Ep. 148 - Tiffanee Cook - Mental Toughness Of Growing Down

[00:00:09] Welcome to Mental Toughness with Dr. Rob Bell. Each week, Dr. Rob sits down with athletes, executives and expert coaches to talk about mental toughness and their hinge moment. Here's your host, Dr. Rob.

[00:00:24] Because I can feel that before feeling, I can feel the terror of that when I talk about it. I can't really feel the after feeling but what I know is that it's 10 times better than that fear was. And to have that as an experience was something

[00:00:59] that I've always fallen back on. It's because fear, you think you go to the pinnacle of fear and then you're courageous and you can step up to anything. Well, it's not true. Fear kept rearing its head in weird situations. I was like, God, I can't wait.

[00:01:13] Even speaking, I remember once going, I can't wait till I'm so good at speaking, I don't feel like this. And it was that day, I was because I was so nervous. And then I gave this talk at a boxing event and I got great feedback.

[00:01:25] And as I was leaving, I'm like, this is the best. And I was like, oh my God, if I didn't feel like that beforehand, I wouldn't feel like this afterwards. Our guest today is host of the podcast Roll With The Punches. They are now over 800 episodes in that.

[00:02:00] It was the podcast was born from the question of why do some people rise stronger after life's blows and what can we learn from them? In addition, our guest today is a coach, business owner and Aussie. Our guest, I'm excited for this conversation because it's going to get

[00:02:17] pretty deep, but is Tiffany Cook. Tiff, thank you so much for taking the time. Glad we could finally do this. Always a pleasure to talk to you, Dr. Rob. Thank you for having me on the show. Oh, absolutely.

[00:02:30] So you're on, um, what episode are you on for your podcast right now? I think it's 112 was the last one that dropped. Sorry. Did I say 112? 812. 812. Yeah. Let's, let's start with that. Okay. Nice slow pitch softball question here.

[00:02:50] Like how, how have you felt that your interview and skills has, has kind of developed throughout all these episodes? It is, you know what's interesting? So it's like it, it happens in the blink of an eye. So one minute it's 2020 we're in lockdown, the world's in chaos.

[00:03:12] And I'd never really listened to podcasts a lot, but I thought I saw the opportunity to do something that was going to build on two things I really loved and one was networking and building relationships and the other one was speaking and communicating.

[00:03:29] So podcasting became an opportunity to do that. And the reason that I chose that is because I didn't want to spend my time in the middle of, so our gyms and we were locked down and everything

[00:03:40] was, and our gym, our boutique, the two boutique gym studios that I was a partner in, one of the two had only March that year, which was the year we got locked down. That was going to be the first month that our gyms weren't, or that

[00:03:55] gym wasn't going to bleed money. So I went, oh right, this is all, we've been pouring money into these gyms for a couple of years to launch them. And is this like, is this going to be bankruptcy for me?

[00:04:11] So the last thing I wanted to do was be in lockdown, training people, personal training people, doing coaching and trying to earn money and then losing everything at the end of that. So I thought, what can I do that's not money focused, that's skillset focused.

[00:04:26] And then it's like I blinked and we're four years down the track. And I didn't know how, I remember a few months in asking Craig, who's my friend who podcasts as well. I remember asking him, been about three months, I'd done however

[00:04:40] many, I don't know, a lot of podcasts in that time. And I said, okay, I'm ready now. I'm comfortable at whatever it is I'm doing. I don't know how to get better. I don't know what getting better means or looks like or feels like.

[00:04:55] And if I go back and listen to the first episodes, I cringe. So you get better sometimes without really knowing what better is. And so I value, I value the opportunity to speak and speak to and listen to and hear and understand everybody's experiences.

[00:05:20] And it's grown that skill without putting a framework around the skill for me. And sometimes it makes me feel, have a bit of personal pushback against people trying to sell tools and strategies and skillsets for things like that speaking.

[00:05:37] And you know, because I think a lot of them come naturally if you're actually really deeply interested. That makes sense? Does that answer your question? Oh absolutely yeah. No, it's fantastic. There's always a point like in the podcast where we title the podcast.

[00:05:51] I think you kind of did that already though, Tiff. So we get better without knowing what better is. Yeah, yeah. She's kind of annoying, isn't it? Yeah. But it's only by knuckling down and doing the thing that that happens. And you can't look for it.

[00:06:12] One thing that became really clear is a few months in I realised, and I know you talk about hinge moments and I hadn't identified this one before until I just started thinking of it then. And it was that moment, I remember getting an email and it said

[00:06:30] about eight weeks in it said, you're number eight on the Australian self-help charts. And I was like, who's this email? What's chartable and what are the charts? What do they mean? I'm number eight in self-help in Australia? And I was like, that's crazy.

[00:06:49] And within that first two months, I had sponsors and I had huge named guests and all of these things. And I just thought, and I realised in that moment that if I hadn't have had that deliberate mindset shift of I'm not chasing money

[00:07:05] for my version of success, I'm chasing a skill set and a passion. I'm going to do what I love and I'm going to work on what can't be taken away. I never would have achieved that success.

[00:07:15] If I had have chased that specific success of I want a podcast that thousands of people listen to that hits the charts, it just wouldn't have happened. I don't believe. Yeah, that's the paradox of life, right? Yeah. Yeah. Because we're always looking, we're always looking for the

[00:07:35] feedback and we're impatient. And we want the feedback, we want the gratification, we want all of things. And if we're looking for that, we actually miss being in the moment. And that's what I've loved the most.

[00:07:50] And it's kind of frustrating at times because, you know, I've been doing it for years, so 812 episodes in four years. At times that has been five for quite a while. That was five, five episodes a week. So it's a lot of time and people balk at that.

