Intro

Hey there. Okay. If you've listened to the podcast for any amount of time, you know, or you might've noticed, I'm guessing you noticed that I've been gone for a couple of months and many people have written, you know, written in and said, Hey, where's Jim and is Jim okay. And all kinds of emails. And I appreciate that.Well, I want to share with you where I've been for the past couple of months, and I want to share with you the personal transformations that I've gone through. And I want to share with you things that I've learned that can help you further transform your own life. Now I'll keep everything close to the vest for right now. But next episode is about where I'd been the past couple of months.And to give you a little hint, the episode is titled life and death. Okay? I'll catch you over on the next episode is the kickoff 2021 here with the Transforming your Life from the Inside Out podcast. Bye-bye.

You're listening to the Transform your Life from the Inside Out podcast in this episode, I'm going to talk about something that you may or may not be familiar with. However, research has demonstrated that this concept can make a significant difference in your personal life and your professional life. And that concept is self integrity. Stay tuned.

Hi, I'm Jim Fortin, and you're about to start Transforming your Life from the Inside Out with this podcast, I'm widely considered the leader in subconscious transformation and I've coached super achievers all around the world for over 25 years here you're going to find no rah rah motivation and no hype because this podcast is a combination of Brain Science, Transformational Psychology, and Ancient Wisdom, all rolled into one to take your life to levels you've never thought possible. If you're wanting a lot more in life to feel better, to heal, to have peace of mind, to feel powerful and alive, and to bring more abundance and prosperity into your life. And this podcast is for you because you're going to start learning how to master your mind and evolve your consciousness. And when you do that, anything you want then becomes possible for you. I'm glad you're here.

Self-Integrity: Keep Your Word To Yourself

Okay. So what are we talking about? Well, when I say self integrity, what I mean by that? It's not a matter of moral integrity or any of that. It's a matter of integrity to self specifically self integrity is, do you do what you say you're going to do? When you say you're going to do it now, this is something that I've learned and I've learned it the hard way over the years, but I've learned that if you don't keep your word to yourself and particular relative to a goal or an outcome or work or something, you know, working or whatever, if you don't keep your word to yourself, whatever it is that you want to create, it's just not going to happen. What I tell people and this pertains to me as well, is that nothing works when I demonstrate a lack of self integrity. Now I want to refer to a study here by Dr. Michael Jensen.

And by the way, I might've said Jenkins. When I, you know, when I referred to this episode in the last episode telling you what's coming up, I think I might've called him Jenkins, but his name is actually Michael Jensen. He is professor emeritus at Harvard business school, and he ran, what's called the social science research network. And he did a year long study. And what they discovered was, I mean, it was really amazing in my interpretation is that when people focus on their self integrity, plain and simple, when they keep their word to themselves, their productivity goes up anywhere from 1 to 500% with no additional input from anything else. What they also discovered is, and what they most observed is that when people actually kept their word to themselves again, when they, you know, they do what they say, they're going to do pretty much a 300% increase in output with no additional input is what was found.

Now. That's pretty amazing, right? I mean, simply increasing your output anywhere from 100% to 500%, by keeping your word. Let's put that in tangible terms. Let's say for example, and of course there are other contingencies here, but let's make this really simple. Let's say, for example, that you started keeping your word to yourself about things that you were going to do to grow your business, or to increase productivity at work, or to make you more money. And let's say that you actually started keeping your word when you said you're going to do it. Well, what if for example, you only have, I had a 100% increase in your, your output. Basically that means if you made 100,000, now you'd make 200,000 or, you know, anywhere from five times in that, I mean, the exponential result of this to me is mindblowing.

Now there are other factors here, but what I want to point out, and basically it's fear because people are afraid of rejection. You know, when it comes to salespeople, they will say all the time. And I know because I've coached, I don't know how many countless thousands of selling professionals over the years. And they will say things like I'm going to prospect on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and they don't do it. Now, the caveat there is the reason they don't do it is because for many people prospecting your lead generation also actually plays into most people's biggest fear, which is the fear of abandonment or inadequacy. People's two biggest fears, either abandonment, meaning people are going to reject you or inadequacy. I'm not good enough, but you know, it's one thing to give your word and say, you're going to do it. But most people or many people, I should say, say, they're going to do it.And they don't do it because of those reasons, meaning the fear of abandonment or rejection.

