Welcome to Future Lab, where we explore the cutting edge of healthspan. I'm Danny Urbinder and with me is my co host, Dr. Denise Finesse. Hello, everyone. And Trevor Hendy. G'day, mate. Now that's very Australian, isn't it? G'day, mate. Just to remind us that we're in Australia. Yes. Now, We are focusing on a series in, in Healthspan, in, sorry, Future Lab, uh, where we're going to do a life mastery series where we speak to those people that have had enormous successes and aspects of their lives.

And this really feeds into this idea I was going to say, we've listened to the listeners. Yeah, that's exactly right. You know, and what we're finding is people want information and really distilled information. So we've got a masterclass series. that we're going to bring the best people in the best areas and give masterclasses so people can really, you know, our listeners can take away exactly what they want.

Well, that's the masterclass. And then we've got our life mastery. People that have walked journeys and been through all the trials and tribulations. Yeah. So one is going to be sort of focusing on, I suppose, more the science or the technical side and the other is actually going to be, well, this is how people live it in practice. 

And today being our first, what better person to actually have in our life mastery session. Then. Mr. Trevor Hendy himself. And just before you kick off, Trev, I also want to clarify with those masterclasses, not just the science too, but actually the action steps. We want to, we're going to have some soon about exercise and what you can actually do.

So the science, what backs it up, then also the actions. But then today being our first life mastery session, we're going to hear about the challenges, what you've been through and how. We can all learn from that as well. I'll vulnerably share some of my story and there'll be a little bit of things that people can put into play.

And proudly as well. Yeah. I mean, look,  just feeding into everything that we just said, just looking at your story, Trevor. I mean, I know that we are really starting to get to know each other now, but I mean, just looking at that on paper, it's very, very impressive. I mean, you have had, um, really such a successful life, not just in sport.

That was my mission, by the way, to have my life on paper look very impressive.  Well, the tick tick. No, it wasn't really. But anyway, but secretly that, that story certainly extends well beyond sport, but really for any one of us who knows you and your story. And I certainly know that from when you were doing your iron man.

Um, That's what really first sort of impressed me. So maybe you can take us back to that and we can see how your story has evolved and where that's taken you because it really has taken you in some very different directions, more about the individual. But let's just start with you. I wanted to say something first, because I think what's interesting about this is we've interviewed some amazing people on this and I love doing interviews and I get.

I go on other people's podcasts and everything, and I do love to speak because you build up all the stuff that you share, you've learned that you want to, that you want to share. But what I noticed, and I've, I've reflected on this a little while ago, when I was the Iron Man, everything was outward facing, public persona, very well known.

The series was very popular in Australia, et cetera. And so it was very loud and noisy and it was easy to know what I was about. because that part of me was very well published and advertised. But since I've gone through this sort of transformation, which we'll get into later, um, it's been very quiet and I've learned way more that is helpful in the quiet times than I did in the noisy times.

But because it's quiet, I've not necessarily communicated a lot of it. So I love every, any opportunity to talk about the transition of. discovering the depth of life from the outward facing good looking stuff to the inward feeling like, Oh, I've got some things to deal with. So I'm excited. We're going to go in deep with that.

Excited about doing this. I think we need to start really right at the beginning. Um, and that is for everything that people know you for,  And that's surf life saving and that's the Ironman competition. So what, what, what originally drew you to that, to that sport? Can I just, even though we think everyone knows you, we might be getting some international guests or someone that is a younger person that perhaps didn't even know much about the art.

When I grew up, it was such a big deal, but it's not such a big deal. So maybe Ironman even is in the competition. If you're over 45, there's a fair chance that you'll remember my name. I'm 46 and only just remember. There you go. So perhaps even. Would it be okay for you to explain what is the competition, and what was involved?

So the Ironman that we're talking about is ocean Ironman racing. Ironman internationally is renowned with triathlon and the Hawaiian Ironman in particular. And it actually has the biggest the copyright on the, you know, on the, the name Iron Man is patented to triathlon. Well, triathlon, but it was granted to them by Australian Surf Lifesaving because it originally owned the name of Iron Man.

Um, and Australian Surf Lifesaving maintained or retained the use of the word Iron Man because it was around. 1966, long story short, was an Australian team went to the USA, raced the Californian lifeguards and they had this race called the Ironman where they did a swim race in the ocean. They're lifeguards, so they're going to rescue people out of the ocean.

So their rescue skills were built on how do we get out and get somebody. So there's a swim leg, there's a board leg or a paddle board leg where you paddle out a board that you can put someone on and rescue them and bring them back. And in California, it was a dory leg. And they used to have this two person dory where two people would row out this little boat facing backwards, row out, pull a person into it and row them back.

That was a rescue piece of rescue equipment in the 60s, 70s. They still race it in California now. So that was the Ironman race. So the Australians did it, did really well at it. Didn't know how to row the dory, brought it back and went, well, let's convert it into Australian terms. And it was swim leg, a board leg, and a dory.

an ocean ski or an ocean kayak leg. So we have these long skis, they're 17 foot 6 long in the old terms. Um, and you paddle those out, drag someone onto it and paddle them back. Now Wasn't there a run leg there as well? The run leg connects all of it together. So you run in, The order is always actually, um, oscillated.

So picked out of a hat on the morning. So it might be swim board, ski board, swim, ski board, ski, swim, ski, swim board, whatever it is, those particular choices. So that order is picked out and then you have to race, um, through what's generally in Australian and world championships, it's a 12 minute race. So it takes about four minutes to get out through both breaks, the shore break and the back break of the ocean to go around a set of swim cans and back in that's about four minutes extended a bit further out because paddle boards are faster and that's how long the paddle board takes to get out and back extend it further out because skis are faster and that's how long the ski leg gets to take around and then you've got the run legs in between and then a sprint to the finish.

So that's traditionally remember. Yeah, it's probably what everyone remembers, you know, it's that sprint to the finish and traditionally and in Australia, people would remember Grant Kenny if they're over a certain age and Grant was the first name. Yeah. He won the junior and senior Ironman. So he was under 18, won the junior title.

Yeah. And immediately afterwards. one, the open title. And he did that at Maroochydore Beach in 1980.  That captured the imagination of Australians. Back then we had no internet, so we had no social media. We didn't have Netflix or Foxtel or Facebook or Instagram. We did have Nutragrain. And we had Nutragrain and we had Channel 7, Channel 9 and Channel 10 and ABC.

Yeah. So, people got their sport only through the newspaper, the radio, or those four stations. And so,  when it was, you know, the Australian Championships were on and all of a sudden in the news and everything, there's a young guy trying to win, he's won the Queensland Junior and Senior. He could win the Australian and everybody watched it and it captured the attention of the nation.

At the time, Nutri Grain, Kellogg's Nutri Grain, went, Oh, we can see something here. The first ad that he did was for Golden Breed t shirts. And, and, and basically, um, his ad was I wear Golden Breed or I wear no shirt at all. And you know, and then he runs off, takes his shirt off and runs into the water. That was a very 70s. 

Yeah. And 70 style, but early eighties, yeah, 81. And at the same time, Kellogg's Nutri Grain and he, I think Tony Greg used to have just like a cricket bat with holes in it, you know, and he was the famous English cricketer that was a commentator in Australia. And then Grant Kenny did the ad where swim, run, paddleboard, you know, corn, oats, wheat, you know, all this sort of stuff.

And so it was this whole. advertisement for, you know, Nutri Grain. But that, um, whilst the nutrition is questionable, the actual, um, at that particular time, that was a massive campaign and it put him on literally the breakfast tables of most Australians. And that promoted I mean, he was the, the, the face of Australian health and fitness at that point, wasn't he?

He really was. Yeah. And a golden haired, you know, big goofy smile, sweetheart of a human. And he went on to win Four, um, four Australian Ironman open in a row. So broke the record. Three had been won before, but not even in a row. He won four in a row. So changed the sport. He then switched to kayaking and raced in the LA Olympics and got a bronze medal over there in kayaking.

So he was like this incredible athlete and inspiration. So at that same period of time, 1980, I'm 12, you know, so while Grant's winning at 16, 17, I'm 12 years of age. So I'm in the nippers. Um, and I'm feeling I've traveled around Australia with my family was born in Melbourne. And, uh, my father felt like I've told this story a little bit before, but my father felt like he had everything he was supposed to have being born being in Melbourne.

He was a foreman of a building site and a construction company, built his own house, had the, the, the. My five year old, a sister, myself, a pet rabbit, a pet dog, you know, a picket fence around a house that he'd built, a beautiful wife. He had the whole picture and he felt as though,  um, something was missing.

Like he had everything he was supposed to have. And it's probably important to say this part at the start, as far as, people being demonstrations. My father felt something was missing. And the two things he said was, everyone's talking about on their holidays going to the U. S. What about seeing our own country?

So I would say he didn't realize at the time, but he was being called to country. There was some sort of a, you know, energetic pull towards seeing our nation and experiencing it fully, rather than just Melbourne. And also, but there's something else. I'm not sure whether the kids should grow up in Melbourne.

I'm not sure whether they should just follow in my footsteps exactly. So we traveled around Australia for two years, settled on the Gold Coast when I was, um, five. I learned to swim in the Daly River. Northern Territory, which is now where you go to watch crocodiles. And you don't come from a swimming background.

Didn't come from a swimming background. So we used to go run up and down the sand dune all day up from the camp that we stayed in. And then the whole camp, like four families or so, we'd all drift down the Daly River, back to the camp ground, climb out and camp. And we'd stay there for a couple of weeks over school holidays.

We do that every day. I learned to swim in that. That's now literally where you go to see five meter crocodiles. So back then they'd been hunted for a long period of time and they were trying to hide from humans, but they were there. And the last time we left there, we got a postcard about three weeks later with a picture with a story about how they found a five meter crocodile sitting on that sand dune.

So I've always said that that's probably why I don't like being at the back of the pack, you know, cause somewhere in the back of the pack. deep in my subconscious. I was trying to be upfront.  But um, I learned to swim there, settle on the Gold Coast, join the Nippers, which is the junior surf life saving movement in California.

