Speaker 1: Hey everyone, I'm so excited because we're going to be
Speaker 1: adding a really special offering onto the back of my
Speaker 1: solo episodes on Fridays. The Daily Jay is a daily
Speaker 1: series on Calm and it's meant to inspire you while
Speaker 1: outlining tools and techniques to live a more mindful, stress
Speaker 1: free life. We dive into a range of topics and
Speaker 1: the best part is each episode is only seven minutes long,
Speaker 1: so you can incorporate it into your schedule no matter
Speaker 1: how busy you are. As a dedicated part of the
Speaker 1: on Purpose community, I wanted to do something special for
Speaker 1: you this year, so I'll be playing a handpicked Daily
Speaker 1: Jay during each of my Friday podcasts.
Speaker 2: This week.
Speaker 1: We're talking about your habits and how to develop better
Speaker 1: daily routines. Of course, if you want to listen to
Speaker 1: The Daily Jay every day, you can subscribe to Calm,
Speaker 1: So go to calm dot com forward slash Jay for
Speaker 1: forty percent off your membership today.
Speaker 2: Hey man, how's the going?
Speaker 3: Questions for you? How are you really doing right now?
Speaker 1: I'm doing really good. It's been a really really special time.
Speaker 1: I've been on the road this year for longer than
Speaker 1: I've been at home, which is a new experience. So
Speaker 1: I've only been in my own home, in my own
Speaker 1: bed for three weeks this year because I've been on
Speaker 1: my world tour. And it's a really interesting experience because
Speaker 1: I'm getting a slight glimpse into how touring artists feel.
Speaker 1: We're doing around forty shows. A lot of touring artists
Speaker 1: will do one hundred, one hundred and fifty shows. You're
Speaker 1: a music artist, and I'm getting empathy for the challenges
Speaker 1: that come with traveling, always being on the move, not
Speaker 1: being in the same place. But for people like us,
Speaker 1: I think for so long, you know, for the last
Speaker 1: seven years, I've been connecting with my community and my
Speaker 1: audience digitally. I started making my first video on the
Speaker 1: third of jan twenty sixteen, just over seven years ago,
Speaker 1: and I've never really met my own community. I met
Speaker 1: people obviously on the streets or at an event or
Speaker 1: whatever it may be. But to be doing events all
Speaker 1: across the world and to see your own community attending
Speaker 1: and having these incredible experiences, and then going on social
Speaker 1: and seeing that people are posting stories and comments and
Speaker 1: their experiences, it's really beautiful. Like it's been really good
Speaker 1: for my soul because I think that when things are
Speaker 1: tough and when things are hard, a comment, a positive comment,
Speaker 1: doesn't hit you the same way as a memory when
Speaker 1: someone looked into your eyes and said that video stopped
Speaker 1: me from committing suicide, or Jay, that book that I
Speaker 1: read of yours helped me get through my divorce, or
Speaker 1: you know when I saw that podcast you did with
Speaker 1: so and so that conversation has changed my career, Like
Speaker 1: when you get that feedback in the flesh when you're
Speaker 1: holding someone's hands and looking into their eyes.
Speaker 2: I don't think anything compares to that.
Speaker 1: So right now I'm really good because I feel so
Speaker 1: fueled up because I've had so many positive conversations with
Speaker 1: so many incredible people, and my heart's filled with gratitude
Speaker 1: for the amount of love and support I've seen. We've
Speaker 1: been to all over the US. We just finished Australia.
Speaker 1: We did three shows at the Sydney Opera House. We
Speaker 1: just finished Singapore, and then we just finished India and
Speaker 1: now I'm in Dubai, and then we go to Paris
Speaker 1: and Amsterdam and Berlin and UK and Spain and Barcelona
Speaker 1: and Madrid. So many left. So anyway, it's been a
Speaker 1: very special time.
Speaker 3: You know, I would say we're in similar circles, and
Speaker 3: you're so right, Jay that until you experience human interaction,
Speaker 3: you don't really know sometimes how and I don't think
Speaker 3: we will ever know, Jay will really you will never
Speaker 3: truly know your impact on world. We will never know
Speaker 3: how to quantify it or measure it fully. Even our
Speaker 3: teams don't. Yes, you hear nice things people post, or
Speaker 3: people stop your sending long letter. Sure, but sometimes you
Speaker 3: get these moments. And you reminded me of a moment
Speaker 3: where a guy stopped me in a souk in an
Speaker 3: old shopping area in Saudi and he told me how
Speaker 3: his mother suffers from Alzheimer's and she likes to listen
Speaker 3: to my voice before like to restore, to calm down.
Speaker 3: And it was one of the most crazy compliments to
Speaker 3: get that you're also on an app for meditation, that
Speaker 3: people are using your voice to actually relax them. So
Speaker 3: you might be like, ah, that's nice, but you really
Speaker 3: don't realize how much it's impacting. So when you're doing
Speaker 3: this tour, human interaction is so important, absolutely, like senses
Speaker 3: and smell and touch and feel, And I think COVID
Speaker 3: scared us when we didn't have that there's video calls,
Speaker 3: and you can't hug people when you see them. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 2: That's my favorite thing.
Speaker 1: My favorite thing is what I bothered is someone has
Speaker 1: given them a big hug and holding their hands and
Speaker 1: looking into their eyes, and it's such a special experience,
Speaker 1: And you're spot on. I don't think we can quantify
Speaker 1: what's happening in the world right now and the scale
Speaker 1: of impact or any of it. But I just I
Speaker 1: live in gratitude that even one person like you just
Speaker 1: said that beautiful example. I know people who are like
Speaker 1: dealing with their cancer recovery, listening to the meditations, and
Speaker 1: it blows my mind and actually inspires me. I think
Speaker 1: so many people look to the things we do and
Speaker 1: think that we inspire them, but I would honestly say
Speaker 1: that when people tell me their stories, I'm more inspired
Speaker 1: by them because sometimes I don't even have the challenges
Speaker 1: they do. Sometimes I don't have the difficulties they do.
Speaker 1: I don't have the hardships the same hardships. I have
Speaker 1: other hardships, but I don't have the hardships that some
Speaker 1: people in my audience do. And when they told me that,
Speaker 1: I always look at them and I say well, you
Speaker 1: inspire me because the fact that you can choose growth
Speaker 1: and self development and healing at a time like this
Speaker 1: that takes courage and strength.
Speaker 4: And so yeah, you sport on that.
Speaker 3: If I ask you, who are you, Jay, how would
Speaker 3: you describe yourself?
Speaker 1: I would say that I am consciousness. I a raw
Speaker 1: energy here to serve support and try to hopefully improve
Speaker 1: people's lives and people's life experience by giving them access
Speaker 1: to wisdom and knowledge that they wouldn't otherwise have come across.
Speaker 1: So I see myself as consciousness and energy when it
Speaker 1: comes to the essence of who I am, and then
Speaker 1: I see that purpose of that consciousness and energy to
Speaker 1: simply want to serve support and improve the lives of others.
Speaker 1: And that's what I'm designed to do. That's what I'm
Speaker 1: built to do. That's what I was created for. And
Speaker 1: so I've often said before that we're educated for greed,
Speaker 1: but we're.
Speaker 2: Wired for generosity.
Speaker 1: And I believe that I'm just trying to tap into
Speaker 1: that part of me that is wired for service.
Speaker 3: And why, like, why do you feel that you should
Speaker 3: do it? Like, I know it's your purpose, but you know,
Speaker 3: we all as human beings want to feel validated or
Speaker 3: significant on this earth, and certain things make us feel valuable.
Speaker 3: Why does what you just said make j feel valuable?
Speaker 4: Yeah, such a great question.
Speaker 1: There's a beautiful statement by Muhammad Ali where he said
Speaker 1: that service to others is the rent we pay for
Speaker 1: our room here on earth. And I love that so
Speaker 1: much because I think that if you look at everything
Speaker 1: in the universe, everything in the universe is always serving.
Speaker 1: I'll give you an example. If you look at the sun,
Speaker 1: it's constantly giving sunlight. There are so many things on
Speaker 1: this planet that depend on the sunlight to be alive.
Speaker 1: If you look at the water, it's always fueling people.
Speaker 1: It's nourishing people, it's hydrating people. The water is always serving.
Speaker 1: If you look at a tree, a tree is growing
Speaker 1: every single day so that it can provide shade, it
Speaker 1: can provide fruits, it can provide flowers, all in the
Speaker 1: service of others. If you look at everything in nature,
Speaker 1: it's always serving. And we ourselves are nature. We may
Speaker 1: see ourselves as separate, but the truth is that we're
Speaker 1: no different. We grow, we evolve, we die, and so
Speaker 1: when you are nature. The reason why it gives me
Speaker 1: so much significance is because I realized that in order
Speaker 1: to be aligned with the universe, I have to serve.
Speaker 1: So when we talk about being aligned with the universe,
Speaker 1: when we talk about being aligned with our purpose, when
Speaker 1: we talk about being aligned with who we are, if
Speaker 1: nature is at the core and at the essence of
Speaker 1: who we are, then service is not making us feel
Speaker 1: significant for any other reason apart from that is our
Speaker 1: natural inclination. But because we've tried so hard to become
Speaker 1: the enjoyer, We've tried so hard to become the person
Speaker 1: who just wants to have pleasure. We've tried so hard
Speaker 1: to become the person that just wants to exploit as well,
Speaker 1: that doesn't lead to joy and happiness. Imagine the sun
Speaker 1: decided to turn off, and when I'm not giving any
Speaker 1: more light for the day, or if the water decided
Speaker 1: to stop and said, you know what, no more water
Speaker 1: for planet Earth, or you know what the trees said,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm not giving any fruits.
Speaker 2: I'm only going to give fruits to.
Speaker 1: My trees all of a sudden, like so much would
Speaker 1: break down in an ecosystem. And so I think it
Speaker 1: gives me significance because I realized that it's how we're made,
Speaker 1: it's what we're meant for, and it's also what leads
Speaker 1: to our happiness. So even selfishly, honestly speaking, it's not
Speaker 1: that service is completely selfless. Service is also selfish and
Speaker 1: selfless because it is knowing that it is good for myself,
Speaker 1: it is also going to make me happy. It is
Speaker 1: also going to make me feel content. And I think
Speaker 1: you know this and we feel this that I'm sure
Speaker 1: in your lifetime you've had so many of the greatest pleasures.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying any of those are bad. And
Speaker 1: I'm not saying we shouldn't have fun, and I'm not
Speaker 1: saying we shouldn't have nice things, and I'm not saying
Speaker 1: we shouldn't be happy and surrounded by beautiful things. But
Speaker 1: what I am saying is we know that all of
Speaker 1: those things are useful and necessary, but those aren't the
Speaker 1: things that make you go to bed feeling fulfilled and
Speaker 1: grateful and happy about your life. And so I think
Speaker 1: when anyone's served, when anyone's tried to serve, the feeling
Speaker 1: is incomparable.
Speaker 3: That's a good answer. If I have a white canvas
Speaker 3: for you like this, and I ask you to draw
Speaker 3: your mental state now what would you draw?
Speaker 1: Oh, these are good questions, man, that is a great question.
Speaker 1: So I've often said, I don't know if you've ever
Speaker 1: come across one of my friends, Humble the poet. So
Speaker 1: Humble the Poet is a speaker and writer, is a
Speaker 1: good friend of mine. And the reason I'm thinking of
Speaker 1: it is because he's probably the only person I've had
Speaker 1: this conversation with. So I try and design my studio
Speaker 1: and my office to look like my mind. So I
Speaker 1: literally have said that before that I try and design
Speaker 1: spaces that I live in, in my home, my studio,
Speaker 1: my office, all of it to look like my mind.
Speaker 1: I like to live in mental spaces, and I like
Speaker 1: to feel like I've taken a vision out of here
Speaker 1: and built it around me. And so if I went
Speaker 1: if I took you into my office now back in
Speaker 1: la or I took you in my studio or my
Speaker 1: study or whatever it may be, you would find I
Speaker 1: would draw a lot of bookshelves, and I would draw
Speaker 1: a lot of books. And the reason for that is
Speaker 1: because I feel for so long I wasn't a reader.
Speaker 1: So when I was growing up, my parents were really
Speaker 1: scared that I wasn't going to be that smart because
Speaker 1: I didn't read, and I didn't read up until the
Speaker 1: age of fourteen, and the reason was because school only
Speaker 1: gave us fiction books. And I was never interested in fiction.
Speaker 1: I wasn't interested in a made up story or a
Speaker 1: made up character. It didn't touch me, it didn't move
Speaker 1: my heart. And then at fourteen, my dad started to
Speaker 1: give me autobiographies and biographies, and so that time I
Speaker 1: read Malcolm X, I read Martin Luther King, I read
Speaker 1: David Beckham, I read Drained the Rock Johnson. Like I
Speaker 1: was reading this complete gamut of people in their lives,
Speaker 1: and I found that studying people's lives has been the
Speaker 1: greatest investment in my life, because when you study people's lives,
Speaker 1: you start realizing how similar your life experiences to so
Speaker 1: many people when it comes to failure, when it comes
Speaker 1: to rejection, when it comes to setback.
