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one of the things that i say um is the most courageous thing you can do
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above all bravery is this is the personal life that i really keep to myself you know i've spoke a lot
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about it today which i've never spoken about before
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[Music] ant middleton and is an adventurer
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a military vet a television host an author an entrepreneur and one that's become highly highly
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respected as an authority when it comes to things like survival and endurance and leadership techniques
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and due to his experiences as an elite special force member he can talk about these
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things in a way that nobody nobody else can and has very very recently been at the center of a huge
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media storm where he was quote unquote cancelled with his biggest show today sas judea's wins being axed by channel 4
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after five years and the broadcaster came out and said that anne's views and values
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weren't aligned to theirs this is his first in-depth conversation that he's recorded
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since he was quote unquote cancelled i've watched countless amounts of interviews that ant middleton has done
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but the side of ant that you're going to hear today is one that even he admits himself that he has never fully shared before
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i'm going to say it this podcast lifted a ton of weight off my shoulders and answered maybe the most
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important question about life that we all must ask ourselves if we are going to be happy and if we're
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going to be successful and if we're going to be free and thank you for your honesty without
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further ado i'm stephen bartlett and this is the dire of a ceo i hope nobody's listening but if you are
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then please keep this to yourself
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and um when i was reading your book first man in there was um there's this quote at the end of one of
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the chapters and i thought it was a good place to start this conversation today because i tend to think that it's probably one
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of the more foundational pieces of information well it might lead to one of the most foundational piece of
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information to describe who you became in your life and what you've got on to achieve and this is what you you wrote at the end of the chapter it says it's called
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making friends with your demons having dark forces living within us is part of being human they're the result
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of inevitable damage of life each one of us has a choice make these demons work for us
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or turn them loose against us and slightly linked to that in the same on the same page you wrote
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most of most of us have horror stories we can tell you about from our childhoods it's not the horror that defines you
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it's how well you fought it what did that mean i think that's just a generic message to everyone to say that
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it's okay to have you know bad thoughts it's okay to have these demons inside you they
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exist in all of us you know but the important message is to exercise them
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because the moment you lock them away the moment you lock these thoughts away the moment you lock these demons away the moment you lock any negativity away
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all it's going to do is take over like a mold and it's going to completely engulf you and it's going to going to control you
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as an individual and it's only because i've been there and i've done it whether that's what i've done in combat
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losing my father at a young age um losing my mother um seeing bodies blown up around me
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seeing dead people around me seeing the effect it has on families seeing what my decision pulling that
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trigger or not has on a certain person or has on a
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certain family or has on a certain situation and it's ultimately being okay with who
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you are that's the whole thing about it it's being acknowledging that listen
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we're not perfect we're human okay we have weaknesses we have insecurities we have these horrendous thoughts sometimes
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now you'd be a liar to say you don't sit there sometimes and you know the things that go through your head if you actually voice them
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then that becomes a problem that's you not exercising your demons that's them exercising you and it's just about
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acknowledging that and i acknowledge that from such a young age
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i acknowledged that from a young age when my father passed away and i couldn't really understand what was going on can you tell me about that um yeah my
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father passed away when i was five years old and um within a few months
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a new man came into our life um my stepfather um and then within two years we up
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moved to france so we lived in portsmouth we often moved completely to france a new situation a new environment a new
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man in our life and i can just remember thinking i remember going into
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a bush in the fields where we lived in france after a couple of months we were there
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and i sat in this bush and the magnitude of the situation was
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so overwhelming i can just remember looking at the road and thinking to myself
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what am i doing here why why am i here what's the purpose i i couldn't grasp anything at that young
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age and it was during that moment when i let everything go
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and i can just remember thinking to myself don't try and understand what's going on don't i'm just trying to understand who
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this man is and where he's come from don't try and understand why you're in a different school speaking a different language
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because you can't don't try and understand all of a sudden you're living in
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caravans we moved we were living in a couple of caravans we were a big big family um from houses
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um and i can just remember dropping everything and thinking to myself understand what you can understand and
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that at that young age what i could understand was what i was feeling you know i could
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understand myself so when i look back on the death of my father and as i flip everything into a
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positive even though years and years and years down the line i'd done this you know the death of my father actually
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made me self-reflect from the age of six or seven so i've been self-reflecting you know
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understanding my emotions understanding how i feel understanding my demons understanding you know the good parts of me the bad
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parts to me the weak parts of me the strong parts of me the positive side of me the negative side of me
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and i've been really breaking it down from such a young age and
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that's given me an advantage in life i generally believe that that's given me
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my sort of bulletproof mindset on how to tackle anyone or any situation today
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so even though it's a traumatic part of my life and it affected me all
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the way up to my mid-20s in in a bad way where i'd go out and try and understand who my father was trying
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to understand you know i never went to his funeral i never went to
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to to his grave now my parents my say my parents my stepdad because he
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came in my life so young i called him my dad um they never told me where he was buried he was just completely cut out of
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our life um because of the situation beforehand you know for him to come into our lives
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a couple of months after it was pretty obvious that my mum was obviously having an affair or there's something going on
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and again i'm not judging anyone or the situation but you know so when he came into our life
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it was like right you call him dad my name changed from aaron to middleton
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not a lot of people know that really yeah um and this whole new life was just
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forced upon me forced upon me so i was either forced to act or force not to act
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you know sitting in that bush me forcing not to act was probably jumping in the road
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you know thinking like listen enough is enough did that cross your mind
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it was a big road it was a big road and
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it never got to that stage where i thought right i'm going to take my life but it was like you know this there's an easy option out
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of here which i mean it's like there is an easy option out of here but it never crossed my mind to
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to do it but i can just remember thinking of that road thinking the cars move fast there i mean if you wanted to it's more like
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if you wanted to yeah so it crosses your mind yeah it crosses your mind but it doesn't register yeah if that makes sense yeah
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and it's only you know throughout these few years when you start to reflect back on on who you are and what you've been
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through you start to go bloody hell and actually maybe i was thinking like that at a young age
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so um but then again you know who i am i you know i'm honest with myself i'm honest
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with my demons i'm honest with with who i am and ultimately i'm i'm honest with um
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with knowing that we're not perfect you know a lot of people and you've described it there they never
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make they never admit their demons to themself and what ends up happening is those demons
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run the show but from the back room absolutely and you know i guess you see that a lot with people that have come back from war
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as well because they don't get the uh the support they need but
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i see it during war yeah i see people level-headed intelligent soldiers lose their head on
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the battlefield come running past you doing things that you think
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wow where the hell did that come from you look into their eyes and there's [ __ ] nothing there nothing there
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and then boom they flip out and you're like do you realize what you just done like
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like you know it's you know those demons are [ __ ] strong
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they're there how do you address them you have to exercise them and you know the way i exercise my
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demons is by getting like-minded similar people in
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the same room in a safe environment and i might drink myself into oblivion
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till three four in the morning you know chatting about what we've done chatting about old times chatting about who we are and
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then boom i'm done for six months you know i've i've released those demons
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when you you know intoxicate yourself with alcohol it you know it allows you to talk and i'm not saying
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go out there and do that but that's just my way of coming from a drinking culture i.e the military a drinking and a fighting
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culture that's the way that we deal with things and for now now it might be a blowout where you know i go out and you know i'll have a nice
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meal and you know we'll have a few glasses of wine you know we'll be in a private room and we we shoot the [ __ ]
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and you know just talk about whatever we need to talk about whatever's on your mind but also physically
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i exercise my demons physically you know i put myself in horrendous situations in
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order to fight against myself um everest is a prime example of what's gonna say um
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you know i didn't have to go up during the storms i you know if i was the normal sensible person i
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would have went up after that storm went so just for context you you decided to climb mount everest with
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a buddy of yours at probably the worst possible time and you got into a little bit of a predicament up there yeah exactly that yeah um to say the
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least yeah but it's one of those where i didn't just want to walk up
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on a nice sunny day you know and and gain nothing from that experience
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what what why though like why are you voluntarily putting yourself through chaos and what anyone else would
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perceive to be agony why are you choosing that that's me exercising my demons really that's me
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you know pushing myself to that limit that's me having tasted that drug of
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living on that line of life and death and a lot of people think that drugs adrenaline but it's not
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i don't feel pumped i don't feel i feel ultimate peace so people find this bizarre but when
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i walk that line of life and death which i've done multiple times it's a pure feeling of euphoria it's not
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what you think where you feel pumped in your your eyes are red and you've got this aggression going through
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you and you have to get through this moment it's like life is so uncomplicated steve so
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uncomplicated you're either going to live or you're going to die all the [ __ ] all the complications
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of life that is implemented on you whether that's through government whether that's through work
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whether that's true family all of that goes and you are left with the most purest
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form of life and it's so uncomplicated that it's so euphoric
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it's so peaceful and when you hear of world war one and world war ii poets that are
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writing poems in trenches people are like how the hell are they writing poems in trenches
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i understand that feeling because life is so uncomplicated it's so pure it's so peaceful
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that they're writing with no stresses no complications no [ __ ] it's just it's
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coming from the purest form of life of i'm either going to live or i'm going to die
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and it's that feeling that i chase i chase that feeling well to want that moment of peace pure and
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utter peace for 10 15 minutes
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that drug i chase and that's crossing those boundaries crossing those
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lines crossing any limitations to the edge of life you take that step you're gone
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you go over that edge you know you're gonna feel it you're gonna feel alive you're
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gonna feel everything that you need that you need out of life um but for me that's exercising my demons
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so whether i do it psychologically where i'm putting myself in situations that i'm saying stuff that
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i believe in that i value that as a message and it's being contradicted or whether i'm pushing myself
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to a physical limit or putting myself in a in a physical situation which is
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uncomprehendable to to the to the everyday man or woman but it's because i've tasted it i've had
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the misfortune i've had the burden of tasting that drug
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and will it be the end of me i can't say that for sure i can't say that it won't
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i can't say that you know i've never put myself in these situations again because i find myself constantly doing it
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but for me that is exercising my demons and everyone's demons are different
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everyone's situation is different everyone's emotions are different everyone's dna is different but that's
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me exercising my demons quick one starting from the minute the lockdown is lifted we're gonna start
00:14:49
bringing in some of our subscribers to watch how this podcast is produced behind the scenes means you get to meet the guests meet
00:14:54
myself and see how we put all of this together if you want that to be you all you've got to do hit the subscribe button
00:15:01
what what are the other if any moments from your early years that went into shaping the man you became was there anything
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else because i i hear you in your books and in your writing and your interviews continue to cite that that that sort of trauma with your father and
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your stepfather then coming in and and being the way that he was but there was was there anything up leading until
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you know your twenties that you cite as being pivotal and who you became yeah when i joined
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the british military i joined the army at the age of 16. i'm just going on to 17. and i came from
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a background of french culture you know i'd go out and drink coffee when i was 14 play bowling when i was 15.
