Download the Episode 10 PDF Transcript HERE

Carmen Morin:

Taylor Johnson, thank you so much for joining me today. So happy to have you. Thank you for taking the time to join us on the Music Mindset™ podcast. I'm very excited for our conversation. So, you and I have connected online and in our conversations. You know, I found it so intriguing, just all the overlap between our different fields, what we do, you know, we're both in the business consulting space, but then your background, how you got there from sports to these professional areas and many other very interesting professional areas I thought was very intriguing. So I look forward to chatting with you today. Thanks for joining us.

Taylor Johnson:

Thanks so much for having me. Very excited to be here.

CM:

Okay, great. So I'm always fascinated by that theory called the Medici effect. I think you and I chatted about it when we first spoke and as fact book and theory that argues that the greatest ideas and the greatest breakthroughs really come when we bring different concepts together, bring different experts together from different fields into new, unfamiliar territory, really helps to shake up that confirmation bias.

You know, the ways that we might look at things that we're so accustomed to looking through our own lens when we're able to bring in another expert from another area. So I love this opportunity to explore just all the intersections of the things that we do and all the different fields that we'll talk about. So what I loved about your background is really that winding path that you've taken to get where you are.

So currently, you know, you coach executives, CEOs, industry leaders, but then you began your career working with top performing athletes and of course, in the NFL, which is very, very interesting with the San Francisco 49ers. And then you've also coached, you know, gamers in between, right? So I would love to to kick off if you would just be open to walking us through that path that you've taken so far in your professional career and kind of what all those pivot points have been that took you from the NFL to working with gamers to CEO software development, all of these really interesting things that are on your on your biography.

TJ:

Yeah, thanks for that. I'd say two point earlier about the Medici effect, What I'm able to do now and the circles that I'm in, the conversations that I'm having, the clients I get to work with, none of that would have been possible had I not had some amazing mentors and learned from just great people along the way. So incredibly grateful for those opportunities.

And like I said, my path is, you know, I guess if you zoom out and you look at the time horizon, it may look linear, but if you zoom in, there were so many zigs and zags, it was all over the place. And I became very accustomed to that. That just became the status quo. And what I anticipated and I looked for which was an interesting thing for me.

So my background is an athletic performance coach in college in the NFL years. And what was interesting about that track for me is I always said that my passion was performance. And it's my curiosity that navigates through the world and so was my curiosity, which really led me to all the amazing opportunities that either were presented to me or that I ended up creating for myself.

And so it was so much more than just the physical training for me, which was my bread and butter, like strength conditioning, kinesiology was like the main kind of staples of what I started. And then I got really interested in sports psychology, nutrition and sports science and the integration of all these different factors. And so getting to the NFL was a journey for sure.

And when I finally got there, I was like, This can't be the end all, be all. It was amazing for sure. And I love the work that I did. And then I was like, Okay, there's got to be something else beyond this because human potential is so much more than just what we're doing on the field. It's so much more than just the program and stuff we’re doing on the back end.

I was very curious to say, you know, this is the physical domain. We do this quite well. What else is possible in the cognitive domain? So that really kind of piqued my curiosity and started to get me down this track of what's like same, same, but different where there's this athletic component and there's this difference and let's use our brains not so much our bodies, although that is a factor for sure. And so that's what really kind of took me from traditional sports into gaming and Esports.

CM:

Interesting. So I love what you've touched on with the adaptability, because I know in my own teaching I try to really speak up on people think that practice is all about that repetition and locking things in with this sort of rigidity, but actually it's about being able to refine your ability to adapt and to not get locked in.

And it's that tricky kind of double edged sword because we're constantly telling people we have to put in the repetitions and you have to focus and go deep. But at the same time somehow stay wide open to completely pivot and adapt when the opportunities arise or when the needs arise. So that's so fascinating that that natural curiosity brought you there.

So was there a clear pivot to move from the NFL to something like gaming, or was it something that you were invited to do, called to do, or was it your saying, Hey, I'm interested, I'm going to go call those gamers and see if I can help them out?

TJ:

Yeah, it's probably yes, it was like a combination of all those things that presented which is like so cool, right?

I mean, that's just kind of like the joke of life because like, if you just show up and play all out, things will present themselves to you and just one point on your adaptability point. It's like for sure when you put in intentional practice and you're putting in a lot of time to develop in your craft, there can be a sense of rigidity of like, Hey, this is the discipline and like constantly chipping away at that stone.

And, to use a pretty overplayed cliche, it's like you want to see the forest through the trees. If you're always focused on what you're chipping away at, you can’t actually see the bigger picture. And a mentor of mine and very early on used to always tell me. He's like, Yes, you stand on the shoulders of giants, but always check to see where they're looking and do the opposite.

Like look the other way. Scan the horizon. And that always kind of stuck with me. And so... it's great advice... it was, I got that at an early age I was very fortunate. Right And so being in the NFL, like the kind of the recipe for how that pivot happened was I was with the San Francisco 49ers. We're in the Super Bowl now.

Super stoked for them. When I coached there, we weren't the best team. Okay, well, it compounds over time. You contributed. 100%. Well, no, here's the thing, though. I think there's tremendous value in being a part of an organization or a team at the low of lows because you really learn about human nature. It is very easy to get people motivated to do things that you want them to do.

When you're winning, you're just one when you're losing and having a losing season specifically in sport, there's always kind of like what's going to happen next? And so the tools and skills are developed in that time, like how to get people to do what they really need to do that they don't want to do. And how do you play the game of building rapport and building trust when things aren't going the way you want them to go?

So I developed a lot of really unique skills. So being in that time frame, those two years, we made it through one coaching change. I did not think we were going to make it through another. I had enough wherewithal and understanding of how the game was played and so started looking for some other options. I had opportunities to go to some other NFL teams and then I kind of paused for a moment and thought, Well, what else is out there?

I’m entrepreneurial minded. People in my family are very successful entrepreneurs. If I were ever to try something different, now would be the time, because the NFL will always be there. And so I again, fortunate to have a lot of amazing mentors and colleagues and dear friends in different spaces. I think that's been a theme of my life is the diversity, the range of people in my life allow me to really assimilate and grab different information, synthesize it, which is such a gift.

I reached out to a ton of people, Hey, you know me. You know what I'm about. You know what I'm into. What am I not thinking of that's out there that could be something really cool? And so one of my dear friends, Rami, was a former CEO of a tech company called PUSH, which later got acquired by Whoop.

He goes, man you should check out Esports. It was like, Like I thought of it, but I didn't really grasp how big it had gotten. So I started to look into that space and ask the questions I would have about any other sports team, like I didn't care that they were gamers, like I saw them as high performers.

