[00:00] Laban Ditchburn: And if you’ve got a root canal that needs happening, you’ll find the money to get the dental examination, right? Like even if you got to sell a kidney, that’s my encouragement. It’s like, find that point where you’re like, you know, I had enough of this and the people that have gone through the most amount of pain end up being the most successful in the healing journey.

[00:20] Laban Ditchburn: In my personal experience,

[00:23] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: welcome to another episode of success through failure, the show for successful people. And for those who want to become successful, the only show that reveals the true nature of success. This is your host, Jim Harshaw, Jr. And today I bring you Laban Ditchburn. Laban is one of those people who comes into your life and you’re wondering how this person came into your orbit, but you’re like really glad he did because he’s.

[00:50] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: This incredibly genuine charismatic guy who he’s absolutely going places. And when you hear his story, you can understand how far he’s come from some low points in his life and some pretty significant stories he’s going to share with you here and you’re about to listen to and to where he’s at now. And he’s interacting with people like Les Brown and Jack Canfield and Brene Brown and some others.

[01:16] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: He told me even off air, after we were done recording, he’s just. A guy who knows how to make connections, knows how to really build relationships through being genuine and being authentic. And I tell you, honestly, this guy is truly going places. So make a note of Laban Ditchburn’s name. His stories that he shares here in the conversation, they’re really genuine and really powerful.

[01:40] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And some of the things he’s doing now that he’s on the other side of those, not just the people he’s interacting with, but some of the ultra races that he’s competed in and completed are just incredible. And we talked a little bit about his book, bet on you. It’s an incredible book. This is an incredible interview.

[01:57] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: You’re going to get so much out of this. If you enjoy these episodes, be sure to subscribe on whatever platform or as many platforms as you can. If you’re listening to podcasts on multiple platforms, give it a subscribe, leave it a rating and review. That’s how more people find this. Share it with a friend, let them know you love the success or failure podcast.

[02:15] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Give it a share on social media. If you see it there, otherwise also interact with me. I love to interact with my listeners. So if you see a tweet or an Instagram post or LinkedIn or Facebook or anything. Make a comment. I love to hear from you and I look forward to interacting with you over there. All right, let’s get into it.

[02:32] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: My interview with Laban Ditchburn. Laban, welcome to

[02:36] Laban Ditchburn: the show. Jim Harshaw, Jr. Mate, it’s my absolute honor and pleasure to be with you today. Thanks very much for having me, brother. Yeah.

[02:44] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Well, the main reason I had John is because I think all of my audience, we just like to hear the Australian accent. It’s like, it’s pretty cool.

[02:49] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: So

[02:52] Laban Ditchburn: do you know what, Jim is superficial as that might sound to some people like exploit your strengths.

[02:58] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: That’s right. Take advantage of it. All right. Let’s get into it. You have overcome addiction to pretty much all the vices, right? Alcohol, sex, gambling, drugs. I want to hear how you’ve got there. How do you got to that place where, where you had these addictions?

[03:14] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Because I think most people struggle with some kind of addiction and a lot of it is unseen, whether it’s food or porn or sex or alcohol, a lot of those addictions can go unseen, so I think a lot of people can relate to this to talk to us a little bit about your journey and how you got there.

[03:34] Laban Ditchburn: I’m a child of divorce, Jim.

[03:35] Laban Ditchburn: Three and a half nothing more innocuous than that and when I share this part of my story I don’t want people to compare their experience to mine as you know comparisons the thief of joy and I know plenty of other people that have endured way way More worse stuff than me and I use that in inverted commas for people that are listening Because it doesn’t matter what happens to you It’s how it sort of impacts you and as a pawn in the divorce Proceedings and it was foster homes and you know a lot of anger and aggression from mom and dad And that really negatively impacted me growing up.

[04:08] Laban Ditchburn: And I used escapism as the way to cope. And when I was young, it was computer games and movies and TVs and stuff. And then as I got older, it became alcohol, drugs, gambling, sex, pretty much everything you could lay your hands on. And it got to a point when in 2015, when I was 35 years of age. But I was at home.

[04:26] Laban Ditchburn: This is in Melbourne, Australia, and I was had my laptop priced open and I was gambling on a horse race in Hong Kong with money that I’d borrowed to pay the bills, and I wasn’t even watching it on TV. I was just F5 ing and refreshing the page just to see whether I’d won, right? Like real, for gamblers out there, it’s real degenerate behavior.

