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Drew Taddia Joins Us On The Steve Jobs Inspired Join Up Dots Podcast
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Introducing Drew Taddia
Drew Taddia is our guest today on the Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots free podcast interview.
He is a man who has an amazing story that has led to where he is today as part ninja, part monk, and part of this world.
Yes, that is a start that we have never done on Join Up Dots, but after you listen to the guest talk then you realise that it’s about spot on.
Going back in time, our guests story started as he travelled the world as a professional athlete coming from Canada, through the US, and overseas into Australia and Germany as he followed his dreams and passion of baseball.
In fact he spent most of his life as an athlete, and as he got older, he discovered a passion that wasn’t expected at the beginning of his sporting life
But throughout an arduous season swinging the bat, he found he was able to stay healthy and injury free through a long season no matter what city, or continent or how far he travelled.
How The Dots Joined Up For Drew
And this was the first dawning realisation of where he wanted to go in his life
The experiments he performed on himself through both nutrition and fitness started to form his fledgling business, and what he found was fascinating,
He discovered that the majority of what causes us issues in our health all stem from our stress levels.
He discovered that if we’re able to reduce the stress in our lives through what we put in and on our body, and by reducing the stress in our environment, we can live healthy, vibrant lives.
So how did he discover this, and although part monk is he able to to now remain stress free in his life when someone cuts him up on the freeway?
And what is the number one thing that we can do to induce this state of stress free relaxation around in our lives?
Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr Drew Taddia
Show Highlights
During the show we discussed such weighty topics with Drew Taddia such as:
How to work out the normal in the life, so you can assess what stress levels you may be unknowingly carrying around with you.
Why Drew feels that its has become so so difficult to change direction in our lives, when everybody else wants us to go the same way as them.
Drew shares his perfect routine for starting his day the day, which he believes sets him up for achieving daily goals better than anything
and lastly….
The million dollar idea that could quite simply change the worlds comfort levels, and see Drew and David creating a tropical island empire.
Drew Taddia Books
How To Connect With Drew Taddia
Return To The Top Of Drew Taddia
If you enjoyed this episode with Drew why not listen to some of our favourite podcast episodes such as Adele Mclay, Adriana Gavazzoni, Sarah Caltieri or the amazing Mandy Barbee
Or if you prefer just pop over to our podcast archive for thousands of amazing episodes to choose from.
Full Transcription Of Drew Taddia Interview
Intro [0:09]
When we’re young, we have an amazing positive outlook about how great life is going to be. But somewhere along the line we forget to dream and end up settling. Join Up Dots features amazing people who refuse to give up and chose to go after their dreams. This is your blueprint for greatness. So here’s your host live from the back of his garden in the UK. David Ralph.
David Ralph [0:34]
Yes, hello there. Good morning. Yeah. Good morning. Well, it’s David Ralph. It’s Join Up Dots. I’m getting a bit excited actually, because it’s the 19th of January, as we’re recording this, and it’s the first day that I realised it’s not as dark at this time as it was the day before. Well, on our way to summer people, it’s the time to strip off look good, look sexy, have ice creams, and just enjoy yourself and then winter is one of those kind of periods that you do. Like close your turtle head down and you put loads of rubbish into your body and try to keep warm. And today’s guest is somebody who’s gonna sort of teaches exactly how to do the right things and not be the turtle. But be somebody who is free and gamble around feels like a lamb in spring. So who is he who is asking? He is a man who has an amazing story that has led to where he is today as part ninja part monk, and part of this world Yeah, that is a stat that we’ve never had before on Join Up Dots. But after you listen to the guest talk, then you realise that it’s about spot on. Now going back in time our guest story started as he travelled the world as a professional athlete, coming from Canada through the US and overseas into Australia and Germany as he followed these dreams and passion of baseball. In fact, he spent most of his life as an athlete and as he got older, he discovered a passion that wasn’t expected at the beginning of his sporting life. But throughout an arduous season swinging the bat he found he was able to stay healthy and injury free through a long season, no matter what city or continent. Or how far he travelled. And this was the first dawning realisation of where he wanted to go in his life. The experiments he performed on himself through both nutrition and fitness started to form his fledgling business. And what he found was fascinating. He discovered that the majority of what causes us issues in our health, all stem from a stress levels, he discovered that we’re able to reduce the stress in our lives through what we put in and out of our body. And by reducing the stress in our environment, we can live healthy, vibrant lives, yes, like the lamb. So how did he discover this? And although part monk, is he able to now remain stress free in his life, when someone cuts him up on the freeway and what is the number one thing that we can do to induce a state of stress and become free and relaxed all day in our lives? Well, let’s find out as we bring them to the show, to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr. Drew Taddia? Good morning, Drew, how are you? Are you stress free? Are you relaxed or do I need to come and sort of smack To around a bit to get you going.
Drew Taddia [3:02]
I wouldn’t mind a light massage.
David Ralph [3:05]
I can’t do that. I can’t do that that would lead into toiletries. But I’m not I’m not willing to go as a heterosexual male, but I’m willing to come around and slap you around a bit.