They have junior lifeguards. Um, what attracted you to that? I mean, was it your choice or? No, what attracted me was my best friend walking around the corner saying,  Hey, Trevor, as I'm walking towards him, um, um, we've got nippers are starting up this Sunday. Do you want to come down, you know, and join? And I had the words formed in my mouth, ready to say, no, thanks.

Not for me. And my father stepped next to me and overheard this and said, he'd love to come down. I was thinking, no, I would not love to come to speak about a pivotal moment in one's life. I mean, that could have gone either way, just that moment in time. Left to my own devices, I would have avoided everything.

I mean, your life would have been completely different. Yeah, so when I travelled around Australia, I had my mum and dad, and I could just grab onto their coattails, I could grab onto their belt. You know, we climbed, um, Uluru, called Ayers Rock back then, and, um, Um, all the way, I ran all the way up. And when I turned to come down, this is a very young kid.

When I turned to come down, um, one of our friends dropped their water bottle and it crashed all the way down and just watched it disappear off the end of the cliff. And then I all of a sudden realized that could be me freaked out. and grabbed onto my father and I wouldn't let go of him the whole way back down, you know, and that kind of summarized my early life was super adventurous.

If, if I didn't see fear or danger, but if I saw fear and danger, I'm not straying anywhere from my father or my mother, I'm like holding onto them. So when I'm invited to go to nippers, it's like, no thanks with people. I don't know to do things I don't know about in the ocean, you get stuffed, you know, and my dad saying he'd love to.

And I'm like, I would not love to, you know, went down, cried the first day, You were at what age? Uh, eight years of age, and we had to swim six laps across the Surfside Six swimming pool, across a motel, across and back a motel swimming pool. I've swam all around Australia now at this stage. And when I got up, dad's like, no problems, he'll do that.

But I looked at the other people and they're swinging their arms around and there's some sort of an energy from the parents and everything as well. It was like, you know, smash them, you know, and I looked at it and whatever it was, I just. I bore my eyes out. I'm not jumping in there and racing against other people.

So the competition racing thing was not only not natural to me, it was like an abomination to me. It was like the opposite to what I wanted to do. I felt threatened. I felt insecure. I felt small. I felt powerless. I felt in danger. I didn't know what was going to happen next. You know, very natural, like simple things.

A young, young kid.  Don't leave me dad. Don't make me do this. So to my father's credit, what he did was he He pulled me over, I'm crying holding on to him, and he said to them, Yeah, go ahead, run the race, and he held on to me. And I just looked and I'm like, I'm probably thinking, vaguely remember thinking, um, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm, I'm definitely not doing this, this is great, thanks dad, you know.

And he waited till everyone finished all the different age groups, and then they went down to the beach to do the thing, and he, and he held me there, and he just, And he said, all right, mate, let's come down to it. And I'm like, yeah, I'm thinking, good. I didn't have to do it. Got away with this. And he said, all right, now do your six laps. 

And so I love this part of the story. I say this to parents all the time, because he took something that was super confronting to me and he took the confront away from it  and he said, But I know you can do those six laps and I know it'll be really good for you and I know it'll break a pattern of not doing something.

So I did the six laps and I don't remember really resisting that thinking, Oh, okay, then, you know, probably a little bit shitty and pissed off at him. But I did the six laps and got out of it and it set up a lifelong pattern for me. And that was, whenever I ran away from something, I always found myself coming back and going, what was your, what was your attitude at the time?

Then when you were doing those six laps, do you remember what you were thinking and how you approached it? I vaguely remember just thinking, Oh, this is way better than racing against them. I'll do my six laps. Right. So it was, did you put your heart and soul into it or you just did it, just did it, got out of it.

Dad's happy. I'm happy. We've both had a win here. You know, I didn't have to race against those. Yeah. Idiots, you know, it was a small step. It was a small step. But what it did was said, ah, you didn't run away and do nothing and become said a lifelong pattern of actually, if I don't want to do it, I'm running away.

You did it, but you took apart the part that was confronting out. So we'll see in my story, I've been through relationship breakups and I've been through major confronting things in my life that, um, I actually didn't, my father set that pattern for the rest of my life that I never could walk away from.

I'd always go, I'll go lick my wounds and I'll come back and I'll do it in a way that's less confronting. And then eventually I'll confront it at the same level that the original fear was at. And my whole life has been defined by that one moment. Uh, literally it's changed my life. Amazing. So what was it?

What was your progress then from there? Went down to the flags and there's a second part, went down to the beach flags and in the beach flags, you get a few pieces of hose that are all cut up and they stick up out of the sand. And if there's 10 kids in it, there's, they're laying down in a line on the sand with their feet on that line, face down, facing the opposite direction to the finish line.

The finish line is there. fifteen metres away, it's another line in the sand, and there's nine pieces of flag put in. So it's in between each person there's a flag. And so they say, heads down, feet together, heads down, and they blow the whistle, and you jump up, spin around, run to the other end. And dive and try and get one of those pieces of flags.

So 10 people run for a flag and nine people get one.  And it's musical beach flags. And then you run back and nine people lay down, there's eight flags, eight people lay down, seven flags. So and it's designed, it's all rescue stuff. So it's designed as a junior surf life. So I'm laying on the beach, just chilling.

Oh, there's a rescue. How quick can you get up and turn around and run out and rescue that person? So it's about response times and all that sort of stuff. And it's ridiculous and funny, but it's amazing to watch the best in the world do this, this event. And there's also a lot behind it. Like you said.

said, you're actually rescuing and saving people's lives. The whole purpose. Yes, it's a sport and it's fun, but you're actually set up to,  to stop people from dying out in the ocean. So yeah. Yeah. The whole purpose of Nippers, junior surf life savers and life saving as a whole is to do two things, is to make the individual capable and confident to go out in any conditions to rescue someone.

That's an internal thing. And then externally for them to be able to go out and rescue someone and bring them back. So the purpose is to rescue someone, but you've got to be prepared to be able to do that. So you got to get past your fears and insecurities and get over waves and under waves and learn about the ocean and whatever's got that person into trouble, you need to be better than that trouble, you know, so for you to perform the role of getting someone.

So it's this thing that we'll talk about when we get to the top of the tree is that some of the best athletes in the world do it. Ali Day, who's the current, you know, um, well, Finn Askew is the current world champion, but Ali Day, best in the world in so many different disciplines, um, is a freak athlete.

Like he could stand up against anyone in the world. He has a VO2 max that would match a cross country skier, you know, like it's absolutely incredible athlete. And he's a lifesaver. Yeah. And he grew up rescuing people in his spare time on a weekend. It's like, wow, it's a crazy thing that's happened. So we're doing the beach flags and they go heads down, feet together, heads down, blow the whistle.

And I go up and I hop up. And for those that can visually, can't visually see what I'm doing, I'm hopping up a bit casually, spin around. All I see is nine bums just racing down the field to, and then nine bums dive at all these nine beach flags.  two people dive on one and start wrestling for it. And they leave this one just sitting there.

And I run up stone motherless last so far behind, I run up and I get a flag. I'm running along thinking loser, just like I thought I always was, you know, like the insecurities of being a young guy that hadn't socialized much. And I get a flag and I'm like, I got a flag. I'm not a loser. I've got something.

And I turn around and my mom is over on the sideline going like, you know, not probably saying this, but in my mind, Trevi got a flag, Trevi got a flag, you know? And I'm like, And mum seemed to be impressed about me getting this flag. And so this has changed my life as well. It's like, hmm, I had a win and I seem to be more approved of or better from the win.

My mum didn't intend that. She's just excited that I, you know, that I didn't bail out and feel like I was last. So I get the flag and I go back and nine people lie down and.  Whistle goes and we jump up. I'm watching eight bums as I casually get up, run down in front of me and two people jump for a flag again. 

And so third time lucky. So second, I run over and there's a flag and I just pick it up. I look around at my mom straight away. Like, do I get the same level of, I'd look at my mom and she's like, yes, you got another flag. And she must've been thinking the little dipshit, you know,  you know, I'm sure she wasn't, my mom would be thinking, I'm just happy for him.

You know, that he. they get a bit, a bit of confidence, you know, so I run back down. Now I'm thinking mental note to self, go as the whistle goes, you know, don't leave this to chance anymore. Like, and so something brewed inside of me in that moment of Okay. This is, I'm not dying out here. No one's killing me.

Uh, this is okay. But if I jump up a bit earlier, like really soon as that whistle goes, I might get a flag. And this is pretty impr cause mum's enjoying it. This is good. I'm having a good, good win here. And simple story, but the whistle goes and I jump up, spin around and I run down with every and I'm level with everyone else and I dive and I get my own flag.

The long story short is end up in the final two. And in the final two, now I'm starting to think, Hey, I'm okay. I can do this. And in the final two, I lose. I think in the early days of me being a public speaker, I think I told the story that I won because I couldn't let go of the winner, but I'm pretty sure I got second.

Um, and I don't really remember that part cause it wasn't the major part. I just remember getting the flags early on, but what it did was those two moments, my father saying, just follow something through. And then this healthy slash unhealthy double edged sword thing of getting confidence in yourself.

But your confidence is built on whether you almost defeated somebody else or you're almost like, I'm not the one that lost.  So therefore, there also seems to be also a sense of, I feel good when I get the cheers and approval of others as well. Absolutely. And my mother and father were so important to me.

And people love winning. Yeah, you what you're talking about with your parents too. You, you know, when my son kicks a goal at soccer, I'd never wanna be one of those parents that makes him think he has to win. But you do get excited. Good on you. Well done. You get praise for these things. Mm-Hmm. So that feeds something.

Yeah. My son, son, you said a double set. Double edged sword. I mean, it's your confidence. You're building, you know, your sense of self. And we'll take, we'll take what you said and it'll come out later in the story. Yeah, go on. Um, yeah. But just jumping forward, my son, you know, TJ is in the Ironman circuit and I have a hidden subconscious sense.

And I've done a fair bit of work to let this go so that my love for him is unconditional. That got you, mate. Love you. How'd you go? How do you feel? How was it for you? Did you break through? Do you feel confident and proud of yourself? You know, not are you waiting for us to be proud of you? Cause I'm proud of you no matter what.

you know, and sometimes friends will say to me, because I'm a bit of an exemplar in life, I'm sort of fit and healthy. I don't drink. There's all sorts of different things that I've grown into not doing and doing that are probably out of the ordinary because I want to live a long healthy life. And so friends will often say to me, Oh, you'd be really proud of me.

