Becoming Limitless with Monica Coleman, Certified Professional Coach and Limitless Methodology

Monica Coleman is the founder of Inside Information Coaching and Consulting, LLC, and architect of the Limitless Methodology. As an athlete herself, Monica has always been intrigued by the link between mindset, performance and leading a successful, satisfying life. Her work over the past 15 years with athletes and executives created a birds-eye view of the challenges inherent to high achievers in both their professional and personal lives. Monica’s natural curiosity, her ability to inspire others, and her commitment to ensure her clients’ move from potential to success has made her a pioneer in the field of performance coaching.

As a Certified Professional Coach (CPC) since 2009, Monica meets clients wherever they are on their journey, helping them to create a successful pathway to the lives they have thought were unattainable. Monica crafted the Limitless Methodology to apply the principles in a different setting and with a larger scope, enabling more people to unlock the top performer who resides within them. Her dream is for every individual she meets to better understand their true nature. Bearing witness to other’s success and watching their transformation is the greatest expression of her true purpose in life.

In this episode, Monica and Cindra discuss:

  • What it means to be limitless
  • Strategies to become limitless
  • Her PEAK acronym
  • Why reducing our judgement is important
  • How intention, expectation and attachment intersect
  • How the ego contributes to our performance

“The one thing that you take everywhere is you, so if you’re going to invest in something that’s probably the one that will show the greatest return.”-@RedefineUNow
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“It’s not about control, it’s about flowing with what’s there and seeing what the possibilities are as you’re moving through it.”-@RedefineUNow
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“Really in the end, the process is the goal, and the goal is the process.”-@RedefineUNow
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“Just because it might take a lot of maneuvering to make the change, doesn’t mean that you can’t.”-@RedefineUNow
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Full Transcription:

Cindra Kamphoff: Monica Thank you so much for joining me here on the high-performance mindset podcast how’s your morning going?

Monica Coleman: My morning is going great, thank you for having me here, this is great starts my day it’s always nice to be out of the gates with a lot of energy so I’m looking forward to having our conversation today.

Cindra Kamphoff: I am was well and I know we’re gonna talk about a lot of things that can really be very powerful for people in terms of their performance and in their life and maybe just to get us started Monica tell us a little bit about what you’re passionate about and what you’re doing right now?

Monica Coleman: Okay, so what I’m passionate about is it’s always been to fold I athletic I’ve always been very athletic as matter of fact, the flow experiences I’ve had one has been playing golf and the other was skiing. So that’s the way I tend to experience my life is through physical activity, so I am about to start my golf season, I am very close. Two years ago, when the USGA we’re still running championships, I was the first alternate nationwide if anybody had tripped or fallen ill, I would have been the person who got to go the championship, so I was waiting so I’m hoping to return to that this year, because now, the championships are running again and, in addition to that, I also have a coaching company that I call inside information coaching and consulting and my primary product that I use is limitless I use that, for all sorts of performers across the board so it’s not just athletes it’s also executives and people who are trying to perform in relationships sometimes people who are in transition, either changing jobs or chasing changing significant others in their lives so limitless is a particularly useful vehicle for people who really want to not just make the external changes that sometimes life requires, but really want to do some internal work at the same time, because I always say, the one thing that you take with you everywhere is you, so if you’re going to invest in something that’s probably the one that will show the greatest return.

Cindra Kamphoff: Love it I love it well we’re gonna dive into more about your background, but I want to start with what is limitless to you because that’s really what the topic of today is?

Monica Coleman: Right so limitless is, as I was going through coach training and getting a wonderful background at energy that I got from IPEAC the Institute for professional excellence and coaching. I learned a lot about how people show up and, as I was learning about that I realized that people really don’t understand that we’re here playing a game and that ego has a tendency to come in and create ideas about what can and can’t be and, in reality, all possibilities exist always so this idea that we’re limited is just that an idea it’s absolutely not the truth in quantum physics would tell you that so there’s plenty of science out there for people who love the science to help us understand that what we really what is really the truth is we don’t know and so to live in ourselves doesn’t make any sense and the idea of being a small little baby right perfect little being comes in. You don’t have a lot of that slapped on you you’re essentially a blank canvas but then people start throwing paint at your canvas well and, by the way, when you’re little you’re not throwing the paint they’re throwing the paint but you

