Author, podcaster, and coach Tripp Lanier joins me to talk about how to feel more strong, free, and alive.

Tripp's Bio

Tripp Lanier is a professional coach, author of This Book Will Make You Dangerous, and host of The New Man Podcast: Beyond the Macho Jerk and the New Age Wimp which — for over a decade — has been downloaded millions of times.

Tripp's LInks

Transcript

Jonathan Stark (00:00):

Hello, and welcome to ditching hourly. I'm Jonathan Stark. Today I'm joined by special guest Tripp Lanier. Tripp! Welcome to the show.

Tripp Lanier (00:07):

Thanks, Jonathan. Appreciate the opportunity to talk.

Jonathan Stark (00:10):

I'm really excited about this. I absolutely loved your book and I want to talk all about that, but first, can you give the listeners a little bit of background on you, who you are, what you do, they might not have heard your name before or just in case they haven't?

Tripp Lanier (00:22):

Yeah well, most known these days as the host of the new man podcast, which has been publishing for over 13 years, we've had millions of downloads. We kind of started in the wild West days and but my main profession is I'm a coach and I work with primarily men, but forward-thinking men that are like, all right, I've done pretty well for myself, but is this really it, is it really just going to be about chasing money or measuring up or trying to prove something that I didn't get worked out in high school? And so these are guys that are wanting more meaning more alignment, not just in their work, but also in their personal lives and their relationships as well. So I do the work with those guys to really kind of break out of this mold and find the unique thing that that really is. They're like, okay, what am I really here to do or give or provide in my lifetime? And you know, confront the fears that get in the way there and then really start to implement that and then world, and in a way where you don't have to live in your car, my clients tend to do very well for themselves.

Jonathan Stark (01:22):

Yeah, there's so, so I didn't realize that the podcast had been going that long. I listened to a few episodes, but wow. That's amazing. Yeah. When did the book come out?

Tripp Lanier (01:31):

The book came out this past year. We're still in the promotion cycle for that. So it's, it's you know, with COVID and all of that kind of stuff, it's like, it's still fresh and brand new and a lot of people's minds.

Jonathan Stark (01:41):

Yeah, it's really good. I'm just going to go ahead, like right up front and say, folks should definitely read this book. It's it aligns with a lot of the things that listeners here are used to hearing me say particularly staying, getting away from the crowd, standing out from the crowd and not being just another, whatever you want to be. The one and only have something very specific and doing that feels really dangerous to people. It feels like they're taking a huge risk by doing something different and standing out. I suppose it's like an evolutionary thing where fitting in was the safety mechanism, but now it's like the polar opposite of what you'd actually want to do. So the book is the book is not only really useful, but it's hilarious. It's definitely dude oriented. Do, do you have, have you ever, has that caused a problem for you at all? I, I, I asked because one of the things that people tend not to want to do is niche down on any kind of subset. They want to be like a software developer. I can build software for anyone and everyone. And I think that's a bad thing. You obviously think that's a bad thing. Have you had any sort of backlash from focusing down primarily on men?

Tripp Lanier (02:49):

No. I mean, if you take a look at the world that I'm in and the personal growth, personal development realm, it's a field largely developed largely dominated by women. You know, this was, I mean, this was a field that Oprah really cultivated. And there, I remember being that person going to that section of the bookstore when we actually went to bookstores to buy books and it was like, there's nothing here for me. I'm a guy. And it's awesome that there's a lot of great books for women here, but there was nothing that spoke specifically for me. And so one of the main reasons why I wrote that book was I was like, okay, what's the book I wish I could have read 20 something years ago when I was starting to ask these deeper questions and starting to really get curious about life and what was really involved. And, and and so that was, that was the impetus for this book.

Jonathan Stark (03:34):

One of the things that I love about the book, first of all, I listened to the audio book, which you read. Thanks, goodness. Because I think it it's, it really, it feels like a missed opportunity to me when authors don't read their own books, especially in a place like, you know, in a, in a, in a space like this or dumb domain like this it's, it's like, you really want it. I don't know. It just makes so much more of a connection for some, especially for someone who does coaching. But what's hilarious about it is, you know, you're super honest in it. There's swearing and stuff. It's there's some, a whole just absolutely like laugh out loud. Funny examples. I'm thinking of like the, the the, the sweat lodge. I don't know if it was a sweat lodge, but it was like, okay, everybody take off their clothes and it's just hilarious, but it's, it's incredibly useful.

Jonathan Stark (04:21):

And the, the, the thing that I want to drill into a little bit is your ability to the role playing that you did in the book. So, so for the listener, there's a bunch of examples in the book where, where one of trips, I don't know if you call them students or clients, but clients they would have some sort of like, I don't feel it something's wrong. I don't know what's wrong. And listening to the way you unpack that was in every case, it was just mind blowing. I do coaching myself and, and with a lot of engineer mentality type of people and they, and when it comes to the stuff that's re really squishy stuff, I'm like, I'm out, I'm like not, not a shrink. I don't know how to go there. I don't know what questions to ask. So it was incredibly informative as a coach to listen to the way that you would ask those questions.

