That feeling of being in the zone is a measurable neurochemical state of consciousness where we feel and perform our best. This optimal state – flow state, as it’s called – isn't limited to hobbies and sport, but can be achieved in various forms of work, and can lead to increased creativity, productivity, and personal fulfilment.

In this conversation, Ben and his guest Dave Murphy explore the value of understanding and cultivating flow state at work, transforming how we approach our professional lives and overall wellbeing.

Dave is an expert, helping people understand and achieve flow state, particularly in the context of work. Prior to this, Dave had a career in advertising, working for one of the best agencies in the world. His journey to understanding and teaching flow was influenced by an ayahuasca experience in Amsterdam, which opened a door of insight for him.

Links

• Connect with Dave via LinkedIn
• The Flow Advantage – Dave’s programme
• Breathe New Life Into Your Work – Episode 38, with Giles Hutchins
• Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement With Everyday Life, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Welcome to Peripheral Thinking, conversations with entrepreneurs, advisors, academics and artists.

All people championing ideas on the margins, the periphery ' cause.

That's where the ideas which will shape the mainstream tomorrow are hiding today.

Uh, in the conversation today, uh, I speak with Dave Murphy.

Now we have a conversation about flow state.

You might better understand that as being in the zone, uh, but flow state what it is, why it's important, how to help you, and how to get there.

Now I've, you know, said a few times that these conversations are with people who are championing ideas on the margins, so that you might bring these ideas back to the, the mainstream of your life, inspiring you with their, with their knowledge, with their wisdom, with their insight.

And, you know, today is no different.

I think flow state is a really important thing to understand.

It's about working from your most creative and capable and high performance self.

Uh, it's not a.

States, which we can exist in for huge periods of time, but it's hugely important to kind of know and understand about it and kind of understand how to find our way back to it.

So whilst this conversation is partly about that, it's also about much more actually.

Uh, and it's about, in part, Dave, you know, like many of the guests that we have on here that I have the good fortune to speak to.

At some point in their lives, they've followed, um, followed the threads of curiosity, which might be hiding in the margins of their own minds.

You know, for Dave, he was a everyday ad man.

If such a thing exists, I mean, not, not quite Don Draper, but who knows?

Maybe he was, uh, an ad man.

He was living in Amsterdam after a stint in New York, you know, doing the.

Living the high road of what the, the kind of 21st century adman does, uh, finding himself in Amsterdam.

He, uh, where he lived, he went on a weekend with his wife, which was actually an ayahuasca weekend, and that weekend really cracked open a door of insight for him.

Um, you know, we will get into it in the conversation about a little bit about what happened, but, you know, it really opened a door, cracked open a door of, of possibilities, cracked open a door of insight into a whole range of ideas and modalities, which existed in the periphery of Dave's mind.

Uh, and his journey from that point on was about following those threads, following those curiosities.

It didn't take shape form immediately, but there was a doorway that was most certainly opened, cracked open by that weekend at Amsterdam, uh, which ultimately has kind of led him all the way back, if you like.

Like I said, to the periphery of his own mind where he kind of found some of these ideas waiting for him, these ideas of flow state, understanding what it is, how you help, how, how he can help you get back there.

And that's actually the core of his work today.

So quite an incredible journey.

Uh, you know, an important staging post was this cracking open that happened in Amsterdam.

Well Dave, thank you for joining me on Peripheral Thinking.

Yeah, my pleasure.

Thanks for having me.

First of all, you are, I'm speaking to you.

I'm in Hove, where I live in the uk.

You Arem not in Hove, are you?

We are, we are spanning the globe in this conversation, aren't you?

Whereabouts are you, you speaking from,

I am, almost as far away as you, can get.

I'm in Sydney, Australia.

right?

Yeah.

So the classic, if I started digging below my feet now, I might arrive at you at some point in, around 55,000 years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You'd be close.

Yeah.

Brilliant.

And, uh, and Sydney is, Sydney has always been home or, uh, is, is home again now.

it's, well, it has always been home.

I was born and raised here, but I did spend, uh, I spent about four years in New York City and then about almost four years in Amsterdam as well.

So, moved around a little bit, but yeah, back here and feels like I'm born and raised, so yeah.

Brilliant.

And I'm gonna, I'm gonna pick up some of those threads of New York and Amsterdam because it, it feels that there's interesting contributing parts of the story in there.

Uh, but yeah, so just to give us a, uh, somewhere to kind of dive in from, uh, and as I said, we'll kind of get into unpacking the specifics of, of Flow State.

But give, give us, give us a headline.

So Flow state, what, what is it?

well, yeah, I mean, I feel like probably everyone has been there at some point in their life doing something.

So it's kind of the, it's often referred to as when you're in the zone.

Um, the sort of more formal definition is the, is that it's the optimal state of consciousness where we feel our best and we perform our best.

but I think, you know, from a, from a sort of day-to-day perspective, or just people going about their regular lives, or whether that's at work or in, you know, personal hobbies or anything, it's kind of when you're doing something and you're so immersed in it and it's going, you know, you're performing so well or it's going so well that you just feel like you're in the zone.

most people get there doing things like doing activities that we'd consider like hobbies or leisure.

So the most common.

Activities, especially in where I'm from, like surfing, like surfers often are in a state of flow or in the zone in flow state, but you can get their gardening, you can get their cooking, you can get their reading, um, playing music.

So generally these kind of leisure activities where you just become so absorbed in the, in the moment and in the task that you're doing.

so yeah, most people have had an experience with it doing something like one of those things.

Another big one is actually, I'm not a gamer, but gamers get fully in can, can enter a flow state or get fully in the zone as well.

Right.

Right.

So the interesting thing, 'cause when you first started giving the examples there you to talk about surfing and like the kind of thoughts, you know, so, you know, did it, was it something that kind of required some aspects of, uh, physicality at the same time as kind of mental, was it a kind of fusion of those things?

But actually as you kind of went on to give other examples, it would suggest not, it's not about the necessary, a kind of mix of those things.

it doesn't require a physicality, but I would say often a physic, some sort of physical exertion is involved.

All those things I mentioned, I forgot to say this.

All those things I mentioned are like, as I said, sort of leisure pursuits or hobbies.

It's interesting, there are, there are definitely certain professions that, you know, people can enter flow state, and we can talk about more this more in a second, but it is a, it is a neurological or a neurochemical state of consciousness as well.

So it is measurable.

So it is like a formal state.

