[Music] Welcome back everybody. You're listening to the Mind Mastery Podcast. These are how you do today. Good. Thanks Scott. Great to be here as always. Excited about what we're going to get into today. We've had some pretty edgy podcasts lately. And I'm interested to see where we go today. We're going to get edgy and edgy here. We always have a great conversation before we go on the air to decide what it is that we're going to talk about because we... This isn't scripted. We don't actually have a formalized, this podcast we're going to talk about this. It's just what's coming up because it's using our intuition for one part. It's very intuitive. I mean sometimes, like the last few, they are news-based as in what's going on historically on the planet at any given time. And of course they're always influenced by what we are experiencing, what we're feeling, what's going on in our hearts and in our minds. That's always going to be influencing things. And that brings us up to today's topic because as I was coming over here, I was driving along and I just sort of letting my mind flitter around from topic to topic to topic. And one came out like big time for me and I wanted to bring it up. Good. And that has to do with decisions because I look at my life and I look at where I am and I look at where I want to go and I look at the type of person I want to be and all those sort of things. And then I go, "Wow, if I did a little timeline of the last six months or three months or one day, I could see some decisions that I made that the result that they get me isn't the result that I say that I want." So I'm making these decisions and then I go, "Why am I making that decision?" and then having to try to unmake the decision or I'm now stuck heading down a path that I don't want to go. And the analogy that I made with you was kind of, "I make these decisions and put a box around me so I'm now stuck where I am, unable to move forward." Another one is, "I make a decision." All of a sudden it's like three burly bouncers are standing up in front of me with their arms crossed and you ain't going this way, dude. You're not working. You're not working. You're not the right strip. Right. I want to go that way. Well, too bad. And I just thought it's not. Obviously, it's subconscious. Of course. Because obviously who would make a bad decision knowingly, right? Well, my first question to you is, are these decisions or are they choices? And that's an interesting distinction for all of us to understand. So you better make that distinction because I don't know it. Because a decision, how it varies is different from a choice in that a choice is something that we often don't even think about. It's just what we're choosing in this moment. And we don't tend to think consequently about what might be the results. And if we make the distinction, we can then say, "Well, the decision is something which we have weighed, evaluated, and then decided upon." Okay, so I make no decisions in my life. Right. I'll be honest, right? Right. And really, it's not you. I mean, it's common. You know, people say I'm not alone in this. People say I'm a bad decision maker, and I will say, actually, no, you just don't make them. You make choices given on circumstances in the moment. Right. Decisions are something you make based on the values base of who you are, that you've evaluated who you are at a values level. And you've decided that you're going to live from a certain set of maxims of how you're going to go through your life. And that's why you've made this decision. And as you've heard me talk about before, decision is decide from the light and decide to cut away from. So you've cut away all other options. Whereas a choice is something you just do right now. Yeah. So as I'm listening to you, I'm thinking of times where I actually, you're right. Like I thought about it, I decided this is what I want to do. I've made the decision. Yes. And my life kind of works good when that happens. And then when I'm thinking of like the things that I called decisions before, which I now call choices, boy, it's screwed up. Well, choices tend to be a reaction. Mm-hmm. That's exactly what they are. Right. They're a reaction. Even our communication as human beings tends to be reactive. And what I mean by that is, as we talk about in our relationship program, most people's communication is merely a reaction to a reaction. It's not even a reaction to something as in another communication. It's a reaction to a reaction. You look to me this way. And so I say this to you because I'm reacting to that look. Yeah. And then you react to my tone. And then I'm now upset because I don't know why you're upset with me because it's just reaction to reaction. Right. And that spirals up or down. Yeah. It can be very, very negative. So these choices we make are based on reactions. Whereas a decision is stopping and evaluating. First of all, who am I? What is my mix? And what are my values? Right. How do I want to live? And where am I going? A choice is, oh shit, this is happening. I have to do something. Right. Yeah. And it's the distinction in the long run between whether you are going to live your life from a place of urgency and emergency or from what's important. As Stephen Coby talked about in the Seven Habits. If you're going to live your life from... You have to decide what's important. Yes. And then you have to stop when you're in that. Because I know what happens to me, right? Like I see this gal every once in a while and she says, "I'm going away for a week. When I get back, I'd love to spend all day Sunday with you." I go, "Okay." That was a choice. Yes. Because really on Sunday, what I want to do is something entirely different than now when I'm stuck doing. Right. Right. So, yeah, so I can see exactly what you're talking about. Right. So, stopping and saying, "Well, how do I want to live my life?" And it's