[04:47] Laban Ditchburn: And I had this fleeting moment where I realized that the direction that my life was heading was not what I imagined when I was a kid. And as I had that thought, Jim, in the bottom left hand corner of the screen… Was this phone number and I’d never seen this phone. I’ve been on this website countless times before and instinctively I picked up the phone and I called this number.

[05:08] Laban Ditchburn: It was about midnight at about three bottles of red wine coursing its way through my veins, smashing into my liver. And this woman picked up. From the gambler’s helpline now, Jim, I’ll never know her last name, but her first name was Mary and I’m going to call her Mary Magdalene because whether she realized it or not, she was my guardian angel and she asked me why I was calling and for the first time in my life, I was listened to without judgment and I just verbally diarrhea.

[05:38] Laban Ditchburn: What was going on in my life to this poor woman and I got to the point where she probably almost broke with the amount of burden that I was putting on her and then I stopped and then she shared with something with me that terrified me and she was talking about the incredibly higher rates of suicide that problem gamblers experience way higher than drinking and drugs and some of the other vices and I’d never even thought about the level of gambling that I was doing at that point.

[06:06] Laban Ditchburn: The interesting thing was, Jim, is I had a job. I was high functioning. My boss liked me. I had a circle of friends. I used to post happy birthday on Facebook, but I was deeply, deeply badly affected by what I was going through. And she put me in touch with the Gambler’s Helpline, and I got access for free to a year and a half of free gambling psychology.

[06:29] Laban Ditchburn: And this woman, Lee, I would meet every week for the first 12 months and then every two weeks for the six months after that. And in that first session, Jim, she asked me a question about the relationship I had with my mother. And I just broke down and wept. And my mom and I, at that point, had a really dysfunctional relationship.

[06:48] Laban Ditchburn: And from that day forward, it started this healing journey. Where I started to recapture my gifts and take the adversity that I’d experienced and used it as my new fuel source and superpower. I came to forgave mom and dad for what they did to me and realize that they were doing the best they could with the tools they had available.

[07:08] Laban Ditchburn: And I actually inherited some really incredible gifts from both of them. And that journey, that sort of started in March of 2015. By the end of that year, I’d given up gambling and I haven’t touched any of this stuff since August 26th, the next year was when I had my last drink. So I’ll be sober seven years in August.

[07:26] Laban Ditchburn: You know, and longer for the drugs and as I started to heal and take ownership for what I’d endured, my mental health massively improved. I started to pay attention to an autoimmune disease that I had, which I put into full remission. And so in addition to the knocking the addiction on the head without a 12 step program as well, and if you need to use one, you need to use one, but I didn’t need to because I was able to reverse engineer what I’d endured and gone through and use it as my new fuel source.

[07:56] Laban Ditchburn: As my body started to heal, I ended up losing 60 pounds of body fat. I stacked on 30 pound of muscle, and then inexplicably in 2008 after never having been a runner after a, a healing experience with my mother, I started running, Jim and I went from running three miles in May, 2018 to completing my first marathon two weeks later at a 3 56.

[08:22] Laban Ditchburn: Time eight weeks after that, I ran a 30 mile and then another eight weeks after that, I completed the first of what has been three 60 mile ultramarathon trail runs and completely transformed my life in the process in that journey in 2018, three days before I ran my first 60 miler, I come out of my office when I was working in recruitment there in Melbourne and from about 70 yards away, I spied this angel of a woman And, what I can only describe happened next, as I was struck by a bolt of lightning, picked up by a force far greater than me, levitated towards this woman and plonked down in front of her, and with the confidence of a thousand Spartan warriors, I said, Excuse me, but you are stunning.

[09:08] Laban Ditchburn: And I wondered if you’d have a drink with me one time. And my wife and I will be together for five years in September

[09:14] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: of this year. That’s amazing. What a great story. So for the listener who doesn’t want to have to hit that low, low point that you hit and feels themself maybe spiraling or maybe just plateaued and stuck, you know, you had this turning point moment, but what advice do you have for others who are struggling?

[09:36] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: With their own demons.

[09:38] Laban Ditchburn: Yeah, Jim, it’s a really, really important question. It comes up a lot for me, right? And I’m only going to share my own personal experiences. I’ll never give advice for anything that I haven’t gone through. And if I am sharing an idea, I’ll be very clear to make sure that I, I indicate that I haven’t gone through that experience.

[09:55] Laban Ditchburn: For me, I was at a level of pain, emotionally, spiritually, even physically, I suppose. Where the prospect of stopping what I was doing and trying something else was way better than continuing on the path that I was on. So the question that I would ask people to ask themselves is, what’s my limit of pain that I’m willing to tolerate?

