Own Your Time Oli Cooke
On Own Your Time this week, I’m joined by Oli Cooke - mindset and performance coach.
In this episode, I’m joined by mindset and performance coach Oli Cooke, who helps driven entrepreneurs create success without the side effects. His “Rapid Root-Level Shifts” method helps untangle fear, anxiety and internal resistance that can sneak in as your business grows.
Now, as a former pharmacist myself, I couldn’t help but fall in love with that tagline, success without side effects. Because let’s be real, success that costs your health, peace or weekends isn’t really success, is it?
Oli’s story is a powerful one. From the outside, life looked dreamy: a beautiful villa in Vietnam, location freedom, a coaching business taking off. But under the surface? Crippling anxiety, daily dread and a constant feeling of something being “off.” In this conversation, we explore how he went from coping to true change, and what that means for business owners who feel like their internal world doesn’t match their external success.
Get ready for practical mindset tools, calming analogies and a conversation that feels like a big exhale.
Key takeaways from this episode:
The difference between fear and anxiety and why it matters for entrepreneurs
How “coping tools” can become another exhausting job
The power of specific intentions and mental rehearsal
A surprisingly simple technique to shift your brain’s fear response
Why time freedom means more than just a blank calendar
Resources mentioned in the episode
Oli’s upcoming mini private podcast “Unblock the Bottleneck” for decision pressure
Connect with Oli
Read the transcript:
Please note - this podcast episode was transcribed by an AI tool, there may be some typos or errors.
00:01 What if running your business didn't mean sacrificing your time, your health, or your weekends? Welcome to own your time, the podcast where we trade hustle culture for mindful, sustainable success.
00:14 I'm Sarah Stewart, and around here we're all about getting more time for the things that really matter. Today I'm chatting with Oli Cooke, mindset and performance coach for driven entrepreneurs who want success without the side effects.
00:29 And as an ex-pharmacist, I just love that tagline. Oli is the creator of the rapid root-level shifts method, which helps business owners dissolve their fears and subconscious blocks that show up at each new stage of growth.
00:47 As someone who spent years battling anxiety, even when life looked great on paper, he knows how draining it is when your internal world doesn't match your external success.
00:59 his work is all about helping people feel calm, clear, and steady on the inside so they can enjoy the life and business that they've built, which feels like a much needed prescription in today's world.
01:13 Let's get into it. Oli, thank you so much for joining me. It's such a pleasure to be here. I'm really excited for this conversation.
01:25 Yeah, amazing. What's also nice for me is quite quite a number of the guests I've had on so far are people that I've actually met through networking or people I know.
01:38 So it's nice now that, you know, I know nothing about you hardly. So it's nice to then sort of start to have conversations with new people, new to me.
01:49 So yeah, excited, sort of in. I'd love to start just a little bit about your story which is fascinating to me.
02:00 And you shared in your pitch that you were living very much what looked like the dream and you know you were in a villa in Vietnam, you had time freedom, the savings, but actually underneath that things didn't feel as maybe good as what they looked like from the outside, can you maybe reflect back and
02:23 tell us just a little bit about that time and sort of your story? Yes, yeah and I'd go as far as to say actually they were perhaps some of the hardest times I've ever dealt with in terms of my mind and so that the contrast between externally what was there, you know we just with my girlfriend we just
02:47 moved into and found really luckily through this friend we'd found this villa which was in central Vietnam there's a place called Hai An which is at this beautiful ancient town and so it was very close to that we were in this villa almost like a French style villa had like a small pool and then as soon
03:07 as you stepped up the door the world rice paddies and in 10 minutes on a motorbike we could be at the beach and really everything was like you know like great but I was probably the most anxious I'd ever been at and doing the most self-help stuff I'd ever done so I was sort of waking up and doing you
03:28 know all of these different types of things to try and get my mind right and yeah so that's pretty much what was going on and and it made no sense to me.
03:36 I was like, what is going on? Like, why, you know, this, this sort of shouldn't be happening. And of course, that was a significant, like, strain on our relationship and just generally day-to-day enjoyment of things.
03:55 And, yeah, this was sort of a few months into COVID, so that was going on as well. So it was kind of, that was something that really exacerbated things for me.
04:08 Yeah. Yeah, wow. And were you over there working? What's sort of your story with work? Like, I know, obviously, now you're a coach, but were you a coach at that point?
