Kind: captions
Language: en
life can often feel like someone's
literally drowning you especially if
you're in an extreme case of anxiety or
stress or depression
and i feel like you just need to feel
like you can just come up for a tiny bit
of it
my thought my emotion my energy and my
body are my instruments of function they
are not impediments in my life
the person can say with their five
percent of their conscious mind
i want to be healthy i want to be happy
i want to be free but the body's on a
whole different program so then how do
you begin to make those changes
whatever position you're in right now
you can change no matter what it is no
matter how horrific no matter what
you've been through no matter what
you've done like there is a way out from
under it
if you
are in a dark place
and you hear
change is real change is possible
doesn't that lift your mood don't you
want that to be true and once you allow
it because you have to allow it once you
allow that to lift your mood you're like
i feel better just by thinking i can
change that was huge for me that was
like moment one was when i realized i
actually can change so this thing that
feels like a death threat this like
smothering cloud of just like despair
it can clear away and it immediately and
it's not like oh it went from gray skies
to blue skies it wasn't that immediate
but it was it literally immediately a
lighter load just because i realized i
can change so i was like whoa i can
change
none of this is a death sentence that's
so like just amazing that was enough to
get me going and people are always
looking for how do i have that energy
i'm depressed i'm down on myself how do
i get the energy to push through
man you've got to find a way to find
energy in that you can change so
whatever position you're in right now
you can change no matter what it is no
matter how horrific no matter what
you've been through no matter what
you've done like there is a way out from
under it but part of it is allowing that
sense of lightness to be there so i
allowed it and so it began to lift off
my shoulders which then encouraged me to
take more action to read more to get
better i started my obsession with
gaining skills that reading isn't about
checking a box it's about actually
getting better at something that lets
you do something and i need a better way
to explain this this is one of those
things like if people really understood
what i'm talking about right now this
one fact would change their life forever
you don't get skills because it looks
good on a resume
you get skills because it lets you do
the thing you want to do
if you're playing soft music or you have
ear plugs in less sensory information
coming to your brain so you're
disconnecting from your environment if
you can sit your body down
and tell it to stay like an animal stay
right here i'm gonna feed you when we're
done you can get up and check your
emails you can do all your texts but
right now you're gonna sit there and
obey me
so then
when you do that properly and you're not
eating anything or smelling anything or
tasting anything you're not up
experiencing and feeling anything
you would have to agree with me that
you're being defined by a thought right
so when the body wants to go back to its
emotional past
and you become aware that your attention
is on that emotion and where you place
your attention is where you place your
energy
you're siphoning your energy out of the
present moment into the past and you
become aware of that
and you settle your body back down in
the present moment because it's saying
well it's 8 o'clock you normally get
upset because you're in traffic around
this time and here you are sitting and
we're used to feeling anger and you're
off schedule oh it's 11 o'clock and
usually check your emails and judge
everybody well the body's looking for
that that predictable chemical state
every time you become aware that you're
doing that and your body is craving
those emotions and you settle it back
down into the present moment you're
telling the body
it's no longer the mind that you're the
mind and now your will
is getting greater than the program and
if you keep doing this over and over
again over and over again over and over
again just like training a stallion
or a dog it's just gonna say
i'm gonna sit and the moment that
happens when the body's no longer the
mind when it finally surrenders
there's a liberation of energy
we go from particle to wave from matter
to energy and we free ourselves from the
chains of those emotions that keep us in
the in the familiar past and we've seen
this
thousands of times in fact we can
actually predict it now
[Music]
well a habit is a redundant set of
automatic unconscious thoughts behaviors
and emotions that's acquired through
repetition the habit is when you've done
done something so many times that your
body now knows how to do it better than
your mind
so if you think about it people wake up
in the morning
they
begin to think about their problems
those problems are circuits of memories
in the brain each one of those memories
are connected to people and things at
certain times and places and if the
brain is a record of the past the moment
they start their day they're already
thinking in the past each one of those
memories has an emotion
emotions are the end product of past
experiences
so the moment they recall those memories
of their problems they all of a sudden
