Rise Above the Script: Reframing Fear and Reclaiming Confidence

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0:44 Denzel Washington, welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you to do the same. Albert welcome to the show. Thank you, Thank you for having me. Really happy to be here. Doctor Doug Well, I'm looking forward to looking forward to it. I'd love for you to share. Number One, you've written a book. Can you tell the outage what the book is and what the name of it is. Sure it's called Rise Above the Script. Confronting Self Doubt and Mastering Self sabotage for performing artists. It was published in twenty twenty four, and it was based on my doctoral thesis why Actors self Sabotage? And so just give you a backstory. I professionally I work with actors. I am a Talian agent in New York.

1:29 So I represent actors professionally for film, TV, theater Broadway off Broadway, and I've been doing this for you know, over twenty years, since two thousand and four. But when I first started, I was noticing a lot of actors were self sabotage and which means that they were shooting of themselves in a foot, denying themselves an opportunity to get getting in their own way. And as a you know, I was also starting to go for my PhD in psychology and as a you know, doctor lital student, and sort of like my scientific mind was like starting to get curious, you know, why is this happening? And so I decided to do different a dissertation, solve a problem in a sense.

2:11 So that's what you know, This is how the book kind of came out. So it's been years, it's been the progress for years. And while the book is geared towards actors and been written you know, initially for actors. It's really there's a lot of good insight in here that can really be topical to anybody. Well, and that's true. You know, you talk about to actors, and you know you mentioned the imposter syndrome, and I know there's a specific psychological definition for that, but I've I've come up with my own definition, or at least an alternate definition, and that's people who are acting. They are literally acting as though they think they should act and behave rather than who they really are. And and so it all in the case. We're all kinds of actors, aren't we.

3:00 Yeah, I mean we're playing a role well every day, you know, like. Whether you know, whether we're with our family, with in our professional circles, you know, where our you know, see when others were playing different roles when their parents where their child. You know, children, if we have children, we're playing different roles. We're playing you know, Carl Young called it the persona, you know, we're putting on a persona. So yeah, we think about wolfs sort of actors. And I think even your definition can you know, even fit into the traditional definition to some level, because you know, if you're saying it putting, if you're acting, maybe you're not acting, you know, any authentic way.

3:40 So true. And when you when you talk about rising about the script, what what is the script? What's your definition of the script? For people? The script? The script is different than you know, when people hear script, they think of the you know, a paper or you know, a play. Or something they're reading. But here I'm talking with the script in your mind, your especially your subconscious mind. Okay, yeah, right, so let's let's get into that. I mean, as you've noticed the actors and you know, you mentioned a little bit earlier before we came on that you work with a number of students and so who are not necessarily actors, right. Right, you know, but if you want to think on a pure scheme of things or acting, they are actors or students. But what I've noticed even with them is like, you know, some of them are really are really bright and really intelligent, but they they would stop coming to class, they would stop doing the work, and I couldn't figure out what's really happening here, you know, initially in the beginning, or they would even like talk, you know, use negative self talk, you know, or I'm not a good test achor I'm not a good student, and they would actually really verbatimly tell that, explicitly say that. So I've always wondered what what's really going on here?

4:56 Yeah, it's interesting how they they start to talk in themselves and that becomes their reality when in fact, you know, and this is a tough one because you talk about reality and you know, from my understanding, reality is strictly based on our perceptions, mainly subconscious, and that becomes reality. And your reality is going to be so different than my reality. Of course, and that's our reality subjective. There's really no objective reality. Yeah, yeah, like and you know, even on a. Pure you know, if you you know, for the listeners out there, think about you go to see a movie with a friend. You know, you could have thought it was the greatest movie ever in your friend could have thought it was, you know, a terrible movie. Yeah, And the question is who's who's right, who's correct?

5:40 And you both are, you know. In a sense, because it's your perception. Yeah, that's so true. So we've mentioned imposter syndrome. Can you, as a psychologist, could you share with the audience the actual definition of the imposter syndrome is the idea. Of imposter syndrome. The word imposter means for yes, you know. So what happens very often is, you know, we start to doubt ourselves and we start to feel like we're frauds, like you know, I know there's also a fear of we're going to be found out two that we're frauds, you know, like for me, you know, it could be like, uh, well, you know, whether like if I'm debating.

