The Success Nuggets

The Success Nuggets #58 - The Gift Of The Target by Rocio Perez

• David Abel • Season 3 • Episode 15

Share episode

 When there’s a target on your back, that’s not pressure—that’s power. In this punchy Success Nuggets episode, Rocio Perez turns fear into fuel: lifting cars, walking on fire, skydiving from sixty floors, and showing why curiosity + courage = expansion. 

We get real about rivals, self-mastery, and clapping for yourself when no one else does.

Nugget of the day: “Only you can jump. No one’s pushing you. The leap is yours.” 

With thanks to One Golden Nugget and Maxwell Preece for editing, support and artwork

SPEAKER_00:

Have you ever wondered what you could learn and how inspired you through asked incredible people from around the world to start the buttons to drive progress? Get ready to dive into a world of insights to inspiration. With the founder of the Digital Light Bulb and your host, David Abel.

SPEAKER_01:

When there's a target on your back, that's not pressure, that's power. Today on The Success Nuggets, Rocío Perez turns fear into fuel, lifting cars, walking on fire, skydiving from 60 floors, and showing us how curiosity and courage is expansion. But what if a bear was chasing you? You'd ride faster. That's pressure. That's today. That's movement. The target on your back is the greatest gift. We don't know who we are until we tested. Fire, glass, free fall, and the moment you clap for yourself when no one else does. Hello, Rossio.

SPEAKER_02:

Hello, mate. How are you?

SPEAKER_01:

It's good to see you. Welcome.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you so much. I'm so excited about today's conversation. This is a leveling it up conversation.

SPEAKER_01:

So champions love a target, rivals make us better.

SPEAKER_03:

Is the greatest gift of all. That is it. There's nothing for me to think about, and everything for me to act on. That target on my back is motivation. It is inspiration. It is an opportunity to keep on going when people don't think it's possible.

SPEAKER_01:

If a bear was chasing you on a bike, you'd ride faster, right? Right. That is it.

SPEAKER_03:

It's really funny because I've had these experiences even as a young teen. I remember one day my uncle, the car was jacked up and it fell on his arm. His whole arm pinned under it. My grandfather tried, he couldn't, and he was a big man. My uncle's wife tried, she couldn't. They both tried together, they couldn't. I walked out. I wasn't even thinking about it. Okay. I was doing my hair. I lift the car up and I walked back in. I just lifted the car up, right? So that is the motivation when I saw it. Okay. I think I'd never had time to think about it. That was the the thing. Like when we have so much time to think about it, it's things get in the way. At least for now, I literally lifted the car up.

SPEAKER_01:

But that's not a target on your back.

SPEAKER_03:

That is not a target. That's superhuman strength.

SPEAKER_01:

You said to me a minute ago, having a target on your back means we can go to places we never thought we could go.

SPEAKER_03:

We didn't even know they were accessible to us.

SPEAKER_01:

But I said, but they are, because we had to. Having a target on your back is a good thing. It's to be celebrated. All the champions love it. Because uh, whenever I have one, find something bigger, I will go again, bigger and stronger, and look at the problem again and go, oh my, you want to have a target? You want to catch this? Ah, we're going up that level now. But how far could we go?

SPEAKER_03:

Infinite. I don't even think we know who we are. Let me just put it that way. I don't think we know what we're capable of until we have that target. And depending on that target is going to depend on what superhuman strength we tap into. I remember years ago in personal development world, somebody asked, Would you be able to run a marathon right now? Would you be able to run a hundred miles? Give me a big enough reason why. And I will run those 100 miles. Even if I've never ran five miles.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm going to find a way to do it. And especially, you know, I think when we don't think about it, we get out of our head and we start doing things that we've never done. So the target on the back, I just say thank you. Because I believe that that's motivation, that's inspiration. That is something that I can tap into and it helps me move forward. What do you think?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, no, it does. It shines a light on it. I do get what you're saying. Because I once went swimming, met a lady who was 76, and she just did 81 lengths in the pool. And I said, How did you do that? Do you like swimming? And she said, No, I hate swimming, but she had a bad knee. Her doctor said, do 10 lengths, and the next week, just do one better. So she did 10 lengths. The next week, she did 11. The next week she did 12. When she got to 50, she taught herself bilateral, you know, the front crawl, not just breaststroke. Did two lengths of that and 48 breaststroke, four lengths, six lengths. So she needed continuous improvement. 1% better, 1% better, 1% better.

