Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to the slow home podcast. This is
Speaker 1: the podcast all about slow living in a fast world.
Speaker 2: My name is Brooke McAlary.
Speaker 3: My name is Ben McAlary Welcome to Season 3 Episode
Speaker 3: 5 where look when you started this season you said
Speaker 3: I'm gonna talk to people from all walks of life.
Speaker 3: I was like I dig it but I would never
Speaker 3: have guessed that you today you'd be talking to someone
Speaker 3: that identifies themselves as a Silicon Valley geek.
Speaker 4: Three quarters of a like a dick nerd but a
Speaker 4: deep in a very in a very positive way and
Speaker 4: a very positive way. Yeah so on the face of
Speaker 4: it when you hear about my guess say you will
Speaker 4: question what any of this has to do with solely
Speaker 4: living socially. Katie Patrick is my guest today. And can
Speaker 4: I just say first thing I absolutely loved her. This
Speaker 4: is the first time I've met her. I have read
Speaker 4: her book and it is phenomenal. But first time I
Speaker 4: met her and there was just a kinship there. And
Speaker 4: again had you described her work to me before that
Speaker 4: I'd think well let's face it you know where where
Speaker 4: do I fit in where the shared values. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 4: Turns out there's a lot. Right. So Katie is a
Speaker 4: she's an environmental engineer and designer.
Speaker 5: And she is someone who applies data driven gamification and
Speaker 5: behavioural change psychology or big word all be words to
Speaker 5: fixing the world's environmental problems using technology and using data
Speaker 5: and using data to back it up. So this is
Speaker 5: someone who has created an app that maps green cover
Speaker 5: in cities in order to try and encourage leaders of
Speaker 5: those cities to increase that green color like a game.
Speaker 2: Who's got the greenest city. Exactly. So she's made a
Speaker 2: game almost of every city in the world comparing each other.
Speaker 2: And you're going to have the world's greener city.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah. And this is this is part of what
Speaker 4: drew me in about her book. Her book is called
Speaker 4: How to save the world. That's a big title. It is.
Speaker 4: And the subtitle is How to make changing the world
Speaker 4: the greatest game we've ever played. Look it is such
Speaker 4: a cool concept. Right. It's magnificent because she goes into
Speaker 4: all of these examples of how we can use gamification
Speaker 4: and technology to get people excited about making change.
Speaker 5: And it's honestly something that I had never read it
Speaker 5: into my own detriment never really considered the role that
Speaker 5: technology and innovation will play in environmental change.
Speaker 3: Without giving away too much of the episode. You've got
Speaker 3: someone who's just created this app written this book. But
Speaker 3: where's the link to the slow movement.
Speaker 4: So we have an audience filled with people who want
Speaker 4: to effect change in the world. I think that's fair
Speaker 4: to say. But we also have an audience filled with
Speaker 4: people who don't necessarily know how to do that. Okay.
Speaker 4: And Katie's whole.
Speaker 5: Theory her thesis I guess is that we need to
Speaker 5: tap into our innate creativity our positive creativity in order
Speaker 5: to create these solutions to these enormous complex problems. That's
Speaker 5: the only way we're going to be able to do
Speaker 5: it to get super creative and funnily enough the neuroscience
Speaker 5: behind creativity says that if we are stressed. If we
Speaker 5: are in the executive functioning mode for too long if
Speaker 5: we fight or flight mode almost essentially then we cannot
Speaker 5: access our creative potential. So we need to slow down
Speaker 5: in order to access our creative brains. Slowing down isn't
Speaker 5: a nice to have. It's not a good thing for
Speaker 5: some people. It is an actual essential need for us.
Speaker 5: For those of us who want to change the world.
Speaker 2: That's what we need to move to a four day
Speaker 2: week right.
Speaker 4: Seriously I mean let's not get sidetracked. There are some
Speaker 4: really interesting case studies about this that are emerging in Australia.
Speaker 4: But that is the crossover. Katie essentially believes that we
Speaker 4: all need to slow down. We need to re prioritize
Speaker 4: our time and energy in order to access that creativity.
Speaker 4: And I'm here for it. This is such a great
Speaker 4: wide ranging conversation that I think everyone who wants to
Speaker 4: effect change social environmental familial like even just in your household.
Speaker 4: If you want to effect change in people who live
Speaker 4: with you or your neighbours. This is a great conversation.
Speaker 4: And what's more Katie's book is a fantastic guidebook to
Speaker 4: how to do that.
Speaker 2: Go over to slow your home dot com slash Season 3.
Speaker 2: To find out more about the book and the app
Speaker 2: and any other resources that Brooke and Kelly talk about
Speaker 2: and also you can head over to Katie Patrick dot
Speaker 2: com that's her home on the Internet.
Speaker 4: Absolute best place to go to find out everything that
Speaker 4: you want to know while you're over it slow your home.
Speaker 2: What do you check out slow beginnings. That's the name
Speaker 2: of our retreat that we've just launched.
Speaker 5: It is. So if you listen to last week's episode
Speaker 5: you would have heard that we have announced a new
Speaker 5: online retreat and we're really excited about it. It's called
Speaker 5: slow beginnings and that's because it is essentially the foundation course.
Speaker 5: It is a six week guided online retreat that involves
Speaker 5: a weekly lesson weekly tasks slash homework and some meditation
Speaker 5: guided meditations and a weekly live video call with everyone
Speaker 5: on the on the retreat.
Speaker 3: Plus myself and may sometimes I guess you can be
Speaker 3: invited if you're invited. Yeah.
Speaker 4: And at the end of that six weeks you will
Speaker 4: have developed a set of values and strategies and tools
Speaker 4: that will form the foundation of your your specifically slower life.
Speaker 4: It's really for people who want to make this change
Speaker 4: but don't know how to or for people who have
Speaker 4: started and have maybe not even back into old behaviors
Speaker 4: and patterns. So if you are finding yourself either frustrated
Speaker 4: at the life as you live it right now and
Speaker 4: want to make changes but don't know how to or
Speaker 4: if you're looking for accountability as well I think that
Speaker 4: is something that we're going to offer a lot of
Speaker 4: then head over to sell your home dot com slash beginnings.
Speaker 4: You can find out more you can sign up and
Speaker 4: you can be ready to go when we kick things
Speaker 4: off on the 8th of September 8th of September for
Speaker 4: six weeks.
Speaker 3: You know what it is. Also for I feel like
Speaker 3: at the end of this course people will then have. The.
Speaker 3: Ammunition to be able to have a conversation with someone
Speaker 3: to explain why they're doing what they're doing. Yeah do
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. I mean that's the hardest
Speaker 3: thing to a non slow person.
Speaker 2: That's the hardest conversation to have is saying why are
Speaker 2: you doing this again. Oh sort of declarative. This will
Speaker 2: give you the tools to have that conversation and the
Speaker 2: people to know exactly where you stand will give you
Speaker 2: clarity on why you're there.
Speaker 4: You know what your personal wants a little and then
Speaker 4: you can stand in anticipation of that. Let's be honest.
Speaker 4: To just to have clarity and to be able to
Speaker 4: communicate that is really important.
Speaker 2: Every story every person like we've said before it's going
Speaker 2: gonna be different for everyone.
Speaker 3: And that's where the homework comes in it's gonna give
Speaker 3: you your individual narrative of how to explain that to people.
Speaker 4: Exactly. So I'm really excited and I really hope that
Speaker 4: you come and join us and again head over to
Speaker 4: say your home dot com slash beginnings and I'll see
Speaker 4: you there first. Yeah.