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you know and all of a sudden i get thrown into a male dominant organization um the culture drinking fighting you fit
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in or you [ __ ] off it's as simple as that so what do you do you try and fit in
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but when you try and put a a round peg into a square hole you know you're going to get stuck and
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you either stay stuck okay you and you go around pleasing everyone else or you pull yourself out
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of that situation and that's ultimately what i've done with the army i spent four years in the army then left because of that situation it wasn't me i
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wasn't this aggressive young lad that loved drinking i'd never used to drink
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i was always polite always respectful i'd walk past someone i'd tip my hat you know in france you said bonjour and
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you know you just have a little chat you do that in england when when i was 16 17 walking past someone nodding and they're like what
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the [ __ ] are you looking at no it used to shock me and i used to think i'm only saying hi mate what you
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know and that was a pivotal four years in my life where i thought to myself
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can i fit in to this uk culture um or i can
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pull myself out of it and for the first four years i found myself fitting in and i found myself being good at
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drinking i found myself being good at fighting i found myself being good at being a
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[ __ ] [ __ ] you know because that's what i needed to be to fit in so again those were demons
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that i discovered along the way that i found that i was good at so would i let anyone take the piss out of me anymore you bet
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no because you're going to get you're going to get good hiding you know would i would i go out and and drink and fit in yeah of course of
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course i would you know hey one of the lads i want to fit in i mean i'm so i'm so far detached from all of that but
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if i'm this young polite respectful sort of multiculturaled individual then
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that's gonna be a more of a hindrance moving forward in in what i need to do
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especially in the military then it is uh a benefit so you find yourself
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turning into this person i can just remember i was about 21 and
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i went to macedonia and i worked with the french foreign legion out there because i speak fluent french
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and i worked with the french friend legion a bit and i saw how they were they're very very mature very sort of you know
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going back to that french culture you know they're all family orientated very i thought to myself wow this is this is
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who i am and when i got back off that tour i can just remember going to the squadron bar
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i was in nine parachute squadron wall engineers going to the squadron bar we've just done a six-month tour i'm
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going to the squadron bar and i remember walking in there and i remember seeing someone um a staff sergeant probably about 35
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36 you know i'm a young 20 21 year old drinking from a a boot for an old desert
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boot right and he's drinking piss being drinking piss from my boot and i can
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just remember looking at him thinking if i continue the way that i'm going that's going to be me
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in 15 years time and it scared the hell out of me i can remember just thinking i've got to
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get the hell out of here i walked out of that bar and the next day i put my notice in i was like that this is not who i
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am this is not you know i've gained more demons from this four years than i have
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any friends any benefits from it and that was a pivotal point that was a
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pivotal point in my life where i thought to myself wow you know i can either go i can have a
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change in such a way and just be stuck in this square hole
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or i can pull myself out rebuild on the foundations that i have of knowing that i'm a good person
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and you and from there you handed in your notice and what happened next from there i handed him my notice and
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and i left and um i found that in civvie street i was acting
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the person that i never wanted to be in the military right but i'd found that that had followed me that that had taken
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charge of me give me be specific those demons that um those demons that had sort of identified
00:20:01
themselves within that four years were running the show so when i got out i joined the metropolitan police
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and i was acting like a proper squaddie right now going out drinking every night you know cheating on my exams um drink driving
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you know i got all the way through training a couple of weeks ago a couple of weeks to go passed all the
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tests i got caught drink driving boom kicked out the um kicked out the met
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um out the training um in hendon and but it didn't bother me i was like yeah you know once a soldier always a
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soldier and i was living in the past and being someone who
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completely wasn't me but who had control of me and then getting into into the street
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life you know i got into the street life where you know
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fighting not gangs not games but that that social circle where you know you
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have to uphold a reputation where you and the one thing that you know well i'll say the one thing but the thing i
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was good at that fitted me is that was a good scrapper i knew i know how to scrap i know how to drink and how to fight but you find yourself
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reverting back to the person who you never wanted to be and i suppose that was the defense mechanism
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i knew that that worked in the uk i'd never tried and tested anything else as soon as i came over to the uk
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straight into the military again now i spent 10 12 years in france before that then
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boom straight over into into the british culture and i thought that that's how you acted i never knew what silly street was about
00:21:34
because um i never i was never in it so um it took me a a good couple of years again
00:21:41
to realize what saved you what pulled you out of the job there's one moment that saved me um
00:21:50
i refused to sign on i refuse to take any any help from the government same um
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and i can remember my auntie i was living with my auntie at the time and you've got you know you've got no money what are
00:22:03
you going to do i said well i'm going to go down to the job center why won't you just sign on you know until you find a job i'm like
00:22:10
no that was proud i was like no i've never taken a penny off the government
00:22:17
i thought now i'm going to go to the job center i remember walking into the job center walking up the stairs walking into the job center
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and i had my red book and the red book when you leave the military it's got all your all your qualifications military
00:22:27
qualifications all your credentials and i walked into the job center and the guy obviously recognized the books
00:22:33
they'd probably have hundreds of people going there you know a year and he said oh mate you're x military on yourself yeah he said come
00:22:39
to the desk he sat down with me and he opened up my book and he started reading my book
00:22:44
and he looked up at me and he said why did you leave the military and before i could answer i was going to say something back and he said
00:22:51
i have hundreds of these come across my desk and they said this is one of the best reports i've ever read he said so my advice to you as he
00:22:59
slammed the book shot he went went go back into that space and i remember just sitting there
00:23:04
um i was 22 sitting down and thinking mike okay he's gonna offer me a job now and he just
00:23:10
handed me the book and called over the next person and i was just like i'm picking up a bit to myself guys
00:23:17
you know but obviously there's there's all military qualifications there's nothing for me out there apart from to
00:23:22
empty bins or whatever it may be and i remember taking the book and as i
00:23:28
walked down the steps of the job center i sat down halfway down on the steps
00:23:35
and i had a train ticket in my pocket and probably about a couple of quid loose change that's
00:23:41
that was my life um this was at the age of 22 23 maybe
00:23:47
and um and i can just remember thinking to myself right why the hell are you sat
00:23:57
skin nothing in your life apart from what you the clothes that
00:24:02
you're wearing and what's in your pockets jobless and then
00:24:10
a moment of clarity just hit me it's almost as if i had an out of body experience and i was looking back at the
00:24:16
boys sitting on the step and i just remember thinking to myself right
00:24:22
i'll tell you why it's because you're pretending to be someone else
00:24:27
you're lying to yourself therefore you're living a lie you're you know you think you're better than everyone else
00:24:33
you know you've got this reputation that you want to uphold that's not you um you're just you're just a shadow of
00:24:40
who you really are you're not you know who the hell do you think you are because the person that i'm looking at
00:24:47
you know almost looking in the mirror the person that i'm looking at is exactly where you should be sat on a
00:24:53
[ __ ] step jobless with nothing because this isn't you and if you want to live
00:25:00
in the shadow if you want to stay stuck in that hole in that square hole then keep lying to yourself and keep
00:25:07
living a lie and that moment i'll always go back to that moment whenever i get a bit above
00:25:13
myself or a bit too big for my boots i always go back to that moment where i ripped
00:25:18
myself apart because it freed me as an individual and i promise you this and it's not
00:25:24
cliche this isn't some kind of [ __ ] [ __ ] story that i'm telling you it freed me as an individual because
00:25:29
i can remember remember standing up on them steps feeling like a new man
00:25:35
because i just identified who i was this isn't you get that out your life get out of your life get that out of your life
00:25:41
be you and i had those foundations to fall back on because i knew who i was ultimately but
00:25:46
it was discovered and and yeah ego covered with so much [ __ ] covered with so much complications that
00:25:51
i'd implemented on myself and when i got rid of it all i was just like that you know what i was
00:25:56
good at the military i've got best recruit best pt when i was in the army you know what i'm gonna do i
00:26:02
love that lifestyle but it's just around the wrong people i was in the wrong regiment you know i'm
00:26:08
gonna rejoin the military but i'm going to be a team player i'm going to be myself i'm going to be this
00:26:13
respectful gentleman hard worker that i know that i am which i mean i'm not going to go out
00:26:18
boozing i'm not going to go out fighting i'm not going to try and fit in you know if they don't accept me for who i am then so be it
00:26:25
