WEBVTT - Finding your purpose, with Tom Rath 0:00:03.000 --> 0:00:09.280 Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning. 0:00:10.160 --> 0:00:15.040 This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:17.599 episode will be a slightly longer one part of the 0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:20.840 series where I interview fascinating people about how they take 0:00:20.880 --> 0:00:24.000 their days from great to awesome and any advice they 0:00:24.040 --> 0:00:26.319 have for the rest of us. So today I am 0:00:26.400 --> 0:00:29.680 delighted to welcome Tom Wrath to Before Breakfast. Tom is 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:32.200 the author of the brand new book What's the Point. 0:00:32.479 --> 0:00:34.440 He is also the author of How Full Is Your 0:00:34.440 --> 0:00:39.959 Bucket and several other books. Thanks he, Welcome to the show. Yeah, 0:00:40.000 --> 0:00:41.680 I'm excited to have you on. Why don't you tell 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:43.320 our listeners a little bit about yourself? 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:48.279 Kind of researching and studying what leads to great careers 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:51.880 in particular, and how work intersects with our individual well 0:00:51.920 --> 0:00:54.560 being in health for the last twenty five or thirty years, 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:57.480 and kind of got pulled into the book writing accidentally. 0:00:57.560 --> 0:01:00.080 But I've always been a researcher at heart, and I 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:01.920 spent most of my time just waking up and trying 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:04.880 to figure out each morning, how can I pull together 0:01:05.000 --> 0:01:08.679 some research, distill some discoveries that help people to apply 0:01:08.800 --> 0:01:11.040 things in a real practical way on a day to 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:13.320 day basis in my books and writing mostly. 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:18.760 Yeah, which you know, your new book What's the Point 0:01:18.880 --> 0:01:23.960 is all about practical techniques, But fundamentally it's about purpose. 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:26.280 And I know when a lot of people hear that, 0:01:26.760 --> 0:01:28.800 you want to set out that there's a difference between 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:31.440 sort of like find your passion, which everyone sort of 0:01:31.480 --> 0:01:35.800 talks about in graduation season. Here, there's a difference between 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:37.720 passion and what is that. 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:45.480 Find your passion is relatively misleading advice because it assumes 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:48.120 that these things you're really passionate about. When when I 0:01:48.160 --> 0:01:49.720 was a kid growing up, I mean, I was so 0:01:49.880 --> 0:01:52.280 passionate about basketball, and I wish that could have been 0:01:52.320 --> 0:01:54.200 my life, but my genetics did not have that in 0:01:54.240 --> 0:01:56.480 the cards. I know a lot of people a passionate 0:01:56.480 --> 0:02:00.280 about golf, passionate about causes. But that's starting with you 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:03.160 and assuming that the rest of the world will just 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:05.120 kind of get in line and revolve around who you are. 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:08.320 And if you go into the work world with that orientation, 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:10.600 things are going to come crashing down pretty quickly in 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:13.160 my experience, And so what I've been trying to help 0:02:13.200 --> 0:02:14.880 people to do is to say, sure, it's good to 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:17.320 work on your talents and know who you are and 0:02:17.400 --> 0:02:21.120 know yourself. But it's probably better to start with what 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:23.919 the community around you needs, what the people around you need, 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:26.639 what the world needs, and then work back to who 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:29.840 you are to make sure that you're not only having 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:32.640 fun each day, but you're making a substantive contribution that 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:36.440 improves other people's lives, because that usually ends up trumping 0:02:36.480 --> 0:02:38.959 happiness five, ten, twenty years down the road. 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:45.320 And you suggest that we ask ourselves a different question, 0:02:45.440 --> 0:02:48.120 not what do you do, but that as we think 0:02:48.120 --> 0:02:50.560 about our careers, it's more who do you help? 