The Talent Forge: Shaping Workforce Behaviors with Jay Johnson

Mindset: The Filter to Your Reality with Jim Huntzicker

• Jay Johnson • Season 1 • Episode 58

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What if your entire reality was being filtered through beliefs you formed as a five-year-old? According to mindset expert Jim Huntzicker, neuroscience reveals we only perceive about 12% of reality—the rest gets filtered out by subconscious beliefs we established before age eight.

In this perspective-shifting conversation, Jim reveals how childhood experiences create the mental "ruts" that dictate our adult behaviors around money, relationships, and success. He shares the shocking story of walking away from six profitable businesses due to limiting beliefs formed while witnessing his parents' arguments about money. This pattern—sabotaging success just when things are going well—is something many high-achievers experience without understanding why.

The episode delivers practical frameworks for transformation, including the powerful "Decision Director" method for reprogramming limiting beliefs and a five-step process for releasing deep-seated resentments that anchor our core limiting beliefs. Jim explains why identifying when you go "primal" (experiencing fear, anxiety, or stress) provides the perfect opportunity to uncover what's truly holding you back. 

For leaders and coaches, Jim offers valuable insights on how to address resistance to change by helping people recognize their emotional patterns and shift from "primal" to "powerful" states. He emphasizes that this work isn't a one-time fix but a lifelong practice of awareness, presence, and gratitude that fundamentally changes how you experience challenges.

Ready to discover what your five-year-old brain decided that's still running your life today? This episode provides the awareness and tools to finally break free from invisible mental patterns and consciously create the reality you desire.

Meet the Host
Jay Johnson works with people and organizations to empower teams, grow profits, and elevate leadership. He is a Co-Founder of Behavioral Elements®, a two-time TEDx speaker, and a designated Master Trainer by the Association for Talent Development. With a focus on behavioral intelligence, Jay has delivered transformational workshops to accelerate high-performance teams and cultures in more than 30 countries across four continents. For inquiries, contact jay@behavioralelements.com or connect below!

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayjohnsonccg/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jayjohnsonccg/
Speaker Website - https://jayjohnsonspeaks.com

Jay Johnson:

Welcome to this episode of the Talent Forge, where together we are shaping workforce behaviors. I'm really excited. Today we've got a special guest, Jim Huntzicker. Welcome to the show, Jim.

Jim Huntzicker:

Jay, thanks for having me Looking forward to it.

Jay Johnson:

So, jim, mindset is one of the things that can hold us back. It can propel us forward. There's a lot going on in that space. You've written a book Mindset Breakthrough. I'd love to just dig right into that. What is mindset, how can we define it, what does it mean? And you know, why should we care?

Jim Huntzicker:

Well, mindset, you know from, if we look at it from a neuroscience perspective, which is, like you know, all the technology we have now is great and sometimes it's bad, but sometimes it's really good, right, and, and like neuroscience, it tells us we're we're only seeing about 12% of reality, right, like, like, literally, we have a filter on. It's like an 88% filtered reality, and what's it? What it's filtering out is is is everything around you that doesn't meet your subconscious filters, the stuff that you decided to believe Most of the time. You decided to believe most of the time you decided to believe before you were eight years old. Right, like, you decided to believe something when you were five and you still have an adult brain trying to prove that right today, even if you don't believe it anymore. Like, a quick example of that we all know somebody who drinks too much and they say they want to quit drinking right, but then they never do. Right, like they say I'm going to quit, this is going to be my last weekend, and then they still drink the weekend, and it's because consciously they want to quit, but subconsciously they haven't changed the program yet. And that's the subconscious is what runs the show.

Jim Huntzicker:

And so when we talk about mindset, we really have to look at the programming that we have and the ruts that we have in our mind that are creating the filters that we see life through, because once you see things differently, you can make a decision to believe something new. And once you see things differently, you can make a decision to believe something new. And once you do that, you literally you see differently, like and when I say you see differently, it is like this epiphany, it is the best thing that will ever happen to you, because everything right now you're seeing like, if you go, I teach, powerful and primal states of being. You know, powerful is when you feel really good, you're clear, resourceful, energetic. And primal is when you feel bad fear, anxiety, stress, and so, real quick, people are always like well, how do I find these beliefs that are negative, that are bad, that are hurting me, right there. Primal Every time you go.

Jim Huntzicker:

Primal, start thinking about your thoughts. Every time you get stressed, fear, anxiety, those are automatic. Right, you start paying attention to your thoughts. What are you thinking? Right then, write them down, because that is where your limiting beliefs are buried, that's where what's messing with your life the most is buried in those belief systems. And, for example, if you have a desire for something and you don't have it right, like you want to get somewhere financially or in your love life or whatever it is, doesn't matter, you have a desire. If you're not there, the only reason you're not is because you have something stored in your subconscious that's stopping you from getting there. It's resistance, we call it. There's four levels of resistance, we'll get into that in a minute. But but this all packs into mindset.

Jim Huntzicker:

So so when you say mindset, it you really got to look at, go a little deeper, because the mindset is created from the beliefs we have. And the beliefs we have, most of them started before we were eight years old, and they were. They were set in motion by the, by our primary influences, usually our parents, and sometimes that could be a fight. We overheard them, you know, or something wasn't even directly at us and we decided oh, money's bad, money causes problems. Or I'm not smart because you hear your parents praising your brother or sister for their homework because they got straight A's and you don't get straight A's, and so, even though they weren't talking directly to you, you assign meaning that you're not smart. Right, and so now you go through life thinking you're not smart because you assign that meaning when you were five, like it's crazy. Like we have five year olds, so we're still. We have these five-old brains that made this decision and now we're adults and we're still going with these same decisions. Is neuroscience, psychology and communication?

Jay Johnson:

And I love what you're saying because it is the formative years oftentimes that ends up carrying with us and it manifests in a number of different ways. So you know, I remember and I'm going to share one with you. This is one that maybe the audience hasn't heard yet, but we've talked a lot about, like the conscious and the unconscious mind, some of the work from Dr Alan Langer, et cetera. But when I was in probably second grade, jim, I had a teacher who told me well, jay, math is probably not your thing.