But I realized very quickly that there's a lot more similarities than differences. Obviously the biggest difference is they're not using their bodies in this physical output, but the cognitive output through the roof. And it takes a physical body to be able to channel and hold that energy, to focus that cognitive energy. And I was like, okay, there is something there.

And what I realized is that not a lot of people were thinking of them in this way, as these high performers. And so I started to reach out. It helps having the NFL on your resume when you start reaching out to people. cool. Let me respond. So it's all about leverage and understanding your skill set and your abilities and your background and leverage.

And so I started to ask questions and that led to more conversations and more opportunity. And ultimately, you know, we did have a gleaning and our staff got let go from the NFL and rather than going to another team, I was like, okay, I'm going to give it a year and just go all in and try to do this Esports thing. And by the end of that year, I got picked up by an organization which actually was a holding company, and we owned five professional organizations, 14 professional teams and a developmental academy. So I became the VP of performance.

CM:

Wow, what an incredible - What a pivot, What an incredible pivot. For sure, but a big one. So a couple of things that I just that stand out in such a huge way. First of all, from the very start of that, where you come at it from an active growth space of, I'm going to ask the people around me who I trust, what am I not seeing?

And that in itself is something that I think all of us can do more of and learn more from. Right, it’s to say, Hey, where are my blind spots? Because truly we can't see them if we don't have those trusted mentors around us. The other part of that is, of course, that you embrace the similarities and the differences.

But how challenging did you find it for you to communicate those similarities to those people in Esports? Because obviously you come from the NFL and they say, okay, you've got that leverage, you've got that credibility, but kind of what are you calling me for? Right? Like, we kind of see that that overlap where you would then be able to frame to them, Hey, just so you know, you're doing a lot of these same things.

Whether or not you realize. Was that challenging or were they pretty receptive, or is it a skill that you've honed?

TJ:

It is probably a skill that I honed over time because, as you know, my background is not in gaming. And so I did not claim to know their space. So it's kind of like you want to go in there with the beginner's mind.

And I made those mistakes early on by just making assumptions of like, it's got to be like this because it looks so similar and it's just trial and error. But I just realized that's just not the case. Just like many other things in life. So I really started to double down on a beginner's mindset, just like, Hey, what is it really like for you?

I have an idea based on what I'm observing, but what's it really like? And one of the angles I ended up taking with these individuals, both at the organization level and in the players themselves is it's all about the framing. So I framed it as your brain is your moneymaker, Do you agree? And they're like, Well, yeah, like I'm I make my money because it's my mind.

It's not my body, it's my mind. Great. Well, what if I told you that reaching your full potential is just the beginning and you could leverage different tools to amplify your moneymaker, which is your brain? Okay, that's kind of interesting. So what I was trying to do was like going fishing. I was just like, What is it like, What's the angle?

What's the language that lands with them. And it's the person with the most flexibility in you language will be the one that can actually control the conversation and drive insights. And so the ability to chunk up, chunk down and lateral chunk. What I mean by that is if I'm talking to an individual and they're just not getting what I'm saying, then I change what I'm saying or I change the direction.

So I'll chunk up, I'll take bigger pictures. Let me chunk up and say, Hey, are you a big picture person? You kind of paint the picture. Yeah. If that's not working, then you can kind of chunk down or a lateral chunk is coming up with analogies and metaphors. And so I learned that flexibility in your communication is a very powerful tool, and I use that a lot of my coaching now.

And so by constantly just checking and trying different things, I found like this brain moneymaker thing, they get, they latch on. And then I think the other thing again, what played in my favor was coming from the NFL, kind of like the confirmation bias, like he's been in the NFL, he must know something. That's at least like a step in.

Yeah. And then it was a lot of co-creation. It was a lot of really getting curious about what's going on for them, what are their pain points and how can we help them very quickly address some of the low hanging fruit and the bigger picture like, yes, I'm going to help you improve the way that you play the game, not from the technical tactical, because you will know more on that than I ever will.

Let me try to help reinforce the lifestyle, the nutrition mindset recovery component. And oh well, by the way, we teach you how to eat, move and be healthy. And that was kind of like the camouflage, the Trojan horse of like, I'll make you a better cognitive performer. Actually, what I'm doing is teaching you how to, like, have better life skills.

CM:

Yes. Yeah. Beautiful. I have to say. I mean, when you're sharing that, just that just such high level communication, to be able to adapt again, that adaptability and be flexible and respond to that feedback that you're getting. And I know from a musician standpoint, I always believe one of the strongest elements of a gifted teacher is being able to respond to the needs of the person they're teaching, right?

Because you might say the exact same thing, the same ten things to all of your students constantly, but you've got thousands of different ways that they need to hear it and they need to receive it. Right. And if you're not able to adapt to that, then you're just going to be, you know, hitting that wall every time. yeah, great.

And then I feel like that is such a smooth transition then. I mean, I'm sure it involved another great big pivot, but how that transitioned into you coaching, you know, CEOs and thought leaders and just with that brain power being able to support that and all of the cognitive challenges that business leaders have. Is that right?

TJ:

Yeah, Yeah, exactly.I'll share one kind of stop along the way to that pivot. It's relevant. So working with the Esport organizations and professional players, I ended up working for a startup where we were blending neuroscience technology with gaming tech. So we were just building this amazing platform for helping individuals train their speed, precision, accuracy and reaction time through video games.

And we were collecting all this data on the back end, and it was basically a cognitive assessment and training tool. And so working in that start up, we were a fast growth startup. I mean, they're still around today and are doing great. They're called game labs. I was like the number ten employee I left when we had 150. So it was like being strapped to the front of a rocket ship with duct tape and bubblegum.

So like, I know you appreciate that. Right? So what I ended up learning through that process was being a part of a startup and taking those coaching tools and the skills that I had and just applying them in a different context. And so that's when I started to really work with different executives and start to understand the throughline in all of it was understanding who you are as a person and how you're showing up so you can be better at what you do.

And I think a lot of times people skip to like, I'm just going to do these things better, do more of these things, but they miss out on, well who am I first. Like, what are my values? What are my goals? How do I perform under pressure? What are the things that flip me on, turn me down? And when you kind of build out this more robust operating system, we'll call this user manual life.

Those are like your cheat codes. I used to tell my players that in Esports. Like the more you know about yourself these are cheat codes. And so the same thing applies for executives and founders. It's like the more you develop a sense of awareness that's like rocket fuel because you develop more filters for what's a yes and what to no. Or you develop more tools and resources for how you want to show up in that board meeting.

