“Beat procrastination, be more productive, and finally do that thing you’ve been meaning to do.” These words, lifted from the cover of Robbie Swale’s book, How to Start When You’re Stuck: Practical Inspiration to Get Your Idea off the Ground, outlines the process he now regularly uses to move his ideas from “zero to done.” In this episode Robbie answers twelve questions, each connected to The 12-Minute Method, which is his approach to merging inspiration with practicality. You can adopt and adapt Robbie’s ideas to meet your goals and turn your dreams into realities. This episode is filled with solid observations, thoughtful lessons, and practical advice.
SHOW NOTES
3:40 – learning contains all of human potential
4:20 – learning can occur at any age
4:50 – little fulfillment correlates with little learning
5:05 – Carol Dweck - growth mindset vs. fixed mindset
6:20 – Mrs. Ramsay’s influence
6:55 – one of the benefits of going to school
7:45 – Mrs. Ramsay’s caring approach
8:05 – family response to Robbie’s first school report
8:35 – Robbie’s creative future assessed
9:40 – carrying the wrong story around for many years
10:35 – Mrs. Ramsay’s assessment corrected
11:15 – our memories aren’t very accurate
13:00 – the relationship between coaching and change
14:00 – commitment to a coaching process
15:00 – how coaching changes the world
15:45 – coaching’s connection to teaching
16:40 – coaching’s connection to leadership
17:15 – coaching’s connection to learning (curiosity)
17:50 – listen to learn
19:05 – does learning drive change or does change drive learning?
19:50 – individual learning leads to change in the world
20:55 – Ingrid Goff-Maidoff poem
22:30 – coaching is a creative endeavor
22:55 – creativity is creating a change
24:45 –what is one’s most meaningful pursuit?
26:00 – coaches want to see the impact of their work
26:45 – impeccable commitments
27:50 – when you can’t keep your word, honor your word
30:25 – maybe create a twelve-minute podcast
31:00 – everything starts with a decision
32:00 – changing careers, securing the support of a coach, and address obstacles
33:00 – create accountability - make a significant commitment
34:30 – sometimes what you are resisting is what you should be doing
35:15 – how the number twelve became a pivotal piece of the 12-minute method
37:45 – what makes a great teacher great?
38:20 – The Inner Game of Tennis
39:20 – we’re naturally inclined to learn
40:15 – creating a space where students want to be
40:30 – the best teachers taught more than subject area content - they taught about life
41:30 – another twist on BLT
43:00 – more books on the way
45:00 – a project around honor
48:15 – inspiration is all around us
50:00 – confidence comes after you do something, not before
50:30 – small actions can add up to a meaningful body of work
51:05 – share your work
robbie@robbieswale.com
How to Start When You're Stuck: Practical inspiration to get your idea off the ground
How to Keep Going When You Want to Give Up: Practical inspiration to help you create good habits and stay focused – even when it’s hard
Mailing list for updates on Robbie’s coaching and writing
David Gemmell’s work – referenced by Robbie
Ingrid Goff-Maidoff – God Spoke Today in Flowers and other poems
The Inner Game of Tennis (Timothy Gallwey)
Conscious Business (Fred Kofman)
David Reynolds (00:11):
What matters most in learning the challenge, the thrill, the benefits, interacting with other people or something else entirely. What is the connection between leading and learning? Does change drive learning or does learning drive change? What's more important teaching or learning? Is everyone a leader, a learner, a teacher want answers, listen in, as we address these intriguing issues through commentary and with guests who share their thinking and tell us their stories, lead learn change.
Robbie Swale (00:54):
As I was home educated until I was about nine, and that was still unusual in the UK. And it was even more unusual in the late eighties, early nineties when I was kind of that age. And one of the biggest and most difficult transitions of my life was to go to school because the environment, the rules, I just didn't understand. I found the social things quite hard, you know, although I'm really glad that I went because I, I learned those social things. That's one of the things that undoubtedly the impact of, of school had on me that when I do things that I'm scared of, that I'm resisting good things happen. Confidence comes after we take action on things. We, we sometimes think it has to come before, but you know, actually it's always a result of the things we've done. When I think about my favorite teachers, maybe we usually my favorite teachers now, of course, we don't all see the world the same. So this is like the things that I admire. They were mostly funny and they were, they told great stories and they were kind people and they had those kinds of qualities too. But, um, what they all did for us really was, you know, created a space where we wanted to be there enough that we, we would pay attention enough that we would learn.
Robbie Swale (02:03):
If you help someone see something in a new way, you've changed their whole world.
David Reynolds (02:09):
Today's guest on lead. Learn change is Robbie swale. Robbie, thanks for taking your valuable time to be with me today.
Robbie Swale (02:16):
Ah, well, David, thank you so much for having me. It's a real pleasure and I'm very grateful.
David Reynolds (02:21):
Author blogger, podcaster, coach, husband, dad, and learner Robbie SW spent 12 minutes each way on his frequent train ride between the London Waterloo stop and clap junction. He did a lot of thinking on his journey, reflecting on creativity, resistance, inspiration, commitments, confidence in the gift of life. These thoughts led to a decision to start writing and the 12 minute method was born. Robbie and I met via an online writing endeavor and it was the simplicity of the 12 minute concept that resonated with me and served as a, a direct catalyst for completing my first book today. Robbie shares practical ways to get your idea off the ground, whether that's starting a business, completing a project, serving those around you or fulfilling a lifelong dream, let's begin with what matters most in learning. How would you respond to that?