6:20 I want to write a book or not. You know, no one's gonna take I'm gonna get bad reviews, no one's gonna like my book. So what will happen is I'll we'll do it period. I won't put myself out there or if they think that someone's gonna find out, I really don't know everything. And therefore the best way to steal myself from that is I won't apply myself. I won't put myself out there. It'll be safe when we play it safe. And so it's it's really a self imposed limitation too. And and is it usually based on what fear or what is it? Multiple factors, but fear, I would say it would be the primary motivated, primary focus would be fear, uh, fear of failure, and even fear of success too.

7:04 Success can be scary. Well, and you know that's interesting. You hear so many different levels of intellect saying, you know, do not fear, thou shalt not fear, on and on and on, and yet there seems to be one of the major experiences that we all have to some degree. Yeah, level, how do you work with how do you work with your students? How do you work with people who are exhibiting a great deal of fear and how do you observe what their behavior is? How do you pick up the fact that in working with someone that, okay, one of their major challenges is fear. Well, it would be looking for the signs like they don't want to try anything new.

7:47 They want to say in their routine, their comfort zone and that's the biggest, you know thing, One of the biggest tell tale signs is. Someone unwilling to step outside their comfort zone and try anything new or you know, take any risks. You know, again, playing it safe is probably the biggest indicator. If they're playing it safe by not doing, you know, things that would make them slightly uncomfortable. Again, it could be you know, putting your resume out there could be you know, going on stage to make a resentation. You know, that could be scary. So one of the best ways to the only way you're going to really overcome fear is by. Facing it, you know, by facing your fears. So that would mean.

8:28 Putting yourself out there, you know, by you know, whether it's even if it's speaking. You know, if you have a fear of public speaking, go speak in a small stage. You know five ten people. Do even do something on zoom, you know that where it's safe from your own home, at least in the beginning, and then gradually build from there. So the only way you're going to face that fear or really get over that fear, overcome that fear is by facing it head on and by confronting it so you know, again you know that fear is going to work against an actor because as an actor or performer, you really have to put yourself out there if you want to have a working liver or any momentum of success, so that the fear of additioning or the fear of putting yourself out there has to be overcome.

9:18 And you know, a lot of times we're in denial. We might we don't even realize a lot of times we have these fears, you know, consciously. Yeah, And you know, it's interesting as I've interviewed a number of lovely ladies who have gone through some horrendous experiences in their life and found themselves in that those codependent relationships with people with men who are abusers, right, and they can't get out of it, and ultimately they do. But as we've talked about that, one of the biggest things that comes up is the fear of change. In other words, they're more fearful of change than they are of the present environment and experience. So as you talk about fear, we've got fear of change, We've got fear that I'm not good enough. What are some of the other fears that come about that are really imprints in people's subconscious minds, That is, they had no control over that initially.

10:17 Yeah, fear of disappointing others, letting other people down. And I think that also ties in a whole codependency or the people pleasing mindset. Is well, if I say no, if I put my when I set a boundary, I'm going to disappoint them. And maybe that could do with the way we were raised too, because very often I would I would even imagine that a lot of these you know, codependent women and men, you know, because I believe it's it's an equal yes. Thing grow up. I think even with parents that they had to jump through hoops to get their parents' approval, whether again that was reality their perception that they had to work really hard to get their parents' approval, and maybe they didn't get enough of that, so they substitute adult relationships to their parents in this sense that goes out subconsciously, so they're fear of letting other people down again, fear of success.

11:12 Fear of money is also a one that I kind of discovered that I wrote a chapter Brothers in my book, it's fear of money because a lot of times you meet grow up in families where you're told money is the root of all evil. I'm not an evil person, you know, I don't want to be evil. And actually that quote was taken out of context. Oh yeah, there's a lot of things that are taken out of context that really have inundated people with a feeling of guilt, of shame, of all of those types of things. So how often how often is you're working with people and you know, this gets to be a very delicate subject. And I've had other people talk about it a little bit, and definitely some psychologists talk about the fact that you know, as you're starting to work with people who are really self sabotaging, as you can observe that you know they're in the imposter syndrome, they're self sabotaging, they're not experiencing the life that they truly deserve or could have, and they go off to therapy, okay, and they go through talk therapy and nothing gets resolved.

