EP 19_ GINO & ROB - THE 4 LEVELS OF DISCOVERY #2
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[00:00:00] Gino Wickman: Welcome to the Shed and Shine Podcast. I am Gino Wickman. This is where Rob Dube and I help driven entrepreneurs shed their shit, free their True Selves, unlock true entrepreneurial freedom, and shine. We truly appreciate you taking the time to spend with us and we hope to make a huge impact on you.
[00:00:22] Rob Dube: Hello and welcome everyone. My name is Rob Dube and I'm here with Gino Wickman. Gino, good to see you again.
[00:00:30] Gino Wickman: You as well, my brother.
[00:00:32] Rob Dube: Okay, so today we will be discussing Discovery #2 from our book Shine: Decisions Are Made Out of Love or Fear, and specifically the four levels that fall beneath this discovery.
So, for everyone listening out there, Gino and I took a deeper dive into Discovery #2, Decisions Are Made Out of Love or Fear, in our last episode, which is Episode 17. And Gino touched on the four levels in his episode four riff. If you haven't listened to them yet, you may want to start there and then listen to this episode. Okay, Gino, I'm going to throw it to you.
I always like to start by asking you to provide context. As always, what do we mean by levels?
[00:01:22] Gino Wickman: Yes, so I'm going to go three levels high in context on this one and then come back to your question because again, I just want to make sure we're rooted in the right context, which is The 3 Discoveries to Free your True Self.
We're digging deeper into discovery #2, all decisions are made out of love or fear. In that episode, two episodes ago, again, like you said, we basked in love and fear. And so we're not going to bask in that. So we're not, this isn't going to be redundant. Now that we've basked in that, and you as the audience out there, you basked with us and you understand love and fear.
Now we're going to go really deep into the root of what's causing love and fear-based decisions, ie, what we call the four levels. Hopefully you read this in the book. It's going to really help and improve your understanding as we have this conversation. But now we're going to bask in the four levels, and I'll turn it back over to you, Rob.
[00:02:26] Rob Dube: I'm going to say what the four levels are, and then I'm going to start at the top. So the levels are: The True Self Level - your True Self is in there. The Pure Energy Level - you are pure energy. The Blocked Energy Level - you can remove blocked energy. And the Awareness Level - be aware of which type of decision you are making.
So we've talked a lot about the True Self, so can you just take us at level one, the True Self level.
[00:03:01] Gino Wickman: Yes. And again, a little bit of context here. So as you think about the four levels, we, Rob and I, have wrestled long and hard about the best way to illustrate these four things to you, with you, for you. And so I need to give a little bit of history around this, because what we concluded for the book is to call them levels, just because in my mind, it's like, we're going to the root.
We're going to the root of love and fear-based decisions. But another way to think about it is almost like concentric circles, okay? And so at the center is the True Self piece, and then from there is energy, and then from there is blocked, and then from there is awareness. You can also think of it as understandings, levels, or layers of blocking.
Understanding because the goal is we're just trying to help you understand them because, oh my God, if we can get you to understand these four things in your bones, there's gonna be a light bulb moment, and you will shed faster and you'll make love-based decisions faster. Another way of thinking about it is awarenesses, and so when I first, originally created these they were called the awarenesses. These were actually four awarenesses, which have now evolved into the levels. And the last thing I will say in kind of setting the stage is, you know, my goal is to always, and kind of the gift that I bring to the world is, I have this way of making very complex topics practical and simple.
And this topic, I believe it's probably one of the most complex topics in the world, that for tens of thousands of years, human beings have been trying to figure this out. And it was figured out like 10,000 years ago, but for some reason, we human beings keep torturing ourselves. We don't want to listen, okay?
And so, this has been written from every psychological standpoint, scientific standpoint, spiritual standpoint, religious standpoint, and I don't even know what they were calling it 10,000 years ago because it wasn't any one of those four words. But nonetheless, this is an opportunity for us human beings to be free and make all of our decisions from love. It is possible and it's been around forever. And so with that, now it's time to bask in those levels and answer your first question. And again, that first level is the True Self level. But the important thing here, that's what we call the level. The important thing is to understand, be aware, that your True Self is in there.
So quickly taking you back to the cocoon that we use as the visual, your True Self is in there, trapped behind the cocoon that is your fear-based ego that is trying to protect you. Its intentions are good. The cocoon is also known as the suit of armor, the layers that we talk about, the block of marble that needs to be chipped away.