Robbie Swale (03:20):
Wow, that's actually a really big question. And, and, and I wanna say David as well. Thanks for that beautiful intro. It's really meaningful for me to hear, hear you say that and capture some parts of my story. Most important about learning. Look, I guess for me, what's most important about learning. I don't know if this is, um, if this is the way that people normally answer it, but it's, it's, it's that like the idea of learning contains within it that we can learn right. Contains within it. Pretty much all of human potential. I, I haven't thought about that until you asked me this question, but it's like the sense of possibility in it is what feels really important to me. I was speaking to one of my coaching clients today and he'd put himself really out of his comfort zone. He hadn't actually told me, but it was to do with the work we were doing really out of his comfort zone and it had not gone fantastically, but it had gone okay. And his real reflection was well, I'm 40 something and it's actually a real relief and quite exciting to know that I can still learn new things and grow. And that is, uh, is an amazing thing about learning. And also for me, it's fun. That's, that's one of the things that's important about it.
David Reynolds (04:30):
Are you surprised to hear from somebody who's only in their forties? I say that because that's been a while
Robbie Swale (04:44):
Yeah, I am a bit because I, you know, um, learning curiosity in some ways, the, the times in my life where I felt least fulfilled when I look back were actually times when I wasn't learning. So learning's always been really important. Hmm. In some ways that that surprise from the, from that story about the client, it gives me that sense of in the work of Carol Dweck, she talks about a growth mindset and a fixed mindset. And if you're someone like me, who's kind of feels like I've always had a growth mindset. It's sometimes really important to realize that empathy is really hard and it's very easy natural probably to imagine that everyone else thinks exactly like we do. So even when someone like Carol Dweck, who's a researcher has got some very well respected books and work on the idea that we can have a mindset where we think we can learn the growth mindset or a fixed one where we don't really believe we can learn and change despite the respect everyone has for that work, because I've always felt like such a person with a growth mindset, I guess, underneath I've always had in some ways, a little bit of doubt that actually other really people really with a fixed mindset.
Robbie Swale (05:49):
And so it's both surprising to, to hear that yes, there are. And you know, I think this person actually, he knew he could learn. We've been learning all the way through the work we've done together over the last year, but to have that really stark event in his life where he remembers I can still learn and grow and change. That's quite meaningful.
David Reynolds (06:07):
I have to ask about your teacher, Mrs. Ramsey. You mentioned her in your first book. I want you to highlight the impact that emerges from the stories that we tell ourselves, and then those that we end up conveying to others. So just tell us about Ms. Ramsey and touch on any of those components that you'd like.
Robbie Swale (06:26):
You know, she died a few years ago. Um, but there's a part of my story that you might not actually know. It might be in the book I can't remember is that I was home educated until I was about nine. And that was a, still unusual in the UK. And it was even more unusual in the late eighties, early nineties when I was kind of that age. And one of the biggest and most difficult transitions of my life was to go to school because of the environment, the rules. I just didn't understand. I found the social things quite hard, you know, although I'm really glad that I went because I, I learned those social things. It's one of the things that undoubtedly the impact of, of school had on me and Mrs. Ramsey. She was one of the two teachers that I had in my first year and a half at school.
Robbie Swale (07:07):
The top class at this primary school was shared between two teachers, Mrs. Ramsey and Mr. Johnson. And they were both really important figures in my life cuz they were kind of guiding me into the education system, you know, for, in which I, in the end thrived and you know, in lots of ways had a wonderful time. And she really, when I look back now, cause we'll get to what, what kind of happened. But she was always a bit scary. Like my little sister, when she got into Mrs Ramsey's class, she really hated Ramsey writing cause she had to practice her handwriting Mrs. Ramsey and Mrs. Ramsey could have a little bit of a kind of like, uh, hard side to her. But when I think back to her, mostly I remember her being actually really caring to me and she must have not really known what to do with me cuz she would've, I I'm pretty sure she would've never had to deal with a sensitive boy who hadn't been to school until he was nine coming into her class before, probably all since in her life.
Robbie Swale (07:55):
And, and she did some of that stuff. She managed me really nicely. And then we have this funny story in my family, which becomes funny later on which, which you're pointing to, which is my first school report is quite, this is quite an important moment for the family. Cause my parents were feeling the pressure of we've kind of made this decision for Robbie. He doesn't really wanna go to school, but for us and the family and we think for him in the long term, it's a good thing. So the first school report that we got felt like it was quite meaningful for the whole family. That's my mom's reflection when I told her the story, which we'll get to in a sec, but what we remembered until I came to edit a final sweep of my first book, how to start when you're stuck. The story was that in my first report, I got a really good report in everything except in art.
Robbie Swale (08:41):
So like visual art painting, that kind of thing where, where it said something like Robbie tries hard, but has no real talent. That was the story. And the piece that I wrote in one of the 12 minute sittings, which is in the book as one of the chapters, was how that story. A lot of us have these stories about creativity, a little, a slightly careless remark from a teacher. This is the story that I'd heard. The sociologist, Brene Brown tell a slightly careless remark from a teacher about creativity can have a long reaching impact. You know, it's one of those things is I'm a parent, uh, as you said of an 18 month old and I'm really seeing at the moment, it's like, there's no way I can get through this time as a parent to Leah, without doing some things that in 20 years, 30 years, 40 years she'll wish I had been a bit different about, and that's the kind of responsibility and courage that teachers have to have as well.
Robbie Swale (09:28):
And Brene Brown says that those stories about creativity can be quite pernicious and stay with us for a long time. So my piece, my chapter in the book was that basically Mrs. Ramsey gave me the story that I'm not creating, but what happened was the next year I won a, a, like a competition across several schools, a painting competition. And it was like, stick it to you, Mrs. Ramsey. I am creative. But in some ways I feel like I've carried a story that I'm not creative my whole life. And it's kinda laughable these days. Cause I've published two books. I've, you know, I've got like 250 articles on my blog. I used to do theater. I used to do music. I'm obviously a creative person, but I have this story in the book. That's the story of the article until, you know, when you're publishing a book and you'll know this, there's a kind of slight pressure to just, or I had, it's just like just double check some things.