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:54.680 Yeah, you for that all the day. We all deserve 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:57.840 to and should and need to know who we helped 0:02:57.919 --> 0:02:59.600 or who's better off because of the work that we 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:02.000 did to day, not just in some grand sense. So 0:03:02.600 --> 0:03:04.040 you know, and I've spent a lot of time working 0:03:04.080 --> 0:03:07.440 with people in the professions that I admire most personally 0:03:07.520 --> 0:03:11.320 teachers and nurses and hospice workers, and even in those 0:03:11.360 --> 0:03:16.040 professions and physicians, they're often not very good at ensuring 0:03:16.080 --> 0:03:18.520 that they connect what they did that day with the 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:21.080 way it had a positive impact on another human being 0:03:21.120 --> 0:03:24.240 and reminding themselves of that. And we almost have to 0:03:24.280 --> 0:03:27.600 do that, because it's in that reminder that motivates us 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:30.519 to get a good night's sleep and to be energized 0:03:30.520 --> 0:03:32.480 and wound up the next morning and to do even 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:35.480 more of it. So you mentioned in the introduction that 0:03:36.280 --> 0:03:38.520 you know, the book's kind of about purpose. But I 0:03:38.520 --> 0:03:40.800 think when a lot of people, myself included here, the 0:03:40.840 --> 0:03:44.120 word purpose originally just kind of gave me anxiety and like, 0:03:44.160 --> 0:03:45.960 oh my gosh, I need to find this big hairy 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:48.360 thing this ends from the heavens someday when it's sunny. 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:51.520 But the more I got into the research and I 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:53.920 actually took purpose out of the book's main title because 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:57.200 of this, it turns out that purpose is just a 0:03:57.240 --> 0:04:01.840 practical daily thing that we can use to reorient and 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.880 reprioritize what we do every hour throughout the day. And 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:07.880 when you do that, it's much more convenient and practical 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:09.560 and easier to get your head around. 0:04:12.000 --> 0:04:15.040 Well, let's talk about that. I mean, you say in 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.279 your book that you know people want to find their calling, 0:04:18.880 --> 0:04:23.120 and yet you know we're in these jobs that exist 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:25.520 now whatever it is, many of us are not, you know, 0:04:25.640 --> 0:04:29.560 saving people's lives on a daily basis. So how could 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:33.000 we take a normal job and craft it to feel 0:04:33.080 --> 0:04:35.400 more like a calling. If somebody is listening to this, 0:04:35.800 --> 0:04:37.719 what are some things they can do over the next 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:39.920 day or two to make their job fail long. 0:04:40.279 --> 0:04:44.240 I think a lot of it starts with reprioritizing what 0:04:44.320 --> 0:04:46.240 you do during the day and kind of your time 0:04:46.279 --> 0:04:49.560 allocation and figuring out, you know, one of the questions 0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:53.080 that when I worked at Gallup fifteen plus years ago 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.560 we always ask was do you have the opportunity to 0:04:55.680 --> 0:04:59.680 use your strengths every day? And the wording of that 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:02.200 was prett important because it's just meaning you get a 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:05.160 chance somewhere in a day to use your strengths. None 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:07.080 of us get to run around and spend eighty percent 0:05:07.080 --> 0:05:09.480 of our day using our strengths and living in that 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:14.920 fantasy world. But almost anyone can carve out twenty thirty minutes, 0:05:14.960 --> 0:05:17.640 maybe even two hours where you really feel like you're 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:19.919 at your best and you're helping a customer, You're helping 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:22.520 a young person to learn and grow, you're mentoring someone. 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:26.279 You're putting together content that really is of a quality 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:28.920 level that you think can help people, whatever it might be. 0:05:29.360 --> 0:05:33.159 And I would recommend to some of your work that 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:36.280 people prioritize, ensuring that they get to be their best, 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:39.600 use their strengths, really serve and contribute to another person 0:05:40.040 --> 0:05:42.720 as early on as possible in the day, and then 0:05:42.760 --> 0:05:44.479 maybe later in the day to get to some of 0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:48.880 the things that are more boring, monotonous, routineized tasks, such 0:05:48.920 --> 0:05:52.280 as doing your expenses, financials, catching up on email, and 0:05:52.320 --> 0:05:56.320 all those pieces that honestly are easier to start within 0:05:56.360 --> 0:05:58.080 the day because it's kind of low hanging fruit. But 0:05:58.120 --> 0:05:59.760 that's the wrong order in most cases. 