#113 Become CONFIDENT In 85 Minutes: How To Defeat Self-Doubt | Dr. Shadé Zahrai

Summary

Podcast Summary: BigDeal Ep. #113 – "Become CONFIDENT In 85 Minutes: How To Defeat Self-Doubt"

Host: Codie Sanchez
Guest: Dr. Shadé Zahrai
Date: January 14, 2026

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Overview

In this episode, Codie Sanchez interviews Dr. Shadé Zahrai, Harvard-trained leadership coach and author of "Big Trust." Together, they delve into the science-backed mechanics of building confidence, overcoming self-doubt, and developing the kind of self-trust that leads to breakthroughs in business and life. The conversation is peppered with practical strategies, memorable stories, and actionable tips for anyone looking to rewire self-perception and show up with greater charm, presence, and agency.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Truth About Confidence & Self-Doubt

• Action Precedes Confidence:

  • Confidence isn’t something you wait for; it’s the result of action. Taking small steps and gaining evidence that you can do something is what gives rise to confidence.
  • "Waiting to feel confident is the wrong goal completely. Confidence comes after we take action." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [00:00, 14:20]

• The Four Drivers of Self-Doubt:
  After extensive research, Dr. Zahrai identified four core traits that, if weak, allow self-doubt to creep in:

  1. Self-Acceptance: Accepting yourself, independent of external validation.
  2. Agency: The belief in your capability to accomplish things.
  3. Autonomy: Internal locus of control—feeling you’re in charge of your outcomes.
  4. Emotional Intelligence: Managing emotions so they don’t derail you.
  • "Self-doubt is entirely doubting our worthiness, our capability, our control..." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [03:36]
  • "Once we have a framework for it... we can ask ourselves: which area is it trying to attack right now?" — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [07:57]

• Expectation Bias:
  Our beliefs become self-fulfilling prophecies. The Dartmouth "scar experiment" powerfully illustrates how what we expect shapes our experience of the world [01:33-03:36].

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2. Differentiating Manifestation, Execution, and Self-Trust

• Manifestation Misconceptions:

  • Visualizing alone drains energy and widens the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

  • True success comes from “manifesting with a pragmatic lens”—visualize, identify obstacles, and prepare to act.

  • "The more someone visualized positive fantasies, and only that—the less energy they had to actually achieve it." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [17:12]

• Pre-Mortem Visualization:

  • Take Michael Phelps' approach: Visualize both success and every possible thing that can go wrong, and plan for your response.
  • “He had it essentially embedded in his nervous system so that if it happened, he wouldn’t get distracted… He had a plan.” — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [19:31]

• Self-Trust as the Real Antidote:

  • Waiting for confidence will keep you stuck. Self-trust (believing you can handle things, even if you fail) is what matters.
  • "Waiting to feel confident is the wrong goal completely... something is missing, and that's self-trust." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [15:35]

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3. Charisma and Presence: Science-Backed Strategies

• Captivating vs. Magnetic Charisma:

  • Captivating: Commanding attention on stage or in a room.
  • Magnetic: Attracting people to you personally after the performance ends.

• Key Elements for Charisma: [23:43-33:21]

  1. Posture: Upright, confident posture is the first cue people notice.
  2. Gestures: Use open, purposeful hand movements.
  3. Facial Expression: Eye contact (not too long), approachable smiles.
  4. Voice: Slow, measured tone and natural pacing.
  5. Walk: Move with purpose—not too fast or slow.
  6. Pausing: Use strategic pauses when responding to convey thoughtfulness and status.
  7. Appearance: Dress intentionally to align with context and convey self-respect—avoid distracting extremes.
  • "You can be captivating but not magnetic—people may not want to talk to you after the speech." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [26:24]
  • "The more confident you appear, the more competent you’re perceived to be." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [23:43]

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4. Navigating High-Stakes Rooms & Networking

• What NOT to Do:

  • Don’t name drop immediately.
  • Don’t brag or monologue about your achievements.
  • Don’t one-up others’ stories.

• What TO Do:

  • Be genuinely interested; ask meaningful questions (5:1 rule).

  • Look for ways to add value.

  • Avoid manipulative conversational tactics.

  • "The best thing you can do is be interested. People generally like talking about themselves. It lights up part of our brain which is rewarding." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [00:58, 44:53]

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5. Dealing With Manipulators & Toxic People

• Recognize Manipulation:

  • Manipulators often attack the four drivers of self-doubt.

  • Use the "CUT" method:

    • C: Cut the emotional reaction—recognize you have agency over your feelings.
    • U: Unfazed appearance—remain calm and respectful, don’t give away your energy.
    • T: Turn off engagement—don’t let them occupy mental space, minimize further contact if possible.

  • "If someone is not actually actively lifting you up, they don't deserve to be in your life." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [50:52]

• In Relationships:

  • You teach people how to treat you by what you tolerate.
  • Address patterns directly and with clarity, decide if the relationship is worth continuing.

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6. Tactics for Conquering Daily Self-Doubt

• Label Your Emotions (Cognitive Diffusion & Affective Labeling):

  • Instead of internalizing ("I am an emotional person"), notice and label ("I'm feeling annoyed right now") [11:24].

• Small Habits, Big Change:

  • Start tiny with habit formation: two minutes of stretching, quick ticks on a visible calendar.
  • Use cost-benefit analysis: what is the cost of not acting? [77:14-80:22]

• Morning Clarity Reset:

  • Each morning: take a breath, note three priorities, and decide which “big trust” energy you want to bring into your day.
  • End of day: reflect—did you do it? What could improve?
  • "How you choose to start your day becomes what you keep reminding yourself of and returning to." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [84:06]

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7. High Performers & Imposter Syndrome

• Self-doubt is common, even among high achievers.

• Imposter syndrome is often a result of increased competence without parallel growth in confidence—“a mismatch between competence and confidence.”

• Leverage the concept of skill-stacking for unique value instead of aiming for mastery in only one arena [66:08].

• Memorable stories:

  • Paula Scher’s $1.5 million napkin logo for Citigroup, highlighting the value of accumulated expertise [63:37].
  • Tinker Hatfield’s architectural background saving Nike with the Air Max 1 [64:14].

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Confidence:
  "Competence equals confidence completely. The more reps you do, the more likely you are to hit it." — Codie Sanchez [15:39]

• On Manifestation:
  "Dream it and you will achieve it tomorrow... for some people, maybe it happens, but they’re the exception to the rule." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [17:12]

• On Costly Habits:
  "What is the cost of not doing this right now? What is the cost in six months? We're often more motivated by the cost of something." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [79:43]

• On Self-Doubt & Growth:
  "Your self doubts are not a sign that you’re broken... They’re an entirely natural part of being human." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [69:35]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00 – Action precedes confidence; waiting is a trap
• 03:36 – Four core drivers of self-doubt explained
• 10:07 – Labeling emotions to create distance and control
• 14:20 – Self-trust vs. confidence
• 17:12 – Manifestation myths & positive fantasy research
• 19:31 – Michael Phelps' visualization & the pre-mortem
• 23:43 – Building charisma: posture, gesture, presence
• 33:21 – Pausing for impact and perceived status
• 44:53 – Navigating high-status rooms and what not to do
• 45:47 – Handling manipulative people & the CUT method
• 60:28 – High performers, imposter syndrome, and skill stacking
• 77:14 – Building habits with the Seinfeld strategy
• 84:06 – Dr. Zahrai’s Morning Clarity Reset ritual

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Final Takeaways

• Confidence is built, not waited for. Action is the prescription.
• Self-trust is your real superpower; nurture it with daily rituals and incremental challenges.
• Charisma can be cultivated through attention to posture, presence, and genuine connection; magnetic presence comes from warmth and authenticity.
• Self-doubt is natural; use it as a guide to identify areas for growth, not as a reason to stop.
• Practical frameworks and science-backed micro-habits are your weapons against self-sabotage.
• Energy, intention, and daily rituals shape the trajectory of your life and business.

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Resources & Further Learning

• Book: "Big Trust" by Dr. Shadé Zahrai – out Jan 20, 2026. Pre-order for access to live workshops and downloads [81:58, 82:21].
• Free Download (Morning Clarity Reset Template): One-page daily intentionality tool – linked in episode resources [85:16].

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"Celebrate the hard, not just the win... The hard is what gets you to the win." — Dr. Shadé Zahrai [56:42]

This episode is highly recommended for anyone striving to become more self-assured, resilient, and influential—whether in business, leadership, or personal growth.

Transcript

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Waiting to feel confident is the wrong goal completely. Confidence comes after we take action. We're building the skill, building the competence, building the sense of evidence. Hey, I can do this. Which means that waiting to feel confident, which is what so many people do, they wait to feel ready and then they're always waiting because they never reach that state.

[Cody Sanchez]

She's a Harvard trained leadership coach. Helps people rewire the way they think, lead and perform. Dr. Shadei Zarai. In this episode, you'll learn how to build confidence backed by science, not slogans, and shift from burnout to breakthrough. If you've ever wondered, why do I keep getting in my own way? This episode is your unlock. Do you make yourself more charming?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

There's a few things that you can do. You know, when you see that amazing person on stage, everyone is hanging onto their every word as they tell that story. That's what I call captivating charisma. But then what happens when at the end of that keynote, that person walks off and no one really wants to talk to them? That's because they lack magnetic charisma. You can have one without the other. Really, the magnetic piece comes down to.

[Cody Sanchez]

Back up that for a second. I have found that to be so true.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Don't one up people. The best thing you can do is be interested. People generally like talking about themselves. It lights up part of our brain which is rewarding. If you can offer to be of value to them, then it doesn't feel like you're just trying to take or impress.

[Cody Sanchez]

What is the line between manifesting and believing in yourself and execution between the two?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Manifestation itself has been misunderstood to be. Dream it and you will achieve it tomorrow. When we look at the research, especially the work on goal identity, you need to.