Robbie Swale (10:16):
Let's make sure I got this quote. Right. And cuz I wrote a lot of my book, the first draft on the train with a timer, you know, I didn't check at the time the quotes. So I got my mom. I said, mom, can you dig out that school report from Mrs. Ramsey about art? And she found it and I don't have the language handy, but it was nothing like what we'd remembered. Both of us had remembered it. My mom and me really clearly the actual thing she said was something like Robby's art is slightly immature or present, but it'll get better as he practices and experiments, which is pretty much exactly an accurate reflection. I'm sure of the art that I did, but I had this story, which I carried around for years and I felt some regret when I found that because I'd had this story about Mrs.
Robbie Swale (10:56):
Ramsey, which I'm sure she did say some things that upset me or whatever, cuz you can't not do that when you're a teacher. And I don't think really, but I always felt really sad that I'd carried around that story for myself and for my memory of her. And just to say, if anyone wants to learn about memory and how accurate it isn't, there's an absolutely amazing, I think it's in season two of Malcolm Gladwell's podcast, revisionist history, cuz this absolutely amazing two or three part series in there about how our memories don't record. You know, we think of our memory as being a kind of video record of what happened and is just nothing like that, which has, you know, incredible consequences for us as humans. It's like when you notice that you, you and your brother or sister have a completely different memory of a Christmas disaster, you know, that's a version of it.
Robbie Swale (11:39):
But you know, and I remember hearing that for the first time I thought, well, what's the implications of this for all our justice systems, which relies so much on eyewitness testimony. And what's the impact for the stories that we carry around for ourselves for decades sometimes about for example, how creative, creative we are. There's a lot in there and it is, it was, I was really glad that I did that little check where my mom sent me like, and she was like, what she, her reflection was, I can't believe it only says this. I think before I'd even asked, she said, I can't believe it. This is what it says. And she put it down to her, maybe all of us being very sensitive at that time taking what was written on the page, feeling upset by it because we were worried. And then what happened is our memories created something different to hold the meaning of that story for a long time, which was not an accurate reflection of what happened.
David Reynolds (12:28):
A transcript of our conversation today will not be interpreted exactly the same way as a verbatim audio version of the same discussion. And I also mentioned this to my brother just yesterday, I think on a phone call that you remember something once and after that you're remembering a memory. Yeah. And it tends to ripple with tiny little incremental changes over time. And it does embed itself in the direction that we're inclined to have it go. Let's toggle over to coaching. It's a major part of your life and your work. To what extent is the purpose of coaching to bring about change?
Robbie Swale (13:11):
I think David a hundred percent,
Robbie Swale (14:05):
And so it, you know, it does start, I think from that place of like, it's hard to imagine a person signing up the reason I, I think I'm confident, pretty confident you can hear not quite my voice as a thing that, that wouldn't have been picked up on the transcript. Right. If I hadn't said that, the reason I'm confident that it's always about change is that it's really hard to imagine someone committing to spend an hour or two every two weeks with somebody and parting with some money. If there wasn't something that was gonna change for them, if they weren't going to get something. Now the hesitancy maybe is that it's not always the kind of change that people expect in my work. It usually does have some outward change. Like it usually does have some project that people are working on, whether that's a relationship or a book or, uh, being effective at and all kinds of other things. But sometimes it, the big changes are internal that Mrs. Ramsey example, some insight like that can come. And, and that's interesting. My friend Mike says the reason he can be confident that coaching changes the world is that if you help someone see something in a new way, you've changed their whole world. So as soon as I've seen that, maybe that story about creativity, wasn't quite what I thought it was. My old world might, might suddenly look a little bit different, certainly parts of it.
David Reynolds (15:20):
All change really happens at the individual level and it might be magnified or scaled, but it's a person making a change in his or her thinking and then his or her practices or applications or decisions. And that sort of thing that makes me wonder then is the best coach, primarily a teacher, a leader, or a learner. And that might be a trick question in that you can say yes. I'm not sure
Robbie Swale (15:49):
Yeah. So I think if we take the term coaching really broadly, like the answer probably is yes. Uh, I think the kind of coaching that I do, we are always really careful when we're training new coaches or learning to be a coach of the word of the teaching word. So I think it's possible partly because we have very, certainly over here in the UK, we have very fixed ideas of, of what a teacher does. You know, I somewhat mostly someone at the front of a classroom, essentially delivering a lecture with some work for the class to do. And that's the kind of feel. I know something I'm the teacher. You don't know that thing. I'm gonna tell you kind of crossing a inviting students to cross a knowledge gap and, and know more at the end of the session. And that's not so much what coach is.
Robbie Swale (16:33):
Although it always includes leadership. I think, you know, it has to often it's very gentle leadership and people don't when their trainings be coaches, they don't quite understand it. You know, for example, often the coach is just, is, is simply the leader of the process because the client is almost always the person receiving the coaching is almost always in charge of what we talk about, what we are doing, the work on what we are trying to change, but the coach is leading the process. And if the coach doesn't lead the process, the coaching won't be as effective. And that's as simple as saying, how do you wanna use this time? And what do you want to be? What, like, what do you want to change? What do you want to be different at the end of it? And at the end, helping people understand what they're gonna do with the learning of you insight they've had.
Robbie Swale (17:11):
And that's the kind of most basic idea of what a coach might do. And the, the learner question is really interesting. Most coaches love learning. I don't know if that's a causation or correlation. Curiosity is vital for coaching and most people who are curious, I think, love to learn and learning a lot helps you often helps you be a good coach, but I, I don't know for sure that learning in itself is vital. As long as the person is curious, but in a way it'd be very hard. You couldn't really coach someone without learning about them. Like, and, and if you weren't learning about them listening, right, is one of the foundations of a great coach. If you're not learning, like if you're listening properly, you, you are learning and you have to really, and then look, what I've discovered as my coaching's gone on is I've become, I've been coaching for professionally for about seven years and I've become, what do you say?
