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Welcome and happy new year. This is take number two. I’m so excited to be speaking with you today. I’m really excited to be talking about three belief systems you must embrace if you want long term success. And so 2022, for me, going into 2022, it’s a time of reflection. It’s a time when people historically look in the mirror and say, “Hey, what do I want to accomplish?” And I want to help you make 22 the best year on record for you that you’ve ever had because it is going to be the best year on record for me because I’m going to make it happen. In order for it to be the best year on record I have to align my habits and belief systems to create that output. And I want to help you create that output. I want to help you live a life where you feel in control.

You feel empowered and you have purpose. So what I want to do, I want to start by reading the chapter summary of chapter two in the book, Atomic Habits. If you do not have this book, you should get it. You absolutely should get the book Atomic Habits by James Clear, you should also go to his website and sign up for his 3, 2, 1 newsletter. It’s literally one of the most popular newsletters in the world and he brings great value, great, great, great value. So check it out. But so the purpose of me sharing this is to tee off. We’re talking about belief systems. We’re talking about identity, okay. If you… So here we go. There are three levels of change. Outcome change, process change and identity change. So outcome change, I’m going to be sober. I’m going to lose X amount of weight. Process change, the things that I’m going to do to, to accomplish goal and identity change.

Identity change is the merging of your habits and belief systems. Your habits and belief systems are in alignment to create an identity okay. So, three levels of change, outcome change, process change, identity change. The most effective way to change your habits is to focus, not on what you want to achieve but on who you wish to become. Let me say that again. Get your notebooks out or at a minimum, make it a priority to buy this book, the most effective way and by the way, I’m reading the chapter summary, everything he says is backed up by science, backed up by pages of support for this statement. The most effective way to change our habits is to focus not on what you want to achieve but on who you wish to become.

Entity emerges out of your habits. Every action is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. Becoming the best version of yourself requires you to continuously and to upgrade and to expand your identity. The real reason habits matter is not because they can get you better results, although they can but because they can change your beliefs about yourself. Now, quick side note, I want you to think about what I just said and put that in the context of the sex addiction model, which is great free resource, no question about that. One of the best free resources, I actually refer people to Smart Recovery but this is another question. So I want you to think about what is the impact of identifying long term with I am a sex addict, I am a porn addict? So we’re going to talk about that in another podcast.

I’m going to read that same chapter summary and share with you some of the pitfalls I’ve seen men experience this identity, I am a porn addict, a partner of a porn addict. Just think about the possible negative implications of that long term identity. So today, so what this says is this is important not to change what you do but change who you are. So I want to share with you three belief systems that are absolutely critical and necessary to creating that change. Like fundamental, mandatory, there’s no sex without this. And by at the end, if you’re joining me live, ask me questions after, get out of your pen, take things down. Welcome. Bing, Bing boy and glad you’re here. All right. So here’s the first, first belief system number one that you must change. If you want to be successful long term, you must embrace the reality.

Failure equals opportunity every single time. And I’m going to say this a few different ways to make sure we lock it in. The new belief system that you must possess around failure is that you see it as a gift. Failure is a gift. Why? Because it has already happened. You can either learn from it or here’s the alternative and let me know in the chat, if this is you because it was me, you fail and then you beat yourself up. The compliance mechanism, the internal training when there is failure is to beat yourself up, shame yourself, literally abuse yourself. If you were doing that to another person, it would be abuse. And if you were saying to your children what you’re saying to yourself, CPS would be at the door and saying, “whoa, you can’t talk like that to your kids, man, that’s poison.

So what happens is people fail and listen, this is a hard lesson in any space. It is a hard lesson here. When we’re talking about lying about some aspect of our sexual expression. We don’t want to do the thing. We do the thing. We beat ourselves up and we shame ourselves for doing the thing. And then we do it again to escape from that self-loathing, to escape from that shame. So every failure, every failure is an opportunity, is a gift to be better. Either you embrace it or it crushes you. It’s literally that simple. Now there’s a lot of [inaudible 00:07:44] work that goes into embracing that. I just want to start with as a practical level, as Rob says, failure is just testing. The road to success is paved literally with the bricks of failure. So, that’s belief system number one, failure equals opportunity.

