How to use NLP to Conquer your Fear of Failure & Expand your Toolkit as a Coach

Check out this incredible interview our AOTC Training Director Mei Ouw went through with recent graduate Sarah Jeavons and how she applied a modelling mindset to conquer her fears in the Australian reality TV series SAS Australia.

Transcript

Mei: Hello everybody. I’m so excited. Now I’m going to get you to say your name with your French accent.

SJ: Sarah Jeavons, and in Aussie it’s Jeavons. Yeah, it’s not as beautiful and romantic. 

Mei: And this beauty lady here, I’ve just said, she’s like this eclectic mix of a blonde Audrey Hepburn slash Coco Chanel, but oh my gosh. I just remembered guys, you may recognize her face and you may not. It depends on whether or not you are a big fan of SAS, Australia, which I am. I’m just going to bring these guys up to speed because as well as being an amazing dating coach, this woman is an incredible athlete. They call it the “Thinking Soldier”.

Okay. So if you have not watched last year’s SAS Australia. So what it was is SJ was with about maybe 16 other regular Australians, like moms and dads, went on this show where they take you through this intense, incredible boot camp,where it was mental prowess, physical stamina, and endurance, and barely anyone makes it through passing the course.. So can I tell you right now we are in the midst of greatness. I am so inspired by this woman. I was so hooked on watching this series. She’s like this quiet achiever, like on-camera we didn’t see much access from you, but maybe behind the scenes, there was a bit.

SJ: Yes, 

Mei: Please. She was one of two contestants that actually passed the cop. So the four, what are they called?

SJ: The four DS are the drill sergeants. 

Mei: Four drill sergeants had this really strict criteria basically. No one barely makes it through. And this woman here was one of two people that passed the course. So, I mean, that’s just an amazing achievement in itself. 

SJ: Yep. I’m going to let that soak over me. I honestly have to pinch myself because it really is a huge achievement.

It’s so interesting that we’re having this chat about NLP because there’s so many parallels to my experience and what I had to channel to get through that.

 It’s interesting even hearing me say that I was a quiet achiever on that show. Cause that’s not me, usually at all when in my day-to-day life.I wouldn’t say that I’m a quiet achiever. 

Mei: Well, I’d love for you to share with us because you said there are so many parallels so share with us what some of those are. 

SJ: Yeah. So what I’ve noticed through going through this NLP course is it just gave me a lot of clarity to realize what I was actually digging into when I was in those really hardcore moments of a challenge,

I guess like mentally, it was really honestly, more of a mental challenge that caused then it was physically, physically the body. My body started to shut down in some ways. And I had scratches all over me and like, I was all cut up and blisters and it was like, you know, physically, you go, oh my God, how can you keep going? 

But it was the mental battle for me. It actually brought up old, older programs from being a kid like this was actually the biggest challenge. So it was kind of like Tony Robbins on steroids, because you’re combining, you know, focusing on your limiting beliefs, coming out through these physical challenges and mental pressure, which doesn’t give up. 

So you’re in a constant state of discomfort and you’re forced in many ways to have to face the fear. So for me, it brought up a lot of that childhood stuff and I was able to work through it. But only in hindsight, did I realise through doing this because I was like, whoa, that’s, what’s going on. And then after the show I experienced an adrenaline hangover, if that’s even a thing or an emotional hangover where I cried and cried and cried for about 24 hours after I was finally out of the war zone. So that as well was very cathartic for me and explained a lot about how I was processing things, finding ways to pull out the lessons without causing too much trauma and damage to myself, which honestly is quite possible to do, going on a show like that you can actually create more trauma if you don’t go in there with a level head. 

Mei: Yeah,and you know, what I loved, what Sarah’s just shared is it was such a mental game, right. A mental challenge. And I always think about NLP in terms of, we all have this brain, but our brain did not come with a user manual. 

SJ: Yep. Accurate. 

Mei: And then it’s kind of like NLP, all of a sudden, it’s like someone handing you the user manual of how to operate this thing called our brain. And so what I loved about what you shared is you intuitively had the ability to understand that your normal way of being, which is like, the loud spoken, like let’s face it. You’re not shy. 

SJ: Nope. 

