Alchemy For Life

Author Mark Bradford
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Welcome to the Time, Energy, and Resources Coaching and Podcast! Our coaching style and podcast are all about helping you make the most of your time, energy, and resources so you can achieve your goals and live a more fulfilling life. Whether you’re looking to improve your productivity, reduce stress, or simply make better use of your time, we have the tools and strategies you need to get started. Join us on this journey and discover how to take control of your time, energy, and resources and unlock your full potential.

  1. 6 DAYS AGO

    What behavioral mapping reveals about Elon Musk

    Disclaimer: this episode is based on my proprietary behavior mapping system. This system is used in conjunction with a discovery conversation I have with an individual. In the case of mapping public figures this is purely an independent analysis and opinion based on publicly available research. See citations below article. Transcript: You’re probably like me in that you’re a very visual person. (see below!) Well, hey there. Welcome back. Let’s talk Elon Musk. But before we do that, let’s talk about behavioral mapping and my book BeCAUSE!. Freud’s Pleasure Principle: Monsters and Unicorns Okay, wait. We have to back up from that and we have to talk about Freud’s pleasure principle. If you are an old fan of this show, you’ve probably heard me say this a bunch of times, but let’s sum it up really quickly. Freud’s pleasure principle is based on the fact that we are binary individuals. We seek pleasure, we avoid pain. Everything and anything we do is broken down into those things. I’ve had a number of episodes on this and the book BeCAUSE! is based on this, but I give the seeking pleasure and the avoiding pain a face. The seeking pleasure is a unicorn and the avoiding pain is a monster. They are neither good nor bad. They are not devils and angels. They simply are. Visualizing Behavior: My New Mapping Software After the book BeCAUSE! came out, I ended up developing patent pending behavioral mapping software. It’s software that allows me to actually map this stuff out. And you’re probably like me in that you’re a very visual person. This episode might be a little bit longer than my self-imposed 10-minute limit, so please bear with me. Paradoxically, when I talk about Elon Musk, I actually want you to not be thinking of him, but to be thinking of you. Every episode of this podcast starts out as an article on Alchemy for Life. This one is no different, and you’ll be able to see the visual mapping on the site if you’d like. You can follow along on there or if you’re listening in your car, you can just visualize based on what I’m telling you. Deconstructing Elon Musk: The Childhood Trauma Most people are familiar with Elon Musk. He’s a rather polarizing person. He’s someone who won’t stop talking about going to Mars and now the moon. He’s someone who created an empire. He owns Tesla, SpaceX, Twitter, now X, the Boring Company, and X AI. He’s had some romances. He’s currently not married and he has a lot of children. What most people don’t know is what I actually found out in the map showing why all of this is happening. And again, because audio is literally linear, meaning you talk in a straight line, you stop it. You can’t go into branches and things like that. It’s a little harder in audio to tell you what something on a screen can tell you, but I’ll do the best I can. When he was young, the family dog bit him. It was actually a pretty vicious bite, but he was terrified that the dog was going to be put down. He needed medical attention, but he kept refusing it because he said, “You need to promise you’re not going to put the dog down.” Unfortunately, they put the dog down. And this was a very traumatic thing. And I can imagine for myself, and I’m sure you’re thinking about this, too, that’s a very traumatic thing to have to go through. You blame yourself. You think, well, maybe there’s something I could have done to not have the dog bite me. It’s horrible, horrible feeling. And it’s a feeling of losing something and someone that’s really important to you. You feel like you’re literally responsible for the death of a living creature. and that you have no control. So imagine that. It puts a pretty strong pleasure center. It puts a pretty strong unicorn in place that says, “Hey, follow me and you’ll have more control. You want more control.” Yes, I want more control. As with a lot of things, sometimes you also have the opposite in place. You have a monster that says, “It really feels bad to lose control.” And I’m sure you can understand that. I’m sure there are times in your life when you’ve lost control for some reason and you vowed to never lose that control again. Whether you were placed in a very unfortunate position due to your job or relationship or or even in your childhood The Teenage Existential Crisis when he was a teenager and we all remember just how wonderful and clear thinking we were as teenagers. He read both Shopenhau and Nietzsche. And I’ll tell you that Nichi is actually on my wall among five other people. But it’s not exactly something you would read out