0:06:02.160 --> 0:06:04.800 And if we're really focusing on serving someone, I mean 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:06.560 that doesn't have to be in a broad sense. I 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:10.240 mean you can make your colleagues life today. 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:14.039 Walking into an office and having a conversation with a 0:06:14.080 --> 0:06:15.960 colleague that picks them up a little bit, even if 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:19.840 it's about something social or going on the media, celebrity news, 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:22.760 whatever it might be. That is a meaningful contribution. And 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:25.480 when people talk to me about the purpose I serve 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:27.480 in a given day, I mean, I think the biggest 0:06:27.480 --> 0:06:31.120 purpose I serve on most days is putting all my 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:33.520 devices away and having a really good conversation with my 0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:36.400 seventeen year old daughter my fifteen year old son when 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:39.280 they get home in the evening and asking some good questions, 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:41.520 keeping my device dowed away, and really listening to that. 0:06:41.839 --> 0:06:44.440 And that is purposeful, and that is a big purpose 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:46.919 in a day because when we really step back and 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:50.080 say one of my big three purposes in life is 0:06:50.480 --> 0:06:52.800 being a good dad and a good husband, we have 0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:55.440 to prioritize those moments as well throughout the day. 0:06:58.200 --> 0:07:00.400 And one of the ways, I mean, we talked about 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:02.920 how purpose isn't something that's descended from on high. There's 0:07:02.960 --> 0:07:05.760 lots of small purposes within the day, and something might 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:11.160 be serving someone or improving someone's day, and maybe practically 0:07:11.160 --> 0:07:15.760 for this podcast, you mentioned that reducing someone's friction could 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:18.200 also count as being a small p purpose. 0:07:18.480 --> 0:07:20.320 You don't talk a little bit about that. One of 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:22.440 the things I've learned from doing a lot of research 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:25.560 on well being all around the world is that if 0:07:25.920 --> 0:07:30.119 you have a customer who's calling into a eight hundred number, 0:07:30.240 --> 0:07:32.680 or you're in a retail store and there or you're 0:07:32.760 --> 0:07:35.440 Starbucks and they're irate and they're really frustrated about something, 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:38.640 and you take them from a negative eight on a 0:07:38.680 --> 0:07:40.680 negative ten through ten scale, if you take them from 0:07:40.680 --> 0:07:43.400 a negative eight to a negative three, that's a really 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:46.560 meaningful victory and you do need to acknowledge it in 0:07:46.560 --> 0:07:49.120 that moment. If you've even disarmed a situation because you 0:07:49.160 --> 0:07:51.520 took something that could have been horrible for a person 0:07:51.520 --> 0:07:53.600 in experience where they've never come in the store again, 0:07:54.040 --> 0:07:56.040 and you got them out of that rut in that mode, 0:07:56.360 --> 0:07:58.760 and that does count. And if you're a teacher in 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:01.400 a classroom dealing with the kid who's really struggling to 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:04.520 learn something and you get them to neutral, those can 0:08:04.560 --> 0:08:06.560 be big victories in the day. So it's a really 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:07.400 good point. 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:11.840 Yes, we're still moving in a positive direction. Well, we're 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:13.240 going to take a quick ad break and then I'll 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:22.560 be back with more from Tom Rath. Well, I am 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:24.960 back talking with Tom Rath, who is the author of 0:08:25.040 --> 0:08:28.679 the new book. What's the point one of the topics 0:08:28.680 --> 0:08:30.720 you covered You just mentioned this earlier of putting the 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:34.120 phone away and having a good conversation with people, whether 0:08:34.120 --> 0:08:37.520 that's your kids or colleagues or someone else. You go 0:08:37.600 --> 0:08:40.200 on for a bit about how people are, you know, 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:44.040 tied to their devices and we have turned into spectators 0:08:44.160 --> 0:08:48.200 from creators. You know, how could we switch that mode? 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:49.719 I mean, what are some effects we can do. 