the military obviously isn't for me i joined the royal marines i went straight down the careers office
00:26:31
straight down the careers office and joined the royal marines and within a couple of months because of my previous
00:26:36
um military uh history um i got him very quick and within a couple of months i found
00:26:42
myself going through royal marine training and when i passed out of war marine training i got um awarded with best
00:26:47
recruit which is the king's badge and i can just remember thinking to myself right and you've been here before
00:26:54
you know you've got best recruit best pt you know you rested on your laurels went to your unit didn't really fit in you're in the same position now now you
00:27:01
can either use this as a positive and push forward and and you know go on to achieve great things or you can try and fit in
00:27:10
booze fight be a be a camp hero you know a pub soldier
00:27:16
and just be back to square one where you was five six seven years ago there's something and i want to carry on from
00:27:23
that story but just going back to that i find it super fascinating that you're sat on those stairs and at a moment when your ego kind of
00:27:30
dissolves because of the circumstances you find yourself in um you're actually able then to go and
00:27:35
pursue your true self and i find you know i had someone sat in this chair previously and he's the biggest investor
00:27:40
in the world in psychedelics and one of the things that he talks about with psychedelics is it what it does is it strips back the [ __ ]
00:27:47
your ego the the identity you've been living to please society and what's left is like who you actually
00:27:54
are and it's and it's so funny that so many of the guests i speak to and some of the psychologists i've spoken to talk about
00:27:59
in order to like find your happiness and pursue your true self you have to get rid of that [ __ ] and what i'm what i was hearing when you
00:28:05
were saying that is you know you'd you'd create this reputation an identity for yourself which actually was leading
00:28:10
you astray but it was helping you survive in those circles absolutely and this tough tough decision
00:28:15
to say do you know i'm going to break out that circle leave that identity behind throw myself
00:28:21
into an uncertain moment and go in pursuit of like who i actually am and everybody faces that in their life
00:28:27
you know as a kid growing up in devon in a school of 1500 white kids pretending that i liked indie music and
00:28:34
pretending i was to fit in and survive yeah and i i left the city because i
00:28:39
deep down in my heart i didn't resonate with anybody but i was in that small town city surrounded by 1500 white kids that liked
00:28:46
the kooks yeah and then 18 i was like i'm out here i'm gonna go be steve move to manchester
00:28:53
you know and i dropped and i started to and i think everybody in their life regardless of what walk of life you you face that decision and either you've
00:29:01
realized that you're living an identity or a life untrue to yourself and you've gone on the journey to go
00:29:07
find yourself or right now as you're listening to this you are and you'll know it yeah because
00:29:12
the words that you've described there will ring true so that completely i completely understand that and that makes complete
00:29:18
sense to me and one of the things that i say um is the most courageous thing you can do
00:29:25
above all bravery is to be honest with yourself why is that
00:29:30
so hard these days i had one day last week was actually sunday where i didn't have my heel and i had a
00:29:38
little bit of junk food and i don't know what it is but i think my body has got used to eating clean food because for the next
00:29:45
three days i felt i still kind of feel what day we are now tuesday i still kind
00:29:51
of feel crap from the junk food that i i just had one drunk meal i had this junk meal
00:29:57
right i still feel crap now i don't know what it is i think my body has genuinely got used to eating good food so the minute
00:30:03
now that i put in something that is bad for me my body goes steve what are you doing um and i felt bad for the last two days
00:30:09
and i've returned to huell and i feel good again this is just an anecdotal story but i said this to my pa last night i said i for some reason having now
00:30:16
transitioned to a really good diet on your any sort of um dabble with the
00:30:23
the stuff that i used to eat is more sort of alarming to my body and i notice it way more than i ever had
00:30:29
so yeah you know it's one thing having a podcast sponsor that pays you money but it's another thing having a podcast
00:30:34
sponsor who you genuinely believe can help people change their lives for the better
00:30:40
one of the things that i say um is the most courageous thing you can do
00:30:46
above all bravery is to be honest with yourself why is that
00:30:51
so hard these days you know people say to me and you know
00:30:56
what's the bravest thing you've ever done and i always talk about the story of the job center steps because that
00:31:02
took courage that took balls that that's bravery right there you know i've been in rooms where bullets are flying over my head i've
00:31:08
kicked doors down and you know i've taken i've saved life it's like that's not
00:31:13
being brave that's just me being extremely good at my job and loving what i do you know it's not there's nothing to do
00:31:18
with bravery you know bravery is almost forced upon you but when you decide to step into the arena when you decide to step
00:31:25
into that and go right i'm going to face this and put that mirror on yourself
00:31:31
ultimately facing yourself that is the hardest but most liberating thing i've ever done
00:31:38
and people shy away from that and they live in the void they live this life where they're just
00:31:43
living the void i call it and say you're on autopilot because you're lying to yourself and it's pretty simple therefore you're
00:31:49
going to live a lie i don't care it's i'm not the archbishop of canterbury you know i'm like
00:31:55
i'm not a rocket scientist it's just simple science you know if you lie to yourself guess what you're going to live a lie um
00:32:02
but standing in a mirror standing in the mirror and ripping yourself apart
00:32:10
does take away all the [ __ ] and all the complications and it frees you as an individual but it's you have to do it on a regular
00:32:17
basis you can't just go i've done it once so here we go i've found myself this is who i am because hopefully you're constantly changing
00:32:23
you're constantly evolving you're constantly um adapting your mindset you know that's what evolution is about you know the the
00:32:30
world is designed to to you know is is it evolutionizes and we are designed to do exactly the same
00:32:37
and the moment that you you're not honest with yourself
00:32:42
this game over for you it's like it's like you do you just want to be just that person you know like a lot of
00:32:48
people say to me and you know i've remember you remember me from the military i'm like yeah yeah yeah they got [ __ ] i you've changed a
00:32:54
lot you've changed i'm like that i haven't seen you for 10 years i hope i've changed and i say to them
00:33:00
you haven't that's why you're still just that guy that's why i'm at middleton and you're still just that guy
00:33:06
is because of course i've changed i'd like to think in another 10 years time when you see me that i've changed again because if i haven't
00:33:12
i'm doing something wrong and that doing something wrong is not being honest with myself and it all goes back to you as an
00:33:18
individual no one can do that for you no one can do that for you and i say to every everyone
00:33:24
everything starts with you and it's it's so true if you don't want to change
00:33:30
nothing will change around you you know if you don't want to be honest with yourself well guess what you're lying to yourself
00:33:36
it's a complete opposite therefore you're living a lie it's like you have to do this on a on a on a weekly on a monthly basis any
00:33:43
time an obstacle was thrown in front of you you couldn't fall back on right to be honest with
00:33:48
yourself be honest with who you are be honest with with with you you know with how you tackle things and
00:33:54
and and don't lie to yourself the cost of being yourself and being honest with yourself is it seemingly increasing in this day
00:34:01
and age and you know i find it i think that's a really really valid point one that i hadn't i didn't think expressed properly which
00:34:06
is you had that reflective moment when you sat on those stairs where you say [ __ ] it we're gonna start being honest with ourselves but then especially as
00:34:13
you get more successful you know in your media career and everything else the forces at play trying to get you to not be
00:34:20
honest with yourself get greater and greater and this is this crazy sort of i don't know paradox or whatever we see
00:34:26
in society at the moment which is you being honest with yourself is the reason you're sat here it's the reason
00:34:31
you're at middleton yeah but and that's what's made you go explode right
00:34:36
but then the higher you get it's like i don't know you know the the resistance for you not
00:34:42
to be yourself becomes greater because now you've got now you're more of a target right hard [ __ ] hard [ __ ] life to live
00:34:49
do you know what i've been witness of it you know the council culture the um don't say that ant because you
00:34:56
will lose this book deal you will lose that media career you will lose that production
00:35:02
and witness of it right now you know um i hear it probably on a weekly basis um
00:35:10
but then that's that square peg round hole it's like no i don't
00:35:18
you know it's it's every time i think about that and i always have two principles
00:35:24
with everything that i do is don't go out to offend so i don't say
00:35:30
things to offend people therefore they choose to be offended i don't say things to offend people i just
00:35:35
say things what i think is right was what served me um good in my experiences
00:35:41
and my career my mindset and the second thing is you know don't don't do
00:35:46
things maliciously so first of all don't go out it's it's verbal and also actions
00:35:53
you know don't don't do things maliciously because then ultimately yeah you're going to have a backlash you're going to have a reaction
00:35:59
to to to what you've done um so that's exactly what i do i don't go out to offend
00:36:04
but i go out to tell the truth but i also go out to seek the truth you know and i go out to
00:36:10
seeking the truth again everything starts with you and with who i am it's dangerous and it's it's it's
00:36:16
definitely in the social media area it's dangerous it is dangerous but hopefully you get past that
00:36:23
that stage of people realizing that actually this is ant he's not been any different he's not you know
00:36:30
voiced anything different he's not tried to fit into a media agenda he's not trying to try to blag anyone he's not being fake
00:36:36
this is who aunt middleton is and he will always be like that regardless yeah regardless but then
00:36:41
there's that platform of not reaching that level quite yet and then everything descending upon you
00:36:49
um and i and unfortunately there's a lot of people out there that are scared to say what they truly feel are scared to voice their
00:36:56
opinions uh scared to you know voice their values because ultimately it takes food off the table
00:37:04
it's a career stopper when your career stops guess what suffers after that your family and then when that when that suffers
00:37:10
guess what there's not much out there for you you have to rebuild again well all those 10 15
00:37:16
20 years career that you've you've built all for that one moment is it worth it no so what do you do
00:37:22
keep quiet what'd you do don't do anything just say what they want you to say and
00:37:28
do what they want you to do that doesn't [ __ ] rub with me that's
00:37:33
a sore point with me you know you try and you try and make me someone that i'm
00:37:38
that i'm not like i've been made someone them than i'm that i'm not you're probably gonna get even you feel
00:37:45
gonna get the worst out of me even more so because everything comes back around to who you truly are they're trying to control you
00:37:51
yeah it's a controlling measure and it's like listen i've i've let people control my life i've let
00:37:57
situations control my life and it's i've ended up psychologically not physically
00:38:02
psychologically on that brink of questioning who the [ __ ] who the [ __ ] am
00:38:09
i who am i that's what i question and the moment i start questioning who am i
00:38:14
then i know that project isn't for me i know that that that sponsor isn't for me i know that
00:38:20
that tv um channel or that tv production isn't for me because the moment that comes into
00:38:26
question and it's like you don't probably don't get who i am you probably don't understand who i am you probably haven't done your homework with
00:38:32
who i am do i fit into your agenda and it's like if you don't fit into one agenda
00:38:38
you get bounced boom straight across to the opposite side right it's like listen i don't belong on
00:38:44