interesting, because I'm going to give you all the tool here, but I learned years ago for myself, designing myself and learning for myself, because I was realizing I was making enormous amounts of reactive choices and very few decisions. I love the distinction now. This is really clarified a lot to me. And so, stopping for those decisions, one of the things was I'd find that my ego mind didn't, as all our ego minds, didn't want to be wrong. Yes. And so, I'd make a quick choice rather than a quick decision. A quick decision. Yeah. But a quick choice. And in order to not look stupid, big thing with ego. You don't look stupid. Right. Yeah, sure. Okay. Oh, no, no, no, no. It's a reaction. And what my deal with myself became, which is a great tool, was if somebody asked me something to do something, to go somewhere, to commit to something, my response was, "I need a little bit of time to think about that." I need a little bit of time to think about that. Right. Well, why? You know, people, well, why? Because they're reacting, right? Right. So, remember, it's all reactions. Well, why? It's just the way I'm doing things now. Oh, it's just the way I'm doing things now. Yeah. I'm slowing down my thought process. I'm slowing down my decision process. I need a little bit of time to think about this. And it may not be that you need six weeks. Right. Right. Now, it might be that you need to walk out, walk around the block and come back. Yeah. Well, even just by doing that, now I can ask the question, right, because I'm no longer reacting. I have some space and I can say, "Well, is this really important to me? Is this something that I really want to do? Is this taking me towards my goal?" Exactly. See, that's not about whether you really want to do it, because often the things are important to us. Not the things we want to do, right? Everybody knows it's important to be healthy. Very few people make it important enough to do it. Yeah. And you know, it's funny that you say that, because the thing I'm going to do on Sunday is kind of like goofing around and hanging out. Mm-hmm. People not really doing anything. Mm-hmm. And what's important to me is to work out and get fit. Right. To get more fit. Yes. One of the reasons that I'm upset about this thing that I got myself into is that Sunday is the perfect day for me to spend two hours working out. Yes. And I can't, because it's going to be spent with like, gone to dusk with her, and then I was like kind of getting home good bed, right? So it's interesting, because, you know, when we start talking about things about how to make the decision, one of the things that I said to people is, the wonderful thing about choice is you can choose again, and you can choose to make a decision. Mm-hmm. So that would be calling her back and saying, you know what, I'm still looking forward to spending the day with you. However, I've also made a decision that it's very important for me to take care of my health and fitness. And so instead of us meeting for breakfast at nine, I'm going to meet you for brunch at noon. Because I'm going to get up and do my workout first. And then we can spend the day together. Because it is important for me to spend quality time with you, but it's also important for me to take care of my health. And Sunday is a great day for me to do that. So it doesn't have to compromise anything. Right. You know, you're still living from your own integrity. You keep your agreement, but you stand in what's important rather than in a reaction. Right. So it can be both ways. You can make it work, is what I'm saying. Well, what you've just shown me is there's an awful lot of skill involved in making a decision. Mm-hmm. And then working that decision into the choices that we've already made in such a way that you improve relationship as opposed to destroy it. Because this is a very easy thing. I mean, yeah, left to my own devices. The call would go like this. Hey, can't get together. It's more important I exercise, talk to you later. Right. Which would have caused a huge downward reactive spiral. What would have caused a reaction because the reaction would have been to something that sounded like rejection. Yeah. As opposed to not rejection, but as opposed to acceptance of self as an important priority. Yeah. And the relationship also has an important priority. Right. Yeah. And that's not an easy thing to communicate. No, so it's just stopping and saying, hey, you know, it's one of the things that it's a management skill. You know, I work with a lot of CEOs and those kinds of people. Right. And one of the things we say, you know, it's certainly not mine and it's certainly not new. But it's called the sandwich comment. Right. Right. Right. Right. Something good. Something bad. Something good. Yeah. A little sandwich. But in the sandwich. So, hey, I'm really looking forward to spending Sunday with you. That's terrific. Yeah. Because it's important for me to have our relationship. However, it's also important for me to take care of my fitness and Sunday is a great day for me. And I realize I've over committed because I need to take the first two hours for me to have my workouts. So instead of us having breakfast together, let's have brunch together a noon. And I'm really looking forward to seeing you. Yeah. I'll speak to you later. Have a great day. Call me back if there's any challenge with this. So you know it's your choice, put it back to you, and I'm not pulling out of the commitment. I'm just recommitting to myself and you. Yeah. And our relationship. Right. That's great. I mean, you don't really like that. Yeah. It's one of these things that, you know, my students have said this to me very often is that a lot of the tools that I give are very simple. However, they're enormously profound. And because they're simple, they're easy to dismiss. That's part of the challenge. So you go, oh yes, because they're simple, they're