Noah St. John is a keynote speaker and best-selling author who’s famous for inventing “Afformations” and helping busy people achieve personal and financial freedom.
On this episode of The Salesman Podcast, Noah explains what the “heck” headtrash is and how it is holding you back from sales and business success.
Featured on this episode:
Resources:
- NoahStJohn.com
- Book: The Book of Afformations®: Discovering the Missing Piece to Abundant Health, Wealth, Love and Happiness
- Noah on Linkedin
- @NoahStJohn
Transcript
Noah St. John:
I mean, it is just so ironic and sad that so many people would rather be right than rich. How to avoid the three big money mistakes that even smart people make. And I know everyone watching this programme is very smart, but you may be making one or more of these mistakes without even knowing it.
What is Head Trash? · [00:40]
Will Barron:
Hello, sales nation. I’m Will Barron, host of The Salesman podcast, world’s biggest B2B sales show where we help you not just hit your target, but thrive in sales. On this episode, we have Noah St. John. He’s known as the power habits mentor. He’s the author of the book, Get Rid of your Head Trash About Money, and that is exactly what we’re talking about on today’s episode. So with all that said, let’s jump right into the show.I’m going to add an extra word here. What the heck is head trash?
Noah St. John:
Right. Absolutely. So, listen. Well, I’ve been teaching this for over two decades. I started in 1997 in my college dorm room because I had these epiphanies that I just realised were holding so many people back. I’d been studying success literature since I was a little kid, and I could never seem to get it to work. I was studying all those traditional books and I just was so frustrated. And so all of the works that I’ve done, written now 14 books that are published in 17 languages, but what’s so unbelievable is that people still write to me all the time every day and say, “Noah, I’m stuck. I’m feeling overwhelmed. I’m feeling like I’ve tried everything. I’ve spent all this money. I’ve spent all this time. I’ve tried all the gurus. I’ve gone to all these marketing seminars and everything, and I’m still stuck.”
Noah St. John:
And so I started hearing this over and over and over again, and I started to really try to understand what is causing this. What’s causing people to be stuck? What’s causing them to feel overwhelmed? What’s causing them to be so frustrated like I was back then? And so I realised that one of the biggest things and the causes of this is what I call head trash. So head trash is that guy in your head that says, “I can’t do it because dot dot dot,” And then you just fill in the blank, right? So you fill in the blank with whatever your reason is of why you can’t do it. Right?
Noah St. John:
So for example, a really popular one is, “Well, I can’t do it because I don’t have the time. I’m too busy. You don’t understand. I’ve got a family and I’ve got kids and I’ve got a spouse and I’m trying to run my business or trying to do this sales or whatever it is. I just don’t have the time.” Another popular one is, “Well, I can’t do it because I don’t have the money. I can’t afford it. I’ve tried all these other things and I just don’t have the money,” or, “I don’t live in the right town,” or, “I don’t know the right people. I don’t have the right connections,” or, “I’m a woman,” or, “I’m too old,” or, “I’ve made too many mistakes,” or whatever it is. Right?
“Here’s the amazing thing about us human beings: we would rather be right than happy.” – Noah St. John · [02:41]
Noah St. John:
And so here’s the thing. Here’s the amazing thing about your head trash. You always make yourself right. That’s the amazing thing about us human beings. We would rather be right than happy. So many people would rather be right than happy. And so you say, “Well, I can’t do it because I don’t have the time,” you’re going to make yourself right. You’re going to find all the ways that, “Oh, gee, I don’t have the time.” Or you don’t have the money or you just have all these excuses that make it so it’s you’re right and it becomes true. So the point is you are fighting for your limitations, which is the last thing you want to do. So that’s one of the main reasons that head trash is really, really dangerous.
The Explanation Behind Self-Sabotaging Behavior and Thoughts · [03:18]
Will Barron:
Okay. So before we come onto the removing the head trash or changing the framing of the head trash, clearly the magic of the conversation, why do we do this? For want of a better term, why do we self-sabotage? Why do we imagine, dream, visualise all these kind of things, write down goals, and then come up with excuse when we know that the excuse is probably bullshit, but then as you said, we justify it the more we think about it and the more time goes on?
Noah St. John:
Well, there are many reasons for that, of why we do this. But I want you to think about something for everybody watching. I want you to think about your home, where you live. Okay. So your apartment, your condo, your house, whatever it is. So let’s just say for the sake of argument, you say, “You know what? This week, I don’t think I’m going to take out the trash. I’m just going to let the trash pile up.” Because no matter what we do, there’s trash, right? You just live and trash accumulates.
Noah St. John:
So you say, “You know what? I don’t feel like taking it out this week.” And then you go, “You know what? I don’t think I’m going to take it out this month. I don’t think I’m going to take it out for three months. I don’t think I’m going to take it out six months.” A year goes by. You haven’t taken out the trash. What does your home look like right now? I mean, it is pretty gross in there, isn’t it? I mean, it’s disgusting. It’s yucky, and who would possibly want to live there? There’s no way you could live there.
Noah St. John:
But so many people haven’t taken out the trash in their head for 5, 10, 20 years or more. I mean, we all know someone who’s walking around saying the same things they’ve been saying for 5, 10, 20 years, and they’re wondering, “Gee, I wonder why my life isn’t the way that I want it to be. I wonder why I’m not reaching my goals.”
