The Mindset and Self-Mastery Show

“Let’s start having those real conversations and really trying to focus on our mental fitness because I feel like for me, that’s the biggest thing. If you have your well-being, you should really try to understand everything about it and how to take care of it.”

In this episode, Nick speaks with Chinazom Sunny Nwabueze, who is the Founder of Dreamcatchers Performance and a high-performance leadership coach and behavioral science consultant with BetterUp Inc. Chinazom also created a mental fitness online community, a video chat series, and delivers workshops and presentations on mental fitness. He has amassed over 2,000 hrs of coaching and recently published his first book, ‘Real Talk – A New Approach for Men’s Mental Fitness and Wellbeing’.

What to listen for:

The timing of Chinazom’s wife being pregnant, him changing careers and moving to another country only months before Covid ravaged the world

The mental fitness Chinazom put himself through to power through and see his vision come to life

The importance of culture, love, and our own personal mission

How we all relate to stories and actually relate to each other more than we think

“I kind of went through crazy transitions. It was all just around the time before I met my wife. I stumbled onto something called performance psychology, which I really, really loved. And someone let me start working with their athletes and I was enjoying it, doing it. And then my wife said to me, why don’t you give this a go and give it a try? So 2018, I left my job and started doing this performance psychology”

We must trust our intuition to tell us when it’s time to “jump ship”

Why it’s important to have encouragement and love while in a transitional phase of life

How we’re not stuck in any area of our life unless we decide we are

“So when I got there, I kind of realized I’m going to have to practice what I preach. Because if I’m preaching like, you know, this is what you do. This is how you do pre-performance routines and this is how you perform under pressure. I’m going to be under pressure. So I need to like, yeah, I need to practice what I preach. So that was the first thing of trying to like to understand what would help in my mindset. What would help when things weren’t going my way? I like to say when you get your ass handed to you, how do you take the lesson and then decide, OK, you still need to keep moving forward?”

We can’t just preach we must practice what we preach

Life doesn’t turn out the way it should or shouldn’t only the way it does and it’s up to us to engage with the flow

How Chinazom went through difficulties but had the awareness to open himself up and accept what was happening

What to do when everything seems to be crashing down around you

“I was so excited, I was so terrified because thinking I don’t even have a work permit. I’m going somewhere where I don’t even have a permit to work, and my wife’s about to have a kid. So if I hadn’t made that decision, well I don’t know if I’d be here talking to you.”

It’s easy to look back and realize that you made a good or bad decision but it’s difficult to do so in the moment

What it was like for Chinazom to leave the familiarity and take a massive leap in his life

How he managed his mindset through changes that have ultimately helped him be a better man, husband, father, and coach

Resources:

For more stories on accepting your current situation and growing through it all, check out:

Episode #19 Keep Moving with Eric Hemati

Episode #14 with Dom Acello.

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!

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Watch Clips and highlights: www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: podcasts@themindset...

“No matter what you’re going through, no matter where you’ve been at in life, no matter what situations happen to you, for you, around you, through you, etc., how we handle our mental health can really affect everything else that we go through.”

In this episode, Nick talks about how imperative it is for us to actually start talking about our mental health. Not just with other people but, first and foremost, with ourselves.

What to listen for:

How we can get lost in our own head

How managing our mental health isn’t just a bunch of buzzwords but an integral part of our healthy way of being

Ways I manage, and continue to work on managing my mental health

Intriguing questions to help prompt you in the healthy right direction

“I’ve spent a lot of time just living in my head. Can you relate? Can you feel what that feels like to just live in your head and to worry?”

Getting lost in our head can be helpful at times but we often don’t let ourselves get in deep to understand ourselves

Understanding that we’re all going through some sort of mental health, either crisis or turmoil, most of the time

And understanding the reasons why we go through these tough or trying mental health times

“Everybody has some mental health situations, some things to go through. We have judgments we place on ourselves. We have situations that happen every single day where we interpret the ways that things are happening to us. We feel like our minds are attacking us or we think too much. We have anxiety that comes from things that maybe we really don’t need to have anxiety from, but we do.”

