Beginner With a Black Belt, Chat With Ana Stevanovic

Yasi: Today I have with me, so I still try to pronounce your name, but let’s move on. So she’s originally from Serbia, graduated with a major in dentistry. And then after that she moved to Milano and then did a master degree in healthcare management. And nowadays she’s living Switzerland and works as a head of professional education in this oral care industry and at the site, she’s also a certified proctor Gallagher Institute consultant. She’s helping individuals and organizations to transform their results and not to owning that. She has also been practicing martial arts for more than 15 years. And not only that. And she also is a international bestseller book author, which is called the beginner with a black belt.

So today I have a lot of questions prepared for Anna, and I know you have a very interesting background and we’ll come to fast-track podcast. 

Ana Stevanovic: Thank you so much for having me Yasi. 

Yasi: For me, it’s so difficult to pronounce your name. So I hope some of the audience, if you speak Serbian, if you’re understand that the language excuse, my pronunciation, I’m eager to find out, you were born in serbia,, how come you have a move to Milan and you moved to Switzerland, like what drives you to have such an international personal experience? 

Ana Stevanovic: I think even when I was even when I was a student, like when I was studying dentistry, I was very active in this like European student organizations. And I used to be at some point, even a president of European dental students association.

And I traveled with them and I realized the value one has when meeting different cultures and meeting different people. And I think this really influenced me a lot. I think it really killed my career as a dentist to be very honest. And this is why I decided that it might be good to go a little bit in different direction to travel.

And yeah, basically the journey led me to Switzerland. 

Yasi: Yeah. So your study and your professional career is in, dentistry, oral care. How come you developed yourself at the side as a personal coach? What was your motivation? 

Ana Stevanovic: It’s always, whenever you do something, this is always like it’s out of some personal reason.

But nobody says, oh yeah, I want to do this just because, people do tend sometimes to try new businesses because they think, okay, new business, it’s a good opportunity. But in this case, I was first a dentist. And as a dentist I felt very much lonely in a dental office. I spoke about it in quite some podcasts, because I think there’s this moment of realizing you started something for six years and then you feel a need to, you need to do something different.

It’s very scary, but it also provides a certain amount. And then after my master’s, I landed in Switzerland, the Navy really have, I always say I have a job of my dreams. I work as a head of education and this is something I really love doing. And I think this part influenced me a lot in a sense to understand that education really drives a lot.

That education is really what changes the world. And but of course there was this coming to Switzerland. There was this moment. I don’t know actually what I’m doing and they have so many difficulties. And then I started to work on myself. I actually took my own coach basically for the same program I’m teaching now.

And I realized that this was basically the best investment I ever made. Not only money-wise, but also time-wise because it’s of course it’s time consuming working on yourself every day for six months or more. And then I decided, yeah, this is exactly what I want to be dedicating also part of my time to, and yeah, since 2000 things, 17, 18, I will be going through.

Yasi: can you tell us a little bit more about the program you did last time and the program you’re teaching now? 

Ana Stevanovic: Okay. So basically the name of the program is called thinking into results. And the deep Proctor Gallagher Institute is the founder of the program especially.

Bob Proctor the name in personal development industry. He developed this program as a kind of. After the first problem he developed was called you were born rich. And he did all this in 1989. And I have the seminar, like 13 hour seminar. That’s now in YouTube, like from 1989. And after I think, 20, 30 years of additional experience, he developed thinking into results.

And this is a program that’s now been working with people for a couple of years. And when you say, what is it helping with people? Basically everybody knows. That they can do better than they’re currently doing, but sometimes they don’t know how this makes you feel stuck, makes you feel frustrated.

And through this program, you clear this stuff up. You learn how to set a good goal. You learn what is the setup you need to have. You learn how to fix your paradigms and you learn how to fix yourself image. Basically we call it the GPS of personal development goals, paradigms, self. And once you learn that, that process, basically every time you go for a next goal, you go through the same process, again, just on a different level 

Yasi: also it’s process that is proven, that works, helping people to achieve results with this goal, paradigm and image.

