Ep. 15: Dr. Paul Jenkins on The 5 Steps to Pathological Positivity

In this episode, David sits down with Dr. Paul Jenkins, Positive Psychologist, speaker, and podcast host, to discuss the 5 steps to pathological positivity.

Dr. Paul’s Bio:
Dr. Paul is a Positive Psychologist who has left the traditional psychology model to help individuals and companies take the wheel and Live On Purpose. Dr. Paul helps to illuminate the obvious, which isn’t always noticed, to clear obstacles out of the way. Dr. Paul is Pathologically Positive, (the name of his first book), a speaker, podcast host and his YouTube Channel, Live On Purpose TV, has over 200K subscribers.

Dr. Paul’s Links:
Website: https://www.drpauljenkins.com/
Get your FREE digital copy of “Portable Positivity” by Dr. Paul: https://drpauljenkins.info/portablepositivity
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drpauljenkins/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/DrPaulJenkins
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PathologicalPositivityBook
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drpauljenkins/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiTdG02P4T9qa6gd3VKjbJA

Key Quotes:
1. “Until you see it as a choice, its not.”
2. “You are constantly judging yourself.”
3. “Evaluation implies comparison.”
4. “When you think your life is challenging, its because you’re comparing it to something easier.”
5. “When we compare what we’ve got to something worse than what we’ve got, we feel better about what we’ve got.”
6. “You can take anything and find something to be glad about.”
7. “What we think about, comes about. What we focus on, we feel.”
8. “If you can create a mess, then that means that you can create.”
9. “If you can create a mess, you can create a masterpiece.”
10. “If you don’t put intentional effort into your creation, it will progress to a more disorganized state.”
11. “Elevation requires effort. Light requires power.”
12. “Easy and simple are not the same thing.”
13. “What are we doing for our mental hygiene?”
14. “Do it now.”
15. “Everything’s ok in the end. If its not ok, its not the end.” – Carolyn Myers

Links Mentioned In The Episode:
“Led by Faith” by Immaculee Ilibagiza: https://amzn.to/3uXH6gX
“Trust Edge” by David Horsager: https://amzn.to/3rklv04

Buy David’s NEW book Trusted Leader: https://www.trustedleaderbook.com/

David’s Links:
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/36AXtp9
Follow us on Facebook: https://bit.ly/2S9O6mj
Follow David on Twitter: https://bit.ly/2BEXgla
Follow David on LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/2Xbsg5q
Follow David on Instagram: https://bit.ly/2QDFOE5

Show Transcript

David Horsager: Welcome to the trusted leader show it’s David Horsager and we have a special guest today.


David Horsager: He wrote the book pathological positivity the proven positivity formula for personal development parenting and relationships. He has a massive following on YouTube and online. He helps people think differently. So they act differently. We’ve got a great discussion ahead. Welcome, Dr. Paul.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Hey. Thank you, David. I’m so pleased to be here today because I’m so passionate about this.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I on it.


David Horsager: I can’t wait. I’m excited. Well, you know, before we get into this, I want to talk about the framework. I want to talk about how we can shift our mind about the things we’ve talked about even ahead of time and


David Horsager: You’re a new friend to us and our audience and I’m so glad you’re here because we need this. And I’m thrilled about it before we do, just as a matter of background, give us give us three things we should know about Dr. Paul Jenkins.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well, the doctor part is all about being a professional psychologist and I have to clarify that sometimes because when the kids were little, and they got an ear infection. My wife said, You’re not a useful doctor


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Because I don’t prescribe medications. I’ve got a PhD in clinical psychology and as a psychologist now a professional psychologist for over 30 years I’ve learned a lot about how to operate the equipment of your mind.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And it’s probably also important to acknowledge, I mean,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Psychotherapy sounds a little like therapy for psychos and so people don’t often sign up for that, even though they could really use the principles.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That allow them to take a higher level of control over their own mind. And so I’ve made a big shift in my career over to the positive end of the spectrum.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So that we can focus more on on education about how to properly operate the equipment of your own mind and I’m having so much fun with that.


David Horsager: I love this.


David Horsager: Yeah. My daughter is a senior in high school, a freshman in college. So she’s just a program out here, where she jumped into college freshmen, so she’s majoring in psychology


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Oh, yeah.


David Horsager: Yeah, exciting. So I’ll let her know there’s there’s real jobs at the end of the tunnel, but


David Horsager: But, but what she’s excited about, like, I know you are is is helping people and I think


David Horsager: You know, there’s a lot more we can learn about you, you, you speak Spanish. I mean you you’ve got a amazing family.


