more about which of the four forces they are maybe more fulfilled in currently, which one they might be trying to get in some way that they’re unaware of. You know, something like that. I mean, I know, I have a lot around connection, right? Like, there’s a lot of ways that I’m that I’m trying and have tried to get connection, that are all say, misaligned, you can correct me in a different way. They’re misaligned with what I’m actually trying to get, right. I’m trying to get this deep sense of connection, and even a little bit into purpose. But I’m going about it or I have been going about it in the past in ways that I’ll get there. But then I’m like, Oh, I still don’t have anything, but I’m not even I wasn’t even aware enough to know that that’s what I was looking for. So how do you start to like, how do you start to figure that out if you’re listening to this now?

Unknown Speaker  44:57  

Yeah. Well, I’m I you know, one of the challenges with this is I really do feel like we need a common operating system. So, so obvious. So obviously for me, it’s like, Come learn some about the four forces and come to non ordinary calm and I’ve got some free assessments and some some information there to be able to learn more about it. And, and even without that thinking of these four in your life around. The tricky part is we’re so confused about what these four things are. So we think that we’re trying to get a connection so it’s really about diving in and untangling some of these. And, you know, it’s what I found is there are there are people in each of the four forces who are untangling them. But there’s, there’s a challenge with it is, for example, learning mindfulness and meditation is A tool. And it’s amazing and you can cultivate that. But it’s not. It’s a connection skill. It’s not a growth skill. So a lot of times people go into meditation, for example. And there’s a sense of being and there’s a sense of peace and there’s a sense of union, but then it’s hard to do anything from there. Like I could totally talks about sitting on a park bench for two years, right? Like you feel all ecstatic and all in, you know, so, one of the things I recommend for people is taking these and start to do really unconventional combinations. Can you be in deep meditation while dancing and totally being in the joy of feeling? head banging music even or classic rock or something and feel both at the same time? Can you put together can you feel totally, deeply relaxed in your self expression? One of the things the most powerful you can feel is when you are just deeply relaxed in yourself and being able to feel matter of factly you like just that sense of matter of factness, like of course I’m me, of course I’m unique. But putting that together with I’m also so unique and so comfortable in this that I’m also going to open to you and feel you and allow myself to be impacted by you. So start to think in terms of anytime even just as a very simple takeaway. That’s not so simple. It’s a it’s a practice that takes muscle building, is anytime you’re in a this or that feeling. Can you stop and say, what happens if I do both at the same time? So one way that you can even do it is if somebody uses meditation as a skill. You can sit and meditate with each option in a hand, like in my left hand, is wanting love and connection and the right hand is I want freedom and independence, right? Like because a lot of times even in our personal relationships, we’re conflicted. Right? Want to be a weed? But then I want to be a me too? And how do we do both? So if you have each option in a hand and when you’re meditating, putting them together, bringing the hands together, and what does it feel like to feel those two together? Or even just brainstorming like, Alright, we have these two opposites and we’re at, if you’re in your organization or your company, and you’re finding that you have this choice to make that feels like an either or choice. Can you stop and reframe it in some way where it’s not an either end or choice? Like? What is the essence of both of the options that want to how can you do both of them at the same time, so that alone will start to break open, I think of it as going from black, white and gray where we’re also trying, we often try to compromise in the middle, and then we don’t get an either right option or it feels kind of like nobody’s happening because we’ve we’ve had a consensus that’s really or a compromise, rather than black and white and gray when you hold the opposites deeply and allow something new then you break open into tech In the color, there’s a whole bunch of options that open up. So just that practice. And really, you know, individually looking at the four of these, the practices for each of them would be meditation and mindfulness would be a great one for connection. For example, doing martial arts is a great one for expression and growth. mindset work which I know both of you do quite a bit a lot of quite a bit of is another great growth, skill and expression. So getting clarity around what you want, you know, purpose, the idea of of intention and Simon cynics work of why asking why you’re doing something is a great purpose skill. So but really be thinking of them as How can I am I addressing all four of these areas in my life and then my putting them together in a new way?

Unknown Speaker  49:51  

Yeah, I think that’s those are some great, great takeaway tools. Anything else you want to add

Unknown Speaker  49:58  

as we wrap up

Stephen Christopher  50:00  

I don’t know, I don’t know if he can talk to this or not. But, you know, what, what? proof or what? Like, you know, somebody that says, Okay, look, I know deep down. So basically, I’m talking to myself, right? Deep down. I know deep down that this is the way I know deep down that, you know, there’s got to be this new operating system. I know that we’re capable of having connection, purpose, growth expression or all of these things at once. But there’s not quite proof in my brain, right? Like in my past experience, that it’s true. So what would you say to people that are like, they know they feel it right? But it’s hard to kind of take that first step into like, Okay, I’m gonna try this because I believe that it’s true, but I don’t quite have the proof in my life yet. Does that makes sense?