Jim Huntzicker:

This is such a typical story, man it's crazy and no joke.

Jay Johnson:

It carried with me through my entire life. I deferred graduating from college for two full years because I was afraid to take the math proficiency examination. Okay, so my behavior clearly shifted over the course and I just thought I was bad at math. Now I do computational probabilistic decision modeling, I do linear programming, I do methodological research, science. Clearly, I'm not bad at math and I ended up, when I ended up, finally getting the courage to take it, I passed four levels above where I needed to pass in order to get through this, which is ridiculous, but it was a mindset listening is so.

Jim Huntzicker:

So look at that, because of that teacher, like, let's find the good, right, because if you're looking for bad, you'll find that, but if you're looking for good, you'll always find that too. And because that teacher said that you studied that much harder. And now, two years later, okay, so it set you back a couple years, but that was also meant to be whatever. It's a story for another time. But but then you, you, because of that, you were four levels higher. So you, actually you. And if without that teacher, you might've just been equivalent, maybe even less.

Jay Johnson:

Yeah Well, and the funny thing is is it was 60 credit hours extra of communication and psychology courses, so it really did set me up for success in the long term. I don't regret that, but I do find it kind of funny is that I was holding onto a belief that I was not good at something, when it was literally an engineer that pointed out like you're doing pretty advanced mathematics with. You know some of the different things that you're doing. Have you considered the fact that maybe you're better at this than you think? And it was so funny because it was that moment that really kind of shifted like wait a second, yeah, I am doing a lot of different things. Now I am still. I was very good at applied mathematics. I wasn't always good at when they started adding in a bunch of letters and everything else.

Jay Johnson:

But let's talk about this sort of mindset. How do we we all have something that we're carrying from some point in time. You know, from hearing that argument from somebody saying something, it could have been an offword comment. It took me a long time to obviously overcome that. You've talked about some different ways in which we can sort of come to fruition with those different limiting beliefs that we have in a much faster way. Let's talk about that, jim. What are your thoughts?

Jim Huntzicker:

All right. So I just explained. You know already how to find them right. These are the surface level ones and we'll get into your core limiting belief and that's the one that really messes with your life the most and it starts to rear its ugly head usually between the ages of 35 and 55. So pay attention for that, because we'll get to that in a minute, because that's the one that's really screwing with your life. But the surface level limiting beliefs, the ones like your teacher said an offhand comment and you carry with it until you were in college, like yours, for example.

Jim Huntzicker:

Now, now, that's a surface level limiting belief. While you carried it with you it did alter the way you handled your life. It's still on surface level and we can get rid of those pretty easily. Like yours was one comment from an engineer that said hey, dude, what you're doing is actually really advanced. Like I think you're being a little hard on yourself.

Jim Huntzicker:

It just took one person for you to be like oh, you're right, that's a decision that was made and maybe you tied it back at that moment to that teacher, maybe you didn't, but either way, you made a decision then to believe something new. So that old decision you made in second grade had finally changed when you were you know whatever you're 22, 23 years old at that point and so you made a decision to believe something new, and so anybody could do that. So there's a real easy framework I'm going to give you. You can just do it on a piece of paper. You don't need to buy anything, you don't need to download anything. I call it the decision director. You take a sheet of paper and you draw two lines to create three columns. So just draw two lines down, create three columns. In the column on the left, you title it limiting beliefs, your existing limiting belief, right, something that you've discovered that's holding you back.

Jay Johnson:

I'm not good at, I don't like, I am stuck, I whatever those I am not.

Jim Huntzicker:

If you ever say why, why we're on this, why, if you ever say I am not, it is it's, those are not just just neutral comments, those are commands to your self-conscious that makes that stuff true. So if you're not good at reading, if you're not good at math, if you're not good with money, that's not what you say, not even in your head. You say I'm working on getting better at this, because it's not a strength of mine right now. I'm working on getting better. Right, it's a mindset shift. It's how you view it. It's how your subconscious views it.

Jim Huntzicker:

But if you say I'm not good at reading, your subconscious says oh okay, I'll make sure that's true and it'll but, if you say you are good, it'll find ways, it'll look for opportunity, just like when people say I don't have time to work out, I don't have time to work out, I don't have time to work out. Well, they don't see opportunities like taking the stairs. Just to go on four flights of stairs is an opportunity to burn some calories. Or parking the car in the back of the parking lot and walking an extra 50 steps each way.

Jay Johnson:

Right, I just the two percent rule, the 2% rule, and I forget the author, but he talks about it. It's literally 2% of the population, is the only part of the population that actually takes the stairs and they've done a couple of different studies, but it's the 2%. In his world is make your life harder. Take that back, build the micro resilience, et cetera. And he's a neuroscientist and I'll come up with his name eventually. Yeah, I know who you're talking about.

Jim Huntzicker:

I thought I had the book, but I don't. I think I have an audible, I think I got it in my audible and I don't have it in print yet. But okay, so so all right. So back to the decision director. So we got two lines of the piece paper that on the left column, or three columns.

Jim Huntzicker:

Left column is the, the old limiting belief. And again, how you find those is anytime you go primal, right, like what Jay said. Also, like when you tell your I am not, I'm not good Like things that you say I am, those are beliefs you have, whether they're good or bad, right. And so if you say I am something, that's not positive, that's a limiting belief. And so the middle column is the new empowered decision. So let's just say you think you're bad with money, I'm not good with money, right, and that's your thing. And you could have a lot of money, by the way, and still be bad with money.

Jim Huntzicker:

Like I have a friend I grew up with who's done very well, he's worth over $100 million, and we were talking like not that long ago, because I was studying finance, and he's like dude, what are you doing? I'm like I never learned about money growing up I didn't go to college. My dad didn't teach me no, they don't teach you in school. Nobody taught me about money. Like I realized I didn't have. Like my financial literacy was super low. And here's this guy worth like a hundred million dollars and he's like dude, he goes. I don't know anything about money either. I'm like well, you better fucking start learning before you lose it all Cause cause you don't get your financial literacy up. People lose $100 million. People lose $300 million, right, look?

