Corey Wilks: [00:00:00] And most of the time we get in our own way. We self-sabotage. We wait for permission. We avoid asking the questions that we need to ask to gain the clarity we need to move forward. All of this is just us getting our own way. 

Cody (2): Mind Hack is a podcast about the psychology of performance, behavior change, and self optimization.

Each episode explores how to think better, work smarter, and lives more intentionally through conversations with top thinkers, entrepreneurs, and scientists.

Cody: Hello and welcome to the Mind Hack podcast, where today we're exploring the psychology behind building a better business and a meaningful life. I'm your host Cody McLean, and with me today is Dr. Corey Wilkes. Corey kicked off his career as a clinical psychologist dealing with tough stuff like addiction and therapy.

But these days, he's [00:01:00] an executive coach working with entrepreneurs and creators. He helps them move past hidden mental roadblocks, things like imposter syndrome, perfectionism, and burnout that keep them per from performing at their best. Cory's big thing is helping entrepreneurs drop someone else's version of success and define their own authentic version.

Instead, he calls things like the lucrative misery trap and digs into why so many high achievers feel quietly miserable despite external success. We'll also unpack practical strategies for beating procrastination and burnout. Explore the messy psychological realities faced by online creators and discuss how confronting uncomfortable truths like your own mortality can become powerful motivators for meaningful change.

By the end of our chat, you'll have actionable insights to identify and break down whatever psychological barriers are stopping you from building the business and life you actually want. Please welcome Dr. Corey Wilkes. [00:02:00] Welcome to the show. 

Corey Wilks: Thanks for having me, man. 

Cody: So you started out doing clinical psychology work.

Uh, we're doing deep stuff like addiction and trauma, and now you're coaching high performing entrepreneurs. And in that span of all that knowledge that you've gained, I'm wondering what's kind of the core psychological foundation that high achievers and entrepreneurs need to focus on getting right before they go into kind of advanced mindset tactics?

Corey Wilks: Most of the time people know what they want, but either they're afraid to go after it or they're waiting for permission to do the thing. One of the most common questions I get either in, you know, one-on-one coaching or when I do like group coaching stuff is, well, what do you think I should do? Or should I do this or that?

And every single time I response is, what do you wanna do? Because most of the time you know what you wanna [00:03:00] do, but you're waiting for me or for somebody else to say, that sounds good. That's a good idea. You should do that. Because we've, we've just kind of become conditioned, maybe societally, to wait for somebody else to tell us it's okay to do the thing we deeply wanna do.

So most of the time that's what we continue to wait for. So like, you know, you want to do the thing, you know this is the right decision for you, but for some reason you don't trust your own judgment to give yourself permission to take that action. So you constantly sit around and wait for somebody else to tell you that.

The issue is nobody is sitting around waiting to give somebody else permission.

Cody: And so a lot of entrepreneurs stop. Because is it, is it like a lack of self-confidence? Uh, are they just seeking validation for this intuition that they have?[00:04:00] 

Corey Wilks: I think a lot of times mo man, most of the time we get in our own way, right? Like we can talk about imposter syndrome and limiting beliefs and you know, shining object syndrome, golden handcuffs, all this other stuff. All of these fundamentally boil down to we want to do a thing or achieve a thing, but then we get in our own way, our own thoughts, our own behaviors.

We self-sabotage. We wait for permission, right? We avoid asking the questions that we need to ask to gain the clarity we need to move forward. All of this is just us getting our own way. So like as a coach, for example, right? My job fundamentally is to facilitate transformation. Whatever the transformation you want is, my job is to facilitate that.

The majority of what I do is, okay, cool, where do you want to go? What's holding you back? It's typically you. Cool. How are you getting your own way? [00:05:00] Why are you getting in your own way? What do you need to do to get out of your own way? And there's a lot like, you know, we can go super deep into that, but fundamentally, that's usually what it's is.

Like what is either the, the false assumptions you're operating off of about how the world is supposed to work, or what you're quote unquote supposed to do, or what you should do, or what are the beliefs you've been holding and carrying with you that no longer serve this current version of you, or don't serve the version of yourself you're trying to become.

That's a lot of what this type of work boils down to is you're probably getting in your own way. How do you get out of your own way? 

Cody: And, and now you grew up in rural Appalachia and you know that that doesn't scream future executive coach at the time. Uh, I'm, I'm wondering, have you kind of gone back and thought about how your background, uh, allowed you to be who you are today? Like how that impacted you?

Corey Wilks: Yes. So, [00:06:00] you know, I think fundamentally everybody wants to matter and feel that what they did mattered, right? Like, we all want to feel like our life matters. The things that we're doing are meaningful to us. And once we're gone or once we're at, you know, the end of our life, we can look back and say, what I did was significant.

What I did mattered. What? Like, I fully lived, I didn't wait for someday to do all the things I wanted to do. I actually did those things that you see a lot. Uh, you see it everywhere, but especially I. When you grow up poor, a lot of the times, everybody you see around you has a lot of limiting beliefs and has just a lot of barriers that they struggle with.

So like they want to do more, they want to live bigger, but everybody around them hasn't. So then you, you grow up sometimes with [00:07:00] this belief of people like me can't do this. People like us don't do these things either because we're not good enough, we're not smart enough, we don't deserve it. Or in some way we are unworthy of this type of success.

And like, you know, it's interesting because, you know, like I said, grew up public housing, food stamps, the occasional church donation for like a Thanksgiving dinner or something. Um, I. I grew up in the US and in a lot of places in the US in like grade school, like high school and things, you have to pay for your lunch.

I never had to pay for my lunch. I always got free lunches because, you know, I was support, we got like a voucher or whatever. Um, and I remember when I would, you know, have friends or just know people who at the time were probably middle to maybe upper middle class and they seemed just grossly wealthy compared to, to me and most of my [00:08:00] friends and a lot of the kids who would, you know, sometimes pick on me or the kids who were just, you know, the, the kids that most people hated.

'cause it was like you just had everything handed to you and you're super cocky about it. You know, at a certain point I had these weird assumptions and beliefs around wealth. But then after I, you know, went into therapy, left therapy, got into coaching, and started working with, you know, wealthy people and making friends who are wealthy, it was like my goal, one of my goals is to become wealthy, but how can I become wealthy if I secretly hate wealthy people?

Right? Like, if, if I hate wealth because of my childhood experiences around wealthy people. 'cause most of the ones I met were cocky assholes. I, how can I achieve this? Because I don't wanna be like those people. Or like, if I [00:09:00] have kids and my kids grew up with resources, am I raising the same kids that I hated in high school?

So like, it was a real, like weird, you just mentally very weird thing to wrestle with. Thankfully through the work that you know, I do online, whether it's coaching, writing, you know, my podcast, whatever, I've been able to become really good friends with people who are quite wealthy. To see like, oh, being wealthy doesn't mean you have to be an asshole.

Like most of like the wealthiest people I know are the most humble, the most gracious, the most charitable, most giving people, the most present people. It's like, okay cool. I don't hate wealth anymore. I don't hate wealthy people. I don't have a problem raising kids who, who you know, are grown, you know, grown up in wealth.

'cause I have now met too many people who are good people who just so happen to have money. So I think, and, and I think that that that narrative, that experience. Reigns, you know, kind of resonates with a lot of other people who grew up [00:10:00] similarly, but, you know, poor but want to achieve success. That is something you really have to learn how to navigate is your own limiting beliefs and getting in your own way around success.

Cody: Yeah, i, I, I really resonate with that because, you know, I grew up poor as well, partly in foster care, and people ask me like, how did you become so successful? And I don't really have an easy answer. It's kind of like two prong. Number one is, I, I was poor, but we, we moved to this little tiny area I. Uh, that happened to be within the school district of one of the richest high schools.

It was the top 100 richest high schools in the country. And so every day on the school bus, we'd be passing by mansions that, that had helipads, you know, kids being picked up in Ferrari's and Mercedes. And I was this weird kid that just wanted to be liked, that I wanted to have friends, and I wasn't really able to get any of that.

And so it kind of deeply ingrained into me that if I wanna be liked and I, I wanna be, uh, I wanna fit in, I need to be successful too. And then I set off, I had [00:11:00] this mission of I'm gonna prove to these, these rich kids that I can be successful too, and I don't need my parents' money. And that was kind of what started off on this, this, you know, this journey that, that set me on, um, that where I am today.