feel unhappy they feel sad they feel
pain
now how you think and how you feel
creates your state of being so the
person's entire state of being when they
start their day is in the past so what
does that mean the familiar past will
sooner or later be predictable future
so if you believe that your thoughts
have something to do with your destiny
and you can't think greater than how you
feel
or feelings have become the means of
thinking by very definition of emotions
you're thinking in the past and for the
most part you're going to keep creating
the same life so then people grab their
cell phone
they check their what's up they check
their text they check their emails they
check facebook they take a picture of
their feet they post it on facebook they
tweet something they do instagram
they check the news and now they feel
really connected to everything that's
known in their life
and then they go through a series of
routine behaviors
they get out of bed on the same side
they go to the toilet they get a cup of
coffee they take a shower they get
dressed they drive to work the same way
they do the same things they see the
same people that push the same emotional
buttons and that becomes
the routine and it becomes like a
program
so now they've lost their free will to a
program and there's no unseen hand doing
it to them so when it comes time to
change the redundancy of that cycle
becomes a subconscious program so
now 95 percent of who we are by the time
we're 35 years old
is a memorized set of behaviors
emotional reactions unconscious habits
hardwired attitudes beliefs and
perceptions
that function like a computer program
so then person can say with their five
percent of their conscious mind
i want to be healthy i want to be happy
i want to be free but the body is on a
whole different program so then how do
you begin to make those changes well
you have to get beyond the analytical
mind because what separates the
conscious mind from the subconscious
mind is the analytical mind and that's
where meditation comes in because you
can teach people
through practice how to change their
brain wave slow them down and when they
do that properly they do enter the
operating system where they can begin to
make some really important changes
so um
most people then wait for crisis or
trauma or disease or diagnosis you know
they wait for loss
some tragedy to make up their mind to
change and my message is why wait and
and you can learn and change in a state
of pain and suffering or you can learn
and change in a state of joy and
inspiration i think right now the cool
thing is that people are waking up
everything in life comes down to what
your own value system is so what's your
identity what are your beliefs what are
your values what are your habits what
are your routines
when you figure those out that like if
you just gave me a sheet that told me
what those were about somebody i would
tell you what the outcome of their life
is gonna be and
for me implementation being willing to
face the fears the anxieties the unknown
um the need to stare at my inadequacies
so i can figure out what skills i
actually need in order to go and do
something because implementation is
really a question of skillset
so it that's why motivation ultimately
is going to let you down it's like you
may be motivated to go do something but
let me walk you through exactly what
will happen you're motivated to try this
thing which you don't know how to do and
you suck at it and so you go do that
thing you suck it hurts your ego because
your ego is tied up in being right being
good being talented worthy all those
like permanent um
set states that people don't realize are
malleable and so they get stuck in that
it damages their self-esteem so they
want to run in the opposite direction
psychological immune system kicks in
reminds them that that was stupid anyway
why were they worried about even trying
that and so they back off and any one
time doing that's not a big deal it's
just that people do that over and over
and over and over and over and my thing
is that's such a predictable pattern in
humanity it's like what do you have to
do to counteract that and the thing you
have to do is emotionally reward
yourself for being willing to take the
steps so okay i know i'm gonna do this
i'm gonna suck at it it's gonna hurt
it's gonna hurt my self-esteem and so
what do i need to do to make sure that i
don't trip up over that in a way that
makes me turn and run in the opposite
direction
number one stop valuing myself for being
good at something and start valuing
myself for being willing to learn so
that's just a core part of my value
system is i'm a learner that's my
identity being willing to put in the
energy to learn and get better is a part
of my
not only my belief system that people
can do it but part of my values that
that is important to do as a human you
should do that so when i see something
that i want to accomplish
then i know that i'm going to have the
fortitude and the stamina to see that
through because it taps into my identity
of the learner and my value system of
this is important and should be done so
then i just keep going down so i hit the
wall of my inadequacy and i don't meet
that with stopping i meet that with cool
now i know what i have to get better at
i'm now aware of what the skill set is
and so now that i know what skill set i
