How We Perceive What We Believe with Dr. Suzy Siegle

Dr. Suzy Siegle is an attorney, business professor, and entrepreneurship coach, holding an MBA, a law degree, as well as a doctorate in leadership and management. As a researcher, she has spent the last decade researching locus of control psychology and is the creator of the Locus Mindset. Today we’re going to be exploring the locus of control, what is it, why do we need it, and how can we use it to improve our mindset, our resilience, and our success.

Links:

Website: www.locusmindset.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzysiegle/

Inside This Episode

  • The Power of Locus Mindset
  • What is a Locus Mindset?
  • How We Perceive What We Believe
  • Understanding the Non-Conscious Mind
  • How We Get Trapped In A Loop
  • The Conflict Between the Compass and the Magnet
  • Stop Outsourcing Your Emotions
  • Why Willpower Doesn't Work
  • It's Not the Event, It's the Decision
  • Change Your Energy to Change Your Results
  • The Core Responsibility of Leaders
  • Change Your Focus & Your Filters
  • Reclaiming Control

John Ryan
You're listening to key conversations for leaders. This is episode number 24. Welcome everybody. In today's episode, we're gonna be discussing how we perceive what we believe with Dr. Susie Segal. We'll be covering why willpower doesn't work, the power of locus mindset, the core responsibility of leaders, and much, much more.

John Ryan 0:25
It's the simple things that we do every day that determines our success. It's the routines, the rituals, the little decisions that we make and the conversations that we have on a daily basis that build on each other to create momentum towards our vision. That's what this show is about better conversations for better leaders. Everybody and welcome to key conversations for leaders. I'm your host John Ryan, and today we have a very special guest Dr. Susie Segal. Susie is an attorney, business professor and entrepreneurship coach holding an MBA a law degree as well as a doctor In leadership and management, as a researcher, she spent the last decade researching locus of control and locus troll psychology and is the creator of the locus mindset. Today we're going to be exploring the locus of control, what is it? Why do we need it and how we can use it to improve our mindset and our resilience, and ultimately, our success. So welcome to the show. Susie. Great to have you here.

Suzy Siegle 1:22
Thank you so much, john. I'm excited to be here.

John Ryan 1:25
Awesome. Thank you. I wonder if you could start out by sharing with us a little bit to our listeners, you know, what is the locus of control and how did you first become interested in it?

Suzy Siegle 1:36
Yeah, great question. So yeah, what is locus of control? Some of you might be listening and thinking, Oh, I know this one or I've heard of it, or I'm not sure. So in 1954, psychologist Dr. Julian rotter, put forth the theory of locus location of control, and it refers to the degree to which we believe and perceive that the results and the rewards And everything in our life is the result of our decisions choices versus external forces powerful others luck and chance. And this is a great topic right now as we look at the pandemic, and then post pandemic coming out of it. And thinking about how much in life is really within our control versus the degree to which we perceive the outcomes and the choices we make because of things. So that's locus of control. And he said, people tend to have more of an internal where they believe they're, you know, they're more responsible, they have more agency and control over their lives. That's why it's internal versus external. It's controlled by other things. And, you know, some people believe they're just kind of at the whim of luck and chance. And I began looking at this because I saw patterns showing up in my legal practice with law clients, I saw patterns showing up with my business students, with my entrepreneurs as well as in my own life. As human beings. We look at patterns we look for clues, right? We don't always know what Causes something but we can tell the effects. And I started to see certain things. And I thought, this is an area I want more control over my life. And I would like my clients to feel more in control of theirs and my students. And let's see if there's something to this locus of control. And then through that research, we'll talk about in a minute, I discovered, what I would tell you is where does that lie? Where is that found? And how do we use that for our benefit? And how can we all have an internal locus of control?

John Ryan 3:29
And so that's the the goal really, to have more resilience, a more positive mindset and better experience in life is to bring that locus of control inside is that is that really the answer?

Suzy Siegle 3:41
Yes. And you know, you think about people in life you think about if you ever heard somebody say, you know, life happens for me, not to me, and when I took a risk, things went better and I'm resilient and I I'm not an overwhelmed person, and I have, you know, great resilience and I'm courageous. And you think, why are some people like that? And some people say, well, that wouldn't go For me, I'm afraid to take a risk, I might lose something, right? And those are very real. And I struggled with that, because I'm somebody who tends to be very, you know, risk averse by my natural nature. And I've had to shift and realize, it really is how we believe in perceive, and where our beliefs and perceptions because that's how we change it. I don't think there's some people walking around the world feeling like, oh, some people have control over their lives and others just randomly got that card taken away from them. We all have more control over how we respond to things. But it happens. It's such a quick automatic level that it feels out of control. And it was like that for me some things I said, I have great control over this. But other things just felt way out of control for me, way out of control with emotions, negative thought patterns, beliefs about the world, my potential my worth. And that's why I thought I wanted people to help people understand what this is, and how they can make it work for them in a way that feels natural that isn't like fighting the grain.