Second. Now, listen, there’s a couple on the fringes that were in fourth place or fifth place that maybe I’ll add, depending upon your question. But here’s the second one. So first seeing failure as an opportunity, all failure, all failure, never not embracing the gift of failure. Okay, you fall down, you get back up, you know it but you have to learn. You have to internalize that, you need to create habits in alignment with that belief system. What are your failure protocols? That’s something you can write after this broadcast. Second, to break a habit you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Let me say that again because they’re all important. Nothing on this list is insignificant, failure equals opportunity. Finding the gift and failure really important.

Number two, I call number two, the golden rule of behavior modification. And that is, to break a habit you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Okay, let me… You may have heard to break a habit, you have to make a habit. Now listen, that in and of itself is important because what it says to you, what it says to me is that if you want to be successful in not doing something, you have to do something else. And one of the limitations of the disease based model, it’s focused on a symptom and by focusing and by having all your focus around not doing something, which is great, that certainly makes sense and obvious but if it is not counter balanced with how often you are doing something else, you’re not going to be successful.

It’s just how it goes. It’s just, to break a habit you have to make the right now, let me finish the other part of the equation, the right habit that meets the right need. What the hell does that mean? What that means is that every single one of your bad habits is meeting a need in your life. I’m going to say that again because you’re going to be but what about that bad habit? What about that bad habit? Every single one, smoking, drinking, gambling, watching porn, getting angry, criticizing yourself, self sabotage. Every single bad habit is meeting a need in your life.

Let’s take pornography for a second. Let’s take massage parlors, escorts and listen, this is so important, that behavior not only is it meeting needs, it’s been meeting needs for decades, mostly back to childhood and it is a very effective, emotional and physical regulator. You want to escape from pain. You want to from feeling like a piece of shit. You want to escape from the stress of work, the anxiety of this. You want something that’s yours. Something in your life that’s yours, you give, give, give, give, give to other people and work so hard. You’ve got nothing left. You’ve got this.

Watching naked people having sex is meeting so many needs. The physiology in the brain, the reduction of the stress level, cortisol, the release, the escape. It is serving very, very, very, very powerful needs. And what happens is a lot of people have demonized that part of themselves. They see that part of themselves as diseased. They want to disown. They want to reject. They want to exile this part of themselves and what they don’t realize and what you may not realize, the more you exile that part of yourself, the more power that part has because that what you resist persists. So to break a habit, you need to understand the needs that this be behavior is meeting. One of the first main exercises that we do in the Mindful Habit Program is called the positive attribute exercise. One of my favorite exercises, period, baring none.

And that’s where the client takes a sexual and a non-sexual bad habit and identifies all of the quote unquote, positive attributes of that behavior. That’s an unmet needs exercise. The goal of that exercise is to get you thinking about, as destructive as this behavior may have caused in your life, you have to understand that it is meeting a need. It is doing something for you and it is critical to understand that because the golden rule of behavior modification is, to break a habit you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Write that down, live that like you do your commandments. To break a habit you have to make the right habit that meets the right needs. So quick recap on the two mandatory belief systems that must change. You must create and build an identity around. Number one, failure is a gift, always.

Learning to respond to failure is a critical, critical, critical component on the path to success. It changes how you show up professionally. It changes how you show up personally, you are constantly in a state of Kaizen, continuous improvement. You create a culture of success in your life when you embrace that reality. The second one that I just talked about is, the golden rule of the behavior modification, a critical belief system that you must embrace and live, live if you want to be successful and that is to break a habit, you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Okay. Third one, I asked the client that I’ve been working with for years, what was the most impactful thing that I said to him. And I asked this of a few clients and this is their answer. Now I will say that you can read the quote, hundreds of quotes on failure.

You can read the hundreds of quotes on to break a habit, you have to make a habit. There are layers to this work. And there comes a moment where you have this cathartic awakening, a leveling up, if you will, to use a video game analogy, where you have now grokked, you have now internalized that belief system because failure equals opportunity, always, always. That’s a tough one. Set to break a habit, you have to the right habit that meets the right need. That’s a tough one to embrace, especially for people who have spent years and in some cases, decades, obsessively fobbed to this. So I want you to write things down and recognize that while they may sound to you, like plassing platitudes you heard of them before. I promise when you are ready and you continue to work on yourself and you embrace these belief systems into the fabric of your reality.

They become not just words you live on a page but an identity. There’s an identity that how you see yourself and how you show up to the world. There’s a belief system that you learn and grow from every mistake that you make, even the stupid ones and even the bad ones. There is a identity where you have internalized the reality that to break a habit, you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. It becomes a way of life, becomes a way of life. Second, third, here’s what a client said was the most impactful belief system and notice I’m hesitating delivering the punchline because it’s… Okay. That makes sense. But let me say it and then if you have any questions about anything that we’re talking about, please ask, okay. We got the chat going. If you’re listening to this recorded great.