Noah St. John:
And so the point is that we do this so we can feel safe. We do it so we can justify our failures, justify our frustrations, justify those feelings of just being right. I mean, it is just so ironic and sad that so many people would rather be right than rich or rather be right than happy.
Noah St. John:
So it is a safety net. It makes you feel safe. It makes you feel protected. And so to get rid of your head trash, one of the things that we teach our clients to do to actually get rid of it, it can be a daunting task. It can feel like it’s overwhelming because you’ve been holding onto that excuse for so many years, it’s like your best friend. And so you’re like, “You want me to let go of this?” And it’s like, well, yeah, because on the other side of it is freedom. That’s one of the quotes that I love to say that Emerson said. Emerson said, “Inside of us, we all know that on the other side of fear lies freedom,” and that’s one of the credos that I live by. And that’s what I’m inviting people to join us in as well.
Change Your Life By Changing the Stories You Tell Yourself · [05:56]
Will Barron:
If you guns ahead had to put a percentage on it, how much of the tales that we tell ourselves are nonsense and how much of it … Because clearly it’s a safety mechanism over thousands of years of evolution and not wanting to go, “That’s not really a big cat that’s going to eat me in the bush.” It’s clearly, it’s better to think, “That is a big cat,” and avoid it regardless whether it is or not. So that’s where some of this comes from, I’m sure. But how much of it is true and how much of it is absolute, complete, just utter nonsense?
Noah St. John:
Well, that’s the amazing thing. Well, it’s a great question because you can sit here and make the argument either way. I can totally sit here and say, “I don’t have the time because I am far too busy and you don’t understand and da, da, da, da, da.” I can sit here and say, “I don’t have the right connections,” or, “I’ve made too many mistakes,” or whatever it is or, “I’m not smart enough. I’m not good enough.” These are just some of the head trashes that people tell themselves.
Noah St. John:
So we can sit here and make that argument all day long, and, “I am totally justified and you don’t understand.” I mean, this is what people have to say to me. Right? And I go, “You’re right. I don’t understand. I’ve only heard this a million times before.” So the point is it’s not whether it’s right or wrong. It’s whether you decide to let go of it or not. That’s why I like to give that example of the trash in your house. I mean, you could not take out the trash in your house. That’s your choice, but boy, it’s going to be pretty gross in there. All right. So what I’m just inviting people to do is to look at that and say, “Are you happy with those results? If you’re happy with the results you’re getting, then why change?”
“Ben Franklin said, “There are only two guarantees in life, death and taxes.” Well, with all due respect to old Ben, I would argue there is a third guarantee in life. And that is that if you keep doing the same thing, I guarantee you’ll keep getting the same results.” – Noah St. John · [07:24]
Noah St. John:
However, Ben Franklin said, “There are only two guarantees in life, death and taxes.” Well, with all due respect to old Ben, I would argue there is a third guarantee in life, and that is that if you keep doing the same thing, I guarantee you’ll keep getting the same results. Right? I mean, we’ve all heard the definition of insanity, doing the same thing, expecting different results, right? So if you keep doing the same thing, I’m pretty sure you’re going to keep getting the same results.
Noah St. John:
So all we’re asking you to do is just take a look at it, and we’re just asking to open that door just a little bit. And we’ve all heard that phrase, “Big doors swing on small hinges.” We’re just asking you to open it just a little bit and say, “Wow, what if I could let go of that? What if I might be wrong that I’m not good enough? I might be wrong that I don’t have the time or I don’t have the money or I’m too old or I can’t do anything right.” Again, these are just some of the common head trashes that we hear. What if we could be wrong about that? What if I could let that go? It feels a little scary. But then, like I said a moment ago, on the other side of that fear lies the freedom that we’re all looking for.
Are We Bound to Deal with Head Trash The Rest of Our Lives · [08:27]
Will Barron:
Before we start breaking this down, then, I want to just build a little bit more suspense here, Noah. How much of this is ongoing forever? And with the trash example, this is what came into my mind. When I was at uni, it wouldn’t be unreasonable in a house of five lads for a bin bag full of rubbish that needs taken out to be left there for a day or two because everyone was too lazy. Even though they were walking past the bag of trash to go out of the door, past the bins at the bottom of the road, people would just leave it there. And it would be up to whoever’s standards were broken first of this is disgusting, they would end up doing it.
Will Barron:
So if you extrapolate that out of now, clearly I don’t leave trash everywhere, but I know my girlfriend’s standard for cleanliness in the kitchen. I’ll cook tea for us. She’ll wipe every surface down. Whereas I would do that every other day, once a week, whatever it is, depending on what we’re cooking. So there’s multiple levels to this, and clearly as a young man, you get more civilised perhaps as you go from student to me as salesperson to entrepreneur to sales entrepreneur, whatever I am now, and those standards get raised and it’s what you wear and it’s what car you want to drive. And then, oh, this ties down into the finances of it.
Will Barron:
So does this process ever end? Do we always forever have head trash that we need to work on to get to that next level? Or is this a binary thing? Is this an on/off switch that we can manipulate?