So like we might, we might often say or describe it that we feel like we're in the zone, but you can actually sort of more formally demonstrate it.

and some of the professions that where people end up in the zone or in flow state a lot, I don't know if this is like formally ranked as number one, but apparently surgeons are the, uh, most likely people to enter flow state.

Um, and again, we can talk about why, like what are the conditions that that sort of, that cat catalyze that.

same with coders or like anyone who's sort of, deep in the sort of backend of, of the, of the internet technology.

Um, and there's lots of others as well.

But yeah, surgeons are, are often described as like the most, you know, when they're doing what they're doing, they're often fully in, in flow state.

Which I guess is a relief.

You would hope so.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I guess, so then there are kind of, uh, some degree of kind of common characteristics, and maybe we can come to that in a minute.

But I guess the, the image which comes to mind with a, a surgeon and or a coder.

Uh, you know, kind of deep in the, in the kind of fibers essentially.

But there is something around the, um, the, the kind of, the quality of the focus, the speci, the specificity of the, of the focus.

That, that, that, you know, I'm kind of drawn into something interesting too, of course, that, um, most of the time if people did recognize something around that it would've been in a hobby, uh, which says a lot about how people are spending their time and or whether they're spending their times in the right way.

Not that of course everybody can earn their, earn a living from their hobby, but it does kind of point to a, a big problem, I think, which we can also come to a little bit.

Um, so my, um, the, the kind of limited, uh, understanding or information I'd heard about kind of flow state, so, uh, was via a, uh, not personally via, but via his, his kind of books.

Uh, there's a Russian, is it psychologist, whose name I can never pronounce.

It's got many letters, which are season Z.

Uh, I have no idea how to pronounce his name.

Do you know how, Do you know how, to

I, I do, I don't know if it's technically exactly how you pronounce it, but his name to, to, to my best attempt is Mihai Chi sent Mihai, he's a Hungarian American psychologist and he is, as you, as you've noted, he is that sort of considered by many to be the founding father of Flow State.

He stumbled across it.

He was originally as a psychologist.

He was, he was studying Happiness and what makes people happy and years of research down that path.

He sort of arrived at this set of conditions that often put people into a flow state, and that, that is the optimal state of consciousness like that is when people are out there most fulfilled, most satisfied and most creative, most productive and their best performance.

That sort of became his, his that, yeah, he was the founding father of Flow state, but that became like his signature or his legacy of, of being the one to sort of land on that.

Mm.

Yeah.

Really interesting that he came to it via a inquiry into, into Happiness and, you know, what was, what was kind of fulfilling, uh, the 'cause some, some of the words there.

And I know you kind of talk about these ideas of kind of getting you to a place of clarity and creativity and performance and, and wellbeing.

I'm really curious about this and how we obviously bring this to more, how more people can find their way, particularly in the context of work and the work that they do.

And I know that's a big area of interest for you too, where these things don't need to just be the domain of.

Me in the garden or me in the surf or whatever, but that there are, you know, that these, these are states that we can navigate to and actually in a way, you know, have a responsibility to ourselves, uh, and to those around us to understand how to navigate to those kind of more, more routinely, more commonly.

Uh, and so I'm kind of really interested in that as a, uh, as a, as a kind of direction generally.

And so, kind of really curious to, to start to understand how kind of, you know, how and where flow state meets in this.

But let's go back a stage a minute.

So you kind of made reference to Sydney's home now.

but there was a, there was a sort of, there was a, a kind of multi-year global tour that happened in there that, uh, seemed to take in some New York and some Amsterdam.

So, uh, what, what, what were you doing over

Yeah.

So, so I, I mean, I bank began my career in Sydney in advertising, in creative agencies, and did that for a number of years, and then decided to go to, I guess, What is the, the mecca of, you know, advertising.

So sort of packed my bags.

I was, you know, single, mid twenties, no responsibilities.

And I decided I'd just try my luck and I, and I, you know, bought a one way ticket to New York with no job, no nothing, but decided I'd try and, you know, try and land something and try and make it in New York.

What happened on day one?

Just outta curiosity?

I mean, luckily I had a, I had a, um, a good friend whose couch was my home for probably the first 10 days or so.

but I, I mean, I had done my due diligence and tried to tee up a number of meetings and interviews, stuff like that, so that when I arrived I was into those.

So I don't know if it was day one?

But pretty quickly I got into those.

and then it became this weird, weird sort of blur of, I live here now, but I don't really live here because I don't have a job and I don't have a visa, and if I don't get one, then I'm gonna have to go.

And that lasted for three months.

It took me three months to get, to get a job.

And, um, I mean, I was super lucky with where I landed.

I ended up at an agency called Droga five, which is in the industry at least, you know, recognized, um, as probably the best trade agency in the world.

And is my dad drove me to the airport in Sydney, and I.

He was sort of asking me on the way he is like, so if you, if this all goes the way you want it, like, where do you, what, how do you want it to play out?

And I was like, well, I'd love to get a job at Droga five.

I remember saying that to him in the car.

And thank God, three months later I did, I was very lucky.

And so that, that was amazing.

And I was, I was fully absorbed in that, like, at that point in my journey, advertising was my career and that was my ambition.

And to sort of work my way up to a senior role in that world was, was what I wanted to do.

And I'd landed at probably the best place to do that.

And so it was, it was, um, very fulfilling at, at the time, but um, as I'm sure we'll get into it, that started, that started to dissipate after not too long.

So then, so yeah.

So then short hop from, um, from, from New York to Amsterdam.

I trust you didn't do it on a boat like it was sort of a hundred years ago.

No.

Um, yeah, the, the short version of a long story is there is, I was loving New York and everything about it, but I met a, I met a girl that, um, is now my wife.

but she, she had to leave the US 'cause she was Australian, of course, I met an Australian York, but she was Australian and wasn't able to renew her visa.

And so we had a decision to make as a couple.

So she had to leave the country, like legally had to leave.

And so we decided, I decided I'd go with her, but we decided we wouldn't, we weren't quite ready to come home back to Australia yet.

So we, we picked Europe just as, you know, something different really.

And in the industries we worked in, Amsterdam is a relatively, I wouldn't say easy place to get a job, but it was certainly possible to get a job there.

And the language is, you know, most, most companies operate in English there, at least the sort of in our industry they do.

Um, so yeah, we picked Amsterdam.

And yeah, again, looking back, I think that's probably because I didn't wanna leave New York.

I was actually a little bit quite reluctant and a bit bit bummed.

I felt like I was cutting it short.

But I was excited to go to Amda M and then, you know, by the time we left Amsterdam, I was so thankful that we did.

