The Wisdom We Share Podcast

Winning the Second Half: Redefining Success, Spirituality, and Joy with Susan Pearse and Matt Elliott

• Anjani • Season 1 • Episode 5

Share episode

Message us with your thoughts, burning questions, or reflections, we’d love to hear from you.

In this episode we sit down with Susan Pearse and Matt Elliot to explore what it really means to “win” the second half of life. We learn that it's not about working harder. It is about wisdom, presence and joy. From elite sport and corporate leadership to daily spiritual practice and playful living, Susan and Matt share how they have redefined success and why midlife can be the most expansive chapter yet.

In this episode, we explore:

  • Why the second half is not decline but depth.
  • Redefining success to focus on who you are being, not what you are proving.
  • Letting go of people-pleasing and the need for permission.
  • Practical daily pillars that shift mood, mindset and momentum.
  • Spirituality as the “main course” that grounds work, parenting and relationships.
  • The power of simplicity in leadership, including visible, human connection.
  • Choosing fun and curiosity as real performance tools.


Connect with our guests here:
Website: www.thechangeroom.info
Website: www.susanpearse.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susan-pearse-022b0311/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/susan.pearse.92856
Book: www.winningthesecondhalf.com

Special invitation
Learn more about their retreat opportunity here: www.thechangeroom.info

If this conversation resonated, follow the show, share this episode with a friend, and leave us a review. It helps more people find practical wisdom for a joyful, awakened life.

Thanks for listening to The Wisdom We Share.
If this episode sparked something in you, follow, leave a review + share it with someone who’s walking a similar path.

🔗 Connect with Anjani

🔗 Connect with Robin

🎧 New episodes released regularly
Be sure to follow to get all new episodes and insights direct to your inbox.