that side it's just cause i don't believe in in this this side doesn't mean i belong on that side
00:38:50
yeah i'm i belong in the middle you know people say you are you on the left you're on the right i'm like i'm not on the left or
00:38:56
right i'm in the middle i'm in the middle
00:39:02
you say slightly something that goes against this agenda then again you just get bounced straight to the other side the
00:39:07
right road i don't recognize you the left won't recognize you so there's who are your enemies of both yeah but it's it's and it's a dangerous
00:39:14
place to live in this is it's it's it it's it's a sad state of affairs a real
00:39:22
sad sad um sad state of affairs and you know just because your values and
00:39:28
your views are different doesn't mean my message isn't isn't the same you know my message everything that i do
00:39:33
is about positivity it's about mindset it's about bringing people together you look at sas who dares wins what does it
00:39:40
do makes people realize what they're capable of makes them find themselves it brings people together brings families together you know mutiny
00:39:48
teamwork brings people together escape you know straight talking being honest and open
00:39:54
and and it makes it makes you feel good it brings you together it unites people
00:39:59
because they can be open and honest with themselves and therefore they know what they're capable of self belief starts to kick in and they
00:40:05
feel good about it's bringing people together right and that is you'd be inhumane
00:40:11
really to to not think like that to not want to help people out to not want to so the message is is is always the same
00:40:18
but it's this bit in the middle right don't you ever get pushed to one side you can't have this sort of in the
00:40:23
middle opinion of well actually my values are the same as yours you know i'm all about positive change
00:40:29
yeah okay so what why are you saying my values don't fit with yours because i'm about positive change look at my message for the last
00:40:35
five six years since i've been in the media it's positive change unity look at what i do everything i do
00:40:41
whether it's my books my tours my tv programs everything is about bringing people together
00:40:46
bringing the best out of people so just because this in-between bit i my
00:40:52
views are different and mine are probably truthful which people don't want to hear the truth it's like right bounce off to one
00:40:58
side and then and then you start to get cancelled but what's the answer though like so i i you
00:41:04
know i hear we've heard pierce morgan talk a lot about this as well and other people talk about how you know if you don't perfectly fit the
00:41:10
the views or the perfect hashtag of the of the left or whatever then um you're
00:41:15
basically being cancelled in culture and i i genuinely this is a [ __ ] probably the most genuine question i've ever asked in this
00:41:21
podcast because it's one that i'm thinking about all the time is i also see this happening my views don't always fit the left or the right
00:41:27
and sometimes like in the black lives matter moment i posted on my instagram saying it was actually my best performing post of all
00:41:33
time i said because there was this whole narrative around like silence is violence and if you're not saying anything then you're a racist
00:41:39
i did a post saying like that's obviously [ __ ] yeah as i said it's unpopular black opinion if someone doesn't post a black square
00:41:45
on their instagram doesn't make them a racist people process things in completely different in fact the most unnatural
00:41:50
reaction to trauma is to take to social media so like and that absolutely it was it was it didn't fit the like silences
00:41:57
violence narrative and and my ability and i like of course that's [ __ ] true like i mean it doesn't it doesn't fit i
00:42:04
understand right but it's no one not one individual in the millions and millions of views
00:42:09
that that posted could tell me there was one slide in that nine that was they disagreed with but it was the
00:42:16
feeling that i wasn't wearing the football kit of the of the left that made some people go
00:42:22
you're an awful person to sleep and then i'd go why they'd go yeah yeah exactly you see their minds
00:42:29
ticking and ticking you're like tell me tell me what's wrong with the post they go oh you know what sorry
00:42:35
yeah and and i i i think well i'm i know i'm not going to change so when i look into my future i go at
00:42:40
some point i'm going to get cancelled because my brand is building i've got some stuff coming up on in the media and i'm thinking i know i'm
00:42:46
not going to change so what's the answer here like i'm always going to and i know that it's getting more is the answer this is why you're here
00:42:54
yeah i know it's like it's like it's like what the answer is to be true to who you are yeah and just take the intention
00:42:59
and it's like it's you know that's the one thing i've always fall back on
00:43:05
is just knowing you know if you're an idiot you know if you're irritating people you know if you're not a good
00:43:11
person and then ultimately you know you're going to get what's coming to you and you probably deserve it
00:43:16
but i know that i'm a good person i know my foundations i'm polite and respectful
00:43:21
you know i don't go out to offend ever go out to offend i hate confrontation
00:43:26
because of the way that i know that i can deal with confrontation it frightens me to get into that situation because i
00:43:33
know what i'm capable of okay so i don't ever i'm over polite i'm over respectful
00:43:39
because i think people should be treated like that now i like to be treated like that i wasn't treated like that when i started off in my army career and i know
00:43:44
what it feels like okay and i never would never want anyone to to experience that so i'm over polite
00:43:50
and i'm over respectful and i've always fall back on that i always look at myself in the mirror and i go and
00:43:55
you're you i know i'm a good person and that are the foundations that i've built that's my foundations that's
00:44:02
who i am okay so you can knock my bricks down i will but guess what i will keep
00:44:07
building and building and building and you can knock it even if you knock them down to the foundations
00:44:13
i can fall back on being true to myself and there's no more liberating steve
00:44:19
liberating feeling than that of being true to who you are going do you know what i'm not going to fit into that agenda
00:44:26
i'm not going to fit into that box i'm not going to squeeze myself in there to make myself feel uncomfortable
00:44:32
for your agenda because that's not who i am would you rather lose at all yeah 100 because i've got my foundations i've got
00:44:38
my foundations i will always build steve always build and this part of the building
00:44:44
is so high now that can you cancel me crack on because i guarantee you i just keep building this side this side of
00:44:50
this side decide because the people that know me know who i am and someone said this to me with all the
00:44:57
stuff that's been going on lately um you know i've had some sponsors i've
00:45:02
cancelled i've had some tv programs that i've kind of crack on but the people that by my side the
00:45:07
sponsors and the channels and the production companies that by my side that have worked for me saying and
00:45:14
we have the privilege of knowing you and that wrong accord to me though i'm like they have the privilege of
00:45:20
knowing me and i think to myself wow you've got the privilege of knowing i've got the privilege of knowing myself
00:45:26
because i know who i am and i'm glad i'm glad i gave you that privilege and it's not being big headed i'm glad i
00:45:32
gave you that privilege of knowing me because you know that this is just a storm of words
00:45:37
you know that this is just media hype you know this is just fake news you know this isn't real you know yeah i've maybe got a little bit of a
00:45:44
fiery side to me but you know you're getting that with me you know i'm rough around the edges
00:45:49
so yeah and i'm happy to you know to to to cut a few of the edges but those edges are still going to be there
00:45:55
do you know what i mean so when they said that to me and it's something that will stick with me
00:46:01
forever and it's from a very very good sponsor you know um very much to do with my books and i can
00:46:09
just and i remember sitting back and just taking that breath and going keep doing what you're doing then you're doing the right thing and then this last
00:46:16
week you know so many doors have opened production companies calling me
00:46:22
channels calling me um you know and you hear about it you hear about oh you know you get cancelled then
00:46:29
that's your career done and but then you've got your peers morgan's you've got your your jeremy clarkson's
00:46:34
and now you've got your aunt middleton's okay and
00:46:39
it just goes to show that i'm doing the right thing and that actually yeah i'm not gonna fit i'm not gonna be
00:46:45
comfortable with with everyone and i'm not gonna be their cup of tea well that's fine because
00:46:50
guess what i don't want to work with you if i get questioned one little bit about my
00:46:56
who i am like i said before if i get questioned one little bit about who i am by any brands any sponsors any channels then i will
00:47:02
not work with them i will say listen thank you very much it's obviously
00:47:08
you know not the right match um you go on and do your thing and i'll go on and do my thing because i will always
00:47:14
go on and do my thing and that building can completely drop to the foundations but when you're honest with yourself and
00:47:21
you know who you are those foundations are solid you will always have something to build from
00:47:28
but when you're not honest with yourself and everything comes crumbling down and you have no foundations to fall on
00:47:34
you're [ __ ] that's when you're in trouble that's when you start to go well i won't say that i won't act like this i
00:47:39
won't do this and i won't do that and that's when you become someone else that's when you become fake to who you
00:47:45
are and guess what desperate times then you're like a wounded animal
00:47:50
and guess what you're probably going to be right at the back of the pack for the rest of your life the
00:47:56
psychological impact of living a life that isn't true to yourself and i mean this is why people have these
00:48:01
like midlife crises when they've even in like the professional world where they've you know their mum and dad have told them to go and be a
00:48:07
whatever a banker or a lawyer they don't want to be they want to be a [ __ ] dancer or whatever and then they get mid-life crisis and
00:48:13
you look at throughout psychology i talk about this a little bit my book you know if you look at certain communities like the lgbtq
00:48:20
community their suicide rates are so so high amongst those groups because a lot of them have been
00:48:25
oppressed in a way where they can't live their true life they can't be their identity so they've had to
00:48:30
live a lie that's live a fake life and then you see suicide rates go up because that is a form of torture and this is when i asked you the
00:48:36
question about you know would you rather lose at all um one would one would actually maybe even if i question myself say well
00:48:43
what are you losing yeah if you're losing tv shows and you're losing things that aren't true to yourself is it a loss you know it's not a loss
00:48:50
because you will always find something that fits you dude i mean if you have the passion
00:48:56
and the drive and the ambition and the positivity of knowing who you are and ultimately
00:49:04
the world is your oyster it's like you know people have this impression of me that i'm this
00:49:09
hard-faced drill sergeant non-accepting person i am the complete
00:49:17
opposite go and be the [ __ ] you want to be that's my message if that's what then don't let anyone
00:49:23
force you into into saying anything doing anything or being anyone else be yourself but this is the side that people don't
00:49:30
see of you and this but this is my personal side steve i people see what they want to see the
00:49:36
media will write what they want to write they will they will make you they will make you out to be who they
00:49:42
want you to be but you can't put all of that into a hashtag you've got to characterize yourself in 10 letters yeah and this is
00:49:47
the problem with with issues that are complex and nuanced and there's different layers and you if it doesn't fit into a hashtag
00:49:53
then and this is the football team analogy as well quick interjection before we get back to the podcast just want to say that as you
00:49:59
know because i've talked about it a few times on this podcast i'm probably one of the biggest users in the world of a website called fiverr.com
00:50:06
f i v e r r dot com i use it for everything whether it's my
00:50:11
podcast or whether it's my personal brand content whether it's my business or other projects that i'm doing and this week i've used it again i've
00:50:17
used it to make a website called katana which is my investment company people don't know this my old company was called social chain and katana or
00:50:24
