JLD: Boom! Shake the room, Fire Nation! JLD here with an audio masterclass on overcoming ANTs, that's A-N-T, Automatic Negative Thoughts. And to drop these value bombs, I have brought Josh Knutti. He teaches people how to overcome those negative self-talks and self-doubts so that they can get out of their own way and achieve at the highest level.

Fire Nation, we'll be breaking down what are Automatic Negative Thoughts, the four types of self-talk, and how you can shift that self-talk into a positive, not a negative. We'll be diving into all that and more when we get back from thanking our sponsors!

Josh, say, what's up, to a Fire Nation and share something interesting about yourself that most people don't know.

Josh Knutti: What's up, Fire Nation! Hey, thanks for having me on, I really appreciate that.

JLD: Yeah.

Josh Knutti: So, maybe not something so interesting about myself, but I'll take this time to name-drop of something interesting that happened to me is, most people are, they remember the Rat Pack. So, Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, and a guy by the name of Joey Bishop. The guy Joey Bishop used to work in Newport Beach, and he actually bought me a Happy Meal one time.

So, that was kind of cool. It was Halloween and all the fellows were out, and we were at one of the fast food places and I didn't have any money. And he says, come over here, son; said, do you know who I am; I go, no, sir. He goes through all the Rat Pack and named all the people, and he's like, well, I'll buy you a Happy Meal; and then actually said, I bet your parents know about me, what's your address, I'll send you a signed picture.

So, I was a talk of the town and the hit at Christmas because I've got a signed picture of Joey Bishop to give my dad and grandma, and all that type of stuff. So, it was pretty cool.

Josh Knutti: But what'd you think was cooler at the time, the signed picture or the Happy Meal?

JLD: Oh, the Happy Meal! I had no clue who he was, but I knew Frank Sinatra, but I had no clue who Joey Bishop was.

JLD: Oh, Fire Nation, that is really interesting stuff. And of course, we have brought Josh on the mike today to talk about OverComing ANTs, and no, not that little pest that we all know about. We're talking about Automatic Negative Thoughts.

So, Josh, we're gonna be diving really deep into these automatic negative thoughts. But before we really get deep into those, just explain to Fire Nation, like what exactly are ANTs?

Josh Knutti: So, ANTs, just like you said, it's an acronym term coined by a neurologist, Dr. Amen, and it's Automatic Negative Thoughts. And one of the things that in psychology and some things that I've learned in my life, is that negativity is natural and positivity is on purpose. Meaning, everything kind of goes towards the negative without, unless you stop it. Wood rots, metal rusts, if you don't use my muscles they atrophy, a garden left unattended grows weeds, so you have to do the positivity things on purpose.

So, we gotta figure out how to stop those ANTs from infesting our brain and our thoughts.

JLD: Now, I just have a little bit of a question because I'm a historian by trade. Like I was an American Studies major, I just love reading both historical fiction and historical nonfiction. And, you know, there's a lot of thought and there's a lot of people that talk about how just these negative thoughts are kind of innate in human beings.

I mean, it's one of the reasons a lot of people say, hey, we're actually around today because of these negative thoughts. Because 70,000 years ago, we were like, no, we're not gonna go outside when it's night time because there might be a sabre tooth tiger that comes and swipes us away. So, we have these negative thoughts that protected us 70,000 years ago, that actually are now harming us because there's no sabre tooth tigers roaming around most neighborhoods.

So, what are kind of your thoughts on that? Is there some innateness to these ANTs?

Josh Knutti: You can utilize them for good. So, it's all about they're different tools. You know, you can use a hammer to hammer a nail, or you can hit yourself in the face with it. It's all about how you use it.

But you have to know what they are first, and you have to be able to recognize them so you can understand how to either avoid them, stop them, or use them for good. So, you just have to figure out how to use them, first off, and recognize them to begin with.

JLD: But is it something that human beings have innately, like are we born with automatic negative thoughts?

Josh Knutti: Yes, without a doubt.

JLD: Okay, so we're born with these automatic negative thoughts. It's now just a situation of, okay, hey, this is the reality, now how do we deal best with this reality, and potentially even send it towards a positive.

So, let's maybe talk about your life because you've had a lot of experience with this. I know you've struggled with depression at times, and I kind of wanna dive into some of that right now with how have automatic negative thoughts played a role in your life?

