"How Fear Can Ruin Aspects of Your Life" Fear is powerful, left unchecked it can ruin aspects of our lives, Learn from Ryan Stanley the author of "Be Patient, Be Present, Be Joyful" ways to overcome fear and find joy.
To learn more about Ryan visit
https://www.ryanstanley.com/
For show note and highlights visit
https://timkubiak.com/
"How Fear Can Ruin Aspects of Your Life" Fear is powerful, left unchecked it can ruin aspects of our lives, Learn from Ryan Stanley the author of "Be Patient, Be Present, Be Joyful" ways to overcome fear and find joy.
To learn more about Ryan visit
https://www.ryanstanley.com/
For show note and highlights visit
https://timkubiak.com/
Hi, this is Tim Kubiak you're listening to Bowties and business. As always, you can find us on Apple podcast, Spotify, Google podcasts and a host of other services. You can find us on social media at Bowties and business on Facebook and Instagram and me at Tim Kubiak on Twitter, LinkedIn and of course Tim kubiak.com. Today Ryan Stanley's our guest. Ryan is a lifelong entrepreneur is known for his impressive natural ability to connect with, understand and empower those are in pursuit of and willing to make significant changes in their personal and professional lives, so they can end up the best version of themselves. Since graduating from the Institute of professional excellence and coaching. In 2009. As a Certified Professional coach, Ryan has changed the lives of hundreds of clients from all walks of life. More recently, Ryan has also been working in his alma mater as an admissions coach, where he closed almost 22 million in sales in eight years, and is their first ever internal coach where he coached staff from entry level to C suite on everything from daily professional growth, to how they want to show up energetically, and in more personal areas of their life. In 2019, Ryan published his first book, be patient, be present, be joyful, a first day get for emotional bumps, scrapes and bruises of life. It can be found anywhere that books are sold, and on his own website, RyanStanley.com. Ryan, thanks for being on and welcome to the show.
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, Tim, my pleasure. I'm really excited to be here. Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure,
Tim Kubiak :I'm glad we were able to connect. So you know, you're a lifelong entrepreneur, a lot of our listeners are in some form of startup or running their own businesses, what have led you down that path?
Ryan Stanley :You know, it's a great question. in some capacity, I have to say it's in my DNA, my father, for for good and bad, was also a lifelong entrepreneur. Had a great days had not so great days. And so but I didn't grow up with the concept of starting your own business and just had an understanding of that in the background in my head. And so that's kind of I think, a from a very early age. But really, my first endeavor into entrepreneurial ism was at 18. I mean, I even started in a, like a multi level marketing organization, and kind of got the concept of creating your own business and what it took to kind of go out and market and brand yourself and to connect with people. During that time, I read, Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. And that was, you know, enough to kind of set me off on the career path of really wanting to always work for myself and kind of create my own thing.
Tim Kubiak :It was truly amazing how many people have read, Think and Grow Rich, and how many people it's inspired.
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, to say the least. And just this whole concept of, you know, a statement of desire and reminding yourself every day who you want to be I mean, that's one of my biggest pieces of advice for anybody certainly had a huge influence on who I am, and how I show up
Tim Kubiak :in a long way you got into coaching. So obviously, first of all, can you tell us what a Certified Professional coaches because I'm not sure everyone knows?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, there's a lot of coaches out there, obviously, the first thing people typically think about is a sports related situation. But they're also life coaches that are business coaches, their executive coaches, people who work with you to help you go from functional to optimal, right. So we coaches and someone who comes in and tells you what to do. A coach is someone who comes in and helps you recognize that you have the answers within, you're just blocked by fears and you're blocked by limiting beliefs, and you're blocked by past experiences. And so all these different things keep you from really functioning in an optimal level. And so coach comes in holding your agenda up high, like so that they're focused on what you want to accomplish. And they don't have your fears, they don't have your blocks, they don't have your limiting beliefs, they don't have these different things that are keeping you small. So they're able to really look at your goals and your intentions from a detached perspective, and help you to look at it the same way and help you move forward. You know, some people refer to it as a life coach, I get different aspects of coaching, but in some capacity, I feel like everybody can use a coach somewhere in their life.
Tim Kubiak :Yes, I absolutely agree. I've had them throughout my life, right? Young man, I played sports, got into business had mentors. And you know, we didn't call them coaches once upon a time, but that's absolutely what they were. And frankly, I've had corporations pay for my coaches for years because of the benefit. So absolutely believe in them. What led you to become a professional coach?