And they assume because they've gone exercising and I, and I stop and I say, but well, I'm always really proud of you. By the way, like, and you should be proud of you, I love you, you know, but tell me your story about how I should be proud of you, but, but I'm proud of you because I just think you're amazing, you know, and I've, cause I've learned that because I had to learn that for myself and it's off the back of what you said, looking for other's approval.

And so TJ will race and I, it's been really hard for me to shake this feeling deep inside of me. It's like a cellular feeling deep in my psychology of, yeah, but if he wins, you'll feel so good about himself. So what do I really want him to do? It's not that I want him to win. I want him to feel so good about himself.

And then there's this other tangled part, which is, but if he wins, other people think he's good too, and they'll leave him alone and they won't hassle him. And he'll get, he'll get an easy path through life and he'll be given good things because that was my experience. So how do you coach your son then to balance that?

Because as you said, you want him to feel good. Winning is a good way of feeling good, but it's also a risk that you can define yourself. My son is now 29, so it's been a long time, and I haven't been coaching, and what I've been doing is sharing the journey with him of releasing that. And as he's releasing it, it's like me, 2.

0. So as he's releasing it, I'm letting it go too. I'm just going, Oh, what do you feel then? So you're healing vicariously through your training? I'm not winning vicariously through my son. I'm healing vicariously through my son and quite openly and honestly about it. So my other son, Bailey, he's um, he's won Australian Open Jiu Jitsu titles and all sorts of stuff.

So there's a bit of competition in the family. And, um, and Bay has got his own journey, his own challenges and all sorts of different things that have also stemmed off my apple tree. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, both of them. the mother tree and the father tree, um, but I'll often just wake up in the morning and I'll be wrestling through an old trait or an old energy that I'm realizing is still in me.

And I'll just  put the message, the text message, and I'll flip audio and I'll go, Hey boys,  Um, just want to share something with you. I've just got this overwhelming feeling that I'm not enough and I realize it goes back to da, da, da, da, da. And I, you know, I really feel like a piece of shit in this space and you know, by a while I just wanted to share it with you in case you could relate, you know, cause I know you guys have been on a big journey lately, um, but yeah, I feel better just telling you and I feel a bit emotional and vulnerable and I love you guys and hope you have a good day, you know, you know, and I'm in, I'm in Melbourne and you're tearing up right now.

Yeah, I can feel it because I feel. You know, I feel at whatever level of, let's call it weird words, but consciousness and awareness that I'm at, of what I've become aware of is that's a better way to walk the journey with your children than the idea that I'm the example, you know, that I'm the positive example.

I want to be the vulnerable example, the real example. What really comes across to me is that sense of consciousness that you've got with yourself now. I want to be. Because we all carry those feelings, those negative. You know, our baggage, our past experiences that  we can feel them. We don't know what they relate to.

We don't really explore them. In fact, we likely run away from them. And what you're telling me is in fact, right now, your purpose is no, no. I want to sit with that. I want to explore that. I want to understand what that is and then relate that to the people that I love.  Make the world a better place my own.

And just quickly, you know, it's bringing up for me something that I've shared before. And maybe our first episode was about my father. So my father's still alive at the moment with dementia and all the declining features of those things. And,  but you know, thinner and skinnier. And when I pull the sheets back to help him out, you know, He's non composed most of the time.

He's communicating, but he, but only through noises and eyes fluttering and, uh, you know, excited to see us or whatever, but he's stuck behind this, this curtain of sickness and disease, you know, um, degradation and I'm watching him fail. And I know that. I can see the curve and where it goes. And I'm looking at my father and I'm going, my father was my greatest role model.

And what if I, if I went back to the moment, my father said in Melbourne, which is where we are right now in Melbourne, he said, there's more to life than this, this pattern that I've lived in this model that I've, he'd modeled very well. All of his friends thought he was an exemplar and they thought he was crazy when he, when he gave it all away to travel around Australia, sold the house and got a caravan.

You've given it all away. You're out of the market at the wrong time, you know, all this sort of stuff, even back in the early seventies. Oh, it's not a good time to sell in Melbourne. You won't get back in and all this sort of stuff. It's crazy. And he gave it all away because he had a sense there's something bigger than this thing that promises me so much, that I followed to its logical end, and yet I don't feel full.

And so if we go back to what you just said, he set that tone in me that every time I've had a sense of, uh, comfort and, ah, I've, I've won now, I've got the world at my feet and I've got respect or whatever it is, I've, in the early days. Yes. I took it and grabbed it and ran with it. And this will come into the story a bit later too.

And it, it started to actually degrade me, like even my own morals and my own ethics and what I stood for and what I valued and the way I carry myself as a human. On the surface, it was still the guy, guy next door and very popular and easy to be around. But I began to be, Take all the sugars in life and everything else.

Let's go, let's go through that journey then. Okay. So obviously you're starting to get your confidence. You're starting to win. Um, something has awakened in you that competitive spirit. Yes. Um, so where did that take you from that point? Not far. So what happened was I just didn't want to go much further than being competitive.

but I never won anything for a long period of time. And then as a young kid, I was skinny, freckly, late developer, no hairs under the arms, underdeveloped, you know, even at the male level, like, Oh no, I'm not packing a big punch here. You know, like all the things that boys think of. Right. And everyone else has gone through puberty, got hairs under their arms and chest and everything else.

And I'm small little guy and I'm not winning much at all, not doing much, but I would try and, but there was a psychological barrier in me that, yeah, I want to keep up. But I don't want to be last, but, um, I don't want to win or succeed or prove or perform or whatever. I don't know what the barrier then was.

It's like, I didn't want to stand out. Um, I didn't want to potentially be attacked for, for being a winner or whatever it was. Cause I just want to winning, winning scared me a hundred percent. And I love the Nelson Mandela. You know, quote, um, Our deepest fear is not that we're inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we're powerful beyond measure.

It's our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most, you know. And I, so we think our deepest fear is losing or failing or being left out or left behind. And at the level, the first level that we explore it, my experience is that is our deepest fear at that level. And then when we start to process and discover and get beyond that level, we realize there's a hidden one behind it.

I'm actually more fearful of actually standing out and shining and being an exemplar and winning and whatever else. Because why do we fear that? Because it sounds like everything that we would want. I'm going to go a bit woo woo, which might come in later is that I believe that we're born with certain traits in us.

And I think there's certain archetypes in the world and there's certain archetypal heroes. that if we look at, and we, what are the earliest ones? Jesus Christ. It's an archetypal hero, you know, and I wasn't religious and, you know, I didn't, we were Church of England, but we never went. And it was, you know, I just got the Bible story read to me so I could relate to it, but I was never religious. 

You know, he was an archetypal hero. And what did he do? He performed miracles. He healed people. He lived with love. He walked the earth with his heart open. He judged nobody, you know, dah, dah, dah. And what did he get for Crucified. Yeah. And that's it. You put yourself out there. You are putting yourself.

You're making yourself vulnerable. Exactly. For people to want to tear you down. You need to be strong enough to deal with that. Yes. If we, and so we earmarked this part of the conversation for later and went archetypically Energetically, at a quantum level, which I know you write into, right, at a cellular level, but deep where energy resides and creates the life of a cell and everything else, we've got patterns and memories and archetypes and all sorts of things that occur.

Who comes along next? Well, there's many. But if, if you jump to the witches, you know, they were witches. What were they? They were practicing women who were in the lunar cycles that were doing healthy medicines, you know, that were trying to, a lot of them were actually birthing the wives of the noblemen, you know, and all this sort of stuff.

And the noblemen started going, Hey, they've actually pretty good. Like they've cured this and cured that. Because at that particular point in time, if you had a sickness or an illness that wouldn't go away, you're a sinner. There was a reason it was that God was punishing you or whatever it may be. So, um, church and state were very much married together in the 14th, 15th, 16th hundreds, you know.

And so these women were saying, no,  no, you just take a little bit of, you know, St. John's wort, or you take it, have some of these herbs, have some of these herbs, or these things, yeah, put your feet on the earth, or,  And then you'll be better. And that people were doing it and it started to build this momentum.

And yeah, some of them were probably worshipping a few other things or whatever, but it actually went into this area. So there was laws passed that you don't have to prove someone, you just have to accuse someone that can be burned at the stake.  the light. They were having successes in their field and threatened, threatened  the establishment energy.

And that's what we're fearing though, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. They might've, they might've threatened church and state, but behind church and state is a certain energy. So the people in church and state are going, yeah, well, I can be someone and I can have control and I can get all the goodies and I can, you know, have power.

I don't have to be left out and I don't have to be a pauper and fit, let them eat cake and you know, all this sort of stuff. And so if you look at just a, at a more of an archetypical level and a helicopter view, the earth has had this energy around for a long time that you can either be in power, power, grade, and control. 

Or you can be in understanding, love and acknowledgement, to use a great teacher of mine's terms. He said, you can make two triangles, one that spirals down into hell, you know, living hell. Um, and you're making deals with whatever energy you want to call it, or the other one that spirals out into expansion and we work together, power, greed and control or understanding, love and acknowledgement.

And at that age, when you were starting to get into your competitive spirit, there was something holding you back, which we just talked about. Ever wondered what a healthier, stronger future you might look like with Melrose future lab, Australia's first longevity supplement range. You can now optimize your health span routine by supporting cellular energy, metabolic wellbeing, and muscle maintenance, as well as much, much more.

And you can find this range at chemist's warehouse and leading health food stores. So And you look through, which has got burnt at the stake? Nelson Mandela, jailed. John F. Kennedy, shot. Malcolm X, shot. But you weren't aware of that when you were 10, 12, 14 years of age. But this is the point, right? It's energetic.

Do you have to be aware of it if it's energetically hanging around your head? If you live in a society that has a frequency and a vibration that says, you don't have to be aware of this until you start standing out. And I, I honestly believe, Um, from my own experiences and strange, you know, memories that I've had, I'm like, Oh, I, I, I feel like we are all, this is just a viewpoint.