Showing grace to ourselves can be crucial in our healing

Knowing we’re not alone… but sometimes we really do need to be alone in our healing

Why it’s important to open up to others even when it’s difficult or feels like we’re exposing ourselves

How the act of speaking our truth about our mental health is sometimes more important than who we’re speaking it to. IF we can understand there may be some judgment

“It’s time that we actually start talking to ourselves about mental health. It’s time that we stop just accepting the noise of social media and actually having these conversations. In previous episodes, again, I’ve talked about how you can’t just manage your mindset. You have to understand the context and the traumas and the situations that have happened to lead you to be who you are today.“

It’s more important than ever for us to share what we’re going through. Too many people are suffering in silence

How it’s not just about “managing your mindset” but it’s about understanding the context and pieces that play a role in how we do so

Learn about the components of a healthy mindset and what can positively and negatively affect us

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,

“Even when you fear failure, you’re not broken. You’re just blocked.”

In this episode, Nick talks about an F word… Failure. Leaning into failure can help us but most people don’t get to the point where failure can be a beneficial thing, they let the fear of failure hold them back before they even begin. Do you fear failure?

What to listen for:

Stories about how my fear of failure held me back for YEARS

What makes us fear failure

The perception people have of “fear” and how leaning in is more than just a nice idea, it’s critical to our growth on our path toward self-mastery

Questions to spark your brain to use the fear instead of the fear using you

“You need to lean into failure, but you don’t want to keep repeating failure. Some people repeat a failure, and they just can’t handle it. They have a hard time getting past it. Some people can’t actually get past it because they fear going through and failing.”

Fearing failure can hold us back without ever knowing if we ever could have actually gotten through it

There are some major life categories that most people have a fear of failure around

Most often the fear of failure is heavier than what we actually fear

“You’re the one who has to live with yourself. You’re the one who has to go through it. And you’re the one that’s either stuck in that job or that relationship, and you’re the one who continues to fear failure.”

Holding ourselves accountable to our fear is crucial to understanding ourselves better and gaining confidence in ourselves

Understanding that we are the only person that will save us from our fear of failure

Being stuck in anything doesn’t have to be a life sentence, likewise, the fear of failure and being stuck also doesn’t have to be a life sentence

Our perception is our reality and how we perceive our fear can be changed, but we must first be aware of it in order to do anything about it

“Take a recent situation that happened where you felt like you were either about to fail or maybe you had failed in a way and that you had fear going through that. Why did you have that fear? Was it something that happened before? Was it something in the situation that was happening at that moment? Was it an interpretation that you created in your head about how these other people that were going to be affected or not affected at all, how they were going to perceive you?”

Reviewing our fears can help us understand what and why we fear failure

Reframing the story we’ve told ourselves about our “failures” is critical for us to move forward with confidence

Learn about how long it took me to make one of the toughest decisions in my life because of my fear of failure

Learn where that fear came from and why it held me back for so long

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,

“It’s not just about managing your mindset. It’s not just about positive thinking your way through it. That’s not how it all works. It’s a piece of it. But it’s not the entirety of the pie. It’s about being able to understand the context, what you’ve been through trauma-wise, and how your brain affects all of that going forward.“

Episode summary:

In this episode, Nick talks about how trauma affects our mindset as well as how managing our mindset is ONLY a piece of the equation. If we only try to manage our mindset and don’t take into account our past traumas then we’re really only masking the situation and trying to bypass what’s actually happening and why we’re reacting the way we are.

What to listen for:

How trauma affects our brain, body, and overall mindset

What Nick has experienced that has shown hoow managing our mindset is really only a piece of the puzzle

Learn what areas of the brain are affected by trauma and how that shows up in stressful or heightened situations

“I’ve heard people say that, where it’s, if you can just manage your mindset if you can just maintain the mindset, then everything else will be alright. That’s not really true, your mindset is only a piece of it.” 

