Speaker 1: Hey, it's Ja Shetty, and I just want to take
Speaker 1: a moment to thank you to express my deepest gratitude
Speaker 1: to you for choosing to listen to on Purpose for
Speaker 1: our first episode of this year, twenty twenty two. This
Speaker 1: year is going to be the biggest, the best, the deepest,
Speaker 1: the most genuine, and most sincere year on on Purpose
Speaker 1: of all time. Since we launched in twenty nineteen, I've
Speaker 1: had the pleasure and the honor of sitting down with
Speaker 1: some incredible guests, everyone from Will Smith to Alicia keys
Speaker 1: Uval Noah Harari to Ray Dahlio, all the way through
Speaker 1: to June Ico Big, Sean Russ and many many more.
Speaker 1: We've had incredible thinkers like doctor Joe Dispenser, Gretchen Ruben,
Speaker 1: and doctor Mark Hyman. I really hope that you're going
Speaker 1: to go back and listen to any of those guests
Speaker 1: that you're excited about, but I also hope that you'll
Speaker 1: join me this year for new guests and new insights.
Speaker 1: Here's how it works. Every Monday, I launched an episode
Speaker 1: which is an interview star with a guest, and on
Speaker 1: Friday a solo episode where I dive deep into something
Speaker 1: i've been going into with my health and wellness journey.
Speaker 1: I couldn't be more grateful and proud of the amazing
Speaker 1: community that we've built here on Purpose. I love seeing
Speaker 1: your Instagram post, your tweets, and every other social media
Speaker 1: platform you're on, and this year it's just going to
Speaker 1: be phenomenal. Thank you for joining me today. I can't
Speaker 1: wait for you to listen to this episode. This is
Speaker 1: a special behind the scenes episode of an interview between
Speaker 1: me and Gwyneth Paltrow at her Goop event. This took
Speaker 1: place at the Porsche Design Center in LA and there
Speaker 1: were only around one hundred and fifty people in the audience.
Speaker 1: This is a sneak peek. This is what we do
Speaker 1: on on Purpose. I really hope you enjoyed this conversation.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to see your reviews and I hope
Speaker 1: you share it. I'm so happy to see ye thanking me.
Speaker 1: I didn't know if you were going to make it
Speaker 1: after all those dwelling parties that It has been a
Speaker 1: really crazy week, but in a good way. And I'm
Speaker 1: just really grateful to be here with all of you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me. This is beautiful.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Thank you. So I would love
Speaker 1: it if you could just give everybody a little bit
Speaker 1: of your amazing story and how you came through being
Speaker 1: a monk and into being this amazing life coach and
Speaker 1: motivator and all of the amazing things that you are.
Speaker 1: So I was born and raised in London, and I
Speaker 1: grew up in a family where I had three options
Speaker 1: to be a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure. And
Speaker 1: I chose the third option. And so, to my parents' surprise,
Speaker 1: when I was eighteen years old, I told them that
Speaker 1: when I graduated from school that I would go off
Speaker 1: to become a monk. And they didn't believe me. They
Speaker 1: were just like, yeah, sure, it's a faith. And so
Speaker 1: when I was eighteen years old, I was invited to
Speaker 1: an event at my university and it was somewhat similar
Speaker 1: to this in the sense that the event was around
Speaker 1: introducing people at university to thinkers thought leaders. I know,
Speaker 1: you've had an incredible lineup of guests this evening, and
Speaker 1: I went along because my friends promised me that we
Speaker 1: would go to a bar afterwards. I didn't want to
Speaker 1: go to this event, and I said, as long as
Speaker 1: we go to a bar afterwards, I'll come and hear
Speaker 1: this monk or whatever you want me to hear. So
Speaker 1: I went along to this event and this monk was speaking,
Speaker 1: and I went there expecting nothing, but I walked away
Speaker 1: feeling like I had completely found a new path in
Speaker 1: life because the monk was speaking about selflessness and service
Speaker 1: and using our time to have an impact in the world.
Speaker 1: So when I graduated, I traded my suits for robes.
Speaker 1: I lived on the floor. All my possessions fit inside
Speaker 1: a gym locker. We meditated for four to eight hours
Speaker 1: a day, and I lived that life for three years.
Speaker 1: And then at the end of it there were two things,
Speaker 1: and the fast version is my teachers said to me
Speaker 1: that they felt that it was time for me to
Speaker 1: go on and share what I'd learned. It was one
Speaker 1: of those it's not you, it's me conversations. I basically
Speaker 1: got kicked out of being a monk. So my parents
Speaker 1: are like, you failed at this too. And when I
Speaker 1: came back, which was now eight years ago, I really
Speaker 1: really saw a world in which everything I'd learned I
Speaker 1: felt had so much of a space in these busy, hectic,
Speaker 1: chaotic lives, and I had no idea how I was
Speaker 1: going to try and share what I'd learned. But I
Speaker 1: started and took a few steps and then you know,
Speaker 1: here we are today, where I've been really fortunate and
Speaker 1: feel really grateful that I've been able to work with
Speaker 1: so many incredible people, have been able to connect with
Speaker 1: so many beautiful humans, have been able to connect with
Speaker 1: so many of you that I bumped into today as well.