Robbie Swale (18:09):
Like my intuition for when the more directive teaching will be helpful and not has improved so that I am, uh, less cautious about occasionally bringing in a framework, you know, having something that I can share, um, which sometimes is really useful for the person I'm working with. And sometimes they aren't that interested in and that's, that's also great. And that's one of the things I think that makes yeah, that, that I capacity that I've developed is to share a tool, an idea, a framework in real service to the, to the learner, to the client, to the, the person I'm working with. And when it's shared with real service, that's when it feels like it has the most impact.
David Reynolds (18:48):
It sounds like some of the qualities or characteristics that you've described about good coaching really would serve good teaching equally. Well, what about learning then? This is another question from the podcast opener. Does learning drive change or does change drive learning?
Robbie Swale (19:08):
Robbie Swale (20:09):
And I've definitely seen change drive learning. I think actually, as I'm saying, I think that happens a lot. So for example, on some training with some adult developmental psychologists, I used to think that brains stopped developing. I can't remember what it was like age 20 or something like that. And in the end they realized that's not true. And then there had to be a new field. So of, of adult development, thinking about how do adults' brains and perspectives change over their, over their adulthood. And one of the ways I've heard Jennifer Garvey burger say the reason that humans brains are developing is cuz cause the world becomes more complex. So we have to, to be able to function in that world. And this has really tough. I think in the last couple of years with COVID, we have to essentially change. We have to learn, we have to learn to see greater perspectives.
Robbie Swale (20:56):
One of my mentors, Robert Holden, he quotes a poem by one called Ingrid Goff Madoff, and I'm gonna slightly butcher it, but it's something like God spoke to me in flowers and I who was waiting on words, almost missed the conversation. And that makes me think always of, of sometimes in life, like in the end, you know, she was thinking she was gonna get an answer from God in words. And in the end, the flowers, you know, there were just so many symbols for, this is me projecting onto that. So many symbols for her that she had to learn the lesson that happens with my clients. You know, I've got another client at the moment. We worked together a couple of years ago. We talked a lot about the future of her career. 18 months later, we're working together again. And what's happened is there's the opportunity for her to basically take a redundancy from her company. And only now with this opportunity there, with the world kind of saying, are you sure you don't wanna do this thing that you talked about two years ago with Robbie? She said, I'm almost fated now to leave. Like I almost can't avoid it. So the world again for her is asking, okay, so what's been happening. Why haven't you been doing this thing that you've been thinking about and you know, what do you need to learn, I guess in order to do, do the thing,
David Reynolds (22:10):
Your first book is full of your blog post. You have one from 2016, so wow. Six years ago already. Wow. And it was about the power of creativity. Of course. Mrs. Ramseys was about that as well. Is there a component of your creative output that you're drawn to the most? Is it coaching or blogging or podcasting or book projects? Which ones really resonate with you most strongly, even though you're pursuing all of them.
Robbie Swale (22:39):
Yeah. First of all, I love that you include coaching in that. I think it is a really fundamentally creative thing. And I think most teachers, coaches, a lot of people and a lot of professions don't think of their work as creative. So I love that you said that. And, and a lot of people, if we think, you know, in some ways we can think of creativity as changing something as well, there's a, there's a way in which creativity is just creating a change. You know, something that didn't exist before I've now written in, you know, in this case in 2016. So one of the earliest pieces of that writing practice, it's really hard. David. I, I think there is a way in which the answer is coaching, but when I do that, when I sit with somebody for an hour or half an hour or 45 minutes or whatever it is, and I'm really present with 'em, I'm really helping them with something meaningful to them.
Robbie Swale (23:23):
There's a kind of feeling of flow in that for me, that is very powerful. And I almost always, I'm getting a bit now actually, because you are such a good listener and I kind of knew I would, uh, from this conversation, it's like the time is just going past, um, we are in connection, even though we are hundreds of thousands of miles apart. And there's something about being in that connection that is very enlivening. Now having said that that is true of my writing, but not always. So there are some pieces, you know, I could point to some of them that I remember having that same feeling with and some that I didn't have that same feeling. Some are much more, for example, thinking pieces, like I thought hard about this thing. Then I wrote something about it. And some of them, they felt like they just flowed out of me, really flowed through me.
Robbie Swale (24:10):
And that is the feeling I think that excites me about creativity and, you know, in coaching when that happens, I love it. Cuz sometimes something gets said in the conversation. No, one's quite sure who said it, you know, or emerged between the two people. And then we know really we can look at the recording or whatever and know that I said it or know that the, the other person said it. But when I said it doesn't didn't feel like my idea, cuz it was so connected to what had just been said. That's a very exciting and, and powerful feeling. And I get that. I'm a little with podcasting. I've have a podcast for coaches and it's been running for going on three years now. And I'm a little bit with it a little bit. Uh, so it is tricky, right? Cuz my second book is how to keep going when you want to give up.
Robbie Swale (24:49):
And my whole thing, what I've learned about is the power of not, not quitting, the meaningful things in my podcast at the moment, I'm getting a little bit of like, oh, some things do sometimes end and that's good. And, and what I've been thinking about for the last few months really is I guess, hearing it now, it's like, how can I find that creative energy that you're just talking about? And the book projects now they are scary and that's a different kind of feeling. And I know I've learned that's the first lesson of, of my writing practice. 12 minute method that when I do things that I'm scared of, that I'm resisting, good things happen. And so the book projects are a bit more like that. The kind of process of turning a draft into a book, I get really at any stage find fun. I don't think seeing it in people's hands on the other side of the world, incredibly fun.
David Reynolds (25:36):
Another phrase in your book that lipped out at me, I had not seen it before you attributed it to Fred Kaufman was the phrase impeccable commitments. I want to hear your current view on the importance of solid accountable commitments. Oh. And before you do that, I just thought of something it's interesting that you said coaching in response to that last question about creativity, the one that you were drawn to the most and the distinction as I see it is it's the one that's most often most connected to another person.