And the second thing was actually the fact that I had no, like, no, no. Backup plan. You know, if I failed in my businesses to be successful, I couldn't go live in my parents' basement. I didn't have parents to live with, you know, and so I was literally gonna be homeless or I was gonna be a successful entrepreneur.

And when your back is against the wall like that, then, you know, you're just like blazing forward. Um, and so I, I kind of theorize that the difference between say, somebody who grows up poor and then wants to be success, because I think there's a difference between, uh, we, we, it's, there's a thing of like, we want to want, you know, we want to want success, but you don't necessarily wanna do the effort.

Or you have, or you're trapped in this mindset that you're, you're meant to be poor, and so you don't even start to [00:12:00] envision the kind of person you could be. But I think if you're poor and you kind of have like a glimpse into, you know, this is just one perspective, I'm, I'm curious, your input on this is like, if you have a glimpse of what success looks like, if you're, if you, if you can kind of taste it, then that can slowly start to build up that, that, that fire within you of, you know, I've gotta do this, I can do this.

Uh, I'm curious what you have to say about that.

Corey Wilks: You know, we, we've all heard the cliche, you know, you're the average of the five people you spend most time with. For me, going a little bit more nuance into that, when you meet people. Who are successful, it makes the possibility of success real and no longer theoretical, right?

'cause like, you know, it's easy to grow up and like, look at rich people, you know, celebrities, you're like all the Kardashians or all this person or all that person, but they're not real 'cause you don't actually know them. So then it, it creates [00:13:00] like this divide, right, of like, well it's here, here's, here's where I am.

And people like me, and then there are people like them way over there. And there's this huge chasm, this, this gap, I can't bridge. But once you actually meet people who have done it and you're like, oh well shit, they're not that smart. Or like, oh, like they, they struggle with things too. Or like, oh, they have been able to make money and maintain their humility.

It makes it real, it makes it concrete rather than this abstract, theoretical thing that is for these other types of people who have some inhuman trait that you lack. That I think is, is the biggest thing that really helped me is meeting actual successful entrepreneurs who did it because then it's like, oh, well if they can do it, so can I.

Cody: And, and you, you veered into being a coach. From being a, a psychologist. [00:14:00] And I, I think you've said before that you kind of felt like you were boxed in by, by traditional therapy. And, and I think Maslow, uh, or or Maslow's hierarchy, kind of infers that, like therapy, it usually stops at, at, at your baseline needs at, you know, helping you resolve what emotional trauma you have.

But coaching, the difference with coaching and therapy is that coaching kind of tackles that self-actualization bit about who you idealize a version of yourself could be. 

Corey Wilks: So especially when, okay, so the caveat with this is if you're a private practice therapist in like Beverly Hills or somewhere, you can kind of do whatever you want.

But most therapists, right? A therapist is a psychologist, counselor, social worker, most therapists are getting paid through insurance, okay? At least in the us. Insurance companies dictate what you can treat and for how long you can treat it. Oftentimes. [00:15:00] So when I was doing therapy, I was working in rural Appalachia, so low SES, low socioeconomic status.

A lot of people were on Medicaid specifically. Some people were on like a, a better private insurance, but everybody was on insurance. The issue with that, with therapy is technically my job as a therapist is to help you become what's called subclinical, meaning to no longer warrant a diagnosis. So I could basically help you kind of get your head above water.

So maybe you no longer warranted a diagnosis of major depressive disorder, single episode, mild, but you were still kind of, you know, low mood. You're still kind of like, everything's kind of just shades of gray. Unless I can find a diagnosis to tack on your insurance company, be like, oh, they're fixed. So they don't need therapy anymore.

We're not gonna pay for it anymore. A lot of the people I work with couldn't afford it out of pocket. So as soon as they became subclinical, they could, [00:16:00] they stopped coming to therapy. So that's fundamentally the difference between therapy and coaching is therapy. The role is to get you back to a baseline level of functioning.

Coaching assumes that's where you start. And now we're trying to flourish, to optimize, you know, self-actualization. That's fundamentally the difference between therapy and coaching. People come to coaching 'cause they wanna get better from where they alre. They're already good. They wanna become even better.

People go to therapy because they're somehow bad and want to be get up to good. It's broad strokes. Some people, again, private practice, you can like, I just want to talk about my childhood and like, figure this out. Okay. Couples therapy sometimes it's like, we just want to get better, but most of the time you go to therapy to deal with a problem that you're wanting to get up to functioning, coaching is like, buddy, I'm good.

I just wanna be great. 

Cody: Hmm. And so in in, when you're, when you're coaching, I, I assume I could be wrong, that one of the [00:17:00] biggest issues that you encounter is, is this huge concept that we've all heard of, you know, of, of imposter syndrome, right. And it prevents people from even initiating this, this the path towards becoming the person that they want to be.

And I believe you, you've talked about, uh, something called the self-concept inertia that kind of keeps people stuck in their old patterns. So can you talk a little bit about, about this concept and uh, kind of what you see in general about some of the issues that people encounter? 

Corey Wilks: Yeah, so that's something I wrote for, uh, psychology Today.

So the simple version is until you can really, your, your self image, your concept of who you are is going to limit you. Because anytime our beliefs and our behaviors are different, they, they're not aligned. It creates what's called cognitive dissonance. And all that means is you feel like this, like angst, anxiety, kind of [00:18:00] friction anytime you're acting in a way that you feel goes counter to a belief or an identity that you have.

Okay? This self-concept inertia is that, so basically if you deep down believe you have this belief that you are unworthy. And then you engage in a behavior that you start to see success. You're like, wait, no, no, no, I'm unworthy. I don't deserve success. That can kind of lead you to self-sabotage, to come back to baseline of like, okay, cool.

Yeah. See how I started to succeed and then something happened, I, I sabotaged and then I didn't succeed. I failed. Now we're back to baseline because I'm unworthy of success. Right? Or like imposter syndrome, right? I imposter syndrome fundamentally is a belief that you don't belong in the room, whatever that room is.

So if you deep down belief you don't belong in that room, then you're not going to go in that room because if you try to go into that room, now you have this [00:19:00] cognitive dissonance of, I don't belong here. My behavior, my belief don't align. So I need to not go into that room. I. Because as soon as I entered, I'm like, oh, I'm a fraud.

I don't belong here. And then you have all this like weird like angst and stress and things around it. That's the self-concept inertia. So it's like, you know, we get really hung up on all the hacks and the habits and like, here's how to do this time. Block, Pomodoro, Eisenhower, like all these other things and they're all solid.

But if fundamentally, you're only focusing on your habits and you're never thinking about your identity and your own like personal narrative, your own beliefs about who you are, what you deserve, what you're capable of. If you never deal with those, that is when you get into the the situation of, you know, all the hacks, you've developed all the habits, but you're still not getting the results you want.

More than likely, it is related to the fact that your identity hasn't evolved alongside your [00:20:00] goals. And that is a big piece is actually holding you back again. You are getting in your own way. 

Cody: So what, what kind of psychological, like fallacies or biases do you, do you see people falling in in terms of like these pitfalls that, that hold them back?

So, you know, we have imposter syndrome. Is that something that tends to start at the beginning or is that something where they're starting to create some momentum for themselves and then eventually they either they, they fail at something and then that's kind of like, maybe that's like a self self-affirmation or, or kind of like the self confirmation bias where then their subconscious is still attached to that old identity and it, and it's like, see you, you failed, you can't do this.

And then they kind of go back and start unrolling that, that momentum that they create, kind of what, what would you advise to somebody that's starting on this journey and that's encountering some of these, these mental roadblocks?

Corey Wilks: [00:21:00] The simplest thing is find people who've already done it and really look at what their trajectory was. Right. Like don't, so for example, I'm working on a book right now and, and, and I've, I've written for, for several years at this point. When I look at some of my favorite authors, it can be intimidating because I'm looking, I'm comparing my blog post that I spent three hours on to their bestselling book.

They spent five years on after they wrote for a decade. Like of course my single article sucks compared to their bestselling book. But if, I'll use Ryan Holiday as an example, 'cause we talked about him before the show. If I look at like the Obstacles Away, or, you know, one of his newer books, his writing is infinitely better than mine on like a per article basis.

But it's like, okay, well let me look at his old blog articles from 10, 12, 15 years ago. Oh, [00:22:00] okay, these aren't terrible, but they're nowhere near as good as his current writing. Right? Mm-hmm. So then I can be like, oh, let me compare where I currently am to the same stage he was at back in the day when he had been writing for four years.

