The 12-Minute Method Podcast

In this final 'normal' episode of Series 1 of this podcast I get into the most recent project that I've got off the ground... this podcast! I talk about how stressed I got starting out and recording the little bits of music, I talk about where it came from and the roles that Cat Preston's Collective Wisdom Podcast and The Podcast Show 2022 both played in creating it. It's also an episode about the 100 Podcast Challenge (see Episode 13 or https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2022/2/4/the-12-minute-method-100-podcasts-challenge for more) because that's what made me get creative and get productive about making this show. 

I talk a bit about some of the struggles, and mostly about how I made it about learning and success beyond success, and not about how many people I had listening, which I worry about. 

I mention this Warren Buffett/James Clear story again: https://jamesclear.com/buffett-focus It's about how to create an avoid-at-all-costs list, and it's the goal-setting exercise I have been using for the last five years, which has really helped me be more productive and finally do the things I've been meaning to do. 

As this project is so fresh - ongoing, in fact! - I can feel all the parts of me that want to tell you more about it, about all the things I'm learning and still learning... and about how this episode isn't good enough. But that's the magic of the timer. And of practising the 12-Minute Method... it's not perfect, but I've done enough for today. Enjoy!

I'll be back later in the year with a Series 1 review, and will be reflecting ahead of next year on how I might continue (or not) this podcast. Thanks for listening!

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In this episode I talk about how I went from having appeared on a handful of podcasts (and feeling pretty nervous/anxious about them) to appearing on A LOT of podcasts, and feeling really relaxed about the whole thing. That is, I talk about my 100 Podcasts Challenge, which I am working on in 2022. [On that, if you have a podcast or know someone who does, and would love me as a guest, I really need help - I'm on 70 with about two months to go. Please get in touch!!]

It's about the power of an outrageous goal and taking focused action, and it's about how I coped when the challenge got overwhelming. I talk about the benefits and insights I've taken away from the challenge and more. I reference Episode 3 quite a few times, as I used a lot of my learnings from building my coaching business, as you'll hear.

Here's the page to learn more about the challenge, listen to many of the shows I've been on (including those I mention) and more: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2022/2/4/the-12-minute-method-100-podcasts-challenge

I'm so grateful to everyone who's supported me with the challenge, in particular all the amazing podcast hosts who have had me on their shows. Please do go out of your way to support those shows - people are doing amazing, creative things in the podcasting space and the world is better for it. 

In particular, here's Michael Chaffin's new show: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4ApIAI6MB8h9Pxo89AWBIZ?si=A4jR3OtUT82hWT8ERTGQ7Q (Michael was, if I remember correctly, the first person to ever have me on a podcast)

And here's Cat Preston's show, where I had the Who am I to do this? insight: https://www.podbean.com/media/share/pb-dxhf6-11b1225

If you want help from me in creating a challenge for yourself, why not come over to the 12-Minute Method Facebook group and post a question: https://www.facebook.com/groups/611939479993065 Or drop me an email. 

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In this episode I talk about how I FINALLY started a meditation practice. I had LOTS of stories about what meditation should be like, and I let all of them get in the way of doing something that really helps me. It helps me do good work and I have no doubt it helps me feel better. It involved prompts from my coach at the time, Joel Monk. It involved really seeing the power of meditation for my work. And it involved learning from Tim Ferriss that the rep of meditation is bringing your attention back - that stopped me beating myself up so much and let me get on with practising. 

I said I would link to a few things:

- The draft preview edition of my book, The Power to Choose, which I referenced in this episode: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2020/3/23/why-am-i-sharing-parts-of-my-forthcoming-book-the-power-to-choose

- The centring practice Joel shared with me: https://docs.google.com/document/d/17qaZ0ppfjreNMbitd8v3Q7Yj7MRG8rsR/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=111629218231061519133&rtpof=true&sd=true

- An article I wrote about how for commitment, RECOMMITTING is the rep: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2018/5/23/recommitting-is-the-journey

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This episode is the story of publishing the 12-Minute Method series of books. How did the books come about? Why did it take me 2 years after having the idea to get them out? I talk about the help I had along the way, including Steve Creek, Jericho Writers and Tim and Joseph at www.self-published.co.uk. I talk about the evolution of the idea and the books and more. I reflect on whether the two-year period was procrastination, or whether it was necessary for the books to find their rightful home. Certainly the journey changed me and, reflecting now, for me feels like it has served my own growth so well.