need to develop and i believe that it
can be developed then i just put the
work into developing the skill
now the one thing that i think it's lost
in all of that is people lose desire and
they think that that means that oh it
wasn't as important as i thought it was
or i didn't want it as much as i thought
i did the reality is that even desire is
something that you have to
learn to cultivate to turn into
a raging inferno like your wants have to
become needs and i think there's some
weird pushback people think that like if
it's real if it's love
then there's no energy that's put into
building that up and i think that's bs
so you think that
that desire is a teachable
concept desire is definitely a teachable
concept the real question is
building that desire will that actually
work and so i think people have
something in their mind of something
they were forced to do that they didn't
enjoy and there was no natural
inclination towards that and i'll say
yeah you're probably never going to be
able to build something there so that's
like trying to start a fire with wet
moss it
probably is not going to happen but if
you have
something where it really is a spark of
real interest it's not a love it's not a
passion but it's a spark of real
interest now that's something that you
can work with and really turn into
something by building it because there
is a process that goes along with
building that desire there is a process
that
takes something from interest to
full-blown passion and if people are
willing to go along that process then
you really can evolve that initial just
sort of oh it's a spark of interest to
the very thing that i'm willing to give
my life over to completely
[Music]
well an apple tree is not trying to be
an oak tree
but an apple tree wants to be a
full-fledged apple tree
that effort is on in every life
so is it in human beings
but the problem with humanity is just
this
that for every other creature
nature has drawn two lines
within these two lines they live and die
so their idea of full fledge is hitting
the ceiling of their life
but if a human being hits a ceiling he
gets frustrated and miserable
[Laughter]
because
nature this process of evolution has
delivered to us to a place where there
is only the bottom line there is no top
line though some human beings are trying
to breach the bottom line and go below
that effort also is going on
so essentially
what human life is is
when
life was in the other forms of life that
you see on the planet
nature determined a certain compulsive
instinctive ways of functioning
once you become human
these lines have been removed
you can act consciously
that means
what you call as human potential is not
of any kind of measurable limit
it can go as far
as you desire or as far as you have the
courage to walk
so when we say human potential
unleashing human potential
it is not about reaching the peak
it is a trajectory
because
what our life is
is a combination of a certain amount of
time and energy
time is rolling away for all of us at
the same pace
if you sit it rolls away if you sleep it
rolls away if you do something it goes
away if you don't do anything it goes
away you're happy or miserable it goes
away
time is running out for all of us
so it's only the energy that you can
do different things with
if you bring your energies to a certain
level of intensity
and possibility
what somebody does in 10 years you may
do it in one year
this means if you live here for 100
years it feels like in people's impact
that you've created it feels like you
lived here for a thousand years
simply because you have managed your
life energies in a certain way
so for me
a human being being impactful means
how conscious have you become this is
very important
because if you're in compulsive cycles
then your energy gets wasted in so many
things
if you observe people
in a day let's say let's take 24 hours
in that anyway most people by
prescription in america they sleep for
eight hours
[Laughter]
so eight hours means one third of life
is gone
in the remaining two thirds they have to
eat they have to you know shower
bathroom this that all these another two
three hours gone
so literally 50
of life is gone daily basis just for
basic maintenance of this life
50 of the time is gone in maintenance
remaining fifty percent what they have
if you look at every single move that
they may make with their body their
thought process their emotions you will
see a whole lot of it is happening in
compulsive cycles
or in other words
if you are a little sensitive to life
you will realize you are the biggest
issue in your life
so this is one thing
that i am trying to do with people that
you are never the issue in your life
i'm not the issue my thought my emotion
my body is never the issue
my thought my emotion my energy and my
body are my instruments of function they
are not impediments in my life
but i would say for 90 of the human
beings their own body
then the compulsions of the body the
compulsions of their thought the
compulsions of their emotions
are ruling them most of the time
so when you yourself are a problem
well
your own self-help
there are some people who think that
their talent and intelligence are fixed
traits that's a fixed mindset then there
are other people who believe that their
talent and intelligence are malleable
traits that can be developed and they
are developed through challenge and
those are people the growth mindset so