Josh Knutti: Yeah. So, a quick synopsis of kind of my life up to this point where I've really started to dive deep into these ANTs and to these automatic negative thoughts.

I, like a lot of your listeners, have had a 9-to-5. You know, I started in a retail career, actually started as an ice cream scooper, and worked my way up. Supervisor, store manager, all the way to the upper echelons of Corporate America, where I was overseeing $580 million of a labor line, 22,000 associates across the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico, making six figures, traveling around the world with my now wife and friends and family.

But, a lot like your listeners, I felt like a caged animal, I felt like I was born for something better. I wanted to do something bigger, I wanted to start my own business, I was tired of putting millions of dollars to the EBITDA line of a billion-dollar company. And I just felt like I was destined for something else. I needed to get out of there. That 9-to-5, a lot like, I'm sure, Fire Nation, I felt like a caged animal.

And with that, it reminds me of a real cool kind of tale about, there's this young boy in grade school and he's walking home from school every single day. And he sees this, just this good ole boy cowboy, big handlebar mustache, in a rocking chair, mint julep, and he's got his hound dog that's sitting next to him. And every single day this little boy walks by this hound dog is howling and howling and howling. Next day, walks by, goes home, this dog is howling and howling and howling. Finally, this little boy says, hey, mister, why is your dog howling so much? And he goes, he's sitting on a nail. And the little boy goes, why doesn't he move? And he goes, doesn't hurt bad enough.

And with that, it kind of reminds me a lot like, I'm sure, some of your listeners and myself and you, feel is that, hey, we're in this 9-to-5 job, we're getting all these accolades, we have this six-figure job. But so many of us today talk and talk and talk and howl like I wanna start this business, I'd like to quit my job, I'd like to start this book, I'd like to just start this podcast. But nobody ever, ever does it.

So, I wanted to take the time and to really shout out to all of your listeners and to you, that if you are doing something, if you are writing that book, if you have that side hustle, if you started that job, you know, hats off to you! Give yourself a pat on the back. Because so many times, I hear in society people howling out but never do anything, never take any action.

So, I'd really like to give it up to your listeners that are doing it. Because I know a lot of them out there are doing so.

JLD: That's a great call to action, brother. And it does actually remind me of a quote, that when I read it for the first time it really just smacked me upside the head. And I'm like, man, this is totally me! And that quote is, "Good is the biggest enemy of great." And here I was, like, I wanted to be great in this world, I wanted to do something great, I wanted to have lifestyle freedom, location freedom, I wanted just all of that financial freedom. That was to me what was the opportunity of living this great lifestyle.

But, you know, here I was in this corner office with John Hancock, looking at the city of Boston. A really good job, making good money, I could see my career path going up, up, up, it was good! But, man, I was never gonna get to great. But that was a problem. That nail was there, but it didn't hurt enough. I wasn't fired, I wasn't thrown out on the street with no other options, then I would've had to go for the great! But I had this good that just kind of kept me plodding along until I finally just said, you know, hey, no matter how little or much this nail hurts, it's time to take action.

Josh Knutti: Yep.

JLD: And you have a phrase here that I really kind of wanna dive into a little bit, which is "if you do not think you can do something you cannot do it". So, obviously, that phrase makes sense as a standalone, but expound upon that.

] Josh Knutti: One of the things, I started this podcast called OverComing You, and we focus on what I think is the most important thing in this world. Which is what we think about ourselves when we are by ourselves. Meaning, if you don't think that you can do something, or you don't think that you can take action to do something, then you are never going to do it.

Now, I know for a matter of fact that I cannot beat Lebron James at basketball. But I know that I cannot do that, so the chances of me ever beating him are very, very slim. But I'm not even going to try.

But, unfortunately, even though that example or that analogy is a bit outlandish, we think about those things sometimes in our business career or in our relationships, like, I can't go do that business, or I'm never gonna find that person that I want. And if you constantly think about those things when you're by yourself, it's never gonna happen in reality. So, you have to change those things there.

Does that kind of make sense?