What did he look like? Right? And same thing with entrepreneurs, right? Like don't compare yourself three months into somebody who's 13 years in. Compare yourself. Like look at them now, but say, where were they when they had only been in business for three months? Let me look there because that lets you softly kind of see the trajectory of what is possible if you put in even a similar amount of effort that they did.

Okay? So you're not comparing current you to to current them. You're comparing current you to past them. And then watching their trajectory, that makes it much more feasible. It makes it much more possible because now you have the belief, oh, this is possible. It isn't just the, the desire [00:23:00] of I want this to happen.

It is the belief that goes with it, of this is possible for me to achieve. 'cause look at this other person. Look what they did, look how they did it. Right. And then a step beyond that is if you can actually get to know those people and befriend them and hang out with them and have candid conversations with them, then you're like, oh, I like this person.

Isn't HU superhuman? They're not a super genius. They didn't have all these resources. They just, they grind it out day in and day out. They're always trying to learn. They're always trying to, you know, iterate. That is what led to their success. I can totally do that now. I believe I'm capable. So now my behaviors start to align with that belief that I am capable and that this is the direction I feel I need to be going in.

Cody: Right. It's, I, I, the example I think of is mk, BHD, you know, the, the popular, uh, tech reviewer YouTuber that if you go back to his original videos, like he's like 13 or 14 year years old and, and he's [00:24:00] already doing these types of, of reviews and obviously it's scaled up to a, a level of quality that is like unsurpassed by any, any, any other kind of tech reviewer on YouTube.

And so it's really important to not get hung up on that perfectionism. And yet I know even when I'm creating content, I still get hung up on perfectionism. I know Mr. Beast, uh, was on Lex Friedman podcast and he said that, you know, if you're just getting started, you should just focus on creating, like your goal should just be to create like 100 videos.

'cause in that sense, you're focusing on creating that habit, you know, creating that momentum, because it's much more difficult to start off having that habit of being able to create that consistent content because he knows, and so many people know that you're going to be constantly questioning, is this good enough to be, to, to go out into the world.

And I think one of the biggest issues that we have is that feeling of judgment, right? You put something out there and you, you're, you're afraid of somebody saying something negative about you. And it [00:25:00] seems like all like the top influencers, there's so much negativity, you know, and all, so many YouTube comments and TikTok and Instagram comments.

And yet, uh, you know, they just kind of keep pushing on. And I'm sure that there's some level of, of cognitive dissonance that they have to deal with whenever they, they get those negative feedback. But I think if you're just starting out and you get negative feedback, it's like 10 times more than if you're already a creator who's used to creating content.

So if you're afraid of judgment, um. I mean, do you have anything else? Is it, is it just focus on creating content and ignore the haters? Like how do you get past that fear of being judged by, by others online? 

Corey Wilks: One of my favorite quotes, um, is from the late rapper, Nipsey Hussle, and he says, you will never be criticized by somebody who is doing more than you.

You will only ever be criticized by somebody who is doing less than you. I have never once been legitimately [00:26:00] criticized or like try, you know, somebody like tearing, tearing me down by somebody. I would like to be more like, or I would like to befriend or somebody who's even doing anything, right? Like, so a couple years ago, uh, relatively early on to it in my own like sort of creator journey, um, I was on the Chris Williamson podcast and Chris and I, you know, Chris was super cool.

This is before, this is like right before Chris had like erman on, so like Chris, I don't had like 200 K subscribers. I was like, oh, this, this dude's a big fucking deal. And then he, you know, blew up to what he is now. And on his podcast we talked a lot about like limiting beliefs and fears and things. Um, and I remember I was so excited.

I was like, oh, this is like the biggest podcast I've been on, whatever. And so I looked in the comments, which you have to just be mentally prepared before you look in a comment section. Um, it any time, 'cause like it could mostly be good, but it's like if you're the kind of person that a single criticism that's the one of the 15 or or a hundred comments, that's what's gonna stick with you.

You need to mentally brace yourself before you [00:27:00] look at any of 'em. Um, most of the comments were super positive. People are like, oh, you know, I've listened to this like multiple times. This is exactly what I need to hear. This is so good, da, da, da. But then a couple people were like, you know, this guy, every time he, he says a cuss word, he loses credibility.

Um, and I'm like, well, I'm glad I got a fuck ton of credibility then, because you know, who, who are you? And, you know, other people were like, oh, they'll just give anybody a, a, a doctorate. Now if this guy's a psychologist, one guy was like, I didn't know Carl Urban had a degree in psychology, which Carl Urban, like he's a sexy dude.

Like, I, I was like, that's not the, the dis you think it is, but like there were a handful of people who were just super shitty and not giving like, constructive feedback of like, Hey man, you should work on your vocal ticks. Or like, Hey, you say write or, um, too much. That's constructive feedback. Right, right.

My own vocal tick. But every single person who just was outright trying to talk shit, if you clicked on any of their, their profiles, [00:28:00] they're just, either they're anonymous or they've never uploaded a video or anything like that. And for me it comes back to like Theodore Roosevelt's Men of the Arena speech, right?

It's like it is easy to point your finger at somebody who's putting themselves and their ideas out into the world and say, oh, they shouldn't do this. Oh, that's stupid. It is like, that's easy. That takes no effort to like look at something and pick it apart. It is infinitely harder and more vulnerable and just exposing raw to actually, you be the one putting yourself out there.

You going on the podcast, you hitting, publish on your article, you starting up your, your business, you doing whatever that is so vulnerable, so raw, so real. And that naturally it provokes all of these fears, all of these insecurities, because. You are doing something you one are emotionally invested in. You fundamentally give a shit about doing this thing.

But also it's you going out and doing that. You're not hiding behind a company [00:29:00] name. You're not hiding behind an anonymous account or whatever. It's you, your face, your voice, your ideas, you're convictions out into the world. That is why we get imposter syndrome because we're pushing our growth edges.

We're doing something new, something meaningful, right? Nobody gets imposter syndrome about shit. They don't care about. Like you straight up, don't get imposter syndrome if you don't care. So the fact that you're getting, you know what most of us call imposter syndrome means you're doing something you care about.

It means you are pushing yourself to grow and evolve. Right? And that's the biggest thing for me man, is like learning not just to identify all this is perfectionism, all this is imposter syndrome, all this is whatever, but really learning to like reframe why is this happening and how could it be a good thing?

Right. Oh, this imposter syndrome is kicking in because I'm entering a new room I've never been in. This is a sign I'm growing. Right? Anytime somebody tears [00:30:00] you down, they're not in your corner. The people who are in your corner will not ever try to tear you down. They may give you constructive feedback to help you grow, but they will never outright try to tear you down.

So for me, anytime I get a comment, somebody's trying to tear me down. I'm like, you're not the person I'm talking to. Right? And honestly, sometimes you kind of wanna be hated by people. Meaning there are some people that you don't want them to like you, right? Like, I don't want a fucking neo-Nazi to like me.

Like, cool, you should hate me, right? Like a hundred percent. If you're a neo-Nazi, you should hate me. I, I fully accept that, right? Like, I want to be hated by that, right? So that's the other thing is like, if you keep getting hate from people. Are they maybe the people that you would want to hate you, because fundamentally, philosophically, they're not the people you're trying to talk to.

Right? Or they are the people you actively are kind of battling against, [00:31:00] right? Not that you should stir controversy, but really looking at, I'm getting attacked. Am I getting attacked over something that I have high conviction is worth sharing despite this yes or no? That can go a long way. 

Cody: Yeah. And, and for all you know, they're, they're, they hate you because they're jealous that you're putting this message out into the world and they're not.

Um, and there's, there's something with, uh, I, I, I once heard somebody say that, uh, success is becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable. And so, you know, you're on the path that you should be on when you, you feel that imposter syndrome when you, when you question like, am I, am I as successful as I'm ever gonna be?

And you start having those worries, that anxiety, because that's, that, that worry, that anxiety, uh, that's simply your brain trying to protect you. It's trying to protect you from, from other people that might do something against you. But we're obviously in a society today [00:32:00] where you harmful stuff doesn't happen that often just because of, of I ideology for the most part.

Um, and so you have to be able to push past the, those, those, uh, protection mechanisms that your brain has, uh, because that's where you're going to find the success in that kind of self-actualized version of yourself that you're hoping to, to, to find. 

Corey Wilks: Well, it's like, you know, for, for me, life is about sacrifice.