people that believe they can grow into
basically whatever they want to become
do humans have limits yeah almost
certainly but
there's such a gap between where you are
and the upper bounds of human limitation
that to even worry about limitation just
doesn't make sense we put people on the
moon so like once you accept that we
could figure that out it's like
you're not aiming at anything crazier
than that so it's going to fall within
the limits of what humans can do so
going after that and developing that
mindset and being aware of what carol
dweck calls the false growth mindset
which you alluded to earlier where
people think they're thinking in the
right way they think they're
implementing something but they're
really not
[Music]
we all get to decide what our values are
what our belief system is what our rules
in life are the code of ethics that we
live by those are all decisions that
people mistake for empirical truth but
if you want to know how just
unempirically true it is look across all
societies they don't share it so
we just
decide that stuff it's usually handed to
us by our parents which is what makes us
confuse it with just being true but the
reality is that we're all constructing
this belief system value system
honor code all of it and it's going to
determine what we do and how we do it
now if you choose to breathe life into
from a value and belief standpoint
putting in that work to get those skills
then suddenly that energy of like whoa
this is going to let me do something
that lets me serve all of a sudden like
wow that's
uplifting in and of itself so you feel
good as you're doing it now as you're
feeling better about it you're going to
want to do it more and so that became
that self-reinforcing loop of i want to
do this more but to do it more i have to
become aware of my blind spots and
that's where self-awareness comes in but
just like any other skill like you have
to cultivate you have to get better at
it you have to see disconfirming
evidence you have to come to realize
where you have been blind now often
those moments where we realize we've
been blind they're emotionally
devastating i love inspiration and
motivation but it is the neurological
equivalent of candy it's rad it has its
place but
everyone because those just happen to be
fleeting neurological states yeah you
you just have to find something that's
way more grounded you need a mission you
need a grand why you need to know what
it is and and this is not a discovery
it's a thing you decide i decided now
because i tell it as a story people
think oh it was unavoidable he meets
this kid rashaan and that coupled with
all the people that he worked with the
quest it's sort of inevitable that he
decides that he's going to
build impact theory and try to change
culture to give everyone an empowering
mindset yeah well literally a year
before i decided to found impact theory
my mission in life was to end metabolic
disease so it's like you decide and then
you point yourself at something nothing
is ever going to feel right like this is
what i was put on earth to do it won't
feel that way until about a year or two
years after you've been saying that's
what you're going to do that that's what
you're committed to and actually acting
in accordance with it and then you'll be
like yeah this actually is my mission
you have to learn how to emotionally
recalibrate so when i was the kid in the
server room and there was a whole bunch
of people farther ahead in their
entrepreneurial journey than i and they
all heard the same message about you can
be a partner and none of them did
anything with it i started asking why
aren't they doing anything with it
and i realized the answer was i could
self-soothe faster than they could and
so yeah it hurt when i was told i was an
idiot that really sucked
especially hearing it from someone you
really respect
but
i decided to not spin out of control not
waste three days being hurt by it but
instead to re-center and just ask are
they right
because if they're right there's
something to learn here and if they're
not right just move on and if they are
right learn the lesson and so i just
slowly started collecting it and the
lessons and the image i started thinking
was whenever somebody throws an insult
at you you have two options you can let
it hit you in the head or you can raise
your defenses and defect it and your
defenses are the psychological immune
system they're real i'm not making that
up so
all of us have this thing that comes to
our aid when somebody says something
that hurts you then you're like oh well
they're mean anyway they're a jerk
they're a bully whatever i don't have to
take them seriously and so that makes
you feel better and you believe maybe
that they're being cosmically punished
in some way being a bully is its own
punishment and all that so and ah like
that allows you to relax and they've
done studies that show people with the
highest level of self-delusion are the
happiest so there really is something to
it but the people at the highest level
self-delusion are usually not the ones
that go the farthest because they
don't stop to recognize where they
really are to own the pain of that so i
thought okay instead of raising my
defenses i'm going to lower my defenses
i'm going to let that rock hit me in the
head because at my feet now is actually
a nugget of gold and i'm going to pick