Speaker 1: And I think that it all started because I met
Speaker 1: someone who changed the trajectory of my life. And had
Speaker 1: I not met him, then I wouldn't be here today.
Speaker 1: But that's a that's a pretty extreme outcome, right, Like
Speaker 1: a lot of us have read a book or her
Speaker 1: a talk and felt inspired or felt a calling to
Speaker 1: change our lives or to think about things in it
Speaker 1: was a different way. But to go and renounce life
Speaker 1: as you knew it for three years is a pretty
Speaker 1: bold move. And I wanted to ask you what was
Speaker 1: the process like of letting go of the material world,
Speaker 1: if you will, And was that traumatic at all? Was
Speaker 1: there grief in it? Like? How did you get used
Speaker 1: to the life as among having been just a normal
Speaker 1: London student. I think there were a few things. The
Speaker 1: first thing was when I met him, and now when
Speaker 1: I reflect on it, I realized that at the time,
Speaker 1: when I was eighteen years old, I'd met a lot
Speaker 1: of people who were rich. I'd met people that had
Speaker 1: been famous. I'd met people who were successful. I'd met
Speaker 1: people who were strong and powerful and beautiful. But I
Speaker 1: don't think i'd met anyone who is truly happy. And
Speaker 1: he was happy, he still is happy, still a monk today,
Speaker 1: and he was happy, and I thought, I want to
Speaker 1: understand that, And it was almost a moment if I
Speaker 1: want that. So my twenty two year old self, when
Speaker 1: I went off to become a monk, I had this
Speaker 1: boundless enthusiasm to say, I want to live this process
Speaker 1: exactly how they live it. I don't want to take
Speaker 1: any shortcuts. I don't want to let my mind keep
Speaker 1: me in my comfort zone. I have to go all out.
Speaker 1: And so I feel like it was almost a boundary
Speaker 1: or a commitment that I made that no matter how
Speaker 1: I feel, I'm going to live it exactly how they do,
Speaker 1: because maybe if I don't do it how they are,
Speaker 1: then I won't read the benefits. And so I think,
Speaker 1: actually it was easier at the time. Now if you
Speaker 1: ask me to do it, feel like, no, I'm fine,
Speaker 1: I really like my bed and I like sleeping for
Speaker 1: eight hours a night. But at the time I had
Speaker 1: this enthusiasm which was I just want to see if
Speaker 1: it works. And I think that's why many experiments are
Speaker 1: so important in our lives. You don't have to do
Speaker 1: it for three years, but the mini experiment of let
Speaker 1: me for a week follow it exactly like this person saying,
Speaker 1: let me for a weekend, do exactly what I'm hearing
Speaker 1: or reading in this book or from this speaker. Let
Speaker 1: me for this day, just live that way and see
Speaker 1: what happens. And so actually removing myself from the material
Speaker 1: world when I became a monk was easier because for
Speaker 1: the four years in between, I'd been doing these mini experiments.
Speaker 1: So the first time I went to the ushroom and
Speaker 1: they told me that I couldn't listen to fifty cent
Speaker 1: like that moment, that moment was hard because I was like, what,
Speaker 1: I don't get to listen to music? And then they
Speaker 1: told me that I wouldn't get to what's television or
Speaker 1: so the first time I went that was hard. But
Speaker 1: what I realized was the sacrifice was just not comparable
Speaker 1: to the payoff. And I think that's what it comes
Speaker 1: down to, You have the choice to do all these
Speaker 1: things whenever you want, any time. So to close off
Speaker 1: for a day, a weekend, a week it's worth the test,
Speaker 1: It's worth the experiment. So interesting. So what do you
Speaker 1: think it is about not having free will in whatever
Speaker 1: these circumstances are that has power in it? Well, I
Speaker 1: think I think we've come to a place where we
Speaker 1: feel that freedom and the freedom of unlimited choice is power.
Speaker 1: And we've all realized, and the science and the studies
Speaker 1: all show this that the more choice we have, the
Speaker 1: worst mistakes we make, and we make poorer decisions based
Speaker 1: on this complete, limitless choice. And I found that actually,
Speaker 1: when you stripped away some of that choice, your ability
Speaker 1: to make decisions grow because now I wasn't experiencing what
Speaker 1: we all know now to be called decision fatigue. I
Speaker 1: wasn't wasting my time making decisions that were irrelevant to
Speaker 1: my personal fulfillment and satisfaction. So now, when you're not
Speaker 1: having to think about certain choices in your day, you're
Speaker 1: freed up to make choices in a healthier way. And
Speaker 1: so I found that actually making certain parts of our
Speaker 1: life systematic, routine, habitual, communal as well allowed for space
Speaker 1: for creativity, spontaneity, and true expression, whereas I think a
Speaker 1: lot of us feel like, no, no, if I just
Speaker 1: can choose everything that I do every day, that will
Speaker 1: give rise to spontaneity, but it does the opposite. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense? Yeah? Totally. It sounds like it
Speaker 1: adds like these are the layers of responsibility that we
Speaker 1: heap on ourselves, which is like choices that we make
Speaker 1: actually keep us sort of slave to the responsibility. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: So when you were there, you were you able to
Speaker 1: really connect with happiness and did you bring it home?