Ryan Stanley :Hey, you know, it was 2008 years I mentioned I've been in entrepreneurial ism for a while at the time I was I owned a business which was an artist management. So I was managing a bunch of bands. And I am a huge fan of music just in general. I love working with creative people. In fact, in general, I believe entrepreneurship is a form of art as well. It's not necessarily a creative art as most people think of it but you are similar to a musician who starts off with a tune in their head or a painter who starts off with a blank canvas. You are starting off with nothing except for an idea and you You're making time to create it and put time into it and put it out there to the world for the rest of the world to see and judge and observe, then hopefully, in the end, you make something out of it. So in that space, I do appreciate musicians, and their creative entrepreneurs. A lot of In fact, the other side of that is people don't realize the musicians are actually entrepreneurs, right, they're kind of doing the same thing. Like they're creating a product that they want to sell to the masses. And so I love working with musicians, I love working with creative people I love but what I love most about it was empowering them to be the best versions of themselves, and to have conversations with them that maybe nobody else in the family or the friends had had with them a lot of the time, especially going into the music industry, which is you know, not necessarily the easiest one to break into the can, it can be a lonely place to be. So those aspects, I love those aspects I didn't love about it, I didn't like dealing with shady club owners, I didn't like being out till New York City till three o'clock in the morning on a Wednesday, especially the time I left when I was just starting to develop a family. There are certainly aspects of it that I didn't love. And I knew that every day. So in October of 2008, the term coaching came up in like three separate occasions. And this was going back, you know, 12 years. And so it wasn't even at to your point earlier, like not even know, not everybody knows what a coach is now, back then even less people knew what it was. And so I heard it come up in like three different times. And I kind of took that as a sign of something I should look into. Because each time it was mentioned, I felt like I you know, that's something that I could do that that is what I'm doing already. That's what I love about what I do. So I did about, you know, six or eight weeks worth of research, I enrolled in a company called AIPAC, the Institute for professional excellence and coaching in 2009. And I initially for many years, probably good half of my career worked with musicians as well. So I kept my type of clientele. I just removed all the aspects of working with them that I didn't like, and enhanced all the aspects of work that I did. And also learned a lot about myself along the way.
Tim Kubiak :That's amazing in your big music guy. And we didn't cover it in the intro, but fishes your band of choice, right?
Ryan Stanley :That's to say the least if I had to pick one, it's one thing I'm a nerd about. Besides coaching and personal development, it's definitely fish.
Tim Kubiak :And what drew you in with them?
Joel Holc :You know, interestingly stuck in a. So I first heard fish for the first time in 1992. And back then it was like, you know, we were just kind of coming out of hair bands. And it was like right before I mean, there was no bands like Nirvana and the grunge thing was happening. And, but really, everything you heard was like kind of just love songs and pretty kind of straightforward. I grew up on classic rock, Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Beatles, that type of stuff, which is all awesome. And I still obviously love all that music. But when I heard fish, it was not love songs, like the lyrics were interesting and unique. And they played jazz, and they played rock and they played bluegrass, and they played all these different things to really opened up my mind to what different types of music were out there. From an enjoyable standpoint, it wasn't just something that maybe somebody told me, but it's something that I kind of found these young kind of nerdy guys from Vermont who are doing their own thing. And then of course, fish is really known for the improvisation, right. So you can, when you go to a show, you can go see them multiple nights in a row, and I have many times, and you're going to get a completely different concert every night. And you might have a favorite song by them. But you can hear it multiple times, it's gonna be a different version every single time. And so when you're hearing a song played by Fisher, you're not necessarily celebrating this is my favorite song as much as sometimes you're celebrating a particular version of that song that that you love from like 1997, or you're celebrating the fact that what was going on in their career when they wrote this set of songs, you're not even, you know what I mean? It's like that there's more of a community in the story behind it. And so I just love the adventure of who they are the fact that you never know what you're going to get. I think there's a lot that speaks to my passion for life about that as well. Right? You never know what you're gonna get.
Tim Kubiak :I was gonna say that fits business and life pretty well, right? Yeah, he, you might, you might get a downbeat version of it, or you might get a thrash metal version, but
Ryan Stanley :you never know what's gonna go on. And the piece that I think as well is that they were kind of doing their own thing. And they did work really hard, like they play, you know, they didn't make their living by being on MTV. Back at the time, they didn't, back when MTV played videos, right? It didn't make their their living by having number one single, they made a living by working hard and showing up in front of the people that they knew their audience was. And I say that in a sense that that has taught me a lot about life as well. And business. You know, it's point where if you decide who your audience is, don't worry about what the market is doing. It's important to pay attention to it. But you can also make your own niche in your own way by doing something when you're really connecting with the audience.
Tim Kubiak :That's really great advice. And there's a whole generation of musicians now that would know what to do without YouTube and it's been a great thing but right that something is probably lost is people went in toward and to the business you were in, played empty clubs three, four or five nights a week hoping to pick up a few fans. It wasn't putting out videos and hoping for likes,
Ryan Stanley :right? Yeah, big time. It's a whole different world period. In fact, you hate back in my day, right? You hate to be like that old guys does it but people kids today, they don't know how easy they have it right to be able to do that and to be able to put stuff out there. for free, you know, to create great content and put it out as often as you like, and you're willing to put in the time and effort for.
Tim Kubiak :Yeah, yeah, it used to cost thousands just to cut a demo. Now you can do it with free software and $100. Mic, right?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, exactly. Brave New World.