A lot of people spend too much of their life trying to avoid making sacrifices. But it's like every, every everything in life is a choice, which implies a sacrifice, right? So I can either sacrifice spending an extra two hours on the couch doing nothing in order to go to the gym, or I do the opposite. I sacrifice the opportunity to get a little bit stronger ke you know, uphold a commitment to myself for my physical health in order to spend an extra two hours on the couch, right?

That's a sacrifice one way or the other. [00:33:00] And I think that one life is about sacrifice and, and learning to choose the sacrifices that are worthwhile to you. But it's also about embracing discomfort. 'cause you can either embrace the discomfort of growth or accept the discomfort of stagnation, right? A a lot of people think that.

You know, I, I just need to avoid discomfort. That is how you live in mediocrity and then die filled with a bunch of regret over all the things you wanted to do, but, and could have done, but didn't out of avoiding discomfort, out of fear, out of whatever. Right? But it's like there's discomfort either way.

So which discomfort is more worth it for you? The discomfort of growth or the discomfort of, of stagnation and knowing you're meant for more, but not going after it. 

Cody: Yeah. And, and it's so that, and then you have like the David Goggins who, uh, he [00:34:00] said that, you know, he wakes up and he runs every day. You know, everybody thinks he loves running, but no, he hates it.

He absolutely hates running, but he does it because if he can run in the morning, then everything else he does that day is gonna be significantly easier because he already, he's, he has already proven to himself that he can do something hard. And when you are able to push yourself to do hard things, you become more comfortable doing harder things.

And it's very rare that somebody, that people on their deathbed, they, it's very rare to say things that they regretted doing. You know, most of them are things that they didn't do right. Those, those chances that you didn't make, uh, those decisions to, that you, that you couldn't decide on. Um, so I think there's, there's overwhelming evidence that pushing yourself to do hard things when you don't want to do them.

Is, you know, that's, that's the obstacle is the way as Ryan, you know, is famous for, uh, [00:35:00] so when you go from having, being able to push past these deeper, uh, limiting beliefs, then we kind of ask or go to what does success mean? And I know you're big on building businesses kind of around core values rather than chasing money.

And I think a lot of entrepreneurs have made this mistake where they just chase money, they get money, and then they feel very empty. And so how do you help clients kind of find their kind of real authentic version of success when they've spent so many years chasing somebody else's?

Corey Wilks: I think a lot of people, I. Think they know what their values are or their core value. I'm a fan of a core value over like multiple values just because it keeps it simpler. Um, so for example, like my core values is freedom. Both the freedom to either be in pajama pants or gym shorts. Mo more days than [00:36:00] not, right?

Never having to wear khakis again because I hate wearing khakis. Had to wear 'em for my job. Um, the freedom to be able to, to go downstairs and like, make lunch with my fiance every day if I want, right? Rather than having to go to an office. But also the freedom to leverage what I've learned over the years to help other people succeed on their terms.

Right? So really looking at like, what is your core value and what does a life in a business align with that core value really look like for you? That's one piece. Sometimes people think they know what their values are, but then when you say, okay, explain it to me and explain what a life align with that looks like, that's when most people are like.

Shit, I can't, like I thought I did, but I don't actually have clarity on, on what this actually looks like for me. So because of that, you know, it's like, it's like trying to hit, it's not, it's not even like trying to hit a moving target, it's trying to hit a moving target in the dark. You [00:37:00] don't even know what you're aiming at.

You can't see it and it is moving, like it's constantly influx. Of course you haven't achieved success 'cause you don't know what success even means for you personally. So what most people do is they chase other people's definitions of success because it's just easier or they've never thought to question it and either they achieve success and then it feels hollow 'cause it wasn't their version of success or in pursuit of somebody else's version of success, they burn out and give up and then di get disheartened.

Right? Success isn't for me man. I've literally spent like six months before with coaching clients. Where every session, the question I opened with was, what do you want? Because it was that hard of a question and not because they didn't, they weren't self-aware, they weren't insightful, but it was like it was that deep, that existential of a question of like, well, what do I want?

Who am [00:38:00] I at my core? What legacy am I trying to build and leave behind? What is meaningful work for me? What is the thing I would do if I never had to think about money again? What impact am I trying to have on the world? Like fundamentally, what do you want? Not what your parents told you, not society, not religion, not whatever.

What the fuck do you want? Everybody else aside? That seems like a really superficial question. But again, like I've worked with like serial super successful founders on just that question, and it took that long and longer sometimes because it's so much deeper than we think it's, but it's a question we don't, most of us never actually think about and like spend deep contemplative time journaling about, thinking about meditating on, because it seems almost too simple.

Cody: Hmm. Yeah. You, you remind me of a book called Second Mountain by David Brooks. Who really eloquently, uh, showed that most of our [00:39:00] lives, we tend to climb this first mountain, which is that fame, riches, glory, success. And, uh, a lot of us never are able to climb that mountain. But for those that do, then they realize how empty it is, and then they have to spend the rest of their lives trying to climb that second mountain, which is connection, uh, family, friends, uh, being part of a tribe and knowing that you're having an impact on others in a meaningful way.

And that can be one of the hardest things to do. And I think you've, you've, you've said before, you've written about lucrative misery, which I really love that because it, it, it seems to kind of encapsulate how you can be successful. You can have the money and the status, but you know, quietly you're miserable.

And so you're, you're clearly missing something in there. Um, I'm curious when you ask that question of what do you want, kind of, what, what do you, what do, what do people say.

Corey Wilks: Most of the time, [00:40:00] if they're honest, they say, I don't know. And then that's what the rest of the, the coaching engagement is for. Other times they will say, well, I want this. I, and this is just another thing, like just behind the scenes of coaching, typically whatever somebody comes to coaching with on like session one, by session four or six we're doing completely different stuff because either the first thing wasn't the real thing they wanted to work on, or, and, and then they realized that and then changed.

Or the first thing was so simple and superficial it didn't take very long. And they're like, oh, actually this is a way deeper thing I wanna work on. Right? So honestly, I don't really give a shit what people say they wanna work on the first session. 'cause like, I know it isn't gonna be the the the deep thing, so what do you want?

They'll say, oh, I want this. It's like, okay, cool. How are you gonna get that? We do it session or two, they achieve it, they do it, whatever, and then they're like, that's not what I wanted [00:41:00] at all. Okay. But now you know, what do you want? I don't know anymore.

That's one, that's the second one. The third most common answer I get is they list out all the things they could do. They list out all the opportunities on the table, all the potential collaborations, all the ways, you know, all the third or 11th businesses they could create. And I'm like, I didn't ask what you could do.

I asked, what do you want?

And that is usually a lot harder to answer because it's almost like we, we kind of deflect, right? Like, oh, what do you want? Well, I could do this or I could do that. That wasn't my question. What do you want? Like, we're so, 'cause again, man, like we're waiting for permission. A lot of times we're waiting for permission to admit we want to do the thing because there is a, there's an [00:42:00] authenticity and a, and a level of vulnerability that is very uncomfortable for most people.

For you to fully unabashedly admit what you want, most people have never really taken the time to think about that, let alone articulate it. It is easier to say, well this is all the things I could do. These are all the things that would be fun to do. These are all the things that would work out because I have the skillset.

That's never the question.

Cody: So if somebody feels stuck despite maybe they look successful, maybe they have money. What's kind of step one two, entangling? What's actually off?

Corey Wilks: What do you mean? 

Cody: Like if somebody feels stuck and they don't know what they wanna do, what's next? How do they find that answer?[00:43:00] 

Or is that kind of asking a question that, you know, you only, only those can, like, you can only figure that out. It has to come from within. Is there no like single broad answer that can kind of encompass a question like that? 

Corey Wilks: Yeah, that, that's definitely a, that's a good question. It's very deep existential question that takes a lot of exploration per person.

But in general, man, again, it kinda comes back to like, we want to matter and feel like what we did mattered. So I'm a big fan of the stoic concept of momentum. Worry. Remember death, remember, you'll die not in like a, a morbid or depressing sense so much as using your mortality as a motivator to live fully.

Uh, Kevin Kelly, he had written about, um, advice from a friend and his friend was like 65 or something, and his friend was like, in order for me to build anything to any measurable amount of success, it's going to take at least five years. So I [00:44:00] measure my life in five year units. If I'm 65, I only have three units left on like being, you know, hopefully.

So of the hundred things I could do, I can only do three more things. What are those things, right? What do I want to, to allocate these final units for? And I think that that's a very clarifying piece because it's like, you know, we like to glorify the hustle and the grind and say, oh, you know, I worked 12 hours a day, eight days a week, or some shit.