JLD: It does make sense. And besides, it kind of leads me to a question that I have for you because it's something that I've kind of felt for a while, but I would like your perspective on it. It's because people come to me all the time, they say, John, I see you speaking from stage and it's like you have no fear, and how do you interview people like Tim Ferriss, and Tony Robbins, and all this stuff, I would just be so scared of doing these things. And I'm, hey, listen, I have nerves when I'm going on stage. I definitely have butterflies and have some fear before I'm speaking to these unbelievable successful and awesome entrepreneurs, and these men and women who have done these great huge things.

But the reality is I go back, again, to what we were talking about earlier where I realize that fear is just part of the human makeup. It's innate. We're born to fear things. That's why a baby won't necessarily just crawl over a cliff, it recognizes, hey, there's something there that's not gonna be good for me if I do that, I'm innately gonna be fearful of that. And that's such a critical thing for us to realize. It's about embracing the fear.

A lot of people are just like, how do I overcome that, how do I just conquer it. And to me, I don't know if that ever can be overcome, or ever conquered in any way, shape, or form. But I can just say, hey, I'm a human being, I'm feeling these very natural feelings. Of course, I'm nervous before I get on stage, I'm not that character from the movie American Psycho that has absolutely no feelings. I'm a human being, I'm feeling, I'm feeling fear, that's natural.

But what are your thoughts on that?

Josh Knutti: Yeah. I couldn't agree more. Obviously, you're one of the GOATs in podcasting, and you've talked to so many individuals. But that's one thing to, this podcast that I started, when I'm talking to like Olympic level athletes – I was just talking, right before we started, to a friend of mine. I just had this beautiful fitness model gal on and she, if you were to look at her, there's no person on the planet that wouldn't go, wow, you're really pretty. But she told me that every single picture that she takes she always thinks she did that pose wrong or doesn't look good. And she's the elite of the elite, she is the top of the echelon in her industry. But she still feels that way.

And I'm sure when you talk to individuals, or when you talk to Olympic athletes, they still get a little nervous right before they get in there, but it's the fact that they still overcome and they go through it. And the reason why they overcome, is because they've done the work to do that. You, John, have done that work, you've put in your 10,000 hours, you've put in the painful-staking thing of listening back to yourself on your podcast and go, oh, my god, I can't believe I said that!

JLD: I can't believe it!

Josh Knutti: You said, I can't believe we did that! But that's the pain.

But because you've done all those little things up to now, now when you sit down across from individuals like me, or people at your level or above, there's really, there may be some fear but you know you've put in the work to do it. So, it's so much different because that's where confidence comes through. Confidence comes through that practice and those little tiny things leading up to that game time, or up to that project or whatnot.

JLD: I'm a big believer in the compare and despair mentality. If you are going to compare yourself to anybody, at some level you're going to despair, it's always gonna be a losing proposition

The only person, in my mind, that you should be comparing yourself to is you yesterday. And that's how I've been able to stay with this now for seven years, for 2,200 episodes, and so on and so forth. Is that I just look at me yesterday and say, hey, am I just a little bit better, maybe even 0.1 percent better at X or Y or Z? You know, that might be a podcast, or a webinar, or writing an email newsletter. Am I just a little bit better at one, or maybe all of those things than I was yesterday? And if I've put in the work, then the answer is, yes, I am.

So, Fire Nation, compare yourself to you yesterday, that's it. And if you're winning that comparison, not all the time but most of the time, you're winning at life.

Now, let's shift this back to your podcast, OverComing You. Because it's all about empowering, uplifting, and inspiring people to actually overcome their life's obstacles, negative self-talk, self-doubt, etc. Talk about that a little bit. Why was this podcast needed?

Josh Knutti: This podcast, you know, it's interesting, you've heard before that a lot of times authors write the books that they need for themselves. And so, me doing this podcast it's a little bit something that I needed for myself. So, I talked about climbing a corporate ladder, I was having six figures, managing $580 million, 20,000 associates, and I quit that job. And actually, I'm kind of a jump in the deep end type of guy, so in one year I quit my six-figure job, I moved states, I tried to by a $10 million corporation, and I got married, all in the same year!

JLD: Whoa, whoa! So, there's a year.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. So, Fire Nation, please don't do that. It's just too much.

But one of the things that I did is I worked really, really hard to start this business in order to buy this company, and worked eight months on it, and literally liquidated all my funds, all that type of stuff. I was all in.