Jonathan Stark (05:09):

Can you, can you think of an example from the book where someone might come to you and say, I say something like, I dunno, man. Like something just doesn't feel right. You know, and they're like driving a Ferrari and they're ma you know, they're happily married and, you know, I think there was one word, you know, the guy was like totally happy with his wife or, or felt that way. And was just like, I don't know. And then you ask these series of questions that maybe you could go into a little bit and, you know, touch on the sort of three things that you know, people are looking for in their lives. It seems like almost like the primary colors of what you go after.

Tripp Lanier (05:46):

Yeah. Yeah. There's a, there's a lot to unpack in that. You know, one thing that I've learned as a coach is that early on, as a coach, it was like, yeah, let's, let's really help people accomplish their goals, whatever they may be, those goals are always or had been at that time were always typically objective. They were things that we could measure. Right. That's, that's part of having a smart goal. Is that something that you could observe you could, you could measure? And what I found was that after a few months, you know, we, we, we finally accomplished this goal and my guy would feel good for a little bit. I mean, really just a little bit, maybe a day, maybe a week. And then he was kind of back into this certain state of mind and I was like, wait a second. That's not, we haven't transformed anything.

Tripp Lanier (06:28):

We're just, we've just leveled up, but we've carried all the same baggage with us. And so I realized that this makes this, coaching's not really fun when my clients are still staying stuck mentally and emotionally in these things. And so I really started to unpack what is it that we really want when we set a goal. And when I realized was that if we set a goal and we accomplished that goal and we still feel trapped or drained or isolated or bored, overwhelmed, and we, we screwed up, we missed the Mark, right? That no, no guys like, yes, this is it. This is exactly how I want to feel. I want to feel trapped and drained and isolated and stuck and all of this stuff. And it's like, okay, so then what does that mean? What are we, what what's, what does that mean? You know, the flip it around and well, instead of trapped, I want to feel free instead of drained.

Tripp Lanier (07:14):

I want to feel alive instead of isolated. I want to feel connected, deeply loved. I want to feel instead of border overwhelmed, I want peace of mind. I was like, Oh, okay. Well, what if we started to set goals that were in service of those intrinsic or interior experiences, these things that we, we want to feel, they can't necessarily be observed or measured, but they can be felt inexperienced. And so once I started doing that, then, then I can help a guy break down why he's not feeling okay. And this is where we come back to your original question, which is, I've got a lot of guys that from the outside, I look like they're kicking, that they've got the goals, you know, they've solved all this stuff and it looks really impressive from the outside, but something's off, something's missing. And if you were to ask them, Hey, are you fulfilled and go, Oh, know, I mean, maybe it's too vague, right.

Tripp Lanier (08:05):

So we can break it down. And I think what you heard in those conversations, I was break it down and say, well, let's go through, let's look at how, how is love in your life, right? How is this? And then, Oh, I got a lot of love. My kids are great. My wife and I are doing really well. That's all, that's all humming along. Okay, great. And lots of stability. Yeah. Lots of stability. Okay, great. Well, what about freedom? Do you feel like you've got flexibility in your life? Do you feel like you've got choice? Do you feel like you get to be who you really are and whatever you're doing? And it's like, Oh, well, maybe not. You know, I'm, I'm always at work or I'm always, my mind is always worrying about family or whatever. Okay. Interesting information. What about a lot? Do you feel alive and what you're doing?

Tripp Lanier (08:39):

Huh? Not really. I haven't felt alive since I was in my twenties. I haven't felt alive since I took my, you know, I got that first round of investment and, you know, we were able to launch ABC or whatever that thing was. And you start to break things down and said, okay, well, what can we do that would, that would be in service of more freedom, more alive in this, because that's really the doorway to this peace of mind that we say that we ultimately want. And then we can set some really smart goals and we can keep an eye on them as we go, instead of just putting our blinders on and saying achieve, achieve, achieve, or only look at the metrics, but never really check in with this dashboard that we've got in front of us that says, Hey, how am I feeling?

Tripp Lanier (09:15):

Am I feeling more free, more alive, more loved, more at peace as I go through my day to day life. So that's essentially what you probably, that you heard me breaking down in those conversations. And, and from that place, we can have a coaching conversation. Great. What are you going to do this week? Is there a conversation you got to have, or is it a thing you got to say no to? Or is there a bold thing that needs to be done with your brand or whatever those types of things are? And then I hold them accountable to that.

Jonathan Stark (09:40):

Yeah. I think one example was, you know one of your clients had a business partner and he was dissatisfied with arrangement. It had been going on for awhile and just never brought it up. Never discussed. It was thinking about buying him out and, you know, you kind of comment. Yeah. And you were like, well, have you talked to him about it? The answer is no. You know, and, and how do you ha but still that, like, it's sort of like, you had a nice sort of neat ball on it where it's like, yeah, I guess I should talk to them. And they went for a hike and had a talk in it and it went well. But do you have, do you have sort of tactics or approaches that people can use to get, it's going to sound stupid, but get them to do the thing that they know they need to do, but still can't get themselves to do so they're, they're still like, how do they, how do you walk them through the fear of having that hard discussion with a business partner or a spouse, or even a kid that, that you probably know maybe consciously know you need to do, or you should do, but you just can't make yourself do it.

