Episode 163 with Eric Balance - Journey of the Conscious Entrepreneur

On this episode we talk with Eric Balance, conscious creator, host of 'The Resilient Minds Podcast, founder and visionary.

We explore conscious entrepreneurship, understanding why we are doing things, embodying change, how we are showing up, going from unconscious to conscious, building a relationship with oneself, becoming a leader, reconnecting with oneself, the need to heal money traumas, the importance of integrating our different aspects and find balance.

Eric talks about his journey, learning to implement new and conscious concepts in every area of life, 5 steps from unseen to unstoppable, being confused and wanting to be 'normal', wanting to find wealth, becoming a drug addict, finding a mentor in Tony Robbins, creating business nirvana.

For more about Eric find him on Instagram, Facebook, https://ericbalance.com/ & https://balancemedia.ventures/.

Transcript

Eric Balance: 0:04

Have

Brian Berneman: 0:04

you ever wondered where the problems in the world today would exist if we have deeper connection to ourselves, others and the environment

Eric Balance: 0:11

and acted from that place? Welcome to the conscious

Brian Berneman: 0:14

action podcast with your host, Brian Berneman, who believed that connection is the key to taking conscious action as individuals and creating

Eric Balance: 0:22

a better world.

Brian Berneman: 0:23

We are here to raise awareness and inspire meaningful action by sharing stories, knowledge, and conversations. With thought leaders and change makers, from sustainability

Eric Balance: 0:33

to wellbeing, and everything related to conscious living, our mission is to empower you to be the change that you wanna see in the world.

Brian Berneman: 0:46

Welcome everyone to a new conversation of the Conscious Action Podcast. I am Brian Berneman, your host, and I have the pleasure to be joined all the way from the Gold Coast in Australia by Eric Balance. Thank you so much, Eric for being here. Such a wonderful. Way of connecting to be able to, to have, you know, the time to, to chat and to connect and to see what unravels in this conversation. So Eric, for everybody that is here listening, watching us, what can you share about you, your path?

Eric Balance: 1:19

Well, first of all, I just want to say thank you for inviting me on the show. I'm very grateful to be here and share with your audience. With regards to myself you know, I've been traveling over the past six years, really learning to listen about what's my internal journey been wanting me to unfold. And I found my, my path has been one of conscious entrepreneurship. And what does that mean? I believe that there's an expression to business. That allows us to redefine what that means in the art of business. I believe it's an art and business is a spiritual journey. I believe. I believe that we can really utilize ways of conducting business in a very evolutionary way. Self managing way that allows the highest levels of principles and ethics to be delivered in terms of not just contribution to what we're delivering to society through our business. However, extremely profitable because I think that also makes sure that everybody at the table is winning. And. Making sure that people are living by the standard. The outstanding standard of principles and values that I think is the law of not, I think I feel is the law of nature that we are defined by. So by discovering my own journey, I've learned that it's important to implement those philosophies into every area of our life. Because, you know, sometimes we believe that we need to silo things, put them in one. A specific part of our life, but if we, if you've ever done, you know, the exercise, the wheel of life where you've had, you know, eight, 10, maybe 12 different areas of your life, you know, health, well, health you know, mission family, you know playfulness career and many others. And. Wheel of life is not full, then we're lacking fulfillment. And so, you know, I won't, I won't go into depth as much right now, but the focal point is really, how can we really expand that and grow that altogether in the same component? And I believe as conscious entrepreneurs that we get to deliver. A very unique way of living because our way of life, our way of peace, our way of business, our way of family, our way of community, our way of creativity, our way of fitness, our way of living life is all one. And that to me is something that I believe is our. Destiny as a collective. Beautiful.