Drew Taddia [3:14]
It’s kind of the, it’s kind of going the opposite of stream of of massage to like slap around Oh.
David Ralph [3:21]
Anyway, once we get to a certain age drew any way that we can get a bit of physical contact, you’ve just got to accept it. You just gotta go with it, sir. Don’t push it back, because you might like it.
Drew Taddia [3:32]
You might like it. David, thank you so much for having me here. It’s an absolute pleasure. I love your energy. I can’t wait to get into the show here with you.
David Ralph [3:41]
is great to have you on because you aren’t one of these guys, actually. But you connected with me to come on the show. And I’ll be honest, sometimes people connect and I sort of like scan up and down their pitch. And you think really, really, you know, but but with you. It’s one of those things that you think like I could do about five episodes here. You’ve got such an eclectic Take background, but of course, but dots join up seamlessly through it. Do you look even though you are still a young man and think to yourself, I’ve packed quite a lot in my life.
Drew Taddia [4:11]
Well, you know, it’s it’s funny that you mentioned that only when I look at these interviews, I suppose or when someone asks me to describe how my travels and how my experiences have been through day to day, I mean, you’re in the trenches. I’m always looking forward I’m trying to get better and improve and experience new things. And I really look back until I get an opportunity like this and I’m like, and I think to myself, wow, you know that that’s a quite a journey that I’ve been on here.
David Ralph [4:38]
And you say you’re in the trenches. Now you are part monk. And part as we say, Ninja, so do you feel like you’re sort of you go to battle or do you just like a mighty twig on the stream of life? Well, through Sydney, mostly.
Drew Taddia [4:54]
It’s a little both. It’s I think it’s a little both. I feel like I’m able to appreciate the failures. As well as the successes, understand that there’s always going to be ups and downs, I can appreciate that. And I’m always looking to move forward I say I’m in the trenches because you know you and I know you know, it’s not easy running a business is not easy doing the things that we do waking up and being excited and performing each and every day and I think to be successful, that’s what you need. So I welcome it with open arms.
David Ralph [5:23]
Well, going into the baseball analogy, and I’ll be honest with you other than watching that Tom Hanks film and and probably every single Kevin Costner film, that’s about as close as I’ve come to baseball, but it’s the swinging the bat, isn’t it? It’s the swinging the bat finding the sweet spot that makes such a difference in your life from business to you know, hobbies to professional lovemaking. Can you do professional lovemaking? I don’t know. But you’ve got to be in that sweet spot to make it happen. So why do we sort of stressed Why do we think that if we put the hustle in and really work at it is going to be better because quite obviously, it’s not as
Drew Taddia [6:01]
Yeah, you know, no, it’s not, you know, it’s it’s our mindset. It’s our mind frame of how we go about life. And I mean, at least here in North America, we have that quick fix kind of attitude of instant results, and we need glory today, or we’re never gonna reach it. So that pressure that we put on ourselves, maybe it’s society, maybe it’s some of ourselves, and then that instant reaction or that instant from text messages to, you know, we want to answer from emails now, we don’t send letters in the mail, we have drive throughs, instant coffee, microwaves. It’s all a giant circle of how you say we can’t join up the dots. And I mean, that just puts more stress, stress and pressure on us.
David Ralph [6:42]
Do you long for the time because I quite long at a time when I can just live in a cave. I’d want I’d want a cave with Wi Fi. That’s the only things that I can sort of like, connect when I want to I don’t want to be totally disconnected. But I do see my kids and my son’s a classic example. He’s in his room. small bedroom is a 40 inch TV screen that is about three inches away from his laptop. He’s got his phone, and he has to operate with all these things at the same time. And I say why don’t you just do one thing, just just play your Xbox or play via, oh, I need all of it. I’m listening to this. And I’m doing that. And I think he’s 14. So he’s already kind of getting addicted to that, that connectivity over time. How do we break free from that drew Because ultimately, that must bring up the stress level Surely,
Drew Taddia [7:32]
absolutely increases our stress levels. First of all, I want to address your cave. Now your cave example there. I often think about moving to an island, isolated away from all of this. All of it is just too much. There’s too much stimulus. There’s too much text messaging emails and information. We live in a world event information which is mostly false or fabricated and you know, it’s firing at all cylinders and And that has so much to do with stressing us out to the point or I decided to stop using a cell phone, which is which I, which I quickly found out only helped me from being less productive and more stressed out.
David Ralph [8:14]
I love that. So you have not got a cell phone in your life.
Drew Taddia [8:18]
Yeah, turn my cell phone off. It was just it drove me nuts. And to be honest with you, I run a business, I run multiple businesses. And that phone was always on my mind. So it would I’d be sitting there working on a project and it would ding so would stop my project. I checked the phone, then I’d have to answer that and go back to my project. And then I realised I would check the phone and interrupt myself when there was no without a notification. There was nothing I was just looking at it to look at it, which broke my concentration. Then I would be out with friends and family. And I’d be checking my phone because I couldn’t miss a business call. I couldn’t miss an email that I need to answer. I couldn’t miss social media had fans and followers look and hear from me right away because everyone wants to instant reaction. And it just ran my life and I made that conscious decision that a phone will no longer run my life. And it changed my life entirely. And for me to tell people that they still look at me like, there’s something wrong with me. They look at me like there’s something seriously wrong with me. And then they say that the next thing is, I couldn’t live without a phone or I couldn’t run my business without a phone.
