WEBVTT - 2 Transformational Habits To Change Your Mental State & How to Refine Your Intentions for a Happier, Fulfilled Life 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:03.200 Hey, everyone, Welcome back to our Purpose, the number one 0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:06.000 health podcast in the world. Thanks to each and every 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:08.440 one of you that come back every week to listen, 0:00:08.800 --> 0:00:11.520 learn and grow. Now. I know that a lot of 0:00:11.560 --> 0:00:17.080 you love and respect deep at Chopra, and this conversation 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:20.400 that you're about to hear is one of the first 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:24.400 ones I ever had with him. He's always been someone 0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:30.080 that I think has presented wisdom in a really fascinating 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:33.639 and interesting way, and the questions he asked me in 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:37.000 this conversation are truly unique. I think you're going to 0:00:37.120 --> 0:00:40.440 hear a lot of new perspectives and ideas from me, 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:43.640 and I am so grateful that you made time to 0:00:43.680 --> 0:00:45.840 listen to this episode. So thank you for being here. 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:47.839 And I hope you've been loving it. I mean, we 0:00:47.920 --> 0:00:51.440 have been spoiled in the past few weeks, everyone from 0:00:51.479 --> 0:00:55.960 doctor Gabel Mattey to doctor Daniel aman Selena Gomez, Kendall Jenner, 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:58.960 Alex Cooper. I hope you've gone back and listen to 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:09.000 those episodes. If you haven't, do that right after this one. 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:13.680 Tell me a little bit about your background growing up. Absolutely. Yeah. 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:16.360 So I was born and raised in London as a 0:01:16.400 --> 0:01:20.760 normal Indian kid, the highest values of success were work 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:25.360 hard at school, get good grades. Life is all about performance. 0:01:25.520 --> 0:01:29.399 My parents were wonderful, very supportive, and more liberal than 0:01:29.520 --> 0:01:31.720 I think a lot of Indian parents, but still it 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:34.559 was always about how well you did at school. And 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:37.000 that kind of lasted for me until I was fourteen 0:01:37.160 --> 0:01:39.839 when I started to rebel. And I think I started 0:01:39.840 --> 0:01:42.560 to rebel because I saw that despite myself doing well 0:01:42.600 --> 0:01:45.800 at school, I was still bullied for being overweight and 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:49.840 obese at the time. I was still a victim of 0:01:49.920 --> 0:01:52.160 racism at the time in the area I grew up 0:01:52.160 --> 0:01:55.080 in London, but a lot of that was I was 0:01:55.120 --> 0:01:57.720 still experiencing these things and I was thinking, well, getting 0:01:57.720 --> 0:02:01.160 good grades in school obviously is not solving life for me. 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.400 And that took me to the other extreme of rebelling. 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:08.679 So I got involved in petty violence crime. I got 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:12.359 involved with experimenting with drugs. I just started going totally 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:16.600 the opposite way, just as a desire to experiment and 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:20.320 test because I wasn't feeling satisfied and happy with the 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.400 life that had been paved for me. Well, that's very interesting. 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:26.640 I never knew that part of your Yeah, yeah, I 0:02:26.639 --> 0:02:29.200 completely went off the rails, and that was my way 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:32.239 of trying to look for something more meaningful. I was 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:34.880 always seeking a thrill in life. I wanted to feel 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:39.320 deeply passionate about something. And you know, one of my 0:02:39.360 --> 0:02:41.399 favorite thoughts is for Martin Luther King, where he said 0:02:41.400 --> 0:02:43.360 that if you have nothing to die for, then you 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:45.960 have nothing to live for. And for me, I was 0:02:46.040 --> 0:02:47.600 looking for that, but I was looking for it in 0:02:47.639 --> 0:02:50.200 all the wrong places. Tell me about that period with 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:53.760 the drugs and the violence and all that. You know, 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:58.200 at the time, it was that tough ego facade that 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:01.919 I had, so I would portray myself as being very tough. 