[Cody Sanchez]

What does neuroscience show us is the main obstacle that prevents people from reaching their full potential?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It entirely comes down to what we believe about ourselves. Entirely comes down to our perspective, our perception of our abilities, our worthiness, our sense of control over our lives. So, Cody, let me tell you this fascinating study. It was from the 70s, so a while ago now. But it helps to articulate why our beliefs are so incredibly powerful. So in around the 1970s, a psychology researcher at the University of Dartmouth was conducting a study to determine the role of expectation, how expectation shapes how people show up in the world. So he brought a huge number of people together. His name was Robert Kleck. Huge number of people together, split them into two groups. One group, he drew a scar on their face from their ear to their mouth. The other group had no scar. Then they were able to see themselves with this scar so they could confirm, okay, I've got this visible disfigurement on my face. Then he sent them into conversations with strangers. Now when they came back, he assessed how they felt the conversations went. The group with the scar overwhelmingly stated that they felt tense, they felt like they were judged, they felt uncomfortable, didn't enjoy the conversations. But here's where it gets interesting if we rewind a little bit right after they were shown the scar on their faces. So before they've had the conversations, the researcher said, I'm going to apply some moisturizing cream just to set the scar so it doesn't crack. And what they did is actually remove it. There was no scar. These people expected to be treated a certain way, and that's what they experienced. Now what's even more fascinating is they had people watching third parties watching these conversations on video. They didn't determine that there was any difference in how any party acted. So it was entirely in their heads. And this is what we call expectation bias. You create the reality that you have in your mind because what you expect is you tend to notice. And so when we apply that to something like self doubt and holding ourselves back, self doubt is entirely doubting our worthiness, our capability, our control, our ability to manage our emotional state and expecting people to respond to us a certain.

[Cody Sanchez]

Way because of that, that's fascinating. So you and your book say that self doubt always comes from four main sources. What are those?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So it's, it was fascinating when I was doing a lot of research into this space, because we think self doubt is one giant blob of worry and anxiety and imposter syndrome and some fear thrown in there. And when we think it's one thing, we then think there's one solution. And this is why so many people are still struggling with it, because they're looking for the single solution and it's not working. And so when I went back to over 50 years worth of research and then conducted my own studies over the last five years, what we determined is actually there are these four qualities. They're actually personality traits that determine whether we experience self doubt. If any one of those traits is weak within us, that's where doubt sneaks in. And so we've converted those traits into actionable qualities because a trait is a trait, and a lot of people will say, well, that's just who I am, can't change it. It's a personality trait. We do know from research, and my own is you can actually change A personality trait if you choose to. But we don't even discuss that. We go into, okay, what are the attributes? What are the behavioral components? So these four things. The first one relates to a sense of worthiness, which is self acceptance. Do you fundamentally accept who you are or do you need validation for you to accept yourself? If you don't accept yourself, you take feedback personally. You take it as a personal attack. You fear failure because of what it means about you. You set impossibly high standards and then beat yourself up when you don't achieve them. So that's the first one, self acceptance. The second one is agency. And agency relates to your belief in your ability to achieve things and get things done. So it's perceived capability. And if you have a strong sense of agency, you believe you can set a goal and achieve it. And fantastic. If you don't know how to do something, you'll figure it out. But if you struggle in this area, this is where we see imposter syndrome. People feel like they don't have the skills, they don't deserve the achievements that they're receiving because someone's going to find out that I'm fraud. We see a lot of comparison in this area. That person is better than me, that person has more skill than I do, and that holds people back. The third one's a really interesting one and it ties into this victim mentality that some people can get sucked into. We call it autonomy. And it relates to what's called a locus of control. A locus of control relates to where do you place your focus. If you have an internal locus, you believe that you are in control of your decisions and your life. Sure, there are things that are outside of your control, but you don't focus there. When you have an external locus, that's where doubt is creeping in and it tries to highlight that you have no control. Life is unfair. Everyone else has it easier than you do. And so naturally you focus on things outside of your control, which makes you feel even more powerless. So that is a form of self doubt too, because you doubt your power in your life. And then the fourth one, let me ask you a question before I tell you this one. So Cody think, although maybe in your case it might be because we were just talking about how Cody's a bit of an anomaly, doesn't necessarily experience a lot of the doubt that many other people would. And a lot of very, very successful business owners, leaders don't necessarily resonate. It might come up in different ways, but not necessarily in relation to the business, but Think about a moment when perhaps you were a little bit anxious. Think about how it felt in and on your body. Now strip away any emotion that you felt at that moment. What would you have been left with?

[Cody Sanchez]

Butterflies in my stomach.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Just some butterflies in your stomach and some thoughts about what was about to happen. And you could probably run through those thoughts very rationally and determine which one's going to help me, which one's not helpful, and then take action anyway. So the fourth one entirely relates to emotion and how emotion can completely derail us. I say that emotional intelligence is a leadership and business superpower because we think we are rational beings, but we're not. We're emotional beings who rationalize. And so once you can get a handle on your emotions, every other area of self doubt becomes much easier to handle and life just becomes much easier to handle. So these are the four drivers of self doubt. And once we have a framework for it, a language for it, it means that when we're experiencing that voice that is trying to hold us back, we can ask ourselves, which area is it trying to attack right now? And then that gives us a pathway to actually strengthen that area.

[Cody Sanchez]

So if somebody's listening to this right now and they're like, wow, I felt all of those things, or I have a lot of self doubt and it's been holding me back consistently. And now I know these four characteristics, what is the next step for them? So if, if you're in that moment of self doubt and you're struggling, how do I steal your research to make my life and self doubt go away?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So when you're in that moment of self doubt, the very first thing to do is acknowledge that you are not your doubts. You are not your doubts. We have this little analogy that I like to share. In fact, I should have brought it for a demonstration. So imagine we have two glasses full of water, glasses filled to the top with water. And I have both a ping pong ball and a golf ball. If I put the ping pong ball on the top of one glass of water, what happens to the water? Nothing, it's just floating on top. If I take the golf ball and I put it in the other glass of water, what happens? It sinks to the bottom. And also what happens to the water?

[Cody Sanchez]

Overflows.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It overflows. It falls out, comes out. This is like self doubt. Self doubt itself is not the enemy. We've like wrongly vilified it. Self doubt should be like the little ping pong ball floating on the top. It's there, we hear it but we can decide what we do with it. Where it becomes damaging is where it becomes the golf ball. And we internalize it. Not only that, we lose a part of ourselves when we're internalizing that self doubt because we think, this is who I am. And then the really interesting part is if you were to take that golf ball out, does the water miraculously come back into the glass? It doesn't. You've lost a piece of yourself for so long that you have to then go through a process of rediscovering who you are without the doubt. So in terms of what the research says around how do we tackle self doubt? That first step, recognize you are not the doubt. The doubt is not you. At any point you can say, okay, rather than having the thought of I'm a failure, you separate and say, I'm noticing that I'm having a thought that I'm a failure. And that separation, it's called psychological separation and also cognitive diffusion. We're diffusing our sense of identity with that thought. We don't have to believe everything we think. So that's the very first step. And then the next step would be to determine which of the four is the loudest. And then how can you take steps to actually address that particular attribute to strengthen it.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's so good because I think, you know, often obviously we run all these companies, we have all these employees and so I get to see all these different personality types. And one thing that I've noticed a lot lately is people will say, well, I'm really emotional. So like it's almost I am X, I am an emotional person. I am emotional not in this moment, which could be true, but as a total sort of brand, an identity. And if instead in those moments I was just talking to one of my leaders the other day and it's really not age related. Like you know, we have employees that are well in their 60s, we have employees in their, their 20s. And you know, I was talking to it to a gent and I was like, you know, let's unpack this a little bit. Like X happened, Y happened. And you've made some assumptions based on that. And it's totally cool for you to be upset or trying to regulate that's all of us in life. But it's interesting that you are saying you are emotional completely. And so I love this idea of like when I'm struggling and I'm like, I'm so annoyed at this person or I'm, I'm, I'm just a person that gets Annoyed often, or I'm easily triggered, or I'm emotional or I cry a lot or I'm a crier to instead just say, you know what, I'm having feelings about this totally. And then you label it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes.

[Cody Sanchez]

What's the word again that we're labeling it?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So it's cognitive diffusion, but it's called affective labeling. You're labeling the emotion as opposed to becoming the emotion.

[Cody Sanchez]

So good. So instead. So every time. And how do you. How do you do this in day to day? We'd be like, all right, I'm really upset. Kody's super annoying. She keeps asking me the same question again and again. So do you say the term in your head?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

There's a number of ways you can do it. Find something that comes naturally to you. What we do find, though, is that when we're practicing this technique, when we're teaching people about this simple technique, it feels a little bit odd in the moment because you're feeling the frustration or that really charged emotional state that you have. And then to take a moment and take a step back and say, well, I'm noticing this, or I'm feeling this or I'm experiencing that feels a little bit robotic. And so we tell them that's the point. You're actually taking yourself out of the state, re engaging your prefrontal cortex, and you simply say, I am noticing, I am feeling, I am experiencing. Or you can even describe the physiological state. So something that we find. So going back to this piece of, oh, I'm emotional or I'm stressed, these are two umbrella terms that we find a lot of people will use when they don't have the emotional granularity in the moment to actually describe what. What it is exactly that they're feeling. So they'll say, I'm stressed, I'm overwhelmed. When we dig deeper, there are so many underlying reasons why they might be feeling that. And often it comes down to one of these four drivers of self doubt. If someone is feeling overwhelmed because they have too much in terms of their workload, too much on their to do list, and they don't think they can achieve it. That relates to agency. Can I achieve my goals? If someone is feeling stressed out because they have this big opportunity and they're worried they're going to fail or fall short or get judged, that's a lack of acceptance. They don't accept themselves for who they are, regardless of the outcome. So one of these things will generally show up. And we call the state of tapping into each of them Reminding yourself, hey, I can work on these, and showing up with that kind of energy. We call it big trust. It's full self trust, which actually reminds me of something that I want to weave into at some point, which is so powerful. But we'll hold off. I'm sure it'll come up.

[Cody Sanchez]

I want to get into it. And I just think, I mean, God, if you guys are listening, I hope you're feeling what I'm feeling, which is I want to come back and listen to this again and again because this is everyday life. But for so long, I've heard platitudes about this stuff like, well, just let it pass. Just move on to the next thing. Focus on something else. But there's something about when you pair research and a bunch of data and you name it and you have a process to actually take the right next step, it feels like I could actually make change as opposed to just listen to another expert on a podcast. So thank you for sharing that with us. I'm totally gonna use this. I want to also start. Well, actually, do you want to go to your next. Okay, okay, tell me. Okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Because it relates to self doubt, everything we're talking about. So, Cody, if I were to ask you, what is the opposite of self doubt, without thinking about it too much, what would you say?

[Cody Sanchez]

Confidence.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah, confidence. So 95% of the people we speak to will say confidence. Now here's where it gets really interesting. When we look at the data, when we look at the definition of confidence, when we look at what it feels like for us, confidence actually comes after we take action. Because when we're taking action, we are getting proof points that we can do the thing. We're building the skill, building the competence, building the sense of evidence, hey, I can do this. And that increases our self efficacy, which then boosts our confidence. So confidence is actually the result or the output of taking the action. Which means that waiting to feel confident, which is what so many people do, they wait to feel ready, and then they're always waiting because they never reach that state. Waiting to feel confident is the wrong goal completely. And it's a huge myth in our society that we need to shake out of people, because that comes after, which means there's something that comes first that we're missing. What is it? It's self trust. It's trusting that you can handle whatever comes your way. Trusting your abilities, your worthiness, your sense of control to show up, do what you need to do, and also trusting that you can handle it if it doesn't Work out. Cody, I would say you have a huge, hugely high level of. Hugely high. You have an extremely high level of self trust.