Speaker 2: So I would draw a lot of books and bookshelves.
Speaker 1: You'd have Steve Jobs's book, You'd have Martin Luther King,
Speaker 1: Malcolm X, you'd have David Beckham and Drained the Rock Johnson,
Speaker 1: and a bunch of others. The next thing I'd do
Speaker 1: is I like having statements or mantras or affirmations around me,
Speaker 1: because I really believe that we don't use visual cues
Speaker 1: enough to change our mindset. What I mean by that
Speaker 1: is when I walked into your space today, which is
Speaker 1: really like your space is beautiful, Like it's so minimal
Speaker 1: and simple and like it calms the mind. Like as
Speaker 1: soon as I walked into your studio today, I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is my vibe.
Speaker 4: I like this.
Speaker 1: Right, everyone seems like they're really happy in their spaces,
Speaker 1: but I find that because of the environment, it also
Speaker 1: creates an energy right internally. So I walked in here,
Speaker 1: I feel a certain way, and I feel that when
Speaker 1: I walk into my home and my spaces. I also
Speaker 1: like putting up either art or lines of wisdom or
Speaker 1: insight that helped me lock back into.
Speaker 2: Where I want to be.
Speaker 1: So I have this one piece of art in my
Speaker 1: office that I'll send you a picture of so you
Speaker 1: can put in the edit if you want to help it.
Speaker 1: And it's a picture of Okay, I'm gonna try to
Speaker 1: describe this if it's a bit complicated to describe. But
Speaker 1: do you remember as a kid, I don't know if
Speaker 1: you had them, I don't know. I guess you had
Speaker 1: them all over the world. But there were these little
Speaker 1: machines that would be outside the supermarket and you put
Speaker 1: a little coin in it, and it'd be like a
Speaker 1: little space machine and it would like move like from
Speaker 1: side to side. Right, Okay, I don't know what they call,
Speaker 1: but you know what I'm talking about. So this artwork
Speaker 1: has one of those little space machines, like it looks
Speaker 1: like you'd have to put a little coin in it.
Speaker 1: But then there's a person sitting inside the space machine,
Speaker 1: but they're dressed as an astronaut, so it's like this
Speaker 1: little kids space machine, but an astronaut is like writing
Speaker 1: this little space machine. And then in the background there's
Speaker 1: all these different prints from musicians and songwriters, everyone from
Speaker 1: Elton John through to other artists that are less well known,
Speaker 1: and there's a beautiful lyric on one of them underneath
Speaker 1: the music notes and it says, may God's Love be
Speaker 1: with you lift off. And I bought that piece of
Speaker 1: art work because there's so many messages inside of it.
Speaker 1: So every time I look at it, I remember that
Speaker 1: I'm just a kid putting a coin into a machine
Speaker 1: trying to get to space. I'm trying to do something
Speaker 1: quite outlandish ridiculous. I believe that I want to be
Speaker 1: able to do something phenomenal in the world, but actually
Speaker 1: I'm just a little kid trying to figure it out.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 2: I'm just a student of life.
Speaker 1: And at the same time, I'm like that astronaut who
Speaker 1: has this big vision and can see the solar system
Speaker 1: and wants to be curious about the world that's around them.
Speaker 1: And at the same time, at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I'm fueled and living at the grace of God, the
Speaker 1: universe of the energy that I've been given through the
Speaker 1: people I've met, and that I need their grace in
Speaker 1: order to do this work. So that art piece is
Speaker 1: what I would try and draw, but it would be
Speaker 1: terrible because I can't draw to save my life.
Speaker 2: So I would have to say, I'll tell you the
Speaker 2: picture please. Yeah.
Speaker 3: If you had to describe your childhood in three words,
Speaker 3: what would you tell me?
Speaker 2: Conflicted? Loving, transformative?
Speaker 3: Tell me about conflictive and transformative.
Speaker 1: So conflicted because I grew up in a home where
Speaker 1: my parents didn't have the best of relationships and they
Speaker 1: had their own challenges, and I have a great relationship
Speaker 1: with both of them and have a personal relationship with
Speaker 1: both of them, but together for them, for each other,
Speaker 1: it wasn't the best relationship. And what I'm really grateful
Speaker 1: for is I feel that I started to have the
Speaker 1: capacity to listen to each of them independently, and I
Speaker 1: think it gave me this really unique skill early on
Speaker 1: of being able to sit and be present with someone
Speaker 1: and just listen to their story and express compassion and
Speaker 1: empathy for their experience, but then do it on the
Speaker 1: other side as well. Because here were two people that
Speaker 1: I loved, two people who loved me, two people who
Speaker 1: cared about me in their own way. You know, my
Speaker 1: mom was my mom till this day. I always say,
Speaker 1: is I'm anything I am today is because of my mom.
Speaker 1: The amount of love that my mom has filled me
Speaker 1: with has only allowed that love to overflow. And so
Speaker 1: the love that the world feels through me is the
Speaker 1: love I felt through my mother, through my monk teachers,
Speaker 1: through the love that I've gathered, and any skill that
Speaker 1: I have is through my father. You know, my father's
Speaker 1: highly smart, thoughtful, strategic, like you know, any skill I
Speaker 1: have in that way is because of my dad. And
Speaker 1: so I got so much from these two people, but
Speaker 1: they weren't necessarily getting so much from each other, and
Speaker 1: being able to learn how to navigate and manage that
Speaker 1: at a young age gave me a lot of healthy
Speaker 1: experience in what I wanted to be when I was
Speaker 1: older and what I didn't want to be and conflicted.
Speaker 1: Also because I grew up in an area where I
Speaker 1: was one of the few Indian people in my area,
Speaker 1: and so I was bullied for being Indian. I was
Speaker 1: bullied for being overweight. I was quite overweight as a child,
Speaker 1: and I would get bullied every single day. And when
Speaker 1: I say bullied, I mean like beaten up. Like I
Speaker 1: would get beaten up regularly at school, primary school up
Speaker 1: until the age of about seven or eight, to the
Speaker 1: point that I would come back with bruises, I would
Speaker 1: come back with my shirt ripped. I would come back
Speaker 1: with like, you know, bloody knees, whatever it may have been.
Speaker 1: And I was just, you know, bullied regularly. And it's
Speaker 1: really interesting because that actually didn't negatively affect my confidence
Speaker 1: because I was loved at home by my mother. But
Speaker 1: what it did do was build an empathy and compassion
Speaker 1: for other people who go through that, because I could
Speaker 1: see how damaging it was for other people. So that's
Speaker 1: the conflicted part where it was like I was having
Speaker 1: these like very mixed experiences where it's like I felt love,
Speaker 1: but then I also saw hate.
Speaker 2: I felt.
Speaker 1: Joy, but then I also saw jealousy and envy. I
Speaker 1: felt pleasure in some areas of my life, and then
Speaker 1: I saw deep, deep pain and trauma in people's lives.
Speaker 1: And I think everyone can identify with that. I don't
Speaker 1: think that's unique to me. I think everyone sees that.
Speaker 1: But I think the way I saw it I'm very
Speaker 1: grateful for because I just started to realize that there
Speaker 1: was this duality in the world, and that learning to
Speaker 1: navigate that duality was the goal. The goal was not
Speaker 1: to run towards the love and ignore the other side,
Speaker 1: because the other side was always going to exist. The
Speaker 1: other side was always going to be present. Could I
Speaker 1: have the ability to live in the middle, accepting that
Speaker 1: the reality of the world is duality and that both
Speaker 1: of these things will coexist for the rest of my life,
Speaker 1: and if I can learn to navigate and figure out
Speaker 1: and maneuver through this chaos, that would be the goal
Speaker 1: of life. The goal of life was not to simply
Speaker 1: run towards happiness, was not to just run towards love
Speaker 1: was not to just run towards joy, because the other
Speaker 1: side would catch.
Speaker 2: Up slowly, it would run right after you.
Speaker 1: So I think that's what was unique about why it
Speaker 1: was transformative. It was transformative because somewhere along the way
Speaker 1: I picked up that ability to notice that I didn't
Speaker 1: have to run away from anything, and I didn't have
Speaker 1: to run to anything. I actually had to be right
Speaker 1: here in the discomfort. And if I could sit there
Speaker 1: and be present in the discomfort, that that itself would
Speaker 1: heal whatever I was experiencing.
Speaker 3: You lost two very close friends when you're sixteen, God
Speaker 3: rest their soul. How did that play with your mind
Speaker 3: or your outlook?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I lost one friend through him being involved in the
Speaker 1: wrong company and the wrong scenarios. And I lost the
Speaker 1: other person in a car accident. And you know, both
Speaker 1: of those losses are You know, when you lose someone
Speaker 1: at sixteen and you don't really understand loss, especially if
Speaker 1: young people.
Speaker 4: Both these people were young.
Speaker 1: It really pushes you to reflect in a way that
Speaker 1: you wouldn't usually. Initially, I was angry. I was upset
Speaker 1: because I felt they didn't deserve it. They were wonderful people,
Speaker 1: they were beautiful people, But somehow, why did they have
Speaker 1: to go through that? Why did they deserve that? And
Speaker 1: that's a question that you can never fully answer, of course.
Speaker 1: But what I realized was that the biggest mistake I
Speaker 1: could make is in not living with the insight and
Speaker 1: the learnings they gave me. The way it forced me
Speaker 1: to reflect was it started making me reflect on my
Speaker 1: choices in life. I started to realize that life was
Speaker 1: a lot shorter and a lot longer than I thought.
Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is we all say
Speaker 1: life is short, like live it now, but also life
Speaker 1: is long when you make bad choices. So when you
Speaker 1: make good choices, you can live happier in the present,
Speaker 1: and when you make bad choices, it can feel like forever.
Speaker 1: Right you make the wrong choice, you choose the wrong partner,
Speaker 1: and you struggle to get out of a toxic relationship
Speaker 1: that can feel like decades. Or you make a good
Speaker 1: choice and a career path you choose, and you can
Speaker 1: live in the present and enjoy the life that you're creating,
Speaker 1: and so life can be sure and long. And at
Speaker 1: that point I realized that my choice has mattered more
Speaker 1: than I thought. I had to be far more intentional
Speaker 1: than I thought.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: Up until then, I lived a quite unintentional, sixteen year old,
Speaker 1: unthoughtful life where it didn't really matter, like there's no
Speaker 1: consequences to my actions, let's just live on the edge.
Speaker 1: And all of a sudden I started to realize, well, actually,
Speaker 1: every one of my choices does matter, because if I
Speaker 1: end up living a long time, I'm going to be
Speaker 1: experiencing them for a long time. And even if I
Speaker 1: go now now in the next few years, as I've
Speaker 1: seen some of my friends do, it's going to matter
Speaker 1: even more.
Speaker 2: And so either way, they matter.
Speaker 1: And I think I hope that realizes a lot of
Speaker 1: times people feel, well, life doesn't matter because you could
Speaker 1: go at any point, and it's like, well, no, it
Speaker 1: matters even more. Or people feel or life doesn't matter
Speaker 1: because I have so long, and it's like, no, it
Speaker 1: matters even more because you have so long to live
Speaker 1: that experience of life. So I hope it helps people
Speaker 1: realize that your life matters whichever length it ends up being.
Speaker 1: But to me, it made me reflect on like, how
Speaker 1: could I be far more intentional and conscious and thoughtful
Speaker 1: with the choices I made? How could I not underestimate
Speaker 1: the power of a choice, and I started to realize
Speaker 1: at that point that there were four important choices we
Speaker 1: make in our life. The first is how I feel
Speaker 1: about myself. How you feel about yourself is the most
Speaker 1: important choice you will ever make in your life, and
Speaker 1: it's a choice because the way you feel about yourself
Speaker 1: is based on the thoughts you choose to believe about
Speaker 1: your So if a thought you have about yourself is
Speaker 1: I'm not good enough, and you keep repeating that thought,
Speaker 1: you will start to believe that thought, and that thought
Speaker 1: will become your reality. And now you've chosen that thought
Speaker 1: so many times that that is the life you've chosen
Speaker 1: for yourself and for me. I started to recognize at
Speaker 1: that point I had to choose my identity rather than
Speaker 1: have my identity be chosen for me, because life is sure.
Speaker 1: And so that was the first decision. The second decision
Speaker 1: I realized was who you decide to spend your life
Speaker 1: with the second most important decision you choose to make
Speaker 1: in your life is who you choose to give your
Speaker 1: love to and who you choose to receive love from,
Speaker 1: because who you choose to give love to is going
Speaker 1: to decipher whether you feel fulfilled, whether you feel inspired,
Speaker 1: whether you feel energized, and who you choose to receive
Speaker 1: love from is going to affect your mood. As we
Speaker 1: get older and older and older, we spend less time
Speaker 1: with our parents, We spend less time with our family,
Speaker 1: We spend less time with our friends. We spend more
Speaker 1: and more time with that person that we chose to
Speaker 1: be with, But often we don't really make a choice
Speaker 1: based on any information. The third choice we make, the
Speaker 1: most important choice we make, is what we choose to
Speaker 1: do for money, what we choose to do to with
Speaker 1: our lives, like what you're doing right now and what
Speaker 1: we do right now, because you're going to do that
Speaker 1: for you know, nine ten hours a day, if not
Speaker 1: fourteen hours a day, if.