and I think that success that word success you know we've had it defined for us haven't we through our whole life through school subconscious conditioning in it goes and I just wanted to redefine what success is and not make it a a dirty word make it a word that you know what success is feeling good success is sitting here talking to three amazing people and you know like loving the conversation hmm and I think um Matt that probably came up in our little discussion around the title of the book which Matt sort of proposed the winning the second half and I had a little bit of a reaction to it just based on the same thing that we have for so long um equated success and winning with hustle driving and like in my mind I was just going oh I don't wanna win the second half I wanna thrive in the second half or I wanna get more rest in the second half like it was just a different paradigm to only kind of discover is that same thing is there is no objective definition of what it means to win and this is the beauty of the second half and having more wisdom and age and experience that it's now the opportunity for winning to be defined by you with no rules but purely just what's inside of you that wants to be expressed in your second half and that's really exciting welcome to the Wisdom We Share podcast where ancient truths and modern intelligence weave together to inspire ground and shape us for a wiser awakened life I'm Angie Amrit and I'm Robin Wald and together we bring you fascinating conversations from the worlds of spirituality science and human behavior so you can connect to your own inner wisdom joy and clarity elevating the way you actually live your life today we're diving into what it really means to win the second half of life not through hustle or invention but through wisdom our guests Susan Pierce and Matt Elliott have lived full first halves leadership sport achievement and then discovered that success alone doesn't sustain the soul Matt is a former professional athlete who played Rugby league for the Saint George Dragons go the Dragons then had a stellar career as a Rugby league coach today he's the founder of The Change Room one of Australia's leading programs in mindset resilience leadership and transformation Susan is a leadership strategist mind fitness educator and best selling author in her own right their new book winning the Second Half is a conversation between a man and a woman navigating midlife with honesty and hope Susan and Matt welcome thank you great to be here great to have you guys and this is my first time being introduced to and meeting both of you so I would love a little backstory on first of all you wrote this book together in the second half of life is this are you guys together as a couple as a partnership as co workers like what is this relationship besides co authors and how did you come to decide that this was a book you wanted to write together this is just laughing this is such a female question and so many women have asked me the same type of question I think we could spend a whole podcast unpacking why women are so fascinated with that but Matt and I are definitely a meeting of the minds that when I released my fourth book I was lucky enough to go on Matt's podcast that he was running with Anthony Minichillo and immediately when we started the interview it was very obvious that a lot of our thinking is really aligned and he'd been applying it in um sports and elite performance and getting into leadership and I've been in leadership for um probably 25+ years at that time and just so much of the thinking intersected that I think we got off that um call and said well we need to do some more work together and the book kind of evolved from that hmm Matt what's your take on the relationship ha ha ha I well I think Susan and I are great mates and you know and that Susan explained it perfectly is is that we got off the podcast and Minnie looked at me and I won't use the swear word that he used but he went holy Dooley that that's there's a female version of you Matt um it was so funny and the the collaboration around the book started was I put a structure of the book together and started writing it and I went this is so narrow that it it's only gonna be about you know useful for a really small part of the population and I you know I reached out to Susan and said yes so if she wanted to to co write it with me and yeah I it's made it like it's not just two perspectives it's also enabled people to understand what their partners are going through and I you know and like if I I think if we were partners and we wrote it it wouldn't be as powerful because it's not it yeah I don't quite have the right explanation for that but I just don't think it'll be as powerful yeah it it kind of I love the way it you've come together on it because for me it's kind of like two different perspectives but could apply to anyone in any marriage in any relationship both life and business and I think it's so clever how you've structured the book um that it makes it so relatable to people and the topic is so important especially in the era we live we're living in and I kind of wanna ask you both what moment made you realize your own first half was done was it through writing this book did it did you have a realisation through writing the book was it beforehand what was it for each of you maybe Matt you wanna start first well my mirror works that's the first thing so my hair colours probably was a little bit of a giveaway on it um no obviously I'm 60 now and I I'd like to be in denial and I spent a little bit of my life in denial after coming out of being a an elite sports coach um and probably not in a way that I wanted to but I I kind of realized the vulnerabilities of the wisdom that I'd accumulated however how poorly I was using it and sometimes actually putting it down and I I've got to give Susan complete credit on the structure of the book we fiddled with it in a whole lot of different ways um then the conversational piece was probably the last of it so there was quite a few ideas that were brought up first so look I guess I had a moment with two friends and this was probably the impetus of the starting of the book where I had a friend who was super fit and healthy same age as me but was just whinging about everything he was miserable honestly it was just so you know we were at a game of a sport that I love that I used to coach and it was just talking about all young people today and life today and I was like god we had how about we look to find a way to enjoy it then I had another friend who who I'm really close with has set himself up so well