[10:16] Laban Ditchburn: Because until you’re at a point where the pain exceeds the future, you’re not going to do anything about it. And, you know, treat yourself like someone you really care about, like if you’re not ready, you know, you’ve got to, you’ve got to allow that time and maybe need to fall down the stairs a little bit more.

[10:34] Laban Ditchburn: And that might sound a bit harsh to people, but think about when you’re in the most amount of pain. If you’ve got a root canal that needs happening, you’ll find the money to get the dental examination, right? Like, even if you go to sell a kidney, that’s my encouragement. It’s like, find that point where you’re like, you know, I had enough of this.

[10:52] Laban Ditchburn: And the people that have gone through the most amount of pain end up being the most successful in their healing journey, in my personal experience.

[11:01] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Quick interruption. Hey, if you like what you’re hearing, be sure to get the notes, quotes, and links in the action plan from this episode, just go to JimHarshawJr.com/action. That’s JimHarshawJr.com/action to get your free copy of the action plan. Now back to the show, you know, it’s interesting whenever I have my first, very first initial free clarity call with. Perspective clients for our coaching program, we really peel back the onion and we help people for the first time ever have this moment of clarity of like, okay, this is really where I’m at.

[11:41] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And sometimes it’s a deep, dark, low place, not usually, but a lot of times it’s just this. I’m stuck. And I didn’t realize I was stuck. I’m going through the motions. I’m not as happy as I know I can be. I know I have more potential. I know I can level up. And we help them have this clarity moment, like before you hit rock bottom and whatever rock bottom might be, right.

[12:00] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: It may be a deep, dark place. It may be just some, some deeply unsatisfying place, but when you help people have that moment, have that clarity, you can start from there. There’s a moment there where you can go, aha, okay. This is truly where I’m at. I’ve been covering it up with being busy and returning emails and climbing the corporate ladder or whatever the case might be.

[12:22] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: But if you get that clarity, that moment of clarity, then you can have an epiphany and then you can really start building from there. And that’s what happened to

[12:28] Laban Ditchburn: you. Well, I just had a thought. This is something I’ve never thought of before until you evoked it out of me, Jim. You know, that famous saying success leaves clues.

[12:36] Laban Ditchburn: I would say failure leaves clues as well because I mean, there’s plenty of the backstory to go, but there was plenty of times and examples in my life. Most of which are in my book incidentally, where things could have gone one way or the other and thank God that they didn’t because I’d be dead or in jail.

[12:54] Laban Ditchburn: But it’s like back with the benefit of retrospect, I was going to reach rock bottom at some point. So maybe the advice is to try and expedite that rock bottom for people. So you can hurry up and do something about it. Maybe, I don’t know. Yeah.

[13:07] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And it’s an amazing success through failure story that you have, Laban, I appreciate you sharing that.

[13:13] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: One of the things that you mentioned kind of coming out the other side of this is you got into doing marathons and ultra marathons. I. Personally find a lot of meaning in crucible experiences. I had a crucible experience as a college wrestler. I still enjoy painful, hard workouts, marathons, half marathons, Spartan races.

[13:35] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Did the Memorial day Murph workout with the full 20 pounds. Wow.

[13:39] Laban Ditchburn: That’s awesome, dude. That’s amazing. Yeah. Painful.

[13:42] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Luckily, the Murph is only a little bit over a half an hour, but, still, but man, it’s, it’s painful, but I find a lot of value in pushing myself. What value do you find in pushing yourself to the limits?

[13:55] Laban Ditchburn: Well, it takes me back to the first 60 mile that I did, Jim, because if you’re hearing the first part, like it was a rapid uptake of distance. And I actually got really badly injured on that ultra at the halfway mark at the 50 kilometer or 30 mile or whatever. I did my iliotibial band, my IT band. And for anyone that’s injured that before.

[14:16] Laban Ditchburn: Yeah, right here. It is the most excruciating pain, right? You know what I’m talking about, Jim? Sure is. Now, the run was a trail run. So it was about 18 miles was on the sand. It was about. 4, 000 feet of undulation and so it wasn’t just a flat surface. And I did the first half in about 7 hours. It ended up taking me 18 hours and 55 minutes and 47 seconds to complete the thing because I had to limp for the last 50 kilometers or 30 miles.

[14:47] Laban Ditchburn: And my Garmin actually registered, Jim, you’re gonna laugh, 130, 000 steps for the day. Right see if anyone on the show previously can beat that and it’s because I was shuffling like the hunchback of Notre Dame Right, but what happens and I had I ran with an amazing friend of mine Sam who just stayed with me the entire time It was bitterly cold.