Brian Berneman: 4:22

Thank you for sharing that. You know, one of the things that that my own journey and then through my work one of the things that I realized is that there's no separation. There's no, you know, like work Brian and life Brian. There's just, you know, this one being and yes, you know, like. One moment and we're in the heart of, you know, like teaching at university and our moment we're in the heart of being like a mentor and our moment. I am a partner and our moment. I am, you know, like a client. It's all in a sense is the same. It comes from where,

Eric Balance: 5:04

how,

Brian Berneman: 5:06

why we are doing things. And when we realize that, as you shared with that will of life, we, we get to, to see that, you know, how can we embody whatever it is that we want to embody and our uniqueness into all of these different facets of our lives and all of these different aspects of life. So I think that's, that's wonderful. And I'm interested, Eric you said, you know, through your own process your own understanding you got there. Can you share a little bit, you know, like, was there some pivotal moments in your life that led you to understandings on yourself? Was it a gradual process? How did it go for you? Yeah. So,

Eric Balance: 5:51

There's actually, I've created a five step process based off of the foundations of awakening. That are actually my journey so it's pretty, it's pretty fascinating and it really goes from unseen to unstoppable and you know, it's fascinating because these things in our own journey, they become our hero's journey, you know, and then we get to express our story. In a way that is way more clear in the way that we get to them, teach, work, listen, share contribute, you know, whatever the case is. And I believe that, you know, this journey of ours is one of, is more of an internal one than external and people, most people. Are not aware of it. And I, I was one of those people, I was the first stage, what I call the unconscious creator, very unseen in my life. I didn't see myself. I didn't understand myself. And I didn't understand why society kept projecting limitations on me. When I felt like there was something really deep within me that I needed to understand or understand. And this inner standing was something that kept getting diluted because of what I was either learning in school, what I was watching on television, what I was listening to on in, in videos, and I was hearing the wrong message because the rock, well, maybe, maybe right and wrong is, is subjective. However, the message for me was wrong because I was not showing up in my fullness. And so. I was extremely disingenuous in terms of the way that I thought a man needed to perceive himself, not meaning that it was unhealthy, but it was unaware. So I was unconsciously, I was unconsciously incompetent in my own ability to show up, meaning that although I had the ferocity, the fire, the conviction, I didn't really believe it. Meaning, I believed in something, but I didn't know what that something was contributing to my world, and I always was taught that it was outside of me, so I could never feel it inside, because I never learned to listen, because I was taught that it was some sort of external validation or external circumstance, and this, for me, I don't know. Made no sense because I thought to myself as I was growing up, if there is something really deep and intense about who I am and how I want to show up in reality, then this essence, this creativity has to be also within me. And this journey started when I was very young. I remember asking my mom, you know, mom, like, how can I see the future? You know, how can I create my future? Like, what can I do? And she said, you know, pray for the gift of prophecy. I didn't know what that meant. So she explained it to me, you know, like you can start to see things that most people can. And I remember because I was raised Catholic, so I would raise, I remember sitting in church and being like, please, please. She's like, I want to see, I want to see the future. I want to be able to see the future. And this was something that for me, all my life, I started to. Like have this internal dialogue of wanting to create the future, wanting to create the future, wanting to create the future. And the external world kept showing me things that didn't make sense, you know, things that were an unfulfilling struggle, whether it was in my parents, finances or in my own finances or struggle in terms of my. Relationships or struggle in terms of how I wanted to create a life that I designed, how I kept thinking of the how, and so my reasons started to get stronger within me. And I started doing this work on understanding what do I need to do to start cultivating a deeper, more meaningful self because I didn't know who I was. So I got married. You know, just kind of followed the pattern, went to university and did all these things, but not before I actually, so rewind maybe a little bit is I was as a young child from 16 to 19, I was very confused and that confusion, I remember being in university or sorry, in high school trying hard to be liked by everybody. And. Having all the great grades and still feeling lost, still feeling unsatisfied. I remember like, you know, coming home and, you know, the struggle with money was always something that was on the. It was on the, in the, in the area, in the space, and it frustrated the heck out of me. It frustrated the heck out of me, and this like scarcity mentality, this, this poverty mentality, right? It was so frustrating. Although there was abundance of love and abundant, the conversation from the mind was always a one of poverty. The conversation of the heart was like love and abundance and joy and happiness. And I didn't understand why there was so much of a separation. I didn't understand why this, like this unseen philosophy was so much. And I realized that this was something that I didn't want to, I didn't want to live like this. I was going to do anything. I remember at the age of 16 to find wealth. And so what did I start doing? I started selling drugs, like taking