“We don’t need more how-tos of success, we just need to give ourselves permission to succeed.” – Noah St. John · [10:10]
Noah St. John:
I think that’s another great question, Will, and I look at it as a spiral staircase. You’re constantly going up. As you just said, we are hopefully evolving, right? Our standards and really what we will accept, what we will allow ourselves. That was the title of my first book. I mentioned I’ve written 14 books now, but the title of my very first book was called Permission To Succeed, because one of the things that I realised back then was that we don’t need more how-tos of success. One of the big, big things stopping most people is that we don’t give ourselves permission to succeed. So you give yourself permission to succeed at higher and higher levels as we evolve. And so the point is that I don’t look at it as an all or nothing thing.
Noah St. John:
I’ll give you a quick example. I was just reading ESPN, the magazine, about their top 20 most dominant athletes of the last two decades. And what was so fascinating was in more than half the cases, there was a point where that person, I mean, we’re talking the dominant, dominant athletes. I mean, the biggest names in sports. And they literally had to say to themselves, there was a point in their careers that they say, “Wow, I guess I belong here.” And this was when they were doing very, very well, like winning the US Open or something like that, winning a race or something. And they’re like, “Yeah, I guess I belong here.”
Noah St. John:
So you go, “Whoa. Even these huge athletes have, is that a form of head trash?” I mean, it’s a form of lack of self-belief, I guess. But then you get to that point where, of course, now you’re like, “Yeah, I got this.” But maybe there is a place for us entrepreneurs, we’re saying as you start your business, one of your goals may be to reach $10,000 a month, and that’s a huge goal because that’s six figures a year. And for many people, I remember when I was starting a business, I would look up at six figures and go it’s this huge mountain. I’m like, “Oh, my gosh, I could never climb that mountain.” And then now when I’ve been in business for a while and 10,000 now is pretty simple. And so I’ve got that conquered, and now it’s like what’s the next plateau? You see what I mean?
Noah St. John:
So for you, it might be 50,000 a month or 100,000 or 500,000 a month or wherever it is. So I really have seen in working with my coaching clients over the last two decades that that’s how it seems to me is as we’re climbing that spiral staircase, you allow yourself to succeed at higher and higher levels.
Will Barron:
I have an example of this. I won’t dive too deep into it, because I’ve talked about it on the show before, but I wanted to take the content, the training, everything that we’re doing to the next level, and I feel for the audience, if they’re listening to multiple episodes like this a week, if they’re tuning in to our other content, they’ve got the constant reminders on Instagram, the quotes that we do in the little videos, the next step is some kind of coaching. It’s some kind of one-on-one. It’s some kind of motivation.
Will Barron:
So I hired a local sales trainer, great guy, to basically spend one day a week on a page coaching plan to help some of our audience. Sent out on this email. I think the email list now is about 104,000 people, whatever it is, and I got a tonne of emails back saying, “Sounds great. I’m interested, but I’d rather it be you doing the coaching as opposed to a sales trainer that I’m sure is great, because he’s on board with you, but nothing to do with me. I don’t know who he is. And I listen to you a couple of times a week and I want your experience.”
Will Barron:
And my guts and my heart sank and my gut got all weird. And I had this moment of I’ve interviewed now 400 plus sales business experts, probably more than … Well, I don’t think there’s anyone. If I look at other sales podcasts out there and other interview shows, there’s no one that’s covered sales as deeply as what we have. And I’m a salesperson myself and all the building blocks are all there. I love coaching. I help a load of local entrepreneurs with their social media content. I help a load of podcasters grow their podcasts, sorry, and all the building blocks of all of this are there. And it blew my mind that people actually wanted me to help them directly. So that’s changed a whole series and whole vertical of our business on its head now.
Will Barron:
I’m not sure when the show will come out, but around about the time it comes out, we’ll be taking on at least another 10 coaching clients, and I’ll be doing 50% of the coaching. It’ll be someone else doing another 50% just to even up my time that I’ll spend with them. But I literally went through this of people want me to work with them? And they were willing to throw money at me to get my insights? And I’m not humble bragging here at all. I literally don’t think I’m that good or talented at any of this, but the results we’ve had from the pilot that we’ve done so far have been fantastic. And I’ve loved every minute of just getting on the phone or Skype and chatting with salespeople and helping them through this process. So just as anecdotally here for the audience, I’m going literally through this at the same time.
Why is Money Such a Weird Topic Yet We All Want It? · [14:37]
Will Barron:
So before now we jump into the how to, something you said here really intrigued me and that is both the permission to succeed, which I wanted to cover briefly, because that might be the starting point of all of this, and then money. So let’s touch on money first. Why does money tie in with all of this [inaudible 00:14:53]? Why is money such a weird topic for most people who haven’t consciously processed this, thought about it, read books on it? Why is money such a weird thing that we all want but we don’t really want to talk about or share how much we earn, and our parents have instilled things into us. Why is it so bizarre?
Noah St. John:
Well, you’re absolutely right. Well, money is a very, very emotional issue. Now, 77% of the people that come to my website, the success clinic.com, that’s our main website, say that money is their number one frustration along with health, relationships, and stress. And notice that stress is caused by basically problems in those other three, money, health, and relationships, right? So basically that’s all your bases covered, and that’s not what we help people with.