0:03:02.440 --> 0:03:04.120 I was doing all these things, and I would have 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:06.840 this ego, but inside I was actually really scared. I 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:10.400 was actually really insecure. I was worried sometimes about going 0:03:10.400 --> 0:03:12.880 to parties or events because of who I'd run into 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:16.400 any time I was experimenting with anything. I wasn't actually 0:03:16.400 --> 0:03:18.960 as confident as I'd make out to be. But I 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:20.760 remember at that time, you would just put on this 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:24.119 face to appear as if you had it all going right. 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:27.200 How many years did that phase last. I'd say lasted 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:30.399 for four years, from fourteen to eighteen. Then what happened. Well, 0:03:30.440 --> 0:03:32.480 what happened was that when I was around sixteen, I 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:34.960 lost two of my best friends. So one of them 0:03:35.200 --> 0:03:37.680 died due to gang violence and one of them died 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:39.920 in a car accident. Like I look back, and I 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:41.720 was like, you know, all of us that were involved 0:03:41.760 --> 0:03:43.200 in all these things, we could all go back home 0:03:43.200 --> 0:03:46.360 and our mums would cook us dinner. Right. It wasn't 0:03:46.400 --> 0:03:48.320 like we actually had to be part of gangs. It 0:03:48.400 --> 0:03:50.680 just became a part of culture, which I think is 0:03:50.760 --> 0:03:54.480 very interesting. So for me, that was one of the 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:56.720 biggest challenges. And when I lost two of my friends, 0:03:57.120 --> 0:04:00.760 that made one as a result of correct correct because 0:04:00.760 --> 0:04:03.600 of life crime, and one because of a car accident. 0:04:04.040 --> 0:04:06.040 And when I lost both of them, that really made 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:09.200 me reflect because to me, they were good people. They 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:11.960 were people who were very kind and loving, and I 0:04:12.040 --> 0:04:14.680 lost both of them at an early age, and that 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:17.920 really made me start to question what's life all about? 0:04:18.480 --> 0:04:20.800 Because if these are good people, they're beautiful people, and 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:23.919 I've lost them, I'm spending my life in this field 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:28.200 which doesn't seem to be getting me anywhere. And that 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:30.680 really made me start to pause and reflect on how 0:04:30.720 --> 0:04:32.960 I was using my time because all of a sudden, 0:04:33.640 --> 0:04:38.839 time became very valuable. I started to recognize how little 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.560 time we could have if it was used unwisely. So 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:45.760 would happened after that? So at that time, you know, 0:04:46.000 --> 0:04:48.640 you're a curious sixteen year old, And maybe people who 0:04:48.680 --> 0:04:51.520 are listening right now can feel like a curious twenty 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:53.080 six year old or thirty six year old. It doesn't 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.039 matter what age you are. For me, I was a 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:56.960 curious sixteen year old, but I was still doing everything 0:04:57.000 --> 0:04:59.840 every sixteen year old. Does you know you just carry on? 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:06.120 You think deeply, but you act UNDEPLI that yeah, exactly right, 0:05:06.160 --> 0:05:07.840 like you? You think deeply, And I think a lot 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:10.520 of us have this challenge today where we our mind 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:13.280 wants to think higher, but we're still acting on our 0:05:13.320 --> 0:05:16.360 lower nature, and so we see that contradiction. So I 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:20.400 was a walking, talking contradiction. I would think deeply, think highly, 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:23.680 but live lowly and be completely a servant to my 0:05:24.560 --> 0:05:27.719 mind and my lower nature. And then I met a 0:05:27.760 --> 0:05:30.800 monk when I was eighteen. So every week I would 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:36.240 be at university and we would have different speakers, influencers, celebrities, authors, 0:05:36.360 --> 0:05:38.960 CEOs come and speak, and I didn't want to go 0:05:39.120 --> 0:05:40.640 because I was just like, what am I going to 0:05:40.760 --> 0:05:42.640 learn from a monk? You know, what does a monk 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:45.960 even have? And so I literally said to my friends, 0:05:46.000 --> 0:05:48.159 who are getting into spirituality at that time, who told 0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:50.600 me to come, they said, no, you have to come, 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:53.039 