Mei: Cannot be either if, if what you’re teaching guys to do is how to actually feel the confidence to get out there and meet people. But you recognize that in this situation, this is what I read on. What you just shared is that that way of being wasn’t necessarily going to do you any favours, especially in the light of these drill sergeants who just want compliance. They don’t want the out there innovative do your own thing, you know, be really highly creative off on tangents type of Sarah, which is what you need to do in your business.

SJ:Yeah. 

Mei: They want someone to follow the rules, be compliant because basically your life is on the line and the life of your teammates is on the line. 

SJ: Yeah. I, really liked the way you’ve packaged that because it was exactly that for me, at least I can’t speak for anyone else, but that was, for me, it was like this is a game with some really, life or death kind of rules to it. So there is no room for being jovial or yeah. Well there is when you’re recovering, which I was definitely when we weren’t in the presence of the drill sergeants. But when we were, it was like, if you didn’t take this seriously, it almost shows that you don’t care about someone else’s life and you don’t care about your own life. And that carelessness on the battlefield is unacceptable. And that was what I really channelled.

It wasn’t about failure and your skillset. It was about your will to come back from failure. That was really the takeaway.

So when it came out of that, I definitely felt that I held my head up a lot higher. Even if you failed, even if you did something and you started to beat yourself up negatively or discounted the effort that you put in. 

I learned through NLP that I discount my achievements a lot. So even at the beginning of this chat, I was like, let me just soak that in and ease a biggest achievement. So I’ve become a lot more aware and conscious of nipping that in the bud before I discount how I am. 

Mei: Oh my God, we’re totally going to have to do another entire interview around this because for those listening at home NLP is a modelling methodology. This is how it came about where John Grinder and Richard Bandler modelled out incredible therapists, psychiatrists, and looked at what they did brilliantly in their practices that got such great results.

So NLP is like this mindset and like an attitude of a particular style of thinking that helps you model, what is it that someone’s doing that is creating success? So if we just use that kind of modelling mindset, listen to what Sarah just shared. First of all, in SAS, Australia, she had this mindset of learning from your failures, right. And not letting your failures kind of crumble you and get you down. And so in NLP, we have a presupposition that says there’s no failure, only feedback.

SJ: Yeah. 

Mei:So I’m hearing from, from Sarah, like, well, what do I need to do differently next time? You know, how do I need to dig deeper? Or what different kinds of meta-programs cognitive bias do I need to kind of bring into the next challenge, whatever it might be. 

SJ: Yeah. This is such a beautiful example of that. Our member, it was day four and I got pulled into the interrogation room and I come off the, the end of a pretty crappy challenge where I just kept slipping off these monkey bars. And I remember when I sat down and they started to interrogate me the word that, or the phrase, I guess that is my weakness started to come out of my mouth. And this DS has, is just as hard as he could just go home on the table. And it was like, boom. Like it was like, he was like a swish kind of moment. Right. It was like that, but it was like, boom, like wake up, wake up, Sarah. Like don’t like, he literally said, you did not say that word. And it would just almost just vibrated through my body. And I just got laser-focused for the, until the end of the course, I walked out of there and I took something from that where I was like, let’s go, this, this is the moment to dig deep because I could have, I was like in a crossroads, I was letting the negative feedback start to control me and bring me down. And that was like this big splash of cold water that got me back in the zone and back thinking positive thoughts, which got me to the end. 

Mei: I even noticed the way she used her body language, right. That light form. It was like a splash of water that got me focused. And then so notice that body language of which took it to the end. So if I was to unpack again with this modeling mindset around and I’ll pay basically what the drill Sergeant did by smashing his hands is we call that a pattern interrupt. And so the strategy of Sarah kind of not losing her grip on the monkey bars and starting the internal narrative of it’s my weakness. It’s my failure. Before she can even complete running in NLP, what we call that particular neurological strategy someone’s come in and really brutally interrupted that pattern.To the point where it’s disrupted the pattern so much that she’s just gone and interrupted the pattern. And then she had the sensibility of you gotta go, what do I need to do differently, laser focus. And that took her to the end of the course. 

This is amazing. I love this unpacking because just in sharing what you did, we can unpack your ontology, which is just a fancy word for it. Like your way of being and your pissed homology, which is another big fancy word for what you know what to do.