Okay? But of all the things you could do. What is going to be worth your life units that you are going to be required to invest to do this thing? What is worth not, not your hours, not your money, not your attention. What is worth your life to do, to build, to experiment and explore? Well, suddenly now, all [00:45:00] these low hanging fruits, all this superficial shit, you're like, well, that's not worth it.

I've never thought about it in the, in the terms of, of my mortality and what is worth my life to build. What is worth dedicating a unit of my life that I will never get back and that I cannot outsource to doing this next thing. What is, of all the things I could do, what is the next thing that is worth doing?

That is one place I'm typically gonna start with people. 'cause it, it immediately cuts through a lot of the bullshit. 

Cody: Mm-hmm. Yeah. If you can, if you can build a business. Around what you value, what is meaningful to you, or what tribe of people that you feel a connection to. I think that's gonna be an infinitely much better business.

Rather than telling yourself that you're just gonna work hard, you're gonna get a lot of money, you're gonna enjoy life later, because more often than not, you, you [00:46:00] know, you, you live that life and you decide to retire, and then you realize that it's not really what it cracked out to be, that you, how you go back into it.

Uh, you, you feel like, you know, your life's not over. And so being able to build this sustainable life path. Around what is meaningful to you, which is a definitely a hard question to to answer. That's like somebody, you kind of have to ask that for yourself. And everybody's answer is very individual. And it reminds me of the book, uh, uh, die With Zero, where he mentioned this concept of, of I think time buckets or, or life buckets where you, you should draw a timeline of your life and then put in each kind of these little segments.

Could be in five years segments or 10 years, whatever. What do you want to do in that, that decade of your life? And have that be the map for the experiences and be able to live the life that you are not going to regret. Um, but yeah.[00:47:00] 

Corey Wilks: And again, that kind of comes back to what do you want, like what do you believe is aligned with your values that. Will matter to you on a day-to-day basis and will have mattered hopefully to the world. And that is worth your life units. Like what do you want again, man, like, it seems like a super, like stupid simple, like superficial question, but like it goes really, really deep.

Cody: So, so say even after defining like what your version of success is, you know, we still deal with burnout, with procrastination, with overwhelm. And you've said that procrastination has nothing to do with time management. It's all psychological. So I'm curious to know what's, what's really underneath those you kind of chronically avoid key tasks.

Corey Wilks: The reason [00:48:00] most people procrastinate or really any self-sabotaging behavior that is holding them back from achieving their goal. Because all these, most of these people, like you've, you've memorized all the productivity hacks, you know how to do all the things. Yet, despite knowing all these things and maybe even putting, putting some of them into practice, you're still still sabotaging, you're still procrastinating.

It's typically come, it comes down to fear avoidance. And what I mean by that is most people who procrastinate, they don't lack discipline. They're like, especially like with, with the people I work with, right? Like founders, entrepreneurs, content creators, things like that. There are plenty discipline, they get plenty of shit done.

So it isn't their procrastination, it isn't imposter syndrome, it isn't, you know, perfectionism, whatever. They may have all of those, but it isn't, but they're still getting a lot done. [00:49:00] It isn't a lack of discipline. It is an abundance of fear. The psychologists do this thing called a functional analysis.

All it really is, is you look at a given behavior and you say, what function does it serve? What purpose does it have? If you struggle with procrastination despite knowing all the productivity stuff, then most likely the function that procrastination serves for you is it helps you avoid risking one of your fears coming true.

So for example, let, let, let's say like with this podcast episode, let's say you are deeply afraid it isn't gonna work, the podcast isn't gonna work, or people are gonna make fun of you or whatever. If you're a failure, if you're ridicule, something like that, the longer you procrastinate. Not hitting publish, not booking guests, not getting the software up and going, not editing the episode, whatever.

The longer you procrastinate doing all of that, the [00:50:00] longer you get to put off risking that failure coming true or all of this judgment ridicule come coming true. So it isn't that you don't like discipline, it's that you have an overwhelming amount of fear and the procrastination is helping you avoid these fears.

That's the issue a lot of people actually struggle with when it comes to procrastination is that really looking at what function is this procrastination serving right now? More often than not is fear avoidance. Mm-hmm. 

Cody: Right? Procrastination could be looked at in some ways as, as an emotion where it's, that's associated with some kind of fear that where avoiding.

And so then we might do what's called productive procrastination, right? Where we end up doing a bunch of busy work, but then so often, I know personally, like I would experience this at the end of the day where it's like. I, I got so much done, but [00:51:00] none of it mattered. You know, none of it was like the long-term stuff that was like the most important stuff.

And there, there's hacks you can memorize, like I know time blocking can work really well, you know, habit stacking James clear, um, having a really solid morning routine. Maybe you wake up and you, you just, you dedicate the first 60 minutes of the day to writing. Um, so there's so many different methods that you can work around that, but I don't know exactly what's exactly, like, are these hacks, are they just kind of band-aids?

Um, or is there some deeper psychological work that you have to do, like meditation or reflection, um, on the, that negative feeling associated with the procrastination? Is that gonna help you more in the long run, or are these other kind of habits or, or tricks like, uh, equally as helpful for somebody who kind, who is encountering chronic procrastination?

Corey Wilks: So I. We're almost seeing this movement, and I don't know if it is a, a new phase outright, uh, for the world, or more than [00:52:00] likely just people getting a little bit older because like, I'm 36, most of my friends are aging millennials and things. Um, but we're seeing, I anyway have seen this shift of like post productivity.

Woo. So I'm seeing more and more of these people who were like, before were like hyper, you know, all the, the productivity gurus and like, they were like, they were huge on in productivity niches. They memorized all the things, they did all the things. They wrote books and created courses and all the things.

But now almost all of them are like post productivity, meaning they no longer are trying to optimize, they're trying to downshift, they're they're trying to slow down. Yeah. They're, they're exploring woo woo shit all of a sudden. And I think the, the, the biggest reason for this is productivity is a means to an end, but we've forgotten that now too often over the last handful of years.

We see productivity [00:53:00] as the end in and of itself. So now people are like, my goal is to be more productive. You absolutely not. Your goal is to get the shit done you need to get done so you can live your life. But that, that stopped being the goal. The goal became, it's almost like, it's like a, like a badge of honor of how much you got done that day, or how many things on your to-do list you, you got done, or how many, you know, Pomodoro sessions you did today.

And it's like, okay, but were you working on what needed to get done? Because I would rather, 'cause sometimes this is, you know, I'll do this in, in coaching stuff too, is like, of the a hundred things you could do, what are the three things that you actually need to get done? I got a hundred things done. Okay, cool.

You would've been better off to do the two or three things that actually mattered. The other 97 were just distractions or just performative productivity. Right. Kind of like productivity equivalent, like virtue signaling. [00:54:00] That became the goal to be productive not to live. So you're seeing the shift of people who, for a decade or more were productive and then they realized, I don't have anything real to show for that.

I spent 10 years trying to be productive at the cost of living. I sacrificed actually being present and living and enjoying myself in order to aspire to this weird definition of productivity I had in my head. So I think that's why we're seeing this shift as well. 

Cody: Yeah. I, I just, last night I had dinner with a founder here in Austin.

I. And she confided in me how she's, you know, she's running this, this business and yet she feels stuck in survival mode, you know, and she's, I guess, internally she sees herself as the successful business woman. And, and her whole identity is kind of wrapped up in being successful and kind of go, go, go. And now she's wanting to be a direct to be a director and, and whatnot.

And [00:55:00] she, she finds it difficult to really like, enjoy life. That's something I resonate so much with because I've been in that, that, that wheelhouse of, I had this mindset of I'm going to work hard now in my twenties, work really, really hard. I'm not gonna travel, I'm not gonna do anything fun. I'm just gonna work really, really hard and enjoy the fruits of my labor when I'm older.

And we've been coming to terms to understand that that's not the perspective you should be living your life, life in. It's trying to balance that, that future self, the, the desire for that idealized version with our present self. Because if you're living completely in that future version, then you're just gonna be completely miserable your entire life.

And so being able to balance that seems to be key. Um, what advice do you have for somebody that is, say like I, I myself, like I had this business, we had a thousand employees, and I would feel like shit. If I didn't get anything done, [00:56:00] even though I had built the system, this, this great business with all these people that were effectively being productive for me, right?