and I said, okay, I'm only coming if we go 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:55.960 to a bar. And that was literally my land. I 0:05:56.000 --> 0:05:57.359 was like, I'm only coming if we go to a 0:05:57.360 --> 0:05:59.719 bar afterwards, and that's how that's how degraded I was. 0:06:00.400 --> 0:06:03.760 And they were like, okay, great, so they confirmed, and 0:06:03.800 --> 0:06:07.159 so I went and I went in there with zero expectations, 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:11.040 and I was completely mesmerized. I'd never heard someone who 0:06:11.120 --> 0:06:15.120 spoke with such eloquence, who spoke with such grace, who 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:19.240 really had an aura of contentment around them. I mean, 0:06:19.320 --> 0:06:21.000 you have this too. The first time I met you, 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:23.000 you have that too, And I think when you meet 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:25.400 someone like that, For me, it was really interesting because 0:06:26.240 --> 0:06:28.960 at that time, I'd met people who were rich, I'd 0:06:29.000 --> 0:06:31.560 met people who are famous, I'd met people who were 0:06:32.040 --> 0:06:35.640 stunningly attractive, But I don't think i'd ever met anyone 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:40.520 who was satisfied or content or happy or at equanimity exactly. 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:43.520 I don't think i'd met someone yet at eighteen who 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:46.320 had that Which tradition was you from? So he's from 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:49.120 the Vedic tradition. Yeah, from the Vedic tradition, the Vedic 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:52.599 Hindu tradition. And for me, it was just you know 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:54.360 when you meet someone and you just inspired them and 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:55.919 you want to learn everything about them. So I just 0:06:55.920 --> 0:06:57.520 went up to him and I said, look, I love 0:06:57.720 --> 0:07:00.679 what you stand for. And he was standing for service, 0:07:00.680 --> 0:07:03.320 he was standing for helping humanity. And I said, I 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:06.040 want to have more of you in my life. I 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:08.440 just feel like I want to experience more of this. 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:10.560 And so he said to me, you now need to 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:13.720 spend your summer holidays or summer vacations as you say here. 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:15.280 He said, you need to spend all of them with 0:07:15.360 --> 0:07:18.080 me in India. And so I started spending every one 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:22.280 of my summer holidays vacations in India before that. Did 0:07:22.360 --> 0:07:24.280 you go to the bar that night? Did we did? 0:07:24.400 --> 0:07:26.640 We did go to the bar that night? Yes? No, no, 0:07:26.640 --> 0:07:29.760 no, no no, the monkey doesn't drink. We did go to 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:31.720 the bar that night. I stack to my promises. I'm 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.240 very committed. I spent the whole night thinking about what 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:37.360 I'd just heard and the biggest thing that stayed with 0:07:37.400 --> 0:07:41.000 me was he spoke about sacrifice, like giving up your 0:07:41.040 --> 0:07:43.920 own needs to serve others and going out of your 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:45.880 way to make a difference in the life of others, 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:48.880 and that really resonated with me at eighteen. It almost 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:51.400 gave me that thing to die for that made me 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:54.640 want to live. So then you did actually have a 0:07:54.680 --> 0:07:57.320 stint as a monkey yourself. So every summer holidays, I 0:07:57.400 --> 0:08:00.160 spent half of my summer living with him as a monk, 0:08:00.160 --> 0:08:03.360 as a trainee monk, just visiting, and then I spent 0:08:03.440 --> 0:08:05.880 the other half of that summer working internships in the 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:09.679 city of London. So I would literally go from steakhouses, bars, 0:08:10.240 --> 0:08:12.600 cars and the world of finance in London in the 0:08:12.600 --> 0:08:15.720 City of London to then going off and trying to 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:17.640 emulate the life of a monk. And then when I 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:21.160 graduated twenty two, I went and lived as an official 0:08:21.200 --> 0:08:24.160 monk for three years. So there was a lot, there 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:27.200 were a lot of month breaks every year, and during 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:28.960 that time I was just going back and forth. So 0:08:29.200 --> 0:08:30.720 I meet a lot of people today, and I'm sure 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:33.720 you do in your whole fast few decades that you've 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:36.319 been serving people through your knowledge I'm sure you've met 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:38.439 so many people who say, you know, I'm stuck between 0:08:38.480 --> 0:08:40.800 the two worlds, and I'm kind of I can't shake 0:08:40.840 --> 0:08:42.600 it off. I've done that. I literally did that for 0:08:42.640 --> 0:08:45.959 four years where I lived two polar opposite worlds in 0:08:45.960 --> 0:08:48.840 one sense. The phrase to be in the world and 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:52.480 not of it exactly exactly, and I didn't know that then. 