And it's the sense of awareness. And so that's really a lot of the work that I do now is not so much on the physical side, although that is a component I'd say it's more holistically. We look at the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual, all of it together and really anchoring to an individual's core values in a specific area of life.

Primarily it's in their career. And then what are the associated behaviors for those values? I subscribe to the notion that values drive beliefs and beliefs drive behaviors.. So if you're not game, you're not taking action or taking a behavior that's in line with your values, either those aren't really your values or there’s something going on like a negative emotion or limiting belief, or you're shooting yourself in the foot that the behaviors don't match.

That's a lot of where my work is now.

CM:

And that's just the richest work to be in, truly. I mean, everything, all any type of output, whether it's music, athletics, gaming, like it all stems from that truly And I love again with that theme of adaptability is that it's about finding your user manual. It's not about you giving these specific, you know, drills.

I know in music, that's one thing that always gets under my skin and people say, do these ten different drills. And it's like, Well, if that's what you need or what are you even experiencing when you do those drills and how are they going to impact and what are you responding to. Right. And so it's like it can't be this one size fits all and finding your unique user manual that is rooted in your principles, your beliefs, that's that's a massive that will change your complete trajectory without a doubt . It’ll change your whole life.

TJ:

It'll change your whole life. I mean, it's it's I mean, you touched on it. It's like some of the most fulfilling and fun work. Like I see it as it's all it's all play, right? It's all curiosity, we're all just trying to figure it out. It's like that's my whole sign off, to stay curious. I think that is the essence of how you really make life more fun and interesting. And growth, right?

You have to stay curious if you want to keep growing. There's always a blind spot. Well, the thing you got back to I heard the other day is like there's this we try and there's this contradiction where we want to learn and grow, but at the same time we want to know exactly what we're doing. And you can see it contradicts itself.

You kind of let go of the fact that you never really know what you're doing if you want to continue to learn and grow. And so it's getting over that fear, whatever is holding you back in that space and just surrendering to, you know, what is. And it's not to say you're not playing an active part in surrender. It's that you’re going to only control what I can control.

I'll continue to open myself up to opportunities.

CM:

Yeah, beautiful, beautiful mindset and very clear how that would apply in all in all scenarios. Okay, so from that, so amazing. What an inspiring journey where you are. And no doubt that it'll just continue to grow and evolve in who knows how, right? Because you're going to be approaching it with that spirit of curiosity.

My experience, obviously owning one of my businesses is the brick and mortar school where we work with so many youth, I tend to come with always a level of curiosity about people's early years because I get to see firsthand kind of how early formative experiences really have this ripple effect through adulthood, through the way that you want to impact the world throughout the rest of your life.

So I'm just curious, with all of this focus around high performance, do you have an earliest memory or any pivotal moment that comes to mind that you remember around performance, whether that being something, you know, we have heartbreaking experiences where you kind of had to get back up again or something, that you were just so charged up and you said, I love this. I want to learn more about this. Do you have an early memory that comes to mind around performance?

TJ:

Let's see. It's interesting. What comes up first for me is where I think I got my curiosity from, which I think will then lead into performance. So my Grandfather on my Dad's side was an engineer for NASA and he worked on some really cool projects.

And I remember very early in my childhood going over to their house in Palo Alto, California, and going and playing in his garage. And it was like the ultimate candy shop of tools and engines being ripped apart and electronics and woodworking and like all this crazy stuff. And I just remember spending hours and he did not care what I did.

He just let me run loose, tear things apart, try to put it back together, which never worked. I’d take something apart and it just never worked in the same way, which is kind of cool because that creates something different. So that's where I think a lot of the curiosity came from. And for me, the performance, I think one of the earlier memories for me was really around in high school where I became I kind of realized I was athletic, athletic enough to be good at football, wasn't excellent, but I was good enough.

And that curiosity, again, I was playing American football and realizing like, Well, we're not really getting a lot of physical training and there’s a lot I could improve in X, Y and Z in the sport. So let me go figure it out myself. So I ended up like reading books and trying to understand training, and I think that's like kind of the shift.

And I was like, I'm actually kind of good at this. Yes. And then being able to share that with my teammates and they're like, You're actually kind of good at this, so maybe there's something there. And so that's really I think what started to take me down that track. Very interesting. It's almost like you wanted to see what made what made the outcome, what put it all together and you pulled apart the pieces just like you did with all the NASA gear.

And you know, it's funny, right? Yeah, it's so funny because so much of the coaching that I do now is really looking for patterns. Yes. And I talked earlier about like the chunking of down a lateral chunking, you know, when an individual is sharing a specific story about something that's challenging that they're trying to work through.

A lot of what we're doing is problem solving, and I can't solve that problem for them. What I can do is ask questions that help them unpack whatever that problem is, not necessarily why it's there, but how are they doing this problem? They have an active part in that. So part of that is being able to elicit the story and whatever it is, chunk down and say, okay, what is the pattern that's happening in the story?

Then chunk up and say, okay, now that we understand this pattern, where else is this pattern showing up? Lateral chunk to that, chunk down, expand. So we kind of extract all these different pieces and say, okay, is this actually the real problem? And they're like, my God, yeah, it is all over the place. I'm like, okay, let's fix it.

CM:

Beautiful. That's brilliant teaching. But really across the board, I'm sure that would apply in all your sports as well. It certainly applies in how we teach music right? So beautiful, so aligned with your with what you've shared there. So with this, this podcast, for example, I named it Music Mindset for that exact reason, it's like, well, it's not specifically about music, it's about how this mindset and the way that you train and the things that you learn about yourself, how it transfers throughout everything that you do, the way you train, the way you practice, the way you approach challenges, right?

So with that, I know just mindset is such a general term. When you think about like the NFL players, you know, the leaders, the gamers and the startup founders, all these people who are really leaning towards this high performance, was there a really key similarity in their personality or mindset that comes to mind of like, how would you describe these people?

Like, are they would you say they're type-A? Are they very creative? Are they like, in your experience, is there that common thread in their personality and kind of mindset essentially?

TJ:

Sure. Yeah, I would say there's different levels to it, right? Just like anything else. Some of the best performers are the ones that have a deep sense of self-awareness, and I think that is the one commonality across the board is they and they may not be able to articulate it, if that makes sense.

Like they just know within themselves, like, yes, this works really well for me and I'm not quite sure why, and that's okay. But like this, this is why I do it this way, because it works really well for me. So just they have this general sense of awareness, whether it's the kinesthetic awareness, moving their body in space or just cognitive awareness or just being able to draw on their senses to create this richness in their environment. That definitely stands out to me.

