when i left being a monk around five years ago and when i left it was like oh my god i'm in the real world now again real world i have to think about how to apply all this i'm gonna test for real all this stuff that i've learned and i was scared like i was nervous i was anxious and all those things that i've been trained not to be rushed back because for the first time in my life i had to really put it into practice and i love that feeling i'm so glad that i
had to do that so for me actually the mindset is completely trainable to bring into the real world that's that's what i'm trying to do and what it allows you to do is it allows you to grain clarity and perspective when you need it because you know when you can just take a bird's-eye view from something you know when you need to get close into something you know when you need to pull back from something there's a beautiful verse in the bhagavad-gita that says that detachment is not that you owe nothing detachment is that nothing
owns you and i love it because to me that summarizes detachment in a way that it's not usually explained usually people see detachment as being away from everything actually the greatest detachment is being close to everything and not letting it consume and own you and that's real power that's real strength how many people do we know that have had fame and then that fame has ruined them so for me that definition of detachment is possible to practice even in the real world rather than saying oh i'm just gonna have a really simple life i'm just
gonna have nothing in life what was the best part about being a monk the best part about being a monk is that your morning routine and practices are so powerful that you can actually aspire for more incredible values in life because your mind is clear because your mind is clear and you have that ability to have more clarity so you can seek that which is which is higher so i'll give an example of what i mean define is that we're about to define what is higher yes exactly so for me being able to overcome ego
being able to overcome envy being able to overcome jealousy being able able to overcome the negative of competitive state there's a positive competitive state and there's a negative competitive state today when people are looking on instagram or facebook or youtube all you're looking at is oh she got that many likes or he got that many likes she got engaged or he got married or oh my god look at her body or look at that and it's like that starts destroying us inside envy jealousy ego greed to be able to have enough clarity to purify yourself
of those things is going to alleviate the biggest anxieties and depressions of our time and mental health problems and and we know that we know that because all the mental health research today suggests that things like isolation overexposure we now can have more pain consumption in one day because of what we're exposed to than the pain we would have had in a lifetime that's huge like that's that's ridiculous to think that in one day because of the media news and social media we consume more negative than we did in a lifetime for me being able
to have time energy and clarity to focus on self-purification that is the best thing about being a monk because you have that time reflection and a process and an environment that only allows you to become more purified of those things so if i was the interviewer that i wanted to be i would have asked you this question when we were on the topic but i'm going to go back just because it's important enough you gave us the three ways that you can really construct your ideal life but define an ideal life for me so an
ideal life for me is a life and this applies to a company an organization an institution for me is an ideal life is when we all have a head a heart and a hand all three elements together working in alignment without one or the other we start to lose something if you only have a head and a heart you'll find that life is stable and defined yeah sure sure sure so ahead is the clarity of vision what you want what you want knowing what you want the way you picture life and being able to navigate
and make the decisions to get there that's a good head a good heart is being able to understand what your intuition and heart wants being able to connect and tap into that understanding deeper and beyond the vision you may have painted for yourself so i often say to people that you'll get to where you want in life just not in the way you imagined and that's because the path that's paved up and down is far different to the path we paid so you can have a great head and a great vision and a great mission
and know where you want to go but if your heart's not able to have that resilience and be able to adapt [Music] and and have compassion and care and all of that then then you're not going to be able to make the toughest decisions without your heart but to be able to realize that we need to care and be sustainable and long-lasting requires a heart and a hand is that service wanting to pass that on that which you have wanting to give it forward pay it forward the idea of serving with what you have i
often say to people your passion is for you your purpose is for others your passion makes you happy but when you use your passion to make a difference in someone else's life that's a service that's a purpose and that's the hand so those are my three elements of an ideal life i like that a lot and i when you first said it i'm glad you defined it because when you first said it i thought the heart was going to be the part about like you know just compassion and caring for others doing something for other
people but i like that the hand being tied to service so one thing that i think a lot about is deep fulfillment like really when i think about okay what is a life we're living honestly it comes down to neurochemistry for me and it comes down to experiencing this world in a way that optimizes for for sustainable pleasure which i'll differentiate between a bowl of ice cream a bump of cocaine those are pleasurable and i i haven't done the cocaine but the ice cream i can speak for okay i've done both good yeah so i'll
trust that it holds up but they they don't bring a lasting fulfillment it's not sustainable right so both of them end up creating this self-destructive loop and purpose really does become that thing that gives you something that is on a neurochemical level deeply satisfying absolutely and how much of this like how did you marry the deeply spiritual the often abstract oftentimes i'll hear spiritual speakers talking and i feel them sort of drifting off into the ether how did you marry that to experimentation neuroscience practicality like one why do you find that interesting and then two
what are you doing with that so i studied behavioral science at university so i've always been fascinated by why people do what they do and whenever i was reading these books that are 5 000 years old my greatest fascination was finding a principle and finding its relevance in modern science and i said to myself the day i can't find that i'll quit i won't believe in this anymore so i'm still doing that and i'm ready to quit if someone shows me a piece of science and i can't find a principle in these ancient literatures or
actually what i like to call these timeless literatures then i'll give up my faith because for me it has to track forward and i'll give you a really basic example today we're in the gratitude movement there's like a million gratitude journals out there there's a million scientific studies on gratitude and gratitude has been linked to better mental health self-awareness better relationships i mean there's so many scientific studies on the on the neural level that shows that gratitude is great for your mind brain and fulfillment now i look back like gratitude is all over the timeless
wisdom one of the first things we were trained to do when we were a monk was to pay our respects to the earth for what it gives us and you do that first thing in the morning what is that if not gratitude when you wake up in the morning you thank the earth for the food you thank the earth for the water you thank the earth for allowing yourself to walk you start your day with gratitude today the biggest tip on forbes and ink and everything is start your day with gratitude like where does it
come from it's it's right there these things are old so i get fascinated i'm intrigued by the parallels and patterns because it saves you time it's the same way as which if i say that this business person got invested by this company and that's why they're successful because they had the right investors etc that's a pattern so i know if i'm building a business in that area i'm going to look for investors like that it's the same thing that patent saves you time rather than you trying to figure out does gratitude work how shall i
be grateful creating your own process almost if you want even more videos like this one click on the boxes over here now i'm really excited to let you know that you can now pre-order my new book think like a monk and you can click here right now to do that pre-order it today
