Best Motivational Speech Compilation Ever - 2 Hours of Motivation To Change Forever

As many of you know my background I mean I grew up in Chicago in a workingclass community my parents weren't wealthy so we didn't have the resources to spend on fees at private schools we went to the neighborhood public school and I went to public school my entire life and I I was always that student who wanted to get A's I wanted to do well I enjoyed learning I enjoyed excelling but what I found out is that When you're one of those kids in a community where not everyone has the same goals I found myself

having to walk a bunch of different lines there were some kids that didn't like kids who were smart and got good grades there were some kids who criticized the way I talk they said that I talk like I was white which was another way of saying that you think you're better than other people so I had To contend with with how do I get my education when I'm surrounded by people who may have different expectations of me and those just weren't the kids in the neighborhood there were teachers I had to confront teachers who underestimated

me every step of the way even when I applied to Princeton I write about in my book and I tell the story all the time even though I was at the top of my class and I was a class officer I was a leader when I sat down With my high school counselor or somebody who didn't know me but was assigned to work with students to help them apply to college and I told them my intention was to apply to Princeton that counselor told me I don't think you're Princeton material the person whose job it

was to help young people reach their dreams when it came to college saw me and whatever she saw on me told her that my dreams were too High and that cut me in a way that even though I continued on I applied obviously you know I got in but I still remember that story I remember that feeling of Doubt just another adult sort of placing a barrier on me that I didn't even have for myself so then to enter into an elite school when your high school counselor has told you you're not good enough when

all of society sort of looks at kids of color or kids from poor community or Rural communities as not belonging you know I like many others walked into that school with a stigma in my own head more young people nowadays call it impostor uh syndrome I don't know if they call it that in in Britain where kids like me feel like they don't belong so they feel like they're faking it and I had to get over that and one of the ways that I got over it was that I looked around at Prince and I

saw kids who were not as talented Or as gifted or as hardworking as I was I learned that this notion of affirmative action sometimes only applies to kids of color or kids from different backgrounds or poor kid but there are all kinds of affirmative action that take place in Elite schools around the country athletes who are admitted because not because they're great students but because they can add value Legacy people who come from families with long Lines within the School they get admission so I started to realize that the doubts that I had in my

head were all mine and I had to work to overcome that question that I always ask myself am I good enough and I write about that that's a question that has dogged me for a good part of my life am I good enough to have all of this am I good enough to be the first lady of the United States and I think that many women and definitely many young girls of all Backgrounds walk around with that question but how I overcame that is how I overcome anything hard work so whenever I doubted myself I

I just told myself let me put my head down and do the work and I would let my work speak for itself and I still find that I do that I still feel that at some level I have something to prove because of the color of my skin because of the shape of my body because of who knows how people are Judging but it takes some time and it takes some maturity to start having some successes under your belt where you realize yes in fact I am good enough I absolutely believe that education is the

key not just for young women but for people in general knowledge the opportunity to mature to try new things to meet new people to be open to different cultures you know a lot of the problems that we have in the world come from lack Of knowledge you know people who are just underexposed to all the different ways there are to be human uh and we judge people based on our limited understanding of the world and and I always try to hold out empathy for those who were in that position because I know that it's based

in a place of ignorance sounds like a harsh word but it's the appropriate word just not knowing you only know what you know and sadly if your world view is this Small and you know no one else that looks or think differently from you because you didn't have the chance to be educated or to travel or to see the world or to have your ideas challenged and to learn how to be analytical you know then it's understandable that you would be afraid of something different from you but the only way we break through that is

to educate ourselves and to educate the Next Generation you know to open them up To new ideas if you're not a strong reader if you can't take in huge amounts of information and break it down and have it make sense you won't even know when things are good for you or bad for you so yes I absolutely believe and particularly for for women and girls because women still raise the Next Generation women are at the heart of all Society we bring life we raise life we Nurture life we feed our families and if we don't