financially but it's so unhealthy you know I just sort of thought we're living by past you know paradigms that are are now obsolete let's let's enjoy life and you know so many people live fear based life and I Learned that off Susan about how our brains wired and and like the media use fear on us everyone uses fear on us to make us withdraw and we've got to actually break free of that and that's part of what we wanted to do in the book yeah fantastic and Susan I think for me and I'm glad the way you frame that cause it's probably just made me realize that I don't think I did realise I was in my second half until the writing of the book and the book almost became the journal that made me contemplate and throw everything open and if I just look at the changes that I've made in my life during that process of writing the book they're absolutely huge but it it wasn't until that point that I kind of realized there is this significant marker of like going I'm now in the second half that I can look back and I can celebrate everything in my life so far but I am actually moving into a new phase what do I want from that and also you know navigating as we do as women navigating menopause and all of those things it was the processing of all of that in the book that helped me come to those realizations and I think really if I look at most books that I write I never feel like I'm doing it for an audience I feel like I'm doing it for my own reflection it's almost like the personal journal that then gets published to the world and so yeah I created the book with just that recognition of it's a new phase that means there's new rules there's new possibilities there's yeah just a new experience hmm I wanna go back to something that you said Matt which actually echoes what you just said Susan about being in the process of writing it revealed a lot to you about sort of reflecting and where you were at and what you wanted next and Matt you said something about how you had a lot of wisdom but the book made you aware of how poorly you were using it so I'm curious if you could say more about that do you have any specific examples of where you were lacking that connection to your own wisdom or actually using it and living it in your life and what you've Learned since writing the book yeah that's that's a really good question it's really about our subconscious conditioning right so when I was 20 60 was old right so yeah you start to reflect upon yourself in that way and all this you know I've been so lucky to meet people like Deepak Chopra and engineers you know you know like spending time with Leon Nixon and and Bruce Lipton and other people where that you know I was starting to focus on what I can't do anymore I was starting to focus on what happened in my past and rather than be proud of it I was sad that it was gone and the book really helped me shift my attention to what can I do with this all this knowledge that I've accumulated what it what kind of impact can I make on myself and on other people and it you know it's not until you actually start to understand that like the past is just a lesson you know you've heard this from you know unbelievable you know philosophers in the past but the only way the only thing that we can do right now is how we wanna be how I wanna be right now in this in this conversation I don't wanna be here to impress I wanna and that's that's an ego based thing I learnt that last week it was really interesting thing just to go oh you're doing that again I'm here to actually share understanding and listen to to what you guys have to share as well and when you learn that as someone who's in the second half of their life you get to actually enjoy life again you get to actually elevate your joy and and understand like how blessed we are I know there's lots of things that we'd like to be happening better on the planet OK but look at the amazing things that are happening on the planet you know and the achievements and that the fantastic people we have our attention drawn to all this threat all the time and I was living in it and it and it's not a nice place to be and it for me and some people don't have that opportunity to make that choice but for me it was a decision what do you wanna do do you wanna think this way or that way you wanna feel this way or this way and you know it's I always say this it's easier to sit on the lounge than it is to exercise it's easier to go get rubbish take away food than cook a healthy home cooked meal and it's easier to sit on the lounge in a state of threat angry that it is to be inspired by what's going on on the planet and I I just decided after writing the book that I'm I'm gonna go the the harder path and be inspired by people like yourselves you know that you're not here to you all you're doing is to serve people that's so inspiring I mean just just hearing that is just so inspiring and I know from my own personal experience it's easy as we get older to go into that negative spiral and so what did each of you have to unlearn about what you thought was a success or your identity to really start to begin your second half more honestly more authentically with more joy what did you have to unlearn about your success or your identity hmm it's interesting cause even as Matt kind of reflected it's funny how we think we learn lessons and then it's like the same lessons just come up again 20 years later and just that path of our own path to um divinity or whatever you wanna call it is like a spiral and so I feel like for me what I had to unlearn was the same things that I unlearned when I was 25 and probably had my first wake up call to there's something bigger out there and it was all around this stuff of um people pleasing ticking off the boxes of what I think I should be doing as opposed to really getting in touch with my heart and my passion and all of that and I went through a massive change with that in 25 when I was 25 letting go of control all of these things um to think I had kind of mastered that to only just go yeah only to the first level and here's a whole range of other things and so I think um something I had to unlearn is just this looking for outside permission to be able to do something that I really really wanna do like there's a whole heap of changes that I made when I just woke up and went this is my life by my rules and if I wanna do something that is completely contrary to what anyone else might be doing in the world or what society expectations are I don't have to wait for anyone's permission for that I can just do it and you know just seeing myself fall into those same traps of when the kids finish