Resilience Expert Robin Hills Joins Us On The Steve Jobs Inspired Join Up Dots Podcast
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Introducing Resilience Expert Robin Hills
Robin Hills is todays guest joining us on the Steve Jobs Inspired Join Up Dots podcast
He is a business psychologist and director of Ei4Change, a company specializing in educational training, coaching and personal development focused around emotional intelligence, positive psychology and neuroscience.
He has taught over 250,000 people in 185+ countries how to build resilience, increased self-awareness and understanding of others.
Today his educational programs on resilience and emotional intelligence are accredited by The Institute of Leadership and Management, cover the most comprehensive and detailed education of any emotional intelligence organization and are used in educational establishments in South Africa and India.
Now if that doesn’t mean a lot to you then lets pose a couple of questions.
How do you cope as you sink in a quicksand of modern life, filled with televisions and phones and social media and shopping and emails and advertisements and noise and traffic and the internet and remembering what you may have forgotten?
And do you ever wonder why some people remain calm in the face of disaster whilst other fail to cope?
Well lets find out as we bring on to the show to find out the answers to these questions whilst joining up a few dots in the process with the one and only Robin Hills.
Show Highlights
During the show we discussed such weighty subjects with Rob Hills such as:
Why it is so important to take yourself out of your comfort zone and tackle head on the problems in your life to develop resilience.
Robin shares how one month in the early stages, he worked 30 days in his business for only £10 pounds profit.
Why the problem of being resilient is that we don’t know that we are struggling with too little (and even more surprising too much resilience) day to day.
and lastly…..
We highlight the benefits to health and spirit that developing a resilient mindset can bring to us.
How To Connect With Resilience Expert Robin Hills
Return To The Top Of Resilience Expert Robin Hills
If you enjoyed this episode with resilience expert Robin Hills, why not check out other inspirational chat with Shifting Work, Noah Kagan, Dorie Clark, and the amazing Pete Sena
You can also check our extensive podcast archive by clicking here – enjoy
Full Transcription Of Resilience Expert Robin Hill Interview
Intro [0:00]
Life shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock. And start getting the dream business and life you will, of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host David route from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another JAM PACKED episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.
David Ralph [0:40]
Yes, hello there. Good morning to you. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning and welcome to Join Up Dots. It’s an absolute delight to have you on with us. And it’s a delight to have spent so much time this week speaking to people live. And as we always say at the end of most of the shows, if you’ve got any issues if you’ve got a struggle to get going, just connect with us and we will give you some free time to help you move on in the direction that you want. And often it doesn’t take a lot to get the ball rolling it really doesn’t. Well, today’s guest joining us on the show is a business psychologist and director of AI for change, a company specialising in educational training, coaching and personal development focused around emotional intelligence, positive psychology, and neuroscience. He’s taught over a quarter of a million people in 185 plus countries didn’t know there was 195 countries, how to build resilience, increased self awareness and understanding of others. And today’s educational programmes on resilience and emotional intelligence are accredited by the Institute of leadership and management cover the most comprehensive and detailed education of any emotional intelligent organisation, and are used in educational establishment in South Africa and India. That if that doesn’t mean a lot to you, AIPAC doesn’t really you know, you don’t understand what I’m saying. But let’s pose a couple of questions. How do you cope as you sit sink in a quicksand of modern life filled with televisions and phones and social media, and shopping and emails and advertisements and noise and traffic and the internet? And then on top of that, remember what you might have forgotten because you’ve got all that to deal with? And do you ever wonder why some people remain totally calm in the face of disaster, while others fail to cope? Well, let’s find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots. And of course, answering these questions with the one and only Mr. Robin hills. Good morning, Rocky, how are you?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [2:38]
Good morning, David. What a wonderful build up really, really enjoyed hearing that and thought, crikey. Is that me?
David Ralph [2:45]
Well, it is you Robin, you’re just being humble. You know, you I’ve been speaking to you beforehand, and You sound very calm. You sound like resilience sort of flows through you. And no matter what I can do to try to take you off track. You’re always going to beat me. Is that a case? Robin? Or do you struggle with it as much as anyone else?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [3:11]
I’m I’m intrigued by the fact that you’ve picked that up because that seems to be something that has bugged me all of my life. I have been along for a number of jobs over the years and have failed dismally to get them because when they did a personality assessment when they looked at my underlying behaviour, my underlying Well, the underlying bits that are me, they found something that put them off. And it wasn’t until years later that I found out that I have a very, very low level of neuroticism. So there isn’t a lot that actually fazes me, and it comes over in the way in which I present to people. So yes, I’ve got this incredible level of calmness, which just happens to be me and I’ve learned to live with it over the years. My wife has said, if Robin starts to panic, then we all need to panic and I just don’t know what it is because I do have levels of anxiety like everybody else it’s just probably that I’m able to cope with it and handle it far better than other people. And I don’t know why.