[15:09] Laban Ditchburn: It was it was below zero and Celsius was like below 31 Fahrenheit and I didn’t know anything about electrolytes So my body couldn’t generate heat. We finished about 3 a. m. And when I finished that Jim, I broke through this last ceiling in my mind of what I then thought was possible and the encouragement for anyone in terms of putting themselves in a physical situation like this, that the impact, the flow and effect of being able to overcome that adversity has bled Into every other aspect of my life, and it’s allowed me to take on challenges that I wouldn’t have even dreamed about.

[15:47] Laban Ditchburn: So what you’re doing and because your background is so super duper inspiring, right? But for people that maybe who are a bit more like my background, who are mediocre at lots of things, if you can find something that you can overcome like that, it will shift. Literally every other cell in your being and allow you to lean into this place of absolute magnificence.

[16:10] Laban Ditchburn: And that’s my recommendation for anyone that’s listening to this.

[16:13] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Yeah. And I want to continue on that because you had to sign up for the thing. You had to choose to do the 50 K because if you don’t, you don’t have this breakthrough. You don’t have this epiphany and there was a chance of failure there.

[16:30] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: There was a risk at doing this and for the listener, you can’t have that breakthrough unless you commit to something like commit to the hard thing. Like sign up for it. Maybe it’s giving a talk at your next company outing or having that hard conversation with the person who’s close to you, signing up for the race, the ultra or whatever, whatever the case might be for you starting the side hustle.

[16:54] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: You can’t have the breakthrough if you don’t make the commitment. And it, it’s scary. I get it. It’s scary. It’s hard. There’s doubt, there’s fear, but once you have it, once you have that experience, once you’re on the other side of it, you’re a new person, you’re a different person, and sometimes, you know, you’re a different person.

[17:13] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: You have this like, Oh my goodness. Like I’m a super human now, but other times it’s just. An unconscious rewiring that happens where you just understand that you have a new potential inside of you. And I’m going to break this down in a probably too much information way for you, because this has been going through my head a lot.

[17:34] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And I’m sorry, Laban, this is a quick, quick aside. next call. I do want to get back. I want to talk about your book next, but you know, as a wrestler, You know, I had to lose a lot of weight. There’s all kinds of dramatic weight loss stories in the sport of wrestling. You have to make weight and it’s terrible.

[17:48] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And the sport is so much better and healthier and cleaner nowadays because of new weigh in rules, et cetera. But back in my day, you could do just terrible things to your body, step on the scale, make weight, and then compete the next day. And you tell people these stories and they go, Oh, I couldn’t do that.

[18:04] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: I couldn’t. You know, go 24 hours without eating, or I couldn’t do this, this kind of weight loss. And then I recently had a colonoscopy. All right. So for anybody who’s had that done before you have to go, you know, for me, it was like 36 hours without food. And it was very easy for me to do it because I’ve been through the wrestling stuff before, and you can stay hydrated while you’re, you’re getting prepping for the colonoscopy, but everybody has to now do this.

[18:29] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Well, when, when you have to do it, you do it like when there’s a have to. Then you can do these things that you previously thought were undoable, but we have so much more capacity, so much more potential when you have to do something. So whatever that thing is, that is scary for you, like sign up for it, commit to it, make the commitment.

[18:49] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And when you have to do it, you’ll be surprised at what you’re capable of.

[18:54] Laban Ditchburn: Well, Jim, if you’d allow me to share something, just to bolster what you’re saying there, because Fasting, water fasting and dry fasting is something that I’m very, very okay with. And in particular, my wife, Anna, who’s from Russia, originally, the reason and the why component that we’ve been deep diving into these extended dry fasting.

[19:17] Laban Ditchburn: And to give you an idea of my wife in January of 2023, did a 95 hour hard dry fast.

[19:24] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Wow. A dry fast, meaning no liquid?

[19:27] Laban Ditchburn: Nill by mouth and hard dry fast means no water contact. So no shower, no nothing. The reason she did that is because Anna and I collectively have had 18 consecutive miscarriages as the result of systemic childhood sexual abuse she encountered from her stepfather in Russia, which resulted in two pregnancies and two illegal underground abortions.

[19:53] Laban Ditchburn: One of which damaged her uterine wall, right now. I want to make a really quick point here I’m not sharing this for sympathy, but I’m sharing this to help people because if you meet my wife Anna She is the most incredible human being she’s got her own podcast called happy on the inside She’s healed or healing from this right that the dry fast She had a three millimeter lining on the uterine wall the before and after scan Jim It was 14 millimeters after her 95 hour dry fast And the reason being for those who aren’t aware of this dry fasting has been practiced for a very long time But it’s not available to the mainstream because it’s like it’s free, right?