David Horsager: All kinds of cool things. But I think to get to it. You know, he read this book pathological positivity and we hear speakers say say you know just jump up and be positive. Come on. Just smile more. Come on. Just, just be happy and that just seemed can seem trite. What say you,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah, annoying.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And you hear all the time happiness is a choice, right, which can


David Horsager: Only see like it.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right, well it can kind of tip you over. If you’re not happy because then the next thought is, well, why would I ever choose this


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But here’s the thing. David and tell you see it as a choice. It’s not. Hmm. And part of my job. I love this. My job is to illuminate the obvious which is so cool because I get paid to tell people things they already know.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But there are obvious things that are completely unnoticed. So let’s just go there for a moment, obvious but I noticed


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Your shirt. Can you feel it.


David Horsager: Now,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now you can


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now, and it’s obvious right now in this moment is so obvious to you, but you didn’t even notice it before it was called your attention or the fact that we’re speaking English. Did you notice


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And and if you did it might be because you had a reference earlier to the fact that I speak Finnish, at which point we check in and mentally we check in. And notice that we’re not speaking finish. Right.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And it’s obvious that we’re speaking English. But we don’t notice that


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The processes that are going on in our own mind all the time. Let me emphasize that you can’t turn them off.


David Horsager: Okay and I’m obviously upset about this and I’m angry about it and I feel frustrated about it and I know it’s there. And I want to feel happy and I want to be joyful, but


David Horsager: I don’t feel like it.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right. And it doesn’t even feel like a choice.


David Horsager: Right. It feels like that happened to me. Right.


David Horsager: Easy right into victim.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yes. And so it’s my job really to call to your attention so that it’s obvious and noticed


Dr. Paul Jenkins: These processes. They’re going on all the time in your mind, but that you never really stopped to notice. And when we get so used to certain things. We just roll with our programming.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Liking English you and I are both program to speak English. I mean, it just comes so naturally to us. We don’t even think about it. But English is not an easy language.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You just ask anybody who’s trying to learn it as a second language.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It’s not, it’s complicated. There’s all kinds of exceptions to the rules, but here we are speaking it as if it’s easy, just because it’s in our programming.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And the processes that are going on in her mind. Here’s, here’s an example of one of those. It’s called meta cognition.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now meta cognition is a fancy psychobabble made up word we make up words in psychology. It makes us feel smart.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And this is one of them.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: If you break it down cognition simply means thinking


David Horsager: So thinking about thinking


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And metacognition is that higher level it’s thinking about thinking. Notice that you can do this.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right. And right now in this moment. You notice that because we’re talking about it.


David Horsager: Sure.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But that’s really important because metacognition creates a little space. And in that spaces where choice exists.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So as


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The other processes that are going on in our mind, we can think about that and start to steer them.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: In a direction that serves us well.


David Horsager: How can we break that cycle. You know, I’ve got this


David Horsager: This thing. There’s a trigger that happens. And that just throws me and I just get frustrated and I I pause and I think about it, but I still kind of feel this way and I want to make the choice of of joy or goodness, how do I break that cycle.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I think the very first step is awareness. Be aware of it.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Here’s an example. David, we’re we’re recording this particular episode.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: in the throes of a global pandemic. Right. And I get people all the time because of my specialty. I get people all the time companies or groups or whatever that call me up and say, Dr. Paul. You got to help our people figure out how to stay positive during such challenging times


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now when I say awareness. The first thing I want you to be aware of is that you are calling it challenging times


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I had, I had an opportunity. A few years ago, you and I are both affiliated with the national speakers association in our conference in Washington, DC, a few years ago there was a keynote from immaculate Elizabeth Giza.


David Horsager: I’ll never forget it.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Were you in the room that absolutely man she knocked it out of the park. But you got to understand her story as a young 20 something year old woman.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: She survived the Holocaust, the genocide that occurred in Rwanda.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And if I didn’t understand the scope of this, honestly, I don’t know how I missed it. I was young and raising a family at the time that it happened.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Heard it in the news. And I thought, oh warring tribes sticks and stones know this is a civilized society civilized. I’m going to use that term, kind of like we could use it to describe our own society right now.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: These were people like you and me and a million people died in about 90 days immaculately was hidden a who to pastor to compassion on her and hid her in a three foot by four foot bathroom for 90 days with seven other women.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I don’t know how to women can share a big bathroom.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But here they are. And they hear the killings going on outside


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That comes to mind for me, David, because really challenging times


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Compared to what


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And this is the first process that’s going on in people’s minds that I want them to see. I call it evaluation.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But evaluation means judgment and just notice for a minute that you can’t turn it off.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You know, you hear people say sometimes don’t judge


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah, I don’t think we can turn it off. Notice that you are constantly judging or evaluating yourself.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Your life your relationships, your finances the government, the pandemic, the situation that you’re in.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Your co workers, your friends, your family, you’re judging me


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It’s cool. I’m judging you.