And I think the other part of it too, is they're this kind of goes in line with the awareness if they're reflective. Like they actually look at how their performance, whether it was positive or negative, there are always lessons. So one is having awareness. Two is the intentionality to say okay with this awareness, what can I do with that. And I think that's a very interesting piece where if you don't apply action to your awareness, then essentially it's only half the equation you can.

And I was actually having a conversation with my mentor about this meditation by itself is kind of just like a hack. You're just increasing your awareness, but you're not actually taking action on what's coming up or what's becoming available to you. And I still haven't quite wrapped my mind around all that yet. I just think it's interesting to throw out there and a lot of times when I work through stuff, I kind of workshop it real time, so you just got a taste of that.

CM:

So yeah, no. And it's beautiful. I mean, it reminds me of things like, like educational philosophies, like constructivism where it's like you need to experience it first, and then you become an active, you become an active participant in the growth when you later reflect on it. It's one thing to hear it and then, but it's very different to experience it and then do that reflective learning towards the experience.

And what I think is interesting is because I think when you like when I say those things, professional NFL players, world class gamers, startup tech founders, right. The things that come to mind are things like type-A, ambitious drive, work all night, you know, like those kinds of things that come up, which I know that there's always an element of.

But when you're saying kind of the key, the key factor that makes these people excellent is actually their ability to stop and reflect is kind of what I heard you say there. You know, I know it's a balance,

TJ:

But yes, I want investments, too, because I think there's a distinction between a high achiever and a high performer.

So a high performer is one that can increase their performance and extend out. So basically they have the longevity. And so to be a high performers, you can consistently perform at a high level time and time again. And with that you have to have recovery and reflection and understand what's working and what's not. High achiever, in my opinion, is almost like a flash in the pan.

You can grind. And get some success. But if you can't sustain that success, is that really success? I mean, it depends on how you define it. So what I've found with the awareness and the reflection is like some of the super vets, we call them super vets in the NFL, like the guys who've been around for like ten plus years.

They know how to regulate themselves in practice. They understand what food works best for them. They understand how to best process film when they're debriefing their own practice or games or when they're preparing for the next game. Same thing in gaming and Esports. Same thing in these CEOs and executives who understand that they're playing like 5D chess. In order to play a high level chess, you have to have pauses and reflection and understand strategy.

Then it's a combination of working in the business and working on the business. So there's always this interplay and one thing I’ll just state from my own perspective is I actually don't believe in balance, you know, like it's possible to hold anything in equal parts. But what I do believe in is harmony where the way I define it is you have the thing that you're focusing on in this season of life and you orient the rest of your life and variables around that and it just works.

It kind of flows with that. But what that does is it's a forcing function to uplevel your communication with other aspects of your life. Because if you just focus on one thing and that's the only thing you focus on, we're going to drop the ball. So the idea is to create harmony in whatever season of life that you're in.

And I think when you do that, it takes the pressure off. I need to balance everything, which is so hard. Yeah, I don't think it's possible.

CM:

Yeah, you know what, that's such a beautiful distinction. So first of all, see the difference between the high achiever versus high performer. I love that. That's going to stick with me for sure.

So thank you for that distinction. And then it's interesting when you say balance versus harmony, because those terms have very similar and synergistic meanings in music, right? So when I think balance in music, for example, I don't actually think of symmetry as having equal parts, right? It's about finding that balance of what's at the forefront, what supports what we hear, what projects.

Right. And so it's what you said I think I'll agree with and support. It's like finding that harmony. So balance is actually finding where it all kind of fits together, where the whole orchestra can play and some are supporting, some are projecting through. I think that's beautiful and I love hearing that come through.

When you think about because you mentioned earlier, it's more challenging to coach a team that is on a losing streak than a winning streak, which I believe when it comes from a standpoint like I've worked with organizations and within organizations, what do you find is the change that has to take place when you're coaching these teams to kind of maintain that that drive that collective drive towards a common goal when you are not doing so great or having a losing losing season?

TJ:

Yeah, I’ll speak for me and my experience and actually what was modeled to me from my mentors in that space, what it really takes is consistency and showing up and being the same person every day, regardless of the wins and losses.

Because I think what that does is it models what's possible despite external circumstances. Like I said, I was never the guy who would be like super rah rah, and I was always just, even keeled. Now, don't get me wrong, we score. We had a great play, of course I’d be fired up, but it was tempered to match the energy and actually counterbalance the energy of what was happening around me.

And that was just what was modeled to me by my mentor And I really that resonated because he actually had said to me, he goes, you need to be the complement to what else is happening. So if there's super high energy, you need to be able to hold the line and contain the energy. If it's super low, you need to be able to kind of bring them up.

But you're not getting so high, right? You're trying to bring them along because they will go as you go. Yeah. And so actually that's really what stuck out to me from that mentor specifically is they will go as you go. So if you are consistent, regardless of the highs and lows, they will go as you go. So they will follow and continue to chip away and just continue to show up because that's what you need them to do.

CM:

And it comes back to that same trusting of the process, right? Like whatever the outcome may be at this time, it doesn't change that you continue to reflect back, continue to grow, continue to look for those blind spots even when you're doing well, right? I mean, sometimes when well it’s like, we're done, we've landed, we're, you know, but then that's when you start resting on your laurels and you start to fall back on those things.

Right. And there's always more that can be done and more to learn for sure.

TJ:

Yeah. Well, one more thing on that point if I can is, you know, there's always lessons in winning and losing, even with winning there are ways to win really well there's ways to win pretty poorly. And it's important. Sometimes winning can mask a lot of dysfunction. of what's underneath the hood.

So if you don't come at both from an objective standpoint to say, okay, what's really the gold in the lesson here? You could be missing out on a lot. And the same is true for the flip side of losing. There's pros and cons to losing. So it's just an important thing, which I would imagine is true across all performing, whether it's music and sports, because again, it's all information and feedback.

CM:

Absolutely. Absolutely. A question on that with just having coached many different team players and seeing that team dynamic as well. If you had to vote, I mean, this comes from probably more of a business hiring standpoint. If you had to bring on someone, if you had the opportunity to coach someone with high skill, but then maybe high ego, maybe not the best mindset versus low skill and low ego that you can kind of coach a little that's a little bit more coachable.

Who would you rather work with? I've got some follow up questions for you for more context.

TJ:

Okay. Does do both people have the aptitude to improve? So I guess it's more specifically the person with low skill. Do they have a high aptitude to increase their skills because some people are capped? It's true.

So it comes from a place and the belief that people can be coached, but it depends on their mindset of if they're coachable. Right so if they’re receptive to that coaching. And then my other question would be like, where are we in the business cycle? And I guess like that doesn't matter as much as to say I would choose the person with the lower skill and the better mindset because you can teach skills, for sure.