school I can go and do this or learn this or have more time here to actually just go there's no time like the present to you know get into things so it's the unlearning of that delayed um gratification but also the unlearning of the people pleasing and the waiting for someone's permission to really step into who I wanted to be yeah I I think we all get stuck in that there's a there's a societal momentum isn't there that we we get carried in and it's so it's it's so easy to go along with that as you were saying Matt um and and to buck the current and find your way out of that so what about you Matt what did you have to learn about success or or yourself to begin your second half you said you had that those realizations that word success Angie is the key one is is I had to redefine what success is it wasn't about being on TV it wasn't about earning what whatever you earn it was about how you're being like it's okay for me to be proud of my past I don't have to regret it anymore you know it's okay for me to learn from that and you know some this used to be woo woo but I've I've got evidence on how I my next book I'm writing at the moment and it's you know it's how your being creates your achievements if you're being miserable angry a victim guess what and this is people call it the laws of attraction the laws of imagination whatever you wanna call it but you know not very much stuff in life happens by accident most stuff happens as a result of what you're doing and who you're being and I just found that I get a choice that I got grandkids now I got a beautiful family and all that sort of stuff I can choose to be happy about that can I or I can choose to be a threat about it oh I wonder what's happening with my daughters and oh I hope they're alright yeah whose choice is that and I think that success that word success yeah we've had it defined for us haven't we through our whole life through school subconscious conditioning in it goes and I just wanted to redefine what success is and not make it a a dirty word make it a word that you know what success is feeling good success is sitting here talking to three amazing people and you know like loving the conversation and I think um Matt that probably came up in our little discussion around the title of the book which Matt sort of proposed the winning the second half and I had a little bit of a reaction to it just based on the same thing that we have for so long um equated success and winning with hustle driving and like in my mind I was just going oh I don't wanna win the second half I wanna thrive in the second half or I wanna get more rest in the second half like it was just a different paradigm to only kind of discover is that same thing is there is no objective definition of what it means to win and this is the beauty of the second half and having more wisdom and age and experience that it's now the opportunity for winning to be defined by you with no rules but purely just what's inside of you that wants to be expressed in your second half and that's really exciting I'm curious what role spirituality has played in your own personal evolution at arriving at this point in your life where you're feeling so optimistic and really like having choice around how you wanna define yourself in this next part of your life so um you know one thing you said earlier Matt was that you know we live in a fear based culture and the media is pushing us with fear fear fear and often you know people talk about that the antidote to fear is faith or spirituality or some higher perspective so I'm wondering if you could each speak to your own personal sense of faith or like how do you connect on a spiritual level that gives you the optimism to then move forward okay then there you go that was your pause there spirituality for me has been something that I sort of learnt in my late 30s and I was a atheist um the reason that I was that is is that again my father served in World War 2 and he came from a very Christian family but he had nothing to do with that um so my family life was not don't believe in it we was never spoken about but I guess if someone has served in a conflict you can maybe understand why that wasn't um prevalent um and I I saw the conflict around the planet based on you know people's beliefs and that didn't really make a lot of sense to me um but I heard an interview that Tony Robbins did with Deepak Chopra one time and I can I can tell you exactly where I was I was in a car and I'm not gonna go the full story of it but that was in 2003 and in 2007 I got to meet Deepak and spend time with him and he made the understanding whether you wanna call it spirituality source the universe you know I think there's too many arguments over what we wanna call it and it's great I I don't think we'll ever be able to explain it fully and I think that's a really good thing that you know it it keeps that curiosity high in us but Deepak gave me access to an understanding of it that made complete sense to me and I I became very enamored with it for a for a for a while and now I've sort of sat back and understand is it's it's not about what you call it it it whatever you want to call it's not the energy that we're given we're gifted okay it's up to us to how we transform it into our life and you can call it God source whatever you wanna call it that that's not in that's not the most important thing all those people that shared that wisdom with us were trying to give us access to that energy on how you live and it it it's disappointing that some I believe that a lot of that information's been poorly used and used for power and particularly with men you know my age it's a way to generate power through fear that if you don't do this whereas I I my current belief with it and as I said it's it's always evolving my current belief with it is is it is that you are that energy and you get the choice of how you wanna use it and if you don't have the same opinion of it that's fine but yeah we're not here to hurt each other we're not here to to run each other down I don't believe that and that's not being a nice me being a nice guy I just don't think that's why we were gifted that that energy and yeah so yes I do believe in spirituality um but like everyone else I'm just I'm giving a theory you know some people say they know it I'm just sharing what I believe is a theory of of it I really appreciate how you verbalize that and that you know especially the time we're living in right now where we're on the verge of holy wars and religious wars like we haven't seen in hundreds of years or millennia like going like have we not Learned these lessons