John Ryan 4:59
So it sounds like The nature of locus of control is not binary. It's not either internal or external. And it's going to vary based on the situation you're looking at at that moment in time in that area of life. Is that, is that fair?

Suzy Siegle 5:12
Yeah. I mean, that's a great point, john, because Dr. Ryder would say it kind of would be more, you know, some people are more external versus internal. What I would suggest is that we are all controlling how we perceive, believe, decide react to things. We're just not aware of it. In that regard. It's like some situations we get in and we might think, Oh, this is going the way we want. We feel like we're in control of it. And then why is that we get into other situations, whether it's relationships or finances or new jobs, and it just feels like things are spinning. There's something going on much deeper than it just being a rational assessment. And that's the locus of control is how do I get a stronger locus mindset, a stronger internal locus, so I can overcome I can come out of it. Anxiety and overwhelm, I can have clear, focused purpose decision making. And I can see things that build resilience. They don't break me down, they build me up.

John Ryan 6:09
And I think what you're saying is it's not a decision, you're not going from moment to moment saying, oh, I'll put you in charge of my response, my situation, or me, these are really as you would say, non conscious processes that are happening. Where Where does that develop, like the tendency heard, like, the degree to which like, in general, are you feeling more? Like is there a developmental process where we develop and internalize that or externalized responsibility? Like how does that work from a developmental perspective?

Suzy Siegle 6:39
Sure, great question. So from the developmental perspective, we think about where our beliefs and perceptions like how do we form beliefs and perceptions. So actually, you know, you kind of hit on it. Our very earliest and strongest beliefs and perceptions about ourselves, the world, other people life in general have When we're very young, and the reason they do isn't because a lot of people hear that and think, Oh, here we go, we're going to blame the parents. Not at all. But when you come into the world, you're a clean slate, you're a blank iPod, right? You got nothing other than the fear of loud noises and falling. It's all you have, right? That's what psychologists have show. And what happens is something has to go into our brains. And we'll talk a minute about the two parts of how the mind works. Something has to go in that helps us shape our beliefs, experiences and perceptions for survival. And whatever got there first, and that has been there a long time is very strong. So that's why children learn new languages so easily because it goes right into their autonomic processing system. It literally you know, or a movie ever, when a kid can just say a whole line of a movie, and they don't even have to memorize it. It's just like they know, so they're much more neuroplastic much more malleable. So that's why developmentally from when we're zero to five, maybe zero to seven, the stuff that got there during that time, you know, if we had believed about money if our parents had beliefs about things if the world, we didn't distinguish between what was our belief and what was people's beliefs around us, it just went in his data. And if we never go back and refresh that data file, or decide what do we want instead, because that may not be working for where we want to go, then we're going to operate from that point. And that's when things feel out of control. But to your question, when I began this research, I thought as a business person, as a lawyer, as an academic, as someone was, like you said, you know, you do degrees and graduate degrees, I could analyze this and find it in my brain because I'm, you know, got a really good conscious brain. But when you look at neuroscience, and you read things like Daniel Kahneman, Thinking Fast and Slow, you recognize we are a dual processing system. So I have my little metaphor here, where a compass and a magnet, our minds work like this, and the compass is like five to 10% this is our rational conscious mind. The one that sets goals that says, Come on, I just got to get over this or I'm just not going to eat that stuff. second piece of cake. It's the conscious rational brain, it's five to 10%. And that's so hard for people to get it was hard for me. And then you have the subconscious automatic processing system. And this is 90 to 95%. And where am I getting these numbers, you can go on my website, you look at the research and resources, and I'm giving you a range, a lot of people would say five and 95. But I'll even broaden it a bit. The bottom line is this is the majority of the patterns and programs and this is why things feel out of control. So when you are this part of the brain will attract or repel, what is in alignment with it. So that's why as you move through the world and you set a goal that you're going to be financially wealthy or you're going to have a great job or a great relationship. There might be beliefs and perceptions that are here that fight against that that we're not even aware of. But we see patterns show up and we go Something must be here that is drawing me to unavailable or abusive or dramatic people in my life or situations. It isn't external To me it isn't these people at I'm finding myself in this place for a reason. So once you embrace this, the work we do in Lucas mindset is with this part of the brain, because this gets change.

John Ryan 10:10
So just if I can explore a little bit on the the dramatic, like the people who sometimes feel they have this attraction to bringing dramatic that bringing the drama and all the drama seems to find them. So it's not a compass issue. They're not seeking out to have that intention. But the magnet is such a beautiful analogy or metaphor, because it implies that you're attracted to or repelling it, which is the two functions of mind, depending on the polarity there. So how does it get programmed? Like, it seems like no part of anyone would ever say I really want the drama in my life. That's not what people desire. How does that how does that work? It's a great question. Okay.