David Horsager: Were and were created to it makes things much more efficient to be a judge that I can. I’ve got a chair, before I sit down and I can assume it’s going to hold me up. Right.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And after judgment. See, that’s an evaluation.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Absolutely can’t turn off as well. You’re designed and I’m not saying stop judging, but check it out, evaluation and and the educators who are hearing us today will will really get this evaluation implies comparison with some standard


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And so we have to think about our thinking to get to the point where we’re like, okay, challenging circumstances really compared to what


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And you’ll notice that when you think your life is challenging. It’s because you’re comparing it to something easier.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That you’re imagining


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that’s not what you’ve got. What you’ve got is what you’ve got.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But you can imagine something easier. And if you compare what you got to something better than what you’ve got her easier then you’re going to feel worse about what you got.


David Horsager: So often jump to something better. You know, it’s like you can be at the top 1% right and you still like, but there’s someone at that half like what, why do people jump to that.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Because it could always be better.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right, I don’t care how well you’re doing. It could always be better than the error we make an evaluation and queued me up for the second thing, okay.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But the error. We make because we take what we’ve got. We compared to something better. We feel worse about what we’ve got. Well guess what, it could always be worse.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Really worse than what a macula Gisela through


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Uh huh. She survived.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So it could always be worse, right, when we compare what we’ve got to something worse than what we’ve got. We feel better about what we’ve got.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You see how high level science. This is


David Horsager: I love it. We’re reading a book right now as a family in the evenings in our home called the hiding place and


David Horsager: Corrie 10 boom made it through the you know the whole Holocaust and it’s


David Horsager: Great amazing story. But her attitude compared to all the others her perspective, compared to all the others, it’s just, it’s so


David Horsager: Powerful because it’s still in the midst of this, we can say that, well that was immaculate. That was Corrie 10 boom that was this person and you know


David Horsager: That. But how did they do, how did they really stop it seemingly stopped their mind or shift their mind when when it was so easy to focus on the, you know,


David Horsager: Even in this case even Corey to moon she she kind of rejoices in all the myths that are eating her hair. And it’s like,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah.


David Horsager: It’s hard to imagine


Right and


Dr. Paul Jenkins: This is why it’s so important to see it as a choice, because when you see it as a choice, it becomes a choice. And you get to put yourself in that position intentionally


Dr. Paul Jenkins: She chose to see it that way. You know, people sometimes accuse me of being Pollyanna ish


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I didn’t even notice that a compliment.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Sounded like they were kind of dissing my position. I feel like we’re kind of the same. I had people call me as a kid. Smiley


David Horsager: And I thought,


David Horsager: That was genuinely happy, but I felt like I was blamed like I was wrong. I was bad, right.


David Horsager: For being authentic way happy.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well take Pollyanna as an example. In fact, I’ve got a chapter in my book called The Pollyanna principle.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I went and researched it there’s no Disney show called Pollyanna


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But the book is even better because it gets into more detail about what’s happened here. This is an 11 year old girl who was orphaned can think about that for a minute at 11 year old enough to know that your parents have died.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: This is pretty profound hardship.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And she can’t just pretend that her parents are dead.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right. So here’s the context and but her dad, who was a pastor of some kind. He was a man of faith had taught her a game. The game was called the glad game.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And the game was you can take anything. It doesn’t matter what it is you can take anything and find something to be glad about


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Related to that thing, whatever it is, and she gave a couple of examples being on crutches, having a disease, whatever it is. Okay.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And so she chose after her parents passed away and she was shipped off across several states on a train to live with her rich aunt who was kind of grumpy and surrounded by other grumpy people


Dr. Paul Jenkins: She chose in those circumstances.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: To see the positive


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And it changed how she felt it didn’t change her circumstances, it changed her position relative to those circumstances, and that made all the difference. So, this


David Horsager: When I went through college. Here’s how I remember basic psychology and this makes a lot of sense to me.