Jay Johnson:

at professional athletes All the time. So that goes back to yeah.

Jim Huntzicker:

It's crazy. That goes back to being like they're never comfortable with money. They were comfortable being poor. They got all this money at once. As soon as the money is not regularly coming in, they find ways to give it away. Some gamble it away, some invest in stupid businesses, and then all of a sudden they're broke because that's actually where they're comfortable, because subconsciously, they never got used to the money. They had zero financial literacy and they never got comfortable with money. What they were comfortable with is being in credit card debt and broke because that's the way they were their whole life prior to making big money when they were 18. So it's crazy that that is how their subconscious beliefs bring them back and so we're dealing. That's a core limiting belief that makes people go broke when they're that wealthy. Because why would you be doing you know financial literacy? That just seems to make sense when you have, you know, making tens of millions of dollars a year, but not everybody, but anyway.

Jim Huntzicker:

So the middle column we're back to the evidence of the new empowered decision. So you got that limiting belief, new empowered decision, and it could just be the opposite, mind you Like. So just don't overthink this right now. It could change and you could add to this, but if I'm not good with money, I am good with money. And then the column on the right is is you find evidence of that Cause?

Jim Huntzicker:

If you're looking for evidence of good, you'll find it everywhere, even little, even little micro examples of that 're good with money, that you can save money, or that you know that you make money every week, or however it is.

Jim Huntzicker:

You could find that, ok, I'm actually, you know, I'm not bad with money, but I do need to learn more, right and so so find examples, and that helps program your self-conscious, your subconscious, that that you are actually good. Because look at these examples that, even finding money on the street like I find money laying around all the time, like who doesn't find a penny, like I pick up pennies all the time, like why wouldn't you? Because, also, if you, if you take one penny, by the way, and you double it every day, so today, be one, then two, then four, then eight, and do that for 30 days you'll be mind blown how many, how many pennies there are at day 30, doubling it, starting with one on day one, two, four, eight, sixteen, thirty two by the time you get to 30, the number's like 11 million or 10 million. I think it's crazy how fast it starts counting when you get to like 20, 21.

Jim Huntzicker:

But anyway, so that decision director, you go through that with any limiting belief that comes up. Anytime you go primal, anytime you tell yourself I'm not good at, I'm not that, anything that's not positive, you have a belief buried there. Anything that's not positive, you have a belief buried there. And so so, like I, part of my my story is that I walked away from six profitable businesses, Like, literally, they were profitable. Nothing went. Nothing went wrong. It wasn't like they had a downturn and I had to go. I just stopped, Like I I was a real estate agent in the top 1%.

Jim Huntzicker:

I just stopped. I was flipping houses. I was doing about 50, 60 a year, doing really well. I just stopped. I created an online info product for real estate investors. It taught them how to use the MLS to find deals to flip. I sold 800 of them. It was a thousand dollar product. I just stopped. And I can go on and on and tell you more.

Jim Huntzicker:

But the point is, in the seventh business, I was profitable until it wasn't, and then at the end to me, it was God saying hey, let me just grab all of this money you had, Because the first six businesses you walk away from you didn't get it, so now I need to get your attention here. And he got it. Because then I looked back and I was like what did I just do? Why would I walk away? Because I could have sold businesses, I could have sold lists. But what I finally realized I had to go on a soul-searching journey of a couple years. I didn't know it was going to be a couple years, but on a couple-year journey to figure out, like why would I do that? Like what was I doing there? Because I've been married 20 years, I got two kids, and so why would I be walking away from money?

Jim Huntzicker:

Well, my upbringing was money causes conflict. We were really poor growing up. Until we were about five we were homeless. At four we had to move in with my grandparents Like we weren't on the street, but we didn't have our own house anymore and my parents drank a lot prior to that and we were very, very poor. And so we lost a couple of houses the last one, we didn't have enough money to get another one.

Jim Huntzicker:

Then my dad quit drinking. He went from driving limos and laying concrete to, by the time we were 10, he owned multiple gas stations and a real estate office. But the fighting never stopped. So my parents went from fighting about having no money to fighting about the. Now the money's the problem. And then, of course, they got divorced when I was 12. So so to me and my brother we both we both have, we had major issues that money causes conflict, money causes problems. And so what was I doing with those businesses? Well, I love my wife, I had kids. So I was just like subconsciously this was not conscious, but I realized what it was. I was running for business. I was running from the money because I thought I was going to start fighting with my wife, who I love to death and I don't fight with, and I thought I was going to break up my family and get divorced. That was my subconscious belief, because that's what I believed when I was seven. You saw it, that was what you experienced, my experience.

Jim Huntzicker:

It was real life for me and so that's easy to make that. So so, when you look at the good even though I walked away from all those businesses that so much good came from it and one of the good things is money's easy to make and if you just heard me say that and you're like you have to work hard for money, you have a limiting belief buried there that tells you that cause it's not true, Right? So so some people learn from their parents because their parents, and from their parents because their parents. And, by the way, there's no blame here, there's no judgment. Everybody your parents, their parents, the parents who are is doing the best they can with the cards.

Jay Johnson:

They were dealt Right. Yeah, I'm really glad you brought that up, because I do think that a lot of times it is that shame, it's the guilt, it's the the sort of like resentment that's underlying that ends up stopping us from even looking at these beliefs and like, well, I, you know, I, I, I guess you know I, I should be thankful for X, y and Z? Yep, you should. But at the same time you can also look at this and say, hey, this is a belief system that's kind of embedded itself that I it's no longer serving me. You inherited it.