Speaker 1: I think when I was there, I was able to
Speaker 1: really learn how to find stillness in discomfort, and I
Speaker 1: think that was the biggest thing that I gained from that.
Speaker 1: So I'll tell you a story of an experience that
Speaker 1: I would never wish on anyone and do not recommend.
Speaker 1: But we did a seventy two hour train journey from
Speaker 1: North India to South India. Seventy two hours. It has
Speaker 1: random stops, but you don't actually physically get off for
Speaker 1: longer than fifteen minutes at a stop, So there's no
Speaker 1: pause for seventy two hours, and as a monk, you
Speaker 1: travel in like coach, but coach in India is not
Speaker 1: coach in the United States. So coach is you're literally
Speaker 1: surrounded by people who haven't paid for a ticket, like
Speaker 1: it's just infiltrated with people, and you're just surrounded by
Speaker 1: all these villagers and people that you haven't even met,
Speaker 1: and they don't have a ticket, and you don't even
Speaker 1: know where they're going. And I decided that I wouldn't
Speaker 1: eat for three days because on the first day I
Speaker 1: saw the state of the toilet and the restroom on
Speaker 1: the train, and so I decided I would do a
Speaker 1: voluntary fast. And you know, to all my teachers, I
Speaker 1: seemed really detached at this point. They were just like wow,
Speaker 1: and I was like, yeah, I'm just I'm so detached
Speaker 1: and renounced now from food, and really I was just like, no,
Speaker 1: I do not want to go in there. So that's
Speaker 1: this is a very uncomfortable scenario as a Londoner. I'm
Speaker 1: used to taking the underground and you know, used to
Speaker 1: driving around my car, and I'm used to you know,
Speaker 1: clean bathrooms and all the rest of it. So this
Speaker 1: is an uncomfortable situation. And it was really interesting because
Speaker 1: I remember saying to my teacher who we were traveling with,
Speaker 1: that I would meditate in the stops. I said to him,
Speaker 1: it's too chaotic on the train. I said, it's too
Speaker 1: difficult to have focus on the train. When we stop,
Speaker 1: I'll get off, I'll meditate for twenty minutes, I'll come
Speaker 1: back on, and I'll do that every stop. And he
Speaker 1: looked me in the eyes and he said, do you
Speaker 1: think life is going to be chaotic like the train
Speaker 1: or still like the stop? And I was like, is
Speaker 1: this a trick question? He said, he said, life is
Speaker 1: going to be chaotic like the train. And so if
Speaker 1: you don't learn how to meditate on the train, meditating
Speaker 1: on the stop is not going to help you. And
Speaker 1: I think that, in a nutshell, is how I feel.
Speaker 1: I experienced joy happiness. The happiness wasn't in an experience
Speaker 1: of feeling happy in the way we think about it.
Speaker 1: It was in the joy of knowing I could navigate
Speaker 1: any situation. It wasn't that you felt happy because you
Speaker 1: did something right. It's because you never felt like you
Speaker 1: didn't know what to do to navigate pain. And so
Speaker 1: that's where the definition of knowing how to navigate challenges
Speaker 1: became more joyful than the idea that I could avoid challenges.
Speaker 1: And I think that desire of you know where we
Speaker 1: are today where we call them unwanted emotions, the challenges.
Speaker 1: Everything we don't want is unavoidable. So if I say
Speaker 1: I never want to feel pain again, or I never
Speaker 1: want to feel stress again, that's not true for anyone,
Speaker 1: including the monks, including me, including any of us. And
Speaker 1: so actually knowing that I am going to feel all
Speaker 1: of these things, but I know what to do with
Speaker 1: then that is a position of strength and joy and
Speaker 1: happiness and what do you do with it? Laugh is
Speaker 1: actually truly one of them. There's their mind is compared
Speaker 1: to a monkey in the Vaders, and it's been popularized
Speaker 1: today in psychology as well as the monkey mind. But
Speaker 1: to refer to the mind like a monkey, and if
Speaker 1: you've ever seen a monkey, they are hilarious. So in India,
Speaker 1: we would see monkeys all the time, and they would
Speaker 1: trade their banana for a credit card, like they would
Speaker 1: literally swap and then they would swap it right back.
Speaker 1: And you'd see monkeys like chase anything that looked like
Speaker 1: food in your bag and they'd rip it and steal
Speaker 1: it like they're the best thieves and monkeys are these
Speaker 1: hilarious characters. And the reason why the mind is compared
Speaker 1: to a monkey is because sometimes we need to laugh
Speaker 1: at the things our mind comes up with. Now, what
Speaker 1: we choose to do currently is we choose to criticize
Speaker 1: ourselves or we choose to judge ourselves when our mind
Speaker 1: does something that we don't like, we think. This literally
Speaker 1: happened to me the other day. I was I was
Speaker 1: in Dallas and my first keynote back since the pandemic,
Speaker 1: and I went in to get a tea at a
Speaker 1: coffee shop and get some coffee for some of my
Speaker 1: team members. And I was waiting there and I went
Speaker 1: to the front and the barista was serving us and
Speaker 1: she may a mistake and how much change she gave
Speaker 1: me and I didn't notice. Actually, I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. And I was about to walk out,
Speaker 1: and literally as I was just about to turn, she said,
Speaker 1: I'm the worst. She just stopped and said and I said,
Speaker 1: are you okay? And she said, oh, I just gave
Speaker 1: you the wrong change. I'm the worst. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1: And I was like, and I literally looked her and
Speaker 1: I said, I said, you're not the worst. You're a human.