04:21 At that point I was, yeah, but I'd been living in Vietnam for a while, so I was there for in total about five and a half years in the north in in in Hanoi and really loved it there.
04:35 And I was working I was teaching to begin with and then sort of thought that was my calling and sort of you know trying to do all the things to develop in that area and then yeah it was kind of I it came about by my dad had like booked this retirement trip where where he was coming to Vietnam to see
04:56 me and I couldn't get the time off work and I was like what if I you know I've seen my partner she was starting her coaching business and I was like what if I just took some time off and just sort of you know went fully into that for a bit and see what I could do and learn all about that and yeah I just
05:15 sort of never went back. Wow amazing so yeah what a turning point then and And so the anxiety that you mentioned, what actually is that sort of inner experience like I have got personally limited experience with me and anxiety, but I do have family and I've also got a couple of friends who have struggled
05:51 with anxiety and so you know they've sort of shared what it feels like for them and I think even the couple of people that I do know their experiences are very different.
06:03 Can you maybe just explain a little bit more about like you know anxiety, what that means to you, what that actually felt like?
06:12 Yes, I love this question because for so long I didn't really understand it and I think most of the information that I had attempted to get and learn from all the courses and different all sorts of things that tried in all the meditations, visualizations, breath work, cold exposure, journaling, CBT,
06:33 like all of these things that I've been sort of trying to get my mind right. And I really explained to me what actually anxiety was.
06:39 And so I We will preface this with, I don't know what's true and people will have their own experiences of what's kind of true, I'm interested in what's useful and I can speak to the experience I've had personally, which is a lot, and then also the experience of my clients as well, and the distinguishing
07:07 sort of the difference between fear and anxiety, fear being like an emotional and physiological response to a perceived threat. So heart rate goes up, blood leaves the brain, so your legs get strong, so you can run away.
07:23 Or the sort of physical sensations that come with that are intended to cause survival. Anxiety is when that mechanism that's going on that a natural defense mechanism that we have hardwired in from our ancestors, when that itself becomes seen as a threat, becomes understood as a threat.
07:50 So all of a sudden it's like, why is my heart racing so fast? Why am I having all these thoughts that are gathering this information on this threat?
07:56 why was my breath so shallow. And so that happens outside of conscious awareness automatically. And so you can notice it, but as somebody who's experiencing it, you know, I was like, I can't switch this off work on.
08:10 I stopped my mind getting so fixated with these sensations, with these thoughts, with all of this going on. And then, and so that in itself becomes perceived as another threat.
08:21 And so now it's like, the mind's like, oh, so there's an even bigger threat. let me give you even more defense and so it sort of escalates escalates escalates until what I experienced many times is sort of either passing out or having really extreme anxiety attacks.
08:40 So that's a very brief explanation if I was explaining it to someone the first person I'd going to more depth.
08:49 Gosh. And, you know, and from the people that I know, like it is really debilitating. And I think also, you know, there's, and I don't know whether it's like social media and the stuff that I see, but I see lots of people throwing around or I've got anxiety.
09:10 Like and I, you know, it feels like loads and loads of people have anxiety. Do you think that's really the case?
09:21 I just wonder, like, is it a case of there's different levels? Like, is that sort of how someone might experience it?
09:30 You were sort of talking there about you then get to the point where you might then pass out or that sort of feels maybe like extreme?
09:38 Like, I don't know if I'm articulating myself very well. Yeah, I think it's one of those things it's so hard to distinguish because everyone has their own inner experience of what it's like and if it's unpleasant enough, then it might be like, well, yeah, this is this.
09:52 So yeah, I don't know, really, I think when people are categorizing it a certain way, of course there's, as you say, there's massive differences to like how extreme that can be.
10:03 like if you're sort of passing out it sounds a lot more intense and it's pretty intense but somebody who's sort of feeling some nerves in their stomach or you know there's a very big difference between that and yeah likely and I think those sensations of fear aren't necessarily escalating any further
10:22 than that for someone you know if I'm feeling sensations before doing this podcast with you, you know, those sort of sensations of like fear, if my mind's perceiving a threat from doing a terrible job or something, I think of that as fear and not necessarily because it's not escalating.
10:43 Okay. I differentiate that from my mind and becoming very concerned with what's going on in my body, you know, and but it can happen so fast and it's outside of conscious awareness and yeah, I can go into a little bit more about that.
10:59 Yeah, and it's really interesting, like, yeah, it really is. And you've mentioned a couple of different, like, what I would call tools there, you know, when you're speaking about visualization and different things.