[00:08:05] And I understand it because it is a huge amount of my time and commitment and most people wouldn't do that if it was a commercial venture, but for me, it's not for a commercial venture. It's because it's changed me. It's changed my world. It's changed my intellect.

[00:08:19] It's changed the way that my mind works and thinks, which as a result has actually changed the world that I live in. Like the world I live in is not the same world because I am in it differently, seeing it differently, seeing things that I wouldn't have

[00:08:35] seen in ways I wouldn't have seen them before, which makes a different reality. If we want to get real deep. Yeah. Well, I want to get a little bit deeper. Elaborate on that topic then on terms of how the world now you live in,

[00:08:49] you just see it and you experience it differently. Yes. I spent a lot of time thinking and talking about because so many people come and podcast, right? They're all about getting information and diving deep into things, understanding things.

[00:09:07] But I think people really simplify that and go, I want the answer. Give me the answer. What's the answer? And the more I did this, the more it become apparent, like the cliche, the more you know, the more you learn, the less you know. But it's true, right?

[00:09:23] The more I learned, the less I believed in. All I had was different versions of possibilities. There's all these potentials and possibilities and you have to decide what fits. There's not, if we keep trying to chase the answer from the guru

[00:09:41] and believe in it wholeheartedly without owning that that belief is a choice. Like I choose, I think that we choose beliefs. My philosophy around beliefs is I choose them. And when I make a choice of what I'm going to believe or how I'm going to adopt

[00:09:56] information coming in, it's looking at it, understanding it, looking at who's who might be portraying it and then going, if I choose to believe this, what difference does it make in my world, in my life? Does it make my life better if I choose to believe this?

[00:10:12] And some, I guess that's where you can, you know, like faith, religion. That's a belief is a choice, but you're choosing to believe in something that can't be proven. But then when it comes to science and a lot of the things that the

[00:10:28] conversations we have on the show and you would have them too with scientists and experts and athletes and people that have narrowed down to this one tiny field to learn it to a depth that no one else has.

[00:10:43] They're choosing to believe that and then we are choosing what it means to us to take on that belief. It's a mess, isn't it? The mind, the human mind, but it's so powerful, right? Yeah. Well, that's what I look at.

[00:11:01] You know, the belief is a choice and then the importance of being able to communicate that as well, because even when it comes like science, you never, none of us has ever have actually seen the experiment take place.

[00:11:18] Like you're taking somebody's word on it that, Hey, they did it exactly like this and that's why they have methodology and there is science, right? But you never saw that take place, right? You never, and so there's always like this disproving of things, but

[00:11:29] it's like, I just mentioned that because it's like, there's so much that we have to take on face value and people's word for it because you never actually see it. How many people actually read the research anyway, right? They don't read the research.

[00:11:46] They read the clip that someone will say about it, you know? Well then there's a couple of steps away from the actual study that was done. But sorry for the tangent, but I figured we'd go over it.

[00:11:56] Yeah, no, it's a great tangent because I reckon at some point we've already passed the tipping point. So we got the internet and we got all of this great access to more knowledge. And at some point that become, at some point along the way, I think

[00:12:11] we've already been at the most powerful point of that. And then we tipped over it where things got diluted and now way down the track, we add AI and conspiracies and it's really hard to decipher truth because truth is just a version of different people's realities.

[00:12:31] And when it comes to science, we are forced, people are forced or not forced to just through the human condition, we have biases, cognitive biases. And I think also when even when I speak to people who are the best

[00:12:44] in the world at things, we can't escape our own ego or the power of money and power and status. Those three things, no matter how wonderful a human you are, they exist. And so when people have learned something and then started getting

[00:13:10] recognition for that learning, it's really hard not to double down on it and see only that and put the blinkers on and don't focus on other things. And what else might correlate or cause the findings that I've found?

[00:13:24] You know, like diet's a really easy one to look at. You can go from eating all the junk in the world to being carnivore and going carnivores the way. And it's like, hang on, what maybe you were allergic to something

[00:13:38] that happened to be in one of the billion things you just cut out. You know, it's never. I mean, I don't think we look at things that deeply. We just yeah. Hey, good looking. If you like this podcast and are already a bad ass, but it's all way

[00:14:10] too complicated, then visit our website, drrobbell.com and schedule call with us to help capture your very own hinge moment. So you said money, money, power and recognition. I mean, you have all three. I'd love more money. Yeah.

[00:14:42] You know, you mentioned that in one of your, uh, like, you know, one of the recent podcasts you had, I mean, I just felt it was important because you're very transparent, but talk to us about what was growing up for you like in terms of financial security.

[00:15:00] So I grew up in a small country town in Tasmania. So Tasmania is a state that's just off the bottom. It's separated by a, uh, by Bass Strait, a stretch of water, treacherous stretch of water. It's treacherous. Yeah. The Bass Strait. Go get in there.

[00:15:17] Come and swim across. What makes it, what makes it treacherous? I think it just, I think it's just a really rough stretch of, of sea just between Melbourne and Melbourne and Tassie. Has anybody swam it? It takes about 10 hours on the boat.

[00:15:32] We go across there on that, on a ship. People have ultra swimmers. Have they swam that? Yeah. They have, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Not me, not a swimmer. I'm a sinker. Yeah.

[00:15:44] But I grew up there, uh, and I grew up from a young age, from about the age of three to maybe, I think 11 in a shop. So it's seven years in my parents owned a little four square store in that beach town.

[00:15:58] And then not long after that we moved into a motel and restaurant in a business partnership with friends. Over that time whilst we were in there, my parents separated. That was quite amicable to be in the middle of. Uh, I would have been in my teens then.

[00:16:13] So maybe 14, I would say 13, 14. It was amicable. Yeah, it was amicable. So they still lived, so it's still both lived on site for a while until dad moved out and away. But long story short that business partnership, those business partners weren't great humans. Mum lost her house.