Tripp Lanier (10:47):

I can, I use a salty language always. Okay. All right. Got it. So there's a, there's a technical term for this called dicking around. And we will Dick around to the degree that our system, right? Our, our system, our, our personal lives, our health, our relationships, our work we'll we'll allow it. Okay. Most of the time you can't coach a guy that is totally okay with dicking around. Like, he may say he doesn't like dicking around. He may listen to a podcast. He may, you know, go on a website and look at a coach, but he doesn't pull the trigger. And so it's really hard to coach those guys because they haven't reached this point where yet, where they're like, screw it. It's it's up to me. I've got to do something about this. And I think even Joseph Campbell, I don't know if he used this exact word, but he said, it.

Tripp Lanier (11:33):

There's that there's the pre it moment. And the post. It, moment. But that, it. Moment is so important where we recognize, Hey, this is up to me. My life is not infinite. My time is valuable. My energy is valuable. My experience of my life is valuable. I am in touch with a deeper why, and I think we can come back around to that, but I am in touch with a deeper way. This is not how I want to live my life, or this is not how I want to steer my business. And unless you're in touch with that stuff, then you are dicking around. You're just kind of putting out fires and you're allowed to just kind of stay in this fog that one day, you know, next month we'll probably get around to that or six months, or now it'd be the right time.

Tripp Lanier (12:08):

Or the perfect plan is going to fall out of the sky. Or, you know what? My business partner is going to read my mind and he'll take responsibility dicking around all dicking around. So I'm going to say that the person that's dicking around is not really coachable the guy who has said I'm done dicking around my life is more valuable. I'm in touch with a deeper why that that guy is coachable. And that doesn't mean he's not going to have resistance. We still work with that resistance and we go through it. But it is about coming back to that. Why so, what are we doing here is if we're still telling lies to ourselves, or we're still kind of living some fantasy, then you know, it's going to be really, really tough. But if we can poke through that fantasy and say, you know, I've been dicking around for two years, three years, five years, 10 years.

Tripp Lanier (12:46):

Some people have been tolerating so much and they're just, you know, it's like, what are you going to do? So I think, I think coming back to, I'm done dicking around. They've got to turn that corner on their own. And other than that, it's gotta be in touch with a really deep why, because otherwise taking action, making the phone call, having that conversation drawn up new documents, whatever that is just seems like a pain in the butt. And you'll default to the familiar fires that you're used to putting out on a day-to-day basis instead of taking those, those more necessary actions, even though they may not be very time or energy re you know, require a lot of time and energy that they just might require us to have a lot more courage.

Jonathan Stark (13:24):

All right. So tell me more about the deeper, why, how do you help people uncover that?

Tripp Lanier (13:29):

I think it's first, it's essential to get in touch with our mortality. And it's w it's a practice that I, I think it's, it's really important for us to, to just remember that our days are not finite. You know, as I talked to you now, there's someone close to my family in my family. That's struggling, you know, we will die this week, most likely. So there's a reminder that, that we're not, we don't have time to Dick around. And I think it doesn't mean we have to be in an urgent state or a frantic state or in any kind of scarcity, but I think it does wake us up. And I think that we can use our mortality to, to, as a sword, to cut through the and just say, is this really how I want to live? Spend time with people who have wasted their lives and what, and, and, and see their regret.

Tripp Lanier (14:14):

And it's like, is this really how I want to go about doing things? Most of the guys that I, that I see dicking around have not had some kind of initiation with death. They they're out of touch with the fact that they are going to die there. They're still young boys that believe that there's this next phase it's coming. And then they're going to have permission to really go for what they want in life. What I found is that the guys that really understand death or have had some kind of an experience of death in their lives, it's like, I'm not dicking around. I could go at any time and I want to feel aligned in my day. Now when my head hits the pillow tonight, I, I want to have a sense that, you know what I'm living my life. I I'm doing my best. I could do better share, but I'm my best. I'm not this time away. So I think that's a, that's a powerful place to start with a coaching client and to set that frame. And what that does is just keeps us from leaking energy. It sets a really tight container. So let's, let's, let's come from this place right off the bat. That makes you an extraordinary person though.

Jonathan Stark (15:09):

Does it map to age as much as I think it probably does?

Tripp Lanier (15:16):

I, I think it really is a perspective. I've met a lot of 45, 50 year old boys, and there's, it's just, but in what I mean by that is there's this sense of like, I don't really have to take responsibility. My wife will do it or work. I can just kind of plot along and then work will kind of work around me in default to something I don't really have to take the lead. And what I do, you'd be surprised how many people in quote leadership positions can run their businesses from that, that place where they're empowered to be that, that way. But yeah, it's not to do with age. It really is a frame of mind, if you think in terms of kind of this Maslow's hierarchy of needs, right? Th th these deeper questions lie at that top. So, you know, depends on where you are in that, that regard for a lot of us.

Tripp Lanier (16:02):

And I talk about this in the book, success as a form of survival, having a ton of stuff is a way that we are going to finally feel comfortable, safe, and accepted once. And for all. So we attach a number to that net worth zip code, whatever it might be. And we say, you know, once I get there, I'm good. I'll be fine. I will I'll survive. And we know it's that way, because we end up doing a lot of behaviors that are actually detrimental to us. We, it's not about getting stronger. We actually, we, we our health away. We our mental health away. We our community away. We do all the things that, you know, we live in places that were terrible crime and pollution and all this kind of stuff that there's not, there's not a rational argument that says, yes, striving for this type of success is makes me stronger.