And making money for me. If I didn't do something that felt meaningful to me on that day, I would feel like crap. And that would just, that, just that fact just astounded me like so much of my own self-esteem was based on my output. And it's not like, did I have a, do I have a great relationship? Am I having great travel?

Am I having fun with friends? It's, it's how productive I was that day. And it seems to be something that still so many high achievers are stuck in. This survival mode of being, of your self-esteem is so heavily attached to what you can do. And I think that's been kind of ingrained in us, partly culturally, right?

In this USA, this hustle culture that's kind of like, at least it's kind of on its way out. But what advice do you have for, for me or even her that are stuck in this, this kind of survival mode and that that identity that's so wrapped around work, [00:57:00] like how do we, uh, separate that

Corey Wilks: there's this sort of like tongue in cheek, uh, zen proverb that goes something like, meditate for an hour a day unless you're too busy, then meditate for two. And it's just this, this idea of like. We forget to live, we forget to be present. And anytime you feel this, this, this sense of I'm too busy to, to live for myself, I'm too busy to kind of refill my own cup, that is precisely the moment you should drop everything and do that.

The question I ask a lot is, what's the point? So for example, I, my office is upstairs in our house. It is too easy for me to work all day in my office [00:58:00] and then go downstairs, you know, make dinner, go to the gym, make dinner, whatever, and then sit on the couch with my fiance and we'll turn on tv, which is, you know, evenings are supposed to be for us.

So whether it's tv, taking a walk, whatever. It is too easy for me to, when we're on the couch to pull up my laptop and work just a little bit longer or when we're out on a walk to check LinkedIn or some shit just real quick. And then I'll look up and it's been two hours and I haven't been present. So it's like, what's the point?

What's the point of working so hard and doing all this super hard shit when you're not present For the people who make life worth living, when you're not present in your own life, when you're not doing the shit that matters to you, being present with your loved ones, just enjoying walking around a park or your neighborhood.

Just little, just [00:59:00] literally like, do you enjoy existence? Can you actually do that or not? 'cause otherwise, what's the point? There are so many easier things you can do in life to make money than especially being a founder, entrepreneur, doing all this shit. There are so many easier things you can do. Like when I had a regular job, I never took work home with me.

Once I was off the clock, I didn't think about work at all. The clinic could have burned down overnight. I would not have cared as long as my salary check kept coming 'cause I would just get shuffled to another clinic, right? Didn't matter. Entrepreneurship, you are never off. You are always on. Your business is always on your mind.

Period. That is one of the things you accept. Yes. Maybe some people are really good at compartmentalizing. I haven't met 'em. Every single person I know. To some degree, your business is always on your mind, especially when part of your business is creating content in some fashion, because [01:00:00] everything is content.

Every sentence you say, every story you come across, every experience you have, you're like, I could turn this into on, this could be a solo podcast episode. This could be a LinkedIn post, like it's always has been a newsletter thing. It can always be something you're always on. So accepting that as a reality, most of the time.

The question is what's the point? If you're not present, if you're not actually enjoying what you're doing and you're not allowing yourself to live outside of traditional work hours, what's the point? You could do easier shit, because we forget to live because we're so busy working. Right. And yes, no, do what you love.

I I do not agree with the whole, like, oh, do what you love. You never work a day in your life. You could absolutely love what you do. It's still fucking work. Like it is, it is just work. Anybody who tells you otherwise is probably selling you something. It's work. 'cause it takes effort. Love what you do, but understand it is work [01:01:00] and understand the point of working is to live.

So if you work and sacrifice living, you have missed the point.

Cody: Yeah. And, and as you know, as, as Viktor Frankl has kind of pointed out, is that if you're able to find a deeper meaning in the work that you do, you know, it doesn't make the work necessarily easier, but it gives you that, that fire, that underlying reason as to why you should wake up every day and do that work.

Especially when it gets tough and hard to do and you wake up and you feel like you don't wanna do it. Um, having that underlying meaning, uh, helps you on that path and continue on that path. Um, and so having an identity formed around, uh, what we accomplish is one thing. And one of the other biggest issues that high achieves entrepreneurs have is [01:02:00] burnout.

You know, it's, it's been rampant, uh, for so long now, and it's been getting worse by, by kind of every measure. And I think you've said before that reflection is key when it comes to burnout. So what, what does real reflection look like when, uh, say you're feeling overwhelmed? 

Corey Wilks: So, burnout specifically when it comes to like, people who work for themselves, right?

Most burnout stuff is, is geared toward like either employees or. Company owners on behalf of their employees, right? There's, there's honestly not much on burnout that are targeted toward like founders creator types because when you work for yourself, like I just said, you're always on, you, you don't really turn off.

So how do you deal with burnout when you can't really turn off? Like you said, I have this, you know, five step process I walk people through. But the third is, is reflection, which is the piece most people miss. [01:03:00] So if you think about like, you know, Benjamin Franklin was famous for like taking long walks to like have breakthroughs and things.

Bill Gates would do his, like think weeks where he'd like Walden it up and like go to a cabin in the woods with a bunch of books and shit. Your best insights often come when you aren't in a reactive. Mental state, when you're constantly bouncing from putting out one fire to the next, or responding to one email to the next, you're generally not going to have an epiphany because your brain is in a reactive mode.

Mm-hmm. Versus if you can find a way to carve out time to protect time, not find time, but protect time in order to reflect and cultivate stillness, that allows your mind to have the time and the space to calm down enough. Like to have like the, the ripples in the water calm down enough for you to see [01:04:00] clearly.

So now you're in more of a proactive mindset. You're not playing catch up. You are ahead of things. You just, you aren't chasing things. Your mind is gonna be a lot calmer. That allows these insights, these eureka moments and things to finally kind of percolate up to the surface. That is something very, very many people who are deeply successful do, and something very, very few people, very, very many people who struggle, don't do right.

It's a, it's a rare quality in a lot of people because a lot of us feel that self-care is selfish. So taking time to myself to be calm, to meditate, to relax, to journal, to just walk or just sit and think that's selfish or it's wasteful as this conversation. Uh, with an entrepreneur the other day, it was like, if I'm sitting doing nothing, I am wasting my time and [01:05:00] wasting my potential.

I have to feel a sense of productivity 'cause then that allows me to feel like I earned rest later. Rest isn't a reward. Rest is a requirement for peak performance. But a lot of people don't think of it that way. Doing nothing is some shit you could put on your calendar. It isn't wasting time, it's doing nothing.

It is making time for yourself to read, to sit, to meditate, anything you wanna put in that block. You don't have to do something specifically in order for that to be time well spent. And that's what trips up a lot of people because it's like, well, if I sit here and I think I'm wasting time, I could be doing something else.

But that mindset, getting in your own way, prevents so many people from having the breakthrough they deeply need to have.[01:06:00] 

Cody: Right. It's that it's that default mode network that we end up getting stuck in. Right. That we're, we're always looking at what do we have to do? What's next? Our prefrontal cortex is just kind of online. And so often, as, you know, pulling up Ryan Holiday again, you know, his, his book Stillness is the key, kind of goes into that on how so many influential people in history had so much spare time and they, they hardly ever worked, honestly, because when they did work, it was maybe a few hours a day.

You know, Huberman said that we, we tend to, you know, to Max, max out our focus at 90 minute blocks, and then you should take a rest in between. And so often we skip that because again, it goes back to the identities being so built on what our output is and this desire of, uh, everybody's passing me by, I have to, I have to work really, really hard.

And then you burn out and then you feel even worse. You feel guilty because now [01:07:00] you can't even motivate yourself like the part of your brain wants to work. But there's no like emotional salience, the ability to kind of put weight behind the tasks to be able to do them. And you just feel miserable. And so, uh, I know one of my core routines is just a 20 minute meditation.

Um, I know Huberman mentioned ns, NSDR, uh, nons, sleep deep rest a lot. And so having some, some part of your day is like a daily habit where you, you're not, you're not thinking, you're maybe, maybe thinking, but you have stillness where you're not trying to do something because that's where you tend to get those really brilliant ideas.

That's that, that's why we get so many ideas in the shower, right? Because we don't have any external stimuli that's directing our attention and we don't really realize that when we're bored and we pull out that phone and we look at that app and we start scrolling, that is, uh, an opportunity. For us to figure out what's bubbling underneath the surface.

And so often now we're losing that connection [01:08:00] with our internal sense of selves. And maybe that's why psychedelics has become like more prominent because people would rather take a substance to connect with their inner selves than just take 20 minutes a day to, to just sit with their thoughts. Right?