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:54.920 I was still learning that. And so when then when 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:56.120 I got to go and live as a monk for 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.360 three years, that really gave me that experience. So what 0:08:59.400 --> 0:09:02.720 did you oh so much? One of the best things 0:09:02.760 --> 0:09:05.960 I learned, which I think is just really practical, is discipline. 0:09:06.280 --> 0:09:09.240 And I think discipline is so I'd love to hear 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:11.160 your thoughts on this, but I think discipline is so 0:09:11.280 --> 0:09:14.840 underestimated today. I think we talk a lot about creativity 0:09:14.960 --> 0:09:18.040 and spontaneity, and I love all that. I'm very creative, 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:22.080 I'm very spontaneous. But I think discipline is just so underestimated. 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:25.679 I think anyone in any field, in any practice, whether 0:09:25.760 --> 0:09:29.920 it's finance or business or singing or art, discipline is 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:32.679 such a key trait. So the discipline to wake up 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:35.120 at the same time every day, at four am, every 0:09:35.160 --> 0:09:38.959 single day, the discipline to sit and meditate for multiple 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:41.960 hours a day, the discipline to do something even when 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:45.080 you don't feel the benefit, the discipline to do something 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:47.240 even when you don't have taste for it yet, but 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:51.280 to recognize that with patience and practice, that taste will come, 0:09:51.840 --> 0:09:55.400 and that meaning and fulfillment will come. That discipline is 0:09:55.440 --> 0:09:57.839 just so powerful, And disciplines is a hard thing to 0:09:57.880 --> 0:10:00.360 talk about because it's not attractive or sexy, So you 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:02.800 tell someone to do something with discipline, they'll just be like, oh, 0:10:02.840 --> 0:10:06.320 that doesn't sound inspirational. But it's like, that's such a 0:10:06.400 --> 0:10:10.840 core part of life transformation in my opinion anyways, discipline. 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:14.120 So I learned discipline. I didn't wake up discipline. I 0:10:14.240 --> 0:10:16.320 used to always try get off school if I could, 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:18.800 and all the rest of it. So to be able 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:21.200 to take that on at twenty two in my life, 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:26.120 to really value discipline and to break the mental limits 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:28.840 of what I believe discipline was. I never believed I 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.240 could wake up at four am. But then when you 0:10:31.280 --> 0:10:32.760 have people who are doing it around you, when you 0:10:32.760 --> 0:10:36.120 build up a practice, everything becomes possible, which is which 0:10:36.160 --> 0:10:39.000 is quite fascinating. When you start breaking your limits. Now 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:43.600 as you start to reflect. When people go into meditation, 0:10:44.400 --> 0:10:46.840 and if they're honest with themselves, there's a lot of 0:10:46.920 --> 0:10:53.079 inner demons that wake up too. The shadows accompany the 0:10:53.200 --> 0:10:56.640 light that comes. Yes. I made a video called why 0:10:56.720 --> 0:10:59.800 Meditation made Me a Bad Person, and it was exactly 0:10:59.840 --> 0:11:02.240 a line with this, So I talk about how you 0:11:02.280 --> 0:11:04.520 know when you see people meditate today, it's like everyone 0:11:04.559 --> 0:11:08.000 looks really serene and tranquil and wearing yoga pants and 0:11:08.000 --> 0:11:11.280 these beautiful sunsets, and it's like, well, when you start meditating, 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:14.080 it wasn't like that for me. A beautiful analogy that's 0:11:14.080 --> 0:11:17.040 given in the very literatures is of cleansing a mirror 0:11:17.040 --> 0:11:20.199 of the mind. So a mirror that's not been cleansed, 0:11:20.640 --> 0:11:23.160 or an attic or a loft that's not been cleansed 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:26.400 for years and decades and lifetimes is covered in dust. 0:11:26.640 --> 0:11:28.640 So when one first starts to clean it through the 0:11:28.640 --> 0:11:31.679 mechanism of meditation, the first thing that