When you look at someone who’s doing something brilliant, whether it’s a martial artist or a figure skater, you want to unpack: What are their belief structures? What are their internal dialogues? What are their resources? What’s the identity frame that they’re holding that helps them be really successful?

SJ: Yeah. 

Mei: Which would be so cool. I imagine as a dating coach having to speak to two guys around, we haven’t quite covered this in our pay yet, but covering what’s the identity that they hold within themselves, that’s either helping or hindering them being successful in dating.

SJ: Yup. I was just about to bring that into the conversation because the patent interrupt, just to finish that thought thread is something I use as a daily practice when I socialise. And it’s something I teach my clients because a topic which they’re usually very uncomfortable to bring into play is there is a sexual innuendo or a playfulness to flirt. They’re like, “I can’t talk about that, Sarah. I can’t do that. And in my own practice of socialising, I utilize patent each rocks a lot often, if the conversation is going dry and it’s boring and I know it’s boring for them, cause I know I’m bored.”

So generally the rule of thumb is they they’re going to be bored, but being polite. And so to introduce a pattern, interrupt, not on the scale of slamming the table but doing something with conviction to change the direction of the flow is a skill that I often teach them. And really it’s a pattern interrupt combined with a few other components, but essentially that’s what it is. So that’s something that I teach a lot. And then coming to that new thread in terms of the beliefs that most of my clients have then 90% male and one of the biggest limiting beliefs is around women that they perceive as beautiful, successful, incredible dream women that they would ideally like today. 

Often, if not always, when they first come to me,they have a limiting belief around this kind of human being of his angel in a way that they put on a pedestal being unattainable and so they separate this person from all other people instead of actually treating them the same, which will, which actually diminishes their anxiety towards the situation. And they can then express a lot more freely and build the attraction that they really truly want. 

Mei: Yeah so they’ve created this representation of this person and put them on the pedestal. I reckon nine times out of 10, that incredibly gorgeous successful woman would be running her own narrative field with self-doubts 

SJ: A hundred percent. Yup. 

And that’s a core lesson that I do coach them on because you’re so consumed with your own narrative that you often forget to externally look to other people and think, okay, I wonder what they would be feeling and making an assumption. It may or may not be true, but being able to empathise on that level from a place of equality makes you as a man stand out compared to most men, because that’s an ability that usually guys don’t put the work into understanding on that level. 

Mei: Yeah, absolutely. Isn’t that interesting. And you know, the parallels between the dating world and even the business world! So like I’m in the business world, working with leaders and exacts. So people who are really shy to put up their hand for a pay rise, or when they ask for a pay rise, ask for a really measly amount, it’s because they’re running a narrative in their head that they’re not worth the amount they really want to kind of ask for. Or that someone who’s in a higher position like, which is the same as you’re dating men thinking that a woman’s gorgeous, unattainable and successful, they think that someone in a higher position has got their shit together or is smarter than them and it’s not necessarily correct. 

SJ: Yeah. So in the work that I do with my dating clients, it is often if not always changing the narrative, which is totally connected to, you know, what we do with NLP, changing that narrative, replacing it with something that, you know, they can stop believing in it. I actually feel that that starts from the coach, you know, having that belief and every, every guy that I have in my program or that I decide to take on, I must see their potential because I, I truly have to, you know, feel both physically and emotionally that I can help them get there.

And when I have that, it’s remarkable to see even then feed off like a transfer of energy in that regard. And I, an example, because it’s fresh in my mind of this, where we changed a client’s narrative, where he was like really apathetic, suicidal. Like really, really negative thinking. And for a few, probably a couple of months, it was just supporting and nurturing him in a very maternal, caring manner. And then it was switching on and really just slamming the fist on the desk with him, which works quite well with my male clients for some strange reason. And then switching him into gear and making, allowing him to realise his potential.

And when he did that, just, just cause it’s fresh. Last week, he suddenly had this beautiful experience where he went to, he went in a state and he went on a trip to meet an old flame of his ended up having an incredibly, you know, playful, erotic experience. And he then realised that they weren’t aligned anymore. So he had a tendency to attract quite manipulative, low vibrational, negative thinking individuals. And he suddenly had this just experience.