12:20 And you know, having a PhD in psychology, this might be a sensitive issue there. But I know, just based on reading your bio and going to your website that you use NLP you probably I don't know. I think you use hypnosis. You're using all sorts of tools rather than just talking. And can you talk a little bit about that to the audience who are seeking some help. What are some of the things that they need to look for in an individual that can really be of value to them as a mentor or whatever you want to call them. What you know, obviously you want someone who's not personally in you, someone who's you know, going to be objective.

13:03 And also, you know, i'll slat out the reason why. I studied it, this is LP, was because I was a little disillusioned with psychology. You know, I wasn't you know when I was going to grad school. You know, for some my master's and PhD, we have a lot you know, some professors that were telling us about cases that they were working with someone who was in their office for years for therapy. And I kept outing adding up in my head. I'm thinking, if you're you know, going for eight or nine years of therapy and the client is not getting better, and something isn't adding up here, something is out working. So I felt like, you know, the reason why I d up. It's a little more rapid, you know, it's a little more fast paid, and you know, sometimes it's just getting out of your head and and you know, reframing things and.

13:54 Working with some Let's talk about NLP just a little bit, because I think it's important for people to understand some of these processes that are available that they should look for in a professional and one of them, I know is NLP. You talked about reframing, So when you're working with someone and you use the NLP process, what are you actually trying to accomplish with with your person. For you know, for a little bit of shift and mentality or thought process, looking at things in a different way, viewing things in a different light. So we're not denying the experience. What we're doing is like I said, changing it, turning it around, and you know, looking at either the bright side or the learning experience from that. So one of the things of NLP is like, there's no such thing as failure, only feedback. So reframing failure or mistakes as learning opportunities because that's this way it empowers a person to not beat themselves up.

14:57 You know that, okay, this is learning opportunity. And when I work with actors, one of the things another you know, NLP reframe my youth when it comes through rejection, because I hear a lot of people say about the word rejection, and I've always felt like, there's no such thing as rejection. It's just simply that your services are not needed right now or today. Because rejection is personal, it means like you know, then it starts ringing your subconscious when you keep your own rejection, it's like, well, that means you're rejecting me at my core, you know, and strictly from an acting perspective, all there's only one person that get to hire for a role or for any job, and there's gonna be hundreds of applicants sometimes and only one person can get the job.

15:42 So it's not personal, you know. And I think if you cause it freezes there, you know, if you really adopt that, it's not personal. Okay, Well you know, now what and what what can I learn from that? Any Any stories of people you've worked with without using their names obviously, but where you have where they have been really experiencing you know, failure or whatever that happens to be, and by using that approach of NLP, that you've been able literally to help them reframe that experience in that event and watch them come out of that into a much more positive, successful situation. Any stories you can share. Yeah, I mean even I'll tell so too.

16:24 One was from an actress I kind of was working with. I was used to be occasionally be guessed in an acting class, given like my agent perspective on things, and there was this one actors who were studying. For over ten years. I just wasn't booking work, and then I just kind of would work together in Dahr in mind myself worked with her to step into her power and step into her you know sweet spot, which was like her type was tough, powerful heart of gold, and so we really had mentally reheard that tough, powerful heart of gold. How would someone with a tough, powerful heart of gold order a coffee from the brussa. I would someone with a. Tough, powerful heart of gold, you know, talk to a customer and you know, just simple things like that that reframe when she started getting.

17:11 Into a power. It took me. Took her a few months before she booked a couple of speaking. Roles in TV, you know, in network TV projects. Another time, this was you know, several years ago, you know, as a college professor, I put class participation as part of the great you know, not not a large percentage, but just percentages are great, you know, at. The end of the semester. So I had one student at the end of the second class send me an email saying like, I think, I don't I don't appreciate that this is kind of you. Know, not fair that you're putting, you know, requiring her class participation. So rather than getting myself getting defensive what you think a out of purpose probably would have.

17:56 I responded as if you know, no. You're helping me out your I want to hear your perspective on things. You have such interesting things to say, and so can we work on you know, you contributing a little bit here, you know, I want to hear what you have to say. And so it was a class and when I refrained it is that by the end of the semesters he was one of the most vocal students in the class. Wow. So a lot of it is just simple reframing and you know, whether again the mistakes, what did you learn from that? What can you do the next time? Well, you're different about you're reframing and your you know, at least in my mind right now, you're talking about very surface re framing that people could learn to do that as they start to experience things, they can say, all right, they can step outside themselves and observe what's going on and reframe that and help them to understand Okay, this will be a little bit different when you go a little bit deeper. I had someone I was working with and we had gone through a number of personality profiling lessons and so on and so forth. And about a year later he called me up and he said, hey, can we get together And I said, sure, yeah, I come out over to the house. And so he came over and we were talking. He says, I am just sabotaging.