an outlet to sell drugs, to make. Money and then eventually getting addicted to those drugs and becoming a crack addict. And this something was like, this is something that really put me into the lowest of the lowest because I was three years, you know, really a zombie living zombie. And I remember the last time my father asked me to go to rehab. He asked me not to do it for him or for me, but do it for my future self. And it was like my soul awoke and asked me to say, Hey, you know, like it's time for you to step up. And I think in that moment, that's where I saw a consciousness awake in me. So that's where I started to see a vision of something that's possible. And I think that many times when we get into that from unseen to, to seen, or from conscious, from unconscious to conscious. We don't even realize it. We just take more of a responsibility. We start taking more of a choice to say, I am going to take that gift of prophecy that we all have the one that I was praying for. And that gift of prophecy was something that I started to see a future version of myself when my father asked me that question. And that question started to allow me. To believe in something greater for myself, still, still not very connected to the higher self, but connected to the one that believes in myself. So at least that ego gave me conviction to say, okay, you can go in and you can start to see something better for yourself. Which I think at the end of the day, when you build that relationship with yourself and you know, people can say the ego is bad and all this stuff. The thing is, is the ego allows us to really move with certainty, really be alive in the ego is something that if you use it properly can be your servant to the higher self. So this is something that allowed me to create the resilience and the conviction to move and walk through rooms. In my case, hell, like I owned it. And that's where I started to start doing the work. So I started to, you know, go to university. I got married and I did the whole white picket fence thing and the whole thing that society had expected of me. And I, it was still unfulfilled, had all the money in the bank account. I was in, you know, from what it, what you can call the American dream or the Canadian dream, or, you know, the North American dream. You know, I was. I was okay and I was still super unhappy and unfulfilled. And so my spirit is then what it asked me to like, okay, so you have this vision. Now you see that you've stepped into that vision. You have all these things and you're still unhappy. So what are you, are you really conscious? So now I became unconsciously competent. So my essence was back. My, my masculine feminine was unhealthy. But I had a vision. And so at least I was moving forward, whether it was conscious or not, was not, was not, was, was, was in different areas and but still very siloed. Yeah. And this gave me like this gave me a. Hunger, and I'm talking hunger from a scarcity side, hunger from a place of like, I want to make it happen because I need something I need to know who I am. And so that fulfillment was lacking because I didn't know who I was or what was my reason for existence. I still didn't have a purpose. I was just making money. I was going, you know. Took the job, coming back home, spending time with my wife, going to work out, and, you know, existing in a survival way, not a thriving way, not a way that was, was hitting my, my needs of growth, my needs of contribution, which Tony Robbins talks about, you know, the six human needs. And those two needs, growth and contribution, are spiritual needs. And I realized that in that moment, I needed to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. And so I tried a number of other things where I, you know, I sold cars, I worked in the oil field, I did online coaching. And that's when I decided I would invest more into myself. And I found myself a mentor. And that mentor was a man by the name of Tony Robbins. That many people may or may not know and he allowed me to step into he gave me the permission through his energy and through his expansive energy to really expand my own energy. But it was very uncomfortable because when I was in London in 2019, Although maybe I was, I had a vision, I was a conscious creator, I was consciously, unconsciously competent. I didn't know that I was unconsciously competent because you're unconscious to the competence, right? So you didn't know how you were behaving. You didn't know how you were reacting. And for me, it was it was really challenging to, Look at all of these unconscious behaviors that I didn't even know that I didn't, you know, cause we all have lights. However, I knew that when I was at these events, I was going to play all. I was going to put all my energy, that ego, that servant, I, my higher self commanded that ego to do absolutely whatever it takes to do all the work, to be absolutely committed and consistent in when I'm at these events to absolutely go all in. And that's what I did. And I remember being moved to the front of the room from the back and That was my first event, big event with Tony and the whole event, I was just like, all energy, just full of full expression. And I remember at the end of that event, I felt for the first time, like I was worth more. Then I've ever been earthed in the war, like ever, like my worthiness went up to a whole new, whole new level. And his platinum partner program was extremely expensive for that part of me. I was like, how am I going to invest this much money, which was 85, 000 us dollars into myself. You know, am I worthy? And I remember Tony's brother put his hand on my heart, right? And he just looked into my eyes and I made the decision. I said, you know what? If I am worthy right now, then I'm never going to be worthy. And I put the down payment it was 25 K and I was freaking out the following day, like I wanted to vomit and it was like, This is a very bodily reaction. And I remember after that, spending time with another plant, her name's Nikki. That we just like run shot content meditated. And I really got myself into a space of