[20:37] Laban Ditchburn: It generates untold amounts of human growth hormones stem cells and it eats up a lot of the folded and damaged proteins And it’s a really powerful Repair mechanism. And in Chernobyl, Jim, they use dry fasting to help with radiation poisoning. Would you believe? Wow. So I really, really resonate with what you’re saying.

[20:56] Laban Ditchburn: And I’m sorry, you had a colonoscopy like my father would say, I don’t know what a colonoscopy is, but whatever it is, you can stick it up your ass. So, um, forgive the profanity. It’s my father’s words on mine. And so that’s just an example of. 95 hours, Jim, of no food and no water, which is actually easier than doing a water fast.

[21:17] Laban Ditchburn: This is a side note.

[21:18] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Wow. All right. Well, that’s a whole other conversation. I know everybody’s Googling dry fasting right now, all the listeners. So, I’m interested.

[21:26] Laban Ditchburn: Sergei Filonov wrote a book, which has been translated into English on Amazon. Um, powerful, powerful

[21:33] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: book. All right. We’ll have a link to that book in the action plan.

[21:37] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: So listeners can grab the link to that if you want to check it out. So speaking of books. Your book, Bet On You, it’s titled Bet On You. It has been described as raw, it’s been described as real. What was the most difficult part of writing your story for the world to read, putting

[21:55] Laban Ditchburn: it all out there? I’d love to share how the book came to existence, Jim, if that’s okay, because I think it helps give really great context to what you’re asking.

[22:05] Laban Ditchburn: And it started in, in May, mid May, 2020. I was able to bring Les Brown onto my podcast. Now for those who don’t know Les Brown, like he said about Jay Canfield, you’ve been living under a rock, but go on YouTube him after this. I had 10 subscribers at this time. We were in lockdown, in the strictest lockdowns of anywhere in the world at that time in Melbourne, Australia.

[22:27] Laban Ditchburn: And he came on and I asked him a question at the beginning of the interview, we weren’t even interviewing at this point, at the beginning of the recording rather, and I said, hey Les, what do you think of the name of the show, Become Your Own Superhero? Now for anyone that’s heard Les speak. Like the way he communicates is just like divine from God.

[22:43] Laban Ditchburn: Right. And he was so endearing the way he responded, Jim, that I was just so moved by it, that I just verbally diarrhea my story of transformation to him. And it went for about seven minutes and he just listened with the patience of a saint and it was a powerful listener. And then there’s a great quote from Steve Artisan that says that power.

[23:03] Laban Ditchburn: is in the listener. He did that for me and he just let me finish. He goes, congratulations, Laban. I said, thanks, Les. He goes, do you have a book? And I go, no. He goes. If you’re going to be a speaker Laban, you need a book to help with your credibility. And I was like, right, okay. Now I never finished high school, Jim, I never went to college, never written anything of any significance.

[23:24] Laban Ditchburn: He said to me, Who was the most influential person in your life when you were five years of age? A question I’d never even thought of or even been asked before. And I was like, thought about it for a minute. I was like, oh man, despite her many flaws, it’d be my mum. He goes, well, what attributes did you get from your mum?

[23:39] Laban Ditchburn: And I said, man, she was spiritual and unconditionally loving and tenacious. He’s writing all the stuff down, Jim. He looks up at me, cocks his head to one side, he says, Laban, this is a God moment. He said, I’m going to show you how to monetize your passion. For the next 10 minutes he reads back to me the blueprint for this book that he wants me to write called bet on you because of the gambling.

[24:03] Laban Ditchburn: He said, Laban, you’re going to write this book. You’re going to turn this book into a keynote speech. You’re going to turn that keynote into a three day retreat. And even if you totally muck this up, you’ll make multiple six figures the next 12 months. I’m sitting there completely dumbstruck. He goes, and I’m going to interview you on my social media platform with 4 million followers and Laban.

[24:25] Laban Ditchburn: I’m going to write the forward for your book. 72 hours earlier, this guy had been my hero for years, and now he’s offering me this gift. And in a moment of complete, another utter insanity, Jim, I said. If you’re going to write the forward to my book, I’ll have it to you by June 30, which is six weeks away.

[24:44] Laban Ditchburn: And in the next six weeks, I wrote the first draft, delivered 30, 000 words of bid on you to list less as inbox and completely changed my life in the process. And then to answer your question about the most difficult part, the most difficult part was the memories that flooded back as I was writing. One of the most cathartic experiences ever that can also be a little bit triggering for shit that you’ve forgotten.