And he said, “Sarah, I’m not putting up with that. That’s not me. I have a boundary and actually sent this woman home so he could enjoy the rest of his time on his trip.” And I just thought that that was a moment of him breaking through and voting for that new narrative and voting for himself in that moment. And it wouldn’t have been able to happen if we didn’t actually sit down and have that experience where we rejigged his belief system and his narrative and what was possible. 

Mei: Yeah, absolutely amazing. You know, and what I love there and what I want to kind of draw up for what Sarah has shared is a couple of things. So there’s two things here in terms of how we work, how we use NLP. One is teaching you processes of what you can do with a client and Sarah will share a couple of those amazing stories in a moment where she is, you know, using specific processes, doing them with the client and the client’s having an amazing change. So what you do as a coach, the second one is who you’re being as a coach. And this is what I want to kind of just draw upon for the moment. So did you notice Sarah said, you know, she chooses to take on certain clients, right? And it’s about seeing and really feeling and believing in their potential.

And last night, when I was teaching these guys and will teach in a model on anxiety, I mentioned, there’s a famous hypnotherapists, Andre wise and Hoffer who in 1957. So way back when said that the client will not actually realise what the coach doesn’t believe. So this is a beautiful example of Sarah as a coach, believing more in her client, then their client than her client believing in himself. He had no belief in himself.

So it’s real, but it’s not just about the belief around that. It’s embodying that whole belief. And so then what I heard from Sarah is another kind of teaching in NLP, which is what we call the facilitation model. So how you facilitate as a coach and how you need to facilitate is it’s always this dance and there’s balance between supporting the client and challenging the client. So she did a couple of months of supporting the client, building the rapport, building the relationship, and then bam, right? The challenge, maybe not so much like this, but without that challenge, the client’s not going to shift. He might’ve just stayed in his mode of, you know

SJ: Just to add onto that, because for this particular client, he was getting what he wanted through my support. 

Mei: Yeah. Great, 

SJ: Very low self esteem. I was giving him all the love he needed Instead of challenging him to go out and create that for himself, not to become, I don’t want my clients becoming reliant on me and having to only come to me to be able to do something in their world. I want them to be completely self-sufficient and be able to go out and confidently do exactly what I’m helping them with. You know, obviously we always need a little bit more support, but that self-sufficiency is a very important value for me as a coach. 

Mei: Yeah. Amazing. There is so much gold here, so let’s speak a little bit more about NLP.

I’m really curious about what drew you to study NLP with us?

SJ: Yeah. It’s been an interesting journey. I find that the attraction to NLP,when I was young, I remember doing a one day course of NLP. And that was like my very first introduction to it. Then along my journey, a few years ago, I had a mentor when I was overseas, who was helping me develop a program and I was doing parching for another business and he practiced a lot of NLP and he just inspired me with the way he spoke about the desired state, and all of these little things. I’m like, wow, I love the way he’s articulating coaching and my program and how to structure it. And then in the current program with Brody Lee, again, it came up and I was introduced to both you may and Kylie Ryan. I just thought, whoa, again, another example of beautiful, positive reference of how individuals are.

I find modernizing and opaque is my first impression was like, oh, this is really kind of boring drive like intellectual stuff. And that’s not me. 

Associating NLP with that mentor of mine, with you Mei and Kylie Ryan, her energy and the way that she articulates herself, it got me really excited about it. So that’s when I obviously started the program and I challenged myself to approach it through a different lens.

That’s how I’ve been able to actually implement it with my clients because previously I would have thought I’m incompetent to run any process with a client. It feels weird for me. It doesn’t feel like I’m that kind of coach, that was the belief system I had. 

Mei: What I love about you is literally I will have taught a process on Wednesday night and then like by Friday, Sarah is in their Facebook group, sharing a client win where she’s literally just done the process she’s learned 24 hours before with a client and sharing some incredible results. 

SJ: I know I right! I have to throw myself in and do it. It really works well for me when I’m learning things, I can listen and practice an integration session. But to me, it’s that moment when I plunge into the water and I just go for it. I remember one of those examples where I did that live the next day in the morning, and I had a moment. Where I had that fear in my chest. And I went, am I going to do it? This is a perfect moment to do the thing that’s in my mind right now. And so that was my breakthrough. Like all my transition I find from learning the knowledge and implementing it, has been the rule change for me. Then the self-belief can start to grow. It might be a little bumpy, I was shaky, which I still am. I would still say I’m very new to this whole space, but I’m just approaching it like a kid, I just want to go for it and then I’ll refine it. 