David Horsager: We talked about a lot in in our work, even though it were. I remember basic psychology first day of class, you can tell me, Dr. You know, first aid class thoughts lead to desires which lead to actions.


David Horsager: Right. And so that was commonly though so thoughts. So that’s my thoughts matter so much because what you put in


David Horsager: Oh, it was that, oh, if I’m thinking about, like, No, I’m not gonna do this, I’m not a golfer. But people think about golf ball template and then they don’t get a plate because the weather’s bad. It’s like, oh man, so bad because we didn’t get it.


David Horsager: Because I was thinking about that right it is. That’s why I often say, you know, you don’t tell me. This guy just got caught in adultery and start thinking about it then became a desire, then it became acted on it starts starts way over here, right, we


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Write


David Horsager: We put this input in this kind of truth. By the way, isn’t just psychology is it it’s every science. The first what the


David Horsager: Great German physicist and the first law of thermodynamics, like the energy put in as exact same as Jenna get energy. Get out and reap what you sow, you, you, you eat bad Poland chili. You get bad output right so input output, no matter what you do and


David Horsager: And that’s, that’s the crux of this


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So one of my colleagues says it this way. He says, what we think about comes about what we focus on we feel


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That is so true psychologically and show you why that’s true. And this is the first part of it. Notice that you are constantly evaluating your life.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And everything in it that evaluation depends on


Dr. Paul Jenkins: A Comparison with some standard. And if you don’t have a standard you’ll make one up and you got a pretty good about are pretty good imagination around that.


David Horsager: So, should I just lower my standards and lower my comparisons, which


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well hey


David Horsager: My thinking


Dr. Paul Jenkins: This is going to cue this up. Okay. Because there’s another process in these to work in tandem. They are separate processes that are going on in our mind, but they use the same tool of our imagination and the second process is called creation.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now this is creation of what is to be and that doesn’t exist yet. We haven’t created it yet.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And one of those laws of physics would say matter can’t be created or destroyed. It just changes form. So everything with which we will create our future already exists right now in our world.


David Horsager: Hmm.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And we use our imagination.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: To go about a process and I outline this in my book as well that the creation process, there are steps to it.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And it has to be imagined for. So check this out. Let’s just explore our creative power here for a moment. What if we all took on a challenge.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And we put a time limit on it half hour. Let’s just say we got a half hour to pull this off, take a half hour employ your best creative ideas in any resources that you can bring into play to somehow in a half hour. Make your life worse.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Okay you ready


Dr. Paul Jenkins: David, would you ever do this on purpose. I mean,


David Horsager: Of course not easy.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah, look how quickly your mind came up with half a dozen ways to pull that off and it wouldn’t take a half hour.


David Horsager: That’s right, it wouldn’t minutes


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Just connect with that for a minute that people don’t realize how good a news. This is


Dr. Paul Jenkins: If you can create a mass which you’re confident you could write


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Then that means you can create period.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now let’s steer that because if you can create a mess. You can create a masterpiece.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But this goes back, like you were saying you know there’s natural laws that play here. The second law of thermodynamics, entropy


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Has to do with things always going toward a more disorganized state. And here’s the thing, if you don’t put intentional effort into your creation, which you can’t turn off.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It will progress to a more disorganized state, you will make a mess.


David Horsager: That is good.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You never


Dr. Paul Jenkins: never hear this small enough where


David Horsager: This is frustrating. Now I gotta do the work. Right. This doesn’t just happen. It’s not a, just a quick. Oh, I can do this in 21 days we make jokes about that around here.


David Horsager: You can, you know, this little thing that little thing. I mean everything matters, but we had to do the work here. How are we going to shift our mind what


David Horsager: Else can we do to to do the work. So that we’re creating a masterpiece, and said, How are we going to be start to be intentional hey by the way everybody it’s psychological positivity. This is the formula is all there.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: We get an astrological positive


David Horsager: Like I said, pathological positivity. I’ve got it right here, but um I think of Dr. Jenkins as the psychologist, so I think I said that but


David Horsager: You know, this is our. This is our deal right we try to suck the marrow of life out of our guests. So we get free counseling and


David Horsager: Consulting all at once.


David Horsager: And this is our gift today we get, we’re going to take everything we can. And we’re going to have everybody get the book, too, but


David Horsager: But I want to, you know what, how can we, let’s take this pathological positivity. Take the proven formula. Make it easy and get a start. And I think we have a good one already.


David Horsager: A good one. We start with us awareness and this understanding evaluation we understand it to choice. We, we can see that it could always be worse as well as always be better. And we see we can easily create a mess.