Speaker 1: You made a mistake. It's okay, it's fine, you're wonderful.
Speaker 1: Thank you for noticing. And then she gave me the
Speaker 1: right change and I left and I was just thinking, wow,
Speaker 1: like she saw the monkey mind to make a mistake,
Speaker 1: and she judged herself. She criticized herself. And so the
Speaker 1: first thing we have to do is honestly switch critiquing
Speaker 1: for laughing. Laugh when the monkey mind makes this mistake,
Speaker 1: When your mind tells you something that genuinely is not true,
Speaker 1: allow yourself to laugh, allow yourself to see it with
Speaker 1: a bit of humor. And when you start to see that,
Speaker 1: you start to notice that when you don't take the
Speaker 1: mind so seriously, it doesn't have that much of a
Speaker 1: serious effect on you. Moving on from that, sometimes our
Speaker 1: emotions are a bit more deeper, and it's hard to
Speaker 1: laugh at them. They're more painful than that. And I
Speaker 1: find that again in that scenario, our desire is to
Speaker 1: push them under the carpet, lock them in a door,
Speaker 1: force them away. And actually, in those moments, understanding that,
Speaker 1: accepting that emotion and recognizing that, knowing that it's going
Speaker 1: to be there, it's almost like the weather. If I
Speaker 1: always say I don't want it to be I don't
Speaker 1: want it to rain. I never want it to rain,
Speaker 1: and then it rains. Now I'm scared, I'm unprepared, and
Speaker 1: I'm stressed. Whereas if I accept that it's going to rain,
Speaker 1: I get time to go and pack my umbrella and
Speaker 1: my raincoat. And so I think it's about developing the
Speaker 1: umbrella and the raincoat, and for our emotions, the umbrella
Speaker 1: is community and the raincoat is our tools and our
Speaker 1: habits and our practices of reflection that it help us
Speaker 1: break them down. How do we go about cultivating that
Speaker 1: inner life, that space so that we can separate ourselves
Speaker 1: from these emotions that blow through us and seem like
Speaker 1: they take us over. I genuinely believe that we all
Speaker 1: have to have a foundation of our daily routine that
Speaker 1: gives us the feelings we want, so the challenges that
Speaker 1: we are surrounded by a day where we don't get
Speaker 1: the feeling we want, and that's what we consider to
Speaker 1: be a bad day. I didn't get what I wanted
Speaker 1: there for today's a bad day. And actually, in that moment,
Speaker 1: instead of wanting a good day, if we start by
Speaker 1: creating a foundational set of habits and activities that can
Speaker 1: set us up for that day, the healthier we are.
Speaker 1: So I'll give an example. You know, eighty percent of
Speaker 1: us study show wake up to our phones first thing
Speaker 1: in the morning, So we see our phones before we
Speaker 1: see our partners and our kids, and we see our
Speaker 1: phones lasting at night after we see our partners and
Speaker 1: our kids, and so our phone gets more FaceTime than
Speaker 1: the people we love. And when I think about that,
Speaker 1: I think to myself, when you wake up to the
Speaker 1: phone in the morning, you wake up to notifications, negativity, news,
Speaker 1: and noise, and these four things make you feel like
Speaker 1: you're starting your day at the bottom of a ladder,
Speaker 1: and now you're spending the day catching up to yourself.
Speaker 1: Whereas if your day started with four key habits of thankfulness, inspiration,
Speaker 1: meditational mindfulness, and exercise, you're now starting your day at
Speaker 1: a plus four. And now even if the rest of
Speaker 1: the day is challenging, you still end up at a
Speaker 1: plus two or a plus one. And so I like
Speaker 1: to set myself up by saying, what are the habits
Speaker 1: that I can practice today that are going to make
Speaker 1: me feel like my day's going in the right direction.
Speaker 1: And they are truly simple thankfulness takes thirty seconds. He's
Speaker 1: the best way to practice it. I don't recommend a
Speaker 1: gratitude journal. I don't recommend writing it down. I recommend
Speaker 1: expressing it, making it specific and personalizing it. Send a text,
Speaker 1: send a voice note, send an email, Send a message
Speaker 1: to someone that you're grateful to for the next seven days.
Speaker 1: Send them a message and make it really specific. Don't
Speaker 1: just say thank you GP for this wonderful event not
Speaker 1: good enough. Say thank you for the amazing deck, or
Speaker 1: thank you for the incredible experience. Thank you for what
Speaker 1: this felt like, look like, what it smelt like like.
Speaker 1: Share the depth of how that experience was for you.
