92: How to Unlock Flow State in Your Business

Behind Their Success: Episode 92

[00:00:00] Paden: all man's problems come from the inability to just step by himself and do nothing.

Paden: Hello everybody. Welcome to Behind Their Success Podcast. I am Paden Squires, the

host, and today we are joined by Reuven Shelef, a visionary executive coach, management

consultant and founder of Out of the Box Consulting. With over 30 years guiding Fortune 500

leaders and innovators. Reuven

Reuven: experie,

Paden: expertise in organizational transformation and authentic leadership has helped

countless executives unlock their true potential.

Reuven, welcome on Behind Their Success.

Reuven: Hi Paden am really happy to be here. Yeah,

Paden: Yeah, absolutely Reuven. So tell us a little bit about what you do currently.

Reuven: Most of the time I'm untangling complex challenges now happens to be the name of

the methodology that I developed. And I coined the term just about 15 years ago, and I

trademarked it.

The essence of the work that I [00:01:00] do is a combination between what I learned as an

engineer, as a farmer, as a military guy, and, uh, field intelligence and, the engineering was in

startups and large corporations.

And then what I did was I, I fused all my professional learning and experience with my personal,

uh, journey of growth and development. And that culminated with, articulating.

This methodology, which is basically how I have been doing my management consulting work

for many years. And then it, uh, translated to also working with people regardless if they're in a,

if the company is hiring me or, or if they're hiring me personally.

Paden: Yeah. So unraveling complex, uh, problems. Huh? how do you begin to attack a

problem like that?

Reuven: The biggest, challenge that people have is that everything is in their mind.

when things are in our mind, it's all [00:02:00] convoluted and it's very hard To figure out what's

actually running the show.

Paden: Yeah.

Reuven: Too many thoughts, uh, and, and too many forces. And this is only our internal world.

I say us just generalizing human beings. Of course everyone is different. Uh, but if I, if I look at

the common denominator and I, I built this whole, methodology on my personal experience. So,

and, uh, learning from others as I worked with them. I allow myself to generalize, but of course

every person is different.

So when we start untangling, the first thing to do is to get it out of our head. And this is a

common practice. Uh, nothing, uh, nothing new People, know the term brain dump and, uh, we

could do a brain dump Of a specific person. We could do a brain dump, of a team, of a

collective, of a, group knowledge, whatever we're working with, we take all that convolution out

of our head and as we do that and put it on [00:03:00] paper or these days, you know,

electronic, uh, format,

Paden: Or ai. Right. Just

Reuven: More, more often. Yeah. I, you know, my, one of my dreams years, many, many years

ago was to develop an application that, you know, I'm an engineer. After all, I, I was thinking how

can I, how can I fetch all the thoughts that are running in my mind automatically because the

rate of thoughts is. Much faster than the rate I could articulate them.

So I'm missing out on many things. So I, I had this dream and I still have it, and to have this

technology that will document all the thoughts that a human has. It seems like we're getting

closer and

Paden: Not,

Reuven: it. It used to be a, a crazy fantasy, and now, you know, uh,

Paden: yeah. Now if you just carry AI around in your pocket, like, you know, almost, you know, if

you vocalize everything, like yeah, it's gonna know pretty much everything you think.

Reuven: Yeah. And, and, and if mu, you know, maybe [00:04:00] Musk already with his, uh,

chips, uh, implanted, maybe it's already working. I don't know. But in any case, it's extremely

powerful to simply articulate everything that's going on in our mind. Sometimes this is pretty

fascinating for some people. It's a very quick process, like a few minutes and they'll be done and

some will take hours. At a certain point, everything is out there and we can start working with it.

And of course, as we start working with everything that's outside of ourselves, Things keep on

popping, but much slower rate because whatever already we articulated is out there so we don't

have to repeat that. And sometimes it's, oh, did I mention that?

Yes, it's written there. And then the beautiful thing is, one of the next steps is we take everything

that's out there and group the items in different, uh, [00:05:00] groups or groupings and, and

then when. I have something else to, to put out there. I can already associate it with a specific

group and, and we start building intelligence around, okay, here's everything, but it's not just

convoluted mess.

It's starting to take shape and that's next step of the work's to distinguish issues, entities,

people, forces, what's actually going on. There is that, that that's the beginning. Just to answer

your, your question.