David Ralph [9:23]
I’ll be honest with you drew, I think that we have connected emotionally almost physically at the beginning of the show, but we leave that behind. Because I’ve never had a phone in my life. I have got no phone and people think it’s madness and it drives them to distraction but they can’t just connect with me when they want and I don’t even have a house but well, we have got house phone I can’t even remember the last time it rang. Because everybody’s always texting each other. My kids even text my wife from upstairs to say, What’s for dinner, and I have no phone at all. So we’ve got something in common true. We’ve got not only do we want to run away to a an island and They’re not together. I think you’d be quite fine. At least we could play baseball and sports up your butt in your fantasy about the island. Do you fantasise about being naked? That’s what I need to know drew before I commit.
Drew Taddia [10:16]
Well, not if we’re together, but if I’m alone, I’m coming in but naked.
David Ralph [10:22]
I’ll tell you why I even if we were together, I’d be naked. I’m quite proud.
Drew Taddia [10:26]
I’m quite proud.
Unknown Speaker [10:29]
As long as
David Ralph [10:30]
as long as water as long as it’s warm water, and it’s a sort of tropical island. So there’s no shrinkage involved. I’d be happy. I’d be happy to be there with you drew in my glory.
Drew Taddia [10:41]
Thank you. I appreciate that.
David Ralph [10:43]
You should. You shouldn’t appreciate it too much. You really shouldn’t. You can tell. You can tell when I’ve been recording all day, and it’s my last show. I start to go a little bit mad but let’s get professional again. Your life you went into baseball world and you were swinging the bat and you were sort of moving around and you were But you weren’t getting injured? Is that a common thing in baseball because most of the time, you’re only in for 30 seconds on each. So you sit there chewing on the on the bench, you get up you miss and then you come back down. Isn’t that how
Drew Taddia [11:19]
that’s fantastic? Well, that’s what most people see. Because I could I could imagine that that’s the perspective. Baseball is one of those sports where it’s, I suppose that you what you see is just people sitting there or maybe standing there. And then what I see is tenths of a second to have a reaction to a ball to swing a bat to catch to move. And or to think you know, when a pitcher lets go with a ball in his hand, we have tenths of a second to decide if we’re going to swing the bat or not. And before before long, that becomes natural reaction. So we have to be quick thinkers on our feet. And regarding injury if we have any type of injury. So let’s say for example, you know, this actually happened to me, I cut my finger in the kitchen while I was cooking, it was my throwing hands. So I had a very difficult time throwing to the point where I wasn’t able to throw for, fortunately, was a short amount of time, but these little injuries so if you, if you roll your ankle for a second, or for a moment, you have to be able to heal quicker so you can get back on the field and played. Now I played at a professional level where there was four or five people waiting for my position. So if you did anything like sprained your finger, you took a play off, you rolled your ankle, if you pulled your hamstring, you’d be done for the season, you may never see the field again. So that was a very stressful, highly competitive environment that I was in for an extended period of time.
David Ralph [12:41]
So those fourth and fifth person in the line, they really just spend the whole season sitting they never get up and do they?
Drew Taddia [12:48]
Well, they could but like I was saying it’s it’s anything could change. You could have an argument with a manager, you could have something that some issues at home and you have now you have stress, emotional stress that you bring to the field. So maybe they take you out and they put someone else in. What I’m saying is when that you may never see the field again, I suppose if that person that takes your spot performs well, then you’re now you’re on the bench and they bring in someone else and you lose your position, you have to go find a job somewhere else. So there’s not literally four people sitting there. But there could be one, two or three people actually sitting there waiting for your position. And if you lose it, you may never get it back.
David Ralph [13:27]
Now, if I was the third person, I’d go home and watch Netflix or something. I wouldn’t just be sitting there waiting for it to happen that somebody chops their finger off in a kitchen, it’s not likely to happen. So the stress bed and the stress because that is so important in all our lives. Are you totally stress free? Do you wake up in the morning? Does your stomach ever churn? Do you ever think to yourself, oh my god, I’m losing my hair. I’m just you totally Zen like.
Drew Taddia [13:57]
I couldn’t say I’m totally Zen like, but I do. feel like I have a very low stress level like I feel like I live a basically a stress free life now, I think that we understand as a business owner or someone more in the public eye that if someone doesn’t disagree someone have I did a presentation this morning and someone was telling me how wrong I was. I mean, that bothers you to a degree. So that’s a bit stressful. When you have a I had a co sorry, a worker just an employee just disappeared on me that I was relying on that stressful. But I mean, when it comes to understanding that the things that I do in my life are based around a stress free life For example, like I wake up stress free, I don’t wake up saying I changed my life. I used to do this I but it changed my life thinking that I do the things that I want to do in my job and the people that are in my life that have very supportive people, very loving people in my life in my environment, the people that I work with or work for. They’re very supportive. I enjoy working with them. And I think that that’s a big thing in our society that we really dislike Going to work we go to sleep stress that we put all kinds of toxins in, in and excuse me, in on our body. So we’re stressed out in different ways. And for me when I look at myself, in the way I live, I feel like I live a very low stress level life.