Speaker 1: If you do that, gratitude actually as the ability to
Speaker 1: boost your immune system. It has the ability to shift
Speaker 1: your perspective and boost your mood. But if you do
Speaker 1: it in a way I'm grateful for the air, I'm
Speaker 1: grateful for my kids, I'm grateful for my job. That
Speaker 1: doesn't have that impact and effect because it stays with you,
Speaker 1: because it stays within you. And gratitude is meant to
Speaker 1: be shared. It's a gift that you get to give
Speaker 1: someone else. Inspiration is a big one for me. It's
Speaker 1: at one point in my life, I remember listening to
Speaker 1: apart from the monks, but listening to Steve Jobs's Stanford
Speaker 1: commencement speech every day for nine months in a row.
Speaker 1: And not only did I know the words off by heart,
Speaker 1: it really changed my heart listening to that speech every day.
Speaker 1: The words in it are so profound and so powerful
Speaker 1: that you start to rewire the neurons in your mind likes.
Speaker 1: It's genuinely changing the makeup of your mind. I recently
Speaker 1: sat down with Matthew McConaughey on my podcast and I
Speaker 1: said to him that I listened to his Oscar's acceptance
Speaker 1: speech every day. It's a five minute speech. It will
Speaker 1: only take five minutes, I said. I listened to it
Speaker 1: every day for thirty days in a row, and that
Speaker 1: rewires how your mind works. Now, you don't have to
Speaker 1: listen to people I'm recommending, but whoever it is that
Speaker 1: you're drawn to in your life. I promise you, if
Speaker 1: you listen to the same thing every single day because
Speaker 1: you like it that much, it will start to rewire
Speaker 1: how you think. It's as simple as that. And then
Speaker 1: meditation and exercise, of course, which I can go into,
Speaker 1: but those four habits for me are like my staple,
Speaker 1: my main course, then everything else's sides and dessert. Alright, alright,
Speaker 1: how do you how do you meditate? Do you still
Speaker 1: meditate for forty five minutes in the morning in the
Speaker 1: night two hours? It's been two hours for sixteen years.
Speaker 1: Two hours. I thought it was forty five minutes. It's
Speaker 1: been two hours for sixteen years, Siah. So I find
Speaker 1: meditation elusive, and I do it every morning, and I
Speaker 1: do TM and like this morning, I had the worst
Speaker 1: meditation and I was like counting. I wanted to open
Speaker 1: my eyes and check the timer. And some mornings I
Speaker 1: go really deep and it's like the most beautiful experience.
Speaker 1: So why does that happen? And what can I do
Speaker 1: to I don't know. It sounds stupid, like improve the
Speaker 1: quality of my meditation, But I don't know. If you guys, ever,
Speaker 1: if you meditate, you'd have those days where, I mean,
Speaker 1: my meditation teacher said to me, even in a shallow dive,
Speaker 1: you get wet. So still do it. But I was
Speaker 1: just wondering, like, do you have these euphoric deep meditations
Speaker 1: every day for two hours? I love that? How many
Speaker 1: people will never meditate regularly? How many people don't meditate,
Speaker 1: and how many people don't put up their hands no
Speaker 1: matter what I say, I appreciate. So yeah, So I
Speaker 1: started my two hour meditation practice when I was eighteen
Speaker 1: years old dirty four today, So it's been sixteen years
Speaker 1: that I've been meditating for two hours a day, and
Speaker 1: that form has taken many different formats. So it could
Speaker 1: be two hours in the morning straight, it could be
Speaker 1: an hour in an hour, it could be four blocks
Speaker 1: of half an hour each depending on what day it is,
Speaker 1: especially now with my busy schedule, it changes all the time.
Speaker 1: And how did you land on two hours? Just I
Speaker 1: landed on two hours because as a monk in my tradition,
Speaker 1: that amount of time was allotted to anyone who wanted
Speaker 1: to be a teacher. So for the integrity of my
Speaker 1: teaching and my practice and the coaching work I do,
Speaker 1: that's a basic commitment I've made to my teachers as
Speaker 1: how much I need to do. And so it's it's
Speaker 1: purely based on my relationship with my meditation teacher, who
Speaker 1: has trusted me with the ability to teach meditation. And
Speaker 1: so it's it's like this big responsibility that I have
Speaker 1: to give up with But it's beautiful. It's really fulfilling.
Speaker 1: And so, like you, I have meditations where I feel
Speaker 1: like I need to check my phone still still to
Speaker 1: this day, till this day, till this day, and so
Speaker 1: till this day, and so the beauty again. So I
Speaker 1: have had euphoric, deep, immersive experiences through meditation that have
Speaker 1: proved to me that meditation works that have helped me
Speaker 1: have a glimpse into the deepest experiences that meditations can
Speaker 1: take you to. But I don't want to talk about
Speaker 1: those because they don't help anyone. But what does help
Speaker 1: is this idea of knowing that what we're actually do
Speaker 1: when you're having that shallow dive, when you're turning up regardless,
Speaker 1: you're training your mind to be where you are. You're
Speaker 1: training your mind to do uncomfortable things. You're training your
Speaker 1: mind to not just freely do whatever it feels like
Speaker 1: in that moment. It's back to the free will. It's
Speaker 1: back to the free will. You are showing yourself that
Speaker 1: even if it's difficult, I can sit with this discomfort,
Speaker 1: even if I don't sit with the discomfort perfectly, I
Speaker 1: have sat with the discomfort, and that sitting with discomfort
Speaker 1: is setting you up for success in so many other
Speaker 1: areas of your life, rather than the desire of like
Speaker 1: I don't like this, let me get out of here.