So lots of ways to think about this, but it's just this mental understanding, I would even say physical soul-level understanding that you have, this True Self, it is powerful, it wants to be free, it wants out, it is in there, and your job is to free it and fully become your True Self.
[00:06:27] Rob Dube: Yeah, you know, one of the things I've noticed for driven entrepreneurs, specifically in my interactions over 30 years with them, and I know you've had many more than I have, is they lose their True Self through their businesses, actually.
And so this is a really important one. We want you to come back to your True Self. Come back.
[00:06:50] Gino Wickman: That's heavy. That's heavy. You know, so let's get really heavy because not only that, you know, we are born our True Selves. We are born our true, innate self. And this term True Self, you know, let's go back 10,000 years.
It's been called like 4,000 different things. So you want to call it soul or essence or spirit, or whatever word you want to use. It's just this knowing that there is this power source inside of us. I think most of us really believe there's something going on on the inside. So that's what we were born with.
So not only did our businesses put us in the cocoon, life put us in the cocoon
Because for the first year or two, we are our True Selves man, and then life gets ahold of us, and then some trauma happens, and some pain happens, and then our parents teach us some shit or show us some shit that just isn't right, real and downright unhealthy. And then we start to build these structures around us. And then by, you know, like I always say 15 for me at least, the ego structure is built and forward we go. Now to your point, we start a business somewhere between 18 and 45, and all of a sudden that business kicks the shit out of us and we build more layers. So yeah, all of a sudden look what's happening, man. We keep getting further and further and further away from ourselves. And so the good news is you can get all the way back to your True Self in that business while you're building the business.
You don't have to wait. And that's what we're about to talk about.
[00:08:19] Rob Dube: Okay. So here I am. I want to shed some layers. I want to free my True Self. And so now we talk about the pure energy level. You are pure energy. Talk about that.
[00:08:30] Gino Wickman: Yeah, so this is the one that audiences start to squirm. This is the one that feels a little woo woo.
This is the one that feels like we're teaching spirituality and religion, and we're not. This is scientifically proven now that we are pure energy. We're like pure energy. 99.99999999 percent pure air. It's so hard to believe because I'm thumping on my chest here. How can this be air? I mean, this damn thing is solid, you know?
So, it's scientific though. And this level, this understanding, this awareness is to realize that you are a ball of energy. You're a pure ball of energy. Now go back to True Self, that True Self, that ball of energy shines very, very bright. It's just not always shining that bright because it's stuck in the cocoon, but now let's use that analogy, the cocoon and True Self analogy.
There's your True Self in the cocoon. Here's a mind bender. Hopefully you can do this, but that visual image of the cocoon in your True Self in there, picture that as energy. That is you. That's energy. I mean, that's the energetic version of you. This incredible power source, this bright ball of light trapped with all of these ego related blocks.
That's all energy. That's all energy, and we're not going to the next level yet, but that's where you start to see all those blocks. The cocoon is just a bunch of blocks, and for some of us it's a handful of blocks. For some of us it's a million blocks. But nonetheless, once you see all of that as energy, the idea is to now shed all that stuff so you can shine as bright as you're supposed to and vibrate at the highest level.
[00:10:21] Rob Dube: Yeah, you know, something that when I'm speaking about pure energy to people that I like to bring up is that we've all had a common experience in our life at some point and that is where we've met somebody and we're having a discussion with them and then they walk away and we think to ourselves, that person had a great energy, or that person had a weird energy. And, that seems to click something on with people, because sometimes you even get a funny chill, like you might get the chills or something, or you know, when you have a weird interaction, that is energy exuding from one person to another. And we exude that kind of energy to other people as well.
[00:11:02] Gino Wickman: Yeah. I’m trying to stop myself, but I can't stop myself because I'm gonna go really deep on this one. All of our listeners may tune out. This one gets so heavy.
[00:11:12] Rob Dube: Stay with us, everyone.
[00:11:15] Gino Wickman: But to that point, okay, so we're talking about shining as bright as possible. Vibrating at the highest level.
We all vibrate at some level. So David Hawkins scale, Map of Consciousness, the lowest level to the highest level. At the lowest level are things like shame and anger. That kind of pain. At the highest level is love and enlightenment and bliss and things like that. So we as beings are all vibrating at some level.