One of the biggest breakthroughs was, I can’t remember what session it was, but just letting your client know that you’re going to try something different. It’s not the normal, it’s not something that we usually do, but should we give it a go and include them in the experimental process. And since adopting that attitude, I’ve noticed that I can more freely test things without judgement of myself and without judgement from my client. And it just has a level of relaxed 

Mei: Love it. And you know, the thing is that our clients don’t know what they don’t know right about how the process is supposed to go. What’s supposed to happen, not happen, et cetera. So literally you could kind of do it 50% and still get an amazing results. Like, you know, these process has been fine tuned and fine tuned and fine change.

I love that you are this living example of taking something from the intellectual knowledge realm Into the embodiment realm, which is the big thing that Kylie and I really focus on and reinforce is it’s not an intellectual game. 

SJ: And you know what, there’s a beautiful parallel because dating relationships, it is not an intellectual game. And my goodness, my clients are the smartest men I’ve ever met in my life. You know, more intellectually switched on than myself. And I learned so much from them. But when it comes to that embodiment realm where they do hit the most resistance and the most fear, and they really realise the gap between their knowledge and their implementation. So that’s a really big focus for me as a coach as well.

Mei: Yeah. Oh my goodness. So share with us some of the results. I mean, obviously keeping client’s names confidential and all of that love to hear like some of the amazing results you’ve had using some of the NLP processes. 

SJ: Yeah. So the one I was just telling you about off-camera is it’s the freshest in my mind, and it’s the one I’m really enjoying because I don’t know whether we’re supposed to do this, but I’d like to experiment. So the eliminating negative experiences process has been one that I’ve been just focusing on because I really want to get a handle on it and see like test it with my clients. I’ve done it with quite a few of them now. 

I come from the intention where I’m taking them through this process to empower them, to be able to start thinking differently with situations that emotionally get them in the funk will get them stopped. So the first time I used that one with one of my clients, he doesn’t speak a lot. Like he doesn’t share a lot compared to me, and I’m going in there thinking like he needs to give me this, entertaining, engaging reaction. And it was very internal and he just took it all in and absorbed it. And that was a really groundbreaking experience for me and for him as well. Because he’s just never done anything like that. He’s never like created or taken a feeling outside of his body and made it into a shape and given it a color to it in a white to it and, a texture or anything like that. And being able to, you know, learn a way to control his own thoughts and to process them, you know, in a healthy way. So that was like the first time I ever tried it. And then I started to get more confident with that particular process. 

Just recently with two of my clients, it’s allowed them to now compartmentalize real life experiences with a much more positive outlook. And when they think about this process, even though it’s obviously better when you have someone facilitating it, they can tune back into that and go, okay, this is what I’m doing with that feeling. This is how strong it is. I’m gonna make it really fuzzy. I’m going to push it away from myself. And I almost do like a self meditation. So this has been like a huge thing that I’ve implemented in my coaching business. And it’s just one of those examples where I can honestly truly say that it’s having a fantastic impact on them being able to be self-sufficient. And if it’s really bad, we do it together. And we really get into the nitty gritty of it. But they have so much more freedom with what I’ve experienced through that particular process.

Mei: It’s just like you were saying before,you don’t want your clients to be reliant on you. You want them to have the tools, but if they have a bad experience, they know that they can clear that. 

SJ: Exactly. Yep. That’s what I want. You know, I know that some of these processes it’s really tough to do by yourself, but when you tune into that subconscious cause what I’ve learned through this course is, we are that facilitator we’re there, we’re guiding them on a journey into their subconscious to rejig a couple of things, dial some things down, like amplify some things here and just do a little bit of maintenance in the garden of the subconscious that’s, what creates the external ships. So for me, I still feel like such a beginner where I can just implement them and make sure that they are effective. Like I always ask the client, how was that for you? Like honest conversation. So I get that feedback and I go, okay, cool that’s interesting. How could I add a little bit of spice to this process where it makes more sense for my particular niche or my particular client’s challenges and things like that. So it’s just expanded my toolkit as a coach, to be honest, I’m just like whoa there’s a lot more here. 