Speaker 1: And so I find that meditation's experience is not meant
Speaker 1: to be a euphoric, ecstatic experience every time. It's actually
Speaker 1: meant to just give you a signal and alert as
Speaker 1: to how you feel today. So if you feel distracted today,
Speaker 1: meditation is just showing you that today you're going to
Speaker 1: be more distracted. Maybe don't make any big decisions. Use
Speaker 1: it as a signal. If I meditate and I fall asleep,
Speaker 1: like I did this afternoon, right, that's my body telling me, hey,
Speaker 1: because you are still today, you needed more sleep. So
Speaker 1: meditation is aligning your body and mind so that they
Speaker 1: can actually do what they want to do. And if
Speaker 1: the answer is distraction, let me not make good big
Speaker 1: decisions today, let me not take seriously today, maybe how
Speaker 1: I feel about someone, you know, Maybe let me not
Speaker 1: say something that I don't mean today because actually my
Speaker 1: mind's distracted. Yeah, you can use it as a litmus test, exactly.
Speaker 1: That's I see meditation as that especially interesting, right. It's
Speaker 1: like a diagnostic tool. Right. And so if someone wants
Speaker 1: to start meditation, How do you suggest that they do it?
Speaker 1: Are there certain apps? Are certain books one should read? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so there are three types of meditation that I was
Speaker 1: trained in, but that I see across the world today.
Speaker 1: There's breathwork, there's visualization, and there's mantra, so a team
Speaker 1: of course, there's mantra visualization I'm sure you've heard of,
Speaker 1: but visualization is actually even performed by Formula one races
Speaker 1: athletes who visualize. And then you have breathwork, of course,
Speaker 1: which again I feel is quite widely spread today, and
Speaker 1: that was the order in which we were trained in it.
Speaker 1: So breathwork helped to calm and steal the body, visualization
Speaker 1: helped to focus the mind, and then mantra helped really
Speaker 1: heal the heart and soul. So it was this ascending process.
Speaker 1: And so I found that starting with breathwork is a
Speaker 1: great foundation because it sets you up physically, and then
Speaker 1: moving to visualization and then to mantra as an ascending process.
Speaker 1: And so I know there's countless apps out there, I
Speaker 1: recommend whichever one truly works for you. I don't have
Speaker 1: a prescribed app because I do think meditation is so personal,
Speaker 1: but I would definitely start with the breath and then
Speaker 1: experiment with visualization in mantra as well. And the power
Speaker 1: of mantra is phenomenal because hearing the sound, even if whispered,
Speaker 1: we all know that sound transports us. We can hear
Speaker 1: a song that we grew up to and you're transported back.
Speaker 1: You can hear a sound that you don't like, and
Speaker 1: you're already feeling emotions that you don't like. And so
Speaker 1: the power of sacred sound or spiritual sound is to
Speaker 1: transport you. And so mantra is my chosen form of
Speaker 1: meditation too, and it's in my opinion the most powerful
Speaker 1: for those deep experiences within. But I feel breathwork and
Speaker 1: visualization of the launch pad for that type of meditation.
Speaker 1: You said that you fell asleep during your meditation today,
Speaker 1: and it just reminded me that. So the theme of
Speaker 1: this has been dreams, you know, sort of following your dreams,
Speaker 1: and I was wondering in your coaching practice, so when
Speaker 1: somebody comes to you, you know, I had a session
Speaker 1: earlier where this beautiful young woman said she's having a
Speaker 1: difficult time because she's in a job that she doesn't
Speaker 1: love and doesn't feel like it's her calling, but she
Speaker 1: feels scared to dare to dream about what that even
Speaker 1: would be or kind of give herself the permission to
Speaker 1: do that. So in your coaching practice, how do you
Speaker 1: what would you say to her, and what would you
Speaker 1: say in terms of finding that like? Is that manifestation?
