WEBVTT - Martha Beck 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.960 I'm Sam Edis and I'm Amy Nelson. Welcome to What's 0:00:06.960 --> 0:00:09.600 Her Story? With Sam and Amy. This is a show 0:00:09.640 --> 0:00:15.400 about the world's most remarkable women. They're professional and personal journeys. Together, 0:00:15.480 --> 0:00:19.160 we'll hear from Gold medalists, best selling authors, and leaders 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:22.840 of the world's most iconic brands. Listen every Thursday or 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:27.880 join the conversation anytime on Instagram at What's Her Story Podcast. 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:34.239 Welcome to Season three of What's Her Story. I am 0:00:34.280 --> 0:00:38.400 more excited for this season than any season before, simply 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:41.000 because I feel like we're better at telling women's stories 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:43.560 than we've ever been in the past. And on top 0:00:43.600 --> 0:00:48.120 of it, we have the most unbelievable lineup of guests. 0:00:48.560 --> 0:00:52.040 This lineup will blow your socks off, no questions about it. 0:00:52.440 --> 0:00:54.640 I am so excited to share all of it with you. 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:59.160 I'm super excited for today's guest, Martha Beck. If you 0:00:59.280 --> 0:01:02.000 don't know, mark that she is Oprah's favorite life coach 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:05.880 and the best selling author of numerous books, including her newest, 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:11.520 The Way of Integrity. Take us back to that time 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:15.280 when you felt like you had hit rock bottom and 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:20.199 something dramatic needed to change. The year I heard twenty nine, 0:01:20.240 --> 0:01:22.840 I decided not to tell a single lie for a 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:25.319 whole calendar year. And by the way, I was also 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:27.800 very physically ill at this time. I had a bunch 0:01:27.840 --> 0:01:30.680 of autoimmune diseases. I could barely get out of bed 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:34.000 or use my hands. I was in constant chronic pain. 0:01:34.360 --> 0:01:39.280 I mean, things were not ideal. And so I did 0:01:39.440 --> 0:01:42.440 go a whole year without telling a single lie of 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:45.320 any kind, not polite, not white, not any kind of lie. 0:01:45.400 --> 0:01:50.400 And my entire life exploded because it needed to either 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:55.600 walked away from or was ejected from my religion, my 0:01:55.760 --> 0:02:00.000 family of origin because of the religion things very religious family. 0:02:00.800 --> 0:02:04.720 Quit my job, which was an assistant professor, quit my industry, 0:02:04.720 --> 0:02:07.360 which is academia, because I hated that and I couldn't 0:02:07.400 --> 0:02:10.600 lie and say I liked it. I because I was 0:02:10.680 --> 0:02:13.960 living in an area. I was raised Mormon in Provo, Utah, 0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:16.840 which is a very Mormon area, and once I left 0:02:16.880 --> 0:02:19.560 the church, it was not really a good place for 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:22.720 me and my family so left my home realized I 0:02:22.800 --> 0:02:26.240 was gay, so they won't my marriage. Pretty much everything 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:29.720 that would define a life went away that year, and 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:34.120 I started to feel happy for the first time in 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:36.480 my life, even though I was grieving all this stuff, 0:02:36.520 --> 0:02:41.280 like massively, something started healing inside me because I was 0:02:41.320 --> 0:02:44.160 telling the truth about myself all the time, And they're right, 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:47.400 the truth does say free. Did you feel any guilt 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:51.000 for not wanting anymore the things that you had chosen, 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:53.520 the people you had chosen in some instances? Like did 0:02:53.560 --> 0:02:56.960 that feel guilty at all? Yeah? I mean, because I 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:00.400 was being so incredibly scrupulous about trying to tell the truth, 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:05.520 I mostly felt just sorrow. But when I would sometimes 0:03:05.520 --> 0:03:08.280 get into the mindset of the people who thought that 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:11.520 I should have lived, like if I everybody I knew 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:15.000 growing up was Mormon, right, So when you leave the 0:03:15.040 --> 0:03:18.240 Mormon church, that is considered a sin worse than murder. 0:03:18.280 --> 0:03:21.440 And in addition, I had left partly because my father 0:03:21.560 --> 0:03:24.960 was a sort of very dominant figure in the church, 0:03:25.160 --> 0:03:29.280 and he had also abused me sexually as a child. 