In This Episode:

My guest for this episode is Itamar Marani from itamarmarani.com. He’s a former Israeli Special Forces and undercover operative, Jiu-Jitsu black belt, and was chief of security for a billionaire… He’s helped well over a hundred entrepreneurs, CEOs, and investors remove the invisible wall between them and maximizing their potential without the usual “Go hard, wake up at 4 am, rah rah!” ultra-motivation nonsense.

Show Notes:

Check out Ben’s Episode on the Emotional Fortitude Podcast HERE

Access the Micro Course HERE

Want More? Join the Arena HERE

Full Transcript Below:

Ben McAdam (00:00.746)

Welcome to the Business Numbers podcast. I’m your host, Ben McAdam, and we have a guest that I’m interviewing today. With these interviews, I’ll bring in other experts to share tips and tactics to help increase your business numbers directly or indirectly. 

In this episode, we’re talking about mindset and emotional fortitude, which for some people is a big hidden obstacle to their goals, profits, and improving their business numbers. It was to mine, and we’ll probably cover that during the session.

My guest for this episode is Itamar Marani from ItamarMarani.com. He’s a former Israeli Special Forces and undercover operative, Jiu-Jitsu black belt, and was chief of security for a billionaire… which is a story you’ll have to see on one of his podcast episodes to learn a bit more about. 

He’s helped well over a hundred entrepreneurs, CEOs and investors remove the invisible wall between them and maximizing their potential without the usual “Go hard, wake up at 4 am, rah rah!” ultra-motivation nonsense. 

Just taking off the handbrake. More on that later. 

Welcome, Itamar. Thank you for joining me.

Itamar (01:06.281)

Thank you for having me, buddy. Appreciate it.

Ben McAdam (01:08.086)

Pleasure. How was my intro? Would you add or tweak anything?

Itamar (01:12.585)

Um, that was pretty good on top. So ex Israili Special Forces. I was an undercover agent for a long time. I worked undercover. I was also mentored by the head of psychology of the Mossad. Um, aside from that, they’re pretty good. Pretty good. Appreciate it.

Ben McAdam (01:23.234)

Yep, forgot the head ofthe Mossad thing. But this is just, like, a bit too long if I read everything! 

So there’s a few major topics I want to touch on today where you’ve got deep expertise and have helped a lot of people. And we’ve got five of them. 

• Releasing the Handbrake (and we’ll explain what that means very soon)
• The Three Core Fears 
• The Elite Performance Pyramid 
• Goal Setting and Values (and the different way you do it), and 
• Identity Lag… which is something that was really impactful for me.

Ben McAdam (01:51.094)

But we’ll kind of see where the conversation leads. Does that sound good? 

Itamar

Sounds great!

Ben McAdam

Awesome. 

So one of the big things that was really helpful for me was I wanted to maximize my potential. I knew I wasn’t reaching my potential, but the only messages I found on the internet about that was “Get up at 4 a.m. ! Push really hard and have ice baths!” And I was like, ehhhmmm…..

Ben McAdam (02:17.95)

Number one, at the time I was a little lazier, but, uh, number two, I was thinking something doesn’t quite feel right about that approach, something was kind of missing and then I came across your stuff and, uh, you explained the motivation fallacy and everything started to make a bit of sense. So could you talk a bit about that for the listeners?

Itamar (02:38.165)

Sure, so what was, I really learned this when I started to work with the head of psychology of the Mossad. So I had gone through some pretty extreme situations, my time working undercover, I had some very close calls. And what was interesting to me is that when I started to work with him, I thought he would try to pump up my motivation or help me just kind of like overcome certain blocks that I had, just like blast through them in order to be able to get to this peak performance level again.

And what was interesting to me is that he didn’t do that. 

He didn’t try to say, okay, how can we get you to go harder? Instead, he was saying, how can we actually let you operate at peak, like optimal efficiency, without having to go harder? How can we remove the internal blocks that you have? 

And the motivation fallacy, like the way I came up with, is very simple. Like people usually think of like taking actions as an equation. So the amount of motivation I have minus the level of resistance I’m facing will determine what action I’m taking. 

So if the motivation is higher than the resistance, happy days. If not, and I’m feeling resistant, I kind of feel stuck like I’ve plateaued, then what I got to do to take action, I gotta up my motivation. 

That’s why you said that’s the common thing out there. Like go harder, ice baths, wake up at 4 a.m., all that kind of jazz. And what was interesting to me is that all the stuff we did in the agency wasn’t about going harder. It was about “how can you remove the internal resistance you have?” So that way you just have a smoother operating performance. Basically, the whole vehicle is better. 

Instead of you trying to crank on the gas while the handbrake is up, let’s just put that handbrake down. And I think the motivation fallacy is a very common thing because it’s very alluring and tempting. 

First off, it’s very sexy to say, I’ll wake up at 4 a.m. I’ll write this motivational quote for myself or whatever it may be. It’s not as sexy to say, you know, let me figure out my main insecurity, shave that down so it doesn’t affect me anymore.

Itamar (04:23.065)

And also we always remember the time when we were super motivated. So we kind of have this, we look at the past, we’re really inspired by it. And we want to reenact that and basically repeat that. And that’s a problem because we all remember when we were starting out as entrepreneurs when we had to make something happen, we were super motivated our first days and we did things. Regardless of our internal resistance to issues that we have in securities, doubts, whatever it may be.

Itamar (04:47.205)

So logically in her head, we’re saying, well, if I used to do that back then with all the stuff that I have, it must be the motivation aspect. So that’s the thing I got to tackle. 

But it’s not realistic to say, okay, like this was how it was back then. Things change. And I think it’s not realistic to expect that how you, you can expect the stories you hear about a mother lifting a car off her son, because she has to get him and have to help him live. It’s not realistic to expect to lift that kind of weight at the gym on an everyday basis.

Itamar (05:15.517)

Like when we’re just starting out, we’re hyper motivated, it makes sense. But as the years go by, we can’t just rely on motivation. Otherwise, just keep riding this rollercoaster. Like we read the book, we wake up at 4am, we attend the conference, we listen to the podcast, whatever it may be, we get this peak of motivation. But then after a week or two, it dies down. 

People keep trying to go like up and down, up and down. And the whole part of the motivation fallacy is that motivation isn’t the answer. It’s not sustainable. It’s up and down.

Itamar (05:42.833)

Instead of that, if you can actually shave down, recognize like what are my main mental blocks? What are my main emotional blocks? And I can shave those down so they don’t impact me anymore. Even when I’m not motivated, I can still take action and achieve my goals. 