peace and harmony and excitement to just keep creating, keep making things happen. That's when I started to embody a conscious leader, which is the third step of how you can really step into this functionality of really believing wholeheartedly in yourself as a leader, because you have the courage to lead yourself. And so this third step of being a functional conscious leader. Going from a, from an unconscious creator where you're feeling unseen to then stepping into a conscious creator and having a vision to then finally stepping into the third step of being the leader because you're embodying that vision and you're functional in your everyday and it's not in just one area of your life, but you're now utilizing it in other areas. And now you're slowly starting to pay attention to the conscious incompetence. So the things that. You're being conscious of that not maybe are things that you don't know about, but you're willing to learn. So you're being functional and you're getting this ability to move and navigate through the world in a way that allows you to see that you're always learning. So you're not actually getting any more triggered by it. In fact, you're just Doing your best and applying compassion wherever it needs. And of course, I didn't know that at the time, however, that gave me the certainty to know that I'm doing my best. And so by putting myself into this environment and regularly, you know, being able to either connect with Tony or share with him, you know, my intentions or, or, you know, generate a hog or, or build this level of confidence. I still was lacking in terms of who I believed I was the existence part. So Tony talks about three levels of mastery, the cognitive level of mastery, the emotional level of mastery, and then the physical mastery of the presence. And so what I found myself is when I went to date with destiny is like this functional conscious leader really was an unconscious leader. Because he was leading by being, he didn't, he wasn't aware of the fact that he was functionally leading. So although people looked at me and they admired me in the way that I showed up with absolute conviction or, or like needing to be dark and egoic when I needed to be to make things happen in business and things like that. There were also the opposite where people were repelled by me because of that fact and I didn't care. I didn't care. And so that's part of the beautiful process of that balance because when, you know, when you're living in your fullness, you know that you can't satisfy or please everybody and that's fine. Right. As long as it's coming from the right intention, people's triggers and story is their story and you can't do anything. You got to be full to yourself. And my struggle brother was that I started to see that I was, people were telling me, Oh, you're intimidating. Intense or you're aggressive, things like this. And I started taking it in, like, like there was something wrong with me. So I wanted to soften because I was still, I was very forceful. So I was very like, ah, you know in anything. So like, we would have a conversation like this and I would tell you like, you know, like we can be doing this, we can be doing this, we can be doing this, we can, we need to go like this. Like, I couldn't be in a state of peace. So it was like, I was forcing a lot of my energy. Yeah, people sense that because I was still, I was still finding who I was. I still didn't know. So I was very Forceful and I was also twice my size. So like my body was like very big and massive I was a huge man like full of muscle and not not like healthy. I was taking steroids. Like I was not. It was very like it was showing up again. The other, the unhealthy masculine was showing up in a very unhealthy way, of course, right? Because it was trying to find. So I was extremely, you know, although people saw me as a leader from the perception, the unconscious leader. The leader was actually inside very hurt and not understood and because I didn't understand him So he was putting on this mask this huge mask this like yeah and I needed to work on that and I needed to learn to listen. And so by learning to listen, being at these events with Tony, I was like taking in the knowledge, the cognitive awareness, because there was no man in this world. There was no man in this world that I admired more, except my father, of course, my father, my father, however, when it comes to business and like the impact out into the world, it was Tony that was kind of the role model. My father was, has been my role model of my internal journey. You know, of how to be, how to be a better man and like taking care of my sisters and Tony has been my role model of how to show up in a, in a more embodied fashion. So that's what I needed because I had such a strong ego. I had such a big ego, right? So I needed him and his. Presence and his ego, right? Because he's using his ego as a way of attracting men like I, like I was, and once you get in with Tony, then, then you see his softness and his kindness and his sweetness, and he can then really like work with you because there's a huge need for. You know, for that essence, especially for men like me, I would have never been able to resonate with him. If he wasn't showing up in his power, he wasn't showing up in that space. Right. So it was very well worth it for me because. I could then see like, oh, okay, I have this grace within me and that visual is what I need to see to resonate. And then once I got closer, I could tap into the softness. And so that's what really then started to help me learn about the ancient wisdom that, you know, that Tony stands on, you know, because Tony stands on thousands of years of historic wisdom that many people don't know, but a lot of people think that it's all his work. Thing is, is that Tony has used his own journey and he stands on the wisdom of thousands of years of ancient philosophy and awareness and contribution from the giants before him. Which is what, what makes him a great giant, which is what, you know, what I needed to understand, because I thought at first, of course, this is all