Speaker 4: Not sixteen hours a day for some of us.
Speaker 1: And then finally, the fourth most important decision you choose
Speaker 1: to make is how you serve the world, how you
Speaker 1: choose to give back, how you choose to reciprocate for
Speaker 1: all the greatness that you've got, because no one is
Speaker 1: self made. And that's when I started to realize that
Speaker 1: I had to start getting intentional about my choices, because
Speaker 1: up until then I was just doing anything and everything.
Speaker 3: Why did you choose to be a monk.
Speaker 1: The two reasons I chose to become a monk. I
Speaker 1: saw two things in the monks that I didn't see
Speaker 1: in anyone else. So when I was eighteen, which was
Speaker 1: how old I was when I first met the monks
Speaker 1: that I speak about in the book Think like a Monk.
Speaker 1: I had met people who are rich. I'd met people
Speaker 1: who were famous. I'd met people who are beautiful. I'd
Speaker 1: met people who were powerful. But I don't think i'd
Speaker 1: met anyone who was happy, or who was content, or
Speaker 1: who was self realized or had gained some level of
Speaker 1: being centered. And when I met the monks, I saw
Speaker 1: two things. One was emotional mastery. The people that I
Speaker 1: met had a sense of emotional clarity and mastery of
Speaker 1: their senses, their emotions, and their ability to convert their
Speaker 1: own envy into positive energy, to convert these darker feelings
Speaker 1: that we experience of insecurity and ego and competition into
Speaker 1: service and collaboration. I saw them be able to be
Speaker 1: magicians and wizards in how they took these very lower
Speaker 1: energies from within and were able to help them to
Speaker 1: rise and transform them into things that actually benefited the world.
Speaker 1: The world has never been benefited by someone's ego. The
Speaker 1: world has never been benefited by someone's insecurities, and the
Speaker 1: world is never benefited by someone taking out their trauma
Speaker 1: on other people, and forget the world a relationship. An
Speaker 1: individual has never benefited from any of those things. And
Speaker 1: I saw that these people were working on that, They
Speaker 1: were working on figuring that out, and I thought, wow, Like,
Speaker 1: who else in the world is trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how to deal with these very real things that we
Speaker 1: all deal with, by the way, But they're trying to
Speaker 1: figure that out. That feels like a worthy pursuit. That
Speaker 1: feels like a really, really worthy pursuit because they're learning
Speaker 1: to deal with the things that make wealth meaningless. Right,
Speaker 1: If you have lots of wealth but you have lots
Speaker 1: of end, you'll just be envious of the other person
Speaker 1: who has more wealth. If you have fame but you
Speaker 1: are insecure, fame does not solve that insecurity, and actually
Speaker 1: it makes your fame worse. If you have beauty but
Speaker 1: you don't have self worth, you allow people to exploit
Speaker 1: that beauty, and you allow people to exploit and take
Speaker 1: advantage of it and feel empty. So actually, all of
Speaker 1: our life, we can have fame, we can have money,
Speaker 1: we can have beauty, we can have all of these things.
Speaker 1: But if we solve that core, we can actually appreciate
Speaker 1: and use and actually enjoy these things in a much
Speaker 1: deeper way. And so I saw with the monks that
Speaker 1: they were focusing on what I believed was the core
Speaker 1: to human life, emotional mastery. And the second thing they
Speaker 1: had which I really gravitated towards, was that they quoted Emerson,
Speaker 1: and Emerson said that we should plant trees under whose
Speaker 1: shade we do not plan to sit. And I love
Speaker 1: that because when we choose to extend ourselves, we've ALWASO
Speaker 1: talked about service today already, but it was that service
Speaker 1: connection what I talked about earlier. That they were choosing
Speaker 1: to live a life beyond themselves and choosing to live
Speaker 1: a life for others and people that couldn't do anything
Speaker 1: back for them. And I thought that there was some
Speaker 1: beauty in that, because despite my conflicted or challenged childhood,
Speaker 1: I still had a lot more than a lot more
Speaker 1: people right as in the sense of I didn't have
Speaker 1: a lot financially, or we didn't have a big home
Speaker 1: or anything like that, but I still had a good education.
Speaker 1: I still had parents who were making me work hard.
Speaker 1: I felt a sense of responsibility and accountability to give
Speaker 1: back to people who didn't have that. And when I
Speaker 1: went to India and I saw you, one experience I'll
Speaker 1: never forget is I was nine years old and it
Speaker 1: was the first time I visited India. And as I
Speaker 1: told you earlier, my father's from India, Southern India. My
Speaker 1: mother was born and raised in Yemen, but she's originally Indian.
Speaker 1: And so I'm there at nine years old and we're
Speaker 1: in the back of a taxi and we're going back
Speaker 1: to our hotel. We're staying at a simple hotel in
Speaker 1: the city. And I'm in the car and I'm looking
Speaker 1: out the window. I've never seen anything like India. Have
Speaker 1: you ever been to India? So I've never seen anything. Right,
Speaker 1: I'm a boy from London. I've never seen anything like India.
Speaker 1: And I look out the window and we're driving past
Speaker 1: an area where there's a lot of young children on
Speaker 1: the streets and they're all there, and you know, some
Speaker 1: of them are half clothed, and you can see some
Speaker 1: of them probably haven't eaten for a while, haven't drunk water,
Speaker 1: or you know, they look like they've had a rough
Speaker 1: rough time, and that as a nine year old, I'm
Speaker 1: seeing kids who are nine years old having the same experience.
Speaker 1: Now I've never seen this in London, and I see
Speaker 1: kids doing all sorts of things. I see some of
Speaker 1: them playing with a little ball. I see some of
Speaker 1: them running around. I see some of them just sitting
Speaker 1: there and I see these legs that are poking out
Speaker 1: of a trash can and I realized that this kid
Speaker 1: must be inside this trash can, and I can see
Speaker 1: that they must be trying to scrape something out of
Speaker 1: the trash can, maybe some food or something. And then
Speaker 1: when the child comes out, I realize they don't have
Speaker 1: any hands, like they're just scraping with you know, they've
Speaker 1: lost their hands and they're just scraping with what they
Speaker 1: have left, trying to get some food. And it's like
Speaker 1: I saw that and I wanted to do anything I
Speaker 1: possibly could, Like I just wanted to, you know, get
Speaker 1: out of the car and just run across the other side.
Speaker 1: But I'm nine years old and I have nothing to
Speaker 1: give them, and I don't know how money works, so
Speaker 1: I don't know what's going on. Like, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: having this little experience of where we're stuck in the
Speaker 1: traffic lights and then the car moves and that you know,
Speaker 1: I can't do anything, and I feel like this is
Speaker 1: the worst experience I'm having right now because I don't
Speaker 1: know what to do. And then we get back to
Speaker 1: the hotel and I remember hearing that there was a
Speaker 1: couple of people complaining about the buffet and I remember
Speaker 1: that just hitting me and just going wow, like that
Speaker 1: kid didn't have You know, that kid was scraping the
Speaker 1: bottle of a trash can to find food.
Speaker 2: And you know me as well.
Speaker 1: You know, we can be so ungrateful sometimes in not
Speaker 1: recognizing that benefit which was upon us even to have
Speaker 1: access to clean water and good food. And it was
Speaker 1: at that point where I was like it was at
Speaker 1: nine years old where I had that feeling. But that
Speaker 1: only came back when I saw the Monk. I almost
Speaker 1: forgot about it, right, It was really interesting. I left India,
Speaker 1: forgot about it, didn't think about it. And then when
Speaker 1: I met the Monk at eighteen and started spending more
Speaker 1: time in India, we would actually go out to feed
Speaker 1: the homeless. So when I would go out, I would
Speaker 1: take part in this program that the monks run called
Speaker 1: midday Meals, and the monks that I was spending time
Speaker 1: with were feeding one point two million now today are
Speaker 1: feeding one point two million kids a day in India,
Speaker 1: and that even though that's such an amazing number, that's
Speaker 1: just scratching the surface, like that's not even enough. And
Speaker 1: so I got to be a part of that when
Speaker 1: I was there and go out every day and feed
Speaker 1: the kids and just you know, see that experience. But
Speaker 1: it was amazing how you forget about that stuff between
Speaker 1: nine and eighteen. I didn't think about it.
Speaker 3: Once you said it was two reasons, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the first reason was the emotional mastery and the
Speaker 1: second reason was this service element, wanting to extend our
Speaker 1: life to others.
Speaker 3: You know, something that has played with me in the
Speaker 3: last year is the importance of contrast in life, Like
Speaker 3: you wouldn't know the other if you didn't taste the other, right,
Speaker 3: and for you to see a buffet and a child
Speaker 3: scraping garbage, just this contrast taught you that this is
Speaker 3: ridiculous that we're hearing complaints about a buffeto when somebody
Speaker 3: can't If you never saw that, all you knew was
Speaker 3: buffets do you think this is the norm. It's okay
Speaker 3: to complain about a caveat or a buffet or a FOURK,
Speaker 3: but contrast really makes human beings compare in a healthy
Speaker 3: way sometimes, I hope, And a lot of times. You
Speaker 3: said also that ego never served anyone. Do you think
Speaker 3: that applies also to sports, for example, or business that
Speaker 3: can ego actually serve you if controlled?
Speaker 1: That's a great question. I think the first part, I
Speaker 1: really loved that point you just made. I think it's
Speaker 1: such a powerful point that you just drew out, and
Speaker 1: I never saw it like that in that scenario.
Speaker 2: But I agree with that point of.
Speaker 1: I think if we were exposed to more opposites growing up,
Speaker 1: it would help us find our middle, it would help
Speaker 1: us find our gray. But we're not. We're just exposed
Speaker 1: to one type of lifestyle. And I think if we
Speaker 1: were exposed to more contrast, more paradoxes, more opposites, more
Speaker 1: seemingly challenging things, it would actually spand our horizons and
Speaker 1: expand our mine, not close it. I think we're scared
Speaker 1: that if someone sees something, it's going to scare them
Speaker 1: or it's going to worry them, but actually it helps
Speaker 1: them become more thoughtful. And I think that's one of
Speaker 1: the things that's become so important to me that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't have become who I am today.
Speaker 2: If I didn't meet the monks.
Speaker 1: But if someone asked me at sixteen whether I wanted
Speaker 1: to be a monk or meet a monk, I would
Speaker 1: have said no. Like I would have chucked a bottle
Speaker 1: of alcohol at them, right, you know, like as in
Speaker 1: the reaction would have been like, you're so stupid, that's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: And so I think most of us are just too
Speaker 1: exposed to the same people, the same faces, the same things,
Speaker 1: or we're exposed to the same parts of people. That's
Speaker 1: one of the things I think you try and do
Speaker 1: and I try and do on my podcast is even
Speaker 1: if you know someone, I want you to see a
Speaker 1: deeper side of them, a new side of them aside
Speaker 1: that you're not aware of, because it's not that that
Speaker 1: person is one dimensional at all. And even today, as
Speaker 1: I'm sharing with you, I feel like anyone who listens
Speaker 1: to and watches this will be like, oh, I'm learning
Speaker 1: by Jay in a way that I've never learned about
Speaker 1: j before. And that's a healthy thing to do. So
Speaker 1: but Anyway, going back to your second question about ego,
Speaker 1: ego can be used to achieve great things, but after
Speaker 1: the achievement of those great things, it will then fail
Speaker 1: us once again. And so yes, in business, ego can
Speaker 1: be used to achieve astronomical success. In sports, ego can
Speaker 1: be engaged to win incredible championships. But in the end,
Speaker 1: ego is the same thing that will break you and
Speaker 1: lead to your ultimate failure, because the real battle was
Speaker 1: with ego, not with the sports team, and not with
Speaker 1: the other game, and not with the other team, and
Speaker 1: not with the other business person. The real battle was
Speaker 1: with your ego. And so I think that confidence and
Speaker 1: ego are two separate things. I think a lot of
Speaker 1: athletes that I admire, and I'm guessing we admire some
Speaker 1: similar athletes have a confidence that they are the best,
Speaker 1: but they back it up and they have the ability
Speaker 1: to still glorify and appreciate someone else. Ego is lacking
Speaker 1: the capacity to appreciate, glorify and admire others in public.
Speaker 1: If you struggle to hear good things about someone else
Speaker 1: and to join in and to be a part of
Speaker 1: that and to celebrate that, that's ego. If you struggle
Speaker 1: to acknowledge. You may say I'm the best in the world.
Speaker 1: You can say you're the best in the world. Sure,
Speaker 1: but even the best in the world, if you really
Speaker 1: sat down with them, they would happily talk about someone
Speaker 1: else that inspires them to be the best in the world.