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:32.919 And also I found out during that year had had 0:03:32.960 --> 0:03:36.480 actually published a lot of things that were just lies 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:41.480 in order to support the church. So a lot of 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:44.240 people told me I was trying to destroy the entire religion, 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:46.680 that I was trying to destroy my family, my father 0:03:46.760 --> 0:03:50.840 and everything I knew. I wasn't. I knew absolutely in 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:53.200 my heart that I was not, But when I got 0:03:53.280 --> 0:03:56.960 into their mindset, I would think, oh, I must be 0:03:57.080 --> 0:03:59.040 such a terrible person to them. So it was a 0:03:59.120 --> 0:04:01.720 kind of guilt, but it was like I knew it 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:05.000 wasn't true because I've been so careful about doing what 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:07.520 I felt was right the whole time. And that's what 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:10.200 I still ask clients. I say, you know, when they're saying, oh, 0:04:10.280 --> 0:04:12.920 I've done the wrong things, I've been a bad mother, 0:04:13.120 --> 0:04:15.840 or whatever it is, I always just say, all right, 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:20.200 have you ever in your life gotten up in the 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:23.039 morning trying to do harm to the world or to 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:26.600 any being, to try to cause suffering? And mostly they 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:28.400 say no, I know the ones that don't, and I 0:04:28.440 --> 0:04:32.920 don't stick with. And then the other question I always 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:35.320 ask them is is there any time when you weren't 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:38.680 trying your hardest to do the right thing? And almost 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:42.159 everybody says yes. I really believe almost everyone is trying 0:04:42.200 --> 0:04:45.400 to do their best, and we leave integrity, that is 0:04:45.440 --> 0:04:50.520 our true selves, because we split ourselves away from what 0:04:50.600 --> 0:04:52.640 our true nature would have us do in order to 0:04:52.720 --> 0:04:56.080 follow the ways that other people think are right or good. 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.520 So it's really important not to get into somebody else's 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:01.960 mind st and look at yourself, to stay inside your 0:05:01.960 --> 0:05:05.680 own integrity and just do your best from there, and 0:05:05.680 --> 0:05:08.159 then you can always be sure you've done all you 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:10.440 can and no one can be expected to do anymore. 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:14.279 One of the really interesting threads throughout your story is 0:05:14.320 --> 0:05:18.880 that you've been willing to leave the comfort of communities 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:22.440 so many times. How did you deal with that and 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:25.919 how do you recommend other people overcome that? Yeah, that 0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:28.600 is really a hard one. I mean, we are primates, right, 0:05:28.880 --> 0:05:31.599 and primates are the only kind of animal that in 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:35.839 a dangerous situation, we don't seek safe places. We seek 0:05:35.960 --> 0:05:41.080 safe others. We go to other primates and huddle together, 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:44.320 and that makes us feel safe. Other animals, like horses, 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:47.560 will try to find a safe place. So for us 0:05:47.600 --> 0:05:52.479 to leave a community is a survival fear, and for 0:05:52.600 --> 0:05:57.440 us to lose a community is almost a life threatening grief. 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:02.120 Like it's such an intense loss, and I experienced it 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:05.600 as very intense. I remember reading a poem by Stanley 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:09.479 Kunitz that part of it goes, Oh, I have made 0:06:09.680 --> 0:06:13.120 for myself a tribe out of my true affections, and 0:06:13.240 --> 0:06:16.599 my tribe is scattered. How shall my heart be reconciled 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:20.240 to its feast of losses. And I remember going around 0:06:20.320 --> 0:06:23.039 thinking how shall my heart be reconciled to its feast 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:26.359 of losses? And then I remember I'm suddenly quoting a 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:28.680 lot of poetry. So I guess that's how you get 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:32.320 through it. You read a lot of poetry. But um, 0:06:32.360 --> 0:06:35.760 what happens is that you grieve and it turns into 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:38.680 a need for kindness from others, which can lead you 0:06:38.720 --> 0:06:44.000 to kindness to the self, which leads you to healing 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:47.600 stronger at the broken places. You come away from those 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:52.880 losses with a kindness where every loss used to be. 