Robbie Swale (26:10):
Yeah. It's, it's certainly true for me. That's a really astute thing to say. It's true for a lot of coaches, a lot of people who end up coaching, one of the reasons they've made that move is because they want to see the impact of their work. Certainly one of the reasons I moved into coaching from what I'd done before, which was working in, in charities in nonprofits, I felt like I was a little bit too removed from the, there was some golden things that I helped time make happen, but I wasn't really in them. I wasn't really feel getting that feeling. And it is very powerful to, to have that. Yeah. So Coffman is, uh, he's Argentinian. So he, he does have sometimes strange terms of phrase, uh, but he spent a lot of time in, in the us. And for me there, there are kind of two ways to think about that.
Robbie Swale (26:53):
Cause I think it is about, it is a very powerful thing to think about in the way we work with others. And there is a sense of which I think a meta competency that really helps people achieve the things they want to achieve in their life is being able to make impeccable commitments to themselves, being able to keep their promises to themselves with others. Uh, you know, we had a partnership with a company. I delivering some training as part of that partnership, their responsibility, as far as we understood was to arrange the venue and it turned out that only arranged the venue for two of the three days, but they hadn't let us know about this. They didn't really apologize for it for all the extra work it created for us thinking about how are we gonna plan this? If we have to move it all online, all those kind of things.
Robbie Swale (27:34):
And once you've started to see what is it like it's better to not make a commitment and to make a commitment which you later at a later point are unable to fulfill. One of the things that Kauffman says in, in a thinking conscious business, it could be in other book, a meaning revolution, a really powerful thing, really, which is when you can't keep your word, honor your word. That's the kind of impeccable commitment piece. So I will make a commitment that is clear enough that I know if I've kept it or not. That's one part, I will make sure that we both understand that commitment and have the shared understanding of it. Cuz there's another place where it falls down. I will only make the commitments if I believe a hundred percent that I will fulfill them. And honor, the word is basically at the first possible moment where I realize I am not gonna be able to fulfill the commitment.
Robbie Swale (28:22):
I will let the person know as early as is humanly possible. And I will do what I can to honor my word, even if I can't keep it. So to make amends, if you like. So in the example with the, with the client of mine, they, they could have said, we're really sorry about this. We know it must be creating some extra work for you. They could have said this three months ago. Right? Probably. And then they could have said, don't worry about it. We'll make sure we have a venue for you on the day. Now that's looking at what they could have done. The truth is we have to remember to take responsibility. We, in that situation we haven't done. I don't think, uh, those, those first two as impeccably as we should. So making the commitment really clear to each, to both sides and knowing that it's a commitment, that's so clear that we'll know if somebody's got it. And hasn't yeah. I think if we'd reminded, if we'd re agreed that at later stage, you know, this is a pattern in my life, you know, I get it in my marriage as well. You, I assume that once I've said something, once a long time ago, everyone remembers that we just talked about Mrs. Ramsey, right? That's not the case. So we could have definitely taken responsibility there. So I maybe pause about that. Cause that's quite a lot in terms of backable commitments or I could talk a little bit more about making commitments to ourselves.
David Reynolds (29:32):
Let's segue into something that's probably connected about making commitments to yourself because it's about deciding and you haven't said that word exactly, but it's a huge piece of commitment is making a, making a decision and it might be, as I read your first book, one of the most pivotal pieces of the, the 12 minute method making a decision. So yeah, we are actually gonna talk about the 12 minute method.
Robbie Swale (30:17):
David Reynolds (30:27):
It's a great idea.
Robbie Swale (30:28):
Is there like sprawling long form interviews that are sometimes I have to book, I've got one tomorrow morning, I have to book two and a half hours in my calendar with the guests. You know, it's like a real, like, they're amazing. I love what I've created and I wouldn't want, want to have created something different with that podcast, albeit the chapter may. And, but I love the 12 minute idea in some ways, going back to the things that I have created that felt more like coaching, that felt the kind of stuff flowing through me. The piece that I remember that mostly I think was autumn 2016. So it was right. The start of the blog of the practice was one called everything starts with a decision was just really felt to me. Like I just seen it in a couple of ways. You know, somebody, Mike, actually I mentioned before, he'd told me a story he'd read in the paper that someone asked somebody who'd been married a long time.
Robbie Swale (31:11):
How, how do you stay married so long? And the person said, well, basically you just decide every day not to get divorced. And then in the end, you know, it'll have been 40 years or whatever it is. And, and Steve Presfield, who's booked the war of art was very influential on me in, he learned a lot about this, I think from addiction, how do you decide to turn pro? So you're somebody who's gonna do their work instead of letting all their procrastination get in the way. And one day you just decide and that's, that was his lesson, I think personally, but possibly further away than that from 12 step programs as well. It's like what happens? Well, one day someone decides to get sober and yeah, those decisions, they make a lot of impact and there were kind of two in the 12 minute practice.
Robbie Swale (31:51):
Well maybe, well there are, there are many right, our life. You could look at life as just a series of infinitely small decisions that were constantly making some meaningful ones. For me, I'd started coaching and I'd hired a coach, a guy called Joel Monk. I'd had a tricky time at the end of my twenties. My life had kind of got a bit torn up. I'd used that in some ways as some energy to change career and think about what I wanted to do. And here I was starting a new business and I knew I needed to get a coach to support me with that. And I had Joel, and as part of that, here's a decision we were talking about sharing things online. We were talking about, I felt really scared about that. I felt anxious about it when I thought about, certainly about writing something, creating something, um, maybe there was some of that old made up creativity story in there, you know, I don't know, but I felt that, and I decided to tackle it with Joel.
Robbie Swale (32:40):
Like I didn't want my life to be, to have this kind of feeling of fear in it in that way, you know? And also I knew that really in the long term, if I was gonna have a coaching business, have a business of any kind, it would really help me to be less stressed, less perfectionist, less anxious about sharing things I'd made being present on the internet, you know, cuz this is 2016. So it was a little different to now things have moved on in six years, but you know, it, it was already fundamental by then for almost everybody to, you know, basically had to be operating online. If you were a coach, that's what it felt like that I think it's not quite true, but it felt like that. And Joel made your decision to do a little bit, like we were saying before to do a tiny bit of teaching in one of those moments or sharing himself, not quite the pure coaching, we talked about the train journey that you, you said, we talked about that before.