Speaker 6: Enjoy my conversation with the delightful Katie Patrick Katie hello
Speaker 6: how are you. I'm great thanks.
Speaker 7: So lovely to speak to you. I've been head down
Speaker 7: in your book over the past few past few weeks
Speaker 7: but particularly the past few days I've been preparing and
Speaker 7: I'm so excited to talk to you about it because
Speaker 7: I think that perhaps people wouldn't would look at your
Speaker 7: bio for example as you know a as an environmental
Speaker 7: engineer and designer someone who you know applies gamification to
Speaker 7: solving environmental issues and in slow living and wonder where
Speaker 7: the crossover is. But having read your book there are
Speaker 7: so many places for us to dive in and so
Speaker 7: many places that your work and slow living come together
Speaker 7: in a way that I think listeners are really going
Speaker 7: to love because essentially my audience is full of people
Speaker 7: who want to change the world but may not necessarily
Speaker 7: know the best way to go about it and that's
Speaker 7: what you're all about how to change the world. So
Speaker 7: I actually want to start with optimism because if we
Speaker 7: are remotely interested in the world and the environment and
Speaker 7: the direction that we're heading as humans it's really easy
Speaker 7: to feel overwhelmed and hopeless which is something I talk
Speaker 7: to people a lot about you know the news feels
Speaker 7: like it's all bad.
Speaker 6: And I think that has a way of making us
Speaker 6: feel like there's no point in trying. But you write
Speaker 6: about this in the book and you write about it
Speaker 6: so beautifully because you said we do have a choice
Speaker 6: you know do we bury our heads in the sand.
Speaker 6: Do we get angry do we get aggressive or do
Speaker 6: we tap into optimism and you very much are in
Speaker 6: the camp of tapping into optimism. You told me the
Speaker 6: power of it in the face of these huge issues
Speaker 6: that we're facing in the world at the moment.
Speaker 8: Yeah well to start with the world isn't as bad
Speaker 8: as people think it is. Negative news tends to get
Speaker 8: a lot of psychological traction with us because we are
Speaker 8: kind of sensitive to fear responses. But if you look
Speaker 8: at the amount of solar panels that are getting installed
Speaker 8: is going exponentially up actually the amount of carbon dioxide
Speaker 8: that America and Australia are putting out not just per
Speaker 8: person but as a whole country is actually going down.
Speaker 8: Many forest areas around the world are actually being replanted.
Speaker 8: There is an enormous amount of positive progress going on
Speaker 8: in the world. So I just wanted to kind of
Speaker 8: like burst that bubble if anyone's in a sort of
Speaker 8: a negative doom loop of thinking that although there are
Speaker 8: still bad things going on in the world as an
Speaker 8: overall trend over the last couple of hundred years most
Speaker 8: of the things that you could measure are actually getting
Speaker 8: better except for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. That's scary.
Speaker 8: But there's a lot of great good news in the
Speaker 8: world to focus on that is that is measurable. So
Speaker 8: once you kind of start to understand that the world
Speaker 8: is really on going in a positive direction it's not
Speaker 8: going in a negative direction just because you saw something
Speaker 8: that was really scary on Twitter which I don't mean
Speaker 8: to say that to sound condescending but there are a
Speaker 8: lot of scary things on social media. It's easy to
Speaker 8: just see them and not see everything else. Once you
Speaker 8: got to realize that the data is actually showing that
Speaker 8: the world is going in. A really wonderful direction and
Speaker 8: things actually are getting better kind of takes the burden
Speaker 8: off that to not be thinking in that kind of
Speaker 8: doom that doom way and you can start getting into
Speaker 8: this optimistic headspace.
Speaker 9: And the reason why we need to be in this
Speaker 9: optimistic world view is that the process of making the
Speaker 9: world better involves being able to imagine the destination you
Speaker 9: want to go like for example if you want to
Speaker 9: build a garden in your backyard a beautiful garden that
Speaker 9: goes through and has flowers and everything you need to
Speaker 9: first imagine that you need to imagine that future reality
Speaker 9: and you have to have an optimistic view that you're
Speaker 9: actually able to build that garden.
Speaker 10: You have to make a mental model that's called the
Speaker 10: positive constructive imagination you can have it in your mind
Speaker 10: and then you can reverse engineer that and then you
Speaker 10: do all the things that you need to do. Find
Speaker 10: the plants and make the soil and do the compost etc.
Speaker 10: dig weed to make that happen.
Speaker 9: And that's the essential part of the creative process. And
Speaker 9: now you would not be able to build that garden
Speaker 9: in your backyard if you did not feel optimistic that
Speaker 9: you could achieve that goal that you could actually make
Speaker 9: it happen.
Speaker 8: So optimism is a part of being able to actually
Speaker 8: first sort of imagine this destination of the world where
Speaker 8: you want to go. This is better beautiful inspiring world.
Speaker 8: And then be able to actually do all the stuff
Speaker 8: that it takes to get there and optimism is very
Speaker 8: good for you. It's actually like a vitamin. If you
Speaker 8: look up up the health benefits of optimism everyone should
Speaker 8: get on Google now and look up the health benefits
Speaker 8: of optimism will you find that optimists are happier optimists
Speaker 8: are healthier optimists live longer optimists get paid more optimists
Speaker 8: to save more money. Optimists are able to achieve the
Speaker 8: goals that they set for themselves. Optimists work harder although
Speaker 8: not really all about it's working harder. I'm sure in
Speaker 8: this community. But generally it's like it's really good for
Speaker 8: you and it allows your brain to be in a
Speaker 8: more peaceful optimistic happy state means that your brain is
Speaker 8: in a healthier place. You're not releasing fear chemicals and
Speaker 8: doing chemicals and closing your consciousness off. So you really
Speaker 8: want to have optimism threaded through everything that you do
Speaker 8: and it's not this like la la land it's actually
Speaker 8: about being able to imagine the destination of what you
Speaker 8: want to go and have the confidence and have the
Speaker 8: dopamine in the brain to get you to that destination
Speaker 8: just the same way as you building your own vegetable
Speaker 8: garden in your backyard.
Speaker 6: And that's the difference isn't it that it's not this
Speaker 6: pie in the sky kind of you know airy fairy
Speaker 6: woo woo idea. It is actually real creative imagination. What
Speaker 6: if someone who doesn't know the difference. You know what.
Speaker 6: How can you differentiate between the two.
Speaker 8: Well first I don't think there's anything wrong with pie
Speaker 8: in the sky imagination. I mean why not. You know
Speaker 8: I mean let's say one thing that we need the
Speaker 8: world needs to have is solar panels on every roof. Right.
Speaker 8: So we might need to install say a million solar
Speaker 8: panels that's a lot of solar panels. Do you want
Speaker 8: to go about that project of trying to figure out
Speaker 8: how to install a million solar panels with all the
Speaker 8: different politics and the different homeowners and different financial situations
Speaker 8: of everybody being like oh that's just never going to happen.
Speaker 8: The government's against us. World's full of corporations that are
Speaker 8: you know that are really greedy people are really selfish.
Speaker 8: The you know by the time we do it it's
Speaker 8: not going to be worth it anyway because it all
Speaker 8: the glaciers will be melted and then you know just
Speaker 8: like right now we're just being really angry and it's
Speaker 8: being like well it's not my responsibility that somebody else
Speaker 8: should be doing it. You know that kind of thinking
Speaker 8: is not going to achieve what you are that kind
Speaker 8: of pessimistic thinking it's not going to get you to
Speaker 8: install those solar panels if you think Okay everybody we
Speaker 8: got to install a million solar panels that's a really
Speaker 8: ambitious target. We can both imagine maybe maybe do call
Speaker 8: it pie in the sky imagination and you might be
Speaker 8: in that headspace which I think there's anything wrong with that.