SPEAKER_03:

You know what? We get out of our head. I love what you said. We definitely get out of our head when we're told to do as much as you can and then tell yourself to do more, as opposed to saying, go do 20 laps, right? 20 laps, I'm gonna get myself in my head funk, right? Well, I can't even do one right now, especially if I'm in pain. But you're given some direction and motivation, enough motivation to make a shift. I think we shift.

SPEAKER_01:

We change. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, Rossio. I followed that pattern. I did 20, 22, and I got to 40. I saw a picture that said, do the thing they think you can't do twice and take photos.

SPEAKER_03:

And I'm tagging on it.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah. That's it. And I went down there and I said, I'm gonna do a hundred lengths today. I'm gonna beat that record. And I did a hundred lemps. And I remember I only got to 40, so I was like, wow, it was inside me all along. The next time I went, I wasn't in the mood, but I remembered the picture that said do it twice. And I thought I'll do it again. And I did it again. And then the following week I just went back down to 20. And I've been nowhere near 50 lemps ever again, whether it's a time or a motivation thing. So I think this target on the back and motivation, we're talking about raising yourself up to the next level.

SPEAKER_03:

I love it. You just keep on like growing and like drawing from that. Here's another thing. Most people that I've known say, I have a target on my back. I can't believe it. I can't. It's actually the greatest gift. It is that let me prove it to you, gift. And you're like, thank you so much for doing that. Thank you so much for the motivation, the inspiration to do something that I would have never done. See, we blame the person because of you. I did this. No, no, no. Because of you, not to prove me wrong, to prove you right. What was inside of you? Maybe we weren't even tapping into our fullest potential within us. And this person actually helped us tap into another level. Maybe we were at the level of conformity. I'm just saying, right? Sometimes we're at the level of the comfort zone. Sometimes we're at the level of the status quo. Things are working. But if they're working, do we want them better? Do we want to be better? See, when we change one thing, our mind expands over and over again. And the ability to be able to expand is seeing something new.

SPEAKER_01:

How do we tap into that? There's no greater motivation than either showing someone who triggers you. Every sports team has to have the rival. Nobody runs away with it. There's always someone chasing them down. Or maybe the pretender then takes the champion's crown. Of every blockbuster, there's a Netflix.

SPEAKER_03:

Completely. So how do we tap into that when we're just hanging out, right? How do we tap into that? I believe in challenges.

SPEAKER_01:

Where's the source that says, I'm going to be the ultimate champion? Because someone, someone comes from you and you raise your game 10 times. Where's the source? Forget the person that's coming for you. It's inside of us. Infinite.

SPEAKER_03:

What we see in our world is what we become. And if we've seen people who are rocking and rolling, we're going to be naturally rocking and rolling it. And if we've seen people stagnant, we're going to be stagnant, right? We emulate the people that we're around. I think about my mentors, Bomb and Pops were 92 when they passed away. They were still doing yoga. They were still doing weightlifting. They were still in their book groups. They were still doing all these amazing things for themselves. And I think about myself, it's like, okay, Rocío, how do you want to live your life? What is it that you would do to level up your game? 15 years ago, I decided that I was going to do the things that scared the living lights out of me. As a little girl, I remember watching somebody walking on fire. And I'm like, that would be crazy if somebody walks on fire. Fast forward 2012, I walked on 30 feet of huck holes.

SPEAKER_01:

How was it?

SPEAKER_03:

I'm just going to say I was sweating up a storm when I walked by. And you know, here's the intention. I put myself in that situation for what it would make of me, how it would expand me. I went to a retreat that was challenging us in every way, shape, or form, mentally, emotionally, physically, everything. The time we got to that, 30 feet. I just remember myself like, I've got this, I've got this, I've got this, I've got this. And then I like, I walk right through it. I also remember as a little girl, someday I thought it was crazy that somebody would ever walk on glass, on broken glass. Guess what I did? I walked on broken glass. Guess what I was afraid of? Heights. Right. And I jump out of an airplane. You know, I have video and I'm like, oh, this is really cool. But inside of me, I'm like shaking. But the moment that I jumped out, everything became amazing. And I'd say that I put myself in those particular situations, everything that scared the living lights out of me, and that expanded me. That was like the target on my back. The gift was expansion.