19:19 I am just making such terrible decisions and I can't figure out why. And he had gone through a lot of stuff with me, and so I said, all right, let's let's do this. Let's use an NLP process, and I explained a little bit about what that is, and let's see if we can get to the rt cause of what's going on here. And so we went through a very very specific ANALP process, and we got back to his childhood and grade school where he remembers his teacher saying you're stupid and put him in the back of the classroom. And as we looked at that, and as we talked about it and obviously reframed it, and as he was able to consciously reframe that and realize, you know, I had nothing to do with him, because he was extremely bright. But the reality is that that teacher, for some reason was expressing emotions in a way and perhaps even being a bit of a bully or he was doing something that was creating an emotion in her, and so she just put him in the back of the room. Once he got that reframed, all of a sudden, I saw him change a position within his company and he just became prolific. He started making more money than it never made. It was just amazing what he did.

20:39 And so to me, that was so interesting to realize that as you can help someone literally get back to the real nitty gritty of childhood and some of those type of imprints that reframing those experiences can make such a difference. Do you get that deep sometimes with fire. Yeah, I mean what it sounds a bit is that you're working with some of the cool cold timeline, you know, where it's going back to an earlier imprinting. You know, something where. It's an imprint where you know, a remark even it could be an innocent, casual remark that someone may you know, not realizing what they said, but it really like become embedded in a subconscious. Mind, so.

21:20 You know, and and that can sometimes be you know, going back to childhood and change and reframing that there's a technique, it's really it's kind of deeper work, but that I've used this something called the inner child work, or you know where we heal the inner child. So all of us, you know, if you want to, if you believe that we all have the inner a little minime inside of us that still maintains our child like innocence and wonder and sometimes if that child is wounded, you know again or maybe you know remark with all innocent remarks are not as the way is it, but like small remarks that our parents are teacher to have said. Doesn't have to be a major trauma.

22:02 Just gonna be like little things, a little you know, day in the life traumas and the sense that just add up. So sometimes what I might do, even in a going stepping outside yourself, is like telling that going back and down, that little child, that little boy or that little girl, that everything's going to be okay, and that you know you are smart, you are intelligent, and that I found has been very profound. Well, and it's interesting, isn't it? As you say? You know, as parents, we may make certain remarks to our children which we think are very positive, but the thing that we cannot control is their perception of what they just said, and that perception as we you know, as we know, becomes their reality and their belief which stays with them until they can get back to the point where they reframe that and become conscious about that. So how how much do you get into this whole concept of not only I identifying what those limiting self destructive behaviors are and beliefs are, but how much you get into mindset, into consciousness, uh, and recognizing that individual who can truly become conscious and aware of those type of situations and acknowledge them rather than allowing them to affect them. How how are you able to get into that?

23:25 Well, just by reframing and putting, you know, gently pointing you know, kind of letting, you know, pointing things out of you know, similarities here. Because I feel like once you are able to consciously, you know, call out these patterns in yourself, that's where change can begin, you know, true change can begin the insight you know again you kind of it's like, oh, that's saying you don't know who you don't know? You know, in a sense it's a double you know for mind there. But it's true. And I think that a lot of it is just becoming aware of it, because then you can develop what we call growth mindset, which is, you know, one of the most valuable skills have. There's a book that you know, I loved, you know, growing when I was in grad schools Mindset by Carol Dweck, And you know, she talked about the importance of a growth mindset, uh, and how that is really important for developing resiliency building buffers in a sense. So, you know, having a growth mindset, you know, extremely important being will learn, you know, learn from.

24:34 Mistakes and learn from challenges and actually enjoy them. So as you talk about that, I know, one thing you talk about in your book is techniques are raising self esteem. And as we talk about self esteem as a definition, really isn't that anyone who's experiencing these subconscious beliefs that literally caused them to think about good enough, blah blah blah, all these types of things. And because you're talking about techniques to raise self esteem, what what what are you talking about in your book? What are some of those steps that you could share with the audience who may be experiencing a lack of self esteem or high esteem to help them to start to develop a better sense of self esteem.

