Speaker 1: You want to expect failure and to make mistakes and
Speaker 1: not try and avoid them. If you're failing and making
Speaker 1: mistakes and learning for them, you're on the part. If
Speaker 1: you're failing and making mistakes and not learning from them,
Speaker 1: then that's obviously not useful. But I want you to
Speaker 1: expect failure. I want you to expect to make mistakes.
Speaker 1: So now you're not surprised. Now you don't judge yourself.
Speaker 1: Now you don't make yourself feel insecure or inferior because
Speaker 1: of it. Hey, everyone, welcome back to our Purpose, the
Speaker 1: number one health podcast in the world. Thanks to each
Speaker 1: and every one of you that come back every week
Speaker 1: to listen, learn and grow. Now, I know that if
Speaker 1: you're here, you're here because you want to be happy, healthy,
Speaker 1: and healing. That's what I want for myself, That's what
Speaker 1: I want for all of you. It's what I want
Speaker 1: for everyone in the world. Imagine if the world was happier, healthier,
Speaker 1: and more healed, what a beautiful world we'd live in
Speaker 1: would be to people, we'd be better parents, we'd be
Speaker 1: better professionals, it would be a truly phenomenal place to live.
Speaker 1: And on Purpose is dedicated to that mission. Introducing you
Speaker 1: to incredible thinkers and minds, ideas, topics, takeaways, insights that
Speaker 1: can help you transform your life. So if you're here,
Speaker 1: take a moment to just acknowledge and express gratitude to
Speaker 1: yourself for showing up for yourself. Now, today's episode is
Speaker 1: something that was sparked by a conversation with one of
Speaker 1: my dear friends, Humble the Poet. If you haven't read
Speaker 1: his work or don't follow him, he's an incredible, incredible
Speaker 1: thinker and I've really enjoyed my conversations with him since
Speaker 1: we became friends around four years ago. And what we'll
Speaker 1: often do is we'll just find questions that we find
Speaker 1: fascinating and we'll think, we'll reflect, we'll try and come
Speaker 1: up with actionable items. And so this episode was inspired
Speaker 1: by that conversation because the question he asked me and
Speaker 1: some of the insights he shared with me, which I'll
Speaker 1: be sharing today, was what is the difference between thinking
Speaker 1: and overthinking? And we probably thought about this ironically for
Speaker 1: like a couple of hours, but the conversation was so
Speaker 1: brilliant that I had to share it with you. And
Speaker 1: some of the things he shared with me was so
Speaker 1: fascinating he's going to be on the podcast soon too,
Speaker 1: because here's a new book coming out, so we all
Speaker 1: look forward to that. Now, when it comes to thinking
Speaker 1: and overthinking, I think the reason why we have to
Speaker 1: address this question is because I think we all experience overthinking,
Speaker 1: we experience overanalyzing. I'm sure many of you experienced brain
Speaker 1: fog or feeling cloudy because there's just so much to process.
Speaker 1: Maybe you feel like you're just constantly bombarded by information.
Speaker 1: You're bombarded by data, you're bombarded by messages andifications. And
Speaker 1: I find that, me included, I have to be really
Speaker 1: careful about what I let in to my mind and
Speaker 1: my space. Just as we're careful about who we led
Speaker 1: into our home, we have to be careful about what
Speaker 1: we led into our mind. And as I was researching
Speaker 1: for this episode, I saw some incredible statistics that blew
Speaker 1: my mind that I want to share with you. And
Speaker 1: this study showed that the average person today processes as
Speaker 1: much as seventy four gigabytes of information per day. That's
Speaker 1: as much as watching sixteen movies. Can you imagine that
Speaker 1: seventy four gigabytes? Right? If you think about your phone,
Speaker 1: your phone might have like two hundred and fifty six
Speaker 1: gigabytes memory. You're processing seventy four gigabytes per day, which
Speaker 1: is a huge amount of information. And when we think
Speaker 1: about our search for information, we know that Google has
Speaker 1: about over forty thousand searches every second. How many of
Speaker 1: those are you responsible for? Right? Like? Just think about
Speaker 1: how often we're searching for information. And I'm not even
Speaker 1: getting into just how many YouTube views per second or minute,
Speaker 1: how many tweets per second or minute. I mean, the
Speaker 1: rate of information creation and consumption is going through the roof.