David Ralph [4:24]
And I’m gonna tell you why. I’m gonna tell you why because I think I’ve actually been a developing this I used to be one of those terrible stresses but never looked like they were stressing. It was like an internal I’d be stewing but on the outside I’d looked like I was just floating around like a mighty tweak in life. And this week, we’ve had a new shower put in into our into our bathroom. It’s lovely is one of those waterfall showers that come out for different directions. And it’s leaking. And my wife is getting a bit stressed by it and she said to me yesterday aren’t you bothered by it? Aren’t you bothered? And I said, Yeah, of course, I’m bothered. But I’m choosing how I react to it. And I’m channelling my energy in a way that can help me solve the problem. Now, at that point, she need me in the groyne, because she hates me saying things like that. But I think it is, I think it’s a case of when you are in the environment, of being aware of these things. You then decide whether you have to jump in or not you, you can decide whether to be proactive, you can decide to be a firefighter, or you can just let it go and let somebody else deal with it or let life deal with it. Would that be one, I think that you’ve learned enough about everything to actually go? It doesn’t really matter. This isn’t the top priority, even though it’s bothering somebody else.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [5:49]
No, that’s exactly it. It’s almost a case of what choices have I got to bake here? And let’s make a choice. Now, you might not like the fact that you have a choice to pay. But what’s the best that you can make? In that circumstance? Put yourself in control and decide for yourself? What, What decisions do you need to make in order to move the situation forward?
David Ralph [6:11]
Now, let’s look at that. Because when you are build, and I’m going to take you from the world of corporate into entrepreneurial, because that’s what we do here. And in entrepreneurial world more often than not, you ain’t got a bloody clue what you’re doing, you’re kind of you seem to be spending time dealing with things and things that going wrong, because over time you’re developing and learning at the same time, you’re always moving out of your comfort zone. Now, sometimes things go badly wrong in your business, where you look back on him over a period of time and you think well, actually, I’m in a better position because of that. Then other times, there’s things but you just know, you’ve got to deal with and deal with it at that moment. Now, what would be your advice for somebody who’s in a new business, they’re building a business, but they’re also developing themselves at the same time, because resilience can sometimes go out the window, can’t it? Of course
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [7:08]
he can. And I think the important thing here is the fact that you’re actually learning as you’re building your business up, you’re gonna make mistakes, you’re gonna fail, you’re gonna fall over, you’re gonna make bad decisions, learn from them. Take yourself out of your comfort zone. That’s where the learning occurs. I look back and say, well, what could I have done better? Yeah, I made a good decision. I’m happy with it. I’ve got to live with it. What can I learn from it? How can I develop myself further, so that I don’t make the same mistakes again, so that I can actually make better decisions if a similar situation comes, comes my way. So what you learn to do through that is you’re learning through adversity and resilience is built up through adversity, you don’t become resilient. Just because you are who you are. You actually learn your resilience and you learn to develop it because you’ve undergone adverse situations. You’ve done things you didn’t want to do, you’ve made the decisions that you didn’t want to make. Life has thrown you a lemon, therefore bake lemonade.
David Ralph [8:15]
I am a little bit obsessed by Bear Grylls at the moment. I used to be many, many years ago, and then I kind of switched off and then I’ve kind of found this channel and I’m sort of watching them. And he’s going through all people that don’t know Bear Grylls, where the hell have you been, but he’s a British adventurer who takes celebrities on survival trips. And most of these people who are sort of like in the survival situation being taken through a couple of days with him struggle madly while doing something. But as soon as they get their feet on the floor, they go, I want to do it again. I want to do it again. And they go from that position of being overwhelmed and stressed to actually being engulfed by oh my god, that was brilliant. Now, I’m going to ask you that, because a lot of times we forget what’s brilliant in our lives, we forget, because it’s not as extreme as that it’s not, but we’re abseiling down a cliff. It’s not that we’re, you know, eating some horrible thing, but he’s dug out the ground. How can we sort of get that same? Oh, brilliant, I want to do that. Again. If it’s just part of our life, it just becomes normal.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [9:27]
Well, I think you’ve actually got to go through all have these bad things when you’re setting up a business and come out the other side and actually say to yourself, yeah, I’ve learnt a lot from it. I wouldn’t say it was absolutely brilliant. Oh, come on. David. Let me share with you an example. When I set my business up or must be about 15 years ago, I had a young family. I needed to put put food on the table. I needed to pay the mortgage. I got all the bills to pay, and one month I earn the good Run total of 10 pounds.
David Ralph [10:03]
We’ve been, we’ve all been there.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [10:06]
And that was a voucher for boots, the chemist. So that wouldn’t even cover that my contact lens solutions. So I wouldn’t say hey, that was absolutely brilliant. But that’s part of setting up a business. When people said to me, it’s very, very hard. There was a certain degree of arrogance there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it can’t be that hard. Because they haven’t got the skill set knowledge and experience I’ve got that arrogance was soon knocked out. And we’ve actually got to go through all of those really, really bad things. So I can now look back, and I wouldn’t say, yeah, that was brilliant. But I’m actually in a brilliant place. Now, because of that.