Paden: Yeah, yeah. And I, that's, you know, like you said, that's not, groundbreaking of ice or

anything. Like you said, kind of, kind of new, right? Like, it's like, you know, journaling, right? Or,

you know, you hear people. You know, suggest to do that. And it's, it is a simple thing. But here's

the thing, 99% of people don't do it.

So while it's very simple, people just don't take the action right.

Reuven: Yeah. And journaling, is a great tool. and I recommend journaling in the morning, first

thing in the morning. [00:06:00] And last thing before we go to sleep. However, journaling

typically people who journal, it's left at that.

So, you know, they journal and then of course they get the benefits of journaling, whether insight

or relief, et cetera. But the things that are, were written down typically stay where they're at.

Maybe one or two are dealt with kind of like a to-do list for tomorrow, if I forgot, are. We're

talking about a, a much more massive journal, so to speak, and then we, morph it into

something completely different from where it started.

Paden: And that's, you know, that's, that's some great work. And if, you know any of the

listeners haven't even tried doing those first steps of just trying to, you know, you have this

subject in your head and you're just rolling around with it over and over again, journaling that,

you know, a lot of the people and entrepreneurs I kind of run around with.

We've all. Try to hold each other accountable to this journaling type practice. Um, but it's

amazing, you know, you just sit [00:07:00] down a pen and paper and ask yourself one question

and you're not allowed to do anything for say, 15 minutes, except write down stuff about that

question. Um, and you can figure out a lot of stuff in that, in that time.

It's just, uh, it's a practice to develop because if you're kind of, you know, your typical kind of

hard driving entrepreneur, just setting, still not doing something, just being very hard to do.

Reuven: Yeah, I remember. I remember the time. it was just after I, I completed my military

service of four years. And, there were a few months until the semester started and there were

still a couple months before I, I was planning to, uh, to go abroad for a, for a backpacking trip.

And I found myself sitting in my parents' home on the sofa and I had nothing to do.

And it drove me crazy. Now, I was 22 years old with already a lot of experience in

multidisciplinary, [00:08:00] uh, uh, aspects of life, and I was just taken down by I don't know

what to do with myself.

Paden: Mm-hmm.

Reuven: Yeah, I couldn't, I couldn't handle the, the quiet, the, uh, and, uh, you know, if you

would ask me, and, and that's even before I studied engineering, but if you would ask me 20

years ago. if you would ask me, Hey, Reuven, are you spiritual?

I would tell you, what are you talking about? Spiritual? I'm an engineer. If I can't touch it with my

hands, it doesn't exist.

Paden: Yep.

Reuven: that's how I was. And then I, I went through a, a, a journey of, of learning and

experiencing that, that, um. That showed me how spiritual I am. And spirituality, by the way, for

me, has nothing to do with religion. it's my connection to the universe or however every, every

person can, can, um, define it or articulate it. Today when I have a, a moment of quiet, I cherish

it. It, it's the, it's the most creative time, it's the most [00:09:00] awesome time to be present with,

with nature, with, with a human being.

Just being that I didn't have the distinction of being,

I, I was a human doer, not, not so much a, a human being. So.

Paden: Yeah. And you're talking to a, I mean, you know, the whole listener group is probably a

bunch of human tutors. Right? everybody's wired a little different. And, and, and generally the

people that, you know, end up in entrepreneurship are very good at doing, and that's why they're

so successful and, and, and do all their stuff.

but I, I just pulled up a quote that I. Thought in my head is, uh, from Blaze Pascal. It says, all of

humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone, that all man's

problems come from the inability to just step by himself and do nothing.

and that's a superpower in today's world, really like the fact that.

The amount of distractions that we have just in our lives, you know, it's thousands of times as

much as it used to be, you know, [00:10:00] just, I don't know, a few generations ago. Um, the

ability to just ignore and block out the, the noise and, and, and focus on the things that you need

to focus on to move whatever you're trying to move forward.

That's, that's really a superpower

Reuven: And the, the tools also changed. So if in the past, the only way that was considered to

center and be present was meditation and sitting meditation, one of the reasons that I, I didn't

come close to meditating is because the only way to meditate that was presented to me that I

knew of is sitting meditation.

And I. I was always chubby. I couldn't even sit on my butt properly. In, in

Paden: I can't cross my legs

Reuven: I could. Exactly. So I couldn't even, even if when I wanted to, and you know, I went

sometimes on vacation, there was in the hotel or the, you know, come, um, meditate, woke up

early when, and I couldn't even sit, I couldn't take it.