Tripp Lanier (16:51):

It's really driven by this egoic self image thing. It's just, you know, this is where I'm going to finally feel safe and I'm not bagging on it, but I think it, it helps to understand what am I really striving for. So if we come back to that hierarchy of needs, it's, I need to be okay before I can even entertain some of these deeper questions. So that might happen for a younger person. They've, they've, they've had whatever, you know, insight that needs to happen. And they're starting to ask those deeper questions that happen for me in my mid twenties. But, but for others, it may not happen at all. Or it may, it may happen later on.

Jonathan Stark (17:25):

Yeah. I was a late bloomer. It probably didn't happen to me until I had kids, which is like early forties. So you talk more about getting stronger. That's a big theme in the book, a recurring theme in the book. Does this make me stronger? Do I feel stronger? It's kind of like a compass that you could use,

Tripp Lanier (17:40):

Right? Yeah. I think, I think most of us have just checked out of our interior world, right? We, we, we say, well, if I have this amount of money in the bank, I live here, I do this, I've got this title, then, then I'll be okay. But then we are experienced. Doesn't line up with the theory that we have in our mind. If I get to this place, then whether we realize it or not, there's that unconscious theory that I'm going to feel free. I'm going to feel alive. I'm going to feel connected and loved and deeply appreciated once. And for all, I'm going to have peace of mind. So we get to this, we might hit that Mark. And we say, Hey, something's off. I must need more. Right. So we, we look, we look at our behaviors and we look at the things that we're doing on a daily basis, and then say, okay, what about sleep?

Tripp Lanier (18:22):

Like, am I moving my body? How am I eating? Just the freaking basics, right? And we, we have an excuse me, well, I can't do that stuff. I've got to work. I've got to strive to be quote successful. So again, I want to make sure this is nothing to bag on doing well for ourselves. But when we look at it through this lens and suddenly your health is taken away from you, I mean, I know guys in their thirties or forties that have had a stroke, or they've had some kind of a, you know, a real breakdown in their body because of the stress. And they're just like, this is not worth it. Like, I, I am I'm on my death bed essentially because of how I'm treating myself or the stress or the panic attacks, or, you know, guys at the highest level of having these panic attacks and feeling like they've got to hide it from people come on, this is not strength.

Tripp Lanier (19:06):

Right. We get to a level of our success. And you think that once we got to this place, that the biggest baddest guys would be willing to start to take chances and really do more in their life. And they're not the tend to be more fragile. They're, they're afraid to be uncomfortable. They're afraid to take risks financially because they can't go backwards. That's a hit. And then there's this third thing it's like, what will people think of me? You know, I can't, I can't fail at this stage in my life. You know, I'm not in my twenties anymore. So I find all of that week, I find that that's, that's a fragile place to be for us. And here I am, I'm 47. I want to raise my hand. Like I love being comfortable. I love being safe. I love being accepted and, and secure in my social standing. So I, I say this to myself as well, but ideally like that real strength is that willingness to go into the places that are uncomfortable or uncertain, or could be a threat to what others may think of us.

Jonathan Stark (19:54):

Can you go into those three things that you just listed there? Sure does. Yeah. The three things that cause people to not want to, you know, perceive this as a big risk, right.

Tripp Lanier (20:04):

Working with a coaching client. And he said his trip, I want to do ABC. And it's like, it's like, okay, great. Now, you know, it's all green lights, right? Well, no, we're going to meet resistance. And so the three buckets that I find that we run into is a fear of being uncomfortable. Well, what does that mean? Obviously there's just a fear. Like I'm gonna have to work really hard or, you know, there's just like there could be effort involved with that, that that's just really uncomfortable or and it could also just be, this could be emotionally uncomfortable. I don't want to, I don't want to have to do things where I'm having conversations with people and I'm having to deal with things emotionally that are, that are uncomfortable. So that's a huge one. I don't want to go down this road if it's going to be uncomfortable.

Tripp Lanier (20:41):

Number two, I'm not okay with uncertainty. I'm not okay with a risk. I don't want to do anything. That's gonna jeopardize my time or my energy or my money. And I think we don't have to look very far. There's a thing that says, yeah, I want ABC and say, great, well, if you could write a blank check for ABC and it would happen, you're like, well, I don't know if I would do it, you know, because we don't want to risk it. We we're not, if we're not sure it's going to, there's going to be, we're going to get what we want. Then we, we balk at it. And then the third one, and it's a big one is that, that fear of looking like a moron for, you know, for lack of a better term, it's that anything that we will do that might invite criticism that might make us look stupid to ourselves or others, that where we might be a failure.

Tripp Lanier (21:22):

This is where you're kind of, you've alluded to this herd mentality thing. And so it can be, I can't be too big, but it can also be, I can't be too small. We've got our Goldilocks place where our, where our self-image has decided that we belong. And so I've, I, I run into this with my clients where there's guys that do just to not, I call it just enough disease or they do just enough to get right up to that place. And then they stop and then their income will calm down or whatever. And they're back into that scarcity thing, right? There's that in this, Oh, I do just enough, but then I don't want to make the effort to go any further and actually get some altitude and some spaciousness. And there's the other guys that do never enough disease, which is, they're always striving in their mind, it's it?

