The Small Business Saturdays Podcast with Aaron Montgomery · Aaron Montgomery

The Power of Now

·45 min·2 clips

Making the exhale longer than the inhale 'flips the toggle' on fight or flight and brings you back to the present.

1. Small Business Saturdays' 'The Power of Now' runs about 45 minutes and applies Jack Canfield's six tips for staying present to running a small business. 2. Host Aaron Montgomery, who calls Canfield 'my mentor' and directs listeners to rsuccessgroup.com, runs the episode as a live broadcast with commenters Tanya, James, Wendy, Kyleen and Eric Campbell. 3. Aaron's thesis is that the brain works as a 'prediction machine' built for avoiding saber-tooth tigers, and that returning to the present raises productivity and a sense of fulfillment. 4. Canfield's roughly five-minute video says 'the present moment is truly all we ever are able to experience' and recommends an alarm every 30 minutes, five deep breaths to a slow count of six, and meditation from 3 to 20 minutes. 5. Aaron describes a mirror routine with a post-it note, in which he tells himself he loves himself and reviews the day's achievements so the brain processes the night differently than if he were 'beating yourself up.' 6. On breathing, he says a longer exhale 'flips the toggle' on fight or flight, because shallow breaths keep the predictive brain running hard and people cannot 'make clear, calm, correct decisions' there. 7. Aaron says he once believed he was a poor meditator because of 'shiny object syndrome,' then redefined meditation as releasing thoughts, and he now uses Zentangles, volleyball and gratitude listening, while Wendy names her garden and Eric Campbell names digitizing. 8. For body awareness he describes fasting 16 hours a day and testing whether hunger is really thirst by drinking a glass of water first. 9. James adds that planning for the future is necessary but should be shut off afterward, and Aaron frames this as a continuous cycle or 'flywheel' that stalls if someone spends too long watching TV or chit-chatting. 10. Small business owners who want practical mindset routines will get the most from it.

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