We tend to lock onto ideas and allow them to sink in but sometimes they actually do us harm because they bypass our feelings and true experience

Your body keeps the score and your trauma plays a major role in how you handle situations

A story about the trauma that stems all the way back to infancy

“It’s not just about managing our mindset through everything. It’s about understanding the context of what we’ve been through and the situation that we have in front of us.”

We must understand context is crucial… in mostly every situation but especially in your pursuit of self-mastery

We never know when and how someone can be triggered

Small things can actually be very very big things to people

Trauma shows up later in life and our bodies feel like we’re back in that moment

“Something I’ve learned is how the brain is affected by trauma. I’ve really been interested in how my organic being handles my subconscious and how the two of them work either hand in hand or in fisticuffs in a sense, and being able to fight against each other, I don’t ever want that. So I want to be able to work through that and understand how things work.”

Three areas of the brain that are affected by trauma and how that affects your body

How there are actions in motion that you’re consciously unaware of even when you’re trying to “think positive” or “manage your mindset” in a stressful situation

How childhood is a traumatic experience for all of us and how that affects us later in life

How our body is absolutely incredible and does what it needs to keep us alive

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,

“It’s a path. That’s it. It’s a path. Keep walking. You can stop, you can smell the roses, you can walk backward. You can stop and think that you’re done. Guess what? You’re not. You’re not until maybe you’re six feet under or however you wanna be, however you wanna go.”

Episode summary:

In this episode, Nick speaks with Dr. Benjamin Ritter about living for yourself and how values tie into everything we do or do not do.

What to listen for:

Dr. Ben’s story from wanting to “go pro” to wanting to help leaders “grow pro”

How “Burning Man” changed Ben’s life

Understanding ourselves and our desires and then putting a plan in place to achieve our goals

“There are two things there I think that happens with novelty. One is the FOMO and the second is getting bored with something before you’re finished with it. I think what’s more what I’m more prone to is just getting bored with things and so what I’ve had to learn is to reconnect with the meaning that I feel from the things that I’m doing and the overall purpose and impact that they’re having.”

How novelty can play a role in our decisions

What FOMO and boredom have to do with living life

Understanding ourselves and thinking then rethinking why things matter to us

How purpose ties into our lives by intention

“I think everything, every problem, is a personal problem. I can tell you all the tactics that, you know, I can throw them at your head. I think they’re all online. Doing them, understanding them, incorporating them, letting them become part of who you are takes that understanding of the human.”

When problems are no longer just an excuse

How Ben helps his clients understand what is at the core of their wants and desires

Learn tactics used to uncover what is holding you back

“If you ever define yourself as being a certain type of person, you have now limited yourself forever. Can’t tell you how many times someone goes to me and they go, I’m just, I’m just an analytical type of person. I don’t, I’m not empathetic. I can’t do this. Do that. I can’t do this. No, no, no. You 100% can. And operating in our world requires you to flex a certain way if you want to reduce the stress of certain environments. As a leader, if you cannot flex, you will still be successful, but it’s going to be, you’re not going to be successful in certain companies. You’re going to struggle with certain relationships. You’re going to bang your head against the wall at times wondering why something isn’t working. We have to take away this concept that we’re just living in a box.”

When are definitions helpful, and when are they harmful

How being adaptable and flexible can make or break your relationship with yourself

How to handle frustration and know when you’re working upstream

The ways leaders better themselves and what they come back to for a “check-in”

About Dr. Benjamin Ritter:

Dr. Benjamin Ritter, founder of Live for Yourself Consulting, is a leadership and career coach, Talent Development Executive, values geek, international speaker, online course instructor, and podcaster (The Executive, and The Live for Yourself Revolution) who’s passionate about guiding leaders to be the leader of their own career and create a career they love.

https://www.liveforyourselfconsulting.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/drbenjaminritter-leadershipdevelopment

Check out Episode #71 with Greg Shephard and Episode # 47 with Matt LeBris to hear more on the topic of personal leadership.

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!

Thank you for listening!