This is a vital, vital, vital concept. And I also, when I was reading some research on this Jensen also said that in his opinion, it's the most overlooked concept in business. Now, I don't know where you work. Maybe you're, self-employed, maybe you're an entrepreneur. Maybe you work for a large company. I don't know. Maybe you work for a small company, but when you look at this seriously, look at this, you will find that people actually ignoring this concept is like epidemic. Whether it be in business or even in our personal lives. So where we want to work from is, and there's two aspects to this and I'll get to it in just a moment, keeping our word to ourselves and keeping our word to others. But where we want to work from is keeping our word to ourselves. Now I remember one morning I woke up and it dawned on me what I'm going to share with you right now. See, I grew up in a small Texas farming town, a very, just simple traditional values and, and the town that is.

And I think even my family to a large degree, but there were three predominant rules in my family. And my parents were very strict about these rules. There weren't a whole lot of rules, but these rules were enforced and that is, do not lie, do not cheat and do not steal. And my parents, as I, you know, as I just said, were very adamant about those rules. So I've always had this interpretation and opinion of myself that, you know, integrity is very, very important to me. Of course, you know, you may or may not know me personally. I don't know, but integrity is very, very important to me and that I do right by people. And I also gravitate towards people that also have extremely high levels of personal integrity.

So I remember one morning that I woke up and this is what dawned on me. I woke up and I'm like, you know what I mean? I'm, I'm a really integral guy. And by the way, I don't know. I mean, when I said it, that kind of way, and it came out of my mouth, that's kind of hokey, but I said that, and then it dawned on me, you know what it dawned on me. That's why I said, you know, what is that? I don't keep my word to myself as much as I should. And I'm going to use the should word there, but basically let me put it this way is I don't keep my word. And this was years ago. I don't keep my word to myself to the degree that I wish that I would want to be at, or I wanted to be at. And in that moment, I thought, you know what, you know, Jim, you think you're such an integral guy. You might be to other people, but you're not integral to yourself. And that was kind of a blow for me.

I mean, it was like a big aha epiphany awakening that morning because I had this notion that, you know, you're an honest guy and that's a really, as I said, a really, really high value to me. And then when I recognized that, yes, I am honest with other people, but not honest with myself. I mean, Holy cow, I was like, if that's not an eye-opener, I don't know what is, so the question that I have for you is to what degree do you actually keep or not keep, keep your word to yourself, ponder that for a moment. Seriously. So if you look at let's go to prospecting and lead generation, do you, do you know if you're in business, do you do it when you say you're going to do it? You know, also how I'm going to jump around here. I don't use notes for these. And my voice is a little hoarse. Also. It's been a long day today. I'm going to jump around here. And by the way, I tell you that for a reason, because somebody actually wrote in and said, Hey, Jim, you sound a little tired. Can I volunteer time with you? So it's, you know, it's interesting to me what things that people pick up. So I'm a little hoarse right now.

So anyway, I remember my sisters and I talking one time and I used to always tell my mom that, you know, mom would call me and I'd say, Hey, mom I got to go, got a business call. I'll call you later. And I didn't even recognize seriously. I didn't recognize that I never called her back. And one of my sisters said to me, we were just chatting one day. And she said, you know, mom had mentioned that every time you said, you're going to call, she already knows. You're not going to call. And I'm like, what are you talking about? Of course, you know, I'm going to call mom. And she said, well, of course you call mom. But every time you tell a mom, you'll call, you'll call her back. You'll call her later. You never do. And I sat down and I'm like, you know, wow. Yeah, that, that, that is true. And I also ask myself, well, if I do it there, where else in my life do I do that?

And I'm going to be, you know, just completely transparent. I've come to a place now in my life where, and I'm going to hop around here a bit, but this will relate to you or many of you as well. I used to be at a place in my life where I would actually overcommit. And I would tell people, yes, I can do that and I can do this. And I can do that. And I'll do all the stuff . And what I would do is by saying, that I was out of integrity quite often, because there was no way anybody, you know, any person could keep up with all the things that I said, said that I would do in the timeframe that I said that I would do them. Now, we're going to keep on going here and take this apart some more. But w where I work from this day and age is I have a really, really a firm. Let me put it this way. A firm commitment place. When if I say that I'm going to do it by 7:00 PM on Tuesday night, I am not perfect. And I have missed that and I have to go back and clean that deadline up and tell people, you know what, I'm out of integrity.