So it took, it took a while until I was, I happened [00:11:00] to, To be exposed to forms of

meditation that aren't sitting meditation, and that enabled me. Step by step to start meditating. I

actually started meditating before I knew I'm meditating. That's pretty cool. So I started reaping

the benefits. So at the time that I understood, oh, this is a moving meditation, I thought it's just a

dancer is a whole story how I got into that.

But it was one of the first forms of meditation that I practiced and I was just letting my body lead.

And, uh, I enjoyed the music. It was, it's a discipline called Five Rhythms. It's a, it takes you

through a wave of, of different rhythms, so it's really fun. it's a whole experience, body, mind,

spirit experience.

And it doesn't matter where you start. Some people come in knowing that it's a meditation and,

and they, benefit from that part immediately. I had no idea what I'm going to. I just responded to

an invitation, a recurring invitation [00:12:00] from a good friend. And I found myself after a

while, noticing that I'm getting so many insights and deep, like I'm, I'm starting to cry in the

middle of the stance.

So I look what, why was I touched, what touched me, why was I moved there And it started just

like in any meditation or deep, Process work. I got to see things from my past that were

subconscious. I got to notice my, uh, limiting beliefs. Uh, what's in the moment, what's limiting

me? I, there are so many stories, so many insights, so many transformations that occurred

during that five rhythms practice.

And. That's just one form of meditation that is, you know, for, for maybe two years. My friend,

invited me to dance in Sausalito in 150 people dancing at 11:00 AM I said, what in a gym? It's

kind of like a JI said, are you crazy? [00:13:00] I'm not doing that. You know, you wanna go to a

disco, I'm a seventies guy.

Right? You wanna go to a disco at night? Okay. Uh, but why would I do that? And she was

persistent. And then when I, I showed up, it just

Paden: Yeah. When

you finally took the leap of faith and showed up open mind, you know, you're, wow. Changed

your life, right?

Reuven: So, and there, there are several things like that. And, and touching on, on the point

that you raised in today's life and your audience, there are tools today that, um, bring.

The essence of meditation in very small, commitment. Quantas. So if, so, some people say, oh,

that's fine. I meditate only 10 minutes every morning. 10 minutes for an entrepreneur is a, is a

long time, especially in the morning when they have to rush to their, burning, uh, issues. So

there is a technique, for example, that I, I got exposed to it actually, um, relatively recently, but I,

Loved it because it [00:14:00] brings so many aspects of, personal, uh, development, especially

for busy people and executives. It, it came out of Stanford, research and, uh, engineers actually

that, started this, um. This method, and it's an app, and basically you take what you already do

every morning, like wake up even before you get out of bed, brush your teeth, whatever, until

you go to the kitchen to prepare something to drink.

If you do that, that period of time, which could be several minutes on average. That is time that

can be used for meditation and, and this methodology teaches how to do that. And I fell in love

with it. I, I've been practicing it for about a year now, and, it gave me a, a level of, um, power

over my negative thoughts.

Like, if before I had to work a little bit harder to do it, oh, now it's given to me just by attaching

this, this [00:15:00] practice to my existing. Morning routine. Very

Paden: And yeah, my, my guess it's, it's super powerful there is, because you're kind of habit

stacking to a degree, right? Like, you do the same thing every single morning. So it's very easy

to like attach a new thing to that, right? And put it in that rhythm. Um, and then eventually, like

after a little bit like, well, and it's just part of your rhythm and you do it every morning without

thinking, right?

Reuven: Exactly. Habit stacking is, one of the keys in this, uh, in this, uh, aspect. Yeah.

Paden: you know, people talk about get your morning routine and everything altogether. And it's

not really necessarily, oh, because it's your morning routine, it's just morning.

It's easier to develop this really nice process that you stick to every day. But that's, you know, I

credit that for changing my life of like going to the gym and, and you know, my, my physical, like,

I think, you know, working out at the gym and that, and the sauna has really kind of become my,

like, meditative practice or at least

Reuven: one of

Paden: areas where can either like listening to some music or whatnot, but [00:16:00] really just

like, shut off my brain, right?

Like get into like a meditative

type state and let just things

Reuven: rise

Paden: the surface.

Reuven: Yeah. you know, I found in the past year, uh, something very surprising you What,

what, uh, triggered this, uh, this comment is when you said music. So, you know, my daughter

listens to music while she, Does work. she has some serious mind work and, and she listens to

music in parallel.