know what to do if those mothers raising children don't know how to keep them alive or not expose them to diseases or to feed them when they're hungry if they can't raise a living to bring resources in we all struggle so it would seemed to me that if we want to solve anything any major issue that you can think about climate change terrorism poverty inequality it starts with an Education I I don't know how we we do any of it if people don't know what they don't know one of the challenges that formal education places

before young people is that you're taught to figure out what you want to be when you grow up right and you're given titles and there's a finite set of them a lawyer teacher a researcher you learn those titles and then you you do the work to get to those titles and then you get Jobs and you have careers what I learned was none of that has anything to do necessarily with who I am not what I want to be what do I care about how do I want to wake up and invest my time every

day what brings me joy what makes me sad we don't teach that in school but I learned to try to find that for me and turn that passion into my career and that was some of the best advice because that's when I decided learned that I didn't want to be A lawyer because I'd never taken the time to think about why was I going to law school I was going to law school because I thought I should be a lawyer not because that's who I was it wasn't that work filled me up so I had

to learn how to do that and that required networking and exposing myself to more people and more jobs and more careers and more opportunities as a result of that I became uh an assistant to the mayor in The city of Chicago and then I went on to run a nonprofit organization and I went on to be an associate Dean at a university and I went on to be the vice president at an academic Medical Center and my life just started opening up in ways that I never predicted because I started asking myself that one simple

question not what did I want to be but who did I want to be and how did I want to show up in the world and if you all can get the jump on Starting to ask yourself that question as you you know go after your careers if you're starting to think about what what kind of work will bring you Joy because if you find that you're going to do well at it and everything else is going to fall into place and it did for me I think young people when they think about change you

get hung up on thinking that The only change that matters is something big and huge and powerful and mighty starting your own organization or moving the needle on it on an initiative but when you're young the best thing you can do do is number one take care of you because you are the best asset you can invest in at this time so that means taking care of your space your health your education protecting your heart is an important investment for the bigger picture and Then think about who's just who's around you who can you really

influence and everyone can influence someone maybe it's a young sibling you know maybe it's a neighbor uh maybe it's another girl in a class below you because when you think about it younger kids they don't necessarily look up to the teacher they look up to the girl right just above them so I would urge you to think about who do you have access to right now today that is looking to you for Guidance they see you as a role model because I guarantee you there is someone in your life right now now who thinks that

the sun rises and sets on every word you say and I would start talking to them and I would do small things like bring them with me when I did something unique taking them to a museum it's those small gestures that matter it's not the grand sweeping actions that make change change happens every single day with the little interactions that you Have have with the people in your life well I Mentor because I was mentored yeah I think Maran Wright Edelman one of my heroins said service is the rent we pay for living and I

feel the same thing I feel like when someone invests in me as many people have I didn't get here on my own I didn't get here because I was some miracle kid that had dust sprinkled on me and things just happened there were people in my life who saw potential in me people who Didn't have to make the investment who held a hand out and showed me the way and some of them were much older than me some of them were people who were my peers or people just ahead of me so I am a

product of the generosity of other people's mentorship so the expectation of myself is that I give that back and it's also selfish of me that I Mentor because I get a lot out of it too I mean one of the best things I do is spend time with Younger people because they keep me focused they as I said at the top of this conversation you all keep me clear and focus I feel fulfilled in helping you achieve your goals it's the most fulfilling thing that I do is to watch another person benefit from something that