SPEAKER_01:

Fear is a big one, isn't it? So when someone's put a target on your back and you go, I know, don't you try and stop it. The biggest fight in your life is that of your self-mastery. Oh, it is. You've only got to be yourself. We can't go after others or let others come after us. So you've got to be yourself. When someone comes after you, it's the beer that you get through, just like you were saying. The fire, the glass, the heights.

SPEAKER_03:

The gift of fear, the gift of breakthrough.

SPEAKER_01:

It's about seeing the biggest picture and having the most courage.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes.

SPEAKER_01:

Now, I wrote something. Genius and the sense of wonder. Genius isn't about IQ, it's about curiosity plus courage. Let's go round this one a little bit. The ability to stand inside uncertainty long enough for the world to rearrange itself. Leonardo da Vinci, he used to dissect corpses because he wanted to understand how wings might work. Steve Jobs, he was obsessed over calligraphy because he thought computers should be beautiful. All genius lives in the tension between opposites. Logic and chaos, fear and play, jumping out of a plane. The minimum point of danger is the maximum point of fear. So I bet, like you said to you, no, I'm not doing this plane jump. No, I just want to have my breakfast. No, I don't want to watch the safety video. No, I don't want to go in the plane. No, I don't want to go near the door. Tell me what happened when they threw you out the plane door.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, first of all, I thought they were gonna push me out. Okay. I didn't know I had to like jump out, right? So when I got to the plane door, I'm like shaking. But the moment that I surrendered to it, everything changed. The serenity to recognize in my moment that I was small in comparison to the universe, in comparison to the earth, in comparison to the trees that we were flying up above, just like coasting with my arms out. It was a moment of clarity, serenity, peace, expansion, definitely expansion in every way, shape, form. The very thing that I didn't think I can do, I had just broken through. And ever since, you know, between walking on fire, I jumped out of a building, like 60 floors. And yes, I got to the edge, and I'm like, I'm shaking. Okay, I'm at the platform. There's wind all over the place. And I'm like, um, are you gonna push me? They're like, no, you have to jump. You know, see, I I had been waiting for somebody to do something like that for me. When in reality, the only one that can actually take the action to the greatest expansion is ourselves. I was the only one that can jump. And then once I landed, it was like, whew, life was different. I was different mentally, emotionally, spiritually. Everything was different about me. And, you know, I'm ready for my next jump somewhere. You know, maybe it's spongee jumping. I haven't done that's probably one of the extreme sports I have not done.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it's the one I haven't done, only because I'm a bit worried about physical injury actually. But I did a zipline off the top of my building in Dubai. So I got the present for my birthday, and I lost the ticket. They'd fallen down the back of a desk. And my wife phoned them up and they said, sure, even though they're out of date, you can do it. So I went and uh in the lift, I don't want to do this, got to the top, and I was like, whoa, face down on the bed, pushed it towards the front of the building, so you were just looking down at the road and you weren't the straps in. I know they had a camera on your head to film the whole experience. So I had the sunglasses on, so I knew I could close my eyes and just style it out for the TV thing, and they winch you up, and as soon as they winch you up, you know you feel secure. Yes, only the first bit you're like, I don't like the look of this drop off here because it's not straight, it's absolutely fine. So it's about movement. Movement is harder, yes.

SPEAKER_03:

The target on your back is about movement, yes, and it's a gift, it's the gift of the target, yeah. It's the gift of fear, it's it changes something inside of us, it changed something inside of me as a human being to know what is possible. And I actually love the fear of the unknown. I love the fear of doing something that scares the living lights out of me.

SPEAKER_01:

Another story from Dubai is they've got a famous water park there that's got some really scary rides, and there's one called the Leap of Faith, which is like a 60-foot vertical drop. So you just got over and then you fly just for two or three seconds. Nothing's touching. You just go down the slide, you go shum through a shark tank. Only last 10 seconds. I went and did that ride three times that afternoon in total, and the third time I did it, and it was all right. But I felt so in pain the next day, I think, from all the adrenaline. But there you go, it's done. Your stories are there. I I did that. Look how far I came from or whatever. No one's clapping for you either.

SPEAKER_03:

Right. But we were clapping for ourselves. I think everything I've ever done has always left me in a better place. There's not one risk that I've taken in extreme sports that has left me saying, I survived, I'll never do that again.