I said I would link to a few things:

- My article on Gay Hendricks' frame, The Zone of Genius: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2022/2/3/the-zone-of-genius-the-most-powerful-thought-experiment-for-personal-transformation

- My time management article, where I talk about Saying Yes and Saying No, and Warren Buffett: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2018/7/23/15-ways-to-change-your-relationship-to-time-get-more-done-and-feel-better-while-you-do-it

- The draft preview edition of my book, The Power to Choose, which I referenced in this episode: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2020/3/23/why-am-i-sharing-parts-of-my-forthcoming-book-the-power-to-choose

- My dad's poetry: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pete-Armstrong/e/B082BDCM2P

- My article about publishing these books: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2021/12/17/the-story-of-the-publishing-of-the-12-minute-method

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When I got ill in 2018, I could no longer find the space or energy to read non-fiction. But it was important to me - to learn, grow and to support my clients. This episode is about how I created a new reading habit, using the ideas of the 12-Minute Method. It helps me keep reading even when things are tough, it's hard to forget and - as I reflect in this episode - it might actually be a BETTER way of reading than the quicker ways I used to read before. 

In this episode I talk about how I started The Coach's Journey Podcast. It was my first podcast, and is designed to help coaches create thriving businesses and thrive while they do it. It's also designed to mimic some conversations I had that really helped me as I started my business... and it's designed to be the Tim Ferriss Show but for coaches. It includes how I used what I'd learned from Ferriss and from things like the 12-Minute blog to get going. It includes how I started with what I knew would be fun and built upt. And it includes how the key moments were making it sustainable in terms of time, and then in terms of money. 

I said I would link to a few things...

- The Warren Buffett goal-setting exercise I love. https://jamesclear.com/buffett-focus

- The Coach's Journey Podcast episode about podcasting: https://www.thecoachsjourney.com/podcast/robbie-swale-adam-hulme-podcasting

- The Coach's Journey Podcast episode about creating new work, including how I thought about and made the Coach's Journey Community happen: https://www.thecoachsjourney.com/podcast/robbie-on-new-work-group-coaching-tcj-communty

- Read about The Coach's Journey Community here: https://www.thecoachsjourney.com/community

You can listen to the Coach's Journey Podcast at www.thecoachsjourney.com or by searching wherever you're listening to this!

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In this episode I talk about my exercise habit. I realised when being interviewed on a recent podcast (this one, I think: https://forum.podcaster.community/t/editing-with-robbie-swale/2884) that my longest standing habit actually isn't the 12-minute writing practice. Instead, it's my habit of exercising every work-day morning. In this episode I talk about that: how someone being mean essentially started it, how I've evolved it over time, how becoming someone who exercises in the morning makes it easier to DO that now, than to not do it. I also talk about the power of considering our mortality, and how future you will be SO GLAD you started exercising regularly. 

This one felt to me like - alongside learning Spanish (E6 - https://spotifyanchor-web.app.link/e/QvYzupBRhtb) - one of the places where perfectionism got in the way of me exercising for a long time. And as I was speaking I also realised that it was the place where the talent myth held me back the most. Read more about the Talent Myth here: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2022/1/23/the-talent-myth

I said I would link to a few things...

My article, It's Time For You To Die: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2021/12/15/its-time-for-you-to-die

The Energy Project: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2021/12/17/the-only-resources-that-last-are-the-ones-we-learn-to-renew

My article about my morning routine: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2021/12/17/how-i-work-through-sadness-and-fragility-each-morning

My friend Paul Thompson and his businesses, which have helped me so much:

Worksmart Wellbeing: https://worksmartwellbeing.co.uk/ 

PT Health Coaching: https://pthealthcoaching.com/

The PT Health Coaching YouTube Channel, which is where I do all my HIITs: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKcdPFoJfe1iJKjVmrsTk2w

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In this episode I talk about how my brother (Ewan Townhead, www.ewantownhead.com) and I have strengthened our relationship over the last few years via a weekly practice that accidentally looks a lot like the 12-Minute Method. And that we have so far - miraculously - not given up on. It started with us signing up to Seth Godin's The Marketing Seminar together and ended with us speaking more and connecting more than we ever have as adults... and arguably more than ever before. I also explain how the importance of connecting with family showed up for me by considering my own mortality, how I have developed similar ways to strengthen my relationship with my daughter and my mum, how Resistance and procrastination can't cope with consistency and how creating a good practice in one part of your life can have knock-on effects elsewhere. 