Jim Huntzicker:

Like you were. You were, you didn't decide it on your own, somebody else decided for you and you're like oh well, that's my primary influence and so obviously this is the way it is. Like you don't have any like when you, before you're eight years old, your brain's in theta, which is just you don't have any deductive reasoning, you just take everything as truth, especially from the people who influence you most, like your parents. So that's why, even hearing fights like I heard crazy fights. There was no abuse, but there was just screaming and yelling about money, and my room was next to theirs and so all I heard was these fights about money and money and money, and so money was just bad, and so that was my core limiting belief. But here's the thing your core limiting belief, which is kind of like a marriage or your parents, if that's who raised you. But whoever your primary influences are, you're going to have your core limiting belief from them. And if your parents raised you, it's going to be kind of half your mom's, half your dad's. And the surface level ones the decision director can get rid of those, no problem. But the core ones, so those are anchored by resentment, and so that was something I did not even like I had to go on this journey and figure out and cause I'm like, all right, I'm aware of this belief and I'm aware of why now, but I couldn't seem to shake it Right. Like I couldn't seem to get the belief. Cause I'd say, you know, cause I used to see, like for me, if it was even seeing cars like Range Rovers in my neighborhood or Rolls Royce, and I would automatically be like rich asshole, like automatically, you know, like all the rich people I've met in my life, most of them, like 99%, are incredibly gracious, generous people, right, like so why would I automatically go to rich jerk when I see a nice car? And so now I switched it to I see a nice car and automatically it's like look at all the abundance in the world. Because I made a new decision.

Jim Huntzicker:

But the reason for that is growing up poor. A lot of people. All the access they had to rich people was TV and if you watch a lot of the shows, like I'm 47. So, like a lot of shows from growing up, like you know, gilligan's Island, mash, I can name, you know, because it's still the same today. By the way, the people you related to were the poor people living in scarcity Like could barely. You know they drank a lot. They live check to check they, you know, sometimes like they bought food, that um with that, with the last money they had, or they had to borrow just for that. But those are the people that were funny and you loved, you related to, and the people that you didn't like, the people that were the jerks and the villains of the shows, were the wealthy people. So so it wasn't.

Jay Johnson:

You know it's subtle like the simpsons.

Jim Huntzicker:

The montgomery burns and a hundred percent, yes, like that's so. So because of that, yeah, but that that there's, they're making a joke of it, right, cause it's a Simpsons, which that show is incredible by, like, just their longevity and the. It's just incredible, that show. I don't watch it anymore. I did for years. But that show is incredible. But there you go.

Jim Huntzicker:

That's a perfect example, cause they're, they're, they're, you know, um, exaggerating the, you know the, but that's not. But that's not an exaggeration. There is really people like that. And so, because there's the few that if you don't have any other access to wealthy people and all you see on TV is Mr Burns types, well then you're going to say rich people are jerks, and then you're not going to let yourself be a rich jerk. So, subconsciously, if you believe rich people are jerks, you're not going to let yourself become a rich jerk.

Jim Huntzicker:

So, subconsciously, if you believe rich people are jerks, you're not going to let yourself become a rich jerk. So so you're going to like, you're going to find ways to get rid of your money. That's why people, even people that are worth 30, 40 million, like let's just not say, sports guys that are worth 300, people that do really well in business 30, $40 million that they, that they have a net worth and they go bankrupt. Why? Because they were never comfortable with the money. Like they were smart enough, they obviously had the business savvy, they had education to get them there and to figure out how to make the money. But how did they lose that? They weren't comfortable with it right, so subconsciously, they were never comfortable.

Jay Johnson:

I want to dig into something here, jim, because I think it's really important. I love this concept of resentment and I actually do a lot of work around resentment. I'd love to hear from you, you know, as you're working with somebody or as you're coaching them, when we look at something like money, it's very easy to go oh, you know that jerk in the Rolls Royce, right Like that. Okay, I can see where that resentment kind of lines.

Jay Johnson:

When we look at something, say, whether it's, you know, the surface level, limiting belief, or if, if it's something that's not money related, how can we as individuals kind of identify the resentment, because it's become such an encoded aspect of the way that we think, the way that we feel and so on and so forth. We may not even, because emotions are so funny they don't always show up as what they actually are. Sometimes we look at it as oh, I'm not resentful and I'm not jealous of that person that has this. You know, that's the. How do we pull that resentment out? What do we do to look for that as the underlying sort of feeling that we might be experiencing?

Jim Huntzicker:

The best and most glaring example is blame right. When you want to blame, like oh, they did this to me, well, there's a resentment there, right. Because you're going to say, well, my parents, this, my parents, that this person, this teacher did this right, and so there's resentments there. And it's when you go primal, usually you know, when you have anxiety and fear, you start paying attention to those thoughts Like that's why you write those down. Because once you write them down and start really getting into the details of that like here's another example Like when I realized like I stopped getting mad at my kids several years ago.

Jim Huntzicker:

Like I don't get loud, I used to yell a lot because my dad yelled a lot. Because his dad yelled a lot, right, and so I yelled a lot. I didn't like that, I did and I would. Just it's what I knew. And then I realized something. I had this epiphany one day I forget why it even was, but I was mad about something Like this is the time my kids were like nine I'm like, he's still a kid, like I just didn't teach him this. So my anger was really at myself for not being a good parent, like I haven't parented properly. He's nine and so ever since then, like my kids don't have a free pass, I'm stern, but I don't get mad and I don't yell because I just realized I obviously haven't conveyed my message well enough to them, where it sunk in as a, as a belief that they need and so that that that mindset shift, taking ownership in that ownership of it they need, and so that mindset shift.

Jay Johnson:

Taking ownership in that space. Taking ownership of it Right.

Jim Huntzicker:

Exactly. And so when you do some deep, you know, when you look inside, you truly look and you don't push it away you're also going to find you have resentments to yourself, right, and so, while your parents are the ones that are probably going to tie your core belief down until you let that go, uh, you're going to have issues in your life till you let yourself off the hook too and and like that's like, I have a, literally I have a, uh, a self-resentment inventory and a and a others resentment, just to get, because people like, well, I don't know if I mean here, here's what you do Go to go to ChetGPT, right, like everybody knows what that is now, and put in can you list, give me a list of resentments people hold against themselves? Enter and it'll give you a list. And can you give me a list, like, of resentments people hold against parents? You know against, you know regarding love, money, whatever, from growing up, from growing up, can you just get?