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:56.160 And what that does is it builds you a new tribe. 0:06:56.880 --> 0:06:59.040 And it is a tribe of your true affections. And 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:04.400 that's what I've experienced since leaving all those communities. Before 0:07:04.480 --> 0:07:07.560 I left them, I was intensely lonely, even though there 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:10.960 were people around me. Now I'm not lonely. You left 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.640 the world you'd built when you had small children. How 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:17.720 did you think about your children in that transition and 0:07:17.760 --> 0:07:20.480 how did it work out? I was very worried about them, 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:23.240 and um, maybe that was right. You can never go 0:07:23.320 --> 0:07:25.400 back and replay it to see what would have happened 0:07:25.440 --> 0:07:27.880 if it had been different. I knew I needed to 0:07:27.960 --> 0:07:32.840 leave when my daughter, my oldest daughter, turned eight and 0:07:33.320 --> 0:07:37.000 Mormon's baptized children at the age of eight, and I 0:07:37.000 --> 0:07:40.200 had already left the church, and one day, right after 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:44.040 her eighth birthday, um, there was a knock at the 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:46.480 door and it was a whole group of eight year 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:50.360 olds from around the neighborhood with a couple of Sunday 0:07:50.360 --> 0:07:53.880 school teachers and they had cookies and balloons and stuff, 0:07:53.920 --> 0:07:57.440 and they said, we're having a party. All you have 0:07:57.480 --> 0:07:59.160 to do is come get baptized and we'll have this 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:02.000 big party for you. And if you don't come and 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:04.840 get baptized, you won't be allowed to play with us anymore. 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:08.880 And I was like, okay, we're out. We are out. 0:08:09.440 --> 0:08:12.480 And that child she's now I could say she they've 0:08:12.840 --> 0:08:16.320 now come out as a non binary, so they they 0:08:16.360 --> 0:08:20.920 remember that as a traumatic experience. And even my younger daughter, 0:08:21.200 --> 0:08:23.280 who now lives in England, she went to a therapist 0:08:23.280 --> 0:08:25.960 and the therapist said, did you ever have a cult 0:08:26.200 --> 0:08:29.920 around you? Because even that child, who was only four 0:08:30.000 --> 0:08:33.400 when I left, it had changed something in her mind 0:08:33.600 --> 0:08:37.840 that later later required therapy. And I remember when we 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:42.080 got to our new home, moved to Arizona. She she 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:44.200 was four, and she came and sat on the steps 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:46.480 with me one day and she said, I miss everything. 0:08:46.520 --> 0:08:50.520 I missed my friends, and she cried for a while. 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:52.839 I cried for a while, and then she gave it. 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:56.320 He this big sigh and she said, oh, well, I 0:08:56.440 --> 0:09:00.800 like the moon they have here. Well, you kind of 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:03.080 glossed over the part where you said and then I, 0:09:03.200 --> 0:09:05.720 you know, left my marriage, realized I was gay. Talk 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:09.920 to us about that, because I imagine that that might 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:13.079 have even been just as hard, or in different ways 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:17.600 more difficult than even leaving your religion. It actually wasn't. 0:09:18.360 --> 0:09:21.280 It wasn't because I had normalized that. I've been living 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:23.360 outside of Utah. I've known a lot of gay people. 0:09:24.120 --> 0:09:26.880 My then husband, I think we both would have come 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:28.760 out of as gay in high school, and we went 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:30.560 to the same high school, so we grew up together. 0:09:30.600 --> 0:09:33.960 We both went to Harvard when we were freshman and 0:09:34.080 --> 0:09:37.480 stayed there for our pH d s and um he 0:09:37.600 --> 0:09:40.920 struggled with a great deal. I never identified as gay. 