up that nugget of gold in form of the
lesson that the person is throwing at me
and here's the thing to realize when
people really come at you they're really
trying to hurt you they have sinister
intent they're going to come at you with
something that's true
nobody comes at you with the stuff
that's not real they're going to hit you
with like the thing that you're the most
secure about in the world
so even the people with the
gravest of intent are the ones that are
giving you the most powerful gift
because you may be blind to it or maybe
you didn't want to acknowledge it but if
you can let it hit you as much as it
hurts then bend down pick it up and
learn from it now you can do something
where i found the um the deepest hooks
into how powerful this can be for
somebody is when you talk about trauma
and you've talked about how
people experience a traumatic event but
they then basically rehearse it and how
that then has this knock on effect so
what is that why do people find it so
hard to get past trauma well the the
stronger the emotional reaction
you have to some experience in your life
the higher the emotional quotient the
more you pay attention to the cause and
the moment the brain puts all of its
attention on the cause it takes a
snapshot and that's called a memory so
long-term memories are created from very
highly
emotional experiences
so what happens then is that people
think neurologically within the
circuitry of that experience
and they feel chemically within the
boundaries of those emotions
and so when you have an emotional
reaction to someone or something most
people think that they can't control
their emotional reaction
well it turns out if you allow that
emotional reaction it's called a
refractory period to last for hours or
days
that's called the mood
say to someone hey what's up you say i'm
in a mood why are you in a mood well i
had this thing happen to me five days
ago and i'm having one long emotional
reaction
if you keep that same emotional reaction
going on for weeks or months that's
called temperament
why is he so bitter i don't know let's
ask him why is he so bitter why are you
bitter well i had this thing happen to
me nine months ago
and if you keep that same emotional
reaction going on for years on end
that's called a personality trait
and so learning how to shorten your
refractory period of emotional reactions
is really where the work starts
so then
people when they have an event what they
do is they keep recalling the event
because the emotions of stress hormones
their survival emotions are saying pay
attention to what happened because you
want to be prepared if it happens again
turns out most people spend 70 percent
of their life
living in survival and living in stress
so they're they're always anticipating
the worst case scenario based on a past
experience and they're literally
out of the infinite potentials in the
quantum field they're selecting the
worst possible outcome and they're
beginning to emotionally embrace it with
fear and their conditioning their body
into a state of fear do that enough
times
body has a panic attack without you you
can't even predict it because it's
programmed subconsciously
so then
you say to the person why are you this
way
and they'll say i am this way because of
this event that happened to me 15 or 20
years ago and what that means from
biological standpoint is that they
haven't been able to change since that
event
so then the emotions from the experience
tend to give the body and the brain a
rush of energy
so people become addicted to the rush of
those emotions and they use the problems
and conditions in their life to reaffirm
their limitation so at least they can
feel something so now when it comes time
to change you say the person why are you
this way well every time they recall the
event they're producing the same
chemistry in their brain and body as if
the event is occurring firing and wiring
the same circuits and sending the same
emotional signature to the body well
what's the relevance behind that well
your body is the unconscious mind it
doesn't know the difference between the
experience that's creating the emotion
and the emotion that you're creating by
thought alone so the body's believing
it's living in the same past experience
24 hours a day seven days a week 365
days a year
and so then when those emotions
influence certain thoughts and they do
and then those thoughts create the same
emotions and those same emotions
influence the same thoughts now the
entire person's state of being is in the
past
so then
the hardest part about change
is not making the same choices you did
the day before period
and the moment you decide to make a
different choice get ready because it's
going to feel uncomfortable it's going
to feel unfamiliar if there's going to
be some uncertainty why does it feel so
uncomfortable is it because of the the
the neurons that fire together wire
together so i've there's like an
easiness to that loop just because
literally and you've talked very
eloquently about this the way that the
neurons connect in the brain how rapidly
i've seen you show footage of how
rapidly those connections happen which
is pretty incredible um is
is that what makes it so discomforting
for people
i think that i think that the bigger
thing is that we we keep firing and
wiring those circuits they become more
hardwired so they're you have a thought
and then the program runs