Speaker 10: You need to be pretty optimistic to believe that you
Speaker 10: can do it like if you're going to run for
Speaker 10: something like the president of the United States. I mean
Speaker 10: you would have to be pretty optimistic but you think
Speaker 10: you've got a chance at winning something that difficult if
Speaker 10: you want to install the million solar panels you need
Speaker 10: to be optimistic that you actually believe that you and
Speaker 10: your team and all the people working with you and
Speaker 10: your ideas are going to be able to get you there.
Speaker 6: Yeah okay. So I think that's that's the for me
Speaker 6: that's the key. You actually need to believe it so
Speaker 6: it can be as fanciful or as pie in the
Speaker 6: sky as we were saying as you want as long
Speaker 6: as there is a genuine belief in your ability to
Speaker 6: unpack the problems and solve them as you discover them.
Speaker 8: Yeah. Yeah. Like for example it's something I'm working on now.
Speaker 8: It's trying to increase green cover in cities so we
Speaker 8: get satellite images of the the green cover and satellites
Speaker 8: can figure out what's a plant and what's not a plant.
Speaker 8: Through the infrared spectrum and then we can work out okay.
Speaker 8: One city has like 12 percent forest cover. But we
Speaker 8: want the city is better for a city to get
Speaker 8: up to you know 20 or 40 percent forest cover
Speaker 8: not forest. But urban forest trees green roofs parks et cetera.
Speaker 8: And now I if I'm going to work on this
Speaker 8: and make this happen I need to be optimistic that
Speaker 8: I'm gonna be able to achieve my goal of getting
Speaker 8: the city from 12 percent up to 40 percent and
Speaker 8: I'm going to be able to push on all levers
Speaker 8: in the city and try and help get them to
Speaker 8: plant more trees and more green space.
Speaker 9: So it's it's basically just having a goal and believing
Speaker 9: that you can get there and then comes the real
Speaker 9: innovation bit which is how do you reverse engineer that
Speaker 9: to actually come true. That's where all the creativity and
Speaker 9: the innovation comes from.
Speaker 6: Yeah I guess so. Okay. And which is one of
Speaker 6: the things that I mean when I was reading it
Speaker 6: in the book it it's it's very rational to say
Speaker 6: well of course we need to imagine First we need
Speaker 6: to be optimistic we need to come up with this
Speaker 6: solution and then we reverse engineer to to actually come
Speaker 6: up with the the you know the the physical solutions
Speaker 6: and to to deal with any of the obstacles that
Speaker 6: come up. And that makes perfect sense. And it's sort
Speaker 6: of highlighted to me why so much of the messaging
Speaker 6: around current climate crisis and environmental issues maybe isn't hitting
Speaker 6: home for people who aren't already there because it's all negative.
Speaker 6: I mean almost all of it is negative and it's
Speaker 6: not that it's not true but that negative messaging does
Speaker 6: that not inspire change nearly as much as an optimistic
Speaker 6: sort of view.
Speaker 8: Not really. You may need a tiny bit of it.
Speaker 8: I think that the negative stories need to be dialed
Speaker 8: back about 90 percent. They should maybe be take about
Speaker 8: 10 percent of the conversation because I think it's good
Speaker 8: to have a little bit there to people that people
Speaker 8: know the seriousness and then the other 90 percent needs
Speaker 8: to be made about a vision of where we want
Speaker 8: to go. And it's not so much that it's sort
Speaker 8: of as simple as you know a positive energy is good.
Speaker 8: Negative message is bad. It's that with any type of
Speaker 8: message you put out there you need to drive human
Speaker 8: beings to take an action to do a thing. You
Speaker 8: know they might be switching to an electric vehicle. It
Speaker 8: might be a mayor implementing a policy. Might be getting
Speaker 8: people to vote on something it might be getting a
Speaker 8: school to put trees in. It could be anything from
Speaker 8: a single person maybe you're trying to affect someone quite
Speaker 8: senior who's going to affect a lot of people but
Speaker 8: you can't effect change. This is actually affecting a human
Speaker 8: being to do a thing.
Speaker 10: So using the positive parts of the brain the parts
Speaker 10: that give us rewards like make us feel good I
Speaker 10: can make it like smiley faces and people say you
Speaker 10: doing a great job and feeling like there's an aspirational
Speaker 10: life ahead of us that we can go towards. That's
Speaker 10: what big fashion brands to present this aspirational life that
Speaker 10: we can. There are these really positive things we're going
Speaker 10: to get out of these actions. They're the things that
Speaker 10: are going to make us identify with those things and
Speaker 10: really want to be a part of it. Like if
Speaker 10: you someone who identifies really positively with veganism and you
Speaker 10: think that's healthy that's gonna make me more beautiful and
Speaker 10: I'll have more friends and I'll be this great vegan person.
Speaker 9: And you have all these positive associations with veganism you're
Speaker 9: going to be really attracted to engaging in the actual
Speaker 9: behavior which is not supporting animal agriculture. You want to
Speaker 9: be a part of that role if you have a
Speaker 9: really sort of negative attitude about it you know it's
Speaker 9: not going to trickle through to the behavior. So it's
Speaker 9: really more about thinking about it like a behavioral driver.
Speaker 9: What creates action and the creating the aspirational yes for
Speaker 9: people like the mental aspirational place. That's a that's a
Speaker 9: good time. Good things will happen in your future if
Speaker 9: you do this. That's a better way to get people
Speaker 9: to act.
Speaker 6: Have you heard of the documentary 2040 that was released
Speaker 6: earlier this year.
Speaker 9: Oh I've seen the trailer for it. But I have
Speaker 9: the whole thing.
Speaker 7: Reading your book and listening to you now it reminds
Speaker 7: me very much of what you talk about you know
Speaker 7: presenting people with this hope filled option for 20 40
Speaker 7: and I walked away from that the screening of that
Speaker 7: documentary feeling so full of hope and so energized that
Speaker 7: I went and made significant changes to the way that
Speaker 7: we were living literally overnight because it gave me something
Speaker 7: to work towards.
Speaker 11: Damon Damon Comeau who created it that was his vision
Speaker 11: from the beginning. It was giving people a different story
Speaker 11: to believe in one where we do make changes and
Speaker 11: we do use the best technologies and innovations at our
Speaker 11: fingertips now to create this better future and it's fantastic.
Speaker 11: I don't think it's out in the States yet but
Speaker 11: when it when it is I definitely recommend for anyone
Speaker 11: everyone to take a look because it's probably one of
Speaker 11: the most hopeful things I've seen in a long time.
Speaker 8: Oh that's beautiful to hear. I'm excited to see it.
Speaker 8: I was really excited to see it but it's so
Speaker 8: warming to hear that you had that you had that
Speaker 8: experience with it.
Speaker 11: Yeah. No it's fantastic.
Speaker 6: I want to shift gears a little bit to talk
Speaker 6: about creativity because you've just written a book called How
Speaker 6: to save the world which at its core looks at
Speaker 6: creativity and how to get into the creative process so
Speaker 6: we can come up with these great ideas and innovations
Speaker 6: that will change the world and really what struck me
Speaker 6: about this whole part of the book is that in
Speaker 6: order to access the truly deeply creative parts of our
Speaker 6: brain we need to slow down. So can you explain
Speaker 6: to me why slowing down is necessary and what the
Speaker 6: relationship is between slowing down and creativity.