But this day and age, I don't commit to as much. And I don't speak words unless I know that you know what, that I can commit when I get people a certain time and day, I don't speak it unless I know that I can, 100% no question be in integrity with that day. I also want to point out that I moved very, very fast in business and I have a lot of things going on and a lot of balls in the air right now. And a lot of amazing things are happening and in the podcast is one of them. And thank you so much. And it's very easy for me to get distracted because I have so many things with PR and the podcast and my transformational programs and coaching and everything else that it's very easy sometimes to get distracted because I have a lot of things going on. And the reason I share that with you is because I'm sure your life is the same.

You're, you've got many things going on in your life relative to your life and your business. And when we get in that place, it's very easy to speak our words and to say, yes, I'm going to do that, you know, do that or do this or that, but we're really not actually even conscious or present when we do it. So that's a place that I've been working on in my own life as being fully conscious that when somebody says, Hey, when can you do X, Y, Z, well, you know what, before I just blabber something and say, you know, whatever date I now think about, well, what are the consequences of me saying I can deliver it Tuesday at 5:00 PM.

I also want to share with you in full transparency here, that I think being honest with myself, that mastering self integrity has been one of the lessons. And I'm just speaking slowly here, because I'm thinking through this has been one of the lessons that's been the biggest challenge for me. And also, you know, I've mentioned on other podcasts about my father, who was an alcoholic. And the reason I mentioned that is because my father, and I'm not saying all alcoholics are this way. I mean, everyone's different, but my father literally was like one of the most challenged people in the world when it came to matters of self integrity. I mean, and also commitment was not a strong suit for him.

And it is what it is. I mean, he is, you know, he is who he is. And, but here's the thing as a small child, I learned from him that it's okay to speak X, Y, Z, and then actually not get to it or not do it or not follow through. So I learned this very early in life. And as I said, this has been one of the lessons on my front burners in life is to, you know, what, get to a place where I'm very, very integral with the words that I speak. And I'm even asking people in my life that, you know what, Hey, if I say I'm going to do something and I don't do it. And part of that's also, brain-based, I'm not letting anyone off the hook, including myself, but I'm a general thinker, which means, I think in big pictures, I'm not a very good detailed thinker. And it's very easy for me to actually say, I'll do a lot of details or, you know, want to get involved in a lot of details and maybe more challenging the follow through because my brain is more things more generally.

So what I want to tell you is I've taken our broom and a mop and a pail and cleaned a lot of this up over the years. But I want to share with you that this is still a lesson for me and something that I have to keep in front of me. And it's something that I ask you to really, really look at in your own life. Because when I started, you know, today's podcast, I said that nothing works. If we are not a person of self integrity. And if you look at your life, let's take simple things. And again, you know, which we're going to talk about in a couple of more episodes, again, about habits and, and brain-based habits.

But you look at,let's just say working out, for example, how often have you said, you know what, I'm going to work out on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, or this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to do this when it comes to working out, or I'm going to do Pilates or yoga or rebound, whatever it is. And if you notice that many times that you speak your words and they never happen. So, you know, this is a great wake-up call for a good, many of you to look at your own life and to look at your level of self integrity in your own life. Because if you're not being self integral, as I just said, nothing works to the degree that we want it to work. You know what I've also noticed over the years as well is I definitely know I can stand by this.

When people ask me to do things for them, a friend, well, they don't do it anymore because we have Uber and Lyft, but for the most part, but when people would say, Hey, can you pick me up at the airport? You can bank on it. I'm going to be there. Why? Because I told you I would be there. You know, when we were kids back when we were, you know, in our twenties and maybe I don't know, early thirties and her friend would say, Hey, you know, can you help me move? You know, move apartments, which, by the way, I never enjoyed that stuff. But, you know, can you help me move in my apartment?

I would be there hung over or not because we were young and going out drinking and all that kind of stuff on Friday nights, you know, but I would be there if I said, I'd be there at eight o'clock. I would be there at eight o'clock. And let me give you some examples of that. A couple of places before I go there is in the book, Don Miguel Ruiz, the book, the four agreements. I strongly suggest you get that book by Don, D O N, Miguel Ruiz, R U I Z. And it's called the four agreements. And one of the four agreements is to keep your word to yourself. Now you've heard of many episodes. I've talked about my brother-in-law, the Shaman.