Mei: Oh my gosh. And you know, like, you’re, you’re just doing like the first level of training right now. 

SJ: Yes. Well ha it’s exciting. And it’s also like, oh my God, mypersonality is like, oh I want to do it all. And I want it all at once. So this has been a big lesson for me to take a breath, slow down. I don’t need to learn every single process and feel a hundred percent confident with it. I just need to go because I think that was in one session, a lot of the processes have a similar effect, but they’re just different ways of doing it. And so, yeah, I’ve been really just allowing that to soak into my attitude towards this work. So I don’t get overwhelmed.

Mei: What I love about Sarah is her ability to be really action orientated. And in NLP, we changed meta-programs and when I’m teaching business people, I call it cognitive biases. 

So what I’m seeing in Sarah is part of what makes her a really great coach are a number of different meta-programs or cognitive biases. One of them is that your action orientated. So what that means is you’re not spending lots and lots of time thinking and reflecting and going, oh, should I like your high initiation? As opposed to some people can get stuck in ruminating and thinking and reflecting, but aren’t actually putting things into action. So I think high action is one of them. And there’s a real level of my sense is that when you’re learning something, can you hear how is almost thinking about how can I practically use this in my business with my clients to help them. So, cause I get what you’re saying by like I’ve seen kind of videos and things about NLP where it just feels like, oh my gosh.

SJ: Yeah. Like it’s a lot, the best NLP book I ever read was Richard Bandler’s book like that colorful one book, introduction to NLP.

Mei: Oh, well done. You. 

SJ: And even that was a lot.

Mei: Yeah. Right. So I’d love to hear about if we’re talking to people who might be curious and interested in studying NLP, what would you say is our main point of difference? 

SJ: Oh my God. Oh my gosh. 

Well, yeah. Look my experience again, I was exposed to my first experience of NLP, very boring, drab mentor. Like it just did not light my heart up. I was not feeling inspired. And I’ve already mentioned this in our chat, but may and Kylie Ryan have this energy about them. They approach every process and every framework with a childlike excitement. Do you know what I mean? That’s the point of difference for me because it can feel quite heavy and there’s a lot to learn. And then when you have a mentor like Mei who, I just love the way that you describe things and suddenly, it’s not that difficult. You’re right where you’re supposed to be. And it just reassures you and you challenge us all at the right times individually. So for me, it’s definitely the way that you coach NLP, it’s your way. That is so unique to both of you. 

So I honestly don’t think I would have done a full course unless I connected with both of you as individuals. It’s both of you, it’s the way you show up as coaches because  I’m modelling myself, against you, I could see myself doing that or I love the way that they described that. And so that really helps me being someone who likes to initiate. I just take it a little nugget each time I am in your presence, to be honest, it’s kind of weird, when I’m doing a process, I’ve got you in the back of my mind. If I had a boring mentor in the back of my mind, I wouldn’t, bring as much energy and passion to it as what I get from it from being mentored by both of you. 

Mei: I think this is why I love this conversation because I can see how you just take an idea or you see something and then the instant embodiment and implementation, which we know that when you continually implement and embodied, that’s what leads to the mastery, right?

SJ: Yes. 

Mei: And your clients are going out there in the world and are doing things differently and showing up differently because of your commitment to your own mastery. 

SJ: Yes. And I’ve noticed that so much Mei like if I’m not switched on, I’m not showing up my clients don’t know why, even though, they’re not, they’re not modeling how to be a woman like me, but they’re the energy and they’re actually going, Sarah always talks about this or does it like this and has that passion behind the words. So now it starts to rub off. It’s just an extra X factor, I guess, for when they go out and practice, that little light chip on the shoulder where you go, boom, you know, you’re a part of something bigger. Like a lot of my clients referenced, like being a part of a team, I feel like we were a team. Do you know what I mean? It’s not just, we’re a group of people or a community that just comes together to do one thing. It’s like, this is my team. And so when both of you were in the back of my mind, I’m in the back of their mind when they go out there and they’d be courageous. 

Mei: Yeah, absolutely. So what I love this is it’s really shaping how your clients are showing up, not what are the right words to say when you made a woman and all of those kinds of things, but it’s actually, what’s the energy that they’re bringing. And, and I can almost start seeing this transmission of them soaking up this playfulness, right. These cheekiness and who doesn’t love LA like that playfulness in shaking who doesn’t love it. 