When you talk about meeting someone with good energy or weird energy, depending on where you are vibrating. We attract people to us that vibrate at the same level. And so when you say they had good energy and you're vibrating at hypothetically 400, you just met another fellow 400 because just for the record, the 700 feels weird to you and the 100 feels weird to you.
And then when a 100 vibrator meets a 100 vibrator, they're saying, wow, that person had really good energy because they're both in the same pain. They're matching each other's pain. Now this is where, again, I'm just going to finish this whole thought. You can read a thousand books written on this, but we are attracted to like-minded, same level, vibrating people.
And so people in pain, shame-based people, are drawn to shame-based people. And so there they are, they live in their shame. Now here comes the really big point. Your business, Mr. and Mrs. Driven Entrepreneur out there, vibrates at a certain level. Okay, and I always lovingly like to say with all of our clients, when your core values are clear, and your core focus is clear, the soul of your organization is clear.
And when it's clear like that, and you have all the right people that align with those core values and that core focus, your organization is vibrating at a certain level, and attracting those kind of people to you. And if your company is vibrating very low, if you have an anger-based, shame-based, fear-based company, you're going to attract lots of anger-based, fear-based, shame-based people.
If your company's vibrating at the level of love, you're going to attract a whole bunch of love-based people. So, hopefully that wasn't too heady, but no, that was great.
[00:13:24] Rob Dube: And when you were sharing the numbers, I just want to encourage everybody, go check out page 57 in the book Shine, and that'll explain the numbers and that Gino was referring to, as well as the words that go along with those numbers from David Hawkins Map of Consciousness.
Okay. So let's talk about blocked energy, blocked energy level, and you can remove blocked energy. Take it from here.
[00:13:47] Gino Wickman: Yeah. So let's go back to, again, we talked about energy, we talked about the cocoon, that visual. Now that you see that that's all energy, I keep saying it's scientific, it's been proven, Google it.
[00:13:59] Rob Dube: I love when you say that, by the way. Google it. I don't have time to explain it to you, just Google it.
[00:14:04] Gino Wickman: Exactly. And by the way, you'll spend a year reading all of the different writings on this. But anyway, so there's the cocoon. Now the cocoon is made up of all the blocked energy, all the things that happened to you in your life that you held on to.
You're just hanging on to all this shit from the past. For whatever reason, you're like, it's a possession of yours. That is not a great possession, and so you just need to let it go. You need to shed it, and so if that visual makes sense, now we just need to shed those layers. We need to remove that blocked energy.
These have been called gunk. It's called energetic blocks. It's called samskaras. Again, the last 10,000 years it has been called 10,000 different things. Nonetheless, just understand the visual because when you are making a decision and it's fear-based, it's coming from the cocoon. When you're making a decision and it's love-based, it's coming from the True Self. And when you realize that it's fear-based, you start to see that this block has a tie to the past. This is why Rob and I are so obsessed about getting you to tell your inner story, share your inner story in the world. It's to release it. Not for a pity party, not to get people's sympathy, not to run around telling everybody.
Find somebody you love and trust and share your inner story so that you can turn the light on yourself and see why this all happened, what the roots are, so that you can let it go, shed the cocoon and go forward. Hopefully that made sense.
[00:15:37] Rob Dube: Yeah, it does. You know, I've spoken to people who have said to me about this one, you know, I had a really great upbringing.
I don't really think I had any traumas. And they'll, they'll say, does that mean I'm free of blocks? Do you have any thoughts on that?
[00:15:53] Gino Wickman: Well I hope it's true. I hope they're being honest with themselves. And I'm guessing there's probably some people walking the earth that don't have a real thick cocoon.
I hope that's the case. Okay. So all I know is I have been working with driven entrepreneurs for over 30 years and I've yet to meet one. So all I know in that world, I just, I don't know how it works, I can just see pain. I see the blocks and then I'm able to pull them out of people as well, you know, for what that's worth.
So, if that's true what you're saying out there, whoever that was that said that to Rob, amen and hallelujah, forward you go, but just take one last look and see if there's something, because, you know, there's an amazing book that's called The Body Keeps the Score, and it talks about a lot of trauma from the past.
It's amazing the number of stories where people forget their trauma, literally forget it. A sexually abused 25 year old woman, her father sexually abused her multiple times. At 25 years old, she doesn't remember one bit of it. And then it all came rushing up. How on earth can you forget that 20 years later?