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:52.120 One thing I've really learned and doing a deep dive 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:54.160 on this and trying things out on my own, is 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:59.560 that our phones are very useful and powerful and helpful 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:04.000 device is when we're using the devices instead of letting 0:09:04.000 --> 0:09:06.680 the devices use us and run our lives. So a 0:09:06.720 --> 0:09:09.360 part of it's kind of just asserting some control to say, 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:12.760 if I need to change my thermostat or lock my doors, 0:09:12.920 --> 0:09:16.840 or download a book on audible, or read a really 0:09:16.880 --> 0:09:21.280 good article in the New York or whatever, my phone 0:09:21.360 --> 0:09:24.400 can be a great learning tool and a resource to 0:09:24.440 --> 0:09:26.640 get things done faster and to save time and all 0:09:26.679 --> 0:09:29.320 those things if I use it in the right ways 0:09:29.880 --> 0:09:34.400 instead of just using it primarily as a mindless consumption 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:37.800 device where I'm always just consuming and letting the next 0:09:37.800 --> 0:09:40.400 show play on Netflix and going through social media feeds 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:45.320 and the like. And I think more and more people 0:09:45.320 --> 0:09:49.760 are realizing how those things are easier to do during 0:09:49.800 --> 0:09:51.520 the day. So we have to push back a little 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:53.800 bit and create some friction and create some resistance and 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:56.760 say I'm going to take control of this so that 0:09:56.840 --> 0:10:01.120 I'm actually creating things, And it can be creating conversations 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:03.640 and relationships with people using your device or doing it 0:10:03.640 --> 0:10:07.640 in person. Or it can be creating a work of art, music, 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:11.760 a new business Entrepreneurially, it can be creating something and 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:15.440 writing whatever it might be, so that you're actually building 0:10:15.480 --> 0:10:18.880 something that other people can benefit from a week from now, 0:10:18.920 --> 0:10:20.840 a month from now, maybe even ten years from now. 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:24.600 And I do where I almost didn't include the chapter 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.680 in this book, what's the point about challenging people to 0:10:27.760 --> 0:10:30.560 be more creators than consumers? Because I had this mindset 0:10:30.640 --> 0:10:33.400 that there's kind of this not all people are creatives 0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:36.360 and the like. But the more I watch people who 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:38.880 are just you see four or five people at a 0:10:39.000 --> 0:10:41.760 restaurant and they're all kind of scrolling instead of talking 0:10:41.760 --> 0:10:44.280 to each other in person, I do think that all 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:47.120 of us need to kind of challenge our own conventional 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:49.320 wisdom to get out of the consumption mode at a 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:52.200 minimum and think about creating, even if it's just in 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:56.200 the form of kind of relationships and purpose for other people. 0:10:58.559 --> 0:11:01.280 Well, it's about intentionally spending time and creating something in 0:11:01.360 --> 0:11:03.480 the world that wasn't there before. You know, whether that 0:11:03.640 --> 0:11:07.960 is a wonderful relationship, great ideas shared with each other 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:10.400 that we don't all have to be a Michael Angelo 0:11:10.559 --> 0:11:14.760 to be creative, but part of you know, creating great 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:17.840 things is sometimes having the time to do it. And 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:21.920 you have some advice about carving out an intentional, bigger 0:11:22.000 --> 0:11:24.880 chunk of time to make progress on something that maybe 0:11:24.880 --> 0:11:26.720 has been lingering for a Yeah, you know. 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:29.640 The more I got into this, and one of the 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:31.920 main reason I worked on this book and some of 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:33.280 the things I've been doing for the last three to 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:38.000 five years is because I took a deep dive for 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:39.840 the sake of kids who are the age of my 0:11:39.920 --> 0:11:42.000 children right now, to say, how do we make sure 0:11:42.040 --> 0:11:44.440 that more people end up in the right jobs making 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.280 the right contributions over the span of a career. And 0:11:47.400 --> 0:11:50.960 what I realized is that I would estimate eighty to 0:11:51.080 --> 