But what you can't, what's harder to teach or unteach is somebody's ego and get them to be a team player and develop a sense of trust. And I think a lot of that comes from if you look at the military and special operations and their selection process. Often they're not really looking for the person with the greatest skill set.

They're looking for the person that can develop the most trust in the teamwork and the ability to maintain composure under stress because they can teach skills all day. And it's really the qualities of the individual that matter. And how well can you mesh with your team? And I think that's what's most important. So it's selecting for that because you can teach anybody skills, you can teach everyone, anybody that.

CM:

Thank you for that. That's, that's great. So in an earlier discussion that we had, I found it really interesting that you mentioned in your coaching that you use terms like and concepts of tempo, rhythm, harmony. You've already mentioned on this call orchestration, and that those are central themes. And I know when I started tennis lessons, for example, I was so kind of pleased that it talked a lot about beats and rhythms and the sound of hitting the ball with a certain type of swing, you know, all those things.

So tell me more about that. Just how did musical elements tie into just how you orchestrate these outcomes for the people that you work with? If it's matter of the terms you use or the analogies that you give them, is it something that permeates more than I might realize?

TJ:

Yeah, totally. So I think it started when in back when I was coaching in college and I was writing our programs for for all the American football team.

And so it was like our varsity team and I was writing programs and again, influence from my mentor who was very much into classical music, and he was very much into having like identifying like the rhythm and tempo cadence because there is a rhythm and tempo to the game, but the game of football can actually be broken down into series sets and reps.

If you look at the amount of activity, the amount of rest, the amount of series and how that compounds over the 60 minute game it’s series sets and reps. And so that became part of how I would reverse engineer a lot of our programing. So it was all position specifics. So we have our bigs which are O-line and D-line, our midfield linebackers, tight ends and then are skill players with like a wide receivers and DBS and such and each one of those player, like each one of those positions have different rhythm tempo, and so it was trying to understand like how can we put them in a position to be successful in the competition itself by reverse engineering or coming up with derivatives of like exposure to those same rhythm, tempo and such.

And so that's kind of how I would fold into their conditioning and their training program and even, you know, the cadence of our workouts themselves, really thinking like, okay, if this was a song, what is like my intro? What's like the crescendo and how do I lead them out of it?

Like, how do I want them to lead, how often to feel? And that's very much how I approach my coaching sessions now. Now, granted, it's very less scripted because a lot of times you get to meet the people where they're at and what's in the room. And overall, you know, there's a rhythm to it. And there's a cadence to our calls and there's a rhythm to how we're communicating, and there's also rhythm in my tonality and how I'm talking to somebody if they're really freaking out, if they're going through something hard, you know, it's like I match

And then I drop them down, it's like a meet them where they’re at and I bring them down, or I might bring them up or bring them left or right. It doesn't matter. And so there's very much that musical element in it. And yeah, and then also I listen to a lot of music every day when I'm writing programs for when I was writing programs for my athletes in different phases of training, I listen to different types of music because I'm like, this is the feeling that I want them to have when we’re training.

And now when I write programs or I think about bigger kind of strategy sessions, I have different types of music that kind of get me in that zone.

CM:

And so, of course I have to ask what music for, what zone, because different music also can change your heart rate, your cortisol. You don't have to do specifics, but like, do you have a certain style where you'll listen to something during a program versus getting geared up for coaching sessions or I'm of course curious to know.

TJ:

For me, I love EDM or different genres of EDM because what I find is like again, it's like it's this integration of all these different types of flavors and textures of music. So it's all over the place with EDM. I also love classical music, I love classical guitar and I love flamenco guitar. So it really depends on what I'm feeling and also how I’m feeling on that day.

It's also to meet me where I'm at and be like, You know what? I'm a little bit low on energy, but let me kind of, I got to get juiced up to write this program. So let me give me something big.

CM:

Yeah. Beautiful Beautiful. I read one of your posts, so I connected with you on LinkedIn. For our listeners and readers, I really enjoy your posts on LinkedIn so you can follow Taylor on LinkedIn to connect with these posts as well. But a recent one said that stood out to me that you don't like the term peak performance, that you try to avoid that.

So that was really, you know, even preparing for our call today, I was thinking, okay, peak performance, peak performance. And I said, this is again a very interesting reframe which I think is very valuable. And I think it would be really worthwhile for our listeners, especially, I think in all fields, but especially when something when there’s sort of a sequence to how you're training in your early years and you get to a point and you kind of go like, have I peaked?

Am I at peak performance? Am I, you know, am I there yet to kind of that idea, So I'm curious if you'd share your thoughts on that.

TJ:

Yes. Yeah, I, I think we should strive and I'd be careful with the word like should, first off, I think nobody should do anything. It's either you could or you couldn’t. You choose or you don't.

Right. And that's totally fine. And I would encourage people to aim for optimal over peak. And the reason being is that I see different individuals that are really like peak performance all day, like strive for peak performance. But what happens is like when you hit your peak throughout the apex, you have to come back down. Exactly. And so the question becomes like, what are you peaking for?

And I think when you are chasing peak performance on a daily basis, actually what you're doing is you're not giving yourself the time and space to rest and recover and you're never really going to push your potential or push the envelope your capacity to increase your potential. I like to encourage people to aim for optimal, and what that means is identifying your upper and lower threshold.

So yes, you're going to push yourself to the edge. You're going to feel what that edge of capacity feels like you're also going to feel like the bottom and you're just kind of doing nothing and you're trying to find a sweet spot in between. And when you do that, you know you're able to one, you're developing a sense of awareness, like, you know, what is too much.

You know, look, that edge is so that if you need to go to that edge, you can go there and you know what it's like to stand right on the toes hanging over it, But you're not jumping off. Yes. And on the flip side, you understand what is the minimum, I call them BAM's like your bare ass minimum.

Like, what is your BAM's level of activity to get things done? If you need to completely drop everything that you're doing and just set the minimum, you know what that feels like, too. So when you play in this range, that gives you this operational output. And I think when people do that, what they end up finding is they're able to accomplish a lot more than they think because they're able to recover. They’re able to actually maintain a higher level of output for a longer period of time, which is what I'm saying is what a high performer is.

And then when you do that, then you choose to peak when it matters most because you can understand what your game day is and that every day is not your game day. You're being strategic about when and where are you placing those maximum bouts of effort and how are you working backwards from that? And so this is what kind of pulling the line from sports is in physical sports.

We're really good at working backwards from game day. So when I coached in the NFL we planned all of our training sessions from either our Sunday or Monday game, and we worked backwards from that. And so it's the same thing in gaming and Esports, but not from a physical sense. From a cognitive sense. So when we play our games, how do we make sure that we load ourselves and give ourselves enough space to recover such that on game day, we can be at our very best?