yet and to hear your perspective that there's a humility in what you're saying like I know what makes sense to me and it's at people call it different things but I believe we're here to do good and not I think that that's a really important thing for all of us to really hold some hope and faith in right we're here for a higher a higher good not a higher evil you know it does make you wonder doesn't it if they all went back and went to whatever is they believed in you and when do you think this is worth having a war over that they don't believe in the same thing what would that what would that source say to them yeah go to war I just I I don't I can't manufacture that in my brain in my body in any way shape or form they just got a different opinion to you let them live their life their way and you live your life your way because this stuff works yeah Susan how are you living your life in spirituality um it's interesting question cause I definitely think there's been a point in my life and I think it was definitely in my 20s even though I can see a curiosity from the smallest of ages like this pull towards spirituality I remember being very young um growing up in a small town and when the Hari Krishna of us used to come to town they'd sort of park in the middle and I'd go on the bus and talk to people and all these type of thing so the curiosity has been there the whole time but I think the shift now is I very much live my life and believe that spirituality is the main course and everything I'm doing whether it's parenting the work I do in the world all of that stuff they're all just the side dishes that are kind of acting as mirrors to the things that I need to be working on and I'm not diminishing their importance but I just see everything through that um spiritual lens it's funny probably one of my closest friends um she'll often ring up and you know she'll say oh how's work going work to us isn't I was with this client or I did this speaking gig or I did whatever work is oh yeah my control issues have resurfaced again and um you know this is what's happened and this is how I'm you know trying to process that in my body and and I just kind of see now that everything that happens around me is happening to excavate something within my own body and there's definitely been a shift in my spirituality that I think when I first discovered there was a pathway there it was very much meditation and all of these things to kind of rise above everything and I think in definitely the definitely the second half from 40 and um onwards I've realized that spirituality and particularly for me as a woman is in my body it's not out there and the only way to actually overcome things is to go through all of this memory baggage karmic things like all of this stuff that's just stuck in our bodies and yeah everything that's happening around us is just assisting us to be able to let that go for the greater good of humanity so I can be a better parent so I can be a better coworker so I can be better in um serving people in the work that I do hmm but the main game is spirituality and that's you know I often think however you start your day probably often shows what's important to you and there's just sometimes where I don't even get into normal life for probably about 3 hours until I have done the things that connect me and remind me of that truth hmm it it's um it's a lovely way to view life um that is possibly not the norm and you're talking about that inner work the inner work looking at our own thoughts looking at our emotions looking at how we might be projecting looking at how at life through that higher lens that higher perspective so that we can grow and evolve um I love that and um so can you share each of you what what you know a specific not the whole 3 hour routine maybe but specifically well you can I I'll love it I'll listen to it all night but specifically like what kind of spiritual practices or daily practices or daily routines you have that that hold you and keep you in that higher perspective or carry you through you know the difficulties the the changes the fluxes the uncertainties in life yeah I'll um continue on if that's OK I think um yeah as you explain it's it's a lovely way to view life but it's the hardest work I've ever done in my whole life and it really I've never experienced such um you know fear and um needed to draw on my courage as much as doing this work so that thing about having your pillars that keep the stability to some degree there is so important to me and so it's kind of for me when you when when I wake up it's the how do I remind myself of that and for me it's hitting the yoga mat so when I um probably about the time I entered the second half which we kind of say is around 40 um I decided to become a Kundalini yoga teacher and I travelled to Spain to um study with you know um my favourite teacher and so that practice is still something that's in my life so that will tend to be the first thing that I do at the start of the day um and also like to bring in some type of meditation or at least intention setting to remind myself that the work that I do today is just an expression of what wants to come through me it's not about getting hung up on this meeting or being nervous about this thing or any of that stuff but just you know asking for Grace to kind of flow through me so starts like that but then it goes into it depends where I am but for at least half of the time it's I'm spending a good couple of hours in nature because again that is so important to me to just be grounded and to get all the messages from um national parks and oceans and all of that sort of stuff so the combination of moving my body but doing it in a way that I'm just expressing gratitude for nature and connecting to nature yeah beautiful and Matt I guess probably some of my past makes me very routine around this so I've been doing a meditation practice called Keeley Meditation it's a 5 minute practice developed by Ron Raphen who's now that that's being taught at San Diego Medical University so I've been doing that since 2,010 um 9 sorry and that's a five minute practice in the morning with journaling and five minute at night and then every morning I I do normally 30 minutes of cardio with my eyes closed and I go I probably about how long ago was it three years ago I went to a Joe Dispensa um retreat on the Sunshine Coast and it was amazing and I I came back and even deepack stuff and I went you know what I wonder if they listen to themselves doing guided meditation and I decided they don't so I develop my own process that I do every day that takes 30 minutes um