Unknown Speaker  50:54  

Absolutely. And what I would say

Unknown Speaker  50:58  

you can’t ever convince Something somebody have something without them having whoops. without them having some kind of visceral experience of it themselves and you’re in your own body like you can’t, it doesn’t matter even you know that you guys are also coaches and you’re doing other work with people or in your, with your staff or with with anybody that you’re working with. It’s really hard to convince something, convince something that is true when people don’t have a physical, visceral sense of it in their lives. So, you know, one of the things we’ve been working with is just what are the little incremental baby steps that you can do? That gives you some, some proof of like, oh, that felt different. That felt a little different, or I did get a little bit more of what I wanted or Oh, that changed that. So it does require some risk taking it requires being willing to be in the exciting unknown, which is that Oh, I’m taking a step into unknown territory. And trying something different. And for each person unlocking one of the challenges with the four forces is just that each person is unique, like how it works for each person is is for you to also be working at as a process and as a building of muscles and how does it work for you to give you that sense of satisfaction? So, if you can also lean into those moments of the more what I would also say is, can you trust that feeling in you? So one of the things even even though Steven you say like you know that proof, there’s a there’s a place in you that you’ve shared even now of like, you know, there’s more like you, I don’t have to prove that to you or you know, or you don’t have to have that be proven to you. There is that feeling and unknowing. So letting letting that lead you and try something. The other thing is it’s not about the goal. It’s about getting feedback. So one of the things about the jazz improvisation Do this what are the other? What are the other players do and then I respond, it’s a conversation. So we’re deep collaboration to me is about being in conversation with each other and with life. It’s about exchange. It’s about allowing yourself to be impacted and changed by what’s happening. So those incremental steps rather than like, Oh, I tried that, and that didn’t work. Can you in that one? It trying something new and that unknown? Can you stop and say, What did I learn from that? What did work? What didn’t work? Why didn’t it work? Like being in curiosity is and really trying, alright, that one time didn’t work. But rather than go back to my old pattern, I’m going to try something different and see, see what works. So those little experiments are, are really important, particularly when you’re within that context of wanting to to step out into a completely exciting unknown territory.

Unknown Speaker  53:55  

Yeah, that whole analogy of you know, are you do you have to jump off the cliff To go into the unknown, or can you, you know, throw a pebble over and see what happens first and then can you take one little step down, as opposed to jumping off the cliff? So yeah,

Stephen Christopher  54:11  

yeah, I guess everybody’s in different places mine always in the clip class. Yeah, screw the clay clay. And I’m always leaning just a little further, right to that point of where you can come back.

Unknown Speaker  54:23  

Well, it makes you, which then makes you jump or it makes you Yeah, which is well, right. actually interesting.

Unknown Speaker  54:30  

Well, it also just using your analogy of that cliff, though, no matter how much I tell you about flying or about being what it feels like to fall from the cliff, there is no proof until you do it. Right. Right. Like it there is just that like there is no there is no way to convince somebody until they have an experience. And that’s where a lot of the experiences we are having in the world or there’s enough motivation of like, oh, what’s here is not working. We have to try something. So either through the push of that or people trying meditation These expanding consciousness pieces, right? Like, those are at least giving us enough of a push to say, okay, the unknown. I can’t have proof. Like no matter how much we talk about it until it’s actually done. You don’t know.

Stephen Christopher  55:14  

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I’ve been the last I don’t know, couple months I’ve been on the edge of the cliff, leaning over just to where gravity didn’t take me over. I’m pretty sure this is my new analogy. Now I’m to the point where I’m leaning further than I could come back from. But Trish has a hold of the back of my shirt. She’s like, see, like, just lean over and look like a little kid like a little kid learning how to die.

Unknown Speaker  55:41  

You’re just running behind me on the bicycle. So you

Unknown Speaker  55:44  

won’t let go until he does. Yeah. And then what happens? Yeah. All right.

Unknown Speaker  55:50  

Cut that rope.

Unknown Speaker  55:52  

Not until I get the okay to let go.

Unknown Speaker  55:56  

Also, this has been so wonderful to have you. Thank you so much. Very much. Is there anything listening? First of all, where can our audience best contact you?