[Cody Sanchez]

As long as it's not in the gym.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah, we did touch on that earlier.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'm working on it, guys. But yeah, in business. But you're right, it's reps. We always say competence equals confidence completely. The more reps you do, the more likely you are to hit it when you're trying to swing a bat. And so it makes perfect sense for me. At some point, it would be irrational for me to say, well, I don't know how to look at a profit and loss statement. Of course I do. Like, you would have to. I would have to lose part of my brain capacity to forget how to look at this, because I've looked at 50,000 of them, but the first time I looked at one, I didn't really know what's going on. I thought it was. Might as well been Hebrew, you know, and so it makes a lot of sense. But. But I think there's also this belief lately in society, at least I've heard it. So tell me what you think. A lot of people these days are like, well, I mean, I hear it on the Internet so much. I was just showing David a couple clips and I was like, they're like, what was the one? It was. It was a young woman and she just kept repeating, I make $30,000 a month. I make $30,000aMonth. And then she was like, if you say it, then you will have it. You know, if you believe it, you will get it. And this, it feels to me like a bastardization of manifestation. I'm like, listen, I could say I make a billion dollars a month, a lot. And unless I back that up with an unreasonable amount of work, it's probably never gonna happen for me. So what is the line between manifesting and believing in yourself and execution between the two?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I see this a lot on social media as well. It's everywhere. And it's really seductive for people because it means, hey, I get to get the thing without doing the work. But it doesn't actually work like that. So there's. Look, there's a lot to be said about manifestation. I am a big believer in looking to the science. I do think there's some element that cannot. That has not yet been proven by science in terms of, like, the energy we give off and all of this. But manifestation itself has been misunderstood to be. Dream it and you will achieve it tomorrow. Look, for some people, maybe it happens, but they're the. The exception to the rule, not necessarily the rule. What we do know when we look at the research, especially the work on goal identity, on setting what's called superordinate goals, you need to have in mind, where do you want to go? What is that vision that you have for yourself? And visualize it, which is the basis of manifestation. Be really clear, visualize yourself achieving it, and believe that it is possible. Because remember, self belief and expectation bias shape how we show up in the world and what we interpret. So you need to first upgrade your identity to see yourself as someone who is worthy of that, capable of that, able to handle it if it comes your way. Because if you don't yet get there, it means you don't trust yourself and you will keep sabotaging. And we see this countless times. So that's the first step. So, yes, of course, know where you're going. There was a study that came out in the. It was probably the mid 2010s and they looked at the role of. They called it positive fantasies. So the term manifesting, or it's not in the literature, but positive fantasies about where you want to be. And they found that the more someone visualized this positive fantasy, and only the positive fantasy, the less energy they had to actually achieve that positive fantasy. Because it means that where you are right now and where you want to be there is this gap, and all you see is the gap, and suddenly you think, nothing's happening. I'm not progressing. Oh, my goodness. Can't do it too hard. So there is a missing step, and that's where you need to actually do the work. Put in the reps, put in the steps, every little thing. You know, we talk about milestones, have a milestone to help you get there. What gets in the way, though? And this is something that we like to teach and this is something that I write about in Big Trust because it's so overlooked. So it's actually a story from Michael Phelps. Let me tell you the Michael Phelps story. It's a short one, but it's a good one.

[Cody Sanchez]

Love it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So Michael Phelps, one of the greatest athletes of all time, multiple world champion, or was not world champion. He set numerous. Yeah. Olympic champions, numerous world records. So 2008, actually, let me take you back before the 2008. So he had. His coach said he had this remarkable ability to visualize, but that's not particularly new for athletes. A lot of them visualize, but his coach said no, it was. It was what he would visualize. Okay, yes, he'd visualize Himself doing really well and succeeding. But he would also visualize every possible thing that could go wrong, everything that could go wrong. Goggles snapping, snip, slipping on the starting block, cramping mid race. And then importantly, he would then visualize what he would do if that happened. So he had it essentially embedded in his nervous system so that if it happened, he wouldn't get distracted, he wouldn't get overwhelmed. He had a plan. He'd been there before. Now this is something that we often don't do when we're thinking about getting to our goal. We don't think about the things that can get in our way. And so when they inevitably come, we get stuck. We see it as a verdict, maybe this isn't for me. We give up, we get overwhelmed, whatever it is. Take the Michael Phelps approach, which is known as a pre mortem in the project management world and a lot of business strategy or inversion thinking. So, okay, now here's where it came into play for Michael Phelps 2008. It's the finals in the Olympics of the 200 meter butterfly. He dives into the pool within the first couple of meters. His goggles fill up with water. He cannot see a thing. But he had been here before in his mind. So as he says, he's quoted saying, I swam blind for 175 meters out of a 200 fly. Broke the world record. And it had been because he'd been there before. He didn't allow it to shake him. And so when we're talking about achieving that goal, know where you're going, take the steps to get there, but also anticipate every possible thing that could get in your way so that you know that you'll be fine. You have an approach. Even if it's okay, if this happens, I'm going to enlist the support of this person. I'm going to get my business mentor on board. I'm going to speak to my board and see what to do. And it's, that's one way you build your agency, which is that second driver of self doubt. When you don't believe you can do it, you will not take action. You'll sabotage your progress.

[Cody Sanchez]

This is a secret. Nobody shares. I've done thousands of deals, but until now I've never shared the most valuable 10% publicly because I want to buy these businesses myself. Then I realized that if you guys buy the businesses, I get to do the deals with you. So this year at Main Street Millionaire Live, it is your chance to see our insider strategies. I'll teach you how we find, buy and scale a business step by step with the frameworks that I literally use to buy all these businesses. So if you want to go from an aspiring owner to someone actually running a profitable business, join me, I'll give you my blueprint and maybe we end up doing deals together. Yeah, it's almost like the right way to manifest completely, which is actually to not, you know, I think in a lot of. I mean, I've certainly been told, hey, if you manifest and you think about negative things, that's what you'll have in life. But there's this in between which is let's be realistic and what could happen and then continue to think about how we could overcome. I mean, Charlie Munger famously was. He always said invert, always invert. And he was pretty famous for inversion thinking. It's one of the biggest credits to why he built billion dollar businesses is because he never thought about what could go right. He always thought about what would an antigle look like. And I think about that a lot too. Imagine you become a billionaire at what cost? Right. And so he would always think about, well, if this outcome was there, that would be terrible for me. So I wanted to avoid it. I really like that.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Pragmatic.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. You know, and as long as you keep taking action completely, it keeps fueling you towards the goal that you want to do. You know, there was a couple things that I want to talk about there. We talked a lot about self doubt. Right. And things that could go wrong. But let's talk more about. Let's get a little positive for them too. Let's say they're already awesome. Yes. And they're doing great. And somebody's listening today. But they want to make themselves like a little bit more charming. How do you make yourself more charming? Is that even possible?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Great question. So when we look at a lot of the literature, fascinatingly, this term of charisma and presence, there's a lot of debate about it because a lot of people say it's. It's been researched in the space of supporting the male style, the very masculine style. And so a lot of researchers are sort of anti presence and charisma. The fact is we live in a world where people are judged based on how they come across. And until that changes, we should just acknowledge that and see how we can work within that strategically. So, okay, if you want to make yourself more charismatic, more charming, there is a few things that you can do. I'm going to start with the five pieces that increase your perceived confidence, which translates into perceived competence. Because we know that the more confident you appear, the more competent. Did I say confident you appear? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The more confident you appear, the more competent you're perceived to be, which is a shame. If you struggle with confidence, you may be the most competent person in the room, but people won't recognize it. And this is where you see people who otherwise are not particularly well skilled or competent at what they do rising because of the perception.

[Cody Sanchez]

Oh, yeah. So what do we have this. Did you ever see that Jon Hamm in what show was it on? But he was. He's obviously a good looking dude and he's on this show and he is terrible at everything, but he's so good looking that nobody ever tells him. So she finally tells him in bed. She's like, you're actually quite terrible.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, how funny.

[Cody Sanchez]

And he says, like, that couldn't be possible because I've been with so many women. And then at the end, you see him try to ride off on a motorcycle and he's like swerving all over the sea. So it's just perfect. It's a perfect example of. We've all met that person who we sit at a boardroom and we say something probably not that well. The person down the way repeats what we say, but better, cleaner, more confident, they get all the credit. And often, like, those are the people that could get promoted to in life or even get the girl, get the guy, get the whatever. So this is cool. Okay, so you're going to teach us how to become the person people listen to.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes, I'm going to start first with. Okay, so let's say I say that there are two forms of charm, two forms of charisma. One of them is, you know when you see that amazing person on stage and they are so captivating and engaging, or you're at that networking event or that party and there's someone and everyone is hanging onto their every word as they tell that story. That's what I call captivating charisma. But then what happens when at the end of that keynote, that person walks off and no one really wants to talk to them? Or that person at the party finishes a story and then everyone kind of just wanders off? No one's following up. That's because they lack magnetic charisma.

[Cody Sanchez]

Whoa.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

And magnetic charisma is what draws you in. You can have one without the other. There are some people who are just so warm and you can't help but want to go and talk to them and get to know them. But you don't want to see them on stage because they just don't know how to captivate. So I'm going to share strategies, simple tips, very basic. We can all implement them. That's going to help with both. But really, the magnetic piece comes down to a lot of the characteristics the person has. The qualities, the attributes, their integrity, their warmth. But. Okay, so, Cody, let's say that we're at an event and I see you across the room. What's the first thing I'm going to notice about you from that far away?

[Cody Sanchez]

What I'm wearing, What you're wearing.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

What else?

[Cody Sanchez]

Maybe my hand movements.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Hand movements and posture.

[Cody Sanchez]

Posture? Yeah, posture.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So hand movements and posture are really important at first glance, before we even get closer, close enough to see someone's face before we hear their voice. Simple things you can do to come across as more charismatic is to have a confident posture. Because posture is one of the quickest ways to determine, do I trust this person, Do I respect this person? Can I trust their words? Upright posture, neck raised slightly. And also not. Yeah, I know. Sit upright, everybody. As my mother always used to say, I know mom.