But if you want to be part of these live streams, I live stream on YouTube, on Facebook, on Twitch and LinkedIn. So if you subscribe to me there, you’ll get notifications. Unfortunately, I don’t have a schedule when I live stream but then you can ask questions and you can be just like Rob. And I’ll say hi to you. Just like I’m saying hi to Rob. What’s up my man? So glad you’ve joined us. We’re talking about the three belief systems that you must internalize and embrace if you want to be successful long term. Here’s the third one. Here’s the punch line. Here is the way, here’s a new reality. And that is all behavior is need seeking behavior. I’m going to say that a couple of times, I’m going to say it from a couple of different perspectives and I’m going to strive to explain to you why that is so important.

Why parts work is so important. The internal family systems model is so important and why the demonization, the diseasefication, the demonization of your addict part is actually causing harm. So failure equals opportunity. Failure is a gift is number one. Number two is, to break a habit, you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Number three is a reality, is a reality that you have embraced that you have internalized into the cells of your body, into the fabric of your reality, is that you recognize that everything you do, every step you take, every movement you make, every word that comes out of your mouth, every slip, every angry outburst, every judgment, every criticism, every single thing that you do is need seeking behavior, everything, everything, everything, everything. And when you embrace this reality and you start paying and you do something stupid, you do something that you regret, that couldn’t be.

And when you look at that from the perspective of a part and you start understanding the needs that these behaviors are meeting, you will come to embrace the reality that all behavior is need seeking behavior. And Rob K who’s read the book, No Bad Parts by Richard Schwartz, knows scientifically that there are no bad parts. Your addict part, your angry part, your sabotage part, your not good enough part, your liar part. The Liar’s a protector, addict is a protector, anger is a protector. So Rob K knows that all behavior is need seeking behavior. Now, listen, I’m going to give you… There’s an asterisk, there’s an as and Rob over 60, still struggling with PMO. I invite you to reframe, that’s the symptom and what I’m trying to do here. And if you didn’t hear all of it, I want you to go back and listen to the belief systems that you need to internalize in order to be successful long term.

I have never worked with a client and I’ve been working with men professionally for nine years. I think. 27 different countries, Steve Harvey, Katie Couric, the A&E’s television show Intervention, Lifetime TV. I’m doing something right. I’m doing something right. I have amazing clients. And out of those thousand men in my group coaching program or one-on-one not one of them, the number of those men who had a sex problem primarily or a porn problem primarily was zero, zero, zero. You got to get to what you are escaping from, what you’re lying about, what need isn’t being met, that you are getting it met subconsciously and reactively? So all behavior is need seeking behavior. Let me first give you the exception to that rule.

When the doctor hits your knee with the hammer, that’s a reflex, that’s a reflex, automatic instantaneous. That’s not meeting a need. So reflexive behavior and there are aspects of reflexive behavior that are actually meeting needs. But minus that very limited category, even jumping when you are scared, as reflexive as that is, it’s meeting a need. So when you embrace that reality, that as Rob K talks about in the chat, that there are no bad parts, that you have no bad parts. That all these parts that you’ve labeled bad are actually broken parts of you that are meeting needs the way they were trained. See, this is why family of origin work is so important. Yes it’s important to heal trauma, of course, of course, of course, of course. Thank you, Rob www.themindfulhabit.com.

There’s a number there you can call. There’s all the list description of the different programs. So when you embrace the reality, listen and make a list of stupid things that you do, make a list of the angry, like all behavior, like really, really, even when I’m self deprecating and I’m beating myself up and making myself feel like a piece of shit? Yeah. Yeah that’s your compliance and mechanism trying to drive performance, trying to get you to do the right thing. That’s how you were trained. That’s how you were trained. So all behavior asterisk is need seeking behavior.

That one is the single greatest thing that came out of my mouth according to one particular client and we’ll call him Jay. And I love you and have such a privilege and honor to be working with you. And I’m so proud of the results that we’ve created. See, Jay came to me with a lot of disease work, a lot of grey addict work. And I remember the first big exercise that we did. I said, “Okay. So tell me all the good parts of this behavior, the hooking up with guys.” He’s married to a woman, “And the adult bookstores. Tell me all the good parts about that.” Anybody who’s been to an adult bookstore, no shame, right? No shame. That’s a, I say that’s the place where grown men go to die. Very, very sad, lonely place. “Tell me the good parts of all the porn you watched, of the escorts that you paid for.”