11:14 But you've sort of mentioned that those tools help to cope, but not necessarily change. and so maybe could you talk a little bit more about that journey in terms of like how did you then decide what you were going to even try and then what was the sort of the turning point.
11:39 Yeah I think I'd become really interested in the subconscious mind and so I was learning you know oh wow we can like influence are this massive tool which is basically running 95% of our behavior throughout the day and how do we get better like sort of communicating with that and I think when I was experiencing
12:01 all of the anxious sensations I'd wake up in the morning and then immediately it would be like I'd just had two expressors, like my full of adrenaline and so I'd be doing things that helped me to manage that and get back to like a kind of equilibrium.
12:17 And so trying the sort of a lot of the ways that we are taught and self-help things and they do work, they help cope, they help down-regulate the nervous system and they're really useful in that respect.
12:35 But what I'd find was happening is the same morning it would be all over again and so it came like a second full-time job and yeah ultimately I had a skilled practitioner basically adjust the dials of my mind and update the sort of root-level beliefs that were sort of causing the responses so that's
13:02 what I do for my clients is kind of go to the root and adjust the dollars there so the experience changes and then you know my clients tell me it feels natural that it's automatic and lasting and it's not like they never experienced fear again it's not like I never experienced fear but it's it's kind
13:26 of you know what to do you understand the mechanism we understand what your mind's trying to make happen and that and less of it is happening because those kind of adjustments have been made.
13:42 So interesting. And so how did you then find the practitioner? Was it like someone that had been recommended or how did you decide to try that?
13:57 Yeah, I've got to give a lot of credit to my girlfriend, my partner, we've been together for a while and she's the sort of person who, she's also a very skilled coach and she's the sort of person who wants efficient solutions to things that really work and so she's just sort of kept searching for things
14:21 and in many different areas of life she's found like really effective kind of systems for things and really effective kind of like tools and approaches.
14:31 So there's a case of just trying, does this work not enough, does this work at some but not as effective as I like and so just kind of like refining like how we do business you know.
14:42 Yeah yeah it's all an experiment isn't it? I think what I've said to few people before like when you're trying to think about your brain and like rewire those stories and different things there's there's got to be a lot of trust there because unlike when you you know if you're at the gym and you're working
15:06 out or whatever you can physically see the muscles change you know and you can see the change whereas when it's in your head like you know there's no real way of knowing that what you're doing is actually making a difference.
15:21 Yeah, yeah. And one of the things that I will sort of do is get like sort of baselines and that can be useful.
15:28 So you have a sort of baseline for starting and then you check back with the same baseline. And if there's a difference that that can be a way of sort of noticing what shifted at that sort of deeper level.
15:39 Because if you can record when you think about something, if you can very quickly bring some level of emotion, then and then you think about that thing again and it after doing processes and it doesn't bring up as much or any of the emotion, then that can be a quite clear way of like there's been a shift
15:56 here and a shift at that sort of deeper level of the mind because the emotions and thoughts I think of them as coming from a different place to where they're experienced.
16:13 So if we see this guy shaking like a bluetooth speaker and going, oh, I just hate this song so much, you know, you might say to him, well, I get you don't like the song, but I'm thinking you're going to have more success if you find where it's playing from and change it there.
16:26 And so that's what I am interested in doing is causing shift to that root level so that what's playing changes.
16:33 And so when that does, the song can change, and I think a lot of the time we're sort of given advice like, oh, just calm down, just get over it, just let go, move past it.
16:46 And it's like, I know people are saying that in such a kind way, but it's, it doesn't really do much, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't, it's, it's, yeah, I mean, yeah, people are saying calm down when you're sort of feeling so anxious.
17:03 Yeah. I'd love to how, how do I, you know, and I think it's, it's like this sort of the unconscious that speaks a different language is much more like visual and so learning to sort of like communicate in that way with that deeper facet of the mind can be really empowering and also that's that's what
17:31 sort of can show the mind, you know, we're safe, rather than just saying. So interesting. And I really love that analogy with a speaker.
17:41 That's, yeah, like that helps it click, like I totally get that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And the work that you do now, so in your pitch, you talk about, you know, you help entrepreneurs create and I'm like quoting success without side effects, which I love so much.
18:08 So the listeners will know I'm an ex-fire racist, like I just love that sort of that tagline's great. But can you maybe unpack what that means to you then and maybe tell us a little bit about You will talk shortly about the specific framework and things that you use, but maybe just a little bit about
18:30 your clients and the type of people that you work with. Yes. Yes, a success with outside effects, to me, is kind of a response to successful costs.