David Ralph [10:56]
Now, it’s key to that, because we’ve all been proved out where we’ve worked, worked worked, and we haven’t made any money at all. And I always say that building a business is easy, hard. I always say, in principle, it’s very, very easy. You find something that people want, if you find enough of those people that want it and explain it and make it accessible to them, Hey, it’s a business. Now, the problem with it is, is it’s all the things that go on behind the scenes, it’s all what makes that engine actually operate. And we hear it all the time about sales funnels, an email marketing, and campaigns and sequences and triggers, which you just haven’t got a clue with at the beginning. Now, with your business. Now, as you say, you’ve been doing it for 15 years, how much of it is walk in the park? Because of the 15 years? And how much of it is Do you feel to yourself, oh, there’s there’s a lot to be done here.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [11:54]
There’s a lot to be done here, David. There’s no giving up. There’s no respite. When you’re running a business, when you’re running a successful business. It takes a lot of hard work. And I have a very, very, very long to do list. I’ve still got to learn skills around sales, I’ve still got to learn skills around marketing, I’ve still got to learn to get out there and find those people that want what I’ve got. That’s the hard bit. But I don’t look at it as being hard look at it as being challenging look at it as being fun look at it as being a learning opportunity. And that will actually help you with regards to running your business.
David Ralph [12:38]
So why have you still got VAT to do then? Is that something that you’re you’re sort of holding back from because I would have said that the key thing to a business is understanding marketing and sales, that seems the number one sort of metric to make a business thrive.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [12:57]
You’re absolutely right. And when I started my career, dear, last century, I was a salesperson. So I know the art of selling. And I wanted to move into marketing. And I went and got a diploma in marketing from the Chartered Institute of marketing. So I’ve got all that background, but that doesn’t stop going out there and finding the right person and selling to them or marketing to them. doesn’t make it any easier. It’s still, as I say a challenge. And it’s it’s a fundamental challenge to running a good business. But it can become easier with experience. It’s just that you’re continually pushing yourself and saying, right, I’ve got a good business how does how do I sustain it? No more importantly, how do I continue to grow it and fundamental to that is getting the sales right and getting the marketing right.
David Ralph [13:56]
So so what is a good business for you? So you wake up in your special underpants on a Monday morning? And do you work nine to five like a corporate hours do you work two days a week? Give us an understanding of what is a good business for you.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [14:12]
Oh, you don’t do what I say. You don’t do what I say you do what I do. No wrong wrong way round. You don’t do what I? Oh, I can’t remember the phrase. The important thing there is I work half past seven in the morning through till about eight nine o’clock at night but I find joy Why do you do that? Why? Because I thoroughly enjoy it they enjoy the challenge. I enjoy the puzzle I enjoy what I do I take breaks when I want to. I
David Ralph [14:46]
really enjoy making love but I don’t want to be doing it. I was a die every single day. The way Yeah.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [14:53]
I don’t get paid for that.
David Ralph [14:55]
You’re doing it wrong. Your marketing is not good enough.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [14:59]
Well, that’s right. Ah, no, I think the important thing is just to do what it is that sustains you what it is that grows you. And what it is that gets you up in the morning. So, know those hours that I gave you, it’s not intensely working all the hours God gave just simply because I need to get my business working. It’s because I enjoy doing it. And a lot of my friends are retiring, they’ve retired. And they say to me, when are you going to retire? What do I want to retire for? Because all I will be doing is finding a hobby watercolour, going for walks, making model of the Eiffel tower out of matchsticks, well, I can actually turn all that energy and focus on to sustaining a business I enjoy and, and actually feeds me mentally and physically. So to a certain extent, it’s my hobby,
David Ralph [16:03]
which, which is brilliant when you’re saying that it is brilliant, but I still think fundamentally, Robin, that’s wrong. I think fundamentally, because I used to be bad. And it just drove me into the ground. Because I realised that actually, when I did have time off, I’d kind of trained myself to always be thinking about the business, I couldn’t switch off. And when I do switch off, then that’s when the good stuff came to the business. And I always say to people, you never heard anyone shout, you Rica, when sitting in front of a laptop, it doesn’t work. You know, it’s always when you’re walking along through the countryside. And then suddenly, that idea smashes into you. And I in my business has grown because I work about six hours a week, basically, I would say. And I make multiple six figures through Join Up Dots. And it’s not because of what I’m doing now. It’s what I’ve learned in the last few years, but totally understandable. But I like nothing more of in not being anything to do with Join Up Dots anymore. I am to a point where I say to people, I’m retired, because what I do I do it as such a is a level of speed and efficiency. But actually what takes me six hours used to take me 50 hours, but I’ve just sort of like compressed now.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [17:23]
Yeah, yeah. I think the important point there is what? What is right for you, David is not right for me and what’s right for me, it’s not right for your listeners. I think everybody’s got to find their own level there. And you’re absolutely right. Most of the good stuff within my business comes when I’m on a break when I have a holiday and I can take a holiday. I can take a break whenever I want. Because I’ve actually got the business to a sustainable level whereby if I don’t work another day in my life, the business will still carry on. I can put it in my Well, I could leave it to my daughters. It’s a brilliant business. But the important thing is it it sustains me It nourishes me it energises me, and I choose to work with my business in the way in which I work. Now, I’ve listened to some of your guests on Join Up Dots. And they are talking about a healthy lifestyle and getting the balance right yeah, and I would not disagree with them. Everything that they said was 100% accurate, you’ve got to look after yourself first, before you could look after anybody else. And you’ve got to look after your own health, you’ve got to look after your own nutrition, you’ve got to look after your own energy. So I’m very, very aware that I really do need to make sure that I am as physically and as mentally healthy as I could possibly be in order to deliver for myself. And if I’m doing that for myself, and I’m doing it for my clients.