[25:10] Laban Ditchburn: And it wasn’t really a bad thing ever. It was a blessing because it allowed me to heal from a lot of the stuff that I had repressed. And it’s a very common coping mechanism for people that have gone through any kind of trauma. So it allowed me to move on from some things, forgive some people and move forward with life.

[25:26] Laban Ditchburn: and I’m super proud of it. You know, it’s the greatest thing that I’ve ever done in terms of my own legacy, you know, which I want to witness in this lifetime, but there you go. Yeah.

[25:37] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Incredible, incredible story. How did it come about to get a chance to meet Les Brown?

[25:43] Laban Ditchburn: So, you know, success through failure is what, which is why I love this, this podcast so much.

[25:49] Laban Ditchburn: Jim in 2018. A few months after Anna and I had met, we got pregnant basically the first time we consummated the relationship and that first pregnancy was an ectopic pregnancy that nearly killed her, right? She hemorrhaged internally and it means the fallopian tube ruptures and it’s, it’s not good. And the way that my two…

[26:11] Laban Ditchburn: Co CEOs treated me, it was a really boutique small company, you know, they’re supposed to be inclusive and, you know, all this other stuff and they treated me like a pariah with the time I needed to go and look after my, my now wife, right? So I was like, I’m, I’m going out my own and I used to work in recruitment.

[26:28] Laban Ditchburn: So 2019, I went out on my own and 2019, Jim was a total unmitigated financial disaster. And I use that term for effect only because it was the greatest blessing in disguise. And out of necessity, I started having to cold call CEOs. In the work that I used to do, CIO was the peak level that I would really deal with.

[26:50] Laban Ditchburn: But I had to call CEOs to try and elicit faster outcomes. And I would have these, these conversations with people that ended up being quite okay. So I developed this self confidence and this ability to connect with people at a much higher level. And on January 2nd, 2020, before I had the book, before I had the podcast, before I had any.

[27:11] Laban Ditchburn: Platform really at all. I got hold of Brene Brown. I got her phone number for some software used on LinkedIn called lucia. com. L U S A H A. com. It’s a plugin that goes over Chrome. It’s legal. It’s illegal software. Got her phone number and she picked up the phone. So it’s January 1st, her time. And she picks up that southern drawl and, ah, this is Brene speaking.

[27:32] Laban Ditchburn: I said, Brene Brown, it’s Laban Ditchburn from Melbourne, Australia. Yeah. She’s. Obviously shocked at how someone’s got her phone number and she’s, Oh, hi Laban, how can I help? I said, Brene, I’ve been instructed by my mentors that I need to surround myself with people that are much further along than I. And I wondered if you’d be interested in sharing some ideas, right?

[27:50] Laban Ditchburn: Because I didn’t know what I was doing. That was the only thing I could think of. And she said, Laban, I’m about to sit down and have New Year’s Day dinner with my family. But if you’d send me an email with what you had in mind, I’ll come back to you. So I wrote this email of my bio and recorded this one minute video that I’ll never show to anyone maybe after I’m dead because it was cringe worthy of time to the power of 10, but she replied back a few days later, she said, layman, thank you for your email with what I have committed with University and family right now.

[28:21] Laban Ditchburn: I cannot give this attention that it deserves. You will do. Fantastically. and in that moment, Jim, she gifted me, right? Whether you like Brene or not, she gifted me with this confidence to keep doing that. And so I took that into the phone call with Les and got him on the phone and I used the same language.

[28:40] Laban Ditchburn: Les Brown, it’s Laban Ditchburn from Melbourne, Australia here. Oh, hi Laban. How can I help? I said, Les, I’m a huge fan of you and your work. And I’m also the host of an amazing podcast series called Become Your Own Superhero. And I’d be honored if you came and shared your amazing story with our audience.

[28:54] Laban Ditchburn: When are you available? You know, the close. And at the time I had 10 subscribers, Jim. So had he asked me how many subscribers I had, I, I’m always honest, but he didn’t. So I didn’t. And the beautiful flow and effect of this, Jim, is that I’ve been able to connect less. With a number of health professionals like world class health professionals that have helped him in his journey with prostate cancer, speaking of colonoscopies.

[29:21] Laban Ditchburn: So and we had dinner at his home last year in Atlanta, my wife and I, it was incredible. So this is the magic that can happen when you, when you take bold, massive and courageous action, you know,

[29:30] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: taking the bold move. That’s the lesson there for the listeners. Like take the bold move. What’s the next step?