Jim Huntzicker:

Just to get, I need some ideas, cause I know I have resentments but I haven't figured them out yet. Like it's a free resource. It's going to give you an incredible amount of information there, and then you can be like, oh yeah, I got that, I got that. I got that. Oh there, it is there, and now you can work. You know, reverse engineer. Okay, like how do I get rid of this to me? Right, like like they're mad about it, but but the person you're mad at doesn't care anymore. They're not even thinking they've moved on Right.

Jim Huntzicker:

So, so, so you're just you're, you're.

Jay Johnson:

Holding out to resentments is like eating poison or they're completely unaware that they've created this condition. Yeah, for sure, For sure. And even if they are, they don't care right.

Jim Huntzicker:

They're not thinking about it like you are, and so so holding out that resentment is like eating poison and expecting the other person to die. The only person that hurts is you. So so you're not letting them go, You're not letting go of this resentment. They're not letting them off the hook, You're not apologizing to them, You're not saying anything to them. You're just processing this resentment internally to let it go, so it doesn't eat you up inside anymore. It's the same thing. It's the same thing. Like you can look at it like this. Like this is it? This is it. It's not about resentment, but clinging and resisting. Right, Like this I got from Michael.

Jay Johnson:

Singer. If you know Michael Singer, he wrote the untethered soul and surrender experiment.

Jim Huntzicker:

Michael Easter, that's the 2% person you just said.

Jay Johnson:

Michael Easter, it just popped into my brain. Sorry, michael Easter, I was like Michael Easter, it just popped into my brain, Sorry.

Jim Huntzicker:

So Michael Easter was a 2% guy, Michael Singer is a surrender guy and he's who I learned surrender from, but this was probably one of the most profound things I learned from reading his material. Is that okay resisting? We all know resisting it just gets bigger and bigger and like, if you just deal with it, whatever the problem is, it's going to be less than you think and it's going to be easier to process. When you deal with it right now, when you push it away, it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and some of you have been pushing stuff away for 30 and 40 years. So you've got these monsters that you're afraid to deal with because it's been so long. But here's the kicker you also got to process stuff you like, because clinging on to stuff you like also messes with you and you're like wait what? Why don't I get to hold on to the good? No, just experience it. The bad gone, the good gone. Experience it as a good thing, as a bad that sucks. Let me learn a lesson from the bad thing.

Jim Huntzicker:

But here let me give you an example. You go to the beach. It's like the most beautiful sunset you ever saw. Like, oh my God, I cannot wait to back and see this amazing sunset. And you go back to the beach the next time. And what happens? Cloudy, it's overcast.

Jay Johnson:

Yep.

Jim Huntzicker:

And it's beautiful. It's all right because you're still at the beach and you still got this ocean. You still got the moonlight through clouds and it's incredible, but it's not the beautiful pastel colors you saw the first time and now you're let down. So now you're going primal, from something you like, something you like right. So you're you, because you had a belief that this is, this is always this way. You said that you clung on to it and you're like I have to have this to be good, so you that that sets your minimum standard of what like yeah, an internal expectation barometer almost, and it can go in either of the directions.

Jim Huntzicker:

That's exactly the next time you go now you're let down by something you absolutely loved. It was incredibly beautiful, when you could have just experienced it. Going back the next time, like look at this, look at the moon and the clouds there's no colors this time, but look at how incredible. This is right, but now you're let down instead.

Jay Johnson:

So I love this. It actually reminds me a little bit of Tai Chi and so I did mixed martial arts for a long time and everybody was always surprised, like Tai Chi is a nonviolent mixed martial arts or you know a martial art, and maybe not even considered a martial art, but it is. It's the idea of being able to surrender to a pressure and to be able to sort of pivot and to be able to reshift and move it into something else and turn, you know, some kind of like net power force yeah.

Jim Huntzicker:

External. I've never studied Tai Chi. I'm fascinated by it though. So so you know you're exactly right with this example. You're a hundred percent correct. Like this is a great example.

Jay Johnson:

Okay, so let's, let's, let's take this Cause I love the, I love the three columns right. So we have the, the limited belief for the surface level limited belief. We have the middle of the, of the opposite of that.

Jay Johnson:

Yeah, and then finding the evidence for it. So I'm thinking about this in terms of workforce development and if we can take it there for a second, jim right, when we're doing training, coaching or anything else inside of trying to develop a workforce. My guess and I've seen this, so it's a partial guess, but I would be willing to bet that in a number of those different instances you're gonna have the audience with some level of resentment Resentment for having to learn something new, to change a behavior, because people don't always love change. They look at it and go, oh my gosh, this is hard. Or the brain says that this is hard and why can't we just do it the way that?

Jim Huntzicker:

we've always done it. Your current belief system says it is right.

Jay Johnson:

Yeah, but you're right, there's gonna be resentment there against this dude.

Jim Huntzicker:

Who's this guy?

Jay Johnson:

So we're going to see some level of resistance, and this is well documented. This is something that we've done in our research. We see a lot of resistance to talent development programs. So, in this regard, if I'm a leader, if I'm a coach, if I'm a leader, if I'm a coach, if I'm a trainer, if I'm an HR person, and I want to introduce some kind of new behavior or some kind of new intervention that's going to create the conditions of change, how should I be thinking about resentment? How should I be thinking about this mindset to start off, so that way I can get the audience in the right foot to be able to make those kinds of shifts or transitions? What are your thoughts?

Jim Huntzicker:

Well, the first step to anything right to make change is awareness. Most of them might not even be aware that the resentment is what is coming up. They just might be getting angry. They're going primal. They're like you know who the F is this guy to tell me how to, how to run my team. Or you know, like who is who who guy to tell me how to run my team. Or you know, like who are they bringing Right? But if you start with the awareness, like you get out in front of it right, like they might already be aware they're going to teach them something. But if you just lead with resentment and tell them what they're going to process, it will change the way they view that experience, because now they're going to see it from the eyes of oh wait, okay.