So some people just have this, the ego has this masterful way of just getting you to forget what happened. And so again, we're not trying to get you to drudge up the past, you know, take yourself through pain, but if there are things from the past that are hurting you going forward from making love-based decisions and you're trapped in fear, it's time to let it all go.
[00:17:28] Rob Dube: And it's important to look at. I mean, some people have major traumas, maybe big T, others little. We have a story, you can check it out in the book, where one of our clients talks about a thousand paper cuts. So it's just a bunch of little stuff that was happening along the way. Okay, so let's go to the awareness level.
Be aware of which type of decision you are making.
[00:17:49] Gino Wickman: Yep, so then all of a sudden this is the magic formula now. This is where, whether you're looking at those concentric circles, this is the outside ring, or you're looking at the layers, this is where we go all the way to the root to the magic, and that is to just simply become aware.
Become present, start paying attention to all the fear and love-based stuff going on. Again, decisions, emotions, feelings, thoughts. With awareness comes transformation and freedom as Eckhart Tolle teaches us. And so the idea there is just to start to pay attention and you'll see it. And when you see it happening, then you can chase it down.
And like the thought that came to me in your previous question is, you know, the person that's hanging onto the past and it just keeps talking about, do you know what they did to me? Do you know what they did to me? Do you know what they did to me? I mean, at some point you have to stop telling that story and let it go.
How is it serving you going forward? And so awareness says, wow, I do do that a lot. Wow, I bring that up a lot. I remember a funny line Les Brown shares in one of his talks, he talks about when somebody's saying, “Ddo you know what they did to me?” Les says, I don't know, but get the hell away from me before they come back.
So it's like, nobody wants to be around you. So, release it however you need to release it, with all due love and respect. We don't want to hear it. And it's not to be mean, but you're making up stories. Or you're hanging on to stories that are not serving you. Rob and I have been through some really shitty, shitty pain, and we could spend our whole life being angry at those people.
Why? Why? You got the whole next part of your life. Why hang on? So just be aware of the stuff that you're doing and how it's showing up. Pay attention to your body. Your body's going to tell you when stuff's coming up. And then just trust the process of shedding the layer, shining a little brighter, freeing your True Self and making more love-based decisions.
[00:19:39] Rob Dube: Yeah. How have you cultivated awareness over your life?
[00:19:43] Gino Wickman: Well, meditation is probably the best way, but my top three are meditation, two amazing books - Letting Go and Untethered Soul - and then therapy. So just sitting in therapy, getting somebody to listen to my shit that I just can't hear and see for myself.
They help me become aware. And then it's like, oh my God, that's why I do that because of that thing from eight years old when that, so it's just that those are my most impactful three ways, but there are a thousand ways and we certainly list 30 of them in the book for what that's about.
[00:20:22] Rob Dube: Yeah, and again, you know, we talked about, I think it was two episodes ago we talked about, oh no, it wasn't actually.
We hadn't talked about that, but one thing I do want to bring up is in one of the disciplines, which is Put Everything in One Place. And you came up with this great idea that as you're going throughout your day, if you feel a certain emotion or something coming up, thought, you know, jot it down. And, and I've been using that, I love that, because I can go back to it and recognize what was going on.
It actually feels like I'm shedding a layer when I do that. You are. It's so great. Something is simple. Yeah. No question you are. Alright, so before we wrap up, is there anything else, Gino, that comes to mind for you?
[00:21:03] Gino Wickman: Rob, I feel we've said it all.
[00:21:05] Rob Dube: Well, thanks as always, Gino. It's always a blast being with you.
And I just want to take a moment to remind you, the listener, that in addition to the Shed and Shine episodes that Gino and I record together, that every other episode we release a solo riff from Gino where he shares what's top of mind for him, the content from the book, new learnings and personal experiences.
So please listen to them. They are so, so great. And of course, we hope you'll continue to listen each week so you can learn to shed layers, free your True Self, and of course, shine.
[00:21:46] Gino Wickman: Thank you for listening in today. We truly appreciate you taking the time to spend with us and please tune in for the next episode.
Until then, if you'd like to see where you are on your True Self journey, go to shedandshinepodcast.com to take the True Self Assessment and receive personalized guidance. If you're all ready to begin your inner world journey with Rob and myself, please join us for the next round of the 10 Disciplines Group Coaching Program.
We wish you all the best in freeing your True Self. Stay focused and much love.