Speaker 1: And as we see this escalation in exposure to all
Speaker 1: of this information that our mind and our brain has
Speaker 1: to make sense of. It has to structure it, it
Speaker 1: has to organize it, it has to bring emotion in,
Speaker 1: take emotion out. I mean, when you think about the
Speaker 1: number of processes we're having to do now, it is
Speaker 1: not abnormal to recognize that so many of us are struggling, right,
Speaker 1: not abnormal at all. So if you're one of those
Speaker 1: people who's going, oh, I don't feel smart enough, I
Speaker 1: don't feel fast enough. I feel like I'm too weak,
Speaker 1: I feel like I should be better at this, I
Speaker 1: just want you to cut yourself some slack. I want
Speaker 1: you to forgive yourself. I want you to give yourself
Speaker 1: a break and recognize that it's so natural that we're
Speaker 1: feeling overwhelmed because of the rate of overconsumption. Now, when
Speaker 1: you think about how much you're consuming and how you're feeling,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that overthinking is something that happens a lot.
Speaker 1: We're now exposed to poorer quality of information. So not
Speaker 1: only are you experienced too more, you're experience to more
Speaker 1: with less quality, with less research, with less evidence, with
Speaker 1: less thoughts sometimes as well, to be honest, and so
Speaker 1: what ends up happening is that we're now having to
Speaker 1: make sense of stuff that may not even make sense
Speaker 1: in the first place, or may not be valid enough
Speaker 1: to make sense of. And that creates a lot of stress,
Speaker 1: a lot of pressure, a lot of tension. I remember
Speaker 1: when I was living in New York I lived there
Speaker 1: for two years. I would often feel tired in the
Speaker 1: evening after a busy day, but I'd feel more tired
Speaker 1: in New York than anywhere before. And when I started
Speaker 1: looking into it, I came across this idea of cognitive load,
Speaker 1: the idea that when you're walking around New York City,
Speaker 1: there's so many sirens, there's so much roadwork going on,
Speaker 1: there's so much noise from the trash and whatever else.
Speaker 1: There may be that our brains are trying to make
Speaker 1: sense of insignificant, unuseful sound, and that takes up energy.
Speaker 1: So the reason why Humble and I started having this
Speaker 1: conversation was because we were realizing that we think this
Speaker 1: is a challenge for a lot of people that we know, friends, family,
Speaker 1: people that we work with, people that we hear from
Speaker 1: where overthinking over analyzing has become the norm. But it's
Speaker 1: not easy to just say to someone, will stop overthinking it,
Speaker 1: like stop over analyzing it, And that's not useful advice.
Speaker 1: It's not helpful. If anyone's ever said that to you before,
Speaker 1: or you've ever said that to anyone before, you know
Speaker 1: how unimpactful it truly is. So let's talk about the
Speaker 1: differences between thinking and overthinking, and Humble brought up the
Speaker 1: first run. He said that his therapist told him it
Speaker 1: was the amount of time. The first difference between thinking
Speaker 1: and overthinking, according to his therapist, was time. Now, let's
Speaker 1: talk about time. I think time is one of the
Speaker 1: differences between thinking and overthinking because there's a difference whether
Speaker 1: you're thinking about something for a month or two months
Speaker 1: or two years. And I would say that this time
Speaker 1: applies to the extent of the task, So it depends
Speaker 1: on thee of the task. For example, if I'm about
Speaker 1: to write a book, and for those of you who know,
Speaker 1: I've just finished writing my second book, Eight Rules of Love.