David Ralph [18:57]
Now I’m gonna give you a quote and this is this is a good quote. Okay. And this ties us back into resilience. And resilience is the capability of a strained body to recover its size and shape after being subjected to adversity or stress. Did you know where I took that quote from Robin?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [19:16]
Well, I recognise it from my book is
David Ralph [19:19]
from your book, I’ve been reading your book and family enjoying it, okay. Now with that of a strain body to recover its size and shape. It’s it’s basically what we’re talking about now. Because quite often you don’t know when you’re in business, right? You are dealing with a strange body. You don’t know until you you know, I’m the poster boy of falling to pieces due to the fact of thinking that everything was right until things started to go wrong with me. So how do we bring that back into resilience into a normal thing where we don’t know that we are under a strain? We don’t know we’ve got a strain body to tell us about it. No, that’s
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [19:59]
absolutely Right, David, we often don’t. And the interesting thing is that that quotes comes from material science when resilience is actually being measured through a physical property of a piece of material. Now, it’s a it’s a metaphor. And it’s very useful metaphor for resilience, but their returns when the metaphor actually starts to fall apart. What about too much resilience? What about
David Ralph [20:30]
when you have too much, then well, how can you have too much resilience?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [20:34]
Well, let’s have a look at let’s have a look at our current prime minister. Boris Johnson, let’s have a look at Donald Trump. Here we have two people who often have too much resilience in the fact that they just carry on regardless of what anybody says what anybody says yes. And what they lack, there is a complete lack of empathy for anybody else’s viewpoint and how they’re feeling, what their values are, what their morals are. Now there is there are very, very good examples of too much resilience. And we can often see in the business world as well, where certainly in the corporate environment, people have undergone change, they come out the other end, and they look back at everybody else and say, Well, you just need to get more resilient. Yeah, how. So there is too much resilience. And then what about learning through a situation as something like a spring, which is a piece of material that you can measure resilience in very easily, if a spring is stretched, and then it goes back to its normal shape, it doesn’t learn through that process. And there’s nothing to tell you that it’s actually been subjected to adversity. So in terms of learning through adversity, the metaphor doesn’t quite work. So what we need to do is we need to look at a slightly different definition of resilience. And when you’ve got good levels of resilience, you’ve got an ability to accept half harsh reality, you might not like the situation that you find yourself in, but you take an objective view to it. So without any subjective views, without any denial without any emotion, and you learn through it, it’s got a, it’s an ability to be able to find some kind of meaning and adversity. So it’s having these very strong values in order to grow and to develop. And it’s got, it’s the ability to be able to adapt, and to improvise and use creativity, to work around the situation that you find yourself in. So the combination of those three gives you resilience and actually is far more sustainable for you in the future. So just to repeat them, it’s having this view that life is meaningful. It’s accepting harsh reality objectively. And it’s having the creativity and adaptability to work around anything that you’re facing.
David Ralph [23:13]
Let’s listen to Rocky, and we’d be back with Robin,
Unknown Speaker [23:15]
you, me or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward, how much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done.
David Ralph [23:31]
So is he talking about resilience now? Or is he just talking about being bloody minded? Well, what do you what’s your position on that?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [23:40]
I would agree 100% With what rocky says it’s, it’s the way in which you are adapting to the situation that you find yourself. And it’s knowing that you have this self belief which will take you forward, it’s doing so with empathy so that you don’t have too much resilience, and you can adapt around the situation that you find yourself in.
David Ralph [24:03]
Now, you said the word empathy a couple of times, and I was reflecting back on my conversation with my wife and the leaking shower. So basically, I had resilience, but I had no empathy. I should have seen it, at least from her point of view, would that be right?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [24:19]
Well, yes. And that opens up a whole nother can of worms because you can have too much empathy at times. But I think the important thing is, there are going to be certain times when you go into a situation and you just don’t get it right. You completely screw up for some reason. And it’s not down to the fact that you haven’t got too much risk. You haven’t got enough resilience or you haven’t got enough empathy or you’re doing things the wrong way. It’s just that you misjudge the situation from time to time. You’ve just got to accept that you’re human and just roll with the punches as Rocky says.
