In this episode, Nick opens up about his personal journey of self-awareness and growth. He discusses his struggles with grumpiness and frustration, the importance of being present, and how underlying issues from the past or anxieties about the future can influence our reactions in the present. He shares insights from his own experiences in business, life, and mental health coaching, offering practical advice on managing difficult emotions, recognizing toxic patterns, and aligning with what truly feels right.

What to listen for:

“Self-improvement and healing, emphasizing the importance of self-awareness and intentional action.”

“In those moments where you’re grumpy, pissed, and upset, gratitude doesn’t always help. Sometimes, you’re not just trying to change your mindset; you’re actually trying to fix the problem.”

“If you feel grumpy or frustrated in a job, it’s probably not just that specific thing in that moment. It might have a similar flavor to something else in your past.”

About Nick McGowan

I’m Nick McGowan, entrepreneur, podcaster, and mental health advocate, and I’ve been on a 20+ year journey of personal development, learning to master my mindset, emotions, and the art of living with purpose.

As a Mindset and Self-Mastery Mentor, I work with ambitious men and women who want to live their most authentic and joyous life, by helping them master their mindset, emotional awareness, and authentic communication. My mission is to empower people to lead lives that feel aligned, grounded, and truly their own.

Throughout my career, I’ve built teams, streamlined systems, and improved client experiences across SaaS, media, marketing, and personal development spaces. Whether I’m leading cross-functional projects, optimizing SEO, Podcasting, designing strategies, or guiding clients through transformation, I bring a hands-on, solution-focused approach to everything I do.

I’m also the host of The Mindset and Self-Mastery Show, where my guests and I unpack the stories that shape us, challenge us, and ultimately guide us back to who we are at our core. On this show, we uncover the secret gems others have discovered through trial, error, and breakthroughs so you can fast-track your growth, and master your mindset on your pursuit toward self-mastery. 

With years of podcasting and two decades of marketing experience, I’ve mastered the storytelling, interview flow, strategy, and technical production that elevate a podcast from “just content” to something truly impactful. Whether you’re a leader looking to amplify your message, or a seasoned speaker and podcast host looking to sharpen your edge or even a beginner who is wondering how to share their message, I mentor thought leaders through every step of having the conversation they’re here to have on this planet.

So, what message are you here to share?!

Resources:

Interested in starting your own podcast or need help with one you already have? Send Nick an email or schedule a time to discuss your podcast today!

[email protected]

Thank you for listening!

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Your Friends at “The Mindset & Self-Mastery Show”

Nick McGowan (00:01.302)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self -Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today, I wanna talk about something that I’m going through and something I’ve been working on with my mental health coach and an awareness that I’ve come to. When we think about being reactive to certain things, I don’t believe they actually always come from the actual situation. I’m not trying to be ambiguous of this, so let me be.

kind of direct with it. There are times where I experience where I’m just kind of grumpy, like not super fucking pleasant to be around. Those of you that have known me for a long time, you’ve experienced that and I’m sorry, I’m working on it and getting healthier and healthier every day. For those of you that don’t know me, you may think, this guy’s got his podcast and he’s got a business and he’s got this and got that and he sure uses his fucking foul mouth every once in a while. All that’s true. However, there are still times where I get…

grumpy or upset or frustrated. And there are times where I don’t know why. It’s just this grumpiness that’s just being upset. There are times where I’ve realized that if I don’t feel good in my skin, that I don’t really feel good. And there are things that I’ve worked on with that. There have always been fluctuations in weight and things of that sort. And as you get over 40, I’m told things happen.

I recently got over 40. So I expect my body will do different things. There are situations that happen just throughout the day with other people or situations with our homes or really anything. Like if something is not just going smoothly, we as people can get upset. We can get upset. Doesn’t mean we always do, but we can. I can get upset at different times.

and I do get grumpy about different things. And something I’ve realized recently, I was having a conversation with my mental health coach with, was it is never ever for me been the actual moment that is the most frustrating or most upsetting. It’s something from the past or something that could happen in the future. Something I’m literally making up because it’s not real yet or ever. But I will be grumpy or upset about it.

Nick McGowan (02:26.113)
And then there are times where I’ll be kind of grumpy, upset, frustrated, and not know what the problem is or what’s going on. For me, that’s an intuitive thing. There’s something happening. There’s something that needs to be worked on, and it’s still there. And I’ve committed to myself that I won’t intellectualize things and just like mindset my way through it. And I’ve committed to myself that I will actually do the work. Doesn’t always mean that I have to do it right then in that moment, but I do need to be able to hold on to it.

And something I said to my coach recently was that I feel like there are times where something will happen, a situation will happen, and it’s like I have a robber, somebody that got into my house to be able to rob us, and I caught that person, and I am not letting them go. I’m not letting them go until, let’s say, the cops get there, but I’m holding onto that. So I can feel that at different times, so there’s something that’s happening, and there’s a piece of me that’s just holding onto it. Like, I don’t want you to come back.

