You Are Two People In One – The Doer and The Observer

Kelly Hatfield: 00:00:00

Welcome to The Missing Secret Podcast. I'm Kelly Hatfield

John Mitchell: 00:00:03

Hey and I'm John Mitchell. So here's our topic today. You are two people in one, the doer you and the observer you. So Kelly, what do you think about that you buy that?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:00:18

I'm excited to dive into it. I need to, I need some more clarity on what this means. I think I get it, but, yeah, let's get into it. Well.

John Mitchell: 00:00:27

This stems from, from teaching, think a bit, to my students at the University of Texas, and I basically have taught it to them over six classes, and now they're all doing their life, GPS template and implementing that, that habit. But I found that it was helpful to make them sort of step back from all this and maybe take a 30,000 foot view of, think it be it, in that, in that you really are two people. There's there's the the you that is doing all the doing, and then there's the you that is observing the doing and directing and guiding and giving feedback on the doing. And I think that is particularly pertinent to think it because you're having the mental clarity to step back from your life and describe your desired life and what you want to achieve, and how you're going to achieve it. And so by the nature of that, you're stepping back and being the observer of your life, and then you're feeding it to yourself, the doer, part of you, every morning, in fact, the way I put it to to them, I said, every morning for 12 minutes a day, you got everybody on the team sitting right there. You got the doer sitting there, and you got the observer sitting there. And you're feeding your desired life to yourself. Well, for the doer, we're just telling the doer here do these things, here's here's what I want you to do specifically. And for the observer, the observer is evaluating what the life GPS template is, is instructing the doer to do and observing, are there any tweaks to this, any refinements to this? And so I don't know. It just feels like a a good way to make people realize really there are two people in one, and they usually fold into each other, but probably three or four times a day, if not more, the observer will separate and make some comment on, on what the doer is doing you, what do you? What do you think about all that you buy that

Kelly Hatfield: 00:02:54

I'm interested. Can you give like, I know you gave like, a 30,000 foot example related specifically to your life, GPS template, like in the morning, right? How would these two selves interact with one another during the day, like a site, so like in the observing and then the doing, can you

John Mitchell: 00:03:15

Well, I think, like an example would be the negative inner voice. Sometimes the negative inner voice will come up and go, Oh, you can't accomplish that. Or, you know, well, okay, now, now there's a part of you that's separating from the doer and is being actually a negative influence on on you, making a comment on the actions of the doer. Said, Does that make sense?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:03:41

Yeah, I think so. I'm, yeah, I'm, I'm trying to make the connection. I get the observer. So is the observer in that example you just gave, the one that recognizes that the negative, yeah, is observing and going, oh, wait a minute. You know, that's negative self talk. We're not supposed to be doing that. And then the doer, the, you know, as a result of the observer recognizing that, then the doer is changing their the behavior.

John Mitchell: 00:04:06

Well, almost, I think the the fact that you have a negative self talk is, is the observer side of you separating from the doer side and making a comment on the performance of the doer and whether you're doing think it, be it or not. And I think that negative inner voice is the most, the easiest way to see this, where, where there are comments made to the doer on what's going on, by by someone else or something else. And I think it just shows you it. It always exists. There's always a doer, there's always a observer. And it's your choice as to whether you make that observer a helpful entity in your in your life, or in. Not, most people don't do anything to make it a helpful observer and and they therefore live with that, that negative inner voice, which is how the observer typically plays out with most people said that help?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:05:17

Yeah, I think so. It's an interesting concept, you know, and again, wrapping my head around it and trying what would be another? Is there another example that you can think of, beyond the negative voice that's more, that's like something more tangible, you know, or a scenario, or, you know, like, or like a scenario where, you

John Mitchell: 00:05:36

know, I don't, I don't know. I mean, you may have trouble understanding it because you don't have a negative inner voice. Yeah, you used to, but, but, you know, you very much do. I mean, like as an example is, is thinking time, you know, setting aside time to to deep think couple times a week. Well, that's a that's a good example of the observer. You stepping back from the doer, you and separating and going, Okay, we're gonna take a little time out here, and I'm going to think about what's going on here in my life, what's working, what's not working. Let me observe and see what I'm seeing, then I can adjust the what the doer is doing, right?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:06:28