David Ralph [24:58]
Now when you do roll with the punches, you know will take you back to the sort of Bear Grylls thing. Okay. Now, I’ve seen a couple of people do things on there, which I actually thought, oh my god, you know, I look at it all the time. And I think, oh, it’s all right. He’s not gonna let me die. I’m tied to a rope. That’s fine. But there was a couple of things that they did where I was looking at it thinking, This doesn’t seem safe to me, you know, this doesn’t seem safe, but they still went with it. They still trusted him. So should we to be resilient? Should we be trusting ourselves? Or should we be trusting sort of other people’s knowledge? And well, because sometimes we haven’t got the answers. So how do we become resilient when we we, it’s totally new to us?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [25:43]
Well, trust is a fundamental part of working with other people, you have to build up a level of trust. Part of it is learning to trust yourself, learning to trust the decisions that you make. And a lot of that comes with experience. A lot of that comes with having rolled with the punches. It’s knowing what you can get away with and knowing what you can’t get away with. I think a lot of that is built into this level of trust that we got not only in ourselves, but in other people. And I think a lot of people are very, very trusting of Bear Grylls purely and simply because, quite honestly, the film crew is not going to let anybody die on the set are they so even though it might look really, really, really scary. I think a lot of people really do put their trust in in bed.
David Ralph [26:35]
But I saw Mel B from the Spice Girls, abseiling down a rock face, while the rope there was no way to tie the rope up. So they tied it onto some phones, just like a bush, and nothing more than that. And she was saying this isn’t strong enough. And he was saying, No, it’d be fine. It’d be fine. And the way that he sort of trains people, he doesn’t say, look what we’re going to do. We’re going to tie the rope here, and then we’re going to pull it down. And then you’re going to move he just basically says, Now trust me, it’d be fine. Let’s do it. And he kind of right almost pushes people into it to get through. But yeah, it was just like tied around a bush. And I saw another one where there was nothing to tie on at all. So he just got to rucksacks that they had on their bag, tied it to them locked out over a cliff and they went down as a counterbalance with these two rucksacks. Now, you could you could sign Well, yeah, good, great, you could say that all the time that the camera crew aren’t going to save me. But we’ve seen it in times where people will stand back and allow things just to happen, because they’re too frightened of jumping in and, you know, changing the future somehow, you know, so let’s, let’s let’s take it away from resilience, because I’m interested in this because one of the things that I was looking at was, I was thinking, how are they coping? How are they coping with this? And I know in your book, you’ve got a section on resilience versus coping. So what is the difference with saying, Yeah, I’m resilient and actually just coping with a situation?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [28:04]
Well, coping really is putting up with stuff. So it’s the sort of thing that everybody has to put up with. On a day to day basis, resilience is a little bit more ingrained, it’s a more learnt experience. And a lot of it comes from things like your personality, your behaviour, and what you’ve learned in previous on previous occasions. Whereas we all put up with stuff. The shower was leaking, we haven’t got enough food in the, in the pantry, we’ve got to go shopping, we might not have as much money as we’d like, the car breaks down, you get a call from your mother saying that she needs to go to the hospital, one of your kids is in trouble with the police. All of these things are happening on a day to day basis. I’ve just giving you a load of examples. Thankfully, a lot of not a lot of those have happened to me. Or if they have happened to me, they haven’t happened on exactly the same day.
David Ralph [29:03]
Or you just haven’t realised. Robin, you, as you said right at the very beginning of the show, you don’t realise that these things are happening.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [29:10]
No, no, no, that’s right. And what you’ve got to do is just accept them when they do arise and make the decisions that you need to make as and when they do arrive. And some of the decisions you might not like having to bake. And some of the decisions on reflection might not be the best decisions. But a decision is better than no decision at all. Go with it, see what works and then if it’s the wrong one changer if you can.