develop an ego that then sort of feeds on itself and then Consequently, we end up thinking the same things all the time and become very limited. So the idea of limitless is to remove some of that and to give people the ability to create their own mindset and beyond that their own belief structure about what this life is so if i’m thinking that life is I you know I grow up I get good grades I go to college I get married blah blah blah, you know all the stuff that’s fine you’re on a path, but you don’t understand that there are a multitude of other paths that you could be on and when people get knocked off the path, all of a sudden they’re like what do I do now i’m not on the path and you know it’s this. I think it’s a mind-bending time for most people were all of a sudden they’re like whoa so transition is a time where limitless becomes particularly applicable and it’s also applicable to people who know they’ve got more inside of them that they’re not exploring and I get that I don’t get that all the time, but I get it fairly frequently with executives people who are mentally successful but part of the reason they’re so successful is because they’re curious and people just want to take themselves up for a spin and think Okay, how could I be on this on this ride, you know flights and amusement park i’m on a ride right and i’m having a great time I love my ride, but what other rights are out there right, so I get those people too.

Cindra Kamphoff: I love it I love the idea of removing these hurdles that internal hurdles in particularly and how that we’re may be conditioned to think that life is has limits, but really that it is limitless. So Monica What would you tell us to be kind of the first start of helping us understand that our life is limitless and our performance is limitless as well?

Monica Coleman: Well, I think one of the first things is to understand that you’re not who you are what you think you are rather. So, so you Sandra are you were that perfect little baby and you came into life and syndrome has been created over the years right it’s the same with Monica, but there’s another part of US there’s a part of us that can observe Sandra and Monica and that part of us is probably the most important asset that you have or ability and in you, because you’re human it’s one of those things that we have as humans. Not every other species can do that, and we can, so we have the ability to look and see Okay, so what am I Monica actually believing so I kind of can pull out of myself for those who meditate it’s essentially that experience, but you can do it in the moment you don’t have to just be sitting there in a meditative state you can actually observe yourself and go oh I’m feeling this or I’m thinking that or and wow what’s that and is that what I want to think or feel and now all of a sudden, I have my power back you know now I’m really questioning anything that limits me because there’s no sense in limiting yourself, it does take practice it’s funny it’s one of the simplest things to do, but people just don’t think about doing it it’s not like it’s rocket science, but it’s hard in a way that it’s a habit and it it’s one that you want to create in life so that you have the ability to look at it now in the moment when I’m out skiing and I’m moving really fast I’m not necessarily thinking that much I’m more with everything but in flow moments what happens is this person Monica sort of disappears and what happens is I become one in skiing with the terrain it’s just a it’s a whole different experience you become one with the mountain. You literally are aware that your body is doing things but you’re not Monica is not in control that was one of the big things I got from the flow experiences it’s not about control, it’s about flowing with what’s there and seeing what the possibilities are as you’re moving through it.

Cindra Kamphoff: I’m thinking about being more automatic right and sometimes we can overthink and that’s one of the barriers, I see in terms of come limitless and kind of what you’re talking about if it’s in our life or in our performance, what are the barriers that you see Monica getting in the way of people’s limits or believing their limitless?

Monica Coleman: Well, the primary one is ego because ego is where all the judging goes on that’s where expectation and attachment lie in and he was not a bad thing if I didn’t have an ego I wouldn’t be able to have the experience that I’m having I have to be separate in order to have an experience so if I’m one with everything all the time now there’s not really a separate experience of I don’t acknowledge my individual right, so you have to have both in order to have an experience so consciousness is everything right and when we’re with everything we’re part of that So yes, there’s this loss of self that happens in flow, but at the same time, if I want to have an emotion it’s going to be my emotion right. So you know I think we have to have we have to have both pieces and so well ego gets in the way and it causes, most of the difficulty it’s also what allows us to have an experience so it’s required, but at the same time, if I can observe it I can be as powerful as I can possibly be so those are judgment is probably the first place that people start to comprehend when they start realizing how much judging they’re doing yeah there’s the ability to say whoa wow that’s like I am limiting myself and the world is the world, especially our environment, right at the moment because there’s so much divisiveness and what I’ll call opposed sinking where we’re just opposing each other all the time on things it’s you know this is right and that’s wrong, and this is good and that’s bad and it’s like wait a minute lots of shades of grey here.

Cindra Kamphoff: Monica I’ve been one of my goals at the beginning of the year, was to reduce my judge, because I could see the ways that it got in my own way, particularly judging myself and it’s been pretty cool how I’ve been on this journey, for the last five months now, and actually I do see that it I am reducing my own judge, but there was there was other things that happened that I wasn’t expecting such as my relationship with my older son got stronger because, like, I was judging myself less and he said I was judging him less you know and so it’s really interesting how this judgment of self or others are our circumstances really do get in our way of really our potential, which I think is really what you’re talking about?