I can't do that. When I focus on my work, I need quiet. And then I found that for certain tasks, for

certain areas of work, I actually do things better with. Either music, a certain very specific kind of

music or even, certain, TED talks.

Paden: Mm-hmm.

Reuven: So I, it occurred to me that when I listen to a, I don't even have to [00:17:00] watch it.

When I listen to a TED talk, it fires certain areas in my brain. The creative parts of my brain that

help me draw fish out, memories or. Creative thinking aspects that don't come otherwise.

Paden: Yeah.

Reuven: That's very new, relatively new to me, and I, I am very excited. So I, I actually match,

you know, I, I match the physical environment.

I'll, I'll generalize it because this can be useful for anyone regardless of music or, or audio. It's

very important to match the physical environment to. The task at hand, and if the task at hand

might be to meditate, you know, it's not new that in the shower. Um, people are creative.

Paden: Yes, because they finally shut. Shut it off,

Reuven: shut it off.

And, and there is a physical sensation. So, so the common denominator, if you, if you look at

also meditation and, and forms [00:18:00] of visualizations, it's focusing on our five senses.

Paden: Yeah.

Reuven: And letting the six sense come in. So it's the physical environment that we actually use

when we meditate or when we put ourselves in situations that, that, uh, empower us through the

body.

The, the body mind connection is much, much greater than people tend to think. Mm-hmm. And

our body is, so vast with all our senses that it's a, it's a vehicle in which we can access. Areas of

our psyche or spirit or emotion through the body, just by placing our body in, uh, in certain

physical environments like hot mineral water, uh, baths in nature, especially in Big Sur.

A place called Dessaline is my all time favorite. You, you sit in this hot [00:19:00] water that

came right from Mama Earth, no treatment, and you're sitting. Above the ocean, so the waves

are breaking under you. So imagine all the sound, and sometimes you'll see whales and

dolphins and sea otters, but the immersion in hot water is so powerful and the sound, so that, so

you think of all the senses you have, the, the, the stink of the, of the sulfur.

Sometimes more than,

Paden: Yeah, more.

Reuven: other you have. You have the, the physical sensation of, of the hot water, and you can

vary the temperature by adding cold water. 'cause the, when it comes out of Earth, it's really hot

for advanced only. and then the, the visual is the, the 180 degrees of, of ocean and sometimes,

uh, life creatures passing.

And, and you have the sound of the waves. So you're immersed [00:20:00] in a physical, uh,

sensation. you cannot, avoid being impacted internally, in a very, very precious way.

Paden: yeah, That's interesting. That makes me think, you know, I've never done this. I've

thought about doing this, but those, like, uh, those like senseless float spas or whatever, right.

I've never, I've never, I assume that's to try to, you know, design an environment like that or to,

to kind of mask all your senses so you can,

you know, it's just you and like you're experiencing nothing than just you and your brain or

whatever.

Right.

Reuven: It's the closest you get to the divine without, without being, yeah, without being on the

way. It's very similar, very similar to what people report who, who had, uh, near death

experiences very similar.

Paden: so, you know, I'm a CPA by background. You're an engineer by background and, you

know, we're very concrete kind of thinkers. But, you know, the more and more I learn about this

stuff, it's like there's nothing [00:21:00] woowoo about any of it.

It's, it's all very scientific and we're all like. We're all just all biological beings, all experiencing life

and subject to biology. And the more and more you understand that and how the brain works

and how to, you know, we can kind of manipulate some things 'cause we understand the brain a

little bit.

Um, the more you can kind of just gain control over your life.

Reuven: Yeah. Well said.

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Paden: Yeah. So Reuven,

Reuven: Um,

what's

one

Paden: of advice you could, or you consistently share with them may help maybe some of the

listeners kind of regain some clarity or, or momentum in kind of what they're doing

Reuven: one piece of advice? Well, it's not

Paden: and it be multiple.

Reuven: yeah, no, it's, you know, I, I feel the pressure, like, oh, I have to give the best one,

Paden: the best one, right? No, no. Just something you, you know, you see as a common

problem, right?

Reuven: Yeah. [00:23:00] Yeah. Common problem is, and, and especially in corporate

environments or in startups, people tend to deal with, with symptoms. So, you know, something

goes wrong, or, you know, someone's not happy with something.