Speaker 8: Yeah well that is the nexus between the slow home
Speaker 8: podcast your movement and and coming up with the ideas
Speaker 8: that will change the world in the modern world where
Speaker 8: people are really busy. We tend to use what's called
Speaker 8: the cerebral cortex engaged in executive tasks like things that
Speaker 8: you're busy concentrating writing an email or maybe you're drawing
Speaker 8: something on you it is something technical on your computer
Speaker 8: getting things done. And also if we are stressed then
Speaker 8: we've got the amygdala taking sort of some dominance over
Speaker 8: the brain producing the fight or flight response. Now if
Speaker 8: we're very highly strung stressed out by doing messages about
Speaker 8: the planet or just life in general that can actually
Speaker 8: reduce the brain's cognitive function by 30 percent. So if
Speaker 8: you're actually trying to do the technical side of coming
Speaker 8: up with ideas or implementing ideas putting this negative shroud
Speaker 8: stressful and negative shroud or any brain 30 percent is
Speaker 8: a lot to lose. Now if you're only engaging in
Speaker 8: that executive function all the time you know being busy
Speaker 8: being productive getting things done you're not taking space to
Speaker 8: have all of that stuff chill out for a bit
Speaker 8: and use what's called the default mode network and this
Speaker 8: is research pitch day research. Here's another great podcast called
Speaker 8: The Psychology podcast called Scott Barry Kaufman. He shot a
Speaker 8: rebranded as the Imagination Network because what happens when you
Speaker 8: just chill out and you stop being busy all the time.
Speaker 8: Stop being stressed and you can just daydream look out
Speaker 8: the window. Just kind of sit back and think about stuff.
Speaker 8: Those are the parts of the brain turn often in
Speaker 8: this default default mode network otherwise known as the Imagination
Speaker 8: Network starts to get activated and that's why you had
Speaker 8: to have ideas new ideas and new creative connections start
Speaker 8: to come out and you might have experienced it sometime
Speaker 8: yourself Are you really really busy one day and then
Speaker 8: you just stop and then you look out the window
Speaker 8: for two hours maybe not everyone does this and then
Speaker 8: does something just comes here. You're just like yes that
Speaker 8: that you know and if you're not making space in
Speaker 8: your life if you're not opening your hours of your
Speaker 8: day up to just kind of like a bit of
Speaker 8: nothing time to just let that default mode network kind
Speaker 8: of like get activated you're not going to be able
Speaker 8: to delay making new Creative Connections in the way that
Speaker 8: if you just look really really busy all the time.
Speaker 8: And another thing that's interesting about this kind of imagination
Speaker 8: and this default mode network is that you can have
Speaker 8: two types of imagination like a good one and a
Speaker 8: bad one. So the default mode network can take you
Speaker 8: down a bad path which is called the neurotic imagination
Speaker 8: which is where you look out the window and then
Speaker 8: you're like we're all going to die. Glaciers are going
Speaker 8: about husbands going to leave me no bills to pay.
Speaker 8: And then you just like horrible things happening should never
Speaker 8: been born. You don't have an active negative loop.
Speaker 9: Absolutely. That's not a positive active imagination. And you can
Speaker 9: get that way about anything. But if you specifically go
Speaker 9: out to create time to use the positive constructive imagination
Speaker 9: which is you lay back look up to the clouds
Speaker 9: and think What would the city what would a city
Speaker 9: look like.
Speaker 8: Or maybe a school or my own garden or my
Speaker 8: town look like if it was totally environmentally sustainable and
Speaker 8: beautiful and happy and creative and just laid it open
Speaker 8: leave that open question and you can only do that
Speaker 8: if you are in the slow lane space.
Speaker 10: So we all have to get into that headspace to
Speaker 10: help get our best creativity out so we can have
Speaker 10: this ideas and this energy to make the world come true.
Speaker 6: So that excites me to no end for so many
Speaker 6: reasons because it it is solid evidence that slowing down
Speaker 6: is necessary. It's not just a nice to have it's
Speaker 6: not just you know something that only some people get
Speaker 6: to do. Maybe it is something that some people feel
Speaker 6: like others only others get to do. But I think
Speaker 6: that embracing this idea of daydreaming or for me it
Speaker 6: often happens if I go for a bushwalk you know
Speaker 6: I'll go for a wander it's nothing strenuous I'll just
Speaker 6: go wandering in the trees and a problem that I've
Speaker 6: been mulling over will obviously be working its way in
Speaker 6: the back of my head and suddenly this solution or
Speaker 6: this this new idea of this imaginative reaction will spring
Speaker 6: out of my brain. And it's one of the most
Speaker 6: incredible feelings you know. So I think it's really exciting
Speaker 6: that we have scientific evidence as to the importance of this.
Speaker 6: And then it also gives people the opportunity to dive
Speaker 6: into their own creative imagination and start coming up with solutions.
Speaker 6: Now I think that what some people listening to this
Speaker 6: might struggle with is that tension right between wanting to
Speaker 6: do and change and shift and grow and the need
Speaker 6: to slow down and allow ourselves and our creative impulses
Speaker 6: to do their thing. Do you have any any tips
Speaker 6: or suggestions on how to manage or how to even
Speaker 6: explain that tension to ourselves and explain to us homes
Speaker 6: why it actually really is important if we're striving to
Speaker 6: make the world a better place to do nothing for
Speaker 6: a little while is necessary.
Speaker 8: Well I've come to the world view that channeling the
Speaker 8: creative force to make the world a better place is
Speaker 8: the meaning of life. Like I didn't start with that.
Speaker 8: But over the years and especially over the last two
Speaker 8: years when I've really focused on it it is just
Speaker 8: rewards you back to no end. If you revolve your
Speaker 8: life around you know getting things done and getting your
Speaker 8: inbox empty every day and saving money and this can
Speaker 8: be you can do this as an environmental activist or
Speaker 8: as a right wing polluting banker. This doesn't mean that
Speaker 8: if you run an organic food shop and you plant
Speaker 8: trees with children you can still be in that type
Speaker 8: of mindset of just busy busy getting things done all
Speaker 8: the time. It's not like those of us trying to
Speaker 8: make the world a better place are somehow just naturally
Speaker 8: freed from it. If you're always in that you're not
Speaker 8: going to be tapping into your true essence. So what
Speaker 8: I'm just trying to get here is getting a deeper
Speaker 8: value system right and then developing your whole life around
Speaker 8: this deeper value system that every single person has a
Speaker 8: unique something inside them world genetically different whole when born
Speaker 8: into the world with different families different places different countries
Speaker 8: and so we really do have something that's scientifically unique
Speaker 8: and we can have something to offer with what we have.
Speaker 8: And I think getting into that finding that special everything
Speaker 8: Oprah calls a unique fingerprint of the soul or whatever
Speaker 8: channeling that in a way that it's going to make
Speaker 8: the biggest contribution to the world. That's why we're here.
Speaker 8: That's what it's all about. So if you bring that
Speaker 8: rather than having that is like a far distant moon
Speaker 8: in your kind of solar system of your life but
Speaker 8: you bring it down to be the sun of your life.
Speaker 8: This is what I've done the last few years of
Speaker 8: my life. I make that the kind of sun of
Speaker 8: my world view and the way I manage my day.
Speaker 8: It's not something I'm willing to compromise on and I
Speaker 8: think once it gets deeper into your value system you
Speaker 8: can be like well I'm just gonna make those two hours.
Speaker 8: I don't care what it takes. I will make those
Speaker 8: two hours to get into that space and then cleaning
Speaker 8: the house and paying the bills and all those things
Speaker 8: come after that. And since I've started doing that I
Speaker 8: mean it's it's made a profound change in my life.