Monica Coleman: Well, so here’s this a potential doesn’t exist if you don’t believe it’s there or you’re blocking it only exists when you shift and so you, you also know this from an energy perspective when we shift our energy, which is what’s happening when we stopped judging there’s an enormous shift in energy that goes on and it not only impacts you it impacts every single person that is around you and every relationship, you have not only to people, but also in a way to things so you know when we’re not judging the you know the image in the mirror right in the morning or right that’s an example. All of a sudden thing change internally right so there’s all these things that shift when you realize that you’re judging because you’ve gone from believing something is one way to realizing that oh my gosh it’s not it’s, it is possible to look in that mirror and go what an amazing body. It gets me where I need to go every day without fail unbelievable are you kidding me the trillions of cells can do this, instead of there’s

that wrinkle in my forehead or whatever else it is they, to look at on your face, so you know there’s it’s just an enormous difference for, especially with self-judgment, but also with things around your relationships, your energy and trains so when we stop judging we shift our energy where we tend to be more anabolic meaning more in growth mode so when we’re more anabolic than everything around us, it doesn’t have a chance to be where it is if you refuse to be down in the lower levels of energy, you have a tendency to bring everybody else up with you, so it all plays together.

Cindra Kamphoff: I would love to talk to you more about energy, and I know that you did some work with Bush Snyder, who is the founder of IPAC and one of the things I want to talk to you a little bit about your work with golf and you were telling me earlier about how if you hit a golf ball with Level one energy for is a different level of energy there’s a difference and I’d love to kind of talk to you more about what you see there and so maybe just give us an overview of energy to start with, for those people who haven’t gone through AIPAC or maybe aren’t really hadn’t really thought too much about their own energy?

Monica Coleman: Right right, so energy is just the way you show up everything as an energetic signal so everything in life is energy the table that’s the desk that’s right in front of me is energy that’s not moving very quickly so it’s solid there’s an energy that most people when they walk into a room can feel you feel the energy of the room, you know that’s not solid right so energy is intangible and what it does, is it gives us a way to really look at how highly conscious are people how limited, are they right so lower level energies come with a lot of limitation we call it catabolic energy because it’s a contracting energy and a lot of people will the judges now on for a lot of people oh, you know now catabolic energy is bad anabolic energies good, anabolic energy is more about growth and potential, so if that’s what you want then that’s what you should use catabolic energy is about contracting, because sometimes we need to do that in order to get away from danger, perhaps. And sometimes we just if we’re conscious about it, sometimes we just want to create a situation where somebody will help us so, for example, if I’ve had a rough day and I walked through the door and my husband is standing there and I want some sympathy from him I will moan about my day and turn on Level one energy, which is essentially kind of infected mode and he’ll rub my shoulders and say oh honey and be nice to me and all the rest of that so I have the ability to move through these levels they’re not good or bad I would say in the lower levels if we stay there too long, because there are catabolic hormone effects literally physical sex in our body it’s not a great thing to stay there for an extended period of time because it doesn’t serve you, but so it’s not good or bad so it’s not just the energy levels, but those higher energy levels are where we have possibilities come into view and what you notice, as you go up the energy levels is that the amount of judging you’re doing is markedly decreased right and so little by little by little, as we move through the energy levels and it’s this energy there’s a wonderful assessment call it energy leaders energy leadership index assessment and that assessment allows you to see where your energy is I highly recommend it for people who are curious about this and want to increase their level of consciousness if you’re looking to increase your level of consciousness studying energy is a very good idea, but there’s a this assessment tells you where your energy is and your energy is a lot, like the stock market is all over the place all day long so nobody’s just you’re, not just on level

five energy or you’re not just a level one energy, you know there it’s not like that you have all the energy levels because we’re human we all do, and you have the capacity to be in any of them, but you may not visit some of them, as frequently as you might like and the more you know about it, the easier it is to see it in that observer gets stronger and more knowledgeable and, consequently, you understand what that intangible thing is when you walk into a room and now you understand, not only your energy, but you can read it around you very readily It makes you far more powerful for leaders, it is a perfect way to become a more highly conscious leader.

Cindra Kamphoff: That’s wonderful Monica I took the assessment, I have a good friend who went through iPad coaching and I took it I don’t know how long ago, maybe about four months ago and it was really eye opening for me it’s something that I’ve been really working towards, in general, but it was really cool to see how I scored on that rate and even though it’s something that I’ve been really conscious of so when you think about performance rate and when we’re performing with like Level one energy, which is more of the victim compared to the higher levels of energy tell us how you see that impacting like let’s say athletic performance and golf since you’re very incredibly high level golfer and you work with a lot of golfers as well as other performers?