Unknown Speaker  56:05  

I’m not an ordinary calm. So I’m going to be putting up a special page too, that’ll you’ll be able to see on the front of the website for you to be able to do an assessment, and be able to get more information about how you can learn more about these skills. I call them the meta skills because they really are the skills that help you do everything else better. So they’re not instead of what you already do, they’re just a way to amplify what you already do. But it’s been a total pleasure to work with both of you individually and to be on your podcast. I’m just totally thrilled and honored.

Unknown Speaker  56:38  

No honor. Actually, it’s our honor and our privilege to get to have so much of your time. Steven, do you want to share with the audience some of the takeaways Oh, yeah. Okay.

Unknown Speaker  56:48  

It’s so hard I know like you’re like, pages and pages like I want this and this and this.

Stephen Christopher  56:53  

Yeah, I got a lot of notes. But here’s here’s a couple of the the kind of the big point takeaways that I have that I’ll share with you guys. Going back to the very beginning, we can absolutely be fulfilled and successful. And I use those two words specifically based on a lot of who our audience is and what they’re looking for. It is possible. And it is something that you that we all should. If we desire to work towards, I promise you that it is possible. So that feeling that we have that feeling that you have like nying at you, if oh my gosh, there’s got to be more, there’s got to be more listened to that more because it absolutely is real. So it is possible to do those. When when structure is done well, it actually allows for more creativity. So I think depending on where you are like on a leader, entrepreneur scale, I know for me, I value freedom. So I fight structure a lot. And what I’ve learned is actually that and what Tricia shared is that within well created structure, there’s actually more room for creativity and that’s something that I’m learning right now something that we’re learning or I’m learning with you right now with the podcast is that there’s a ability for much more creativity within intelligent structure. And kind of a sub bullet point of that is, you know, a bigger frame as opposed to a goal is an intention, you know, having this bigger intention, you know, maybe Simon cynics why some, some tool like that. So you kind of have this bigger vision, maybe it’s referred to as like a mission or something like that. But either way, you’ll get to the same, quote, unquote, goal, but you’re going to be a lot more fulfilled when you have a much bigger intention. And you’re going to be able to make a much bigger impact on yourself, your family, your team, the world and the whole start playing a different game. Now. Wherever you are right now, just start playing with these little tools, start taking some of these little risk and start playing with these little things as experiments right like when you have two different feelings or Two different emotions like, can you do them both together? Can you experience both of them at the same time? Having a deep sense of confidence in you, your own skills, and basically the wholeness that you are. So, I was like this Trish has always said this, knowing what’s the best way to say this? No, there’s a powerful person is somebody that knows that they don’t need to prove that they’re powerful. You just know. I am powerful. I am powerful in my uniqueness. I am powerful and who, who I am. And I just innately know that I have no need to prove that to you to anybody else. Kind of like the jazz improv, right? Like, one musician is not trying to prove I’m the best musician. They’re just simply they just simply know that they are powerful in their in their little wheelhouse, and that’s where they stay and then it just creates this really, really cool connected experience between everybody and Oh, yeah, the only other point that I have is, for anybody listening, I give yourself the gift of trying this, the proof will show up. Like Trish mentioned the proof, you know, there’s really no way to prove this. I mean, you can look at people that have done it, and they’re extremely fulfilled. But until you actually start to get your own proof, you can’t actually you can’t actually know. So, again, going back to trying these little experiments, giving yourself the gift of listening to that little thing, sometimes big thing depending on who you are, when you wake up in the morning, and you’re like, I know, there’s more I know there’s something little right like I know, there’s got to be a way to be more of this or more of that or more fulfilled, or more connection or more growth, like whatever that is, give yourself the gift of at least just trying some of these little experiments and becoming this next, best more fulfilled wholeness version of yourself. Because I promise it, I promise it’s worth it. I’ve been doing this work for a long time. And you can shortcut how long it’s taken me to do it, I promise. If you want to coach cold, call somebody like trash or even reach out to us. We’re happy to help initially. But yeah, be curious, experiment with it. There’s a lot of wholeness and richness in life that you can experience without having to give up something else.

Unknown Speaker  1:01:29  
​
Great, awesome takeaways, you know, that actually reminds me that if our audience wants to tune in our next episode, you and I are going to talk a little bit more about some of these things that we’ve heard from trash. That’s true share that we’ve experienced in terms of our real life. Yeah. So everybody, feel free to tune in for that next session. All right. All right. Until next time, everybody. Thanks for joining us on the exciting unknown.