I’m very interested. Can you elaborate little more? A goal is easy to understand, right? What’s your title? And what about paradigm and 

Ana Stevanovic: image? You will be surprised actually. It’s not that it’s not that easy as it seems, majority of people, they know that they need to have goals. They all dislike doing the set up of having smart goals, but majority of people actually never have the goal written down.

And this is, I think one of the first quizzes of knowing what is the right goal. Like we call it a C type goal and then knowing, to really write it down and. Develop the steps to cheat it. And that when it comes to paradigms, this is basically your belief system that you have. And your belief system is usually expressed as a certain habits that you have.

And very many times we tried to fix our results by fixing our behavior. But usually this doesn’t work because you need to fix the cause of your behavior. And that is the belief system. And you need to work on that. So basically it’s like assessing your results. In your, in your life and then trying to see, okay, which result am I getting for years now that I really do not want to get and then asking yourself why?

And then working with that part. And the last part is the self-image. And this is basically the aspect of the same. We have a certain belief system about the world. We also have a certain belief systems. That’s usually we get when you’re small, when you’re pretty much unable to determine whether you are good at math or you’re not good at math.

And somebody tells you, based on certain results that you’ve got some of the tests, what you suck at math, and then you have your whole life saying, okay, now Alfred Adler actually had the same issue is I think that the famous psychologist that he never liked. Because he thought he didn’t know it, but then one day he realized that she actually knows math, but it was just his belief system that was preventing him to achieve better results.

So that’s also one of the, one of the points that you have to work on, because if you know that quote, like before you can achieve something, you first have to become someone that’s basically it. And that’s this third pillar. Basically goal-achieving. So the goals, the paradigms in a self-image, when you 

Yasi: say before you achieving something, you have to become someone.

Is it like project oneself to as a new, to have a new identity? 

Ana Stevanovic: Yes and no, basically you need to be able to. You need to be able to become this type of person way before you actually achieved this kind of results. And this is something that I think when people, especially young people, when they come to me and they say, oh, I wanna earn, I dunno, this amount of money.

I said, so why. I said, yeah, but, I want, I said, look, it’s a very, it’s a very, not good set goal because you want to become a person, that’s able to earn that money. If you have money, can lose it. Whatever you have, you can lose. Who you become, it’s yours forever and you have to work on becoming. And this is, I’m speaking also about mentality, about behavior of a person that’s able to do certain things.

So being able to become that way before. You’re doing it. Yes, it does contain the part that you need to be able to think like this person to behave like this person, you need to become that person. It’s not the fake it till you make it. It’s more really becoming, asking yourself if I was this person, who would I be?

And starting from there. 

Yasi: Oh, so it’s already projecting oneself to become a new person that this person wants to become and then behave in a way that the future self would have behaved instead of the current self. 

Ana Stevanovic: Yeah. But it’s all just all goals. Like behavior is really the behaviors being just in the consequences of your change belief system of your change, concept of self and concept of the world around you.

So it’s not just like changing the behavior, but change. Who you are. They’re just as an example later, we can talk about more, but in, in the book that, that I’ve wrote, I described this concept that we have in martial arts, where you basically, where they give you a next rank way before you earned it, and then you have it and then you need to become this person.

And one day reached this rank. So they give it to you and you’re not there. 

Yasi: Really? I didn’t know that. 

Ana Stevanovic: Yeah. So that pushes you to start to think of yourself as is this kind of person starts to work more, you work harder, you read more, you do everything because you have that, that rank until one day

you come there and say, oh, okay now there, but then they give you another one. So it’s like the chase never stops, but that’s basically the concept you really need to become that person. 

Yasi: Okay. Now I understand why the title of your book is called beginner with a black belt. 

Ana Stevanovic: Yes, that is basically, and that goes to another concept because the other meaning of the beginner with the black belt means.

That you have to think from the goal and up to the goal. And that’s also the thing that I’m speaking about right now. So you have to imagine yourself being there today and look back and say, okay, what do I need to, what do I need to do to be here at this point? So what’s the steps.