Speaker 1: They'll never say they're self made. They'll say that I'm
Speaker 1: the best in the world because they have ten people
Speaker 1: around me who are amazing. Look at you, you have
Speaker 1: a huge team around you today. I would assume that
Speaker 1: you know you're getting to do this because you have
Speaker 1: a team around you. It's how I feel like we
Speaker 1: have an incredible team. Like I can walk around thinking
Speaker 1: that I'm doing something phenomenal in the world, but I
Speaker 1: know that it's brought by by a team. So ego
Speaker 1: is when you lack the ability to acknowledge that there
Speaker 1: are other people in your journey, that there are other
Speaker 1: people adding value to the world, that there are other
Speaker 1: people who are improving the world in their own way,
Speaker 1: and that there's.
Speaker 4: Space for everyone.
Speaker 1: Ego says there's only space for me, and I think
Speaker 1: that ultimately will lead to someone's demise because.
Speaker 2: It's just not true. And ego set up that way.
Speaker 1: It has to be broken by the time we die
Speaker 1: in order to let us live. And if we don't
Speaker 1: break our ego, life will break it for you. And
Speaker 1: I've seen that many times in my own life in
Speaker 1: little ways, and I've seen it many times in people
Speaker 1: that I've coached. I've seen it many times in people
Speaker 1: that I know where it's much easier to relinquish your
Speaker 1: own ego. It will save you a lot of time
Speaker 1: and a lot of stress. And ego doesn't mean you
Speaker 1: don't have the confidence that you're brilliant at what you do.
Speaker 1: I think I'm really good at what I do. I'm
Speaker 1: very comfortable saying that. But that doesn't mean that I
Speaker 1: think I'm better than others. I just think I am
Speaker 1: who I am. I'm just different. I'm just And I
Speaker 1: think that's the human construct that in modern society we've
Speaker 1: made people think you either have to be better or
Speaker 1: worse than others. You're either head or behind of others.
Speaker 1: You're either early or late compared to other people. And
Speaker 1: I'm just like, I'm just different. My timing is different,
Speaker 1: my opportunity is different, my voice is different, my background
Speaker 1: is different. And that applies to you, it applies to
Speaker 1: everyone in our space. It applies to everyone outside of
Speaker 1: our space, which is different. It wasn't ever about being
Speaker 1: better or worse. I mean, you talk about soccer right
Speaker 1: or football like I'm a CR seven guy all the way,
Speaker 1: but you know it's like the constant debate of who's
Speaker 1: better between CR seven and Message Like they're just different.
Speaker 2: They are genuinely different players.
Speaker 1: They play different positions in their career, they've played in
Speaker 1: different places, they've played in different teams. Like, in one sense,
Speaker 1: if we acknowledge that difference is what makes us special
Speaker 1: and beautiful and what makes everyone phenomenal, we can appreciate
Speaker 1: that we stop getting lost. And what we don't realize
Speaker 1: is when we compare ourselves to others. So if we
Speaker 1: think we're behind, then when we get ahead, we're going
Speaker 1: to be scared of the people behind us, because we
Speaker 1: know that we call up and we beat someone who
Speaker 1: is number one, now we're scared of their number two.
Speaker 1: And so you keep staying in that cycle of like
Speaker 1: I'm ahead, now, I'm behind them ahead, I'm behind them ahead,
Speaker 1: and that's just going to go on forever. Like I
Speaker 1: don't think Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are sitting there
Speaker 1: looking at the rich list, going I'm number two now,
Speaker 1: man like, oh my god, I got to get back
Speaker 1: up to number one, Like who's that LVIERMH.
Speaker 2: Guy who's like you know.
Speaker 3: You know, if people, I'm a very practical, logical guy.
Speaker 3: If we just use logic, and I say, jays g
Speaker 3: he is a certain height, certain looks, certain eye color,
Speaker 3: certain skin color, certain personality, certain childhood, certain journey logic,
Speaker 3: and I say, and as you're the same. So it's
Speaker 3: already not apples to apples. So I can say how
Speaker 3: can I beat them? Or how can I be better
Speaker 3: than I'm not competing. It's a pineapple and a chair.
Speaker 3: It's it's you can't just make that comparison logically. And
Speaker 3: if we but people are under the perception of all
Speaker 3: human beings, I should compare myself to a girl compares
Speaker 3: to herself to another girl or another actress, And the
Speaker 3: comparison is really dangerous because you don't know what they're
Speaker 3: going through. You don't know how their life is, their
Speaker 3: mental state, their money actually in the bank, You don't
Speaker 3: know anything. So this comparison has already flowed from the
Speaker 3: beginning logically. So the moment you're like, how can I
Speaker 3: be better? You know software one point oh one point
Speaker 3: one one point five too, and until I die, I
Speaker 3: am at the best version of J the best I
Speaker 3: really worked on myself and this is the best gear
Speaker 3: I could give.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well then we're good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it really was said, I can agree with
Speaker 2: you more.
Speaker 1: And I think that that allows you to be inspired
Speaker 1: by others.
Speaker 2: I think it's really interesting.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: Comparison can work two ways.
Speaker 1: You can either compare yourself to someone and say I
Speaker 1: wish I was them, or you can compare yourself to
Speaker 1: them and say I'm going to learn that.
Speaker 2: Right, I see what they learned, I see what they started.
Speaker 2: I think I do that.
Speaker 1: I've done that my whole life, where I compare myself
Speaker 1: to so many people, but in a positive sense of well,
Speaker 1: if they can do it, then I can do it.
Speaker 1: Or if they learned that, then how do they learn that?
Speaker 1: What do I need to learn? What am I missing?
Speaker 1: And then comparison becomes this beautiful thing because it's inspiring,
Speaker 1: it's energizing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you can come and learn and as use this camera,
Speaker 3: maybe I can use That's a good comparison, exactly exactly.
Speaker 3: It's a very good point. So comparison can be positive
Speaker 3: and negative. Yeah, now I know why you became a
Speaker 3: white Did you leave?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a hard, hard, hard decision. I don't
Speaker 1: At that time, I don't think i'd made a harder
Speaker 1: decision apart from joining. So I just want to give
Speaker 1: contact because you know, sometimes people will say, like, you know, oh, Jay,
Speaker 1: you became a monk, so you could tell your story
Speaker 1: one day. And it's really interesting that comment, because I
Speaker 1: decided to become a monk at a time when all
Speaker 1: my family and friends were like, this is the worst
Speaker 1: decision of your life, Like, think about this. I'm a
Speaker 1: London boy, I went to a good university. I have
Speaker 1: a good education, I have a first class honors degree.
Speaker 1: I'm a straight A student. My life is ahead of me.
Speaker 1: And I decide to go away. Everyone's thinking I've gone mad,
Speaker 1: I've been brainwashed, or I've lost the plot. And a
Speaker 1: lot of my friends and family said things to me like, Jay,
Speaker 1: this is the biggest mistake of your life.
Speaker 2: You're going to regret this decision.
Speaker 1: You're wasting your parents' investment in you, You're letting your
Speaker 1: family down.
Speaker 2: What are you doing with your life?
Speaker 1: And so I left with a lot of friction and
Speaker 1: a lot of pain and a lot of tears and
Speaker 1: a lot of emotion from my extended family who were
Speaker 1: just like, what are you doing? Like this is not
Speaker 1: a good idea. And so I didn't leave to like
Speaker 1: a cheerleading squad of like, no, it's amazing. But you know,
Speaker 1: it was quite a tough decision to leave everything behind.
Speaker 1: I turned down my job office that I had in
Speaker 1: the city, and I left with a lot of negativity
Speaker 1: and confusion. And then when I decided to come back,
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you why I decided to come back.
Speaker 1: But when I decided to come back, it's like all
Speaker 1: those people were there on the other side saying, we
Speaker 1: told you so, look now you messed up. And look
Speaker 1: at all your friends are. All your friends got promoted,
Speaker 1: they got apartments, they're getting engaged, they're getting married. Look
Speaker 1: at you. Look where you are. You're three years behind
Speaker 1: everyone else. And so it was never easy to go
Speaker 1: or to come back, because I knew what was waiting
Speaker 1: for me when I came back. And the reason I
Speaker 1: decided to leave is in three years, when all you're
Speaker 1: doing is self awareness in terms of so much of
Speaker 1: your work is dedicated to understanding yourself. I realized that
Speaker 1: I wasn't meant to be a monk. I didn't have
Speaker 1: the qualification or the ability to be a monk for.
Speaker 2: The rest of my life.
Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is monks live very obedient,
Speaker 1: disciplined lives, and while I'm a disciplined individual, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of a rebel. I like being independent. I like making
Speaker 1: my own choices. And while that was a beautiful training
Speaker 1: ground and it was great for giving me my foundation,
Speaker 1: I felt like it was a foundation to help me fly,
Speaker 1: not a life.
Speaker 2: To live forever.
Speaker 1: And it's almost like I spoke to my monk teacher
Speaker 1: when I was leaving, and I was actually really embarrassed
Speaker 1: to talk to him because I thought I was also
Speaker 1: a failure in his eyes. Now I'd already been a
Speaker 1: failure in my extended family's lives, and now I'm scared.
Speaker 1: Now I'm letting my monk teacher down. And I said
Speaker 1: that to himsel I'm so embarrassed that I'm leaving after
Speaker 1: three years, and I wanted to do this with the
Speaker 1: rest of my life. I'm feeling worthless and I'm feeling empty,
Speaker 1: and I feel like I let you down.
Speaker 2: And he said to me.
Speaker 1: He said, Jay, what's more powerful. Someone goes to university
Speaker 1: or college, and after they graduate, some people become professors,
Speaker 1: and some people become entrepreneurs, or they go outside and
Speaker 1: work in a company. Said which one's better? I said,
Speaker 1: neither of them. It depends who the person is. And
Speaker 1: he said, that's the same for you. He said, you
Speaker 1: came to university, You've got your three years, and now
Speaker 1: you've just got to go and use what you learned
Speaker 1: here and share it with the world. He said, but
Speaker 1: you don't have to stay here to make it a success.
Speaker 1: And that was such a freeing mindset. And so the
Speaker 1: reason I left was I realized I wasn't a monk
Speaker 1: in the in the rules and the obedience.
Speaker 2: In the lifestyle. You live communally.
Speaker 1: You live in a room, sometimes with thirty people sleeping
Speaker 1: in a room, sometimes one hundred people sleeping in a room.
Speaker 1: It was really tough on my health. When you're living
Speaker 1: in that communal quarters. It's like you've got someone waking
Speaker 1: up at two am who's waking up two hours earlier
Speaker 1: to meditate, and you're waking up at two am, but
Speaker 1: you want to be up at four am, so your
Speaker 1: sleeps disturbed because you're sitting right next to someone, You're
Speaker 1: using communal showers, bathrooms, like all of that space is shared.
Speaker 1: It was like really tough on my immunity. And then
Speaker 1: food as well. It's not like you're getting to choose
Speaker 1: or for menu what you eat.
Speaker 4: Every day.
Speaker 1: You eat what you're given. And I started to realize
Speaker 1: that my body and mind needed far more sensitivity than that.
Speaker 1: And so there was also a physical aspect that led
Speaker 1: to it, And there was a deep burning desire in
Speaker 1: my heart I can say this to you and us,
Speaker 1: like there was a deep burning desire in my heart
Speaker 1: that I want to share what I've learned, because if
Speaker 1: I stay here, all my friends back home, all the
Speaker 1: people that I know that I grew up with, they'll
Speaker 1: never get access to any of this because they'll never
Speaker 1: do this. And we're learning so many incredible things here.
Speaker 1: But I know my friends at home are struggling and
Speaker 1: suffering and going through so much, but they don't know
Speaker 1: how to start. So I felt some accountability and responsibility
Speaker 1: that even if I share this with the people around me,
Speaker 1: would help them, and I had a desire to share
Speaker 1: it further. But I never imagine you would get to
Speaker 1: where it is today. I never, never, in a million years,
Speaker 1: thought it would be where it is today. But I
Speaker 1: had that, and all those three reasons made me very
Speaker 1: clearly convinced that I would regret it if I didn't leave,
Speaker 1: even though I was going to go back to no job,
Speaker 1: twenty five thousand dollars worth of debt because of my
Speaker 1: student loan, moving back in with my parents, who don't
Speaker 1: have a lot anyway, and having to figure it out
Speaker 1: from scratch. I was like, that's better than not living
Speaker 1: an authentic life.
Speaker 3: Do you wake up happy or said?
Speaker 2: I wake up neither.
Speaker 1: I wake up feeling purposeful and disciplined. So there's some
Speaker 1: days where I wake up and I'm tired and i'd
Speaker 1: rather the in bed, But my discipline gets me out
Speaker 1: because I have commitments that I believe are important and
Speaker 1: that are going to get me to where I want
Speaker 1: to be and who I want.
Speaker 4: To be, and it's worth getting up for those.