easy to remember. Well, no, they are. But that's the challenge. You see, they're easy to remember, but the ego mind makes them unimportant. So it goes, oh yeah, I guess that makes that. But you know, it's like, unless we work through some, you know, enormous amount of effort and then we go, oh yeah, okay, I'll let this break breakthrough. So the breakthrough doesn't have to take a lot. Right. For you to pay attention to it. So making this distinction in your mind, a choice is a reaction. Yeah. And the decision is a consideration. Yeah. I've considered it based on who I am. What is my values? Yeah. What are the methods I want us? And where am I going to? Because remember, we talked about this just a minute ago. It's not about whether I want to do it, it's whether it's important to do it. Right. There's lots of things that I don't want to do, but they're important for me based on where I want to go to. And the fitness one is exactly like that for me. It's something that there's a million things I would rather do than work out for two hours. But I like the way I feel when I work out and I like the way my body looks and I like the energy levels I have and all those things. So I do it. And it's not something that I love to do, but it's something that I know is important. Exactly. And that's why I want to bring that up. It's important, it's not something that I love to eat ice cream, much more than I love to work out. Right. But I don't eat ice cream than I work out because the working out is important. Exactly. The ice cream is not. Right. So desire over importance. Yes. Yeah, emergency, which is a reaction over importance. And stopping constantly to say, is this taking me to what's important? Or is this in some way shape or form a reaction to some emergency? Because we are brilliant at creating all kinds of dramas to create all kinds of emergencies to pull us away from. So when somebody says, well, why didn't you show up or how come you're not coming in? Oh, well, this happened. Yeah. What is this? This is the reactive emergency. As opposed to, I'm not coming because I've made a decision. Yes. Or I will be there because I've made a decision. It's important. Yeah. And I think just taking that time, whether it's just ten seconds or it's a walk around the block to make the decision to contemplate it is huge. You know, I ask people all the time just to stop and just ask, where do you want to be in five years in your life? It's not complex. I'm not asking you to write down a thousand pointers. Just where do you want to be in five years? And now faced with this decision, whatever it is, what is the best decision keeping in mind where you want to be in five years? And that's the only thing that can keep you straight. Because particularly in this time, as we sit here in 2009 with all kinds of economic threat, it's easy to get reactive. But if you stop and say, where do I want to be in five years rather than how do I need to react to the economic situation? Where do I want to be in five years? What is the best decision for me to make right now in order for me to get to that? And the challenges, of course, and I think this is where people go off track, is they're afraid of hurting anybody's feelings. And the bottom line is I certainly not encouraging people to hurt people's feelings, but the bottom line is, if you don't decide to take care of yourself and your dreams, what about your feelings? Which is more important? Is it more important to not offend people? Or is it more important to fulfill your own dream? Yeah, and if you don't stand in your own power, how much respect are you going to get? Exactly. So, you know, the people who like you will only like you because they've also given up their dreams. As you say before, right? Don't expect those who have given up their dreams to support you in your own. Misery loves company. And I think with that, we're going to call this one hand. Yeah, lots of people to think about on this one. That's right. I think this is probably, I mean, there's always great information and insights in all of the podcast episodes that we've done, but I think this one is a life-changing episode. I mean, just take 10 seconds, walk around the block before you make a lot of your choices, turn them into decisions. Yes, be very clear on your vision from your life and step that way not in, because we do, we have all of these distractions and things that are pulling us every which way, and we've got to keep going on the path we want to go on. Or we'll never get to where we want to be. No, and you'll always be living your life for other people. Right. Awesome. Well, thanks, Doug. Thanks, Scott. It's been great being here today. If you want to know more about Doug Baron, or the work that we do, or my company, please go over there. Please go to www.baron, that's B-A-R-O-N, mastery, M-A-S-T-E-R-Y.com, baron, mastery.com, or you can go to www.govbaron.com. That's D-O-V-N-O-E, not about our soap, D-O-V-B-A-R-O-N.com. And of course, you can register for these podcasts at www.baron.partumatic.com. Oh, no, the freemindmasterypodcast.com. Freemindmasterypodcast.com, and you can register there, and then when you plug in your MP3 player, or your PlayPod, your Walkwind. There are actually Arizona Walkwinds that do this. Oh, is it okay? I thought I was flashing back and crying. You were a bit. But, yeah, they'll all download automatically onto your iPod, and you'll be able to listen to them, you know, hot off the press so to speak. Excellent. We'll see you next time, and don't forget to leave us your comments and your feedback. We love hearing from you, and it's a way for us to direct us. As Scott said, we don't have an agenda, and we are very happy to take this in the direction that you want it to go. See you next time, everybody. Bye-bye. [music] This podcast is a part of the C-suite Radio Network. 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