25:14 Well, one of the techniques I took overall about is creating what I call a happy file, which is a journal. They are taking a journal of all the things that you're you know, either grateful for or even all the things that happened to you that was positive. You know, someone gave you a good compliment, We've got a good performance in review at work, or you know, you've got good feedback from an audition, or you know, if you're a performer, you got a good review, you know, feedback from the audience or a review. Every little thing you document and then when you're having those moments of self doubt, pull out that to remind you, pull out your happy file. So that's one technique that I talk about.

25:55 Also, the company you keep too, I mean a lot of you know, help in the psychology. You know, experts will tell you, you know, you're some of the company you keep. Yes, So so it might mean changing the company you're around too. You know, hang out with other more successful people because they'll puld you up. Consequently, being a negative people will bring it down. Well, and that's so true, isn't it. And that can be really tough sometimes sometimes as family members that are literally in the negative influences on you. So how do you help people to make that disconnect and have the courage literally to make that disconnect and to realize that that's part of what's affecting them in a negative way.

26:42 Yeah, well pointing that out and also point you know, really it's gonna take time, but I think the important thing to understand it's not about you personally, even though they may be, you know, saying negative remarks about you or or shooting it on your accomplishments, a lot of it has to do with their own their own fears and insecurities. So and it's not about you, so kind of reframing like that like they're doing, they're projecting their own insecurities onto you. Okay, And so so here comes my question that comes to my mind. It is kind of an off the question how much is social media, the news media and all of that have become the people that we surround ourselves with and are being totally affected by that? Because we see such a dichotomy now and such anger coming from all different sides.

27:39 At this point, I. Would say this has become really more polarizing in the past five years. You know, we all know what happened five years ago. So I think that you know is part of that. I think, you know, the thing about social media, and I've always said social media is like a double D swort, meaning that there's some good things. You know, we can be connected, you know, we're able to really expend our network, our reach, but also at the same time, there's a cost and what we say, you know, and a lot of research is found, especially found that the more especially routines and young adults that use social media, the more mental health crisis are going to experience depression and anxiety goes through the roof. Wow, because it's isolating if you think about it, you know, even though we may appear to be connected, we're actually isolating, you know, by spending more time on you know, social media, and you see people who put the best foot forward, and then you have the whole phenomenal gresses green on the other side, and you start to think, well, maybe my life is not because everybody else seems to be doing so well and here I am struggling.

28:46 So that can add to fuel to the fire. And then you have the anonymity which you know on social media, which makes people. A lot braver online than they are face to faith, and which means they could be more bullying and crueler sometimes. And it's interesting to me to see some friends of mine that I've known for years that have suddenly taken up a cause that is just really, from what I can see, is based on anger frustration, and they're putting now and their comments or just you know, where does that come from? And I know, and you know, I'm saying that to myself, what what happened here? And then as we get into it a little bit more, I realized that, you know, there's a lot of things that went on in the past that have placed those imprints, and you know, it's so interesting that we can no longer be both and rather than either or you know, yeah, and realize that you know what, Yeah, I have my point of view, you have your point of view. I would suspect if we got into a discussion about some of those things, we probably are a little bit on the opposing sides there. But the reality is is, if you can respect my thoughts and I can respect your thoughts, not necessarily agree, but respect the fact that there's some validity, all of a sudden, that changes the whole dimension of the communication, doesn't it.

30:10 Yes, Yeah, And it's just trying to get the emotion, you know, it's like trying to get the emotion out of the argument. The argument is great, I want to hear the argument, but you know, we need to temper up, down the emotion a bit, you know, the the anger, the thing and that. And sometimes I often feel when I see people that are really enraged, and again I'm not talking it's for other side. I'm often wondering if that's really what's going on. It's really meant to make something else is not happening, and they're just using that as a target or displacing their rage onto another target. I suspect that's true in many cases. I remember, as I was going through some certifications, one of one of the comments that the tell that was doing one of them, and we were talking about the imprints and so forth and relationships. He said, you know what, and I've shared this before. He says, this is something you never want to do with your spouse or your significant other, but it's something that you ought to do. And he says, when you get into a situation where there's a disagreement and strong feelings going on, the question you can ask is what emotion just came up for you that is causing this type of reaction. Well, if we ask ourselves that with the proper mindset, all of a sudden, we're realizing that, you know what, we're reacting because of emotion and where did that should come from?