And it’s a very different approach. It’s not common, but from what I’ve seen, this gets much better results. Not just only in the short term, but in the long term.

Ben McAdam (06:03.206)

Yeah, I definitely like the sustainable aspect of it. Like there are lots of things we can do to give ourselves a shot of motivation. Like for me, when I was in high school trying to do assignments, one of those late night sessions, I would have like a block of chocolate and I would have a cube of chocolate. I would like feed myself every so often to spike my motivation and focus and everything. And then I’d feel like crap for days afterwards from having done that. 

And instead, I like this idea of like how you can perform at a higher level, even when you’re not feeling motivated, even when there’s things going in on your life that prevent you from feeling motivated.

Like we all went through the COVID lockdown period where there were no events that we couldn’t, you know, juice up our motivation from. And if I had known a bit more then about like reducing the resistance, like I certainly would have got a lot more done. And I imagine pretty much everybody listening to this would have as well.

Itamar (07:03.121)

Yeah, and to add on to that, I think even there are some people, so some people experience it in a different way. Like some people just don’t have the motivation so they don’t take a lot of action. Some people, they make so much effort to get themselves motivated so they can overcome the resistance they’re facing, that they make this really big effort. And then they get exhausted and burnt out. And they wonder why do I always feel burnt out? 

Well, maybe you feel burnt out because you’re struggling not against only the technical challenges in your business, because of also all your personal stuff that you’re attaching to that.

Itamar (07:33.637)

And every time you have to do a technical task in your business, you’re also having to do the emotional stuff like, I have all this resistance, I’m afraid someone’s going to judge it if it doesn’t go well, what are my employees going to say? What are my customers going to say? And I’m dealing with all that as well. So it’s so, it requires so much more effort to actually do the thing. 

So they will get themselves motivated. They’ll pump themselves up whatever way, but it’s just so much effort that when they’re done, they’re exhausted. And again, like you said, it’s not sustainable to do that. It creates burnout or just honestly people just dislike their business. 

I see a lot of people actually exit businesses prematurely because they just can’t deal with that emotional weight they’re handling.

Ben McAdam (08:04.278)

Yeah. I think it’s worth underscoring for people the nuance that removing the resistance isn’t like “stop doing the hard thing” or “stop trying to do something that’s great but hard.” That’s not what you mean by removing the resistance. It’s about insecurities, emotional fortitude mindset stuff so that you can still do the big thing but it maybe doesn’t require such inhuman levels of motivation and you can find that success is a little bit easier.

Itamar (08:42.965)

To encapsulate it, the way I would try to clarify myself is to say that every task we do, there’s some level of like actual technical challenge to it. And then there’s the emotional weight we attach to it. There’s those two components. 

Now, for example, if I have to have a tough conversation with an employee, there’s a technical component as well. I have to figure out how I’m gonna structure this, how I’m gonna get clear that like, okay, these KPIs are working, these KPIs are not, this is how things are going to change. I need to figure those things out. I need to deliver them in a way that they can receive it.

Now, that’s, let’s say, at a scale of zero to 10, that’s maybe a four or a five, the actual technical part. But if I also have a lot of my own issues that I’m like, “Is this person not gonna like me anymore?” “Are people gonna judge me?” Like, “Am I even supposed to be the CEO or the boss?” And “Is it okay for me to do these things?” All of a sudden, that task, instead of becoming like a four or five out of ten, it feels like a nine.

So sometimes we even avoid that altogether. So it’s not that it’s just not about avoiding doing the big things. You can actually do a lot more big things with less effort because those big things actually require less effort. I think that’s kind of what you’re trying to encapsulate, correct?

Ben McAdam (09:54.358)

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And that’s a great example about, you know, having a conversation with an employee, uh, actually came up in a coaching call for one of my clients earlier today, it’s like he had to, you know, it took a great deal of effort for him to have hard conversations with, with his employees over the, over the years, but like, he was really proud of himself today that it didn’t take nearly so much. And that meant that he could actually get other stuff done that day! He didn’t, you know, go and eat a whole bunch of junk food or drink or like just clock off in front of Netflix for the whole day. 

So before we started recording, you mentioned that there’s a bit more to these insecurities that ties into the three core fears.

Itamar (10:39.805)

Yeah, so here’s what I would say about the motivation fallacy. So we said there’s some kind of resistance. It’s usually something that people are not consciously aware of. It’s just something that you think they want to do this thing. I have this tough conversation with the employee. For a lot of you guys probably just like listening to Ben’s podcast, I need to get better with my numbers. Follow the numbers, follow the structures, or like whatever it may be.

You have this goal that you really want. You think you’re connected to it, but in reality you’re more connected to something else. Like you think you want this thing that you talk about, you talk to your business partner about, you talk to your mastermind buddies about, anybody else, but you’re actually more connected to something else. 

And the way you can know that is because you’re actually taking different actions than what you say you should be doing. Now this thing that most people are connected to, it’s a fear. 

It’s a subconscious fear that they’re not really aware of, but it ends up steering their actions. And it’s not a fear of spiders or a fear of heights, but it’s a fear of having certain feelings. And this is the stuff where, you know, everyone is like, what is this special forces guy talking about feelings? But the reality is that it affects us, and we have to own it. And I think not owning it causes us to get blindsided. 

Now, what I was saying is that on a primal level, like when we evolved 100,000 years ago, we developed three core fears that, by and large, they really, really helped us back then. 

They helped us stay safe from the savanna, but nowadays in 2023, they don’t make sense anymore. They don’t actually help us. More often or not they hold us back, but we still feel connected to them on a primal subconscious level. That’s why if we’re not aware of them, they can really, really derail us. 

So first off, am I making sense so far?

Ben McAdam (12:11.446)

Yes, yeah, absolutely.

Itamar (12:13.829)

Great. So can I share the core fears with the audience? That’s basically how we’ll do it. Cool.

Ben McAdam (12:17.45)

Yes, yes, please do. Uh, I, I found it extremely helpful…

Actually, hang on. Did I mention in the intro that you were my mindset coach? I don’t think I actually said it! 

I’m so used to saying to some of my clients and some of my friends like, “Hey, you should go look at this episode that my mindset coach put out on his podcast, because it’s really, it’s going to help you with that thing that you just said”.  I’m so used to saying that, that it just didn’t come out earlier. 

Anyway, three core fears. Let’s hear it.

Itamar (12:27.066)

Yeah, those three core fears. 

So again, remember these are things that you’re not intentional about. You don’t want to have these fears. You don’t want to feel this way. You don’t want this to dictate your actions, but because that operates on a deeper subconscious level, it’s something that takes precedent over what you consciously do want. 