Monica Coleman: So I think that the way the way of understanding, energy is to it it’s where I have gone with limitless is to take the concepts of energy and understand what’s changing when we move from one energy level to the next, so there’s a lessening of judgment and the other major change is that the self the sense of self is dramatically different so when I’m in the lower energy levels, I don’t I don’t feel as powerful as I do in the higher ones so from an ego perspective, and what I reached the highest energy levels, the I that I am really isn’t there in the same way and that’s the experience I had with flow both times. So when I am and I have tons of golfers that I’m working with right now, because it’s you know that time of year, where everybody’s in season is about to start, and so I am working with a lot of them, and people are coming in wanting to play better they really want to have that thing there, they’ve worked on their skill, they worked on their physical stuff they’re drinking and the right stuff they’re eating the right stuff they’re getting enough sleep and they’re doing all the things they can do to play better golf and then they get out there and it’s like where did it go I had it on the range and now it’s gone. So they’re having that experience of I don’t I don’t like this feeling and so, so what you need to understand about energy, when you study energy is not only the energy levels and about judging, but you have to understand what’s going on with ego I teach a whole class and limitless on ego so the lower levels, I don’t believe that I’m powerful I don’t believe I can make a change so consequently I’m not making one right yeah and so, then, as we move up the energy levels ego gets stronger so he goes week and those lower energy levels ego gets stronger now I believe I’m all that right, I can do this and that’s an awesome place to play from I am you know it’s great people talk about confidence, all the time. They want more confidence standing over a shot that’s gotta go overwater 200 yards blah blah blah it’s like Okay, I get it, I don’t nobody wants to hit it in the water, but that again is that ego coming to bear and wanting to have that confidence once we move into highest energy levels, the self really starts to disappear go starts to disappear, and consequently fear isn’t there isn’t any and there’s nothing

I need to be there’s the sense of wow What do you mean I am unique unto myself and that is one of the definitions of perfect so we’re already perfect there’s no need to be anything so if I’m standing over a tough shot if I don’t need it to go somewhere i’m not going to create any tension if I don’t create any tension and particularly in golf final create any tension that’s a great thing and now I can I have access to all the potential of physical and skill potential that I’ve built is now available to me I’m not blocking it with tension.

Cindra Kamphoff: I’m thinking about several high-level performance performers as I’m listening to you and I’m thinking, if you stand over the shot and then have no tension and there’s no expectations and you already feel like you know that you’re perfect how that can be really freeing and I’m thinking about people who are listening, and they say okay Monica I totally want to feel that way every day and I that’s what I wanted to ask you is obviously this is a process to move up and energy levels, but you know what your thoughts are on how do you get there, and I know you have a system called limitless that we can dive into but what would your answer to that question just to get us started?

Monica Coleman: You know the biggest the biggest piece is what I touched on earlier about learning to turn on your observer and it’s you know anything that that you’re any emotion that you experience that comes in, is just a signpost it’s coming as a message and the message is not that you’re bad you’re broken is none of that. The messages wow I have a belief in there that’s telling me this is scary, I have a belief in there that’s telling me this is dangerous, I have a belief it’s telling me and don’t get me wrong there are times when things are dangerous and there are times when things are scary but the vast majority of things that we face, day in and day out, are not and so, in turn, there’s this story that gets built right now, sometimes the stories are about what’s going on right now. Other times the stories are about the future, and there is no truth in the future it hasn’t happened yet okay so whatever story picking up make sure it serves you right so what’s the point of that. So my point in all of this is the easiest thing to do at the very beginning, is just a turn on the observer and start to catalog or start to understand what’s already in that brain of yours, as you sit there you’re the perfect sum total of every experience you had and so then you’re not even responsible for what you believe, especially the stuff that came in with your little person right so understanding that and i’m not saying going back and doing therapy i’m saying just understanding that it’s there we don’t need to know why it’s there. We just need to know that it oh it’s there and it’s the thing and it might be a thing that I don’t want to believe, like maybe I don’t want to understand myself as that limited being.

Cindra Kamphoff: Yeah.

Monica Coleman: So maybe I’ll just decide not to feel that way about it, and there are, and I tell the kids, especially the teams that were quick, because the parents and I started talking about there so like no good no bad no right no wrong.

Cindra Kamphoff: I know control is very different than maybe what they can get conditioned to think.

