How To Digitally Detox for a Healthier Life with Daniel Sih

In today's episode I'm visiting with Daniel Sih. In part 1 of our conversation, we'll discuss my standard 3 questions and Daniel has some great insights about how to prioritize and establish new habits.

Daniel is an award-winning author, TEDx speaker and productivity expert with 20 years experience working in senior leadership and strategic consulting roles across Australia and the UK. 

His first book, “Spacemaker” won the American Axiom Business Book Award in 2023 for Work-Life Balance / Time Prioritisation, an Australian Business Book Award in 2021 for Personal Development, and several niche book awards. His newest book, “Raising Tech-Healthy Humans” is a best-selling parenting book to help parents reset their children’s tech-habits and give them a great start to life. 

Daniel is an accredited CliftonStrengths® Top 5 and Team coach with the South Pacific Strengths Network, and co-creator of Email Ninja eLearning®.

As a trainer, coach and keynote speaker, Daniel has worked with CEO’s, executives, and other senior professionals throughout Australia and beyond, ranging from global corporations and businesses to universities and non-profits. He has a broad professional history, including leadership roles in physiotherapy, health management, Christian ministry, and project management. 

Daniel has 3 children, 14 chickens and is the CEO of Spacemakers in Australia and Canada.

Connect with Daniel and find his blog and other resources at https://spacemakers.com.au/

DoTERRA Wellness Advocate
At Wholistic Natural Health Australia, we often recommend the use of high quality essential oils.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Transcript

Magic Barclay: 0:59

welcome back to a Magical Life. I'm your host Magic Barklay, and today I'm joined by Daniel C. Daniel is the co-founder of Space Makers, A productivity consulting group for busy leaders is Books Spacemaker. Actually in my hand at the moment is, uh, a book about how to unplug, unwind, and think clearly in the digital age. And it won the Australian Business Book Award in 2021 for personal development. And he was a finalist for the best technology book and best cover design as a trainer, coach, and keynote speaker. Daniel has worked with CEOs. Executives and other senior professionals throughout Australia and beyond. He is the creator of Best Selling Productivity courses such as Email Ninja. List assassin, priority Samurai, and making space with more than 20,000 students online and offline. Daniel has a broad professional history, which includes leadership roles in physiotherapy, health management, product management, and Christian ministry. Daniel lives in Tasmania, Australia with his wife Kylie and her three children, Naomi, Caleb, and Jethro. He also keeps 14 purebred chickens who eat a lot of grain and lay too few eggs. Welcome Daniel.

Daniel Sih: 2:29

Hi. Thank you. Magic. It's great to be here.

Magic Barclay: 2:33

It's great to have you here, and I love that you keep these. Girls, even though they're not producing many

Daniel Sih: 2:39

eggs. Yeah. Although one's called Dave because the, uh, the kid saw that she had a mullet, uh, is this kind of defect on the back of the chicken's neck, and they decided to call her Dave. So, uh, we have one cho called Dave and the rest are females.

Magic Barclay: 2:55

I love that. And for the, uh, overseas listeners, a mullet is kind of a short do on top. Lengthy at the back, very eighties, very, um, Aussie bogan, I guess you could say it from back in the day.

Daniel Sih: 3:10

Although it's popular with footballers nowadays, and apparently popular with one of my chickens.

Magic Barclay: 3:14

Well, it's all coming back. And Dave, the chicken is sporting a mullet. Love that. Now before we get into it, I was just saying to you off air, you know, I actually have this book in my hand and I have really enjoyed reading it. So I know that we are going to get so much from this interview. I'm going to preempt it and say we'll do two interviews. So listeners, this is a two part episode. You are going to get so much outta this, and I'm not blowing smoke here for Daniel. It's very rare that I actually read a book that gets sent to me by one of my guests because normally they're sent online. Daniel actually sent this to me in the mail, and so I actually read it and I love everything about it. So listeners, I can't wait to unpack this for you. Daniel, let's get straight into it. I always ask my listeners the same three questions, and everyone gives me such amazing different answers that I can't wait to hear yours. So here's the first one. What can your expertise do to accelerate health, not just physical, but also emotional and spiritual health?