Robbie Swale (33:24):
I kind of used it. Like you said, for thinking, for reading, learning, I think for a little bit of creativity, private creativity. And we talked about that and we talked about, maybe I could use that as a way to write and take the pressure off. And Joel decided to say, you know what I, um, when I was a visual artist, cause he used to be a painter. There we go. Interesting echoes. Right? I used to like painting series and I knew a little bit, I'd heard other people say that one of the things when you're making something new, it's really useful to commit, to doing a few of them, to make a decision, to, to do a few of the things. Otherwise you'd be so embarrassed after the first one that you'll stop. But if you've committed to doing five or you've already recorded five podcast episodes before you release the first one, there's that little bit less likely that you give up.
Robbie Swale (34:02):
So it was a decision to do a series and then I had another decision. So it, it felt writing those pieces on the train. So it was, the practice was get on the train at, at clap injunction, right? While the train's moving, get off at Waterloo and stop writing when the train stops there and then proofread it once and post it online. And you know, if we think about keeping promises to ourselves, one of the things I didn't really realize at that point was that there were some conditions there that made this a promise that I would be able to keep for nearly six years, because what happened after that was, it didn't feel like fun. I don't think to like post those early pieces had some stress. There had a lot of creative fear what Steve Steven Presfield would call resistance, but it felt like the right thing.
Robbie Swale (34:42):
So it's, it's your, your distinction before really about the things you it's okay to give up on and, and really the thing you should be doing, not in a kind of, you know, dad says you should, but in a kind of something highest saying, this is the thing that you need to be doing right now. And so after that, although I didn't feel nice, it felt good. I decided to, for some reason, I don't really remember, you know, maybe it was cuz I'd read a lot of Seth Godin and heard him talk about the power of writing practice. I decided to make it a weekly practice at that point till Christmas, I think. And then at Christmas that year 2016, I decided to carry on. I've got about 250 blog posts written in that way. Now I should say at some point the reason 12 minutes came in is at some point I stopped getting the train as much.
Robbie Swale (35:19):
And I, I didn't wanna not write on the weeks. I didn't get the train. So I checked how long the train journey was and it was 12 minutes that day. And so it became a 12 minute method. So set a time over 12 minutes, right. While it's going stop, when it stops proofread once post online. And um, there's now over 250 of those. And what I realized three years in was I thought it would be funny. This is about when we met. Right. I thought it'd be funny cause I could call it. I wrote this book in 12 minutes. That was the first kind of slightly in your face. Humorous to me idea. And then what happened was, was really kind of magic. My friend Steve said, well, he was gonna edit, help me edit it. He's a professional editor. He said, well, that's a great title.
Robbie Swale (35:55):
It's kind of in your face. It says, you know, if I can write a book in 12 minutes, you can do your thing. Right. But he said, can the book do that? Like can the content of the book I wrote this book in 12 minutes, help people with those creative challenges and what was, is still kind of a bit mind boggling to me is that it could, that when I sat down, I printed off. Then there's about 130 of these pieces. I think maybe a little less than that. I printed them all off. I thought about the stages of the creative process, the places that people fall down when they try and, and get something off the ground. And I dealt out the pieces and I basically went almost all of them into, into these different categories. And, and later we decided that the title didn't quite do as much as another title could.
Robbie Swale (36:35):
And that actually the book, it was quite, it was like 80,000 words from those first three years. And it might work better as a series so that people could get the help with the bit of the creative process that they wanted help with. And that's why there's a start book. There's a keep going book and there'll be two more. That'll come out later in 2022. And just the last thing to say about it, you know, there's, there's so much I could say about this. Essentially. I followed one of the things Stephen Presfield says, which is the place where you feel the most resistance is the place that's most important for your soul's evolution. And I had a feeling in 2016, that that was true. That was really, that was one of the reasons I was tackling this thing about sharing things online with Joel felt like there was a lot of resistance there, disproportionate amount and the things that have come the abundance and the satisfaction that's come from nearly six years of, of writing a piece every week in about 12 minutes, including for example, this connection that, that we have, you know, is just an incredible thing and I've transformed and yeah, other people have, have been impacted by it too.
David Reynolds (37:32):
You've answered this question indirectly with pieces of multiple responses so far, but I would like to ask you to pull it all together and say what you think makes a teacher a great teacher.
Robbie Swale (37:50):
Well, it's interesting. What comes up for me in this moment, which I wouldn't have thought about. I don't think before this conversation, not that it's necessarily come up is when I think about the great teachers that I had, they mostly just, you know, in their own unique ways and different ways, different ones, they created a space where we wanted to learn and we learn, and it's not necessarily an easy thing to do. It's a lot about what I think about, you know, we've been training training, some coaches recently we've thought a lot about it in that it's like, how do we create a space where these people can learn? And I recently read a book, an old book called the Inner game of Tennis. It's a really amazing book. And it's really not just about tennis. It's about everything, about learning. And it's one of those times where seems to have predicted a lot of research that happened after they wrote the book a bit like, uh, the other one that I always think about is How to Win Friends and Influence People who wrote it in the thirties or something that basically predicts everything they've learned in behavioral sciences.
Robbie Swale (38:46):
And I've heard of one of the world's leading behavioral scientists say that. And in a game of tennis is really interesting because essentially in some ways the whole field of coaching that I work in is based on the inner game of tennis, by the way. I didn't know that. And I, I found it out recently, um, just after I'd read the in game of tennis, essentially, the idea is that in tennis, more important than instruction is being able to really notice what's happening in your game and being guided by somebody to just be more and more present with what you're trying to do. You gotta know what you're trying to do, right? You've gotta, you gotta watch fed or something like that. Right? So that, you know what it's supposed to look like when you hear a forehand, but it's really in that book just about helping people notice what's happening for them.