[Cody Sanchez]

I got it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Represent the mom. So. And also hand gestures. A lot of times when we're anxious, when we're feeling a little bit flustered, we throw away our gestures and we keep them quite small. It doesn't look very good. I used to do this when I was presenting on stages many, many years ago because I was myself. I was so anxious that it would come out and bless. Someone in the audience came to me and said, shade, I'm not sure you're aware of this, but your hand gestures are very distracting. Really appreciate that. She shared it. I went home and probably cried that night. But still.

[Cody Sanchez]

But I'm fine.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah, I'm fine now. I learned. So gestures are really important. So posture and gestures. That's your first one. Now, as I get closer, what else am I going to notice? I'm close enough to now see your face. What am I going to notice?

[Cody Sanchez]

Any facial expressions?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah, specifically eyes and mouth. Eyes are one of the quickest indicators of perceived confidence based on whether you make eye contact with someone and whether you hold eye contact with someone. So a lot of the time people will. Again, when they're doubting themselves, they don't look at the person. They look around constantly. Which is fine if you're thinking. But, Cody, if we sat here the whole time and I was darting around my eyes like this, firstly, I'm not building connection. You probably would start to doubt the Validity of what I'm saying doesn't convey charisma. So you want to be making the eye contact, being present in that eye contact and then maintaining it, but not too long, because that can be creepy. So it's like generally around three seconds, and then you might shift your gaze elsewhere and then come back. Does vary culturally. So know your cultural culturally.

[Cody Sanchez]

Glad you said that. I went to Brazil. I went to Carnival one year, and they kind of jokingly told me when you went into the clubs that you shouldn't make eye contact with anybody because that was an invitation for you to get kissed.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, wow.

[Cody Sanchez]

Immediately. Right? And so I was like, shut up. Whatever. I'm walking around. I'm. I'm not, like, I'm not, you know, staring, and I'm being what appears to be normal from an American. I'm looking around and I get my two drinks from me and my girlfriend, and I turn around, there's a man, and he's in my face, and he starts kissing my face and all these. And I panic with my tiny hand movements and start sort of hitting him with these two drinks. And he looked at me like I was a psychopath.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

That's crazy.

[Cody Sanchez]

He was like, in Portuguese, which I kind of speak for, which is like a mixture of Spanish and Portuguese. And he said, he's like, what's wrong? You. Like, we looked at. Why are you upset? And I was like, this is fascinating. So it is true. Careful when. But unless you guys are partying in Carnival, you probably, by and large, I would assume, I'd be curious what the data says. How many people, like, what percentage of the population do you think doesn't have a very strong posture, doesn't make eye contact and has kind of too small of movements? Like, how many people are listening right now? And even if you think you're looking confident, you're probably not looking that confident.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So in my experience, 40 to 60%, and it varies depending on where they are. Some people will tone it up when they're at work, and then it drops off when they leave. Uh, some people know to turn it on when they're in that meeting with that senior stakeholder or their boss or their clients. And then they'll drop it off. Yeah, 40 to 60. So it's. It's quite a lot.

[Cody Sanchez]

So it's probably pretty likely that you could benefit from just a slight shoulders back and a little bit more.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes. And then we have smiling.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So there's a perception that smiling equals weakness because it signals too much warmth. And if you're trying to make a positive first impression. Don't smile. But we know that smiling is all, you know. People say smiling is one of the quickest ways to demonstrate approachability. And I completely agree. So if you want that magnetic charisma, you want to be smiling, even if it's not a like, crazy, you know, don't crazy smile, but have a warm, approachable face, which just means, like a subtle, you know, upturn as opposed to a frown, because no one's going to want to approach you if you're frowning. So that's the other one. Now then, as I get closer to you, Cody, and I hear you speaking, I'm going to start paying attention to what you're saying, your vocal tone. When you're not feeling confident in yourself, what do you do? You speed up how quickly you speak. Your pace increases. Also because your pace is increasing, you don't breathe through it. You don't pause through it. And I'm going, oh, this person doesn't believe in herself. I don't believe in her. So slowing down slightly. And this is where it's important to kind of combine them. Some people will slow down so much, and then they combine it with looking around so that the other person then just butts in and they keep cutting them off. So if you're slowing down, make sure you're maintaining the engagement. So the other person knows. Okay, I'm still listening here. They haven't tuned out. So that's a really important one. And then all the others, make sure you're pausing, take your breaths, have your intonation in your voice. And then. Okay, the final one's an interesting one for charisma. It's to do with how fast you walk. So studies that are looking at body motion, they're tracking physicality, motion and physicality. And they found that the slower you walk, the less presence you have.

[Cody Sanchez]

I knew it. I got ridiculed on the Internet so hard for this.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, I'll share it with you. The study. You can reference it.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'll be slapping that all over the place if I told you so. No, wait.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah. It's because it perceived status.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So if you. And I'm not talking about power walking around the office. I'm talking about everybody calm down. Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

There's two ways this could go.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

If there is.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

No, I'm just talking about walking with purpose. You know where you're going and you're going to get there. And they found that if you can get that balance right. So not too slow, not too fast. Your Perceived status increases, which increases your charm and your charisma. Now, it's really interesting when we look at what a lot of women choose to wear in the office. Sometimes they wear more restrictive clothing, sometimes they wear very, very high heels that prevent them from maintaining a steady pace. So this can unintentionally be undermining how they're seen by other people. So when we put all these things together, that's how we're able to convey more of this charisma. It sounds like a lot, but actually it's not. It's like, smile, look at someone straight back. It's what your mother told you to do when you were a kid. Smile at the. You know, at the guests.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

And then, of course, use their name. The last one, though, which I haven't mentioned, is what I call the 3 SP. It's the pause. You do this really well. I'm not sure if you're aware of it. And a lot of highly charismatic speakers who are also magnetic, like a Mel Robbins, do this. They pause, they get asked a question, and they'll pause two to three seconds before answering. Actually, I need to get better at this because I'm pretty sure you've asked a question, and I've been so excited that I've gotten straight into it. So there goes my charisma score. But the whole idea is that when you take that moment off the you're asked a question or when someone turns the mic to you to pause, firstly, you're able to capture your own spinning mind. If it's spinning, determine what are you going to say? Get the right tone. Because when we're rushed, we might often have a slightly higher register, and it just draws people in. It's so super interesting.

[Cody Sanchez]

You know what else I've. I've found, at least with zero studies whatsoever, just Cody Sanchez's experience. So we should check my. Which is valid, is that people who walk slow, I found, have been less successful at my companies.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Wow.

[Cody Sanchez]

Crazy thing to say out loud.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So if you're listening and you're at Cody's company.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. If you're slower at ordering. Sign of indecision. Also lack of prioritization, like, how important is this? Obviously, there are some meals where you should really savor the moment and analyze the menu and have a fun time picking what's next. But for the most part, if you haven't figured out your coffee order, you know, and you're 35 years old and you've been doing this for a minute, we probably got some issues. And so yeah. So part of my screening process for hiring is actually coffee order. Yeah, I love taking them to coffee. I love. Yeah, I love. You'll see all of our offices are glass, so I watch how they walk in, how they walk out because it really is a sign of. I haven't met a lot of people who have been really successful at our firms who walk really, really slow. And obviously there's always the outlier. You know, I do have one friend that kind of walks like a lumberjack. I mean, just so slow. I'm almost like, this is. This is why.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Reminding you to be present.

[Cody Sanchez]

She is. She's the opposite of me. It's great. That's why we're friends. But that's really, really fascinating for women about the heels because how much of the time did we think that we were getting judged because we dress too hot and our heels are too high and actually if we just walked a bit more purposefully and int. That might not have been the way that we dress at all?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

What. Actually, let's talk about that for a second. Do you have any research or data that you have on how we dress and how that is important to impressing?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Completely. There's a. There's a huge research area purely looking at physical appearance. So not only how we dress, but also physical attractiveness and whether we're wearing makeup or not wearing makeup. And it's truly fascinating. Now, depending on what study you look at, the results are slightly different. But the overarching theme is that people make perceptions very quickly. They make a judgment about you. And the more the way I like to think of it is the more pride you take in your appearance. It reflects that you trust yourself, you believe in yourself, you're willing to express that to others and it increases percept the perception of trust and competence from other people. But I always do say don't dress in a way that makes you stand out. For the wrong reasons. Yeah, for the wrong reasons. When I used to work in corporate, So I spent 10 years in the corporate world. I was a commercial lawyer by training. Then I moved into banking and finance. Totally wrong roles for me. But hey, I learned a lot when I was in the banking and finance space. When I was working in a strategy role, there was a girl who worked within one of the corresponding teams, so competent and she was very big on authenticity and dressing to stand out and. But it was so out of the norm that I remember being in a meeting with executives because part of my role was to facilitate their meetings. And they were talking about her with her not in the room. And it wasn't good things. It was entirely based on what she was wearing. Not her work, not her deliverables, not her performance. Did you see her earrings today? Did you notice the shoes? Don't wear anything that could distract in the wrong way. Doesn't mean you have to. So when I worked in the law firm, my entire wardrobe was black, gray and brown.

[Cody Sanchez]

Me too.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

You lawyer as well. Finance.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So we dress to fit in and that's actually okay early on because belonging is super important. So kind of bringing back theme of self doubt in. Because I think it's really relevant here. I thought that self doubt for most people, excluding the likes of Cody. But I thought that for most people, but for some, like for many, it's debilitating.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Like completely debilitating.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So I thought that you get to a certain level in your career, a certain level of success and it just disappears. But what we found is if you had it early on, you will have it. It just morphs with responsibility. It evolves. So earlier on in our careers, our doubt often relates to belonging. Do I fit in? Am I? And sometimes related to your agency? So it's acceptance and agency. Agency is, can I do the thing like am I competent? And so with that competence piece, we'll often try and sound more intelligent and use really big words, which studies have found that actually undermine your perceived intelligence and perceived competence when you use back.

[Cody Sanchez]

Up that for a second. Because that is so. I have found that to be so true. It's like, you know, if, if you want to see if somebody's quite intelligent, see how much they can simplify very complex things.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes.