0:11:53.520 ninety percent of people end up at the very end 0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:55.160 of the career, at their career and the very end 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:58.560 of their life, and they never even had a preview 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:00.400 of it. They never even saw, let alone worked in 0:12:00.400 --> 0:12:02.439 the area where they could have made the biggest contribution 0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:05.640 in life. And I say that after doing some real 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:10.520 math on it, because if you wanted to understand what's 0:12:10.559 --> 0:12:12.480 out there from a job standpoint in the United States, 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:15.400 you would need to understand about fifty jobs just to 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:17.880 get half of the US workforce based on my math. 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:23.520 And so most people enter college, finish college, and maybe 0:12:23.559 --> 0:12:26.160 they see what mom did, what dad did, They might 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:29.800 see one mentor maybe or maybe they're pulled by financial 0:12:29.920 --> 0:12:33.240 or societal expectations into something, but they have about a 0:12:33.400 --> 0:12:36.719 five to ten percent aperture of what's out there right 0:12:36.760 --> 0:12:39.880 now based on all of my estimates. So I think 0:12:39.920 --> 0:12:46.280 we need to challenge ourselves pretty early on to really reprioritize. 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:47.719 If you're going to say, I'm going to get to 0:12:47.720 --> 0:12:49.439 the end of my life, and what do you want 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:52.280 to be known for. It's if you want to be 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:54.160 known for being a good dad being For me, it 0:12:54.240 --> 0:12:56.640 might be a good researcher, someone who's communicated some of 0:12:56.640 --> 0:13:00.360 those findings. If that's what you want things to look 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:01.680 like at the end of your career, the end of 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:05.040 your life. How to what degree is that aligned with 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:07.839 how you spend your time today? And so, to get 0:13:07.880 --> 0:13:11.760 right back to your original question, working through that for 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:16.360 me personally has dramatically changed the way I structure and 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:19.400 allocate and prioritize my time in a given day so 0:13:19.440 --> 0:13:23.079 that it's more anchored around what matters most especially in 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:27.800 the first quarter and half of my day. 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:29.520 Well, we're going to get to that in a minute, 0:13:29.559 --> 0:13:31.720 I promise, because we always like to hear about people's 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:35.280 mornings on this show. But I have a question then 0:13:35.360 --> 0:13:38.480 about I mean, so you you actually put in the 0:13:38.520 --> 0:13:43.319 book like fifty careers. I mean I didn't count them exactly, 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:47.400 but it looked to be about fifty and how those 0:13:48.200 --> 0:13:50.600 jobs are sort of done, what they look like, and 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.760 what the impact might be on different people. I'm curious 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:55.080 why you. 0:13:55.080 --> 0:13:58.200 Decided what I do. So I mentioned I got into 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:00.040 this just kind of thinking about it. I want my 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:02.600 wife's a second grade teacher, I'm obviously a writer. And 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:04.960 I asked my daughter when she was fourteen, three years ago, 0:14:05.559 --> 0:14:07.240 what do you think you might want to do, and 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:09.920 just out of curiosity, not like a formal thing, and 0:14:09.960 --> 0:14:11.480 she said, oh, I think I might want to be 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:13.760 a writer or maybe a teacher. I'm like, well, that's 0:14:13.800 --> 0:14:16.920 how and that's how I mean, And that's exactly set 0:14:17.160 --> 0:14:18.480 up in the job I'm in right now. And most 0:14:18.520 --> 0:14:21.040 people I interviewed ninety five out of one hundred. So 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:24.640 I realized at that moment that even my kids, who 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:27.000 are have great public school system and everything else, and 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:30.680 good resources they're probably going to need to pick a 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:33.840 major in college and a career with well looking out 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:36.600 of a little pinhole of what's available and what's out there. 