happens is the 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:34.360 dust comes in your face, and that dust is those 0:11:34.360 --> 0:11:37.960 inner demons. Your ego. You start noticing it more. Your pride, 0:11:38.000 --> 0:11:40.839 you start noticing it more. You're lost, your anger, you're greed, 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:43.920 you're envy, all of these demons. You start to notice them, 0:11:43.960 --> 0:11:46.280 all the things you don't want other people to find 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:48.800 out exactly, all the things that have just been sitting 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:50.880 there and you haven't focused on and you don't want 0:11:50.880 --> 0:11:53.079 people to know you have them exactly, and you start 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:55.719 seeing them more so. First, when I started meditating, I 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:57.480 was like, oh my god, I'm such a bad person. 0:11:58.200 --> 0:12:00.880 And really, the way I broke through that was recognizing 0:12:00.880 --> 0:12:04.120 that again, I am not those things. They are not me. 0:12:04.520 --> 0:12:07.880 I am not envious. I'm pure consciousness. Envyous something that 0:12:07.920 --> 0:12:10.360 I've taken on as a garment that needs to be 0:12:10.400 --> 0:12:12.560 taken off. A lot of people say, I don't have 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:16.160 time to meditate, to have all this work to do. 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:19.200 I have to take care of the kids, my job, 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:22.640 I have all this stress. Aren't those the people who 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.280 need it most? Yeah, we all need it most. I 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:28.120 feel like we'll excuses are always going to be there. 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:30.360 This is why I say to people that I think 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:31.960 it's good that we start five minutes a day, ten 0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:34.160 minutes a day, But if you can take a day, 0:12:34.520 --> 0:12:37.480 take half a day, whatever's practical for you. If you 0:12:37.520 --> 0:12:40.040 can take a week or a weekend, go on a 0:12:40.080 --> 0:12:43.040 retreat and have a real deep experience of how powerful 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:46.360 meditation can be. When you have a deeply profound experience, 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:48.319 you want to do five minutes every day even if 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:50.440 you don't have time. Right, we all make time for 0:12:50.480 --> 0:12:52.240 the things that we're in love with or that we 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:54.840 really really need in our lives, and we also forget 0:12:54.920 --> 0:12:58.160 that it's the pause that helps everything else. And I 0:12:58.160 --> 0:12:59.800 think we think, and I know, you've got your daily 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.000 every day, which I think is so beautiful, and it's 0:13:02.040 --> 0:13:04.640 like we forget that, Wait a minute, if you don't 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:07.240 breathe properly, none of this is going to last for 0:13:07.360 --> 0:13:10.720 very long. Then you left after three years? Yes, what 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:13.920 was going on in your mind? Yeah, so this one's 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:16.840 easier to answer. In hindsight, it wasn't as easier to 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:20.960 answer then At that time I was conflicted. The first 0:13:20.960 --> 0:13:23.160 thing meditation does is that it gives you a really 0:13:23.520 --> 0:13:27.280 raw mirror reflection of who you are to yourself. And 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:32.479 for me, at least for my psychophysical nature, my meditation 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:35.240 was giving me the self awareness that I wasn't a monk, 0:13:35.960 --> 0:13:41.080 that I enjoyed rebellion. I enjoyed my independence, and monk 0:13:41.120 --> 0:13:43.640 life isn't about rebellion and independence. In one sense, it's 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:47.520 it's a lot about surrender exactly. One of my teachers 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:48.800 said to me. He said that he felt it was 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:50.400 my time to leave so that I could share what 0:13:50.440 --> 0:13:53.360 I'd learned. And when I actually left at that time, 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:56.160 it was really heartbreaking because I was still conflicted whether 0:13:56.240 --> 0:13:58.000 I was doing the right thing or not. So I 0:13:58.040 --> 0:14:00.560 always describe it was like a divorce. I really felt 0:14:00.559 --> 0:14:02.320 like I got divorced from the love of my life 0:14:02.320 --> 0:14:05.000 after three years, because I'd given up my corporate jobs, 0:14:05.040 --> 0:14:07.080 I'd given up a girlfriend I was dating, I'd given 0:14:07.160 --> 0:14:09.840 up my family, I'd given up everything to make this step, 0:14:09.960 --> 0:14:12.679 and now I was going back into a