Speaker 8: I feel like I've been able to just like gather
Speaker 8: all this creative force and share it with people and
Speaker 8: build this community and create all these new interesting connections
Speaker 8: interesting projects etc.. I mean there's nothing about it that
Speaker 8: I have not even an atom of regret about. It's
Speaker 8: it's profoundly rewarding. So I don't know if I completely
Speaker 8: answers the question but I think if you just make
Speaker 8: that your central value system it's kind of like you
Speaker 8: know some people think that like they go to the
Speaker 8: gym at 5:00 a.m. no matter what. It's a little
Speaker 8: bit like that. Yeah. You just you do it no
Speaker 8: matter what because that's what all the good things in
Speaker 8: life come from. It doesn't mean you become responsible but
Speaker 8: you just kind of make it center to your core
Speaker 8: way that you run your life.
Speaker 6: And I think that's the key. You know it's sort
Speaker 6: of a reprise realisation isn't it really sort of doing
Speaker 6: some hard work and some hard work and figuring out
Speaker 6: what your truest values or your you know your highest
Speaker 6: priorities are in life and kind of get big picture
Speaker 6: about it.
Speaker 12: And then shifting the way you do things in order
Speaker 12: to send to that. Yeah I think I mean I
Speaker 12: really think that that's at the core of any change
Speaker 12: that we make it's where we're choosing to do things
Speaker 12: with our time and our energy. So perhaps if we
Speaker 12: step back and ask if what we're doing with our
Speaker 12: time and energy right now is serving us and serving
Speaker 12: a greater purpose we feel like we have in the
Speaker 12: world or if it's something we can shift. Yeah I
Speaker 12: think that's really really good advice. Yeah it's really solid advice.
Speaker 12: And the funny thing to me about slow living and
Speaker 12: you know it's often tied to the idea of simple
Speaker 12: living is that none of it is is simple. It's
Speaker 12: quite complex to to work this stuff out but at
Speaker 12: the heart of it figuring out what our highest priorities
Speaker 12: and values are does simplify things because it's like well
Speaker 12: yes I will get up and go to the gym
Speaker 12: at 5:00 a.m.. Yes I will give myself two hours
Speaker 12: of creative imagination space in which I can do nothing
Speaker 12: and see what comes of it. Yeah I think that
Speaker 12: it's you know its intention really isn't it. It's living intentionally.
Speaker 8: Yeah well I I get up every morning and I
Speaker 8: will I aspire I try to live this way every
Speaker 8: day and get up and I aim before anything by somebody.
Speaker 8: There is a child drop off somewhere in this in
Speaker 8: this morning. But I try and say well the universe
Speaker 8: what do you want me to do. It's kind of
Speaker 8: like a question like How can I best channel my
Speaker 8: creative force to do the most good in the world.
Speaker 8: I don't do this before cleaning before having a shower
Speaker 8: before any yoga classes before checking my email social media
Speaker 8: all of that. It gets top priority and it's not
Speaker 8: through having enormous amounts of time or money or privilege.
Speaker 8: It's just a value system I've adopted to be the
Speaker 8: most rewarding rewarding for management. And I do that. And
Speaker 8: then I spend after I've done a couple of hours
Speaker 8: that I spend the rest of the day trying to
Speaker 8: you know just normal life life management stuff. But in
Speaker 8: terms of where this fits in with being slow or
Speaker 8: kind of simple or minimalism is that in order to
Speaker 8: do this I had to shred my life values way
Speaker 8: back into what I thought was most important. And someone
Speaker 8: asked me this yesterday on another another podcast. Something about
Speaker 8: you know life goals whatever and I said I don't
Speaker 8: have any life goals anymore. I'm not trying to like
Speaker 8: reach a savings goal or a social media followers goal
Speaker 8: or a certain sort of life you know bucket list
Speaker 8: stuff I've just shredded it right back and all I
Speaker 8: try and do is channel my creative force to do
Speaker 8: things that are good and interesting in the world and
Speaker 8: have my human relationships with people and my child and
Speaker 8: I realize that that's kind of all I need in
Speaker 8: life really. You know people pay me to do stuff
Speaker 8: and that's that's cool. And the more creative work I
Speaker 8: do the more people find me and hire me to
Speaker 8: do stuff. So that kind of pays the bills and
Speaker 8: you know and I get great human relationships with that
Speaker 8: good a great child. And. I don't need any big
Speaker 8: goals to stress out over.
Speaker 13: So it's more like living in the present moment channeling
Speaker 13: the energy rather than hurry hurry hurry. Trying to achieve
Speaker 13: some thing.
Speaker 11: Mm hmm. Does that does it make sense. It does.
Speaker 11: It makes a lot. It actually makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 11: I think it's quite counter to the way most people live.
Speaker 11: So I've spoken to people about this before as well.
Speaker 12: You know the idea of living without goals or living
Speaker 12: without those big lofty ideas that we're working and striving
Speaker 12: towards and it's not something that a lot of people
Speaker 12: can do without a huge amount of reshaping the way
Speaker 12: they live and think about this sort of stuff because
Speaker 12: I think that's like that's what we're taught. That's what
Speaker 12: you do. That's what success is. It's having a goal
Speaker 12: and striving until you get there. And then what you
Speaker 12: come up with another goal but what I love is
Speaker 12: that you've essentially centred your life around this value. You
Speaker 12: know these these two or three values and everything else
Speaker 12: ebbs and flows. And I think that that is kind
Speaker 12: of simplicity in action. And to me it's slow living
Speaker 12: in action even if it doesn't feel slow even if
Speaker 12: it's not looking slow in the normal sense. It's essentially
Speaker 12: you're essentially someone who has figured out what's important to
Speaker 12: you and you've made space for it by letting go
Speaker 12: of other things. And I think that that's a really
Speaker 12: admirable way to live and to bring it back to
Speaker 12: your book. That's how people find the time and the
Speaker 12: space to make big changes for themselves in the world.
Speaker 12: I think it's um it's something we all benefit from
Speaker 12: doing a little bit more. I'm curious did you ever
Speaker 12: do an exercise or anything to to highlight what your
Speaker 12: personal values were. I mean I wrote my eulogy when
Speaker 12: I was in my early 30s and that helped enormously actually.
Speaker 10: I've heard that people really get a lot out of that.
Speaker 11: Yeah. What about you. Did you did you have a
Speaker 11: moment or a catalyst or you know some sort of
Speaker 11: exercise that you did or was this just something you
Speaker 11: arrived at organically.
Speaker 8: I don't think there was a singular moment but it
Speaker 8: was something that formed over a few years. There were
Speaker 8: two books that took me a lot closer to this
Speaker 8: world the kind of daily practice I do now. And
Speaker 8: one was called the big leap by Gay Hendricks who
Speaker 8: talks about your genius zone and that you know you've
Speaker 8: really got to sort of step into what I call
Speaker 8: the creative genius so and I said the word creative
Speaker 8: on top. But it's just that one thing that you
Speaker 8: are kind of supremely excellent at or love to do
Speaker 8: or get the most joy out of and then you
Speaker 8: know no matter what happens carving out time to do
Speaker 8: that and trying to get that to take up you
Speaker 8: know at least 50 percent of your work life you
Speaker 8: never get it 100 percent because there's stuff to do.
Speaker 8: But some people it's like how often. How many what
Speaker 8: percentage of your time do you spend in your creative
Speaker 8: genius sign. People like nothing zero. Never. You know you
Speaker 8: want to get that at least like a little bit
Speaker 8: get it up. And so when I read that I
Speaker 8: was like Okay I'm going to commit to at least
Speaker 8: an hour every day seven days a week no matter what.