Jim Huntzicker:

Like I would even use powerful and primal states of being. So you see, like you're, either you're either going to be learning here in a powerful state, like you are right now, like you're optimistic, you're energetic, you're excited, or you're probably like who the F is this dude? Who does he think he is? I need, I have work to do. You know you're pissed off, like so. So if you're in a primal state of being, you're not going to learn well today, but if you're in a powerful state of being, you're going to take. Even if you take one thing away. What if it's that one thing that helps you get a 10% raise on your next evaluation? Right Like what if?

Jay Johnson:

that one thing Saves you five hours of time a week, whatever that might be, yeah.

Jim Huntzicker:

Right, exactly so I think, framing it the right way and letting them know that they're about, some of them are about to experience resentment and go primal and they're not going to learn, and so you could take that into their everyday life, right Like, be like, hey, does this happen in your daily life too? Because if it's happening right here, right now, this is not because of me, it's got nothing to do with me. This is all because of your internal resistance, because of your belief system that you have. You're allowing you to resent something you don't. This could be the this, this one meeting could be the thing that makes this pivotal change in your entire mindset and future, that changes the entire trajectory of where you're going.

Jim Huntzicker:

It could just be one little thing from the 10 points I'm about to give you, but because you're primal, you're not going to get any of the 10 points, because you think you're too good for this, because you have resentment right now. And so if you don't turn on to being more open-minded or optimistic, I'm sure you're noticing this everywhere in your life, because it's not just me, right? So if you throw it back like that and tell it, they're going to start, they're going to reflect and be like oh shit, like this is all over my life, like, I do this all the time, right, like, and so they, because we're, we're, we're, we're, we're creatures of habit. Every you know. So these are just and here's the craziest thing that we get addicted to negative emotions. We get addicted to like.

Jim Huntzicker:

That goes back to like well, why do people go lose $300 million and go bankrupt? Because they, they're addicted to scarcity, they're addicted to poverty, and it's because it's what they're comfortable Like. Well, why, why would that be? I want money, and everybody says that, but but when your comfort zone, in your subconscious, when you're comfortable, is poverty, is poor, it's how you grew up, right, and so so the change is is becoming the person with money, becoming the wealthy person, and so so they, they go back to their, their, their, what they're comfortable with, which is which is living in scarcity.

Jay Johnson:

I see that a lot in entrepreneurs, cause it's often it's oftentimes chaos that breeds innovation and that's where you get a lot of really good entrepreneurs. But they are comfortable in that world of chaos and they're not able to necessarily break out and say, okay, what got me here was this innovation, this having to overcome whatever this chaos, this craziness is, but now I need systems and that transition that that shift, uh is where I see a lot of entrepreneurs go wrong is because they are essentially resisting some of that sort of like structure, because it's not comfortable to them or it's you know, and they might have to ask for help to get it in.

Jim Huntzicker:

A lot of guys, especially if they made, they'd made some, you know, and they might have to ask for help to get it. And a lot of guys, especially if they made, they made some, you know, they started this business from scratch, they did, they did well. And now, all of a sudden, what I'm going to go listen to somebody else Like, I have to take orders, I have to, I have to ask for help and let somebody like, like, and they can't do that because that's a you know well, we are taught. Going back to the beginning of, like, world War. I, like men, were taught to not have emotion because men with emotion don't kill people, right, so that still carries forward today. Right, like, why are men like you? Men don't cry, right, like, well, why is that? Like, why men can't be vulnerable? Why is that? Well, because we were taught that from a very early age, because they were making soldiers, right, so we don't have to worry about that so much anymore. Right, there's no draft, they're not making everybody a soldier, but that mindset is stuck with. And because this is how the this is why there's no judgment and there's no blame anywhere, because your parents and their parents and their parents were all doing the best they could with the cards. They were dealt right Because their parents taught them. So if they never did this kind of work the kind of work I teach you know on mindset and you know and how to deal with beliefs and how to change beliefs if they've never done that work especially the resentment side of it then they're just carrying it and they're giving it and they're giving it and they're giving it, and there's no blame. They're not doing anything wrong. They're doing the best they can with the cards they were dealt.

Jim Huntzicker:

So, like, a lot of people don't want to deal with resentments to their parents as an adult Cause like, well, I love my mom, I love my dad, they're my best friend today and it's. It's not about not loving them today. But if you go back to when you were five and you're like that mother, like you got, you have some resentment there, well then you have to let it go and it's not about dealing with the other person. This is all inside you and so that's like, like you know, most people are afraid to deal with resentment because they're like, they think they have to confront the person, or or they think it's they're they're confronting it in their own minds to bring up an emotion and it is. And you have to process that emotion because if you don't, you're never going to get rid of it. Right, you don't have to process it for days, like you've already been processing it for years, right, years. Well, you've been avoiding it, so it's been growing right, but all you have to do you sit with it Like this is the resentment framework. I'll give you this as the last framework. We're going to be wrapping things up here soon.

Jim Huntzicker:

But in order to get rid of resentment, once you figure out what it is which is not hard, where you go, primal, you say I'm not, you know. When you think back and you're like you know, they wronged me, like that there's a resentment there. So you got to name the resentment like, literally write it out on a piece of paper. My mom, my teacher said this. My so-and-so said that, whatever, it is right. And then you got to feel it. You got to sit there, close your eyes, go back to that time in your visualized and cry about it. Like you know you don't have to, but if you do, that's really good. That's you processing the pain. You never you haven't done that yet.

Jim Huntzicker:

So once you process the pain, like do it for three minutes, do it for five minutes, like stop, cause, cause, then what you do is you say, okay, all right, I felt this pain, this sucked, that, that really sucked. But is there, is there a cost to keeping it? Or is there any benefit to keeping this and holding onto this resentment? And of course, it's going to be no, right. And so then this is the most powerful part Give it a new meaning. Because why would we give anything a meaning in our lives? Like Jay, we do this, all of us do this every day.