Please subscribe on iTunes and give us a 5-Star review! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mindset-and-self-mastery-show/id1604262089

Watch Clips and highlights: www.youtube.com/channel/UCk1tCM7KTe3hrq_-UAa6GHA

Guest Inquiries right here: [email protected]

“For the most part, a lot of people, I think have an external “should”. Like, well, my parents told me that I should go to college. My parents told me that I should get a great job, or that I should be a doctor, or I should be a lawyer, or I should be this, I should be that. What the fuck do you wanna do, though? Like, what is it? What is it that you feel you should do? Are there times where you feel like, I’m doing this, let’s just say, job, and I don’t really feel like I wanna be here anymore?”

In this episode, Nick talks about the “shoulds” and the “should nots” we subscribe to in our lives.

What to listen for:

The difference between something we should / should not do for our health (mental, physical, etc…) and what others simply push on us because it’s part of their beliefs

Ways to differentiate what you believe you should / should not be doing and what is systemic or environmental

Challenging questions as to how you’ve formed your beliefs around what you should / should not be doing and how life should / should not look

“It’s almost like fighting with your Dharma and fighting with what you feel called to do within your life. But if you feel like you should work at a job or you should go do this thing because you were told that if you do that you’ll have safety and security, well. You should know that safety and security really isn’t true.”

We’re all raised to believe things that are lovingly, or unlovingly, pushed upon us by our parents and guardians

You have choices and always will no matter what you’ve been through or what you’re going through but we sometimes can’t see this through our past traumas or experiences

Understanding why we feel we should / should not be doing something we’re doing and understanding that it’s never too late to make a change

“So whatever age you’re at, if you’re somebody who listens to this show and you’re in your early 20s or you’re somebody who listens and you’re in your early 90s, think about the things that you have done over the course of your life that you felt you should do. And why do you feel or did you feel that you should do those things?”

Breaking ourselves of habits is never an easy thing to do but more importantly, it’s difficult to clear out the reasoning behind what you’re doing

Some people feel they’re too late or too early to do something but that’s never the case

Understanding why you do the things you do is most often more important than doing, or not doing, those things.

“Fair warning, this could spiral you. If you’re in a hopeless marriage with several kids and you feel I should do all these things for my hopeless marriage and my kids, there’s a lot of unraveling that could come from that and you’ll have to sit with that.”

Sometimes we truly need our world rocked in order for us to make the changes necessary to grow

You’re not alone, I too was in what felt like many hopeless situations due to doing what I felt I “should be” doing

If you struggle with finding the reasons why you do what should / should not do remember you’re not broken you just may be blocked

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.

“What you do in that specific second where you could react a negative way is going to impact the way that you continue for that climb or that you start the descent downward on the side of the mountain, literally free falling or just going down on your ass and sliding down and having to figure out how to climb your way back up with a lot of extra baggage. And if this is something that you struggle with, understand that you’re not alone.”

Episode summary:

In this episode, Nick talks about reactions, specifically our first reaction, and how we can conquer that first reaction. It can either help you climb up a mountain, or it can have you just slide directly down the side of it.

What to listen for:

How we react to situations isn’t always because of the actual situation

What it means to react and climb or react and slide down the mountain

How our traumas trigger our reactions

About learning how “to take a beat” and react differently

“There have been times where I’ve reacted to things and then thought afterward like oh, oh shit I probably shouldn’t have said that or I probably shouldn’t have done that or I probably shouldn’t have acted that way or I shouldn’t have felt like that. Can you relate?”

What it’s like to go on an apology tour because you said something stupid or emotionally reactive

How we can stop ourselves in that quick nano-second to take a beat and reset before reacting

The importance of that first split second before we react and how that helps us or puts us in a really bad place

How I reacted as a child and young adult and WHY I reacted in such ways

“Here I am, closer to 40, and there are times when somebody will say something to me, and I can feel that I’m triggered inside, and I can feel that the reaction is about to come out. And I’ve started over the past handful of years being able to really capture that energy as it’s getting closer to coming out.”

