Yo yo yo. Welcome back to the Further your Lifestyle podcast conversations on lifestyle passions and hustles. My name's Chris, I'm your host and I'm super excited to be back here having the conversation with you Episode 186 today and we're talking through a topic which is very dear to my heart. I'm very passionate about this. It's probably a thread that's been through so many other conversations over the last probably 6, 7, 8, 12 weeks even but it comes down to the concept of trusting your gut. And again, this has come from a question that I've pulled out and I've got this statement that says well, it's a question more so, what's a piece of advice you ignored or went against that ended up being the right decision for you? And this one's great because there's a lot of the time where we are faced with information or advice from other people and it can be challenging because we think, oh, is this someone giving me great feedback, or is this someone projecting? And how does that play into what you're thinking and making your decisions on what you want to do? And I want to really discuss that. I've got a personal experience on this one, multiple times actually, so I really do want to dive into this. We'll be answering that If you enjoy these episodes, if you enjoy this podcast, or if you're new here for the first time, make sure you do hit subscribe, leave a comment if you enjoy this conversation. But, as we go through, what I do ask is if you do enjoy this and if you feel like it is helping you further your lifestyle, share it, send it to someone else that you think can resonate with this. All right, we're going to roll the intro and we're going to get into it.

The question was what's a piece of advice you've ignored or went against that ended up being the right decision for you, man? There is a lot of this, but I think the main one that I want to explore is taking the chance on me, and I know this is a repeated conversation or topic that I bring here constantly, but at the end of the day, that's what this whole podcast is based off. For me to further my lifestyle, I'm going to have to make a drastic change that's going to enable me to grow and show others that this is possible to do, and I remember when I decided to make the decision to step away from the nine to five, to go, take a chance on myself and start reselling, build a podcast and pursue those dreams. There was people at work that I spoke to. There was a lot of people at work that I spoke to that were amazing and said do it, it is the best thing to do. Like they wish they had that. But then there was these other people which it was almost like because they were so scared to do it themselves. They projected that onto me and I remember some people saying you're crazy, you're nuts, it just doesn't make sense. Or they look at me like, oh wow, good luck with that. Like just no sense of care or empathy. And, look, I get it because it's not for everyone and I would never encourage someone to go step away from everything they know and take a really crazy chance like that. But at the same time, I would support someone if they did it.

But at the end of the day, when people do give you advice or tell you things, you need to. Look, I struggle with this. When people give me feedback, when people give me a point or a comment, I can get defenses pretty much straight away, because I'm probably one that does better in flesh, in person, in conversation like this, because I can read mannerisms, I can read understanding and the way someone is behaving and their structure and all that jazz. But when it comes over a message, is there a context? Where is this coming from? What's your tone, what are you referring to? And it comes off the cuff and it really does come out feeling like I'm getting slapped. So I'm not one to necessarily take on unsolicited advice from anyone. If there's things there which I think, oh, actually, maybe I need to really revisit this. But I digress here. There's been a lot of.

I think my biggest moments in which I've gone against other people's insight or advice is the doubters. There's been a lot of people, especially in the last one and a half years of me changing my business, really focusing on clothing, outsourcing, hiring people, going cost heavy, the amount of people that are saying this is not realistic, you're not even making a huge profit. No, I'm not making a huge profit. There's people here that think that's ridiculous and look it's ridiculous to them because they wouldn't be able to live off that money and, to be honest, no one really can live off such a low wage, like such a low income. But it's circumstantial, it's a timing thing, it's a seasonal thing, it's something which I'm also willing to take the risk for.

And there's this I've spoken about this, I think I spoke about it in one of my vlogs where, imagine if we did listen to the doubters, imagine if we did follow the advice of those that told us that we weren't good enough. Imagine if we followed the input of those that told us that we suck or that this doesn't make sense or it's not realistic or we're a fraud or a fake. Imagine if we followed that advice, how crap our lives would be, because, one, you would go against your gut, you would go against your instincts, you would go against your very core being of you being able to make this happen yourself as an individual, being independent. So one, you would diminish that. And secondly, is you're just feeding these people this idea that their idea exists and that's the reality.

I think a lot of the time, there is this separation between what people are saying from their own projections and they're playing that out because they're telling you no, don't do this, that doesn't make sense, because to them they would never do it. Because it doesn't make sense. So therefore, that's why they explain it to you that way. It's why I always struggle with people that are telling me, oh, you shouldn't do this when they're not even doing it themselves, like they're not even operating in the same ecosystem, in the same space or they're not even playing in the same concept, kind of thing, right? You wouldn't have necessarily someone that's never played drums come tell you how to play the drums. So you need to do this to be a better drummer. Okay, thanks for the feedback, but sorry, have you taught drums before? With the feedback, but sorry, have you taught drums before?