Tripp Lanier (22:03):

They, they can never measure up to this. You know, the self image changes once they get to this place, then it's like, well, I need to be that other guy now. And they, they keep adding onto who they're supposed to be. And they exhaust themselves that way. So all of that gets wrapped up in this, who am I you know, bucket and all three of those, those areas are huge. And they are typically what gets gets in our way. It's not the lack of information. It's not the lack of resources, really. It really boils down to those three things. I'm afraid to be uncomfortable. I'm afraid of risk or uncertainty. And I'm afraid to look like a moron.

Jonathan Stark (22:38):

Mm yeah. Playing not to lose instead of playing to win. It's like the one that, the one that I find people are most willing to articulate when I'm coaching someone is the second one, the risk. I don't know if this is going to work. How's this going to play out? They want some kind of guarantee that, that the strategy is going to definitely work. You know, it's like, well, if it was definitely going to work, it wouldn't be interesting. Like you can't, you know what I mean? Like they want to show me the data that this thing that you were suggesting I do is going to play out. Not everybody, but some people will, they want to see, like, it's almost like they want to see that map of the entire territory before we, you know, we leave. If we're going to drive from New York to LA, they want to know every place they're going to stop, how they're going to get there. What are they going to see along the way? How long is it going to take all of this stuff? And it's almost like they want me to drive them all the way there before they decide whether or not they are going to drive the car. And I mean, is that just dicking around? Is that more digging around or is it like, yeah,

Tripp Lanier (23:40):

It's a version of it. I did this for years after I sold my first company. I had enough, I had just enough to Dick around for a few years and I sold my house and had, you know, had some money in the bank after that sell. And then it was like, it was probably one of the worst things for me was because I didn't really have to lean in and do anything uncomfortable. I didn't have to really lean in and put anything at risk. And I certainly didn't have to do anything that might make me look like a more on our failure. And so I just circled the drain there and watched my bank account go down, go down. And it was one of the more anxious times that I've ever had in my lifetime, because I was disengaged. I felt rather powerless to do anything. I was looking for the perfect plan, anything that came across and like, okay, here's, here's an idea for the next phase of your life. I was like, well, I could see how it's not going to work out. I could see where it's not going to pan out. And then I would walk. And I was like, you know, there's gotta be the perfect thing. It's

Tripp Lanier (24:32):

Going to come along here. I just need to wait a little bit more. Meanwhile, I'm looking at the bank account going down and I watch so many of us do this as well. I think, I think it's a, it's a tough thing to wake up to, but it's, it's the truth, which is there is zero certainty about anything. And I think it's a mature stance to say, look, given that we've got to just go with the information that we've got and that step eight is not going to reveal itself until we're at step seven. And one of the things I like about this is that it's a lot easier to have an edge over so many others. If you're willing to walk through life this way, most of us can not tolerate that uncertainty. And so they will stick with kind of the, the safe boxes that give us the illusion of that certainty, but then they're confined as well.

Tripp Lanier (25:18):

If we're willing to, to approach things more, artistically, more vision, more from a visionary place, then we understand that this uncertainty is part of the equation. And it doesn't mean that we have to be morons and reckless and take a ton w w take on more risk. I think there's a sweet spot here, which is if we're willing to slow down and say, Hey, I'm here. Just need to take this next step. Just need to take this next step. And then mitigate that, that, that voice, you know, pay attention to that voice that says, I need to have that certain certainty. And you say, yeah, great. Got it. And it's just not going to be this path. If we want that path, we can go, you know, get this job. There was a, there was a time when I was struggling with my coaching practice and I hadn't quite put the pieces together at a big audience with my podcasts, but I hadn't quite figured out how to, you know, get the thing going with the, with the coaching and all that stuff.

Tripp Lanier (26:05):

I had this guy call me. He says, I got an opportunity for you. And I was like, great. Here comes, this is it. Here's my ship is coming in. And he offered me a sales job to sell air conditioners totally random. And I remember just being like, what? Like that, that's it. But if I remember feeling like that was such a test, it was like, here's your certainty. If you want certainty, give up on this mission that you've got to empower guys and to do this work in the world, the thing that you'd sold your other business for and go take your certainty. And I, I just remember being like, thanks so much, because you've really served me more than you'll ever know,

Tripp Lanier (26:44):

You so much. And I'm, I'm clear. I don't, I don't need to go down that road. Like, it was just like, Oh, okay. Then the uncertainty part is part of the equation. There's no escaping it. If you're, here's a big one. If you're feeling that uncertainty certainty, it doesn't mean something's wrong. And I think that's usually what it's like, I'm feeling all this discomfort, all this uncertainty, I must be doing something wrong. I'm looking at those guys. They seem to have it all figured out. They can go on there, you know, interviews and talk about all this stuff, exponent, you know, how you know, crazy growth and all that kind of stuff. Chances are they're, they're, they're living with a ton of uncertainty too. They just probably don't talk about.

Jonathan Stark (27:18):

Hmm. Yeah. So there's a, a great segment in a book by, I think it's in linchpin, Seth Godin's book, where he talks about the safety zone and the comfort zone and the, and how for a long time, because things were, you know, sort of industrial end of the industrial revolution, the strong middle-class, the safety zone and the comfort zone overlapped. So like, if you were looking at a Venn diagram, the safety zone was, or the comfort zone was inside the safety zone. But now with everything, you know, sort of new everything just crazy, everything's changing so fast. The, the, those two circles are no longer overlapping. So people are continuing to stay in their comfort zone, which used to coincidentally be in the safety zone as well. But now it's not, you need to get out of your comfort zone to get into, what's actually safe, in my opinion, or at least as a business owner, let's just limit it to business owners.