That makes sense to me, that like immediately clicks for me, because when I think of observing, I, you know, I think about observing. I think about right, looking at your life, you know, back to when we were talking initially, when you intro the subject, when you're talking about putting getting the clarity that's required to get your life GPS template set up, you're in observer mode. You know, in my mind, you are observing when you are it. That's the way I'm interpreting it. Anyway. Is that true? Like when you're finding clarity and evaluating your life, and you're on that you are an observer mode in that seat. And then in the example you just gave, when you go into thinking mode, you're in observing mode. What right is there a connection between conscious mind and observer and unconscious? And the do in, oh,

John Mitchell: 00:07:18

Yeah, I I think exactly, I think they're, they're completely tied together. The the conscious mind is always the observer, yes, subconscious mind is always the doer.

Kelly Hatfield: 00:07:30

That makes sense to me, right, right?

John Mitchell: 00:07:33

I think that's, that's true. And I think at the end of the day, though, when you say, who are you? You're the observer of your life. That's what that's that's who you are when we're talking about who are you, you're the observer of your life. And I think I got this from the book, letting go, but it is a powerful concept when you start seeing that, oh, I am simply the observer of my life. And yes, there is a doer side of me, and they fold into 181 another most the time, but at the end of the day, I'm the observer of my life. Well, what do you think about that concept?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:08:18

No, that makes sense to me. Absolutely. That makes sense to me. But the one question I have that ties to so much of what we talk about is, to what extent are people fully in that observer not fully in that observer seat, but in that observer seat enough? Because I feel like that's part of the challenge that society has right now is that they're so externally focused, that they're, you know, that that observer of themselves is something that is being, you know, overlooked with, oh, I That's a fair, you know, absolutely,

John Mitchell: 00:08:56

Absolutely, I think there was probably something After I taught my class, they could be at this, this most recent time that, that they, they don't even understand that there are two people in one. They're, I mean, they're very driven by doing their influence by the outside world and and they're just so wrapped up in in doing and basically hanging on for dear life to get things done. Yeah, I and this, and this is true. I think not just college students, but people in general. They get up and man, they are. It's a scramble to get out the door and get to work. There's not a lick of stuff done for mindset. They're just all doing, doing, doing and and if you said to them, Well, you know, might be good idea to set aside time to think. A couple times a week, there go, are you kidding me? I don't have time to think and, and I'm like, Whoa, then you don't have a life.

Kelly Hatfield: 00:10:11

Yeah, I and I would argue too, how much time are you spending on social media? Yeah, the average people, you know what I mean, then you have time to think for sure, because the hours person, I think it's crazy now, and this is low, is like three hours a day, right?

John Mitchell: 00:10:27

I know Tony Robbins. I heard him say, if you don't have 10 minutes a day, you don't have a life. Yeah. Boy, that is, that is so true. And I was telling my my students, just get up 30 minutes earlier. Just that solves everything. Yep, and I don't know it's so, you know, I go through this every semester, but I forget that I go through it that, you know, there's at first, for the first few weeks, I'm teaching them deep thinking, and I'm teaching them organization, all that. And I'm like, yo, this 12 minute a day technique is coming, but boy, we're rolling. We're playing the game of life up here. And then I there's a point, you know, middle of the semester, I go, Okay, kids, here we go. I can teach you this over six weeks. Let's go, and then I teach it to them and and then they've got it. And now, now we're at that stage where you have to apply it to your life and and my attitude is, okay, we're playing the game of life up here. Let's go. This is great. Here's what you're going to experience. This is going to happen, then it's going to happen. And then there is where I go. I realize, well, not all of them are embracing the habit as to the degree I want them to. And so there's always, oh, I don't know, an opening to my class a couple times where I'm like, now, if you're struggling with this, that's normal. You're you're wired for survival and you're adverse to change. But I'm like, Listen, man up or woman up. Get your act together and do this if you want to have the exceptional life rather than the average life. And, and, you know, I'm, I'm pretty brutal with them. I'm like, you know, you if you're going to achieve anything in life, you have to have a modicum of control over yourself to make yourself do certain things and and I really see this now because I am reading their assignment to tell me if they really understand the methodology. And you'll see and that again, this is a microcosm of society in general. You'll see that well, I, I, I'm