Speaker 1: And if I'm going to write a book, I may
Speaker 1: think about that book for a couple of years before
Speaker 1: I start to write it. I don't consider that to
Speaker 1: be overthinking, because it's a book. It's words on a page,
Speaker 1: it's set in stone, It's there as a thoughtful, curated,
Speaker 1: researched piece of work that I can't wait to share
Speaker 1: with you. Right, So the amount of thinking that it
Speaker 1: requires to create a three hundred page book is very different.
Speaker 1: And so some people may say, well, that sounds like
Speaker 1: overthinking you spend two years on it, But it's only
Speaker 1: overthinking if it's based on the task. Now, if I
Speaker 1: spent two years thinking about one thirteen minute solo episode,
Speaker 1: that can be considered overthinking. I may have thought about
Speaker 1: this idea before, I may elected on it before. But
Speaker 1: if I'm consistently thinking every day for two to three
Speaker 1: years about a thirteen minute podcast episode that would be
Speaker 1: considered overthinking. So when you're making a plan, one of
Speaker 1: the things I'd recommend is that you first look at
Speaker 1: the scale of the task, and based on the scale
Speaker 1: of the task, you figure out the scope of the time.
Speaker 1: The larger the task, the more difficult the task, the
Speaker 1: more challenging the task, the more you give yourself a
Speaker 1: certain time. And this is also the difference between thinking
Speaker 1: and overthinking when it comes to time. Scheduled time makes
Speaker 1: it thinking. Unscheduled time can make it overthinking. So if
Speaker 1: I say to myself, hey, I want to write a
Speaker 1: book about this subject, I'm going to spend a couple
Speaker 1: of years thinking about it before I really you know,
Speaker 1: while I gather my thoughts, gather my research, gather my insights,
Speaker 1: and then those two years will give me these things
Speaker 1: that I need. Now, you're using your time wisely. Now
Speaker 1: you are actually thinking and not over thinking because your
Speaker 1: time is accounted for. And so if you're someone who
Speaker 1: wants to do something big, something that's coming up, something
Speaker 1: significant that I want you to think about, how much
Speaker 1: time is that going to take for you to think
Speaker 1: about it, for you to reflect on it. The mistake
Speaker 1: we often make is we just try and dive in,
Speaker 1: and when you drive in, you could get discouraged. And
Speaker 1: this is why it really comes to self awareness. There
Speaker 1: are a lot of people who don't need to function
Speaker 1: this way. They would just dive in, they'd make mistakes,
Speaker 1: they'd figure it out and everything would work out for them.
Speaker 1: And there are some people who need more thought, need
Speaker 1: more process, need more structure. So I want you to
Speaker 1: really think about your self awareness to figure that out.
Speaker 1: Have you ever had one bad moment spoil your entire
Speaker 1: day or felt overwhelmed for no reason? What about stress
Speaker 1: or anxious over that big moment or difficult conversation. You
Speaker 1: should try meditation. And I know what you're thinking, Jay,
Speaker 1: you used to be a monk. I don't have time
Speaker 1: to sit in the woods for hours doing nothing, but
Speaker 1: really all the time you need to start your own
Speaker 1: mindfulness practice is seven minutes a day with the Daily
Speaker 1: j my daily guided meditations on the car mapp. You
Speaker 1: don't need to close your eyes or find a special seat.
Speaker 1: You can try it while you brush your teeth, do
Speaker 1: the dishes, or walk your dog. My goal in seven
Speaker 1: minutes a day is to help you find a calm
Speaker 1: and feel grounded in your busy world. Plant beautiful intentions
Speaker 1: for an abundant life and simple steps for positive actions
Speaker 1: to get you closer to the life of your dreams.
Speaker 1: Here's what one of the listeners of the Daily Ja
Speaker 1: had to say about their meditation. Wow, I just had
Speaker 1: a super hard day at work and couldn't get my
Speaker 1: bosses comments out of my head. Then I did the
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Speaker 1: eyes at the end of the session and felt renewed again.