David Ralph [29:37]
Well, I love that because that is how that I say that to my daughter. You know, I say there’s no decision you’re gonna make which is an end game. If you go through university and you fail at the end, then you could do something else or you know, there’s there’s nothing. Now, one of the things in your book that I was looking at is the word emergencies because I don’t have a mobile phone in my life and the amount of time People say to me, what would you do if there was an emergency. And I always say, emergencies don’t happen. I can’t think of any emergencies where you know, but it was life and death, but I didn’t have a phone. But that is one of those things that people project. And they actually create stress in their life in case an emergency happens. And you will see that in corporate world where people basically stay available 24 hours a day, just in case an emergency happens. And more often than not, they’re just dealing with meaningless crap all the time, because I haven’t defined that. So do you think emergencies really happen in life? Real big emergencies?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [30:39]
Well, if we take it away from medical emergencies, and no, I don’t think they do happen. And often when I’m actually training people in the live environment, most of them are surgically attached to their mobile phones. Let me take you back 50 years ago, those things didn’t exist. Yeah. And we coped, and we live. And we worked through emergencies. And a lot of big organisations are still here 50 years later, because of the fact that people didn’t have mobile phones. So I often say to people, when I’m working with them, when I’m coaching them, when I’m mentoring them, an organisation is not going to crumble, the share person is not going to crash. Because you didn’t answer an email at 11 o’clock at night. You’ve got to learn to actually say no. So you go back to what I said to you earlier, in terms of my working hours, it’s me to say that I’m actually answering emails and all that time if an email comes in, and I’m not in the right place to answer it, I’ll just leave it. Yeah. If if, if it isn’t urgent email, and I think somebody needs an answer very quickly. And my empathy kicks in at an appropriate level, then I’ll answer it, but otherwise, No, tomorrow, we’ll do or even the next day,
David Ralph [32:06]
I look at mine once a week now. And again, I just plough through them, I bash them out really, really quickly. And, you know, I say a lot to, you know, you’re not gonna connect with a podcast, or if it’s an emergency, it’s not gonna happen, you know, if you’re drowning, I’m not the person if your house is burning down, don’t think of me. But a lot of people in business think that it is an emergency to have all the notifications up. And I think that strips away their resilience, because they’re not actually putting strategies in place to deal with stuff. When it occurs. They’re kind of dealing with stuff all the time. Do you understand what I’m saying? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [32:48]
I think a lot of people are feeling one, too, they feel needed. And a lot of it is down to their level of impulse and impulse control. So what happens is Ping, there’s a notification that’s come through on the mobile phone, that there’s a message there, people have to look at it. And a lot of it is down to the fact that they kind of get a dopamine rush, as soon as they hear a ping, oh, somebody wants me, there might be something exciting here. So they’ll go and get that dopamine rush just simply because they need it. And what we’ve got to do is to train ourselves, not to look at the mobile phone. Now you’re in a brilliant position, David, where you can look at your emails once a week, I can’t do that. And the nature of me, the nature of my business means that I have to look at my emails and answer them. Every day, I have to set aside half an hour in the morning to go through the emails, deal with those that I’ve left deal with anything contentious. And with a quarter of million learners in 180 plus countries, I get emails from people all over the world. So I do need to set a time aside in order to answer their queries. But none of them are emergencies.
David Ralph [34:07]
No, I used to do it every three weeks. And then I found that I was getting people chasing up. And now we’re going to adjust to bring it to the top of the email. And I think, oh god, I’ve now got two that I’ve read. Now, you know, just and I find a week is the way to sort of deal with it. Now. This interests me as well, is the emotional intelligence because emotional intelligence and these are your words is a function of how you combine your thinking with your feelings, to make good authentic decisions, and consequently how you act and behave. Now my wife, I’m going to tell you about my wife, my wife is basically like a Tasmanian devil, or do you remember as a kid, one of those spinning tops that you used to sort of like whiz off and I used to bounce around a plate all the time until they sort of run out? Yeah, she’s a bit like that. And she often says to me, what do you think and I go, What is your head? say and what does your heart say? Because your heart is always right. And when she comes back a little bit later on, she says, I think this is what I should do. And I go, does it feel right? And she says, yes. Okay, well go off and do that. Now, lots of again, it’s difficult to separate yourself from your thinking with your feelings, because people haven’t given themselves the space to actually be aware of the difference in them. It’s just, it’s happening all the time. So what would be your advice for people to actually be allowed to make those good, authentic decisions? By giving themselves the space to actually go right? Okay, yeah, this is my brain operating here. And this is my, my heart operating here. This is the difference?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [35:44]
Well, you’ve answered it, it’s go with your heart, your heart has a neural network around it, God, I’m
David Ralph [35:51]
good, I am good. I’m gonna take over your business. Robin, I believe I’ll be a four change again, by the end of the week.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [35:58]
Well, this is it, your heart has a set of nerves around it a neural network. And it really is a second brain. And the heart actually links into the brain and helps with the decision making.
David Ralph [36:13]
I thought your gut was your second brain. That’s what I’ve always heard your gut
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [36:17]
is a bit larger in terms of its neural network, but your gut will only help you to make intuitive decisions. So you ask your gut, is this decision a yes or a no decision? Your intuition, your gut will tell you one way or the other, the heart actually puts the emotion around it, does it feel right? Do you feel it in your heart, that will tell you whether that decision feels right. And if it does feel right, then go for it, your brain then kicks in with the logical rational analysis, and can then build that up in order that you make that authentic, good quality decision. Now, if people learn to make their decisions that way, I think we’ll have better decisions. The problem is that within the corporate world, everything seems to be done rationally and logically. And they move away from emotions and feeling because there seem to be some thing, awkward, that doesn’t really contribute to good quality decision making, I would say do it the other way around,
David Ralph [37:25]
I find a lot of people and I’m thinking about my son here, actually. And my wife, they and my daughter, all of them actually now are thinking about it. More often than not, they will make a decision based on how it’s going to make the person that they’re interacting with feel like they don’t want to let somebody down or they don’t want to make the other person unhappy. So they will make decisions. And I go, that’s the wrong decision. And they go, oh, yeah, but I couldn’t really get out of it, you know, that kind of thing.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [37:55]
And that might be a situation where people are being too empathetic.