Monica Coleman: Exactly, but I also make the point and it’s the same for all of us actions have consequences when we throw a stone into the pond there are ripples right, and you know, there are going to be ripples and know that there will be ripples but decide Okay, am I willing to deal with whatever the consequence of that action is because the game of life has rules, and when you don’t play by them. Sometimes the responses you won’t like but to come at that decision from a fearful place or from a limited place doesn’t allow you to see all the options you know, for people who you know people who deal with situations that are tough that that aren’t going away that are, what do they do right I give people a poor older I’m in a marriage I’m not happy, I have all this responsibility and so I’ve got all this stuff and I can’t do anything now we’re a victim to life.

Cindra Kamphoff: Right right absolutely.

Monica Coleman: It’s not the truth, you have a lot of choices, that’s why coaching people who are in transition is very gratifying because once you open their minds it’s not like I can go change the circumstances of people’s lives I don’t change the circumstances of people’s lives I do, change the way they’re thinking about them and what they believe, and then they go out and they change everything in life that they want to change so.

Cindra Kamphoff: I love everything that you’re saying so far and I’m thinking that the thing that’s kind of hitting home with me most is this idea of perfect and despite you know, knowing that you’re perfect just the way you are because I think there’s so much judgment that we can have of ourself and our circumstances Monica I want to talk a little bit about your system limitless and I love the modules you have i’m going to read off some of them and then we can dive into some of these ideas, but you have a module on judgment another one on the intention expectation attachment a third one on ego a fourth one on consciousness energy basics. The process which I agree with confidence, creating your experience, are some of the modules let’s talk a little bit about intention expectation and attachment, and you know you kind of describe stop shooting all over yourself which I think is awesome and I’m thinking in performance there you’re you want to do well or I’m thinking about it a lot of athletes I work with want to do really well and maybe they are attached to their self is attached to their performance and they struggle, especially times, where they don’t perform up to their expectations. So tell us a bit about intention expectation and attachment, and what do you think is most important there?

Monica Coleman: Well, the most important pieces intention, because intention is what you want to set an intention is what allows the energy to start flowing in a particular direction so it’s important you know if you know if you don’t have a goal in mind and you’ll end up driving all over the place right you’ve got to have a destination that you’re reaching for. However, generally speaking, people set goals and people really understand the process at this point of setting goals they’ve got pretty good at people know what smart goals are, they have a tendency to want to jump right into that and have these great goals and I personally am one, to set the high bar I love having a high bar out there because I don’t get attached to it, so if I’m not attached to it, whether it gets there and not is not going to create a lot of catabolic energy for

me and a lot of unhappiness so I like goals. I think they’re boring but they’re there they were I would prefer and I do a whole class on goal setting limitless goals are just intentions there an intention for what you intend to do right and there’s a whole class on process, because the really in the end, the process is the goal and the goal is the process, right so there’s really no difference between the two and there’s this sense of i’m working towards something but it’s actually the work that is the goal itself right if we do the work we will get an outcome it’s a foregone conclusion, it’s just people put this goal and that’s where an expectation attachment come in, because all of a sudden i’ve got a call I call expectation and attachment peanut butter and jelly they’re almost always together if I find one I find the other they’re usually i’ve got an expectation, and the reason I got an expectation is because I got all attached to something that’s where intention it’s softer its intentions are a little bit softer than goals that doesn’t mean they are clear there, they are pinpoint accurate in terms of clarity that’s very important, but at the same time, I want to intend that but also understand that this is a process, and there will be lots of things that come in that I didn’t even know existed as possibilities, because everything exists as a possibility in the quantum field life is limitless so we can’t anticipate we can set a course and then go and see what happens right but expectation that attachment when it comes to athletics, or for leadership when you’re in meetings when you’re in a situation we going to be thinking on your feet. Expectation and attachment or killer So if I came into this to this podcast today and had a lot of expectation and attachment about what this is going to do, I wouldn’t be available to our conversation, and the way that I am I had no expectations about what we were going to be talking about I provided you with some information I have no idea where you’re going to go with it and i’m perfectly happy to be that way there’s no prep I need to do with it other than making sure my mind is clear my energy is where I wanted otherwise you know that that I just show up and I talk. So I think that it allows life to flow and it cause we have when I’ll never Bruce coined this phrase and i’ll never forget it, when he said it there’s effortless power and powerless effort If we want effortless power we’re not trying to control life we’re moving with right, we have an intention, we have a we have a clear view of what it is we’re intending right, but then we’re going to move with what is that’s how it becomes effortless becomes effortless power, otherwise we’re trying to control the things around us all the time and inevitably that comes from fear it’s a fear based behavior try and control everything around you all the time.

