
What is holding you back from your goals? Understanding limiting beliefs with John Assaraf
Explicit content warning
04/02/20 • 54 min
Our internal dialogue creates our external reality. When this reality is one of fear, self-doubt, shame, and judgment, it acts as an obstacle, holding you back from living a life of alignment and purpose. No matter how good we may be at goal setting, if we do not work on these mental roadblocks, we will never get to where we want to be. Today's guest is a phenomenal leader in the behavioral and mindset world, John Assaraf. When he started, his focus was on helping people thrive financially. He has since pivoted to helping people overcome what’s holding them back. In this episode, John shares his fascinating journey with us and the tools he was given at a young age to succeed. The skills John’s mentor equipped him with helped him change his neural pathways of beliefs, habits, expectations, and setpoints. We also learn about achieving goals and why it is a more holistic process than many of us know. It requires activating five parts of our brains, which means that setting the goal is simply the first step. John also talks about the importance of understanding how your emotional responses are triggered when you begin to work on new goals. If you have continually let yourself down by not achieving your goals, you likely have trauma around it. By learning new skills of awareness, you can rewire your brain to set yourself up for sustainable success. John also sheds light on his innercises, and how taking small, decisive steps have cumulative effects that ultimately help create seismic shifts. He shares more on the importance of alignment as well as why focusing on the process and not the outcome gets you where you want to be. John is an incredibly inspiring leader, and we are so grateful he took the time to be with us. Today's podcast is brought to you by BLUblox, the world’s most advanced blue light glasses. It's so important to take care of your eyes, yourself, your sleep, especially during a super stressful time. So, head to blublox.com and use the code ‘muscle’ to get a 15% discount on a pair of these incredible glasses.
Timestamps
- How Ben and Muscle Intelligence community are moving through this challenging time. [3:56]
- Learn about John’s background and the shift that happened in his teaching and thinking. [7:23]
- Find out what John’s mentor showed him that changed his life forever. [9:07]
- What happens in the brain when we set goals and increasing the likelihood of achieving them. [11:41]
- What motivated John to write his latest book, Innercise. [15:45]
- Goal-setting versus goal achieving and what prevents people from taking action. [16:57]
- How we developed our current neural networks and what we can do to change them. [22:13]
- Why creating skills and a language of awareness will lead to neural changes. [24:11]
- Learn more about how mindfulness training brings us back into a state of consciousness. [26:09]
- How long it takes to develop a new habitual pattern. [28:58]
- Success comes from following fundamental processes and patterns and commitment [31:14]
- Learn why you have to interrupt existing processes to create a new mindset. [34:12]
- Insights into three of John’s innercises and how they help retrain the nervous system. [36:14]
- The Get Off Your Ass Law: Learn about John’s GOYA law and what it entails. [40:29]
- John’s unusual way of getting clarity and staying focused on all his goals. [43:38]
- Find out more about John’s meditation routine and how it changes. [48:11]
Our internal dialogue creates our external reality. When this reality is one of fear, self-doubt, shame, and judgment, it acts as an obstacle, holding you back from living a life of alignment and purpose. No matter how good we may be at goal setting, if we do not work on these mental roadblocks, we will never get to where we want to be. Today's guest is a phenomenal leader in the behavioral and mindset world, John Assaraf. When he started, his focus was on helping people thrive financially. He has since pivoted to helping people overcome what’s holding them back. In this episode, John shares his fascinating journey with us and the tools he was given at a young age to succeed. The skills John’s mentor equipped him with helped him change his neural pathways of beliefs, habits, expectations, and setpoints. We also learn about achieving goals and why it is a more holistic process than many of us know. It requires activating five parts of our brains, which means that setting the goal is simply the first step. John also talks about the importance of understanding how your emotional responses are triggered when you begin to work on new goals. If you have continually let yourself down by not achieving your goals, you likely have trauma around it. By learning new skills of awareness, you can rewire your brain to set yourself up for sustainable success. John also sheds light on his innercises, and how taking small, decisive steps have cumulative effects that ultimately help create seismic shifts. He shares more on the importance of alignment as well as why focusing on the process and not the outcome gets you where you want to be. John is an incredibly inspiring leader, and we are so grateful he took the time to be with us. Today's podcast is brought to you by BLUblox, the world’s most advanced blue light glasses. It's so important to take care of your eyes, yourself, your sleep, especially during a super stressful time. So, head to blublox.com and use the code ‘muscle’ to get a 15% discount on a pair of these incredible glasses.