Noah St. John:
But first of all, money is a very emotional issue for that exact reason, because not only are we not taught to talk about it, we’re taught to not talk about it. I’ll give you a quick example. Now, I grew up poor in a rich neighbourhood. I know that’s a total cliche, but I grew up in this little town called Kennebunkport, Maine, which just happens to be one of the wealthiest communities in New England, but my family was dirt poor. And I mean that literally. We lived at the bottom of a dirt road in a draughty, unfinished house that my parents ended up losing to foreclosure. So from a very young age, I was very, very painfully aware of the dichotomy, the chasm, the gap between the haves and the have nots. The haves was everyone else in the community, and the haves nots was my family.
Noah St. John:
And so it was very, very weird growing up because I saw that my parents worked really, really hard. I mean, they struggled, they sacrificed, and yet they could never seem to get ahead. Meanwhile, right across the street, there were all wealthy people and kids and they had nice things and clothes and food and all that stuff that my family didn’t have. And I’m going, “This doesn’t make any sense. Why, why are my parents working so hard? They have nothing. And these people over here seem to have so much, they don’t seem to work so hard.”
Noah St. John:
So I went on a crusade, basically. I just I had to figure this out. I hated that poverty and lack and fear and not enoughness that I grew up with. And so I just wanted to find a way out of that, that poverty, because I saw it right across the street. I’m like, “How come my family doesn’t have this?” And so it was very confusing, very painful, and that’s really what started my spiritual studies and studies of personal and business growth. And so that’s what really led to all the work that I’m doing today.
Noah St. John:
So I remember this very clearly. When I was a kid, because it was a wealthy community, we’d have different people come in and speakers and presentations and things. I remember there was this one presentation at our grammar school. It wasn’t even high school. It was a grammar school and a string quartet came in and it was playing the violin, viola, and stuff like that. And this was a travelling thing and showing the kids to expose them to the arts, which is awesome. And so they said at the end, “Does anybody have any questions?” And so I raised my hand and I said, “What do you guys make? How much money do you make?” I just basically said, “I’m curious. Hey, how much do you guys make?” And then, of course, what did they do? Everybody laughed and then they said, “Well next question.”
Noah St. John:
And then as a kid, you go, I mean, what I did was I went, “Why was that funny? Why didn’t you answer my question? I wasn’t trying to be a jerk. I mean, I was just curious, what did you make?” And that was my first exposure. And you can see, I remember it very clearly, distinctly. Why was that funny and why didn’t you answer my question? And that was a thing, of course, as we get older, we go, “Oh, that’s rude.” But why is that rude? I mean, we get it that you shouldn’t ask people that, but it’s a taboo, but why? Why is it such a taboo?
Noah St. John:
Now, we don’t have time to get into the whole thing of all human experience, but you can see that’s just an example, and I’m sure we’ve all had experiences similar to that, that you go, wow, this whole thing around money is very emotional, number one. And number two, the worst part is that you can’t talk about it. There’s nobody to talk to. And that just makes it worse. So that’s one of my things with my coaching clients is to just get it out so people can talk about it, so they have a safe space to talk about very emotional issues like money.
How to Overcome the Head Trash Stopping Your Success · [19:06]
Will Barron:
So I’m going to come on to Permission To Succeed in a second, but just to touch on this a little bit further. To solve some of these head trash issues, some of this negative self-talk, all this that we all experience, do we need to go on a deep dive through our history, what our parents had said, the things that they’ve instilled into us, or can we not do all that and still solve the problem? Because that seems like a lot of work. That seems like sitting on some dude’s couch, laid back and talking nonsense for 25 years while he charges you $200 an hour. Can we solve these problems without having to do all that digging?
Noah St. John:
It’s funny you mentioned that, because I have literally had people come to my three-day live events. We have three-day live events that we do twice a year. We call it The Freedom Lifestyle Experience. And people come to them, and I have literally had people stand up at those seminars and say, “Noah,” I remember one woman in Denver, and she said, “Noah, I have been going to therapy for 20 years.” Literally. I mean, just almost exactly what you just said. “I’ve been going to therapy for 20 years and you just fixed me in three days.” So it’s like, well, good. I guess you got your money’s worth.
Noah St. John:
So I had another guy stand up at one of our events in Las Vegas. He said, “No, I have been studying personal growth for 40 years.” We have this on video. It’s on video. You can go to the webpage and look at it. But he said, “I’ve been studying personal growth for 40 years. I have a master’s in psychology and I had studied everything out there. I came to your event to expose you as a charlatan.” He said this on camera. “I came to this event to expose you as just another one of those frauds or another one of those bullshit artists.” and he said, “Noah, I have had to eat crow this entire time, because not only have I done a million dollar deal here, I just closed a million dollar deal here at this event, but you’ve taught me more in the last 48 hours than I’ve learned in the previous 40 years.”
Noah St. John:
I mean, so the answer to your question is sure, there’s plenty of people who will take your money for 20, 30 years if you want to do that. What we do at Success Clinic is we just cut to the chase, because that’s what I wish someone would’ve done for me. Can we just fix this damn thing? I’m sick of always having to talk about all this crap without having a solution. So I’m the nerdiest nerd in this industry, Will. I’m just I’m such a nerd because I have to have something that works. I have to have a step by step checklist, and that’s what I wish someone would’ve done for me and nobody did. So I had to do it myself.