Speaker 1: Previously today would have destroyed my whole weekend. Meditate with
Speaker 1: me by going to Calm dot com forward slash Jay
Speaker 1: to get forty percent off a Calm Premium membership. That's
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Speaker 1: The second difference between thinking and overthinking this was Humble's
Speaker 1: answer is that he said it's about action. So he
Speaker 1: was saying that if you are thinking, then it will
Speaker 1: lead to action, and if you're overthinking, it will lead
Speaker 1: to inaction. I thought this was a brilliant, brilliant answer
Speaker 1: from him because I couldn't agree with him more when
Speaker 1: we're thinking strategically and effectively, it leads to action, it
Speaker 1: leads to change, it leads to transformation. But when we
Speaker 1: just overthink, and this is why things like gossip, why
Speaker 1: things like negativity, why things like comparison, complaining, and criticism
Speaker 1: are often not healthy thinking and are overthinking because they
Speaker 1: don't lead to positive action. So I think the question
Speaker 1: you have to ask yourself as hey, well, if I
Speaker 1: thought about this for a long time but it led
Speaker 1: to action, then maybe I'm not an overthinker. I remember
Speaker 1: before launching my YouTube channel, I spent two years thinking, researching, looking.
Speaker 1: It took me two years before I even launched my
Speaker 1: first video. Now, some could say that was overthinking, some
Speaker 1: could say that was stalling. Some would even call that
Speaker 1: a failure. But for me, I just saw that as
Speaker 1: part of the process and guess what, It led to action,
Speaker 1: and that action has led to all these incredible things
Speaker 1: in my life. I'll give you another example. Before I
Speaker 1: launched on Purpose this podcast, I thought about launching a
Speaker 1: podcast for another two years. I found that some of
Speaker 1: the biggest projects, biggest ideas that I've created in my life,
Speaker 1: whether it's my books, my podcast, the content I'm creating.
Speaker 1: I'll often spend a couple of years learning, growing, researching,
Speaker 1: experimenting to truly understand right to really think about what
Speaker 1: I want to do and why I want to do it.
Speaker 1: And I find that to be extremely helpful because by
Speaker 1: the time I get going, I'm already really clear on
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to achieve and why I'm trying to
Speaker 1: achieve it. Diving in sometimes I find actually takes me
Speaker 1: three steps back because I don't give myself the time
Speaker 1: to really know why it's important to me, why it's
Speaker 1: relevant to me, and how I want it to flow.
Speaker 1: So try this. Ask yourself, the next time you're thinking
Speaker 1: about something, how quickly can I get to action? What
Speaker 1: is the right action to follow this thought? All of
Speaker 1: a sudden, you won't be overthinking. Overthinking means you keep
Speaker 1: repeating the same thought, you keep repeating the same emotion,
Speaker 1: the same feeling, and you never ask yourself, what do
Speaker 1: I change? What can I do about this? How can
Speaker 1: I shift from this position? And that simple question can
Speaker 1: make all the difference. Now. The third difference between thinking
Speaker 1: and overthinking, which came from my insight, is how structured
Speaker 1: your process is. So when I'm thinking about something. I'll
Speaker 1: have a structure, I'll break it down, I'll have steps,
Speaker 1: I'll have points that I'm following. I'll have principles or
Speaker 1: values that I use as a guide. But when you're overthinking,
Speaker 1: you just keep repeating the same thought. You keep going
Speaker 1: round around in circles. There's no structure, there's no process,
Speaker 1: there's no system. So I want you to focus on
Speaker 1: having a system for how you think. Every time you
Speaker 1: have a thought, try and create an if this, then
Speaker 1: that system with that idea. If I feel this, then
Speaker 1: I do this. As soon as you start implementing that
Speaker 1: and practicing that, that will now become the thought pattern
Speaker 1: you carve for your mind. What we have to realize
Speaker 1: is that every thought you're having is simply a thought,
Speaker 1: a pathway in your mind that has been carved because
Speaker 1: you've walked on it so many times. It's like if
Speaker 1: you take the same route to work or to school
Speaker 1: every day, that becomes your norm, and now anything that's
Speaker 1: different to that feels random, it feels awkward, it may
Speaker 1: feel uncomfortable. All you have to do is start taking
Speaker 1: another route, and as you take that route every day,
Speaker 1: if this, then that, If it rains, then I take
Speaker 1: this route, now you start to have a different approach.