Jonathan Stark (28:14):

If you don't get out of that comfort zone, you won't, you are not being safe. So it's almost like it's almost like, and I've internalized this personally long enough that if I'm feeling comfortable, it scares the crap out of me because it's my internal compassing, you're going in the wrong direction. So to me, I think the uncertainty, you can use it, if something scares you, I'm almost always, I agree with you. I don't want to take on too much risky there. I've got little kids in a house and all that. But, but we're not, I'm not talking about taking crazy risks. If I, if something kind of scares, if I have like, Ooh, that's an idea. I'm like, Oh, I've got an idea, but it kind of scares me. I'm like, that's probably a good idea. I should probably do that. And then, you know, generally, sometimes I'll dig around and not get around to it, but I know that's, you know, but other times I'll just do it.

Jonathan Stark (29:01):

And I just like, yeah, I'm going to do this. I might screw up. It might not work. You know, whatever it's things are going to go wrong. But if you've got, I see the, that internal feeling as a compass and I've got a vision. So I know I want to go in that direction. I want to, I have this vision of the, of this future state. And, and I've got this guy. I don't know what the path is. I don't know where I'm going to stop for gas along the way, but I've got this compass. And I know if I follow the compass, it's going to take me in that direction. But so I'm, I'm just, I could be completely wrong though, but that's the, that's the thing that causes me to do something, you know, and actually it feels like forward. And it seems, you know, if you look back, it's kind of like, wow, I did cover a lot of territory. This seems to be going in the right direction, seems to be going in a direction and not circles. And anyway, so that really, that whole section of the book really resonated with me about the, your, to me, your compass is, does this make me feel stronger?

Tripp Lanier (30:00):

Yeah. Yeah. And I, I want to be really clear that this isn't a one size fits all thing. I don't think all of us are cut out for this type of livelihood. I don't think it's for everybody. I don't, I don't think that, Hey, that guy, that that's feeling sick in his nine to five right now he can do it if he really wants to. I, I don't believe that. I think it really is going to be up to that person and whether they decide they want it that bad, but I don't think that it's, there's an entitlement to that, that they just need to kind of come out here and follow the steps. It really takes a certain type of person to be able to do this work. And I've, I used to think that it was available to everybody, but I've learned that through conversations that I can, I can kind of smell it in the first 10 or 15 minutes when I'm talking to a guy.

Tripp Lanier (30:45):

And if he says he wants ABC and I'm like, good luck, I'll be like, call me in a year. Like, why don't you call me in a year and see where you are? Cause I think where you want to be is the, is the place we should start. Like once you get there, then we would start our work. But you've got a lot, you've got a lot to establish for yourself before we get to there. So I don't say that to discourage anybody. But I do say that because I think there's some of us that can beat ourselves up because we're not different. We're not, we're not somebody we say we should be or cut from different cloth. They're, one's not better than the other, but I think it is this, this ability to handle the uncertainty, to find actually actually find a creative flow in it, to get jazzed about it. A willingness to say, Hey, I've got a hunch here. I think this might go some place it's valuable to me. That is not everybody. Right. That's that's not all of us. And so I just want to lay that out there that it, that it's, it's, it's it's a smaller group of folks, men and women that, that tap into that.

Jonathan Stark (31:44):

Right? Yeah. I mean, I'm trying to, like, I have nothing else to really go on, but my past experience with a lot of this stuff and you know, I was pretty serious about music in my late teens and early twenties actually pretty much through my entire twenties, went to music school. The whole thing, you know, lived in a van too, you know, toured around the Northeast, all that like was like, I want to be a rockstar. And, and that looking back on it, if I was going to do it over again, or, you know, like the older me was going to give advice to younger me, it would, it has a lot to do with me having a vision of myself as like a rock star. And it wasn't a good fit, like, so do you mean like, what do you mean I would have hated it?

Jonathan Stark (32:36):

Like, I don't like being recognized. I don't like talking to people on the street. It's like, it would have been the absolute worst. I can't stand being on a skit. You know, like a routine, like going on a tour would have killed me like a big tour, like a world tour. It would've been like, this is the worst thing ever. I would have hated it. I can't stand planes. Like the whole thing. It would have been, it would have been terrible. Right. The thing I wanted was more about the, you know, proving it to my, you know, junior high friends that I actually was actually good. You know, like I'm actually a good musician. See, I can prove it. I run, it won a Grammy and I tour the world and it was more about that stuff. And hilariously, you know, for someone who would get up in front of a crowd of people to presumably entertain them, I never thought about the audience at all.

Jonathan Stark (33:23):

It was all like, how does my hair look? Are these pants tight enough? Blah, blah, blah. You know, like, am I cool? That was, that was it. It was terrible. It was terrible. But the reason I bring it up is because I had a vision of myself as this like cool rock star guy. And I spent a lot of time going after it, but it wasn't, it was, it was bad vision. It was super self centered. And especially in like a performing art, it was bizarre to be that self-centered. And if I had, I reached it, I wouldn't have liked it. I guarantee you, I wouldn't have liked it. I don't care how much money I would have made if any, but it was not my jam. And so I'm kind of tying that into two things. One is that I had a, a weird vision that was very self-centered and I tried to turn myself into that thing, but it wasn't like I was on a journey to help any, I was not trying to help anybody.