Tim Kubiak :Brave New World. Speaking of brave new world, what advice would you give to anybody who's ready to change their life?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, I think that's a great question. So as far as, like I mentioned, we, as coaches, we typically don't like to give too much advice. But since you asked, I would say Listen up, the first thing is to decide what that looks like. Right. So if you're on, fulfilled with your life, if you're not content with who you are in any area, whether it be business, whether it be relationship, whether it be finances, anything you want, there's an important moment where you need to decide what it is that you do want, it's one thing to sit them complain about what you don't have, what you don't like, or to stare at that. And that's really going to keep getting you what you've already gotten, in my opinion. So there comes a moment where if you're not fulfilled, and you're ready to make a change, to actually go through the effort of going back to Napoleon Hill, go through the effort to write down your statement of desire, who do you want to be? What do you want your life to look like? How do you want to live every day, physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally, you know, what, all these different areas, write it down. So that's a, b, is then decided that isn't a potential outcome decided that will actually happen. If you put in the time and effort like you, you have to have faith in the outcome and believe that it is a possibility. Because you could write stuff down and say it all day long. But if you don't actually believe it's gonna happen, you're, there's a part of you that's just fighting against yourself. So write it down, decide that it's a possibility. And then, you know, see would be take action on it every day. Like, actually, I'll dial it back, let me see, let me change that sees actually to read that aloud every day. And again, this is Napoleon Hill, not me. But it is something that I use it advise. So literally write it, say it out loud, when you start your day, say it out loud, when you go to bed. At this time, you're doing two things. One, you're reminding yourself just out loud, of who you want to be. And you're creating a vision for what that actually is going to look like. Because the first day you write it down, compared to after you say it every day for 30 days might be a little bit different. And even by saying it every day for 30 days, you start to really get more of an idea of what you want your life to look like and feel like, a lot of the time people feel like, hey, I want change, I want my life to be different. But they have that that's just kind of an abstract concept in their mind. It's like, well, I want to be rich. Well, what does rich mean? I don't know, a million dollars. Cool. Well, what would you do that you want to make that in one year like, so really to get down the details of you want by taking out of your mind and putting on paper you are in some capacity actually creating it, or more of a deeper vision of it. But then also by saying it out loud every day, you're reminding your subconscious of these truths of who you are, who you deserve to be, and what your life can actually look like. And when you create that you say it out loud, not only just say it out loud, but but imagine it happening and feel gratitude for the outcome, the elevated emotion that you're creating from quantum physics level, you know, the intention of what it is attached to the elevated emotion really attaches to it. And then from my experience, things start to unfold before you. And by by reminding your subconscious of what you want to occur in your life, you're now going to be more open to conversations where you might hear something in a conversation that you might not have heard of, had you been not thinking about it every single day. And so then you start to take action, and from my experience, more things start to unfold for you.
Tim Kubiak :So how does fear of what other people think, hold you back as you do these and work through this?
Ryan Stanley :It's it's one of the most important things to recognize. And so that's a it's a huge question, Tim? And it's a great question. Because for me fear of what other people think just fear, most fear in general of that, that keeps people small entrepreneurs, small or whatever, is when it comes down to this fear of what other people think I'm not successful enough. I'm not I don't, I don't look good. Whatever these different fears that everybody has, it typically comes down to because somebody else is going to perceive me in some way. And if you remove fears from of what other people actually I mean, really even just I think I had a coaching call this morning. And I just said, Well, what would it be like if you didn't care what anybody else thought. He said, Oh, my whole life would be different, like in every capacity, right? I'd be showing up on purpose every day because it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks. And when you start to step into that it's the form, acknowledging your true self because the truth of the matter is that every single person including you, the listener, are exactly who they should be for every single second of life they've lived up until this moment. And so to care what someone else thinks someone else who has lived a completely different life, I don't care if they're your brother, they have literally had different moments and different thoughts and different anxieties and different stresses and different lessons. Every single second of their life has led them to be who they are. But so who they are has nothing to do with who I am. And so for me to what I will say waste energy and I mean my energy like your physical thoughts or energy you're creating, putting focusing energy on what someone else thinks is a waste of time. Because if I were to tell you listen, there's a somebody else in some random village in China, and they don't like what you're doing you kind of like what difference does it make? What does this person have to do with my business? It's the same thing for every other single person on the planet, there are billions of unique stories. And when the grand scheme is, it's really none of your business what someone else thinks of you, because it has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with them. When we stop focusing on what anyone else thinks and focus on who we want to be, not only will we step more into our purpose and create more authentically, but we will attract people who are more authentically attracted to us and aligned with our vibe anyway, again, going back to the fact that there's billions of people, why care what other people think, who don't like you, when you can really be focused on who you are to attract people who do care and are attracted to what what you do and what your vibe is and what you're putting out there?
Tim Kubiak :And what advice do you have that? How do you incorporate this into living your best life? So there's billions of people billions of experiences, different perspectives, and each and every one? How do you take action on that and live your best life?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah. And that in itself, like by asking yourself that question, every day, and it is a practice, and it is a consistency, and it is not something that you kind of, you know, to be your best self, you know, you look at people who you might admire, who are the, from a social standpoint, the best versions of themselves, people like Michael Jordan, people like Elon Musk, people, whatever, who have made big changes that have made an impact on the world, one way or another. They're typically people who are doing something every day towards that. And once you realize that, that is an option, again, we go back to it's like, first of all, decide that it's an option, okay, I can be the best version of myself, it might not happen in a week, a month, a year, or 10 years. But in the grand scheme of things, if I eventually turn out to be what I believe is the best version of myself, then that's part of the journey. That's where I'm headed. And if I know that's where I'm headed, and that's in the grand scheme of things, all kind of adds up together. So the other thing I would add to that is patience, right? We talked about the book, be patient, be present, be joyful. The first part is patience, be patient with yourself, it's not going to happen in a day, it may not happen in a week, it may not happen in a month, or whatever, who knows. But in the grand scheme of things, if if you know what your ideal looks like, and I'll just use something that's easy for everybody to align with, let's just say, I want to have $10 million. And I want to, you know, have a great marriage and keep the perfect weight of 187 pounds, or whatever the different thing is, and it takes you 10 years to get there, but you got there. And it took you 10 years of everyday reminding yourself to be the best version of yourself, and 10 years of every single day, living on purpose, but you got there. In the end, the path to getting there would be so fulfilling because you are it is on purpose, you know what the outcome is that you want? And so be patient with yourself and enjoy the journey as much as possible.