Robbie Swale (39:26):
You know, we are naturally inclined to learn, you know, I've got an 18 month old and you can just see it. No one's instructing her how to walk, but, or how to hold things. But today she picks up two flip flops and walks around the two sandals and walks around the, around the flat. And it's like, ah, you know, she didn't used to be able to do that. No one's told her how to do it, but she's watched her mum and me carrying cups of tea or whatever it is. And now she knows. So I guess thinking out loud with you in this moment, it feels like one of the most important things that makes a great teacher is being able to create the space where people could learn for themselves. Often of course, I would think that that's coaching, but that happens in weird ways. When I think about my favorite teachers, they usually my favorite teachers. Now, of course we don't all see the world the same. So this is like the things that I admire, they were mostly funny and they were, they told great stories and they were kind people and they had those kinds of qualities too. But, um, what they all did for us really was, you know, create a space where we wanted to be there enough that we would pay attention enough, that we would learn.
David Reynolds (40:26):
Is there one of those teachers that you'd like to mention right now as one of your greatest teachers?
Robbie Swale (40:33):
Yeah. Is, is tricky. There are two that come to mind. And what I liked about them both, like I actually learned like one was a history teacher, when was a math teacher, but I actually learned a lot about life. Like how life works, how to be a human from both of them because the history teacher, Mr. Lehman, his teaching technique was basically tell stories for about 45 minutes. And then the end quickly write some things on the board that we could, we could copy down, you know, so that we had the record that we could go back to about whatever it was he was teaching. But, but the learning, I think probably all happened as he was telling stories in a, in a really beautiful way. And the other one, Mr. Keel, he was a math teacher. It was funny. Cause I had a really, I had a math teacher that I loved and he left and I was like, this is terrible.
Robbie Swale (41:15):
Like the reason I do math is because of Mr. Scott. And I did math as an undergrad, partly because of these two teachers, Mr. Scott, and then Mr. Keel. And I thought there's no like, Ugh, everything. I was had three more years at the school, everything after this is gonna be a disappointment. Now, Mr. Scott Owen's left. But I learned a lot from him in lots of different ways. And this is probably an joke that isn't, isn't funny, but he basically had this affectation where he would start by saying something and then going, oh no, it's not. You know, as, as part of the joke and he said, this morning, I'm here to talk to you about BLT. You have BLT in the states, bacon, lettuce, and tomatoes, a sandwich. Sorry. Just suddenly realized that. I dunno if that travels across the Atlantic today, I'm gonna talk to you about BLT.
Robbie Swale (41:53):
Oh no, I'm not. I remember my friend Dean getting that. He was gonna say it, you know, it's like a, it's almost like a refrain of Mr. Haw. I'm gonna talk to you about LBT, leatherback turtles.
David Reynolds (42:45):
You've mentioned two more books in your series. You've mentioned toying with an idea of another podcast, 12 minutes in length. Is there anything other than those two things, projects, plans, ideas that you're thinking, uh, this might actually happen?
Robbie Swale (43:00):
Yeah. There was two things actually. So like, I feel like it's been a long time that these books, like we met in late 2019 at that point, I, I already had the, these four books finished. I thought it was gonna be one book, but I had it finished. It's been a long time, quite a painful process and a lot of resistance to get them out. So it does feel in some ways, like one of the thoughts I had for next year is I'll have a really relaxed year where I don't set myself any goals and I'll just see what happens and that's that.
David Reynolds (43:27):
I don't, I don't see you keeping the committed to not set goals.
Robbie Swale (43:31):
We'll see
David Reynolds (43:32):
Oxy, moronic commitment.
Robbie Swale (43:33):
Yeah. But what of my goals might be, for example, um, create lots of space for just conversations. You know, for example, we haven't spoken for, for quite a while. I, I don't remember if I don't think that you and I actually have had a situation where we've tried to meet up and, and, and have a conversation on haven't, but that does happen with people. And often it's because someone says, do you wanna grab a coffee or a zoom coffee? And I say, well, I can fit you in, in November, you know, essentially, or like, I'm not adding anything more into my diary cause I'm trying to get my book done, you know, that kind of answer. And I'd love to have some more flexibility in my life. So that's one of the things I'm thinking about. And I'm wondering in terms of creativity, what I'll create, but what actually came up first, when you, when you answered that, is that I had this thought about my business.
Robbie Swale (44:12):
I don't think it was, it was happening when we first met, but it emerged over the last couple of years. And actually there might be three parts of it. So there's the creativity piece. That's what this series of books is about. It's like how to start when you start, how do we do that thing? Whether it's a book or a business or whatever, there's the coaching piece, which, because you've asked so much about learning, we've talked quite a bit in this conversation. There's also a, a leadership piece. And for me, in some ways that's the bit of my coaching. So I do work with coaches and I do work with people on creative projects. And of course often all these things overlap, but the leadership piece is something I'm really interested in. And one of the ways that I sometimes think about myself and help people think is like, what's the unique contribution that I can make?
Robbie Swale (44:47):
Like, what is all the experience and training? And, um, what do you say? Like, uh, just happenstance of my life mean that I am set up to do that a lot of other people are. And one of the things that I thought about last year sometime was I have a pretty high level obsession with a fantasy, a British fantasy author called David Gemmel. And I have a website about called www.wisdomofgemmel.com, which is about the wisdom and philosophy in his work. Cuz I realized like I'd learned a lot about how to be in there from reading these fantasy novels, like a lot about it. Uh, and about some very meaningful values to me, you know, really a lot of my values there they're present throughout all those books. It's integrity, its honesty it's uh, and it's honor. And so I have this idea that I might do some kind of honor project.