Jonathan Stark (34:11):

I had no, no proving totally outright. It was proving. It was totally would have been completely unfulfilling. But the other thing is, you know, like you were talking about not, everybody's cut out to be, say an entrepreneur. Well, I wasn't cut out to be a rockstar, but I wanted it really bad, but everything got way better for me after I gave up on that idea. And it was just like, you know what, and that wasn't easy. Cause that's like your whole identity, everybody who knows you is like, yeah. You know, singer songwriter tours around it. So I guess two things there. One is like, well here, let me turn this into a question since we're supposed to be talking and just me monologuing what, when someone comes to you with a goal or vision or something that they want to work on that you suspect is proving w how do you unpack that for them? So you can really find out for yourself or maybe help them find out if that's really what they want. 

Tripp Lanier (35:11):

Most of the time I can hear it in their language, right. So if I ask him, you know, if I was coaching you back then, and I had, I had a lot of the similar things, cause I was in a band and we were, we were doing the whole major label courtship thing. So and I was around people that were real rock stars, like, Oh, that guys, he really wants it. Like he's going to make it happen. Like that, that kind of, I'm going to move mountains to be a rock star kinda thing. But the, the thing I would listen for is how much are they focused on that outcome and how much are they focused on the process? Because if they hate it, they hate waking up every day and doing the process. And the only thing they can do is focused on that outcome.

Tripp Lanier (35:48):

But the image I get is that the person that's depriving themselves of oxygen, it's like, okay, when they go in their water and they're going to hold their breath all day and or months or whatever, to get to this outcome. And then it's like, Oh, you know, and it's like, okay, what about that strengthens you, right? Which is different than I get to get up. Every day, I get to noodle around on my guitar. I get to then talk to people and they tell me how great my record is. And then I get to go on stage. And then I get to work with these guys. And then I get this, I get to, I get to like, isn't this awesome instead of make this stop, I just want, I only, I'm only in it for this one particular thing. And if, if that's it, and it really is this, you can tell the, the, the outcomes that are like, wow, look at how special I'm going to be.

Tripp Lanier (36:32):

Then I know where we're on the wrong foot there. And sometimes that guy needs to go do that stuff. He actually needs to just that's his karma. He just needs to go exhaust that and get hit with the two by four enough times where he's like, okay, I think I've done with trying to prove that I'm finally special and unique and lovable. So, but the, but it does, it does flip around and to come back and say, wait, do I actually enjoy this process? And, and for the entrepreneurs that I work with, especially developer guys, they're doing this stuff, no matter what, you know, one of my clients is a developer. This was his passion project on the side. You know, this, I, I think he started it, you know, pulled it out of the, out of like, Oh, by the way, I got this thing, I kinda like doing, you know, he was an hourly kind of dude got this thing, a kind of like doing, you know, he's doing a clear and 50 grand a month.

Tripp Lanier (37:16):

And I think there's over a million users of this, of this product that he's built now. So it's it's, but there was all this stuff in between, which was like, well, this is the thing I love. And I don't want people to tear apart, my baby, and this is my hobby. And that is the place I go to escape to. And, but you couldn't stop him from doing it. Like after a 14 hour day, he would, he couldn't wait to pull up his, his computer and start working on this project. So those are the guys that my money is on. Whereas it's like, you couldn't stop them no matter what, like they love the process. And the only ones that are good that would get motivated by some kind of a carrot. I was like, yeah, you can't,

Jonathan Stark (37:48):

That's not going anywhere. Yeah. That's a good way to put it. Yeah. And I've, I've gone through, I go through like 10 or 15 year phases, or I have gone through where it's like, I start loving the process and to get into it. And then I [inaudible] with the rockstar thing, that goal kind of came later. It was like, how am I going to, I don't want to be broke. That was, you know, it was like, okay. So while I got to be famous, so but then after a while, I did start to hate the process. I can see, I can give you clear stories of when I, you know, like driving up to it in ATM on a Tuesday night, at three in the morning to deposit seventy-five dollars from sub gig, I just did. And like too drunk to be driving. Anyway, what am I even doing?

Jonathan Stark (38:26):

And I have to get up early to do my day job the next morning. It was like, I'm like, you just have one of those wake up moments where you're just like, okay, I think I'm done here. This is fun. S I've got a question we're coming up to time here. So we should probably wrap up soon, but I want to ask a question about whatever you want to call it, purpose, mission, vision, your why, your big idea, whatever that is, that, that sort of larger purpose, what, how do you help people? Do they, do they, people need to come to you kind of knowing that, or you help them uncover that. And if so, how do you do that?

Tripp Lanier (39:03):

I'm not really popular for saying this, but most of the time when people come to me and they say, I need to know my purpose in life, it's usually this, it go show. Like they they've, they've decided that they need to have their ego has decided that this is the thing that's going to make me really unique. It's another form of proving, right? Like this purpose in life makes me somebody, it means my life is meaningful. That means it's worth living. And I mean, I think that that's, you know what man searched for, meaning like, we are struggling for that. Like, it's, it's innate in us to, to want to look for that at some point. And I think it's good to have a sense of humor about it and recognize that it's usually just a story. It's a nice wrapper that we put around ourselves you know, and say, Hey, this just helps me.