katana is the italian word for chain that's the inspiration keep that to yourself um but it's just another example of how
00:50:30
you can use fiverr to help you expand your capabilities as an entrepreneur as a content creator
00:50:36
and i've managed to get a website up for my investment company katana in the space of two and a half days and it cost me 400
00:50:44
quid typically that would cost tens of thousands of pounds and typically it would take months that's the power of fiverr allowing you
00:50:50
to quickly and affordably extend the capabilities of your team of your personal brand and achieve things that you might not have been able
00:50:56
to otherwise i want to talk though going back to your you know when you started in the military one thing i find really interesting is the guy that
00:51:03
was running around drinking boozing getting in trouble for him then to go into the military and
00:51:09
pass with flying colours is like a massive contradiction in my mind i'm like one appears to be a guy that's kind of out
00:51:16
of control the other one and and seemingly lacking the appreciation of authority and then the other guy is one
00:51:21
that's able to do what he's told and follow orders and and and how did you achieve such that's
00:51:29
what they want that's what they need they need the animal on the battlefield they need
00:51:36
the aggression they need the violence
00:51:41
because ultimately on the battlefield you counter violence with extreme violence you know there's
00:51:48
zero tolerance to violence in sydney street in society nowadays you show any form of violence you can end up behind bars been there
00:51:55
but in the military you you counter violence with extreme violence you you counter anger with extreme anger
00:52:02
and you're that's needed i i needed to be that person on the battlefield i needed to
00:52:08
to have to cut myself off from any emotional sort of feelings any emotional you know sort of
00:52:15
um discrepancies because
00:52:22
they were the missions that i went on now i was hunting down taliban commanders you know i was
00:52:27
getting into [ __ ] [ __ ] storms to firefights every week every couple you know two
00:52:32
three times a week i needed to put to call on those demons to come to the forefront of who i was to
00:52:39
get the job done and then switch it you're expected to switch it because
00:52:44
one moment you're kicking the door down you know taking out enemy combatants the next
00:52:49
next door you're kicking the door down there's women and children in there so you you live on that side or you live on
00:52:56
that side and then when you get the two confused
00:53:01
you know you i might be in afghanistan best man put me on camp you know
00:53:08
well you can't be doing that and well what who the [ __ ] do you want i mean you can't be doing that you can't be you know getting into fights downtown
00:53:15
you can't be you know getting you know i just get into a hell of a lot of fights you know it can help ruin my military career because you know
00:53:22
but then three tours of afghanistan are done almost back to back perfect out there man boom boom boom
00:53:29
boom boom so what what animal do you want you know and it's okay to be able to flip from one to the other when when you're here
00:53:35
but when you live on the complete opposite sides of the spectrum you're gonna get confused every now and
00:53:41
then you're going to be met with a situation in society where you're met with aggression you're met with violence and this
00:53:48
demon takes over you know what it is is it's a moment of madness it's just a confusion confliction between the two
00:53:56
you know and it's between the two two people and sometimes it goes whack yeah and before you know
00:54:01
it that crossover is too much they're both like trained to survive but in different
00:54:06
environments in completely different environments and sometimes those environments you know you're forced to act and those environments get switched yeah and it's
00:54:13
literally like a flash in front of your eyes it's like bang bang [ __ ] i used the wrong person there i
00:54:18
used the wrong environment it's it's and and that's that's the world that i live in that's the world that i lived in that
00:54:25
was my life that was you know i used to come back from from afghanistan and you know i've got four four four
00:54:32
four children at home i'm a fifth one from a previous relationship who's 19 but um used to
00:54:37
come home i remember coming back from afghanistan and my daughter was born
00:54:43
she's 13 now my daughter was born um 10 days before i left for a six-month tour in
00:54:49
afghanistan so she was born so i didn't know her and i came back six months later and she was like nearly seven months um
00:54:58
and then i went straight on special forces selection so for another six months so i came back after like a year really
00:55:03
of not really being at home to a to a one-year-old daughter who
00:55:08
barely recognized me you know she would push me away she would you know and i'd interact and i'll be
00:55:15
playing dolls on on the floor barbies and my wife came in one day and i was playing with these barbies and she
00:55:21
thought i'd lost the plot she's like she's like you know got these barbies together trying to make her
00:55:26
laugh trying to make her smile because for the last year she's just seen this pent up
00:55:32
war machine you know and i've come back and i'm not i'm not very easy to deal with you know
00:55:38
during those transitions you know i need a bit of time what do you mean by that you're not very easy to deal with in those transitions
00:55:44
well you come back from you can't just take a hit even though i can do it i can take your head off put
00:55:51
a different head on but that transition of
00:55:57
kicking doors down to being back with a family i need even now when i come back off of filming
00:56:04
when i come back i need before we actually start getting on again you know before i start settling back into the into
00:56:10
into the family it takes about two weeks and again me and my partner are the best most compatible partners in the world
00:56:16
the teamwork that we have is absolutely amazing you know hence why i've been with her for 16 years been
00:56:22
married for 14. um but it still takes that two-week period
00:56:27
for me of me breaking her her routine of me coming in you know taking over
00:56:32
everything you know with the kids taking taking the kids to school taking ruining her her life that she's built i come in like
00:56:39
a storm and it takes two weeks before that storm normally calms down and we go all right
00:56:45
you know i cannot argue in to this but you know just disagreements just control issues can you know it's it's
00:56:52
like two worlds colliding right and then after the two weeks as everything settles i'm away again
00:56:57
i might be on tour i might be like i'm in australia for two months now it's like so it's that constant communication or
00:57:05
that constant you know crossing over of of worlds that you need to really sort of mold together
00:57:11
and as my life is getting more and more and i'm not in these high octane situations i'm not in these life
00:57:16
or death situations um it's becoming easier and easier
00:57:22
you talk you know i had actually a military commando sat in in the seat as well who talked about his experiences and
00:57:28
when he came back from war he was talking to me about the ptsd he suffered and um just being around the house and
00:57:34
you know seeing the tin can stacked on the shelf at home and and like you know barking at his wife because they weren't straight and things
00:57:39
like that and feeling that you know feeling some of the disciplines of all coming home with him you i've seen you talk on this topic so
00:57:46
i know that you know you've you've handled that in a different way but um what are some of the the things
00:57:53
that have come come back with you from war that you don't like or that you think aren't helping you in
00:57:59
your in your personal life um they're two different worlds
00:58:05
you know you deal with dark humor dark banter to get you through certain
00:58:13
situations and that dark humor and dark banter and dark way of talking is a norm to you
00:58:21
because you live and breathe that and sometimes that comes out you know
00:58:30
and only when i'm doing a military style show you know you you come out you might say something which is a for me
00:58:37
probably a throwaway comment or a bit of banter then you realize there's a hundred of crew members listening and there's
00:58:43
nothing you know it just might be i might say something about someone or my it's never direct you know it's always an indirect conversation that we have um
00:58:51
it's that military banter that i [ __ ] hate sometimes i hear myself talking like a military man and i hate it i
00:58:59
might say military words hoofing honking was you know there's loads of them out there
00:59:05
um and i think to myself why are you talking like that but it's just come it just comes out because i might find myself in in a
00:59:13
high octane situation in a stressful situation in a in an aggressive situation and a violent situation which which i revert back to
00:59:20
what i know works which is this ultimately this military person but then i think [ __ ] you know i'm not
00:59:25
in a military environment i'm not in in in a i'm in society you know i've got you know
00:59:30
and it's controlling that that i find really difficult um but knowing also acknowledging that
00:59:37
it needs to be controlled you know i'm not in the military anymore you know and i always hate this once a
00:59:42
marine always a marine you know you get people go hey once a marine always a marine i'm like i was a marine 12 years ago 10 years ago
00:59:50
you know now i'm i'm a media um tv presenter i'm now an extinguished author i'm now
00:59:57
you know i like to say like you know about mindset my mindset girl go around do my tours you know i'm in a completely
01:00:02
different space but i have to pull upon this young soldier every now and then in order to get the
01:00:08
job done because i know that that works you know i know that if i do that but i just need to fine-tune it i need to
01:00:13
buffer it around the edges which again is a work in progress you know i i put my hands up when i go [ __ ] hell do
01:00:20
you know what i mean yeah i shouldn't have said that i shouldn't have done that you know and i'm the first one to admit it
01:00:25
but people have to realize that listen it's it's it's a work in progress it's not
01:00:31
something i can change overnight you need to understand me you need to understand who i am
01:00:37
um in order to to acknowledge that okay well [ __ ] hell yeah that was a bit uncomfortable to see some of the things
01:00:43
that we do with the recruits you know they're like [ __ ] you know and she's like he's on on his knees and
01:00:48
you're you're literally you know saying to him that you stay there you know if you think you're not worthy
01:00:55
you know if you if you're a piece of [ __ ] blah blah blah but it's hard for people to see that and to watch that but ultimately there's
01:01:01
always a positive motivator behind that so that's where people i think get get
01:01:07
confused is like negativity is a great fuel it's a great source to use to get
01:01:14
to where you need to be but only if there's a positive motivator ahead of it so you can't use negativity to get
01:01:21
through a situation if there's not a positive motivator because all you'll do is you'll feel off in the
01:01:27
negative lane because there's no positive motivators to aim towards it's like a plow like i say the plow is is the positive
01:01:33
motivator and the fuel is the negative with aggression whether it's revenge whether it's you know prove
01:01:39
people wrong whether it's you know these are all things that that that fuel you but you
01:01:45
be sure that there's always a positive motivator so when i'm talking like that to the recruits what i'm doing it's believe it or not
01:01:52
to get the best out of them to make them realize what they're capable of make them bring their attributes and and and um
01:01:59
personality to the forefront so they can identify who they are and a lot of people they bring that to
01:02:05
the forefront or i fit that mirror on them and they look at themselves and they go oh [Music] no i don't like what i see they vw or
01:02:12
they go or they leave yeah so that's what i was going to say it's also a filter it's a filter and that's what a selection process is
01:02:18
and that's but that's how i it's not only what selection process is that's how i live my life steve
01:02:23
i'm i'm so brutally honest with what i do in situations i find myself in
01:02:29
and the environment that that i choose to be in is it and it's that brutal honesty it's that
01:02:36
brutal sort of truth
01:02:41
that the motivator is always becoming a better version of who you are of of learning something growing from it
01:02:48
and becoming a better version of who you were yesterday and how important is it to take personal responsibility for your outcomes in life
01:02:55
because there's a growing culture of blame and you know victimhood and i see this as well as someone that
01:03:01
um you know the the best thing that probably happened to me is if i was successful and i had parents