world that 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:14.920 now was judging me as well, because when I left, 0:14:14.960 --> 0:14:17.800 my extended Indian family was like, You're really going to 0:14:17.840 --> 0:14:21.480 become a monk after all that education, after working so hard, 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:24.960 all your family's doctors and lawyers where they relieved. When 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:27.400 I came back, they were like, you failed at being 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:30.160 a monk, like really like they were like they were 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:32.480 more mortified. They were just like what they sent you back, 0:14:32.600 --> 0:14:35.040 it weren't good enough to be a monk. So it 0:14:35.080 --> 0:14:39.640 was actually harder to come back to some time, did 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:45.400 you re enter into I re entered into moving back 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:50.320 in my parents physically and mentally feeling like, wow, this 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:52.280 is going to be really challenging because now I have 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:54.640 to think about normal stuff, like maybe I have to 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:56.920 think about a career, maybe I have to think about money, 0:14:57.160 --> 0:14:59.280 maybe I have to think about paying rent, and then 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:01.040 all of these, you know, all of these thoughts start 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:04.280 bringing up. So I started every day. I would wake 0:15:04.360 --> 0:15:05.760 up at the same time every day, and I would 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:07.520 meditate every day, and I was trying to stick to 0:15:07.560 --> 0:15:09.120 as much as I could. And there were a few 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:10.880 months in between where I did the opposite. Like I 0:15:10.920 --> 0:15:12.640 remember the day I left being among, the first thing 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:14.880 I did was buy lots of chocolate. The second thing 0:15:14.880 --> 0:15:17.040 I did was go and catch up on every single 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:19.920 movie and TV show i'd missed out one. And so 0:15:19.960 --> 0:15:21.640 I completely went the opposite way. And I think that's 0:15:21.720 --> 0:15:23.480 very natural that when you've been in one extreme, you 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:26.320 can fall back into your old habits very quickly. And 0:15:26.360 --> 0:15:29.320 I think some of us feel this after holidays or retreats, 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:31.160 or you go on a meditation retreat with deep back 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:33.400 and you go really deep for two days and three days, 0:15:33.400 --> 0:15:35.040 and then you come back and then after a couple 0:15:35.080 --> 0:15:36.880 of months then I started to kind of come back 0:15:37.360 --> 0:15:40.760 in the middle. So, other than discipline, you learned, of course, 0:15:41.720 --> 0:15:46.440 reflective self inquiry, right, absolutely, yeah, absolutely, the bigger questions 0:15:46.480 --> 0:15:48.640 of existence one hundred percent. And this is what I 0:15:48.720 --> 0:15:52.840 talk about that I think today we're we're so enamored 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:56.760 with circumstantial solutions, but what we're trying to do is 0:15:56.800 --> 0:16:03.400 solve our existential challenges with circumstantial volutions. So my point being, existentially, 0:16:03.480 --> 0:16:07.200 we don't feel connected to ourselves existentially, we don't feel 0:16:07.200 --> 0:16:09.960 like we're serving. Existentially, we don't know our purpose, and 0:16:10.040 --> 0:16:11.800 we try and solve that with the bottle of wine. 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:13.760 We try and solve that with a late night out 0:16:13.800 --> 0:16:16.760 with friends, and again we feel that same thing every week. 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:20.880 So circumstantial solutions don't solve the existential problem. So for me, 0:16:21.000 --> 0:16:24.600 this reflective self inquiry that you're speaking about was me 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:27.000 really asking myself, what is my life about? What is 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:29.240 the purpose of my life? What do I want to 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:32.280 do with this incredible time and human form that I've 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:35.840 been given, this unique blessing of being a human with 0:16:35.880 --> 0:16:39.120 a human mind and human consciousness. It's such a gift 0:16:39.160 --> 0:16:41.800 and such a blessing, how can I make the most 0:16:41.840 --> 0:16:43.400 of it? And so I used to spend every day, 0:16:43.400 --> 0:16:46.000 after meditating for two hours a day, I would go 0:16:46.080 --> 0:16:49.680 and sit in a library and just read, and I 0:16:49.680 --> 0:16:52.200 would read and study everything I could to try and 0:16:52.320 --> 0:16:57.000 find more answers and the particularly the commonalities between what 0:16:57.040 --> 0:16:59.720 I'd studied in Vedic texts and what I was seeing 0:16:59.800 --> 0:17:04.080 in modern knowledge. Share some insights, yeah, absolutely, great question. 