Now, in our, you know, desktop jobs or our business athletes is what I call them. We don't really do that very well. We don't understand. And we think every day is game day. And so when you're chasing your peak performance every single day inevitably you're going to burn yourself out.

CM:

So valuable. Thank you for that. It's also in line with another question that I had, so I'll go straight to it because it's so related is that, you know, in performance, in music performance, we have our practice, we have our practice performances. And then, of course, again, we're preparing for that, that live performance where you're on stage and everything kind of counts.

How do you recommend that your players, for example, like some of the things that you shared, Is it about having that cadence? Is there a set framework? I imagine you're going to say no. There's no one size fits all for everyone. Is it about finding your threshold and figuring out how you ramp up to those game days, those performances in the things that you do before?

Because there is a tendency in music performance, for example, it's right before performance You start looping and performing too much and kind of racing through it. Let me try it again. Let me try it again. And it's like, no, that's actually going to have the opposite effect, right? Do you have something that works for athletes that you can share with us?

TJ:

Yeah. Yeah, totally. Yeah, you're right. My answer would be like, it depends because everybody's so different. And so the way I, the way I like to frame it, which pulls in some of the inspiration from sports and then blends that with product development. So like the Scrum or Agile system where essentially you're working in sprints and I made a post about this too, where it's, it's more about being intentional with your effort and then having intentional recovery.

So if you know that you have a music performance coming up. I mean, one is understand like, do you have a pre performance routine? On the front end, what is your what is it like a couple of days before? What is it like the day of what is it like after? Like how do you decompress, recover what your debrief look like?

You understand that piece of it? And then you say, okay, if I were to work backwards from that, how much, how many weeks or how many months am I from this performance? And then what are the cycles that I can run through. Maybe it's a one week or two week sprint where you're kind of building up your capacity, your practicing different aspects of it and you get a little bit of rest and recovery and then you build build build and then you recover and then you build build build and then you recover.

And so a lot of times with the individuals that I work with, we're running these like sprint cycles and I call them sprints because that's what we use in product development. And they understand like it's a bout of effort. intentional bouts of effort, followed by a bout of recovery. Rest recovery, and then also reflection.

And so I think if you do that and it's very similar to sport where we would run, you know, anywhere between 2 to 6 week training cycles, depending on where we're at in season. So load, load, load, three weeks on one week, reload, three weeks on one week reload. And so if you look at the time horizon, if you kind of zoom out, it's this projectory of like upward growth and increasing your capacity with very intentional breaks to give yourself time to rest in recovery.

And the other thing I'll say to this kind of speaks to your point about the looping and overdoing it. This is taken from track and field where a lot of times people are really there's four things there’s stimulate, adapt, stabilize and actualize. We're really good at simulating or adapting. We're not very good at stabilizing.

I was going to say. - Four? What do you mean four?. Yeah, exactly right. So and I think that's really important to know. And it's really important to know about yourself. Because the time that you spend in each one of those phases is really dependent upon who you are at this stage of your life and your skills and your determination, the things that you want to accomplish and stimulate, adapt, for sure.

And then you've got to be able to stabilize that new growth of that skill set and really test and tinker and to kind of poke holes in what you got to then actualize with that real performances and then get back into tank or the think tank and practice and and stimulate adapt again and then stabilize and actualize.

CM:

Beautiful. So valuable. Thank you very much for sharing that. Very, very valuable. So this ties in so at every stage of what we've talked about today, you talk about the importance of that recovery and that rest and reflection, which I love and I think is so important that reflective learning, but then that also reflection for self awareness for being strategic about what your next steps are.

So from a physical standpoint, so I know from as musicians, we're often we'll talk about how we're doing so much. It's very physically demanding, but with these kinds of micro movements and micro muscles, whereas you may not be seeing the whole macro movements, but there's so much happening at such a fast pace. When you mentioned that neuroscience program that the gamers use, I was thinking, musicians would love that because there's so much that's happening.

But just in these small, small fires, I always advocate in the importance of sleep, nutrition, water, right? People will, you know, get close to performance and then just kind of pull all nighters because they want to practice practice. And it's like, well, you're still your physical being. You have to care for your body. For performers who are, you know, will spend an hour or more on stage performing something that's very demanding cognitively and physically, very complex for memory, that they have to pay attention, keep their focus, all of these things.

What would you say? The most important thing is, along with everything that you've shared, to keep specifically our bodies performing optimally? Like, do you think if is it a matter of make sure that you also do weight training, make sure that you get a certain amount of sleep. Are there certain foods? I know that's all very broad, but just for our physical, our true instruments are our bodies for our output as well.

TJ:

Right. Yeah. I love that you bring this up. The first thing I would say is, is sleep. Life is way easier when you see I'm such a sleep person. Yeah, it's so important, right? It's like your tactical decision making, your ability to articulate. You know, it's oftentimes I've worked with individuals in the past, like for them when they don't get sleep.

It is a lot of different factors that go into it. But it's like pushing your thoughts through Jello. And if you're a high performer and you're whether it's you're a pianist or you're a gamer or you're a CEO, you know, closing deals, you need to have clarity of thought. And so sleep is it's free. Newsflash. It's free.

The thing about that is it's. It's a skill. Like, sleeping is a skill. And we're not taught really how to sleep. And part of that journey comes back to the awareness of understanding what sleep hygiene is. And what does that look like for you? And are you the type of person who needs a little bit more or less time to get in that zone of sleep or that like the space or the mindset of sleep?

Like it is a mindset and it's a skill. So sleep is the first one I think the other one is, you know, obviously with the food that we put in our bodies, definitely it's going to impact our cognitive output and also just our physical body and our energy and being very mindful of the food that we eat. And I don't subscribe to any one diet.

I say whatever makes you feel the best, like go with that. And the caveat being, you know, try to limit sugar and things like this. And you can get very granular with that, with the cognitive athletes specifically, you know, the gamers. We were really interested in exploring different types of nutrition diets and supplementation for them and all those things.

Yeah, totally. But the basics is just eat some good food, real food, drink some water, food, drink some water, you know, stop at 80% full. Yeah. And, you know, be mindful about how you're spacing out your meals. Hydration is a big one too. And then you talk about physical movement. And I can appreciate that there's probably a lot of similarities between gamers and musicians, and it's a lot of posture, right?

It be a lot of posture because I understand, you know, different instruments. And so for that, you know, the with the gamers, we didn't put them on our barbell and have them squat or do super heavy weight. It's like, what is the actual competition environment and positions that they need to be in and how do we allow them to do that longer And without hurting?