It was, it was probably some of the best years of my life and probably one of my favorite, if probably if not my favorite place on the planet.

So

And so that, uh, together kind of formed a chunk of the, the advertising chapter.

And as you said, you're kind of, as you, as you got into that, that was, that was your life, that was your motivation.

That was to some degree, um, how, how and where you played out some of your own flow state.

And I guess the specifics of that are, are relevant.

But, um, you know, I think you've kind of then made reference to the, the shine of that, kind of paling a little bit.

So

Yeah.

So I mean, over those years, even probably at the back end of the New York years, I was like sort of working my way up into more, more and more senior roles, you know, earning more and more money in, in, in the industry.

And, you know, it was, it was, it was, it was good, but every time I got a, whether it was a promotion or working on, you know, a bigger account or whatever it was, and, you know, I, I was at, at the time the best agency in the world.

And so I kept, I, I sort of was like having this realization that I'm, I'm here in the best agency in the world in New York on some of the most famous brands in the world, working on these huge global campaigns.

You know, I'm becoming relatively senior in this agency.

And I was like, I'm kind of reaching, I'm, I certainly wasn't at the top, but I was, I was on my way to the top of that industry, but I was becoming less and less fulfilled and sort of satisfied by what I was doing.

And I was actually starting to feel.

Disconnected to what I was doing.

I was like, something didn't align.

I was having, I was coming into more clarity about around my own values and I was realizing and recognizing that what I was doing didn't align with my own values.

And I was, yeah, just starting to feel quite disconnected and unfulfilled and, and like I was losing a sense of meaning and what I was doing.

And so that began in New York.

I think when we moved to Europe, I probably just got distracted by the fun of being in Europe.

And that was also new and exciting and amazing, especially as an Australian to suddenly be right in the heart of Europe.

And you know, you've got, especially with no re no responsibilities and all of that, we were having a great time.

I was working at a great company, so it probably, I probably put that sort of growing sense of unease on the back burner for a little bit.

But it still was there and was present and yeah.

And I guess to kinda long story short, while while we were in Amsterdam, I actually had my first breath work experience, um, which.

Was really profound in the sense that I had no idea that it was possible to, to enter an altered state of consciousness without, you know, without ingesting something or, something, or whatever it might be.

And we had this, I was with my partner when we had it, and we had this incredibly powerful deep, deep breath work experience.

And within that, I had a lot of, I received a lot of clarity around my values and, and sort of, it became really clear to me that what I was doing in my career was not aligned to those values.

And so that, that set me off on a path there.

But it also just planted this seed, which at the time, this is now eight, eight years ago, nine years ago even, um, had no intention of sort of pursuing a, a career in wellbeing or breath work or anything like that, but certainly planted a seed that there's this like whole realm of modalities and practices and, you know, states of consciousness that are available to us that.

I just began to become more and more fascinated by.

Yeah, so really, yeah, obviously the, uh, the title of the podcast is podcast is, is Peripheral Thinking.

And what we're interested in is kind of exploring ideas which are on the margins.

I think one of the ways we talk about, you know, the ideas which will shape the mainstream tomorrow are hiding on the, on the margins, on the periphery today.

And so, kind of really interesting, this sort of experience kind of opened a, a window, a, a door for you to be able to see this suite of modalities as you talk about, which are on, we're on the periphery for you, just sort of backing up a tiny bit.

So what is breathwork for those who dunno?

Yeah, so I mean there are, there are a lot of, so breath work, as listeners may be aware is, is sort of entering, you speak of peripheral, but I feel like breath work is, is beginning to enter the mainstream.

It's not mainstream yet, but it's, it's sort of where yoga.

Was maybe 10 years ago.

It's, it's starting to become much more sort of recognized and accepted.

and so when you hear that term breath work, which more and more people are hearing today, it's important to remember that breath work can mean like a whole spectrum of things.

So at its core, it's just a, a deliberate conscious.

Um, it's applying a deliberate conscious breathing technique to the way that you're breathing.

but the, you know, the types of techniques and the durations and the settings and, and all those variables, they're so vast.

So I guess at one end, one end of the spectrum, there's things like box breathing or square breathing, which people may be familiar with, which is a really simple, accessible breathing technique.

It usually involves a four second inhale, four second hold, four second exhale, four second hold.

And you just kind of repeat that button for a few minutes.

And it's really effective at downregulating the nervous system and helping you feel calm or, um.

Just putting you into a sense of ease if you're feeling stressed or overwhelmed or anything like that.

And what's great about that is it's really accessible.

Anyone can do it at any time, whether sitting at your desk or, you know, driving your car or walking or even lying in bed.

So if that's like at one end of the spectrum of breath work, then at the other end of the spectrum of things like holotropic breath work, which was actually my first breath work experience, and that's like a really deep immersive breath work experience.

It's often, you know, a couple of hours long in a, in a ceremonial setting, often with a, a shaman or a, or a guide, um, you know, drums and music play a big role in it.

And you can, and quite often, um, activate dimethyl tryptamine, DMT in the, in the in the brain.

And you can have quite a trip, like you can have quite a, psychedelic experience.

but that modality of breathwork was discovered by Stanis love graph in the fifties and sixties.

Who was researching psychedelics?

at the time when the government, the US government sort of.

Squashed any research into that space.

So he discovered you can kind of get there without ingesting anything.

So there's a whole, spectrum of what breath work can mean.

So when you hear that term, it can mean sort of an anywhere on that spec spectrum, which I think is always important to, to clarify because, you know, breath work, as I said, like the first example, it could just be you and I pausing now for two minutes and just, you know, really slowing down our breath and really just, you know, calming ourselves.

And that is a form of breath work, but it can be a really deep, immersive, experiential process that can Yeah.

Bring up a lot of emotions or limiting beliefs or just have a big physical release sometimes.

So it's probably a much, much longer answer than you were expecting.

But yeah, breath work can mean a lot.

So your, your first experience of it, you were saying it was the holotropic, is that what it was called?

Yeah.

And so, and that, that was in, in Amsterdam.

Were you, that's when you Were living in Amsterdam.

yeah, funnily enough, I was actually at a psychedelic retreat, which was going, it was about to be my first psychedelic experience, which in Amsterdam is legal and they have these beautiful, um, settings or facilities where they host these psychedelic.

what's, what psychedelics would that be?

Um, this was an ayahuasca journey, or was to be, and so it was a three day retreat and my wife and I went there on some of our friends had done it, you know, some months previously and just couldn't stop sort of saying how powerful it was.