Tim Kubiak :You mentioned the book. Why did you write it?
Ryan Stanley :I wrote it as much for me as I did for the rest of the world. One thing I was finding with my clients and consistencies in conversation, were people not being patient themselves, people having fears what other things we've already talked about people having fears of what other people think people worried about what they said last week, last month, last year, so they were worried about the future so that they weren't being present, they were putting more their focus on stress and anxiety or anger towards other things are happening outside of them. And so they were lacking in joy in their life. And so, to dial it back, I am not a great reader. And I don't even like to say I am not a great anything. I don't think words are important. But I don't enjoy reading as much as I could I let's let's put it that way. And so there's some amazing books out there that are like three 400 pages long, and they will change your life. There's amazing content out there. And I would never finish them. And I would never you know make the time to read the 340 pages you give me 100 pages and tell me what you're gonna tell me 100 pages of you telling me what you're telling me. And then another hundred pages of you telling me what you told me. And I was like, Listen, man, my clients are coming up with these these challenges. They don't want to, I don't want to read 300 pages, maybe they don't want either. I would love to have something that I could just pick up if I'm having a tough day and read through in 30 minutes and have some some basic layman's terms, conversational perspective of how I can lead a better life and enjoy the process of living now. And so I wanted to make another there's not books like that out there, I wasn't able to find one. So I wanted to make one. For people like me, the book actually is twofold. So as a bit of an add entrepreneur, I'm always coming up with something and I've got a couple of different projects. And so this book was another piece of art, like it was another creative aspect. Or I could say here's something that I can create for the kind of scratch that itch that I have as an add entrepreneur, but be also serve the world you know, and put my message and leave a legacy after I'm gone and leave something for my kids and my grandkids and and ideally the intention of maker of writing the book and publishing it was to have a global impact. And so, but to do it in small bits, right? So so the book is it's written really with two two end results in mind. One is that you will read through it in 35 minutes or so right? You don't spend hours or days reading it. You Read through it, you can take these concepts of who I want to be in any given moment. How do I create patients? How do I create presence? How do I create joy and kind of use it in a step by step process but be the reason that the subtitle is a be a first aid kit for the emotional bumps, scrapes and bruises of life is it was physically created in the sense of being a first aid kit, to where if you're having a tough moment, you can open it to any page in the book. And there will be something on that page that is intended to pop out or be highlighted, or might be a quote from someone else, or just a blurb here, like a quick passage, that you can open it and get some first aid in the moment and allow it to kind of serve you when you when you need it most. So that was my intention.
Tim Kubiak :So the book is, be patient, be present, be joyful, a first aid kit for emotional bumps, scrapes and bruises of life. Where can people find that if they want to go get a coffee?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, thank you. So first of all, you can definitely get it at Ryan Stanley calm. That would be my own personal website, if you go there, you can hear some of my audio blogs, my podcasts, you can just get some other content. But there'll be other podcasts interviews I've done. But there will be in fact, this will be on there as well. So check, feel free, if you want to come back, you can check it out there. And then if you there's a button that says Be patient, be present, be joyful. So feel free to click on that. And you can just order a book, if you do, you'll get a signed copy for me and depending on my availability also come with a complimentary coaching session. But you can also get an on like I said, everywhere books are sold Amazon Barnes and Nobles, if that's easier for you just to pick up. And then also, you know, specifically during this covid time right now I am offering a free copy for anybody who's just I mean, I personally I like the physical copy. It's something it's small, you can carry it with you. It's fun, and it's again, something you know, it's a first aid kit to carry with you when you go. But if you don't feel like spending the money, you really just want to be served by the content within you can get a free copy on my website as well by going to Ryan skilling comm slash free dash ebook, you can download a PDF of the book as well.
Tim Kubiak :Oh, that's a very generous offer. So, yeah, that's great. Um, you talk about uncertain times, there's increased stress and anxiety, you know, give a few ideas you can share that people can use to lessen the impact on their daily lives.
Ryan Stanley :Yeah. So it's, it's, it's a great question, especially in the year 2020. And sometimes when I say things like this, I feel like it's it can come across as aloof or uncaring as to the challenges that other people are going through. And I just want to say out loud, that it's, that's not the case at all, I've had my share of traumas and stress and this aspects of anxiety. But in any case, if you as a as a tip, or if it's a quick tip, or not, Tim, but you know, if anyone out there is at a point where they're feeling stressed, or feeling anxiety, one thing that a couple different things to do. First of all, stop judging yourself is probably a great place to start. Remove the word should, from your from your vocabulary and replace it with could, when you're referring to how you are living your life, I should lose more weight, I should be more successful by now, I should be in a better relationship. All that stuff puts you in a label is not being good enough. And when you start to say I could lose weight, that gives you an opportunity that that takes off the label and gives and presents opportunity. When you say I could be further along in my career. Great. So what does that mean? What What am I what's my responsibility in that then? I could be in a better relationship. Well, that insinuates that you're not either in a relationship or you're not in a good relationship. So that gives you an opportunity to say, Okay, what would I like to be different? So, this is not mine, that I stole this from someone who couldn't even tell you, I'd love to give him credit. But you know, stop shooting on yourself.
Tim Kubiak :That's great. I've never heard that one. Yeah.