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:45.880 I was too traumatized. But we had talked a great 0:09:45.920 --> 0:09:48.640 deal about it, and I remember always thinking, you know, 0:09:49.040 --> 0:09:52.160 he's his best self when he just lets himself be 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:57.240 this way. So thanks to him, I had normalized it really, 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:01.400 really deeply. And then we just decided to unmarry. And 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:04.000 it wasn't a fake marriage. It was I felt deeply 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:08.440 loved and I certainly loved him, but I thought, you know, 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:10.199 you've got to let yourself be you, and I've got 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:14.080 to let myself be me. So because he was my 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:18.600 closest friend at the time, I said to him first, 0:10:18.679 --> 0:10:20.720 like once we left the church, I was like, you 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:24.280 need to be you and that's kind of sad because 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:26.800 well I do. And he said, well you should do 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:28.959 the same thing. And I said, you mean dat other 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:32.120 man and he goes, not man, and I thought women. 0:10:33.160 --> 0:10:41.040 And then I was like, yeah, totally. And then I 0:10:41.760 --> 0:10:44.600 met someone that I thought I would experiment with and 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:48.280 we're still together and it's been like thirty years. And 0:10:48.400 --> 0:10:56.280 now a quick break your evolution in terms of you know, 0:10:56.400 --> 0:11:03.800 you met Karen and then many many years later you 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:10.280 and Karen introduced another love into your relationship. Can you 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:12.679 share a bit about that. Yeah. At that point, we 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:16.040 were living in California, which is a place I also 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:18.599 went just because I felt a strong inclination to go 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:21.720 out there and sort of live in a forest area, 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:26.080 and I sort of lived away from human interaction for 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:29.280 about six years and it was beautiful. I mean I'd 0:11:29.320 --> 0:11:31.720 go out and track animals in the forest every day. 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:35.240 And we were there for so long that you forget 0:11:35.520 --> 0:11:39.320 what it's like to be sort of interconnected with human society. 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:43.720 A lot of those pressures of social expectation start to 0:11:43.800 --> 0:11:47.000 just drop away when you're living in nature. And somebody 0:11:47.040 --> 0:11:50.160 came to visit us at the ranch where I lived, 0:11:50.720 --> 0:11:53.920 and I had met her once before, which is an 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:57.480 Australian novelist, and I'd been her in Africa where she 0:11:57.600 --> 0:12:00.440 came to go on safari with a group for people 0:12:00.480 --> 0:12:07.040 I was with, and I thought she was amazing, like brilliant, funny, sensitive, amazing. 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:11.679 So she came to stay at the ranch for a 0:12:11.679 --> 0:12:13.800 while to do work for somebody else who was there, 0:12:14.320 --> 0:12:17.800 and we started talking to her more, and Karen actually 0:12:17.800 --> 0:12:20.840 got to know her before I did really well. And 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:22.880 one day Karen came to me and she sat down 0:12:22.920 --> 0:12:25.400 and said, I really have to talk to you about something. 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.199 I said, what is it? And she said, well, Rowan. 0:12:29.360 --> 0:12:32.959 I feel things about Rowan and I'm not sure why. 0:12:33.640 --> 0:12:36.720 I'm not sure if it's like a sister connection. But 0:12:36.840 --> 0:12:39.080 as she talked, she was turning bright red and I 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:43.319 looked at her and I thought, you're in love, and 0:12:43.400 --> 0:12:47.880 I I felt this burst of joy, absolute joy. I 0:12:47.920 --> 0:12:51.440 was so thrilled for her, and I thought, that's the 0:12:51.440 --> 0:12:53.600 way it's supposed to go, but that is what I feel. 