 One of the concepts that's made a lot of difference in my life and in my business is this idea of Kaizen, I don't know if you've heard of it, but it came out of Japan It made its way into US corporations and made a lot of difference there Kaizen is basically continuous incremental improvement and with that you can pretty much achieve any goal that you want And but not only is it was a big incorporations is a big right now still But it's also been really important in a lot of people's lives whether it's for fitness or You know health or for you know relationships or for work Or for you know personal development anyway, I'm really excited today to be interviewing someone who is an expert on Kaizen Her name is Dr. Susan Peck She is actually one of the members in my master heart group coaching program and let me read her bio to you And then I'm gonna bring her on and she's has some wonderful insights to share with us that will help us to Not be as afraid of our goals and to really take steps toward our dreams So let me share with her bio with you all Susan is a Kaizen based life coach who specializes in helping people who feel stuck in some area of their life To get unstuck using a process based on small incremental steps or improvements changes so small That they slip under the brain's fear radar and so we're gonna talk about that today Typical clients are individuals going through a life transition such as burnout or divorce And it's calling them to reinvent themselves and their life or People who've been putting off a big dream they've been putting on the back burner because deep down they don't really believe they they are capable of Achieving that big dream and maybe some of you might might relate to that too Susan helps her clients to believe in themselves and in their vision and to get into action Starting with simple easy steps that allow them to quickly experience success Cultivate confidence and build momentum Susan welcome to this interview. Thanks for being here Thank you, George I am honored to be here and thrilled to share the concept of Kaizen with your viewers. Yeah, absolutely then this is You know as I said in the beginning it really has made a big difference in my Life and in my work. I feel like it's I I learned about Kaizen Probably 20 years ago or more and ever since then I think it's really woven itself into The core of my my character so much so that I don't Even talk about it anymore because it become it's become so obvious to me But then I realized that wow a lot of people haven't either haven't been exposed to concept or they don't really understand it It sounds so simple that People don't use it often enough and so that's why I'm so glad that you're gonna be giving us a focus on it So maybe the first thing we can start with and I know you have you know, we could talk on this topic for hours but There's a couple of key insights And I know you want to share and one of them is about how our brains are wired So talk about that. I'm sure that with us Yes, and it's so funny that you say That you said you forget about it because it's so simple and I find when I'm sharing these ideas with people It's like the light bulb goes off and it's like, oh, that's so obvious But yet there's still this little bit of resistance to try it because it sounds so ridiculously easy and simple that there's no possible way that it can work and yet it is Transformational for the people who do give it a go so Getting back to how the brain works Okay, so the way the brain is set up There's a core at the brace that the brain stem. That's the reptilian brain This takes care of our heartbeat our breathing our basic functions right above that is the mammalian brain and The mammalian brain is kind of the instinctual Reactive part of our brain within this part of our brain There's a little area called the amygdala and this is where the fight flight or freeze response lives and Our brain this part of our brain does not like change Change is threatening this part of our brain goes back to the cave people days where any type of change was a threat to survival and so This part of the brain wants to keep everything the same so that we can survive Now above the mammalian brain. We have the cortex. This is the rational thinking part of our brain where we Where we come up with logical plans will come up with a vision goals You know figure out how to get from point A to point B and we and where we accumulate knowledge Well, the problem is When it comes to a fight between the cortex and the amygdala the amygdala wins Because it's more basic and integral to survival. So let's say you have a goal maybe you want to lose weight or get fit or Start a business something like this and your cortex comes up with all the plans It knows exactly what you should eat what healthy eating looks like How many times you should go to the gym? It knows you should exercise but those things are changes from your comfort zone and As soon as you start getting outside that comfort zone as soon as there's a big change That amygdala kicks in And the fear response takes over and it actually floods your brain with Neurotransmitters and other chemicals the kind of short circuit the thinking part of the brain and let the amygdala take over and This shows up as resistance to change And that's why a lot of these big success achievement gurus who are talking about massive action You've got to go out there and kill it 150% people get all revved up listening to them and Maybe they go out for a day a week maybe even a month. We're just sheer willpower pushes them through But eventually that amygdala is going to resist that change Now you might be saying I'm not afraid to lose weight. I'm not afraid to get in shape I'm not afraid to write that