And I was at a the one-yard line, literally ready to sign the papers in the lawyer's office, and the seller changed some of the logistics and there was an expiration date on the contract. And then, unfortunately, he had used me to get the sale price up and sold it for cash two days later.

And so, with that I started to spiral down out of control; drinking, drugs, both prescription and non. And then, every single day just going, what did I do, I am a piece of you know what, I can't provide for my brand-new wife, my friends think I'm a loser, I can't believe I failed, I'm a failure. And just spiraled, spiraled, spiraled. And then – I won't go into the nitty gritty details of that, you can go listen to episode zero of my podcast and find all that stuff out.

But after I got help, both medical, therapy, friends, family, and got out of that negative loop, I looked back and realized that every single negative thing that ever happened in my life, or anyone's life, all started in their mind, all started with the thought, and it went why. And it sounds so simplistic. But the thing is, most of us don't know what the negative thoughts are, or don't know those patterns. And the first way to correct something is to know you're doing something bad.

And that's one of the things that I wanted to talk about today, is that there's 10 real scientifically proven psychological ways that we think to ourselves that actually will contribute to an unhappy, negative self-doubt, negative self-talk. But if we can figure out what those are, and realize that we're doing it, and then figure out tips and tricks and ways to correct it, then we can, like we talked about in the beginning, use these things for good instead of having them used for bad. Does that make sense?

JLD: It makes sense to me. And I love how you use the phrase, you need to get out of your own way if you wanna reach those higher levels of happiness.

And so often, it's us, Fire Nation, getting in our own way. You need to get out of your own way, and you need to learn from others who have, maybe like Josh has just talked about spiraled and spiraled and spiraled, that we can learn from those people we can avoid those rabbit holes. We can take that shortcut on the things that are actually working, like gratitude, and a mindset of abundance, and journaling and meditating so we're actually keeping a finger on the pulse of what we're feeling every single day and what we actually want. Again, what we actually want.

I can't tell you how many times I've had conversations – because I've been doing a ton of 20-minute strategy calls recently with some really up and coming entrepreneurs, and just so automatically they're just like, oh, you know, I made $50,000 last year, I need to make a $100,000, I wanna double my income; or I made $200,000 last year, I need to make $400,000 this year. And I always ask, why?

I'm like, why do you wanna double your income, why do you wanna double your revenue? Is everything else in your life amazing? Is your health and wellness amazing? Are you getting eight hours of sleep every night? Are you eating right, are you exercising? Is your relationship thriving? And often, the answer is, no, to all or some of those things, and I'm, well, why do you wanna kill yourself even more to double your money? Give me a good reason and then we can talk about it. And they don't have a good reason. They're just like, well, aren't you just supposed to double your revenue every single year?

And I'm like, of course, not, I haven't doubled my revenue once since 2015, and I'm living exactly the life that I wanna be living right now because I'm very intentional about it, I'm very intentional about that. So, you need to get out of your own way, Fire Nation.

And we're gonna be talking about the four types of self-talk as soon as we get back from thanking our sponsors!

So, Josh, we're back. And before the break I alluded to the four types of self-talk. Let's break those down one by one. The first one's All or Nothing. Get into that for us.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. So, the first one's All or Nothing, or black and white, or actually the psychology term of it is actually called Dichotomous Thinking. And this is what, I hear this a lot, I've been hearing it a lot usually in the beginning of the year, is on January 1st I have a buddy, or we all have friends that go, hey, no more, this is it, I'm doing five days a week, I'm eating boiled chicken, I am going – and I go –

JLD: Living in the gym.

Josh Knutti: – yeah, that's all I'm doing. You don't understand, The Rock you better watch the heck out, I'm coming for ya!

But you know, I always ask them, I say, oh, cool, you're gonna do five days a week, how many times do you go right now? And they go, oh, I go about once. And I go, so you're gonna go from one to five? And then usually what happens is, the first week they do it, the second week they're sore because their body's not used to it because you can't increase 400 percent effort overnight. But these folks usually do or they think they do.

And then, all of a sudden, the third week goes on and something comes up, like life comes up, it's going to happen, and all of a sudden, they go three times instead of five. And they go, oh, my god, I failed, I can't do that, I'm never gonna be like The Rock, I'm never gonna look like Beyoncé. I said I was gonna go five times and baby got sick and I only went three, so forget it, I'm not gonna go any more. And they do this all or nothing type of thing.