David Ralph [38:02]
Because I don’t care. I don’t care about how, I don’t know, that’s unfair, I do I care passionately. But there’s a bigger part of me that goes, I can’t care too much, I’ve got to bring it back, I’ve got to make the decision based on what’s right, not about the other person.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [38:22]
That is exactly it. It’s a case of getting the balance, right. Again, it’s what’s right, what’s right for you, and what’s right for the other person. And sometimes you have to make a decision that the other person won’t like, because it is right, and you’ve got to let them down. Because first and foremost, you’ve got to make the right decision for you. And if making the right decision for you, is letting the other person down. So be it. But if it’s, it’s a case of not being selfish. It’s a case of being self ish, you look after yourself, before you start looking after other people. And the way in which I say this to people in the corporate world, nobody else could eat that sandwich for you. Nobody else could go to the toilet for you. You’ve got to do it yourself. You’ve got to make the decision to do that in the most appropriate way. You’ve got to breathe yourself, you can’t delegate that. So look after yourself. Make sure that you are nutritionally physically, energy and energy really energetically in the most appropriate place to make the authentic value based decisions that you need to make. Go with your values. Go with your gut, go with your heart, go with your brain.
David Ralph [39:49]
Because I used to do a lot of corporate training and I used to go around doing training courses in the old days when I used to wear a suit and tie and all that kind of stuff. And one of the things a lot of companies used to save it They used to say, yeah, if we do it by that customer, we’ve got to do it for all customers. And I used to think that’s rubbish. That’s rubbish, because all customers may not need that thing. And I see that very much in entrepreneurial world where people are aiming to scale their business. And they scale it from the level of service that they provided when they only had one customer or two customers at the beginning to, you know, 1000 customers, and they’re trying to sort of over deliver, and when they over deliver, that is, that’s the threshold. That’s where people go, Oh, this is what I get. And then as soon as you detract from that, because your business can’t deal with it, or you can’t deal with it, but are not as good as they used to be. Oh, you know, and I see, but I’ve actually got an offline shop. And I’ve been running it for the last five or six years. And I keep on saying to the staff, I know that you’re trying to be helpful, but nobody else is doing that. So you know, stop doing it. Oh, it only takes a second. Yep. But then when they come in, and they don’t get it next time, then it’s all going pear shaped? Do you see that as well in businesses where people are too empathetic, but every single customer where once again, they should almost strategize and cop, you know, put people in? I don’t know, different boxes, depending on their requirements.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [41:25]
Yep, yes, you’re right, you have to go with what each individual customer needs. Now, within your organisation, if you get it right, you’re servicing the majority in a way, which is different from what it was when you first started up the business. Now, when you started up a business, you had all the energy and enthusiasm to be able to deliver to 12345 customers. And so you can spend all your time doing that and tailor make and bespoke a quality solution for them. When you’ve got hundreds of customers, hundreds of 1000s of customers, you can’t do that. But what you do is you give them the best quality experience that you possibly can. And on an individual basis, then you can serve his customers better when they come to you and say, Oh, this is what I need. Rather than assuming that everybody wants the same and everybody wants to be treated the same. They don’t do the best in terms of offering what you can give them a good quality product, let them know that you’re there if they need you, and service them when they do need you. But you’ll find that the people that really do need you are going to be well, you can probably count them on the fingers of one hand.
David Ralph [42:49]
Take it back to resilience again. Because obviously there’s benefits. And we’ve been talking about how to sort of develop them. But what are the core benefits that people are going to get by being more resilient in their personal life and their business life Robin?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [43:05]
Well, when get the benefits of good resilience is the fact that you actually feel that you’re in a position where you can cope far better. You can make good quality decisions. You can build up appropriate relationships with people, you can learn through adversity, you can grow, you can develop, you can you can do things that you didn’t think were possible. It helps you to maintain a focus on what is important, what matters. It improves your happiness, your well being, it helps you with the balances that we’ve been talking about. It helps you to feel well, you feel better in yourself, you feel better in terms of the way in which you’re servicing people, it actually reduces sickness, and it reduces mortality. So through that, you can live a longer, happier, healthier life.
David Ralph [44:09]
So you can work 20 hours a day in your business until you’re 140 robbing.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [44:14]
But that’s the intention. Why should it not be that way? For me?