[Cody Sanchez]

That is actually the hard part. And in fact it is, it almost is jarring to the here to the.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Ear when it's so simple.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, like I remember early. No, no, when it's not.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, when it's not simple.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. I remember early on I fell into this exact same trap.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

And you know, I was a. I was a public school kid, I went to Arizona State. You know, I had all these fancy people around me in finance. So I was like, I don't even understand half these words. I'm going to be using them. I'm throwing out some $5 words left and right and, and I remember at the end of a particularly loquacious sentence by me, I got pulled away by my manager. She was like, what are you talking about? And I remember the look, like, really, like, what is wrong with you? You know, what are you talking about? I was like, oh, wow. I was trying to like be sophisticated and I wanted them to know I knew all these things and I'm also smart, you know, she was like, it was very apparent. And, and so there is this mixture of, you know, I always say like, if there's joy to a word, you know, so if you're like, ah, I love using this word today, then I'm okay. But if you're throwing them in consistently. Yeah, it almost for some reason. Why do you think our brain notes it immediately? Because it is a turn off. I feel it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It's like a pattern interrupt. Because we're left to think, oh, that's a word I haven't heard in a while. And then we're also left to think, how do all of these big words come together? What is the meaning? And so we're out of the conversation suddenly because you're trying to make sense of what someone just said.

[Cody Sanchez]

Interesting.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

As opposed to something which is just natural conversational language that we get. Also when we use the bigger words, we're often throwing more of them in. So a sentence that could otherwise be very short becomes a little bit longer and people are left trying to catch up. And so it completely backfires. And I think it's such a common experience whenever anyone is either early in their careers or starting something new or transitioning, they're in their first business, maybe their first team meeting, and they feel that pressure to impress. Because we want to be accepted by others, because when they validate us, we validate ourselves. It's a lack of acceptance and so we compensate that way. Interestingly though, as people advance in their careers or they become more competent, proven track record, if they had the self doubt initially, it will often come with them, but this time it morphs into more of a bit of a fear of failure because of what the failure means about them and the reputational damage that could be caused because they have a lot further they could fall. So they become a little bit more risk averse. They also start to doubt their competence the more they learn about where they are and what they're doing and the more they start to rub shoulders with other people who are now as good as them or more successful. And suddenly they realize, oh gosh, what got me here is not going to get me there. And then they start to doubt, which can have really detrimental effects on how they're showing up. Because again, that whole expectation bias. But the best thing about that is when you're in a new room with new people and suddenly realizing, wow, look at all of this that I still have to learn rather than feeling like the imposter. Tell yourself amazing look at all I get to learn. Who can I learn from? What do I need to ask? Which mentors do I need to seek out? So you see it as an opportunity to emulate rather than compare and feel less than so you're about to make a trade based on a friend's text, but which you do you listen to is it we could buy a house.

[Cody Sanchez]

In Tulum.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Get optioning those options. We could lose everything. Or let's do a little research, get your head in the trade and make the investment decision that's right for you. Learn [e-mail] TradeSmart Olivia Culpo here to tell you all about the launch of the new Abercrombie spring denim collection Made the way denim should feel. Their denim has always been a staple in my wardrobe and has a wide range of fits, styles and washes. Every jean is available in both their class Fit and Viral Curve Love shop in the app, online and in stores.

[Cody Sanchez]

So let's say you are in a room and everybody in there is a player. They're more successful than you, they have bigger businesses than you or they have more friends than you. More status. However the game is that you want to play. What do you do when you're in that room to not look like you want to impress them? When all you want to do is impress them? Or said alternatively inverse. Always inverse. What should you absolutely not do? So brand new in a room, tons of successful people. Please don't do these things.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Don't name drop. It's a turn off that can organically come up later. But if you're name dropping as a way to impress you will absolutely turn people off because they probably know all the same people and no more people. So it'll show that you're really trying to get in. That's the first one. The second one is you don't have to go in there and try and impress them with all your achievements. Oh when I did this, oh when I did that. So don't do that. Don't drop all the achievements in there. Don't one up people. We see this a lot. Someone will be sharing a success and then someone else will jump in and say oh well when I. And then they're trying to. It's not going to go down well at all. The best thing you can do is be interested. Show them respect. We've heard this a million times. Ask them questions, show genuine curiosity not only about their Businesses, but also about them. People generally like talking to them, talking about themselves. It lights up a part of our brain which is rewarding. Not everybody, but most especially people who tend to be very successful in business, who are at events in these rooms, they love talking about themselves. So if you could ask them questions. And not just the surface questions, get deeper. You know, what did you learn about yourself during that experience? What was one of the most challenging things you faced? You don't want to put them on the spot, though. So you don't want to say what was the biggest challenge you've ever experienced? Because then they're going to think, gosh, the biggest, I don't know. And then you might lose them. But you can ask questions about challenges, about goals, about things that you can support them with if possible. If you can offer to be of value to them, then it doesn't feel like you're just trying to take or impress.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's really good. One of my favorite mentors taught me the five to one rule, which is they were like, you know, ask five questions to every one thing that you.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Give or that you share.

[Cody Sanchez]

Beautiful. And when I was early, I just needed a rule, you know, I was like, I'm gonna just. So then my head would be, one, two, three, what am I up to?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Four.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, exactly. But otherwise, that little voice inside you that tells you to keep going does start chattering.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It does.

[Cody Sanchez]

And that chatter can derail you. I mean, it's so much more powerful sometimes to just be a little quieter and to be the person asking the questions. It's really, really good. This is like, let's say I'm really careful about naming people usually. So I struggle to use this word manipulator, but there are certainly people out there that are going to try to manipulate you, that are going to try to put you in a box, that are going to try to constrain you. What do you do to someone who is trying to manipulate you?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So I always like to start by separating the person from the manipulative behavior. And that helps us, those of us who really like people and don't ever want to, you know, name people poorly. No, the behavior is different. Same with toxicity. Like a toxic person in a workplace or a toxic leader. Separate the person from the behavior allows us to address the behavior. What manipulative behavior will try to do is attack each of these four drivers of self doubt, which is fascinating. Again, bringing it back to that. They will either make you try to feel or they will either try to make you feel like you are worthless, which is tapping into your sense of acceptance. They will try to make you doubt your skills or abilities. Tapping into agency. They will try to make you feel like you don't have control over a situation or get you to doubt your memory of something. Gaslighting, which relates to the third pillar, which is autonomy. Or they'll just fill you with such a sense of overwhelm when you're around them or stress or insecurity that it undermines your belief in what we call adaptability, which is the fourth pillar, the fourth driver of self doubt. So what do we do? You can go through and determine, okay, which of these drivers of self doubt is this person trying to attack right now. That helps you, again, separate from it. But then the next really tactical step, we call it the cut method. And I have to try and remember each of those components. Let's see, the first one is C, which is cut the emotion. So tell yourself, I'm not allowing this person to make me feel this way because no one can make you feel a certain way. You're allowing yourself to feel a certain way in response to what the person is doing based on how you're interpreting it, the meaning you're applying. Like, there was this great. I've seen it on social media. It's a fantastic analogy. Cody, if I said, I hate your blue hair, it looks terrible, you look stupid.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, I don't care.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

No. Why?

[Cody Sanchez]

I don't have blue hair.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

You don't have blue hair. You're not internalizing it. So when someone's trying to manipulate us, it's also often because it's something we deep down believe about ourselves. They are trying to attack. And when they get a response, they know, huh, this is the button I'm pushing. So if you cannot give them the response, fantastic. Cut the emotion. The second one is you unfazed appearance. So you can cut the emotion. But you also need to make sure that when you're interacting with them, when you're near them, nothing. They don't get that from you. They're not worthy of any kind of expression. You respond to them with respect, polite tact, but that's it. And t turn off engagement. Do not ruminate. Don't allow them to occupy precious mental energy. Because as we were talking before about, you know, not necessarily manifestation, but the energy that you give off creates your reality. You're also contagious. The energy that you take into a room influences other people. So if you're allowing that person to affect you to such an extent that you are then ruminating on them and that and how you feel you're going to be creating that in your reality, don't do it. And then if you can, try and remove yourself from interacting with them.

[Cody Sanchez]

So how do we know if somebody's a manipulator? So you gave us sort of. Here's what they're going to attack these four components. But let's like play it out in real time. So like in my life, I'm trying to think. I remember the first time somebody stole from me and it was in business and I thought we were friends. And I remember there were like little moments where I felt something weird in my stomach or gut in particular. They would kind of neg, right. So they'd be like, oh, you know, all, all influencers say that. Because I hate being called an influencer. If you want to piss me off, call me one on the Internet now you know. Yeah, exactly. Now you know. So I'm like, it's a weird word. I'm not trying to influence anybody on anything. And so, you know, they would kind of. And they knew that. So they would kind of make these little. And I remember thinking, huh, that's a weird thing to do to somebody, that. But it was a joke, right? I remember they would have me question something. So I guess this is my. So if they're having me question something, what is that?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Autonomy or relates to autonomy.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay, so in this instance, he was like, well, you know, in this particular. Like, you can't do that. I have this expertise here. You can't do that. You kind of, you need me for this. Like, let me, let me come over there and help you. But that's not, that's not for you. Let me see.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

No, this is agency undermining your belief in your capabilities.

[Cody Sanchez]

There you go.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay. And so what does this sound like to you? Have you ever had this happen where somebody tried to manipulate you? And what would it. How could we just start noticing that immediately?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It's tricky. It's tricky because the definition of manipulation differs depending on where you're looking. And I think it's so nuanced and different depending on the situation. It also feels very different depending on whether it's a co worker, a business partner, a spouse.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

A child, a family member. The way I see it, it's when someone gets you to doubt one of these four drivers, that creates more self doubt. And they do it consistently because we know someone might do it once and they're not aware of it, but they do it consistently. That's the first piece. The second piece is. Or they get you to do something that you intuitively do not want to do, but they position it in such a way that you feel like it's what you want to do, and then it's only after you've done it, you're like, wait, I didn't. That's not aligned with my values or who I am.

[Cody Sanchez]

Mm.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So again, it requires you to reflect. I always say if someone is not actually actively lifting you up, they don't deserve to be in your life. Call them out. Not always as easy to do that, but when it comes to signs, are they actively trying to undermine you based on one of the four drivers of self doubt? Are they trying to get you to question your version of reality? Or are they trying to get you to do things that you intuitively know are not the right thing for you, and then once you pick up on it, you can try and address it. The reality is, a lot of people are not aware that they're doing these things. It's just how their mother treated them. It's what they're seeing. It's the pattern that they're replaying from their own childhood. And they've never had someone in their lives tell them, hey, this is not okay. We don't accept this kind of behavior. So you can call. If you value the person and value the relationship, call it out. Acknowledge it. Same thing is toxicity in a team. Let's say you have a toxic team. What do you do? Three things. First thing, call out the toxicity. Hey, guys, this is not okay. We're toxic. Let's acknowledge it. Let's go. This is not a blame game. We need to acknowledge it. Do we all acknowledge it? Great. Here are the reasons. Call it out. The second thing is to actually cut out the toxicity. And I know that's really harsh, but there are people. If you know that someone, unfortunately has that tendency. Again, we're separating person from toxic behavior, but for the sake of illustration, I'll just say the toxic person. Cut them out. It's too hard. They leave too big of a footprint in a team. And same with someone in your life who's manipulating you. They can leave too big a footprint. And even if they change their behavior when you're around them, you still go back, right? So if you can unfortunately remove them, do that. The third thing, though, is also to ask yourself, am I the toxic one? Am I acting in a way that's encouraging these other people to act in that way? Am I creating an environment where I'm allowing this person to manipulate me because I'm not having an opinion on things. I'm not addressing things when they come up. We don't realize sometimes we are the source of the problem.