I just get on a roller or a bike and listen for the um go through my own process until the the music stops after 30 minutes and um my new challenge around all that is now do this so I don't like I know a lot of people that have access stuff through doing their meditations I access silence and darkness and the more I can stay in with no thought that's my that's what I try and do in my meditation my stuff that I do exercising is more about manifestation than meditation my challenge my new challenge is you gotta feel this way and be this way with your eyes open it's it's great that you can do this you know connecting to nature you can do it with you know sitting in a quiet room you've gotta be this way in life and that's where my my conditioning as a you know a white Australian male gets challenged and and which is fun I I I I used to think it was hard but now I've just decided it's fun well you know it's up to me to frame it because it it is difficult sometimes to you know feel the way that I wanna feel all the time hmm I think that raises a really important point and reminds me of the first time I ever did yoga I think it was in my early 20s and um it was my first introduction to the practice and I remember driving out of um you know the venue at the end of the day and there's these people raging having road rage in their cars and stuff and I'm thinking you've just been to yoga for an hour and a half so there's me judging um but you know it just really brought home I remember this thing about you can't have a practice that goes for one hour or 20 minutes or whatever and for the rest of the day be thrown around with your ego it's then how do you have the little moments of connection that bring you back in I think that's really important that's why like Wayne Dyer he sums it up beautifully that ego is edging god out yeah that's what he called it and I yeah I'd I look at that most mornings just to remind myself you know that was yeah again God that let's not be scared of that that's just his description of what we are calling spirituality hmm let's just say God lots of times so people you know just get used to it God God God God God yeah you know let's just let's just let them get used to it oh my God hahaha um I'm curious Matt if you could tell us just a little bit abbreviated version about the change room what are your goals there and now that you're in you know your second half well into your second half like what are your goals for the future and are you you mentioned family as being super important to you do you see yourself slowing down retiring passing the baton along to someone else or are you feeling very called to continue to contribute through your work that's a really good question um first of all the Change Room really operates across a couple of areas but we started specifically with injured workers and predominantly psych injuries and we have eight foundations that are really practical you know from how you think how you feel how you breathe how you move how you sleep um how you connect with people exercise and what we did was we don't take all those eight foundations just choose one or two because if you sleep better you'll probably wake up with better mental clarity that you'll probably make better decisions and you'll probably you know if you eat better you'll feel better and so it's we had a lot of success with it a lot of success with it coming out of Covid the industry that we worked in has been in a little bit of a dunk fight still for a fair while so it we're getting back to but we also do leadership and corporate stuff as well as well as with government agencies for preventative work and you know what it's pretty much the same content um you know what the recovery and the prevention so it's interesting I don't frame any of that as work yeah I I get to do it yeah so if you talk about family I feel like that's family as well so I have no ambition look I'm not a very good gardener I don't go fishing I you know I I if you said well what what do you wanna do mate every day I just if I could go to to a room full of people and work out how we can heal that room um that'll do me yeah I just I learn more from the people that we work with than they learn from me I know that cause I'm just taking in stuff from them all the time and all that does is elevate the power that we can make difference to other people you know and that's probably something that's been a bit of a strength of ours particularly in recent times I was you can imagine as a past you know Rugby league coach I was very structured and we need systems of development and blah blah blah and I've learnt that yeah look that they're handy as a background but you know the stuff that Susan and I have gone if I told you like how we've saved millions of dollars in centres is like we got leadership to do this hold on brace yourself get out and walk the floor and say hello to their staff instead of hiding in their office that's it you know so I just started to also understand the power of simplicity and making that choice you know and because it is easier to sit in your office then go down and interact with all your staff but it's not better and that's one simple example of about 50 that I've got you know just of and just to see that be put into practice like some some things are timeless like we're evolving at really rapid speed aren't we and it's fun I you know I'm not resisting it you know I'm not saying oh back in my day no it's amazing you know the technology and it's amazing how people are you know evolving but there's some things that are timeless that you just get you know particularly in the last probably four or five years I've got a reminder of yeah don't ever walk past that stuff hmm I love that what's easy versus what's better for us is um you know a real gem there yeah in Sydney um actually I remember Matt and Minnie asking me this question in um their podcast you know that was nearly three years ago and um it was kind of like you know you've written four books and you've done this what's next like what are your big goals and I remember saying at the time my goals are more space in my life more and better connection um more expression of myself through music and art like none of it was work related it was just this deep craving um to I suppose to be more and get out of like just you know the business even though I feel like I've been on that journey for numerous decades and so even though I said that at the time um you know I I since wrote this book with Matt um we've had so many things that we've been doing that I've absolutely loved doing and I think the space I've just