SJ: Yeah. Well, exactly that’s something that I’m really leaning into at the moment because it’s always like a default to bring in humour or play in as many ways as possible to interactions or experiences or whatever it is. And it’s really a superpower you don’t need to be joked about. It’s not that you’re joking about everything, but it just brings this height, a buzz like you get, especially with dating, it allows you to be able to talk about topics that ordinarily you wouldn’t be able to touch on because they’re taboo or they’re too serious.

There’s a little bit of humour. Ah, I know that we’re playing. So both people are w we’re just having a little joke, but really you’re finding out incredible things about yourself and the other person. And when you’re dating, that’s what you want to do. I don’t want to go on a date and feel like I’m being interviewed. And I sure as hell don’t think the other person wants to go on a date and feel that you’re being interviewed. 

Have you been divorced? 

How many kids do you have? 

Where do you want to live? 

Do you want to have a dog? 

How you, you know, like, versus of, well, let’s play a game, all right. Would you want to have a cat, a dog or a Guinea pig? Like changing the, how the intention. And like I said, the energy behind your interactions rather than the, what, you know, the literal illogical. 

Mei: So I need to do an interview series with you where I model and unpack all of your unconscious strategies. And then you can write a book. 

SJ: Oh my God. Yes, because I know I like in the back of my mind as well, I’m not nice watching bench and how I do this. And you know what, that was actually what led me to apply for SAS not sitting in bed going, yeah, I’ll do that because these are like very emotionally intellectual, like ex special forces soldiers. On the journey of discovering yourself, it’s so interesting to get such incredible feedback about what is functioning, what is happening with me? Because I just want to share it with people. I would love to live in a world where people just owned whatever their unique IP was. You know? I don’t know the big word you used, but like how they go about their lives. 

Mei: I love unique IP. I’m totally gonna use that. 

SJ: I guess. Yeah. Okay. Because to me, success is not if my client gets in a relationship, success is if my client expresses with absolute confidence, what their unique IP is the most attractive version of themselves, and that will attract their dream pot, not seeking the dream partner. It’s all starts with your unique IP. And that’s from my personal experience. I just everyday work on that. How can Sarah express Sarah congruently and confidently and without shine.

Mei: Love it, love it, love it. So that’s your branding clearly. What you’re really all about in terms of your purpose is helping people. And I know it’s mainly men, but helping key people, express with absolute confidence and certainty their unique IP. 

SJ: Oh my gosh. I love it. And that’s true Mei cause I have a little bit of a complex, a lot of people go, Sarah is a dating coach, but I don’t find that I’m a typical dating coach. I really don’t because I don’t define success on how many women my clients have gotten with or are dating, 

So, there’s been a little bit of it because to attract my clients, that is what they really want. It’s what they think they want. And when they get started, what they really want is something different. So it’s that marketing battle.

Mei: That’s the thing about NLP is people come to you because they think they want a particular result. But because it’s about transformation.The results that they do get, they never actually feathered or thought of when they came and saw you because they didn’t know what was possible. All right. So your guy who said no to that woman and sent her home so that he could enjoy himself is starting to break the pattern of neediness of always feeling like he needed to be with someone, I’m just assuming that might’ve been involved. And now what’s starting to emerge is a new identity, a new self of what it feels like to just enjoy his own company and do things for himself. So I can’t even imagine what else is going to open up for him.

SJ: Yeah. And promotion, as soon as he left, he got this job, this project that he’d been wanting for six months now. And I said to him, “this is so much more than just you stepping into who you are”. The universe rewards you when you let go, or when you make that decision, and he declared it. He let go, he got back on a dating app. You know, it was this moment. And the very next day his boss said, Hey, you got that project. You wanted six months, he’d been complaining and thinking, I’m not going to get it. I’m going to look for different jobs. Boom. You know, it was just alignment. 

Mei: Amazing. So what he didn’t realize is that the change in one areas of his life then translates to every single other area of your life. So good. 