David Ralph [15:15]
How do you know this is? Um, it’s a leading question, because this year or last year 2016 was a very bad year for me. health wise now I didn’t realise I was doing anything untoward. But I can join up my dots. And from January all the way through, I had about four or five different things that kind of when I looked at it as a package was all stress involved, and I would have sworn blind Drew, but I wasn’t stressed at all. So how do you calm yourself down when you don’t even know that you’re stressed in the first place? Because I imagine so many people just think that’s life, and they’re just going and doing their normal stuff.
Drew Taddia [15:54]
Yeah, that’s a that’s a great point. Because many times we have to look at your normal and that’s a question that I often ask whether it’s a client or customer. What is your normal? So you’re exactly right. When you say that many times that we wake up like that, say, for example, waking up is challenging for some people because they wake up, they don’t exactly love their job. So they don’t love where they’re going in the morning, they get up from a restless sleep, they think they don’t sleep well. So for five hours, they get up there groggy, they go and have a coffee and a pastry, putting more toxins in their body. And that’s normal. That’s just everyday life to a lot of people, especially in North America. And so I think that if we were really to look in and see what’s going on, there’s little things that we can tell like we usually get messages if we pay attention to our body that really trigger the that those stress were those stress release or stress valves. But that’s what’s so important about stress. It’s, it’s actually hidden. So we don’t actually have a stress valve that we can release. We have to pay attention to the things that we’re doing. We have to pay attention to all the little things like morning routine is a fact Fantastic one, having a relaxing evening routine, paying attention to those toxins we’re putting in our body and on our body and in our environment plays a big role as well. So, to answer your question, David, I don’t know if there’s something that we can say is this is this is my stress level, this is how high it is. But we need to look in, look into our lives and see where that stress is coming from, and how we can continually and constantly reduce stress in different ways. There’s
David Ralph [17:25]
my first thing was I had to go for a blood test for something I can’t think what it was now. Oh, I’ll tell you what it was. I had gout, right. You’re like a doctor here, Drew and you’re going to get all my medical ailments. And I’ve never had gout at all ever. And if anybody actually has gout out there I sympathise because it was the most painful thing I’ve ever had in my life. And I would have been quite open for the amputation at its peak. And so I went to the doctors and the doctor said to me, oh, would we go for some blood tests and I have my blood tests and I found my cholesterol was sky high. And that was the first bit and He said, Are you stressed? I said, No, not really, you know, I work for myself, I’ve got a good job. And you know, he said, Well, I think you’re stressed. I said, Well, I’m not. He said, Well, your cholesterol so high, you’re six months from a stroke or heart attack. Now, that doesn’t help with stress. We’re being told that you’ve got to change something, but you don’t actually know what to change. But what I discovered was that and hopefully you can back this up as truth is the fact content that my body was storing is because of a fight or flight scenario. So if your body is stressed, it stores what it can so that you’ve got some kind of protection if you need it, if you need to run away, or if you need to fight. And that’s what I was doing. I was sort of naturally stressed and so it was going into my blood. Does that sound true? Or has my doctor been telling me Porky pies as we say in the United Kingdom, things that aren’t true?
Drew Taddia [18:52]
Well, I don’t pretend to be a doctor on TV or on podcasting, but I would have to agree that I will leave just reinforcing that point that our bodies our bodies are, I would say, That’s I love our bodies so much. It’s so incredible our bodies like a giant defence mechanism, what our body does is rebuild to prevent future pain. So for example, if we, if we break a bone, for example, our bone that it grows back over on that part, and the bone actually grows back a bit thicker in that area, the same thing if we work if we’re working out in the gym, if we’re working our muscles, we’re actually putting our body under a certain amount of stress in a good way to build it back up. So the next time your body goes through that same amount of stress, your body’s stronger and can handle in the future. So yeah, I’d have to agree with you there, David. And I’ll take that a step further, is when we’re stressed out, our body stores that body fat, and especially when we put toxins into our body, we put highly processed food these toxins our body can’t utilise, absorb, digest very well. Our body actually Puts fat cells around these toxins, which causes more stress. And that’s where we accumulate body fat.
David Ralph [20:07]
Well, let’s play some words now. And then we’re going to delve back into your own personal story. These are the words said by Jim Carrey. So let’s hear him again.
Jim Carrey [20:14]
My father could have been a great comedian, but he didn’t believe that that was possible for him. And so he made a conservative choice. Instead, he got a safe job as an accountant. And when I was 12 years old, he was let go from that safe job. And our family had to do whatever we could to survive. I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which was that you can fail at what you don’t want. So you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.
David Ralph [20:41]
Now doing that, taking a chance on doing what you love, I would imagine that is the perfect way to just ease into your sweet spot and allow stresses to just leave you would that be right?