01:03:08
that were rich and i had loads of money and i got a degree and i got these great grades people would immediately go well no steve can't tell
01:03:14
us anything because he got to hand it to him fortunately i was the opposite i'm a black kid born in africa
01:03:20
kicked out of school dropped out of university after one lecture got no degree parents are bankrupt so i can talk a
01:03:25
little bit more about like personal responsibility without being discredited people say oh well of course you [ __ ] say that and like yeah
01:03:31
but i see this growing culture because i was a kid in moscow in manchester stealing pizzas to feed myself only i
01:03:37
don't know seven eight years ago and i know that my mindset and the
01:03:42
the behavior that my mindset created is the reason i'm sat here now like of course there's luck timing i
01:03:49
understand that but my mindset increased my probability of being sat here now so when i preach that to people
01:03:55
especially people that don't want to take take personal responsibility or like you know victimhood or blame keeps them
01:04:00
nice and safe and comfortable and it means they don't have to look in the mirror yeah they go vague [ __ ] you [ __ ] you guy
01:04:07
but it's hard to attack me it's hard to attack me because what you're going to say yeah you know what privilege i had the
01:04:13
privilege i had was moving to this country as a baby but that's a privilege privilege of knowing who you are yeah so you can take
01:04:19
all that income yeah yeah because they haven't got the private privilege of knowing you yeah right but you have the privilege of
01:04:24
knowing yourself because guess what you've been there you've done it you've got the t-shirt you've been honest with yourself you you
01:04:30
you realize you know you realize your mistakes you realize your areas of your way you learn from failure you grow from
01:04:35
it you become a better version of who you are so that's what that's why i say that that statement of we we have the privilege of
01:04:42
knowing you is so powerful because ultimately that's what you fall back on all the time that's why you can take it that's why
01:04:48
you can take that take that and you can it will bounce off you just like that's your negativity that's your
01:04:53
it's not nothing to do with me that's that's you and it bounces off me like it bounces off you but the moment you step into that victim
01:05:00
mentality that's when you feel that the world owes you everything that's when you feel like
01:05:05
that you know why is he why is he where he is and i'm not there why has he got this and i haven't got
01:05:11
this why oh right well i could quite happily
01:05:17
go back and not be cancelled okay for example if i went guys yeah
01:05:23
really really sorry about that but i suffered from a bit from ptsd you know the death of my father you know
01:05:28
it's it's like [ __ ] hell it's it's like one i don't suffer from ptsd
01:05:34
how many times have i had that thrown at me steve going and if you say you suffer from ptsd who can question
01:05:41
that well no one can question it actually wait wait there's one person that can question it
01:05:48
me because i haven't got [ __ ] ptsd well no no no no you haven't but if you say that then
01:05:53
you know the papers will do this the um the the courts will do this people will start to go oh well actually
01:06:00
you know the stuff that he's been through and he's seen he's done he's witnessed yeah of course listen throw him another bone
01:06:06
give him another chance i feel sorry for him [ __ ] that jeremy and it's like when i went to
01:06:12
prison i left the military went to prison got into a violent violent altercation
01:06:18
yep violence on violence of course put my hand up 100 i'll do my time my lawyer said to me and
01:06:25
do you want to go to prison i was like of course i don't want to go to prison who wants to go to prison he said well listen he is you're out he
01:06:32
went say you've got ptsd if you say you got ptsd he said i guarantee you that's what he
01:06:39
said to me guarantee you you will not go to prison you'll get suspended sentence you'll have to go and do a couple of courses
01:06:45
um and then you'll be at home with the family and i had four kids and a and a wife
01:06:50
actually at the time i had two children and a wife at home that relied on me
01:06:56
i couldn't lie to myself i thought don't get me wrong i'm not gonna lie to you i thought to myself do you know what
01:07:03
that sounds appealing because who can tell me that i haven't got ptsd but then the question always goes back
01:07:08
to you because only you hold the answer steve only you have that answer only i
01:07:14
knew that answer i could lie to myself and live a lie and [ __ ] knows where i'll be now
01:07:21
right i might be a bloody ptsd with a counselor i might be you know but
01:07:26
i would have gone down that road for years right so i've got two years suspended since
01:07:32
two years of going down a road that wasn't me going down that road of pure lies every step i took wouldn't be a
01:07:38
true one i always say to people people will mould you and direct you in life
01:07:44
you know that's what people are there for good people anyway they try and mold but if that first footstep that you take
01:07:50
is not a true one i said do not take it and the only person that knows that
01:07:56
is you and i always always always go back to that do i feel
01:08:03
comfortable taking this footstep yes i do the rest of the world doesn't
01:08:08
well guess what i feel comfortable doing it but yeah but that she he's gonna have something to say about it she's gonna have something to say about
01:08:14
they're gonna have something to say about it i don't care is it true to me go back to who i am
01:08:20
yeah boom i take it and i deal with whatever comes at me because it can bounce off me right because
01:08:25
as we spoke about it's like it's like we know who we are we know what we're about we know we know we're good people
01:08:30
so i'm willing to take that bang bang bang and it does steve it does literally bounce off me but also it when
01:08:36
it does get into me because the moment it starts you know when it gets over it does get into you
01:08:43
once i sit down and process it it fuels me i feel like thanos you know it's like
01:08:51
it's just like because i'm being true to who i am and all this negative and i'm thinking right just just boom because guess what i preach
01:08:58
positivity till it comes home i everything i believe is down to a positive mindset and how you perceive
01:09:05
the way that you think um and the way you know we have this default mindset which is negative you know everything's
01:09:11
like what if this what if that won't do that because of this and mine's the opposite mind's like right the best outcome is this this if
01:09:17
anything comes along i deal with it okay and it's that mindset that i always
01:09:22
always fall back on and it's and again it's it's one of those i just find so liberating that i can just
01:09:28
just think that way but i put myself in the firing line i put myself constantly in the firing
01:09:34
line to constantly challenge myself to constantly flip these negatives into positives without
01:09:39
negativity you wouldn't have positivity it wouldn't exist it doesn't you know it's a polar
01:09:44
opposite so people say so i challenge negativity i love
01:09:50
negativity because i will challenge it and challenge it and challenge it i love the work ethic and the psychological
01:09:57
sort of resilience it takes to challenge negativity there's a lot of people that negativity
01:10:02
comes and they ignore it or they bat it off they run away but the moment you dig into it and you dig into it and you dig and it takes
01:10:08
time it takes time as well isn't it it tests you right and you dig into it and all of a sudden you see a little light
01:10:14
you see a little glimpse of positivity and that's all you're looking for is that one little seed you grab that
01:10:21
boom bank that and then you grow that seed until you find the next one and there's nothing more rewarding in
01:10:27
this world than flipping a negative into a positive because if you're willing
01:10:32
and again if you're willing to work hard enough and you're willing to take the [ __ ] and the [ __ ] uh and the [ __ ] and everything that
01:10:38
surrounds negativity if you're willing to dive into the center of it and you're willing to work
01:10:44
in order to flip it into a positive then i guarantee you you you will find a positive in it
01:10:49
and i guarantee you that would be the most rewarding thing you ever do it's like failure it's exactly the same
01:10:55
with failure i look at failure and it's just it's like a challenge to me it's like you can't do that and you don't know
01:11:01
nothing about that you're going to fail at that well listen i'll tell you what i probably will fail at it but i'm not scared to commit because i know that the
01:11:06
moment i commit to failure i take two or three or four steps into
01:11:11
failure and i might go yeah i haven't achieved that but those three or four steps i've taken
01:11:17
that that's that's what i bank those moments in the moment that's what i bank a lot of people they
01:11:23
they might take on failure and they might fail their objective and they think oh i failed that therefore i'm a failure
01:11:29
and they forget how far they've come that this is completely automatically written off because they're going oh i failed that
01:11:35
mean it's like yeah i won't go near that again that becomes part of your identity i'm a failure i'm a failure
01:11:40
yeah so they anytime failures that they think their safety bubble or victim but whatever they won't go
01:11:46
anywhere near it but i love it when negativity comes along and failure comes along
01:11:51
you know i'm so intrigued on what i'll get out of it i'm so intrigued what i learned from it because when you learn you grow when you
01:11:58
grow you become a better version of who you are it's just that it's that knock-on effect that it has and failure is exactly that
01:12:06
failure isn't going anywhere i found up to now in my life i'm gonna fail to the day i die so you so you so you every single one of
01:12:13
you in here is gonna fail whether you like it or not it is everyday part of life as much as it is breathing
01:12:19
it's surrounded by us so why do we ignore it if it's part of who we are and part of part of part of
01:12:25
what's what makes the world tick then why don't we use it to our advantage because the perceived cost of
01:12:30
failure whatever that might be you know jenny at work is going to think i'm not so whatever and this person is going to
01:12:36
write this about me the perceived cost especially in the short term feels greater it feels and that's the same force of
01:12:43
like the pc brigade or that you know it's like it's better just to stay in your lane today
01:12:48
and to just like put your head down be quiet because people think and this is the where it's
01:12:54
wrong people think that's the safest place to be reflecting on my own journey when i went to university
01:12:59
and i knew that i this was a piece of [ __ ] and that i needed to quit if i was actually gonna become an entrepreneur like it's calling my mom and then
01:13:05
telling her i'm dropping out and her telling me never to speak to her again right that was the resistance that was
01:13:10
the moment where life goes stay in your [ __ ] lane right yeah but when people get you were so you were so and
01:13:16
then you're but my brain was so clear the biggest risk the biggest failure
01:13:23
would have been staying in university and living a life not true to myself some people people say oh you're so you have so much
01:13:29
courage courage would have been staying yeah right and i think that's the that's the thing of course my mom says i'd never
01:13:35
speak to me again and i don't speak to her for two years but look at the upside of living my even if i'd failed like look at the upside of
01:13:41
being myself and i think that's pretty much what i'm hearing from what you're saying is like there's this you know
01:13:46
the there is the short time resistance where it's like oh my god if you fail you're going to lose it all so i know you'll lose it all if you don't try
01:13:53
exactly how the thing about it is the way that your mindset thinks then it is it's not a complicated way of thinking
01:14:01
it's like it's it's so simple really so simple stupid that it's almost
01:14:07
incomprehendable um and everything that i do and you just said it then and make what you
01:14:14
just said that makes complete sense to me every single word you said about that story i'm like that yes
01:14:19
it's like it's obviously like why wouldn't you do that right but sometimes the most obvious things that
01:14:24
are the hardest to process the hardest to to to achieve and with my books and and my tours
01:14:32
you know i don't get people coming off my tours going and you know i've tapped into this part of my brain now thank you for this it's
01:14:38
like they come off my tools i'll read my books and go it was always in there yes you just gave me this kick yourself
01:14:45
moment where i'm just like how did i not see that how did i not you put it in such layman terms because i'm
01:14:51