Speaker 1: So then sometimes it's a discipline day, and sometimes it's
Speaker 1: a purposeful day. I wake up and I feel so
Speaker 1: connected to my purpose, kind of like today, I knew
Speaker 1: I was coming to see you today, and I was
Speaker 1: excited about being with you. Today and with your incredible team,
Speaker 1: and I respect what you do so much. So today
Speaker 1: was a purposeful day. I didn't have to come here
Speaker 1: out of discipline. I came here out a purpose that
Speaker 1: I'm going to get a chance to be myself and
Speaker 1: share myself with someone and someone that I've heard so
Speaker 1: many amazing things about through mutual friends that we both respect,
Speaker 1: and if I can be that, then that will be amazing.
Speaker 1: And so purpose and discipline are what I try and
Speaker 1: wake up with as opposed to happiness and sadness, because
Speaker 1: I can't really be happy every day because sometimes I'm
Speaker 1: just going to get through the day and get it
Speaker 1: done and I'm not. Generally, I don't experience so much
Speaker 1: sadness because I've the emotional mastery training really works, and
Speaker 1: you don't want to spend so much time in that
Speaker 1: space either.
Speaker 3: You know. The cool thing is you figured out the
Speaker 3: show without me explaining the show. The show is a
Speaker 3: slogan is discovering the human behind the title. So for
Speaker 3: me today, it's about who's G the human being the
Speaker 3: ones that you You know, people love your snippets and
Speaker 3: your videos and your podcasts and your book, But who
Speaker 3: is G? And I want people to get to know
Speaker 3: you and I want and you'll see those comments usually
Speaker 3: after you see I love you g but now I
Speaker 3: love you more.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 3: That's because they connected now. Yes, that you're vulnerable, you've
Speaker 3: had tough times. And what I loved about your Monk's
Speaker 3: story is you had the pleasure and the blessing to
Speaker 3: know also what you don't want at a certain time.
Speaker 3: Sometimes it's so important to know what you don't want.
Speaker 3: And I think you reached that three year and you're like,
Speaker 3: I've given it a shot. Yeah, my mission now is
Speaker 3: beyond a bigger or outside the circumference. And I think
Speaker 3: what you just answered about purposefulness you wake up, Jay
Speaker 3: and I can relate is because it's bigger than you thousand.
Speaker 1: That's the only way you can get out. If it
Speaker 1: was just about me, I'd rather stay in bed.
Speaker 3: But if somebody asks you how can I be happy?
Speaker 3: What would you answer them?
Speaker 1: Don't try to be happy? That would be my honest answer.
Speaker 1: Don't try to be happy. It's it's a loaded word
Speaker 1: which has so many hidden meanings from so much baggage
Speaker 1: that we had in our mind of what happiness is.
Speaker 1: Because let's take me to your example, which I love
Speaker 1: that question you asked. Right, if we said to someone,
Speaker 1: draw what happiness looks like, either people wouldn't know what
Speaker 1: to draw, or what they would draw is what they've
Speaker 1: seen in a movie or they've seen in some picture,
Speaker 1: or if they've seen in some film or some image.
Speaker 1: Because when people say they want to be happy, my
Speaker 1: challenge is what does.
Speaker 2: That mean to you?
Speaker 1: And do you even know if that's good for you?
Speaker 1: I'll give you an example. Someone would say to me.
Speaker 4: Jay.
Speaker 1: If I said to someone, what would make you happy
Speaker 1: for lunch? What would you like to have for lunch?
Speaker 1: Let's go out for lunch. What would you like to have?
Speaker 1: What would make you happy? That person may say burgers
Speaker 1: and fries, right, They may say pizza, they may say
Speaker 1: a sugary drink like some sort of whatever.
Speaker 2: It may be.
Speaker 1: Now, that may make them happy, but it's not good
Speaker 1: for them. It's not actually beneficial, it's not actually healthy.
Speaker 1: And so what I'm really interested in is do we
Speaker 1: want to be happy at the cost of being healthy,
Speaker 1: at the cost of being nourished, at the cost of
Speaker 1: being fulfilled, or would we rather be healthy, fulfilled, and
Speaker 1: nourished and happiness will just come anyway, because that's a
Speaker 1: far more sustainable experience.
Speaker 2: And so I would encourage.
Speaker 1: People to pursue something very different. I would say, pursue
Speaker 1: what's healthy life. If you're healthy, you'll be happy. I
Speaker 1: feel that every day. I don't feel like going to
Speaker 1: work out every day. I don't feel like eating well
Speaker 1: every day. Like when you I always give this example
Speaker 1: of like when you wake up for breakfast, or you
Speaker 1: go to lunch, or you go to dinner and you
Speaker 1: see a healthy bowl in front of you. You feel
Speaker 1: bad before it, You're like, why am I doing this
Speaker 1: to myself? And then as soon as you finished it,
Speaker 1: you feel so good, you feel happy, you feel wow,
Speaker 1: that was a great choice. I'm so glad I chose
Speaker 1: the healthy choice, because healthy choices make me happy. But
Speaker 1: now if I did the opposite, if I chose the
Speaker 1: Burgram fries, and by the way, I used to leave
Speaker 1: burgram fries sometimes as well. I'm not saying not to
Speaker 1: eat burgram fries. But if you choose the unhealthy choice,
Speaker 1: you're happy in the start. You're happy before it. You
Speaker 1: look at it and you go, let's get some more fries,
Speaker 1: like bring the catch up in like you know, let's
Speaker 1: let's get it, let's do it properly. You're happy at
Speaker 1: that time, then you consume it, then afterwards you pay
Speaker 1: the price. And so I think I always focus on
Speaker 1: on not how I feel before something, but how I
Speaker 1: feel after. The things that are good for you will
Speaker 1: feel bad before and good after, and the things that
Speaker 1: are bad for you will feel good before and terrible after.
Speaker 1: And so I'm more focused on how can you be healthy?
Speaker 1: We want mental health, we want physical health. I want
Speaker 1: relationship health, I want love health, I want friendship health
Speaker 1: Like health is more important to me than happiness, because
Speaker 1: health creates happiness, And so I would encourage people to
Speaker 1: pursue health in their life. Have a healthy relationship with
Speaker 1: your partner, have a healthy relationship with your kids, have
Speaker 1: a healthy relationship with your body and your mind, have
Speaker 1: a healthy relationship with the people you work with every day,
Speaker 1: because health will never let you down, whereas happiness, you
Speaker 1: constantly keep trying to find it in grab it and
Speaker 1: hold it, but it will it will leave you, it
Speaker 1: will escape you because it's not meant to be found.
Speaker 1: It's meant to be almost felt through being healthy, like
Speaker 1: a byproduct, correct, Yeah, like a byproduct. But even more
Speaker 1: like it's like I think, yeah, when you think of
Speaker 1: happiness as something to be found, you keep chasing this
Speaker 1: thing that you don't know what it is and you
Speaker 1: don't know what it looks like.
Speaker 2: Whereas when you're healthy, you feel happy, and I think
Speaker 2: that's what it is. It's a feeling.
Speaker 1: And so this is actually let me throw this out
Speaker 1: there to break it down even further, to really help
Speaker 1: people out, to make it practical. So at any point
Speaker 1: in time, we're doing one of four things, thinking, doing, feeling,
Speaker 1: or knowing.
Speaker 2: We all know what it feels like to think. You're
Speaker 2: thinking a thought and you repeat thoughts or you change
Speaker 2: your thoughts.
Speaker 1: The second is doing. We're doing something. We know what
Speaker 1: that feels, we know what that looks like. Right we
Speaker 1: all do something. You're shooting right now, me and you
Speaker 1: are talking. I'm talking, you're listening. We're doing something right now.
Speaker 1: The third is feeling. I feel sad, I feel happy,
Speaker 1: I feel tired, I feel burnt out, I feel annoyed, angry, upset.
Speaker 2: We know what it feels like to feel.
Speaker 1: And the fourth is knowing, which I class is more
Speaker 1: of like a spiritual potentially for some people, faith based
Speaker 1: a faith, intuition, knowing, where there's a knowing I'm in
Speaker 1: the right place, there's a subtle energy that's guiding you
Speaker 1: in a certain direction. So we're always doing one of
Speaker 1: these four things. What's really interesting about our generation is
Speaker 1: we're trying to change our feelings with more feelings. We're
Speaker 1: trying to feel different by trying to change our feelings.
Speaker 1: So we say things like I don't feel like exercising today,
Speaker 1: so I won't do it. That doesn't make you feel better,
Speaker 1: It makes you feel worse. But if I say I
Speaker 1: don't feel like working out today, I should do a workout.
Speaker 1: I should have the thought that working out and exercising
Speaker 1: will actually make me feel better. Now when I follow
Speaker 1: through on that, I do feel better. And so you
Speaker 1: don't change your feelings with your feelings. You change your
Speaker 1: feelings through your thoughts and your actions. And we need
Speaker 1: to start using thoughts and actions to change feelings because
Speaker 1: otherwise you'll never feel like working hard. You'll never feel
Speaker 1: like going to the gym, you'll never feel like having
Speaker 1: an uncomfortable conversation with your wife. You'll never feel like
Speaker 1: asking your boss for a raise, You'll never feel like
Speaker 1: doing anything that's hard because your feelings are always going
Speaker 1: to tell you no, no, no, don't do it. So we
Speaker 1: have to change our thoughts and our actions, not our feelings.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that resonates or makes sense.
Speaker 3: It does. If you could teach children only one lesson.
Speaker 1: Ah, these questions. Man, this guy, you're a pro man.
Speaker 1: You're amazing that. That's a great question. I'm going to
Speaker 1: be thoughtful about this. Give me one say just one thing, right, yes,
Speaker 1: take your time. If I could teach children, one thing
Speaker 1: would be to not repeat their parents' trauma. I think
Speaker 1: that all the challenges in the world that exist today
Speaker 1: are because we keep passing down trauma and the trauma
Speaker 1: we experience from our parents or the people in our
Speaker 1: lives are caregivers. We pass on to our partners and
Speaker 1: our children, and then they pass it on to the
Speaker 1: next generation, and they pass it on to the next generation,
Speaker 1: and it keeps spreading across the world. And so the
Speaker 1: number one skill I would teach any child is the
Speaker 1: ability to heal from their own trauma from their parents
Speaker 1: as they grow older, and help them gain the insight
Speaker 1: and the healing that means they won't just.
Speaker 4: Pass it on to their kids. And their partners, because.
Speaker 1: It's really interesting how we just keep repeating mistakes and
Speaker 1: keep doing this.
Speaker 4: And I'll give you a person example.
Speaker 2: So, when I was.
Speaker 1: A young kid, some of the caregivers in my life,
Speaker 1: some of the people in my family, they loved me
Speaker 1: a lot, but they made me feel guilty that I
Speaker 1: didn't love them back enough. So these adults would love me,
Speaker 1: but then they would make me feel inadequate, that I
Speaker 1: don't care about them the same, that I don't make
Speaker 1: them feel as important. And I carried that for so
Speaker 1: long that when I married my wife Ruddy, for years
Speaker 1: in our relationship, I did the same thing to her.
Speaker 1: I loved her, I showered her with love, but then
Speaker 1: I made her feel guilty. You don't love me the
Speaker 1: same I love you more. You don't love me enough,
Speaker 1: you don't show me you love me enough. And she's
Speaker 1: there thinking, but I, but I do love you like
Speaker 1: I didn't ask you to do all these things, and
Speaker 1: I didn't expect any of this, and I do love you.
Speaker 2: This is how I love you. But when you've been
Speaker 2: loved in that way, we.
Speaker 1: Love people the way people have loved us, and sometimes
Speaker 1: the way people have loved us has actually not been healthy,
Speaker 1: and so the love we're now repeating and passing on
Speaker 1: to other people is unhealthy love, unprocessed love. We're loving
Speaker 1: people with the same mistakes and the same negativity as
Speaker 1: the love we received because we've never healed that. And
Speaker 1: that's what we think love looks like. We think love
Speaker 1: looks like making someone feel guilty. Subconsciously, we don't actually
Speaker 1: think that. Subconsciously, somewhere in our heart and our mind,
Speaker 1: we think love looks like creating drama. Maybe the first
Speaker 1: boyfriend you had always made you feel insecure and you
Speaker 1: always had to make it up to him. So now
Speaker 1: when someone makes you feel insecure and you have to
Speaker 1: make it up to them, you think that's love.
Speaker 2: That's how love looks like.
Speaker 1: Or maybe you had someone who always created drama and
Speaker 1: so something was always interesting. And now when you date
Speaker 1: someone and there's boringness because there's peace, you're confused. You're like, wait, wait, wait,
Speaker 1: this can't be loved because love's going to be more
Speaker 1: fun than this. But we don't realize that that fun
Speaker 1: was trauma. And so if children were trained, as they
Speaker 1: got older at the right time how to heal their
Speaker 1: own trauma, the world would be a much better place
Speaker 1: because most of the problems that exist in marriages, in
Speaker 1: parenting between kids and their.
Speaker 2: Mother and father is not anything but that. It's not
Speaker 2: something unique to that.