Suzy Siegle 10:47
It's a great example too, because, yeah, I don't think many people are walking around thinking, I want to have conflict with friends. I want to fight with my partner. I want to have all this stuff at work, right? Because they come home, they're just upset about it, but it keeps happening. So Many times and there's a lot of different reasons. And I just want to say to the audience too, is we may not always know the trigger, because a lot of this work is just trying to figure out the patterns and then we're going to replace them with something else. But I am a curious person. I'm kind of an investigatory person, you know, and so I like to kind of figure out what might have gone in just so I can reverse engineer the outcome. And many times what you find and I have relatives like this in high drama situations where you know, they get really close to somebody and then that person betrays them. There's a great psychological theory called the Cartman drama triangle, victim rescuer persecutor, and we kind of go around this triangle without even realizing it. We go rescue people and they need our help, but we don't really need to be rescued, but we got to look look out for them. And then you know, we get upset that they're taking us for granted. Now we become the persecutor and then the victim and this is what happens is something early on in their life, signal that that would create safety, security, love and belonging because at the very core of Human beings we're more similar than we are different. We want to be loved, accepted, we want to feel like we're enough, and that we're never going to be left alone. And so something in there when Okay, I'm seeing this happen in the world around me. And this is either a way that people get attention they interact with people or this happened to mom and dad and they tell me they love me. So love means this. So something went in that said, this is familiar. And your brain will always choose familiar over healthy because it codes familiar is safe. So even though you might consciously say this is unhealthy, this is causing anxiety attacks, this is all this, this brain goes but this is familiar and we've linked this to safety and love. And that's what you see. And and then you have other people that that is not there come from, they will just totally repel that. They'll just say that's not I don't want to deal with these people and other people they get sucked in. So you see this a lot. I have a lot of friends, not a lot, but maybe a handful of them. They're always in the state like they grew Call me and say, I just had this conflict with someone. So I'm like this exact same thing that happened with this person. And it usually has to do with they get close to them, and then they feel betrayed. And you're just repeating cycles. So this happens with money. People say I just can't, you know, like, they'll make a little bit more, and then all of a sudden, they're back broke again, or they just can't break out of a certain income level. But then when you talk to them, they've turned down six offers because well, that won't work, because so you just find that we always come up with a reason for why it happens. But sometimes it's when you start to see a pattern. When you see things repeat more than twice, there's probably something down here pulling that forward, pulling that down.

John Ryan 13:40
So you need that the multiple data points to imply a line to get a direction to get the pattern. And that gives you a clue that there's something beneath the surface in the non conscious unconscious mind that we need to explore and really replace it with because we can we can try to extrapolate what the story is. And it looks like you've done that thinking to figure out what would cause that familiarity I love it's kind of like the language thing. So when you become primed as that open book, the empty iPod, as you said, which is such a great analogy, it's not programmed, you put in the program from the environment, and then you have that familiarity. And then you kind of recreate that over and over and over again. Very cool. When something came up and looking through your website, Lucas mindset calm, I saw the resources and the references related to a lot of your work you have and one, which I love is games, people play by Eric Byrne, do some of the, you know, transactional analysis games come into the worker? Do you analyze that in terms of the payoff and the victim and the persecutor and all that?

Suzy Siegle 14:41
Oh, yeah. So games people play. It's so funny when I first studied transactional analysis, this is back in 2009 2008 2009. That was kind of the first foray into this thought about the dual mind and I say the dual mind carefully because it's really not like, I mean, it's separate, but they're integrated, right? And really, it's the whole system. transactional analysis we'll talk about just because you see a transaction happen, that's not what's really causing it. That's not what's really going on, you know, the Yes, but game if you know, Dr. Burns work or Okay, well, this happens, it just always happens to me. Like, if something's gonna go wrong, it's gonna happen to me. Again, that's the magnet, right? And so the problem is alignment. It's like, you know, if I have something up here that I want, but I've got a program that's down here, like if I want to make more money, and I want to be wealthy, but somewhere in my childhood or in my life, I've got the belief and perception that rich people are awful or crooks or greedy, that's going to pull and I'm not going to be aware of that. I'm not going to walk around and go, Well, I've got these dual beliefs, because the point of this and you hit it right on when kids are younger, like when we're zero to probably six, five or six. Our brainwaves our brain hasn't developed. So we're operating more in a more downloadable state, right? alpha delta theta, we're not in that beta thought like conscious mind state. That's going to be important because when we talk about how do we get Change here. We actually work with the lower brainwave states and people are listening to this going is that hypnotherapy and not really based on the same science of it. But the reason is, that's when things just drop in, they don't get audited or bounced out by the conscious brain. So when we get older and we think, okay, now I'm going to willpower my way out of this, you don't do it because the problem formed before you even had that critical rubric. It's down here, and it's associative. This is why you can listen to a song and feel an emotion and not even want to think about that. Or you smell something and you're taken back in time. Our perceptual filters, our eyes, our nose, our ears, taste, all of that is connected to those memories and emotions that are down here for our survival. But we don't want to just survive, we want to thrive.