The First Step To Overcoming Head Trash and Give Yourself Permission to Succeed · [21:25]
Will Barron:
Okay, well, let’s get into the steps here. I might be totally off here. Hopefully I’m not miles away. I guess, is the first step to suss out what head trash we have or is it just to start to give ourself permission to break through it?
Noah St. John:
Well, actually, no, it is. So in the book, the new book that we’re going to give away to your readers, I mean, your viewers, Get Rid Of Your Head Trash About Money, the subtitle is How To Avoid The Three Big Money Mistakes That Even Smart People Make. And I know everyone watching this programme is very smart, but you may be making one or more of these mistakes without even knowing it.
Noah St. John:
So one of the biggest mistakes that I see is very simply not getting rid of your head trash, particularly about money. That’s why we’re having this conversation right now. So the point is that one of the first steps that we give you, for my coaching clients that we talk about this in the book, is write down what head trash you have about money. What are you saying to yourself? What’s your, “I can’t do it because”? And also, what are you telling yourself about money, wealth, abundance, your ability to manifest, your deserving level?
Noah St. John:
I’ll give you a great example. I was just talking with one of my clients the other day, and she said, when we were doing this exercise, she said, “Noah, I didn’t know this before. I didn’t realise this consciously until we started working together.” And she said, “I realise that one of my head trashes is I’m a bad money manager.” That’s what she was telling herself. “I’m a bad money manager.” And I said, “Well, gee, how is that showing up in your life?” And she said, “Well, as soon as money comes in, I just make sure it goes right out again.”
“If you don’t even know where the trash is in your house, how can you possibly take it out? If you don’t know where the trash is in your head, how can you take it out?” – Noah St. John · [23:39]
Noah St. John:
Hmm. I go, “Well, isn’t that interesting? You’re making yourself right.” And she said, “Yeah.” And I said, “Do you want to stop doing that?” She goes, “Yeah.” I said, “Okay, well, that’s the first step is to just be aware of it. Just understand that how is this affecting you?” So yeah, you’ve got to write down what is your specific head trash, and then how is this affecting your life? And then, I mean, really you’ve got to ask yourself, are you willing to be wrong? Are you willing to change that? Are you willing to take out that trash? And some people are and some people aren’t. If they’re watching this programme, probably they’re ready to take it out. But I mean, that really is a big, huge first step. Because if you don’t even know where the trash is in your house, how can you possibly take it out? If you don’t know where the trash is in your head, how can you take it out? So, yeah, that’s the first step is just that awareness.
Question to Ask Yourself When Trying to Understand The Things Hindering Your Success · [23:49]
Will Barron:
Are there any questions that we should be asking ourselves to generate this awareness? And as we go through this, if there’s anything that pops up in my mind, I’ll share that for the audience as well.
Noah St. John:
Yeah, absolutely. So the question really is what do I tell myself about money? What am I telling myself is my relationship with money? All right. So again, using that example that I just mentioned, “Well, I’m a bad money manager.” Now, let me just be clear about this again, that you have tonnes of proof that what you’re saying is right, like the example that I gave earlier. Everybody can sit and say, “I don’t have the time. I’m too busy.” No problem. Okay. Then you’re too busy. Great. Yay. You win. You get to be broke. Good job. So like I said, I’m inviting you. I can’t make anybody do anything. I’m just inviting you. I’m saying, “Hey, would you want to come over here where there’s some money or do you want to stay where you are, where you’re stuck? It’s totally up to you.”
How People Justify Their Head Trash with Almost Sensible Reasons · [24:52]
Will Barron:
Well, something came up to me as you said that then, and then I immediately give myself an excuse for that is I don’t know if I… My language that I want to say is it’s my belief. So we can touch on what that means, I guess, in a second. But I believe, again, rightly or wrongly, we can dive into this perhaps, that it takes quite a lot of time to build momentum with money. And as I say this, I’m not sure if that’s actually wrong, but the way I’m justifying myself is that I’m patient, and I’m willing to put in the work for that five, 10-year period with the business, everything I’m doing here to then drive enough revenue to have cash to then throw into different investments, which then compound over time.
Will Barron:
As I’m saying it, it doesn’t seem like a daft belief. But I know that when I say this to entrepreneurs that I hang around with, I’ve started doing a lot of clay pigeon shooting, and I’m hanging around with old dudes who can, one, shoot a shotgun like nothing else I’ve ever seen in all my life. It’s incredible to see a 85-year-old dude blow up these clays and I can barely hit any of them. But two, I say stuff like this to them, and their initial question every time is, “Why do you think it’s got to take five years? Why can’t you do the same thing in two years?” And again, I give myself the excuse of it’s okay. I’m patient. And maybe it’s okay. I don’t want the extra stress or I’m okay to grow slow. Or if I feel like perhaps if I go fast and I put out more content or we hire more people, there’s more chance for mistakes.
Will Barron:
So as you were saying that, Noah, and again, it’s tied into money of driving revenues to, I guess, invest in the future, that was the head trash that I came up with of let’s go slow. Why go fast?