loud at like a children’s birthday party. So for him, he deeply regretted reading that stuff because it created in him an existential crisis. And imagine that’s essentially what being a teenager is, is having an existential crisis. You you question life. you’re halfway between being an adult and being a child. So reading that created in him a monster of avoiding the feeling of having existential dread and personal meaninglessness. We all want purpose in our life. Imagine removing that as a teenager. Imagine questioning all of that and saying, “Oh my god, this feels terrible. I I I can’t experience this.” So, conversely, it creates the unicorn that makes it feel really good when you feel purpose and meaning. It’s the same one most of us would have. The Scars of Bullying and Humiliation When he was in school, he was severely bullied and beaten basically to the point of not being recognizable. Some of us were bullied, maybe all of us were bullied. And it tends to shape us sometimes in bad ways and sometimes in good ways. But to compound this, when he came home to his father, his father blamed him for this and made him stand for 2 hours while he bered him and called him a loser. How would you respond to that? How would you psychologically speaking respond to that so that it would never happen to you again? You would have a monster that would be very strong in making sure you avoid humiliation and being vulnerable. And from the bullying, obviously you would have a monster that would say, “I’m never going to be bullied again. Never.” This is probably the first time you’re hearing about a lot of this stuff. Probably what you tend to hear about Elon Musk is his purchase or he makes a decision that you think is chaotic or egotistical. you’ve probably never heard any of this other stuff unless you have read his bio or multiple bios and things like that. Connecting the Trauma to the Billionaire’s Actions So, now that you know the monsters and unicorns that he has in place, what actions did these cause? Well, let’s go through them. If you’re trying to avoid the pain of bullying and the monster keeps getting in the way and saying, “You’re going to be bullied. Don’t do that.” Wouldn’t you be a bit combative on social media? Wouldn’t you make sure that in an interview you’re not going to be bullied? Wouldn’t you make sure that when you are dealing with the feds or other court systems or other CEOs that you would tend not to back down? In fact, maybe even not back down even when it’s to your detriment. If you’re avoiding the pain and fear of scarcity because of what happened with your dog and that you had no control over that, and you’re avoiding the pain of humiliation and especially vulnerability and bullying because of the place you’re in as someone who is almost a trillionaire, would it not affect your approach on forming a family? If you are married and have children, you are in a position of vulnerability. You have more vulnerability right now than someone who, let’s say, doesn’t have children or isn’t married. If you’re in a loving relationship, that’s part for the course. It comes with the territory. It’s something you welcome. But if you combine a fear of scarcity and you’ve developed a sort of pleasure for having absolute sovereignty and control of any and all outcomes and you have a terrible monster that makes it feel horrible. If you are losing control, you would be in a unique position to want to perpetuate the human race, but not in a traditional way that causes vulnerability. which is why he has 14 children across four different women and he is presently not married to any of them. This monster for avoiding pain and the fear of scarcity, working together with this pleasure of having absolute sovereignty and control and this extremely strong unicorn pulling him towards the feeling of purpose and meaning would obviously lead him to the creation of Space X so that he could continue to make the race multilanetary. Oh, and that monster telling him that scarcity feels bad, he helps as well. And guess who’s also looking over his shoulder? The monster that’s avoiding him having the feeling of existential dread and personal meaninglessness. You’re definitely listening to that monster if you are trying to perpetuate the human race on another planet. If you are avoiding losing control and you certainly enjoy the absolute sovereignty of being able to change the outcome and you enjoy the feeling of purpose and meaning and you’re terrified of having existential dread and personal meaninglessness, would you not purchase the most well-known social media platform in your attempt, at least according to you, to save free speech? Mapping Your Own Monsters and Unicorns Whether you’re a fan or not of Elon, whether you’re completely neutral or not, you can’t help but empathize with some of the things I’ve described. And like I said, you’re more likely to think of you than of him in these situations. What would you do? What have you experienced? What emotional turmoil have you gone through? What horrible things have you gone through in your childhood, in your teens, and even in your adult life that have shaped who you are? Those things just don’t go away. They stay wit