So the first core fear, that’s a fear of uncertainty or powerlessness. This is, I feel terrified to feel out of control. Or what if I can’t control everything? And what ends up happening a lot of times is people end up micromanaging or being the bottlenecks in their business or they feel this anxiety if they do something that they can’t have 100% control over. 

And if you’ve ever been called or if you felt like a control freak, this is probably why.

Now, when you think about it from a very, it’s called an “evolutionary perspective”, it makes a ton of sense that we would have this fear of powerlessness or {lack of} control, or uncertainty. 

It’s like, if you walk the wrong way and the way from your hut in the savanna to the watering hole, you get lost and get eaten by a lion. That’s a pretty severe consequence. 

But again, in 2023, the consequences of us having some level of uncertainty, or powerlessness over a situation, they’re not as severe. But some of these feel that severe. That’s why we have a hard time having that conversation. Because what will happen if something goes wrong? Well, probably nothing, but it feels like the world sometimes.

Ben McAdam (14:05.862)

Yeah. Unless you know, 100% certain that, like, it’s going to happen the way that I wanted to happen or that I think it’s going to happen,, it’ll make people feel uncertain and very uncomfortable.

Itamar (14:20.485)

Yeah, that’s the first core fear. 

Second core fear, and this is the one that I stuff to deal with some of the stuff that I went through in the agency and in the military is a fear worthlessness. 

This is “I’m not good enough to…” or “I need to have x y and z before I…”. So I need to have certain accolades or an accomplishment, certain results or permission from someone, whatever it may be, before I feel comfortable to actually do the thing.

It’s a fear of failure or fear of success a lot of times for people. 

Like, do I deserve this? It’s this “Who am I to…?” and a lot of times people putting glass ceilings on themselves that they feel this kind of sense of imposter syndrome.

Ben McAdam (14:58.899)

Mm. Yeah, that’s my big one. Absolutely.

Itamar (15:01.841)

Yeah, that’s what I was gonna say. And that was the big thing for you. If you remember, like back in the day, that was the thing. 

It’s like, I’ll put it this way, confidence without competence, that’s self-delusion, but competence without confidence, that’s when you usually play small. 

And that was what was happening with you. You had the competence, but you didn’t have the confidence because you had this like, who am I to? I’m not sure, I had a bit of imposter syndrome. So you’re really holding yourself back. But once you broke free from that, like you went to the next level, right?

Ben McAdam (15:29.526)

Yeah, it was amazing.

Itamar (15:31.845)

Yeah, so that’s fear number two. Is that one clear? 

Ben McAdam

Yeap. Yeah to me certainly! I know all about that.

Itamar

Cool. So as it is also for the people listening, like if this kind of hits home in an uncomfortable way, like, oh, I can resonate with that. I’ve had a situation where I felt that like, “Who am I to…” or “I can’t do this yet, because I feel like I need to have this permission or result or achievement before it’s valid for me to do so.” That’s probably what’s going on there.

Itamar (15:57.877)

So that’s fear number two. 

Fear number three is the fear that you’ve seen me when I give talks, nobody likes to actually admit that they have this, everybody kind of looks down, but we all do, is that fear of abandonment.

Again, this is a very primal tribal thing. It’s like, “What if he or she or they leave me?” Or “I could never do this or that because of what they might say about me.” And we’ve all felt that in sometimes, right?

Ben McAdam (16:21.89)

Yep.

Itamar (16:22.465)

And the weirder thing is that usually when we feel that it’s this really weird ominous they. It’s not like, “Oh, Ben, Jeff, and Jamie are going to think this exact thing of me if I do this, and that’s gonna have this specific consequence.” It’s this very weird and ominous fear of the tribe that we’re afraid of getting outcasted and judged. Which again, 100,000 years ago, if you live in a small tribe of let’s say like 20 people, if you did something really bad, they get you outcasted, you’re probably going to die in the savanna.

Itamar (16:49.017)

And these days, like if one employee leaves or one person leaves you a bad comment on content you’re creating, whatever it may be, like it doesn’t actually have a consequence in your life. But it still has a very strong emotional impact. And that emotional impact drives you to do things that don’t serve you. 

This also this whole fear of abandonment sometimes cause people think what will people think if I fail, so they don’t even start something? Or what will people think if I succeed, especially more than them? And this is see a lot of people with a cut from the Commonwealth countries.

From like the UK, Australia, New Zealand, there’s a lot of that “tall poppy syndrome” as you guys call it. And it’s a big thing. 

It’s this fear of like, okay, if I succeed, I’m actually gonna have a worse life because people are gonna judge me. If I’m financially successful, people are gonna judge me for it. And I don’t really recognize what’s going on, but for some reason I find myself not doing the things that’ll make me financially successful. Well, that’s why, because there’s a party that probably doesn’t wanna be abandoned by your friends, your family, or whoever else you think might judge you for it, negatively.

Ben McAdam (17:23.606)

Oh yes.

Yeah, definitely, definitely on that, definitely on that financially successful piece. 

Uh, this is for anybody. There’s relatively common money mindset issue that comes up, and I know you mentioned it on one of your podcast episodes for one of your clients is if there’s money mindset issues in the family where it’s like earning money is greedy, or businessmen or investors are greedy, or corporate people are greedy, and that’s terrible or it’s sinful or against our religion or something like that. 

It’s like people will have some certain level of success and then for some reason, they’ll find themselves compelled to spend a lot of money on something stupid or irrelevant or extravagant. And they don’t know why they behave this way. And it’s because of the fear of abandonment they want to still be part of the tribe who believes that having too much money or being too successful is a bad idea. And so they just, why do I self sabotage? 

 This is one of the reasons why.

Itamar (18:45.245)

Can I sharpen that a little bit? Because I think I’ve actually clarified that since I’ve written that podcast back in the day. 

So what I found is that people spend excessively on things they don’t need, like fancy cars, bad investments, whatever it may be, things that don’t actually serve them when they have an issue on worthiness. They don’t feel comfortable seeing that number in their own bank account, so some they got to do something about it. So both they spend a lot of money and they give themselves a little bit of a dopamine hype of buying things.

{When} people have a fear of abandonment, they actually block their business from growing. They don’t get to that point where they have a lot of money, they actually serve as a block for themselves. So like, I don’t even want to get to here. But sometimes people get to there, they’re like, “Oh, shit, I don’t think I’m deserving of this. So now let me somehow self sabotage”. Instead of self-blocking it, let me self-sabotage. Does that make sense? A little nuance.

Ben McAdam (19:33.998)

I like that. Yeah. 