18:44 And so the message that's very common of like never be satisfied, you know, and it's especially in entrepreneurship, you know.
19:00 And so for me, success with outside effects is intentionally growing your business with your satisfaction and fulfillment and clarifying what your version of success actually looks like and where does that come from and recognising that it's part of a full package of the human experience.
19:25 So often when clients come to me they're like, I want to be more present with my family, I want to spend more time focusing on my health and my fitness as well as building business and because I work with driven entrepreneurs who usually have very big goals they notice that they can become very fixated
19:42 on that and and and and then those kind of side effects which I would call like the sort of the overworking, the perfectionism, the inner pressure, anxiety, guilt, overwhelm.
19:57 The approach I take is kind of reducing those at that deeper level so that even if nothing changes with the circumstances, the way that their mind's processing that data changes.
20:11 So there's a different experience. And because of course there's so many challenges in life and also in business, you know, every day there's different type of challenges that come up.
20:25 And so it's not about suggesting there's going to be none of those, you know, that's not what I'm talking about like it's it's the side effects of like the unnecessary pressure that was our minds like putting on us to do things a certain way.
20:38 Well maybe it's left unchecked you know maybe it's like what is this actually is this pressure actually effective even is it doing what it thinks it's doing for me is it actually making me perform better is it making me get these things out there and am I am I okay with that you know the way it's doing
20:58 it do I want to build that intentionally into my future and how I'm growing my business so and I so I think of things as like high performance and high fulfillment so they grow together rather than sacrificing the high fulfillment I think you can you can be fully fulfilled in this moment but also have
21:18 wildly ambitious goals. I don't think it's about just sort of like, and now I should want nothing, and that's, you know, just be content with how things are.
21:27 I think you can be content with how things are, and also really ambitious. Yeah, nice. I also really like the word intention.
21:39 You use that a couple of times there, and I think it's, yeah, it's something that I've been doing, is being intentional as I've grown my business and I think a lot of people, particularly coming back to sort of the time element and how we use our time, I see a lot of people go into business and then
22:04 they have the side effects and they're overwhelmed and they're burning the candle at both ends and so on and and and they sort of have their I guess once I reach this goal then I can you know then I will get my time back or then things will come down and and so on whereas I really took it differently
22:28 as I started out and I intentionally was slower And I, you know, I never was burning the candle at both ends.
22:38 I, you know, I knew that I wanted something that would fit around my lifestyle and the kids and so on.
22:45 And so I intentionally carved out the business to fit around that rather than going out with all guns blazing and, and, and yeah.
22:54 Amazing. Wow. Yeah. I love that. I love that. Yeah. But not but I don't think everyone you know think about it that way and I and I you know I suppose I wonder whether that's like you know my story and Time has always been something that's been at the forefront of my mind And so I suppose it makes sense
23:15 that then I would maybe approach my business in that way from that from the start Yeah Yeah, absolutely and I love the focus on time and I think it's it's one of these it's this resource that we, it's very easy to sort of dismiss it, you know, it's just my time, you know.
23:37 But yeah, I think so much of the way we operate is really upheld in cultures and in the beliefs we have.
23:46 So it's going to be difficult to kind of like shift those ways of seeing things. And I often think about it's time and then it's also within the time that you have, it's where's your attention as well, because I think I can have some free time.
24:02 But then if the entire time off is spent either thinking about work or worrying about work, then does that count?
24:12 Yes. Does that count as time off? because I think as an entrepreneur, often your ideas are one of the things that can really accelerate things and grow things in new ways and innovative ways.
24:27 And so if you're thinking about ideas and work, then it's kind of working. Yeah, exactly. You're so right. In your pitch, you shared a line that I loved, another line that I loved.
24:47 And it said, don't let fear steal any more time from your one beautiful life, which is like such a lovely line.
24:59 And I guess that sort of ties in a little bit with what we were talking about there in terms of your time and you know if you're you know if you're like away from work or whatever but yet your mind is elsewhere and so how does fear or you know anxiety and and our sort of thoughts like yeah maybe explore
25:22 a little bit more about how that then chips away our time yeah um I think this is I could talk about this for a long time, but yeah, I think some of the ways that it plays out in this context, so for my clients who are entrepreneurs, I would say, overworking, reworking things, you know, like sort of
25:46 over-needing them, like, dove, you know, like sort of because underneath that is like a sort of fear of making a mistake or judgment from that.