[00:16:31] So she kind of lost everything she'd worked for. And she, she didn't grow up, like she grew up in a low income household. Like they didn't have a lot of money. Growing up. So money was, you know, we always worked hard for it, which is probably

[00:16:45] why I'm a really hard worker and I'm very security focused. Like I was talking the other night. I'm fascinated by the psychology of money and our relationship with money. And I often feel tied down by mine.

[00:17:01] That idea of working so hard and sometimes feeling like I never really get ahead, but I envy people who can just go and travel without a care in the world and maybe not care if they have anything secure to come home to.

[00:17:16] Like the idea of that just couldn't, yeah, that's a non event for me, but it's interesting because, you know, I had a similar experience where I went into business with business partners and I came out worse off

[00:17:32] for that experience and it was funny, you know, eventually looking back at that and going, yeah, sometimes we do repeat the things that we've said, you know, it's like, oh, I literally repeat of what my parents did there. But yeah, what was the question?

[00:17:50] Where was I heading with that whole money tangent? I asked you about, you know, the financial security growing up. Yeah. Your attitude, your awareness towards money. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's it. I think if I'm honest, I reckon I'd like to really deeply unpack that more.

[00:18:08] I think that it's a double edged sword for me. I think there's both, and I think financial, our relationship with finances, I think can reflect a lot about deeper parts of us. So I think that there's something in me that fears abandonment and loss and not being okay.

[00:18:28] And so that plays out in my life as being really independent and maybe kind of keeping myself, keeping walls up, you know, making sure that a lot like you can't lose. And I've overcome a lot of that.

[00:18:45] Like you can't lose what you walk away from or what you don't allow in. So I've seen a lot of that playing out and I've worked through a lot of that over my life, but yeah, I still think that that whole security

[00:18:59] and being able to let go of things, to let other things in is really challenging. Yeah. No, I appreciate you sharing that. But that's why I was listening to the podcast, you know, you're talking about it. That's why I had to bring that one up.

[00:19:15] It's like, yeah, that's a good point. You, one of your quotes, you have a lot of them, but maybe getting punched in the face by life could be the best thing that ever happened to you. Yeah.

[00:19:27] So if I think about the everything in my life that I value the most, that holds meaning that I want to cling to, every single thing or circumstance comes from a place of shit, of adversity, of hardship, of a challenge.

[00:19:48] There's not one of those things that if I look back at the steps that led to that and allow me to have that or be that or feel that or do that, then it doesn't come from a really shitty situation that I had to adapt to and overcome.

[00:20:04] And so I think there's a lot of people out there talking about positive mindsets and silver linings. And there's, there's a line between toxic positivity and just understanding that there's also two sides to a story and there's the ability to have,

[00:20:24] of how you see what, where you are and what comes from what you've been through. Mm-hmm. You know, like even boxing. So when I started boxing, I thought I was just doing it for attention. It was like, I'm 29 years old, I've moved over to Melbourne,

[00:20:46] I've lived here for 10 years. I loved doing stuff that people would be like, oh, you know, I just want it to be different all the time. But 17 years old, I was cruising around on a road bike in Tassie, a motorbike, none of my friends had bikes.

[00:20:58] I just, because I want to be the chick on the bike. Then I moved to Melbourne, I wanted to be the chick that would jump in the box and punch someone in the face. And after a couple of years of fighting, stuff started coming up.

[00:21:11] Like I started ruminating on this childhood experience that I'd had of sexual abuse that I'd never told a soul about. And for some reason, in these first couple of years of fighting, all of a sudden I'd be out for a walk.

[00:21:25] I remember walking down St Kilda Road and it'd pop into my mind and I'd think about this person and I would get really angry. And I was like, why is this even coming up? Like what, cause you know, thought if you just put it in that little black

[00:21:39] box of your mind, it'll be gone forever. If I just start, I mean, it's been, well, I was 29 then, so it's been two decades, like what's going on. And I started, one of the first things I started doing was journaling, just writing stuff down.

[00:21:55] And I remember as journaling and in the middle of a sentence without even planning what I was writing, I remember just midway started just writing, maybe I should thank this guy because I would never give back the traits that I have that are a result of that.

[00:22:16] I would never give back my tenacity. I would never give back my independence and my inner strength. So if that came as a result of that happening to me, well, good, I guess. And then, and you know, I love the boxing ring.

[00:22:34] You know, if I didn't, if that didn't happen to me, I wouldn't have found the boxing ring. I wouldn't have started on this whole self discovery. I probably would have bounced through life just in blissful ignorance of even knowing who I am.

[00:22:47] Because for 29 years, I thought I was one person. And then that unraveling of seeing yourself who you really are in the boxing ring where there's no time to justify, there's no time to tell a story about your actions because your actions, they happen before you have

[00:23:05] a chance to think because you're in fight or flight and they happen in front of everyone so you can't tell a story. So what was happening in the ring and then in training that brought all that out?

[00:23:18] Um, when I reflected on it, I think that I was always curious about the attraction to the boxing ring and that feedback where everyone else was scared of it and all I wasn't, they couldn't understand it.

[00:23:31] So I was asking, why aren't you scared of getting punched in the face? And I was like, no, no, no. But eventually I was like, that's weird, isn't it? Right? It's a weird place to feel comfortable in the boxing ring.

[00:23:42] So I started looking at why that might be and why, and at some point started to make the association with sometimes feeling of familiarity is our feeling of safety, whether or not it's safety.

[00:23:57] So if, if a place of danger and high alert, if a place that makes you dissociate feels familiar and safe because there's a lack of emotion. So I identified something there. I was like, there's something in that. There's a relationship there.