Uh, I think there was some study for some famous study a long time ago where they had like people in a room by themselves and they could either choose to just sit there or there was a button in front of them that they pressed that button. It would shock them. And more participants chose to, chose to shock themselves rather than just sit there and do nothing.

Um, so

Corey Wilks: it's all insane, man. Like we don't know how to be bored, like. You know, Neil Gaman, part of his writing routine he's talked about before is he'll just like, again, he'll go to a cabin or something with a notebook and a pen, and he's like, I don't have to write, I'm allowed to not write, but I'm not allowed to do anything else.

Mm-hmm. [01:09:00] So he embraces boredom. So then naturally, 'cause like sometimes like if he, if he makes the task of like, I need to write something right now, then your brain's like, oh, I, I don't know what to say first. If it's just like, I'm just gonna be bored, brain do what you wanna do, eventually your brain is gonna entertain itself.

Right. So that's part of his creative process is his brain comes up with stories and shit to entertain him, and then he just writes 'em down sometimes. But also, like for us, like you said, the, the shower thoughts kind of thing. The in the shower on a routine long drive, like a drive to like a 30, 45 minute commute and at bedtime.

Is when people's minds tend to wander the most. 'cause those are the only times you're not distracted throughout the day. Like if, if you really think about it, most people, we spend our entire waking hours going from one distraction to the next. One thing that requires our focus and attention to the next, very, very few of us [01:10:00] intentionally protect time that doesn't allow distractions and anything else tugging at our attention.

But if you do, it can be legitimately transformational.

Cody: No. Um, now kind of asking, uh, or moving to, I know that you've worked a lot with online creators and you ended up creating something called the creator, the creator alchemy. Uh, so, uh, what kind of work do you do with creators? What kind of problems that do you see them having? 

Corey Wilks: Yeah, so sort of the, the, the main unquote brand I, I operate off of with like my newsletter, my YouTube channel, my podcast and things is creator alchemy.

And fundamentally, you know, it, it's alchemy philosophically is about transformation, right? Kind of realizing the potential we all have. So I mostly deal with creators, creator, [01:11:00] defined as anybody who creates things. It isn't, most people are like, oh, I'm not a creator 'cause I'm not an Instagram influencer.

I'm like, I don't give a shit about influencers, right? Founders, entrepreneurs, podcasts, things like that. Authors, they're all creators in my book, because you create something in order to make the world a better place. That is a creator to me, hence creator alchemy, helping creators transform themselves and their lives, or businesses, all that.

A lot of the work I do is one-on-one is private coaching. Uh, one, one creator I worked with who's like publicly talked that we've worked together, um, is Ali Abdu, New York Times a selling author, big, you know, productivity, YouTuber things five plus 6 million views or subscribers, whatever. Ali's super cool.

Um, but I don't work with a whole lot of people privately 'cause I, I try to keep my schedule pretty, pretty open. Um, so in order to make the things that I talk about a lot more accessible to people, I started [01:12:00] the Creator Alchemy lab, which is just like my online membership community. We do like a bunch of like group coaching every month.

We do monthly themed workshops. There's the community itself of other creators doing really, really cool things, podcasts, newsletters, uh, their own businesses, that kind of thing. It's super, super fun. It's basically just like, you know, the age of ai. Content is, is less of a moat versus community now, right?

Like people want to connect with other people. And on this journey, like we've talked throughout this episode, it can be really lonely. It can feel really isolating. It's really easy to think like, well, maybe I can't do this. Maybe I'm not the kind of person who can do this. I was lucky early on when I came online as a creator to meet a handful of people who kind of took me under their wing, their wing, we became friends and they made success feel real that I could achieve it.

But that's not the, the common story for a lot of [01:13:00] people. So I wanted to create a space that facilitates that for others of like, look, come join this. You'll meet people like you. You'll get group coaching with me. You'll get a bunch of other really cool things. Just join here. Um, especially if private coaching isn't where you're at right now.

This community's for you. Um, that's the, the, the big thing with the creator alchemy lab, um, because a big thing we do a little bit differently. Yes, we talk about business, business strategies and tactics. We talk about, to a degree audience growth and creativity and things like the normal stuff. But for me, after you've read the, a couple business books, you pretty much have everything you need after you've taken one or two people's courses on almost any topic, audience growth, newsletter growth, whatever.

You, you probably heard it all before after that. Um, very few people are really talking about the psychology [01:14:00] of what it means to succeed as a creator. Navigating burnout, imposter syndrome. How do you actually embrace your own authenticity and leverage that to build a values aligned business and life?

That's more so what we focus on. We kind of say it's 80% personal development, 20% business tactics. Um, that's, that's my, my latest project. Yeah. 

Cody: And it can be difficult to, I, I, I remember encountering one creator, uh, who said that he actually will record his videos and give it to a friend to upload. So he doesn't even have the opportunity to say, look at like the YouTube stats.

'cause I know one of the biggest issues is you can get really hung up. You know, if you get 5,000 likes on a video, then you know, next time you have to get 6,000 likes. And if you don't get that, then you start questioning what's going on? Am am I doing it right? Should I be doing something else? And you might stop.

And, and a few months ago there was this thing where you had these really online prominent [01:15:00] creators with millions of followers kind of quitting, um, or pausing. I, I remember being Tom Scott being one of them, and M-K-B-H-G came out with a video where he talked about this. And I love the analogy that he used at the end.

Um, because content creation can be this wild beast where once you get it going, then. You become kind of like an owner operator business, right? Where not only do you have a business, but it's it's surrounding on you. So you can't even, you can't travel, you can't take time off because you're so focused on needing to create that next video to satisfy the needs of your audience or else you might lose them.

Uh, and I love the analogy that he used, which was like, that you looked at, like as a content creator, like you're like an octopus and you have all these tentacles. And when you start out, you know, maybe you're having to, you're having to do the thumbnail, you're having to edit the audio and video together.

And then as you start to grow, you can start cutting off these tentacles and you give them to somebody else, you know, somebody else, maybe they enjoy creating thumbnails, right? And now you don't have to do that. But [01:16:00] ultimately you can't cut off all the tentacles. You have to find like a core, maybe three or four of those things that you really still love to do and then keep doing them.

You can't delegate or outsource them. Uh, so I assume that a lot of the issue that you encounter with creators is this, like the momentum of how to keep going, how not to burn out. Like, uh, do you have any kind of generalized advice on how to sustain like this level of content creation when if things are so competitive now?

Corey Wilks: So I think it depends on the level you're at. So I will talk at the level of you're at like a hundred K or more, right? Um, 'cause at that point audience capture becomes a, a pretty prominent thing. Audience capture are typically defined as, um, you have attracted a specific type of audience in a given niche or a given, you know, three buckets within a niche.

And now you feel pressure to placate that audience you have now attracted, um, you have captured an audience, but your audience has also kind of captured [01:17:00] you sort of a deal. Um, at its worst audience capture can turn into you kind of becoming a caricature of yourself. So examples sometimes people give is like, uh, this kid, well, he's not a kid anymore, I'm assuming, but, uh, NDO avocado or some shit.

He was a kid who like started off as like a skinny vegan kid and then did random videos and then started doing like muck bang or some shit like. Binge eating videos. And then he got one video, like went super viral. So then he is like, oh, just I'll do more of this. 'cause clearly this works. And then he became like hella obese from just doing these grotesque eating videos.

Somebody told me he recently like, took back control of his health and like went back and like got healthy again. Which also for him, if that's true, um, but that's an example of, well I will, I'll give the algorithm what it wants, I'll double down on what works. That's what we're told. Um, or you know, you would've even seen like Jordan Peterson slowly kind of moving further, further, right?

Um, versus [01:18:00] before he was a little more centered and he would kind of criticize both sides. But over time the right leaning members of his audience were more engaged. So then it just kind of, and other reasons he just kind of slowly moved over. Those are examples of audience capture. Mark Manson recently put out a video talking about how he was completely basically burning his podcast.

Um, despite it being really successful. He was like, I just, I don't wanna do that anymore. Audience capture starting to kind of creep in. Um, I started, you know, there were a couple times where I would have guests on that I didn't really care for and I just kinda had to sit there and like do it anyway because we had a sponsor or this or that.