book. I just I don't have time I don't I It's genetic. I can't lose weight All of these excuses. Yeah, and another one if I may jump in is This this concept of limiting beliefs Yeah, now I know some people watching this Believe a lot in limiting beliefs I have some issue with that. I Not I mean you can believe what anything you want But I do see limiting beliefs holding a lot of people back and sometimes I question Living beliefs as a as a as its very own limiting belief But tell tell say say more about how does how does that relate to the fear? Yes, okay. Well, thank you for that beautiful segue because Exactly we don't realize that we are afraid or Resistant to something as simple as a change What happens is we get that response in our amygdala. It doesn't like this change that's coming on and it starts Putting on these disguises and It kind of involves the cortex because some of these disguises get very creative limiting beliefs is one of them It finds the brain finds a way to rationalize this response. So it's not I'm Panicky I'm afraid it's a limiting belief. I'm too old to go back to school I don't have the resources to start a business. I'm not whatever enough to Go higher in my career. I don't like Exercise, I'm not athletic all of these things that as you said they're limiting beliefs and I Would say limiting beliefs are very real and They do hold us back But what they really are is a smokescreen for this fear response in the amygdala Other ways that the amygdala reacts And puts up this resistance. Let's say you start going to the gym or You start on a new diet plan or something, you know, you start down this path to whatever your goal is and all of a sudden You know a trip comes up or a bunch of trips your boss asks you to work late or You have these parties to go to and suddenly it's impossible to stick to your plan So it comes up with all of these Rationalizations for why you can't do what you said you were going to do or it'll come up with Distractions I'm gonna spend an hour tonight working on Writing the great American novel. I'm not afraid of that. I want to I have these ideas in my head And you sit down at the computer and let me just check my email first or let me just you know cruise Facebook for five minutes Just to get in the zone and get used to sitting in the chair. All of a sudden an hour later your time It's gone and you look up and it's like, oh my gosh now I don't have any more time to work on this all of these things the limiting beliefs the rationalizations the Distractions they're just your brain's devious way of Covering up this fear response and keeping you in your comfort zone because whatever you were doing was uncomfortable this is great and I You know, I see I see a couple of things happening that I'm wondering if it's related to this I see this happening in you know people's lives as they try to build a business because that's who I usually talk with One is family and friends You know a lot of like a lot of oh, but I need to take care of them you know things come up and You know as you're talking about it's like that actually is a comfort zone, right? Because they are they've been maybe for many years accustomed comfortable with taking care of family and friends or Responding to their needs and wants and that's very comfortable Even though sometimes it seems like a you know a problem or crisis that they have to deal with but then once you know They're comfortable dealing with that instead of facing their own project their own dream Which is which is the most fearful thing and the second thing and this may be taking it too far I don't know you can let me know I wonder if it might be related to some people's illness now again You know illness has a lot of factors. There's genetic There's environmental there's you know other lifestyle factors or you know infection or whatever of course But I wonder if some some discomfort physical discomfort or illness might have some cause from the amygdala and the fear response like It's almost like I'm I'm more comfortable being ill Than I am working on my project my dream I Know that you can speak to any of those you'd like well, I think on the family and friends definitely that You know compared to working on the business which there might not be positive feedback and Reinforcement right away. It takes a while to build the business and start getting some momentum there So you've got this huge swath of time where you're not getting any Positive hits you're not getting that serotonin The positive neurotransmitters in the brain now. Let's switch to taking care of friends and family Even if it's an obligation or it's not fun. Yes There's there's a comfort in that and there's also positive reinforcement Even if it's taking care of the need of a relative and you resent that need you still get a positive hit of I'm doing something good. I'm being helpful. I'm being Ultra-wisting and so that makes your brain feel good Whereas working on the business that's out of the comfort zone. It's scary. It may not be working There's a risk of failure There's just a lot of monotony to the things that you need to do to build it So of course we're going to gravitate towards the things that make us feel good now on the side of illness you know again, I think it depends certainly there are Illnesses that that just come on us that we have no control over But I think you know, there is a category of psychosomatic illness there is a category of You know aches and pains and just not feeling our best not and I think some of that is You know some of that could be triggered by the brain Feeling uncomfortable. In fact, some of the illness Symptoms, you know that like a headache or just feeling tired And I can vouch for this myself, you know some