0:14:36.600 --> 0:14:39.280 So I've spent much of the last three to five 0:14:39.360 --> 0:14:43.440 years sending camera crews and production crews out to look 0:14:43.440 --> 0:14:45.480 at a day in the life of what it's like 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:47.360 to be a veterinarian, what it's like to be a pilot, 0:14:47.360 --> 0:14:50.400 what it's like to be an engineer, so that young 0:14:50.440 --> 0:14:52.840 people can gain a broader sense and field of view 0:14:52.840 --> 0:14:55.040 around that. So, I mean, a big part of my 0:14:55.120 --> 0:14:59.000 personal mission is just helping people to think much broader 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:01.640 about what they put atentially could be so that they 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:03.920 don't end up. I'm fifty years old right now, and 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:06.800 I really wish I would have known someone or seen 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:08.680 someone in medicine, because I think that might have been 0:15:08.680 --> 0:15:11.680 my superpower. But it's probably too late now and I 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:13.880 never got to see that, right, And I think we 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:16.800 all have those little superpowers where it's kind of it's 0:15:17.160 --> 0:15:19.880 and there's some excitement about that. As job markets change 0:15:19.920 --> 0:15:22.920 with automation and AI and everything elsewhere. I don't think 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:25.840 people should be as scared of reinvention because most of 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:27.960 us are doing what we're doing today just because it's 0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:29.960 what we saw and we kind of fell into a default. 0:15:30.040 --> 0:15:32.360 And even we have a chapter that gets into this 0:15:32.400 --> 0:15:34.800 in the book. But I think even most people, if 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:37.120 you ask them about their childhood dreams, they're not really 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:40.040 their childhood dreams. So I think their childhood dreams of 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:42.600 their parents and social expectations and a lot of other things, 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:45.080 and we never really step back to challenge that because 0:15:45.080 --> 0:15:47.680 we get caught in the vacuum of expectations by the 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:49.000 time we were fifteen or something. 0:15:51.440 --> 0:15:53.560 Well, if you did decide to go back into medicine, 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:55.960 I bet you still could. Lives are long at this point, 0:15:56.440 --> 0:15:58.760 but it's a lot of work, So that's what you 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:00.360 have to think about. Well, we're going to make another 0:16:00.400 --> 0:16:02.160 quick ad break and i'll be back with more from 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:11.840 Tom Wrath. Well, I am back talking with Tom Rath, 0:16:11.840 --> 0:16:14.160 who is the author of the new book What's the Point. 0:16:14.200 --> 0:16:17.040 He's also the author of several other books, including Eight 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:20.720 Move Sleep, How Full Is Your Bucket, several other titles 0:16:20.760 --> 0:16:24.320 you've probably heard of. So, Tom, do you have a 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:26.360 morning routine? Then you mentioned earlier that you were very 0:16:26.400 --> 0:16:28.800 careful with how you spent the early hours of the day. 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:34.000 My morning routine, the number one thing by fivefold, is 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:36.160 just getting a good night's sleep the night before. So 0:16:36.240 --> 0:16:39.920 my morning routine starts by making sure I'm in bed 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:41.840 by ten o'clock so I have a wide enough window 0:16:41.880 --> 0:16:44.120 to hopefully get seven or eight hours of sleep before 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:46.680 I need to get up. And I've really learned that 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:50.720 no matter how rough things are, whether I'm traveling or 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:53.760 have a lot going on or stress, that if I 0:16:53.800 --> 0:16:56.800 get just one real good night of sleep at least 0:16:56.840 --> 0:16:59.840 seven hours, ideally eight, that's kind of like the reset 0:16:59.840 --> 0:17:02.200 by on a smartphone or a video game or whatever, 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:06.119 I get a whole new energy level next morning. So 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:09.159 starts the night before, the good night's sleep. When I 0:17:09.200 --> 0:17:12.960 wake up in the morning, I think if on days 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:15.479 when I'm not traveling, I can exercise really early on 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:21.000 getting ideally outdoors ten fifty minutes outdoors twenty minutes of 0:17:21.320 --> 0:17:23.800 pretty vigorous activity where my heart rates between one hundred 0:17:23.840 --> 0:17:26.200 and one hundred and twenty five to the point where 