Speaker 1: There's a beautiful statement by There's a beautiful statement by
Speaker 1: Russell Barklay where he said that the people who need
Speaker 1: the most love often ask for it in the most
Speaker 1: unloving ways. And I think that is the challenge with
Speaker 1: our world. That everyone is screaming out, reaching out, calling
Speaker 1: out for love, but their way of doing that is
Speaker 1: causing pain to others because they don't know how to
Speaker 1: ask for love. They didn't know how to ask their
Speaker 1: parents for love, they didn't know how to ask their
Speaker 1: partners for love, and now their way of asking is demanding, aggressively,
Speaker 1: sometimes pressurizing, sometimes exploiting, sometimes taking advantage of And that's
Speaker 1: only because they were never loved properly.
Speaker 3: It's scary, you know, Jamie. It is scary if everything
Speaker 3: in our life is a word, and then it's a gap,
Speaker 3: a line, and then the first experience is the definition.
Speaker 3: So if a child he still didn't experience love and
Speaker 3: then his father beat him, love is beating first definition.
Speaker 3: And the first definition is very difficult to break at
Speaker 3: a race, even if you're a you'll still see the
Speaker 3: lines there. So to take a lot of work. Yeah,
Speaker 3: would you say that you were able to break that
Speaker 3: trauma for you?
Speaker 1: I would say yes that I have spent the last
Speaker 1: couple of decads my life simply trying to heal, monitor,
Speaker 1: and navigate any trauma I've had. And you're absolutely right
Speaker 1: that you don't become fully free of it.
Speaker 2: It's not like it's all gone and now life's great.
Speaker 1: And you know, I still catch myself making mistakes with
Speaker 1: my own wife all the time. I had a conversation
Speaker 1: with her the other day and I was just messaging
Speaker 1: her afterwards, going, I'm sorry that conversations are all my fault,
Speaker 1: like literally just like two days ago, and it was
Speaker 1: I realized that I was. And it wasn't about something.
Speaker 1: It wasn't between me and her. We weren't arguing about something.
Speaker 1: It was almost like there was something that had happened
Speaker 1: in our family and we were both taking different sides.
Speaker 1: And I realized the side I took was only because
Speaker 1: of my own ego. It wasn't because of I actually
Speaker 1: believed it. I just wanted to be right about it,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to be seen and heard and felt
Speaker 1: and understood in a certain way, and I went about
Speaker 1: it completely the wrong way. And I remembered how nicely
Speaker 1: the conversation had started, and she called me up. And
Speaker 1: you know, we've got crazy time difference right now because
Speaker 1: she lives in La as we live in La, but
Speaker 1: I'm in Dubai right now. And so in that short
Speaker 1: window we had, like I wasted the core. And so
Speaker 1: the trauma doesn't go away completely, but you get better
Speaker 1: at noticing it, you get better at observing it, you
Speaker 1: get better at limiting it and how often it happens,
Speaker 1: and you get better at communicating it to your partner.
Speaker 1: And I'll often say to Radi that, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: that was just me projecting this thing. I just want
Speaker 1: you to be aware of that. It wasn't about you.
Speaker 1: And as long as you understand that, I just want
Speaker 1: you to get that. And at least it helps you
Speaker 1: have that conversation. Whereas without you being aware of it,
Speaker 1: you think you're right right, You still think that you
Speaker 1: got it right.
Speaker 3: What does love mean to you?
Speaker 1: So I'm like you, I'm very practical and I like
Speaker 1: to define things less wishy washy and more like practically,
Speaker 1: what does it mean? So I define love as three things.
Speaker 1: The first is when you like someone's personality, basic obvious.
Speaker 1: If I like your personality, that is one aspect of
Speaker 1: what love is about. To me, it means I like
Speaker 1: your company. Studies show that in order to call someone
Speaker 1: a casual acquaintance, you have to spend forty hours with
Speaker 1: them just to call someone a casual acquaintance.
Speaker 2: Now, I think podcasts are different.
Speaker 1: I think when you spend two hours like this with someone,
Speaker 1: you accelerate the casual acquaintance for sure. And when you
Speaker 1: listen to someone's podcast, you accelerate it too. Even if
Speaker 1: someone's listening or watching us right now and they listen
Speaker 1: to you every week and enjoy the content you make,
Speaker 1: they know you deeply as well because they're fully embedded
Speaker 1: in your life. The study says that it takes one
Speaker 1: hundred hours to call someone a good friend and it
Speaker 1: takes two hundred hours to call someone a great friend.
Speaker 1: So love to me is can I spend two hundred
Speaker 1: hours with this person? In the personality section in getting
Speaker 1: to understand them? That's the first, and the personality part
Speaker 1: is do I take the time to understand? Do I
Speaker 1: take the time to listen. That's what love includes, not
Speaker 1: just you know I like them. The second thing, this
Speaker 1: one's really important, and I'll define it more specifically. Do
Speaker 1: I respect their values and do they respect mine? When
Speaker 1: we talk about respect and we talk about values in relationships,
Speaker 1: we want people to value what we value equally to
Speaker 1: how we value it.
Speaker 2: That will never happen. There is no one in the
Speaker 2: world who will equally value what you value in the
Speaker 2: exact way that you value it, even if you have
Speaker 2: the same values. And what love is is I respect
Speaker 2: you so much for what you value, and you respect
Speaker 2: me so much for what I value.
Speaker 1: I actually respect that you are who you are because
Speaker 1: of what you value. I don't want to change your values.
Speaker 1: If you want to change someone's values, you don't love them.
Speaker 1: If you want to change someone's priorities, you don't love them.
Speaker 1: I have a lot of friends who say to me,
Speaker 1: I'm getting this guy. He's not ambitious enough, and I
Speaker 1: want him to be more ambitious. And I'll be like, well,
Speaker 1: what if he never is more ambitious? What if he's
Speaker 1: happy being unambitious and happy where he's at. Oh well, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: but he can become more ambitious. I know he has
Speaker 1: it in him. Yeah, but what if he doesn't want to? No, no, no,
Speaker 1: I know he can be. And I'm just like, this
Speaker 1: conversation's unhealthy because that's not love, that's not belief, that's
Speaker 1: not you think you're seeing his potential and you're going
Speaker 1: to find him and you're going to be the one
Speaker 1: to make him the guy he becomes.
Speaker 2: But the truth is he doesn't want to be that
Speaker 2: for himself. So now, even if.
Speaker 1: He does it for you, at one point, he's going
Speaker 1: to figure out he only did it for you, and
Speaker 1: then he's going to be upset that he wasted his
Speaker 1: life becoming someone he didn't want to be for someone who.
Speaker 2: Didn't want to be with him. And that's what happens
Speaker 2: to so many of us.
Speaker 1: We become someone we don't want to be for someone
Speaker 1: who doesn't want to be with the real loss. And
Speaker 1: if someone doesn't want to be with the real you,
Speaker 1: because they don't, if you don't respect that, that person
Speaker 1: is not ambitious, but that's what makes them special. And
Speaker 1: if they don't respect you as being ambitious and that's
Speaker 1: what makes you special, then there's no chance of love.
Speaker 1: And the final one I was going to say is
Speaker 1: the third part is am I committed to helping you
Speaker 1: towards your goals? And are you committed to helping me
Speaker 1: towards my goals whatever they may be. Because that commitment
Speaker 1: that I'm going to help you, I'm going to support
Speaker 1: you to become who you want to be, to achieve
Speaker 1: whatever you want to achieve. I'm going to support you,
Speaker 1: and you're going to support me. And sometimes that support
Speaker 1: me in space. Sometimes that support means a call. Sometimes
Speaker 1: that support means cheer leading you. Sometimes that support means
Speaker 1: checking you and telling you the truth. Love requires all
Speaker 1: three of these things. Liking someone's personality, respecting their values,
Speaker 1: and committed to helping them achieve their goals, and they
Speaker 1: have to have it back if it's two way love.
Speaker 2: And I'll give you a real example. A lot of
Speaker 2: people have been asking me.
Speaker 1: So the number one question I get asked anywhere I
Speaker 1: go in the world for my World tour is where's
Speaker 1: RADI right, where's your wife?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, she's back in La and they're like,
Speaker 2: oh man.
Speaker 1: And so I go through this thing in life where
Speaker 1: people are happy to meet me, but then when they
Speaker 1: know about my wife, I'm a nobody and like she
Speaker 1: steals all my friends and no one cares about who
Speaker 1: I am.
Speaker 2: It's a good thing. My wife's amazing.
Speaker 1: What's really interesting is that a lot of people are like,
Speaker 1: why's your wife not traveling with you? And I'm like,
Speaker 1: because she has a purpose, she has a passion. She
Speaker 1: has a life as well. And if my wife's only
Speaker 1: job was to follow me around and just be in
Speaker 1: the audience every night while I'm on stage, sit in
Speaker 1: a chair right now while I do this podcast, that
Speaker 1: can't be a fulfilling life for anyone, just in the
Speaker 1: same way it wouldn't be for me. Now, my wife's
Speaker 1: come to some show, She's going to come to the
Speaker 1: London shows.
Speaker 2: She's supportive, we talk every day. It's great. But I'm
Speaker 2: not going to make my.
Speaker 1: Wife sacrifice her purpose to support my purpose, because if
Speaker 1: I love her, I'm going to be right there supporting her,
Speaker 1: making sure she has time to do what she loves,
Speaker 1: because that's what makes her special. If I take away
Speaker 1: from her what makes her special, I might even fall
Speaker 1: out of love with her. And we forget that. We
Speaker 1: think that if I change this person, they'll be more lovable.
Speaker 1: But as you try and change someone you take away
Speaker 1: the parts you actually even love about them, right now?
Speaker 1: So yeah, man, I just, you know, in order to
Speaker 1: answer your question, I just feel like I don't even
Speaker 1: know where I start.
Speaker 2: I don't even know what is love? What is love?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What is love?
Speaker 4: I don't know?
Speaker 3: I repeat, I repeat the Monica BLOUTI article quote, and
Speaker 3: it's very similar. She's like, don't change. Don't try to
Speaker 3: change your lover, your son, your child, because if you
Speaker 3: do end up changing them, it might fall out of
Speaker 3: love with them.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, I didn't know that. Yeah, exactly, that's exactly. Wow,
Speaker 1: that's exactly.
Speaker 3: Like this photoshop. I want to edit J because I
Speaker 3: have an image of what my ideal husband, brother Frend,
Speaker 3: should be like. So I need to edit you. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then when the editor is done, you're like, I
Speaker 3: don't even like them anymore. Yeah, And I think sometimes
Speaker 3: the editor also comes out of an ego because I
Speaker 3: think you should be this way correct. You know, is
Speaker 3: that the reason why you wrote your current book? Yeah?
Speaker 1: The reason I wrote my current book is so much
Speaker 1: of what we've talked about today, And you know, it's
Speaker 1: the reason I wrote it was because I saw that
Speaker 1: falling in love was such a critical part of whether people.
Speaker 4: Were fulfilled in life or not.
Speaker 1: So I saw people who had amazing professional lives, but
Speaker 1: if they didn't have a partner or they didn't have love,
Speaker 1: they felt a bit unfulfilled. And I saw other people
Speaker 1: who had amazing partners and even if their professional life
Speaker 1: wasn't good, they still felt resilient and ready for what
Speaker 1: the world would bring to them. And I want to
Speaker 1: caveat that with the reason. Real reason I wrote the
Speaker 1: book was because I wanted people to get to the
Speaker 1: deeper understanding. And I think this will resonate with you
Speaker 1: from what you just briefly told me before.
Speaker 2: Is that we compare.
Speaker 1: We put romantic love as the highest love. So even
Speaker 1: if you love your kids and your kids love you,
Speaker 1: even if you love your brother and he loves you,
Speaker 1: even if you love your sister and she loves you,
Speaker 1: and even if you love your mom and dad and
Speaker 1: they love you, you feel because of the way society
Speaker 1: has set it up that if you don't have a partner,
Speaker 1: that you can't have the ultimate love.
Speaker 2: But I disagree with that.
Speaker 1: I actually think that all love is love. Often the
Speaker 1: love that parents have for their kids is the greatest
Speaker 1: love that one will ever experience. And if you look
Speaker 1: at the greatest love stories in humanity, they're not between
Speaker 1: two people. They're not romantic love. The greatest love between
Speaker 1: two people is usually one person sacrifice for humanity, one
Speaker 1: person sacrifice for their people, one person sacrifice for their community,
Speaker 1: their town, their city, their country. That's sacrifice. That's love.
Speaker 2: It's not romantic love.
Speaker 1: We don't talk about in history, like two people who
Speaker 1: loved each other and how that helped the world.
Speaker 2: You never hear that story.