[00:24:16] And then I think the healing aspects were the idea that this person, this opponent standing in front of me, they're not pretending that they're going to, that they're my mate and they're not telling the world that one thing and then punching me in the face and doing

[00:24:34] another, they're standing there and saying with brutal honesty, I'm going to hurt you in front of everyone. And, and it's, and there's no hiding it. And everyone's there to see, no one can help me because they're on the

[00:24:48] outside of the ring, but they can see and they can watch how strong I am. Cause I guess I felt really strong because I dealt with that and I'd fought that my whole life, but it was a silent fight in the shadows that no one saw.

[00:25:01] So I think the idea of visibility and control and a big one, I think I still, it is still really powerful me is it's a place of boundaries. There's rules and I know the rules so I can feel safe in those rules.

[00:25:19] I know when we're allowed to punch and I know the rules. I mean, I can allow someone to come in and get close to me there because there's rules around it and I know them and I don't have to ask them.

[00:25:33] What do you mean you still struggle with that? I think boundaries. I think that there's still times where knowing that you can set a boundary and feel safe and not dissociate. I think that when children have gone through that, there's for me, I

[00:25:58] think there was a, there's a removal of understanding what's okay. What's a boundary and what's okay. And when you can speak up and when your body and mind learn to dissociate, this is why I have a real gripe with resilience from a lot of people.

[00:26:15] Resilience like just because dissociation looks a lot like a resilience because I can look at resilient in the boxing ring, but there was a time in the boxing ring where I would just walk into all of the punches with no regard.

[00:26:28] And then after three years of therapy, sparring became very different because there was regard. I didn't want to get hit because I had a bit of self-love and I was feeling the effects of it. Right? I cared.

[00:26:40] So it wasn't just you can hit me as hard as you want. It was like, actually you can try to, but I care more now. I'm going to. So yeah. And I think I was talking about this the other day with someone

[00:26:53] how that podcasting I realised really quickly was like a second boxing ring for me. It was like the boxing ring of vulnerability. There was this place where I started having luck. You and I are right now, these really open and vulnerable

[00:27:07] conversations, which I would ask people intimate questions that I would never have asked someone in real life. And I, and it, and I was doing it from the start and I was like, this is, this is a version of me. I didn't know I could access.

[00:27:23] And that's what I think was this, this boundary of here's the rules and the thing, but this is a safe space and I'm opening myself up and giving you a space to open up where we can both share something within these confluence of these boundaries, like a

[00:27:40] boxing ring. Yeah. Which is really interesting. I've had friends kind of say, I mean, like I'm still a disaster in relationships if I'm honest. And when I say that, I mean, like I just don't have them. Their walls are up. I just don't, I'm not open to them.

[00:27:57] And a good friend of mine, I've talked to him a lot and he says like, you just punch a bloke in the face if you did something wrong. Like this is where it's hard to explain if people haven't had that

[00:28:10] experience of understanding what it might be like to disassociate. Like I'm not the same person in a relationship as I, as you see walking into the boxing ring as this strong girl that knows the rules and won't be effed over. Right. Right. Yeah.

[00:28:26] So you had, um, was that, was that one time or was that something that happened repeated when you were a kid? Yeah, that happened for a long time. And so you develop, I mean, a way to cope with it.

[00:28:39] It was, and that was a secret you couldn't tell anybody. Yeah. Cause there's by luck by that. So it started at a very young age and I couldn't even tell you how long it happened for. But I feel like the shame associated with something like that,

[00:28:56] especially when you go, well, okay, that started when I was really, I didn't have a clue what that meant, but then at some point you become, you're in an age where you've gained an understanding that that's really wrong and you're a part of that.

[00:29:11] You've like, you've been playing a part in this thing that's wrong. And so then it's, you, you stay silent because it's, you're a part of it. It's shameful. So I was like, if I just, I think I always thought if I just never spoke

[00:29:26] of that, it would go away forever and I could leave it behind. And it just, it's just not the case. Unfortunately. I mean, you know, the instance that happened to me was, you know,

[00:29:50] it was with the female, I was like 10 years old, so I had like no idea, but there was enough awareness that it was like, I just knew I couldn't tell anybody. That was the main thing, right? I couldn't tell anybody.

[00:30:05] And when bad things would happen, it would bring up that same shame and same feeling that I had of like, you know, I am something wrong. Yeah. You know, so if it was like striking out or something bad happened,

[00:30:21] like at that, it would always bring back those same emotions that I had. Yeah. And it's like, you don't have words for them. I remember talking to Dr. Bill, who's my psych now, who was a podcast guest, turned, well,

[00:30:34] he was always a psychologist because he kept turning our podcast conversations into psychology. I was like, maybe we should work together and do this off air. But I remember a particular conversation where we were talking about my

[00:30:51] childhood and he said he did the whole inner child thing, you know, when you have a look in the corner of the room and look at little you sitting on a chair there, and he was making me look at her. You have to look at her.

[00:31:06] And he said, is it her fault? Now, you can go over in your head as many times as you want. Like I didn't in my mind, in my logical thinking mind, I knew, of course, it's not her fault. She's a child.

[00:31:20] But the moment I went to speak that, I realised that we hold beliefs that even we don't understand and I couldn't say it. And I was like, oh, Bill, like you've just uncovered something. And I thought you can think I hadn't spoken about it publicly until Harps on

[00:31:40] episode 68 back in the first year of my show. We were having a chat and he happened to wheel back and ask what happened. I must have alluded to something and I said it for the first time. And it was a next really a next to nothing conversation.

[00:31:56] He was like, oh, wow. Have you ever said that before? And I said, no. And he goes, well, we love you. And then we went on with our conversation. And the next day I woke up and went, that's been heavy.

[00:32:09] Like, I didn't realise how heavy you think you're dealing with something. I'd done some therapy over some years. I'd talked to therapists, but I think it's really complex understanding when you've really accepted something or really put it out there.