David Ralph [44:20]
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I, I’m a big Paul McCartney fan. And he’s at now he’s coming up at and he said the other day, he wants to live to 100 so that the Queen has to be 120 to give him a you know, a letter or whatever. And he always says, you know, there’s no point in retiring because what my retiring prom exactly as you said, it’s just things I love doing in a way that sort of gets very well paid. So let’s leave before we send you on the Sermon on the mind. Let’s give people the absolute three step process to build resilience by the end of The day they’re listening to this podcast, and they can do three things that actually it will it will change them for the better.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [45:08]
Well, I think the most important thing is to focus on the here. And now what is it that you can do today, that will make a difference. So look at where you are, who you are, what you are, and look at the way in which you’re interacting with the environment, that you find yourself in the job that you’re performing the role that you are performing, or the roles and look at working with those situations to do the best that you possibly can. And look at what you’ve got, and say to yourself in order to move forward, how much better it would be if I did this one small thing, either for me, or either for that other person, but do so from the heart and do so from a core set of values that you understand within yourself.
David Ralph [46:03]
Now, where are we heading with all this? Is it is it going to be something that the world is going to need more of and more? You know, as we said in the introduction is all going on around us, isn’t it? We’ve got phones, we’ve got televisions, we’ve got social media, we’ve got shopping and emails, is it going to come to a point when resilience is brought into schools as a sort of preemptive strike to going into teenager life and everything else?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [46:30]
Well, I think what we need to do in schools is not necessarily look at resilience, we need to look more at emotional intelligence as a core components, which will then drive resilience. So how can we make our pupils? How can we make our children? How can we make our teenagers more emotionally intelligent? How can we help them to build up those relationships that they need for the future? Those authentic relationships? And how do we help them to make better decisions?
David Ralph [46:59]
Well, I’ve got to make a decision. Now I’m going to press this button that I’ve got flashing in front of me because this is the part of the show called the Sermon on the mic when we get to send you back in time to have a one on one with the young Robin. And was he more resilient? Did he have to learn these skills? Well, we’re going to find out because I’m going to pray the music. And when it fades is your time to tell us this is the Sermon on the mic
Unknown Speaker [47:27]
here we go with the best bit of the show. Sir man on the mind, the sermon on?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [47:47]
Well, you’re gonna rope in, what I would say to you is that part of your character, part of your nature, part of who you are, is the fact that you’ve got very, very high levels of resilience built up through let high levels of calmness. Look at it as a strength. Other people do not see it as a strength. Other people see it as a weakness in you. Learn to work with it. Enjoy the selling role that you’re doing. Learn through that, learn how you are interacting with other people, learn the elements of empathy, learn the elements of making good decisions, you will make decisions, some of them will be good, some of the ones won’t be quite so good. Learn through those decisions. When you get to the point of life where you are where I am now, you will be happy and contented in the fact that you’ve made these decisions you’ve learned through them. And you’ve got to a good point in life. So just relish every moment that you are going through currently, because it’s special. Just enjoy it. I’ll give you a little example. I live in the northwest of England now. When I was in my 20s, I worked in London. I went back to London a couple of years ago to do some work. And I was working in one of the hospitals that I used to work in. And as I was driving home from that hospital, I went through a route of winter long routes that I used to travel quite frequently to go home. And when I got to a turning point, there was a real deep feeling of regret disappointment and unhappiness in the fact that I turned right instead of turning left to go back home, to go to where we used to live with the family. And the fact is, no matter what happened, I could not go down that route. The family wasn’t there anymore. They’ve grown up, they’ve moved on. They are not the family that I had at that point. Moment. So whilst they couldn’t enjoy it, then make sure that you enjoy it now. Ah,
David Ralph [50:09]
great advice. I love that one. So Robin, what’s the number one best way that our audience can connect with you, sir?
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [50:16]
Well, the best way that they can connect with me is by going on to the E i for change website, e i for change.com. That’s ei with the number four change.com. And there’s a contact sheet there. Or you can contact me by email, which is Robin, our OB I Ed, at ei fortune.com. Please, if you feel inclined to send me an email, send me an email, I’d be more than happy to engage with you
David Ralph [50:45]
write stuff, and we have all the links on the show notes to make it as easy as possible. So Robin, thank you so much for spending time with us today, joining up those dots and helping us develop our resilience. And of course, please come back again when you got more dots to join up because I do believe that joining those dots and connecting our past is the best way to build our futures. Robin, thank you so much.
Resilience Expert Robin Hills [51:07]
Thank you, David. It’s been wonderful really, really enjoyed it.
David Ralph [51:14]
Mr. Robin hills from AI for a change. So do you feel resilient? Do you feel like you’re pushing yourself? Do you feel like you’re getting bolder, I think for a big period of time, I’ve coasted and I’m aware of that now. I just think I needed to sort of relax and allow things to sort of float around me. But certainly now I can see that you’ve got to push yourself you’ve got to tackle problems head on. And that’s where the good stuff comes. There’s good stuff is always one side ahead of a challenge. So go for it and if you need myself or if you need Robin you know where to connect with us. But until next time, we will be here taking you to the Dream Land. Yes, my friends that will see what we do. And look after yourselves and stay sexy. Cheers. See ya. Bye bye.
Outro [52:04]
That’s the end of Join Up Dots. You heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action. Create your future create your life. Easy only you live God. We’ll be back again real soon. Join Up Dots during the gods Join Up Dots. Gods Jolina Join Up Dots
