Unlocking High Performance: How Pattern Interrupts Can Transform Your Life

In this powerful episode of The Nathan Newberry Show, filmmaker and personal branding expert Rowan North shares his remarkable journey from depression to high performance through intentional pattern interrupts, environment changes, and daily practices that create opportunities for growth and transformation.

Introduction

What does it truly mean to perform at your highest level? According to Rowan North, high performance isn't just about productivity or achievements—it's about achieving "a state of optimal agency when you have total control over your mind, your body, your spirit, and your environment." While this perfect state may be a horizon we aim for rather than a destination we fully reach, the pursuit itself transforms our capacity to show up powerfully in our lives and work.

In this enlightening conversation, Rowan shares how he overcame clinical depression, rebuilt his life, and developed consistent high-performance habits that completely changed his trajectory. His journey offers powerful insights for anyone looking to break free from limiting patterns and step into their potential.

From Crisis to Catalyst: Using Life Challenges as Transformation Opportunities

Rowan's high-performance journey wasn't linear. After being laid off from his corporate job in 2016-2017, he found himself in a deep depression that impacted his family relationships and pushed him to contemplate suicide. This crisis point became the catalyst for profound change.

"I went to Austin, Texas for a year and a half, close to two years," Rowan explains. "I worked on myself super hard. I treated it like a full-time job... cracking the code of my mind and what had gone wrong, like jailbreaking my brain, getting down to the source code."

This radical environment change provided the space needed for transformation. Rowan approached his healing methodically, asking fundamental questions about the sources of his discontent and getting to the root causes of his patterns.

During this period, he discovered dance as a powerful tool for transformation. "I taught myself how to dance. That was like a catalyzing moment," he shares. "I started my Instagram channel... it was called 'Dance Away Darkness.' If you go back to the very beginning, it's all daily dance videos."

This seemingly simple practice became a powerful pattern interrupt that shifted his energy and opened new possibilities. In fact, it was through a dance video that he met his fiancée Dana—a connection that wouldn't have happened in his previous state.

The Lottery Ticket Perspective

A powerful mindset shift that fueled Rowan's transformation was recognizing the extraordinary opportunity of being alive.

"We're alive. We won the freaking lottery," he emphasizes. "Gary V said the math one time is 400 trillion to one—that's the odds of all the makings to get to be a human being, all of the odds that the biology and everything has to overcome to get here. So everyone who is alive has a lottery ticket."

This perspective helps frame challenges as puzzles rather than problems—an approach Rowan later memorialized in a tattoo he got during the pandemic: "Problems are inevitable, but they are soluble."

Leveraging Environment Changes to Break Patterns

One of the most practical insights Rowan shares is how our environments unconsciously trigger habitual responses. When we're stuck in negative patterns, changing our surroundings can create the space needed for new behaviors to emerge.

"The biggest point of leverage you can get is to change your environment," Rowan explains, "because our environment is full of these subconscious triggers and cues that trip us back into the patterns that we have established."

While relocating to a new city as Rowan did might not be feasible for everyone, even smaller environmental shifts can be powerful:

"Even if you can't move, if you can rearrange your environment... you could still live in the same house but rearrange your furniture radically or do something in your physical context that forces your brain to approach your physical day in a different way."

These environmental disruptions create what Rowan calls "micro windows of intervention"—moments when the brain is temporarily taken off autopilot, creating opportunities to establish new patterns.

Breaking Down the Pattern Interrupt Process

The process works like this:

1. Disrupt the familiar environment - Rearrange furniture, change your morning route, or otherwise alter your usual surroundings
2. Create micro windows of intervention - These brief moments of confusion give your brain a chance to break from autopilot
3. Introduce new patterns - Use these windows to establish more supportive habits and responses

Nathan offers a practical example from his own experience: "I remember working one time and I took over a branch at a recruiting company I was running, and the gal that was working at the desk had to print stuff... but literally the copy machine was super far away. I went and grabbed it and put it right next to her computer. Why are we wasting time here trying to make it a marathon every time there's a PDF?"

This story illustrates how we often accept inefficient patterns simply because they're familiar. By questioning these routines and making intentional changes, we can free up mental and physical energy for more important priorities.

Daily Practices for Sustained High Performance

Beyond environmental changes, Rowan emphasizes the importance of consistent daily practices that prime your body and mind for high performance. His own routine includes:

1. Daily exercise - Running shoes placed by the door to remove friction
2. Cold plunging - Nearly 700 consecutive days (approaching his 700th plunge on December 1st)
3. Music - Using audio as a form of productive "stemming" (a self-regulating behavior)

The consistency of these practices is key to their effectiveness. Rowan explains how he's set up his environment to make these practices nearly automatic: "I have my running shoes right next to the door ready to go, and I have a fresh towel and my Adidas slip-ons nearby in the same exact spot."

These environmental cues reduce the decision fatigue that often prevents us from maintaining positive habits. As Nathan adds: "I prep my lunch the night before, I prep my gym shorts and everything so the time the alarm goes off, I don't hit the snooze button. I get up and I know exactly what I'm doing."

Balancing Structure with Joy

While consistency is crucial, both Rowan and Nathan emphasize that high performance isn't about rigid adherence to routines. It's about creating structures that support flexibility, presence, and joy.

"We're all going to die someday, and none of this is as important as we frequently make it out to be," Rowan reflects. "What really matters is the people we love, the good we put out into the world while we're here in this form, and everything else is just details."

This perspective allows high performers to maintain discipline without becoming rigid—to have structures that support freedom rather than confine it. As Nathan notes, "I try to think of this and reverse engineer where I look at my day and I plan ahead of time... I want my rhythms, the positive ones, to be no-brainers for me where it becomes this ingrained habit."

Conclusion: Problems as Puzzles

Rowan's journey from depression to high performance illustrates how intentional pattern interrupts, environmental changes, and consistent practices can transform our lives. Perhaps the most powerful takeaway is his reframing of challenges: "Reframe the idea of problems as puzzles... Don't think of a problem as a bad thing, just think of it as something that needs to be wiggled."

This perspective creates space for playfulness and curiosity—qualities that can turn even difficult experiences into opportunities for growth. As Rowan says, "If something is not forbidden by the laws of physics, it's possible and achievable given the right knowledge. So just walk through your day with playfulness and a sense of curiosity, a Jeff Goldblum sense of wonder, and life can be just dazzling."

By applying these principles—changing your environment when stuck, establishing supportive daily practices, and approaching challenges with curiosity rather than dread—you too can unlock new levels of performance and fulfillment in your life and work.

Ready to create your own high-performance patterns? Start by identifying one area of your environment you could change today to interrupt an unhelpful pattern. Maybe it's rearranging your workspace, changing your morning routine, or simply placing your exercise clothes in a more visible location. Share what environmental change you're committing to in the comments below!