31:36 You know, it could be something from our childhood, like you know where you know, you may be thinking you're fighting with someone on social media, go, and yet what subconscious is going on. Maybe you're fighting back with. Your father at a you know, when you were five or six, you know, and that's where that anger comes in, or that energy, that that displeasure comes in. And you may think consciously it's about the other person, about the issue, but it's not. It's something deeper that needs to come in. And that's why I think we're seeing that, you know, especially in the past you know, eight years, just the amount of anger that we've been seeing on social media on both sides, Yeah, has been you know, a bit disturbing almost you know, let's see.

32:18 It, it's major disturbing. But you know what, to me, it's interesting that an individual, if they can could get to the point where they can literally say themselves. Okay, what's causing this emotion? You know, there's events or events. Events do not have emotion. Events are non emotion, but we tie an emotion to an event based on our perception or whatever that happens to be. And you know, how people can get to the point where they can understand that, I think takes a lot of curiosity, a lot of personal work, and help from others. One of the things that you talked about that I wanted to get into a little bit was personality. And I don't know if you do personality or behavioral evaluations. That's something that I happen to be certified in and I found it very interesting. But as you look at personalities, how important is it for someone to begin to really understand that from a perspective of living their life, choosing their profession and those type of things. What's been your experience with that?

33:25 Well, you know, in my book, I have all unit of personality because I focus on one of the most you know, I guess popular models is a big five five factor model, which is openness, conscience as in a extraversion, agreeable, and sinneraroticism. Now all of us have you know, these five traits of varying degrees. So I think what's important, at least from my perspective, is to understand where you fall into that into all you know, into these five and then if there's ways to optimize it, you know what to optimize these you know, these five. So I work for you, you know, and in my research, because that's what I did from a doctor's station when variables they measured with some when I was measuring self sabotage was I was looking at the big five and see what the relationship was with the Big five and the self sabotage.

34:12 And so what I found, and this is what I did after I did my research. Was that if you are high high neuroticism which means emotional reactivity, being easily stressed out, and low and conscientiousness, if you combine those two together, that's going to be, you know, be a greater predictor of self sabotaging behavior because now you're only fear running, but you're not necessarily disciplined as you should be. And you know, so I have my you know, one of the projects I do with my classes for my students is I haven't taken a you know, an instrument, an inventory that measures a big five factor model. I also have them do to meyers breaks, which give them a bit of a personality profile, and then I have them react to it. I don't I don't do any diagno because that's not my job there or to you know, but I just have them reflect on it and then you know, so you know, I think that just understanding your your own personality also can be an impact, which I kind of seem missing a.

35:21 Little bit in the clinical psychology beef. You know, work. Is really understanding that personality factors and how you can optimize that, like how you can become more conscientious, how you can become more you know, open minded, you know, and even you know, work on your agreeableness, and then when you work on those valuables, that's. When you could start to see some changes. Well, you know what something me and I've not used a Big five and I don't use my bridge. I've done that, and I you know, I don't understand that I've got a brother that loves it. I've used something different than I found was very very you know, valuable for me to use with people with clients. And one of the things that I realize is and I think this is where understanding your personality traits is so important, because every personality trait that we can observe or we can begin to understand, is a very positive thing for us.

36:20 The challenge is if we overdo it, then suddenly that becomes a problem. So for instance, you know, and I think I work on the right brain, left brain external you know type of thing. But you know, the left brain or the right brain extrovert is that person that just loves to be in a community, loves to chat, so on and so forth, and it's wonderful. I love to be around them because I tend to be an introvert. So if I can be around people that just will chat and so forth, that's great. But all of a sudden, when it becomes yeh app and never stops, that strength has now become a weakness because the not been able to be in total control of it. Or like someone who's who's left brain extravert, who's just really strong willed and so forth. That's great, you know, and really is motivation for success and all that type of stuff. But as that becomes a little bit too much, now you are overbearing, you're really using words and using you know, body language that is a little bit overwhelming to people who are receiving that communication. So I think it's so interesting that we we can really look at those strengths and understand that, you know, if I keep those strengths in the proper value, that they really are great strength.