John Mitchell: 00:13:02

depressed. I'm on anxiety medicine. I have my life is a mess and and I'm struggling to read my life GPS template every day. And I'm like, shut up. Just man up. God Almighty, please. I want, I want your success more than you do. I want a better life for you more than you do. And and I don't know, I know, in some ways, maybe I should have more compassion. But the other side of the coin is sometimes. And I told him this, you got to kick your ass. Sometimes I've had to kick my ass. Sometimes my life to go, let's go, stop being a wimp, and let's go, yeah, and will you agree with that?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:13:52

Yeah, I think so. And, you know, it brings this I want to keep exploring this observer role. What is its connection? Because, obviously, you know, right now, without getting too much into politics or anything, we've got leaders, you know, on the free world here that have that victim, you know, kind of mentality, you know, how, how does the observer like, where, what is the connection to the victim? Because even when you were talking about like, I'm anxious, I'm, you know, some of those things that you were just using as a case this, to not be reading the 12 minute, you know, to not be reading their life GPS, like that falls into that bucket to one degree too, of like learned helplessness, victim blaming others or blaming other things for not having you know what I mean. So where does well

John Mitchell: 00:14:42

I think that's a great that's a great question, because the the observer can be a negative influence on the doer, if the, if the observer takes the attitude that, oh, I'm a victim

Kelly Hatfield: 00:14:57

And he's out to get me, everything always go. Is wrong. Everything, boo, boo, boo, right?

John Mitchell: 00:15:03

I mean, what's what, again, what is happening is there's that part of yourself that's stepping away from the doer and observing what's going on, and it, it's electing to take the position that that life is against me and that I'm a victim. So so the person the you is, and again, this is primarily the conscious mind, maybe 100% the conscious mind is the observer, and it's up to you if that observer is going to be a positive force in your life or a negative force in your life. Yeah.

Kelly Hatfield: 00:15:42

Yeah, absolutely, yeah. Because I, you know, we think about like they're the facts are the facts, you know, like you can have bad things that aren't that are happening in your life right now. You know right about this before too, with kind of the lens that you look through and how you frame that you know whether life is happening to you or whether life is happening. For you kind of framing, we've had prioritizations around that and so, so, yeah, I totally buy it, yeah. And just trying to connect the dots between some of these other concepts that we've talked about and how they connect, you know, to from that the observer versus the doer.

John Mitchell: 00:16:16

So, right, right, right. You know, I tell you one, thing I have, I have evolved to is, is to appreciate that what this methodology is for is so for the 2% and again, I wish the 98% a great life. I want everybody to have a great life. But boy, I am not worried about that 98% and I shun the 98% because, as Darren already so eloquently explained to me, for 98% of people more success is merely a preference. And I see that with my my students vividly at this time of year because, like, the first day of class, I said, So I literally first thing I said to him, as I'm meeting him, is, who wants the exceptional life? Well, all the hands go up. Who wants the Amherst life? No hands go up and and very enlightening for all of us. No surprises there, but now they have the tool to create the exceptional life, and some of them don't really want to do it. Well, why is that? Well? Because for them, more success is merely a preference. Yeah, I'd like to be more successful, but, but I don't want to do anything to do it, to make it that way. And I told them the other day, I said, think about that person, that there was to be a marathon runner. They got to get up and and run like two hours a day to train to be a marathon runner. I'm like, boy, that is hard. Now let's compare somebody doing this 12 minute a day technique with a goal to create the exceptional life. So they're going to take 12 minutes a day lay in their country bed and read about their desired life that is easy. I'm like, so man up or woman up, you know? I mean, I don't know how you can make it any more clear, but I think, I think so much of what we're talking about comes down to being self aware, and I think we all struggle with being self aware. I look at how unself aware I was early in the process of of developing. Think it be it because I thought everybody was like me, you know, they're not, you know. And and the more you can get away from seeing the world like just like you see it, and realize

John Mitchell: 00:19:04

people are different than you and the better off you are. Would you agree with that?