fatigue syndrome not not to take anything away from Medical chronic fatigue syndromes But I know when I start pushing myself Outside the comfort zone all of a sudden I get ridiculously tired and I need to map more than I did before And it's an escape. So Yeah, I think and and we never intentionally do this but think, you know, our brain has ways of Tricking us and and keeping us away from what we say that we really want. Yeah, I I Have I've said before and I still believe I think the smarter we are The the more brilliant our excuses are That's what I I tend to see but So funny thing is I don't consider myself a very smart person. So my excuses aren't not aren't that aren't that very good, you know Anyway, um, there's so much we can talk about and I can keep you on here for hours so I'd love to skip to Talking about how do we what do we do now because we've spent, you know About 10 to 15 minutes talking about what what are the causes of this and of course they are books and books written about this And you've read them, but what about okay? So now now that we know that this this is such a such a an opponent or such a massive You know, you know sort of thing that's resistance, right? It's it's like we're getting our in our own way How can we what do we do? Or just to give us some ideas here Well, that's where Kaizen comes in and just like a one-minute blurb about where Kaizen came from It kind of started out in the manufacturing sector It actually started in the United States in the lead-up to World War two a group of statisticians led by man Named W. Edwards Deming They led this effort. We didn't have time to build new factories We had to get our product of productivity up there as quickly as possible because we were getting dragged into the war And so these statisticians came up with this way of making small Incremental changes lots of them, but they were all small and easy to implement and they resulted in dramatic increases in productivity And that led to that was part of what helped us win the war And then after World War two was over We kind of our manufacturing sector put that aside and forgot those lessons But we exported these statisticians and Dr. Deming over to Japan and Japan didn't have the resources To build new factories from scratch, you know, they were devastated after in a World War two And so they had to work with this system of small incremental changes to get their productivity and their Manufacturing and factories back online and they did and they made it their own And if you think back to the 70s 80s 90s how Japan was trouncing the rest of the world in Automotive and electronic manufacturing. This was all because of Kaizen and there's a book out there called the Toyota way And you know, they coined the name Kaizen, which is simply a Japanese word the characters mean good change And it was kind of adopted to mean small incremental changes small incremental improvements, so Anyway, and then, you know, we learned from Japan. We brought it back over here You have things like Six Sigma into her total quality improvement, but we don't really care about business We care about our own personal lives and let's of course some of your viewers are business people and this works beautifully in small businesses, too Okay, so the man who really pioneered Bringing the concept of Kaizen to personal development is Dr. Robert Moorer and he is a professor out at UCLA a psychologist and he started using this concept of Kaizen with his patients and Seeing these dramatic radical transformations So he's now like the leading expert in the world and I highly recommend his book It's called one small step can change your life the Kaizen way and that's the book I read many years ago that had such a profound impact on me. Yeah, yes, yes, and In the setting of personal Transformation Kaizen is all about finding steps or Changes that are so tiny that they slip under the brain's fear radar They don't set off the amygdala and that's why they work. So let me give you a few examples I started using it When I read this book, I was a complete couch potato and I would sit on the couch And I would watch, you know, three episodes on Netflix and that was my night And I was gaining weight and I didn't like it So I read this book and I had tried to exercise before and get myself to go to the gym And that lasted, you know, a week and then I was sore. I was tired. It wasn't comfortable I found some reason not to go So after reading this book I was I got the idea and he talks about this woman who had no time to exercise But she needed to for health reasons and she was going to resist any any Suggestion that she exercised and go to a gym and work out for an hour and take classes Or even walk for half an hour and he told her just can you know, your prescription? It's just walk in front of the TV in the evening when you're home relaxing for one minute a night and When you find out these kaizen steps, they are so small that you're like, that's ridiculous That won't do anything, but your brain can't argue. It's like is there any reason I can't stand in place and walk for one minute? Yeah No, of course, I can do that And so she did and she wound up over a couple of months, you know Getting into a fitness routine upping the amount of walking and then joining a gym and loving it and getting healthy Well, I kind of did the same thing I had a stair stepper in my living room So I was like, I'll get on that for one commercial one 30-second commercial every night And I started doing that and then it was so easy it's like well that I can go a minute and then maybe I can go two minutes and Then I started walking, you know And this took place over a couple of weeks to months and then a running class came along and like oh let me