Drew Taddia [20:54]
You know, it’s not it’s not so easy. I would say I wouldn’t say it’s that easy for a lot of people. In fact, changing your career. Rear or leaving of career is probably the exact opposite and entirely stressful for so many people. But, you know, I feel like I’ve been, I don’t know privileged to be able to understand that this is what I want to do. And I’m going to go after it with the with as much effort and consistency and dedication sacrifice as I possibly can. And that’s gonna form my life into the least stress. The least stressful life I could possibly imagine, really.
David Ralph [21:28]
But you you had to make that decision. That was a decision you made. It wasn’t an easy decision. When I was 40, what was I 44 when I quit my job, and I had a good job. I was at the top I could have just coasted for years. I made a decision. I just walked out started Join Up Dots, you know. So I think that it is difficult, but it’s not insurmountable is it? But I think if you went by that message of Hang on, what am I doing today? Am I looking forward to it? Or is it just a drag or Brilliant, I can’t wait till the alarm goes off because I’m gonna get up and do that again. It’s gonna be better to go the Jim Carrey way is for your personal health, isn’t it?
Drew Taddia [22:09]
Absolutely. I mean, if you wait, just think about that for a second. I mean, there was a point I developed this whole food protein supplement. And one of the things that I thought I had to do was cold call drive to do demos stand there all day talk to people that were hardly interested because I was interrupting their day. These are the things that I woke up with. After I developed this product. And I was trying to sell it. I was trying to get into retail stores. And I hated getting up. I didn’t want to wake up in the morning, and I very well knew that I created this. This was my choice. This was my life that I decided, and I thought to myself, What am I doing? Why do I continue to do this to myself? So I made a change. I took this, I took my product off the retail stores, I started selling online in our membership groups. And I understand it that’s the decision I make but that we make every day but but for me personally, I have a beautiful Morning Routine that I absolutely love. I’m getting one or two of them. Tell us what you do. What is your morning routine? oh my what you want me to get really specific because I love it.
David Ralph [23:11]
Yeah you tell us you tell us what the early morning in Canada or wherever you are brings to you.
Drew Taddia [23:16]
Okay, my early morning routine is when I when I wake up about 5am in the morning. And I first thing I do is I turn on a salt lamp, a Himalayan salt lamp very relaxing, very natural way for me to wake up. And I sit there and I think about what I’m grateful for usually think about three different things that I’m grateful for. Then I send out some love. I send out some love to a certain person, individual organisation something that I feel could benefit from it. Because we know as we know what we send out comes back. Then I think about some goals maybe my most important goal that I want to accomplish that day. After I after I set after I I’m still laying in bed by the way, I’m just I’m sitting here thinking then I turn on some zen music, and I wake up and I turn on I start getting up and I turn on the zen music, I start the tea kettle, start boiling some hot water. And I head over to my yoga mat. And I start stretching, I go through about five to 10 minutes of stretching five to 10 minutes of breathing exercises. And I have my tea, I put my tea together and I start reading an inspirational book or a business business book, something for me to aspire to, I suppose. And then I move on to my most important tasks. So I take about 30 minutes and I start working on something that has to be done something that I want to accomplish that day. And then from there, I move on to a notebook. I have a success book I call it and each day I write in the success book of my weekly goals, my monthly goals and my yearly goal of what what do I want to accomplish so I have a laser like focus, I know exactly what I’m working towards each day I wake up from there only after I sit and look at my goals. I drink a green smoothie, open up my computer and that’s when I start access my My business groups, my Facebook groups in my email.
David Ralph [25:03]
So that is a pretty comprehensive, perfect start to your morning. Do you do that every single morning? You’ve been doing that for years, have you?
Drew Taddia [25:11]
Well, it actually I’d say it evolves into more the things that I want to accomplish that say, I thought to myself, I wasn’t as focused as I want to be. And instead of reviewing goals, maybe once a week, or once every two weeks, I thought, what if I did goals every single day, that’s just laser like focus, and that’s where I want to be. And I feel like that’s what I need to accomplish, accomplish my goals and where I want to get to. So that’s, that’s something that was added. So it’s, it’s evolving and changing. But I think that that morning routine is something that I look forward to. It’s a reason that gets me excited to wake up in the morning. And for those couple hours from about five to seven in the morning. I feel like I’m super productive. And if my whole day was ruined if I only had those from five to seven, those two hours In a day, I still feel like I had something accomplished for the rest of the day.
David Ralph [26:04]
How can I almost you a bit of a personal question, but are you married? drew? Yeah. And Does your wife share the bed with you?
Drew Taddia [26:13]
She does.
David Ralph [26:15]
So How the hell do you manage to put kettles on and stuff my wife will not even allow me to, you know, when you get out of bed and you just want to see what the weather’s like outside. She doesn’t even let me move a curtain and you’re putting lights on and you’re playing music and you’ve got candles going, how have you managed that?
Drew Taddia [26:34]
She’s She’s pretty similar. She has her own morning routine. She gets up at 5am to she gets up and she she does some kombucha. She has green smoothie. She heads to the gym. So we have our own morning routines and they kind of coincide together.