And there's a level of it where some people are just providing some feedback oh, maybe you did too many fills or maybe you were a bit too loud. That's a different kind of feedback, right? People are telling us like, oh, you should, I don't like the way you play, like, again, that's opinion, right, but everyone not everyone's going to be on the same level of understanding. We're all in different parts of our lives, we're all running our own different races, and that's why opinion's fine, opinion's great, because we're all entitled to it. But I don't think we're entitled to push our opinions onto other people and then, when other people, when you don't agree with it, or when other people don't agree with it, that you push it harder. That's a dictatorship, right? That's pushing other people into a space which is of your own doing, not of their own.

So there is a fine line there where we need to be mindful of advice that comes from other people. And I'm very frank with when people do ask me things and I'll say, hey, look, it's a funny thing. It's because, like, we're very easy to say, oh, look, go do this, but something goes wrong. It might not work right. We do put caveats around it, but at the end of the day, if you're making a decision to do something, you need to stand behind it 100%. You need to back yourself. Don't do something on the basis of someone else telling you something, because maybe you look up to them right. You need to tangibly understand okay, is this advice warranted? Is this advice good feedback? Is this advice actually going to get me where I want to be? And if it's not, it's okay to say no, it's okay to push it aside.

But we can't become arrogant, we can't become stubborn and we can't become naive of also becoming self-aware, of knowing we need to become a better version of ourselves. Becoming a better version of ourselves does require going through some messy and gnarly things, right. Sometimes it is dealing with issues that we have with other people. It might be our self-worth. It might be how we value ourselves. It might be imposter syndrome, it could be dealing with tall poppy syndrome, all these different things.

And I know this because I still struggle with it, especially with imposter syndrome, thinking I'm not good enough to get these results because I've been told I can't, or not thinking I can make it happen. But when you change the narrative of understanding why can't I make it happen, just because I haven't made it happen today doesn't mean it's not possible. And that's the beauty of the world we live in we can do and achieve what we want to achieve. Of course, we have to be willing to do the work. Just because someone else isn't willing to do it and they think it's not possible because they would never be able to do it, doesn't mean it's not possible for you. So you need to break those chains. You need to break those perspectives and mindsets and do not let other people have those influenced upon you. I also understand that this is easier said than done.

None of this is going to be simple. None of this is going to be a cup of tea or a walk in the park. Dealing with advice is going to come from mentors, it's going to come from family, it's going to come from friends and it's going to come from randoms on the internet. But my advice would be to surround yourself with people that are rooting for you, that have the same energy for you and understand what it is you're trying to achieve, and I think then you'd have less opportunity to then go against it because, unfortunately, the people that love you, they want you to be happy, so sometimes they're not going to give you the best advice possible. Therefore, it's okay to go against it, but at the same time, hopefully, the ones that love you, on the contrary, are the ones that are going to tell it to you raw, bring it up to you and say hey, look, this is the reality of it and you can really have a deep and meaningful understanding of it. So it works both ways.

There's been other moments of advice where, with my running, both ways there's been other moments of advice where, with my running, I've had people say you're too big to run. It's usually been negative stuff, unfortunately. I'm trying to think of a piece of advice that has come through which is probably actually really good advice. Maybe they've encouraged me that I could take a role, or I'd be really good at doing it and I didn't do it and look, we don't know what we don't know. So, like, just because you didn't do something, you didn't follow it, and it was the right decision because you're happier now. We don't know how happier we could have been following a different decision, but I think there's been times where I've decided to call off a deal, trying to purchase a house before, and just there was too many things just not going in the flow and I said no, and just there was too many things just not going in the flow and I said no, let's not do it, let's not make it happen. And it's been the right decision, it's been a godsend right. It's been a missed a bullet there, dodged a bullet.

I think there's been other moments where choosing to separate or sorry, not separate, yeah, distance yourself from other people as well. That's been sometimes some very hard decisions, but in the end it's been some right decisions because, at the end of the day, who you surround yourself with is who. That's what your influence is going to become of. You'll become a mixture of those people that you are surrounding yourself with. So, picking who is the right people to hang around and not following necessarily the cliche of oh yeah, you should hang out with these people because they're the best of the best, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's the best for you. So you know, there's a lot there to discuss, there's a lot of deepness, and I think the more we were to probe into this, we could probably get into some really interesting things.

I'm actually continuing to think through if there's any other major moments where I haven't been able to take any advice and through if there's any other major moments where I haven't been able to take any advice and if I actually think back in some of my other episodes. I don't think there's been any. Let me just check. I'm just going to quickly scroll through and see if there's been any moments that I've spoken through. Okay, I'm back. I don't think there's anything that's coming to mind, but I think there is a whole bunch of other things which you know. Maybe it's probably going to be the to you as an audience, as an individual, because it's probably going to be something which we've all experienced, and that is the challenge of peer pressure, the challenge of validation, the challenge of cultural narratives and challenge of decision fatigue as well, and I've spoken about that before, but I think peer pressure I touched on this already is when we are making decisions understand, are we being pressured into this and therefore we don't have to just make a decision because they're friends, family or whatever. So really making sure we understand that.