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:29.879 it'd be tough to maintain a real good conversation. That's 0:17:29.920 --> 0:17:33.800 the key to having enough energy to get into my office, 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:37.360 make sure my phones are still on focus mode, not 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:40.960 getting into my email and response mode, and being able 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:44.560 to work on whether they're entrepreneurial projects or things I'm 0:17:44.560 --> 0:17:47.920 working on with AI tools or new books, or getting 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:50.720 into editing, kind of that substantive hard work that I 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:53.080 feel good about. And I know that if I can 0:17:53.119 --> 0:17:55.280 do that in the first three to four hours of 0:17:55.280 --> 0:17:59.600 my day, then I will be able to kind of 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:01.840 get into the responsive stuff and feel good about it, 0:18:01.880 --> 0:18:08.520 and then ideally I've spent ten years now working most 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:12.840 of my days on a walking treadmill desk, and that's 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:15.160 been one of the most transformative things I've done, because 0:18:15.200 --> 0:18:17.920 when I worked on the book Movesleep, I realized pretty 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:21.359 quickly that as much as everyone's been promoting standing desks, 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:24.119 that standing all day is no better than sitting all 0:18:24.160 --> 0:18:27.159 day and just physiologically, I mean like blood pools and 0:18:27.160 --> 0:18:28.920 your ankles and all these bad things. And I think 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:30.480 people kind of make that mistake to say, oh, I 0:18:30.520 --> 0:18:34.399 need a standing desk, when really I've learned that unless 0:18:34.440 --> 0:18:37.359 I'm really doing something very creative and writing, that if 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:40.639 I'm editing or responding to email or doing things on 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.359 my computer, if I walk at about one point five 0:18:43.440 --> 0:18:45.760 to two miles an hour, I can walk more than 0:18:45.760 --> 0:18:48.000 fifty percent of my day. And if I do that 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:51.040 really well, by four o'clock, when my kids are home 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:52.960 and stuff, I can still go play basketball with my 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:55.159 son and go for a walk with my wife and 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:57.040 be real active and have as much energy as I 0:18:57.040 --> 0:19:00.960 did at ten o'clock in the morning. So I've learned, 0:19:01.040 --> 0:19:03.760 especially as I worked on this book, to structure the 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:07.800 meaningful and important and purposeful work early on in the day, 0:19:07.800 --> 0:19:10.400 and then by three or four o'clock to do the 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:15.440 expense reports and accounting and taxes and financial and email responsiveness. 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:20.160 Yeah, so the stuff that doesn't demand the same focus 0:19:20.240 --> 0:19:22.960 later in the day. I'm curious about your evenings. Is 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:24.919 there anything you do in particular to make sure that 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:27.240 you protect that getting into that arm clock. 0:19:27.280 --> 0:19:32.080 I've been very careful about what I eat throughout my 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:34.879 activity and sleep and what I eat in particularly throughout 0:19:34.880 --> 0:19:37.040 my day, so that I mean, I learned a long 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:39.639 time ago that if I for lunch, if I go 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:42.080 out and I have anything that's kind of a fried 0:19:42.119 --> 0:19:45.720 food or a sandwich or carb heavy, that wipes me 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:47.480 out by about two or three in the afternoon. So 0:19:47.880 --> 0:19:50.040 I've learned to eat in a way that manages those 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:51.880 energy cycles, and then to have kind of a light, 0:19:51.920 --> 0:19:54.719 healthy dinner as well, and to cut off most of 0:19:54.720 --> 0:19:58.679 my food and liquid intake by about seven o'clock. Ideally 0:19:58.720 --> 0:20:01.960 I rarely eat anything after seven o'clock. And then to 0:20:02.040 --> 0:20:05.560 just have some quality unwinding time with my wife and 0:20:06.080 --> 0:20:10.200 kids and have some good conversations. And again, I mean 0:20:10.560 --> 0:20:13.679 like when I'm talking to my kids or my friends 0:20:13.760 --> 0:20:15.960 or my wife, to make sure that my device is 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:18.000 in my pocket, because even if I'm not using it 0:20:18.040 --> 0:20:20.920 and scrolling, it just sends the wrong message if it's 0:20:20.920 --> 0:20:23.480 out on the table. And I think we've all learned 0:20:23.520 --> 0:20:24.919