Ryan Stanley :So stop shooting yourself. And then along with that, and the same thing goes for others stop judging others, when you when you really start recognizing and we touched on earlier, everybody is literally exactly who they are. This is one time I think it's okay to use the word should. Everybody is exactly what they should be. For every single second left, I've lived up until this moment. And had I've been like, if I'm judging somebody is being rude or dressing weird, or just a behavior that I don't align with. Had I been born at the exact day to their parents who lived every single second of their life up until this moment, I would be behaving that exact same way. So for me to judge them as being good or bad, or better or worse, doesn't make any sense because I'm comparing them to my life. And so when we stop comparing people and stop saying they should have done that doesn't mean there's not ramifications for behavior, right? I'm not excusing poor behavior that harms other people. I am saying there's an opportunity to level to under to choose empathy and understanding over judgment, when we start getting more curious as to why someone might have behaved a certain way instead of judging them right off the bat and putting them in a box. But we're like, why wonder why that person behaves that way. Wonder what their life must be like, doesn't mean you have to love it or want to spend a lot of time with them if they're if they're behaving the way that really doesn't align with you. But some level of understanding and empathy will make you feel more relaxed and then stop being so angry that the world is happening to you, right, this person behaved this way that happened. To me, and then so the last part to that then shifts into the kind of answer your initial question. Start looking at life as if it's happening for you and not to you. This changed my entire life, once you recognize, and then sometimes it feels like that a global pandemic happened for me. And I'm here to tell you that Yes, it did. And if you decide that's the case, in your particular life and your experience that this happened for you, and you wake up every single day that everything is happening for you, it's your responsibility to do something with it, you then get the choice what now that I know this is happening for me, why would it have happened for me? Cool. That's the question I'm ready to answer today, or I want to be answering or constructed look to answer be more curious as to why life is happening for you. And what what what you can do with it.
Tim Kubiak :being present, you talk about life happening, being present seems to be a struggle, right? We live in a distracted society, there was a ton of research coming out even pre pandemic about, you know, people not being focused the impact of social media, everything out there in the world. What advice do you have to help people stay present? You know, in trying times and good times? in general?
Ryan Stanley :Yeah. And so it's a great question, because it's really important. And the cool part is, I'll get into a tip in a minute. But I will also point out to others that once you start to develop the habit of presence, it is an amazing habit to cultivate into enjoy, because it starts to happen on its own. And you start the benefit of being present is that you're not worried about the future. You're not worried about the past, or what I might have said, or someone else might have said, or some voice or what someone somewhere else thinks you're here now. And then really, the truth is that now is all there is I mean, in the grand scheme of things, the past are just memories of previous nouns, which by the way side, you know, to your point, they've done studies, and typically people don't remember the past as it actually happened. They remember now through more fitting for phones and videos that they have than ever before, pictures that they had ever before. But truly, there's really is only now So who do you want to be now? The future is future now's right that we're hoping to create or worried about creating. But if you're all that stuff at the end, which, oddly enough, I earlier, earlier, I mentioned, like, hey, decide what you want your future to look like and who you want to be in the future now. And I'm also now saying Don't worry about it. So there's a difference between worry and creativity, right. So it's not about worrying that I am or am not going to be at this one space as much as deciding now who I want to be what I want my house to look like. And ideally, if it could happen in an incident would. But so tips, right? from a very basic standpoint, if you're interested in being here now, first thing is just I would say recognize. So first of all, recognize that there is only now and ask yourself what that means to you. But secondly, utilize your five senses. It's a quick go to like right now, instead of me thinking about whether this client is going to sign up next week, I can say, What am I smelling? What am I hearing? What What am I what is going on all around me? Can I feel air against my face, like these tiny little things that we take the time to do you are whether you may whether you know it or not, you are being present because you're not focused anywhere else except for right here right now. concepts of gravity of sunlight of oxygen that are here, literally, so that you can exist and create your life are all are all here for you every day, every day is a gift. So what are you doing with it? Now is a gift. And when you start to recognize that as well. And you choose this more often, that's why I said when this becomes a habit, you really start to enjoy the now more often. And where moments of stress might have happened in the past. By the way, it's not that I never get stressed or never get anxiety or never get frustrated. Like I said, I've got a six year old, nine year old. So I definitely have been there many times. With love I say that, of course. But I stay there for a lot shorter amount of time, right? I recognize this. Hi, I want to be feeling now. Am I being here now? Am I worried about what effect? You know, we've been married for 13 years, I might have a disagreement with my wife. And you know, in the past, I might have been been angry for hours, right over after a disagreement. Whereas now I'm, I'm unhappy for about 10 minutes. And then sometimes less. And I say is this who I want to be right now? You know the difference between being right and being happy. So if we choose joy and happiness in the moment, and this doesn't mean be so passive that people can walk all over you or treat you poorly. But it does mean how long do I want to sit here and think about how this person treated me poorly? How long do I want to sit here and think about why I should be right and they should be wrong? How long do I want to think about the pandemic or the stresses I can when I can instead think about who I want to be in this moment and focus on creating joy and creating a life that serves me and the future.
Tim Kubiak :Is that a way to manage pressure and stress? I just learned to work through it faster. It becomes less consuming. Is that really the output of that?