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:07.320 I think one of the biggest insights I saw was 0:17:07.800 --> 0:17:10.560 that all ancient texts tell us that we're not the 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:13.640 mind and we're not the body, and all of our 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:15.520 problems come from our belief that we're the mind and 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:22.080 we're the body, which are transient, femoral, ungraspable movements and consciousness. 0:17:22.119 --> 0:17:25.200 Exactly exactly what you explain, far more articulate and beautifully 0:17:25.200 --> 0:17:27.040 than I ever will. So I'm going to leave that 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:30.119 to you. But that's the truth that we are completely 0:17:30.240 --> 0:17:32.240 in the belief that we are this mind and body. 0:17:32.440 --> 0:17:35.520 The mind and body are an experience. Exactly, you're the 0:17:35.560 --> 0:17:39.200 one who's having the experience, right Exactly. We are simply witnessing, 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:43.720 we're observing, we're within that where the energy that sees 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:46.159 through the eyes through the years and functions through the 0:17:46.200 --> 0:17:48.679 mind and body. And so for me, one of the 0:17:48.680 --> 0:17:50.960 first things was, how can I remind myself of that 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:53.040 on a daily basis now that I'm in a world 0:17:53.359 --> 0:17:55.760 where I'm back believing that I'm the mind and body. 0:17:55.800 --> 0:17:58.280 When I was a monk, you forget you're the mind 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:00.040 and body. We didn't even look in the mirror to 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:03.520 leave for three years, because you're removing that aspect of yourself. 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:05.960 And so I started to put up like a small 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:08.280 sticky note next to where I brush my teeth every 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:11.240 morning saying, remember you're not your mind and not your body. 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:13.240 So every morning and I'd be brushing my teeth, I'd 0:18:13.240 --> 0:18:15.200 look at that, and that would help me and remind 0:18:15.240 --> 0:18:18.080 me that I wasn't. So how did that lead to 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:21.840 you know, pure now well known in the world as 0:18:21.920 --> 0:18:28.360 an expert on success a purpose driven life. But tell 0:18:28.400 --> 0:18:31.040 me a little bit about your initial kind of foray 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:34.520 into the world of business and the world of commerce 0:18:34.600 --> 0:18:38.920 and the world that in a sense, everybody wants that right, 0:18:39.040 --> 0:18:43.680 everybody wants success in one way or another. So one 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:45.680 of the first things that happened when I came back 0:18:45.760 --> 0:18:47.720 is a lot of my friends now worked at large 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:51.040 corporate companies and they'd been working for a number of years, 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:53.600 three to five years, and they were all experiencing stress 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:56.159 and burnout. So they heard that I'd come back and 0:18:56.200 --> 0:18:57.960 they reached out to me and said, Jay, you're a monk. 0:18:58.080 --> 0:19:00.480 Right this is twenty thirteen. They were like, you're a 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:02.399 monk cri. I said yes, and they said, well, you 0:19:02.480 --> 0:19:05.359 must have learned something about like mindfulness and meditation. These 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:08.400 words were just kind of coming up into the mainstream 0:19:08.400 --> 0:19:10.360 world at that time. And I said, yeah, I learned 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:12.800 how to meditate, and I learned these principles of leadership 0:19:12.800 --> 0:19:15.760 and these values and how to work from a deeper 0:19:15.760 --> 0:19:18.040 place and intention setting. And they said, well, do you 0:19:18.119 --> 0:19:20.600 mind coming in and speaking at our companies? And so 0:19:20.640 --> 0:19:22.959 I started to get invited into corporates and a lot 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:24.800 of the executives then would ask me to coach them 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:26.960 one on one. So this was almost like a natural 0:19:27.080 --> 0:19:31.200 default coaching world that was created in my life out 0:19:31.200 --> 0:19:34.879 of demand rather than me. But the monk could actually 0:19:34.920 --> 0:19:39.560 helped you exactly. I would not be where I'm at 0:19:39.560 --> 0:19:42.160 today without living as a monk. And I laugh about 0:19:42.200 --> 0:19:44.040 that now because so many people when I was about 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:45.679 to become a monk. Said yeah, you realize no one 0:19:45.720 --> 0:19:49.080