So before you leave, I want to work through all of this stuff. And I don’t always know why those things are or what’s going on until later when they kind of reveal themselves. But in that moment, I’m grumpy. I’m upset or frustrated or just got an attitude. It’s not pretty. And the reason why I’m talking about it on this podcast is because I partially get to out myself with that. But I know that I’m not the only one.

There are people that I grew up with, there are people that I’ve met, people I’ve conversation with that as you get in deeper conversations, they’re like, yeah, look, I do the same thing. Maybe not the exact same way or the same flavor, but being able to understand that we do those things. We do need to understand where they came from, why they keep coming back, and what do we do with them? But the whole point of this episode is to be able to talk about just fucking being there in the moment, being able to be present.

not be cheesy with it, not just making up bullshit that you’re happy or excited about or gratituting your way through all of it. There’s something to be said about being grateful, but there’s something to be said about lying to yourself about it. Like, yes, I’m grateful that I’m able to breathe. I’m grateful that I have coffee to drink. I’m grateful that I have…

Nick McGowan (04:48.246)
fruit for breakfast and I’m grateful that I have an iPad. I’m grateful for life. And yes, those are all things to be grateful for and there’s a lot more to be grateful for. But in those moments where you’re grumpy and you’re pissed and you’re upset or some variation of all of it and you don’t really know why, those gratitude things don’t always help because you’re not, for me, not trying to actually just appease it and just be grateful and just realize something and just

change my mindset. I’m actually trying to fix the problem and figure out what the problem is. And sometimes I don’t know what it is, at least at that moment. And that can make it more frustrating because I want to be able to fix it. But I can’t actually just say time out to the entire world while I go try to fix that. So being able to be present and understanding that there are things that happen throughout the day and ebbs and flows and all of that. think we also need to account for not just there’s something else happening there.

or something that has happened in the past, but being able to figure out how does it directly correlate to what situation we’re in right now. Let’s break that down a little bit. If you wake up in the morning and you’re just pissed off and you don’t know why, it could be so many different things. I mean, you would know better than I would because of your own life. It could be your family, it could be work, it could be the temperature, it could be so many different things. But being able to understand why

you feel a certain way towards something may not be the simple thought or fact of you just woke up on the wrong side of the bed or you woke up with a kink in your neck and that’s messed everything else up. There are deeper pieces to that. So I’m gonna break this out into something that I think all of us can use, our careers, no matter what you’re doing. If you’re a business owner, if you are a corporate worker,

If work in a factory job, if you’re an influencer, no matter what you do, you’re doing something with your days and you’re trying to either make money or at least make a living and be able to do the things that you feel led to do. Or you may be doing things that you’re told you need to do. And we’re just going to clump those all together for now because if not, that’s a totally separate episode. Being able to look at the situations where you’re at.

Nick McGowan (07:15.624)
and understanding that you can get grumpy or you can get upset or frustrated at times. I want you to then think back through the different situations that have been very similar to that, again with your career. For me, I’m part owner of Shoot Your Calling. I’ve had different jobs, I’ve had different companies, I’ve been partners in companies, I’ve tried my own thing, I’ve done different things here and there, all the way back to God, guess, grade school.

I sold different random things. And then high school, I remember selling the spacers that you put in your ears. I would sell different stuff. And I have always been entrepreneurial trying to make money, but also trying to just do something cool, experience things. There are situations that happen to me now as a business owner that I can tie back to other companies I’ve been with, either working for as an employee or as a partner in a company.

And it takes us being able to shift the way that we look at things and how we go about things. I’ll use a really tangible example of something that’s happened recently. My sleep schedule can get thrown off at times, especially right now we’re traveling a lot. So being in different places, being in different time zones, all of that can be disruptive in a sense. If I actually follow what my body tells me to do, I’m pretty much going to stay up till

one, two o ‘clock in the morning. And if I get the adequate amount of sleep that I need to get, about eight hours, maybe sometimes even more, I’ll probably then at that point need until 10, 11 o ‘clock in the morning. That feels weird and a little crazy to me because of the amount of years that I spent having to be at a desk or at least be on a call or in a meeting or something by nine o ‘clock in the morning.

That nine o ‘clock may have actually been a nine o ‘clock somewhere else. Especially right now, I’m recording this on the West Coast. those of you on the East Coast, my nine o ‘clock is your afternoon. And I’ve experienced being in different companies, getting the things, let’s say, thrown at me because I’ve started later in the day or whatever. And breaking myself of that habit and the routines of that,

Nick McGowan (09:41.77)
takes me then looking at why do they even become a routine? Where are they coming from? And are they coming from a healthy space or an unhealthy space? And there have been times as a salesperson, I have to be on a call for so many hours, I have to be talking to so many people, there’s a numbers game, there’s this and that, blah, blah. All of that doesn’t feel 100 % true for me. And I don’t know if it ever really did, but I bought into it.