David Horsager: So that means we can create a masterpiece. So how are we going to take this little. I love that second law of thermodynamics and and we have to we don’t want entropy. So we got to be intentional how it’s time for our work, how are we going to start to be intentional.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: First of all,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The fact that it’s going to take work is not bad news. It’s an acknowledgement of a natural law.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I learned this on a little place called this the stairway to heaven.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Are you familiar with this, David. It’s metal stairs going up the sheer ridge of a volcano on the island of Oahu.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: We just heard a him out.


David Horsager: And we stopped out your way there and you tell we just were coming back through Maui that it’s blowing again, by the way, that one of the


David Horsager: One of the options on the Big Island right now.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah, well then you know how shear and steep these volcanoes are


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It’s incredible. Well, the stairs go upside of the mountain. I’ve got a picture that I took with my son, where I’m taking I’m looking down at him below me on the stairs and it looks like he’s lying down flat on the stairs.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well he’s standing on the stairs. It’s like a ladder at that point straight up well. Which direction are we going if we lose hold


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You never hear anyone falling up


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that shouldn’t surprise us that if we want to go to a higher place.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: A place of more organization and more order and and more peace and happiness and prosperity.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It’s going to take some work to get there elevation requires effort.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And light requires power. Welcome to Earth, folks, these are natural laws. Don’t be tipped over by that and when you said you know there’s, it’s an easy way to do the easy and simple aren’t the same thing.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: These principles are very simple. It will not be easy because of the work that entails. So when when we say happiness is a choice. Yeah, so is playing the guitar.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Or speaking finish.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: It’s a choice. And you can see that the choice is necessary but not sufficient. So let’s get over that hump. First, some people think, Well, okay then I’ll just choose happiness. That’s like saying, yeah, then I’ll speak German, right.


Right.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: hire a coach enroll for the course put in the work. Get the reps in


David Horsager: Tell us an example of somebody you’ve worked with a lot of people helped a lot of people in a lot of ways you’ve got you’ve got you’ve got for what you do, you’re, you’re doing


David Horsager: This psychological work, your, your cat, you could say counseling coaching equipping


David Horsager: Tell us a story of somebody who you’ve taken from here to here or the process says, you know, maybe take all the credit for it, but I know you’ve had done some some great work. And you’ve seen some transformation. Give us an example.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The, the process, like you said earlier when when you were asking. Okay, where do we start with first step.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Is the awareness, right, because until you become aware of it. See, it’s the principles that change your life when you apply them.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So there’s really a five part process that people go through and all of my clients are at some point in this process. So am I. So are you. Yep. And, and I’ve labeled these five steps encounter.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that’s where you become aware of a principal cave. When you encounter it for the first time I was on a call earlier today, where


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I had just been introduced to something that I had never known about. And she said, well, you never know until you know like


David Horsager: Right.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That’s profound so you encounter. But then you have to recognize that principle that’s the second step, you recognize the principle as truth.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Now, and for this I think David. We all have a natural knowing


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And people describe this sometimes as the AHA experience. You know where the lights go on it resonates with you, sometimes ask my clients is this ring and and singing with you.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Where Does it resonate in you in terms of being true.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So encounter recognize embrace is the third step.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that’s where we have to get it into our programming. Okay. This is where the practice kicks in. And this is where most people


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Stumble a little because there’ll be in the seminar or the listen to the book or the podcast episode of the lights go on and it’s like, yeah, this time of fired up about this.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Then what


Dr. Paul Jenkins: We’ve got to practice it. Just like if you choose to play the guitar speak Finnish, you’re going to have to practice and put in the reps.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And this is why I’ve built a membership site around this where we provide daily, weekly, monthly input you brush your teeth every day, I hope. I mean, if not that’s another conversation, but that we pay attention to our dental hygiene. What are we doing for our mental hygiene.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I would invite everyone who’s listening, if you’re listening to this show right now spend at least as much time on your mental hygiene as you do your dental hygiene.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Your brain is so much more important than your teeth. Okay. Apologies to all of our dental friends, but it is more important.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Than your to your brain will allow you to take care of your teeth to that’s so that’s the embrace part where we do the actual practice we put in the reps and then the next part is to live that principle.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: If you don’t incorporate a new skill into your daily practices, you’ll lose it over time and a principal doesn’t have the power to improve your life until it’s applied.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So that’s the live stage that’s for and then at the fifth stage.