And this is really thinking from the goal, thinking. Black belt, even though just the beginner. 

Yasi: This is so interesting because I have mentioned this few times to so many people nowadays I’m reading this book is called breaking the habits of being yourself because who we are today consists of our past memories and experiences, but if we want the future self to be different, we need to think about the future, not think based on how we think today, we have to think if we’re already that person, we already achieved that. And then looking back, what would I do to make the future a reality?

Ana Stevanovic: Yeah, like a very dear friend of mine and a martial artist, and he is aserial entrepreneur Robin Dannika from Australia who used to live in Japan when you’re, sometimes we write to each other and then once, he wrote me, Anna, we all exist without our stories.

Like you exist also without your stories and do not get attached too much to your story your experience, because the fact that. I don’t know if you’re religious, but for example, imagine, if you were born in Afghanistan, that the chances are you will be Muslim. If you’re born in Serbia, the chances are you would be Orthodox.

If you were born just in a different place, you would have a completely different set of beliefs. And then you see people like holding themselves so much to a certain belief system, even though if they will think about it, like they exist even without it. And if they were born in just in a different place, they will have completely different set of.

We should not be that strict. And then there are some stuff that just limit us to grow and we should really let go of that. 

Yasi: Yeah. That’s a very interesting sample the way, how to think and to change oneself. And nowadays you like, you are helping professionals, to transform their results. What are the common challenges they are facing from your experience working with them?

Ana Stevanovic: I think really, even for the people that are. That are very high up in it like that they’re very high up managers or the people who are like, let’s say not having teams, but they’re working in certain companies like. Common thing of, we all have limiting beliefs and there is sometimes you have people coming and says no, I have no, I have no paradise. Then we start to work with in substance once. Ooh, there is something actually I think common thing that we have is that we common challenges that we face is that first of all, we really don’t have the right. ’cause even if they have, there is very difficult. Sometimes they cannot repeat the question on why you have that exact goal and not somethingelse.

And I think it takes time for people to really enter into this process of design, because we were thought, you don’t fantasize, you don’t do imagination. You do what, what that you do. You don’t as a kids, we fantasize a lot when we are adults, we don’t. One of the common challenges is actually this fantasizing that people don’t get about the size.

And then once that, except then beating the belief system that’s really a challenge for all of us like finding what is that limiting belief and beating that one.

Yasi: Can you give us some examples of a limiting belief? 

Ana Stevanovic: There’s so many actually, but let’s say like this. Yeah. You have people coming with a certain personal goals. You have people come professional goals. The limiting belief is that you believe that this is how much your time is worth. For example, like you’re earning you believe, okay, this is what you’re worth and that’s it.

Or belief that, it’s. Okay. I’m not saying economies, bad economies, not, but people sometimes focus so much on that, that they forget the stuff that they can do. There is so many, it’s sometimes like you, when you work with people there’s so many different beliefs, but I’m not good enough.

I’m not good enough is a really limiting belief. And it’s you can just insert it in whatever personal professional. That’s something that’s that self-doubt are huge when it comes to end. We’re speaking about good people. Like all people that come as plans. They’re good people. They’re hard workers.

They really are. They deserve so much, but yet there is this self doubt of what I’m good enough. I also have the same. I also have the same many times. Am I good enough? 

Yasi: If someone came to you and they will like to, they have a goal and they would like to achieve it, but they are not sure if they are capable of achieving it, what will be the next step?

How to remove the limiting belief, what would be the general steps people can take? 

Ana Stevanovic: Okay. Now I’m speaking like very general, because if for every person there is a little bit different, that’s the, let’s say like this. If you have a certain, you have something that you really want to achieve.

And for the past few years we assess what is the situation? Start to score basically what, what is happening for the past two years? And you can see the balance between. It’s current status and where you want to be. I think one of the main points is actually not only yes, finding what is the limiting belief, because it’s always exist.