And so we decided we'd, you know, went in Rome kind of thing.

We'd, we'd go and do that.

It was a three, three day thing, but the first day was all practices that didn't involve psychedelics.

It was all about sort of coming into the body and opening up, opening, opening yourself up to new experiences.

And one of them was this holotropic breath work session, which I remember the guide at the time saying, sort of want warning us or letting us know that some people find the breath work of this weekend to be just as powerful as the psychedelic experience.

And I, I remember sitting there going, yeah, right.

Like, we're just gonna like what?

We're just gonna breathe and that's gonna be as, as powerful as ayahuasca.

And, you know, that was, that was my naivety.

But um, fast forward a couple of hours later at the end of this experience and I was like lying on the floor, like shaking, crying, and just having this full on physical release, emotional release.

And I.

Yeah, it was, it was really powerful and I can absolutely see how for some people it is just as powerful for, as a psychedelic experience.

So that was my first one, which I wouldn't necessarily recommend is, is most people's first experience.

It's kind of, that's, that's jumping in to the deep end, which I didn't know I was doing at the time.

I was so naive to it.

But, um, it was so powerful that it definitely planted a seed.

And because I was living in Amsterdam, which is where like Wim Hof is from which people have heard of him and connect him to breath work.

And so I remember after, after that retreat then, you know, going back to regular life, but seeing all these Wim Hof workshops popping up.

And so then I started to explore going deeper into just breath work and, and what we could do with.

did you then go on to do the ayahuasca?

I know we're not talking about that, but so, so you, you kind of did, uh, you kind of Yeah.

You, you went through the whole, the whole three

Yeah, I did.

So yeah, we, we, we can cover, 'cause that, that's probably a whole other conversation, but maybe we'll, we'll, we'll stick to

I was just about to say the exact same thing.

I could derail this if we go down that path.

Exactly.

Yeah.

We kind of sort of pop open, pop open that little, uh, I would say can of worms, but yes, we, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll come back to that at another stage.

I'm really curious around, around that.

Um, I'm also really curious, like, so you have this, in some senses, well, in, in every sense, maybe a, a kind of life altering, uh, experience over a few days.

Uh, and was it, was it a weekend?

Just outta curiosity.

Friday

So did you go back to work on Monday?

I.

I.

took the Monday off.

Instead a Monday.

I was gonna say.

So,

Yeah, I mean, it was, we were advised beforehand to take Monday off if you have a regular, regular job, kind of like I did.

And yeah, it was, you're right, it was a life altering experience.

I don't think, I certainly knew that weekend that something big had happened and something had shifted, but it probably wasn't till a few years later that I realized, like if you look back, you could probably see the sort of the change of direction of my life.

And in the moment, you know, it was just like a, a little one degree shift.

But you know, five years later that one degree shift has taken you down a very different path.

And so in the moment, so on that Tuesday or the Monday and Tuesday, like I knew something had happened, but I wasn't, like, I wasn't sort of in a complete state of shock or like overwhelm of, of as to what now.

But I knew that, I was like, okay, something's happened here, but I was just gonna, you know, let life life play out.

so you had friends who had done it, what, what was, what was sort of going on for you at the time that this, you know, that this felt like a thing you might do?

So, as I mentioned, like especially at the back end of New York, and even, you know, the first couple of years in Amsterdam I was, I was, you know, in, in the industry I was in, I was becoming, I was, I was sort of hitting the, those senior roles and, you know, starting to earn towards the, the sort of ceiling of What you'll learn in this industry.

And, and I was just get becoming less and less satisfied and fulfilled, as I said by all of this.

And so there was something in me, something like brewing in me going, this, this can't be it.

Like, and at the time I was 30, I think late like 29, 30, 31, and kind of sitting there going, what is this?

The next.

20, 30 years of my li like, if, if I'm already feeling like this might not be it now, like yeah, those questions had begun.

And so the friends that had had gone and done that retreat, you know, trust them a lot and could, you could see the, like, the authenticity with which they were like, this was a, this was a very powerful weekend and it certainly wasn't for them or for me.

And for most people who do ayahuasca or those kinds of things, it's not done for most people.

And for, I'll speak for myself though, that weekend we didn't do it.

To go and have like a trip and, and sort of have a wild, wild experience and just see what happens.

We did it with the intention of maybe it'll help re reveal answers to some of these questions that we're asking.

And my wife was having sort of her own version of similar questions and so we were like, maybe it'll help us uncover some of these answers we're looking for and give us some clarity or point us in the direction that we hope that we hope we end up in.

So, and it, it absolutely did that.

But like I said, it, it wasn't crystal clear.

The day after, but it it, it shifted the trajectory or the, or the course that we were on.

and how long, how long after that, so you, you go back to work on Tuesday, although, you know, I'm being a little bit dib, so you go back to work on Tuesday, uh, and then at some point, um, you, you leave Amsterdam and is, when you leave Amsterdam, is that because you were basically at that point saying that I can't work in this industry anymore?

Or, or, or I'm just going home, or, or what's

Yeah.

It was actually, so my wife and I decided we'd come back to Australia and try and try and have kids and, um, start a family and just 'cause both we're both Australian and all our families here.

We just thought let's do it in Sydney because for that reason.

And so we left Amsterdam quite reluctantly.

Like we were loving Amsterdam and the city and living there.

But we just decided we'd come back and, and just build, build this sort of family life back here and, and so I.

I was definitely at this point in my career, knowing that this was, that I needed, something needed to change.

And so we came back, I actually got a job at a, you know, a corporate, um, big, sort of big corporate business here in Australia.

And I knew even before I signed the contract, I was like, this is not, this is not the right thing.

Like it was, it was a, you know, it was a good paycheck and it was a, it was a, it was a good way to land back in Australia with some stability.

But I knew from before I'd even started the job that it was not gonna be, I wasn't gonna probably gonna be there very long.

and yeah, sure enough, I mean, probably two, two or three months later, COVID happened.

So then there was a big sort of, you know, global, global sort of reset in terms of what happened when that began.

and that for a lot of people.

Allowed them the opportunity to re-look at their values and how they were spending their time.

And I think I, I was already, you know, a fair way down that path.

So it probably just accelerated, if anything.

And probably a year after Covid had, begun and probably once it started to like settle, I suppose, a little bit where we were like, okay, well this is like what's happening now.

I actually went and booked a series of private one-on-one breath work sessions with a practitioner here in Sydney to help me get clarity to, to know what was next.

Like I knew how powerful breath work could be at, at helping find clarity and, and give that sort of help you figure out the path for you.