Speaker 8: And that's another uncle by Eric myself called the artist within.
Speaker 8: He talks about the same thing that was he talks
Speaker 8: about like you can't clean the house go to yoga
Speaker 8: drop the tile off pay all your bills check your
Speaker 8: e-mails and then do it. And then by the time
Speaker 8: it's three or four o'clock and you're exhausted you have
Speaker 8: to do it. If it means getting up at 4:00
Speaker 8: in the morning you know you do it then you
Speaker 8: do it before all the other stuff you have to
Speaker 8: ruthlessly prioritize your creative slow in killing time before otherwise
Speaker 8: the rest of life just cannibalize it. And then what
Speaker 8: are you left with. And then people say things like
Speaker 8: I don't know who I am anymore. Life's missing me
Speaker 8: by I've lost my identity. That's having a family and
Speaker 8: being married and when you make this ruthless sort of
Speaker 8: time thing. So those two books really pushed me in
Speaker 8: this in this direction but also a few years before
Speaker 8: that it was about when my company green pages were
Speaker 8: closed down in 2010.
Speaker 13: I mean I had lived the opposite of slow. I
Speaker 13: worked 100 hours a week worked so hard at the
Speaker 13: office at 8:00 or 9:00 in the morning we'd stay
Speaker 13: till 10:00 or even midnight.
Speaker 8: Most nights of the week or work all weekend you
Speaker 8: know and I had built this company and then a
Speaker 8: I got really burned out and then the company had
Speaker 8: died and I wasn't too worried about that because I'd
Speaker 8: sort of become exhausted by it anyway and I kind
Speaker 8: of wanted to close it up. And even though it
Speaker 8: was all a save the world company it was all
Speaker 8: about the environment. I really experienced how achievable these goals
Speaker 8: I keep so many goals that people would see as
Speaker 8: conventionally successful.
Speaker 13: Now it's invested in by the Murdoch company I've been
Speaker 13: on the front cover of BMW and just like several
Speaker 13: newspapers in Australia and on the ABC and the ABC
Speaker 13: and the Channel Ten years and all these magazines is
Speaker 13: in vogue twice.
Speaker 8: Had I had 15 employees the company was multi-million dollar
Speaker 8: valued on paper. I did all that stuff and then
Speaker 8: I realised that it all just sort of comes and
Speaker 8: goes and it doesn't really mean anything and it can
Speaker 8: go just as quickly as it comes and you can
Speaker 8: be doing one thing that's fabulous. Having a red carpet
Speaker 8: one moment and then now a lady crying with your
Speaker 8: boyfriend and you feel really alone that everything's bad like
Speaker 8: this all that stuff that doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 13: It doesn't necessarily mean your life is good. Life can
Speaker 13: be very bad in some ways. Also have good external things.
Speaker 13: I just realised that none of it really mattered and
Speaker 13: the only way to forge forward was to go through
Speaker 13: something really kind of purely creative and authentic and just
Speaker 13: let my life shape around that instead of racing to
Speaker 13: get to the next million this thousand that or whatever.
Speaker 11: Like I'd been doing in my 20s because I think
Speaker 11: I mean ultimately what I discovered with goals like that
Speaker 11: or particularly external validation or external signs of success is
Speaker 11: you part of you things were part of me thought.
Speaker 12: Once I get there then I'll be happy. Once I
Speaker 12: do this then I'll be happy. Once I meet this
Speaker 12: goal then I'll be happy and you get there and
Speaker 12: you realise that just hiding behind that goal is another
Speaker 12: one and hiding behind that one is another one. It's
Speaker 12: sort of this relentless pursuit of happiness that I've only
Speaker 12: ever found by turning inward and shifting my priorities to
Speaker 12: two other things you know to away from goals away
Speaker 12: from external signs of success or status or or whatever
Speaker 12: it was that I used to pursue.
Speaker 6: And it is it is really incredibly liberating. I mean
Speaker 6: I think you've taken it to a place that I
Speaker 6: I hope to get you know by. Your main focus
Speaker 6: of life is to is to focus and operate within
Speaker 6: your creative genius zone and I think it's fantastic. Can
Speaker 6: I Can I ask what does it look like if
Speaker 6: you give yourself two hours a day to be in
Speaker 6: this creative energy. What does that look like for you.
Speaker 12: Is it the same all the time or do you
Speaker 12: just let yourself be led by what's happening in you
Speaker 12: in your head or in your your heart or whatever.
Speaker 8: Oh I often work on different things depending on what's
Speaker 8: going on and I don't want to oversell it. It's
Speaker 8: like the perfect recipe for making everything work. I really
Speaker 8: really don't want to feel like I've figured out all
Speaker 8: the acts of that ego but it does figure out
Speaker 8: one really big answer which is meaning and purpose.
Speaker 13: I never feel that I have an existential gap of
Speaker 13: meaning and purpose and I feel pretty awesome about that
Speaker 13: and I have a lot of great relationships in my
Speaker 13: life surrounding that so that's great.
Speaker 8: And but all the other stuff in life always full
Speaker 8: of challenges. So my process is or has been the
Speaker 8: last few years incredibly unglamorous and messy. So some people
Speaker 8: think it's like I wake up and then I have
Speaker 8: like a peppermint tea and then I meditate on the
Speaker 8: moon and then I do like a little chat. Then
Speaker 8: I get on my computer and I write. It's not
Speaker 8: like that at all. It's like depending on how motivated
Speaker 8: I am sometimes I put my alarm on like we're
Speaker 8: going to early like 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning.
Speaker 8: Sometimes I just wake up like a normal hour more
Speaker 8: like six or seven being normal and whatever project is
Speaker 8: going I just like open up my computer and I
Speaker 8: hit it. That was the book. This is how the
Speaker 8: book written before the child wakes up. I just open
Speaker 8: it up and I hit it and I'm just like
Speaker 8: get another three pages written or get off and I
Speaker 8: do like concept design or user interface design for environmental software.
Speaker 8: So I get ideas just constantly all the time for
Speaker 8: environmental and kind of change ideas. I just open up photoshop.
Speaker 8: I just hit it. Then maybe an hour or two
Speaker 8: later the little girl wakes up and so I give
Speaker 8: us some breakfast.
Speaker 13: Sometimes I'll take her to preschool sometimes I'll put her
Speaker 13: on a cartoon she wants to watch you catch her
Speaker 13: in for an hour or two. Sorry. Hashtag bad parenting.
Speaker 8: Bad parenting goes into this. So yeah anyway um. And
Speaker 8: then I kind of just make a little whatever I
Speaker 8: feel I have a little sense of achievement from it.
Speaker 8: It'll be like finishing a design. Designers usually take me
Speaker 8: two or three hours so I'll be like cool I
Speaker 8: got that something that's kind of shareable on Twitter you
Speaker 8: know like OK well I got something nice it's finished
Speaker 8: I can share it. And then that's like.
Speaker 14: Tweeted out and then I feel like it's done well
Speaker 14: sometimes it's writing sometimes I'll work on something that's written
Speaker 14: but it's usually just it's either a part of one
Speaker 14: big project like the book was like did that everyday
Speaker 14: for six months and that's how the book got done.