try that and Just starting with that 30 seconds a day on a stair stepper I gradually through just little incremental increases Wound up a few years later running half marathons And joining a gym and now I do weightlifting and things like that. So And that gets a little into how kaizen works. So it's all about these tiny steps Finding things that are so small Your brain cannot put up any resistance because they're easy But the reason that this works is number one it becomes fun Remember we were talking before about meeting that positive feedback Meeting some sort of positive reinforcement. Well when you do your one minute of Walking in place and you finish it you get a pat on the back you get that serotonin hit I hit my goal I feel good. Oh my gosh I can do this and your brain your brain loves to have fun And so your brain starts after a little while it keeps doing that It's like I'm pretty good at this walking for a minute I'll bet I can do two minutes and then maybe it's I can park farther away At the grocery store I can take one flight of chairs stairs. Let me challenge myself It starts having fun Then there's also the magic Geranium effect and this goes back to a children's story from I think the 1950s But there was this old woman and she lived in the lapidated run-down house and she wasn't doing anything to improve it It was just overwhelming And one of her friends comes over one day with the tyrannium and says this is a magic tyrannium. It's my gift to you and So the woman takes the magic tyrannium into the house puts it on the kitchen table The tyrannium is beautiful and she notices how ratty and ugly the tablecloth is So she goes to the store and she gets a new tablecloth to match the tyrannium puts the tablecloth on and it looks beautiful the table is lovely But now she notices the paint is peeling off the chairs and you know other things in the kitchen are all shabby So she starts changing these things to match her table and her tyrannium Well, then the kitchen is remodeled and this goes on throughout the house You may have to do the dining room and you know the living room because it has to match these other areas Finally, you know, she has a beautiful outdoor garden the inside is all renovated her friend comes back over and it's like Oh my gosh what what happened and she's like it's all that magic tyrannium it made all these things happen and That's part of the magic of kaizen too a lot of times We you know one of the ways that our amygdala Stops us is this feeling of overwhelm. I don't even know where to start There are so many things that I have to do with the magic or with kaizen and the magic tyrannium It doesn't really matter. I'll work with my clients and it's like Let's just find one small thing. Let's say you're starting a business You know, what let's make a list of all the things that you're going to need for your business just that let's just make a list Let's spend five minutes a day Working on that list That's not threatening anybody. You know most of us love sitting down and making lists And then you start there and then your list is made then it's okay. Well, let's spend five minutes a day Let's pick one thing the smallest thing on that list Let's just start working on that five minutes a day and all of a sudden You know, you're you're getting into this habit of putting in five minutes a day You feel good because you're meeting that goal and over, you know a couple of weeks you start seeing progress I've seen people do this. I've done it with decluttering I have another client who started decluttering and she had, you know stacks and stacks of old documents going back decades and We set a goal with her of five minutes a day of shredding old documents Well first maybe two to three weeks. She's like, I don't know if these piles are getting any smaller There's still so many of them, but I could see progress. She's like, you know, moving from the 90s to the 2010 one day she writes me, you know in her little update and she's like, I'm running our things to shred like all of a sudden this massive pile of Work where she didn't even know where to get started was was cleared up So that's kind of how it works. I also mentioned, you know, five minutes a day I find this tends to be a sweet spot. We can pretty much put up with anything for five minutes We can get ourself to do that. Sometimes it needs to go down to one minute, but Usually five minutes is a good spot and people underestimate that. They're like, I can't accomplish anything in five minutes Well, if you put in five minutes a day, that's 35 minutes a week That translates to a little more than 30 hours over the course of a year We're working on some small, you know, some project like decluttering your closets or You know, I Don't know something along those lines creating a new offering Yeah, we're writing writing content writing content. Yes 30 hours if you had 30 hours, what could you accomplish? Most people are like, wow 30 hours That's that's huge but if you tried to sit yourself down and work on content for 30 hours straight or even, you know Four days, eight hours a day, your brain would shut that right off, but five minutes, that's easy And then finally it builds momentum So we've been talking about sticking with, you know, one minute of walking or five minutes of decluttering or writing or whatever it is The thing is your brain, it's this whole process starts to rewire your brain To where whatever this activity is that was outside your comfort zone that your amygdala was resisting All of a sudden it starts to think this is fun I can do this your confidence grows and all of a sudden you find yourself wanting to do more I tried this last year I was trying to do things out of my comfort zone to get used to