Tony's work, but then when I started doing a lot of deeper work after Tony, I started to learn about the ancient philosophies of these premises, and so I started to read more, and I started to learn more, and I started to listen more, and like, Tony was the breakthrough that I needed to learn into everything else past that. And this is what started to help me philosophize. Okay. Now I need to find that identity within myself and that foundation of awakening that conscious leader actually turned into a functional influence, not, not an influence, an influence, big difference. Because that influence actually helped me help me step in to where influencers were actually coming to me to. For certainty for how can they communicate better for a compass for guidance. And this need for me to go inside was deeper now that I was getting all of this approach from the outside world, because I was feeling like an imposter. And so this influence, this conscious entrepreneur was again, extremely unconscious because of the blind spots, right? I'm really, I'm reaching a new level of competence. And this response now to the world, I felt like a complete imposter. I didn't know what I didn't know. And I was like, okay, why am I attracting all of this from the inside? When I'm like. Still not fully embodied. I wasn't, you know, I was still figuring it out in when I went to the jungle and I felt and I spent time with indigenous leaders and I spent time in Ecuador and Costa Rica and Mexico and Brazil in Spain, I learned a lot of wisdom of the identity that we all inherently have. It's about actually letting go of all of the masks. It's about letting go of all of the stories. It's about letting go of all of the facade or the pleasing, and really having discernment onto who we are as individuals. And also as a collective and then taking these ancient philosophies of from the books and from Tony and from the medicine from the indigenous and really bringing them into my own spirit, into my own value, into my own experience, into my own certainty so that I could really bridge that influence. Into consciousness into my own consciousness, and so that started to help cultivate a story of how now I wanted to show up because before it was all about Eric balance. Now it's all about balance media ventures, right? So there's a different way. Where it was about, Hey, look at me what I'm doing now. It's about, Hey, what are we doing? How are we redefining culture? How are we working together? What do we need to do? It's not about Eric. It's about the collective. However, I needed to have that experience of that. It's about Eric to find out who Eric is. So the process, you know, it went from egoic to ethno to world to spirit centric. And that creator philosophy transitioned from going from the unconscious creator to feeling unseen, going to the conscious creator, having that vision and that clarity to stepping into a conscious leader and functional. Then finally recognizing that we're conscious entrepreneurs and being of influence and then finally recognizing after building balance media ventures really being consistent with the resilient minds podcast working with different clients organizations focusing on culture and cultivating my my presence as I've traveled the world and building community being now a conscious integrator. An unstoppable force for good, an unstoppable power for something greater than ourselves. So that becomes, when a conscious integrator goes and becomes unstoppable. It's about actually now, how can we work together? What does that look like in your business, in my business, how can we build, how can we utilize this evolutionary psychology to really manifest the teal management theory that has been self sustaining for billions of years? And we know this. Now we just need to implement. Yeah. And this is beautiful because, you know, Patagonia, for example, is one of these organizations that really focuses on impact, you know, or a local foundation. Yeah. You know, these are, these are, these are Organizations that really focus on making things happen, utilizing their profits still to be profitable and good for everybody to win. And then also implementing those profitabilities into community development, into people, into education, into you know, ultimately into regeneration. And that is the responsibility that we have as a collective. And that's how we integrate consciously and become unstoppable. Because now, when you're in that state, you take the revival from the unseen. Individual, you step in to the vision of your exposure of your essence, my apologies, the vision of your essence to then be the functional exposure to stand out there and then you influence the community so that as a result, you can work towards that shared purpose and integrate that all together. You're welcome. And for me, that's been the presence, the foundations. Those really have been the foundations of awakening of my journey. So that I could really start to appreciate and understand that there's different communities from Ibiza, from Tulum, from Brazil, from New Zealand, from Dubai, from London, from Turkey, from Greece, from New Zealand, from here in Australia. And I've started to put together and weaving together the masculine feminine energies that are focusing on making. Our responsibility of the conscious collective, a physical embodiment of what we truly believe. Because if we believe in the one collective wisdom, we now have a gift that we get to now work together and making that come to fruition. Yeah. And the fascinating thing, my brother, is that lots of people say that they believe that say that, yes, it says when it comes to taking actual action or to get to talk about the numbers. To focus on really being very detail oriented on how those solutions are come to life, they run away, they don't take responsibility because they have money traumas, or they have finance traumas, and they're not willing to do the work to really implement the projects, or they're not willing to, they want it to be easy, and sometimes ease and grace comes with focus and determination. You know, I