So I went to a facilitator with that intention and came through the end of these six weeks of one-on-one work with her.

super.

It was really powerful for reasons beyond career as well.

There was a lot of like, limiting beliefs and internal, family dynamic stuff, self-belief, self-confidence worth, all that kind of stuff was coming up.

So I kind of came out of it pretty, pretty impacted by that, that process and quit my job.

and came out of that and I was like, well I've, I've got 15 years of experience in, in brand strategy and, you know, building campaigns and brands.

so maybe I can just keep doing that, but for brands and businesses that I feel align with my own values.

So I actually set up a business, which was brand strategy for impact led brands that are sort of aligned, I would say was that are doing good things for human and planetary wellbeing.

which is how we got connected actually originally.

So I was working for businesses, Doing that.

So applying the skills I had from that previous career, but just doing it for businesses that, that felt aligned to my values.

So when I quit my, that last job I had in Sydney, I had a three month notice period and it was in a lockdown and probably a, a week after I'd quit, they, they'd quickly sort of taken me off everything important basically.

And I had, I had nothing to do, um, I had no kids.

It was a lockdown, so it couldn't, couldn't go anywhere.

I had literally no work to do.

So every day was waking up in my apartment with nothing to do and nowhere to go, but still getting paid to sort of see out my time at this company.

And it was in that moment that I, 'cause I'd just come outta this amazing breath work process that I decided to do a breath work, um, facilitator training, not with the intention of necessarily starting a business as a facilitator, but I was just so fascinated to learn more about what actually I'd just been through at a deeper level.

so I had this time to do this facilitator training.

so then began my consultancy, the brand strategy consultancy.

Then sort of on?

the side, just initially just to friends for free was who were interested.

Started, you know, taking, the first person actually was my wife's sister.

She was like, oh, I'd like to try some breath work.

So guided her through a session and she had a really powerful experience.

It was like, okay, this does work, you know, more than like for other people.

then a couple of guys I was in a running group with asked for a session, so did that, and then one of those guys asked me to come in and do it with his team at work.

This was all for free, all with no business sort of mind, or trying to, you know, have a mindset of how I build a business around.

but just did that for six months maybe, and it sort of snowballed to the point where more people were asking me to do it for their team at work or, and suddenly it went one step outside of my immediate circle.

So I might have got a, you know, an email from someone I didn't know who was like, Hey, I heard you do breath.

So, and it was, the timing was right as well.

'cause we were still deep in like covid world of, you know, where wellbeing was, you know, obviously at the top of mind and businesses were looking for things to engage their people and for wellbeing initiatives.

So there weren't that many people doing when, in fact, at the time I think there was only one person in Sydney doing like corporate wellbeing programs or breath work programs, I should say.

So it was a bit of a case of Right.

timing and that just like got to the point where I was like, okay, there's something here, there's a, there is some sort of business model here, still doing my strategy consulting and I just sort of decided to set up a business alongside that initially doing breath work, um, workshops and programs for businesses and teams.

and did that for, Yeah.

probably did that for a year, 18 months, um, and still do that.

But then I got to a point where after 18 months or so of doing that, I felt like something was missing in the sense of, I think the, the breath work experiences were amazing.

I was getting incredible feedback and, you know, getting invited back and referred on.

And so I was like, this is what, like this is valuable for people, but personally I felt like something was missing.

And so I was like, I was struggling with this concept of like, am I just a breath work facilitator now?

Like I had no intention of doing that.

That was not, that was not on the plan or the vision board, but, I decided to then just kind of go deeper into my own understanding of wellbeing and decided to study.

Um, initially I studied with Zach Bush and did a program called The Journey Intrinsic Health and did the facilitator training of that so I could learn how to facilitate that, that journey, which is basically like a holistic wellbeing program, um, that looks at sort of like eight, eight points of wellbeing,

like around breath is one of them, but like nutrition, hydration, movement, um, rest, play connection, so all these Yeah, holistic pillars of wellbeing.

So I kind of went deep down, deep down that for six months of study.

To become a facilitator of the in journey of intrinsic health.

And then the final missing piece for me, at least now I'm sure it'll always continue to evolve, but I then discovered a guy called Steven Kotler, who has written a number of bestselling books.

You may be familiar with him.

Stealing Fire is probably the most famous book he's written with Jamie Wheel, um, where he studied, he studied or they studied the world's top performers.

And what, how, how these world's top performers, whether it's, you know, sports people like Roger Federer, or business people like Richard Branson or, you know, Buddhist monks or whoever it might be, these top performers in across this variety of disciplines.

What allows them to be, be, and perform the way they do.

Like how, how, how they, what state of consciousness allows them to be the best in the world at what they do.

And so, Stephen, over many years, Stephen Kotler, the author of that book, sort of became, I guess a thought leader around this concept of flow state, as well as Mihai, who we spoke about earlier.

And Yeah.

long story short, he, he then built a program, with the flow research collective, which, taught people like myself how to, well, firstly how to understand like what is flow state and what is the neuroscience of flow state and optimal states of consciousness, and then how can, how can I then it was basically he had a program that taught people to facilitate others into accessing flow state.

So I did that program and then basically then merged all of that learning I'd done around breath work, holistic wellbeing, and flow state, into, into now what is my business?

which just, that felt like that missing piece that I was talking about.

Like, I was like, oh, now I've, now I now it feels complete for me because with the breath work, it was kind of like my question internally was like, breath work, but for what?

Like.

Breath work is amazing And I love it as a modality.

It's, it's incredible.

But I felt like using my background in the corporate world, I wanted to be able to apply it to something.

so now with this understanding of flow state and optimal states of consciousness for creativity and performance, I could apply it to teams and businesses to allow these teams and businesses to firstly have a baseline of wellbeing and understanding of that.

But then on top of that, how can they learn to understand this, this zone where we can be and feel and perform at our best?

So that's kind of very long, very long answer of how I arrived at at now.

Flow State.

And so I'm kind of obviously really keen to just explore and understand how, how do you, how do you get there?

Maybe a little bit more about what the, what the flow state is and, and how you get there.

One, just other thought observations you were talking, which is uh, sort of a bit periphery to peripheral to the conversation we're having is just the importance of following threads, right?

So, um, you are in this kind of one, on this one career track and um, you know, it's losing resonance, it's losing your hold and you know, things kind of happen by kind of chance, by invitation and then following a thread of curiosity and that following a thread of curiosity, um, kind of led you to this place now.