And after a shock, like what are you talking about? He was able to come up with one of the most comprehensive list of needs that he needed to be meeting proactively. It was the best start, the best, best start. And he had reaped his skepticism of wait, all needs. And listen, I can’t say that too early. Some of you now might be hearing this and saying, “That guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” Continue to learn about the internal family systems model, continue to learn about habits, continue to learn about identity, continue to learn about the challenges and there are so many great things about it but the challenges of long term identification with the label, I’m a sex addict and I’m a porn addict. And the impact that, that has on identity. Is it freeing you when you say that? Do you mean that as someone who’s and has risen like a Phoenix from the ashes and now has self control, who now has emotional intelligence, who now lives a belief system where failure equals opportunity, where he meets his needs proactively?

He has embraced the reality that to break a habit, you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. He’s embraced the reality that all behavior is need seeking behavior. I’m a sex addict. I’m a porn addict. I prioritize sexual health. Does it mean there’s an identity around sexual health where you realize in the fiber of your being that sexual health equals physical health, mental health and spiritual health, all three? So is that what you mean when you say I’m a porn addict, I’m a sex addict? If the answer is no, then you have got to upgrade your belief system.

You have to upgrade your identity and you take the best of that model and you add to it, Atomic Habits, you add to it, the internal family systems model, maybe you add to it, the mindful habit system, where we dive deep into these concepts because they are so important. They are mandatory. They are mandatory. So if you started late, listen again because I read the chapter summary from the book Atomic Habits, if anybody has any questions that they’d like me to answer before I wrap up this stream, let me know. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for sharing with me your precious time, your most valuable resource, and I’m going to do my best to keep these lessons crisp, concise. That is an absolute challenge for me because I love to talk. And so I will go off on tangents but I’m going to really try to think about how can I be more crisp? How can I be more concise?

TikTok has taught me how important it is to be crisp and concise in the delivery of your message. How much value there is. It’s like the opposite of that is searching for a recipe. You go online to search of the recipe and because of SEO, you’ve got six paragraphs of how this recipe helped someone and it came from grandma and how it… I just want the recipe. I just want the recipe. Now I just want the belief systems. I just want the habits. I just want the identity. These concepts are complicated. I’m going to do my best to explain them in a way that brings value to you. So I want your feedback and I’m going to get ready to wrap up in the next 60 seconds. Unless I get a question in the chat.

And today we talked about the three belief systems that you must embrace, that you must become, that you must internalize in order to be successful long term. Belief system number one, failure equals opportunity and failure is always a gift, embrace that reality, your life will change. Second belief system that you must internalize and embrace is, to break a habit, you have to make the right habit that meets the right need. Why is that important? Why is that the golden rule of behavior modification? Because number three, all behavior is need seeking behavior. All behavior is need seeking behavior. Every bad habit. Every addiction that you have is a part trying to get a need met in the way that, that part was trained. It is why the IFS model is so important, it’s why I’m getting trained formally. I paid the 3,500 bucks for their training, starts in April.

I’ve been doing parts work 11 years, personally, nine years professionally. By far, one of the most impactful parts of the Mindful Habit system. And what it gives you is, what do you do about that trauma, about that past, about that training? What do you do? How do you meet the needs? You do it in the context of your part. So check it out. If you missed the beginning, go back and check it out. And of course I will conclude. And Rob Goddammit man, I am so glad you’re here because I was so saying to myself, what else is missing? Something is missing. And I wrote down, to be successful you must prioritize self care, rooted in self love. And I said, “Nope, Nope, Nope, Nope. That comes with these other things.” What was missing and what I was missing is this, the cure for your addiction.

And thank you, Rob, the cure for your addiction, for your bad habits, for your anything is the aggressive pursuit of a great life. It means that if you don’t want get needs met this way, you’re going to be on your game. You got to be successful. You’ve got to have purpose. You’ve got to exercise self control. You’ve got to have emotional intelligence. You’ve got to be able to manage stress and anxiety effectively. You’ve got to have community. You’ve got to prioritize sexual health. What that means is the aggressive pursuit of a great life. Rob, thank you everybody for joining me. Happy new year, I look forward to helping you make 2022 the best year yet because that’s what I’m building for me. And I want that for you too. Happy new year.