i'm a simple man i mean i'm not i'm not an intellect i'm not a bookworm i'm i'm i'm i'm a simpleton i'm a simple man i
01:14:58
keep things the way that i get to my answers is good bad right wrong positive
01:15:03
negative yes no i mean i keep it and it's listening but it's listening to who i am
01:15:09
and it's it's the most simplest way of of of getting to where you need to be
01:15:15
but we let the constraints and the [ __ ] and the complications
01:15:21
of society and what other people think cloud all of that
01:15:26
i almost see it like two dials right one of them is this voice inside which everyone has in them they say go and dance in the hills of costa rica
01:15:33
and then there's this other really loud dial right the sound dial and it's society and your mom and your
01:15:38
whatever and that one's saying go be a [ __ ] lawyer and shut up right and in all of our lives i think one dial
01:15:43
is a little bit higher than the other and the the the challenging thing but the most important thing you can do if
01:15:48
you want to reach your potential be happy avoid mental health issues avoid midlife crises is to like turn up the internal dial and
01:15:55
just try and get that that other dial which is society's voice right down to to [ __ ] zero
01:16:01
right and i and i just do you know i just feel if everyone could just do that in their own lives which is not easy to
01:16:07
do because listening to this internal voice is going to come with real resistance people are going to cancel you they're
01:16:12
going to my mum's going to not speak to me for years right but that's the short time cost for
01:16:18
a long term gain and as is the way with comfort i see like comfort and like avoiding with that resistance is a it
01:16:24
looks like a friend it's a short-term friend but a long-term enemy and if you you know if you had if you in
01:16:29
the moments where you've said you've been like cancelled quote-unquote um had you caved
01:16:35
short-term friend probably would still have a show or two yeah of course long-term belongs and i say to people
01:16:41
what you've got to realize is that you are with yourself 24 hours a day for the rest of your life
01:16:48
no one else can even come close to that no one else will will even come close to
01:16:53
that so you are with yourself your whole life people they come and go
01:16:59
situations they come and go so ultimately you've got to live with yourself first
01:17:05
before you try and live with anyone else before you try and live with any situation before you try and put yourself into any environment that's
01:17:11
what i say to people when they go well i'm like you're with yourself 24 hours a day to the day you die nothing comes close to that no one comes
01:17:18
close to being anywhere near that that's the person you've got on that's who you are yeah so that's the person who you've got to honor that's the
01:17:24
person that you've got to make make happy boss that's the boss right that's the person it's impossible to please
01:17:30
that voice and that voice right so like but please yourself and and ultimately you know what comes out
01:17:36
it will you know should should be war should be authentic should be true so and then you'll find your belonging
01:17:42
you'll find your circle you'll find you're like-minded people you'll find your your your yeah you'll find your belonging it's like
01:17:48
you know you must know as you get more successful as you you
01:17:54
know you start thinking you start changing start evolving your mindset more and more and more and more
01:17:59
your circle gets smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller i'm happy with that you know i'm i'm happy with that because
01:18:05
not that i'm above anyone or below anyone you know we're just on different ends of the spectrum okay because
01:18:10
guess what i'm going to keep evolving my mindset's going to keep changing i'm going to keep getting wise i'm going to keep getting more knowledgeable i'm
01:18:16
going to keep being honest with myself and for me that's my purpose in life nothing out there you know it's nice to
01:18:21
have the nice cars and nice houses don't get me wrong it's nice to have money i've had no money and now i've got
01:18:26
money i know which side i'd rather be on okay that's all but that's all that comes part and parcel with being true to who
01:18:32
you are um and my purpose in life
01:18:38
which is i will never achieve but which is i find fascinating is
01:18:45
trying to get the best possible version of ant middleton trying to get to that okay but knowing
01:18:51
that i never get to that answer because i'll be on this constant progression of becoming a better version of who i am
01:18:58
but i never become the best version of who i am because that's when you're perfect that's when
01:19:03
you're 100 you and that's not real it doesn't exist but the
01:19:09
purpose of getting closer and closer and closer and closer to that answer
01:19:15
is such a fascinating journey for me that there's nothing that comes close to it
01:19:20
there's nothing that comes close to it and whether i have the the counselling or the shows that keep coming or the tv
01:19:28
production companies that call me now and the channels that go whether i have failures or whatever it may be all of
01:19:34
these everything that bounces in towards me is a is something to learn from
01:19:40
and it's a lesson and it's gonna i'm gonna learn from it and i'm gonna grow from it and i'm gonna
01:19:46
get closer and closer to the answer closer and closer to
01:19:51
to my objective closer and closer to my purpose and that is to try and get as close as i can to
01:19:58
being the best version of myself and i'm fascinated with it i'm addicted
01:20:04
by it i'm i'm addicted to it i'm i'm obsessed with it um so like i said when i get that thanos
01:20:10
moment i'm like bring all this negativity at me bring it because i'm just churning away
01:20:15
it doesn't mean i'm always happy you know i'm not always happy you know you know i don't go around sprinkling
01:20:22
positive fairy dust i'm not that type of preacher right but i preach you know working on your
01:20:27
mind to make it positive you know you know challenging negative situation thinking negative situation i've got a tackle
01:20:33
with a positive mindset make a conservative effort to train your mindset to think positively to flip the script
01:20:39
from this default mindset where everyone you know thinks thinks negatively um and i love working
01:20:45
at that i love working out so all of this stuff that you give me it does once i got because i go quiet like this
01:20:50
last week has been a media storm and i'll go quiet and i'll be with with my family i'll be with my management
01:20:57
they're like aren't you quiet i'm quiet because i'm churning away at negativity i'm not unhappy don't
01:21:03
get me wrong listen but i need to be left alone for two three days maybe a week
01:21:08
because there's so much negativity coming in and i'm chipping away trying to find the light no nothing there and i find the light trying to find boom
01:21:15
bang and then i bank this positivity and then the next week i'll be boom
01:21:23
back to ant do i mean back to this positive naturally positive person because i've trained my mind to think
01:21:28
like that i'm always in a positive head space um but sometimes i'll go quiet doesn't
01:21:34
mean i'm always happy so don't get don't get positivity mixed up with happiness yeah yeah because they're two completely different things and happiness comes
01:21:40
from yeah in knowing who you are you know it comes from from being true to you are knowing
01:21:46
who you are and you could be the poorest man in the world and you could be there you know you could have no one or nothing but you
01:21:51
could still be happy you know you could be the richest man in the world and you know you know you know the script um one of them's like a general sense of
01:21:58
optimism that i'm positive about the future the other one's just like internal contentment and and um but our moods change yeah of
01:22:05
course you know we have [ __ ] days bad days whatever but we're optimistic and tight right yeah one of the questions i really wanted to
01:22:11
ask you because of what's going on in the world with this whole pandemic in covid is i was thinking as i was like brushing my teeth or whatever this morning i was
01:22:17
thinking there's a ton if my audience could ask you one thing probably would be around the fact that the world changed
01:22:24
this year a lot of people's lives were uprooted they lost their businesses their jobs whatever and then i thought you know ants
01:22:30
probably well i for sure have been in situations where you felt like whether whether it's on the battlefield
01:22:36
or whatever that this was a fight that you where the odds were against you yeah and in those moments there's winners and
01:22:43
losers and i you know you always talk about mindset what is the mindset that people need
01:22:48
in these moments where the odds don't look like they're they're very much in their favor from that you've seen from the
01:22:53
battlefield where you've emerged victorious because you know you didn't you didn't indulge in victimhood or whatever
01:23:00
and you and you yeah does that make sense yeah it 100 makes sense um for me it hasn't
01:23:09
it's about embracing change you know majority of people they live their life
01:23:16
on autopilot or they they live in the void i call it um where everything around them is changing
01:23:22
you know the world is constantly changing everything around us is constantly changing whether it's
01:23:28
you know climate control whether it's you know in the way that we think the way that
01:23:34
we're evolving the way that the world is going the way that animals are evolving the way that the sea is
01:23:40
is is encroaching or you know decreasing whatever it may be everything is changing around us and we
01:23:46
are designed to change with it so what we're actually doing is we're actually going against
01:23:52
the grain when we become complacent when we get comfortable
01:23:57
when we get into one sort of situation and we stay in that situation it's going we go we're working in the opposite way
01:24:04
that the world should be evolving we should be constantly changing we should be constantly evolving we should
01:24:09
be constantly moving forward you know look at my career i've gone from the army to the marines to the
01:24:15
special forces to the media to to books to authors to literacy to
01:24:21
business it's like i'm cons i love love change i love
01:24:26
being put in a situation where i'm literally chucked in the deep end with dive boots on and i have to tread water
01:24:33
i love that because it's so challenging and it's so so stimulating that you're forced to
01:24:40
change you're forced to think of something different you're forced to to to do something differently you're forced to
01:24:45
change the way that you you approach something because you've been put in a situation where
01:24:50
it's been forced upon you but when it's not forced upon you when it's not forced upon you um which
01:24:57
the world does it forces it upon us but when it's not forced upon you when you when you get comfortable then you get you fall into this voyage you
01:25:04
fall into this complacency you fall into to not moving along with the world
01:25:09
but is that those your demons again because i'm thinking the reason why aunt loves to be chucked
01:25:14
into the water with his dive boots on is because you relish challenge and this
01:25:20
is comes maybe links to the victimhood point and a general problem in culture and society where
01:25:25
people like comfort cotton wool yeah a lot of people are being brought up now with cottonwood not designed we're not designed to be
01:25:31
comfortable we're not designed to have cotton walls wrapped around us it's society it's the restraints and the shackles of society
01:25:38
that is forcing us to be like this it's not who we are look how far we've
01:25:44
come you know look out look at look at just through history how far we've come and i feel like that
01:25:50
we're actually devolving now i actually feel that we've got to a point where we're going backwards
01:25:56
where you know you used to be survivor of the fitness yes you could push a rock in front of your cave you know i mean to survive you know
01:26:03
used to be at the you know the top of the food chain um you know it's we're not designed
01:26:10
to be comfortable we're not designed to be wrapped up in cotton wool we're not designed to be shackled down and that's
01:26:16
why there's so many problems in the world right now is because of these shackles
01:26:21
is because of these chains it's because of the restraints that society is putting on us it's forcing us into into mental illness
01:26:29
it's forcing us to to act in ways that we're not designed to act in is forcing us to to switch off to the
01:26:36
most powerful tool that the universe that's in the universe your minds we're forced to just put it on [ __ ]
01:26:42
dormant you know that be a it's it's we're going against the grain of what we're supposed to do
01:26:48
of who we're supposed to be on how we're supposed to act and how is it um supposed to evolve so when when
01:26:55
you've got this going around like this and then this stops is
01:27:01