And please, Fire Nation, don't misconstrue being all in mentally or being all in with your actions. I'm talking about being adjustable and being able to adjust when things happen because life's going to happen. And just because you wanted to do five days a week but you only ended up doing three, you still did three! You still increased 200 percent, you're still good! Don't quit and then don't stop that, and don't start thinking, oh, my god, I'm never gonna be this or I can't do that just because the plan didn't go just exactly as you thought it would.

Does that make sense?

JLD: It does make sense. And so, Fire Nation, this All or Nothing and, again, another word for it could be black or white, or dichotomous, is, listen, you go from all or nothing, like those are the only two options you're giving yourself and those are just two very stark options.

And I like to talk about goals, I always talk about that within the Freedom Journal. What's the right way to set a goal? It's called a SMART Goal: Specific, Measurable, Attainable and Relevant Time Bound. What's the key word in here, for what we're talking about right now, Attainable. SMART goals are specific, measurable, attainable relevant and time bound, 400 percent increase overnight, that's not attainable, that's not sustainable, so what are you doing there? You should be looking at getting 1 percent better, 1 percent better every single day.

So, guess what? Maybe for the first month of the year you're gonna go two days per week, and you're gonna really get settled into that routine. And then, maybe the following month, you're gonna up it to three days per week, and maybe stay there for three or four months until you really settle in to that routine. And then you figure a way out to make it four. And then you really are deciding, hey, what fits best to be committed to, I'm gonna be able to consistent with? It's all going back to comparing yourself to you yesterday –

Josh Knutti: Yeah.

JLD: – and winning that comparison.

So, the next type of self-talk is Disqualifying the Positive. Talk about that.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. So, Disqualifying the Positive is actually one of the, in my opinion, one of the biggest detriments that we do to ourselves. And not only do we do it to ourselves, but we do it to others. Because there's two types of things, I know I've been guilty of it, but most of us have. Is that you do something good, you have a great presentation at work, and somebody comes up to you and goes, hey, John, you did fantastic with that. And you immediately go, oh, I know, I think you, I know you think I did but I messed that thing up, or I forgot that, missed that bullet point.

And something's happening when someone's trying to give you a positive complement, is that think about it in the reverse. Everybody loves to give complements, especially when they're real true and to the heart. And what you're doing is you're robbing that individual of that opportunity to do something good that's gonna make them feel good. And so, when somebody does that, make sure to, when someone tries to give you a positive complement make sure to take that in and give them a second – A good little tip and trick is if someone says, hey, John, you did fantastic on that presentation, just go, thank you very much, I appreciate that.

What that does is, that allows a little space, it gives credit to the individual, it's thanking them, but then it allows your mind just a fraction of a second to go, okay, maybe I did do good. Versus, going back to what we talked about in the very beginning, these automatic negative thoughts constantly trying to find the things that you did wrong, or you didn't do correct, and go right into that. So, it gives your mind just a little bit of time for that.

The second portion of Disqualifying the Positive, and this is one of the worst ones, is when you do it to yourself. When you have that presentation and you go back to your office, or cubicle, or home, or whatever, and you go, my god, I messed that up so bad, I forgot that percentage point, or I didn't tell them this, or I forgot to do that, or I messed my closer up. Or nobody laughed at my joke, which is something I think about all the time when I speak on stage!

But what you're doing there is you're actually – and I know a lot of us know this portion, the brain – but what you are doing when you constantly are disqualifying the good that you did is you are activating that RAS, that Reticular Activating System. Which is that part of the brain that is literally designed to show you everything that you tell it.

And the analogy that's been used to describe this portion of the brain is – it actually worked perfect when we were living, my wife and I were living out in Arizona. She wanted to buy a Jeep, and so, we're in Phoenix, Arizona, when it's pretty much the capital of the Jeep world. But all of a sudden, as soon as she started to buy that Jeep, she said, I can't believe how may freaking Jeeps are all around here. I'm like, babe, they've been there forever, you're just now looking at it.

And the same thing goes when you disqualify the positive. When you go, you know, John or Josh, you really messed up, you really did that. And your mind goes, okay, let's find all the times that you did that wrong, let's find all the times that you messed up.