25:57 And like overthinking ideas instead of sort of like taking that what I call like daring action. Nice.
26:09 There's sort of, you know, let me just make sure it's just get it just a little bit better, a little bit better, a little bit better.
26:20 Because I think often, you know, we have very high expectations of our work and rightly so, you know, it's good to produce things to a high standard, but I think it can get to that point where I sort of, I think in that analogy I've used before is like over-seasoning, you know, you want some seasonings
26:34 to make it look like it tastes good, but then if you've just over-seasoned it, then it's like, I think that's when it's like over-working and costing like a lot of extra time that could be going to other things.
26:45 Some of the ways fear does that as well as like people pleasing, you know, and that can come from, you know, like childhood things.
26:55 And yeah, and like I said, I think with the rest and worrying and sort of like, well, I just do this for my business when you were sort of like, no, I'm taking this day off.
27:08 And then when those intrusive thoughts become so compelling that we end up like acting on them, I think that's one of the ways it could really take time away from what you wanted to be doing.
27:20 Yeah, but so many more than I even know actually. Yeah, and so then your work with your RRS methods, and we'll talk a little bit more about that, so that that then helps people ultimately reclaim their time because you're sort of addressing some of these things.
27:46 Is that? Yeah, time, energy, presence. Yeah, so rapid root level shifts is the method. And it's an approach to changing the way you automatically think can feel and act and react.
28:07 So yeah, as I was saying with that the Bluetooth analogy is sort of changing things at that root level so that they, without even really needing to think about it, I'm already the type of thoughts that are occurring to me are different or that the feelings around this particular topic or context are
28:25 just different. And it's, yeah, it's kind of the normal way to think about things is that situations cause feelings. And I'm definitely not saying that's true because I think that's how most people would talk about things and I think certainly that's how we'd understand a lot of what goes on and and
28:48 most people talk about it so like if there's a guy standing in a queue another guy like shoves him out the way and the first guy gets angry would say well yeah he got angry because that guy shoved him in the back but there's not so much power there for me to be So how has your mind been processing that
29:13 information that's been causing the thoughts and the feelings and adjusting that and that can make a significant difference even without the context changing or the circumstance changing?
29:24 So that's what I'm looking to cause for my clients in a way that is sort of fun and light in our sessions.
29:31 And so most of the time my clients will sort of come in feeling a certain way and they'll leave on that session feeling significantly clearer, calmer, and generally more energised.
29:46 So having more energy back, because perhaps some of that energy has also been going to things that aren't possible, like things I wish I'd done differently yesterday, or things that don't actually exist, let me try and make sure that I do this thing perfectly in six months time and there's nothing that
30:05 actually should be done done right now, the unconscious mind is still causing a lot of energy to try and do something about that and so energy comes back in that way and therefore a lot of time because often we do things to try and like preempt certain, you know, like almost like a risk analysis on things
30:24 that might never happen. So yeah, I'm always looking for people to be thinking clearly and strategically and feeling clearer and calm as a baseline.
30:41 Amazing. And are there are there any things that the listeners like are there any sort of mindset shifts or anything that we could maybe get the listeners to try?
30:59 Like, is there anything that we could be doing to make it a little bit more practical for them? Yeah. So one of the things that comes to mind is when we spoke about intentions and you said using intentions and I really think intentions can be such a resource and particularly harnessing that power of
31:24 the unconscious mind because it's doing so much for us without even really noticing. Like I don't know how I'm moving my mouth to make these sounds but I'm just experiencing the fact that I'm communicating to you and it's seeming to make sense but I don't know how to make these sounds consciously.
31:42 So unconscious mind is running so many things all the time. And if we can sort of tap into that, then that can make it can be a huge asset to doing things.
31:51 And so a lot of the time when I speak to people and what I notice with my own mind often is I have vague intention.
31:59 So it would be like, I'm going to map out my launch tomorrow. And that's quite vague. It's it's and when it's too generalized and intelligent people tend to generalize things and put them in concepts and so when it's too general and vague that can really quickly and easily lead to overwhelm because it's
32:19 like how do I eat this entire table of food in the first bite and so a specific intention would be more like at 9 a.m.