Speaker 1: So the three differences between thinking and overthinking are time, action,
Speaker 1: and structure. Now now that we know that, how do
Speaker 1: we shift into taking action? The first thing you have
Speaker 1: to remember is that you will never ever feel ready.
Speaker 1: I don't know anyone who started something who ever felt ready.
Speaker 1: If you asked me when I launched my YouTube channel,
Speaker 1: did I feel ready? I would have said no. If
Speaker 1: you asked me before we launched on purpose, if I
Speaker 1: felt ready, I would have said no. If you asked
Speaker 1: me that about a book, you asked me that about genius,
Speaker 1: you asked me that about anything we've ever done. We
Speaker 1: never felt ready. I never felt ready. If any thing,
Speaker 1: it was always like, well, if we had six more months,
Speaker 1: we could do this. If we had twelve more months,
Speaker 1: we could do this. But I realized that the growth
Speaker 1: I'd make in six to twelve months of not doing
Speaker 1: something would never outweigh the growth that I would make
Speaker 1: if I did launch it. When you launch something, when
Speaker 1: you create something, when you think about something, you learn
Speaker 1: so much more. Then when you wait till you're ready,
Speaker 1: you wait till the perfect time, You wait till everything's
Speaker 1: calmed down right, we always say like, I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: wait till things settle down a bit. By then you
Speaker 1: could lose inspiration, lose motivation, you could get busier, you
Speaker 1: could get distracted, something else comes along. I find that
Speaker 1: I've learned that my ability accelerates and expands every year
Speaker 1: as I add more to my plate and create better
Speaker 1: practices to deal with it. So you'll never feel ready
Speaker 1: start anyway. Right, Please remember that if you're worrying about
Speaker 1: starting something right now, I want you to know that,
Speaker 1: don't wait till you're ready, don't wait till you know everything.
Speaker 1: Don't wait because you'll never know everything. You'll never be ready.
Speaker 1: That's the point. There isn't a point where you go, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm completely healed now, Okay, I'm completely here now. This
Speaker 1: is a Western ideology of beginning and completion. Have you
Speaker 1: ever completed anything? Like? What do you you know? Have
Speaker 1: we completed our education? No? It was just an arbitrary
Speaker 1: mark of saying you've now graduated. So recognizing that things
Speaker 1: are more cyclical organic in nature, has a tree ever
Speaker 1: finished growing? No? Right, it's not fully grown even as humans. Right,
Speaker 1: there are parts of us that may stop growing, but
Speaker 1: they don't stop changing, and so I just want you
Speaker 1: to recognize that the second thing I'm going to say
Speaker 1: can be counterintuitive, but you want to expect failure and
Speaker 1: to make mistakes and not try and avoid them. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons why we don't take action and where
Speaker 1: we sitting overthinking is because we're trying to plot and
Speaker 1: plan how to avoid every mistake and failure. I can
Speaker 1: honestly tell you that with every venture I've started, I
Speaker 1: have failed and made so many mistakes. Honestly, I've made
Speaker 1: so many mistakes. I've failed it so many things, and
Speaker 1: I've realized that that's just the path. When I think
Speaker 1: about things like Steve Jobs getting kicked out of Apple,
Speaker 1: can you imagine getting kicked out of your own company?
Speaker 1: What kind of failure that is? What kind of challenge
Speaker 1: that is? When you think about any of the people
Speaker 1: you admire, they have all failed and made mistakes. That
Speaker 1: is the path. If you're failing and making mistakes and
Speaker 1: learning for them, you're on the path. If you're failing
Speaker 1: and making mistakes and not learning from them, then that's
Speaker 1: obviously not useful. But I want you to expect failure.
Speaker 1: I want you to expect to make mistakes. So now
Speaker 1: you're not surprised. Now you don't judge yourself. Now you
Speaker 1: don't make yourself feel insecure or in fear area because
Speaker 1: of it. Step number three, I want you to break
Speaker 1: down what you want to achieve to the smallest thing.