One, if there is more, but one is like the one that’s that is really crucial to the development. And then replacing it. You can just delete the belief. You have to replace it with it. And that is done through very hard work. First of all, like one of the processes assessing past successes, like trying on a rational level to understand that these beliefs is not the correct one.

It’s not just why I tell you, you need to replace it. And then you just repeat the new thing and that this is actually trying on a rational level to find, okay. Was there an opportunity in my past where this was not this thing I believe in was actually not correct. And starting from there. And then we go with the process like some basics.

Yasi: I find this very interesting. Even personally I attended some events. We do sound like a small exercise. Like one question is what you are proud of yourself, so hard for me to think, what am I proud of myself? And then we just use a small exercise. Then I realized that, I’m not the person who was looking at my wins when I have some achievement that I move on to the next.

So in situations that I’m not confident maybe I should look at what I have achieved in the past, and then I can do it instead of thinking the goal is too big. Maybe I cannot achieve it. Maybe I cannot make it that I think now I can recognize it as also a limiting belief. 

Ana Stevanovic: No, but this is, I think good goals are the goals where you have no idea whether you can do it and where it makes you super enthusiastic, but also makes you super scared.

I think this is a description of a very good goal. When I see that the clients are sometimes frustrated or they’re not sure if they can do it. I make them make a list of all their past successes, everything they can remember in this area where they made it.

And usually when they write the list down and they see the list, they’re like, oh I actually might be able to make it. I’m a bad ass. Exactly. We’re all badasses.

Yasi: In general how to stay at peak performance. People make 

this breakthrough achieving results, how to stay on it?

Ana Stevanovic: If you’re like every other human and. You want to grow and goals are there to help you grow.

Goals are that there, because you want to have more, whatever, more money or more, whatever you want to grow. This is the purpose of goal to get your growth. And this growth is, it never stops, but an advice maybe of really how to keep the performance and how to keep this growth is rituals. You have to have your rituals whether you’re doing sports or you’re not playing sports, whether you’re CEO or just an like Rituals are there to really keep you grounded, keep you balanced, help you to keep performance. And yeah. And everybody has the question is just which kind of rituals they have either they have productive rituals or they’re not that productive, but everybody has them. 

Yasi: Rituals could be, you mean something like a, doing sports regularly meditate or like write success journals?

Ana Stevanovic: Whatever it is. You just have to do it every single day. Like I never, when I went to speak to people, so I don’t care if you’re studying three hours a day or studying 50 minutes a day, but I want you to do everyday this continuous learning or continuous doing something is essential. It’s how you get a habit, but this is also how you get grounded than any imagine if you’re studying or working in yourself 15 minutes a day.

Yeah, 365 days. There is this law of accumulation where you actually get to accumulate a lot. It’s like living 10 bucks every day on the site, but every single day with time, it becomes a lot. And this is why it’s important. This is another reason why it’s important to have. 

Yasi: I think it’s just even you do it 15, 10 minutes a day or something that’s helping you towards achieving the bigger goals, but once you do it every single day, the idea and the work like a seed into the mind every day the likelihood of achieving is bigger.

Yeah. I immediately think about my German learning experience. I think it’s totally necessary for someone to learn a new language is even 10 minutes, five minutes, just do it every day. 

Ana Stevanovic: And this is the thing, that this is what one of the consultants school colleague of mindset did something I really appreciated when you’re adopting a new habit or a new ritual or developing your new self image.

She says, look, everyday, you get. And you do this with your intention. Like you, you get up and you say, okay, I have to do this. Now you do it until one day you get up and it just happens automatically. And then, you’re right. And then you just keep doing it. You kept keep doing it automatically, but it’s very important to do it until you reach the day when you don’t have to do it because it comes out.

Yasi: Can I put it this way. It’s like we are learning to become someone doing something. And then the learning, the doing part is the small actions. Every single day. Once you become a habit, once you become a subconscious action, like driving, it become a state, you become who you are, or you become who you want to be.

And it become a state of fact And then next question I want to ask is earlier we talk about martial arts and you have been practicing it for more 15 years. Why you pick a martial arts? 