David Horsager: This is why is that back that up knowledge isn’t power only knowledge applied is power. Right, so


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right, exactly.


David Horsager: That’s the point. Okay.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: For knowledge is potential power at best.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And then the fifth stage is to share


Dr. Paul Jenkins: To share that principle, this one comes naturally. David and I get this from a lot of the people that I’ve coached to say how can I go out and teach people how to do this.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So I’ve developed some certification and training for for people to actually do that. But it’s a natural desire, when something gets into your life.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And I see this with you in the work that you’ve done around trust and and everything that you learned about that. And then it’s like, I gotta show this.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right. No.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: lights you up and it turns on and you can’t sleep until you go do it. So, so that’s a natural part of that process. So we’ve got encounter recognize embrace live and share the principles that have empowered you


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That’s


David Horsager: I love it.


David Horsager: This is a great process and for all those out there. We’re going to put in the show notes exactly where you can find Dr. Paul Jenkins and how you can get coached by him if you’d like, or be a part of his


David Horsager: Groups, because this takes work. And with little coaching. We all know with accountability and coaching. We can amplify it we can speed it up. We need each other. We need community and we need experts.


David Horsager: To help us on the way I’ve talked before about how much mentorship is matter to me how I’ve been mentored in business.


David Horsager: Marriage life, physically, but let’s get to you. You said mental hygiene is you know so important. We should do that at least as much time as dental hygiene. So what are you doing, what’s the doctor do every day to take care of that mental hygiene.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I have already today. We’ll just take today. As an example, I’ve already today listened to two podcasts podcast and part of an audio book.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That was specifically selected to support my positive mindset.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And and so I’ve probably spent between the two. And I speed up the speed K so you get more content and less time I speeded it up so I probably spent 20 minutes on that.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Just input.


David Horsager: Equals output right so


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I have


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I cheat. Okay. Because I set up my day to spend my entire day talking with people about these principles and I call what I do a practice, it’s my psychology practice.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: But I spit. I literally spend all day every day. I’m a black belt in positivity. Right.


The same


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Okay, should


David Horsager: I should have had some cold delivered or something. United States. See how he reacts to start the house on fire behind them and just see


David Horsager: If this is good. Well, for those of you just listening to podcasts, obviously we’re on student, we can see each other, shining faces.


David Horsager: But so so other just as long as we’re on the topic of habits because you we believe little things done consistently make the biggest difference. It doesn’t matter if it’s physically or


David Horsager: Financially, or you know in our, in our craft on the platform as leaders. What are just whether you jump in here you jump in.


David Horsager: What you talked about or just in life, what our habits like you’re doing that’s something you do every day. That’s a little thing you really try to do or what consistent habits anything around routine.


David Horsager: When you get up where you live. That really helps you live this positivity because I could see someone being in a you know black belt someday, even in positivity and atrophying


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Oh yeah, and that will happen if you’re not constantly refreshing and renewing and and supporting that because of the second law of thermodynamics


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Right, things will go to a less organized state if they are left untended or if we lose our intention around that.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And so the constant daily maintenance is important. There I talked to my clients all the time about this and it’s something I tried to do personally it’s called brain maintenance.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And it’s very basic around get enough sleep, eat a balanced diet regular exercise and regular daily periods of prayer and meditation.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that came from Dr. Ned Halliwell at Harvard who presented this as brain maintenance is how you take care of the actual physical equipment, the houses, you’re


David Horsager: Like anything we’ve talked about around here. That’s unbelievable. So my wife. This is just crazy that you talk like this because


David Horsager: This is totally not from a book or anything, but my wife and I were talking about what is it about people, you know, people set goals and then they don’t accomplish anything right. They set this


David Horsager: Yeah, nothing happens. And we said, what is it about the people that actually really can, you know, set something and accomplish it or make the big thing happen or kind of when ongoing


David Horsager: And we just start talking about in an acronym actually seeds and this isn’t from another book or anything, but I’m sure all you know truth is truth right so


David Horsager: Seeds. We certainly well. And when we, when are we in our best right it S stands for sleep. Gotta get sleep.


David Horsager: The E stands for exercise turns out when we move a little bit when we’re not permitted this. I’m not going to run a marathon like my wife, I will watch her that’ll be good exercise but I you know I I move a little bit that the second Ian seeds is eat right, you know, when we


David Horsager: It’s kind of funny because I was told one time by a Dr.