[29:35] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: What’s the scary move that Yeah. What’s the worst that could have happened to you? Brene Brown didn’t pick up the phone. You left a voicemail or she hung up on you. I mean, what’s, what’s the worst that can happen, but you’ve made that bull move. You took those moves and, and it’s creating amazing things in your life.

[29:51] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Levin any habits that you do regularly that you’ve done in the past that you feel have been most responsible for your success?

[29:58] Laban Ditchburn: Yeah. And you and I have interviewed a couple of the same people. One of which, which I reckon might be a, not a crowning achievement might be, but having Jack Canfield on your podcasts.

[30:08] Laban Ditchburn: I know it’s a big deal. You’ve been trying to get him on for years and I really, really enjoyed relisting or listening to it for the first time and getting some dialed in manifestation and visualization stuff from him yesterday. So you need to go and check that episode out. It’s amazing. But when he came on, one of the middle parts of the interview.

[30:26] Laban Ditchburn: He was talking about a swear jar for negative self talk. He said at home, if anyone says anything negative, they have to put 5 in there. And I’d been working on my self talk and self deprecating humor, which is what I used to do because I was a real validate validation seeker in the life that I used to live, you know, people pleasing.

[30:46] Laban Ditchburn: It’s a codependent by product of kind of what I grew up with. And so now Jim. If you and I were to hang out for seven days, for 24 7, you wouldn’t hear me speak poorly of myself. And even when I said 2019 was a total unmitigated financial disaster, it’s very clear that I said I use that for effect only.

[31:06] Laban Ditchburn: Because what happens is when you eliminate negative self talk, and I’m not talking about becoming delusional, you reframe it, right? Is that you become hyper aware of the people in your life and how they speak. And one of the keys to being successful, and Jim Rohn’s quote, which you would have heard a million times before, is that we become.

[31:28] Laban Ditchburn: And earn a few thousand dollars with the, of the people that we spend five people, we spend the most time with. So I’ve become ruthless as a result of that, that behavior at who I allow my life and people that speak poorly of themselves. Don’t get an opportunity to be in there very long because why would I be around that energy?

[31:47] Laban Ditchburn: So the advice is this get a swear jar at home and make it ten dollars because inflation, right? Ten bucks is gonna hurt even if you’re wealthy people don’t want to pay this money and put it in there Do it for a month and you’ll develop a habit that’ll allow you to reframe and you can just swap words out with like the Problem I have with the challenge that I’m overcoming and people might say I shut up laboring you bloody woo woo goose Well, do it or don’t do it.

[32:13] Laban Ditchburn: Trust me, the people that are much further along that are successful in health, wealth, and relationships and are creating massive impact in the world. All think the same thing or a good chunk of them. And it’s been one of the best things I’ve ever done for myself, Jim. So hopefully that answers your question.

[32:32] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: That’s a great response. And to add to that for the listener, if you go back and check out my episode with Dr. Nate Zinser, he’s the director of performance at West Point. He’s a friend of mine. He talks about the difference between. Positive thinking, right? We talked about, you know, people don’t like the positive thinking that kind of has this stigma these days of toxic positivity and well, how can you be positive in the face of certain things?

[32:54] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Well, there’s a difference between he, he talks about the difference between positive thinking and productive thoughts, productive, like think of them as not just positive, not just sort of daydreaming or making stuff up and lying to yourself, but actually having. Productive thoughts, like turn those negative words into productive words.

[33:12] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And it’s just a good way to think about what Laban’s talking about here. So Laban, thank you so much for sharing. What is an action item for the listener? Something that they can take from this interview and apply in the next, let’s say 24 to 48 hours, something that they can do, some kind of action item.

[33:31] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And maybe it’s one thing, or maybe it’s a couple of things, but what’s next. What do we take from

[33:34] Laban Ditchburn: this? So I want to have a bit of fun with this, right? I’m affectionately known now as the world’s best courage coach. Now, for people that might hear that, not, not carriage as in horse and cart, courage. And I know the accent can throw people off a little bit.

[33:51] Laban Ditchburn: And the follow on line is I teach people how to take bold, massive and courageous action so that they can facilitate their own miraculous outcomes. My encouragement to you, listener, watcher, is this, like we are divine beings, right? Whether you realize it or not, I believe we are infinite. Spiritual beings that inhabit the physical form many, many times, right?