I share a couple of stories of getting into physical altercations during my younger years and how those experiences prompted me to consider how I reacted to other situations

Taking the time to process past experiences and understanding how we can best learn and grow from them

What it’s like as we “grow up” and look back on our past experiences to use them as case studies for our present and future selves

“When you think about the times that you’ve been through, where you’ve reacted to something in a way that you didn’t want to react, think about other times where you have reacted in a way that you wanted to react. Maybe you took that second. It may have even been subconscious. It may have been something that kind of knocked you off your rocker and you were like, whoa, I need a second to process through that.”

Some experiences may not trigger us and in those experiences, we’ll react differently

Understanding our triggers and therefore the responses that come from them will help us as we grow

Understanding the repercussions of our reactions and how we can physically and emotionally climb or slide down the mountain

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,

“I remember taking a step back and thinking, yeah, this needs to be different. This needs to be changed. And that was a piece that I changed. So I guess in some ways this episode is more of a, oh, hey, by the fucking way, I’m no longer on social media, I’ve stepped out of the noise and out of the machine, and I suggest you do the same thing.”

Today on the show, Nick shares about how he recently left social media and how it took years to get to this point. It took that long because of the story he was telling himself about who he was with or without social media and how he couldn’t imagine what life could look like without it.

What to listen for:

Nick's background and history with social media

Stepping back from social media and planting your feet on the ground, staying present.

The impact social media has or doesn't have on his business

The challenge to you regarding social media

“I think the first time I was able to get onto any sort of chat room or anything like that I was maybe 12 or 13 and there were a handful of different websites like early dating sites and just connecting sites, communities, and stuff like forums for different bands I’d listen to, regional bands or big national acts”

Social media was supposed to make us more social but feels like it’s done the opposite of that in most cases

Early “social media” weren’t considered social media but actually felt more social

My early experiences with chat rooms and forums feel like the olden days of the great early internet

“It felt like social media was fun and playful at that point. I also didn’t try to make any money off of it. I didn’t try to do anything that was business related or anything like that, especially in high school.”

Early social media was an exploration of new people and new interests

About when I started to really look at social media as a tool for business and my entrepreneurial mind started to shape ideas around the concept of social media

About a business I had that was geared towards small businesses using social media and how I was “late” to the party

What I learned from that entrepreneurial experience and what my takeaways were for moving forward

How we can’t feed into the lie and story of “if you’re not on social media you don’t have a real business”

“About a month and a half, two months ago at this point, deactivated all my social media accounts and it’s been beautiful. Well, correction, it’s been fucking beautiful. It’s been a lot less noisy. I’ve been able to work on my business, work on myself, work on my relationship, work on my internal world, read a lot more, work on my music, work on my hobbies, work on my tiny home, work on so many different things that I wanted to be able to do instead of just doom scrolling on Instagram or just getting sucked into something or feeling like I have to do all these things to produce all these different pieces of content or have my team produce different pieces of content.“

Feeding into the peer pressure is never a smart move

Being able to step back, assess, and figure out what is real and what is not is important but can be tough to do at the moment

Being honest with ourselves about what we really want and what we want to spend our time on

My challenge to you in regards to being an active participant in the noise machine we call social media

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,

“So everything I’d been working for a year was taken away from me. Like the carpet was ripped underneath my legs.”

In this episode, Nick speaks with Dan MacQueen, who had to re-learn how to walk, talk, and smile after a traumatic brain injury in 2014. What he found out along the way might surprise you, there is nothing like a brain hemorrhage to refocus the mind!