Cindra Kamphoff: I am thinking about this word trust as I’m listening it, you know, like trust in when you just were talking about this interview and you’re like all I need to do is clear my mind and be in my you know catabolic energy and then you know I’m just kind of thinking about trusting, right, especially high level performers they’ve had spent years and years mastering their craft and then sometimes they push or press or try too hard right and I’m thinking about this idea of expectation and attachment is peanut butter and jelly do you think like this expectation come first and then attachment and how would you help somebody unravel that?

Monica Coleman: Well, a lot of that it’s interesting because, again I get a lot of golfers and I actually like sports, especially with the teens because it’s a very easy way to get into this with adults we’re usually dealing with a pain point over something or with the high performers, the ones who really don’t have any pain when they come in we’re trying to understand where

they’re limiting themselves so usually I look at where the judgment is and where we’re bumping up against something so, or where is something that I want so if there’s something that I want that I don’t have then we’ve got to figure out what the process is for new maneuvering and, in doing that, inevitably, you will bump up against people’s attachments and expectations that they already have so one of the one of the things that when it comes to performing let’s I’m going to go back to golf. People create tension in their bodies when they have expectation and attachment and so it’s getting back to what do I want and when I ask people why do you why do you want what you want what’s underneath that what’s creating that for you so they’ll tell me well, I want, I want to play golf I want to win I get I want to win all the time, all right that’s a that’s a normal expectation or attachment and, interestingly I’m working with an 18 year old girl right now, who has in this is a phenomenal statistic she has won five out of the seven golf tournament she’s entered the spring and we started working together in January, and it is remarkable, she has she has enormous skill right. Nobody wanted her from a D1 school, which is unbelievable to me because she’s very, very talented but she was newer, so they didn’t really know her. So now they know her, because I think she’s ranked as she’s definitely top five in the country, right at the moment, but I don’t know you know. I don’t know exactly where she is but anyway, the bottom line is looking when I work with people who are talented and most people I work with are extremely talented it’s removing the I want to win piece and getting them to the if I do these things, if I follow a process and I don’t get attached to the outcome, which by the way you don’t control winning. No always.

Cindra Kamphoff: A battle.

Monica Coleman: Yeah so that that’s a false thing to choose. It really is about what experience, do you want to have and what I what I get to when I dig down and he asked a lot of questions to get there in the coaching when you’re individually coaching somebody when I dig underneath that, why do we want to win it all comes back to ego wants to feel good ego wants to its good enough. No one wants, not to be embarrassed you know ego wants all these things, and so expectation and attachment are born out of that and when you’re asking me earlier about what really gets in the way it’s that right, but we can’t have an experience without ego. So, it’s being able to be with an ego that wants these things and wants to feel certain things and believes that it can be more and believes that it can be is terrified that it can be less right. Yes, right so getting around that and getting people to really truly believe that if I win this tournament I’m not more if I lose this I’m, not less, now I can be out there and enjoy myself, it would be like me coming at all and thinking this is going to either make or ruin my career really. How much pressure I wouldn’t be able to put two words together It right it serves no purpose. The truth is, as we if we really want to do something I don’t care what it is you want to become the best leader, you can become anyone to be able to stand up and run wonderful meetings with people, the more you do it the better you will become and you’ve the way to become better is to turn on your observer take a look at what you did decide what you’d like to do differently, but none of that has to do with your value your value is not going to be more because you ran a great meeting and less if you didn’t yes, the game of life might pay you more. Sure you’re good at reading meetings but don’t confuse that with your value.

Cindra Kamphoff: Yeah and I see a lot of high-level athletes connect their value to their performance right, so I do some work with Olympians for training for Tokyo the summer and a couple of months right and at least in track and field, they have to go through the trials, which is in the United States at the end of June so there’s a lot of pressure kind of leading up to that are there can be a lot, especially now, with co where there’s kind of less meats, that they can kind of you know, go out there and compete again and I’m thinking about you know how it’s really easy to attach you know your performance with your worth and maybe even the way that you get comments from others, you might get in the media right so you’re sort of having to work against maybe how the system is built. So the to see your value based on your performance.

Monica Coleman: 100% Cindra, you’re hitting the nail right on the head, that is absolutely what happens with athletes and you know, in the game of Olympic athletes if i’m playing the Olympic athlete game like i’m on the Olympic athlete right that’s what i’m doing it’s the same for me when I have there’s only one qualifier to get me into the national championship either play well right oh right so there’s a sense of oh my gosh there’s only one opportunity and if I don’t do well now whoa right but here’s the question, and this is the best question for anybody asks themselves is there anything else you’d rather be doing with your life.

Cindra Kamphoff: And they would say no, I love this.