Ryan Stanley :I would agree. And it's not even worth so yes. I like what you said there. We'll work through it fast because that's what I just said. But if you get caught up in working through it faster that almost can add it's like oh my gosh, I'm not working through this fast enough, right? That is, then you're suddenly adding additional pressure or stress, as opposed to really just, gratitude is a huge key in reducing stress and anxiety, in the sense that if you are literally and this is, it's one thing to say I said, Thank you. But if you're literally creating gratitude, in any given moment, it is the opposite of stress. And so if you're literally creating gratitude, and you're generally in a feeling of receiving, you have an emotion of receiving, it is impossible, like stress comes from lack the feeling of lack, I don't have enough, I'm not in the right space, this happened. There's just not enough love, whatever stress comes from lack. And so when we're in a feeling of gratitude, it is the opposite of lack. And so when you generally start to realize that there's, at any given moment, always something to be grateful for, I think another so you can create gratitude intentionally in any given moment. And that, again, also takes practice. But the more you do it, the more time you spend in it, the more you start to realize what a gift life is. The other thing is love, like in the sense that it could be for pet, it could be for a child, it could be for a friend, I mean, you know, there's so many different types of love out there. But if you're feeling stressed, and all of a sudden, you know, there's somebody or something or some experience in my life that I have unconditional love for. And when I think about it, and other times when I'm not stressed out, I generally feel better about who I am in my life, or I feel, I feel good in that moment, my body is great creating chemicals that make my body my brain feel good. And so love gratitude, if you make time to think about somebody else who you love unconditionally. In those moments, just for the sake of that, and only creating that two things happen. One, you will shift your energy right physically, but be you start to develop that habit of creating love and creating gratitude. And then your body starts to like those those chemicals, and wants to do that more often as well. The challenge is, like you said, those those studies that were coming out even before the pandemic, is that we physically create habits of stress and preparing for anxiety and preparing for the worst case scenario, which releases a whole different set of chemicals in our body. And our body physically gets used to making those and wants to do it more often. So when you initially start changing and wanting to change from anxiety to presence into joy, it's not an easy shift. And your body's like, No, no, no, no, no, don't forget about this, don't forget your taxes are laid, don't forget, you know what so and so said, Don't forget these other things. So it does take practice and intention. But once you kind of get in the zone and make it part of who you are, from my experience, it's definitely a more enjoyable way to experience life
Tim Kubiak :is happiness and maintaining responsibilities, really a realistic goal in modern society? Hundred percent. How so?
Ryan Stanley :I just I was I was answering this short on purpose. Like let me just just to kind of prove a point. I'm happy and proud to say and humbly though but I mean, that is how I live my life, I would say that I'm happy. A lot of the time. I wake up every single day with clear intention of how I have a morning routine. Every day I start off my morning, I wake up between 530 and six, I come down here to my office and I meditate for anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour plus. So I'm so I'm starting my day off mentally in a place of presence and spiritual awareness. Right. So that's first part of taking care of, then I go and I exercise for 25 minutes. So now I'm getting in movement. And I'm physically making my body getting what it needs movement and blood flow and working on trust me, you can see me I know they're only listening. But I'm not like super muscular guy. This is not crazy, intense workout. This is just something to keep my body moving right healthy. I then after I'm done with that I come in I do my statement of desire, what I call my IMS right. So I spend time every morning thinking about who I want to be, again, physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally, I'm setting my day up. So now I've worked on my spiritual ism. With my own meditation process. I've worked on my body with my physical activity. I'm now setting up my day intellectually and emotionally and spiritually for who I want to be as a human being, as a boss, as a father as an entrepreneur. And then I do some stretching, and then I do some journaling. And I write down exactly what my day is going to look like. But I have scheduled what don't have scheduled, I write down three things I'm grateful for. I write down my goals for the day. And my goals are not tasks. And so it's not, you know, email this guy, send this back, whatever it's be present with whomever I'm with. It's be joyfully productive. It's no different things who do who do I want to be? And by reminding myself to answer your question, like these are things that what I know if practiced, and at least planted seeds for intention, they will bring me happiness. And so is it realistic in today's society? 100% does it take intention and effort? Absolutely, as well, because if it was that easy, everybody would do it all the time. But they don't, right. Most people do. People who are joyful, they typically seek it. And so it's like anything else that is worth doing and takes takes practice and time but yeah Definitely worth, it's actually a possibility.
Tim Kubiak :You think people in modern society mystifying what happiness actually is?
Ryan Stanley :Do I think they mystify it,
Tim Kubiak :Miss define, so that they have a definition that, frankly, isn't truly what happiness is. It's what they've been sold, whether it's by consumer culture picking on Americans were Americans, right? Or whatever it is that it's not truly what happiness looks like for people.
Ryan Stanley :Sure. I think, again, going back to the fact especially in America, but you know, there's millions of us billions of us, whatever, everybody's experience going to be different. So some people absolutely, I think there is clearly a presented culture, from ad agencies. And that's their job. And there's nothing wrong with them doing it, but of saying, you'll be happy when you get this. That's why we want you to buy this. I think there's also but but unfortunately, the challenge is, is that people see things on social media, and they think I'm going to be happy when I have this or they're constantly comparing themselves to others. Right? So there's a great quote by Teddy Roosevelt, the comparison is the thief of joy. And so when we're constantly seeing what we could have, or what other people have, or whatever, and by the way, we're not seeing their stressful days, we're not seeing their anxieties, we're not seeing they're overwhelmed, we're not seeing their loneliness, we're only seeing what they decide to put on Instagram. So there is this concept of I think people feel like I'll be happy when I get this, I'll be happy when I do that. I'll be happy when I accomplish that. And so in Miss defining that I think, as an individual people will miss define them that that their own journeys, I'll be happy when. And they believe that to be true. But the truth of the matter is, if you ask any of those people and you say, well, well, what will what will happen when you get that, they say, well, I'll be happy when your goal is really happiness, your goal isn't that your goal, whatever that is the car, the house, the relationship, health, whatever it is, your goal is happiness in general. And if you change your your mindset to make that your goal every day, and to be excited about bringing happiness into your life, then that is what you'll start to pursue. And you'll start to be listening for that. And then once you get that, then all of a sudden opportunities to get that car to get that house to get that relationship tend to unfold from my experience as well. Happiness is being present, it is being joyful, and again, really realizing that I know I kind of set it I hate to sound like this whoo guy, but really now is all there is. And if any moment we can choose to be happy. And we choose that as often as possible. It starts to have a ripple effect not only in our life, but in the people that we surround ourselves with.