So it's just a really kind of helpful reminder I think for people, particularly where they are feeling Some of that sort of dissatisfaction or some of the malaise, whatever it may be.

you know, one of the, one of the ways through that is to, is to pick at the threads of, of curiosity and follow that line to see where it takes you.

Um, and of course we don't really know in the walking, it's easier to see that retrospectively, but you, what you just articulated, there was a, a really helpful reminder to people I think, of, you know, follow the threads of curiosity.

It can lead you to a, to a good place.

And so the good place and so sense of view.

So, um, this kind of real rich bringing together of, um, of kind of, of sort of breath work leading into this idea of flow state, um, and the work that Steven Koler has done, sort of understanding that, you know, what is it about, um, sort of elite performers and, uh, you know, how, how they, how they are doing what they're doing.

And so it is part of what then you've kind of learned from that is an understanding about how to help people get to that.

So how to help me be.

The Dai Lama or Richard Branson, whatever my kind of flavor of kind of preference might be.

Yeah.

I guess so.

I mean, it is like, I think it's, there is a, there is a process I suppose for getting into flow.

There is a, there is a controllable set of conditions and triggers that once you understand them, can allow you to access that state, to get into the zone, to get into flow state more reliably.

And in some cases on demand.

But unless, you know, then we're often just leaving it up to chance or, or it's just happening when we're doing things like surfing and gardening, which is amazing and absolutely keep doing that.

But if you, you know, if you're in your, in your career, in your job, you're a writer or whatever you do, if there's, sometimes we just need to perform at our best and get, and get stuff done.

And.

If you know this like controllable set of conditions and triggers and you have an understanding of that, then suddenly we, we can become a lot more effective and efficient and productive creative in, in the work that we do.

So what?

What are some of those controllable conditions then?

Yeah.

I mean, I think, so there's a, there's a few things I'll just touch on a couple.

So one of the reasons I I went down the holistic wellbeing path is because, and, and I actually did this unknowingly as you said, I was just following, following threads.

But first and foremost, and, and I teach this in the course, is you are probably not going to access flow state very reliably, if at all.

If you are just baseline of wellbeing is, is is out.

So at, at a, at a, at a starting point, I talk, I talk about it as state management, so like our internal state management.

And so it's all the classic things and, and I go into them in, in quite some detail in, in the program, but I.

You know, things like sleep, nutrition, hydration, movement, like all the, all the obvious things that we, you know, that is not news to anyone.

Um, although there's aspects of things that are, are news to people, especially around things Like breath and rest and, connection

and, um, nature, think that's probably one that's less, less sort of acknowledged.

and how,

importance of being in

yeah.

Connection, yeah.

Being in nature, connection to nature, that's one.

I mean one that's maybe a little more abstract.

One like one around hydration is one that I think is, there's some emerging science around now that, Maybe one way of putting it is sometimes, or what, what the science is now showing is that how much we drink, how much water we drink is actually has very little to do with how hydrated we are.

And there's a, relationship between our body's electrical charge, which we all, everyone's body has a, has a, an electrical charge.

And things like, you know, being in nature or grounding, putting your feet on the ground can change the body's charge which influences our body's ability to absorb the water that we consume.

so sometimes like little things, and I go into this in quite some detail, but things like, you know, when we, when we do a wei and it's very yellow.

Sometimes a lot of people think that that means we're dehydrated, which it sometimes is, but sometimes it's signaling that our body, our body's current state, is unable to absorb the water that?

we're drinking.

And so, so Yeah.

there's just some things like that that we go into, which, um, yeah, I won't sort of go too deep now, but others, there'd be probably a lot of tangents, but at a baseline, there's some holistic wellbeing principles, I suppose, that are the starting point for this flow, that allow us to get our state management in order before we then, take the

next step, which I suppose, if we, if we assume that some of those holistic wellbeing principles are in order, then the next thing that I like to try and tackle is focus.

So Steven Kotler, Has coined a saying that flow follows focus.

And in today's world, as I'm sure you don't need me to remind you or anyone, is we are so distracted in, in our day-to-Day lives at the moment.

Um, there's like, I mean there's, especially if you work in a, in a traditional sort of office or professional environment, the level of distraction is, is like, I mean, you know, it's full on.

And we aren't going to reliably be able to access flow state when we are being like, you know, pinged and buzzed and text and messaged and emailed and um, and have, and have calendars that are stacked with meetings.

Like, it's just, so there's a whole piece around distraction management or a distraction elimination,

How, How, how, might we do that?

I mean, yeah, there's some really simple things that, again, is not probably news to some people, but, there's thing, there's behaviors we can do.

So for example, we can put our, like our phones on flight mode for certain periods of the day.

Um, but there's some interesting tech emerging now as well.

There's like there's an email program where you can, so people can send you emails as they do, but if you apply this program to your email server, you get to choose when the emails actually land in your inbox.

So you can just, okay, at two o'clock or whenever, you can just sit down and go, okay, I'd like to go through my emails now.

And you sort of pre, uh, press release.

Suddenly all your emails will, will appear rather than just the constant flood All day.

of, you know, thousand distractions coming through.

And, you know, again, tangent probably won't go into but.

The impact of these notifications and emails on our nervous system throughout the day is not conducive to accessing a state of flow.

So there's some tech that we can use as well.

Um, things like that program and, and some others.

So distraction management is like a big one.

and learning to focus.

And then that probably brings us into the next thing to understand is that flow state is not an on or off state.

You're not, you're not in it or not in it.

It's actually a four step cycle or a four state cycle, I should say.

And this is often the aha moment for a lot of people when I'm sharing this stuff is that the first stage of flow state is actually what is called struggle, or it's defined as a struggle.

It's usually the stage of resistance.

And I'll try and describe it in a way that people might be able to relate to.

So.

If you sit down and you know, you, you know, you've got something to do, again, I'll, I'll sort of use the professional office worker type type role.

Um, you sit down and, you know, you've got a big report to write or presentation to write or something and, and the, and like sort of when you sit down to start, it's a very, it's often very challenging to start and you'll often, you know, sit down and you're checking LinkedIn or your phone or always checking back to your emails.

And there's this sort of agitation phase where it's just really hard to start.

And there's a huge mindset piece and mindset's obvious, uh, which we probably won't go into either.

But the mindset, is a huge element of flow state.

But there's a huge mindset set, set shift that needs to occur around this first step, this first stage of the flow cycle, which is this stage of agitation and learning to just recognize that it is a precursor to flow state.

So most people unfortunately, sort of.