David Ralph [26:48]
Now my morning routine is being shouted out because I’ve touched a curtain trying to get dressed in the dark. No one do I end up wearing knickers after time. I’ve got no idea what I’m getting dressed and then kind of Have annoying the kids when we have to wake them up as well as it’s a very different life. I think I need to come and move in with you, sir and learn some of your practices.
Drew Taddia [27:09]
We could do this on the island.
David Ralph [27:12]
Yeah, but you know, I’m gonna be naked, you know, and he wasn’t keen with that. So how did you take this idea then of stress free living and converted into a business because that’s that’s a key thing. So many people get an idea and they get an understanding of what is needed, but actually to get it out there and create income. How did you do that?
Drew Taddia [27:34]
Well, you know what, I don’t think I’m not sure if I believe in accidents per se, but it I suppose when I came back in between my travels and I was when I was playing, I took a break and I started to run a business I needed to feed myself I need to pay rent. So I started at a gym and people started to ask me questions and they said I was just working at the desk and needed a job. And they said they asked me some questions. I answered them. I didn’t even think anything of it, that’s just how I lived. I knew those answers from my own experiences. So they sent their friends over to ask me some questions. And I answered their questions too. And it was a bit, it became a bit much it was people were calling and showing up at the gym and sending the emails and I thought I should be getting paid for this people’s questions, you know, on a regular basis. And so I started running, I started running my own business, I started off with fitness classes, and that transition to personal training, and personal training went on to you radio and reading a book is just a crazy adventure. And I don’t think we have four days for me to get into all the details, but I just realised that the stressful environment that I lived in, as an as an athlete, and in a competitive environment, that many people in a different way through maybe maybe at home or maybe in the office, they live in a stressful life too. So I thought if I could share with people how I was able to reduce stress in my life, they could better benefit from it as well.
David Ralph [29:01]
So do you think and Well, basically, I know they say I cannot live without my phone and I can’t? and all those kind of things, but do you think at their car, they would quite like to just get rid of all of it and just have a simple life?
Drew Taddia [29:13]
Oh, well if they could, if they understood that that would bring them happiness and that those, I would call them fake endorphins, those fake endorphins that we find when we flip a flip on our Facebook or Twitter and we see someone actually responded to one of our posts. If we could understand that those little things don’t bring us happiness, and more actually equals less than yes, I do think that, that they would be happier without those things.
David Ralph [29:38]
Because I say that to my wife, my wife walks around, and she’s always looking at other people going, Oh, they’re doing very well. And I go, you can’t tell you can’t tell that they’re doing very well. They just got a new car. Yeah, but you might be on credit. You don’t know if it’s a car and she sort of bases her life on what she sees other people doing. And that is one of the problems isn’t it? There is a social conformity is required, you know, I know. But if I suddenly decided now not to have a mobile phone in my life be quite difficult because people would have got used to actually connecting with me because I’ve never had one people accept it. But to actually change direction when the whole world is going in a certain direction, it is very hard, isn’t it to go for a stress free life when the weld is screaming more and more and more.
Drew Taddia [30:27]
It’s it’s so difficult. I mean, that’s, that’s the way we live. First of all, like you’re saying with your wife, like we compare ourselves to one another, we want to achieve more, we want to have a nicer car, we want to have a bigger house and those things, we think that that kind of stuff is gonna bring us happiness, but it doesn’t just just think about the things that we have. I mean, you we get excited. I got a new app for my show, for example, a new app super excited. other businesses have apps and that was exciting for about three days, and then and then it was over with no difference. Like I always wanted to Cadillac, that was something I wanted to since I was very little my grandma had a Cadillac passed down from her. Or actually her husband, it was in the family for a while my uncle has always wanted to Cadillac we used to play in it. I went and bought a Cadillac. Because I was able to and I mean, it’s super nice to sit in and I enjoy the new smell but I mean, that doesn’t that doesn’t determine my sex, my my success each and every day. And I think if we understand that these material possessions, these brand new cell phones, the newest Xbox or tablet that’s not going to determine our happiness, we would be so much better off but we can understand that.
David Ralph [31:39]
I like a nice pair of socks. That’s what I like Drew. You know at Christmas when people are opening all their devices and stuff I always say to the kids in the family, buy me anything because you know if I want it, I’ll buy it myself. And then they go well you but you don’t you don’t buy it and I go well that proves I don’t want it but a nice pair of socks. You know when the heels are getting a bit baggy. They’re comfortable, but you know, you should just let them go. And when somebody gives you a new one, it’s like a new skin. Is that not the greatest feeling in the world, sir, a new pair of socks on Christmas morning.
Drew Taddia [32:13]
You know what one of my favourite things to do is put on a brand new pair of socks, like get out of the shower. They are all fresh and clean and you put on a brand new pair of socks. Nothing makes me feel better. Is that crazy?