David Horsager: David, you know, you want to run a Ferrari or a Junker and you put different fuel in a Ferrari. So what are you gonna put in there. If you’ll eat five vegetables a day instead of what you’re eating. If you’ll put this in, you’ll have a different


David Horsager: You’ll have a different vehicle and you know little about a decade ago, I lost 50 pounds in five months and basically kept it off so it


David Horsager: Was kind of thinking about what’s that like, especially as flying 200 times a year. I just felt differently on the flights and I showed up in you know


David Horsager: Japan differently. And that was the biggest thing and I haven’t been sick for years and years. I don’t know if it’s been a decade or not, maybe


David Horsager: More but I it some of these things so that he and the D in seeds for us was drink water. You gotta get a drink, drink.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I mean just yeah on here.


David Horsager: I’m


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Gonna stay hydrated.


David Horsager: My 91 year old Dad says best drink least advertised.


David Horsager: Of course, now, now you can. Exactly. Now you can buy it back then you just pull it out of the tap. But now you can


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You can pay more for it than a


David Horsager: Soda, I suppose. But anyway, drink water. I make sure I’m drinking a gallon, half a day at least


David Horsager: And that


David Horsager: And the final s like what you talked about his source of strength. Where do you get your source of strength and


David Horsager: I won’t tell everybody what that should be exactly but what we’ve noticed in the CEOs presidents of countries and peasant presidents of companies that I sit next to


David Horsager: They do better if they have a source of strength beyond themselves. And if that’s family if that’s faith if that’s friendships, but those that are all in only on that whatever it is business. They do. They don’t do as well as those that have a source of strength beyond themselves.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: That’s right. So,


David Horsager: That’s very, maybe. Interestingly, because unlike my trust research that wasn’t validated. But now you validated seeds by your Harvard friend and your own Dr. Jenkins brain so


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I appreciate that.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Yeah, and big surprise, right, because these are universal principles and that’s why you’re going to see them showing up almost everywhere you look. I am a junkie about personal development self improvement.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Kind of emotional psychology junkie.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Development junkie. I’m a Ferrari on


David Horsager: Like it


Dr. Paul Jenkins: This and and it shows up everywhere. It really does. So these are consistent principles and when you take good care of the equipment.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Then you’re able to to go to that higher level, you know, you want to develop a skill, you’ve got the brain prepared to do that for you and


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Also I interviewed


Dr. Paul Jenkins: James Garrett on my podcast. Just last week and he’s into the brain science and he talks about habits and you know builds on some of the work done by Charles do Hagen James clear and some of these guys who’ve written about habit.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: He says, make it simple, make it obvious and make it non negotiable.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And if you do those things, you know, making it simple that parent down to what’s really important to you instead of saying, I’m going to start running five miles a day.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: If you’re not currently running a mile or two a day, you probably want to start with. I’m going to put in 10 minutes or like our mutual friend Jim Cathcart he talked about when he lost all of that way. And he made a goal to put on his running shoes and tagged the curb. Was it


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Well, you know, bait, way back


David Horsager: And I got fortunate enough to know him, for he passed away, but Ziegler the same thing. You know, he started. He’s the first first block. He hated it.


David Horsager: Secondary right so I’ll run two blocks. He hated it. And pretty soon, nine months later, he’s in Oregon. After speaking at an event and he’s out running is like I like running right it just something changed so


David Horsager: Yeah, I love it. Well, this has been awesome.


David Horsager: You know, you can find. We’re going to show you where you can find Dr. Paul Jenkins. We’re going to show you in the show notes exactly where you can get more and we’re going to come to that in just a second. Before we do, we get a lightning round here. Keep it quick. Keep it sharp


David Horsager: Here we go.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Bring it.


David Horsager: I know that you also are kind of a productivity tip guru to like you, you, you keep things, at least from what I saw. What would you say about productivity. What’s an idea, anybody to be more effective and efficient at the same time. Any tip you have for us. I didn’t ask you at a time.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Biggest tip that comes right to my mind is do it now.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You can’t do everything right now so I define now is having a start time and in time and a very specific task in between.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Stop telling yourself. You’re going to do all of these things and have it be a list of and kept commitments, put it on your calendar.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And break it down to the next.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Doable step good and do it now between the start time and in that time.


David Horsager: It’s a great one. If we would just love it. Favorite book or resource right now.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Favorite one right now is probably the trust edge by


I love


David Horsager: I love that you’re awesome. That’s my favorite book, too, because that’s that that at one point provided quite a living so


David Horsager: Yeah.