Monica Coleman: Right exactly So is there any better use of your life right, I have this with people who are aspiring professional golfers right and I had one in as you were saying the whole world is saying, maybe you should quit maybe you should stop you’re getting older, you haven’t made it blah blah blah and, and he came to me in one meeting he said, you know I just getting so much pressure from the outside, and I said to me, and he was starting to believe, maybe I’m wasting my life.

Cindra Kamphoff: uh huh.

Monica Coleman: That’s the whole thing if you’re pursuing what you want to pursue and you can find a way to in the game of life support yourself and do what you need to do, how else would you spend your life will be a time for all athletes. There is, and not only athletes, but I would say corporate athletes, there will be a time where you won’t want to do this anymore and then it will be time to do something else, for now, and in this is where limitation comes in, because okay now i’m older and I have a house and I have kids and I have two dogs and I have whatever else and I have all this responsibility and all these financial commitments right. So how do I make a change, just because it might take a lot of maneuvering to make the change doesn’t mean that you can’t.

Cindra Kamphoff: Absolutely.

Monica Coleman: So and it’s the same things with the athletes if you try for your athletic years to reach that goal, and you don’t get there that doesn’t make you worthless, you went out and you lived your life, the way you want it to what better use of a lifetime, is there than that.

Cindra Kamphoff: yeah yeah that’s wonderful that’s powerful. When we were talking about intention and expectation and attachment, I mentioned that part of your module tool to is named stop shooting all over yourself. I want to talk a little bit about that, and how that connects with expectation and attachment, and the way i’m kind of thinking about it is that people might say, well, I should have done that or I should do this and what should we, what should we do instead of using the word should, in your opinion?

Monica Coleman: Well, I think when something happens I have something called a peak process it’s perform evaluate adjust and key into what was important right. Okay, so perform, collect the data right and we’re going to evaluate the data we’re not going to judge that in. Alright, so shooting is usually judging, or I should do it this week, if it’s if it’s future oriented I should do it means that I have a belief that there’s a right way to do it and part of me thinks maybe I don’t want it right so so there’s a little bit of a disagreement going on in there, which is great that’s an eye opener. So when you hear the word, should you want to start paying attention because there’s something in there that it again it’s a signpost like an emotion, it gives you the ability to say what am I believe in here, and is it really, what I want to believe. So that’s where I think shooting is an important piece of expectation attachment, because it shows you, if I if it’s if it’s post tense right if i’m doing the when i’m doing the evaluating if I find myself jumping into I should have and judging I know that I had an expectation and attachment right, so if I’m not instead of creating the expectation and attachment what i’d like to do is go in with it with a crystal clear intention. So for a at the top of at the top of a ski run, for example, to have the intention of I am just going to allow my feet, to tell me when to turn i’m not going to try and control anything that goes on during this run i’m going to move with the mountain right and allows that to tell me when to turn. Which is what I had in that flow experience it was the biggest piece of information that came out was that all the things I needed were already there and by trying to control things I was getting in the way. So it’s this understanding when we’re when we’re in that evaluation phase of peak that. We want to evaluate what’s there and by setting a clear intention for what we’re doing and ahead of time right. Then we can move into when we’re actually performing we can move into just letting things go after we perform and we’re evaluating we’re taking a look we’re keying in if there’s any shooting going on there, we definitely want to get rid of the judgment understand where it comes from so you know if I if the other day I forgot what I was doing I caught myself saying it was so stupid and I thought wow that was judgment right, I mean i’m human I just because I know all this does not mean that exactly or I don’t human life, so, in turn, all these things happen to me too. I was like wow and then I thought well what’s that about and I thought you really don’t have any tolerance for yourself sometimes when something you did was not the most intelligent thing in the moment and then usually, when I look at that I realized that I was a little impulsive in my action that I took and what I really what i’m really saying to myself, as we don’t want to slow down a little bit. So if you take just a little time it’s not like you know, a therapy session we’re going to spend a lot of time it’s just understanding wow what am I doing to myself because you’re doing it in

small pieces all the time and expectation at attachment you’ll catch little pieces of that right, as you go through life if your observer so it’s having that observer on that is truly the key to sustainable change.

Cindra Kamphoff: Right Monica this is really good suit the peak performance evaluation, what was the A and the K adjust.