Daniel Sih: 4:30

Yeah, that's a great question. I used to be a physiotherapist, so I do have a health background and now I work with productivity, so it's a different type of health. It's helping people make space to think deeply and rest fully, and reconnect with people away from a screen. Uh, you know, I suppose mental space as well as physical space in their lives, and yeah, so, so that's what I do. I, I, I can help people to make space in the clutter of everyday life and to put the things in that matter most, because I think essentially health is about prioritizing the stuff that matters most and trusting that the rest will somehow work itself out.

Magic Barclay: 5:09

So, without getting too far down this rabbit hole, because we are going to talk about the book in depth in our next episode, but what are some ways that people can prioritize things for their health? Some easy ways that don't require, you know, such an overhaul or a huge change, cuz we know that. Massive changes. As health practitioners, we see that they don't always stick. So what are some incremental things that you suggest?

Daniel Sih: 5:39

Yeah, I mean, it's, it's the same if it's productivity or if it's physical health. Uh, it's the same practices, isn't it? It's starting with one small step and making a small change. I mean, I do really like. The work of James Clear in terms of how to habit stack. So the idea that, you know, pick a habit. Let's say you wanna learn to floss your teeth. Well, obviously it makes sense to, to try to put the floss next to you and floss after you've cleaned your teeth. But, you know, if you want to create other habits, like, I don't know, do 20 pushups, well then what if you were to do 20 pushups after you'd clean your teeth? So you, you stack one habit on another habit. whatever change you wanna make, I think it is. as simple and as complicated as working out what you want to see changed, what might be, uh, one small actionable habit that you could do regularly that would logically lead you towards that outcome. And then trying to work out how you can with minimal amount of effort, either change your environment or change your patterns to include that habit in your day-to-day activities. Does that make sense?

Magic Barclay: 6:40

That totally makes sense and, and thank you for that. And we talk about wealth here, so people think that's just financial wealth, but you know, we look more at personal and emotional wealth here as well. Cause you can't really have one without the other. Mm-hmm. So what are your top three tips to creating wealth?

Daniel Sih: 7:01

Oh, wow. That's a great question. I think you have to know what wealth you're aiming for. Firstly, I'd love to answer by saying these are the top three things I'll do, but interestingly, even in my life, I've changed my focus over time. you mind if I explain a framework that I use? Please do. Yeah. Okay. So I, I, I like looking at wealth from a holistic perspective using five capital. So realizing that actually, you know, we don't just have to grow our financial capital, we actually need to grow our relational capital, our intellectual capital, so that's knowledge, our physical capital. So that's time and energy and physical health, our spiritual capital, our wisdom and spirituality, and obviously our financial one. And so what I tend to do, even every year, I tend to do an exercise where I map out what my portfolio is. So, uh, let's say I had 17 gold bars and they represented all of my capacity or my capital across work and life. I tend to, to put those bars against those five capitals and think, you know, how much financial do I have, intellectual, spiritual, relational, and, and physical capital. And I look at what I, my portfolio is now, and then I work out which direction I'm heading with each one. So, I then look at if I got 17 more gold bars in the next year, where would I distribute them if I had the type of balanced and holistic life that I would like to live? And then it's pretty obvious to know which of the areas where I need to grow in and which of the areas where I need to maybe reduce my activity and effort in. And then work out what are the habits I need to do to shift my capital base from one point to the next. So I mean, I'm, I'm a structured person, so, uh, that's a way in which I do it. But to answer your question, I, the top three will depend on which areas of growth I feel I need to balance or rebalance for the next season. And obviously I'll put more investment. In that area, whether it be growing my mind, so reading more and doing more study, uh, growing my physical health, you know, doing more physical activity and or my relational health, you know, spending more time having beer at the pub with my friends or investing in walking with my kids, that kind of stuff. So it depends on my season of life.

Magic Barclay: 9:07

I think that's a great answer and you know, our season of life does change quite regularly, so sticking to one thing just won't work the whole time. So I really do love your answer. Now we do talk about weight loss here, and many people struggle with their weight, whether it's a stress based. Consideration or whether it's a physical thing to do a diet, exercise or illness. So have you ever battled your weight? What was the trigger to lose it, and what can you offer the listeners to win that battle?