John Ryan 16:51
I love it. Thank you for sharing all that. I just kind of thinking a little bit. The empowerment nature and becoming aware of the programming and what Magnus doing is such a huge part, it's the 95% of our experience no give or take a couple percentiles, here and there. Is there ever a time where it's okay to have the locus of control externally? Or is it just comfortable for us to do that sometimes?

Suzy Siegle 17:16
Yeah, that's a good question. So that question I hear a lot, I think maybe what we want to ask is, are there it? You know, people hear this and what happens is, there are some people that immediately go to, well, Susie, this can't be right, because we're not in control of everything, like, how am I in control of COVID? Or how am I in control of the economy, right. And there are some schools of thought that will say, you know, in some way, because we're all interconnected, we're all responsible for the energy that's out there and there, and that's probably true. To some extent, it's true enough to be true. But for our own personal lives, we didn't consciously want this. So I'm not going to say we're in control of everything that happens around us. But what we do have control over which is so hard and I and I own this because I see this in my own life. Like you know, if I Get a blood test back and I'm out of range and one of the areas or something, I immediately can notice my mind go to the worse like, Oh, no, here we go, right? That isn't based on rational reality. It's based on a fear down here from when I was younger, and when I got sick, and you worry because you don't have the tools, so your brain sort of has this cellular memory. So no, I would say whether we are aware of it or not, we're all role creating the perceptions and beliefs we have based on the past experiences and the pattern matching. So we all have an internal locus, it's just we may not be aware of it, we might be thinking it's something else or something triggered it. When you really understand the control you have you understand that? You know, I'm going to get I'm a person of faith. So I do believe that God works in our lives into our lives and is ultimately in control but we have freewill. But you really understand is that you do control what you are doing with the things that happen in life. That's what I'm talking about by feeling more in control. So it rains out I'm not in control of the rain, but I'm in control of what I wear, do I take an umbrella? Do I leave extra time on the road? Do I let this get me down. And it's really owning the reaction, the response and not outsourcing your emotions to other people that allow you to change. And eventually you don't even get triggered you build new systems of resilience, so that, you know, you can handle things in life and we don't fall apart. And this is a tough time for people. You know, I'm talking to people who aren't even necessarily exposed or worried about cobit even though it's serious, and it's real, it's very awful. I mean, nobody, you know, want it and, you know, my heart breaks for those that have suffered and died from it. So you have people though, that that there, but they're freaking out about other things, right? Because there's so much fear and anxiety in the world and they're concerned. So this really helps us restore that and it gives you simple systems that work. It's not just like we're talking right now and people are listening going all sounds great. I wish I could do it. I know, the conventional way. I would tell you it won't work. Because it's too much reliant on this part of the mind, and that's not where the promise, it's like trying to get a sliver out and the wrong finger, you're not going to get it out because it doesn't live here. It lives here. So that's the good news. If you've been trying stuff and it hasn't been working, and you haven't been working with your autonomic system, one subconscious brain, you're in luck, because we can do that. There's a system that works. And it's so simple because it actually goes here. It doesn't try to fight this.

John Ryan 20:26
I love all your models are coming together conscious, no unconscious system, one system two autonomic nervous system, it's amazing. So your depth of knowledge and your different models you have they're all running concurrently. I can certainly see that. So when someone is getting into that, well, that's all fine and well, but I've tried to make changes before I've used my willpower. I would suspect that your willpower falls into more of the compass. Is that is that correct? It's trying to

Suzy Siegle 20:52
Yeah, yeah, there's a couple books I would recommend. But Dr. Benjamin hardy wrote willpower doesn't work and then work Baumeister wrote a book willpower, and they'll talk about how it's a finite resource, okay? And it'll work temporarily. Like if you're at a party and somebody comes by with, you know, bacon or chocolate, you can go, No, thank you. But you burn off some energy doing it. And that's why at the end of the day, when people are just tired, and they come home, and they open up the fridge and just walk, right, or if you if you try to diet for a while, and then you go to eat, and you didn't plan your dinner, you end up just grabbing stuff. It's a finite resource. And it only works temporarily. It's like a stopgap. But it's there. Because there are times evolutionarily in life, we're moving through the world. And you know, we're having an emotional reaction, let's say someone passed away or we lost something, and then we got to show up for work. So we have to have this little temporary governor that keeps the emotion, but it can't stay there because it'll destroy us. If we hold it in, and then it'll pop out right, it'll explode. And generally, you know, it's a mess with people. So you want to be able to not have to rely on your willpower and that's where people are As soon as I see more willpower, and I'm like, No, we need to just switch the association. Because you know, this is going to be weird. I'm trusting a non gross way. But if people have ever gotten really sick, right, and whatever you ate before you got sick. Boy, that association, you probably don't want that food anymore, right? Sure. So it's not like that per se. But imagine how you know because your brain goes, oh i that is associated with not great. And that's how we can do things, we can begin to create positive associations and overwrite what's here, so that you don't even have to go to willpower, and then you actually feel in control. You don't feel like you're trying to, you know, you're holding the steering wheel and it's not working. It actually feels like you've got this.