It's a crazy one, but I feel, um, that we are all eternal beings. This is what I've come to experience or feel that  potentially you could look at many lifetimes. Like I come back to learn this lesson, that lesson, this lesson, until I get all of lessons together. And then they all line up and they turn into a congruent, beautiful.

Masterpiece that might be a life well lived, you know, that shines a light or it becomes a beacon for others. So I look at all those great people we just mentioned and we go, Oh, they were all versions of that which were taken out by the planetary energy at the time. So for myself, I didn't, I just, for some reason, I don't even know why I didn't want to stand out.

And it was with me the whole time, the whole time, meaning through childhood, I didn't want to stand out. I just want to stay and hold onto my mom's coattails. So I didn't want to stand out. But I've, I've now developed, I don't want to be left behind. I don't want to be last, but I don't want to be first. So I'll just do enough work and enough effort to not lose. 

You can screw winning because, um, you can, you can get it. So you consciously made the decision that I unconsciously subconsciously made those decisions. I can consciously now recognize it because I could feel, ah, yes, I was like, no, no, no, no, I don't, I don't want standing out. I want comfort. I want to be liked.

I want to be admired. I want to be acknowledged. I want to be included. I want to be believed in. I want to be good enough, um, and seen as maybe attractive so that a girl might couple up with me because then I could be more like my mom and dad who are my heroes. But I don't want any more than that. I don't want to, I don't want to be someone who's going to draw attention to myself.

I just want to be loved. So what switched and when? Well, what happened was you can't stay wedged in one place for too long because ultimately the right people came along, particularly one person who was just the right bully for the right amount of time in my life to say, and he was the winner. He stood out and he was like, he, he, part of him winning was keeping me down because I was on the rise and I was starting to explore the idea of winning and succeeding and paddling faster and everything is now I'm talking 15 and 16, but he was the guy that, that really  And part of him loved me because I made his teams better and he liked being around me and we're good friends and all this sort of stuff.

But another part of him that was the winner was like, hang on a second, keep him in his box though, because he's actually got quite a bit of talent. He could be better than me. So. What happened was I had this experience of being bullied. I had this experience of being, you know, flushed and initiated in the surf club at a certain age, like 14, 15 and humiliated.

And well, now we're all in the same club because we've all been humiliated. And now we know what power is. Power is where you, because you've been humiliated within a year or two, you can chase the other young kids around and humiliate them. And that's what power, it was a terrible rites of passage that took you into power, greed and control, not into understanding, love and acknowledgement.

It did however, so no victim story here, what it did was it woke up my power, but the power was now tangled in, in I need to win because I never want to have that feeling again. So I literally went from never won a race at 16 years of age to being Australian Open champion. So I was fifth in my own surf club as a junior in 300 clubs in Australia.

Out of six people and the kid that got six was my best mate and I talked him into racing the Ironman at club championships because he couldn't paddle a ski, then I wouldn't get lost. And there's my story again. There it is revealing itself. I got fifth out of six as a first year junior. As a second year junior, um,  you know, six months after this snap, I got third in Australia in the juniors.

As a, um, you  You were also though, physically developing as well at that stage. I was beginning to physically develop and I was beginning to mentally develop. I was coming out from under the rock and I was literally, and the anger  and the, the power that was in the anger and the rage and the upset, no one's ever going to make me feel like that again.

So that one,  Not the one kid, those experiences of feeling underneath all those experiences, but he was a key, beautiful, powerful part of it because it was all symbolized in those moments where one's the winner and one's the loser. And our, our crew, our senior crew used to say, winners are grinners and the rest can please themselves.

And it's like, you're basically first or you're last. Yeah. And there's some, you say, you're first or you're last. You know, it's either first or, you know, and they called it, um, the consolation prizes and so it wasn't the silver medal. It was first runner up, you know, it was all this sort of stuff that was like basically said you're either a winner or a loser.

So it was very polarizing and it was very much like in my mind, the, by the way, that young guy, he was good looking, blonde, you know. He's a really actually cool human, you know, like he's built like, you know, like, uh,  carved by the hands of Zeus, you know, like he was like incredible, got all the girls, got everything.

I, I got the courage up to, to ask this girl out and there's a long story, which I won't go into, but I got the courage to ask this girl out and she was like a promotional model from Brisbane for a radio station. They brought all the promotional girls down. They did their bronze medallion. Um, yeah. And they were paid.

I had to be the patient because my father was the chief instructor. And he always had this thing where he'd say, Trev, do you want to be the patient for the bronze squad this week? And it'd be like 50 year old men in midlife crisis. And they'd had garlic and a few rums the night before. And they'd be pretending to do a recess.

Right over me, they rescued me with their little manoobs hanging in my face and, and I, I'd be like, oh God, I'm a patient for dad's bloody bronze squad and doing my bit for the world. And I hated it, you know? I enjoyed helping my dad, but I was like, oh God, I think that could've been better. What was he drinking?

You know, like, and I'd walk away going, thanks dad. Yeah. See, I couldn't get far enough away. And then one day my dad goes, Trev, do you want to be the patient for the bronze squad this Sunday? It's their pre assessment, you know? And I'm like, nah, dad, I, I've really got to get bit this other thing. And he goes, oh, it's the girls squad from Brisbane.

And I had this one girl that I had my eyes on the whole time. And I all of a sudden pictured her laying down and giving me recess and not her man boobs, but you know, I'm not breathing.  And her leaning right over me. And all of a sudden I was like, dad, I'm available. You know, and I was there 15 minutes early, ready to go.

Always happy to help you dad. You know, and, um, and in, in, in raw, real honest terms, not politically correct terms. I was a young guy just going, hell yeah. You know, and rescued by this woman of my dreams, you know, in my, in the picture that I had in my head and she rescued me, resuscitated me. I actually correct them.

I'm like, I'm lying there and she's. resuscitating me too fast. So I'm going and one and two, and I'm counting cause I knew the count so perfectly. And she's like looking at me, smiling. I'm like, thank you. And she's, you know, and then the instructor says, Oh, young lady, perfect timing. You went past whole squads passed on that.

Well done. You know, and she's looking at me like, yes. And she's thinking, thank you so much for your help. And I'm thinking, thank you so much for the greatest day of my life. You know,  we're both wet right here and you're laying over top of me, you know, this is incredible. I never saw this happening, you know?

Yeah. And, um, and I, she said to me, you know, do you want to, I said, I wasn't going to tell the story, but now I am, but she said to me, do you want to, um, Oh, I seen you really good on the paddle board next week. We're to do the board rescues. Do you want to take me out on the paddle board and show me how to paddle and catch the waves?

Cause I'm scared of the waves. I said, yeah, no worries. Look, I've got my board down here. I'll go get one for you. And she said, no, no, no. I want to come on your board. And that's where you, in, when you're doing board rescue with your mate, you lay your mate on the front of the board and you've got to slightly part his legs, lay on their, lay on their bum.

Cause you've got to be kind of connected like one. And then if you nosedive, you get tangled in your mate's, you know, you're laying between his legs. So you get, you know, I'll let people picture this and I hope you don't feel this. This is just me being raw and real. The picture's real. The picture's real.

And, and so it's like board rescues fun with your mate until you end up between his legs crashing in a wave. And all of a sudden I'm picturing the woman of my, the girl of my dreams is I'm going to board rescue, you know? And so I took her out on the paddle board and we had long story short was we had this amazing time and she loved it and I certainly loved it.

And um, and, and she said, Oh, let's do that every day. And we did it for the next week. And I eventually got the courage up to ask her out on a date and to ask her not on a date to be my girlfriend. And back then, how you said that was, would you go with me? You know? And so I approached her across the surf club.

I've built up the courage. I'm a scared little kid, right? I've built up the courage. I swear Eminem was, if he was there, he would have been in the background going, lose yourself in there, you know? And I'm walking across, it's one, don't miss your opportunity, you know, like this. And I walk across and I asked her, asked her to go with me.

And she said, yes. And I was kind of shocked. I was ready to walk away. And so I went and brought her a strawberry milkshake and, you know, and it was my first ever girlfriend. Right. And the next day I had to go away for the second half of school holidays because my dad's finished the bronze squad. They've passed.

Um, it's a week after that original experience. And we go horse riding in Northern New South Wales for a week with my family and I'm all week. Trevi's got a girlfriend. I'm so excited. I've got a girlfriend. I come back a week later, walk up. Can't wait to see her. Walk into the club. Last day of school holidays.

As I get to the top of the stairs, I look around the corner and look over and I see her looking absolutely beautiful. An incredible sitting on that guy's lap.  And so if you get the, if you get the heartbreak of the story was as a young kid, my mind went nuts. The subconscious went into overdrive of how do I protect myself from, I just got humiliated.

I'm not good enough. I'm not enough. Go away with your family badge. It'll happen. Can't trust your mates. Can't trust women, girls. Um, I, I. Good enough to get them, not good enough to keep them. Um, da da da. And I, so I turned around, went to walk away before anyone saw me, and I'm freaking, like I'm dying on the inside.

My mate walks up the stairs, oh Trev, you're back, da da da. And he goes, oh, what are you up to? I said, oh, I just got to go do something. And I'm like crying, dying on the inside. And he says, and I said to him, oh, hey, What's going on with so and so and so and so? And he goes, Oh yeah, they're dating.  And I went, Oh, okay.

I'll see you soon. Like, and now I'm dead. Um, I'm like, ah, you know, and I, I'm sure people that are listening to this can, can relate, it was the first major heartbreak, broken hearted, broken spirited moment, you know, and I, because of you just trying desperately to be liked and loved, I was. And I thought for a little period of time I was liked and loved and I was enough the way I was, but it turns out I wasn't, you know, in my mind.

So what happened was I, I, I walked the streets of service paradise, went to KFC for some comfort and then got some donuts and other things. And I walked the streets of service paradise and I thought to myself the whole time, how do I never have this experience again? And after I decided, can't trust women, can't trust your friends.

I can't trust you family for taking you away and set a whole lot of patterns into play in my mind as beliefs like a later teacher called them, um, pattern forming decisions that you make. You decide that that's the truth and it then repeats itself over and again. And um, so, but what I concluded was, He's the Australian champion, he's the winner, he gets the girl, he gets the laughs, he gets to call the shots, everything else.