32:30 tomorrow I'm going to sit down at my desk I'm going to open my notebook and I'm going to write the dates of my launch So that I'm clear on the exact dates when I'm starting and finishing this launch and I'll do that in an hour and then Do something, you know, so that would be a sort of like specific
32:48 intention that is That we can see like with a video Because that that then allows The the mind to get it in a different way and the second tool I would say is It's linked to that, and it's something I do with my clients a lot, which is like mental rehearsal.
33:10 So, top performer's athletes have known for a long time, you know, but Olympic athletes use mental rehearsal, like Michael Phelps, for example, mentally rehearsing everything that might happen in his swimming, and to the point where I think, you know, he's spoken about even when his goggles completely
33:35 came off because he'd rehearse exactly how many strokes he needed to take to get to that finish line. His mind just automatically knew, yeah, just keep going like this and he's still one, you know.
33:48 So it would be, you know, to make this more practical, I guess anyone listening can do this now, if it's safe to do so, So just for like two minutes, you can close your eyes and connect or lower your eyes and see a movie of yourself.
34:09 So if there's something that you want to get done, next, think what that is, and then and closing your eyes, see it as a movie, and see yourself moving through that, moving through each part of the task.
34:31 Notice how you handle a challenge. Maybe that's a distraction. Notice how you come back to it. And as well notice how good it feels to be sort of moving forwards with this, how are you acting, interacting, and even what thoughts are supporting you in it.
35:00 And so you can do that and then take a breath and then open your eyes again. And that gives your mind like a blueprint for how you want to perform.
35:13 So it takes that specific contention and then it adds a whole other layer to it where you're sort of, like, rehearsing it.
35:23 And it's amazing how effective it is. I love that. And it's definitely something that I do. It's probably not something that I've always done.
35:37 I reckon in the last couple of years and I can think of one example in particular there was a meeting that I was having to go into that I was I was a little bit nervous about and so I mentally rehearsed it quite a lot and I you know I was visualising me feeling good going into the meeting the meeting
36:03 going well and then sort of coming out of meeting at the end and also feeling good about it. And yeah, when it came to the meeting, maybe didn't go exactly how it was in my visualisation, but I certainly came out of it feeling okay, whereas if I hadn't done any of that, I'm sure it would have gone differently
36:30 . Yeah, yeah, I love that. Yeah, and I think that's such a good point as well as like it the purpose is not to make it go exactly how it was practiced, but it's going in with a level of intention that means you can kind of adapt to things as they happen in real life, those things that we can't control
36:50 . and that's why I always like to build in challenges because I think it's seeing how you would respond to this type of challenge and seeing how, you know, and so you're sort of practicing even when the difficult things happen.
37:06 So like the example of Michael Phelps again, he would practice what if my goggles came off, what would I do then?
37:13 And so, you know, his is probably an extreme example way would go through every type of thing. So he was not surprised at all.
37:19 I don't think it needs to be like that. It's kind of just giving like a guiding intention. Yeah. And I do have another tool which which might be useful to show as well.
37:32 Sure. Because I think this one is if you keep, if you bear it in mind it can be so useful is when you avoid something and when you continue to avoid it each time you do you teach your unconscious mind that that thing is something dangerous.
37:55 So if we think about ancestors and there's this honey and they move that They know there's like a saboteur tiger that's kind of lurking around, but they're like, yeah, but that honey.
38:10 That would be moving towards something dangerous, but there's a reward at the end. So it's justified. And likely they would still, they had no it's dangerous, but it's worth it.
38:21 But if they were just going into an area with a saboteur tiger and there was no benefit to them, they wouldn't do that because that's dangerous, right?
38:32 So they go out of their way to avoid doing that. So it teaches the mind, ah, dangerous. And on mind, it kind of doesn't really, it's not really even on what's actually dangerous.
38:45 It's not, so something can be objectively really dangerous, like let's say formula one driving is driving a couple of hundred miles an hour, it's not safe, right?
38:57 And yeah, I'm thinking that formula one driver's on their practicing, they probably don't feel much stress or fear, because they've done it so much and gone out of their way to do it, that they've taught their unconscious mind this thing safe.
39:09 It's good, it's fine. And yet, and the opposite happens, so when we go out of our way to avoid something, each time we're teaching the unconscious, this thing is dangerous, avoid.
39:21 And so what you can do is move towards the thing. But the caveat is even when you don't need to.
39:32 So, you go out of your way to move towards the thing, even when there's no purpose to it. Because then your mind's like, well, I would never be going out of my way for no reason to move towards this thing if it wasn't safe.