And the first thing that we're presented with is a symptom or, or a group of symptoms. And then

the, the. Typical, um, approach is to go and deal with a symptom before taking the time and

putting in the effort to looking, why did this happen? Where is it coming from? What's the root

cause or the root causes?

And then deal with those. That's, I think, very common. Very common in, in business, especially

in business environments, not only also personal, uh, as

Paden: see it in the medical world, right? That's all we ever do is deal with symptoms, right?

Reuven: yeah. So a, a, as you gather, my, my personal life and business life are very, uh,

[00:24:00] interconnected. So everything that I say in, uh, in the world of businesses is personal

and vice versa.

but yeah, it's something and, many companies don't. Uh, the people aren't empowered. To, to

dive deeper. Uh, it's considered, hindrance. It's considered, you're digging for the sake of

digging.

Paden: Yeah. You're causing problems.

Reuven: causing problem? Why are you, or, or sometimes people are just afraid because it's,

it's usually, managing upward.

And many

Paden: make somebody mad.

Reuven: many people don't feel comfortable doing so, so they just. Take orders and deal with

the symptom, and, and it happens again, or it, or the situation deteriorates, et cetera.

So that's, Yeah.

Paden: Yeah. And, and you know, I love that you made the comment. I know like, you know,

your life and your business life is not separated. Well, it that's true. Right? And that, that means

you, you know, you live in integrity really. but like that. the world, has a certain set of rules, right?

And we're all just kind of trying to figure those out and live aligned with [00:25:00] those, right?

And the more we can align with those, the better our lives can kind of be. And a lot of the, the

work and self-development and stuff we do is trying to get aligned with a lot of that stuff.

Um, and not living in separate components and your life.

Can you speak to

Reuven: to that a

little

bit?

I love the word alignment. I actually, uh, I actually introduced, program called Alignment to

Excellence program. And that's, for, people in the workplace, especially cross-functionally. So,

early on in my career, I discovered that the biggest problems in an organization are happening

between the functions.

So every function, you know, department function

Paden: and they do

Reuven: has, they, you know, they have their challenges, but there is a, a strong leader. At the

top, at least in the organizations that I was, uh, in, first, uh, I dunno, 10 years. great people,

each manager of, the organization, you know, each vp, handled [00:26:00] pretty well the issues

in their own organization.

So I was looking at the issues that we're facing and I noticed that it's no man land. In order to

solve the actual problem that I'm facing, and I was a young engineer then, but uh, it didn't matter

to me. I wanted to get to the. Root cause and I was committed to fixing whatever I can fix or

whatever the, for the sake of the company, like we are, we are developing products.

I want the product that I'm developing to be the best it could be, and for the customers to be as

happy as they can, so. I would find where things are going wrong and typically the things that

stayed wrong unattended to were between the functions. So that's where I put myself in order to

remedy then them.

And that's how I got exposed to so many departments in, in high tech and, um, way beyond

[00:27:00] my. My, uh, capacity or my job description. And I, you know, I worked in startups, so it

was encourage, and in those startups it was encouraged not in every company, it's encouraged.

Sometimes you'll get a lot of, a lot of heat for, stepping on other people's toes or, or on crossing

your functional boundaries.

I didn't care about any of that, and I was supported by management. So, so it worked well. And

later on, what I discovered after a. The first years I, I would handle the specific issues that were

in no man land. So I became, and in a, in a company, you know, one would say, well, why isn't

there someone that is responsible for the cross-functional

Paden: Well, yes. Somebody has to be responsible. Somebody has to own it, and that's part of

the problem, right? Yeah.

Reuven: And there is, so there is a CEO and if it's a. Larger company. There is a COO, chief

Operating Officer. There might be a CFO or a finance guy who cares cross-functionally, but,

and, [00:28:00] and there is it, but it is limited to it,

Paden: Yeah.

Reuven: and that's it. So the CEO. It doesn't have time to deal with a specific issue, and they

shouldn't be.

That's, by the way, one of the early projects that I did as a management consultant was to, to

actually release a CEO from working in the trenches, just figuring out what went wrong between

the functions. So, long story short, I focused, I, I understood this phenomena and then I started

focusing my work and my.

Consulting on the cross-functional aspect of things and specifically the alignment between them.

'cause I couldn't be, especially when I'm an outside consultant, even if I'm, you know, I'm not

kind of McKinsey consultant that comes in, does analysis and hands you a slide deck and then

you're, you're off to the races on your own.