And so, what you need to do is, yes, you need to look back and see where you can correct, adjust, and move forward but you need to make sure to tell yourself the good that you did in that project. And it may sound weird or may feel awkward, but no one's listening, it's just you, just you and your car, no one's gonna hear you, but give yourself some credit. Because if you don't, you're gonna have that RAS, that reticular activated system work against you instead of for you.

JLD: Fire Nation, I wanna go back first and foremost to the part about getting a complement. I have a very specific way that I "receive complements". I literally receive them. If somebody comes up to me and they say something kind, they give me a complement, I look them in the eye and I say, Josh, I receive that, thank you so much for sharing that, it really does mean a lot.

Because what you're doing, you're acknowledging the fact that this person went out of their way to say something kind about you. You're not brushing it off, you're not gonna just turn in to that self-deprecating person of, like, oh, man, I did better last time, or ho-hum. Like, that's all crap. There's a person, a human being in front of you giving you a complement, receive the complement, Fire Nation! Receive it! And going to just acknowledging the things that are happening in your world.

That's why I'm very specific with all three of my journals. At the end of the day, you need to sit down and write down what happened that was great today, so you can reflect on the day and focus on the great things that happened. Then, you're gonna end the day on that high note, on a positive note. Then what happens, you go to bed and fall asleep on a positive note. Then what happens, you wake up on a positive note. It's kind of funny how those things happen, Fire Nation.

We need to now talk about No. 3, Josh, which is Mind Reading. Expound upon that.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. Mind Reading happens all the time. So, this is when all of a sudden, we think that we're Nostradamus, or, what's that gal, she used to be on TV, was it Cleo? Remember her, she was a mind reader or something like that?

JLD: It sounds familiar.

Josh Knutti: All of a sudden, we think we can read people's minds. May mean, I know my boss thinks I'm terrible, or I know my peer doesn't think I'm as good as him or her. Or I see it a lot in relationships, like, oh, my god, I know my spouse just really, really thinks all my ideas are stupid.

You know, you have an example where you come home and you go, hey, honey, wanna get dinner; she goes, yeah, what do you want; so, oh, let's, I'll have sushi; and she goes, no, I want Italian. And then in your head you go, she always thinks my ideas are stupid, she never wants to do anything I wanna do, how come she thinks her ideas are always better.

And then you think about that the rest of the evening, you're kind of short and curt at dinner. Then it rolls over into the next day, and then all of a sudden, she says, hey, honey, how's it going. And then you're like, what are you talking about, what do you mean how's it going, and you lash out. And they're like, whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa, what's going on?!

When, in fact, if you were just to realize that you don't know what that other person is thinking; you don't know that she thinks that your ideas are stupid; you don't know that your boss thinks less of you or doesn't think you're doing a good job, you don't know that for a matter of fact.

And as soon as you can figure out that you're having these ANTs, this automatic negative thought, without knowing for certain that they are thinking that, as soon as you have that, just go to that person in the appropriate time, at the right setting. And go, hey, I'm getting a little feeling that maybe Mr. Boss or Mrs. Boss I'm not doing, am I not up to par or am I not doing something? And they'll go, no, everything's fine. You know, oh, okay, good. And you'll eliminate that automatic negative thought right there and then.

Or when you go to your significant other and go, hey, I sometimes feel like you don't like my ideas, or something like that, and they'll just be like, no, I saw an advertisement for Olive Garden and I really felt like having some pasta and bread. It's like, oh, okay, you don't think my ideas are stupid.

So, so many times, we get in this automatic negative loop of knowing for certain that we know what that other person is thinking, when in actuality you don't. And it will take a fraction of a second if you just have the guts or you have that conversation with that person and just ask them, hey, this is how I'm feeling, am I misreading that, or are you feeling this. It will eliminate so much of that guess work, and so much of those awkward drive homes going, oh, my god, my boss hates me; oh, my god, my peer thinks they're better than me; oh, my god; you know, so and so, my direct report is coming for my job; whatever it is.

Because the thing is, you're not a mind reader. You're not Cleo, you're not one of these people that can read somebody's else's mind for certain.