He was like, and I feel like that was coming across on camera, so I'm only going to upload when I want and I'm going to do like super deep dive, all encompassing episodes, only a given topic. Now. Even Tim Ferriss, he's like, I don't wanna do book tour authors anymore 'cause they're all just saying the same shit on, on all the podcasts to go on.[01:19:00] 

I no longer wanna do that. I am burning out doing that. So I think I. People who have survived. Again, Tim Ferriss, mark Manson, that kind of thing, they have said, I am going to resist audience capture at my level and accept that I'm gonna be leaving money on the table. I'm gonna be leaving growth on the table and I could even go backward for a while, but this is what I need to put out content I have high conviction in because if I burn out, the content stops.

So it's, you know, kinda like Charlie Munger and, and Warren Buffett talk about like, rather than trying to be brilliant, just avoid stupidity. So rather than trying to like be super successful, avoid the things that you know are gonna guarantee failure, like that's the starting point. So I think that's a big piece is.

Also understanding fundamentally, people don't follow you for your content. They follow you for you because no matter how niched you are, no matter how, whatever you're in, [01:20:00] there's probably somebody else saying similar things. It's not the content itself. People follow you for you. Not everybody will follow you if you change, but if you don't change, if you don't allow your content to change, even though you personally have your interests have changed, your, your whatever, have changed.

If you don't allow your business to grow with you and fossilize, that is how you burnout. You, especially as a creator, your content is allowed to evolve with you. Your business is allowed to evolve with you because your name is what made your content, is what made your business right. Most of the time your name becomes a stamp of approval or a, a quality stamp almost on anything that you do.

Understanding that understanding you are the core value prop of everything that you do. [01:21:00] That's the real big piece. So it's like you are allowed to evolve, but there's a lot of pressure to not evolve. And that's when you see creators, they put out, they basically, they identify the 12 topics or 12 videos that do really, really well and they shit out 12, the same, 12 videos every quarter, four times a year.

And it's like, it's the same type of video over and over and over again for 2025, for 2026, for spring, for like, it's the same thing over and over again. And when you talk to 'em, they're like, I'm burned out, but this brings in money. This is guaranteed. And what almost every single one of 'em do, they start a second channel, they start a personal substack, they do something else to get more of that creative energy back.

Cody (2): Hmm. 

Cody: Yeah, you, you kind of typecast yourself in a way, uh, and you're afraid to experiment or do anything else because you know that you've captured an audience that are interested in one specific, very niche type of thing. And if you're afraid, if you try to [01:22:00] do something else, you're afraid that it's just not gonna resonate with them.

Uh, and then you might, you might feel like, you know what, if you're a one hit wonder, you know, all of those negative thoughts that go through your head. And I know, know, you brought up Kevin Kelly earlier, and I think he said about having, you know, capturing those, those 1000 true fans, uh, being able to just care about having some people who really believe in your authentic self.

Because you have the paradox of that, that the paradox between authenticity and your, and the identity capture, like the identity that you've, uh, that you come across to an audience of a channel that you formed. And yeah, if you go down that path, then you're just kind of torturing yourself and you're gonna end up burned out and feeling like, why am I doing this?

And you're just gonna kind of hate life to some extent. Um, so yeah, very important to be able to maintain that level of authenticity. With who you are as a person and not let yourself play that game or get wrapped up too much. And you know, how many, what, what are [01:23:00] the stats and, uh, being able to, to, to how many fans and followers do I have?

Um, now 

Corey Wilks: the, the other thing is like, there are a handful of people that I think have allowed themselves to evolve really well and continue to see successes and also just enjoy their life. Nat Eliason is one, um, I. Currently, people would probably describe Nat as an author 'cause that's what he's currently really working on.

But like Nat has done like coding, he had like a, an app with like teaching Kegels to guys or some kinda shit. Nat has done all kinds of weird shit in like over an eight year plus span just in the most recent eight year span. He did, he had a crypto project, like a big like crypto game project, um, with tokens and shit.

Made millions, lost millions, wrote a nonfiction book, crypto confidential on it. Then decided to self-publish fiction books. Husk just came out as his first like [01:24:00] fiction book. He's got a community for like how to build your own apps and ship. Nat kind of does whatever he wants and people continue to follow him.

And that even talked about it. He's like, look, I have, you know, uh, a newsletter of like 40 plus thousand subscribers, but none of them followed me for my fiction writing. 'cause I just started fiction writing. Right. Dan Co, another great example, Dan Coe does whatever the fuck Dan Coe wants. Like if Dan came out with shoes tomorrow, like, oh, is Dan Coe?

Of course he came out with shoes. Dan went from like web design to copywriting to, you know, online writing, to now he's building his own like software and things. There are a handful of people who have allowed, uh, Tim Sauer, Tim, uh, he was on Starter Story that did a, a thing with him. Tim grew a handful of, um, agencies and, uh, database based agencies and things, and then sold 'em.

And then he taught copywriting, but now [01:25:00] he kind of does whatever he wants. And people followed those guys for them. Their content's great, but what makes their content great is their story, their experiences. None of them are easy to describe. None of them are, are niched at this point. And I think that's the thing is like you can start niche if you want.

It's definitely easier and simpler for people to understand who you are and what you do. But if pigeonholing yourself in your niche is burning you out, you are not required to stay in this niche the rest of your life.

Cody: Very, very well said. Uh, yeah. I, I, I love that. And it's, uh, it's amazing how much he's able to jump from one thing to another thing, just it seems so effortless in a way. And another friend, I have Nick Gray, who seems to be doing that very well as well. Like he has a huge following and he just kind of [01:26:00] posts whatever he wants.

And it, it can be like, for a while we ended up, we, we even had a dating salon at my, at my house. We had a bunch of people over. And because there was like a, a, a last year, he was very interested in wanting to have a relationship and finally have a girlfriend. And so he focused so hard on that, and all of his content was focused around like, how do you find the right person?

And he even went, he even went to, uh, Tokyo and he went on this blind date with some random, random girl that he met, uh, who connected on social media. And then he blogged about, uh, or talked about the entire experience. Uh, and that went viral. And so now he's kind of, he's been able to find some kind of relationship and, uh, so it seems interesting that you can Yeah.

You just got engaged. Yeah. True. Um, and so it's, it's fascinating how, uh, you can, you can have your interests and you can still have a following. And so, uh, I think that's, that's important to note. And there's, there's an [01:27:00] increasing number of examples where you have people that have a variety of interests and they're able to talk about that freely.

And I think that's, that's a beautiful place to operate in. And I, I, I can hope that anybody is able to step up and be able to operate from a place like that. Um, 

Corey Wilks: Matthew McConaughey, I don't remember if it was on Ryan Holiday show or not, or somebody else, but McConaughey was talking about social media and, 'cause I think he's got a kid, he was talking about a teenager.

I, I think it's his kid. I could be wrong, but it was like, don't create content for social media. Live your life and share what you're doing. And I think that is a really key just mindset shift. 'cause it's really easy to get caught up in, I have to create something from scratch for LinkedIn, for Twitter, for Instagram.

And then you put all this creative energy into that [01:28:00] versus saying, let me live my life. Let me run my business, let me do whatever, and then share what I'm doing along the way. That is a fundamental shift I feel, and Gary V, he talked about a similar thing of document, don't create, like just document what you're already doing in day-to-day life.

And I think all the guy, all the people we've talked about so far, that is a lot of what they, they did and what they continue to do. They live their life and then share lessons learned behind the scenes, whatever, versus people who are influencers, they're not living life. They're creating within this predefined box for this social media platform, but they're not doing anything outside of that, that platform.

I think that's a key piece as well that allows you to evolve and take some of that pressure off as well. To be a specific thing or in a specific niche.

Cody: [01:29:00] And on that note, I think that's a great point to end on. Uh, so Dr. Corey, Dr. Corey Wilkes, uh, it's been an absolute pleasure to have you on today. Uh, and if you're listening or you found yourself kind of nodding along, you know, remember that you're, you're not alone. Every, every entrepreneur, every creator, frankly, every human deals with a lot of these challenges.

But I think as Corey showed us, having awareness, uh, stillness, um, maybe even having the right coach is a powerful first step to helping you have that level of self-actualization that you, you really want. And so for more Corey's work, work, including articles on human flourishing and practical resources and, and even his, his community, uh, check out his column and Psychology today.

Or you can visit his website at corey wilkes psy d.com. And of course we'll have all that info in the show notes. So as always, thank you for joining me today and, uh, if [01:30:00] this conversation resonated, please take a moment, subscribe, share the episode, leave a review, all that fun stuff. Um, anyway, I'm Cody McClain.

Until next time, keep hacking your mind. Build intentionally and pursuing the life you gen, genuinely want. Thank you.