Kelly Hatfield: 00:19:10

I think so. And it's so funny that you should say that, because as we've been talking and kind of giving our opinions and thoughts on things, I've been thinking too about looking at something from somebody else's perspective. So, for example, to me and you, when we think about the exceptional life, so in the terms of, I guess it doesn't need to be students, you know, it can be anybody. But I wonder too, whether for us, the exceptional life like we have a real clear vision of what that is. And I wonder whether a good portion of society just given kind of what has been happening in society, you know, over the last 20 years. You know, things are very different. You know, they're very different now than they. Were for us when we were coming right up. There are different obstacles and things that are present that weren't when we were, you know, coming up. And so I wonder whether this, what's the word? It's not group. But like this overall sense, you know, things are hard, kind of, you know, especially the young people, the cards are kind of stacked against us, like getting a house, being able to get, you know, those kinds of things, whether you know that's informed, like you know how your brain, does the brain believe that the exceptional life is possible? So then, does it mean, then that you, when we're teaching it, you need to make it smaller. So what we're thinking about like, maybe you're defining initially, if you if you have a lot of anxiety in your life, or you've got maybe initially, how you're defining the exceptional life or success is peace and having more, you know what I mean, having diminishing the stress in your life, or whatever things are then set, you know? So you're breaking it down and making it a lot smaller. Because I wonder, too whether there's such a disconnect between where things are for the majority of people, of Americans, if we're just talking here in the United States, the divide between what we're talking

Kelly Hatfield: 00:21:11

about and where they feel like they are is so great that their brain even is is creating even more resistance against it. You know,

John Mitchell: 00:21:20

Yeah, I think that's an interesting idea. I think though, that today, people are created from the outside in, not from the inside out, and that's the fundamental problem. They are created from social media says, Be this, and says, be that. And as opposed to, you know, stepping back and creating yourself from the inside out and understanding yourself, but, but I would say that today, being successful has never been easier, because

Kelly Hatfield: 00:21:54

100% that's what I was gonna like. I'm like, you can look at it through that lens, like, yeah, it's hard. Some of these things are harder. But like, creating wealth is never been easier than it is with all the tools, the inner very same things that are causing some issues in their life are also part of the solution to what they're you know, going through as well. Like you can learn anything at your fingertips, you can create. You know, this AI thing, as much as it's going to take away opportunity from some white collar is going to create a ton of opportunity. So again, it's back to that lens that you know, that people are choosing to look through.

John Mitchell: 00:22:29

Well, you know, I tell you, I'm glad that the University Texas doesn't listen too closely to what I tell these kids, because they'd probably freak out if they really knew what I was saying to him. But, but. And then again, my college students are really just a microcosm of of people in general. But I'm like, Listen, you want the exceptional life. Just look at what most people do and do the opposite. Do not do what most people are doing, and just do the opposite, and you'll create the exceptional life. You know when you look and see especially when you see it, I feel like I'm blessed to have an insight into people and normal people's lives, because they'll say stuff to me in the assignments that they will not say to me, yo, if I'm in front of them, yeah, and I hear all these stuff. I'm, I'm on medication for this, and I'm, I'm depressed and all that. You see it one after another after another. I'm like, Man, this is a war zone, it looks like to me, and I think that's true of the vast majority of people in the United States, so much so that you'll find this rising I had a conversation last night with Jim Cathcart, and we're Talking about taking my book, doing it in Mandarin, and doing the live GPS template in Mandarin, and with the idea that the Eastern, Eastern philosophy is way more maybe receptive to the concept of mindset and and, and think it be it, then the American mindset is, and that's why, you know, I focus on the 2% I just wonder if, if in other cultures, it might not be better to to explore that in a way that I've never explored it in the, yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, it is a and he's got a great connection in in China and Malaysia. So we're looking at maybe doing a road show to Singapore and in and Beijing. So we're, I don't know, we'll, we'll see how that goes. But, yeah. But you know, so as we sort of wrap up this again, just think about your lifestyle, when you put your head on the pillow tonight, and as as you're in

John Mitchell: 00:25:10

in the holiday season, just think about this idea that you're two people in one, the observer of you and the doer of you. And you can make that, that observer a force for good and the 12 minute a day. Timmy methodology is happy to do it. So until next time, we'll see you.