Noah St. John:
Well, like you just said, you’re perfectly justified in everything you just said. You believe it, and so there you go. I mean, those older gentlemen that you’re talking to and who were saying that to you, they’re right, also. So it’s all about your perspective. So Will, you and I should probably get on a coaching call, because it sounds like you need some help. I mean, and I’m happy to help you and, of course, everybody else watching, but I mean, seriously, this is exactly the kind of thing that I work with every single day, because I mean, I’ll give you another example. Okay. I was speaking at a seminar in Los Angeles and just give my regular presentation. I was walking off the stage, and this guy came up to me out of the audience. It was 1,000 business owners. He ran up to me and he practically tackled me, and he says, “Noah, I want you to be my coach.” And I said, “Okay, great.” I didn’t know this guy from Adam. Ironically, his name was Adam.
Noah St. John:
And so I said, “What’s going on?” He goes, “Noah, I’m totally stuck. I’m only making $4 million a year.” I go, “Okay. Well, a lot of people would like to be stuck at $4 million a year.” No, that sounds kind of funny, doesn’t it? And anyway, so he goes, “No, no, no, you don’t understand. I’ve been at the same level for the last four years. We got to 4 million in sales and we’ve just been plateaued for the previous four years. And I’ve tried everything.” He said, “I’ve thrown all this money at it. I tried this guru and that Guru.” He named every big name and he goes, “I’ve spent tens of thousands dollars and I’m still stuck.”
Noah St. John:
And he said, “As soon as I heard you talk about head trash and your foot on the brake and permission to succeed and everything you just said,” he goes, “I knew you were the coach I’ve been looking for.” So long story short, I ended up coaching him. And that one year, I coached him for about a year. In that one year, his sales, his revenues for his company, which had been stuck at 4 million for the previous four years, went over 16 million in sales in one year. Okay? So does it have to take five, 10 years? No, it doesn’t have to take it. Can you take 4, 5, 10 years? Sure. You can do whatever you want. I’m not telling you or anybody else what they should want. It’s what you want that’s important.
“How fast or slow you go is totally up to you. You shouldn’t let anyone dictate what you should want or how fast you should grow. But at the same time, make sure you’re not driving down the road of life with one foot on the brake.” – Noah St. John · [28:50]
Noah St. John:
But this guy, this example, the CEO knew that he wanted to expand. He wanted to accelerate. He wanted to get that momentum going. And frankly, I think that’s what all business owners, salespeople, entrepreneurs want is just momentum. Now, how fast or slow you go is totally up to you. You shouldn’t let anyone dictate what you should want or how fast you should grow. But at the same time, what I do is I make sure for my clients that at least you’re not driving down the road of life with one foot on the brake.
How to Overcome Head Trash and Live The Life You Were Meant to Live · [29:10]
Will Barron:
So you might have subtly answered this next question here, but practically, then, when we know we’ve got a foot on the brake here, we’re slowing ourselves down, as you say that, and I think I’m getting the gist of it. Perhaps stories helps change our perspective. Perhaps that’s what we need to be doing, working with coaches, people like yourself as well. But what’s the next practical step? Once we’ve established what the head trash is, how can we knock it a little bit off its perch?
Noah St. John:
Well, that’s the second mistake that I see even smart entrepreneurs making, smart sales professionals making is trying to do everything themselves, meaning not having a mentor, not having someone help you, not having someone to make your life and your job and your career easier. Now, at Success Clinic, we teach that a mentor is three things. The first thing is a mentor is someone who’s where you want to be. Now, the problem is, that’s the easy part. Now, you can’t turn on Facebook these days without seeing this guy and that guy saying, “Hey, look at all my cool stuff. Aren’t I awesome? Yeah.” And yeah, you’re awesome, dude. And they rented a car for the day and they got a cool car. And listen, there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m not saying that we don’t want nice things. The problem is when you dig into that, 99 times out of a hundred, that guy who got there was driven by personality driven success, meaning it’s dependent on their personality.
Noah St. John:
So the second part of mentorship that people forget is that that mentor has to have a system, a step by step system to help you get there. Because if it’s personality driven, then by definition, if you don’t have that personality, then it won’t work for you. Do you see? And I mean, I gave these guys so much money before I figured this out. I mean, I lost tens of thousands of dollars myself because I bought all this stuff, meaning I bought it and I bought it. I bought all this, “Hey, man. Hey, man,” but then so I believed those images, and then I paid them a lot of money and they did nothing. And so that’s what I call sucky teacher disease. So a lot of people out there may be suffering from and may have been affected by an STD without [inaudible 00:31:17].
Noah St. John:
And then the third thing, the third part or the third facet of mentorship, true mentorship is someone who actually helps you. So it’s someone who’s where you want to be, but that’s the easy part. That’s what everybody gets sucked into. That’s the STD part. Then you have someone who can actually help you get there. Someone who has a step by step system, that’s one out of a hundred. And then somebody who actually helps you get there. Now you’re down to one out of a thousand. So I’m just urging people, your viewers, to realise that it’s really, really easy to show those cool images and that’s awesome, but do they have a system and will they actually help you? And that’s what unfortunately is very rare today. And that’s why a lot of people are getting sucked into these things. And frankly, that’s why I say these things out loud so to hopefully save people a lot of time, money, and effort.