Ana Stevanovic: I was 16 and I was training best basketball at the time.

And I really wanted to be in a national team playing basketball, but. I have to admit something like I sucked, like I was an amazing training player, but when we would come to the game, I would completely be blocked. I could not score nothing and I was a scorer. So it’s really bad. If you cannot score, you should do this.

You’re like, and at that time I decided to do some, like self-defense because I thought it was important. That was a girl at 16. I never went to the same place as we mowed the brothers. So I thought, okay, it’s good. And then it started. And I think now when I look back it’s quite clear why I did it at that time.

It was just, it did it because I liked it. Yes, I learned some stuff from self-defense, but then I continued doing it because it really it’s helped me learn how to live life. So then I started doing it from a different perspective. Basically. I learned so much in dojo about like how you should live your life, that.

It became really a, it became a, my ritual, like even now I go once a week now because it’s in Zurich, so I have to travel. But every Sunday, like I sit on the train and I say, people go to church. I go to my Dojo basically the martial arts have given me so much knowledge, but also like experience of.

How one should lead the purposeful life. 

Yasi: Can you elaborate? What is it with martial arts that you start to reflect on the purpose of life? What is it 

Ana Stevanovic: about martial arts? It’s funny because I recently realized that all the things they did in life, regardless, like when we’re martial arts dentistry, because actually deal with preventing dentistry in my job or.

We’re only, I did only one thing all during doing past 20 years, I basically wanted not to be a victim basically to move from victim to, to, to hero. And martial arts have been basically the first part of that. You’re you help yourself and your colleagues not to be victims on the street. That’s basically what you’re doing, but then it goes so much beyond.

Then you really move into, okay. How to be a victim of your mind. Because when you’re doing martial arts, there is like a lot, there is a lot about your mindset and how you’re thinking and how you’re behaving. And I started to find so many parallels between martial arts and coaching that it started to be like a game for me.

This is how the book happened and I never thought I would actually write a book. The first time I started to realize that the lessons are the same. Just maybe the language is different. I started to write them down and this is how basically this whole, they’re not intuition to the book. 

Yasi: And then this book beginner with a black belt.

What is it about? 

Ana Stevanovic: This book is really a small guidance through this art of self-mastery or self-leadership put it whatever you want. All the things self-mastery is a little bit deeper context than self-leadership. And this book is divided actually in three different chapters or three different, big parts, even though the book is not so big, but the book is divided in three parts.

And I actually took the part from the book that we have in martial arts is called the tensions unit. Economic are the principles of heaven, earth, and men. And I took the GPS of goal-setting, what ups have results from the coaching. And the first part is basically the principles of heaven. And speaking about our vision, our goal setting or willingness.

So this is the, where we want to be. The second part is principles of earth, which is basically the paradigm. And they always speak about experience, about space, about control and everything else. And then the last part is the principles of human, which is self-image. And then I speak about the attitudes self-image and everything that’s connected to that part.

So basically the book is like a small guy guideline or guidance from where you want to go to where you are to who you are. Basically replying the three questions I said in the beginning, it replies the question. What do you want to go where you are now and who you are? 

Yasi: And where can people find this book?

Ana Stevanovic: And it is on Amazon. So I think it’s basically in every country, so you can find it online. It’s both Kindle and paperback as well. 

Yasi: The title is very unique. I like it. It’s called beginner with a black belt now I really understand why you name it this way. And is there any other ways that people can contact you?

If they’re interesting, receiving consultation session with you, connect with you, follow up with what’s going on with your life there. 

Ana Stevanovic: Yeah. I have a website. It’s my first name, last name. So anastevanovic.com and to have LinkedIn Facebook basically. Find me there. I still did not open Instagram account because I really cannot afford another social media for, but who knows?

Maybe I should do it as well, but it’s easy to find me on anastevanovic.com and it’s I’m there. 

Yasi: Okay. So you will also be in the show notes. Yeah. Thank you so much for being here, Ana. 

Ana Stevanovic: Thank you for having me. It was a pleasure.