And so what happened was, and it's interesting to take a fair bit of time to tell the start of the story, which is now the end of this story at the start, is because that's what created the person that I became to win everything. Because from there, you know what, it's just really simple. This is enough's enough.

This is bullshit. This is all happening inside myself. I have to win everything. I will win everything from now on. No, we'll swear for a moment. No fucker will ever beat me again. No one will ever beat me again. This is ridiculous. So I, I birthed a power inside of me and that's a power that exists inside of all of us to take control of our life and our destiny.

But it was married to dysfunction and dis ease and hatred and upset. Yeah. So it was going to give me a certain amount of fuel. Um, but I was always going to have to come back and go, what birthed that? You know, where did that come from? Because if I don't resolve the original upset. Well, that's almost like a trauma.

It's like it absolutely was a trauma and rather than it's not a big victim. He story trauma. We'll relate to it at 16 years of age when you had your heart broken. I was destroyed. Yeah. And then the person I thought I was was destroyed and a new person was born a better version in that moment to never feel that pain again.

And that's a really key part of it. Never. I will never feel that pain again. So I used my, whatever considerable power I had to never feel that pain again. And we'll get to that later. Yeah. Well, I mean.  I'll win everything. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that is the fire that was lit in you. Yes. To then have such a successful career.

And, and is that what you say drove you for, I mean, how long were you really competitive in that sport? It was. Well, so the coach turned up, we set the goals off the back of this burning thing inside of me. You were 16. 16, never won a thing. Fifth out of six in my surf club in junior. Decided to be the Australian junior Ironman champion in a year and a half.

decided to be the Australian Open Ironman champion two and a half years, five years down the track or 10 years down the track. Oh my goals. I had all the goals  to be the greatest of all time, to have won more than anybody, Captain Australia more times than anyone else, to be a public speaker, to have a wife and kids, um, to have a house on the water, drive a sports car.

Um, oh, the early ones were to be, to have more friends and to get a girlfriend and then it was, But by five years in my goals, I was married. So I wrote that at 16, 15 going on 16, at 19 I was married. So are you saying that the key driving, motivating factor for all of that, that entire list and the success that you achieved behind that was the pain and the hurt that you experienced at 16 and your strategy?

for avoiding that. Is that, is that the primary driver for all of that? That was the primary activator. So the, the, it's the, the rolling relationship between  needing power because I'm powerless and wanting to be loved and liked. So I want to be enough. So deep down inside, I want to be enough. I want to be enough.

I'm not enough. I am clearly not enough. I've met someone beautiful. It's shown to me straight away that I thought you were enough. but I've seen him and he's more and he's better. He's, he's enough. You're not enough. And that this is not anyone's intention. There's once again, archetypes and patterns and things that a lot of people experience.

But what drove, it actually drove me to go, if I don't feel loved, which is, remember I said, understanding, love and acknowledgement. If I'm not understood, loved and acknowledged, then I'm going to have to lean. So I go over to power, greed and control. I need to, I feel powerless. I feel like a nobody and a nothing.

So I, I actually, I want to be included. It was simple things like I want to be included. I don't want them all to leave, to go surfing down the coast and watch them drive past in the car. And I'm standing with my surfboard. What are you going to pick me up? Yeah, there are experiences that I had. You know, and I was like, and the week before there was a pattern here week before they took me surfing.

So I'm like, I must've been cool enough. I must've said stupid things while I was away. They must've liked me in the water with them. Went down surfing Kira, which back then was like going three hour trip. You know, it wasn't, it was like 45 minutes. Now, now you're winning your, you know, I mean, you are six times Australian champion, four times world champion. 

A massive, massive achievement. How were you dealing with the successes that you were trying so hard to achieve? What was like life like that at that point? What were you feeling? Were you feeling good about yourself? Were you on top of the world or were you still struggling with some of those demons? You said it, now I'm winning. 

You know, like, it's not, it's not winning like we might automatically assume. But in my mind, what does that mean? Now I'm winning. I'm not losing anymore. I'm not powerless, I'm powerful. So I call the shots, no one else calls the shots. So, I'm addicted to the winning, and I'm addicted to the power. So power, greed, and control.

I've got some power. I want more of it. I just need to keep this scenario going for as long as I can, because I definitely don't want that other feeling I had, which is being a nothing and a nobody, which is not love. Which must have been a scary experience in itself, because you must have known that there's always someone coming up behind me that could potentially beat me.

There's always the possibility that this isn't going to last. Well, can I Surely I'll introduce something really quickly, and that is right through the middle of this, if you look at the duality of it, which is the loser and the winner and the powerless and the powerful and the loved and the unloved, right through the middle, I had great friends, I had great coaches, I had great support, I had a great family, I had love of the ocean, I felt incredible.

So, so there was almost like this, um, the real world is. It's what you're immersing yourself, what you're experiencing. But then I've got this world of my mind telling me I'm good or bad. We're not, so this is happening around it. So the whole time this is going on, I'm winning because of the support and the love and the connection and being part of a team and great coaches, Dennis Cottrell in the pool, Bill Haylock on, in Ironman coaching.

You know, I saw, I saw all these different people. Um, it's later when I met Keith Maitland and he took me down the chiropractic path and he said, Oh, it's holistic, mate. Your body falling apart is to do with what you haven't dealt with. And we'll get to that in a sec. So I'm now winning, but the only reason I'm continuing to win is because I'm loved.

I am actually looked after. I am part of a great group of people. Like I've got a great power on my side, but then I've got this power struggle, which is tangled in it. Like it's confused in the whole thing. So to answer your question, what happens is I'm now winning. And what happens when I win across the line?

I'm the good guy. I sign all the autographs. I love being around. In fact, I'm talking to the cameraman. I've got the camera over my shoulder on the tripod, walking off, helping him carry the gear off the beach. I'm the last to leave. Everyone's going, God, he won the race and he's just such a nice guy.

Because deep down, that's me. But then this other thing I've tried to become to win, it's, it's obscuring everything. It's like filtered through everything. So then I go to the nightclub. And the good part of me wants everyone to feel loved like me, wants everyone to be happy, wants it. I want everybody to feel great.

So I get to the nightclub and it's like, Trevor's at the nightclub. And you know, we're, you know, this stage, you know, I'd met Michael Jackson and hung out with him. I was on Baywatch and I played myself on Baywatch. I'd met Madonna and spend like a whole night hanging out with Madonna and her crew, um, played on stage with John Farnham and the Beach Boys.

And we had this crazy experience on the front cover of this and the front cover of that. And so I had this, this, version of me was on this ride, you know, this starry ride. Did you believe everything that was presented to the world on the covers of magazines and on TV? Did you believe that that was you or did you know?

I was mostly lost in that belief. Yeah, I was mostly, I was mostly, well, the people around me were trying to keep me grounded and particularly my first, you know, Jackie, who I was married to at 18, 19, um, she was trying to tell me the whole time, which eventually, and we, her and I laugh about it, was I had to get rid of her because she's trying to remind me of who I really am, you know?

And so I don't, I'm not, I'm  unimpeded to be this great person, but it was exactly the same time when I didn't want to be that anymore as well, you know? And so, um, I met my wife, Jo, I've been with for, you know, nearly 30 years, you know, um, and it was crazy because at the same time that I didn't want to be this anymore because it's like seven years through this process of being the guy, eight years through the process, I was also tangled so much in all, in all the habits and behaviors of a guy that was lost in that world.

So I was never a drug taker. I never was into drugs.  Um, you know, have a party afterwards and women, you know, parties, drink cards.  Fame, adulation, being the leader of the pack, you know, being attracted, you know, having the prettiest girl in the town be attracted to you or in the nightclub or whatever, all fed that original little demon inside of me that felt like I was the opposite.

The prettiest girl didn't like me. The prettiest girl liked someone else, you know, and  the, the false, uh, reality that that means anything, you know? Um, so the prettiest girl likes you, you've got great, um, uh, you know, value in the world or whatever. It's like a, it's like a form of exchange. You know, it's like a, it's money, you know, like you're liked by the pretty people or the good looking people.

So I've literally spent enough time locked in that place where, um,  I lost myself in that, and I believe that was the truth, um, but I suspected in the background somewhere that, um,  that, hang on, I think I've lost my way here because I've had to hide a lot of things and I'm having to live almost two lives, like the, almost the playboy life and feed this sugar.

And then, you know, and then.  point out, well, the other life's not good enough. And now I'm starting to be too towards my first wife. Well, you're not good enough. So I was putting onto them what was, what I experienced, you know, and this is what you do without even realise you're doing it. So you're projecting all the stuff.

You're projecting everything. You're just an arsehole basically, but you don't, you're an unconscious that you're an arsehole because a lot of people tell you, God, you're a great guy. Thanks. You keep telling me, you know. I'm just wondering as your career was progressing, there must've been a point at some stage where you started to realise.

I won't be able to win forever. There's only, there's only so long this career lasts before I'm going to have to move on. And then what becomes of me? Who am I? So I've got this one part of me. that's going, I will win forever. I'll win at whatever I turn my hand to, because I can, I'm supreme. Like I've got this, you know, it's a double edged sword because you give a huge belief in yourself, but it was also arrogance and egotistical and like delusional, right?

I was just thinking you must have had a lot of confidence though, and there must have been some times of, pure elation. And as much as there was this internal, internal struggle, it must have just been the highest of the highs. I mean, it'd be hard to even just balance all of that. Imagine everything you're going through.

So it's a drug, isn't it? I mean, you said you went into drugs, but you could imagine the highs. It was a drug. That was my drug. Yeah. And I know you can relate to it in your own way is that when you become the leader in your field and everyone's looking at you going, Oh, wow. And shiny and you're the shiny one.

Um, and to go back slightly is that there was two energies at play. One was right in the center of me was who I really was. The kid that learned to swim in the Daly River that loved his family, that wanted everyone to win.  And then this person that, that says that that kid's not good enough because he'll get you nothing, he'll get you nowhere.