Speaker 1: Is that like? How do you start to connect with
Speaker 1: those ideas of who you could be in your next iteration? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I can relate to that. I just just over
Speaker 1: five years ago, I was in a job just like
Speaker 1: that because when I came back from being a monk,
Speaker 1: I had to pay the bills, I had to pay
Speaker 1: off my student loan. I couldn't rely on my parents,
Speaker 1: who I moved in with when I first came back,
Speaker 1: but they weren't financially capable, of course, to take care
Speaker 1: of me for the rest of my life. And I
Speaker 1: already moved back in I was twenty six years old
Speaker 1: after living as a monk for three years, and so
Speaker 1: for me, I was in that position just over five
Speaker 1: years ago. So I know exactly what that feels like
Speaker 1: and what I'd say to that is the first step
Speaker 1: is learning to appreciate where you are, because if we
Speaker 1: can't appreciate where we are, we will never appreciate where
Speaker 1: we get to. And that is just the truth anyone
Speaker 1: and everyone. Someone could say, well, you know, I'm am
Speaker 1: running a great business, but only when I exit will
Speaker 1: I really feel happy. Or someone may say, I'm, you know,
Speaker 1: building this brand, but only when we work with this
Speaker 1: partner will I feel satisfied. And I feel that we're
Speaker 1: constantly in any scenario postponing our feeling of joy and
Speaker 1: success and happiness. And so for me, when I was
Speaker 1: in this corporate job, my goal was how can I
Speaker 1: appreciate where I am? And the only way to appreciate
Speaker 1: where you are is asking yourself, what can I learn
Speaker 1: here that might be useful for later? And if I
Speaker 1: look back and I honestly ask myself, so many of
Speaker 1: the skills that I learned in that job over five
Speaker 1: years ago are huge parts of my business, my ventures,
Speaker 1: my work today. That if I didn't have that experience,
Speaker 1: I'd actually be really bad at what I do today
Speaker 1: and I wouldn't have the skills that I do. So
Speaker 1: I think there is an honoring of where we are
Speaker 1: because something in your life has brought you there. And
Speaker 1: I often say to people like you're exactly where you
Speaker 1: need to be, and we're scared of accepting that because
Speaker 1: we're like, well, I don't like being here, But that's
Speaker 1: because we don't see it as part of our story.
Speaker 1: So focus on what can I learn in this job.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's networking, maybe it's sales. Maybe it's connecting with
Speaker 1: different people from different backgrounds. Maybe my company is launching
Speaker 1: a program to learn about crypto. Right, I'm going to
Speaker 1: dive into that, whatever it may be. As you as
Speaker 1: an individual, what are you drawn to try and take
Speaker 1: a moment to learn and therefore appreciate where you are.
Speaker 1: The second step I'd say when it comes to dreaming
Speaker 1: is I really believe we dream through people. I think
Speaker 1: we dream through people. And what I mean by that
Speaker 1: is that there's a beautiful statement by Marion Edelman who
Speaker 1: said that you can't be what you can't see. And
Speaker 1: I love that so much because if you don't see
Speaker 1: something happen, if you don't experience it, you will never
Speaker 1: want to become it or follow it. So if I
Speaker 1: never met a monk, I would never have dreamed of
Speaker 1: becoming a monk. I would that would never even cross
Speaker 1: my path. And what I find so fascinating. This is
Speaker 1: why I love what you do and I honor it
Speaker 1: so much in all the amazing programming you've created, what
Speaker 1: you've done with Goop, and the incredible work that you've
Speaker 1: done with the shows that you've created, because you're introducing
Speaker 1: us to people and ideas that taboo untalked about. And
Speaker 1: the point of that is, it's incredible. We live in
Speaker 1: a world where you can access anything at any time,
Speaker 1: yet we all follow the same people, watch the same people,
Speaker 1: and pretty much talk about the same people and shows
Speaker 1: and things. It's incredible, right. It blows my mind that
Speaker 1: in a world where we could literally access a random
Speaker 1: tribe in the middle of another country if we really
Speaker 1: wanted to through the powers, we're all watching squid games, right,
Speaker 1: and no offense to scrid games. There's nothing wrong with it.
Speaker 1: The point I'm making is that we all get very
Speaker 1: we all get just enamored by the same things. And
Speaker 1: when I look at the most amazing experience if I've
Speaker 1: had in my life, it's when I've become enamored by
Speaker 1: something that's different and unique and has been more random.
Speaker 1: And so I feel that there's a need to explore
Speaker 1: and expose ourselves to people and experiences that you don't
Speaker 1: just come across every there, and of course that's what
Speaker 1: your work's doing. It's why I have my podcast, because
Speaker 1: I can sit down with people and even if there
Speaker 1: are people that you know, I'm hoping that we can
Speaker 1: go deeper with them or go to a place that
Speaker 1: you haven't seen. And if it's people you don't know,
Speaker 1: when that's fresh anyway, And so I feel like exposing
Speaker 1: ourselves to more people allows us to dream through people.