Timestamps
- How Ben and Muscle Intelligence community are moving through this challenging time. [3:56]
- Learn about John’s background and the shift that happened in his teaching and thinking. [7:23]
- Find out what John’s mentor showed him that changed his life forever. [9:07]
- What happens in the brain when we set goals and increasing the likelihood of achieving them. [11:41]
- What motivated John to write his latest book, Innercise. [15:45]
- Goal-setting versus goal achieving and what prevents people from taking action. [16:57]
- How we developed our current neural networks and what we can do to change them. [22:13]
- Why creating skills and a language of awareness will lead to neural changes. [24:11]
- Learn more about how mindfulness training brings us back into a state of consciousness. [26:09]
- How long it takes to develop a new habitual pattern. [28:58]
- Success comes from following fundamental processes and patterns and commitment [31:14]
- Learn why you have to interrupt existing processes to create a new mindset. [34:12]
- Insights into three of John’s innercises and how they help retrain the nervous system. [36:14]
- The Get Off Your Ass Law: Learn about John’s GOYA law and what it entails. [40:29]
- John’s unusual way of getting clarity and staying focused on all his goals. [43:38]
- Find out more about John’s meditation routine and how it changes. [48:11]
Previous Episode

A new deep dive on peptides with expert Ryan Smith
Peptides will most likely be a familiar term for most listeners of this podcast, with the awareness of their benefits and effects growing steadily during the last part of the 20th century and into this one. Today we are joined by Ryan Smith, one of the top three leading experts on the subject of peptides! He is the CEO of Tailor Made Compounding, a company out of Kentucky that has now gone international. He is here to discuss the impact of peptides, the effects of certain products and just share his general genius for this area of knowledge. It has become clear that peptide use, amongst so many other types of supplements and health science, is the most tissue-specific treatment modality and Ryan shares so much about how this all works in many different cases. You are not going to want to miss out on a second of this conversation! He gets into so many different products, some of which might be familiar and many you may not have heard of too.
Do not forget to visit our unbelievable show sponsors, BLUblox. Get 15% off my favorite blue light-blocking glasses from BLUBlox at https://blublox.com/muscleintelligence using the code MUSCLE
Timestamps
- Ryan's work in the realm of peptides and the two approaches his company takes. [2:55]
- The history of peptides, important discoveries and mainstream awareness. [4:49]
- Two mechanisms for peptides and different long term benefits. [6:58]
- A broad-stroke approach with growth hormone versus more precise means. [10:06]
- Thoughts on the concerns about growth hormones and different types of cancers. [15:53]
- The excitement around NA-1 and its efficacy in fighting cancer and viral illnesses. [17:09]
- Dosing schedules and the mechanistic, inner workings of Epitalon. [18:58]
- Sleep benefits, daily dosage times and fitting into a natural pulse. [20:28]
- Using peptides to stimulate the pituitary and the effects on sleep. [21:42]
- The range of mitochondrial peptides that Ryan is working with at the moment. [25:56]
- The fat loss dimension to this conversation and the results seen so far. [27:21]
- Ryan's thoughts on the popular BPC-157 and who could use it for best results. [31:11]
- The products that Ryan is most excited about in terms of brain optimization. [34:07]
- Statistics for Dihexa and how it compares to other products. [37:08]
- Cerebrolysin and the results that have been noted in cases of stroke and TBI. [41:27]
- The areas that Ryan is most excited about currently in the peptide space. [45:25]
- The process of FDA approval and listing of available products. [47:58]
- Potential negative effects of peptides; side-effects and allergies. [4:26]
- Understanding lipopolysaccharides and avoiding some serious health dangers. [50:30]
- Regulation and legality; avoiding dangerous products from unknown sources. [52:07]
Next Episode

Q&A: Taking listener questions and more thoughts on thriving during quarantine
We find ourselves in quite a crazy crisis right now but there is still so much to be grateful for and we can only look forward at the opportunities that are present in front of us. Today's show is the recording of a live broadcast in which the Q&A traverses the usual range of topics with the added element of the coronavirus and quarantine! The first point that is made is that this is an opportunity like none other; why not use this quarantine period and break from regular routine to do something you have always wanted to do or make some important changes in your life? The hurdles that we find in our path are the only way to growth! Ben makes an argument for why this is a better time than any to offer value to others. Whether in your business or outside of it, show people what you can do for them and you will reap the rewards. Ben and Ash talk about their routines during this lockdown period and share some of the steps they have taken to make sure this time is profitable and healthy.
They also give a bunch of practical advice for certain exercises and how to incorporate better breathing into your routines before tackling the subject of female weight-loss. The episode ends off with some thoughts on cycling in and out of keto and how to help your body through regular fasting. Thank you to our awesome show sponsor, makers of my favorite grass-fed collagen and powdered MCT: BUBS, a company making just a few extremely high-quality products and giving back a whopping 10% of their sales to charity. I use their powdered collagen and MCT in my coffee every morning. Use the code MUSCLE for a full 20% off your purchase HERE.
Timestamps
- Current opportunities for innovation and support; obstacles as the way to growth. [0:50]
- The group coaching program that Ben is launching next week! [4:50]
- Figuring out how to provide more value during this crisis. [8:49]
- The concept of unimpeachable credentials; more meaningful than anything else. [14:00]
- Ben's quarantine experience so far and how he started taking action ASAP. [15:38]
- Doing better instead of more to scale your current projects. [18:02]
- Routines for food and exercise around the Pakulski home. [24:37]
- The opportunities that are offered by quarantine to make a massive change. [30:15]
- Squatting techniques, getting back to bodybuilding and better weight-loss practices. [35:05]
- Optimizing breathing and opening up the diaphragm for fuller inhalation. [39:20]
- Finding ways to improve on and beat competitors in your lane. [46:11]
- Some workout recommendations from Ben for better extensions and range. [48:30]
- Obstacles to female weight-loss; eating too little, bad gut health and not lifting enough. [50:50]
- Keto periods and cycling in and out of these as a health tool. [54:30]
- Some exciting news about the Muscle Intelligence membership site and blog! [1:02:16]
- Fasting and taking a break from meat protein to jumpstart cell-death. [1:10:15]
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