  2. 5 MAR

    The Dark Side of Repetition & What’s Really Causing Your Pain

    Well, hey there. Welcome back. Let’s talk about the dark side of things. I don’t mean the dark side of everything, even though that sounds kind of exciting, doesn’t it? Okay, let’s rewind. The Psychology of Motivation: Monsters and Unicorns My recent book because talks about fundamental building blocks. In simple terms, it’s built on Freud’s pleasure principle. And in simple terms, Freud’s pleasure principle states that we basically do everything based on two sort of drivers. One is to seek pleasure in all forms and to avoid pain in all forms. These two driving factors are neither good nor bad. They are neutral and sometimes they’re used to great success and sometimes they’re used to your detriment. In the book, I take those semi-intangible concepts and I give them a face. The avoiding pain takes the form of a monster. The seeking pleasure takes the form of a unicorn. But the book goes farther than that. I then go on to talk about something that really separates all high achievers from everyone else. And that is essentially repetition. And there are many books out there and I cite some of them talking about this repetition and how you become an Olympic athlete by repeating. But the thing that everyone else forgets about or ignores is, well, how do they repeat so much? What drives them to repeat? And of course, it’s the monsters and the unicorns. The Secret Weapon of High Achievers And I have always said to myself, or rather recently, whatever you repeat, you enhance, you create, and you achieve. At least that’s what I tell myself. And that’s what because is about. It’s about repeating something over and over and over again. And and it doesn’t have to be a 4 secondond action. It can be something that’s fairly long term, something that takes days or something that requires a lot of nuance, but if you continue at it and repeat it and repeat it and repeat it and stick at it, you will achieve it. You can do great things this way. You can make amazing changes this way. But like the monsters and the unicorns, repetition is neutral. Think about that. The very concept of repetition doesn’t carry with it good or bad. It doesn’t carry with it constructive or destructive. It’s both and neither. So swimming almost constantly will make you a better swimmer. Practicing speaking will make you a better speaker. Studying and practicing repetitively and diligently will get you your realtor license, your pilot license, etc. The Dark Side of Repetition: How Unconscious Habits Hurt Us But my friends, let’s talk about the dark side. The dark side of repetition. And you know what’s interesting about that is that from a lot of people’s perspective, the dark side is actually what they know better. And I’m not saying it’s because they live in the dark side of repetition, but it’s because that sort of has been their perception of it. Stop making that face. If you keep making that face, it’s going to stay that way. Do you remember that? Did your parent ever say that to you? How many of you grind your teeth? It’s also called bxism. That’s a repetitive thing that people do with their teeth where they just clench down or they grind them side to side and it has tremendous negative impact on your health. Ergonomics is based partially on people repeatedly doing something that’s bad for their body. You can sit in a bad chair for a little while and not a lot’s going to happen. But if you spend hours and hours in a chair that’s slightly tilted or lifts your legs off the floor and puts a lot of pressure on your arteries and so forth, it can have really devastating health effects just just from sitting. You can eat good food and even in smaller portions, but if you eat it fast, it can also affect your health. Eating it fast once isn’t going to do a lot, but every time you eat, if you eat fast, it’s going to affect you. You will find or probably have found that you have aches and pains that are actually caused by you. And they’re caused by you in a way that is just repetitious. It’s, for example, I had an issue with my ankle for a while. I didn’t know where it was coming from. It it really hurts and I couldn’t remember doing anything to it. I couldn’t, you know, I would I would go work out. I’ i’d run and all that stuff. I wasn’t doing it incorrectly. Something was going on. And I found that when I would work at my desk sometimes, I would sort of let my ankle flop over to the right. So, I’m putting all this tremendous pressure on it just because that sort of felt, and you can see the quotes, felt comfortable. But what I was doing is hyperextending some things and really causing some damage. So I just had to become aware of that. I mean, it’s the same thing with even crossing your legs, squishing up your your hand and arms at night and tucking them in so that you’re constantly woken up with tingles and things because you’re sort of squishing up like a dead spider. This extends to the way you speak, the negative self-t talk, the way that you interact with others, preconceived notions that you continue to repeat, and the list goes on and on. I mean, how many times in your life have you had this thought? Oh my god, I did it again. How to Predict Your Triggers and Break the Loop If you’ve ever had that, it can be really frustrating because it’s something you do repeatedly that you probably can’t even predict. And that seguays us into the next section, which is, okay, we’re aware of this, Mark. Now, what do we do about it? Well, predicting your habits or just embracing something you do and saying, wait a second. I think I’m probably going to do that again. I’m about to eat. I should probably somehow figure out how I cannot eat fast. I’m hungry. I shouldn’t suddenly impulsively say I want three times as much food because right now I’m really hungry. That sounds really good. I’m sitting in my chair. Do I have the right chair? And if I do, am I sitting in some weird way that I think is comfortable or compensates when I’m stressed? I’m working on something intensely. What am I doing with my jaw and my teeth right now? I keep squinting my eyes. Do I just need different glasses or am I sitting too close to my screen? I seem to have a headache every day at the same time. What is it that I’m doing? Having a little bit of forethought can help dramatically. And I guess that’s one of the pluses of this repetition. It’s going to repeat. So, at least it’s sort of on a predictable schedule. And as I talk about in my micro seminar, do it to a fault. Things that you do can be attached not just to time, but to actions and feelings. So you might just do something when you’re feeling a certain way. It can even be when you have joy. You might do something around the same time or you might do something around the same activity. The whole concept of triggers essentially is described in what I just said. And in fact, there’s a section of the book because it talks about triggers that they’re your monsters and unicorns that sort of raise their hand and say, “Hey, I’m here. Just so you know, I’m going to be doing this thing.” So, give some thought to your repetition in your life. It is one of the most powerful things that you can use from a from a 30,000 ft view. Repetition in general is an amazing thing and it can do amazing good and amazing harm. So let’s try to limit the harm. Let’s nip that stuff in the bud and let’s try to use it for good. Outro If this made sense to you, then check out my over 300 other episodes that talk about interesting things like this. If you know someone who you think would benefit from this quick 10-minute podcast, feel free to forward it to them as well. And thank you as always for listening. And feel free to provide any feedback. Take care. Want a proven tool in your asernal for getting things done? try CheckMark™, the no-install todo list that lives on your phone and your desktop. It’s completely free. BONUS: The excersizes mentioned in this episode can be instantly copied to your checklist clipboard.