Jim Huntzicker:

Why do we give anything a meaning that doesn't serve us? Like, think about that, it's the craziest thing. Like we assign meaning to stuff all the time that bring us down, that make us sad, that make us unhappy, that make us not as productive, that make us not as beneficial to other people, not as good in our marriage, not as good to our kids. Why in the world do we do that? It's because we're wired for survival, right, so we know why. But here's the thing you don't have to let that be. You could always assign a new meaning to things. If you go by default, your default is going to assign a meaning that doesn't serve you. That's just the way we're wired. That's our human nature. That's us running from saber-toothed tigers. That's like caveman programming, but we still have the same minds as cavemen. So crazy, but it's true. And so now you're left with the. Where's I going with that? The? I lost my train of thought.

Jay Johnson:

It's the meaning that ultimately ends up yeah, it ends up giving us the context of how we perceive something, because it's the same thing that you said earlier is we can take something like I stubbed my toe and go, oh gosh, that's the worst thing ever. Oh, I've hurt myself and I can't believe this rather, stubbed my toe and go, oh gosh, that's the worst thing ever. Oh, I've hurt myself and I can't believe this. Rather than the meaning of wow, I was able to walk, which is a value proposition. Oh, I still have feeling in my toe.

Jim Huntzicker:

Oh, I have toes. How about? I'm grateful, I have toes still right.

Jim Huntzicker:

Like this reminded me that I still have toes that work, and if I kick things it hurts, so maybe I should pay better attention when I'm walking around what's at the ground. But but just that alone, just that, just that gratitude alone, and so like, like so. So the you know people that have desires, like, like so. So if you have a desire and you don't have it yet and you're not grateful for what you have, no matter what it is and when I say grateful for what you have, I mean everything, all the terrible stuff that's happened to you, all the good stuff, whatever you have in your life, your current bank account, whatever it looks like right now, if you can't find gratitude for that, like for today, for being alive today, If you're hearing this, you're taking a breath, and that is something for you to be grateful for.

Jim Huntzicker:

Well, right, and you have abundance because you're listening to this on an electronic device that probably costs a thousand dollars, right, like that's what most people have in their hands these days, and so you should. There should be a ton of gratitude, but but so, like my, the first thing I do every day after I take a cold shower is I have a gratitude journal.

Jay Johnson:

And I'm a cold plunge person too.

Jim Huntzicker:

I love it. Yeah, all right, it's incredible, I don't. I do a shower, because that way nobody has excuses. Because it's like, okay, if I have a cold place, you're like, well, you have a cold plunge. Like like I don't have that, so I can't do it. I'm like, okay, well, cold showers are harder. Yeah, yeah, well, I don't get. By the way, I don't jump in cold. I'm not a psychopath. Like warm, you know, like jumping into a cold shower is impossible. So if that was your excuse, you're right, that is very difficult to do. If you can do it, more power to you. But I put it lukewarm, I get in and then I turn it as cold as I can and I sit there for a minute and I just eat it.

Jim Huntzicker:

And it's because one it teaches your subconscious that you can handle uncomfortable things, because in order to grow in life, you need to do things that are uncomfortable and you start your day off doing something uncomfortable. Well then, the inevitable uncomfortable things that come with growth during your day are going to seem a lot easier and you're going to automatically go through them instead of shy away from them. So it's extremely, extremely powerful. But the gratitude, but the first thing I write is for me. I write, dear father, thank you for. And I write today because we're not guaranteed today, right. But then the second thing I write that I'm grateful for is a negative event that's happened to me recently that good came out of. So that way I'm conscious of looking for good in everything.

Jim Huntzicker:

Every day I write a negative event that good came out of. Even for us there was a ton of my family. A ton of good stuff came out of COVID, like several good things, and so while that was a shitty time in history, for my family it was really good, and if you look at your family, there's probably a lot of good too. Sometimes you got to dig for it. I didn't have to. I was like this is incredible, know this? This was a. You know this sucked, but for my family it didn't, because so much good came from it.

Jim Huntzicker:

And then I, you know I write I'm grateful for my family. You know my dog, uh, my house, my cars, clothes, you know like, like and and so. But the negative event changes your mindset, the way you view things, because then you even like, when a guy cuts you off, like who cares? Like, like he doesn't know you. It's not against you. He would have cut anybody off if he watched that guy drive. He's gonna cut four more people off. It had nothing to do with you. But why do you let that boil your you know, boil your blood so much and get you so mad like you gave all your power?

Jay Johnson:

to your heart attack yeah, that doesn't that doesn't bad. Driving should not be the cause of your heart attack.

Jim Huntzicker:

No, but, but so many people do. And now somebody you know like, like, I used to be like that. And now somebody cuts me off, like oh, they're probably having a bad day. I'm not and I'm not gonna let them ruin mine. Right, like, so it's all how you frame it Like, so, so, so the the uh back to the uh framework to let go of resentments. We are on giving it a new meaning. You could always assign a meeting that serves you always. It's a choice not to. And the last thing is is let it go right. So. So that was the five steps. You know it was name it, feel it, cost benefit analysis, reframe it, give it a new meaning and let it go.

Jim Huntzicker:

And I literally like, when I was like learning this stuff, like okay, I gotta let it go. Like, how do I like? How do I like, what do I do to let it? You know, like, something, like, and so I like this is I still do this today because every day I go primal. I'm not like some superhero that doesn't go. Every day I go primal, but I don't live there if I get mad, upset, angry, stressed, 30 seconds, maybe 90, 90, if it's something huge and I'm out, I'm done. I'm like, okay, let's reframe this, I'm not gonna let it affect me anymore. But I literally go like this. I like I take a deep breath in, I wave my hands past my head, gone, and I don't feel it anymore. Like so for me, like this action, like I thought I would like at first, like I won't do this forever. But to me, like whenever I process it, like I'm processing a resentment, a new resentment that comes up, like you don't get, this is not work. There's no finish line with this work, by the way. It's just, it's a way of being right, it's a way of dealing with life, because life is not easy if you haven't noticed right, and so it doesn't get any easier. This work helps you process the suck right. There's really good parts and that you process just fine. But the suck, which is a lot of what life can be if you don't process it the right way and give it good meanings. This work helps you process those parts of life.