Will Barron:
We’re on totally the same wavelength for this because in the sales training industry specifically, exactly the same thing happens. And this can be you both go down bad, I guess, but it can be misleading for sure if you have someone who is a character, who is naturally charismatic, who crushes it in sales for five years, then becomes an internal sales trainer, then goes out and does their own sales training, but they don’t have methodology. There’s no structure. There’s no step by step guide. And clearly-
Noah St. John:
It’s dependent on their personality.
Will Barron:
Yeah. And they sell a lot of coaching products, and we’ve done literally specific shows on this, of who the people within the sales industry that I spend time with who are great sales people versus who are great sales trainers, how you can spot them. And then some people are just totally bullshitting as well. We all know these Instagram accounts, as you pointed out there, they rent the Ferrari for the day. They rent the house for the day. They borrowed Rolexes off their mates, and they’re making a shit tonne of money from selling some get rich quick scheme on the internet. I’ve never fell into any of that, but there’s plenty of names that come to mind.
Will Barron:
And it just depends how you look at it. They’re making a tonne of money. They’ve got a profitable business, but perhaps people on the other side of it, perhaps it’s not sustainable. And I say this to the audience all the time, and I practise what I preach with this. In a world where everything from now forever that you do is documented where people can comment on LinkedIn, where they can comment on blogs, where they can make their own website with thoughts about you that you can’t edit, you can’t delete, I think that’ll fade away and change over time.
Noah’s System For Getting Rid of Head Trash · [33:50]
Will Barron:
But with all that said, Noah, in your words, what is your system? Conscious of time as well, but what is the steps? For someone listening to this who wants at least a taste of it, how do they get rid of head trash using your step by step system?
Noah St. John:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And so just so you know, we are going to mention about how you can get the book for free, but I also have dozens of other book or, well, over a dozen other books where I talk about this in online programmes and coaching and mentoring. So obviously I can’t give you the whole thing, but let me give you one really, really awesome thing that people absolutely love, and that is my technology called app formations. All right? Now, everybody watching this programme I’m sure has heard about how to use affirmation. An affirmation is the old school way of doing it, traditional way what traditional teachers are telling you, which is, of course, to say these positive statements. I am happy. I am rich. I am a great salesman. I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And gosh darn it, people like me. I mean, we’ve heard this a billion times. Okay. So that’s the old way of doing it.
Noah St. John:
Now, we’ve all learned this, and see, remember I told you earlier that that’s all those books that I was reading? They all basically say the same thing. “Hey, say these positive statements and write them down,” and I did everything they told me to do. I put them on the wall. I followed their instructions to the letter, and I got nothing, nothing. I was totally frustrated. And I figured I must be the biggest idiot in the world, because I’m following every direction and nothing’s working. And so I was so frustrated because I’d been doing this for years.
Noah St. John:
And so finally, one day in April, 1997, I was in the shower thinking about all this, and I said, “Wait a minute. Now, what are we talking about here? We’re talking about beliefs, right?” Because if you want to change your life, you’ve got to change your beliefs. And I knew that part was right, but they’re telling us the same thing and I’m doing what they’re telling and it’s not working. So I said, “Okay, well, what is a belief? A belief is a thought. Well, what is thought?” And the more I thought about that question, I said, “Well, human thought is the process of asking and searching for answers to questions, not statements, but questions.” For example, if I ask you why is the sky blue? Why is the sky blue? Your brain instantly immediately starts to search for the answer to the question. The sky is blue because … It’s like a Google search or a computer searching its files. Your brain’s basically just like a computer. And so it’s searching its files. The sky is blue because … I don’t know, but it’s searching. Right?
Noah St. John:
And so what’s happening is that you can’t even help doing that. You do it without your own volition. You can’t not do it. So I said, “Now, wait a second. If the human mind is automatically searching for answers to questions, why are we going around making statements we don’t believe?” Because the problem isn’t with the statement, the problem is we don’t believe the statement.
Noah St. John:
So I love to do this at my live events. I have everybody stand up and I say, “Okay, guys, we’re going to use the old school affirmation way. Ready? And we’re all going to say, ‘I am rich.'” Everybody says, “I am rich.” And you know what happens next? Everybody starts laughing and I go, “What are you laughing at?” They go, “Well, I’m not rich.” I said, “But yeah, you just said you were.” “Yeah, but I don’t believe it.”
Noah St. John:
See, that’s the problem. It’s nothing wrong with the statement. The problem is you don’t believe the statement. Now, the traditional teacher said, “Well, listen, if you don’t believe your statement, all you’ve got to do is repeat it a thousand million, billion, gajillion times, and then you’ll believe it someday.” Right? We’ve heard this a million times. So really what they’re saying, if you think about it, is bash your brain into submission. That’s really what they’re saying.
Noah St. John:
So I said, “Wait a second.” Now, that’s the old way of doing it, and that works great for some people, but for millions of people I didn’t work at all and it didn’t work for me. So I said, “What could be a better way? There’s got to be something they’re not telling us. What could be a better way?”
“When you ask lousy questions, what do you get? Lousy answers. And that creates a lousy life. – Noah St. John · [37:52]
Noah St. John:
And I started to say, “Okay, that’s a statement, I am rich, and your brain says, ‘Yeah, right.’ What would the question be? Why am I so rich? Why am I so rich?” Now, when you ask that question in your brain, what immediately starts to happen? You start to search for the answer to the question. Now, we all know about the law of sowing and reaping, right? As you sow, so shall you reap, but what are we sowing? We’re sowing seeds of thought. But what are most people doing? Sowing lousy thought seeds. Why am I so stupid? Why am I so fat? Why can’t I lose weight? Why can’t I make more money? Why isn’t my business growing? Why is there more month left at the end of the money? Right? And when you ask lousy questions, what do you get? Lousy answers. And that creates a lousy life.
