So welcome to the final episode of 2021 from the High Performance Podcast and it's going to be a little bit different today because Damien and myself are going to be having a conversation with the host of the Happy Place Podcast Ferncauton.

Fern and I go back a long way we worked on kids TV over 20 years ago since then she's gone on to create an incredible platform and a community where it's really asking questions and really challenging people to think about life in a slightly different way.

And the plan for the next hour or so is to share with her some clips from High Performance and for her to share some clips from Happy Place and I think it's going to be really interesting Damien just doing an episode of High Performance like we have never done before in the two years that we've been going.

Yeah I think what Fern talks about in terms of people finding happiness is our equivalent of people talking about finding high performance, finding that joy in the moment and pursuing a life on your terms.

So I love listening to Fern's podcast and I'm really excited to spend some time hearing her explain the impacts of it.

Brilliant this special episode of High Performance which you can find both on the High Performance Podcast and you can also listen to it on Happy Place as well comes next.

This is now verticement from BetterHelp Therapy Online. Now one of the things that we are desperate to do here on the High Performance Podcast is drive real change when it comes to people seeking therapy looking for support.

Let me be totally clear at the start of this okay I have been in therapy I've had help and I would recommend it wholeheartedly.

Why do we spend hours in the gym working on our bodies but no time in therapy working on our minds. Why do we have to think that for some reason a conversation about mental health or mental struggles means that we're broken or that we're damaged or that in some way we're weak it's the total opposite.

Like human beings are complex creatures the world is a complex and challenging place to navigate and I know that when it comes to mental health we can only do the work ourselves right but why should we do that on our own you need support you need help with a mark Cavendish Max Whitlock Tyson Fury Danny Sipriani Johnny Wilkinson

Owen O'Kane they've all sat on this podcast and spoken about the power of therapy and the challenges of mental health and with over 1000 therapists in the UK already better help can provide access to licensed professionals with a really wide variety of expertise in mental health as well as that listeners to this podcast get 10% of their first month at betterhelp.com slash performance that's better help H.E.LP.

Can I just talk to you very quickly about Slack they're partnering with us on today's high performance podcasts but actually they partner with us at high performance every single day of the week so the way this podcast works is we've now got seven or eight people in the team and we are based all over the UK.

So how can we be based everywhere and still collaborate in a way that we always used to well the high performance team you slack and we love it it means that we can collaborate with each other we can collaborate with the companies that we can do.

We're working with Slack's channels allow us to stay organized to keep our conversations focused to store all of our essential files in one place it also allows us to share creative ideas for the podcast and then easily search for them so I want you to look at Slack as your digital HQ Slack is one digital space for organized and efficient work where you can bring your teams your partners your tools together in power flexibility.

Automate workflows accelerate your projects forward faster I think it's a really smart and brilliant way to work and I think it's where the future works so if you want to know more if you're interested to work in a way that we do behind the scenes on the high performance podcast then check out one of our partners Slack.com forward slash dhq that's slack.com forward slash dhq

Hey fun. Oh, J.K. Damien, what a joy this is. You know what this is the part with my eyes the perfect way to win 2021 I haven't seen enough of you anyway in the last of years with the pandemic so it's nice to get together.

You did get to my house this year which was so lovely to have you drinking tea in the kitchen that was a joy and I agree look I don't like New Year's Eve party so this is my kind of thing having a chat and then having a little nap afterwards wonderful nice what you like on New Year's Eve Damien.

Exactly like for number early early to bed and wake up the next morning feeling fresh love it now I guess there's some people thinking what is going on here why are happy place and high performance talking to each other why I have to very very different world maybe slightly different world collided.

We just thought this was a good idea didn't we fern to get together and talk about the work each other have done and introduce audience to ours and our audience deals.

Yeah I think although sometimes sort of thematically our work might be different there's so much crossover although you might be talking to not always but often sports personalities and I might be talking to you could be a Buddhist month one week and then someone the public either next we're actually talking we're coming from the same place we want to understand people better we want to you know get under the layers of of someone's life to see what's really lurking and to have a greater understanding of it to learn that's that's where I think we're both coming together.

So it makes a lot of sense for us to delve into each other's archives of the last 12 months and see what we've been up to and and just have a nice chat about it.

Yeah I think what you do brilliantly fern if you can jump in there is that it's a message Jake and I often talk about that we don't interview sports people we interview people that sometimes working sport and I think that's a lovely one that you you managed to peel back those layers and regardless of the industry you tell us about the person and the challenges that they're doing so much.

...