Remain in this struggle phase where they'll sort of begin, they'll maybe write a little bit, they'll, they'll see an email, they'll check the news, they'll go get a coffee, and you kind of, you stay like sort of stuck in this no man's land of, you're not in any deep work, but you're, you're sort of starting, but you're not really getting anywhere.

And there's a neurochemical signature to that as well.

There's a lot of cortisol, so it's quite unpleasant.

and that is the, the first stage of the flow cycle that most people remain stuck in.

I think just knowing All day.

often, their whole life basically.

Most people never really learn that.

I think this, again, will sound really simple and almost like a bit too good to be true, but the first mindset shift that needs to happen in order to be able to access flow state is that, is recognizing that that stage is a, is a necessary gate that you must pass through in the flow in terms of accessing flow.

And all you need to learn to do, which is sometimes easier said than done, is persist.

Persist through the struggle.

and, and what helps enormously is being aware of the fact that it begins with struggle.

'cause most people have no idea that ing and accessing flow begins with struggle.

But once you become aware of that and you, so when you're, you know, tomorrow if you sit down and you need to do, do like write a report or something and you begin and you're kind of in that normal pattern, but you suddenly now are aware of that and you just go, this is okay, this is normal, this is what happens.

You get better at it over time, you accelerate your way through it.

But just recognizing that, Is hugely important and is a big mindset shift.

and then, yeah, so then there's a, stage two is called the release stage, which is basically where the body's resistance to the activity.

So that sort of agitation of checking things and can't quite drop in.

Um, that fades away, that dissipates.

And we enter what is called the flow cycle, the release stage where we sort of, or are like dropping in, we're now like we've let go of any resistance and we're beginning the task that we're doing, whether it is writing a report or learning, you know, an instrument or, if you're cooking is, it is a

common one where you're just like, instead of thinking about what ingredients you need or preparation stuff, you're just, now you're, you're doing it.

So that's the second stage of, of flow.

And then the, the third stage of the flow cycle is flow.

So it is when you're in flow state, um, and again, all of these.

All of these stages have like neurochemical signatures to them, and there's all, all sorts of things going on with oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin.

and, and flow, once we're in flow is the most sort of, you know, it's like a neurochemical cocktail that feels amazing.

It you feel great, And so, yeah.

third stage is flow when you're in flow state.

And then the fourth stage is actually coming out of, flow, which is recovery, which is actually flow is quite taxing on the body.

It's quite energetically, um, you, we often research varies, but we can usually stay in flow for anywhere from like 60 minutes to May, maybe up to three hours.

But usually like 90 minutes to two hours is the sweet spot.

And then you'll need, you'll need to recover like neurochemically, the body will need to recover and flush, you know, all the, all the chemicals that have come through the, the brain.

So Yeah.

the fourth stage is recovery.

And so that's when you need to, you know, get up and go for a walk or.

Go and do something completely unrelated or have a little nap or some do something else.

Um, ' cause you can't, you can't sustain a state of flow for, you know, an an eight or eight or nine hour one day.

So, again, without sort of going into too much detail and, and, and taking too much time, that, that is so understanding that flow state is a, is a cycle and not an on off state.

Recognizing that there's sort of gates you have to pass through and once you start to learn that it's, it becomes much more, um, I guess readily accessible.

I'm really, really kind of, um, interested in the cyclical nature of it.

Um, because I think that's sort of one of the things which didn't run through a lot of my work and work.

I, there's importance of just kind of slotting into systems, understanding that things go cyclically, things don't go in a kind of linear, linear way.

Uh, and actually what a sort of enlivening opportunity that is.

And you know, you kind of made reference a few times in there, oh, these things, you know, they sound kind of o obvious and or too easy.

Like we know the thing around distraction is a, you know, is, is a huge problem.

Yet it's sort of striking how little distraction management there is that I guess employers are gifting employees with and or, you know, employees themselves are, or kind of taking ownership of to, to kind of insist on, you know, and so the whole idea, like the, the kind of the nightmare phrase of our time is I'm on back-to-back calls.

It's like, it's just like, whenever I hear that, I feel so sad because it's like, it's such a painful idea.

Uh, and also just totally counterproductive.

You know, there's just no domain where that can be useful for.

You know, for anybody in that cycle.

Right?

But of course, that is a, that is a, a sort of super, super dominant thing.

One very little thing, as you were talking about the four stages I was struck, uh, but in the, in the kind of similarity, uh, in a way with the, the kind of Buddhist four noble truths, because that starts with the idea of suffering, right?

So it starts that suffering is, is a suffering and struggle essentially is, uh, is a given, right?

And so then it is about recognizing that, uh, and understanding that there are causes to that.

And with those things, then there is a path free from that.

And actually, what you were sort of talking about in this, in this kind of flow state journey was, was very kind of similar, but that is, uh, again, also a conversation for, for another day.

Um, but yeah.

So you, you kind of made reference to, um, a kind of an idea that you, an extra idea you wanted to leave people with.

Yeah.

I think it just is a helpful one.

It's called, um, it's from Steven Kotlow.

It's not my model or concept, but it's called the challenge to skills balance, and basically all the research that he did around all those top performers.

And since then, and, you know, his, his 20 odd years of research into this topic, he discovered that there's this thing, and there's a, there's a beautiful visual that I can share with you to, to help visualize this, but it's pretty simple.

basically in whatever task that we're doing.

So whatever is going on for you that you would like to get to into flow state for or with, there's a level of challenge to that.

So if we'll pick an example.

So if you are, I mean surfing's an easy one.

I'm just trying to think if there's a more practical one for people.

yeah, we'll go with, we'll go with surfing.

So the challenge to skills balance, so if you are, if you're a very poor surfer but you are going out into really big, dangerous swells, you, you're not gonna get into flow.

'cause it's gonna be very challenging and very unpleasant for you.

And, um, and vice versa, if you're a world class surfer and there's, you know, no waves, you're not gonna get into flow 'cause you're gonna be bored.

So basically there's this challenge to skills balance where basically the model is that if whatever skillset you're at in whatever the task is that you're trying to do, if you can marry your skillset with the appropriate level of challenge, and then Steven's research shows that if you can just nudge it a little bit beyond your, like, current skillset.

So like research suggests 4% beyond, which is very specific, but 4% beyond your current, um, level of skill that is the optimal condition for getting into flow.

And so I just did think of a, a, a better example.

Sometimes people, you know, in in, in like an office type role where they have to say, write a presentation, it might be really easy for them.

Like that might actually be boring.

And so you'll never actually really do a.