Here's the Tim Urban Wait But Why blog I mentioned: https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/12/the-tail-end.html

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In this episode I talk about how I beat procrastination to propose to my then girlfriend (now wife) Emma. It includes an incisive question (see Nancy Kline's Time to Tink work for more on that) inspired massively by my friend Vegard Olsen (www.coachingpartner.net) finally got me moving. Then we get into how I used some textbook beating procrastination moves to get the ring. I also talk a little about the pressure-cooker of being engaged and what I have learned about marriage and the impact it can have on our lives. 

Here's the article I mention that I wrote about recommitting - the equivalent of the Duolingo Streak Freeze: https://www.robbieswale.com/writing/2018/5/23/recommitting-is-the-journey

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In this episode I'm talking about how I *FINALLY* started learning Spanish. This was something I had been thinking about and wanting to do and not doing for YEARS. 

Then a move to Costa Rica made it very important that I had some Spanish and a combination of a great tutor, an app my wife's family used and the repeated decision not to give up mean that I have now been practising my Spanish almost every day for five years. And whilst I'm far from fluent yet - just listen to me stumble over the word 'aprendiendo' in the opening couple of minutes of the show - I'm immeasurably better than five years ago and far better than I would have been if I hadn't created a '12-minute method' practise for language learning. And if I keep going, who knows where I'll be in another five years? 

I get into a bit of positive psychology theory I learned about from one of Shawn Achor's books, and I also reflect on what I learned from listening back to Episode 4, where I talk about the origin of the 12-Minute Method. 

PS There's also a lot of love for Duolingo in this podcast. 

PPS I decided not to go for the clickbait-y title in the end! More on that next time, maybe!

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Right - it's time to talk about how the 12-Minute Method came about. In this episode, as part of my investigation into what we need to beat procrastination, be more productive and finally do the things we want to do, I talk about one of the most important commitments I've ever made: to write a series of short blogs on my train journey over a two week period. That became a blog I've now been writing weekly for six years, which has changed so many things about me and genuinely been one of the most transformative things I have ever done. It was also how I created the four books in the 12-Minute Method series. You can read the first of these - How to Start When You're Stuck - here: https://geni.us/startwhenyourestuck

Important parts of the journey included the gentle invitation I got from Joel Monk of Coaches Rising to create a series, the things I had learned from Tim Ferriss about how to get something going without your embarrassment stopping you, and Steven Pressfield's Resistance (and the rule of thumb: the more Resistance you feel about something, the more important it is to your soul's evolution).

The easiest way to read the 12-Minute Blog is on my website here: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog 

It's also still on LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robbieswale/detail/recent-activity/posts/

Here is the first article of The Train Series, which became the 12-Minute blog: https://www.robbieswale.com/the-12-minute-blog/2021/11/23/the-train-series-1-stories

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In this episode, as part of my investigation into what we need to be more productive and finally do the things we want to do, I explore how I overcame my procrastination and created my coaching business, which got to a point where I could work on it full-time less than two years after I started my coaching training. 

Important parts of it were Steven Pressfield's Resistance and The War of Art; making space for what mattered to me; sitting down and staying sitting; and getting into a place - thanks to some insights on a Coaches Rising call from the coach Carolyn Freyer Jones - where my business's success felt within my control. Oh, and setting myself ambitious challenges, too!

If you want to hear more from me about coaching, check out my other podcast The Coach's Journey, and all the resources that I've created for coaches, at www.thecoachsjourney.com

In particular, this is the article I mention about building my business, which is still my most-read article: https://www.thecoachsjourney.com/writing/how-i-became-a-full-time-coach-less-than-two-years-after-starting-my-training

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In this episode, on my investigation into how we can finally do the things we want to do, I reflect on creating The Wisdom of David Gemmell, a website dedicated to the philosophy of my favourite author. You can find it at www.thewisdomofgemmell.com or follow it on Twitter at www.twitter.com/wisdomofgemmell. 

The most important part of it reflecting on it was: I *didn't* start it for a long time.

It took the pain of seeing two ideas I had move on to other people (remembering what Liz Gilbert says: if we don't use an idea it will find someone else who will use it). It took navigating all kinds of Resistance, which tied me in knots. It took a call to arms from then-stranger-now-friend Inga Umblija to make me take action because of who it might serve. And then it took breaking it down into small steps. 

I hope you take insight from it that helps you get your idea out into the world. 

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In this episode, I talk about my career change and how learning about start-up methodology on the Careershifters blog got me unstuck, out of my own way and moving towards work that really fulfilled me. 

I also have some technical problems, talk a little more about how the podcast is going to work, and discuss timers. 

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