David Ralph [32:24]
He’s not crazy. But I tell you what, while we’re on socks, this is something that’s been bothering me and maybe you are the man who can answer this. You know, when you’ve got a pair of socks, and if you turn them inside out, right way to your big toe in your little toe is there’s like little knob, knobby bits, where the seams all join up, right right by your toes. You know the bit I’m talking about when you turn them inside out and a bits of stick in there. Number one with a whole sock. Why do they have to put them just where your toes are? And secondly, you know, why can’t I put them at the top that’s by your leg that has no confidence. Have you at all? Why are they putting it where you want the most comfort? And secondly, why stick it inside the sock? Why not outside?
Drew Taddia [33:07]
What is that about?
David Ralph [33:09]
Why am I doing that? I don’t understand it.
Drew Taddia [33:11]
You know, it’s crazy as they’ve been making socks the same way for years. So I think that if you were to start a new business, and made those uncomfortable parts on different areas of the Sox instant millionaire, you see we’ve mastered it drew you and me together on our island just wearing socks.
Unknown Speaker [33:31]
Taking on the world,
David Ralph [33:32]
I’ll let you wear three socks, you can choose where you put the third one. And wait, we still got more comfortable, like we would be sorted we would be sorted. Well, I’m gonna play some words now. And these are words but I don’t believe when he made them. He would fault that he’s ever gonna be as closely linked to my show as he is he is but he comes again. This is Steve Jobs.
Steve Jobs [33:55]
Of course. It was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards 10 years later. Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path. And that will make all the difference.
David Ralph [34:30]
As he’s saying, you need to trust in something you need to find that inner belief calm or whatever it is to sort of move you forward. Do you buy into those words? And how do you find that in yourself when times are hard and you really haven’t got a clue what the answer is? How do you keep on moving forward?
Drew Taddia [34:49]
You know, it’s really that that belief that the things that we have, and want, you know, I feel like we can have them I really do and I just think that sometimes we need to wait a little bit longer, most times we want things right right away, a lot of times we give up, instead of, instead of understanding that we’re getting so close, for me, it’s understanding that each step that I take gets me closer. Each time I fail, I get up, I get a little bit closer. So I think that the goals that I’ve set for myself, they’re quite big the things that I want to do the things that I want to accomplish the things that I want to have, and understand they’re going to take some time and understand it’s going to take a whole lot of effort. So by continue to, excuse me continuing to make small steps, pushing forward and dealing with rejection and failure, I can better understand that I’m getting better with each each progress in the in the way
David Ralph [35:43]
that I’ve got this kind of logic now, and I’m not a woowoo person at all. I kind of like the law of attraction in concept, but actually, there’s a lot of it, I just want to sort of throw out the window. Now but what I do like the fact that I believe that the universe almost wants you To prove yourself, they want you to put the effort in the hours. And then when you’re ready, they go, yeah, there you go. You deserve it now. Because I think as a kid, you put effort in to get the first place in the running team. And as a kid, you there always seems to be effort to achievement. But as you get as an adult, it’s almost like, Oh, I just click that button. I do. I put my credit card in and it’s instant. So I think it’s kind of like, the adult way of the world saying, prove yourself, prove yourself. If you want to have that first medal around your neck, then you’ve got to put the effort in, you’ve got to do the reps. And that’s how I kind of kept kept going when things were difficult Join Up Dots now he’s brilliant. It’s just sort of flying, which is amazing. But it started off very well and then for about a year, it was real plateau. I couldn’t get it up or down or whatever. And that’s how I I considered it it was that you’ve got to put the effort in and little by little, that effort will be rewarded. That’s what I think what do you think?
Drew Taddia [37:01]
You know, it’s that, you know, I believe, like I’m on I’m with you, I’m we’re on the same page here. I mean, you on the island Sox Did you know we need to put in that constant effort that constant, that constant grind that the time and effort I look at. When I look at the most successful people, I feel like they’ve been most successful because they’ve been doing it for a long time, not because of the things that they’ve done or not because of their failures. If you put all that aside, it’s because they’ve been doing that job or that book, whatever it may be, but they’ve been doing it for a consistent amount of time for a duration, which makes them successful.
David Ralph [37:39]
And how would you look at in so you say to podcasters we’re both podcasters in the podcasting world, who do you look at somebody who really has put the effort in and deserves everything they’re getting?
Drew Taddia [37:54]
You’re putting me on the spot here. I don’t know if anyone comes to mind. You know, went to one of my first like the first one I started my business someone gave me this book and I did had no idea who the author was or what he did. And I started reading this book and it’s kind of funny and I was like, well, maybe I could do this too. and ended up being a Tim Ferriss was the first kind of business owner and entrepreneur guy that I started to read and follow a bit so he would be the only one that stands out but but to me, I’m I just feel like everything is there’s so much knowledge out there. There’s so many people doing things differently, maybe better, maybe worse, maybe they’re way that we can learn from and I just did a show about the library, for example, for me, right now I can count 123456 books that I’m surrounded with right now. And I feel like that I can continue to learn and get better and grow by surrounding myself with influential people that have done the things that I want to accomplish. They just show you how to
David Ralph [38:52]
surround yourself with free. That’s my view on this Drew. I think that there’s so as you say, absolutely right. There’s so many people Doing it in different ways. But I think you choose free you choose one who’s very good at marketing one very good at doing what you want to do and then another one and all the clues are there you look at their website you see how they do their their sales funnels their lead magnets, you you click on things, you sign up for things. It’s all there. But I think the problem is there’s too much choice out there now and we get swamped by so many people doing it in different ways. Choose free, you can’t go wrong.