but it's the emotion that follows the
thought if you have a if you have a
fearful thought you're going to feel
anxiety the moment you feel anxiety your
brain's checking in with your body and
saying yeah you're pretty anxious so
then you start thinking more
corresponding thoughts equal how you
feel
well the redundancy of that cycle
conditions the body to become the mind
so now when it comes time to change
a person steps into that river of change
and they make a different choice and all
of a sudden
they don't they they they don't feel the
same way
so the body says well you've been doing
this for 35 years
all you're going to just stop feel
suffering and stop feeling guilty and
stop feeling shameful and you're not
going to complain or blame or make
excuses or feel sorry for yourself well
the body's in the unknown so the body
says i want to return back to familiar
territory so the body starts influencing
the mind and it says
start tomorrow you're too much like your
mother you'll never change this is going
to work for you this doesn't feel right
and so if you respond to that thought
as if it's true that same thought will
lead to the same choice which will lead
to the same behavior which will create
the same experience which produce the
same emotion
[Music]
so pain is a good thing physically
because that is your
preservation self-preservation mechanism
[Music]
but suffering is something that you do
in your mind
so pain that happens in your body you
take it in your mind and multiply it a
thousand times or a million times
depending on how capable you are
or how stupid you are
and suffer it a million times over
right now
most human beings are like this what
happened
10 years ago they can still suffer
what may happen day after tomorrow they
already suffer
they are not suffering life they think
they are suffering life they are not
suffering life
they are suffering the two most
fantastic faculties that human beings
alone have
a vivid sense of memory and a fantastic
sense of imagination i want to know how
close to encapsulating the notion of
thinking like a monk can you get like
how like if you were to give somebody
just a nutshell notion
of what that means what would you say it
means to live a life
in alignment
and what that means
is that you live a life where what you
think
what you say and what you do
are aligned with your truer self and
what i mean by your truest self
is the self that was not given to you by
your parents
or by your education or by media or
movies or not the self that you've
created to function in the world so i
think if you strip away
all of those expectations obligations
and opinions
what you're left with
if you live in alignment with that then
you're thinking like a monk the monkey
mind is what we all experience every day
so the monkey mind is jumping from
branch to branch
it doesn't want to focus on the root of
the issue it wants to find the next
banana it wants to find the next excuse
it wants to find the next instant
gratification right that's the monkey
mind and so the monkey mind is never
going to help you focus on your
strengths
and the reason going back to one of the
earlier questions you ask the reason why
we struggle to find our passion is
because the world has constantly pushed
us away from our strengths
we've constantly told to focus on your
weaknesses oh you've got three a's and a
d you should be working on that d let's
get that up to an a
right i remember
in my school
they had this excruciating exercise
where you'd be ranked
1 to 180
on every subject every year
and they'd send the list home to your
parents so there were 180 students in my
year group and every subject art math
english science geography history you
name it you were ranked 1 to 180 in
every subject based on your test results
and scores and that was like painful
when my parents received that and the
crazy thing was i would always
outperform always
in art design philosophy and economics i
was in english i was always in the top
half if not in the top quarter if not in
the top five
right of my whole year group and stuff
like science and geography and math i
was kind of like in the middle
and and towards the bottom end of my
year now granted i went to a competitive
school so i was still okay at those
things
but the interesting thing was that my
parents and my friends parents would
never look at what you came one or two
or three in they'd be looking at the
things you came 90 100 110 in and so
we've all been programmed to say oh your
strengths are they're fine they're good
the way they are but why are you not
performing at this
and so the one way to know your
strengths
is to ask yourself what do you do
that you feel the most confidence doing
and it could be something as simple as
i'm great at organizing birthday parties
it could be like that may be your skill
right that may be your strength or it
may be something like i'm really good at
putting on makeup
or it could be that i have a great sense
of fashion
it could be any of those things and if
you don't know it yet
you can also do an exercise where you
sit down with a colleague a family
member and a friend because you need
people from all areas of your life and
you ask them what do you think i do
that i excel in that i stand out in or
if you could trust me to do one thing
in your life for you what would that one
thing be
if we know that people are struggling