And I remember saying at different jobs, like, you’re paying me for this. So it’s my duty to do this and I’ll jump. How high, what do need me to do? But being able to work for ourselves, for those of you that work for yourself or being at a company, we still have our rights and we still have what feels right for us to do. But we are the only ones in control of that. We’re the only ones that can take responsibility for that. We’re the only ones that can take action with that.

And if we don’t, the only ones that that affects. Unless there’s something that happens and it affects the rest of our family and blah, blah. But really it starts with us. So when I think of those situations where I get really upset or frustrated and they’re never actually from the thing right then and there, it’s from something in the past or the future. For me, what has been helpful has not only been to talk with somebody, but to also go through processing to be able to

change those stories, change those situations. But overall, it’s the self -awareness to go, there’s something that feels off, let me work back through and figure out why this is the case and what’s the familiarity with it. Just like how some people can be kind of their own worst enemies with certain things because they are afraid if they make too much money, bad things can happen. Likewise, if they don’t make enough money, bad things can happen. So they’ll stay right where they’re at because it’s comfortable.

and they know that it’s fine.

Nick McGowan (11:44.328)
That can be good sometimes to be able to say, know where I’m at. I know what lane I’m in. But to be able to step outside of that and go, how do I actually grow and how do I change from this? And how do I get to that evolutionary next level for me? Not by anybody else’s standards, but for your own. I feel like it really takes us being able look at those situations and go, well, what do I do from here? And understanding how our strategy comes into play, specifically our winning strategy. You’ve probably heard me talk about that on different podcast episodes.

almost entirely over the past 60, 70 episodes about our winning strategies. It’s really a strategy that we’ve developed. All of us have it, but we developed as a kid in our developmental ages between let’s say three and nine. Most often it’s between four, seven, four and eight. But being able to figure out a strategy that helps us win in life and get away from the pain

That is our deep core wounding. I realized that my core wounding was to be unloved or unlovable and to be abandoned. That was what the wound was. So I developed strategy that I could not be abandoned. I could not be unloved because I would be the best at whatever I was doing and I would outperform other people and all those things, especially in sales. I would run circles around people and if I didn’t, I’d get really fucking pissed and upset and figure out how do I do it.

And I had manipulated at different times and I had tried to force numbers and try to force people in the cell, you know, buying something or try to force other people that were on my team to sell things or whatever. They’re all toxic pieces of trying to keep that strategy in place. But we as people will get to a certain point where that strategy will no longer help us. In fact, it hurts us. And it takes us being able to look at those moments.

and the situations that come up and the emotions that come with that and just using them as a guiding factor saying, I feel really upset or I feel frustrated right now. And maybe in that moment, you can’t spend 15, 20 minutes to dissect it and work through it and figure out what that is. Maybe it would take a lot longer than that. But we don’t always have that luxury to just be able to do that in the moment. But being able to actually look at those things, the situations,

Nick McGowan (14:11.321)
and be able to look at all the components that have worked in and out of your favor to feel the way that you do, it’s really important to be able to look at and say, well, what do I do differently next time? But more so, how do you heal from it? And what do you do differently in that moment right then and there? Or do you not do anything at all? The choice is yours, so you get to be able to make that choice. For me, I’ve looked at

How do I make these choices, but how do I feel about making these choices and what are the ways that I feel about the choice itself? Now, I’m a very emotional and feely type person. Those of you who listen to this often know that. Those of you who know me know that. And for those of you who are listening who are more of the thinkers, think about that. You can be logical about it. You can certainly think about the different situations. So go back, either feel through it or think through it.

of the situations that have happened over the course of the life that are very similar to where you’re at right now. If you’re in a job where you’re thinking, I hate this or I don’t like it or things could be better, and you find yourself being frustrated, and then figuring out why you’re frustrated, probably not that specific thing in that moment, but that might have a similar flavor to something else. I’ll give an example from myself. I had a company in the mid 2010s.

So from like 13 to 17 or 18 or so. And I was the sole salesperson within my own company and partners and all of that, some ex -family members. And I was making close to, I’d say on average 140, 150 calls, cult calls every single day, every work day, Monday through Friday for a solid year, maybe even two years. And it didn’t feel right.

I love being able to talk with people, as you know, because I have this podcast and we have strategy sessions and client calls pretty often and I love that sort of stuff. But the cold calls, I became good at, but I didn’t like it. And there are different ways that I can unpack all of that. And those of you who make cold calls teach their own. But I realized for me, that wasn’t the thing that I wanted to do anymore and couldn’t see myself out of it. That led me to a thought of, I guess I’ll just kill myself.