So, Podium, he can sit in the background and shut up and he can Be listened to when he's spoken to, right? And then this other dominant energy in me says, no, I, I have to win. So there's these two things at play that are wrestling the whole way. And what would happen was I wouldn't usually win from the aggression or the anger.

In fact, if it came through in the race, I might temporarily win a race. or around, but I would be really hard to recover. But when I actually found the flow and the groove and I was trained to be in the moment by Billy Halock and my family did have love for me and everything else, this other energy would come in every now and then.

And I'd be, I'd be next to the pack and all of a sudden I'd break out of the pack and I called it effortless effort. I later learned the term, the zone, and they talk about athletes getting in the zone. Um,  There's a, there's this real thing when you're a professional athlete and you're with everybody else and you're all at the same level and you're battling and all of a sudden something clicks where you're so in the moment and you're so focusing on what you're actually doing.

Maybe it's your stroke or the feel of your hands or just why you're doing it like it. And all of a sudden you go and you go into another realm and I would go into this realm and then I would, in that realm, everything would, we'd like it to slow down. Like I watched Gary Ablett jr play football or Scott Pendlebury or Nick Dacos now I'm calling with As most people listen to this note would know, um, you know, uh, I would go into this place where I actually, I knew where the wave was going to be.

I, you know, you're saying that and we've spoken about this before, but I actually watched that race and I remember, I remember the commentary. And I remember. The questions about what's Trevor Hendy doing, broken away, just break away from way left. It didn't make sense, but obviously that's what you were experiencing.

What's he doing, what's he even thinking? And I'd be going along and in my mind, the voice would be going through my head. You've got to go your own way. The song was in my head.  Never even listened to it. Didn't have it on a playlist or anything. It was just in my head. You got to go your own way. And it was like, you know, talk about other archetypes, Angelic Archetype Scum.

Hey, buddy. You know, go your own way. You're here to learn about how to go your own way in this lifetime. Like that's what it felt like. And I would just be like, Oh, so this bigger part of me is here not to, not to win. That was the trapped part of me was here to win. The bigger part of me was to learn how to go my own way.

And so whenever I followed that, I would go, I've got to go left, you know, and quite often it was left, not right. Sometimes it was right, but it was really weirdly quite often left. Yeah. And I'd go left and I'd go right down the beach and I'd tap into a bit of water that I could feel a hundred meters away.

And everyone would go, the fastest line, you know, between point A and point B is a straight line. Well, that straight line was going straight across the sandbank with all the waters running. And there was a rip running around the side and there's one here, but there's this other sort of half one. And I'd feel it.

I'd go, I've got to go down there. And I'd run away from equal leader. I'd be like maybe second or third, the leader would be out. And instead of chasing him down with hard work, I would run to the point where I'm further behind now, more people are in the water and I'm still running. And I'd get in the water and I'd go, I'd get, I'd have to back myself.

And then I'd feel this water moving and I'd go, there it is. I'd dive down, I'd go to the bottom and I'd feel it.  And the whole duck thing, the duck feet underwater going really fast and on the top looking really calm, it's the opposite. When you're going through the ocean, on the surface, you're swimming, when you go under, you're really calm, and you're using all the flow.

And I'd go, there it is, and I'd get validated straight away, I knew there was some flow here. And that flow would go, thanks for coming. Like it was this really weird experience and it would increase and could more water would join it because it was coming across a bank and flowing into a spot. And maybe all the waves just broke in one section because the sandbanks don't denote where the waves come in.

It just denotes where they flow, where they break. The waves come in wherever the force has pushed them in, you know, so. The waves might all come in one spot, break, and they're all flowing out. And for whatever reason, in that moment, I'd be tuned in and I'd go and I'd tap into it. The water would come together.

Next minute, I'd be on the bottom, holding my breath, relaxing, doing breaststroke, going under two or three waves. Yeah. On the bottom, in the freight train, just going out. And then they couldn't even see me. So the camera, well, we've lost him. We're not going to try and follow him. Trevor seems to have made some stupid decision.

He's blown it. He's gone way left, but up the front, you know, Scotty Thompson's got the lead and Guy Leach is chasing him down and Craig Rennington's making a move on the side, watch him in the swim leg and, you know, Dwayne Tyres is still right there and, you know, all this that there'd be going on, they'd be talking about it.

And then, and Guy Leach is, you know, taking the lead and he's just got to the front out the back and, and then, you know,  They'd get the shot of Guy Leach, like here he comes over the wave and as the wave drops, you can see the swimming can at the back and he's in a straight line straight towards it. And then as the wave drops in the background, you'd see me going around the swimming can, you know, and they go, Oh my God, true.

And he's like 150 meters in front, you know, and it was this strange thing that, um, you can't control. You can only be, um, open to. Yeah, but that's really interesting to me because everything you've just described, your whole life up until now has been predominantly driven by a fear of not wanting to experience that hurt.

And, and that was the fire in your belly and everything that was, and yet, At that key moment where you needed to win a race, you, you accepted something that was beyond that. That was part of something greater. The light as you described it. The ocean I saw as my friend. So how did that happen? How did you accept that given all of your drive up until that point?

I was paddling out on the back of Surf's Paradise one day and I used to do these things Denise, I reckon you'll get this feeling when I say it. I would paddle out on the paddleboard for a recovery session without anybody else because my recovery, I started to enjoy my own space because clearly I'm trying to be something else around everybody.

So I'm getting naturally drawn towards God, it feels good when I just go and just be myself. So it was always you're filtering in and out. And one day I'm paddling on the paddleboard and, I'm just paddling along and I'm like, I just go, Oh God, I feel so good. This, I'm going to do this more often. I'm just out to sea at surf.

It's a beautiful day. It's the middle of winter preseason training. I'm on my own. I'm paddling and all of a sudden I'm going up in the air. A whale comes up underneath me and picks me out. Yes. And I, yes. And I come up. And I'm like, what the, and I dive off the whale, like I dive off the whale, the whale goes in the water, my board's back in the, in the water, I go, I swim, I grab it.

And I'm like, Oh my God, you know, that's crazy. And I swim out of the way and the whale disappears and I paddle along a bit further and the whale picked me up again. You know. So it was playing with you. It was playing with me. And I'm like. in this quiet moments. Now it's illegal to go near whales. You're not allowed to seek out and paddle towards a whale.

I've got a whale. It's not legal for them to seek you. So something was happening because in that moment I would go, Oh my God, this was the greatest feeling I've ever had. And I've got no one to share it with. I can't explain it to anybody. I'm going to go back and I'm going to say a whale picked me up today.

And they're going to go, Yeah, mate. You know, cause I, I was pretty handy at lying and fibbing as well, particularly as a young kid. Oh yeah. Telling a tall story. Cause I was always trying to be bigger than small. So I tell a story that made me bigger, same, same traits, you know, and, but then these things started to happen to me and I started to have these quiet moments where incredible experiences and I can name so many, I had dolphins making love in circles around me sitting in the break.

And I thought no one's ever going to believe this. And then one day I was out with a mate, Todd Prestidge, used to be on the world tour surfer and he took me to his, one of his favorite little secret spots, spot surfing and we're sitting out there together and next minute these two, two, two pairs of dolphins started making love in circles around me in the water and he's going, uh, I wouldn't have believed if I didn't say it, you know, and I'm like, ah, you know, it's happened before.

It happened before. And so this happens so many times. Like I've had, I've swam, you know, with white dolphins and then they've circled me and pushed their, their young next to me. So I had this, this feeling like, I can't talk about this, but. Oh my God, I, I think I might be really connected to the ocean. I think I might be connected to something other  that I can't explain except when I let myself feel that I just experienced magic and it wasn't an accident because it's this coincidence is happening more often than not.

I was like, am I connected to this? And that's what this is happening during the period of your career. Yeah. This is starting to break up my career. And so I started actually looking for terms to describe it. Cause it didn't come from a spiritual family or religious family or spiritual mates. It was like,  try and find the prettiest girl and sleep with her was what all my mates wanted to do, you know, and what did my family want to do?

Just live a good life and, you know, be, be true. What I'm having these experiences and I'm like, I didn't know how to explain it. And then, but I'd have these serendipities, I'd have this like, moment where I'd think about somebody and then, you know, people have experienced this, then they'd give you, they'd call me straight away.

I'd run into them around the, in the street. I'd think of someone I haven't seen for a while and I'd turn the next corner and they'd be right there. You know, or I had moments where I'd be visualizing a race And I'd visualize myself, um, all the way through the race and I'm coming down on the board leg.

And as I'm coming down the board, I'm going to be in front of everyone else. It's the last leg. I'm just going to run up on my own. So I'm coming down the wave and I'm visualizing myself. I've got towel over my head  and I'm in the visualization, which I'm creating. I'm manifesting this visualization. And all of a sudden I'd be coming down the wave and a seagull would fly right across the front of me in my visualization.

And I'd be like,  well, that was weird. Like just, you know, I just saw a seagull in my visualization. Like what? You know, why did I choose to have a, I didn't, I'm just, I don't just want to see myself winning, you know, and the seagull go across and then I'd be in the race. The race would unfold exactly as I visualized.

I'd go down the front. And one day I went down on the board and after this visualization, I went down the board, laid down. And as I laid down, this put my head up and the seagull flew straight across in front of me, exactly the same seagull. And I'm like, well, what just happened? Like what? And so I come in, win the race and everyone's going, yeah, he won the race.

And I'm going.  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's something that I can't even talk about. Cause like, how do I say, Oh, I just visualize even down to the seagulls. Occasionally I try and say it and people would go, Oh, cool. You know, but it was like, so more and more often and more often, as I found my way into this central place where I could win through connection with the ocean and following this intuition and this flow.

Yeah. It began to, create the beginning of the end of that ego or that persona, because I might've used that to survive for a period of time. It might've inspired me or encouraged me to be there in the first place, but it wasn't my fuel. It sort of fueled me, but it wasn't the ultimate fuel. And so what happened was naturally in my life, I started to come to the point where I was more interested in what was that zone feeling I got into today.

And I try and talk to someone about it and they wouldn't know what I was talking about. Oh, what was that? Why did I visualize and see that? And no one could talk about it and no one around me. So I started to feel a weird little alone thing again, but a curiousness of wanting to understand it and jumping forward slightly when Kelly Slater came onto the scene and Kelly will be on with us soon. 