John Ryan 22:41
What have you found in the research about how long it takes because it's not about the short term willpower? It's about really changing the associations, the connections inside the magnet, how long does it take to literally have that stick?

Suzy Siegle 22:54
Okay, so I want to talk from the research because I'm glad you asked that question. So I mean, I can all of the other And since on my site and I'm going to just start quoting stuff or referring to stuff, but some, you know, you heard the conventional thing people will say a habit is formed in 30 to 60 days. Right? And, and there really is no research that shows that although they will say that when somebody does something repeatedly, what happens is the brain, okay, system one, right says, Well, we better automate this because this is obviously very important to the person and we don't want to take up this conscious brain that we need to solve, like tips at a restaurant or math problems or conscious things, we got to automate it. It's the same thing that happens in anything in life. When you get dressed. When you brush your teeth. When you drive to work, things are just automatic. Okay. So that's why after a certain period of time, it becomes more automated. So what is that period of time? Sometimes it depends on how strong that neural pathway is. When you look at the neuroscience, they can actually find neurons firing when certain emotions or decisions happen. And so if something's really deep and really ingrained, it can take a little longer. And I would reference you if you google the backwards bike example. This is a great example where Germany Engineers reverse engineered the steering of a bike. And they told people when you turn right, it goes left left it goes right, try to ride the bike. So they're not hiding it. They're telling people, no one could do it. They couldn't even get it to feed on the stage. And it took nine months for an adult to relearn how to ride a backwards bike. So there's an example of we know it's backwards. We know right, goes left, left goes right, but it doesn't do anything, because that neural pathway was so ingrained. So it's not identical, but it's a similar analogy. So some people have said, depending on how you work with the brain, like there are hypnotherapists that can get changed very quickly, because they can go in and really work on the beliefs here so that there's nothing to link to. So I've heard, you know, people demonstrate that after a few sessions of hypnotherapy, even their their patients that were in post traumatic stress had new associations, okay. Other times, it would take longer. So there really isn't an agreement on what is the magic number that I have found Generally, it's 60 days if you do something continuously, because again, the brain is going to automate it. But after that they've talked about three months, six months, it really does depend on how deep that pattern is. But the point is, if we can get in and get deep now, that's if you just rely on repetition alone. If you just rely on repetition alone, then your brain is going to go, how long is it going to take for me to adapt this habit versus the other one? And that can be an individual thing? Right? You know, with COVID I think about this. Now we're going into I don't even know what month four or five. So people have really developed new habits. I've talked to people that have said, Well, we don't eat out as much we're cooking in more and we'll probably keep doing that. So you might see some businesses close that they're even able to come back because people's habits have changed. Okay. The reason why the system Lucas mindset the thrive we're talking about that after the thrive framework works is repetition. Our for thrive is only one of the elements, we use many more More, because I want things faster like business people want results quickly. Yes, we want to see change and we want it to stick. But we want it to stick and we want to see change in a more prompt way than not. And that's what the framework does.

John Ryan 26:13
Was it a TED talk with the bicycle with the reverse handlebars?

Suzy Siegle 26:18
Yes, they did a TED talk but then I also just saw youtube video.

John Ryan 26:20
Yeah. Amazing. And I think it would be totally very hard because of the amount of programming and the the association as you said in the mind that says no, when you turn the handlebars this way you go that way and to rewire that would take a long time that's that's really Yeah.