I'm more like a mini Deloitte where we actually do the work. But I, we couldn't do the work for

each company. They, they have to do [00:29:00] the work. So I found myself actually teaching

my clients cross-functional alignment. And once the people can work together and be aligned,

you don't need a higher power to deal with the problems.

You can eliminate the problems from happening, and if they occur, you work together to solve

them. If it's, if the cross-functional issue is between sales and marketing, then the VP sales and

the CMO can work together to solve that. If it's between engineering and manufacturing, the VP

manufacturing or operations, and.

And engineering can work together to figure it out. So that's a ma A majority Part of the work that

I do is around alignment and specifically cross-functional alignment. The beautiful thing is we're

talking about companies and product companies, et cetera. This works also with people just at

large.

what are the functions? [00:30:00] Husband, wife,

Paden: Yep.

Reuven: child. These are different functions run by different people and, and sometimes within

ourselves we have different functions and departments, right? We want this and we want this.

They're competing, how do we resolve this? So this is the kind of work that I do.

Paden: Yeah. I love that. You know, it, it reminded me when I, you were talking there, even

when you, when you brought up, you know, husband and wife, um, my wife and I were on a, a

trip a couple weeks ago in the Dominican and, and like we did some. It's a bunch of

entrepreneurs, but long story short, we were doing some like marriage work and, and one of the

sessions was on like, okay, just like professionally run your household of like, you know, it's,

everybody has their duties, they're responsible for, right?

Like, and, it's just trying to professionalize that and systemize that to some degree of like, okay,

my wife owns this, I own this. it's not that we don't do the other thing for the other person that we

need to, It's just like ultimately she's [00:31:00] responsible for X getting done and I'm

responsible for X getting done.

And it's just communicating that

Reuven: that and clarifying Yep.

Paden: if neither one of us knows that we're the owner of it, right, or ultimately the buck stops

with me or, or whatever. Right? Then it just, you just get into finger point and sales says it's

marketing's fault. Sales says, you give me crappy leads,

and marketing says, yeah, close the leads, and everybody just points at each other. Yeah.

Reuven: Well said.

Paden: because that is the issue, you know, you got the CEO up there doing the thing, and, and

each individual department is doing a great job. Um, it's just,

those little tribes below you departments can just be battling between each other, and then it just

kills the entire organization.

Reuven: You know, my wife, uh, laughs at me that, uh. I have a process for everything and

anything,

Paden: I said engineering brain. You got there?

Reuven: but you know, where, where I, I experienced true fulfillment is when she adopts,

processes and kind of then I, oh my God, you have a process for that. I'm so [00:32:00] excited.

Paden: Yeah.

Yeah. And, you know, you can take it to as far extreme as you want, and like, no joke, this was

a, a room full of a bunch of, spouses, very high performing spouses. And like we were in talking

about scheduling

Reuven: about scheduling

Paden: on the, uh, calendar and like a full blown, which, um, is kind of, you know, might rub

some people the wrong way, I guess.

Reuven: so my wife and I did a lot of, a lot of workshops, around, uh, sensuality, sexuality, and I

remember the first time that we were invited to schedule intimacy, we didn't like that

Paden: Yeah, that, that puts a lot of people off, right?

Immediately or,

Reuven: to be

Paden: yeah. Yeah. Just

Reuven: and then after practicing what we learned, uh, by the book, you know, there's a whole

difference when you do, uh, when you learn something, you read a book, you, you do a

workshop or you, you get to practice something. There's a whole world of difference between

doing the work as it was designed versus doing your own thing.

once [00:33:00] we did the work as designed, miracles happened. and you know, as long as you

treat everything with humor and, uh, and stay connected no matter what, uh, which is one of the,

one of the principles that I use, then you, you can break through unbelievable challenges.

Paden: Yeah. you know, I had a mentor of mine, uh, I don't know, a year and a half ago, and it's

always just stuck out to me. He's just goes, Paden, you're, you're just winging life. You're just

winging life. And that is because he is like the ultimate, get clear on everything you're trying to

do and, um, yeah, I mean like the more you schedule out and get so clear on what you're doing,

even intimacy, um, you make sure it happens then, right?

Because like we have three small kids, we have busy schedules. We have like, you know, that

stuff just falls by the wayside unless you're intentional about it.

Reuven: yeah. And don't forget to schedule time. To do nothing or to not have schedule. So a

block of time, have a [00:34:00] scheduled time to be non-scheduled. That's where many people

fail or, or many teachings fail to.