39:45 And, yes, so that's a big one. And you can, if it's too much for the nervous system, you can kind of start with just doing it in your mind, moving towards it in your mind, and sort of build up that way.
40:00 And it can be a hard thing to do by yourself, so it may be worth getting someone else to help with that, depending on what it is, but for smaller things, it might really be totally fine to do that, and to practice it, like if someone had like a fear of showing up on social media or something, and let
40:18 me just move towards this thing, practice in my mind first, and then doing something small, yeah. love that. Yeah, that's great.
40:30 You also have a very, like, calming presence and like your voice and everything is really calming as well. Only just as we were sort of working, working through some of those things.
40:43 I sort of feel nice and relaxed. Okay. And so the, I've got just maybe like one or two more quick questions.
40:57 And so when we've touched on this a little bit, you know, and I was sort of sharing how, you know, being really intentional with the business that supports my life rather than then sort of causing problems and so on.
41:12 And one of the phrases that I like to use is peaceful productivity. So what does, what does that look like for you?
41:23 And yeah, just to sort of get a little window into like what's your day-to-day like? Yeah, I love that term.
41:33 One of, this has actually been quite a recent shift that I made towards what I would say is peaceful productivity, is moving from like a time-focused day where my objective was to work for this many hours to an outcome focused approach to my days and that's made an incredible amount of difference to
42:00 how good I feel at the end of the day because previously I would sort of stretch work to fit that time and then I'd often get distracted and if you're like okay well at least I've done that much but then I wouldn't feel like I'd done enough in terms of what I got done and now the way that I work is,
42:17 you know, perhaps, okay, I want to get three emails written and scheduled by lunch. Obviously, I'd say a specific time, you know, and oh, actually no, sorry, yeah, in this example, I wouldn't be like three emails done and it would be based on outcome, outcome focused.
42:35 So it would be the earlier I finished, the earlier I can reward myself in some way. And I think it kind of, as somebody who's able to create your own work schedule, I think it's a really nice adjustment to make where you sort of shift from trying to make yourself like an employee in your business and
42:56 have all these hours to get done and rather like what are these outcomes and particularly, so I have this framework of what I call like the hierarchy of action and so I think for the first step can be like if you're taking no action in your business then obviously the next step on would be like taking
43:18 some messy action and I think for most like early stage like entrepreneurs it's the messy action that's really giving you so much information of feedback and you can then like fail here, learn from this and keep moving forwards but I think that gets to a point where you know what strategic you can you
43:37 know what makes sense for the business and it's that top level which I would call daring action which is the stuff that's ultimately it's it's it's scarier and and so that's why I would put as the top of the priority for those outcomes what are the scary actions that you that are going to move the business
43:54 forward. Nice. And doing them first can be you know then reward yourself. Yeah, love that. And I find it so interesting how different people like take a to-do list and like how they prioritize it or use their time and stuff.
44:15 So yeah, that's some some interesting insights. Thank you. Sure. Okay, couple of quick questions for a little mini lightning ring before we wrap up.
44:28 So do you have one piece of wisdom that you wish every entrepreneur knew? Yeah, I think it sort of relates to what you were mentioning earlier actually about like the moving gold posts.
44:43 I think there's never going to be a time in the future where you arrive, where all your problems disappear. The goalposts keep moving, there's more problems.
44:58 And so, bake fulfillment into the process. Kind of almost make it like a non-negotiable. And as I was sort of saying, I think you can do that and keep your wildly ambitious goals.
45:17 and yeah, so just kind of like, almost like remembering that, bringing that top of mind that, just remember, there isn't actually going to be a point in the future where all the problems are solved and everything's perfect, it doesn't exist.
45:30 So with that awareness, how do you want to approach today? Yeah. Love that, yeah. And what's one way that you protect your time that might surprise people or maybe a new sort of hot take?
45:50 I think this would probably be related to mindset. So one of the things that my mind can do and I think it's really useful to kind of notice if there are particular times or states where your mind is offering you more useless thoughts and so for me like first thing in morning or when I'm like hungry
46:10 or tired, you know, the quality of my thoughts can go down quite significantly. And so I have this term that I call the disregard window.
46:20 And so knowing my tendencies, I'm in a disregard window. So I can assume that the quality of my thinking in this window of time is going to be really reduced.
46:32 So just don't take it disregard it. basically disregard the type of thoughts that are coming up because I know that they're, I'll wait for a time where likely I can think about that thing when my thoughts are a bit sharper.