Brian Berneman: 37:59

love that you're sharing like, well, first

Eric Balance: 38:01

of

Brian Berneman: 38:01

all, thank you for sharing all of that. And your, your story one of the, the biggest things that I shared a lot with my students, but with everything that I do work wise is, you know, that taking responsibility and to do the work because we don't know what we don't know. Every time that I keep on getting, you know, like people or businesses asking me the, the, you know, like, tell me what to do. And I'm like, okay, like the, what to do, where does that come from? As you're saying, you know, like that we're doing a lot of things that are super unconscious with all of the limiting beliefs within a system that doesn't work for us or for the system itself, like

Eric Balance: 38:49

how

Brian Berneman: 38:50

to be able to integrate as you were just saying, to integrate. The, the beauty and the wisdom of our being into business, into the systems, into a collaborative regenerative principle that allows us to be our unique self, our unique, original, beautiful being. In the collective, within the spectrum of all this dynamic energy that allows you to be your unique self, allows me to be my unique self, allows all of us to do that, and as you're saying, like Bringing all of that together, and we do that by developing initially that relationship with ourselves, because most of us, we didn't grow up with that. Like, I'm so fortunate that I was able to, to have that from a young age, but most of the people that I, that I talked to, I, you know, like, they weren't introduced to ways of seeing themselves. And to experience themselves, and if they weren't, you know, like, fortunate to put themselves on the path like you did with Tony Robbins, to find someone that can, you know, see you, meet you where you are, and understand, okay, this is the way. That, you know, you need that this moment, and then you start to develop, and then you start to unravel and take up all of, and take off all of those masks and to, to fully show up. And that is, you know, like, that's a path. And that's one of the things that I keep on telling people, you know, how do we change all of these businesses? Well, we change ourselves and we change the people and we change consciousness and we change the systems within which. We work and we stop working in those systems if we want to change them in a sense as, you know, like collaborations, community coming together instead of perpetuating this unconscious competition that is just for someone, not for the collective. And I would love to know, Eric, you know, like as you're working with this integration parts now, how, like, what do you see? That is mostly happening now in the world, because the world is changing a lot. There's a lot more people waking up and trying to do things differently. What are you seeing in this space of, of community, of collaborations?