Speaker 1: I'll give an example. One of my friends wanted to
Speaker 1: be a movie director and he said to me, I
Speaker 1: really want to be a movie director. I want to
Speaker 1: make Hollywood movies, right, but like big budget feature films.
Speaker 1: So I was like, okay, that's that's a big goal, right,
Speaker 1: and that could lead to a lot of overthinking because
Speaker 1: it's hard, it's far away, it takes time. Let's break
Speaker 1: it down. What do you need to do in order
Speaker 1: to do that? And he was like, well, I would
Speaker 1: need to be able to get that kind of a budget.
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, well, what do you need to
Speaker 1: do in order to get that budget? He said, well,
Speaker 1: I would have to make movies that were impressive with
Speaker 1: less of a budget. And I was like, well, what
Speaker 1: do you need to do that? And he said, well,
Speaker 1: I need to learn how to make movies. I need
Speaker 1: to learn directing and scripting. I was like, okay, how
Speaker 1: do you do that? He said well, I need to
Speaker 1: get into film school or I need to make short movies.
Speaker 1: And I said, well, which one do you want to try?
Speaker 1: He said, well, maybe I'll start with short movies. So
Speaker 1: he started making short movies and then he went to
Speaker 1: film school because he realized there were certain skills he
Speaker 1: didn't have. Now he's on the path. But notice how
Speaker 1: if his goal was to make feature films, he would
Speaker 1: overthink about that for maybe a few decades. But when
Speaker 1: his first step would start making short movies or apply
Speaker 1: for film school. That's something you could do today. And
Speaker 1: I think people forget this, that the goal is the
Speaker 1: same but the current move looks different. It's like when
Speaker 1: you're climbing Mount Everest. That's the goal. The goal is
Speaker 1: to get to the top of Mount Everest, but every
Speaker 1: step doesn't take you to the top of Mount Everest.
Speaker 1: And so we have to recognize that the step and
Speaker 1: the goal are different, and we have to know the goal,
Speaker 1: but focus on the step, and your step may lead
Speaker 1: you in directions that you don't want. You might have
Speaker 1: to learn skills you don't care about. You might have
Speaker 1: to build qualities and character traits that you didn't even realize.
Speaker 1: I've had to develop so many more leadership qualities than
Speaker 1: I ever thought because of the team we lead. I've
Speaker 1: had to learn so much more about investments and finances
Speaker 1: than I ever thought I would need to because that's
Speaker 1: getting me to my ultimate goal, which is impacting one
Speaker 1: billion lives and making a difference in the world. So
Speaker 1: the path, the steps look very different from the goal,
Speaker 1: and we can't keep fixating saying no, but I just
Speaker 1: want to feel this way. I just want to feel
Speaker 1: like I'm having an impact. It's like, well, no, If
Speaker 1: you really want to have an impact, you have to
Speaker 1: be ready to learn this. And the fourth and final
Speaker 1: step to start taking action is you have to be
Speaker 1: surrounded by people who are taking action. You will not
Speaker 1: move forward. If you're around people who are going backwards,
Speaker 1: you will not move forward. If you're around people who
Speaker 1: are happy being behind. If you're surrounded by go getters,
Speaker 1: people who are making a difference, making a shift, making
Speaker 1: an impact that will make the difference. Your circle will
Speaker 1: define your impact. Your circle will define how fast, how
Speaker 1: effectively you move forward. And so it makes you find
Speaker 1: that tribe. I'm not telling you to change all your friends.
Speaker 1: I'm saying have a few people around you that are
Speaker 1: also on a mission, because those are the people that
Speaker 1: will help you reach your vision that you so deeply
Speaker 1: care about. I hope that this episode accelerates you in
Speaker 1: a growth. I hope that it inspires you into motion,
Speaker 1: and I hope that it helps you remember how to
Speaker 1: switch from overthinking to thinking. Thank you for listening. Thank
Speaker 1: you for choosing happiness, health, and healing only an on
Speaker 1: purpose