SPEAKER_01:

No, but break it down into the normal world, because I've just been through this this week in a personal thing, once again referencing my son, who's only eight. A bad thing happened to him, and I said, pain is temporary. And he said, What does temporary mean? Pain is temporary, just like bad things are temporary, and often good things come from bad, because he was like, only bad things come from bad. And it's like, no, good things come from bad. That's where the growth is. But it was just something you said then. You climb up those stairs to the top, and it's cold, and you're shaking, and you're saying, Don't, don't, don't, and that can just be like anything in life. Nobody is saying carry on. If you say I don't want to go, no one's gonna be able to talk you out of it. You're giving yourself permission.

SPEAKER_03:

I remember, speaking of that, I remember a gal who was that target on my back. I remember with my marketing company, she's like, Rosio, and I'm like, oh my gosh, she would get on my nerves. She would get out of my nerves. And then one day she's like, You should like take your money and reinvest it. I'm like, I live comfortable. Why would I want to reinvest it into my business? And I did that just thing. I started reinvesting it, and I started seeing things grow and grow and grow and expand. And it was absolutely beautiful what was created as a result of that. Had I not, you know, yes, I could sit there and blame her. Well, what do you think, right? You're not the one who has to make the sacrifice. Then reality was the greatest gift. I think that we think that adversity, that we think at these targets on our back as a bad thing. Let's bring it back to your little guy. If he wouldn't have fallen, he would have never been able to walk, right? If he wouldn't have scraped his knees, he wouldn't have been able to build those muscles.

SPEAKER_01:

Great balance.

SPEAKER_03:

Or have great balance. So gradually we don't see this as little children. We don't see this as adults. If our boss didn't put us in a place that they knew was possible and made us uncomfortable to do the things that we needed to do, then we wouldn't be in the places that we are today. None of us. That's what I get to say. That year that we feel, that target on our back, that opportunity to expand, explore, connect, create, and then be able to share it with others. See, for me, it's who we become as a result of transcending whatever it is that we all think is serving us. And even if we do it to prove somebody wrong that we can't do it, that's still a gift. If they wouldn't have said you can't do this, we wouldn't have even tried.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. I think that transforming thing is so important. I've heard people that they actually think some of their greatest successes are they were running a marathon and their running partner got stuck at mile 18 or 19, and they actually felt that it was a much bigger win and lesson to have helped that person get through. And if you stand on the shoulders of giants, you can see further than you'd ever seen as well. And a bit like we said at the beginning of the conversation that we can only see what we can see. We think something or someone or some idea is the best because it's what we've seen. And then you get to that level, and that level doesn't want you there. But you're like, no, I want to see further. You're not the top anymore. This ladder is infinite.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. And it has so many possibilities for us. So, so many. I think there's a magic in the expansion, and I will name it over and over again. There's expansion, there's a gift into going even further. Jamone should say, like, go as far as you can and then go further. When COVID hit, my life changed. I was a social butterfly. I was attending 30 to 40 events, meetings, stage time, all these things that were going on throughout the week. And then all of a sudden there's nothing to do. And I said, Okay, Rocil, how about I open the mind shift experience up to everyone? And so I hosted two groups, one in English and one in Spanish, seven days a week. Why? Because if it was about somebody else, of me being of service to somebody else, I was gonna be able to make it through. And I did. I mean, it worked out perfectly perfect as the best as that it could have worked out for myself. But what are those moments? And I think that each of us must look at ourselves. What are the gifts of having this target on our back? What are the gifts of actually expanding? What's going to happen if we don't? What's going to happen if we do? Who would become if we do? Who would become if we don't? What type of life will we live?

SPEAKER_01:

Having a target on your back is excellent, but it's really motivation that's driving it. Overcoming fear, giving yourself permission to do that thing, seeing further. Have I missed anything else? Challenging yourself. Challenging yourself.

SPEAKER_03:

Challenging, and I love the way that you've summarized that. It's definitely like seeing further, making sure that you do that. There are gifts in everything. There's gifts. Take a look at what the gift is for yourself.

SPEAKER_01:

A one golden nugget that you live by.

SPEAKER_03:

Only you can jump. No one's pushing you. The leap is yours.

SPEAKER_01:

Love that. Thank you, Rosteo. Guys, you heard a breakthrough lives on the other side of fear. Rosteo, it's been amazing seeing you again.

SPEAKER_04:

Likewise. Join David and his incredible guests next time on the Success Nuggets podcast. And to find out more, visit oneGoldenNugget.com. Thank you for listening.