Speaker 1: I can't think of one couple that you think, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: when they got together that changed the world, That made
Speaker 1: the world a better place. The love that made the
Speaker 1: world a better place was the love that a few
Speaker 1: people had for the people in their town that they
Speaker 1: protected through tough times. So the families that came through
Speaker 1: together when there were floods, when there were famines, when
Speaker 1: there were wars, when there were hurricanes, when there were
Speaker 1: tornadoes and tsunamis, like people who came to that was
Speaker 1: the love. The love that we all felt during the pandemic,
Speaker 1: when people were trying to help each other even when
Speaker 1: it was so tough, that was love. Those were the
Speaker 1: love stories we told so let's not live and think
Speaker 1: if I don't have someone in my life that I'm
Speaker 1: without love.
Speaker 3: I have an interesting question that needs your imagination. Gone,
Speaker 3: it's a cool one. Well, I need you to close
Speaker 3: your eyes, okay, Okay, I want you g to imagine
Speaker 3: empty desert.
Speaker 2: Easy to do here?
Speaker 3: Yeah, nothing in this desert, completely empty. And then suddenly
Speaker 3: you see a cube. Have you done this cube test before?
Speaker 2: I've never done the cube test. I've done something else,
Speaker 2: but not a cube test.
Speaker 3: So now and this empty desert, you see a cube appear.
Speaker 3: Can you describe the cube?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's white, and it's I'm gonna because it's changing
Speaker 1: in size right now, but I'm gonna. I'm going to
Speaker 1: say it's white and big, like it's big enough for
Speaker 1: me to walk into.
Speaker 3: Okay. And is it on the surface, sunk floating?
Speaker 4: It is on the surface, on the surface.
Speaker 3: Is it transparent or solid?
Speaker 1: It is solid on the sides, transparent in the part
Speaker 1: that I can walk into.
Speaker 3: And then you see suddenly a ladder up here? Where
Speaker 3: is it?
Speaker 1: The ladder is on top of the cube, pointing into
Speaker 1: the sky.
Speaker 3: How tall is it? Is it above twelve steps or less?
Speaker 2: It is above twelve steps?
Speaker 3: New or old, it's new, okay. So it's on top
Speaker 3: of the cube. And after the cube you see a horse.
Speaker 3: Describe the horse.
Speaker 1: So the horse is a platinum horse. And the horse
Speaker 1: is very active, like running fast but also raising on
Speaker 1: its back legs, and it's a beautiful horse. It's like
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, the horse has platinum. So it's pretty,
Speaker 1: it's pretty spectacular.
Speaker 3: It's a it's a it's a vision because it's running
Speaker 3: to the cube, to that away. Where is it going?
Speaker 2: I would say, right now, it's running around the cube.
Speaker 3: Okay. After the horse, you see flowers appear where.
Speaker 1: In the round circle that the horse has formed. So
Speaker 1: it's the cube in the middle, ladder on top, and
Speaker 1: then there's all these beautiful flowers now around and then
Speaker 1: the horse is running around them.
Speaker 3: Okay. And after the flowers, I'm assuming they're in good health, yes,
Speaker 3: the way you described it. Okay. And after the flowers,
Speaker 3: you see a storm. Where is the storm.
Speaker 2: All the way in the background.
Speaker 3: Is it far away? Is it affecting any of the things. No,
Speaker 3: open your eyes.
Speaker 2: I've never done that before.
Speaker 3: Seriously, I'm glad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've never done that before. I've never done that before.
Speaker 3: Look, I have you in front of me. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 3: taking advantage of this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you do, man. Yeah, I've never done that. I
Speaker 2: love stuff like that, and I've never done that before.
Speaker 3: You love this.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: It's called the Cocology Cube test by a Japanese psychologist.
Speaker 2: I love it. Yeah, I love stuff like I'm excited.
Speaker 3: Now you can. You can even use it and you'll
Speaker 3: find it on Google. And so the cube is your
Speaker 3: sense of self or ego. Yours was a medium size,
Speaker 3: so it's between bold, confident and willing to be seen
Speaker 3: and small, which is introvert, shy, modest, quite rather to
Speaker 3: blend in and stand out. You're somewhere in the middle
Speaker 3: because it was a nice size you could walk into
Speaker 3: standing on the sand. Means you're stable, know what they
Speaker 3: want from life and intend to get it. Your logical
Speaker 3: and precise sounds right. And you're the first one who
Speaker 3: had a solid and hollow okay, So you're between knowing
Speaker 3: yourself and not easily manipulated, and you're very self assured
Speaker 3: and still busy discovering yourself.
Speaker 2: That feels right, That feels fair. Yeah, that's good, that's good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, lad, there is family and friends. You've said this
Speaker 3: was interesting because I've hardly got this. You said, it's
Speaker 3: fairly new, so most of your friends are fairly new
Speaker 3: or you don't know each other well because of maybe
Speaker 3: your new tour and all of the life that you're
Speaker 3: living now. You said many steps, So you probably enjoy
Speaker 3: being the social butterfly. You know a lot of people,
Speaker 3: a lot of acquaintances, few friends, but also entertained acquaintances, and.
Speaker 2: Would and I would agree with that.
Speaker 1: I would say that I have a lot of new
Speaker 1: friends because I've moved country and moved state, so I've
Speaker 1: had to build new community. Like I've been in LA
Speaker 1: for five years now, okay, and so that's fairly new.
Speaker 1: And I didn't know anyone when I moved to LA,
Speaker 1: so it's been a lot of new community. I have
Speaker 1: a lot of good old friends that like my best
Speaker 1: friends that like you know, that I grew up with.
Speaker 1: But yes, I've always kept a tighter circle, like I
Speaker 1: don't have a huge circle, so that feels fair.
Speaker 2: Yes, I have a lot of acquaintances.
Speaker 3: Of course higher than the cube value friends and family
Speaker 3: very highly and dependent on them. Okay, so you said
Speaker 3: it's touching the cube, so not completely dependent on family
Speaker 3: and friends, but rely on them for support and guidance
Speaker 3: at times.
Speaker 4: Correct.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not.
Speaker 1: I would consider myself to be as in that's good
Speaker 1: and accurate. I would consider myself to be quite independent
Speaker 1: in how I make decisions. But I appreciate the value
Speaker 1: that friends and family have in life. Like I wouldn't
Speaker 1: want to live a lonely life. I don't think that's
Speaker 1: healthy to you know, disconnect completely in order to be
Speaker 1: successful or anything.
Speaker 3: Yeah, of course, ideal partner Brady. Okay, So he said,
Speaker 3: it's interesting since she was going around the cube so
Speaker 3: close to the cube signifies a close relationship. And you
Speaker 3: said the thirdy glamorous prancing or glamorous prancing house, your value,
Speaker 3: outward appearance and once someone that others would also approve of,
Speaker 3: and a sign moving towards the cube a sign of
Speaker 3: new relationship or strengthening of bonds of an older relationship.
Speaker 1: Well, I think ralely orbiting makes a lot of sense
Speaker 1: because we're both connected, but we're both doing our own thing.
Speaker 1: And so there's like, yeah, that's interesting, that's fascinating. Wow,
Speaker 1: And the platinum that doesn't what does that's the beauty? Oh,
Speaker 1: that's the beauty. I have a very unique partner since
Speaker 1: because I've never heard platinum before.
Speaker 3: Yeah, rather here whatever, Rady is very.
Speaker 4: Like, Yeah, she's, she's she's a very unique person for sure.
Speaker 1: Like I've I've never met anyone who has judged me
Speaker 1: as little, criticized me as little, and not wanting wanted
Speaker 1: me to change as little.
Speaker 2: I've never met someone like that.
Speaker 1: I think everyone I'd ever dated before wanted me to
Speaker 1: change in a certain way, judge me in a certain way,
Speaker 1: criticized me in a certain way.
Speaker 2: And to be with someone.
Speaker 1: Who's really happy with you being who you are and
Speaker 1: allowing you to make mistakes and allowing you to rectify
Speaker 1: them and then you provide the same space back to them.
Speaker 1: That's the uniqueness that I love the most, because it's
Speaker 1: hard to.
Speaker 4: Find that, you know, it's hard to find that. So yeah,
Speaker 4: very Yeah.
Speaker 3: She must be very at peace with herself.
Speaker 1: She is, she's definitely, she's so self assured. I've never
Speaker 1: met someone who's, like, you know, not insecure in that way.
Speaker 3: Flowers children, we don't have any Yeah. Yeah. The idea
Speaker 3: that it was between the cube and her and it
Speaker 3: was around that was around you, which is both it's
Speaker 3: the joint venture, you know, and near the cube shows
Speaker 3: you wish for a close relationship with your children future children.
Speaker 3: Amount of flowers signifies the amount of children, like.
Speaker 2: I saw way too many flowers.
Speaker 3: But I think in my experience with this question is
Speaker 3: children in general. Yes, you like to be with children
Speaker 3: because they're pure or what. Some people don't like. You'd
Speaker 3: see that, he says, one flower, two flowers. I also
Speaker 3: see like the company of kids.
Speaker 1: I also see what's beautiful about that? And I think
Speaker 1: you've resonate with this. Is so my monk teacher never
Speaker 1: had biological children because they're monks and they're celibate and
Speaker 1: they don't have partners, but they always treat us like
Speaker 1: their kids or younger brothers, depending on the age difference.
Speaker 1: And I've always found that my community and my audience,
Speaker 1: I see them as younger brothers and sisters. I see
Speaker 1: them as people who are you know. That feels like
Speaker 1: that paternal aspect, if that makes sense, not like a father,
Speaker 1: but like a sense of being an older brother. There's
Speaker 1: that paternal aspect I have towards even my community and
Speaker 1: audience because it's like, hey, don't need to make mistakes
Speaker 1: I've made, like you know, here's here's what I'm learning. Like,
Speaker 1: there's that guidance you want to pass on. So I
Speaker 1: also see that example perfectly as it's not just biological children,
Speaker 1: it's people of the world that you feel you want
Speaker 1: to extend yourself to.
Speaker 4: So I love that.
Speaker 3: Last one is a storm fear, stress, and anxiety. Vaguely
Speaker 3: insight or on the horizon, you are at a more
Speaker 3: peaceful innerth place. However, the closer the storm, the closer
Speaker 3: they made the threat, and he said it didn't engage
Speaker 3: with any of the elements. So you consider the threats,
Speaker 3: any of them manageable, and you have the confidence and
Speaker 3: ability to resolve them.
Speaker 1: That is a really cool activity. That's probably the best
Speaker 1: one that I've heard of, because I've done some like
Speaker 1: more simple ones that have been done with me.
Speaker 3: You have to try this, yeah before she sees this, Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I shows you also how honest a person was on
Speaker 3: your interview or whatever, because they can tell you their story.
Speaker 3: But this is subconscious answers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had no idea.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I've genuinely never done that before,
Speaker 1: and actually like I didn't. Also, what I love about
Speaker 1: it is you don't know what you're being asked about. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I had no idea that horse was rathery or
Speaker 1: the kids. It's brilliant. It's really good man.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 3: Do we do the Evy talks one, the random card
Speaker 3: you have it? And so this we just released this.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I love this. Let's do it, man.
Speaker 3: Okay, let me just get a bunch and we'll just
Speaker 3: do one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, you're gonna get me a pick one.
Speaker 2: Wow, there's a dice as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll use this thum mix. Yeah, this is cool man,
Speaker 3: all right, I'm just us the one. The question is
Speaker 3: do you think of yourself as an optimist or a pessimist?
Speaker 3: Throw this and you have to answer accordingly.
Speaker 1: Throw it all right, okay, right, but not far away anyway.
Speaker 3: We'll read it. Story.
Speaker 4: Oh okay, cool.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, that's a great addition. Man, I've not seen
Speaker 1: we worked on this for nearly two years. I've not
Speaker 1: seen anyone do that. That's genius, that's brilliant.
Speaker 2: That is the best.
Speaker 1: Okay, guys, you will have to get this box of
Speaker 1: cards because that is the best one I've seen. I've
Speaker 1: done cards, but that is that's a beautiful little.
Speaker 3: Pessimist or optimist and story for them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know which one it is, but I'm trying
Speaker 1: to find the story, so.
Speaker 2: I'd say overall optimist.
Speaker 1: And the story is when Radi and I got married,
Speaker 1: I made a commitment to her, and I promise to
Speaker 1: her that we would live within one mile radius from
Speaker 1: her parents' home. And I was happy to commit to that,
Speaker 1: and I was optimistic about it and I was looking
Speaker 1: forward to it.
Speaker 2: Our friends live in that area and we like the area.
Speaker 1: And then two weeks after we got married, I got
Speaker 1: an opportunity to move to New York. And when I
Speaker 1: told her about it, it was heartbreaking for her because she's
Speaker 1: so close to her family and she wanted to be
Speaker 1: close to her parents. But I was so optimistic about
Speaker 1: the move. So in twenty sixteen, I changed job three times,
Speaker 1: I got married, and I moved country all in one year.
Speaker 1: And they say that those are three of the most
Speaker 1: crazy things to do in life. And the only one
Speaker 1: that we didn't add was have a baby that year.
Speaker 1: But those are considered to be like three of the
Speaker 1: most difficult things to do in a year, like change jobs,
Speaker 1: change country, and get married. We did it all within
Speaker 1: three months, and I was optimistic.