Tim Kubiak :So you've transformed people's lives through coaching, how many have you seen made significant changes in their life's work because of coaching? Does that happen all the time?
Ryan Stanley :Because people come to a coach with so much baggage and so much stress, and again exactly who they should be right. I worked with a client recently and she said, She's 25 years old, and she just bought her first house and she was outside. And she was trimming some tree. I think she had a Rhododendron or something slick Ryan, I never there's apparently there's this thing called pruning. And I had never done pruning before. And I was like, I was like, tell me more. And she's like, yeah, I went out there. And I was like, kind of, you know, the plant was alive. But it had all these extra dead branches that it needed at one point, but it doesn't need any more. So I was clipping them, so that it could continue to grow and really be a more beautiful plant what it was supposed to be. And she said, and as I was doing this, I thought about that this is what I do with Ryan, like, this is my homework, right? Because we are we have stuff that served us or at least made us who we are up until this moment. But it doesn't mean that it's necessarily serving us anymore. In fact, the opposite it's it's kind of bringing this down and it's heavy, and it's needs to be removed. And so by coming to a coach and then having them ask questions, which you would be afraid to ask yourself would even think to ask yourself, and help you look at life from a completely different perspective, gives you the opportunity to start seeing what your life can truly be like. It's another and another client instead it was really about shining a light on their true self wasn't that the true self didn't exist. It's just that it was kind of hidden and buried in darkness of experience and different fears and blocks and maybe a past identity that they believe they had to be. And so when we start to shine a light on it, it's not that something you're necessarily becoming a new person. It's just that your your true self is really is coming out from underneath.
Tim Kubiak :Do you find in your coaching work that you help people manage their self talk?
Ryan Stanley :Absolutely. It's one of the things that we work on day one. In fact, a majority that started my career, as I mentioned, was working with musicians and they would always come to me like when they first started wanting to work together with I want to get more gigs. I want to get a I want to get an album made I want to build my social media following or whatever it is, and all these very kind of left brained task oriented things. I'd say great, that's cool. We're gonna get you there. What do you think is stopping you? Well, you know, I suck at this. And you know, my mom says this and that, like all these different reasons. So now all of a sudden, okay, cool. Now we know what you want to be. But really now we're going to focus on what your internal dialogue is, what are you saying yourself every day, I have my clients build their own Northstar document. And I suggest they read it every day. And I work with them on that because it helps them get clarity on who they truly want to be. And once you start stepping into that, you realize that this is the path that I have the opportunity to take. And you're working with a coach at the same time, who's reminding you of that on a regular basis. It's kind of a no brainer. Makes sense. Okay, I could have what I want and be who I want, even if it's gonna take me a little longer, I could sit here and tell myself what I don't like about my life and focus on that, and keep getting what I've been getting. So yeah, self talk is kind of the most important thing there is. Real quick, you know, our thoughts are things right, the most important things that actually we create, because they create everything else in our life.
Tim Kubiak :It's interesting that musicians, artists, because you know, you've probably seen it with business people, I know, I see it with sales leaders and entrepreneurs all the time, they get so mired in so many things that aren't really the core of what they do, which is in the case of musician, right, creating great songs, arrangements, production, execution of that music, it's everything else around it, that becomes such a distraction.
Ryan Stanley :Yeah. And really, when you recognize and so here's the other thing to that, which is great specifically talking about musicians, But to your point, whatever you decide your gift is, and if your gift is to be a sales professional, if your gift is to be an entrepreneur, if your gift is to be a musician, like you know that for a reason, we all know, sometimes there's humility. Sometimes there's there's different ways of being as a human being. But I think in the grand scheme of things, we know what we're good at, we know what we like to do. We know when we're in the zone, we know what aligns with our personality. And so in the example of musicians, I've had, this comes even just recently with a client of mine, like you know, who you are, when you are creating music, you know why you do it. And so this is your unique gift from God from the universe from life. And it aligns with who you are, and it's being created by you. And when you start to get fearful of what other people might think of that gift, or think of how you're performing or how you're presenting as in any capacity of your life. And it keeps you from really letting your soul sing that gift. And whether that's musician or not, I'm not I think what we put out there is our soul singing in some capacity is our unique song. And when you are denying that gift, you're really doing the gift, a disservice by being afraid of what someone else somewhere else thinks you're doing the gift of disservice, you're giving your ability to present that gift a disservice. And it's in the grand scheme of things you're kind of telling life and God that you don't want the gift that you've been given. And to me, that's again, emotional, just saying it, knowing that every single day and moment is a gift to say, Listen, I'm not going to make the time to share it with the world because the part of the world might not like it is an insult, right? is an insult to life itself. So yeah, I mean, it's a big and it's something we all do. By the way, I don't want to come across as as high and mighty, oh, you're insulting. How dare you. We all do it. It's human nature, it's feared. It's this fear of stepping out of the cave. Because the saber toothed Tigers out there, it goes back from you know, thousands of years. And so when we're afraid of that, it's okay that we are, I'm just here to tell you that it doesn't serve you. And fear is a liar. And fear really shows up more often just to keep us from from being great. And when you start stepping out of fear and into greatness with intention and purpose. Yes, that's how you change the world.