Suzy Siegle 26:36
Like his ideomotor meaning like so that so you know your nervous system and we'll talk about that and thrive handwriting. When you hand write something, it goes right in, because it's an idiom motor activity engages your nervous system in the learning. So we're not just a mind and a body walking around that just happened to be no, it's all connected. So when you learn a dance, move a sequence you know, some people don't like all this just comes naturally. To me, but there's a part of the brain that has that seared in, right? Mm hmm. That's the point is whether it's riding a bike, the same searing happens with emotional reactions, conclusions about what this person's behavior means to me. That's another thing I learned to john is most of the things that really cause us to be emotionally upset, negative, sad, depressed, angry. It isn't so much the event. It's what we have decided it means to us, and means about us and for us and other person. So you have a fight with somebody and it's not even the event. It's this means they don't like me, value me respect me or love me. This person didn't do this, which means they didn't clean up the sink so they probably don't respect or care about me. Why is that important? Because it goes to that fundamental human thing. Now most people aren't self aware enough to know that so they'll just blame the other person for being disrespectful and not listening and finishing the dishes, right? It has nothing to do with that has to do with what it connects to. doesn't mean you shouldn't do the dishes, but you don't need to have a major blow up. You can deal with you can feel the emotion of it and just figure out another plan. You know, a good example I'll give real quick is you know for a while I would get upset with my husband we wouldn't lock the door from you know the garage to the house and now it's all locked, multiple lock, you know, whatever. But for a while you get upset about that because it went to feelings of what safety, security right primal feelings. I didn't aware of that. And then one day I just said wait a second. It's totally within my responsibility to lock the door to I'll just lock it. But I was outsourcing like, you won't want to keep me safe. You don't want to protect me which goes to love so I was like stacking a bunch of them versus I can lock the door. Now the second I did that he likes it every time. Because Wow. It's just so weird. Like once you come out of that, that that back and forth drama, it doesn't have any place. And I always check it because that's what we do. But I'm like, Wow, it had nothing to do with the door. Even though in that moment. It felt like it had everything to do with the door and him. It had everything to do with my own safety and Security. And I thought, What am I complaining about? Can I can I physically like that? Or Yeah, done? Oh, problem solved. But I disconnected it from the meaning from the threat to my safety.

John Ryan 29:11
That's gonna be so freeing to not have to blame and put the locus of control on other people. But to really bring it inside and have that empowerment.

Suzy Siegle 29:20
And your relationships get better. Your health gets better, you feel better. You don't feel like you're walking around waiting for the next emotion to take you in the wind.

John Ryan 29:29
Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, I'm feeling more. I'm feeling better right now. Just as a result of that, yeah.

Suzy Siegle 29:34
It doesn't mean difficulty isn't going to happen, but you develop systems. So when it does, number one, you go, I know what's happening. I'm clicking into this. Now, how do I shift and where are my tools and resources versus people stay in that for days, weeks, and then it's just an explosion.

John Ryan 29:53
So putting it back in your court and what can I do to resolve the situation and not make it mean other things It sounds like that's got to be part of what you mean by the locus mindset. What are some other characteristics of what it means to have a locus mindset?

Suzy Siegle 30:08
Sure. So I think it's a self awareness of how the brain works, how the mind works. And that's why we talk about that in the first lesson or two of the thrive course. And the reason I call it thrive and its locus, right? But it's an acronym for the the system, I just try to make it very simple. Here's six steps, do them every night, you know, like that way, you'll get changed. And people find that refreshing because they're like, just give me the solution. I don't know how you are, john. But, you know, there's this kind of stereotype out there. They say, well, women just want to vent and talk about a problem, but men want it solved. And if there's a kernel of truth that I want a solution, like if I share a problem with somebody, I just want them to solve it. That's the whole reason I'm taking the time to share it right. I don't want them to say Oh, thank you for sharing is so valid, I mean, just fix it. Right. So that's what thrive does. But what I would say is a couple things. One is being aware that you are more Than Your Memories than your emotions than your previous behavior and be willing to to disassociate disconnect your identity from your behavior. A lot of times what holds people back from really delving into the locus mindset is they say, wait a second, you're telling me I do have to change aspects of my personality. And you know what, that's me. I'm gonna do me. Well, Dr. Hardy wrote personality isn't permanent, he talks about not even our personality, like our personality doesn't drive our behavior experiences that happen shape our personality. So if you can be open to the fact that your identity is deeper and more important than any behavior, speech pattern personality tests, he doesn't like those then you can free yourself of the fear that if you make change, you're going to lose yourself because you're not you're you are more than all those and that was a big realization for me. Because a lot of people in my life and say, Oh, you're just great the way you are. Susie, we just love this about you. That's just you don't change and you go, Wow, I'd love for that. I can't change and what does that do when certainly aspects don't work because I'm not saying everything about everybody is bad enough. But when certain things don't work, it causes you to almost identify with them. And what you identify with controls you, what you dis identify with you gain control of. So that's the second thing. And then the third thing, I think, is the awareness that you can you have to begin to take almost imagine you're have a Polaroid camera. And as you go through life, you're taking a snapshot of what's going well, and where do I see patterns repeat of pain. And we usually know this. I mean, if you ask people what isn't going well in life, you know, it comes up. Sure. And say that's okay. That's good. Now we have things we know we can focus on and help with we actually have a directional coordinate here, right? And say, Well, what what appears to be happening I don't ask why questions because if you ask why your rational brain will give you a reason. Well, it's because of what has happened and what might have happened in my past that allows me to see the A world this way. And what happens right before I have this reaction, but we're really trying to investigate this. And then what do I want instead? Well, I want to be calm. I want to be resilient. I want to, Okay, great, because your brain will always sort two thirds negative to one third positive, that's survival. neuroscientists will tell you that's built for survival. So it's not enough to just go in and say, I want to get rid of this. Isn't this great? What do you want to put it in set? Well, I want this gone. Yeah. But if you remove it, and you don't put something else in, what's going to fill it up the same type of worry and anxiety, right? That's why you can be going along. I'll be running along and everything's going great all of a sudden, oh, I wonder if this could happen. It's your brains way of saying, Oh, we better audit for risk. So we have to take a bigger control of that. And then working with the thrive course, I mean, this is not a system you need to I tell people obviously this isn't like counseling. This isn't psychology. I can't make any guarantees your claims. I'm not licensed in that. But what these are is there's six pieces of research. Based mind development work of how to go in and make change, and all of them have research and science behind them. So that you can develop a system. It's a framework of synthesis, that works. And then you start to see change. And you're like, wow, this is really possible. I didn't realize it.