with the monkey mind they
they're telling they're filling their
cup up with a lot of things that are
self-destructive maybe too big of a word
but it's directionally correct that
things that aren't leading them to joy
to peace
how do we bring the ashram to them how
do we go about you know
beginning the process of healing i know
a big part of your journey was questions
questions questions questions questions
what are the right questions um do we
have to meditate is that optional do we
have to give up sex like where where did
we fall when you got to that part in the
book i had to laugh out loud
so what how do we bring the ashram to
people how do we help them like now
start doing things specifically to empty
their cup to refill it with something
that's going to lead to
to peace and to joy and yeah the first
thing i'd say is i think everyone needs
the feeling that they can just come up
for some air
life can often feel like someone's
literally
drowning you and you feel like you're
drowning and floundering especially if
you're in an extreme case of anxiety or
stress or depression
and i feel like you just need to feel
like you can just come up for a tiny bit
of air so for that in the book i talk
about the 3s model which is your sights
sense and sounds
what we see
what we hear and what we smell has a
profound impact on our mental state and
we actually underestimate our sense and
i'll give you an example all of us have
been walking around with masks and
someone said this to me the other day
and it hit me
they were saying to me that now that we
all wear masks and do this the whole
time i think my over there they were
doing this all the time they realized
they couldn't hear people properly
and the reason they couldn't hear people
properly is they realize they don't use
their ears they use their eyes to see
people's lips
and so actually they're not even using
their ears that much they're using their
eyes to follow the lips and know what
someone's saying
so actually we depend so much on our
eyes
in every interaction
how many times have you been looking at
someone attractive and you forgot what
they were talking about
right you're just so engaged with your
eyes that you completely even forgot to
listen
right or you're so lost in in the vision
of something again and you're in a daze
you can't smell anything you can't taste
anything
so
we've got to learn to reactivate our
senses so i'll give an example of what i
mean as monks
our life was sight designed
sound designed and scent designed
what's the first thing you see when you
wake up in the morning for 80 percent of
people the first thing they see in the
morning is their phone and the last
thing they see at night is their phone
that is poor sight design because you
don't even choose what the first message
of the day your mind receives it
actually made my stomach drop
that's a gnarly thought it's true yeah
right imagine the last thing someone
sees is not their partner or their
spouse the person they sleep with they
see their phone and the first thing in
the morning they look at is their phone
and guess what it's not a good site but
you're looking at a message that you
didn't design for your mind you're
looking at a picture or an image that
maybe came through on your instagram
feed that you didn't choose for your
mind so now you've started your j with
envy jealousy comparison competition
collab like all of the all of the monkey
mind stuff and the monkey mind is
excited the monkey mind's on the monkey
mind's like yeah we're ready to go and
now you've started the day with the
monkey mind so my advice is
start your day with a quote that you
love
start your day with a picture of someone
that you love or your family start your
day with a work of art that inspires you
start your day with seeing the first
thing that you see make it so closely
connected to your soul and your goal and
your purpose
that your monk mind naturally comes
alive
so as monks
the first thing that we saw was
sometimes a teaching that we'd keep next
to us it might be a spiritual text where
i just ripped it out of a book and stuck
it there next to my bed so i woke up to
that
just wake up to something that you
actually want to see when you wake up
and make it intentional and make it
focus it could even be a reminder on a
sticky note i remember for a long time i
had one when i was a monk that said i am
not this body
just to disconnect from the fact that i
was more than this body and because we
didn't have mirrors in the ashram it was
very easy to forget i was this body
or i've had other ones where that say to
me i'm exactly where i need to be and
i've read that in the morning
and that just reminds me because so
often i wake up feeling anxious that i'm
behind on my day or i'm late and then i
actually make up a mess whereas if i
read i'm exactly where i need to be and
i remind myself i can start my day there
so that's sight
this and that's simple easy for anyone
to do you don't have to change your mind
you don't need to meditate you don't
have to do anything the second one is
let's talk about scent design now one of
the things i've been missing during
quarantine is going to a spa
or going to like a resort because i love
massages and i love spas and like me and
my wife love getting away
and if you think about it whenever you
go into a spa or a massage space or
whatever they're called or a resort
you can always feel relaxed from the