And he had told me one time, he's like, there are not just four agreements. There are 13 agreements and all the time and all the time that I've known my brother-in-law and worked with him. I have never one time. And I'm saying this as, as, as stone faced as I can, I have never seen him one time ever be out of integrity with anyone, including myself, for people that I've seen him talk to, he has never been out of integrity with me in particular, because I can't talk. I mean, I'm not with him 24/7, you know, but I remember like last year he, he told me, he goes, I'm going to get something for you. There's something that I wanted. And it was a healing device.

And he goes, Oh, he goes, I'll get it for you. And about a month later, he hadn't gotten it for me. And I thought, wow. In all the years, I've never seen him out of self integrity. And this is the first time he's out of self integrity. And about two weeks later, he came over for dinner. And what did he have tucked under his arm? He had tucked under his arm. What he told me he was going to do for me. And I just look and I marvel at all the years that I've seen him maintain such a high level of self integrity. And I remember him sharing his story with me when he was young, he grew up in Mexico and he started apprenticing with shamans when he was six years old.

And I remember he told me when, as a teenager that he and some boys they were talking and they were saying they were drinking and all this kind of stuff. And, and they were saying, Hey, tomorrow morning, we're going to go swimming at like 7:00 AM. And we're all going to meet. And he told me that he talked to his mentor,who was a shaman. And later that night, and he told his mentor that, you know what we all said, we're going to go swimming tomorrow morning at 7:00 AM. But you know what? They're all going to be hung over. They're not going to go. So therefore, I'm not going to go. And his mentor said to him, he said, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter whether or not they show up or not show up. What matters is that you go, because you said you were going to go, you must be an integrity.

And you know, that reminds me of another story. I read somewhere many years ago about Geronimo and Geronimo in his later years. He lived in Oklahoma. And every week I believe as I, as I read every week, he used to ride a horse. I mean, that's, what else would he ride? Right back in the 18, whatever seventies or sixties or whatever it was. He would ride a horse for two hours to go see his biographer. And I read that one time when he was supposed to go see his biographer,he was like, he had the flu and he was really sick. And he rode his horse for two hours in the snow to see the biographer. And he went to see the biographer and he told the biographer, I'm really sick today. I can not sit with you today. And the biographer said, well, how come you, if you're sick,why don't you just skip? I mean, why don't you send me smokes signals or something? You know, why don't you text me? You know? And, and Geronimo said, he said, I came here to tell you that I couldn't be with you today because I told you that I would be with you today.

And wow. Right. I mean, providing that stories true. And I, I read it somewhere that rather reputable years ago, I mean, he rode for two hours in the snow, having the flu or whatever, to tell a guy, he couldn't be there. And then he rode two hours back. And in all honesty, that's the way that I see my brother-in-law show up. And that's the model to me is, and I'm suggesting maybe you explore that in your own life is, do I do what I say I'm going to do?

Okay. Let me come back here to the topic for a little bit. When we talk about words, I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time right now on this, but there's phrase that I work from. And I, one of my coaches, my NLP coach, Peggy taught this to me many years ago. She said to me, she said, we speak our lives into existence. And when you really think about that, look at your life. And then of course that much matriculates in the self-talk, but you look at your life and wherever your life is right now, it is because you have spoken your life into that place. And you know, a place, a lot of you have spoken your life into his money's hard to come by. Money is hard to make. I've got a hustle and grind that I've got to work like a dog, and I have to work 60 hours a week.

Take, take this.And let's just slow down here for a second and really, really get introspective with that. And you notice that your life is exactly the way that you say that it is. My brother-in-law. The Shaman taught me one time. Many years ago, he shared this with me and it was just one of those knockout phrases for me. He said, the world is this way or that way, because you tell yourself the world is this way or that way, ponder that my life is this way or that way, because I tell myself my life is this way or that way. And if you ponder that and you take a step back and you look at your life, your life is exactly the way that you tell yourself that it is now.