Jim Huntzicker:

And so now something comes up. I just like I'll sit in my car or sit in wherever. I'm like all right, and that's the good stuff too. When something awesome happens, I'm like rock and roll, that was fantastic. I just look, I smile thinking about it, right Because it's so good, but I don't want to hold on to it.

Jim Huntzicker:

Right, because I know that until I learned that, which wasn't but five years ago during COVID, I read one of Michael's books, um and um, uh, that is where I learned to process the cause, cause I was like I was holding on to everything, right, and so I had all kinds of I was a mess, right, and I'm still sorting out pieces because, like you know, like my mom, god love her, she's fantastic, but she's extremely judgmental, very opinionated and doesn't stop talking about it. So when my parents were fighting, when my dad was gone, as a kid, I had my mom in my ear and she is just nonstop. When she's talking to people on the phone to like, so she just says whatever. And so that's why my money issues were so deeply ingrained as, like my core limiting belief and the tide of these resentments Cause my ma. I had all this resentment for her because I knew that she's the one that planted all this stuff.

Jim Huntzicker:

And so, while like, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna make a new decision, make a new decision, but nothing changed, nothing changed, nothing changed, and I'm like, no, this shit doesn't work. You know, I got this. I got the surface level ones are easy, and I was, I was, I was bad, right, and then I found resentments and I was like, oh, what's this Like all right. So I had to dig deep into resentments and, like I'd studied the you know, the behavioral, psychology side of resentments, and once I realized how, how, like, like, like I read, you know, like you know, eating poison, expecting the other person to die, I read that I was like that. That was the one phrase that changed everything for me, because it was like, yeah, I'm not forgiving, she did this to me, you know, and but but when you really think about it, like, does that mean serving you? Is it providing good in your life to keep that resentment, hold on to it and be negative all the time? Probably not Right.

Jay Johnson:

And so it's a process. It's probably not changing any behaviors.

Jim Huntzicker:

No one really.

Jay Johnson:

which is really that? You know it's not changing their behavior, it's not changing your behavior. The only way to change that is to really kind of do that internal work.

Jim Huntzicker:

Yeah, and if you've never done the work, guess what? It's still in you and you have to do it or you're going to die with it. And some, and most people do like like, you know, like, if you look at, look at, ask Chad GPT, how many people are financially broke at 70? It's crazy. It's because they never dealt with those beliefs from growing up, because most people do grow up in scarcity and poverty or not with a lot of money, and the reason they stay there is because they never changed the belief system and so they live check to check, or they have investments that they make that aren't good, that money gets taken away and so anything extra they don't have by the time they're 65 or 70, they got nothing. That's most people, right, because they never do this work.

Jim Huntzicker:

So if you're listening to this, just be fortunate that you're becoming aware that this work even exists, cause I, it still blows my mind that I talk to people about limiting beliefs and they're like, yeah, I've heard about that, or you know I'll say resentments and like, well, you know they don't like, they don't get it, and I can appreciate it because you know, eight years ago I didn't either, and so it is just it's a, this is just a way of being and it's a way of dealing with, you know, life's problems. And here's the best part is, once you figure this out, like nothing bothers you anymore, like like the stuff that sucks is like all right, let's give it a good meeting, move on like that. I don't like that. I didn't, or I made this mistake. Like I wish I didn't make that mistake, but I did learn this lesson.

Jim Huntzicker:

Here's what I learned from it, here's the value that came from it and here's how I can operate in moving forward, move on right Because, like if you're having stress or anxiety all the time and you're taking drugs for it which is nonsense, by the way but if you're having stress or anxiety, it's because you know where you're not living. You're not living in the present moment, You're living in the future, which is where your anxiety comes from, or you're thinking about the past, which is where your stress comes from, and so they can change too, but usually anxiety is about the future, stress is about the past. But if you just focus on the present moment and being the best version of yourself today, right now, in this moment, and be present for the people in front of you, everything changes. Gratitude and presence will change your life.

Jay Johnson:

Such a great call to action. Jim, if the audience wanted to get in touch with you, how would they connect with you?

Jim Huntzicker:

My book is available on Amazon Mindset Breakthrough. You can just search it. You can go to mindsetbreakthroughcom also to get the book and my website. I'm not on social media very much. You shouldn't be either, unless you're using social media to make money. Maybe 20 minutes because, because part of your fear, stress, anxiety, fear, missing out, comparison, all the stuff that's causing issues in your life, it could be from social media alone. So so just know that your hours of scrolling a day are messing with your mindset in ways you we never even experienced 10 years ago, 20 years ago. There was other ways. Back then, this is, uh, this is like messing with your, your emotions on steroids and and they have it you addicted to it too. Right, like they.

Jim Huntzicker:

they know the algorithm yeah, well, they use, they use, they use casino um slot machine technology. It's the same thing, you know, because that's how they keep you going triggering that dopaminergic system?

Jay Johnson:

yep 100.

Jim Huntzicker:

So my website's jimhuntskercom. It's just my, my name. It'll be in the show notes, um, but you can go there and get ahold of me. I do have social media, like. You can find me on LinkedIn, you can find me on Instagram, but I don't log onto them. So if you want to send me a message, go to my website. Uh, because I's not on social media much easier, so she's not very good, but because social media is not where there's nothing good on social media, like, I'm using it now more to get you know, to get to my audience, cause this is a newer business for me. I started about a year ago getting it off the ground and so so this is still newer and so I'm growing my audience. I've never been a social media person.

Jay Johnson:

That could literally be its own show. Let me tell you Now, jim, this has been an incredible conversation. I really appreciate you bringing these tools like actionable tools that are going to help shift some behavior. So I just want to say thank you for being here and sharing your wisdom, your experience and your story with everybody that is listening here today. So thank you for that.

Jim Huntzicker:

Yeah, benji, thanks for having me. This was a great, great conversation.

Jay Johnson:

And thank you, audience, for tuning into this episode of the Talent Forge, where together we're shaping workforce behavior.

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Jay Johnson, CEO and Co-Founder of Behavioral Elements

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