moved to is I don't really have goals and intentions I just wanna slow down have more space and really meet the things that are coming to me rather than have the there's a goal for this next book and this thing and that thing it's just kind of like meeting what's there because I never would have predicted I was gonna write a book with Matt Elliot or I never would have predicted or had on my goal list of speaking at south by southwest all of that stuff just comes because it's meant for me and it's meant for us and whoever and it's kind of just being in the space where I can meet whatever is purposeful that's coming towards me Matt can you talk to that as well being in the space to receive what's coming at me cause you talked a while ago about manifestation what's your what's your approach to that take on that yeah I'm again it's it's funny how you get exposed to some wonderful mentors and like engineer you know because you yeah you've been in the same space and um I just I've I'm really focused on how you're being and I know that sounds simple it's a little bit like walking the floor right but I I I consciously have to make a decision like when you get up in the morning let let me use this you don't tend to get up and go oh this is an amazing day and I can't wait to get out of bed and it's gonna have my I got that coffee waiting for me you know you you tend to because of the way our brains wired you tend to go for oh no and I got this and I got that and so it and it's easy to keep that momentum going you know it it's actually becomes very difficult to turn that momentum around even if you do your you know my Keeley meditation so I've really worked on how I wanna be and the more I can be that and it's not this again I know people call it the laws of attraction and they dive under tables and stuff like that and it's I just know in my personal experience with all this you know I had some really amazing success you know you know on how I became a head coach and I wasn't surprised by any of it cause I was actually being that way before it you know I share a story I worked with Mick Fanning world champion surfer for a long time before he was a world champion his conduct was a world champion before he was one you know he he did all the things that he needed to do and felt the way he needed to feel again he didn't win that first title and go god I can't believe this has happened just doesn't happen that way so I wanna be a certain way that my grand chick kids like being in my space I wanna be a certain way like Susan just said where we get up and speak and I'm not trying to impress people I serve them they go away and go shit I can use that that's something that I I can actually bring into my life and you know what I get the most joy out of I get a text message from someone and go oh look thanks I just wanna you know I had this happen and I'm feeling you know I'm lucky that I get a few of those of how life has been it's not my information you know I I use all those incredible I I give people access to that sometimes you know when you have a conversation with Deepak I have to go stop man I like hang on I I that is way beyond what I understand you know so but I've got a little my my gift is I can give people access to stuff that you know isn't accessible to them so I don't create the information so I just get to access it and share it and and maybe you know that's that's what God's given me and that maybe that's what source has given me as as my my skill set that's beautiful actually that really speaks to why Angie and I started this podcast right because who are we being in the world is we both wanting to just show up in a way that is like sharing wisdom and letting people share their wisdom and other people glean from that what they need what they could apply in their own life and it's all about this kind of creating a community where everybody can you know come to the door and get what they need and raise consciousness and elevate you know um and it's what you said Matt about being of service right I just wanna serve people it's not egoic it's not about what am I getting it's I just wanna be of service I was put here by God to give with certain skills and gifts and talents and how can I offer that you know as a free gift and offering into whoever can receive it yeah and you know what happens with that is this like this conversation here that we serve each other and then I you get information back yeah you get people coming and telling you stuff sure you know it's weird the more you do this service people just come up to you and tell you stuff and you take away more wisdom you know so it's it's not a one way street I'm here to serve you all now sit down and I'm gonna it just doesn't work that way is it that I find the more that I can give people access to that stuff the more I get to learn from them and you know the the more and that's also the fun part right isn't that the fun part yeah because then it feeds your own curiosity and your own sense of playfulness and joy and like whoa look what I Learned from this person you know it just makes it really wonderful to be alive each day when you're interacting in that level and the most underutilized high performance tool on the planet I I share it all the time fun yeah you dropped the F word this is what we usually ask our guests is what what you Robin usually ask us but I'm gonna ask it today what do each of you do for fun do you want me to go ha ha ha ha um oh again like just like I said before I feel like spirituality is the main course I also feel like a big part of spirituality is bringing as much fun and joy into your life so a few things for me like music is definitely a really big passion of mine like being in the audiences for live music and I just love that experience of community that happens when people gather to experience and move with music um to the point that I then decided at the age of 50 I'd like to become a rock drummer and I've now joined a band and play the drums still not great at it but um I get so much joy out of that so yeah it's just those things of music then anything to do with nature anything to do with the water like being in the water being on the water um and just like the fun that I get from the great relationships that I have around me and being able to laugh with my girlfriends or clients or basically anyone that I deal with that's so cool what's the name of your band the Outros they're called Outros okay we'll look out are you on Spotify are you on the platforms we're not we're not that good yet we will we will watch this space and Matt what do you do for fun oh well I've