Tim Kubiak :That's really beautiful. Because, you know, most people just let their fear I find, but their fear, just continue to chew at them and don't really have the courage or aren't confident enough for themselves to step out and take those chances, big time.
Ryan Stanley :And there's a quote somewhere. Maybe you've heard it says something along the lines of you know, courage is not not having fear. Courage is stepping into fear. Right? So everybody has fears. And that's okay. and myself included. But what I do is I asked myself is how is this? How is this thought serving me right now? Or is this a fear right? If I recognize something is a fear I can say how is this thought serving me? How is it serving my purpose? How is it serving my job whatever it is that I'm you know, this thought is around? and nine times out of 10 especially if you're recognizing in a fearful space, the answer is not and it's not serving me. So then a great so that's doesn't have to be a bad thing. Oh my gosh, I can't believe it. So it's not served me Why am I having all these bad thoughts? No. So you ask yourself a question. Why is my thought Why is this thought serve me if the answer's no, what might be a thought that is so if your fear is you know I'm not a good musician. I'm people aren't going to like my music. That thought is not serving me. So if I shifted to cool, I wonder how many people are out there that like exactly what I'm doing? Wow, that that opens up a lot of possibilities is a huge world. And as we said earlier, I've got YouTube, I've got Facebook, I've got Instagram, I have so many different ways to reach millions of people for free on my own. So now you've just gone from there's there's a small group somewhere that people don't like me, I don't even know who they are. But I just feel they don't like me, as opposed to I wonder who the people who do because that's who I'm playing to anyway. And so by asking yourself, what is a thought that could serve my purpose? Well, the thought is, there's people out there that like my music, now it's up to me to step into it, make sure to get hurt, and add some responsibility to who you are.
Tim Kubiak :Nice. So if people go to your website, if they're interested in your coaching as well, can they get in touch with you through the website,
Unknown Speaker :Yep, there's a contact page on there. I'd love to hear from anybody.
Tim Kubiak :Great. So other than fish, who are your favorite bands?
Unknown Speaker :Ah, you know, I think the Beatles I mean, you can't go wrong with the Beatles. They were you know, without the Beatles there wouldn't be a fish right? Without the Beatles. It wouldn't be most of what we get to hear and be in love today so that they're way, way up there. And I touched on some of the greats Pink Floyd Led Zeppelin, big fan of Grateful Dead. But I also listen to a lot of jazz and listen, I love Vivaldi. I love classical music I love you know, as long as it's interesting kind of keeps my brain going. For me, I liked it. And that's probably why I align with fishes that I do. Like, you know, I don't dislike, you know, your average pop song. I don't really listen to radio so much as much as I kind of seek out. Things are going to make my brain think a little bit and feel a little bit more. I hate to sound like an elitist least in that standpoint. I'm not belittling anybody else's music, but like me, so you look at like jack Johnson, I love jack jobs. It's great. It's quick, it's easy. So that stuff I appreciate as well. Lately, I've been listening to a lot of a band called my Morning Jacket. And there's another band called TV on the radio, which I've been listening to a lot lately as well. No, there's that's cool. You know, we live in such a time where you don't have to just be stuck with what what the internet what the radio channel is feeding you right, that there's so much great music out there. So I love diversity.
Tim Kubiak :Yeah, it is a beautiful time for diversity in music, and so many other things. So cool. What did I ask you that I should have? What? What's the question that I missed that readers could really benefit from?
Ryan Stanley :I gotta tell you 10 this is a pretty great interview. I think we hit a lot of nails on a lot of heads. Um, I think the one question, I would say, I don't know, I don't know what the question was, if I can leave a message for everybody. For the listeners out there, I would say to quote David brothers who also been listening to a lot lately, by the way, they're, they're a great band as well. They have a song called, I think it's called head full of doubt, something something, it's like a twofer. But anyway, there's a line into that goes, um, decide who to be and go, be it. You know, like everybody out there you have the opportunity to decide and as long as you're patient with yourself. And if you wake up tomorrow morning and decide who you're going to be and you remind yourself every day what you want to do. That is the secret to life. And I would say to include in that a person who is joyful, occlude in that a person who is loving, because those are the things that you're really seeking on the back end. So I may want to be a famous musician, I may want to be a millionaire entrepreneur, I may want to be all these different things. But you know, be the light you want to see in the world at the same time. Because if you do that, if you do that, you'll inspire others to do the same. And then it becomes this this ripple effect where you are having global impact, and you're creating more light by being liked. And I think that's where where we need to go is as a as a world.
Tim Kubiak :That's a great way to end. So folks, you know, we've had Ryan Stanley on today. You can find him at Ryan stanley.com. We've got links in the show notes. We've got links to his book there as well. And I'll put them up for Amazon and Barnes and Noble as well in case you prefer there instead of getting through his website. And thanks so much for the time today.
Ryan Stanley :Yeah, Tim, really My pleasure. Thanks for having me.