The other one is in cultural narratives, and this one this is a tough pill to swallow because a lot of the time, our upbringings, whether it's through religion, whether it's through culture, whether it's through just styles of upbringing, we can have our focus set on these, whether it's stigmas or ways of going about growing up. Therefore, we base our decisions on that, and sometimes we might have to step away from that. And I'm not saying to go against what you believe, but I am telling you to make sure that we do look at things holistically, that we do look at things from a logical, broader standpoint. Just because someone sends something to you and says, oh, I read it and this is truth, understanding where's this information coming from, what's the narrative from it? What's the context, is it legit information? Has it been checked? How does it sit with you? Does it make sense? All those different things.

The other one, then, to think about is validation. I don't think we need to seek validation when making decisions. If you make a decision and it feels right, stick with it. Own it. Own your decision making. If you own your decision, then you can be happy with it. Don't go make a decision and then try and justify it to other people to get their validation from it because you're not really owning your decision. Put your skin in the game, run with it and see what happens. Right, own your decisions rather than seek validations for your decisions.

And I think the other one is like decision fatigue and just actually taking the courage to decide, and this is an encouragement to you. It's okay to take risks, it's okay to make choices based on your own beliefs and it's okay to even face the opposition. But what you can't do is tell other people, because you don't like the way they're doing it, because it doesn't fit your method or approach, that it's wrong. That's not true, because the way you're doing it might be the complete opposite to them. Therefore, is your way wrong and I'm starting to learn this is and I've got a lot of backlash from this is because I'm doing things my way which are different, which aren't usually traditional, which aren't really safe or secure, and it probably isn't the best advice for other people. I get challenged on it, but I'm not building my business or my lifestyle for other people, right, I'm building it for me.

And everything that I do, I have to be willing to live with the consequences. That's why we take risks. You take a risk, there's a consequence. You have to be willing to take that consequence. It could be a really good, positive outcome consequence, or it could be really bad as well, and that's on me, it's got nothing to do with you. Of course, there's going to be people that will say I told you, but at the end of the day, there's people that are going to be like that, regardless of wherever you're from, whatever you're doing or whatever industry you're in.

The other thing that I will just say is when it comes to getting advice from other people and not following it, I think then there's this being careful around questioning authority. The last five years, obviously that's been a big conversation because of the pandemic and, depending where you lived in the world, a lot of things changed what we were and were not allowed to do and how that was challenged from a norms perspective and is this right, is this violating me? And things like that. I think there comes a level of making sure you're being sensible and mature about the things that you do decide to ignore. There are rules for a reason and there's boundaries for a reason, and people make decisions that fall into our own realms of operating as an individual whether it's a society rule or council rules or government rules or what you can and cannot do and I'm not saying that we shouldn't be following those rules at all, but what I'm trying to say is making sure, when you look at those things that do come through, that get passed down, that are out of our control, understand them from a methodical and broader and holistic view of the people that are making decisions that you know impact our lives. They're not doing it personally for us. They're doing it for the greater good of a majority of people, and sometimes we can get so stuck up in that the world revolves around ourselves that we forget that there are other people and there is not a majority meaning they're better than us, but there is a lot of people out there that all need to have, hopefully, the best outcome for everyone, even though not everyone's going to be happy by it. I just wanted to bring that one up, because obviously, me talking about this can bring up some conflicting and different narratives from that.

Let's just recap I think that the key thing that I want to really remind people here is like it's okay to make your own decisions and to not follow blindly what other people are saying, but at the same time, we do need to do our research. We do need to understand why we're making these decisions. Why are we going against, maybe, advice that other people give us? Is it feedback? Is it conflict, constructive criticism, or is it information which just isn't valid or there's no right for it? The other thing we need to also make sure is we're not being peer pressured. What is the cultural narrative that's coming into this? But also, are we doing things to seek validation or are we doing things because we want to own it? So there's a lot to dive into that.

Now I'd love to hear from you what's a piece of advice that you've ignored or went against some time through your life and it ended up being the best decision you've made? I would love to hear that. How has that gone for you? For me, this has been the best decision for me to step away from the nine to five, to build my business, to continue to build it, and now I can just start to see things happening. It's still got a long journey to go, but I wouldn't change it for the world and that's because I've self-trusted myself, I've backed myself and I've been willing to go do the work.

If you're willing to do that and you're willing to put in the work, the effort and, you know, push back against the doubters, then that's okay. But also, we can't sail a sinking ship into a port right, because it'll get there and it'll drown. So you do need to have a level of self-awareness to understanding advice and making the right decisions. It's a lot Appreciate being here. Drop a comment down below, give me some feedback. Happy to continue the conversation and, yeah, if you enjoyed this episode, please share it with someone who really enjoyed having the conversation. I'm learning a lot about these and it makes me think about other things. I need to probably go think about myself, but appreciate you and you have a wonderful day, cheers.