Um, he's doing a journey with you at the moment, Denise, around his health and it's a beautiful thing. Um, when he first came on the scene as a young kid in Florida, the very first time I saw him in a surfing magazine as a surfing fan, I saw him and I felt like he was my younger brother. I felt like he was my little brother and I needed to look out for him.

I was like, this is a really weird feeling. I'm a few years older, four, three, four years older. Um, and three years older. And I'm like, but he feels like I'm supposed to look out for him. And then the part of me that's attracted to famous people at that stage, and he comes and he wins the world title. I'm just like the whole time.

We'd go to parties and I'd walk in and in, in Sydney or in Bali or somewhere. And they'd say, Oh, you just miss Kelly. He was just here. And he'd go into a party and say, you just miss Trevor. And there were people always trying to connect us together. And when we eventually connected, we played golf. I won't go into the story, but we played golf together.

We're inseparable for a few days. He came back, we hung out, we talked all night. And at three o'clock in the morning, I'm talking to him on my lounge room, um, living on the beach at Mermaid Beach. And I'm talking to him about when you're coming, I'm swimming in and I can feel the wave coming. I know exactly which wave I'm going to catch and I've got to slow down a bit.

So I'm in the right tune, but I'm not looking at it. I can feel it and I know it's coming. And I'm. I need this wave and I've swam way off course to get this wave, but I know it's there and I've got a date with it. And then the wave comes and I didn't even look at it. I pick it up and I catch it all the way to the beach.

And he's going, Oh my God, I'd have two minutes to go and I'd need a 9. 5 and everyone's going, why didn't he take that wave? And he goes, cause I was looking at these waves going, no, that's not the wave I've got the date with. So he is tuned to the same, whatever he is tuned to is the same thing. It's the same thing.

And I got so.  Oh, it was so much love and connection there straight away, but it was almost, almost so much, oh, thank God, someone Validation. Validation. What I was going to ask you though is, did it affect your competitive spirit at all? But given that you just told me the story of Kelly Slater, who had a very long and storied career after that, perhaps it didn't. 

In what way? Well, I don't know. I mean, if you, if you're starting to experience these things Oh, yes. Yes. Then you would, I would imagine you'd start to think, well, what is the point of competing so hard? You know, do I really need to, to, to work so hard just to win? Or do I focus my intention on, on growing this, to evolving this, to exploring this?

Is that What about the curiousness of the fact that the guy that played the original role to, to motivate me into that discovery of power from those terms. Yeah. That win and lose terms was the best surfer, the one that got all the girls that everyone wanted to be like. He was the best surfer. Now I'm best mates with and hanging out with and toe surfing with the best surfer in the world of all time.

And I'm having a different experience because I'm coming out the other side of these things. And I'm starting to win races because I've explored with some people, um, I'm starting to do some work, I've worked with Keith Maitland and everything else. He says, mate, you've got emotional stuff that you've buried, blah, blah, blah.

So I'm starting to go, there's a whole other holistic journey, which is not win at all costs, which I've been in, it's win on all levels, which is like, I'm not winning on all these levels that I'm hiding,  buried those so no one can see. Where are you in your career at this point? I'm 25, 26. And there's, there's a line in the John Denver song, Rocky Mountain High, at the very start.

He says he was born in the summer of his 27th year, coming home to a place he'd never been before. He left yesterday behind him. You might say he was born again. You might say he found a key to every door. John Denver wrote that song. I understand mostly about himself because he went through this spiritual journey.

They went from a, from a country singer to a folk singer at 20 in the summer of his 27th year when he went to Colorado and discovered all this stuff. When he first came to the mountains, his life was hanging by a thread. Well, there are plenty of 27 year old musicians who didn't quite didn't. And isn't this a crazy thing, summer of his 27th year.

And so here I am a few years in front of Kelly.  He, his biggest title was the world title and the one that was back then really good for them was the U. S. title. He won four U. S. and six world. Our biggest title was the Australian title and the one was also good was the world. I'd won four world and six Australian, you know,  we'd had all these mirror experiences the whole time, but I just walked this lap around the block and when he got to the same point that I got to, I had people help me.

So I was able to say, Hey dude.  Do you want help with this? You know? And he's like, yeah, yeah, this is why we're in each other's life beyond just surfing together and everything else. And so we went on a journey together. Now, the reason I say this is not about Kelly, the reason I say it was he became a key part in me completing a cycle around being with the best surfer, hanging out with him as a mate and as an equal, but now being of service and actually And so there's one thing that I, I, I partly discovered, I was partly taught is that to rise up the ladder of awareness, you have to have a problem,  then you have to get knocked on your ass so you can be vulnerable and honest about it.

And then you clear the problem or you become aware of it. And then life will give you a chance to help someone else with it. And then you can move on from that problem. So it's like this strange thing that I discovered around mastery that is life will say to be rather than just be in your head and say, Oh, I'm, I'm, I'm a spiritual person, or I'm, you know, I'm all about winning on all levels.

It's actually life will say, right, I'm going to give you a problem. I'm going to kick you in the ass because you haven't dealt with it until you deal with it. Then I'm going to give you a chance to help someone else with it. And then you can move on to the next level and your new problem. I'll kick you in the ass for that one too.

You'll have to help someone. It's like, um, basically you've had it.  You cleared it and you help someone else with it. So you've seen it from three different angles under it, above it, and help someone else and we've passed it on. And so many people in my life ended up coming to me. A lot of the people that I mentioned earlier come to me in different ways to say, can you help me?

You know, I noticed that you just handle that really well. And I'd meet all these famous people and they'd end up hanging out all night cause they just want to talk to me. And I'm like, I think I have a counselor inside of me. I think I have, you know, and so it was starting to be birthed, like who am I outside of all this on, on all levels.

And these are thoughts that you're having while you're still in your competitive career. Yeah. And what happened was the right people came, taught me the right things at the right time. And I finished my competitive career winning races with less training, more connection, more honesty, more love, more clarity, more biggest smile on my face.

And you know, um, after I first met Keith Maitland, started working through this and then met my, my buddy Colin that I worked with, I had 10 international level races the next year and I got eight firsts and two seconds. Yeah. Yeah.  And I'd be coming, you know, one stage I was coming 35 at the halfway point of a two hour race.

I'm way back. I'm 10 minutes behind the leader. And I went, Oh, you know, I just let go. And all of a sudden I just came through the whole field and ended up winning the race. You know, is that that same experience? You just sort of got into the zone, got into the zone. Yeah. So whenever I was in the need to win, it was like, because that, that, from what I understand of the zone and I, look, I mean, I suppose I'm not a competitive sportsman by any degree, but I But I have gotten into the zone in different things.

So art, I come from an artistic background. My dad was an art teacher and I remember growing up. And once I started a piece, I could have immersed myself in that, that hours had passed and I hadn't realized. And I've just developed this entire world. And that's kind of a similar sort of experience. I think you get into the zone, time stops.

So I'll ask you, how do you feel when you're in that zone? I feel.  Amazing. I feel it feels great. It feels like you feel about yourself.  Well, it's interesting because I don't even reflect on myself. Yeah. There's no self. Yeah.  That's, that's exactly it. There is no self when you're right in the zone and there's a straight line between you and whatever source of creation you're tapping into. 

You can feel it when I say it, right? Yeah. And it's like. Ah, I've got my hairs. Yeah. There's a, there's a nothingness that goes on and that nothingness is so beautiful. And it's a, it's a nobody and a nothingness. And, you know, I love, um, I might've shared this before, but I heard this thing where Tucker Carlson was saying how he ran into famous, you know, um, Fox host and got kicked off of that for saying too many things that were ridiculous.

Provocative and true. Um, Fox. Yeah. Well, they're just two sides, but right. And, um, he runs into Mike Tyson and he's having a conversation with Mike Tyson. He thought, I never in my life thought that I would interview Mike Tyson or I would want to, that I would get anything out of it. And then I interviewed him and he said, I can't stop thinking about this man.

And he said, I asked Mike a particular question. He said, you are the toughest man in the world. Surely you're now this peaceful, spiritual guy that's, you know, so thoughtful and well got these worldviews and everything. Surely you must get moments still when some guy wants to pick you, pick a fight with you in the middle of the street and just prove that he's stronger than you.

Yeah. You must still get that. And he said, he goes, doesn't it bother you? And he said, well, Tucker, you know what? And I'm paraphrasing. He says, you know, it bothered me.  It's bothered me for a long time. It's always bothered me until I remember that I'm nobody and then doesn't bother me at all.  You know, and the idea that he was somebody that he had anything to defend or protect would create this whole world of something he had to actually defend, you know, and then he had these experiences for him, a lot of plant medicine stuff, you know, that he had these existential oneness.

And through that avenue, he went, Oh my God, who am I really? With his lip, you know, and it's incredible to hear him talk about it now, you know, because this is the guy that wanted to beat the shit out of everybody. Be the strongest, very correlatory story, really win in a different way. Um, and then he discovered who he really was in these moments of nothingness.

And so the zone. was hinting to me the whole time, you're at your best when you're nothing and nobody. Yeah. But this is, I mean, it sounds like that this is an experience that is particular to you or particular to Mike Tyson. These are people who are one in a billion, but it's not really, is it? This is, this is everyone.

And I'm not sure that everybody is going to sound strange. I'm not sure that everybody in this lifetime is supposed to have this experience, but I would imagine that almost everybody that's  Uh, in this podcast is connected to this experience in some way, shape, or form. But what I know is I've gone on to be a counselor, like the people that help me, a life coach, a clearer is probably the best word, because they help me clear the shit out.

All the obscure thoughts like can't trust women, can't trust men, can't go out with your family, all the things that built up as pattern forming decisions that created this self, you release those and the self just dissipates back to pure energy and you just start to act as your heartfelt, humble self.

So I help. Um, other people get into that space. And that's what you're doing now. That's, that's right. What is it that you're doing now after all of that? Where has this led you? Well, everything that I do is around that. Yeah. Including this podcast. And where I try and steer topics to is to make people realize how powerful they really are.