Nick McGowan (16:37.136)
terrible thinking, but that’s what that got me to. And I tied so much into all of that, that any situation that I got into next that had remotely any feeling like that, had a bit of that feeling of desperation and suicidal tendency in a sense. So I went from that company and I ended up getting out of that company, taking a bit of a sabbatical. And those of you who have listened to these episodes for a while,

Feel free to go back to episode 10. That’s where I talk about the story that led me to this point. But there was a bit of time where I spent time away from working and figuring out what I wanted to do next. I didn’t start another company after that. I got into a job. took a job with a company as one of their sales leaders in one of their departments or divisions that needed to be grown. And remember at one point, the chief revenue officer told me, I need you to make cold calls.

And I felt every bit of my body just crunch up. And I stood my ground and I said, no, I’m not going to. I believe there’s gotta be a better way to go about it. And I figured out a better way to go about it because I decided I was not going to do that. I figured out a way to be able to not only bring in more money, but bring in better clients and not spend all that time just making cold calls. As a quick little side note, that guy had also said to me,

maybe two, three years into all of that, we’re gonna try cold calls again. And again, I told him no. And I said, you do it. You let me know how it goes. He and somebody else tried it for two weeks, got absolutely nowhere. And there was a part of me that felt vindicated by it. And I think I was a little bit of a jerk because I remember being like, so how did your calls go? And that was a dick move. But I empowered that I didn’t have to do that.

and looking at it now from a healthy perspective and years later, really what I was doing was saying, that does not align with me and I’m not going to do that. I’m going to look at something different. But there are still times now in my business now while we’re traveling around, we’re making money, we’re working with incredible companies, doing incredible things in this world, that I still have that pain and that fear.

Nick McGowan (18:53.718)
at different times of how we’re going to make more money. Do I have to make cold calls? Do I need to go do this? Do I need to go do that? So the reason why I bring that up is to be able to think about those situations that you’re in that are frustrating to you. Take a little bit of a step back and take inventory. What are the other situations that happened that were even remotely similar that can then help you and put those pieces together to say, this is why I feel this way.

or this is why I’m thinking this way, this is why I have an aversion to it or whatever. And then you get to do something with that. Like if you can work through all of that and you get to the end of it and you go, you know what? It’s actually not that bad. And it does actually feel aligned to me. I just don’t want to do it right now because I’d rather do something else or I’d rather go do this thing. Then that’s a different topic to get into, but at least you then know. So if you’re able to work through where you’re at in the moment.

why am I feeling this sort of way or what am I thinking this way for? Then you can start to unpack those other situations that have happened to be able to see the patterns that have laid themselves down to let you understand this is why this is this way and what you can do differently with it. The awareness that you can have from that and the guidance that can come from being able to look back at those things is separate.

from being able to hem and haul with the situations that happened before and think, my god, this was terrible. You really want to be able to look at the situations and say, well, what can I do differently now? Or why did I feel that way? And why am I feeling this way now? And then figuring out what do you want to do from there? Again, I totally understand that that’s not a thing you can pretty much always do right in that moment. And if you can do it within a nanosecond, beautiful. I’m still on my journey to be able to do that where I can

figure things out within that moment, but I can also feel like it needs time to just kind of percolate and just simmer even and just kind of work its way through as I process through it. But then being able to have somebody to talk to or do some deep subconscious processing to be able to reframe that story and understand the pieces and components of it could be absolutely huge. So let me wrap this up. If you have different situations that happen where you get really upset, really frustrated,

Nick McGowan (21:17.442)
and you don’t know why, but you feel like something’s slightly off. I believe that’s typically your intuition telling you, there’s something here, there’s something going on, and that there’s also typically something for you to work through or work on. Again, you don’t have to do it in that moment, but to be aware of that and say, well, it’s probably not the thing right now, but it’s something that happened in the past that I need to work through and need to reframe. You can then start to look at that and figure out, is this something that I want to continue to do?

Is this something I don’t want to continue to do? And being in the present moment is a beautiful thing. It can be really difficult to do at times because of the way that we have learned things and the way that we interact with things. We aren’t goldfish. We don’t just have a three second memory. So we base things off of patterns and situations that have happened. But those patterns and those situations are just like our emotions.

They’re not going to hurt us in those moments unless we let them to. And it’s really a warning and a guidance for us to be able to take those and do something with them. So my challenge to you is next time you feel like you’re just kind of in a grumpy or frustrated head space and you’re doing something that kind of adds to that, pause for a second, pause for a few seconds and ask, why am I feeling this way right now?

What am I thinking? And what are the things that have happened before? What can I do differently? So thank you so much for being on with me today, for being part of this. If you have any questions, I’d love to hear from you. I’d love to be able to help however I can. And I hope this is helpful.