[00:32:28] Like there was a lightness that came from just saying it to someone and same thing, realising in that moment that I could sit inside my head and think till the cows come home and understand that it's not a child's fault. It's not a child's fault.

[00:32:44] But when I was put in a situation where I had to visualise me as that child, I couldn't say it wasn't her fault because I was holding onto all of this shame and blame. And it was, you know, I don't know if that's something that you that you

[00:32:59] relate to with your experience. I mean, my question then is so what did you tell that girl? What did you tell that little girl? I think what I've learned is I would often in my conversations with Bill,

[00:33:24] especially at the start, you know, I would grow, he would call it growing down. I would grow down when I would answer something. He'd go, how old do you feel now? My shoulders would slump and I'd kind of look down and I'd go to the

[00:33:38] place where I'm answering from and it would almost sound like childlike. Either that or I'd say, I don't know a lot. I don't know. I don't know. And this would never happen when we were on a podcast doing it. So it was this separation of being there.

[00:33:55] It was and then when he pointed that out to me and I gained awareness on some of these small things, then I remember times where I could see myself doing it out in life. Like just I would notice a moment where my interaction with someone,

[00:34:09] I was like, I felt myself grow down then. I felt myself grow down to respond to a person in some way and or if I had an emotional reaction or a circumstance, just realising that you have to take action to change your behaviours to... Here's an example.

[00:34:34] It's a weird one. My dad was over from Tassie for a while and we were out for dinner and we'd had our entree and then our main came out. We were at an Indian place and our curry came and then about five

[00:34:51] minutes had passed and she hadn't brought the rice and I was sitting there and I was just seething and I couldn't just hang out with my dad and have a conversation. I was triggered. I was like wild.

[00:35:05] I was like why the fuck can't you just bring the rice? Like being a rice cooker, how hard is it? And I was telling Bill, my emotional reaction, I had no... The reality is it's not because I was starving because we just had our entree.

[00:35:18] I should have just been enjoying time with my dad. It triggered something in me and we put it down to this idea of being unworthy, not worthy, not seen. So being not seen again. I wasn't visible. She didn't come and bring...

[00:35:34] And he goes, well what could you do about that? And I was like, oh Bill, it's hardly the waitress' fault that I have the inability to control my emotions. I was like of course I'm not going to say anything. It's not her fault.

[00:35:47] Like I just want to deal with it. Then I realised, I thought about it for another week after that and then I was like no, no, no because there's that part of me wherever that part exists, if you want to get

[00:35:59] to the point where there's a part of me that needs the grown-up part of me to do something to show that part of me that I'm not invisible and that could be like, I don't know if it would

[00:36:11] be an asshole but it might just be going, hey excuse me, I was just wondering if you might be able to bring over the rice. It's like a fucking adult might do. Sorry, just wearing a show. Yeah.

[00:36:19] But you know, I think as I made that realisation, I think we have to show ourselves behaviourally different actions if there's something that comes up because something comes up and we shame ourselves more. Like I think that's a really shitty trait, like grow up,

[00:36:43] don't be like you're not that special but you know what, there's a part of me that that holds some sort of a trigger and a meaning that has a deeper meaning. I need to figure that out and I need to show that

[00:36:54] part of me that it doesn't need to feel like that, that someone's got its back. Like I need to have my own back really. The same exact thing happens to me in those kind of situations but I will get stuck and perseverate

[00:37:12] and just think about it and then I'm like, I can't be here in the moment because I'm thinking when is this going to come here? And now you've got to make sure you stay calm when you're going to have to ask and get the

[00:37:22] attention, you know what I mean, because and then they're not looking and oh my God, they're still not looking over here now. Do I need to go get it? You know, I mean, I will run through it. Yeah. Same exact thing happens to me. Yeah, yeah, see the.

[00:37:38] Maybe we titled the podcast, maybe you titled it right, Growing Down. That's a fascinating concept, yeah. Because it's so interesting when I notice it happen now. I'm so much more attuned whereas before it was just a thing. But I mean, growing down is, it's almost

[00:37:59] a step towards that dissociation. Like it's a reaction to the environment for me. It's like I'll grow down probably around a particular archetype of person or a situation. You know, it's, I notice it sometimes if someone, I'm out doing something and someone

[00:38:20] does something and I say thank you and just the childlike voice when I say thank you. Like it's a little weird, I go why do I do that? And why do I, because it's not just the voice. It's this, the voice is probably not even

[00:38:36] that different to what but I feel it inside. I feel something in my chest when I do that and I go, you feel like a child. Oh, because there's something that still holds on to you're actually not worth whatever.

[00:38:50] Like it might just be someone getting out of my way or passing me something or doing something small. Once I was riding my push bike on a walking path or no, on a bike path and two guys moved out of the way.

[00:39:04] All right, it's a bike path and I'm riding on it and just the way that I said thank you, I heard myself and I was like, why did I just say thank you like that? Why don't I say it like a grownup in my normal voice?

[00:39:15] Why do I feel like a kid when I say thank you to somebody just showing me common courtesy? Like I don't deserve common courtesy. We've got a way to go, Rob. Yeah, that's pretty good. One of the triggers for me would be if I was running

[00:39:36] and I guess this was part of it, right? Like I'm showing up as my best self. Like I just wanna acknowledge you and just say, hey, I see you, right? So my part would always be like saying hi, waving. And when someone wouldn't acknowledge back,

[00:39:49] I'm now in my head, what the fuck is wrong with that person? Like I wouldn't pray for them. I wouldn't be like, man, maybe they're having a bad day. I wouldn't be like, damn, hope they get better. You know what I mean?

[00:40:00] I would just be like, how the fuck didn't they recognize me? I went out of my way here to make sure I'm waving. You know, it would be a trigger if that happened. That would happen a couple of times

[00:40:10] because my thing was I'm showing up as my best self. And so this was like, that's not reality, right? The reality is that then everybody else should be nice to me and that's ridiculous. That's a false narrative or belief, right? Cause that's not true.