moment you walk in just through the
power of scent
it could be the most basic room in the
world
but a scent can literally illuminate a
whole room
so sense like eucalyptus lavender
sandalwood if you've got a diffuser or a
candle and you can make this a part of
your routine before you start your work
day just have a candle that you breathe
in for four seconds and breathe out for
four seconds
[Music]
live through the moment where i know
what i would do when i have money and i
have to give it up to do something and i
choose to go do something that makes me
feel alive i've had the moment where
i've had all the money in the world and
i know what i do do i retire and the
answer is no i don't i keep going as if
i had urgency for what though you could
say oh to have the impact to leave the
legacy but i don't think legacy at all
in the slightest if you told me tom you
could spend the next 40 years building
the sink but no one will ever know who
you are i'd be like fine does it does
the impact actually happen and carry on
yes perfect it is that experiment of
thinking like whoa we can actually make
the world better and that people will go
on to do amazing things the only thing
that matters to me is what i think about
it it doesn't matter what other people
think about me that's irrelevant i can't
control it it's going to change from my
life it just too many people have said
if you stay in the game long enough you
will see yourself become the villain so
i know like right now people come up to
me crying and thanking me for their help
i'm one sentence away from saying
something that really upsets people and
then people come and are like you i
hope you burn so it's like i get it i
know how that plays out so i don't care
about that it's beautiful when it's
positive and i've helped somebody but
i'm only worried about what i think
about myself so i know about myself the
thing that i'm moving towards is really
thinking that i'm making impact and
while it's possible that on a long
enough timeline i will stop being
neurochemically rewarded for that and
not care anymore and thus i might slow
down and not want to do anything
but nothing in my 42 years of experience
lead me to believe that that is true
about me so i am there's nothing
there's no shortage of things i'm so
excited about that the thing that scares
me i have two fears my wife dying
because we have this beautiful shared
experience and i don't want i don't want
to
try to recreate that and it can only be
recreated in real time so it would take
me 18 years to get back what i have with
her and then the other thing is brain
damage because
if i can't process data the way that i
process data now i worry it won't be as
fun
so
like the struggle of everything the
trying that's i value myself for that
and that's what i really love and then
just innately and i don't know that i
did anything to earn this i love change
so where other people are freaked out by
change dude i welcome change
aggressively the bigger the shake up the
better and so what i tell people is
because you're more likely to believe
something negative don't even worry
about what's true worry about what
empowers you when it comes to just
yourself i'm not talking about you know
fake news or you know a post-truth world
i'm just saying for yourself there's
both of those narratives are based on
facts so the truth of one or the other
doesn't matter one is empowering and one
is disempowering
act in accordance with the one that's
empowering if you look at that as a
philosophy of life which is let's just
accumulate let's just hoard and let's
just celebrate on my own
we know people and stories about people
who will not be satisfied that way to
just have you're one of them you and
lisa and i ca and i can say this
honestly and i said this to liz the
other day are two of the most generous
loving
people and humble people that i know
despite all your success and incredible
achievement and that's what endears
people to you
it's not what you have that endears
people that may endear some people to
you but what keeps the right people
around is that you both have these human
qualities because you want to serve you
want to help you want to support and
collaborate and so for me i feel like we
either live and then we leave the
opposite the other opposite life is our
life is just about giving it's just
about service it's just about helping
that's not sustainable either and so to
me
i've discovered through real monk wisdom
that life is actually embracing
polarities
it's actually about doing a dance and
knowing which way to go at the right
time so i believe as much in strategy
as i do in sincerity
and i believe in much as generosity
as i do in generating value for myself
and i believe as much in giving as i do
in growing and i think as soon as you
start to say no it's either or you have
to choose i think that's where we start
to lose a part of ourselves and that's
why i add that compassion to passion
because i know a lot of people who do
what they
are passionate about
but actually lack meaning and purpose in
their life
because they
haven't turned it into a service look at
yourself in 10 15 20 years time and ask
yourself the question
is that where i want to be
and if the answer is no
then you need to find a new part
to just get to understand yourself you
don't know what you need in your life
until you figure out who you are