It's a lot of corrective exercise. And yes, you want to do some strength training just for general health and wellness for longevity purposes. But really it's about understanding how do you unwind them in certain positions because let's say, you know, a lot of gamers, their backs will start to hurt because they're sitting for a long period of time.

Yeah, well, if you're sitting for long periods of time, your hip flexors get super tight and when your hip flexors get tight is this thing called reciprocal inhibition where if your hips are tight, your glutes will turn off when your glutes are supposed to be the primary stabilizers of your back posterior chain. If your glutes are off, then your hamstrings and your low back take over and that's why you have back pain.

So they’ll try to stretch their back but it’s like dude it’s not your back, it’s your hips. So it's, it's trying to understand like, hey, what are the positions I'm going to be in? How do I allow myself to do this more comfortably and for longer so that I can be the best at what I want to do?

CM:

Brilliant advice. On that same note, you know, we've got the physical aspect and our outputs are what we're relying on. But do you notice, like, if you're having that off day, like, for example, I love what you just said about sleep being a skill because I value sleep so much. But then sometimes the night before a performance, you kind of put all this pressure on yourself to have to get a good night's sleep and then you end up getting insomnia that night.

Right. And what you said there is like, well, I guess not if you've actually practiced sleep as a skill, if you're kind of hoping for it to be like an output of chance, that's, you know, from how you do all your other skill building. No, it's a skill that you need to build. So that's a huge light bulb that came up went on for me right there.

So thank you. Do you notice, do you have experience with yourself or with athletes or gamers that you train, that really your mindset will be what impacts the physical outputs? Like you can do all the things right, but if you aren't in the right frame of mind, is there a way that you can ensure that you stay in that frame of mind so it doesn't have any negative impact to your physical results?

TJ:

Yeah, Yeah. The big thing that I've been spending more time practicing myself and also working with clients on is equanimity. And by that is like the ability to remain cool, calm, collected, regardless of what was happening around you. And it's this game between observation and entanglement. And my mentor is the one who's been really work with me on this.

He's very brilliant with psychology. It's this game between observation entanglements actually is are you able to merely observe the thoughts that you have? So this is kind of like the awareness of meditation. Are you able to merely observe the thoughts that you have or do you latch on to become entangled and get caught up in the story, the loop or whatever narrative that you're creating and like, it's okay, you're human, it's going to happen, but the game becomes, how quickly can you catch that thought, that entanglement, and come back to a place of neutrality?

And so it's this combination. And then from that place, like what did you learn in that moment and how can you create more useful knowledge so that the next action that you take is in alignment or commitment towards the ultimate goal and values that you've set out for yourself? And so it's this interplay between awareness and action. And the action comes from creating knowledge.

And when you can do this, then essentially you can take it out to the extremes. But anything that could happen will happen. There is no there's nothing that's impossible that won't happen. So it's like when you kind of get that nothing can phase you. And that's just practice. Now I'm not at that point,Right. Like things still throw me off and I'm like, that's really interesting.

I thought that I'd be able to regulate myself and have that not impact me, and it did. Cool. Why is that? And I start unpack that for myself. And so it's this game of awareness and action. Yeah, And that's that reflective growth again, that curiosity of like, that's interesting. I thought I would have been okay with that and not what can I learn through that and how can I reflect on that and wait until the next time it comes up?

Right. It's that same curiosity that you've shared. Yeah, it is and one more thing I'll add to that is sometimes it's not even the why like the why doesn't really matter. What's more important is like, how am I doing that pattern? Because sometimes what you need is a pattern interrupt to do something different. Yeah, because we become conditioned to just follow with the patterns and loops that we're in.

So even if I catch myself in a thought or if we're working through with a client, and he catches himself in that thought it's like what led them to that thought? Not really the Why behind it? Because we're going to think the thought regardless of that. But that thought particular, can we catch that pattern, interrupt it for things to happen different. And that becomes very useful knowledge.

CM:

Very, very interesting. Very valuable. And another very big distinction that you've given me a light bulb on today. So thank you for that, Taylor. Really great. Kind of a practical thing is, do you have a limit, I'm curious for athletes that you work with or gamers or anyone to the time, because I know it's not always time based, but when it comes to practice, like practice is a common thread in all of these different any kind of skill building in any kind of growth, right.

And building the skill of sleep versus NFL versus piano, is there a time limit where you think you really your optimal performance starts to decrease? Like we'll often say you shouldn't practice more than 4 hours a day. Some people practice 8 hours a day and they say they need that much, or does it also depend on the person?

TJ:

Yeah, my answer is always going to be it depends, I think. And again, for and for clarity, you know, I don't really work with a lot of athletes and gamers anymore, primarily working with like these business athletes which is the CEOs and executives and even still like back then, I think what what's interesting about like when I reflect back on by my time in traditional sports, specifically the NFL, the people who were in it longer, the guys who'd been around for a long time, they actually auto regulated themselves in practice.

And what was interesting is, like coaches would be like, oh he’s sandbagging. And I'm like, No, actually what he's doing is he's regulating himself because he knows that he needs to flip the switch come game day. So it's this balance again, coming back to awareness of like knowing how much to push and when. And I think in gaming what we noticed we did because we had a ton of data and research on is looking at people that play our game.

What was the drop off point in performance And it kind of varied, but typically, depending on how many repetitions these were one minute very fast paced games, you know, typically after, you know, 30 minutes of playing nonstop, the performance would dip just a little bit. So it's like, hey, if we were to give him a little bit of a break and then get him back into it, could they keep that going for longer?

And so again, it comes back to just knowing who you are and how you operate and really be honest with. There is a point of diminishing returns. So what does that point for you?

CM:

Brilliant. And I think, again, that that rest and recovery. But then knowing how to make it sustainable, right. It's like it's not just about putting it all out to get those 8 hours in a day.

You might be able to do that, but after two months, you're probably going to be pretty fried. You'll be toast. You know, when we spoke earlier and previously had said, like, self-awareness is the key to performance. And I really think that you've given a lot of context to that really great insight. Do you experience either athletes, gamers, CEOs who experience a fair bit of performance anxiety?

And if so, is that addressed mainly through that self-awareness and that exploration of where it's coming from, what the root of it is. Or do you have I'm sure won't be a clear one size fits all path but your your insight on that.

TJ:

Yeah, totally. So I think there's a couple of ways to approach it. I'll use an example of an individual that I was working with who very successful VP in the fashion industry.

Worked with some amazing outerwear company outdoor companies and then went through a series of layoffs. And in that he, you know, developed some anxiety about like what's going to come next for me and ended up having a job interview series of interviews and end up getting another job. But part of that was like this performance anziety of going into the interview.