Yeah. But in a sense of power that you've got built inside of you, the power of the whole universe, you know? Um, but the one-on-one work that I do and I work with, I've worked with musicians, athletes, CEOs, billionaires, all sorts of stuff. You get a lot of, um, I get a lot of industry leaders attracted to me or word of mouth.

It's all word of mouth and, but I get mums and dads and I've get policemen and women and priests, you know, whatever. Like also I've get psychologists and psychiatrists and, you know, shamans and people come in and go, you know, I've been a shaman for years and I, and I, you know, like they're, they're taking people through these crazy plant medicine journeys, and they go, Oh, I've heard you can help me release this thing that I just can't get rid of, and that we'll do one session, and they'll go, Oh my God, and I can't believe I got rid of that.

How did I not see that the whole time? It's like, well, as a certain part of, um, the, the freeing ourselves out, Um, is just meant to become through human connection as just sitting with someone. So I do that in groups. I do it with corporations. Um, I try and do, I put out a, you know, um, Denise commented on a post I put out the other morning about my morning routine where I dive in the beautiful Creek at the property that we're now on and, and, um, Coroman Valley and, and, uh, inviting myself along.

Yeah. Denise is inviting herself along and I'm saying quick, the door's open, hurry up.  And I'm making a smoothie and I'm using some, you know, Melrose Future Lab product, which is sponsor of this podcast, you know, and, and I'm using the product and everything else. But it's actually my true morning routine.

It's what I'm now tapping into that I do to tap me into the best energy. So what I'm noticing is, um, yes, It seems like an athlete telling a story of these high levels of achievement and then coming through this thing But I have to come back and actually for for about five years. I had no mobile phone I had no email address.

I did no public appearances. I did nothing. I had no savings I went bankrupt in the year 2000 and I had to lick my wounds and work out what parts of that persona  had I not cleared up. So I eventually got a car that I had to tie my roof racks on the roof because it was so rusty at 32 years of age, 33, 34 years of age.

Now I'm way, I'm supposed to, now I'm a spiritual guy, you know, but That's discovered the secrets of life and I'm driving around in a rust bucket starting from scratch where I had nothing. So I also, I sit here as someone who's rebuilt from nothing and yes, doors have been opened to me because of my past and everything else as well, but that's kind of cool as well because I get to stand up as somebody different,  but ultimately I'm working with all these people.

And the craziest feedback is people that just say, Oh my God, I know exactly what you're talking about. And thank you for that. And so that's, that's what I'm doing. That's where I've ended up. And ultimately what I discovered through sport, through wrestling with my own persona that I needed to, was that there's different levels of power, entanglement.

distortion, confusion. I love referring to it as the third dimension is where the body sits and it's got incredible, incredible wisdom. It's a, it's a freak genius. We did Qi Gong this morning, we talked about it, Denise and I. And then the fourth dimension is where everything's up for grabs and up for debate.

Is good, bad, right, wrong, win, lose, success, failure, dumb, smart, rich, poor, good enough, not good enough. Everything I spoke about. It's where the wars are being fought. It's where people have the wool pulled over their eyes that this is good for you to take this. And it's not so good. And We can question things that give you short term benefits, like a medicine that then keeps it creates a long term dramatic effect on our health, and then you're reliant on it.

So there's all these different things that is stuck in the fourth dimension, which is our psychology and our story. But then when you start to know yourself as that artist that goes into the moment, who's this? Why do I feel so good? And I said, what do you feel about yourself? And you went,  I don't really think about myself because there's no self when you're in that, there's no protection or defense, you're just free and flowing.

So the fourth dimension is not to be skipped  to get into this happy place where we're meditating on a mountaintop. I believe it's to be understood and played with and rolled around like plasticine and like a, you know, to really experience from every single angle. So you've got the full experience of it.

And that's why I believe I discovered power, sex, rock and roll, you know, and I've got Fame and all that sort of stuff is because I needed to know what power wasn't. Yeah.  Because it seemed like power at the time. It felt damn good and it seemed to prop me up and everyone else thought it was power, but it wasn't part of a, a more like, um, supreme, what's the word I'm looking for?

Um, more like a, an eternal power. which is more this strange soul energy thing that if you take it out of religion and science and other things that have tried to define it or dismiss it, you end up feeling this thing of, um, Oh, my presence, when I'm not trying to be myself or a self, my presence is very connected and very powerful and very loving and very worldview ish and very, you know, wants everybody to win.

So that's who I really am. This other thing is a temporary thing that I've experienced and it's given me great, um,  I suppose, clarity to what is real and what's not real. And so I spoke to you guys that, you know, yesterday when we're catching out. We haven't seen each other for two months.  And I spoke to you about, it's really boiled down to there's two sources in life.

And that's that power, greed, and control, or that understanding, love, and acknowledgement. But the two sources are the real eternal source of stillness, connection. And by the way, when you don't sit there and just meditate and go, I'm surrounded with light and I feel good and I don't have to do anything.

Inspiration comes in, kicks you in the ass. And goes, get up and go and be there for your family, go make a difference, go build a business or start that product line that you always want to do, or make those homemade soaps or, you know, write an ad for something. But what you're allowing is you're allowing that thing of meaning, of purpose to appear.

That dimension of source to come through you and inform you. Form what you're gonna do so you're in oneness with something you know, bigger rather than serving that source that was tangled with me, which was, as long as you end up on top, mate, everything will be great because you just need to dismiss all the naysayers and, and get them under control.

Yeah. So Denise, you're gonna say that? Yeah, I don't think that we are here by accident. You know, so many things have to go right for us. Now you may think of things on a more spiritual level, I don't know how to explain it, but you know, even as a scientist, thinking about a sperm and egg coming together at the right time, the amount, the millions of things that have to go on for that DNA to replicate, like so many things have to happen that it is like a miracle, really.

And I do think that we all have some kind of purpose. And we don't have to spend too much time thinking about what is the purpose, because  a lot of us may not know, but there is a reason. But I don't think we stop and explore the feelings. You know, what you've explained is that you've actually felt things.

You've thought about them. You've felt them. You've listened to your intuition. Embraced them.  And a lot of us, and I and it feels, I feel a bit sad saying this because as you're talking to I'm thinking how many people aren't getting these, these signals, these, these moments. Or aren't listening to them.

Because now we're all stuck on phones and things as well. So it's always, Not all of us are going to get those pulls that you've had, but I think in this day and age, it would be even harder to feel connected to what is pulling us, driving us, what's going to get us to that level because we're so distracted by all these other things.

So I think if there's anything for the listeners, Just allowing yourself to feel these feelings. Don't just go and start scrolling or go and do something else. I think that is a topic of discussion that we should probably devote an entire episode to. Because it's such an amazing story. I'll just say this, there's two, I'll just say, allow the possibility.

Don't believe anything I say, but allow the possibility that there's always two forces at play. And every moment is a living moment. You get to choose which one you're serving. You can serve false source, which promises you a temporary result, which could be drugs, alcohol, medications, it could be gambling, could be sex, could be fame, could be interest, could be just comfort, a donut, you know, a coffee.

It's like, just, it's not, you can't have them. It's just check out. Are you serving another source that promises you something? It can't actually deliver. Yeah. It promises you something in the future. And so all of our social media, not all of it, but a lot of it, um, our billboards, our ads, even the way our industries are set up, the way we're set up for profit and everything else, there's an overwhelming dynamic of serving you.

This other source, which promises so much, but can't deliver something you've already got inside of you, which is stillness and a connection to all that is. And that is the thing we will discover that in our own ways in greater or lesser forms when we're ready to. And we want to, a lot of people that listen to this far, but Probably because they know what I'm saying, or they're like, Oh, I'm on the benchmark of this, or I've did that.

I couldn't hold it. And we can talk about that in another episode, we'll do a masterclass I think, to end this, which could have gone on and on and on. Again, I want to say one more thing. What ended up happening for me is that all those relationships that were broken, I now live with an amazing wife in an amazing life with two children from each of my major marriages.

And that's four all up. We're all just a demonstration to each other. We're all vulnerable and honest, including Jackie, Joe, Christelle, TJ, Bailey, Charlie. We all just do our best to look after each other. We're raw, we're real. And it's like this crazy thing of, Oh, the whole family is, including the grandkids, I've now got four grandkids to a couple of the kids and the whole family is now slowly but surely serving, trying to serve that source of inspiration rather than the source of how can I get in front. 

You know, and that is the magical place you can end up where a small community and I've got friends around me that live to do this now. And then my best friends now go, Oh, talk to me. And we just all share your mentorship  and you having, Oh no, just through me being true to myself, I've most of it I've attracted. 

You know, you end up attracting the people around you that are true to what you want. You don't have to be a formal mentor to mentor people. No, you can just leave. Just through demonstration. As you talked to your dad. Leave your truth. As you talked to your dad right at the very beginning, whether you realize or not, that attraction that you have, that you are drawing other people to you is through those experiences. 

People see it, people feel it. And closing this loop fully. You are teaching them as a result. Closing the loop fully. My father laid the groundwork for me. He laid the groundwork of don't accept what looks like you're winning, but you feel like there's something else. Go and explore what that something else is.

Feel it, experience it again. There's something more than this. Be happy to go explore it. never run away from something fully, always come back. My mother taught me, um, what true valuing really was, you know, as in you're winning, but she was actually saying, I just want you to be loved and liked and everything else.

And so this whole journey and my sister by my side the whole time, just always being my best mate, you know, just by my side, unbelievable. So  ultimately we're all leading examples all the time in everything we do. We can say all we want, But what, what's our truth? And it's great to know your truth, but are you slowly but surely living it more regularly?

It's great to know it and not be living it fully. That's okay. Cause knowing it's a start, but slowly but surely, are you living it more frequently and, and, um, fully and flagrantly. Like you said, looking for that source of inspiration. I'll let you tie it up now, Dave. No, all I have to do is say, thank you.

That was, that was just a Fantastic. Really fantastic. Oh, thanks mate. Thank you. And that's why I'm passionate about us together. Cause I just love. I love you guys. We get to share this. I love being with you guys. We get to share this. It's amazing. It's so cool. And all this in other people. Can't wait for what's next.

We'll continue this discussion. Yeah. Thanks mate. Thank you.