Paden: Yeah. And that's, that's where people also too, they hear, you know, they hear people

like me and you talk about this, and they're like, oh man, that sounds like a prison. And it's like

all these things, and I never get to do whatever I want to do. And it's, it's actually the complete

opposite.

but the more dialed in and scheduled you get it absolutely creates freedom in your life.

Not,

Reuven: not

takes

away Yeah. And it's, by the way, at a certain point, after you do it enough time and it's a, it's a

true practice, it becomes, you become part of the practice. You, you notice that you don't need

to adhere at a certain point.

At a certain point, you don't need to adhere anymore to the rigorous aspect of it because you

Paden: It's kind of become a part of you. Yeah. At

Reuven: and you flow and things happen already. It's similar to, to [00:35:00] the habit stacking

that we talked about. It's already ingrained in you that. Every day you attend to this and every

day you attend to that. If the timing shifts, no big deal and you're calm.

'cause you know, you trust that everything will be handled and that's when the rigor stays as a

framework. But you already. Are beyond, it's, it's like the transition from, learning, practicing,

being real good at something, and then towards mastery towards, we're always towards

mastery, uh, at a, in certain things, at certain levels.

But that, that experience of flow of surfing, that's when, when we're in the zone, when it happens

on things that were really hard and rigorous before, that's

really fulfilling.

Paden: Yeah. And that's where, you know, you've, you've, you've broken through. and, I, I hit

some point, you know, I've been working out consistently for over five years and, and

somewhere in there, I, I knew I had [00:36:00] hit that point where it's like, no, I. I'm not like

going for a goal. It's like I just like working out.

Like I like it in of itself. And then it's like, well, you've won there. Right? Or you know, you're not

gonna quit. Right. And that's, um, it's getting that point. It's getting, it's getting that mastery

though, right? Like I can go in the gym when my brain totally shut off and like, just, it's like

driving

home, right?

Driving home. You, you forget and all of a

Reuven: of a sudden

you're, I'm home.

Paden: Yeah, you're home and you're like, I did, I made all those turns. Right. It's the same

thing, like in the, you know, that's like getting in a flow state where you're, you know, you're,

you're doing something that is so habitual your brain can like shut off because like all the

instructions already in there, like it's just doing a thing.

it's just pretty amazing stuff. And people don't realize that's actually how your brain works.

Reuven: and that, and that's also, by the way, a form of meditation.

Paden: Yeah. Yeah. 'cause you're hitting a total flow state there, right? when you like almost go

unconscious, right? You've kind of hit a, hit a flow state. But ru man, this has been an amazing

conversation. what's the best way [00:37:00] people can connect with you, get to know more

about, you know, your consulting and

Reuven: and

anything you

do.

Yeah, my website, Reuven schiff.com is available and if you wanna, if, if something struck a

chord here, and you wanna get in touch with me, chat and, uh, share. Where you're at, what are

the challenges that you're experiencing? You can book a call with me, a free call at, uh, meet

Reuven.com special, URL for, uh, for podcast interviews, meet Reuven.com, and you can book

time with me and I'll be happy to, uh, to chat.

Paden: Awesome. Well, Reuben, I I appreciate you coming on. Anything you wanna leave the

listeners before we sign off?

Reuven: I'm really moved by these kinds of conversations where we get to share with each

other our personal experiences that had an impact on us and on others. And, our personal

experiences are, tied to our professional life and making a difference in the world.

I appreciate your work, Paden. I'm really happy [00:38:00] that I got the opportunity to be here

with you And, uh, thank you for doing what you're doing. You're, I, I'm sure your audience are,

are grateful. As, I am your audience as well. Uh, I, I'm grateful for your work and, uh, thank you

for having me.

Paden: Yeah. Reuven, I absolutely, I, you know, I can tell you're doing, uh, you're doing some

good work. I for certain. but yeah, man, appreciate you and, uh, listeners, we'll catch you next

time.

Speaker 2: Thank you so much for listening to the podcast. If you found it valuable, please rate,

review, and share it. That is the best way to help us build this and reach more people as we're

trying to accomplish our goal of help creating more healthy, wealthy, and wise entrepreneurs.

You can follow us on social media by searching for me Paden Squires.

Or going to padensquires.com on the website and social media. We're always sharing tips of

personal growth and there we can actually interact. I'm looking forward to it. Thanks guys.