Daniel Sih: 9:45

Yeah, look, so I'm not an expert in weight loss. I'll, I'll be straight out there. If anything, I struggle with weight gain. I've always wanted to increase my weight and so I'm, I have a different metabolism. Uh, and it's not that I exercise too much. I, I tried once eating a whole lot of bad food to try to increase my weight, and it just gave me a little podgy stomach, but I still didn't increase my weight. So I am lucky in that sense. Uh, however, what I've experienced in terms of health generally related to physicality, Is that in my life I've realized that the mind shift and the identity that that I have around my health has really impacted the habits that I can live out. And I would imagine that that's similar, whether or not you're trying to lose weight. Or gain weight. I used to have chronic pain in terms of neck pain. And my, uh, my father has ankylosing spondylitis, which is a genetic back disease. Uh, it's the one that the hunchback of Notre Dame had where his spine got fused up and there was lots of inflammation. And I have the same genes. And for many, many years I had regular chronic pain and. Was on Celebrex and anti-inflammatories. this might be a strange story, but I, I ended up having, uh, a, a bunch of people pray for me and, and it was like a spiritual experience. And, uh, there was this kind of image I saw and, and I saw like these dark clouds, and then the clouds moved and there was like blue sky behind it, and then it closed. Like just, I suppose just a picture in my mind. And I just had this real sense that. I'd always seen myself as an unhealthy person and I was, I'd almost been grown up expecting to have this pain cuz of my father and I had that expectation, and yet the sense I had was that actually behind those gray clouds, I'm actually a healthy person. And, and for some reason that that spiritual experience shifted my identity and instead of seeing myself as a sick person, I. I realized I was a healthy person and I was actually strong and not weak. And that totally changed my mindset. And then somehow that changed my habits, uh, and I got off Celebrex. I exercised in a different way, and I just know that I'm not a sick person. And somehow my immune system changed. So I can't explain that. Uh, that's only my personal story, but somehow my change in identity has. Helped me to shift how strong I am physically, and I suspect that works in different areas of weight and health. Y you will know more about it than I will.

Magic Barclay: 12:15

Totally, and, and you've hit the nail on the head there. When we identify as fat or skinny or unwell, or in pain, then our body hears that and our body actually makes that happen because it says, well, that's how you feel safe. By having this label. So it's all about safety. Every system of the body wants you to be safe, and when you label yourself, it sees that as a safety mechanism. So definitely, I love your story, and I think the listeners really do need to look at how they label themselves. I'm not saying that we've all brought our own issues on ourselves. That's not what I'm saying at all. I. But be careful of what you tell your mind. Mm-hmm. Cause it will enlist all the other systems of the body to make it so.

Daniel Sih: 13:11

That's really interesting. Oh, I remember as a physiotherapist working with people with chronic pain, again, it is often the stories that people have told themselves and the labels that they've given themselves that lead to degenerative behaviors. And we would often encourage people to say, for example, that I'm doing pain today rather than I have chronic pain. so it's, dissociating yourself. From your identity, like your feelings and experiences from who you are as a person, uh, just like as a child, you know, with the shame, resilience stuff that Bene Brown does that you, you generally wouldn't want to tell your kids that you're a bad person, but that was actually, not an okay behavior and to separate that. And I think that that makes sense from what I understand in other areas of life and productivity.

Magic Barclay: 13:57

Exactly. Now look, Daniel, we love freebies here. What can you offer the listeners as a freebie and where can they find that?

Daniel Sih: 14:06

I'm at space makers.com au. That's my website, and there's a bunch of stuff there. in terms of free freebies, I mean, read my blog. There's lots of stuff in my blog about personal development, about habit change, about grief, about loss, about life. yeah, if you're interested, read my blog and sign up. That's one of the things you can get for free.

Magic Barclay: 14:25

Terrific. Listeners, this was your episode two 10 and in two 11, Daniel rejoin us because this book needs to be delved into. I can't wait to bring you some information from the Fantastic Books, space Makers Daniel, thanks for joining us in this episode. No

Daniel Sih: 14:45

problems. Thanks.

Magic Barclay: 14:46

Magic and listeners, thank you for your time. Go forth and create your magical life.