What to listen for:

The story about how Dan had to recover from two brain surgeries in less than two years

How having a brain injury, and recovering, can really set your sights on what is important in life

The difficult and uphill battle Dan endured to recover from his brain surgeries and what it’s meant to his life and those he speaks with

The silver lining of two brain surgeries and a layoff leading to a speaking career

“I had a brain hemorrhage in 2014. What had been happening was I was having these headaches that were getting really bad over the course of a few weeks and I was taking painkillers like candy for them.“

What seemed like a migraine and a misdiagnosis led to a near-death experience

Find out what was causing the insane amount of pressure built up in his brain

How one minute he was having bad headaches and several minutes later was told he needed to go in for emergency brain surgery

How he needed to relearn how to walk, talk and smile again

“I woke up, my mom, dad, and brother around the bed. I’m trying to speak but I can’t talk because I had a tracheotomy removed and I couldn’t, it took me a few months to get my voice box back. So I pointed to my brother and I go, you, give me a pen and paper. I wrote down, get me out of here. And I showed him. Yeah man, make it happen.”

Imagine being so confused and the battle within your mindset and overall attitude not being sure where you are or what’s going on or how you’re going to recover or IF you will recover

Dan was unsure of what happened and had a long road ahead of him

How Dan dealt with being told “the life that you knew of before is now gone”

How it took Dan about a month to come to terms with what happened and what the road ahead would look like

“Every day I wake up, I’m better than yesterday. I’m trying to be better than yesterday. I’m trying to be intentional in my vibe, the way I present myself, the way I show up for work, and everything like this. I’m intentionally going after what I want. And it’s not easy for people to hear, look, you gotta accept it, but that’s how you get through this stuff.”

How he felt about his path to recovery and the progress he made that ultimately was reverted by another brain surgery

What happened to him that led to his mom finding him unconscious on his floor

How he managed his mindset after the second surgery knowing that he wasn’t going to get the same help he had gotten before

How he managed losing his job and how long it took him to make a career shift

About Dan MacQueen:

Dan had to re-learn how to walk, talk, and smile after a traumatic brain injury in 2014. What he found out along the way might surprise you, there is nothing like a brain hemorrhage to refocus the mind!

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https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvetrjnuZDZ66QRTiJtt6mw

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https://www.macqueendan.com/

Resources:

Check out Episode #13 “Why not choose to be joyful” about dealing with a loss, managing your mindset after being thrust into a tough situation

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!

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

“With traumas, for the most part, I think a lot of our stuff that we work through and really the tough shit that we as adult.”

In this episode, Nick talks about feeling trauma in ourselves and what to do with it. When we think about trauma, most people think about the kind of crazy traumas like head traumas or something major like a car accident or even a tragedy where somebody died. There’s also the trauma that a lot of us don’t often talk about, but we all actually have… which are the traumas we experienced at a young age.

What to listen for:

What are traumas actually

Where do traumas reside in our body

Where do traumas show up and how we can become aware of them

Practical ways to become aware of our internal state, our past traumas and make changes quickly

“When you think about trauma or when I think about trauma, and I think most people when they think about trauma, they think about kind of crazy shit like head traumas or something.”

Learn the actual definition of trauma

Traumas aren’t just the horrific and tragic things that happen, sometimes they’re subtle

Triggers bring traumas to the surface and you may have experienced one and not even really registered it yet

How smells, sights, and touch can bring upon past traumas

“With traumas, for the most part, I think a lot of our stuff that we work through and really the tough shit that we as adults work through are our traumas from when we were children. But that’s not where they all stop. It’s not like you from four to nine, you went through some fucking wacky shit, but after that, everything was peachy because there’s still stuff that’s going to happen no matter what. But it’s also how you react to those things that had happened before.”

Childhood experiences and trauma linger unless we properly process them

How we can bypass our emotions and write off a trauma as “just a bad experience”

I talk about a story from when I was a little boy with my father and how this trauma affected me for almost 2 decades

“I think we all kind of know when we feel anxious at times, even though it’s not always easy to know it right in the moment, being aware of it, but it is knowing that, hey, I feel really anxious right now, even if it’s just been simmering for a little bit. So being aware of those things and being able to work through them are two different parts”

How a recent experience flooded my body with anxiety and reminded me of past traumas I still need to work on

How traumas stack upon themselves

How my traumas kept repeating and showing up because of the processing that was done and not done

The commitment I made to myself and how I stuck to it

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,