[Cody Sanchez]

Well, it's so good because if you're the source of the problem, you can fix it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Exactly.

[Cody Sanchez]

Way harder to fix somebody else.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Totally. You just need to have the humility to acknowledge, okay, it's on me. What am I going to do about it? That's hard.

[Cody Sanchez]

So let's say right now you're in a relationship with somebody, which is probably where a lot of this comes up for people. And in that relationship, you feel like they are engaging with you in these behaviors that you find to be inappropriate. Give us some examples, like what would you say explicitly to that person? What. What tools do you have? What exact verbiage do you use to say, I don't find this behavior appropriate? Is it as simple as that?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It can be.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Every relationship is so different. So I always say that there are a few things we need to acknowledge within relationships. They're very nuanced, they're very sensitive. But if you do not address something, it will never get better. You teach people how to treat you based on what you're willing to tolerate. So if something has been happening for so long, sometimes it's very difficult to go back. But you can always break the pattern if the person is worth it. And if you know that you can be your best self with that person. Sometimes we have to make the tough call. In fact, the other day, so I've been traveling around the US currently, and the other day I was on an. In an Uber going to the. Actually the audio recording of my book Big Trust. But the Uber driver was so wonderful. She was telling me. So she asked me what I'm doing and I mentioned it and I shared a bit about the book. And then she said, oh, gosh, I've experienced so much self doubt. Can I tell you my story? And she, you know, in a nutshell, she said that she had always wanted to. Okay, it's a little bit broader than what we're currently talking about, but it relates she'd been in a relationship for four years. It wasn't going anywhere. She also always wanted to be a physician, but she never believed in herself. So she ended up just pursuing sales and business administration. She was now almost 30 and she was really unhappy. She realized that her relationship was not allowing her to be her best self. She was a healer by nature, and so she was trying to fix this person that was only preventing her from being able to be everything she could be. So she made the call a couple of months before her 30th birthday to end her four year relationship. It was hard, but it would have been harder. You talk about this a lot. It would have been harder to stay in that relationship for 20, 20, 30 years and look back at a life full of regret. So she ended her relationship. She also quit her job. She moved back in with her parents into her old childhood bedroom. And she's starting medical school in January. She'll be 30 years old and she's choosing to take control of her life. So good for her.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. Good for you. I know. And isn't it also interesting that you know when you're doing all those things, you're like, the story I think you often tell yourself, or at least I do, is like, oh, I gotta move in with my parents now. I don't have anybod.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

I don't have a job. And instead, like, know that there's people like us celebrating you and being like, you did an incredible thing. Good for you. You quit the job you hated because you want to do something else. You broke up with somebody that was bad for you. Like, if you can spin it the positive other way, like, massively different things can happen in your life.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Totally.

[Cody Sanchez]

And sometimes it's nice to know there are people cheering for you to do the hard thing.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Completely.

[Cody Sanchez]

You know, my, my, my mom's amazing at that. Like when I am married happily now, but I was divorced. And I remember at first that was really hard for her. You know, we're, we're Latinos. And so it's like family and Catholic and you don't really do that. And. But then she finally, one day she said to me, you know, I finally realized how hard that was for you.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Wow.

[Cody Sanchez]

And that you made an incredibly hard decision. And I'm really proud of you because it would have been much easier in many ways to stay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Wow.

[Cody Sanchez]

And like hearing that.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So somebody else, especially your mother, it's completely different.

[Cody Sanchez]

Oh, yeah, it was, it was really big. And so I think it's, you know, if, I think if more people can celebrate those tough decisions, even if it's not the win. Celebrate the hard totally. Doesn't have to be the outcome that we celebrate.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I actually think there's more value in celebrating the hard than the win.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Because the heart is what gets you to the win. And if you're not celebrating that, hard is hard.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

And that's why people avoid it. And the Sunk cost fallacy. Right. We've invested so much time in this relationship, it would be a waste. Or I've invested so much time in this career, it would be a waste. And then we listen to what everyone else tells us, but they are not us. They're not in our situation. So absolutely celebrate the hard. And the more you get better at doing the hard, the more you're desensitizing yourself to the discomfort, and then the easier it gets.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's so good. I mean, I. Going through all the notes we took from your work and your book and your YouTube and your. I mean, there's like. You have an incredible body of research. Do you also have a crazy memory? Have people told you that? Like, your ability to remember all these studies and the dates, I would be getting these so wrong. So next. Next podcast, it'll be like, top memory.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Tricks, actually how to remember stuff. Well, one tip on that is write things down by hand. So there has been a study that was published recently in the last five years, which was looking at the difference between people who type things for recall versus handwriting for recall. And they found you're significantly more likely to remember something when you write it by hand, and even more so if you use col coding, if you circle key pieces, if you, you know, do underlines and things like this. This is why I always travel with a notebook. In fact, I'm meant to have one with me today to take notes. It's in my bag.

[Cody Sanchez]

We took it from you. We didn't want you distracted. That's fascinating. So there are actual studies that show if you want to remember something, the tactile aspect of writing it down, circling, underlying, will actually help you remember.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Absolutely. Because of the parts of the brain that it's activating. Oh, interesting. And then some people will ask, well, what about if you use those. Those like an apple pen and you're writing. I actually don't know if they've looked at the difference between the electronic version versus paper, but the way I see it is on paper, you also have the visual cue because you're like, oh, yeah, I wrote something at the top right of the second page. And you go. As opposed to like, some long, big stream of writing that you've got. Because that's usually how it works with those electronic devices.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So I feel like there's definitely an element of the physical space, what you're doing, how it felt, the process of the writing, and then how it just helps us with. Very cool.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. I was reading a study the other day about how if you want to remember things, you have like a 20 to 30% increased likelihood of remembering if you listen and read.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh brilliant.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. Which I thought was useful. Now they say to do it at the same time. And I was like, fuck, that's it. I don't even know if I could handle that. I like it at 2x speed too. Which probably does not help with memory recall, but that to do list is checked. But I think, I think these days we're so onslaughted with information so much and everything is, you know, we can't even control what we consume anymore. No. And so if instead there are ways to really cement the things you want in your brain. That's such an, that's an unlock. So that's what you do when you're looking. Studies have to be super boring to read.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

So you basically your notes over there like a motherfucker in order to keep that whole straight.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

They're boring. And when you read a few of them, you're like, they all kind of sound the same. So I have actually have a document, I have a document that I use, it's a Google sheet. And I will keep the citation of the study, the link to the study authors. And then what did the study find? And then importantly, how does this apply to someone's life? Because a lot of studies are not necessarily written in a way to be applied. They're written in a way to be published, which is very different. And I learned that when I was doing my own thesis, I was like, this is the most boring thing I have ever written. But I need to satisfy a certain academic standard and that's what papers were like. So if you're looking at papers or anything, I encourage you to keep the paper. And also like what did it find and how is this applicable to my life or someone else's life?

[Cody Sanchez]

Love that. Let's talk about high performers for a second. One, do high performers not have self doubt or do high performers in fact have a lot of self doubt?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

In our experience, high performers have a lot of self doubt and they're very aware of their self doubt because they hear it and they feel like it is either something that's completely getting in their way or, or they need it because that's what pushes them. But again, when we look at what the research says about high performance, we know that you're actually going to be more inclined to keep pushing, more inclined to keep growing if you're more compassionate to yourself and have less self criticism and less of that self doubt. Fascinatingly, if we look at imposter syndrome. So imposter syndrome was initially called imposter phenomenon. It was a phenomenon that they found mainly in high performing women. But since they found, it's actually prevalent everywhere, including with men. And some studies have found that up to 82% of people have felt like an imposter at some point in their lives or careers, which is huge. That's 8 out of 10 people feeling like they don't deserve their success. So the definition of imposter phenomenon is believing that other people think that you are more capable or smarter than you actually are. So it's a mismatch between competence. You know, Cody, early on you said competence and confidence usually grow. And that's how it should be when you're healthy, when everything is working. Imposter phenomenon is where your competence has increased because you have to have a track record of success in order for it to be considered imposter syndrome. But your confidence hasn't caught up. So you're constantly doubting whether you can do it, whether you have what it takes, whether other people will determine or discover that you don't belong there. And then you get in your head about that. There's a really brilliant story that comes from graphic designer Paula Scher about how she sees her competence, which I think we can all learn from. So she was incredible graphic designer. In 1998, she was hired by Citibank or Citigroup during their merger with Travelers Group. And so she was hired to design their new logo. So she's sitting at this meeting and they're all talking about what they want for the logo, what they have in mind for it. She grabs a napkin and she starts scribbling on the napkin. A couple of seconds later, she slides it across the table and she says, here's your logo. Everyone at that table was stunned. Someone even said, how is it possible that you just designed our logo in a matter of seconds? And she sat there and she smiled and she said, it's done in a second. And 34 years, it's done in a second. And every experience I've ever had, you just get it in the few seconds. But I'm bringing with me everything. And I think this is such a beautiful and powerful story about how we need to see our skills and our abilities and our competence. I think when we show up to something and we're just looking at it in a vacuum here and now, how can I perform? And I may not have done this before, we fixate on the gaps and what we don't know, how to do, we forget that we're not a blank slate. We have years, decades of experience behind us. We have transferable qualities from other industries we can bring in. Quick second story about the transferable qualities which also helps us when it comes.

[Cody Sanchez]

To the first logo.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, they did. They paid her 1.5 million for it.

[Cody Sanchez]

Get the fuck out.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah. So the Citibank logo that you see that has that little umbrella, that's the one she did.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

If you Google it, you can find the napkin.

[Cody Sanchez]

I need to see this piece. It's wild.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It's so cool.

[Cody Sanchez]

That is a very cool story. I think I would be like, I'd be negotiating a discount. I'd.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, I'm sure they tried.

[Cody Sanchez]

I love the confidence, but man, she must have really pitched the hell out of that.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

Because I think I would have been like, that's cute. Give me 12 other examples, wouldn't you?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, totally. I would have, I would have.