that and I started out with tiny little steps Just going to new places, driving a different route to wherever I was going, trying out a new app And then pretty soon I was up on this high ropes adventure course when I have a fear of heights And I was driving around LA in a rental car things that would have terrified me before But because I had kind of stepped up my tolerance to being outside my comfort zone All of a sudden I was like, I want a bigger challenge. I want to do this So it builds momentum If you're doing this with writing, I suggest to people, you know Let's say you've been putting that novel on the back burner How about spending five minutes on the outline or even just write one sentence a day? Anybody can write one sentence a day, but all of a sudden you're going to be sitting there one night And you're going to finish with your sentence You're going to be like oh my gosh the ideas are coming and you keep writing and all of a sudden You're writing for 15 minutes or an hour or whatever it is because you're in the flow. Yeah, so that's that's the magic This is this is and Yeah, it's just incredible. I mean and and if people aren't doing this if I mean some of us have heard of these concepts before but if you're not doing it working with a coach on this is Translational because they provide the accountability the encouragement the guidance and Susan this is what you do with your clients, right? I mean you work with them to calm down the overwhelm and focus down on the actual improvements that are so small they could definitely do it and it really makes them and I've I've heard from folks who have worked with you and They they find it magical they find it to be a magical process. So tell those who are watching if we're interested How do we how do we work with someone like you? How do we work with you on something like this? Yes, well, um, first, let me reaffirm what you said the accountability principle That's where coaching comes in. So when I work with my clients one on one, I help them Um, you know first we we clarify what their goal what they're trying to achieve is Sometimes that's the small step of just getting clarity there But then we figure out something, you know, we start breaking that down and we come up with A small step that is very specific to them because the small steps are different What might be a small step for me might be a huge step for somebody else And might be too tiny for somebody, you know, another person So it's all about finding the individual sweet spot and then the accountability with all of my clients I have them text me or email me every day To report in that they have completed whatever their little step is and I find that is really key because I can tell people about kai zen and They're like, yeah, that sounds great Um, I could do that. But then again that little bit, you know, again Even kai zen is different than what you've already been doing or it's different than what you've been taught that you have to You know, it's not worthwhile that limiting belief. It has to be massive action. You have to transform overnight You have to get instant results. It's a little bit different Um, so, you know the amygdala even on even on the concept of kai zen rears its little ugly head um But what I find so when I tell people about it and they're like, oh, yeah, I'll try that and then they really don't You know, they might try it one day and then because they're not seeing an instant Transformation or an instant result and it takes a couple of weeks to rewire the brain and really get it going I have my clients report in every day And that's how we see the change. Usually I see with them this miraculous brain change and transformation And they start seeing tangible results around about three weeks in which is Where a lot of people say habit formation or whether that's a whole other topic But you know to kind of get something Beginning to be etched into the brain that takes about three to four weeks Yeah, so if anyone watching this is like, you know, I really would love to make a change in this particular area of my life Or got to get going on my business You know, susan is a great coach to work with on this. So susan your website is www.call2excellence.com Call c-a-l-l-t-o excellence just like it's spelled excellence with a ce at the end call to excellence.com and Yeah, I think people can find all the information there. Is there anything else you want to say about How people can contact you or work with you? Yes, so on my website There's a page Under services that goes into all of my different one-on-one coaching options I have single sessions and then I also which you know, those are great if you just want to come up with your kaizen plan and then I also have like Three sessions succession and nine session packages With discounts and then I also have a blog and I have written Several articles with a lot more to come on the concept of kaizen and how and why it works and How we can use it to affect specific areas of our life like fitness or career or relationships Or things like that. So You can check out the blog you can sign up for my new newsletter to get regular updates to get basically the blog delivered to your inbox And I also have a facebook page under call to excellence and on there I also share a lot of inspirational information And we'll be having kaizen challenge questions and things like that. So Following on, you know, either my newsletter or my facebook page or any of those Cool. Thank you so much susan for your work and for sharing this inspirational information with us Um, I hope those who are watching this will take one small step Today on On the dream that you have so Thank you susan Well, thank you for having me george. It's been a pleasure