Speaker 2: That I would be okay. Like I was like, Yeah,
Speaker 2: this is going to work.
Speaker 1: Out, this is fine, but it's a lot of like
Speaker 1: it's very demanding. Like the reality is that I was
Speaker 1: very optimistic, but it's extremely demanding. So you have to
Speaker 1: be that optimistic about it because it's hard. It's much
Speaker 1: harder than it looks. It's much harder than I thought
Speaker 1: it was. But I'm an optimist.
Speaker 3: What are you afraid of?
Speaker 1: I think my honest fear for a long time has
Speaker 1: been not reaching my potential. And that's what's spurred me
Speaker 1: on so much, is that I never wanted to live
Speaker 1: a life. I felt like I got given a lot
Speaker 1: of gifts and a lot of beautiful mentors, teachers, guides
Speaker 1: in my life, and my fear would be that I
Speaker 1: don't not that I don't live up to what they
Speaker 1: want because they don't have any pressure, but that I
Speaker 1: don't feel like I lived up to that potential. But
Speaker 1: a deeper answer that's coming to me right now as
Speaker 1: I'm sitting with you, is that the thing I'd say
Speaker 1: the fear I work on the most. I'd like to
Speaker 1: give that answer if that helps, because I'm always working
Speaker 1: on my fears because it feels manageable and a healthy
Speaker 1: thing to do. The fear I work on the most
Speaker 1: is getting ready to be able to free myself one
Speaker 1: day for when all of this goes away, that I'll
Speaker 1: be able to peacefully let it go, that I'll be
Speaker 1: able to happily step back and realize that it was
Speaker 1: a beautiful blessing and a beautiful journey, and that I
Speaker 1: did my part. But then now it's okay to let
Speaker 1: it go. It's okay to be insignificant, it's okay to
Speaker 1: be irrelevant, it's okay to be.
Speaker 2: Forgotten.
Speaker 1: That's okay, it's okay, and to allow yourself that piece
Speaker 1: that at the time of death when it comes, that
Speaker 1: you did your part and you tapped out, and that
Speaker 1: life was about so much more than just this that
Speaker 1: seems all consuming and all central at this point, but
Speaker 1: my relationship with God and my relationship with the universe,
Speaker 1: my service to humanity was always what it was about,
Speaker 1: and it didn't matter what it looked like and how
Speaker 1: it sounded and what it felt like. It was just
Speaker 1: that I did my part and that I left peacefully.
Speaker 1: I think being able to be prepared for that is
Speaker 1: the fear I work on the moment.
Speaker 3: It's one of the best answers I've got. If you
Speaker 3: were on your deathbed, hopefully after a long fulfilling life,
Speaker 3: and you're surrounded with loved ones, people you can imagine
Speaker 3: now that you want them around you, and you had
Speaker 3: the blessing of saying a few words before you die,
Speaker 3: what do you think you'd say?
Speaker 1: I would say, don't cry for me, don't cry for
Speaker 1: losing me, but cry for the people that are in
Speaker 1: pain right now, who are still alive, And find a
Speaker 1: way in your life and in your heart positively impact
Speaker 1: just one person. Take your time to extend your life
Speaker 1: beyond your family and friends, to one person out there
Speaker 1: who may need your love the most right now. Someone
Speaker 1: you may not even know, someone you may have never met,
Speaker 1: someone who's a stranger. If you could just to extend yourself,
Speaker 1: extend that love you feel for me now, extend that
Speaker 1: love to them. I'm good, I don't need it. Extend
Speaker 1: that love to just one other person. If you can
Speaker 1: extend your love to and express your love to one
Speaker 1: person apart from me, with the same love you feel
Speaker 1: for me, that would be the greatest gift of your
Speaker 1: love for me.
Speaker 3: And hypothetically, if I could take your heart and place
Speaker 3: it in front of you. What do you think your
Speaker 3: heart will tell you.
Speaker 2: At that time?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 1: Oh, now, just keep speaking your truth. Some people will
Speaker 1: like it, some people will hate it. Some people will
Speaker 1: understand you, some people will judge you. Just keep speaking
Speaker 1: your truth because that's all you have anyway.
Speaker 3: What is something you need more than anything at the
Speaker 3: stage in your life?
Speaker 4: What I need most of my life right now is
Speaker 4: to trust myself, just like I trust myself even years
Speaker 4: ago when I started this journey that I don't know
Speaker 4: the part ahead, but we'll figure it out.
Speaker 3: Last one Jay in one word, purpose, thanks.
Speaker 4: Thank you good.
Speaker 2: I enjoyed this. I loved it.
Speaker 3: I have I have a fun one gone. If you
Speaker 3: could choose three people on a dinner table or alive,
Speaker 3: and they all speak the same language, who would you choose?
Speaker 3: Because I know you met a lot of people in
Speaker 3: your life, and someday maybe you never met, But would
Speaker 3: you love me?
Speaker 1: So everyone everyone I admire is dead and so so
Speaker 1: who was on there to be?
Speaker 2: Steve Jobs.
Speaker 1: I've studied Steve Jobs his life for years and I
Speaker 1: find him fascinating.
Speaker 4: And he was very spiritual too.
Speaker 1: He spent a lot of time with monks in India,
Speaker 1: and so I have a lot of fascination because he
Speaker 1: has this incredible east west paradigm and dynamic.
Speaker 4: In his life.
Speaker 1: And so Steve Jobs would be at that table. I'd
Speaker 1: say Nicola Tesla, like Tesla himself, because I think that
Speaker 1: there's very few people again, so you'll notice all the
Speaker 1: people I'm picking, they had east and west like they
Speaker 1: were able to see like he was able to see science,
Speaker 1: but then there was he had a belief in something
Speaker 1: beyond science, and that that's what fascinates me is people
Speaker 1: who were able to find these synergies in things that
Speaker 1: we often see as black and white or opposites. But
Speaker 1: the paradox is the contrast you talked about earlier. So
Speaker 1: Steve Jobs, Tesla, and yeah, I would say I would
Speaker 1: have to add Martin Luther King because I don't know
Speaker 1: anyone who like built like you know when you talk
Speaker 1: about these people, what they built like shattered so many.
Speaker 2: Generations of thought.
Speaker 1: And so I think what I'm trying to do in
Speaker 1: the world is and what we're trying to do, both
Speaker 1: of us are trying to do in the world, is
Speaker 1: we're trying to shatter so many myths and misconceptions that
Speaker 1: exist in the world around people, around ideas, around culture
Speaker 1: and society. And I don't think I can't think of
Speaker 1: anyone better than Martin Luther King who did it in
Speaker 1: such a prolific way and emphatic way that you know,
Speaker 1: has made such a difference long lasting and broke down
Speaker 1: something that was so longstanding.
Speaker 4: So I agree, yeah, those three people.
Speaker 3: You know what's funny, while we were doing the interview,
Speaker 3: we sometimes move similarly, really, like when you're thinking and
Speaker 3: I'm thinking, I can see we do this. Really I
Speaker 3: always do it. Yeah, sometimes you.
Speaker 1: Do this and do That's so funny, man, that's so funny.
Speaker 4: I love that.
Speaker 1: Now, dude, you are phenomenal at what you do, honestly, like,
Speaker 1: you are so good at what you do, easily easily
Speaker 1: the best thing to be done in a long, long time.
Speaker 1: And it's because of you as in and also the
Speaker 1: stillness and the presence I fell in this room is
Speaker 1: really special. So I was so present because the environment
Speaker 1: you guys have all created and the energy that you
Speaker 1: guys have created.
Speaker 3: You don't see them not moved there.
Speaker 2: It's real, not even.
Speaker 1: Cough, but I mean, it's incredible in here. So thank you,
Speaker 1: Thank you man. Honestly, I mean that from the bottom
Speaker 1: of my life change.
Speaker 3: I think it takes two to tango. Also, I could
Speaker 3: be a very good interview about if I'm not dancing,
Speaker 3: hopefully I really get it too looking easily talk for us.
Speaker 1: Have you ever had a friend get really into something
Speaker 1: and then try to get you into it too, like
Speaker 1: doing a detox, going minimalist, or taking up CrossFit. Maybe
Speaker 1: you even got sight and said, yes, I'm totally doing that,
Speaker 1: But when it came down to it, you never did
Speaker 1: give up coffee, get rid of half of your stuff,
Speaker 1: or learn how to do a muscle up. Well, if
Speaker 1: you felt bad that you didn't follow through, don't worry.
Speaker 1: The problem wasn't with you, It was with your why.
Speaker 1: The next seven minutes are about your goals and how
Speaker 1: to line them up with what really matters.
Speaker 2: I'm Jay Shaddy. Welcome to the Daily Jay.
Speaker 1: Before we dig into our goals, let's pause and get
Speaker 1: centered with three deep breaths. So take a deep breath
Speaker 1: in and let it out, flowing in and flowing out,
Speaker 1: gathering up your attention and landing in this moment. Now,
Speaker 1: let's dive in a few years ago, a team of
Speaker 1: psychologists wanted to study what makes people accomplish some of
Speaker 1: their goals but not others. They are subjects to list
Speaker 1: a few personal objectives they were trying to accomplish. The
Speaker 1: participants said things like payoff debt, lose twenty pounds, and
Speaker 1: clean out my closets. The researchers had them rate how
Speaker 1: they were faring and then answer a pretty unusual question,
Speaker 1: did trying to achieve each outcome make them feel more
Speaker 1: or less connected to their true self. The participants were
Speaker 1: also asked to indicate how much they believed that accomplishing
Speaker 1: those goals would make other people like or respect them.
Speaker 1: In the end, the researchers found that when our goals
Speaker 1: align with what's truly important to us, we're more likely
Speaker 1: to achieve them. But when our motivation is to make
Speaker 1: others happy or to look good, the odds are against
Speaker 1: us doing what we set out to do. Whether it's
Speaker 1: from parents, friends, or even just culture at large, it's
Speaker 1: easy to feel buried under a mountain of shoulds. For one,
Speaker 1: people are often quick to offer us advice, or we
Speaker 1: see what others are doing and automatically think we must
Speaker 1: do the same. Either way, it's easy to internalize those
Speaker 1: shoulds and make them our goals. I should do yoga,
Speaker 1: I should start a company, I should travel more. Those
Speaker 1: objectives may be positive, but if they don't align with
Speaker 1: our values or what we want for our lives, we're
Speaker 1: less likely to accomplish them, and that can derail our confidence,
Speaker 1: sap our drive, or distract us from what we really want.
Speaker 1: Maybe you came across an article that outlined how every
Speaker 1: successful person reads at least twenty books a year, and
Speaker 1: you say, I'm gonna do that, But two months in
Speaker 1: you're only halfway through book one. Then the criticism starts.
Speaker 1: Why can't I just do this? You think, what's wrong
Speaker 1: with me? But the issue is an aptitude or even attitude,
Speaker 1: it's alignment. The goal was never truly meaningful to you.
Speaker 1: Of course, it's totally fine to get external inspiration. Sometimes
Speaker 1: what someone else is doing can clue us into our
Speaker 1: own passions and desires. But you might find yourself pursuing
Speaker 1: something only because you feel like it will increase your
Speaker 1: status or help you fit in, or perhaps you think
Speaker 1: it's what you're supposed to do. If that's the case,
Speaker 1: chances are it's going to be an uphill climb, and
Speaker 1: if you do make it up the hill, you may
Speaker 1: not feel as excited or fulfilled as you'd imagined. So
Speaker 1: as much as possible, try to set goals that appeal
Speaker 1: to your authentic self. Line up what you want with
Speaker 1: who you are. And now, with our time today winding down,
Speaker 1: let's turn to a short meditation before reflecting on your goals.
Speaker 1: So get comfortable wherever you are, tuning in to the
Speaker 1: present and leaning into ease, letting go of distractions, judgments,
Speaker 1: or expectations as you give yourself permission to pause and
Speaker 1: simply be here in this moment, continuing to settle your mind,
Speaker 1: continuing to settle your body, continuing to embrace your experience
Speaker 1: of the present. Now, begin to become a little more
Speaker 1: aware of your experience, aware of how you're feeling physically, emotionally, mentally,
Speaker 1: aware of any thoughts that may be popping up, or
Speaker 1: aware of the quiet in your mind. Whatever your experience,
Speaker 1: see if you can observe it with clarity and non judgment,
Speaker 1: while always orienting yourself toward ease. When we check in
Speaker 1: like this, we start to grow more aware of ourselves
Speaker 1: and any forces that are pushing or pulling us hopefully,
Speaker 1: ultimately we can take back some of the control. Now,
Speaker 1: let's open this up. Bring to mind a current goal
Speaker 1: of yours. Is that objective aligned with your authentic self?
Speaker 1: Is it something that really matters to you, or is
Speaker 1: it asshured you've internalized from the outside world. Going forward,
Speaker 1: can you make sure your aspirations come from you instead
Speaker 1: of others. Thank you so much for being here today.
Speaker 1: I hope to see you back again tomorrow.