[Cody Sanchez]

Wow.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Maybe they did. Maybe they asked her for others.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's a great story. We're going to run with it. I like it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Bring her on there. That'd be amazing.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, exactly.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

But so the second story that links very closely when it comes to imposter syndrome, it's a story from Nike. So 1985, Nike is going through a lot of challenges as a business. Their stock price has declined, they're laying off huge amounts of stuff and they're struggling to enter the basketball market. So they needed fresh talent. So they held a 24 hour shoe design competition for their staff. And Tinker Hadfield was a corporate architect working for Nike at the time. He had zero experience working in footwear design or designing anything, but he entered and he won. And then basically the next day he was said, he was told, okay, Tinker, you're now moving into the design team. Okay, New space. For his first official shoe design, he drew inspiration from a building that he actually studied in architecture school. It was called the Centre Pompidou in Paris and it's known as an inside out building. So all of the mechanical structures, the airflow systems, it's all on the outside of the building by design. So if you Google it, you can actually see it's a very cool building. He thought, why don't we try that inside out idea with a shoe? And so he sketched it out and that's how the Nike Air Max 1 was born. He thought, let's provide a little bit of a visible air pocket so they can actually see inside the shoe. So and then Phil Knight from Nike actually Claims that Tinker Hatfield's design is what single handedly saved Nike in the 80s. So, and then of course you have Michael Jordan and all these other parties involved. But just that thinking of, okay, he was in a new environment, he could have focused on everything he didn't know how to do, which was design, because he'd never done it before outside of architecture. But instead he transferred his architectural thinking into a completely new medium. So you don't need to feel like an imposter. You just need to remind yourself that there are other skills and experiences and perspectives and instincts that you have that you can bring to the task at hand.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. Scott Adams is so thoughtful about this with his skill stacking. I love the idea of that idea that, you know, you can either become Michael Phelps and spend the 10,000 hours that it takes to become the number one, you know, 0.001%, or you can stack a plethora of skills and at the cross section of multiple talents, you could become the.001%. And if you, you have the ability to be Michael Phelps, I think you should go for it. And that's incredible. But if perhaps you don't see that, it is really freeing to think, huh, okay, well, I could be maybe not the number one Olympic swimmer of all time, but could I be the best graphic designer, copywriter, coder that also understands how to speak publicly about all of those things? Yeah, you probably could. And that's a lot of why you're successful too, I'm sure. I mean, how many former banking, finance, attorneys that talk about research on communication and neuroscience of how we, how we communicate exists in the world? Like there's probably like 101. Yeah. And I think that's pretty neat. And obviously took you. How many years were you in finance and banking?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

10 and 10 years. Oh, so law and banking together with.

[Cody Sanchez]

10.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah. 10 years.

[Cody Sanchez]

Wow. Yeah, that is, that's pretty miserable. Those are two.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

Careers.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Thank you for acknowledging, I think, look, it may be right for the right personality type. It was not right for me.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

And I did, I took too long to listen to my, my intuition and that sick feeling in my gut every time I turn up to work.

[Cody Sanchez]

So is this book really for you? Kind of in some.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's for me back then.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

You know, I mean, look, even now there's things I was writing in the book that I'm like, wow, this is really good. I need to apply this. I'm taking that, that's part of my daily routine.

[Cody Sanchez]

So I think that's the best part about creating. It's why I like, like doing this too. Because half the time, like, why do I do that? Oh, I would do it better if, if I had it that way. That's perfect. But you know, you never get too old for a book that helps you scale to the next level of the game. I mean, I wish, I wish that at some point all self doubt went away and that, you know, a lot of people say that to me today, like, well, if you've had this success, then X, I'm like, man, just higher level, higher.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Totally. Yeah. It fails. It goes away when you know that death is coming. Like when you're at the end. There's actually Bronnie Ware. Have you heard of Bronnie Warehouse? She was a palliative care nurse and she wrote a book called the Top five Regrets of the Dying. So she spent years working in this space. She absolutely loved it. And it was basically the final weeks and days of people's lives. The masks had fallen away, the pressures had fallen away. And she said it was fascinating because what they were regretting had nothing to do with business success, spending more time at work, buying another car, another house. It was entirely. Actually, the first one was I wish I'd lived a life that was more aligned with what I wanted to do as opposed to what others expected of me. And so that's when the doubts finally fall away. The key for us now on the journey is how do we know that they're there but move forward anyway and still embrace what we can do and what we can contribute and create a life and an expectation for ourselves that we can create a life that is going to be fulfilling and give us the satisfaction that we look for.

[Cody Sanchez]

So as you're talking to young you, 20 year old you or 21 year.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Old, I still feel like I'm 20. 21.

[Cody Sanchez]

Me too. I mean, we are 20, right? Yeah, you know, Totally, totally. But if you were talking to young you today, what advice would you give you? The person that hadn't yet written this book or was on podcasts like this?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Okay, if I were talking to young me, I would tell her, your self doubts are not a sign that you're broken. They're not a verdict that you need to stop. They're an entirely natural part of being human. And you can still choose to show up with big trust energy anyway, which means believing in your inherent worth, reminding yourself of your capabilities, focusing on the fact that you can control certain things in your life. So focus there and then taking Steps to manage everything else that comes.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's really good. I don't know why it makes me tear up because I think all of us when we're young, it's just self doubt is so the driving motivation.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It's hard. Being young is hard is.

[Cody Sanchez]

And then you get older, you're like, it was awesome. It's so confusing. But you actually don't understand it until you've been there completely, you know, and then you're talking about hip issues.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

And then I've become the kind of person that when I'm with someone young, I've become that old person who's constantly imparting wisdom and I'm like, I know you didn't ask for this. I know this is unsolicited, but I've become that person. I know, I know people who were that person to me and now I'm that person.

[Cody Sanchez]

It's.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

But I need to just step into it. Right. Hopefully 1% of what I say will stick. And it's usually people on planes because I'm on planes so frequently. It's like the young person on a plane next to me.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'll be like, I'm the anti talker. Oh, so good for you. I pretend to speak Spanish.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

No, I think it's great not to talk because you retain your energy. I always find I get to the other side and I'm like, I need a nap. So now I wear a mask.

[Cody Sanchez]

That's good.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Like, like, like this mask and an eye mask and sometimes earplugs so that I, I prevent myself.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah. From doing that too much. Yeah, yeah. I need to be like quiet and alone. I got my good book on the podcast. I'm a little bit of an introvert. Really.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I would not have guessed. Only on planes or everywhere.

[Cody Sanchez]

Well, I definitely like, I didn't want to be public when I was doing all this. Was never the goal. You know, I've only been on the Internet for three or four years, but I know I'm very happy in a spreadsheet working on a business. Yeah. You know, my self doubt even today, you know, would be night my nightmare. Just like a really big networking event where I don't know anybody isn't okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So everyone listening. You can even be someone like Cody and still have self doubt about big networking events.

[Cody Sanchez]

Which I think that has to be normal. Right. Because a lot of people, a lot of people really like, oh yeah, I'm gonna actually I do have a friend, Nick Gray and I take him with me. I have an emotional, emotional support Friend.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Can you come with me as well? Nick, can you come with my.

[Cody Sanchez]

No, you can't have him.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, he's yours.

[Cody Sanchez]

He's married, actually.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, no, no. I'm married too. So it's all good.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, he's platonically mine.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

This, this idea of. It's not even social anxiety. It's just the effort associated sometimes with these big events. And for a lot of people who are naturally introverts, I think the introversion piece often becomes more magnified as we age. Because when I was younger I wasn't so aware of it. I loved people, I loved being around people. Now I'm with people for an hour and I have to go and have a nap like, because it just drains me, but I enjoy it. So I think there's this piece around being the ambivert.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Where you have the learned extrovert behaviors that allow you to achieve what you need to achieve and then you can return into your little space. And again, there's nothing wrong with that. It's knowing what energizes you and what doesn't and doing enough of what energizes you. And sometimes that. That's being horizontal in bed with an eyepatch at 2pm on a Wednesday.

[Cody Sanchez]

That sounds great. Haven't done that in a minute, but that sounds great. Wait, so if somebody listening out here, if somebody hates big networking events or gets anxiety about going to them, what do you tell them? How do you kill that anxiety when you have to go into a big room with a bunch of people?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

There's a few things. The first thing is when you're feeling that anxiety, your thoughts are going to be reflecting how you're feeling, which is going to be, oh, what if this happens? Oh no, what if that happens? We're catastrophizing worst case scenarios. They're going to think that I'm stuck, silly. They're going to think I'm foolish. I'm going to say the wrong thing. So for every what if. For every negative, what if moves in, move into I wonder whether. And make it a positive. I wonder whether I can find someone who I really connect with tonight. I wonder whether I can add value to someone tonight. So again, this simple reframing. Anytime we do any kind of cognitive reframing, cognitive restructuring, it sounds so simple. But what we're doing is re engaging our prefrontal cortex. Because the thoughts are created often by that emotive center of the brain that is leading us down these paths that are not helpful for us. And then our body Responds in kind in terms of what we physically do. So we can hijack that with a pattern interrupt, which is, okay, I wonder how many new people I can meet. So do that first thing. The second thing is you're going to need a hype playlist before you go in. Music has been found remarkably to fundamentally change your state. So create you know what song. This is a little embarrassing, but I will share it. The song that hypes me right now. Have you seen the. The 1K pop demon hunters? Have you heard about it?

[Cody Sanchez]

Not the top of my list. Shock. No.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Well, it's not mine either, but I have nieces and nephews and they love it.

[Cody Sanchez]

I hear, like, adults like it too.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Apparently there are a lot of deeper themes about inner criticism and inner demons and being true to yourself. So I feel like I should watch it from the psychology analysis perspective. You probably should. But my nieces and nephews were loving it and listening to it constantly. And there's one song in there, golden. Anyone listening? If you know the song, you'll know it. And that's become my hype song because it reminds me of my nieces and my nephews and niece. That's actually very sweet.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, mine is. You know what I'm getting into? This is probably. Don't tell me if this is pseudoscience, I don't want to hear it. But this. There's this guy called Abelhart.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Have you heard of him? No.

[Cody Sanchez]

Oh, okay. Let's see how full of it I am. But okay, so it's Abelhart and he has these songs. One's called Magnet, I like. And another one's called Lucky. And they have certain hurts, like, so they're actually at a certain frequency. And so, you know, I have a really embarrassing, silly one. If I have to go, like, close a big deal or I'm going to go, you know, you know, try to talk business negotiation to go xyz. He has this one called Let the Money In.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, that's great.