So of the three core fears you’ve got the fear of uncertainty tends to be visible as like you’re a control freak or micromanager, the fear of worthiness (and it is just my brief summary. Feel free to do one after), um, the fear of worthiness is like you have some success and then you sabotage yourself back down to all that where you’re comfortable, and the fear of abandonment. So you block it.

Itamar (19:45.212)

Or you don’t go beyond the level you’re comfortable. Sometimes you go up or you go down.

Ben McAdam (20:04.519)

Okay. Interesting. 

So, so summary. So for people who are listening and they’re like, “I kind of think I might be this one or that one, but I’m not sure which is the primary one for me” or the first one they should address, for example, like what would be some signs of what they’re doing?

Itamar (20:26.741)

So can you answer it a bit of a different way?

Ben McAdam (20:28.916)

Sure.

Itamar (20:30.493)

So I think the important thing, the primary thing that needs to happen is before you actually decide, okay, this is a specific one I wanna focus in on, is taking ownership of the situation that you know what the reason I’m not doing the things that will actually serve me is because I’m having an emotional issue here. Like this thing that I’m connected to is actually not my goal, it’s a fear. 

Being able to own that, that’s the first step in order to solve the problem.

I think that’s the most powerful thing to recognize the car you said about the motivation. It’s actually I don’t need more motivation, actually need to address this thing. Because once I actually address it, and I can shave it down and resolve it, then I don’t need to get motivated. 

Now, that’s the thing I should be doing regardless of the fact of which fear is it, exactly? Or whatnot. I usually honestly like say these fears to people just so they can resonate and be like, “Ah! I do have something here.” 

Like we have a very good mutual friend, I’m not gonna bring him up here. But he always thought he never had any head trash.

Itamar (21:25.833)

He was blocking himself, but he thought I never had any head trash. And then when we just told him this, he’s like, “You know what? That actually hits home.” 

They’re like, so maybe there is something that it’s holding you back. And I think that’s the point of it. Like if you can recognize one of these three things {that} pop upped… and you recognize because of these things, this fear of worthlessness, this fear of uncertainty, or this fear of abandonment I actually end up abandoning my goals, projects, businesses, or even abandon myself by staying in relationships that really, really don’t serve me. Then maybe there’s something here.

Itamar (21:54.701)

or if I find myself resorting to all these kind of vices, like whether it’s food, whether it’s drugs, whether it’s porn, whether it’s sex, whether it’s procrastinating in many different ways because I don’t like how I’m feeling about myself because I’m not proud of myself, because I know I’m not acting in a way that I should be acting, that’s probably why you’re doing those things. 

So if any of that resonates, I think the first step before, like, you know, which one is which and what is relevant to me, just only the fact that this is the actual issue. Because once I can identify the true problem, then I can begin to solve the actual problem.

Ben McAdam (22:28.83)

I like that. Identify that there’s a problem before picking which problem it is. Yeah.

Itamar (22:33.989)

Yeah, it’s like the basic rule of decision-making. First, you know, identify the problem and only then begin to solve it. And I think most people try to skip that part. And identifying the problem has some technical level but also owning it. Saying, I do have a problem here, I need to fix it.

Ben McAdam (22:41.078)

Yeah. I tend to assume that like the people I surround myself with generally have some basic level of emotional awareness about them. And I didn’t even think that there might be some people listening to the podcast that might actually need to hear that bit. So thank you for clarifying that. I appreciate it.

Itamar (23:03.165)

Yeah, but I think emotional awareness, there’s some, there’s a difference between saying, “I’m emotionally aware I’m a bit stressed right now.” That’s like a very surface level thing. And saying, you know what, “I recognize right now that one of my primary insecurities that drives a lot of my behaviors is X. So therefore I need to address X.” Or two different levels. Because I’m just feeling stressed right now, it’s like, okay, I should just calm down…but it doesn’t create a long-term result. 

By being able to say, you know what, I recognize that one of the core issues that’s affecting me and not enabling me to get towards my goals is this specific thing. Then once you resolve it, then it’s a more sustainable thing where it doesn’t keep bumping up into you.

Ben McAdam (23:41.665)

Mm-hmm. I like it. So anything else to add about the three core fears before we move on?

Itamar (23:48.625)

No, just that would be it. Like if you find a lot of times that you’re acting in ways that you wouldn’t recommend somebody else in your position act, or {you’re not doing} the things that you would recommend somebody else to do, that you ask yourself “why?” Is it one of these things that’s affecting m?. They can give you a lot of clarity and, like actually assess is it something I need to dress or not?

Ben McAdam (24:06.21)

Hmm. I like one of the things I really like about your teachings and conversations and coaching is this idea of making the invisible visible. Or what’s your Carl Jung quote, the unconscious….

Itamar (24:24.929)

Yeah, “Till you make the unconscious conscious that will direct your life and you’ll call it fate.”

Ben McAdam (24:29.214)

Yes, exactly. I love that idea of like, there are things holding us back or we hold ourselves back or they get in our way or we get in our own way and we don’t even know that there’s a problem there and making that visible, bringing it to our conscious attention, I really like. 

And there was a, well, what’s the thing you say? It’s like, if someone with your exact skillset is doing better than you, that’s a mindset or emotional access issue. Did I get, did I get the quote right?

Itamar (24:58.405)

Yeah, yeah. that’s just that.

Because if they have the same skill set but they’re getting different results, then why can’t you access all of your own skill sets? What’s the emotional block that’s stopping you? 

Like mindset, the way I look at it, it’s not about motivation. It’s not about how you can get more skills or how you can do more. But it’s an access issue.

Itamar (25:20.333)

Most people have a great skill set. Again, most of the people that I interact with have a phenomenal skill set. 

Like you, you were already in the game for 10-12 years, you were doing your thing, and you were very, very competent at it. But you just weren’t accessing it fully. So once you release that, then people go to move very fast. Because it’s not a this incremental, “let’s add another skill on, another thing”, but it’s like, “let’s open up the floodgates,” so to speak. 

I think that’s really the big part. These fears, what I noticed, they’re the gates. Once you remove them, then things really start to flow.

Ben McAdam (25:46.939)

Yeah, I’ve even found this idea of the emotional access, like you’re not able to access your skills….I found that helpful in parenting my kids a bit actually. Um, and public speaking, um, like the most articulate person in the world can hop on a stage and then suddenly like they don’t know what to say and they freeze. It’s not because they don’t have the skills to speak in a way that entertains other people, it’s that they can’t access it because of what’s going on with their emotions and their mindset.

So that’s probably a good segue into talking about the elite performance pyramid.