probably mentioned my grandkids about 50,000 times right well I'm lucky enough that I live right next door to two of my grandkids so you know I woke up this morning beside my three year old grandson you know and and we had fun straight away I walked next door and my one year old grandson was there and you know it's really interesting it's a little bit like what we've been discussing is you know like Robin said is when you actually kids pick up your state quicker than anyone else if you're miserable they aren't coming near you right so you know it's just so nice to walk into in you know into in into my daughter's house and have my 1 year old come flying at you along the floor and climb up your leg you know what I mean is how much fun is that so my I get most of my fun out of human connection friends you know going to a cafe and boring people by talking to the people sitting at the table beside me that sort of stuff I just I love it speaking yeah doing speaking things probably a little bit different to other people rather than you know normally just standing on the stage and normally go down and be a bit of a pain in the backside and I like people cringing so that gives me fun as well so yeah that that side of things I just I I adore awesome great any final words of wisdom advice wisdom that you wanna share before we sign off for what would you tell your 30 year old self now if you knowing you know having lived past that age now you're in your second half what would you tell them what would you tell your 30 year old self or 20 year old self what wisdom would you share with them oh mine would probably be a couple of things one would be um don't be so hard on yourself don't take everything so serious don't make a life out of just fixing yourself experience the fun experiencing the joy but also um not not probably in these words but I think one of the motivations of our book and reflections of our book I guess is that if we started doing a lot of these things when we were 30 our second halves would really be quite different and my message to myself then I was always kind of into physical health but the need for a holistic look at your well being from physical to mind and mindset through to emotions through to spirituality and how you connect with each other just to be more balanced in making sure that I'm putting investment in all of those areas hmm great Matt such a good question I would probably say just keep enjoying it just keep enjoying it I you know I had an amazing you know I would have preferred that my dad didn't pass when I was you know 13 years old and I would have preferred there was a lot of things that didn't happen in my life and I wish I understood what emotions were hmm cause we're never taught what they are I had to learn the hard way and but you know the fact that I had to learn the hard way maybe that's a good thing so I don't know if I'd change anything to be honest with you I maybe it should be the other way around maybe my my 60 year old self should go back to my 20 year old self and go or maybe my 8 year old self what would you do in this situation bro because I kind of feel like there was the joy for life then is slowly gets taken away from us doesn't it through our programming through school through God I I can't even watch TV it's it's you know they're just they're just trying to manipulate I feel like we're trying to be manipulated through fear stop it so that's I'd go back to my 8 year old self rather than the other way around and and go mate what she what would you do here cause I know what he'd say go out and have fun don't worry about it don't watch it yeah that's just a fabulous perspective I love that you brought us there yeah thank you let's all just sit with our 8 year olds right now um the innocence and purity and the wisdom of that childhood you're so right that it it does get stripped away and it's so important that we bring it back um so can I ask a question cause you guys might know that why is it because that fear in our brains Susan you tell us about was our brains wide 3.1 to 1 to see thread over joy I don't feel like I had any fear as an 8 year old none not a jumping off roofs not not of sharks in the water you know does our brain progress that way or are we just like was that is that what an eight year old boy's like yeah I reckon it's a combination of um conditioning and when we get into systems being told to look for all the fearful stuff but the other thing is there is brain stuff that that consequential part of the brain doesn't really develop until you're in your early 20s and particularly for boys it's it's definitely sort of you know that early part of your 20s and so you're just living a carefree life where you don't see the consequences of a lot of the things that you do which is yeah sometimes that ignorance is absolutely bliss yeah I I think it's it's known as the Great Unlearning isn't it that we we um we can have that as an awareness but then there has to be some unlearning and unraveling of that so that we don't shrink interfere our lives don't shrink so thank you so much both of you for um spending your time with us it's been really really rewarding just having your wisdom shared where can we find your book your books your work how can people how can people find you the books um Amazon tends to be the best place to find cause you'll find the ebook there as well as the um print copy book as well and um Matt websites yeah the the change room dot info is another place that you can go to um yeah um Coach Matt Elliot is all another place that you can go to Susan's website as well um find us on socials we're kind of everywhere just do a bit of a Google and you'll find us everywhere yeah great and we'll link all of that in the show notes so people who want to find you will know exactly where to go um thank you both so much really a pleasure to have this conversation and to listen to your perspectives thank you yeah thank you both for reminding us that the second half isn't about decline it's about depth and for anyone listening we hope that these stories really help you see that wisdom isn't what you know it's what you live Susan and Matt thank you both for sharing your wisdom with us today thank you thank you so much for tuning in to the wisdom We share podcast we hope today's episode sparks some new insight imagination and practical tools you can integrate into your daily life continue this journey with us by subscribing sharing and dropping us a review until next time stay wise

Head Shot

Anjani Amriit

Host
Head Shot

Robin Wald

Host
Head Shot

Matthew Elliott

Guest
Head Shot

Susan Pearse

Guest