Your best work there 'cause you just kind of can't be bothered.

but there are things we can play with on this challenge, skills balance where we can actually say, I'm gonna give myself 45 minutes to write that presentation.

And suddenly the challenge, if you'd given yourself the whole day off it's due on Friday, you'd be like, well, I'll get to it, I'll get to it.

But suddenly if you go, I'm gonna sit down now and I'm gonna give myself 45 minutes, and when I'm at the end of that 45 minutes, that's it.

It's finished.

Suddenly you've reframed the challenge so that this challenge, the skills balance might marry up quite nicely now.

So you've probably got the skills to get it done in less than an hour.

And so it's a really interesting concept when, if you're thinking of things that you'd like to be able to get into flow in, whether it's work or not work, but it's like recognizing where you sit on that challenge to skills, balance, and if there's anything that you may need to do to shift it more in your favor.

And, The last point, or to reiterate that last point is.

Ideally you want the challenge that, of the task that you're working on to be just outside your like current cap capability level.

I really like that because one of the things which comes up, particularly where there are people I might work with coaching, uh, which is true for then individuals, but this is also true actually in another way of, of, um, companies, people would sort of talk about, you know, a kind of plateauing, a boredom, a joylessness.

Uh, and it's kind of interesting what you're talking about there is, you know, actually maybe the thing that's happening is the, the, it's, there's an imbalance.

Actually my, my, my capability, my skill is, is kind of, is, is outweighing the, the, the, the challenge, the thing that I'm kind of working on.

And, uh, another guest in this series, uh, of conversation of Charles Hutchin, who has done a lot of work around understanding how we might kind of, one of his books, his two most recent books kind of sum up the idea of is this idea of kind of nature works and leading by nature.

So how we might bring the principles of nature into the work and the leading that we're doing.

And I bring that up because what you are talking about there, this idea is about tension.

And one of the things that Giles talks about is the importance of tension.

You know, in nature there is tension happening all the time.

There are opposing forces which are playing off and working from, and supporting and balancing against each other.

And to this idea of, of, of tension.

And in fact.

He also makes reference to, um, some of the flow state work too.

'cause I think in the, uh, aforementioned Hungarian person whose name I can't mention, I know what he was talking about.

This idea of, um, I think he was talking about its intention and attention being kind of important sort of characteristics of, of flow state.

And as Gil makes, you know, makes tension is key to those things.

And just the reference that you were giving there in terms of, um, kotler's research is again this idea of tension.

If there is a kind of flattening, if there is a boredom, if there is a joylessness, maybe the tension is out of balance somewhat.

that's spot on.

Yeah, it's beautiful bridge or connection, you've just Yeah.

Between that, that's, yeah.

Spot on.

Brilliant.

So you made reference a couple of times to a program that you have.

So, um, just give us a little, uh, headlights that I'll obviously include links to all of your work in the notes and, and whatnot.

But, um, you've made reference to program.

Be kinda curious just to sort of share with people a little bit, an overview of, of what and when and how, and all of those

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Yeah.

it's, um, yeah, it's kind of, as I said earlier, it's, it's the merging together of everything I learned about breath work.

I.

Everything I learned about holistic wellbeing and everything I've learned about flow state into one program, it's a two day workshop that's, that I've designed for businesses for sort of modern, modern day professionals, to, it's called the Flow Advantage.

Um, and it's designed to teach people what flow state is, what the benefits are and how to access it on demand.

And so we go through some of the stuff we've, we've just discussed Right?

now.

Um, but we just, Yeah.

we just go a lot deeper, obviously over two days.

and we do, you know, a couple of really deep immersive breath work experiences as part of it.

I've sort of designed a flow state breath work.

Um, there's some stuff we didn't get time to touch on today, but.

When we're in flow state, um, the prefrontal cortex of our brain, deactivates, which is like the rational thinking part of our brain, um, and a lot of our ego and sense of self resides in that part of the brain.

And so one of the characteristics of being in flow is a complete absorption in the present moment and a complete, loss of self-consciousness.

So you don't, don't become, you know, fearful of being judged or how you might be coming across, you just get completely absorbed into the task.

And so Breathworks really effective at, at making that happen as well.

So breath, the type of breathwork I facilitate, deactivates the prefrontal cortex, so we have a flow state breath work experience as part of the program.

that's what I've designed.

It's currently, I'm, you know, offering it to businesses here in Australia.

I am flowing with the idea of doing an online version.

I don't think I'll do it.

Quite, quite yet.

So I'm not sure where, where your listeners are, so it may, may not be, um, available to, to many of them, but, one day I may do an online version 'cause I think it can be distinct to a, into more sort of self-paced program as well.

Um, but yeah, that's, that's the flow advantage, which is, is just launched a few months ago and it's, yeah, as I said, it's the sort of culmination of, of what I've learned so far and I'm sure there'll be more.

And, you know, some of the work you've touched on with, with, um, Giles and I've been reading, um, which is I think also how we got connected.

But I've been reading, um, regenerative Leadership by Laura Storm and I think he co-authored that with her actually.

And, so I've been going down that path as well.

And I'm fascinated by the, the connection to the natural world and all that.

So maybe that that'll get infused into it more as, as I learn more about that one day.

That's fantastic.

And we've got, uh, we've got, we've got many listeners in, in Australia.

So, um, I think, you know, the opportunity to be able to sort of do this in the real life as, uh, my then 4-year-old used to say, um, is, you know, will be, will be, will be good for, for many people.

And, uh, yeah, really kind of curious to follow that work and learn more about it.

And so, Dave, thank you so much for, for joining me today.

Thanks, Ben.

Thanks for having me.

Really appreciate it

Thank you again for listening.

We really hope you enjoyed that conversation.

As ever, if you like what we're doing, uh, if you think anyone, if anyone you know, would benefit from listening to this conversation, enjoy it or dislike it even as much as you have, please feel free to share it.

Uh, we really appreciate you taking the time to do that.

The sharing is the lifeblood of this sharing and liking.

I think are the, the currency of our modern time.

So if you take a moment to, you know, share it with somebody who you think would benefit, we hugely appreciate that.

Or even take some time to write a review.

Uh, irrespective, if you like what we're doing, you can find out more if you search up peripheral-thinking.com, you'll find your way to the podcast website.

You can sign up there, you can register there.

You can keep abreast of everything that we're doing.

We'd be sure to keep you notified as soon as the next conversations go live.

Meantime, thanks again for your time.

Thanks again for your ears, uh, and we look forward to you joining us next time.