Itamar (26:30.289)

Yeah, so the way I look at it, so I don’t think everybody, I know everybody’s like, “oh, everybody should work on their mindset.” I’m not a real fan of that. I’m more of a fan of the theory of constraints and actually approaching like, “what should you work with?” Your resources, your time, your energy is finite. So you don’t wanna be working on step 15 when you’re at stage two. 

And the construct of the hierarchy of elite performance is simple. It’s like if you have the very bottom, let’s say you have a skill set, you have great character traits, and you have like determination grit and all that. You have all those things in place already. But you just don’t have that emotional fortitude because those fears stop you. You’re not going to access everything. 

So I don’t think people should work on their mindset first, honestly, I think even if you have the best mindset in the world, but you don’t have any skill set to attach it to, you’re not going to get great results.

Ben McAdam (27:25.793)

Hmm.

Itamar (27:25.881)

And like I said about that whole motivation fallacy, when you’re just starting out, honestly, like this truthfully, it doesn’t serve my business sometimes to say, but it’s the truth. When you’re starting out, like even if you have all these issues, you’re going to have to make something happen. You’re going to have that beginner drive, whatever you want to call it. 

And that’s why I honestly, I don’t think at the very beginning, you need to focus on mindset, like first, build up a skill set. That’s the bottom of that pyramid. Then make sure you actually have the character traits…. some determination, integrity, honesty, you think long-term, you’re not just doing short-term things that don’t actually serve you.

On top of that, you gotta have that little bit of, let’s call it the mindset part, which is that you give yourself the opportunity when you see a challenge to view it as an opportunity to grow and to create separation. Not just as a, “Oh, this is hard for me, I’m a victim.” 

And then at the end, if you have all that and you’re still not getting the results you want, but let’s say you have a skillset, you’re determined, you’re disciplined, and you don’t buy into victimhood, but you still don’t get the results you want, and those other people with the same skill set as you are doing better? It’s probably because this emotional access issue, that’s the final frontier. 

And once you lock that in, like we said, like you open up the floodgates.

Ben McAdam (28:34.998)

Hmm. Yeah. And, and each, each level unlocks a new level of success. Like you can actually have some level of success. It’s not like you have to go all the way out the pyramid to earn you know, five or $10,000 a month. Um, each one of them, uh, unlocks in a new level. I found it very helpful. 

I’m actually getting flashbacks to the episode I did on your podcast. I was in Rome with the family at the time and you were going through this.

Ben McAdam (29:04.286)

And it was, it was very, very helpful. Even though I’d heard all the concepts before, like each time going over these things, there’s a new nuance or a new level of understanding. Like for example, you know, in the podcast, I’m paraphrasing things in my words and you’re like clarifying the word choice and the way to express it. Like there’s always a, you know, you can be a black belt, but then there’s like levels among the black belts. 

And it’s always like these, these little tweaks that make a, make a difference.

Itamar (29:29.533)

Yeah.

Ben McAdam (29:35.387)

I like it. Anything else to add about the hierarchy of elite performance?

Itamar (29:41.093)

I think just assess where you are. Like again, like I don’t think, and I recognize this isn’t something that’s great for my business to do that, but I don’t think everyone should work on their mindset.

I think that’s marketing hype. I don’t think it’s truthful. I think if you’re, let’s say you just for example, got laid off a job, and you’re like, “Okay, I can’t go work back in corporate America,” or Australia, or whatever it may be, So I want to start becoming an entrepreneur. It’s like, do not work on your mindset, find an actual skill set, where if you do this thing for the marketplace, you can actually have some income for yourself and your family. 

Just that desperation, so to speak, that need, will drive you to do the things you need to do. It will give you ample amount of motivation. Once you get to that point where things are kind of good enough, and you’re not that motivated anymore from a place of desperation, but you still have an internal desire to do more, that’s when you got to work on that emotional stuff. 

But if you just feel that sense of desperation and you’re taking action, it’s like, why do something more productive with your time? You don’t need that yet.

That’s the whole part of the action equation. Like that’s when you switch. When you can like, you can’t rely on motivation anymore when it’s not realistic for you to say, I have to do this. You don’t have to, you’re good. Things are good enough. You have enough money, you have enough cash. But if you still want to do something more, instead of trying to pump up your motivation, work on that resistance. 

So that’s how I conclude that.

Ben McAdam (30:57.035)

Yep. Yeah, definitely like high performing, highly skilled, highly intelligent people, whatever. Put them into a situation where they need to make a difference, they need to make some money, or they need to build their business. And like they can get it to a certain level. And then as soon as things become comfortable, and that strong need goes away. That’s when all this other stuff becomes important.

Itamar (31:27.209)

And that’s when you address that when the need isn’t there, but you still have a want and you want to do big things you want to have a big impact you want to make more money for yourself your family and all that. 

That’s when you address these things.

Ben McAdam (31:30.826)

Yep. I like it. 

So something else that you do a little differently and I liked it. It’s a little different. It’s a really good approach is goal setting and values and why I mentioned that in the same sentence is something I’m sure it’ll cover in a moment, but goal setting is definitely on my mind at the moment, like this podcast is we’re recording in a journal go live beginning of July, middle of the year. I talked to a lot of my clients about resetting or refocusing on their goals and planning and how they should think about that. 

And you have a slightly different way of doing it.

Why don’t you explain that? Like what, what do people normally do with goals and how, how do you suggest they should be thinking differently about it?

Itamar (32:25.178)

Okay, so again, I’ll approach this kind of from a side angle, if that’s alright.

Ben McAdam (32:29.035)

Hahaha

You’re kind of easy and hard as a podcast guest at the same time, because you always want to say it differently, but also like, I really don’t need to frame the question particularly well, because you’ll just like, you know, take it in the right direction.

Itamar (32:38.305)

I appreciate it. So like, here’s what I think about this as a general principle. I think, like your external success is a downstream effect of who you are internally. And I think a lot of people set out these goals, like they say, this is what I want to do, but you haven’t calibrated, how am I going to need to change in order to be able to do that? And I think setting out external goals is extremely important. Because you said, okay, this is kind of the mountain I want to conquer.

But then what you got to figure out is, “okay, what would somebody who would conquer this mountain, who would who would that be? What would their values be? What were the rules that they live by?” 

Forget about just the strategic KPIs, these are the things that we do on a daily basis… But what do they value in life? And how do they actually operate? 

Because like, I think, you know, there’s always those exercises like “What are your top values?” Man, I think this are such nonsense if you’re trying to grow and evolve. Because they’re asking you what are your top values right now today? And like, yes, it is nice. It makes you feel like, oh, now I understand more about myself. I’m aligned, etc, etc. 