Noah St. John:
So I said, “Wait a second. What if instead of asking lousy questions that lead to lousy answers, create a lousy life, what if we just flip the whole thing on its head? Start asking empowering questions that lead to phenomenal answers and create a wonderful life.” And as I was standing there in the shower, April, 1997, I said, “Holy cow, I think I just invented something.” And so I had to give it a name and the name that I gave it afformations. If you could see this book here, this is my book from, hey, I was called the book of afformations, not affirmations, but afformations, A-F-F-O-R-M-A-T-I-O-N-S. So afformations are the foundational step.
Noah St. John:
So this is going back to your question that this is the foundational step that I’ve talked to over a quarter million people all around the world. And I tell you, Will, we have had so many incredible success stories from people who have changed their life using afformations. That’s why we have our community called Afformation Nation of formers from all around the world and just incredible stories.
Noah St. John:
I literally just got an email this morning from a fellow in South Africa, who’s been using my afformations method, and he was at the end of his rope. He was feeling really down on himself. And now he knows that he’s going to be creating this awesome, being an entrepreneur, create an amazing life and an amazing business and helping so many people. He’s just so excited about it. I get these emails. I get these notifications on social media every day. So afformations is the process of using empowering questions to immediately change your subconscious thought patterns from negative to positive. And it’s so simple, and yet it’s so amazingly powerful.
A Practical Example of an Afformation · [39:44]
Will Barron:
What would be an example of an afformation for a B2B salesperson listening to this? Perhaps listen to this and perhaps today they’re just not having the most confident of days. And we’re not even going to get time to dive into habits, but that was something I wanted to touch on as well, and that obviously plays into a lot of this. But perhaps they’ve not set the habit of this up in the morning, whatever, before they walk into a sales meeting to live to this. Usually they’re pretty confident. They’re happy. They’ve got high self-esteem, but today they’re feeling a bit like bleh, but they’re going into a sales meeting. One, is this a tool that they can use to then get them change their belief in that moment to get them in the right frame of mind for that meeting? And then what should they be saying to themselves?
Noah St. John:
The answer, yes, you can change your subconscious thought patterns immediately, instantly using my afformations method. And secondly, very simply one of the things that you could afform is why am I so confident? Why am I so confident going into this meeting? Every time I do an interview, one of the things that I afform is why is this the best interview that I’ve ever done? And what’s so nice is I make it true. And so the next interview will be even better and better and better than that.
“You can form the life you want by changing the questions you asking yourself.” – Noah St. John · [41:23]
Noah St. John:
And so you’re afforming. What you’re doing is you’re afforming. By the way, the word affirmation comes from the Latin word [Latin 00:40:46], which means to make firm. The word afformations that I invented, and by the way, it’s perfectly legitimate to invent a new word because when you have a new way of looking at the universe or a new technology, isn’t it true we often need a new word, like Google, Facebook webinar. These are new words. A new technology. We needed a new word. Well, afformations is a new technology of the mind. So afformations comes from the Latin word [Latin 00:41:09], which means to form or give shape to. So what I often ask my clients is what if you’re making something firm, but it’s in the wrong form? That’s called you formed the life you didn’t want. So now using afformations, you can form the life that you want by changing the questions you’re asking and thereby change your life.
Parting Thoughts · [41:42]
Will Barron:
Love it, love it. Well, as I said, there’s habits. There was another couple of money questions I wanted to dive into. We’ve just not got time to go any deeper into this. So we’ll have you back on, Noah, in the not too distant future to carry on the conversation. But you’ve mentioned the book, Get Rid Of Your Head Trash About Money. Tell us where we can find it and, yeah, a little bit more about it.
Noah St. John:
There it is. Get Rid Of Your Head Trash About Money. Like I said, How To Avoid The Three Big Money Mistakes Even Smart People Make. So all you have to do is go to sendmeabooknoah.com, very simple. Sendmeabooknoah.com, and I will send you this book. And so I’ve covered the cost of the book. We just ask you to cover the shipping. And if you want to download the ebook version of this, it’s free free, no money at all. If you want to get the hard copy, which I love this. I like reading books books, and there’s tonnes of stories in here of my clients. We just ask you to cover the shipping.
Noah St. John:
And by the way, just real quick, I want to mention that you see how excited I get talking about my client success stories? Well, we call that our wall of fame. When you go to our website, when you go to successclinic.com, you’ll see our wall of fame. And we just dozens and dozens and dozens of stories of real people, real stories who’ve gotten real results using my method. So for everybody watching, we’d love to add you to our wall of fame.
Will Barron:
I mean, I’ll link to the book. I’ll link to the website, the wall of fame, everything else that we talked about as well over in the show notes for this episode over at salesman.org. And with that, Noah, I want to thank you for your time, your insights on all this, mate. I want to thank you for joining us on the Salesman podcast.
Noah St. John:
My pleasure. Bye.