Speaker 1: You see someone and you think, oh, I love what
Speaker 1: they're doing, I love what they're about, I love what
Speaker 1: they're channeling, I love what their vision is, and then
Speaker 1: your mind opens up to what's possible. And then the
Speaker 1: third part of it, truly is that I've seen the
Speaker 1: most powerful dreams be linked to service and impact. And
Speaker 1: so I find that a dream is incomplete without service
Speaker 1: and impact. The biggest and the best dreamers in the world,
Speaker 1: the people that shift the trajectory of the world. We're
Speaker 1: not doing it just for themselves. They were doing it
Speaker 1: for others. And so when your dream expands into having
Speaker 1: a service element, then you get the opportunity to work
Speaker 1: harder than you've ever dreamed of. You're able to learn
Speaker 1: things that you never believed you could because we're so
Speaker 1: phenomenal at extending ourselves beyond what we know for people
Speaker 1: that we love and people we want to serve. So
Speaker 1: I'd say that that step process, to me, it's very
Speaker 1: different from manifestation. I think manifestation we often think of
Speaker 1: it as well, let me see where I want to be,
Speaker 1: and I think of manifestation as visualize what it's going
Speaker 1: to take to get there. So, if someone wants to
Speaker 1: be something, don't visualize what it looks like to be
Speaker 1: on that stage, or be on the front cover of
Speaker 1: that magazine or whatever it may be. Visualize the hidden journey,
Speaker 1: which is the behind the scenes of waking up at
Speaker 1: four am, of doing the work, of learning the skill,
Speaker 1: of practicing the art. Use your manifestation to visualize yourself
Speaker 1: breaking your physical and mental limit. It's not in visualizing
Speaker 1: the destination. And then, as if that's kind of at
Speaker 1: the base, how do you or when do you decide? No,
Speaker 1: now it's time for me to jump, it's time for
Speaker 1: me to take the risk, it's time for me to
Speaker 1: leave this relationship. But how do you know when you're there? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I often think that with careers at least, we'll talk
Speaker 1: about relationships, but with careers at least, there is a
Speaker 1: need to build two lanes at the same time. And
Speaker 1: so I rarely recommend to anyone in my practice for
Speaker 1: my life to make a leap or a jump, because
Speaker 1: I feel that not only is the risk high, the
Speaker 1: failure rate is high, and the fall is really painful
Speaker 1: and to recover from that can take a lot of
Speaker 1: energy and effort. And so the pain and stress of
Speaker 1: managing a day job and doing something in the evenings
Speaker 1: at the same time sounds stressful, but it's a healthier
Speaker 1: route to make that transition. And the day you make
Speaker 1: the switch, at least in careers to start off with,
Speaker 1: is the day that you feel you've created enough momentum
Speaker 1: in this new space where it can now push you
Speaker 1: and carry you forward. If you make that switch too early,
Speaker 1: you can actually do a disservice to yourself, where now
Speaker 1: you feel like you're still playing catch up. And so
Speaker 1: I often ask me, will build something that's at least
Speaker 1: half of where you're at right now financially, so that
Speaker 1: you can make that leapover And I've had plenty of
Speaker 1: clients who've done that who. I've been working with a
Speaker 1: client for the last five years, and within two and
Speaker 1: a half years was when he decided to quit his
Speaker 1: job in law to move over to the work he's
Speaker 1: in now. And he's already within two and a half
Speaker 1: years he'd made fifty percent of what he made as
Speaker 1: a lawyer, and then the next two and a half years,
Speaker 1: this year he has the opportunity to replace that completely.
Speaker 1: So I always feel that the financial part is the
Speaker 1: hardest part, and so I feel like if you've replace
Speaker 1: fifty percent, that's a healthy time. With relationships, the time
Speaker 1: to leave is really when you feel you're no longer growing.
Speaker 1: You know, when you feel that you're not growing, when
Speaker 1: you feel like you're not becoming the best version of yourself,
Speaker 1: when you feel like you're not moving in the direction
Speaker 1: you want to be moving in, not because the other
Speaker 1: person's helping you move or not, you just feel that
Speaker 1: you're carrying so much negative or toxic energy that you
Speaker 1: feel stuck. That's when you need to shift and make
Speaker 1: a move. And so that's a much more emotional transition.
Speaker 1: It's a much more difficult and painful transition, and so
Speaker 1: it should not be again done in a rush. I
Speaker 1: don't believe in fast, big jump decisions. I don't think
Speaker 1: that that's what works best. Usually as humans, we do
Speaker 1: better with incremental, small changes than we do with these big,
Speaker 1: huge decisions. And anyone who you notice has made a
Speaker 1: big decisions in their life, I promise you they sat
Speaker 1: there and thought about it for three hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: five days. Right, you make a decision in a day,
Speaker 1: that's what it looks like, but really that decision was
Speaker 1: made over three hundred and sixty five days. And so
Speaker 1: allow yourself that grace in space to slowly develop your
Speaker 1: reasoning for that big decision over time, and then make
Speaker 1: that decision. Don't feel rushed or forced to make it faster.
Speaker 1: To develop the relationship with yourself as you're I mean,
Speaker 1: that's the heart of it. I promise you the relationship
Speaker 1: you have with yourself will always be the best relationship
Speaker 1: you could ever have in the world. Like I really
Speaker 1: mean that. It is such a joy to be present
Speaker 1: with yourself and to fall more in love with yourself.
Speaker 1: And the truth is that no one will ever love
Speaker 1: you the way you want to be loved apart from yourself,
Speaker 1: because no one else can know you that intimately. And
Speaker 1: even if you try and articulate to someone who you
Speaker 1: are and what you like and what you love and
Speaker 1: what you need, they're coming with so much of their
Speaker 1: own background and baggage and their own challenges and pain
Speaker 1: and likes and dislikes that it's really hard to translate that.
Speaker 1: So I'm not saying it's not possible to have meaningful relationships,
Speaker 1: it's just harder to expect that from anyone else. And
Speaker 1: actually that gives you more grace for them too. It
Speaker 1: helps you receive more of them, and you see it
Speaker 1: as an addition and extension to the love you have
Speaker 1: for yourself. So so glad you edited, Jay, Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. It's always such a pleasure.