But they’re not asking you like if you want to grow and you have these new goals where you want to get certain external things and therefore you also need to become a better internal version of yourself. How do you need to change? What do you need to start valuing? Maybe to get to a certain level in your business, you really valued hard work.

Maybe now you need to start valuing a lot more strategic vision and actually delegation and leadership. And that might terrify you because you might have a fear of uncertainty. So delegating and helping getting other people to do your things, that’s terrifying for you.

Itamar (34:30.057)

So you can’t just ask what are my values. You gotta ask what are the values of somebody who could complete the goals that I want? What would they value in life? And from there you say, okay, on a tactical level, forget about like vision boards, all that kind of jazz. How can we distill these values into actual day-to-day rules? 

Like if somebody, for example, valued and let’s say they grew… Like Ben, what was your main values from the last arena, if you remember?

Ben McAdam (34:36.682)

Discipline, kindness and leverage.

Itamar (35:03.673)

Leverage, beautiful. That’s a big one. That’s a growth one. That’s usually one we don’t need to employ at the beginning of our journey, but then we need to grow for it. 

So for leverage, what were the rules you said, okay, if I do these specific things, that will indeed show that I’m valuing leverage in my life and in my business?

Ben McAdam (35:19.018)

Yeah, yeah, it was about relying on the supports or, you know, using leverage, using the team, using supports in the domestic front as well. It wasn’t just like, “Oh, I need to be more leverage. Okay, cool. Now I’m going to get to my emails and just go through those.” It was like, there was a yes/no thing. It’s like, “Am I embodying this value? Am I using leverage?”

It’s like, am I relying on my team? Am I using my team? Yes/No. Um, it becomes a bit clearer.

Itamar (35:48.177)

Yeah, I think the clear we can get this like the ranking rules, like I’m actually doing this, for example, leverage, like I’m not allowed to do $10/hr tasks. It’s a big thing for a lot of CEOs. 

Like if you do that, okay, like you can’t be just doing the small stuff anymore. You actually have to rely on other people or tech or whatever it may be. Am I having, for a lot of the guys, am I actually having the weekly one on ones with all my employees and preparing for it appropriately?

Ben McAdam (36:04.983)

Mm.

Itamar (36:13.337)

And not just looking at this as a must to do, but actually I’m excited about this, how I employ leverage. 

Or if anyone is working with any kind of tech in their business, is this only my only doing things that can actually be leveraged in some way? Not just one-offs. 

I think the clearer you can get about that and saying these are the values and these are the rules I’m gonna live by…that goal, it kind of happens. You know what I mean? Because you’re doing the things that will get you towards the path that will get you on the track to there.

I think that’s the big thing. It’s like, I don’t think goal setting just external things without addressing how do you need to change internally. I don’t think it’s gonna create a good outcome for you.

Ben McAdam (36:53.299)

Yeah, or if somehow you do manage to achieve the external goals, it’s going to be harder for you, because it’s like you’ve got the handbrake on.

Itamar (37:03.153)

Well, I think a bit different here. So this is interesting. I would say that these… distilling the values and the rules, that’s you choosing the most optimal path to get you up the mountain. The one with the least curves, the most efficient one. And this is the path I got to go from here to there. 

The emotional stuff, that’s what is how big is this called the rucksack or the backpack? How heavy is it the one that I’m carrying up with me?

Ben McAdam (37:31.266)

Mm-hmm.

Itamar (37:31.529)

For example, if I know that the easiest path, the simplest technical path would be to employ leverage to get me from the bottom to the top of the mountain, but I have all these trust issues. I have all these issues with uncertainty. With other people do it, I’m gonna feel all this anxiety. That’s gonna weigh me down. 

And that’s why we do it in that kind of process in the program. First, we figure out the goal. Then we figure out the most simple technical path. How do you need to change? And then we figure out what are the specific things that could be weighing you down from doing that?

And that’s how those core fears act together. So we can say, okay, you know, they need to employ leverage to reach like the next level, seven, eight figures in your business, whatever it may be. But you have this issue with uncertainty because you have a belief that if I delegate people and respect me, or I need to do everything because that proves that I’m a great boss, or if I don’t know anything, something’s going to collapse.

Ben McAdam (38:19.79)

We have leading from the front.

Itamar (38:22.557)

Yeah. And like once we remove those things, that’s when people can fly up. Does that make sense?

Ben McAdam (38:25.966)

Hmm. Yeah, absolutely. I really liked the example you gave a little bit earlier of the person who values hard work and they work really hard. And then they get to the point where they can’t really hard work their way to the next level, like they need to use the leverage of a team. And so they need to change their values. They need to let go of the old identity and the old values that they held and adopt some new ones. And the rules make it easier to embody those new values in a way that’s a bit clearer. 

Um, any other examples of, for entrepreneurs, business owners of values they might need to change or like old values that you see hold people back from when there’s some new values they need to go for.

Itamar (39:18.902)

I’d actually love to double down what you just said. Because the whole working hard, that’s such a hard thing for people to let go of. And I explain how it all ties together. 

Like we talked about the motivation fallacy. Like how it’s more tempting for people to get motivated than to actually resolve their internal stuff. Like telling yourself, okay, I know that working hard has gotten me this far(whether it’s because I have a certain chip on my shoulder, or whatever it may be) and now, to actually to go the next level, I have to let go of what got me this far is terrifying for most people.

Because you basically have to take a leap of faith to say, “You know what, I need to change. And that’s not comfortable.” So instead of doing that, actually acknowledging that we need to change what’s easier, let me get more motivated so I can actually do even more. And that’s why people fall back to that.

Itamar (40:08.137)

So like instead of actually going in a different direction, I’d love to double down on that. 

I think giving up that I need to work harder is the toughest thing for a lot of entrepreneurs, especially the driven types. Because it’s literally shown that they’ve gotten feedback that when they work harder, they’ve seen success. And you have to come to a mature realization that, okay, but this only gets me this far. And then I have to make the decision, am I willing to evolve?

Ben McAdam (40:33:263)

Yeah, that actually happened for me. Um, so we started working together two years ago? Two, three? Yeah. Two years ago. It’s been a big two years. That’s why it seems like it longer, not because, you know, it’s, it’s boring or terrible just cause a lot happened. 

Um, and at the time I wasn’t particularly motivated and I wasn’t driven and I wasn’t working particularly hard. I had optimized for lifestyle and I wasn’t really getting me where I wanted to go. And then we did some work together and suddenly like I’m working hard, I’m like, you know, putting in a lot of effort. And things took off!

