Matt Sturgess is one of the coaches that we found this month and we did a little interview with him. He impressed us with his innovation and creativity.

He was exploring his business career path through many industries following his curiosity, from Electronics Engineer to Sales and then leading businesses. Eventually he stumbled upon coaching.

He had a coaching session and fell in love with coaching. He loved the fact that he could talk about business issues with someone independent. Then, he became a coach himself.

For the past 10 years he was researching the mind, trying to find all the knowledge he could in order to create a mind “user guide”. Here is what he said.

Meet Life Coach Matt Sturgess:

Name: Matt Sturgess

Pillar: The Mind

Who is this coach for: Anyone who wants to be able to stop overwhelming thoughts so they become focused, highly productive and motivated. He is also able to help people overcome past trauma using his Unconditional Love technique from his book “Nuclear Powered Resilience”.

How they can help: Through coaching, online training courses, 121 online support and his books. He can also be booked for speaking and workshops.

First of all, how are you and your family doing in these Pandemic times?

It has been an interesting time, we used the various lockdowns to really enjoy nature. We took the view of accepting it was happening and we had no control over it, so we looked to see how we could make the best of it.

Before the pandemic my wife had a years draining treatment for cancer, during 6 months of Chemotherapy we were already used to constantly using sanitising gel.

Income security was a concern, but when the UK government announced Furlough payments that gave some reassurance.

I think the complete forced change in routine and thinking has left a big mark with lots of people, often a positive one.

Many people reconnecting with nature, family and what really matters, more than they had for a long time.

I used some of the time to write books, the first of which I finally published on Dec 23rd, my book is called “Nuclear Powered Resilience” which shares a simple technique to help people develop a deep level of resilience using conditional love and the fact that the unconscious mind behaves the same way to real or imagined events.

This technique can also help people overcome trauma’s without the need to “examine” the trauma in any way. Very powerful, I will share more later.

How does the coronavirus pandemic affect your clients? Did it affect you at all?

It has created more need for support and greater awareness of the importance of mental wellbeing.

It has also helped people be more open to ideas they may have rejected in the past.

People are more conscious of striving for happiness now, which is something my techniques help people achieve at a core level.

What are the biggest lessons that you learned in this pandemic?

I was already fortunate enough to really value my immediate family and I had a healthy relationship with nature.

The pandemic taught me how important it is for our wellbeing to be regularly out in nature, it’s a key part of being human.

My wife did not always enjoy nature as much as me, know she really understands the benefits of a walk and talk, especially with a flask of hot coffee to accompany us.

The Origin:

Tell us about you, your career, how you started with your coaching career?

I started life as an Electronics Engineer completing a sponsored degree.

In my first job I designed the first surround sound loudspeakers.

I got into sales in different international roles.

I always like to test and challenge myself, so I have had a career in lots of different industries. This way I got lots of learning and personal growth.

I am curious my nature, this curiosity led me to learn as much about business as possible.

I read lots of books, did a Marketing Diploma and then a Warwick University MBA, whilst holding my first role as a director.

When I became a Managing Director I joined a learning group to develop business leaders.

There I enjoyed learning from other MD’s and CEO’s, other business experts and received coaching for the first time.

I really valued being able to talk through business issues with someone independent.

I then became a business coach myself, helping other business leaders.

For the last 10 years I have been reading about how the mind works on many levels.

My intention was to create a “user guide” for the most powerful piece of kit we have, our minds and the brain.

Our minds are capable of achieving incredible things or take us to dark places.

Without a “user guide” we have to work out for ourselves how best to use our minds.

I have developed lots of really simple useful techniques to help people manage their thoughts and emotions.

I train and coach people and enjoy speaking on many topics about the mind.

One of my speaking sessions is called: “What they should have taught you at school and did not about how the mind works and how to get the best out of it.”

What was your biggest obstacle that you had to overcome in your life that made you who you are today?

I have had to overcome many different challenges in life, but I never viewed any of these as obstacles but events that just had to be tackled with a strong sense of needing to always move forwards.

The biggest challenge I had was losing my mum to cancer within 1 week of being diagnosed for the 2nd time, when I was 17.

I was studying at the time, just under halfway through my 2 year course.

I was told other people in my circumstances often got poor exam results.

I was determined this would not be true and got an B in my Electronics A level.

I think my biggest obstacle, especially when younger, was a fear of failure which sometimes held me back from trying out different experiences and being a big worrier.

Something I learnt to manage, but now I have a good understanding of the mind I find this really easy now. I wish I had this knowledge much earlier in life.

The Coaching Style:

How do you innovate with coaching your clients?