[00:40:27] People don't owe you anything and people are just kinda stuck inside their own shit. So I made it a point when people wouldn't then recognize me, I would just say a nice prayer for them and hope for the best because there's gotta be something wrong.

[00:40:42] Like I'm waving, acknowledging. But my thing was, is like, I would show up thinking you needed to recognize me, right? I'm showing up as my best. I just knew you recognized it. You just needed to acknowledge it. And that wouldn't happen. That bothered me.

[00:40:56] Like if I held the door for somebody and somebody wouldn't say thank you, whether it was a little girl voice or not. Like that would bother me so bad because it was like, why don't you just acknowledge that?

[00:41:09] And I think that was the part of like, hey man, you're not being seen, right? Yeah. It's funny though, because it's just, I guess the last year or so I've been paying attention to how stuck in my head I can be all the time.

[00:41:22] So I work in a gym and sometimes it smacks me in the face when I see people outside of that gym and they know me and have a conversation. And I go, oh, they're from the gym. How do they know me? And I don't recognize them

[00:41:39] because I've walked past and I'm so busy in my, I just think of all the times I'm so busy in my head that I probably even look at people but I'm visualizing in my own mind. So I don't acknowledge them and how rude that is

[00:41:54] and how would that make me feel? Like I've really turned inward in the last 12 months and paid a lot more attention to that because I think that I do that a lot. And I think that I fear how that would come across to other people.

[00:42:12] Like rude, I'm a rude mole, I think I am. I get embarrassed when I've met somebody and I don't remember I've met them and then they call me out on that and be like, well, we met last year at the Bar Mitzvah.

[00:42:29] I was like, oh yeah, that's right. But it happens a lot. Yeah, I've got an inherently bad memory. I'm the worst and soon as someone's out of context I see you walk up to someone in the street and they start having a big chat

[00:42:45] and I was like, you're in the middle of the conversation. You're unwilling to say who are you? So I'm holding this conversation going, okay, are they from the boxing community? Then do they know me from the gym? Do they know me from business networking circles?

[00:43:00] Because it's like holds context of what I might assume they know and I don't wanna have a conversation where it's obvious that I don't know them. Sometimes I walk away and say to whoever I'm with, I've got no idea who that was. Yep.

[00:43:17] That's why I'm really thankful of like I can be in the talk and put together the clues and then I remember and then I'm thankful. And I'm like, yes, yes, okay. We didn't have at least an hour conversation. I didn't remember who you were.

[00:43:32] Like it was just a couple of awkward moments but I remember now. Yeah. Yeah, at least I can blame it on getting punched in the head. Oh yeah, it's a good one. Yeah. Real good one. It's a good fallback. Want to listen to your favorite music

[00:43:51] but you're sick of all the commercial interruptions and negative news today? Tune into kukoradio.com. Music for your mindset. We're a commercial free online radio station. Play nothing but hits. Our free iOS and Android apps are available for download at kukoradio.com. Another one of your good quotes

[00:44:14] is one crazy say yes moment. Can you share that? Yeah, when I was doing a talk recently and I said, you know, like most people have this story of fell in a hole, this bad thing happened. And then I found the solution and then I did this

[00:44:37] and now I'm here. And it was like, I stumbled into this idea of boxing with no idea what I was about to uncover. Like I fell into the solution before I realized there was a problem. And it was just this crazy, I'd been to a talk through

[00:45:00] and you know, it was like I'd met someone in business networking, he was from overseas. He was staying at this hotel. The hotel had a really great gym there. At the gym, Paul Taylor who's now friend has been on the show a few times.

[00:45:12] Paul Taylor was giving a talk on resilience upstairs at the gym. He goes, you'd really love that because I was outgoing punchy little, you know. This was way before I was boxing. And I said, I hope go to that.

[00:45:23] So I went to this talk and it was about resilience and we were watching videos of the SEALs doing their interrogation training and learning about the neuroscience. All the stuff that you would get off on like it was just the best.

[00:45:36] And then so you're all fueled up for doing hard things. And we get this tour of the gym and we go downstairs and there's this big poster for Zero to Hero 12 Week Boxing Challenge. And I was like, yeah, I'll do that. And you know, I just,

[00:45:52] I never could have anticipated that that moment was gonna change my life. And it's funny because you say when was the most, as you mentioned that and it was just trying to figure out where the moment starts. And I started at a different spot every time

[00:46:12] because it's like, well, then what, like even just the idea of what got me into business networking, like I was terrified of even doing that and speaking in front of room. Now I'm a speaker, like it's where did that start? Cause then there was this other thing

[00:46:26] that rolled into that, that rolled into that. It's such a weird progression. But yeah, these one, these tiny little moments that you think you're just doing one thing and then next minute it just changes your world. I remember that first fight

[00:46:42] and I remember standing outside of the ring afterwards had a shower, frocked up, watching the other fight, standing there with a glass of wine in my hand. And I remember being in my mind and just going, wow, that's it. And that's it. And this is life.

[00:47:06] This is anything. So that was 12 weeks of discomfort and fear and changing the way I socialise and changing the way I eat and doing hard things and having imposter syndrome and having my inner critic on my shoulder telling me I'm shit and doing it anyway

[00:47:24] and not being able to drink a wine when I go out for dinner with my dad and turning up every single day to train and being scared and being, oh like it was 12 weeks of that for what turned out to be four and a half minutes

[00:47:35] in the moment. And then four and a half minutes that seemed like the biggest thing in my entire life but in reality no one else gave a toss. No one else cared aside from wanting a friend to do well at something like what are we doing?