[34:12] Laban Ditchburn: And for anyone that’s read Dr. Brian Weiss, many lives, many masters, this kind of books will help explain this more. And we all have an Evan Carmichael. I know he was a guest said that we had Michael Jordan level genius. It’s something find what that is. But, but maybe by helping you find that you can make your own world’s best declaration and the stipulations of this, it needs to be non quantifiable and intangible.

[34:39] Laban Ditchburn: Cause if I said to you, Jim, I’m the world’s best wrestler, you go, Laban, that’s not true. It’s so and so or I’ll film the world’s best hundred meter sprinters. No Laban, clearly that’s not you. That’s Usain Bolt, but world’s best courage coach until there’s an event at Mandalay Bay up the road here in Las Vegas with a competition to declare the world’s best courage coach.

[34:59] Laban Ditchburn: No one can take that away from me, and I want to really clearly stipulate. I know this will resonate with the right people, and it will polarize some people, and that’s okay. It’s a declaration that I’ve made to the universe, alright? And I’ve helped more than a hundred people come up with these declarations.

[35:16] Laban Ditchburn: And what it does is when you wake up in the morning, you go, how would the world’s best courage coach conduct himself? What habit it’s forced me to do, Jim, is it forced me to step into this place of uncomfortableness every single day. And as you know, when you do that, you grow exponentially. And whether you have the self belief or not, I’m telling you right now, each of you have a divine gift that the universe Needs to be presented with the people on this planet need your Michael Jordan level genius at whatever your thing is.

[35:46] Laban Ditchburn: Right. And the moment that you step into that and really lend into that, and what people think of you as none of your spiritual business, which is a great less Brown quote, you will never work another day in your life. I, that’s my commitment to you today, Jim, you will never work another day in your life.

[36:01] Laban Ditchburn: I’m not saying it’s easy, but the work becomes so incredibly rewarding and fulfilling that it’s easy peasy lemon squeezy. So a bit of a different one maybe, but that’s my encouragement.

[36:13] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Yeah. And for the listener, that’s the distinction that I make between hard work and inspired action. We’re talking about turning that hard work into inspired action.

[36:22] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Laban, where can the listeners find you, follow you, learn more about you, buy your book, follow you on social media, all that good stuff?

[36:30] Laban Ditchburn: Well, there’s two things I’d like to make available. One is for a particular subset of people. I know you’ve got a very diverse audience here. One of the things we didn’t really talk about a lot, we’d need another three or four hours to go through all this stuff, but I created a program for people that have a podcast or YouTube channel or seriously thinking about it that teaches them how to reach out and connect in the way that I did with Les Brown and Renee Brown and Jack Canfield and Nobel Prize winners and stuff.

[36:57] Laban Ditchburn: Even if you don’t have a big audience and people can get their free training at Podcastingheroes. com which is hero spelt the correct way. I’m sure you’ll be able to put that link in there. The other thing like Energetically, I’m a big quantum guy as well I think Laban Ditchburn is the only combination of those two names on planet Earth So whatever your favorite browser is, just punch it in there and see what comes up and see what the universe presents to you.

[37:23] Laban Ditchburn: If you want to know more, if you don’t, that’s okay too.

[37:25] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Excellent. Laban, thank you for your time.

[37:28] Laban Ditchburn: Thank you, Jim. Hey, and if you’re listening to this and you haven’t subscribed or you haven’t shared this with someone you care about, or you haven’t taken the time to review the show, Jim is doing incredible work, more than 400 episodes.

[37:40] Laban Ditchburn: And we have obligations as people that benefit from the incredible work that goes into the background. You have no idea how much work goes into this. So take the time to review it, share it with someone you really care about. And that’s how these kind of things blow up. Next thing you know, it’s going to be the Jim Harshaw, Jr.

[37:56] Laban Ditchburn: Podcast experience out of Boston, Texas is going to be the biggest podcast

[37:59] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: in the world. Preach on, preach on Laban. Thanks man.

[38:06] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Thanks for listening. If you want to apply these principles into your life, let’s talk. You can see the limited spaces that are open on my calendar at JimHarshawJr.com/apply where you can sign up for a free one time coaching call directly. with me and don’t forget to grab your action plan. Just go to JimHarshawJr.com/action.

[38:25] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: And lastly, iTunes tends to suggest podcasts with more ratings and reviews more often, you would totally make my day. If you give me a rating and review, those go a long way in helping me grow the podcast audience. Just open up your podcast app. If you have an iPhone, do a search for success through failure.

[38:45] Jim Harshaw, Jr.: Select it and then scroll the whole way to the bottom where you can leave the podcast a rating and a review. Now I hope this isn’t just another podcast episode for you. I hope you take action on what you learned here today. Good luck and thanks for listening.

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