David Horsager: That’s fun. I pretend something just for the fun of it. Here’s something you can’t live without.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: My wife came right to mind.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Happy is


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Such a sweet blessing in my life. She, she provides support and companionship and fun and grandbabies. I mean, we’re just having a great time and I have the best marriage. I know.


David Horsager: And you’re expecting a couple more that


David Horsager: That is good when you have the best marriage, you know, because you know


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I know a lot of them.


David Horsager: Exactly. I think I could say the same thing. So I appreciate that.


David Horsager: I quote, what’s it. What’s something you live by, or think of what’s an inspiring quote for others today.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The one and this is lightning round so you get one comes right out stuck my head. I did the one that came to my mind was Carolyn Myers.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Everything’s okay. In the end,


Dr. Paul Jenkins: If it’s not okay. It’s not the end.


David Horsager: That’s a good way to leave us today.


David Horsager: One thing left for you bucket list. What do you hope for still


Dr. Paul Jenkins: I would like to take my sweet Vicki and go live in Finland for a few years.


David Horsager: Great not cold enough for you are not dark enough where you are. There’s some of the happiest people on the planet. Speaking of joy. There you go. Right. Those Scandinavians


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You know, we’ve got a lot of dear friends over there. We speak the language. There’s a little part of our heart that got left in Finland, when we were young adults and we were over there doing some volunteer church missionary work.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So that’s just been on our bucket list for us. First thing came to my mind.


David Horsager: Hey, hey, I’ve got some advice for you.


David Horsager: Yeah, do it now.


David Horsager: Ah, do it now. Hey, he’s gone. Everybody you went to the airport. He’s, he’s doing it right now.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So la


David Horsager: Hey work well I’ve got one last question for you, but where before that. Where can we find out about you. I know you gave us some gifts here, this Dr. Paul Jenkins dot info slash portable positivity is going to be in the show notes. Everybody can click that. But tell us about that.


David Horsager: And where you’d like to share more with us.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: So portable positivity is a little mini book that I wrote to


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Capture a model that goes over those two processes that I just told you about valuation and creation so it walks you through the model.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And and it takes positivity from the trite fluffy motivational speaker version to the hard psychological science behind it. So the chill understand how to operate the equipment. So that’s available for free, that the link that you just share


David Horsager: You are kind


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You can also go to the main website. Dr. Paul Jenkins calm and there’s a big orange button there where you can get a free plus shipping offer on my pathological positivity, so you get that as well. If you’d like


David Horsager: And I noticed you can also get a breakthrough what tell us give us a one minute on what’s, what’s it like to go through this this schedule your free broke breakthrough session.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: The, the breakthrough session is where you get on the phone with one of my zoom call typically where you get on the zoom call with one of my client experience guides


Dr. Paul Jenkins: Who can walk you through different options that are available. I already told you, we have a membership site. We have coaching both group coaching and private coaching.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: We’re doing everything that we can to provide the resources that you’re going to need for your mental hygiene and one of those breakthrough calls would allow you to have that conversation with one of our client experience guides


Perfect.


David Horsager: Well, here we are eight we could talk a whole lot more. But the final question. It’s the trusted leader show who is a leader you trust and why


Dr. Paul Jenkins: There are so many, you know, the first one that came to my mind was my little league basketball coach.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: This was so many years ago, but he left an indelible impression on my mind as he taught me something about how to have influence


Dr. Paul Jenkins: And that has since since developed into a model that I’ve, I call the influence quadrant, which is an upcoming book that all right about the short version.


Dr. Paul Jenkins: You get out of your own way. It’s not about you, how you feel is only secondary you put your focus on how they feel about themselves and that gives you influences leader.


David Horsager: I love it. Well, that’s a, you know, there’s a lot of data around that to the more you look at others. The more you volunteer. The happy are you happy are you are so


David Horsager: When we start focusing on others. A whole lot can shift in the mindset anyway to wow


David Horsager: It’s true. Well, this has been fascinating, go to the show notes. Get the free book and connect. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Paul Jenkins. This has been a treat. And just fun to see your smile here to next time I’m in Utah going to connect


David Horsager: But absolutely, we’ll see each other again, face to face, but this has been the trusted leader show. We had a great guest and Dr. Paul Jenkins today and we will see you next time, stay trusted.

Accelerate Your Performance Through Trust
Click “Receive Access” to get our COMPLIMENTARY Trust Tools and join 25,000+ leaders that are increasing their performance.
We respect your privacy. Your information is safe and will never be shared.
Don't miss out. Get FREE tools today.
×
×