Becoming a 'Magician': Finding My Flow Update #5
Newsletter #40
Wahhhooooooo! Welcome!
I believe a magical flow exists for everyone’s life.
Not like a preordained destiny.
But certain paths exist that only you could walk due to your unique skills, experiences and circumstances.
I see it as an alignment of what gives you flow internally, with what’s flowing for you externally.
Csikszentmihalyi’s research beautifully articulates the concept of flow state and how to find your internal flow.
But to find what’s flowing externally I believe you need to listen to the universe.
The problem is the universe can’t use words. It uses other means that are easy to miss or dismissed as luck or coincidence if you’re not listening.
I believe the universe's language is ease and resistance (EAR).
Resistance as a way to redirect. Ease as a way to say continue.
The crazy 18-month journey I’ve been on since quitting my job has led to an unwavering belief in this.
There’s no other way for me to explain going from popping-up with 13 headsets on a beach on a small island in Thailand to becoming Bali’s largest supplier of silent disco headsets with 350 headsets and running events at beach clubs.
When you find your flow it’s crazy how quickly ambitions become reality.
My desire to write about this is to record reflections of my own journey. But equally to increase “safety” for others who are keen to find their flow. So without further ado…
Update #5:
My knees dropped into the sand, eyes swelling with tears, my heart full.
A hundred people danced around me, all wearing a silent disco headset branded “Huzz”.
Twelve months earlier I was happy if 20 people joined a disco my girlfriend and I hosted on a beach in Thailand.
Six months before that the first disco I ever hosted had only 4 of us.
Now here I was hosting an event at one of Bali’s most luxurious beach clubs. How did this become my reality?
Introducing the Archetypes
Jungian psychology shares the concept of the eight psychological archetypes. Four light archetypes, each with a shadow archetype.
The Warrior and the Victim.
The Lover and the Prostitute.
The King and the Child.
The Magician and the Saboteur.
All eight archetypes exist inside us. However we have a choice about which we embody.
A choice dependent on courage.
Here’s my journey transitioning from a Victim, sitting in my Prostitute and acting like a Child to a Magician.
Becoming The Warrior
From the age of 16 I lived in a secret shame spiral.
A descent triggered by failing to live up to sporting expectations that were born from excessive high-performance from the age of 13.
The antidote to my shame became partying.
However, rather than provide long-term relief it led to a greater spiral.
My drinking led me to lose fitness and underperform in sport. My hangovers led me to be less productive studying. My drunk behaviour was a turn off to any prospective partners.
I lacked energy and the only decisive “yes” in my life was for more partying.
Post school graduation for two years straight I went out drinking 4 nights a week on average. Monday, Tuesday and Friday (the night before footy), were my only nights off.
However, I found comfort in having an excuse for failing. It was easier than opening myself to failing without an excuse.
I was sitting in the Victim.
The Victim lacks energy and commitment. They have no or low boundaries, they lack resources and find themselves continually unwell.
Whereas the Warrior has energy.
They have energy because they’re clear on their boundaries, they have a good diet and sleep and are committed.
The moment my Warrior came online was exactly two years to the month before this event at Sunday’s Beach Club.
Despite every person I was close to in my life having a habit of drinking, I decided to quit.
The courage required to stop drinking was in part due to the environment I found myself. But on a deeper level it required courage to remove the excuse I always had for underperforming. It forced me to confront my insecurities about whether I was good enough.
Becoming The Lover
As I celebrated my 23rd birthday I found myself feeling lost in my career.
Throughout my final year of university I had a casual job supporting the delivery of entrepreneurial programs for a venture capital company. Upon graduating I had no plan B and was intent on doing everything I could to see them offer me a full-time job.
I even said to my manager I don’t care how much I’m paid, I just want the job.
So a month after starting full-time I was horrified that this role that I dreamed of left me bored and unfulfilled. What changed from going casual to full-time?
I realised when grinding away working as a casual the thought that kept me going was the allure of securing a full-time role. Now that I had the role, that carrot disappeared, and with it the facade of enjoyment I thought the role provided.
I realised that the allure that motivated me wasn’t the role itself, it was the status I thought securing a full-time position would bring. How it would impress my friends and family. Finding self-worth and validation externally was easier than finding it internally.
I realise now I was sitting in my Prostitute.
The Prostitute values things because society attaches status to it. They lack awareness of their worth and undervalue themselves. They people please and compromise what they desire to please others.
Whereas the Lover is clear on their desires, specifically their values, worth and their ambitions. They do things because they want to.
The moment I fully stepped into my Lover came in the middle of 2023. Over three years since I realised the job I was in wasn’t what I desired, I was still working there.
In large part due to an amazing manager who allowed me to do things such as work remotely from Bali.