Robbie Swale (45:35):
I don't really know what it is. It might be as explicit as a podcast or something about, you know, thinking really carefully about what does that mean, but it speaks really to that. And I've really seen the power of the impeccable commitments. I've seen the power of words, really mattering. So being really careful and precise and honest telling the truth as well as you can. I've seen that for myself and for others and all that in some ways is held in that idea of honor. And there aren't many people talking about honor in the world in the 21st century. So I wonder if there'll be a project that's, that's something to do with that. So one of the things that I realized is I don't know that many other people who think about honor. So if anyone's listening or you know, anyone who strikes you as a really honorable person or somebody who, you know, thinks about that idea and how to do it and how to be it in life, then I'd love to be connected to those people because that feels like part of it. It's like, it's like partly it's a research project. It's like, I know how I think about honor in the 21st century, but how do other people think about it?
David Reynolds (46:30):
I think you've just crafted the entire project. Take your 12 minute podcast and the question or questions you want answered about honor. Yeah. A single prompt, a single question. Let the person talk. What is honor to you, you know? Yeah. That
Robbie Swale (46:48):
Is the question, isn't it? What is honor to you? That is exactly it.
David Reynolds (46:50):
That's what you wanna know. You could actually have a 12 minute podcast about that with as many people as you wanted and you'd be freed up just to talk to people for a while, which accomplishes your other goal.
Robbie Swale (47:02):
Yeah. I love that. You're saying that love your creativity, David. It's just going back to the thing about the 12 minute method. Like one of the things I've been thinking is you know one way to keep promises to yourself, to make sure that you keep promises yourself is to, like we said, about impeccable commitments, make one that, you know, you'll be able to keep. And I don't really know you. I think you're spotting it. You've heard it in this conversation. I don't know that I can keep a commitment to interview people about honor for two hours at a time. I don't wanna make that promise. Right. Cuz flexibility's important to me, but 12 minutes at time that I could do. Yeah.
David Reynolds (47:32):
Are there any parting thoughts that you'd like to close with today?
Robbie Swale (47:38):
Huh? Can I have two?
David Reynolds (47:40):
Sure. Thoughts was plural as many as you'd like no more than 12. Twelve's a magic number for everything today.
Robbie Swale (47:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, and the funny thing about 12 David is it was totally arbitrary. I realized that again, when I was publishing the book, mostly the trains from clap conjunction to Waterloo don't last 12 minutes.
David Reynolds (47:56):
Yeah. I've got online to check that out and yeah, I saw sometimes it's eight minutes. Yeah. And occasionally 17. And then I was shocked to discover. There were literally hundreds a day. It's nonstop.
Robbie Swale (48:07):
I used to have a sign at clap conjunction and say it's the busiest station in the country. So, so when you asked that question, David, I was gonna say a thought from the, the first book, but actually then I realized that more meaningful to me at the moment is a thought from the second book. So the thought from the first book is a, a funny story again from this, this, this whole podcast in some way, feels like it's about me, proofreading my book and checking things. I had this funny thing where I had a Stephen Pressfield quote in the front of how to start when you're stuck. I thought I better check that I've got the wording of Pressfield's quote right here. I couldn't find it anywhere. And in the end I found it and it was something that I had said. So, so I was able to delete the, and I, you know, I, I doubt that there was any way that I would've put a quote from me on like the first page, but once I thought it was Pressfield, it was there front and center.
Robbie Swale (48:48):
And then when I realized it wasn't and I, I just thought I've gotta leave this as it is. And that thought was, and it was from Pressfield. It was really influenced by him, but it was my phrasing, my flavor of, of some things that he says in a different way. And that is that our inspiration is always around us, but it's when we make a start that we let it in. So that's, that's thought one and thought two is the, to us and the thought, and it's essentially this, this is what I've realized from having conversations, but also from publishing that, that second book once, once I've seen that, if I just sit down for 12 minutes a week in three years, I can have 80,000 words and I can accidentally have written four books in this case, in that time. And once I've kept that promise to myself, I've made that commitment and it's not been impeccable right.
Robbie Swale (49:32):
There have been weeks when I haven't done it. I didn't do it last week. Actually I was working really hard and I planned to do it on Sunday. And then I got a bit sick on Sunday and I didn't do it. But I know by now that I'll do what you have to do when you, when you have a commitment that you want to keep and you slip, you have to recommit at that stage. Now that I know that I'm someone who can keep a habit going 12 minutes a week for in this case nearly six years now be six years in, in August, 2022. I really believe in myself that if I make a commitment for the long term, I'll keep it. Cuz I got proof of that. Confidence comes after we take action on things. We, we sometimes think it has to come before, but you know, actually it's always a result of the things we've done.
Robbie Swale (50:11):
And I now know I have confidence embodied confidence that if I choose to do something every week for 12 minutes, I'll do it. And the interesting thing about that is, especially when we think about a growth mindset, we think about learning that pretty much anything feels possible at that point. As long as the timeframe is long enough, like I, would've never guessed that you could write a book 12 minutes a week for three years. It just feels like such a small amount of time. And yeah, almost without noticing I had 80,000 words and of course with nearly three years later now, so I actually got another 80,000 words and I'm wondering projects for the future. You know, are there another four books in there? I, I don't know, I have to find out, but that piece, but if you have a habit, you make a promise to yourself, you keep it for a long time. That possibility really comes in. That feels really important to me. And, and it's, it's good if it's a creative habit, cuz it gives you so much more and it's good. If the fourth book will be about sharing our work, it's good. If you share the stuff, cuz then you're making a difference. And also it's a transformational thing too, to share things we've made David I'm afraid. I think I went over 12 thoughts there
David Reynolds (51:10):
Robbie Swale (51:36):
It's been a real pleasure to think with you in this conversation. I, I feel like I've thought new thoughts and it's been a very alive conversation. So thank you very much.
David Reynolds (51:44):
Have a great day. Thanks for listening today. Find the lead. Learn change podcast on your search engine, iTunes or other listening app, leave a rating, write a review, subscribe and share with others. In the meantime, go lead, go learn, go make a change. Go.