There's a difference between ways that you wish it could be different or any, or any of that. But if you literally, and you got really honest with yourself and you look at where you are, it's because you have talked yourself into that place with words now and entirely different podcast episode. And I'm, I can't go into it right now. But something else that I was taught is that everything begins with sound. You probably know me well. And I find now is that I don't endorse any religion. However, in the, by meaning that everyone's going to find their own path. So let me, let me leave it at that. But in the Bible, there's a phrase. And the phrase is this in the beginning, there was the word. And I want you to recognize that in everything in your life, before things, you know, happened, as they did in the beginning, before that there was a word it's because we speak our lives into existence.

So the next question I have for you is what are you speaking? And then are you keeping the words that you're speaking? One of my transformational coaches, I remember talking to her one day and she was actually on a coaching session with me. And she said to me, and this was so powerful to me is she said that when we give our word and we don't keep our word to ourself, what we're really demonstrating is that our word is of no value. Wow. I mean, when I really think about that, and then she said that if we give our word and we don't keep our word, that's also a matter of low self-esteem because what we're telling ourselves is that I don't even value. I don't even value my own words to myself. Wow. That's powerful. So let me ask you a couple of questions. What do you do? What do you do when you break your word to yourself?

Consider that, are you kinda like, well, let me clean this up, let me actually fix this. Let me make this right to myself. Or are you kind of like, and I've been there and most people are there or are you kind of like, eh, all right, no big deal. And if you noticed that when you actually break your word to yourself and you go, eh, no big deal, it's always easy to continue to break your word. I remember reading this story about a Navy seal, and this is what I call an unbreakable standard. This is something that I talk about in my coaching is having unbreakable standards. Meaning when you give your word it's unbreakable, however you're giving it. It is an unbreakable standard and you keep it no matter what.

And I remember the story about a Navy seal. And he said he was a young guy. And he said that he was going to run. I don't know what it was. He was going to run like three miles a day for the next 90 days. And he woke up one morning and he wasn't feeling well. And he said, you know what? I like a lot of us, we're going to roll over in bed. Should I get up and run today? Or should I, you know, should I stay in bed? And what he ultimately, well, let me ask you, what do you think he did? Do you think he, you know, he woke up and he was a Navy seal. He woke up, he had the flu and he said he was going to run every day for 90 days. Do you think that he rolled back over and went to sleep? Or do you think that he got up and ran? What do you think? Well, as he recounts, he got up and he ran because he said that, you know what?

And of course he was a young guy, you know, heals much quicker than older people. And that could even be able to leave as well. But he said that he could recover from the flu. And maybe if it's setting back a day or so from the running, but what he would not recover from is breaking his word to himself. So, consider that, and look at your own life. And where do you break your word to yourself? Another question for you, do you think that people who achieve amazing things, do you think people, and by the way, none of us are perfect. I don't know a single person, a perfect person on this planet, but do you think that people that have achieved great things or have achieved what you want to achieve?Do you think they're in the constant habit of breaking their word to themselves? You know, that's really some really good food for thought. And then something else I want to ask you is this is where are you going to be relative to your goal? Whatever is health, wellness, you know, weight, work, money, whatever it is, where are you going to be?

Let's keep this simple. Let's not look at a year, but where are you going to be 90 days from now, literally three months in the future. If you continue to break your word to yourself, all right. So the big takeaway this week in this particular episode is that really? And if you take a step back and you really get honest with this is the reason that things don't happen in your life, the way that you want them to happen. I don't mean controlling people or any of that, but I mean, you know, weight goals or whatever, or business goals, not always because life's not black and white, but many times you're not achieving the outcomes that you want because you're not keeping your word to yourself. And your transformational takeaway this week is to be 100% impeccable with your word. Because when you do that, you are much more likely to get the outcomes you want than to actually keep saying you're going to do something and not doing it. All right. Thanks for listening to this one and I'll catch you over next episode. Bye bye.

Conclusion

Thank you for listening to this entire podcast. If you're the kind of person who likes to help others, then share this with your friends and family. You know, if you found value, they will too. So please share via your social media channels. Also, if you have questions I'm here to assist, you can email me questions to support@jimfortin.com. And I may even use your question for a future podcast episode. Also, if you want transformational content like this daily connect with me on Instagram, my Instagram name is I @iamjimfortin. Finally, I do have a personal request. I believe that we're all here to help others and to grow and evolve ourselves together. You and I let's help more people. If you would, please leave a review on iTunes and a good one, by the way, I'd be grateful. And through your assistance together, we can transform more lives. Thanks for listening.