    10 min

  3. 30/03/2025

    Time is sometimes money but is always Energy

    Time is money You’ve heard that phrase and it is often accompanied by someone clapping, tapping their foot, or some other show of impatience. Chop chop, time is money. In our world of Time, Energy and Resources as separate entities, they are saying time is resources, aren’t they? But it’s actually more accurate to same time is energy. Let’s discuss, and see if you agree. This just might help you plan your time in a way that makes more sense. Transcript: “How Do You Have Time For That?” How do you have time for this? Like, how do you have time to listen to this podcast? I know. I’m kidding. I’m kidding. It’s only 10 minutesish, so it’s really not that long, right? But have you ever heard that phrase? Has anyone said that to you or have you thought or said that to anyone else? How do you have time for that? And that’s typically accompanied by or it follows a statement about someone doing something that seems like a big project, a monumental endeavor, or just something that’s very repetitive and apparently timeconsuming, right? I for one have gotten that a number of times, no pun intended, for the things that I’ve done, you know, the a couple of the things that I accomplished, you know, writing a bunch of books and getting a certain kind of license and and just a bunch of other stuff, right? I mean, I’ve even had people just justify and expand on that and say, “Oh, that’s because you’re this or that or the other thing.” You know, they they want to explain it away. And what they’re really doing is they’re just saying, “Well, your life is different than mine. I couldn’t do that because I don’t have the time for it. That’s fair. That’s understandable. But they do. And I’m not saying they should do those things because they do. How dare you not do the things that I’m interested in, right? But I simply want to take a step back and say they’re using the wrong element. The Real Issue: Energy vs. Time What do you mean by elephant, Mark? Well, you know, life is made of three things: time, energy, and resources, right? And when people say, “How do you have time for that?” What they really mean is, “How do you have the energy for that?” And you can say, “Well, well, not everything takes a huge amount of energy, right?” And and here’s an example. Someone that I know who is relatively accomplished and active was just mentioning a bunch of old movies that they had like rented and were watching and they’re always talking about like these movies that they’re going through and I’m thinking you know they’re burning up a couple hours and that and my immediate reaction was how do you have oh and I caught myself I mean I have the time to do that. I certainly have the time to go and watch a movie. You know, I could watch a movie like every night if I wanted to, but I don’t want to and I don’t have the energy for it. I don’t have the interest, the dedication, or the energy for it, right? And interest and dedication basically are forms of energy. They’re not forms of time. I mean, marking off your time is is easy because it’s an external thing. It’s basically you saying, “I’m going to put these stakes in the ground temporally.” Don’t you love that word? That’s so cool. I’m going to put these temporal stakes in the ground and I am going to say this time is marked for that. And you can say, “Well, Mark, what if something comes up?” Like, what if you have little kids and you say, “Okay, I’m going to put my little kid down for a nap and I’m going to do this.” And the kid wakes up early. Well, yeah. Well, then obviously reality has encroached on your on your stakes that you put down. They kind of trampled through the little wires you put up and and there you go. But you can’t use an exception as as a reason, right? So that particular time you didn’t have the time. How Life Drains Your “Earmarked” Energy But again again you’re thinking about energy but you’re labeling it time. Think about that. Because if you say, “I’m going to put my kid down for an hour nap and I’m going to go and I’m going to sit down and I’m going to I’m going to do that thing. I’m going to concentrate. I’m going to try to write a book. I’m going to try to do this, that, or the other thing.” Right? And the kid wakes up 10 minutes into it and you get up and you’re like, and then you’re like, “Well, should I put them back to sleep?” And, you know, did their little nookie thing just fall out or what? And you’re just you and you do get them back to sleep. And it only takes like a minute or two to get them back to sleep by some miracle. No, now I don’t feel like doing this. I lost my concentration. You look at the clock, you still have 45 minutes, but you lost your concentration. Or now you don’t feel like it. Or now you’re worried about your child waking up again. Do you see how all of this has to do with your energy and none of it has to do with the with the clock, which it moves at exactly the same pace for everyone. and you’re misleading yourself into thinking I just don’t have the time for it. No, no, no. You don’t have the energy for it. And you’re having difficulty in in in in mustering and controlling the energy for it, which is acceptable, which is fine. And I’m not faulting