Although I have a valuable business background, which really helps me relate to others, my focus is on helping people manage their thoughts and emotions so they are more productive, happier, more resilient and creative.

I am a great fan of thinking differently and helping my clients get new insights and what I call the “aha” moments, when something really clicks and they make a breakthrough.

Everything we ever did or will do started with a thought, so knowing how to better manage our thoughts is a core skill.

One of my innovations is to share really simple techniques to help people make the new learning I give them a habit.

This way they keep getting the benefit long after any coaching, training or speaker sessions with me.

95% of what we do in life is a habit, so its important to teach people how to implement their learning with new habits.

I call my framework ACE:

Awareness of how the mind works and new techniques.
Choices of how they can respond to situations in new ways in the future.
Embedding new habits so that they get a permanent benefit from what they learn.

Probably the biggest innovation I have is a technique where I share the power of Unconditional Love to help people build an incredible level of resilience and overcome past traumas.

I am not aware anyone else has been able to do this as I have.

What’s unique about your coaching approach?

To be honest there are a few things that come to mind!

1. Having had a varied business career, I can easily relate to the person and the business challenges they are facing.

2. I have a big tool kit of support techniques that I can suggest to help my coachees both from a business perspective and helping them manage their thoughts and emotions to become more productive, happier and more resilient.

3. Many of my mind management techniques come with a simple habit element, to make it easy to embed into everyday life, so my coachees get a permanent benefit not just a one off boost.

Some of my techniques are unique and all very simple and practical to use.

What benefits do your clients get after working with you?

The biggest benefits are that they become:

1. More productive, able to focus thinking and have clarity of thoughts.

2. Happier.

3. More resilient in a way that gets stronger over time.

4. More able to understand and manage troubling, distracting thoughts.

5. Increased self confidence.

6. More aware of what has caused them mental pain in the past and how to manage this going forwards.

Do you use any specific tools to be efficient with your clients?

I keep an eye on various bits of technology that helps me reduce my time spent on administrative, so I can spend more time with clients.

The tools I use keep changing as people bring out new apps and website based tools.

The Impact:

If you had a super megaphone that, when you speak into, the whole world will hear your message, what would you say?

Unconditional Love is the cure all for most, if not all mental anguish.

If I could bestow Unconditional Love on the world I would.

My book “Life Transforming Nuclear Powered Resilience” is all about my technique to help anyone have Unconditional Love in their life, regardless of their history up until now.

Also developed a training course to accompany the book.

We all have a deep biological need to be loved and belong to something, it’s a big part of the older parts of our brains (evolutionary speaking).

In Feb 2020 during the pandemic, a friend of mine asked for help sharing with me they had a childhood trauma that had affected them all their life and occasionally mentally took them to a dark place every few years.

During a 2 hours walk in the snow, I shared my Unconditional Love technique with them.

The next day they were in their words “transformed” like a huge heavy weight had been lifted.

They said to me “you saved me”, “you have to share this technique with others”.

My friend had spent a lot of time and money with lots of therapists over 60 years, with no real benefit.

All the techniques they had tried before required analysing their trauma, my technique does not require to talk about of discuss the trauma in any way. It’s a game changer.

What is the greatest lesson you have learned in your life?

The biggy for me was recognising most mental suffering starts with a thought and that we can control our thoughts.

I previously assumed thoughts just come and go and there is not a lot we can do about them.

I then started to realise, that too often its our thoughts that then develop into bigger “stories” in our minds.

Those stories bring discomfort, fear, worry and anxiety.

But when I started to learn how to manage and control those thoughts, using really simple but effective techniques, this was a game changer for me that I simply had to share with others.

Your final thoughts?

Everything we ever did or will do started with a thought.

Having the skill to manage our thoughts so that more of them are positive, nurturing and move us towards what makes us feel happy and fulfilled is so important.

An important skill to have.

Our thoughts turn to emotions, so managing our thoughts also helps us feel better, more often.

95% of what we do is habitual.

Once we learn how to change our thought habits, we start to automatically get the benefits we choose to have.

We in turn feel and are more in control, which is a wonderful place to be.

That’s what I help people achieve with very simple, practical techniques.

Where Can You Find Matt Sturgess?

If you liked this interview and you would love to find out how Matt can help you get rid of your mental suffering and unlaesh your mind’s full potential, go to www.mindlocksmith.com and find out what your next step is.

If you like ot connect more personally with him, you can do that through LinkedIn or by sending him an email on [email protected].

If you like to capture a glimpse of his coaching, follow his Facebook and Twitter accounts. It was an honor having this interview with him.