Episode 033: The Power of an Authentic Permie with Kevin Cormack

Welcome back! This week on the Seeds of Tao Podcast we have the world-traveler, Kevin Cormack, here to share his fantastic story of his adventures in finding himself and becoming who he was meant to be. This is a journey all of us face in our lives, some more than others, and a big takeaway from this podcast was really to go after your passions wholeheartedly. 

Making the Decision

In Kevin’s interview, he brings up some really common struggles that he was faced with when he was younger, including finding out who he was and what he wanted out of life. We hear this all too often. Teenagers will spend their adolescent years trying to “find” themselves, most of the time trying to be what other people expect out of them. But even then, it’s extremely common for adults in their 20’s and 30’s to finish college and get a job, only to find out that’s not what they really want to be doing. Sometimes we even hear of the older adult who just retired from their career job, only to feel like they barely started living how they wanted after retirement. This is a plague - indecision and lack of intuition leading to regret-filled years and no real progression towards the things that truly matter to you. 

But here’s the thing with decisions. Sometimes we get burnt out and suffer from decision fatigue. We make choices all the time, and when we’ve used up our decision-making energy, there is simply no gas left in the tank to make any more decisions. At that point we oftentimes start putting those decisions off, which create open communication loops in our brain, which our brain holds on to, unable to move on. One way to get through this hangup is to literally grab a piece of paper and start writing down all of the decisions you have to make, and then just write down practice answers so there’s SOMETHING in the answer portion for our brain to close that communication loop with. This buys us time without stepping into anxiety, in order to deal with the really important questions we need answers to.

But at the end of the day, just make a decision. Look inside yourself and ask yourself the hard questions. What do you want out of life? What is important to you? Where do you want to be in 10 years? 30 years? Give these questions their due effort and if you are still struggling, definitely use meditation and visualization to help with clarity here, they work wonders.

Go Be Selfish

The word “selfish” has gotten a bad reputation. I love how Kevin brings this up and how depending on our perspective, selfishness can be a negative thing, or it can be a liberating thing. In society today we’re chastised for being too focused inward on ourselves, and yet that is where we gain clarity, by connecting with our inner self. Constantly focusing outwards throws us into others’ expectations and trends, wrapped in the whirlwind of others’ needs and desires from us. We can lose ourselves there.

Yet when we really take time to connect with ourselves and truly identify who we are and where we want to be, we are better able to serve those around us. You cannot fill someone else’s cup if yours is empty. 

This is exactly why we created the FREE Dreamcatcher Mini-Course and the Pando Academy Online Course. In the world of permaculture and sustainability there is always available education to increase your skills of recycling, gardening, sustainable business and so forth. Yet you must fill your cup first, by building up your mindset tools. Only with a strong mindset and deep connection with yourself can you be truly impactful with your outward efforts.

Getting the Right Education

We all spend the majority of our youth getting an education, some of which we will actually use as an adult. But when we are old enough to choose our educational endeavors, the choices are overwhelming. We can often find ourselves in the “perpetual education” loop where we’re constantly striving to learn “enough” to be able to go out and do what we want on our own. But it’s a dangerous balance there. Our brain LOVES what it knows. What it knows is safe, predictable, and comfortable. If we are not careful we can find ourselves stuck in this place, afraid to go and take action because we feel like we don’t know enough, but really it’s our limbic system of our brain being too scared of the unknown. We’re not saying to NOT go get an education in your area of interest, just to be wise, and sometimes going and doing in a trial by fire is one of the best ways to learn.

Living Authentically

Authentic living is quite the buzz word lately. There are countless hashtags and blog posts related specifically to this topic, and I’m sure you are aware of the higher level of personal power you can access by living more authentically. But what are some real tools you can use to uncover this mysterious “authenticity” people are raving about? Here are three strategies anyone can do. 

1. Write Your Story - We tell ourselves stories all the time. We tell ourselves why the world is the way that it is, and why people make the choices they do. We tell ourselves what we’re bad at, and who we want to be more like. But these are not necessarily very proactive stories. You have the power to create who you become. So write your story, not of where you have been, but of where you are going. Pick a point in time, a year in the future is great, and write what your life is like if you had perfect control. What would you be doing? Where would you be living? What types of relationships would you have? Be as clear, and descriptive as possible, making sure to insert plenty of emotional words. Write how it FEELS, how you FEEL. Once you’re happy with your story, read it every single day. As you read it, you will find more focus on the important things that will drive your life to where you want to go. Stories are powerful, so use them to create the life you want to have, your most authentic life.
2. Create Boundaries - All too often we start becoming less authentic when we are trying to please others. We take on projects that really aren’t where we want to be spending our time. We fill our lives with so many things that aren’t really of importance in terms of bettering ourselves, and furthering our goals and dreams, so we end up lost in a pile of “things to do” that aren’t what we want to be doing at all. We can also do this with energy. We can take on negative energy that we don’t really want, take on anger we don’t want, and let it bog us down. However, we can change this. Take a piece of paper and draw a little person in the middle, then draw a fairly large circle around the person. Inside the circle, write all the things you want to come into your life, with arrows pointing to you. Fill the circle, really think hard about this. Then, outside of the circle write all the words you don’t want to come to you, and draw arrows next to those words that are pointed away from you. Doing and reviewing this simple exercise is fantastic for bringing consciousness to what we allow into our lives, and what we don’t, allowing us to dwell in more space with the things we want, living in a more authentic space.

I hope that through this podcast episode and blog post you have been inspired to uncover more of your passion and power, and take the reins to follow your passion and live life more authentically. If you are ready to start learning some higher level mindset tools to help you live more authentically, check out the FREE Dreamcatcher Mini-Course. 

Keep Growing!