SJ: It’s beautiful because Mei you obviously work in the business space? You know, most of my guys are either pretty high up, doctors, software engineers. They’ve got their own business or the managers or amazing sales guys, like when they’re off in their role or often their business, almost always they’re off in their social lives. So a lot of the time I do end up having more focused sessions around business, how they’re showing up. And we do a lot of intricate interpersonal communication methods. So they can get out of their funk because it always translates into their social status, like how they’re showing up in their socialising or going on dates. 

Mei: I cannot wait to see how you evolve. There are going to be big things happening for you. Things like the more and more you master not just NLP, but master you and the more you get to unlock and express your unique IP, the bigger the changes you can make. It just feels so big!

SJ: It’s very expensive. It was such an uncanny moment yesterday. I’ve just been getting into sort of manifestation and crystals and stuff. I’m like, Ooh, you know, again, just something new. And I was sitting, writing a manifestation script and thinking about the future and really like modelling it and like believing that I was already there. And then I jumped on because I didn’t know what we were doing yesterday. And in no pain, it was, oh, we’re doing manifestation. And timeline, I like designing a goal for the future. I was like, whoa, it was just the most perfect timing. 

I don’t think anyone really knew, but you’ve probably noticed that. Yeah. I was just like, yes. And then when I was doing it, I just felt it like so much. It was a really magical moment. And again like that alignment with sound just like going for it. And then it happens beautifully. 

Mei: But even more than that, so those of you watching at home, when I was taking people through creating your future visualisation, it’s like stepping into the picture and bring it to life. And Sarah’s whole body was literally vibrating off the roof. But here’s the thing, here’s the thing that you guys may not explicitly know, is that in terms of manifestation, you’ve got to be vibrating, like in urology has gotta be vibrating and holding a certain vibration. And if I were to test into what level you are vibrating on in terms of David Hawkins work, scale of consciousness, I reckon you would have been right up there. You were totally vibrating joy, which is at least 600 hrtz. So the very fact that your body was literally vibrating and your nervous system was holding that energy and vibration actually makes it like that. The manifestations are already done. 

SJ: I couldn’t contain myself if it wasn’t for a little bit of a program running about like embarrassment and judgement from others, I would have been like jumping off in my office. I was yelling. And I was talking to myself. It was amazing!

Mei: And full permission to apply for that and do that because you’re there to serve you and your greater community and your clients.

SJ: I was inspired. I remember a while back doing an exercise and watching her do it. And she was just so visceral. Like she was really feeling and letting something go. And that gave me permission on one front because I am influenced by it by groups a lot. And that’s what it’s about. You’d go to commit to whether, if you’re letting something go really, like you got to let it go. You know, or not if you’re doing something like that, I was really feeling into the words you were saying. I feel like I had another 10, 20% that I could have released. 

That’s something though on a personal level that NLP is allowing me to step up to in terms of being coaching. And actually during the time of being in this program to hide a six person team and my business, prior to that, I was one person. Do you know what I mean? 

The boundary has really broadened and now it’s Sarah, you are stepping up and you have a team to inspire. You have new goals to hit.

It’s calling me to lead it and to step up a lot more.

So the manifestation and thinking about my future is becoming a lot more important to me because it’s not just me now. It’s my family, my team.

Mei: Yeah. Oh my gosh. Incredible. It has been, and this was supposed to be a 20 minute interview generous with your time and your energy base is just absolutely gold. I cannot tell you how much energy I have from this conversation.

SJ: Yes please. I feel it as well. It’s really special. I just think, thank you and thank Kylie Ryan for reigniting my passion for NLP and for expanding my toolkit as a coach, because prior to this, I was closed off. I was like, nah, Sarah only coaches this way. 

You know, I was really scared and now that I’m in the sand pit, I’m like, whoa, well, let me try that toy. Let me do that. Let me, it’s a completely different experience. So yeah, that wouldn’t have been possible if I didn’t allow myself to come into this beautiful community. So I thank you for that. 

Mei: Oh, well, we’re just so proud and inspired by you. And I cannot wait until I get the message that your goals have been realised. And I cannot wait to see what’s happening for you in six to 12 months time. Like it’s going to go gang busters. 

SJ: It’s already happened. It’s already happened in my mind. That’s why I’m just like walking around, like, yeah. Am I saying, thank you. This was wonderful.

Mei: Awesome. Thank you.