Speaker 14: And then other times I'm trying to get through a
Speaker 14: whole bunch of concept designs that's many little designs. And
Speaker 14: sometimes I just feel something that's has been buzzing in
Speaker 14: my head for like three years I'm like like I
Speaker 14: just did this one the other day which I call
Speaker 14: the compost to Tron which I had sort of five
Speaker 14: years ago. But I had forgotten it for five years
Speaker 14: and then one day I was at the beach and
Speaker 14: I remembered the composted Tron which is like a garbage
Speaker 14: can shaped like a robot but it only takes compost
Speaker 14: because you know you can't compost your new out on
Speaker 14: the street at the mall on the street. You have
Speaker 14: to like if you really devoted you like you banana
Speaker 14: peel under a shrub somewhere and I thought you know
Speaker 14: there's no way to do this.
Speaker 8: And I've read all these behavioral research that shows if
Speaker 8: you make a garbage can look like a fun animal
Speaker 8: people a little less like I put stuff in it
Speaker 8: because they get attracted to the novelty of the eating. Yeah.
Speaker 8: And also because it's like something animate with like eyes.
Speaker 8: You know I like it I mean a robot maybe
Speaker 8: it's sort of like a board because people get like
Speaker 8: an emotional attachment to something that's it's real then they.
Speaker 8: So they made these trash cans look like birds the
Speaker 8: litter went substantially down because people were attracted to the
Speaker 8: bird thing. So anyway that's the kind of like design theory.
Speaker 8: And one day I woke up and I was like
Speaker 8: the compost to chew on this has to be put out.
Speaker 8: So I spent like three hours. It's got nothing to
Speaker 8: do with anything I'm working on at all. And then
Speaker 8: I just put it together and then I put it
Speaker 8: out on Facebook and Twitter and everyone's like oh this
Speaker 8: is the coolest. So fun. I don't know if it'll
Speaker 8: ever turn into like a real startup or a project
Speaker 8: but I'm really happy I did it and I'm happy
Speaker 8: it's out there and it's something it's like on my
Speaker 8: website and maybe one day we'll build it. So that's
Speaker 8: just a little random example of just something that just
Speaker 8: popped into my head and I do it and sometimes
Speaker 8: it's more substantial sort of big project.
Speaker 11: Yeah. I mean I love that though because I guess
Speaker 11: in the as you said sometimes it's a big project
Speaker 11: and that just feels like a grind. You know writing
Speaker 11: a book is a grind. No matter how passionate you
Speaker 11: are about what you're writing about. I mean it's it's
Speaker 11: hard work. So sometimes that's what playing and working in
Speaker 11: your creative genius looks like. But I love it. Other
Speaker 11: times you get to insert all that myself to do
Speaker 11: this compost to try and or work on this thing
Speaker 11: that I can get done in a couple of hours
Speaker 11: and no it's not adding up to some bigger thing
Speaker 11: but it is I mean it is adding up to
Speaker 11: a bigger thing.
Speaker 15: It's adding up to your output over years and years
Speaker 15: and I think sometimes we get very I get very
Speaker 15: earnest about things like what is the greater purpose in this.
Speaker 6: And I think it's nice to know that by inviting
Speaker 6: this creative space into our lives sometimes it does look
Speaker 6: like what we used to call the destruction. You know
Speaker 6: we used to call wasting time.
Speaker 15: I feel like maybe the idea of wasting time necessarily
Speaker 15: exist when you're in that zone.
Speaker 8: Well I don't buy that. Well view of wasting time.
Speaker 8: I call it creative channeling. Yeah. You know it's all
Speaker 8: wasting time. It's creative channeling the purpose of the universe
Speaker 8: through you while you're alive as an organism. The universe
Speaker 8: has been evolving since it started many billions of years ago.
Speaker 8: You're here. It's trying to get you to do stuff
Speaker 8: channel it's force of evolution. You're just letting it do
Speaker 8: its job through you as the tool. And if you
Speaker 8: if you start to think about it as wasting time
Speaker 8: that's a very negative. That seems like a very corrosive
Speaker 8: way to think.
Speaker 11: Yeah I agree. And it's funny I used to think
Speaker 11: a lot of what I was doing was wasting time
Speaker 11: and nothing good came out of that. You know it's
Speaker 11: when you allow yourself to be playful and curious and
Speaker 11: creative access that sort of positive creative imagination so much
Speaker 11: more springs out of it.
Speaker 12: It grows from there. I feel like if you shut
Speaker 12: things down by saying it's just a waste of time
Speaker 12: I mean nothing's going to grow there is it.
Speaker 8: No and you never really know what leads to what
Speaker 8: you know sometimes you know you do a bunch of
Speaker 8: stuff that doesn't really lead anywhere. Or something times you
Speaker 8: do something that does lead lead somewhere. I was just
Speaker 8: it just had a like a Skype meeting with a guy.
Speaker 8: I think it was like three weeks ago. I never
Speaker 8: met him before and he was like all we're doing
Speaker 8: all this stuff with augmented reality terms like see like
Speaker 8: the environment through the glasses. And I was like That's cool.
Speaker 8: You know these glasses that you're like a little hologram
Speaker 8: and then I was like hey you know we need
Speaker 8: to do we need to have like an urban corridor
Speaker 8: you like walk down then you can see the air
Speaker 8: pollution and you can like see the energy efficiency of
Speaker 8: the buildings and then everybody suddenly gets excited about sustainability
Speaker 8: because they can see it in this augmented way. I'm
Speaker 8: like That's cool right. So I just hit photoshop I
Speaker 8: had these ideas and I was like oh I could
Speaker 8: be like waste of time. That's not immediately you know
Speaker 8: like a jobs to do. Yeah. But I was like
Speaker 8: I really got this idea buzzing in my head I
Speaker 8: gotta to get on Photoshop so I spent the weekend
Speaker 8: maybe it was I didn't I would've been 10 hours
Speaker 8: at the most doing those three prototype designs I put
Speaker 8: them out on Twitter CEO of magically who's a billionaire
Speaker 8: comments on them and chairs and then everyone else starts
Speaker 8: getting excited about it then they all these introductions start happening.
Speaker 8: And then it was really just a few hours of
Speaker 8: my time and then I just put it out there
Speaker 8: and then it's like all this kind of cool stuff
Speaker 8: this is happening now from what was really quite a
Speaker 8: fairly small slither of my time investment but I just
Speaker 8: kind of let the energy take me over instead of
Speaker 8: squishing it out and being like no yoga class clean
Speaker 8: do laundry and I'll be it my child did watch
Speaker 8: cartoons that time I was a really bad parent that
Speaker 8: time right.
Speaker 13: You know I really wanted me to kind of if
Speaker 13: I was always going to be the perfect parent I
Speaker 13: would have gotten up early and taken her up a
Speaker 13: mountain but I kind of make that judgment call that
Speaker 13: ultimately you know you can't do everything perfectly. So I
Speaker 13: chose to do that. And then you know next weekend
Speaker 13: I'll take her up the mountain.
Speaker 15: So this is the thing. This is why I think
Speaker 15: so many of us wander around feeling so pressured by
Speaker 15: life you know achieving quote balance in life. I'm all
Speaker 15: about tilting and you tilt into the creative project that
Speaker 15: has got your blood pumping this weekend and then next
Speaker 15: weekend you tilt into going for a hike or you
Speaker 15: tilt into a camping trip or you tilt to going
Speaker 15: to the movies. You know I just I truly believe
Speaker 15: that we carry around so much guilt and stress and
Speaker 15: pressure placed on us by these expectations of being perfect
Speaker 15: and that in itself shuts down for me that shuts
Speaker 15: down energy and creative thinking and my ability to just
Speaker 15: kind of go with the flow of things more. So
Speaker 15: that's why I'm all about to do. I mean there's
Speaker 15: nothing wrong with allowing kids to hang out and watch
Speaker 15: screens for a few hours if you've got something you're
Speaker 15: working on.