Drew Taddia [39:27]
I couldn’t agree more. David, I couldn’t agree more.
David Ralph [39:30]
And that’s why Sir, I’m a podcasting legend. And that’s why when I said Is there anybody who inspires you could have lied. You can allied you could have said, well, there’s this guy from United Kingdom. He’s pretty hot. I imagine him running around on a on a Fantasy Island. He’s He’s the guy that impresses me.
Drew Taddia [39:48]
Well, we already had the island thing and I didn’t I didn’t know how, how close and personal your listeners wanted to get. So I didn’t want to sway that too much in your favour. It’s gonna be no swaying. I promise.
David Ralph [40:00]
No swaying at all. So with the Steve Jobs speech, looking at your own life, is there a big.in your life when you think to yourself, that’s really when it come together? That’s when, when my path became clear to me, you know,
Drew Taddia [40:19]
by short answer would be, um, you know, the things that I do on a regular basis are things where, you know, I’m focused on where I go and where I want to be. When I think back of when I was thinking back when Steve Jobs was telling his story. I just thought back to my college playing days, it was very difficult. And I didn’t play a lot. I wasn’t one of those people that wasn’t the best player around. I had to work so incredibly hard, just to get on the field. It was incredible. And you know, I can translate that now into the job, you know that the job or jobs that I do, but it was the travelling the rejection. It was the failure that really is the reason I am here. Today and then moving forward in business and just knowing that when I was probably about 25 years old, and I was thinking that maybe there’s other routes to be successful in life, maybe there’s other things that I want to try or experiment with, and thinking back and knowing that as long as you keep moving forward, and as long as you keep your eye on the prize, and keep moving forward to where you want to go, that it doesn’t matter what route you take, or what direction or whatever, whatever what Avenue, however you want to say it is that you’re going to get there as long as you keep your focus and you keep moving towards it.
David Ralph [41:35]
Absolutely. As we kept our focus on where we are now. And that is the bit we called a sermon on the mic, when we’re going to send you back in time to have a one on one with your younger self. And if you could go back in time and speak to the young Drew, what age would you choose and what advice would you give? Well, we’re going to find out because I’m going to play the theme tune and when it fades, you’re up. This is the Sermon on the mic.
Unknown Speaker [42:03]
We go with the best bit of the show.
Drew Taddia [42:09]
My man. Alright, so I’m talking to drew at about age 25. And I want to say that it’s okay for failure failures, okay. Failure is a part of life. In fact, we need to fail to keep pushing forward. So find things to be grateful for, find things every day to connect with, that’s going to take you closer to the goals that you want to. It’s you want to go to the to what you want to be, understand that there’s going to come a time in your life where you’re going to be exactly where you want to be exactly where you need to be. And people are going to look at you at this time in your life, and they’re going to give you that insight. They’re going to be inspired by the life that you live. And the travels that you’ve taken through the failures that you’re going through on a regular basis. So find a way to be happy today, find a way to surround yourself with positive supportive people and keep moving forward, because it’s all gonna work out.
David Ralph [43:14]
Absolutely. Why is it bias drew what’s the number one best way that our audience can connect with you?
Drew Taddia [43:19]
My main website is trueform life.com that has everything that I do that has our membership site that has my radio show that has some of my products that I might my detoxing and stress products. So that’s the best place trueform life.com.
David Ralph [43:37]
And we will have all the links on the show notes. Drew, thank you so much for spending time with us today. joining up those dots and please come back again when you have more dots to join up because I do believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our paths is the best way to build our futures Drew Taddia, thank you so much.
Drew Taddia [43:55]
It’s been an absolute pleasure, David, thank you so much for having me. I love what you’re doing. Your show is super active. Writing, like I said before, I love your energy. And thanks to your listeners those that have tuned in and stick around till again for giving us some time and and enjoying some of that some of our conversation.
David Ralph [44:11]
Cheers pal, Mr. Drew Taddia? I liked him. I really did like him up in, he’s got a good business there. He’s got something that people are going to be looking for. It brings in so many different income streams, as he was talking, I was thinking, yeah, you could do this, you could do that you can do whatever. So that’s what you need to do. You need to look at something that might be simple in concept, but the world needs. I’ve had experts on here that are teaching people how to sleep better. I’ve had drew that’s about stress. There’s always something in our lives but we actually feel that we could help others with and that is what makes a business. So if you need any more information on anything that we talk about, drop us a line at Join Up dots@gmail.com or of course, keep on listening to the show. And we will be back very, very shortly with another one. James.
Outro [45:04]
David doesn’t want you to become a faded version of the brilliant self you or wants to become. So he’s put together an amazing guide for you called the eight pieces of advice that every successful entrepreneur practices, including the two that changed his life. Head over to Join Up dots.com to download this amazing guide for free and we’ll see you tomorrow on Join Up Dots.