Eric Balance: 41:31

So I see that there's still a lot of money trauma, tons. And, you know this, this woke world or the wokeness, wherever, you know I've heard or I've, I've, you know, attracted, you know, these great creators are becoming, they're like super creative and they want to make the right things happen. And they're like, Oh, I just want to flow and I just want to like make it happen. And it's just like, like, it's going to be amazing. And then. When it's time to be really focused or grounded, they, or like direct and, and, and certain they can't handle it or they, they, because they, they don't feel comfortable in their darkness. So they don't know that it's still okay to be strong and that you don't need to you know, be, it's, it doesn't mean that I'm not loving light because I want like direction and focus and integration. Or that I need this to be a process and not just like you know, Oh, just get this done. And that's just not how. It works because there's a lot, if there's more, the more people that are involved in any project, the more process oriented, it needs to be and the finance, the numbers, it needs to make sense. And if, if, if people are getting triggered because they have, it costs money or because it's expensive or because the project, you know, and they think that these, you see, money is not a negative thing. It's the way that you perceive money, right? It just magnifies who you are and okay, you know, the societal system has created that. It came from humans. I understand it's created by man and it was made. It's a form of exchange. It's a form of barter, right? And maybe it's worthless and maybe the money system will change at some point. Right now, yeah. I don't want to think about what I'm going to use in the future to exchange value with you because you believe that the current system is flawed. I want to focus on being very grounded in the present moment because I have a team that I need to support. I have bills that I need to pay and I want to make things real now. I don't want to assume that something's going to shift into the future because those are one of the things is if we continue to make assumptions, that's going to, it's, it's an agreement that we take away from ourselves. If we, you know, Don Miguel Ruiz, don't make assumptions, you know, like, keep your word. I forget the other two off the top of my head. But nonetheless, the point is, you know, this is something that gives us. A responsibility, you know, if, if we are not willing to be so specific in the details, but just in the big picture, then it's going to be very hard. There has to be that, that, that, that balance. And so I see people that maybe are coming to work. My, my is like, how can you get more into the integration phase? How can you get more into using this love and light in a way that, yes, your heart shows up in that capacity with conviction, with certainty, and you're grounded, you're making things happen in the right way, in the kind way. But it doesn't mean that you just bend over and let everybody like take advantage of you. It just, that's just doesn't work for me. I choose to create boundaries. Around those people because Yeah. It's just, it's, it's a healthier way to live in my perspective. Yeah.

Brian Berneman: 45:49

One of the things, you know, that as I hear you shared that one of the, the things with a lot of people that I work with, they, they are so focused on that possible future Mm-Hmm. that A, they are not present and grounded at all, and b. There's no realization, you know, as you're saying, one of those places that. Are the blind spots there, you know, like I, I work a lot with, with trauma. I often say to people like, Oh, good. You know, like setting the intention for how you want to be in the future, but you're carving this backpack until you take off that backpack. You're still going to carry it. You know, like how can we open ourselves to a different future if we are not facing what is now to be able to, to see, as you're saying this. This balance and, and this integration of, you know, like, yes you know, like there's things in the system that aren't working and potentially will change how, when, I don't know, what can I do with what is there now in a way that aligns with what I want to do. With

Eric Balance: 47:07

my building. Yes. Because you see, if you're fighting what's already there, like Socrates said it, right? It's not about fighting the old school building new. So if you're constantly focused on the bullshit of, of, of like the stories of what you don't like with the old system, then go out there and build something new using. The resources you have, and if you are around a collaborative environment where people want to exchange energy in terms of sweat equity and benefit on the back end, and it's a win win win situation, that's great. However, if you're asking somebody to give, deliver you a service on the hopes that something will benefit on the back end, and they are not in agree, but they have a lot of expenses to pay. It just doesn't work. People, people are not understanding that sweat equity is beautiful when it's a contribution and everybody's working together. There's also expenses that need to be delivered that people need to pay for and that things that are like, it's very real. People need to still take care of their families. They still need to like. And so if, if somebody wants my advice, I'll give it to you for free, but if you want my advice and then you still want me to like implement things and do things and like, to me, it's like it feels, it feels very unconscious and traumatic because people are wearing that backpack and then they're not thinking of like, maybe the 10, 12 other families that. There, there's a wage that needs to go, there's a payment and it's like where's the responsibility then, you know, like you're saying you want to build a community and you want to deliver value and you're starting that off with actually a scarcity mentality.