Tripp Lanier (39:50):

It helps me get through the day. It helps me to do the work. Now. It doesn't mean that we don't experience meaning. Cause that's a, that's a different part, but the story it's usually identity oriented. Look at me, I'm a rockstar. Look at me. I'm an author. Look at me. I'm, you know, I'm just, I'm not just another Joe blow. Right. Nobody's ever like my purpose in life is to live on a cul-de-sac in in in this, you know, kind of middle-class neighborhood. Like that's, nobody's like I wake up and that's my purpose, right? It's it's always extravagant or unique or something on that level. So I think most of the time, those stories are like, I take with a grain of salt that said, when I asked him, what has you feel alive? What has you feel deeply rewarded? What has your heart open when you do this thing?

Tripp Lanier (40:33):

And you just feel like, Oh my God. And usually there is a sense, like, this is why I'm alive. For me, that was coaching, right. For me, it was having those conversations with people and helping them transition from one way of being in the world to another, like, I get this deep sense of like, yes, this is really powerful for me. And it's also really powerful for them. This is awesome. I can't believe I get to do that. I want to help you tap into that. Again, we're more into these process oriented things instead of this identity or, Hey, here's my label kind of thing. So again, if somebody comes to me that big, that big fancy story, I usually am like really? And then I look at their actions. Cause a lot of times they may tell me that their purpose in life is ABC, but they don't put any time or energy into it.

Tripp Lanier (41:12):

It's just what they like to tell people. So what do we, what do we do on a daily basis that has us feel more expansive? What has us feel stronger? What has this feel free? What has this feel alive? What opens our heart has this field deeply connected with other people? Those are the questions that I tend to ask people. That's really where kind of our whole body is telling us and saying, this is what you're really here for. And that can be surprising to find that that doesn't necessarily align with the conversation we're having about ourselves in our head. So I tell this story in the book, I was coaching a guy, a music producer LA had had his own studio on a fancy lot with a bunch of other fancy names and all that kind of stuff miserable right on the outside looks so cool and hanging out with all these fancy people and all this stuff miserable.

Tripp Lanier (41:59):

Why is he miserable? Because he hasn't gotten a Grammy and these other people had Graham and that guy over there had a hit and this hit did, he didn't have this hit and like this, all of this comparison. Okay. I didn't get invited that party. Why did he get into that part of that? All of that. And so I said, let's, this is miserable. Right? So I said, what if we actually got in touch with where you actually felt alive and you felt strong and you actually felt had a heart again. And, you know, I said, just track it, just track throughout your week. And let's, let's just see where that happens. And he said he he'd stopped into home Depot or something. And he was getting something, this old lady came up to him and said, can you help me find a light bulb?

Tripp Lanier (42:32):

And he was like, sure. And he's just chatting her up and they're chatting. And he just like dropped the whole I'm important thing and was just relating with her. And she was so appreciative and it was so sweet and it didn't matter about him being important or anything. And he found himself and he was like, that was the highlight of my, of my week. And he's like, and I'm not even embarrassed. Like he was like, that was so cool. Just to have that experience as a great, we'll use that as data. Let's just see if we can have more of those types of experiences instead of you chasing this idea that you need to be so important.

Jonathan Stark (43:01):

[Inaudible] Yeah. That's wild. It reminds me about, it reminds me of something dark services too, about, you know, like the best advice is the advice that causes you to do something like you're excited. Like you hear it. You're like, Oh, I'm excited to do that. I'm hearing a lot of echoes of that. Here in what you're saying, it's like, Oh, I get to do this or that I get to do this today. So that can be it's it's, I'm sure it was true in this case, you know, I bet you that guy's not like working in nail Island home Depot now, but you know, it's like it can be a big identity shift. I think when you, you've got this one picture of yourself, rockstar, and then you're like, Oh, actually I like writing books. Like I get up here. I would much rather write books and, and not be an author, but have do this stuff. And author does, which is write books every day. Right.

Tripp Lanier (43:49):

And I, I think more of that more and more when we just wake up and we were doing that stuff, and we're just in the flow of doing their thing. We're not sitting around navel gazing or looking in the mirror and wondering if our butts too big or, you know, any of that kind of stuff. We're just, it's like I'm living my life and I'm feeling aligned now instead of living from my ears up and worrying about.

Jonathan Stark (44:13):

Yup. Awesome. Well, that's a great place to leave it. Where can people go to find out more about all things trip? 

Tripp Lanier (44:19):

Let's see, the new man podcast is available anywhere where you get podcasts and there's a ton of free resources@thenewmanpodcast.com. You can pick up the book which is called this book will make you dangerous@dangerousbookstore.com. Amazon also has all the formats as well. And if you want to learn more about the coaching services that I provide, you can go to trip linear.com.

Jonathan Stark (44:45):

Awesome. Well, thanks so much for joining us. Everybody has got to check out this book. I really it's one of those few books that I think literally anyone could benefit from, from reading. So get out there and buy it. Cool. Thanks Jonathan. Thank you. Thanks for joining me. All right. That's it for this week. I'm Jonathan Stark and this has been ditching hourly. See you next time. Would you like to learn how to get paid? What you're worth? How about selling your expertise and not your labor? What about making more money without working more hours? We worked through all of this together in the pricing seminar registration starts soon. So head on over to the pricing seminar.com to add your name to the announcement list that you are L again is the pricing seminar.com. I hope to see you there.