46:48 Oh, I love that. That's really good. It saves me a lot of time and wasted energy on thinking about, you know, it's like, okay, it's 3am, this is probably not the time to be planning out my launch, you know, But I'll think about that at this time, you know, and that would be an example of a disregard
47:06 window. Disregard these thoughts. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. And on the, on the, the, not having great thoughts when you're hungry, like that's part of my, when I'm going in to do like some deep work or I've got like a window of time when I know I'm going to be like, yeah, working on a launcher, you know
47:25 , whatever it might be. That's one of my things that's in my ritual to get ready is make sure I'm fed Yeah, I'm fed and I'm watered and I'm like and then I come to my desk I Love that and that's likely just become from like years of experiencing and just knowing yourself so well And I think that that's
47:44 that's part of like learning what what's my Process that helps me so much. Yeah, so individual I think that's quite a universal one actually.
47:55 Yeah, I think that's so well known. And then lastly, is there a book or a podcast or a person that's had a big impact on sort of how you approach mindset or time or your business?
48:12 So with your focus on time, you'll likely know this one, but it's all of a book, book 4,000 weeks. It's on my shelf.
48:22 Yeah, yeah. Slightly off, off, I'm of short, but it's in my line of I say yeah. Yeah, I really love the way he thinks about certain things and and particularly time and yeah, I think just the fact that kind of how he says with you, you won't have all those problems sorted.
48:46 You will miss out on most things, almost like embracing the FOMO, and that can actually give things meaning, knowing that I sacrificed that choice for this choice, that he gives us even more meaning.
49:03 So yeah, that book, yeah, I knew you'd have it, or I knew you'd have read it, and yeah, I think I just found that brilliant.
49:09 Yeah, I loved it too. It's probably one that I should reread. I think there are some books that I will come back to and yeah, that's definitely a good one.
49:23 One of the more recent ones, have you read Slow Productivity? It's not actually on my bookshelf. I think it's, was it Cal Newport wrote Slow Productivity, that was a newer book and it's a good one as well.
49:44 One that I read quickly when it came out and now I need to reread it. Yeah, I love books. It's funnily enough, you can't actually see any books in the shot but I've got a big bookshelf here and like out behind this door there's another big bookshelf and every time a package comes to the door my daughter
50:10 will say to me, Mum, not another book. I'm like, I can't help it, I can't help it. He's actually got a new book, Meditations for Mortals, which I've been reading and he talks about this and he says seeing the bookshelf of books that you haven't read not as a to-do list but rather almost like a river
50:36 and you sort of picking them out and reading those as they float by and and yeah it's an interesting analogy but I think it's kind of takes some of the pressure off like I have to read all of those books but I can kind of take the ones that sort of seem to fit at this moment and yeah it's exactly that
50:52 isn't it And I think that you just sort of intuitively will go for the right book that you need at that time.
51:04 Yeah. Yeah. It's amazing how that happens, isn't it? You just get like, wow, this is just what I was talking about yesterday.
51:10 You know, or something, you know, you're struggling on something and then there's an insight in the book you're reading. Yeah.
51:16 It's amazing how that happens. Yeah. Oh, amazing. Oli, thank you so much for joining. Can you tell the listeners where they can find you all all of that sort of usual stuff?
51:30 Yes, my website, Oli, O-L-I, cook with an E on the end, OliCookeCoaching.com, you can have a look at my work and my coaching.
51:44 I also have a freebie that I'm making will be ready very soon, which is a mini private podcast series on unblocking the bottleneck.
51:59 So it's about the pressure, decision, particularly around decisions. So clearing that decision pressure that's stalling your next big move in less than 10, 15 minutes.
52:16 So that's coming. And my Instagram as well is kind of the main place that I hang out. Instagram and emails.
52:25 Yeah. Amazing. And I love the sound of your private podcast. Please do share with me when that's ready because I'll with my audience.
52:38 And yeah, thank you again so much for coming on and joining me. Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed this conversation.
52:46 I appreciate it. Thank you for listening to Own Your Time. If you enjoyed today's episode, maybe you've been nodding along, scribbling some notes, do me a favor and leave a quick review if you can or a comment and this podcast will be on various different platforms so I never really know quite what I
53:08 should be saying here but if you can leave a review or a comment or a like it really does help and please do share this with someone who needs a bit more cam in their calendar.
53:19 Until next time, bye for now.