you for that. You’re a human being. You only have so much concentration. We even talk about this in people multitasking and how there’s a glue that holds that together. that is is an additional energy that you have to account for. Right? But I hope you’re having kind of an aha moment right now. I hope while I’m talking, you’re starting to think of other things in your life where you’re like, “Oh, well, I guess it’s not about time.” Controlling the Variables of Concentration And I will submit to you that when you pull off something in your life, something that you’re like, “I didn’t think I could do this.” And, “Oh, I guess I got that done.” You’ll find that it wasn’t really the marking off of the time. it was the fending off or the sucking it up or the redoubling of your efforts or whatever it is that had to do with energy because like I said and I’ll use the book example again because it’s such a good book and such I’m sorry it’s such a good example and it’s near and dear to my heart and something I’ve gone through many times is that you can earmark a certain amount of time each day or every other Thursday or or whatever in your schedule and it typically isn’t about the fact that you marked the time. It’s about you going, “Okay, time to write and you got to get in a certain frame of mind and you have to let go of reality.” I mean, even if you’re writing a non-fiction, you still have to let go of reality because you’ve immersed yourself into your own reality in which you’re talking to people that don’t exist because that’s what writing a book is, is talking to people that don’t exist yet. You’re talking to people in the future. And so, but it all has to do with the energy. And once you learn that, it’ll make all the difference in the world. Try it just once. So, let’s do the let’s do let’s do an exercise. Okay, since that point was fairly easily made and hopefully you are having the light bulb moment, let’s either think about or write down. And the cool thing is this is a podcast so you can pause it. I mean, if you’re in your car and you’re like, “Oh, this is good. listen to it again later or pause it if you’re just you’re sitting around or whatever having your coffee and staring ahead. Think about or write down a thing that you’ve been wanting to accomplish. Then think about how much time you think it will take to accomplish this. And when I say how much time, I mean, you know, not like, well, it’ll take about 73 man hours to do this. I’m talking about it’s going to take a while to do this, so I probably want to do this for an hour a day or an hour a week or whatever. Right. Right. Cuz on paper that looks really good and and it’s really simple, but then it never happens because you don’t focus on the energy required. The “Bookends” Squeezing Your Energy And this is where it gets smart and this is where it gets good. So once you’ve earmarked the time and you get the amount of time it takes, you have to then reserve and control and deal with the energy which is going to be the biggest variable and really the only variable. And what do we do here all the time? We think ahead and we cheat, right? So if you say I’m going to and again the book example, fine. again. I’m going to either write at a cafe or write it at at home in my office or I’m going to write by the couch or in my bedroom so the kids leave me alone. Whatever it is. And you say it’s going to be this hour. Well then, well, which hour is it going to be? Well, when I have a free hour, nope, not going to happen. Okay, fine. After I put him to bed. Okay. Or it’s going to be my lunch hour. It’s going to be whatever. What you have to do is you have to look at the bookends around that earmarked time. what’s what happened before it and less importantly what happens after it because those two things are also going to try to encroach on your time. They’re going to squeeze it which is why I called it bookends. They’re going to squeeze your time. The thing before it is either going to run too long and you’re like, “Oh crap, I’m starting this later than I wanted to.” So now you actually have the time element that’s been adjusted. Or more likely, the thing before it was a bit more exhausting, right? You want to drop your kid off for something and then spend that hour doing something, but your kid was really crabby and you had an exhausting emotional time with them and now your mind is racing about how they’re pissed at you. W

    11 min
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About

Welcome to the Time, Energy, and Resources Coaching and Podcast! Our coaching style and podcast are all about helping you make the most of your time, energy, and resources so you can achieve your goals and live a more fulfilling life. Whether you’re looking to improve your productivity, reduce stress, or simply make better use of your time, we have the tools and strategies you need to get started. Join us on this journey and discover how to take control of your time, energy, and resources and unlock your full potential.

Information

  • Creator
    Author Mark Bradford
  • Years Active
    2017 - 2026
  • Episodes
    250
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Show Website
    Alchemy For Life

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