[00:47:54] It doesn't mean anything to anyone. Whether I had won or lost that day didn't mean anything to anyone else. And just this idea of contemplating the reality of that and the reality of the work ratio for the goal. So if 12 weeks to four minutes

[00:48:12] is the ratio of discomfort to the moment and then the relationship between meaning and purpose that that thing, that goal has to have to you that is actually separate to all of the accolades and all of the feedback and all of the things.

[00:48:28] Because it was also the other thing it showed me like I kind of went from someone who I used to do things that people said I was good at. So I was a great runner, I was great at athletics. People say you should do this.

[00:48:43] And I remember before ever doing that boxing fight doing some fit box classes at the, they're actually the very gym I work at now, PCYC gym and was doing these classes and just in my head going, I just wish that one of the trainers

[00:49:03] would tap me on the shoulder and say, you should fight. Because I thought people will tell you if you're talented and then you're allowed to do it. You don't just, you know, I would never, if it wasn't for that poster, there's no way in hell

[00:49:19] I would have ever went to a boxing gym and said I'd like to learn to fight. I didn't think that learning something was something that was reserved for just, I thought it was reserved for people that had this elusive talent that someone else bestowed upon them.

[00:49:32] You know, like what a weird thing. And just realizing that actually the choice to do anything in the world you want and talent doesn't mean anything. Like I didn't have talent when I won most of my fights. Without, because talent actually, if anything, talent can be an anchor.

[00:49:55] Talent can, things come too easy with talent. Talent's like this thing that you just, that's just, you're given and you don't really value it. It's like, hey, I just already had that. You don't have talent. You've got all this other stuff that drives you.

[00:50:11] Like this obsession and tenacity and a point to prove not to everyone else, but to yourself. And then knowing like that voice I said, that was always talking about how shit, like I was so uncoordinated. I was the worst person in that gym.

[00:50:26] I was like, it's so embarrassing for you. And even the people, even the trainers know that you're crap at this. Like this is embarrassing. But I would go on those walks, like I said, through St. Kilda, just obsessively thinking about sparring and the training and the doing.

[00:50:42] And there was just this knowing in my mind, this relentless knowing. It was like, no one will beat me because no one knows what I can take and no one knows what I can ask of myself and no one knows what I can put in.

[00:51:00] And it mightn't look like talent, but I've got everything else in spades. And it was just like, you have to have that because the inner critic is relentless. Like the negative chatter about ourselves, doesn't matter how good you are at anything. I think it's always there.

[00:51:19] So you have to have something else to counterbalance. If you didn't have the negative chatter, I don't know if you're human. Kind of hardwired for it. You know, you've spoken about the allure of certainty, right? And I kind of want to ask the question,

[00:51:37] like I'm related to like fear and your relationship with it. And when you experience that fear that happens, like how do you, I don't want to say overcome it, right? Because it's, boy, I don't really think you overcome it. I just think you develop a relationship with it.

[00:51:57] How can you talk to us about that? That's really lucky because the day of my first fight, the morning I woke up, I had about an hour sleep because I'd freaked out that night and I had to get up an hour later

[00:52:14] and pick my mum up from the airport. And I had no capacity to hold a conversation with her. The anxiety and fear and panic in my body was visceral. And I remember saying to her, I will never ever, ever do anything like this again in my whole life

[00:52:33] because there's nothing worth going through how I feel right now. Now that's the level of what it took to make me really feel. I just, feelings just had never been that big to me. And I was just in too deep. Like I had to do it.

[00:52:49] And you kind of in this vortex of time, just you're in the middle of that feeling and then next minute you're sitting at the event and then next minute someone's shoving gloves on, tying gloves up on your hands and putting a mouth guard in your mouth

[00:53:02] and you thrust out into the lights and you do it. And then the feeling afterwards, I don't even have words or I can't even really, because I can feel that before feeling. I can feel the terror of that when I talk about it.

[00:53:23] I can't really feel the after feeling, but what I know is that it's 10 times better than that fear was. And to have that as an experience was something that I've always fallen back on. It's because fear, you think you go to the pinnacle of fear

[00:53:43] and then you're courageous and you can step up to anything. Well, it's not true. Fear kept rearing its head in a weird situation. I was like, God, I can't wait. Even speaking, I remember once going, I can't wait till I'm so good at speaking.

[00:53:55] I don't feel like this. And it was that day, I was, cause I was so nervous. And then I gave this talk at a boxing event and I got great feedback. And as I was leaving, I'm like, this is the best.

[00:54:06] And then I was like, oh my God, if I didn't feel like that beforehand, I wouldn't feel like this afterwards. So fear is actually my best friend. And everything I do, boxing, speaking, even podcasting, everything I choose to do are things that evoke that

[00:54:24] on some level within me. And if they didn't, I wouldn't have any interest in doing them. It's a bit of a fear chaser, I guess. Still a bit murky. Yeah, no, that's good. So if I didn't feel that way before, I wouldn't have felt that way after. Mm.

[00:54:45] And also it's a performance enhancer. You know, I know that I sure wouldn't want to go into a boxing ring without that adrenaline in my body. So it's just learning to have a relationship with it and respect it and understand that because of it,

[00:55:06] you're sharper, you're faster, your reflexes are better. Your decision-making is better. You don't feel pain. Like it's easy in a sport like boxing, I think, and maybe other sports and other situations, which is really easy in boxing to be able to frame that.

[00:55:24] And, you know, realise that fear and excitement, they're kind of the same neurochemistry. Exactly, yeah. So question for you, don't you think like, in your experience like living in life, don't you think that's the closest to like the essence of life in those moments

[00:55:47] though that you can get? Yeah, yep. Like when you prepare for something, you really put a lot into it and then, you know, you're gonna be in that moment, right, like everything is clear. There's nothing else going on except you and that challenge.