37:40 But I need to be aware that if they go a little bit too far, then all of a sudden they become a disadvantage. Yeah, well, I think it's relying on anything too much, even as a crutch sometimes can be you know, be a disadvantage, you know. And again it's it's what works for you. I mean, I I I you know, reason I like the Big five that I feel really. Fits into the work of self advertised very well, at least for me, you know, and I always like to purchase that for me. And I think that's also another thing too, because it's our perception, you know, really, and you know, I think also too much of anything is you know, not not always optimally given for production or its this time. We need to need time to you know, decompress and recharge. Even for me, I like being around people, but sometimes if I'm in a group, like a large room with a a lot of people, I have to step aside because I'm like, Okay, this is a little too much for me right now. But you know, even though I do like being around people a lot, it's you know, I know my limits, you know.

38:48 Like, Okay, I'm not I'm not. I'm not a really big fan of large crowds. That's me, you know. So I think just understanding yourself is a major. Again, it doesn't really matter what personality model do you use. I think, you know, I think just having that self understanding. Exactly and being able to understand that, you know what, as you were talking about, there's balance. There needs to be balance in our lives, yes, which I think becomes so important to my daughter, who ended up getting a master's degree in sociology but mainly research, and she was going to move towards her PhD and called me one day and she said, Dad, and she's major with the personal I profile, she's major right brain extrovert. And she says, I'm not sure as I observe the lives of the PhDs at the university here, I'm not sure that's going to give me the type of balance in life that I'm looking for. And so she made the brave decision because she was on a pathway to end it and just get her master's degree and then basically get into an entirely different area. But you said it education as a background that has helped her to be very successful.

40:03 So I think it's so important that we really look at balance in our lives and understand that. You know what, if we can create a good balance, we can then create a greater sense of happiness enjoy in our lives. One hundred percent. And you know, going back, they want to say before, if we look at even the traits in the Big five, you shouldn't. You don't want to be on too extremes on other end, you know, too high or too low because even like like one of the things I talked about aboutcus being agreeable. Agreeableness is great, you know, to be coachable and be open minded and being able to follow directions, But at the same time, if they're too agreeable, you can be taken advantage of.

40:43 And there's times when. It comes if you're negotiating, you know, whether it's for to buy a house or a salary or anything like that, you have to stand your ground, which means being disagreeable a little bit. Yeah, Well, wait, we can talk about all sorts of things here as well as we're getting near the clothes. What I'd love for you to do is share with the audience how can they find you and what are the same what other than your book, what are some of the things that you offer two people. So I on my website Alberbramonti dot com. I have a lot of hypnosis audios which has you know, which have to do anything with mindset, athletic performance and you know, working with fears and phobias, anxieties.

41:31 And it helps. There there recordings that you can buy, and that's one way we can help. You could also just you know, I post a lot on my social media, my LinkedIn, you know, so you can find me on LinkedIn. I post a lot of content there. You know. I'm working on sorry, a sub stack right now, which is to be you know, articles on mindset and articles on that. So be sharing that with the community so you can follow me. You get on Instagram and LinkedIn for that and you know, even reach out. Feel free to reach out. I'm always open to conversations. And how do you find how do you find your book? Okay, so you're going it's available on Amazon Rise above the script. You can get it as a paperback, kindle or audiobook.

42:17 I have it also an audiobook. Great. I love audiobooks. Yeah, so that they're great. Yeah, they're great. So as we close, what would be kind of that final message that you'd like to share with the audience. So the final message I would say is connect to here why, Like really, you know, every day, reflect on why you're doing what you're doing, what you're sending out to do, and really stay committed to that. So know your why, I would say previous much webe the biggest message I'd want to say, because that'll keep you focused, I'll keep you dedicated. You know, remember each day why you're doing what you're doing. Well, And I think that really gets to a purpose and understanding your purpose and you say even asking why why am I behaving this way? Why am I bringing up this emotion? So I love that because it not only gets into purpose, but it gets into a mindset that helps you to really start to improve your life.

43:12 Yeah. So yeah, and the emotions and mindsets, even the ones that may be working against us, I always say, have a positive intention and that's protect us. So now what's maybe work on it, reframing it so it could protect us, still protect us, put it in a different way. Amen to that. Well, hey, Albert, thanks so much. This has been great. Yeah, I appreciate you being on the show. I mean, thank you again for having met folks. Thanks for listening. Hope you've enjoyed it. Get to the website. There's some good things there. I can promise you. I've already been there and I observed that. So anyway, this is doctor Doug saying no mistake.