JLD: Fire Nation, one sentence: You're not Nostradamus, stop trying to pretend that you are, stop living in that world.

Now, the final one we're gonna talk about is Jumping to Conclusions. Which, obviously, bleeds a little bit into what we just talked about. So, maybe expand upon that a little bit.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. Jumping to Conclusions is kind of two parts. One, that we just talked about, the mind reading. And the other one is, the fortune teller.

This happens a lot with entrepreneurs. So, I'm really excited that we kind of saved the best for last for your listeners. Because I know a lot of them are out there looking to do something big, get out of the rut, start that side hustle, that book, that business, that talk, what have you. And so many times, we all of a sudden, once again we think we know the future. We think we have this glass ball or this thing that we know, we go, okay, if I start this business, oh, my god, I just know it's gonna fail. And then, especially as adults, we get so good at rationalizing and making excuses that they sound truthful, you know.

And so, you have somebody in their 9-to-5 job. They're sitting on that nail, they don't, like, crying that they wanna do something more. But they go, oh, you know, well, what is it, 80 percent of new businesses, small businesses fail in the first year or three years, or something, so in actuality, the odds are not in my favor.

And I can tell you from experience, it happened with this podcast that I started, this podcast, OverComing You. I felt, oh, my god, I'm late to the game, I'm never, never in a million years am I gonna be as good as Entrepreneurs On Fire, John is so much better looking than I am, what the heck am I gonna do. But I had those thoughts. But the thing is, I didn't know, I didn't know that I could do this. But at the same time, I didn't tell myself I can't do it or it's going to fail.

What I did, and what we talked about earlier, is I started taking little actions towards that. Because the thing is, as soon as you start to think those things, how you can't do that business or it's going to fail, the truth is you don't know that for certain. You don't know it until you try. And I guarantee you, if we just take that example of I wanna start that business, if you go read five books and watch 20 YouTubes and listen to three Masterminds, or get into some coaching, you will start to build that confidence. And you will stop fortune telling, thinking, oh, I know this is going to fail, and go, huh, maybe I actually can do it.

JLD: Fire Nation, All or Nothing, Disqualifying the Positive, Mind Reading, Jumping Into Conclusions, these are four types of self-talk that so many people let them weigh them down like an anchor every single day.

Hopefully, after hearing this, after hearing Josh break this down, you're not gonna be one of those individuals.

And Josh, we've been dropping nothing but value bombs this entire episode. End with a bang! What do you wanna make sure our listeners really get from everything that we've talked about today?

Josh Knutti: Two things. One, the most important thing in this world is what we think about ourselves when we are by ourselves. And lastly, remember, just be kind to yourself, be kind to others, but be kind to yourself.

JLD: Give us a call to action. Where can Fire Nation find out more about you, the podcast, any gift you might have, let us know.

Josh Knutti: Yeah. So, the podcast is titled, OverComing You. We're on all, iTunes, Spotify, Android, every which way. We talk to top level, Olympic level athletes, C-level executives, inspirational individuals, thought leaders, and everyone in-between, going over those negative minds. Those negative self-talks, that self-doubt, and realizing that every single person, whether you're Beyoncé or Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg, or Entrepreneurs On Fire, we all go through times where we have self-doubt, negative self-talk. But the difference of the successful is that they figured out how to overcome that and still push forward.

So, I hope everybody will give me a chance and listen to the podcast. I think there'll be a lot of value bombs. And just, hopefully, to be good as Entrepreneurs On Fire.

I really, really appreciate you having me. It's really, really a pleasure.

JLD: I love it. And one thing I just wanna echo that Josh ended with is, what do you think about yourself when you're by yourself? Ask yourself that question, start being present and focused on those thoughts. And as you start to shift those thoughts to the positive, Fire Nation, the world becomes your oyster.

So, Fire Nation, you’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with, and you have been hanging out with JK and JLD today!

So, keep up the heat and head over to eofire.com; just type Josh in the search bar and the Show Notes page will pop up with everything that we've been talking about today. Links all that jazz, and of course, his podcast, the OverComing You podcast is a great listen! Get over there, check it out, get On Fire with that content.

And Josh, I just wanna say thank you for sharing your truth, your value bombs with the Fire Nation today. For that, brother, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side.

Josh Knutti: All right. Thanks, guys. See ya.