[00:56:07] I think that is the essence of life. Yeah, and I feel like it's in those moments where you get complete clarity to what matters to you and why. Like even when I'm doing speaking events, I'm driven with this sense of, and sometimes, you know, I'm so nervous beforehand,

[00:56:31] especially if they're a different... I remember at that boxing event because of the context, it was a big event. I was gonna be talking about something really deep and heartfelt because this particular boxing event was for people who were going through mental health challenges themselves.

[00:56:47] So what I wanted was to tell the audience, I wanted to be able to give them some insight from someone who's been in that ring and felt what these guys were feeling. I want people from the outside watching people just get flogged in the ring

[00:57:02] to actually get a concept of what's really, what that feels like and what's happening. And the reality is most of the guys at that event, there were a lot of construction guys, you know, builders and blokes. It was blokey and it was going for four hours

[00:57:18] before I spoke. I felt like the energy was low and then I was like, people are drinking. And also I know a lot of these people, but from a former version of me. So now I'm standing up here and I was so sickly nervous.

[00:57:30] I was messaging Harps going, I could just run out the back door. Oh, I feel sick with nerves. How am I gonna lift the energy in this room? How am I gonna deliver the level of speech that I wanna deliver here in this space?

[00:57:45] I was so terrified and it felt so amazing afterwards because these blokes come up and they give me a hug and they're like, I felt seen. I felt I know what you mean. And I was like, you know, when you can deliver, when you can shift someone's perspective

[00:58:06] and they're the moments where I go, that's what I care about. I care about cracking someone's heart and soul open to connect with something and be able to share it even momentarily with a stranger and say, me too, for a moment.

[00:58:23] Cause those, cause you know, it was like my moment on that episode with Craig, that 30 second exchange of me going this happened, that shifted me and it shifts other people. And I think, you know, the boxing shifted me and sharing the journey with other people shifts,

[00:58:44] you know, when you go and watch your mate and people watch a friend go and do a boxing challenge or a thing and see them go through that and see them shift a little bit, they get to shift too. Like I just, I love that.

[00:58:56] I love the idea of growth, I guess. You just feel like we can meander through life unaware and anything that just shines a light on anything for me is just, it's gonna feel like 30 years of my life was just kind of me acting

[00:59:14] in a play that I believed. I didn't know who I was and that was, you know, that was not living, that was not life. I'd love to sit in a room with that person and this person and have a conversation.

[00:59:33] Like wouldn't it be cool to be able to do that? Get like former you and just have a chat and see how they interact and what they think and believe and where you can lead them in a conversation because it'd be so different.

[00:59:46] Yeah, I do have one more question. So back to that little girl, right? That was in the corner. So, and maybe you did say this and I missed it but what did you share with her? I think it was just that she's okay.

[01:00:14] You know, I think that that particular conversation was all about saying I'm here now. Like you don't have to be the grownup. Like you don't have to call the shots anymore because that's where like you don't have to keep turning up.

[01:00:31] We got this, you know, I think that that's important because those parts of us, they're coming into the world of a grownup trying to do it. Do you know, they should be fucking, this feels weird and woo woo. It's weird talking about the whole inner child stuff

[01:00:53] and not that I've done a lot of that kind of work but the conversation themselves. Like, I just think, yeah, there's bits of us that show up and like imagine a kid, imagine a six year old kid happening to be out in the world making decisions

[01:01:10] on the behalf of an adult. And that's kind of the reality of what's happening. She's showing up, dealing with situations that a child should have no business dealing in because there's a familiarity there. You know, it was learning to say no, learning to, learning instead of when somebody

[01:01:28] and instead of when somebody asks something of you and this could even just be in a work context. Hey, my default was to accommodate everything. Yes. Without even having the ability, it's almost like I dissociate in those moments so I would say yes to everything.

[01:01:46] And then a day later, be like, I don't wanna do that. Why do I say yes to everything? Because I couldn't recognise any sense of what do you want? Is this good for you? It's like, yes, yes. So and it's like that little girl turns up and goes

[01:02:03] we say yes because we don't matter and we just have to please them. Otherwise they'll all abandon us and then we'll have nothing and no one. It's a long winded answer. No, no, no, it's good. Yeah. Tiff, what questions should I be asking

[01:02:23] that I have forgotten to ask or that I'm not asking? Thank you. That's my last question by the way. No, I think you've taken, I think I've really enjoyed this chat because nobody's really taken me down all those paths before on a show.

[01:02:40] So I think you've done good. No questions coming to mind. High five you. Well, I'm used to there being an awkward pause and then someone saying, you know what? There is one thing. No things here. No things here sir. Did we cover it all? Hey?

[01:03:07] Did we cover it all? Yeah. I think so. Well, oh, I guess in this timeframe, right? Yeah. I mean, we could probably cover it for another 10 hours, but I think it's good. I'm gonna put the links in there, but is there, where would you want people to,

[01:03:24] I mean, obviously I'm gonna put the Roll With The Punches podcast, that link, but where would you want people to find more about you? You can check me out on tipcook.com, T-I-F-F-C-O-K.com and all the places. Do you need the .au?

[01:03:39] No, no .au, just go to theuniversal.com. I've got about three websites that all link to that. RollWithThePunches.com.au and I was like, Tip Cook's easy, Tip Cook. And then yeah, Insta, Facebook, all the places. Facebook and Insta are just riddled with photos

[01:03:54] of my cat and dog, but you know. Yeah. Well you do, you know, you do a fantastic job. Thank you for coming on. I can't wait till this comes out and just really appreciate you. Thank you, I enjoyed it. Thanks heaps. Thanks for listening to Mental Toughness

[01:04:32] with Dr. Rob Bell. To find out more about Dr. Rob, visit his website at drrobbell.com or follow him on Twitter at Dr. Rob Bell and subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast platform to get the next episode of Mental Toughness as soon as it's available.

[01:04:52] Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.