And I made a connection there like, “oh, hard work equals rapid success.” Therefore, you know, I’ve worked hard and I’ve got to this level. So okay, I guess I should work harder, and then I’ll have even more success. And that was that was driving things in the wrong direction. And the last six months for me have been trying to not work hard as a way to achieve the next level of success. And the thing that helped was a workshop of yours I went to in Bangkok in October.

And I realized that there, it was really obvious the limit to the success I could have using hard work. So for me coaching, if I have one-on-one coaching clients, there are only a certain number of hours in every day. You know, of those hours, only a certain number of them, I will be effective coaching, but you know, let’s say I didn’t sleep very much and I could coach a certain number of hours every day. Um, that’s the best I can do. 

Or it’s a limiting factor. If all I did is just like, okay, just take on more clients, just work more coaching hours, it’s like, yes, I could have a bit more success, but it’s nowhere near where I wanna aim for. I won’t be able to do it that way. 

So I had to make changes to my coaching model and it wasn’t work harder, it was actually work a little bit less, which was terrifying. It was really, really hard.

Itamar (42:42.191)

So I was just gonna say, there’s work harder, there’s work smarter, or you can also work braver. And that last one is what most people don’t talk about. 

And it’s like, it doesn’t mean that you’re not gonna have to work hard on the things that also require courage, but it just means that you’re opening yourself up to a whole different level of opportunities. When you can work on the thing that actually requires more courage, and you can put the work behind it in order to facilitate the results, that’s when amazing things happen.

Itamar (43:09.037)

I think that’s the thing. Some people are like, okay, let me work really, really hard. But

they’re actually emotionally very comfortable because they’re not risking anything, really just doing a lot of things. Then they let me work a little bit smarter as well. Let me employ some tactical leverage. But again, in a way where I feel emotionally safe, where I’m not going to be judged, there’s no possibility for failure or whatever it may be. And there’s finally let me work braver in a place where I’m actually giving myself a possibility for really big rewards and not even a possibility, but probability that someone’s not going to like what I do, someone’s going to judge it, someone’s going to say this or that.

And I think what’s really freeing for a lot of people, if they can accept that, okay, I accept ahead of time that someone’s gonna judge, something negative is gonna come out, I’m gonna feel a certain feeling that I don’t wanna feel, but that’s okay. And on top of that, let me employ some very intelligent leverage and let me actually get to work on it. That’s when amazing results can happen. But most people, because of that, they’re not aware of that, so they kind of shy away from it.

Ben McAdam (44:03.278)

Hmm. Yep. Working braver for me, like I said, the last six months, I had to have conversations with all of my clients and say, okay, we’re changing the way we do things. Um, and I had to also say things differently on sales calls for new potential coaching clients. Like I knew that if I did things the old way, I knew it would work. Work. I should put in quotes. I knew what it would get me.

But there was like this uncertainty and like, what if they like me and do I deserve better success, like all the three coffees were coming up. Um, and it was, it was, yeah, it took a lot of bravery, but it has led to more success and enabled more success. Uh, even though, you know, it took a little, things took a little bit of a dip when I did that, that’s not like “Oh, you know, things, things will be fine.” They only Mike about it’s like, no, you have to do the hard things. And there will be an element of sucking about them.

Itamar (45:03.657)

But like forget about the external success you’re facing right now. How about internally? Like, do you feel better about yourself or having done that and being on the other side of it? Yeah. And that’s, and that’s the real thing. Like, you know, like I talk a lot about numbers and business and all that because people have to justify business expenses, but that’s the real goal, man. At the end of the day, it’s like, we want to feel great and proud about ourselves. We want to feel happy. We want to feel content. We want to feel proud. And I think a lot of the other things are just a way to get that.

Ben McAdam (45:09.987)

Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, incredibly proud of myself.

Okay. So there was one other topic I wanted to make sure that we cover today, but I’m, I’m looking and the episode has gone on a bit long. I really think identity lag is something important. It’s a really important concept. Like I’ve pointed people to the episode on your podcast that we did about identity lag a number of times. And they’re always like, Oh, thank you for telling me about that. But this episode has gone on a bit long. So maybe we’ll just kind of leave the breadcrumb there that people can follow.

And like, I’ll leave a link in the show notes. Um, you don’t, uh, you can search for the podcast name and then my name.

Itamar (46:13.453)

Just go to Itamarmarani.com/podcast And there you’ll find the list of the episodes and “Identity Lag Ben McAdam” should be there.

Ben McAdam (46:22.25)

Yes, that’s the one was really good. So I talk a little bit about my journey and some of the things that helped me now work together and identity, like in particular, should we, can you think of a teaser we could give people about why they should care about identity? Like, like, I know it’s super important, but

Itamar (46:42.993)

Yeah, because the reality is more people, a lot of people, the results are not indicative of who they are, they’re indicative of how they feel about themselves.

So therefore they only go for certain level of things. So like, I think I’m a three in business. So let me only go for three opportunities, but the reality is only feel a three, because that’s how you remember yourself from two years ago when you were a three, now you’re a six. But you’re still going for level three opportunities and getting level three results. And once you can bridge that gap to not take actions based on how you remember yourself from three years ago when you just started, but in who you are today.

your results on the podcast things when you went from 5k a month and you made that first like 70k month. And like things really started going bananas and like, that should that should be a big enough breadcrumb. That’s a possible result that and I’ve seen not only with those numbers, I’ve only seen like a lot of people also go from mid six to eight figures because of that exact same thing. So I hope that’s a big enough breadcrumb why it’s important to actually make sure you’re not operating off a false assumption of who you are and what you’re capable of. And we share the exact tools that you use to do that.

Ben McAdam (47:29.208)

Yeah.

Yep.

Ben McAdam (47:43.874)

Excellent. Yeah, absolutely. We walked you walked through the exercise, you gave it all away. I was really impressed. So yeah, breadcrumb and my recommendation, we’ll put the link in the show notes or go to it, itamarani.com and it’ll be there on the site, like you said. Okay, so any final tips or any last pieces of advice you want to leave people with?

Itamar (48:06.837)

To be honest with yourself, if you feel that somebody else with your exact skillset or less is accomplishing more, don’t fall for that motivation fallacy, it doesn’t work. Just because it worked once back in the day doesn’t mean it’s actually what’s gonna get you to the next level. Like have an honest look at yourself, if any of the core fears that resonate.

Like step up and say, okay, this is, I recognize that this is tough. Most people are going to shy away from it, but I’m capable of looking at it in the face and this is what I’m going to address. And this is once when I, the thing that once I remove, I’m going to go to the next level, not just externally, like we said, but also internally, because things will just feel much easier, much smoother, just much more enjoyable. And I think if you can have the courage to do that, you can be way ahead of the game of everybody else, because most people won’t do it.