[Cody Sanchez]

And I play it really loud and my husband dies on the inside during this. And it's so good. We have to. I'll play it for you. But so, yeah. And then when I hate something, I often create a I hate this but I love these songs playlist. So I have a I hate running, but I love these songs.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, very nice. Very good. See, you're tapping into the power of music. And then there's a second element that comes into it here. Rituals. A ritual is anything you do repeatedly before something. So a lot of sports stars will have their rituals. You might have teams like, doing, you know, the New Zealand team will do the haka before a game. That's obviously culturally significant, but it's also a form of a ritual, which is this routine that helps prime. You know, and rituals have even been found to help your state, manage your emotions, manage your anxiety, and help you perform. So. Good.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, I'm gonna try that.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yeah.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay. Fix one other thing for me, because now this is about me, not everybody else. But I've been having a hard time lately with prioritizing something that is so silly. Stretching. Okay, so I'm, like, getting older, and I need to stretch, and I sit too much, and. And it's really bizarre because sometimes David laughs at me. He's like, why are you so weird? Like, all this stuff is hard, and you pretend like none of it's hard, but I just can't get it done. Like, I am in my own way. I know that I need to do it each evening. I do way harder things than this every day. Why can't I just stretch every day like my beautiful husband?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

He stretches every day.

[Cody Sanchez]

He does it every day with him. No, let me tell you all my excuses. Okay? Okay, let's go through one by one. One, it's cold in the house, so I'm like, I don't want to stretch when it's 62 degrees to be husband temperature. Two, I'm tired. It's the end of the day. Three, oh, this is my time. You know, it's my one time of the day. I don't want to have to do something else that I don't want to do during the day. Four, Like, I'll get to that tomorrow. So those are my excuses. Okay, so how do I fix that?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Okay, how do you fix it? So I feel this one, too. I struggle with stretching. Love a good gym workout. Don't enjoy the stretching. Even though I know when I'm doing the stretching, I'm like, oh, this feels good. Not the first time. It's like after a week, you're like, okay, this feels good. The first time is hard. Second time, very hard, but okay, so how do you do it? Few things. The first thing is I would change the time of day you're trying to do it. When you're already maxed out, you're physically tired, you're cognitively tired. When you are in a job where you're having to make a lot of decisions throughout the day, your willpower decreases. So our ability to function is like glass in a cup, water in a.

[Cody Sanchez]

Glass I was tracking. But we must both be dyslexic. I was on board. I think you nailed it.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh, my gosh. I feel like I'm even more dyslexic when someone is giving me a number or I'm like, typing in credit card numbers.

[Cody Sanchez]

I think there's a word for that, actually, about numbers, which makes me feel better. Great. That is when I do label myself, I go, the thing is, I'm a number dyslexic.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes, Yes. I resonate. I resonate. So I would change the time of day, because by the end of the day, you don't have it in you to do it. Try and do it in the morning. Five minutes. Five minutes. Just start even two minutes, start super short. And if you can have someone guiding you through it. So a YouTube video, a five minute stretch. It forms, like, a sense of accountability. Even though it's not live, it's just a video. But find someone that you vibe with. Five minutes. Then what you want to do is take the Seinfeld strategy. Have you heard of this one? So what Jerry Seinfeld used to do is when he was an aspiring comedian, he used to practice every single day. Every day he would practice. Either he would go to a club, comedy club and practice or practice at home, and he had this calendar on his wall. Every night that he did it, or every day he did it, he would put a big green tick in that calendar. And so what would happen is he's creating this commitment chain. And then if he didn't do it one day, there would be two elements that would come. One, he would see a gap, and he would then think, okay, I really need to fill this gap, so I need to get back to it. And then the second thing was when he did come back and fill the gap, he got the big green tick again. So it was that shot of dopamine. Hey, I'm. I'm doing this. I'm completing this little goal. So if you can visually track and again, make the goal as small as possible, Two minutes, five minutes, whatever is doable. Because anytime you do anything that you haven't done for a while, it's hard to get started. Once you get started, you might do the two minutes, the five minutes, and think, I'm really enjoying this. I'm going to do another 20. James Clear talks about this in his book, right. As small as Possible to Get Started. And then David Allen also talks about it in getting things done, once you get started, you build the momentum, the resistance disappears. Exactly.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

The Second thing, I'd recommend cost analysis. What is the cost of not doing this right now? What is the cost of not doing this in six months? In a year? Okay. What is the benefit of me doing this right now? And then be super clear, because we're often more motivated by the cost of something and we often look at the cost here and now. The cost right now is I'm tired and I just want to crawl into bed or I just want to go to sleep or snuggle up with my husband or whatever it is. But the cost in a year is I'm going to start getting hip problems and I'm not going to be able to maybe lift as heavy or whatever it is and then be really clear on that and then come back and do it. I'll hold you.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'm going to take a little screenshot of it. Send to you daily. Can you please stop cooking for my number? I really like the idea of putting the calendar on the wall and keeping it really simple because I have these habit tracking apps that work really well with me for some things, but not when I'm forming a new habit.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Totally. And remember we talked about writing and recall, Right? Yeah. So when you can physically see something and you see it every day, so don't put it like in your bedroom, it has to be somewhere ugly, like in your office or on your fridge or somewhere where you'll see it.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Especially if you're really into aesthetics. It'll be something that ruins the aesthetic, which is good because then you'll also notice it every time.

[Cody Sanchez]

That's a pattern interrupt.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Exactly. Exactly. So. And it'll help. And then the best part is you start to just like a gym workout, you start to look forward to it, ticking the thing off, doing the. And then obviously your body will benefit as you go. It'll feel better.

[Cody Sanchez]

This is so good. Thank you for being on the podcast.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

You're welcome.

[Cody Sanchez]

I think people listening to this are really going to take away actionable things that can change their life. I've found increasingly we can give people all the business tactics, all the, all the tools, but if you don't believe in yourself, if you're riddled with self doubt, it's really hard to achieve much of anything extreme. So I always used to just think, well, I'll just give them a spreadsheet. This is how you do it. Absolutely not. And so I think what your message is, is really important. I think the book is an incredible way to name it, frame it, and then make change from it. And I'M really glad that you are sharing this message as opposed to, you know, what a lot of people do is just keep all of this for themselves. So thank you so much for being on the podcast.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Thank you for having me.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'm so excited about this book coming out. I'm excited. So already combed through all of it already. But tell us what is the book called? When is it out?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So the book is called Big Trust, Rewire self doubt, find you'd confidence, fuel success. It's coming out January 20th and it's essentially a masterclass on how to build the kind of self trust that we've been talking about so that you can show up and back yourself no matter what the circumstances and back yourself when it counts.

[Cody Sanchez]

I love that. And I hear you have something really special if people pre order the book too.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes. So as my way of thanking anyone who pre orders, they get access to a monthly live masterclass with me. If any of them have already been, they get access to the replay. So it's 90 minutes where we deep dive on topics that are going to help people get unstuck, build that confidence, build that self belief and then we have a Q and A at the end. So that's the pre order incentive. If you pre order it, you'll get access to replays. You'll get to come to the next live one which is coming up in just a few days.

[Cody Sanchez]

That's amazing. You can ask all the tough questions like I did.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes.

[Cody Sanchez]

They can get their stretching routine fixed by you. Okay. I love this. Well, I'm really. I know what it takes to write a book. I know what it takes to write a good book. And it's not fun. So thank you for putting.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I'm glad you said that it wasn't fun. I also did the PhD at the same time. Book and dissertation. Wouldn't recommend it. But hey, we got to the other side.

[Cody Sanchez]

Overachiever. That is. That is good. All right, favorite channel that you are on right now. Like where if are like if somebody's watching you right now. I'm obsessed with her. I gotta get more.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I would say. Well, LinkedIn.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Which is more of the professional geared content.

[Cody Sanchez]

And I think you just said that LinkedIn is your favorite channel right now. It's you and nobody else.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Oh yeah, I know. Well, LinkedIn is a massive under like it's an underappreciated, underutilized the audience on LinkedIn. Yeah. They, they are thirsty to grow people on Instagram kind of want to be entertained and like maybe educated A little bit.

[Cody Sanchez]

That's very true. And on Twitter, everybody's mad.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Yes. Yeah, I never really. I, like, tried Twitter.

[Cody Sanchez]

I was like, don't do it. So scary over there.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

It's not even Twitter anymore.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, you're right.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

That's why everyone. Now, there is one thing, though, that I was prepped before about, like, this one tool that I can share with people.

[Cody Sanchez]

Tell me, what is it?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So it's something that I do every day. I don't do a lot of. I'm gonna be honest. Like, I'm not one of these business owners or researchers who have like 37 biohacks, right? Not at all.

[Cody Sanchez]

Okay.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

I have one thing, and even that sometimes I forget to do. So maybe I should get the calendar as well. But it's, It's. It's there if I need it. I'm big on intentionality because I really believe that how you choose to start your day becomes what you keep reminding yourself of and returning to. So I call it the Morning Clarity reset or the morning clarity approach. Essentially, the first thing I do is just take a couple of breaths in the morning, start with some gratitude. But then I go, what are the three priority pieces I need to focus on today? Get clear on what they are. And then the important part is, what is the big trust energy that I want to bring into my day? Is it a little bit more groundedness? Is it a little bit more self acceptance so that when things go wrong, I don't beat myself up? Is it a little bit more of that agency where I feel like, you know what, I'm going to back my skills today, and if I can't figure it out, I'll get someone to help me. Right. So I become really clear on that energy I want to bring. And then at the end of the day, I bring myself to account. Did I do it? What could have been better? And then a part of that is also, did I treat other people the way that I want to be treated?

[Cody Sanchez]

Oh, that's good. And I hear you have a tool that you can download for free. We're going to link it below. That'll help you actually achieve a lot of what we talked about today. Is that right?

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Exactly. So it's to do with this idea of intentionality. How are you going to set your day? What three priorities you're focusing on? And then what is that energy that you wish to bring to your day? And I've created just a little one pager, which takes you through the step by steps. And if you can download that, you can start to fill it out, or I just put it in a notebook. The beginning of every day, I'll write it down in there. And then at the end of every day, I look back and think, did I actually achieve these? And how do I make tomorrow even better?

[Cody Sanchez]

Love a one pager.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

So it's. That becomes a little bit of a reset for me and I'm going to add into that stretching.

[Cody Sanchez]

Yeah, we were going to limber, motherfuckers. Just run around, legs everywhere. I can't wait. I aspire to be the 90 year old, hiking mountains, doing the sports.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Epic.

[Cody Sanchez]

I'm not there at 39, but you can get this.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Plenty of years to go. You'll be good. You'll be good.

[Cody Sanchez]

Thank you so much for being on.

[Dr. Shadei Zarai]

Thank you, Cody. It's been so wonderful.

[Cody Sanchez]

It was so fun.