Speaker 12: I really truly believe that because I think that that's
Speaker 12: just another way of shutting down the goodness that you've
Speaker 12: got inside you.
Speaker 15: And then we wouldn't have had your your workout and
Speaker 15: you know none of that would have happened had you
Speaker 15: been too worried about doing the right thing at this
Speaker 15: exact moment in time to do the right thing.
Speaker 8: I got plenty of parent guilt though don't worry.
Speaker 11: I think we all do that as well.
Speaker 8: It's not perfect but I think I did the textbook
Speaker 8: and I I actually wrote down all the reasons why
Speaker 8: I'm a terrible mother. I write down I write and
Speaker 8: 18 things because I got carried so much guilt I
Speaker 8: really got to process this and I looked through it
Speaker 8: all and I was like Okay I got to do
Speaker 8: something about this. Brushing teeth you know really you know
Speaker 8: they've gotta get on the brushing teeth thing a lot
Speaker 8: more and got to eat more fruit and vegetables. And
Speaker 8: so I kind of felt so guilty I went and
Speaker 8: invested in a bunch of improvements in the in the parenting.
Speaker 8: But also I see all these are the women with
Speaker 8: with children being a highly structured about the way they
Speaker 8: a mother that they're children and putting a lot of
Speaker 8: stress on themselves but I'm not sure if it's really
Speaker 8: necessary you know like dinner has to be exactly six
Speaker 8: five after 6:00 and bedtime is exactly 730. I have
Speaker 8: never followed a bedtime never once. I always know what
Speaker 8: they are like. We go to bed whenever we feel
Speaker 8: like it and we're just not that much later than
Speaker 8: 730 maybe nine. But you know sometimes it is bad.
Speaker 8: It's like 11 p.m. but it is following this like
Speaker 8: as soon as I have a child like the massive
Speaker 8: structure comes on. Yeah. Bedtime bedtime dinner. And you don't
Speaker 8: have to.
Speaker 10: There's no law that says you have to feed your
Speaker 10: child at this exact time and be here at this
Speaker 10: time and do that by that and that their clothes
Speaker 10: have to be perfectly clean. That's a great deal of
Speaker 10: stress to adopt that their child probably doesn't even notice.
Speaker 12: Yeah it's really interesting actually I think I felt you
Speaker 12: know when I first became a mom for the first
Speaker 12: few years I really did try and stick to what
Speaker 12: I thought I should you know quote should be doing
Speaker 12: which was having this very structured sort of existence and
Speaker 12: I don't know if they're related and I said I
Speaker 12: was suffering with postnatal depression at the same time so
Speaker 12: whether that had something to do with it too. But
Speaker 12: I was deeply unhappy all through that period and it
Speaker 12: was this gradual learning to let go of what I
Speaker 12: thought I should be doing and doing more of what
Speaker 12: felt right with my kids and with myself and the
Speaker 12: way we run the house. It's sort of a lowering
Speaker 12: of standards it's letting go of what other people think
Speaker 12: and of expectations and it's working with the flow of
Speaker 12: things rather than kind of rigidly sitting in it and
Speaker 12: not moving. And for me I can only speak about
Speaker 12: my experiences but I know I found a lot more
Speaker 12: freedom in the flow of things rather than that rigidity.
Speaker 12: But I do know that there are a lot of
Speaker 12: people who find it comforting I think to to have
Speaker 12: when you got kids you know what it's like there
Speaker 12: isn't really like they don't they kids don't operate on
Speaker 12: a timetable they just don't. Babies don't toddlers don't. Older
Speaker 12: kids don't. And I think that for me anyway it
Speaker 12: was trying to find control in amongst a world like
Speaker 12: a life that didn't feel like there was any. And
Speaker 12: it's been interesting like the letting go of that has
Speaker 12: actually given me the freedom that I was craving.
Speaker 8: I was trying to find time for myself by structuring
Speaker 8: and regimented everything and it didn't work because I was
Speaker 8: too busy worrying about the next thing I needed to
Speaker 8: do was letting go was was actually the key for
Speaker 8: me in finding that yeah I think often these days
Speaker 8: these experiences that are very negative like you have some
Speaker 8: severe depression or something very difficult happens in your life
Speaker 8: and you have to confront it because life's pushed you
Speaker 8: into a corner and if you don't figure it out
Speaker 8: then you just get more cynical more depressed and have
Speaker 8: more anxiety attacks or whatever. So I think you know
Speaker 8: it's it's cool to when you have a very negative
Speaker 8: response to something to look at it almost like a
Speaker 8: like a gift it's like something's going to tell you
Speaker 8: like there's a breakthrough and it's really hard to do
Speaker 8: at the time because you like the way it's going
Speaker 8: to end you know. But to see it like it's
Speaker 8: a it's a door to open to the next level
Speaker 8: of enlightenment.
Speaker 13: And I think when you see it that way like
Speaker 13: I remember once feeling like I saw it in so
Speaker 13: much emotional suffering months I was driving through San Francisco
Speaker 13: it was being like why is my life so hard
Speaker 13: this is so difficult. Having a child and being kind
Speaker 13: of self employed on my own and I don't have
Speaker 13: close family and friends here the way I do back
Speaker 13: in Australia and then I was like What is it
Speaker 13: trying to tell me. What is this sadness I'm experiencing
Speaker 13: trying to teach me right now but is some door
Speaker 13: I have to get through and I just got this
Speaker 13: big like message from it you know like kind of
Speaker 13: like you know that evolution of generation after generation after generation.
Speaker 13: It was like well you know my job is to
Speaker 13: evolve you know from where my mother was and her
Speaker 13: job she evolved from where her mother was and this
Speaker 13: is kind of like my thing I have to overcome
Speaker 13: to evolve to the new place and then my daughter Anastasia.
Speaker 13: She'll evolve and I'm kind of like an ant in
Speaker 13: a place on a very long continuum of women.
Speaker 8: And I just kind of saw it as like this
Speaker 8: quest and it just felt the sad this took a
Speaker 8: totally different shape. Then after that I love.
Speaker 12: I love that idea of sort of communicating with it
Speaker 12: and saying well what am I what am I learning
Speaker 12: from this. It trying to show me. And I also
Speaker 12: love the idea that I've never thought of it that way.
Speaker 12: You know this this continuum of individuals like evolution kind
Speaker 12: of it's all leading up to something it's different for
Speaker 12: every person. That's really incredible. Kelly I could talk to
Speaker 12: you for hours about everything but I just wanted to
Speaker 12: say thank you so much for. Joining me on the
Speaker 12: show and also thank you for writing your book. It's
Speaker 12: it's really genuinely incredibly powerful and I think that anyone
Speaker 12: listening who is interested in social change or environmental change
Speaker 12: or changing the world saving the world even if it's
Speaker 12: you know your small corner of your thinking globally to
Speaker 12: go and get a copy of the book so I
Speaker 12: will put links to where you can get the book
Speaker 12: in the show notes. But if people head over to
Speaker 12: Katie Patrick dot com you can find everything you need
Speaker 12: to know about Katie and her book there. So thank
Speaker 12: you again for showing up and and sharing your story
Speaker 12: as well as you know all this stuff that's got
Speaker 12: my brain buzzing about creativity and slowing down.
Speaker 8: Thank you Brooke. That was her fun. It's lovely to
Speaker 8: talk about all these more qualitative and meaning based things.
Speaker 12: I dreaded a lot.
Speaker 16: Thanks Katie.
Speaker 6: Can't to pass.