John Ryan 34:16
Wow, that's awesome. And so comprehensive, and it sounds like you've a real focus on application, not just theory, here's where it came from. Here's how we know it works. And here's how you use it so you can get results. Right away. Is there is there a one thing that you think most people need to start doing more than others? Or does it really does kind of depend on whether

Suzy Siegle 34:39
I think, I think understanding how to work with this part of the mind and not fight it up here. Right. And what do I mean by that is allowing is explaining away okay. So if you say to somebody, where is it that you want to work on your life and let's say they say, Well, I have struggles with you know, my family, we're always in the same condition. But you know what? I know that that's because Bo blah, suspend the desire to justify and just say, Okay, I'm not saying to you that the whole world is your fault and responsible, but I'm asking you to look at the fact that this is bothering and triggering you means you have control to change the feeling. So even if you knew that person was never going to change their behavior, if you had a way to engineer something within you that that didn't cause that, would you want that? Oh, yeah. And we know it's possible because, you know, you and I were talking about this. You ever have somebody that says, oh, that person really bugs me, they get under my skin, you're like, I know them. They don't bother me at all. But then vice versa with someone else, it bugs you, but not somebody else. So I would say the toughest part is understanding that our emotional reactions and triggers is this brain saying we're not safe, we're not loved. We're not enough we might be abandoned. And it doesn't mean other people get to treat you a certain way or have to change they may have to change to but Let's first stabilize your reaction so you can move through the world. And you don't always end up in panic and cortisol and stress and all that thing, right? Taking migraine medicine and all that. And then we can address how do you respond? More times than not? We are more in control of how we show up. That's leadership. That's our own personal leadership and how we control a conversation, even the energy we bring into the room. And that's hard for people because they want to immediately point out why that's happening versus how can I shift so I feel better, and to know your worth it, you know, you Everyone is worth doing this work, getting more control over life. And taking a hard look. And I wish I could tell you it's just a matter of flipping a switch, but these systems will work. It's just we've spent a lot of time trying to work here. And people are frustrated and they're sick of let's just say traditional talk therapy that doesn't go beyond anything else. It just talks about the problem talks about the problem, the diagnosis and stuff and doesn't move forward. Now. Again, there may be people I mean, I'm not saying there isn't diagnosis you have to. But when you're working with patterns of human behavior, it usually is pretty simple to go back and think, Okay, this is tapping into one of those foundational things. What do you want instead? And know that you can do that second quick thing. I will encourage everyone to look at the research on memory reconsolidation. Why do I say this? Because many times we believe our memories are as accurate as our as our thoughts as which are both inaccurate. But when you actually look at research around memory, in fact, the laws saying we don't even like to have witness memory testimony in court because it's unreliable. Every time you access a memory it shifts it changes like a file in your computer based on your emotion. You don't know that you think it's actually being accessed and you're adding you're adding to and putting it away but you're not. And so those memories only exist those deep ones because there was a strong emotion attached that usually went to survival people have lived their whole life making decisions based on prior events and said, Well, I want to learn from the past again kernel of truth, but they let that dictate how they go moving forward. So I think it's important for us to be aware of this. And then people will move at different paces, but simply by being aware of how the brain works, the two systems, the compass, the magnet, locus of control, and memory, I would tell you, that's your like, 60 70% there, because most people don't never even go there. They'll just blow through life thinking they're thinking when they're really remembering, believing they're making choices based on you know, ration and reason when it's emotion Association and fear. And it will and they'll keep repeating patterns, like Groundhog Day.