it you you there's a synchronocity that's not working in in in partnership with each other you
01:27:07
know without us on this planet this planet wouldn't be as evolved as it was without the planet then we wouldn't be evolved as it was
01:27:13
you know and what what's actually happening is is you've got this this this these two forces that
01:27:20
are grinding against each other rather than working together with each other in synchronocity i i i
01:27:27
was reading this crazy thing the other day and i think i've talked about this maybe once before but it shows that um
01:27:32
the life expectancy in the uk and the us fell for two years in a row and everything was like last year the
01:27:37
year before whatever for the first time ever and they look at the numbers as to why the life expectancy has fallen to the first time ever and it's because
01:27:43
of like the opioid crisis people who are getting addicted to drugs and then they say why are people getting more and more addicted to drugs and they
01:27:48
say well because they're lacking meaning in their life and when people like meaning that the science is showing whether you do it to
01:27:53
animals you take away their meaning i i talked i think in the last podcast and i i hate to repeat myself but i also
01:27:58
don't care about these rats and i [ __ ] because they're right about my bucket so fascinated by it they put a rat in a cage and take everything from it
01:28:05
and they give it the option of drinking hair and water and normal water it becomes a drug addict they then introduce a partner some
01:28:11
stimulation some running wheels some other things and they give it hair and water or normal water and it doesn't choose the heroin
01:28:16
water it doesn't become a drug addict just by inserting meaning into its life it avoids the heroin and then you think okay so
01:28:22
what's going on in the society you say well people are lacking challenge and meaning because we're
01:28:27
trying to create a culture maybe where challenge and meaning are a bad thing and and that's actually having an
01:28:33
adverse effect because as you say very eloquently like that's not who we are you know i love how you just put that steve because you've just
01:28:39
put my thoughts into a scientific sort of into scientific form because again i'm
01:28:45
not an intellect i'm not a bookworm you know it's it's like i have psychiatrists come up to me and go where did you just study and well but not
01:28:51
honestly what brexit and i'm like no no this is all every single little ounce of me is through
01:28:56
life experience i come from the university of life you know what i've just said there's it's strange that
01:29:02
and that's why i love talking to people like yourself because i've put that as in how i'm thinking i
01:29:08
haven't read anything from and you've just put it into a whole sort of scientific and it's like that's exactly that it's exactly what
01:29:14
i've just said and you've just put it into into something that's been proven and that's that's the way that i think that's the way that i
01:29:20
that's the way that i perceive life and it's funny because as you say you're not you didn't see it i'm not an intellectual but i've sat here with
01:29:26
intellectuals and they've said the exact same thing like johanna hari he wrote a book on this nine reasons why people are getting depressed and anxious
01:29:33
best-selling book he sat here and he said the exact same thing so when i hear it twice or three times and then i read
01:29:38
it another i think these are just fundamental truths and when i get to that point where you've been you've walked a
01:29:44
different walk of life to that that intellect who's wrote a book on it but you've both arrived at the same place
01:29:50
that's going in my [ __ ] like in my diary forever you know that's that's super interesting as well
01:29:56
it's like you know you you but you can't take away that you know you can't
01:30:01
you can't unwrite that because it's written within evolution
01:30:06
it's written within the way the world it has evolved it's written in the way that we think it's written in in the organs the
01:30:14
muscles and the body that we have it's all here it's all [ __ ] present right now
01:30:19
yeah it's not in a book that we're going to read it it's [ __ ] happening right now it's here it's real
01:30:24
this energy source that you are your [ __ ] energy source where energy sources is synchronized with the planet which is
01:30:32
one big energy source it's one big ball and i'd have had a moment of clarity on
01:30:38
on when i was filming i've always felt connection with the earth you know i talk about
01:30:43
you know we can climb to the highest peak of the apex of the world mount everest we can climb to that because people said
01:30:50
yeah but we've had to do this this and this in order to get there you know working against the mountain i'm not know
01:30:55
the way that that mountain is formed is that's a foothold for you that's a that's an arm reach for you
01:31:01
that's you know it's that it's designed to work with you so don't look at a mountain and go off can i go
01:31:07
get up there it's working against me no no it's that little stone there that you put your foot that's helping you up to to to stand on on its apex it's
01:31:14
helping you up to stand on its summit and um i've always felt a connection with
01:31:20
the earth always always always you know when i put my feet in it when i put my hands in it you know i belong here you know and i
01:31:26
have this sort of i have this theory that people think that you know that if you put the planet as a as a as
01:31:34
a tree where they think we're just birds that come and sit on the tree and i think we're just visitors and then and
01:31:39
then we go we're not we're we're the leaves yeah we're the leaves of the tree i mean and then you know we grow in that
01:31:46
we're part of you know we're part of this evolution it's spiritual but yeah yeah i'm not a spiritual person but maybe you
01:31:52
are but maybe your definition's wrong because i posted on my instagram last week yeah i did so we've just had it's funny my instagram
01:31:58
post literally says i've never thought of myself as a spiritual person because i don't resonate with like the hippie
01:32:03
stigma yeah yeah like i'm not that guy however the end it's one story right the end of it was like i if you
01:32:10
define as feeling somewhat connected to the world which i now do then i now consider myself to be
01:32:15
spiritual this was just one story and this was like three days ago because a lot of people do ask if i'm spiritual and i i always say no
01:32:22
but yeah maybe i am but it's that's that theory of of being there's a con you know
01:32:28
connection there's one currently from the other and when when that when you know we're the leaves yeah we're gonna fall off and there's gonna be new leaves
01:32:34
you know but everything recycles back into itself do you know when we don't just all of a sudden go up into you know
01:32:39
everything goes back into the earth everything really generally spiritual because i i went and googled it definition of spirituality
01:32:46
and the definition i read was like the feeling or belief that we are interconnected with the world
01:32:51
the stigma is the issue that's what alienates both of us from saying i'm a spiritual because we're not like hippies we're not like you know but we are we like i love
01:32:58
that you know what i mean so and i go about going back to this moment where i've where it just resonates you
01:33:03
know and the reason why i do all these things is i just want to reconfirm that my way
01:33:08
of thinking is is true is true to me is is why i do this you know
01:33:14
and that's why i put myself in these awkward situations because it just it gives a light bulb moment where i go
01:33:20
do you know what bloody hell you know i'm i'm on the right path i'm getting this right and um as i wait i was away filming
01:33:27
and i felt this you know i was out in the mountains in um in chile in the andes and i could just
01:33:33
feel a real connection you know like a like a real presence
01:33:38
you know and it's it's just a lovely lovely feeling and i can just remember just a an energy connection it was
01:33:44
really strange that it happened an energy connection and i was walking by i was walking a lot alongside of this mountain and i was walking
01:33:50
alongside i heard a big massive bang and i turned towards the mountain and i'm not joking it was
01:33:56
probably about 300 meters away so it's like you know and this bit of rock went
01:34:02
it must have passed no no word of a lie within two meters of me you know and a big one because the
01:34:08
mountains it's an energy source they're [ __ ] bursting they're literally like that
01:34:13
and the mountain every now and then and it's the first time i experienced it i heard about it but i've never experienced it and i went bang
01:34:19
and it nearly took my head off to the point where i was like [ __ ] health was incoming you know i
01:34:24
was like and then i realized i was like well just and you see a little bit of
01:34:30
mount mountain fall off by one bomb and it's where the energy the energy of that mountain and you know
01:34:35
unless you get out and about you see it's like and i thought to myself wow i remember
01:34:41
stopping and thinking i felt that before that even not that specific moment but i felt the energy so i felt
01:34:49
the connection there and then that was it's almost as if the mountain was talking to me going
01:34:54
what you feeling is right listen we are listen we are powerful we have a connection
01:35:02
without you there wouldn't be me without me that wouldn't be you and just that confirmation just makes me
01:35:09
realize wow you know this is this is this is powerful stuff this is you know
01:35:14
this is how you should be feeling once you're in tune with yourself and then and and and connected to the to
01:35:20
this planet then there's there's there's not much
01:35:25
that you feel that you can't do there's not much that phases you in life there's not much that you won't try and achieve there's no
01:35:30
there's not much that you won't achieve and i feel i feel sorry or because you can i can
01:35:37
talk about being in tune with with the planet and being you know
01:35:42
being connected to to mother earth but unless you are in tune with that then you just
01:35:49
think i'm talking bollocks you just think what the hell is he on about he's some spiritual idiot blah blah blah blah blah
01:35:55
so you know this is the personal life that i really keep to myself you know i've spoken a lot about it today which i've
01:36:01
never spoken about before but this is this is who i am i mean so there's there's so much more behind
01:36:08
what the media put out and what the what the papers put out and what the you know the media agenda is on what
01:36:14
they want you to be seen as and there's this whole life behind me that is
01:36:19
that i just that's the real me that's who i am so when any of this other stuff
01:36:25
that's made up by other people that comes in from from not within it is so easy for me
01:36:31
just to battle so easy for me just go bang bang bang but don't get me wrong sometimes i work harder at it to batter off
01:36:37
sometimes it does stick and you have to go all right but it's such a liberating feeling and
01:36:43
i'll always say to people and this is this this is my you know find out who
01:36:48
you are go on that journey not self-discovery because that sounds spiritual right go on that journey of of
01:36:54
finding your purpose of fun of becoming the best version of who you are because once you start that journey
01:36:59
you will get addicted to it it is fascinating and it will it will only serve you well he will only
01:37:06
serve you well because it's a life i want i want to live till i'm 150 because you say i live to
01:37:12
until i'm 50 a hundred 100 years isn't long enough i still want more i want to know more i want to i want to be on this
01:37:18
journey for them for as long as i can be on this journey this is what gives me longevity this is what gives me purpose
01:37:24
i want to be on this journey for as long as i can be and when i think the only setback is when i think you
01:37:29
know i've got another you know 50 60 years of it it sort of saddens me so uh
01:37:35
i'm hoping that by that stage we can we can live to be a bit bit more immortal a bit more a bit
01:37:43
more immortal oh yeah well listen um i think that's a really powerful place to end
01:37:49
and i think that's um that's something that i'll continue to point out i wanted to say thank you though because there are a few people that are
01:37:55
have the courage in this day and age to be themselves and to speak their mind and that and unfortunately it feels like a bit of a dying breed but you're one of those
01:38:01
people and having spent time with you before we started filming and during this conversation i got to know
01:38:06
i had the privilege of getting to know who you are a little bit as you say and um that's a person that i do respect one
01:38:12
that inspires me and reminds me of the importance of following my my truer self so i just wanted to say
01:38:17
thank you thank you for having this conversation today and thank you for being yourself save your gentleman thank you thank you
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