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:57.600 I just didn't feel the things you're supposed to feel 0:12:57.800 --> 0:13:01.599 in society. I was thrilled. That was like, this is amazing, 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:04.200 invider to come stay with us, I'll stay in the 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:06.680 guest room. You guys can get together, like I was 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:11.199 just I still can't explain this overwhelming joy. I felt 0:13:11.200 --> 0:13:15.120 it was ridiculous. So Roke came and stayed in the 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:18.680 house with us, yes, and we all sat around talking 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:20.240 and getting to know each other, and I thought, oh 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:23.560 my goodness, this person is really amazing. And we just 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:25.599 talked and talked and talked and talked and talked for 0:13:25.640 --> 0:13:30.120 about three weeks, like almost constantly, and then towards the 0:13:30.200 --> 0:13:32.440 end of that time, we were like, we're all in 0:13:32.520 --> 0:13:36.200 love with each other, Like I'm in love with both 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:37.960 of you, and you're in love with both of us, 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:39.600 and you're in love with both of us. Like we 0:13:39.720 --> 0:13:43.080 just sat there. It's not like we said polyamory we wanted. 0:13:43.200 --> 0:13:48.959 We were completely stunned and embarrassed. But we were also 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:54.199 surrounded by nobody but bears and deer, so we were like, okay, 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:57.480 and um, we just thought, all right, this, let's see 0:13:57.480 --> 0:14:00.800 how this turns out. And let see, it's been like 0:14:01.000 --> 0:14:04.400 six seven years and we have a two year old now, 0:14:04.800 --> 0:14:08.440 and it's like having a three legged stool. You wonder 0:14:08.559 --> 0:14:11.760 how it ever worked with only two do you all 0:14:11.760 --> 0:14:16.679 share a room? Well, since then, since we had our baby. Um, 0:14:16.800 --> 0:14:21.120 what we realized is Row sleeps in the room next 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:25.480 to the nursery, and um, Karen gets up early with 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:28.560 the baby. So Rokan who we're not mourning people, So 0:14:28.720 --> 0:14:30.680 Karen is she gets up with the baby in the morning. 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:35.080 And I like to stay up late but not be 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:37.320 waking up with the baby. So it turned out that 0:14:37.480 --> 0:14:39.960 each of us has our own room. And it's like 0:14:40.000 --> 0:14:46.040 a wonderful, wonderful thing. And and it's all as I said, 0:14:46.320 --> 0:14:50.200 we have this amazing Our whole family runs according to 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:54.680 sort of almost almost it's like you know, nuns would 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:56.600 get up and do their morning things, and then go 0:14:56.680 --> 0:14:58.760 to their chores and everything. When you have three people, 0:14:58.760 --> 0:15:01.720 you have to be really organ eyes and really communicative. 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:05.120 And what happens, especially since my son with Down syndrome 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:07.800 lives with us, and people with Down syndrome tend to 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:11.400 love ritual every day, is like we have morning communion 0:15:11.480 --> 0:15:15.240 where we all connect and talk. Then we have you know, 0:15:15.320 --> 0:15:17.680 we all go to our separate things during the day. 0:15:17.880 --> 0:15:20.600 We have a schedule who gets Lilah the baby at 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:24.440 what time? And then at five pm, Adam has decreated, 0:15:24.560 --> 0:15:27.480 is absolutely no work, and we all get together and 0:15:27.520 --> 0:15:30.360 we commune again, and then we have our dinner, and 0:15:30.400 --> 0:15:33.840 then we always have this cuddle time after dinner between 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:36.760 dinner and sleep. And my god, if nobody out there 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:40.560 is doing this, do it. It will change your life. 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:44.840 It is awesome. And then you sleep in your own bed. 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:48.160 What happened when you left the bears and you had 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:54.080 to the three of you enter back into society that 0:15:54.280 --> 0:15:59.680 is less accepting of unusual arrangements because everyone is a 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:03.800 fear the unknown, and so they probably imposed that fear 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:06.680 on you. I would imagine just when we were ready 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:09.600 for people to really put pressure on us, there was 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:13.960 a plague and nobody did anything for two years, so 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:17.480 nobody ever got in our faces about it because no 0:16:17.560 --> 0:16:21.040 one was there. So it was like we were separated 0:16:21.040 --> 0:16:25.000 by distance, and then we were separated by pandemic. And 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:28.360 then we went on Glennon Doyle's podcast and talked about it, 0:16:28.400 --> 0:16:30.000 and now we're talking about it with you, and so 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:32.480 it's sort of out of the out of the box. Now, 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:35.960 let's talk a bit about your career, because it seems 0:16:35.960 --> 0:16:40.560 almost impossible to people that Oprah has a life coach, 0:16:40.880 --> 0:16:45.000 let alone that you became that. I mean, how does 0:16:45.080 --> 0:16:51.680 one become Oprah's life coach. I hate bursting people's bubble 0:16:51.720 --> 0:16:54.480 on this, but I am not Oprah's like hired and 0:16:54.560 --> 0:16:57.720 paid life coach. I am a life coach who worked 0:16:57.760 --> 0:17:00.480 for Oprah through the whole span of the Oprah magazine. 