John Ryan 38:44
Exactly. I love it. Wow, I love how you just tied all of those things together, and really forced us to look at okay if we're perceiving the world in a filtered way, and our magnet is guiding that and then we're also perceiving our memories in the filter world. And then really we have to bring the locus and control and really make some decisions about what do we want to do going forward, instead of being reactionary, so proactive versus reactive as it sounds like part of the theme as

Suzy Siegle 39:12
well, you're going to change your perceptual filters. So the very things that you pick up on will be different, because you'll have different different things will be important to this brain, right? It won't be scanning and scouring for the negative the suspicion that you know the threat, it will, you're always going to have that that survival. So I'm not going to tell you that you'll be walking down a dark street, it'll be dangerous, you'll be like, everything's fine. But I'm talking about when it's not useful when you're in a situation where you don't need to be doing that. But instead, you'll be attracting opportunity and calm and flexibility. And well, maybe I can see this from different perspectives and, you know, yeah, this person got upset at me, but that doesn't mean that I'm not valuable as a person, you know, all of a sudden things shift. I've seen this in my own life where I would make decisions based on fear. Based on these scenarios, that would never happen, I can imagine some great risk management scenarios. And I'd actually believe they were possibilities. The reality is, if you operate from that, you're never going to go where you want to go. Here, you're never going to get your goals because you're always going to be Risk Manager. So you have to hold space for both and say, Well, what is it that I might still need to make sure my safety is taken care of like locking the door. And now I don't need to play out all these scenarios that can happen. I can focus on something else instead. That's hard for people because we like to be black, white, we don't like to hold space for two things and then have to decide moving forward.

John Ryan 40:38
True. You have to be in the mix. You have to be present and really pay attention there. Is there if you could have a conversation with all the leaders that are out there? What would be one message you would like them to to walk away with?

Suzy Siegle 40:49
Yeah, absolutely. that the most important thing you can do is work on yourself. So I believe for leaders and leadership development. I teach graduate leadership students That it is a journey. It is a process of self discovery. It's like a journey to the center of yourself and your professional growth, your advancement, your career, your life, whatever it is, will never outpace your personal development. So working on yourself reading, you know, not self help books like in the traditional sense, but reading things that will help build you up that will talk about how the brain works, how you can get goals, you know, things like Daniel Coleman's book things like Ben Hardy's book that works on yourself because leadership is how you show up. It isn't based on a strategy a tactic people will see right through that it's based on who you are. And the most important thing you can do is invest in change yourself and be open to that be open today. And I remember when I made the commitment, like over a decade ago, I'm like, I will change anything and everything about myself. If it can get a better result. Nothing was off the table. And that's free because I was more than my behaviors. You know, you know that because you come into the world with very few neural patterns built, you build them, and you still existed. So it's the same thing. Now, we just have to work with a different part of our system to get that neural plasticity going. Because now we've got this conscious brain that filters things, you know, that filters things that going home finite things, and it's matching for what's down here. And I won't even let something get down here if it doesn't match, so you got to wait and bypass it and really work with the bigger system, the stronger system.

John Ryan 42:29
Wow, fantastic. Such a great message. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Susie, so much for spending this time with us and sharing us with all the great concepts that you have. What is the best way for our listeners to connect with you and find out more about the thrive program and the options that you have available for training?

Suzy Siegle 42:46
Sure, absolutely. Lucas mindset LLC us mindset calm and a lot of free stuff on there. A lot of fun stuff on there research and resources. But there's a course the thrive course and it's I think you can access it you just click Get a local mindset or it's midway down the page. This is a very good course it is. It gives you everything you need. There's nothing how bad it teaches the thrive framework. It explains the compass in the magnet, and it gives you a practice you can use every day, five minutes a day, you never need to come back to me for more, you can just literally implement that to lifelong thing. And I can't make any guarantees, right? any income or any you might not see any results. But I can tell you, I've done a focus group and the people that have done it now over 100 people probably pushing to 50 have just said, Wow, we can't believe how seamless This feels like we're actually feeling and getting change. Because again, you're not fighting, you're not just trying to use willpower to a habit kicks in. They just they literally shift how they feel. So it's simple. And it's the supercharge of six systems. So it works because it doesn't just rely on one. And it's just done in a very specific time. So that would be the very best way and you can also you know, contact me through the site, but yeah, Lucas wines. I just I want everyone if someone had come to me 10 years ago and said Susie can explain to you what's going on here and I can give you a tool that you can use to get change. I would have said thank you rather than just kind of hunt and pack and experiment and be in talk therapy and think, gosh, why aren't we solving anything? and leaders, business people, lawyers, they want things resolved. They want solutions. It's great to know the theory. You'll get all that, but you'll get a solution.

John Ryan 44:24
I love it. Awesome. Go find out more at www.locusmindset.com. Dr. Susie Gunn. Thank you so much for being here.

Suzy Siegle 44:29
Thank you so much, john. This was great.

John Ryan 44:31
Awesome. And thank you all for listening. Until next time, develop yourself empower others and lead by example. Thanks for listening to key conversations for leaders with your host john Ryan. If you enjoyed the show, please let us know give us a rating or write a review. If you have a question send me an email john@keyconvo.com. If you haven't already, you can connect with me on twitter at keyconvo or on LinkedIn under JohnRyanLeadership.

John Ryan


Host of Key Conversations for Leaders Podcast, Executive Coach, Consultant, and Trainer

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