However in May of 2023, I received a message stating our new office in Sydney was opening and the CEO expected me to return.
Serendipitously, only a few days before I did an exercise with a mentor that saw me design my dream day. What it showed is that every aspect of that dream was being fulfilled by my Bali lifestyle.
The problem was I had no other jobs or guaranteed income lined up to support my life here. To give up this job felt like giving up my lifeboat to a financially secure life that didn’t make me miserable. I doubted I’d find another job where the manager gave me the privileges I currently had.
After this fear kept me restrained for years, in a moment of courage, I replied to my manager that I’d resign.
I made a bet on myself that I could figure it out.
Becoming The King
Fear crippled me for the three years I remained in that job.
My head swam with dreams of things I wished to do instead. However, the pain of unfulfilled dreams wasn’t as strong as the fear that paralysed me.
Strongly inspired by my own uncertainty, one of my ambitions was to create a program that gave people clarity on fulfilling career options.
After a year of devouring every book, podcast and program I could find, I felt I’d created amazing frameworks that would do just that.
They were the type of frameworks I wish I’d had myself.
However, two years later the frameworks sat collecting dust.
I didn’t have the courage to promote or share them. Fear of judgement crippled me from action.
Simply dreaming of my ambitions was safer and more comfortable than taking action towards them.
I was sitting in my Child.
The Child is someone who has all the dreams but lacks commitment to creating them. They find themselves stuck, either not knowing what action to take or thinking it’s too hard to even try.
In contrast, the King takes action on his desires.
The King is clear, concise and committed. He does not waiver. He knows what he wants and what he must do to get there.
In December of 2023 I faced a moment of truth. After quitting my job six months earlier, I found myself with a desire to call Bali home for the long-term.
The only problem was I hadn’t secured a consistent stream of income to support my life here.
However, committed to making this desire reality, I spent a few thousand dollars to register an Indonesian business and secure a two year temporary residency visa.
What terrified me most about this decision wasn’t the potential of losing the investment if I couldn’t afford to live here. It was the embarrassment I’d feel if I took this action, only to return to Sydney, broke, in a few months.
Becoming The Magician
The Magician accelerates how long it takes for desires to become reality.
Their embodiment of the Warrior gives them energy to take action, their embodiment of the Lover makes them clear on what action to take, and their embodiment of the King empowers them to take action.
To become this Magician you also need to overcome the Sabotauer.
The Saboteur is someone who starts to get results and then disappears. They suffer analysis paralysis and overthink everything. They comprise on their desires, trading one for the other.
They secretly feel unworthy of the good things in their life and self-sabotage.
For me to step into the Magician and make my dream of hosting 100+ people events, I faced one last moment of courage:
To take a loan for more money than I’d earned in the past 6 months to purchase new headsets despite not having any guaranteed deals lined up.
The terror I felt in this moment was in part the thought I’d never be able to repay my creditors, leaving them out of pocket.
The other was the thought of buying this many headsets (300) only for them to never be used and to live with the crushing reality that my dream to make a living from hosting events wasn’t viable.
So when I found myself on my knees at Sunday’s Beach Club, my emotions overflowed into tears. I felt a sense of wonderment that I could be getting paid whilst having so much fun, and pride for the courage that got me here.
What’s coming up?
The final Growth Game of the year is launching this Sunday, the 17th of November.
The Growth Game is a 3-week gamified accountability for doing things outside your comfort zone. It’s designed to make the uncomfortable, comfortable by gamifying the process and connecting you to like-minded legends.
Wondering how the Growth Game could support you? Click the button below:
First game is free to join :)
Favourite videos of the past few months:
A video for anyone who loves to travel:
The Tuk Tuk Tournament is revolutionising travel by gamifying getting off the beaten path, travelling sustainably and minimising the westernisation of local cultures 🫶🏼
A video for anyone keen to reconnect with their 5-year old self and their playful, loving, care-free essence:
A video for anyone keen for a laugh:
Funny moment of the past few month:
Picture this: you’re at one of the most luxurious beach clubs in Bali. The sunset is a spectrum of oranges on the horizon. A silent disco headset blasting absolute bangers.
Eyes closed, sand between your toes, feeling bliss as you groove.
When all of a sudden the music cuts out.
100 people turn to look towards you curious about the disruption.
A few moments later you and everyone with a headset hear Siri say “Father Huzz is calling”.
I bolt up the beach towards my phone to reject the call.
No this wasn’t a nightmare.
This happened at my most recent event at Sunday’s Beach Club after I forgot to put my phone on ‘do not disturb’.
Fortunately, everyone found it very funny.
Until the next newsletter,
Much Love,
Huzz
What an incredible journey, Nic. Cheering for you in Bali!