Monica Coleman: So adjust, we perform, then we evaluate. So the evaluation tells us what adjustments, we could make what are the possibilities, then we pick one right, and then we key into what became the most important thing, because once we look at the adjustments that could be made one or two of those is likely, going to be the key for golfers you’re going to go to the range and you’re going to try and figure it out and then you’ll also keep that with you as you perform the next time. So it’s a way to come about making change people have results right judgment comes in, with results, all the time we start judging. This you know that the amount of judgment that goes on, I choked I this I that I hear it, or you know I didn’t I was so. I was so mad at my child because they you know they did something and I really was just really angry, it was I was such a bad parent that that kind of thing all the time. Now we got data, right that’s our data it’s not for judging.

Cindra Kamphoff: I like what you said about signposts that made me think about data or just seeing our emotions is information it is it’s just information and you have the opportunity to have something different, if you want something different and all of this is helping us raise our level of consciousness and you use that word earlier but for those people who, maybe are unfamiliar with that word, how would you define it?

Monica Coleman: But it’s just in my mind being conscious is being aware, it’s just that simple it’s the understanding. To me it’s the understanding that life is limitless all things exist right so at a high level of consciousness I, I understand that i’m aware of that and when i’m a highly conscious person in the moment what it means is that my awareness is turned on not only externally, not only am I observing everything externally I’m observing internally and that’s probably the most important observation, because everything around us is just a stimulus for us right, so what we turn the stimulus into tells us about us and what somebody else turns a stimulus into so when I walk into a room i’m a stimulus if I walk in and somebody says, look at her, she looks so strange it’s not about me. Yes, that’s true and that’s another really important piece, because people egos get all wound up and worried about what everybody else thinks all the time, so again, you know understanding that I’m responsible for the reactions or the responses that I have, they’re created inside of me they’re not created by the by the thing that I saw are the something that somebody said so the responses are also limitless.

Cindra Kamphoff: Awesome Monica you’ve given us so many things to think about and really some great strategies and I love this idea of limitless and being perfect, the way that we are in kind of seeing that perfection and how many times we see all the things that we do wrong or the all the things that were not so really great messages today, I know you have a program called limitless that people can enroll in so tell us a bit about the program 10 modules and just

like what include what’s included in there and then where people can find more information about that as well as your coaching.

Monica Coleman: Sure, so I have a website at redefine you now calm it’s easy to go there and learn about limitless that’s a course that I teach probably about twice a year, I do take people through it individually, if they want to it’s a little bit more expensive to do that it’s 10 modules it’s 10 weeks we basically go to 10 weeks straight each class has a period where i’m a PowerPoint presentation, where i’m giving the information that’s important and then I leave time for question and answer at the end and then the other thing that people get when they come to limitless is I give them an assignment every week that they can do that will help them to I call it a mastery exercise because we’re always working toward mastery of whatever topic we’re working at. So, and you know mastery of course has no finish line, you can just keep going for a very long time with mastery. So there’s the 10 classes and there’s work they do every week and we go over the homework at the beginning of the class and then we go through a new concept I answer questions at the end and then, once people have been through that I highly recommend that people do that, first, because it’s a lot less expensive than coaching with me individually. Although I am willing to take somebody through the course individually if they really want to do it. So then, people can come in and have individual discussions about things that they want to do sometimes the classes aren’t as full so there’s room for a little bit more individual discussion on a class, but you know, hopefully, the classes are relatively large so because that’s where it’s priced its price to be a larger group. So it’s a it really makes a difference, again I said this earlier Center I think it’s so important that if you’re going to work on something don’t just develop the skill don’t just develop your physique don’t just develop all of the things you think you need to perform take a look at you that you that you think you are because I can guarantee you 100% that that you that you think you are is a mirage because you’re really everything and anything that’s limiting you that’s getting in your way it’s not necessary and it could very well make the difference across the board for you, because when I work with somebody on golf or on leadership it doesn’t just change their golf or their leadership it changes their being an intern it changes everything so.

Cindra Kamphoff: Wonderful Monica well I’m so grateful that you spent some time with us today really helping us think about judgment and leadership and performance and energy and the things I really enjoyed talking to you about is this idea that potential doesn’t exist unless we believe in it right and we talked about how limit limited is an idea, and that all possibilities are there, we just need to really see that we talked about the difference between catabolic anabolic energy and how the ego is really judging I loved your peak acronym to help us think about you know performing but then, evaluating and adjusting and getting into the thing that we need to adjust and I just really appreciate what you’re talking about related to expectations and attachment and I wrote down the word trust. Trusting yourself and trusting that you have everything that you need inside you so thank you so much, Monica for your time today and for your energy and your commitment to helping everyone who’s listening be their best today.

Monica Coleman: You know it, thank you for having me it was really a pleasure it’s very fun to speak with you and the podcast is wonderful so good luck with it all.

Cindra Kamphoff: Thank you, Monica. Monica Coleman: Thank you.