Brian Berneman: 49:07

Yeah, well, it's one of the things that I remember. But I had to change a lot of my perspective. I went it's been now quite a long time ago, it seems. But I went to live in a Buddhist retreat center in a mountain. And one of the things that I realized soon was like, Oh, well, we need to make money, you know, like as a community. To make sure that the community still stands and it was like, yes, inside of the community, we do everything free, in a sense, like no money was exchanged within the community. We're exchanging time, wisdom energy. But to make sure that we operate as a community, we need to make money. So, you know, like we're running retreats, we are running workshops, we are running programs, we are hosting this and that other event so that, you know, like money comes in. And yes, we are doing it in a way that aligns with the principles, that aligns with the way that we want to do things, being grounded with the fact that This is the system, and we need that money, and we need, you know, like, all of the bills to be paid, and we need all of the people there to have food, to have electricity, to have internet. When, when we're able to, to bring that balance, and, and, you know, like, it's, it's one of the things that one time one of my teachers told me that a lot of the spiritual community is living, you know, like, up there. We still need to live in here. It's, it's that balance, that integration of things. It's not that, you know, as you were saying, that, that light and love and that energy from what we would call perhaps spiritual, that we need to stop that to be grounded or we need to stop being grounded, like, and stopping that. How would we bring it all together? And I think that's such a, you know, like a beautiful message for all of us to, to keep on remembering all of the time.

Eric Balance: 51:14

And this is what I call business nirvana for me. This is once you become that conscious integrator in the conscious entrepreneur, you create business nirvana because you've now cultivated a way of really building a predictable recurring revenue model. That is focused on your passion, your purpose, so that you can start to really attract all of the community that you're destined to serve for a greater mission. And as a result, you're living your life and you're doing all the things that you love. And we can all do this, all of us. Beautiful.

Brian Berneman: 51:55

Ericka, I want to honor your time, so I just have one last big question for you for everybody that is watching and listening to us. What is one message that is alive now that you'd like to share with everyone? Trust in yourself.

Eric Balance: 52:11

All you need is yourself to trust. There's this ancient saying that once you realize the most ancient secret of the world, you'll realize that you're actually here alone. And when you trust yourself. You can create anything. We had a fun. We had a fun.

Brian Berneman: 52:38

Thank you, Eric, so much for, for taking the time for sharing your story for sharing your, you know, your now more integrative aspect of your journey. If people resonate and want to check out more of what you're doing, where can they find you?

Eric Balance: 52:59

So checking out, I have a few different masterclasses. So I have a conscious entrepreneurship dot online, where you can check out the conscious entrepreneurship masterclass. It really helps you cultivate a meaningful message around impact. And we also have a scale, your summit masterclass. So if you're into events and you want support on how to create better events, empowered events, utilize your message towards the event space. Then that masterclass is on balance media dot ventures and we're also rolling out a couple of different conscious cashflow accelerator courses business Nirvana page for, of course, for people that, you know, are already making 10 K and want to be making over 10 K per month. And amplify your voice. So those are going to be three offers being rolled out in the new year. Because I'm leaving to India next month to work in a village where we're working on developing the town and really helping children to step into a space where they are mentored and excited. And empowered to know that their thoughts can become things and can do it in a very grounded way.

Brian Berneman: 54:17

Awesome. Thank you so much, Eric, for sharing that for everybody listening. Go and check out those, those links. I'll put them on the show notes that it's easy for, for you to check it out. As always, if anything resonated with you or anything that you heard from this conversation was interesting, leave us a message, keep the conversation going. And, you know, thank you for being there. And once again, Eric, thank you so much for, for sharing this, this time with us.

Eric Balance: 54:46

Thank you, my brother. I just want to acknowledge you two for making and putting this all together. I know what it takes. And I know, you know, the heart and spirit that it takes to really cultivate this. So thank you for what you're up to.

Brian Berneman: 54:58

Thank you. Thank you. And thank you everybody for listening. And we'll see you all on the next episode.

Eric Balance: 55:03

Bye. What did you like the most about this episode? Take a moment to think about what change you can make in your life today.

Brian Berneman: 55:11

Share your conscious action on social media using hashtag conscious action and tagging at conscious action and said so we can celebrate your Impact on the world and create

Eric Balance: 55:21

a ripple

Brian Berneman: 55:21

effect

Eric Balance: 55:22

one easy action We would love for you to take right now is to share like and subscribe to this podcast This will help us get these messages out into the world and inspire more people to take conscious action in their own lives contributing to the better world we hope for