0:17:00.800 --> 0:17:04.600 Because I wrote columns for the magazine. She read my 0:17:04.640 --> 0:17:07.280 first few columns, and then she wrote to me and 0:17:07.760 --> 0:17:11.440 told me that every episode she read, every every episode 0:17:11.480 --> 0:17:15.720 she study, she always read my column first. So I 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:17.760 was Oprah's life coach in the sense that I kind 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:23.560 of belonged to But it's not that she needed a 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:25.640 life coach, but I was always sort of giving her 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:29.560 advice through the columns, and sometimes she'd reach back and 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:32.600 thank me, And then she started sending people to me. 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:34.919 When celebrities would go to her and say fix me, 0:17:35.000 --> 0:17:36.800 she'd say, I can't do this, and she would call 0:17:36.840 --> 0:17:38.560 me on the phone and say, how do you want 0:17:38.600 --> 0:17:40.560 to deal with this? And I'd be like, send them along. 0:17:40.720 --> 0:17:45.240 So do celebrities have different problems than the rest of us? 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:47.560 I mean, how do you think about that? They have 0:17:47.640 --> 0:17:53.159 the very same problems, only so much worse, so much worse. 0:17:53.359 --> 0:17:57.840 I have never seen fame or money or power heal 0:17:57.920 --> 0:18:00.840 anybody's life, not ever, ever, ever. I have seen people 0:18:00.880 --> 0:18:05.560 with tremendous fame and money and power who were just 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:09.960 destroying themselves. I mean, when you have the money and 0:18:10.000 --> 0:18:12.680 the influence to get I had one celebrity client who 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:18.840 was taking two d oxycontent a day a day would 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:22.399 have killed an army of elephants. And this was not 0:18:22.520 --> 0:18:27.600 a large person. It's only money and influence that can 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:32.800 get you that deeply into the horrors that are available 0:18:32.840 --> 0:18:34.720 to people who are trying to kill their own pain, 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:38.879 and it just gets worse. In this last book, I 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:44.480 talked about it as being the false solution. Wealth fame, power. 0:18:44.560 --> 0:18:47.000 They look like solutions to us, but they are not. 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:51.600 They make things much much worse unless you you've come 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:55.320 back to integrity yourself and become whole, and then they 0:18:55.320 --> 0:18:59.639 can make the whole world better. So replace those three things, money, power, fame. 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:03.280 What are the three things that do heal, that do 0:19:03.480 --> 0:19:11.240 make a life better? Great question, stillness, self examination, and honesty. 0:19:11.960 --> 0:19:14.560 Those are the three things. That's it, that's all you need. 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:18.600 And I've seen people take those three things and become 0:19:19.480 --> 0:19:23.720 incredibly famous and powerful. Nelson Mandela did this during the 0:19:23.720 --> 0:19:26.439 twenty seven years he was imprisoned in Robin Island. He 0:19:26.480 --> 0:19:29.480 went in as an angry young activist and he spent 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:34.080 those twenty seven years in stillness, self contemplation and getting 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:37.320 really really honest with himself. And he looked at things 0:19:37.359 --> 0:19:41.280 like the fact that he was against racism and yet 0:19:41.280 --> 0:19:43.720 he was angry at white people, which you know, he 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:48.520 was being really self scrutinizing as an anti racist and saying, no, 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:51.040 I have to He started to learn Afrikaans, he made 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:55.480 friends with the guards. In those twenty seven years of stillness, 0:19:55.800 --> 0:20:03.160 self scrutiny and just absolutely relentless honesty, he became so powerful, 0:20:03.880 --> 0:20:07.760 and not even his picture was allowed out of Robin Island. 