And so for him, you know, it's understanding the root of this anxiety is one thing. Then also noticing what he would do is always jump to the negative outcomes. So for some individuals, a easy shift is saying, okay, well what is a positive outcome? Like what is the desire that you actually want to have happen? And if you were to create that and visualize that and see what you see here, what you hear and feel what you feel in that moment of a successful outcome, what are all the things there that would not have anxiety even show up?

And I think this is talking to somebody through that is very helpful in other ways, like your fear setting exercise is like, what's the worst thing that could happen? That's kind of the opposite. Yeah. Another is, you know, sometimes anxiety or performing under pressure comes from just a lack of preparation.

And so if you really prepare and you're confident your abilities and also trust the process that comes out to, Yes, I'm giving you a couple of different answers because everybody's little bit different.

The situation and then another one is, you know, what are these are hacks for sure, but what are the ways in which you can down regulate or up regulate? Because sometimes anxiety can have a down regulate like you're very flat or very low and you kind of amp yourself up or you can be overstimulated. And so there's kind of like this framework that kind of ties on the senses where it's like five performance tips under under 5 minutes and my buddy

David came up with this framework and I kind of riffed on it. The first one is, you know, take 5 minutes and just and you can do box breathing. So 4 seconds and four second, hold four second, exhale for a second pause. And that rhythmic breathing and rhythm right at its core, it's causing your body does Down regulated On the flip side, if you need to up regulate, you could do a double inhale or sorry, that's that's still down, ready to shoot.

It's double inhale and slow Exhale. It's very fast in the moment. So it's actually and then it back. So that's the down regulate.Anytime you do that and exhale longer than an inhale, it's going to cause the parasympathetic to kick on your diaphragm, slow things down and you could flip by just breathing. Like kind of like wim hof breathing where it's a very fast they call breath of fire and yoga where it'll ramp yourself up.

Another tool is listening to music and understanding what are the playlists that get you amped up or calm you down and know what your sweet spot is for that. Another one is visualization. Visualizing a successful outcome or visualizing you stepping into that arena or you stepping on stage and you going through your whole routine and what happens pre before, during and after.

And what's interesting about visualization is people tend to just call on one of the senses. There’s really like there's seven, right? So you have your eyesight so eyes, hearing, touch, smell, taste, but you also have motion like are you moving through space and you also have emotion. You have seven things to play with with your visualization. So you really want to get at least three of those in motion, like playing together.

So whether it's like what you see, what you're hearing, what you're feeling and then are you moving in space, what does that feel like? And then the other one is it might be different for, you know, musicians because your hands are actually doing something, but like kinesthetic or grounding touch, right? So like trying to through the ridges of your fingertips or like pressing your toes into the ground, sometimes when you’re over regulated, all you need is just like ground yourself and be where your fear are at just kind of ground yourself by squeezing your toes like, yeah, right here.

CM:

Those are brilliant examples. And I love that there's a wide variety between how we can shift what's happening in our minds to what's happening physiologically in our bodies. Right? And again, I imagine coming at it from a place of curiosity and testing out which ones you need at different times. And that always grows in your self awareness because you can respond to what you need. Beautiful.

So I know that we are in performance based fields, right? So it's kind of very right front and center that, you know, growing your skills, being ready for that optimal performance is kind of top of mind. For those who aren't in performance fields. I believe ultimately we all have this innate drive to reach our full potential.

You know, Maslow's hierarchy of needs, we're all reaching towards that self-actualization. But if it might not be so clear, how can people start to reach towards their full potential in any field ? If there's one piece of advice that you could give them of how they can get started or move forward on that path, what would it be?

TJ:

Ooh, it's a good one. It's a big one, I would say, for whatever area of life that they want to get some traction or movement in getting very clear on what your values are, what is it you value in that area? And it's actually more than just writing your values down on a piece of paper. And it's definitely more than just like picking some words from like some of those value programs that you have online or whatever.

You know. What I mean by that is go through that conversation with somebody else and have them ask you, So I'll play this game with you if you're open to it. So what area would you like to elicit some values on, I guess health, health, physical health. So awesome. So physical health. So what's most important to you about physical health?

Honoring. Honoring the vessel that I've been gifted to move through this world for Awesome. What else? Impacting others through my example demonstrating, demonstrating the way that I honor myself so that it will impact my children and those around us. And what else do you value? An area of physical health, Longevity. Enjoy enjoying my time here, truly, and wanting to stay here as long I can guess what else do had sleep, rest and recovery that came up lots today.

And my friends and my friends will tell you I'm obsessed with my Oura ring tracker and getting high scores on that sleep, rest and recovery again. Yep. And what does sleep rest recovery allow you to do in the area of physical health? Rejuvenate. Come back as my best self input more in the ways that I want to to have impact. Awesome.

So your body is a vessel of impact longevity. I heard impact quite a bit. So you see like even just having somebody ask you, it's very different than you just picking from a list of cards or, you know, selecting from a computer program. And the reason why I say that's important is because consciously it's very easy for us to come up with something.

But subconsciously, if you were to really dig and ask questions and to tease it out, there's so much more there and when you can really elicit a true set of values, values will drive your beliefs about your model of the world and what you choose to filter in terms of your deletion generalization, generalizations and to and how you're processing information.

And that informs your behaviors. So if you get a clean set of values or a clear set of values, it'll help give you a roadmap for what actions you can take and at least gives you some some direction to take one step and then get on that step and then get the feedback and see where it takes you. Yeah, right.

Yeah, yeah. So it all comes back to values.

CM:

Beautiful. Taylor What is music to you? I was thinking about this. You know, the first thing that came up when I was there was, like, music is life. It is this universal language that connects us all. And it's all around us. If you think about, like, the universe, you know, one verse songs like one song so connects us all together.

And that's a very beautiful thing. And it's this super adaptable, flexible language that allows us to articulate how we're feeling, even if we can't even put words to it.

CM:

Beautifully said. Beautifully said. Thank you so much, Taylor. This has been an absolute gift. All of your insights, all of your perspectives, the way that you are moving through the world and living through your example of all the ways that you impact different fields.

Thank you for sharing that with us today. How can our listeners find you, where can they find you?

TJ:

Yeah, well, first, thanks so much for having me on. It's been a pleasure and amazing sharing space with you. TaylorJohnsonPerformance.com is my website and then follow me on LinkedIn That's where I do all my posting.

CM:

Beautiful and we'll make sure the links to that are in the notes to the show and thank you again thank you for joining us on the Music Mindset podcast.

We look forward to learning more about what you are going to be bringing into the world. Thanks so much. Thanks, Taylor.