Ben McAdam (48:51.374)

Absolutely. Great way to wrap it up. So anybody who wants more Itamar wisdom, more mindset, emotional fortitude gems, uh, I highly recommend your podcast, itamaramorani.com slash podcast or emotional fan fortitude. Every time I say it to someone, I’m like elite foundations. No, that’s the old one. Emotional fortitude podcast. Um, they also got a micro course, which.

Itamar (49:06.793)

the emotional fortitude bodies, emotional fortitude. Yeah.

That’s all what…

Ben McAdam (49:21.242)

is another one of those give away all the secrets and I can’t believe he’s not charging for me kind of things.

Itamar (49:28.126)

Yeah. So, sorry, go ahead.

Ben McAdam (49:31.783)

Tell people about the Microcourse.

Itamar (49:34.105)

So first of all, my philosophy in general in the business is that we try to give everything away and there’s going to be some people who are already doing really well, but want to do even better. And they’d be like, dude, I just want to get help with this. So you can help me implement it. I could do this much faster, much easier. Like that’s our philosophy in general. Like with the podcast, like you said, we’re actually sharing everything. And the micro course is the same thing. The point of the micro course is to help you basically unblock yourself. So if any of these core fear resonates, like it’s a very broad thing. This is saying, okay, I have a fear here. But the micro course, how you actually figure out, oh, what is the exact beliefs that I hold, but now that I can so clearly see it, I can actually break free from it. And the micros, it’s super fast. It’s only five modules of, I think, up to, it’s 21 minutes total, the whole thing together, but it’s very high impact. It actually creates a lot of lasting change. And like Ben said, it’s a nothing held back thing. It’s not like, oh, let me show you this one little thing. And it’s nothing held back. Everybody can use it. And if some people see it and they’re like, this is amazing, I wanna keep working on this, they know where to find us.

Ben McAdam (50:32.462)

Hmm, absolutely. And I went through that course a little over two years ago and that was the thing that made me reach out and say, okay, we need to work together because this thing helped me so much for it. It’s just an email course with some videos and things that it really helped me. So like, man, working with this guy, how much would it really help? Um, speaking of which you only do the arena program a few times per year. And at the time this is going live, uh,

You’ll be signing people up. It’ll be starting pretty soon. I think, um, I’ve been through the arena twice. I’ve recommended so many of my clients and friends go through it and everybody who goes through it has had great things to say. So while I normally don’t allow pitching on the podcast, I feel like I’m doing a pretty damn good job of pitching for you right now. So for those people, for those people who do actually want to make a big difference and not have it take years and years of therapy.

Itamar (51:16.285)

the

It’s appreciated, man.

Ben McAdam (51:32.272)

What are their options there? What does the arena program do?

Itamar (51:34.521)

Yeah. So I’ll say this kind of like what you said about therapy. So self help is usually self therapy. It’s like you feel good once you’re doing it. But once you’re done, the effects kind of fade. And the difference is what we do in the arena, it’s military grade mindset. So we take regular civilians and equip them like military operators, special forces operators, and we train them like their life depends on mindset wise, because honestly, I believe that they do.

it might not be dependent on the fact like, okay, you’re going to catch a bullet and you’re actually going to die, but you’re not going to have the life that you want it in 1020 or 30 years from now. I think that could be a shame. So we use the military grade mindset tech, all this stuff that I know there’s really special forces and from the head of psychology of the facade, and how to help people that are really ambitious, but are kind of stuck. How to have an unstoppable mind so they can do whatever they want to do. And  because you’re at a place where you’re able to do that, and you have this in the top of mind, you just execute. Things don’t feel as big anymore. Like you said, you can actually do a lot more with less effort. And because you’re also doing that, things feel much more enjoyable, because you’re not facing this resistance. And that’s what really the arena is all about. We do it in an extremely systematic fashion. It’s not that, okay, I’ll just get here and let’s talk, like you saw, and you remember, there’s a curriculum, there’s a structure, there’s a reason why everything works on top of each other. To get people clear on what they want.

Itamar (52:51.529)

give them a very clear pathway and then remove the specific things that could be stopping them. And that’s why it only takes six weeks. Like we’re not trying to like figure out your entire childhood or whatever it may be. It’s just figure out what are the specific blocks that are holding you back from doing what you know, you need to be doing or to accomplish what you need to accomplish so you can really feel proud and happy and content. And we’ve had an array of entrepreneurs on like you said anyone from six to eight and also nine figures as well.

Ben McAdam (53:10.268)

Absolutely.

Yeah. So if people want more information about that, I’ll put a link in the show notes, but that’s inamamarani.com slash apply. Awesome.

Itamar (53:26.051)

So it is, to clarify with that as well, it’s an application process. We offer 100% money back guarantee because we believe in our program and I think we’re the only ones who do that in this kind of space. But because of that, there’s an application process. We only want to help people who really want to win and open to being vulnerable and actually getting to work. So that’s a big thing to take into account.

Ben McAdam (53:36.936)

Hmm.

Hmm. Yeah. And you prune people who somehow get through the application process, but aren’t really good fit for the group or, you know, aren’t participating, aren’t putting it through or who you don’t think it’s the right move for them to do the arena. And like you prune them either. It’s great integrity. I like it. But yeah, I like it. So apart from the podcast, the micro course, people can go to the website Itamamarani.com. Which socials are you on? How do people find you there?

Itamar (54:15.833)

Everything we’re starting up our YouTube channel now. We’re releasing a lot of the podcast there as well as like small little clips. You can find it again. If you just YouTube Itamar Marani you’ll find it. Facebook as well everything Instagram LinkedIn at itamarmorani. It’s I T A M A R M A R A N I and you’ll find everything you need there.

Ben McAdam (54:21.76)

Hmm.

Absolutely. I like the YouTube shorts. I’m finding like my good daily dose of it. It’s it’s helpful. It’s like a multi vitamin that you take every day. So thank you, it amount for sharing valuable knowledge and tips. I let the interview go a little bit longer and yet because it was all gold and yet I still had to cut off some of the things I wanted to make sure that we cover. So definitely recommend people check out the podcast, the micro course and have a look at the arena if some of this stuff resonated.

So yeah, thank you, Itamar. And thank you, everybody. 

Thank you, everybody, for joining us. Before you go, don’t forget to like, subscribe, rate, share all the thingy things to help spread these ideas to more people. And I’ll see you on the next episode. See you guys.