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:11.400 Nothing of him was that. And yet his his fame 0:20:11.480 --> 0:20:15.120 has influence. His power circled the whole world. And when 0:20:15.119 --> 0:20:16.880 he came out, he was able to quiet the whole 0:20:16.880 --> 0:20:21.359 country without bloodshed and become this incredible inspiration to the 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:25.320 whole world. But he didn't want When he went on Oprah, 0:20:25.480 --> 0:20:27.639 he sat down on the stage and then he started 0:20:27.640 --> 0:20:29.560 the show and he said, so, what are we talking about? 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:32.800 And Oprad laughed for like a full minute, and then 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:36.960 she said you. He was like, well, why would you 0:20:37.000 --> 0:20:40.199 do that? Like he was so he was so whole 0:20:40.280 --> 0:20:43.400 in himself, he didn't need anything. And that's the point 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:46.800 at which we can access everything. And now a quick break, 0:20:49.320 --> 0:20:51.480 how do we become more helpful to each other? And 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:53.320 now there's a lot of layers to this question. One 0:20:53.440 --> 0:20:56.080 is just in general, how can we be more helpful 0:20:56.080 --> 0:20:59.600 to one another? But also, um, and you and I 0:20:59.640 --> 0:21:02.440 have just us as way long ago Marthin you probably 0:21:02.440 --> 0:21:04.879 don't remember, but and you help me so much. I 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:07.360 I was sharing with you that I have this blessing 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:10.359 or curse where I see pain. Right, so I'll be 0:21:10.359 --> 0:21:13.160 in a supermarket and I can see who is beaten 0:21:13.200 --> 0:21:15.919 by their husband or like I just I see pain 0:21:16.480 --> 0:21:20.359 everywhere and I absorb that and and it's been a 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:23.040 problem for me. And you shared with me at that 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:26.919 time that the best way to help someone if you 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:29.280 see that is often to stand near them and look 0:21:29.320 --> 0:21:31.240 them in the eye and let them know they're not alone, 0:21:31.480 --> 0:21:34.879 just by being there. I don't know if your answer 0:21:34.920 --> 0:21:37.760 to that has changed since then. I would still say 0:21:37.800 --> 0:21:39.680 that's a really good way to do it. But another 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:43.400 thing that may have changed a bit. If you look 0:21:43.440 --> 0:21:46.679 at psychological research, you will see that in our brains 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:50.040 we have something called a negativity bias. And it's because 0:21:50.040 --> 0:21:53.000 our brains evolved to pick up danger and problems so 0:21:53.040 --> 0:21:55.400 we could avoid them. But what happens is we get 0:21:55.440 --> 0:21:59.040 stuck in our negativity bias and we don't see things 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:02.479 that aren't negative. I remember getting on a plane one day. 0:22:02.560 --> 0:22:04.639 I was talking to a guy who was a white 0:22:04.640 --> 0:22:08.399 water river rafter before I got on the plane, and 0:22:08.400 --> 0:22:11.840 he said, you know, even in a channel where there's 0:22:11.840 --> 0:22:16.000 almost no water, there's just rocks. Never look at the rocks, 0:22:16.480 --> 0:22:19.800 because where your eyes go, the boat goes. Then I 0:22:19.800 --> 0:22:22.439 get on the plane and I sat next to a 0:22:22.440 --> 0:22:25.000 hockey player, professional hockey player, and he said, you know, 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:27.880 when you're shooting the put, the goalie is so huge 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:31.000 and the goal is so small that you only have 0:22:31.080 --> 0:22:33.720 these tiny little apertures where the puck can get through. 0:22:33.760 --> 0:22:36.040 And he says, but never look at the goalie. Only 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:38.639 look at the spaces, because where your eyes go, the 0:22:38.680 --> 0:22:41.440 puck goes. Then I got off the plane. I was 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:44.520 talking to someone about horse riding and they said, well, 0:22:44.520 --> 0:22:46.119 you got to make sure you don't look at the 0:22:46.160 --> 0:22:48.480 places you don't want the horse to go, because where 0:22:48.520 --> 0:22:50.359 your eyes go, the horse goes. And this was in 0:22:50.400 --> 0:22:52.600 one day, and I was like, Okay, I get it. 0:22:52.640 --> 0:22:58.199 Where your attention goes, everything goes, your life goes. So 0:22:58.320 --> 0:23:02.200 you're a negativity biases helping you pick out pain, destruction, 0:23:02.640 --> 0:23:07.080 abuse and all of that. What I invite you to 0:23:07.200 --> 0:23:11.400 do is start pulling away from from your negativity bias 0:23:11.520 --> 0:23:15.320 and seeing the way a dog sees like, find the 0:23:15.480 --> 0:23:20.000 joy in people, find what what is working for them. 0:23:20.440 --> 0:23:22.880 Stand by someone and don't just say in your mind, 0:23:22.960 --> 0:23:25.359 I'm so sorry you're being beaten by your husband. In 0:23:25.400 --> 0:23:27.280 your mind say I know you have the strength to 0:23:27.359 --> 0:23:30.720 leave that asshole. Excuse my language, you know, but like 0:23:31.040 --> 0:23:32.880