I help them do I'm not not here to compete with people I'm here to keep continue to lift people up my hope is that the support that I've Shown you and others have shown you you will find it in you to show that to someone else one of the reasons I started the mentorship program in the White House was because I wanted people to know that everyone has the time and the capability even the first lady and the president of the United States because the president had a separate mentorship program too and we connected our

mentees with senior people throughout the White House from The chief of staff to the head of the household to Secret Service agents they were connected with people on a regular basis so if we can do it if we can find the if we could find the time in our busy lives to take a moment out because it doesn't even take that long you can have an impact on another person with one good conversation you know I never underestimate the value of showing Children my regard which is why I take time out when I see kids

cuz I think even if I'm with you in a photo line or on a rope line that maybe there's one thing I can say to you that you're beautiful that you're smart that I see you you know that I believe in you yeah I don't know you but sometimes a kid it just needs to hear that and that doesn't have to come from the first lady it's powerful when it does come from the first lady but coming from you coming From all of you to someone who looks up to you it means the same thing

so my expectation for all of you is that you find a way to mentor and maybe now is not the time but at some point in your life when you get to a place where you have the space My Hope Is that you make that time and that you continue to look for the mentors in your life because I still look for mentors even today anybody who knows more than me I'm going to sit them down and they're going To become my friend and I'm going to ask for help I did it when I came

into the White House one of the the first people I sat down with were other living first ladies I made it a point to meet with every single one of them number one to just thank them for their service number two I wanted to make sure they felt the lines of communication were open with me third I wanted to know what it was like for them what were their challenges so you never stop learning And I never stop learning so if I'm still looking for mentorship you all should be doing that at every phase of

your life whether it's another mother when you become a parent you're going to need other parents to help you Mentor if you're in a relationship you're going to want mentorship to help you get through your relationship ship it never [Music] stops I did a little experiment with a Homeless person not like on them it's not like electrodes with them voluntarily helped me because the whole idea of giving right you've all walked down the street and you've all seen someone begging and you either have or haven't thrown a few pennies in their cup when you do

you feel good you bought that feeling that is a legitimate commercial transaction you know commercial transactions are defined as the exchange of consideration There was an exchange of consideration here you gave money you got the feeling of Goodwill you paid for that feeling if you didn't give money you either feel nothing or you feel bad you can't feel good by not giving all right you paid for that feeling so now the question is how is that person encouraging us to give the joke is they act like every corporation in the world they talk about themselves

me me m me me me me right like they sit there with their little Outdoor Advertising little sign right and it says I'm homeless I'm hungry I got 12 kids I'm a veteran God bless they got it all in there trying to appeal to somebody the religious vote the veteran vote you know the child sympathizer surround yourself with lots of pets go for that one too or all in an attempt to get something from someone takers not givers right all about me well what do what do corporations do we've added more RAM we've added more

ROM we've added more speed this one's number one we're the biggest we're the best we've been around since 1969 we're better than them we're faster than them we're more efficient than that one me me me me me me me me me me and so even if we buy their product guess what I don't really feel much so I did this little experiment I found um um a nice homeless lady on the uh streets of New York who's willing to help out and I learned that With her sign which was pretty typical I'm homeless I'm hungry

blah she makes between 20 and $30 a day for you know for a day worth of work 8 to 10 hours of sitting there selling Goodwill 8 to 10 hours she'll make $ 20 to $30 $30 is considered a good day I changed her sign and the new sign made her $40 in 2 hours and then she left it's one of the reasons she's homeless is cuz she's decided that she only needs $2 to $30 a day to live if she stayed she would have Made $150 the point is she made 40 bucks in 2

hours what did the sign say the sign said if you only give once a month please think of me next time it has nothing to do with the taker it has everything to do with the giver and what are the objections people give when they don't give I can't give to everyone how do I know that they really need need it and so I address both those concerns I know you can't give to everyone so if You only give once a month my cause is legitimate I will still be here when you're ready to give

40 bucks 2 hours make it about them not about you the fact of the matter is 100% of customers are people and 100% of clients are people and 100% of employees are people I don't care how good your product is I don't care how good your marketing is I don't care how good your design is if you don't understand people you don't understand Business we are social animals we are human beings and our survival depends on our ability to form trusting relationships do you ever watch um uh Deadliest Catch on the Discovery Channel I was

flipping through channels one night and Deadliest Catch came on and on this episode just random they were in a huge storm now for those of you who don't know deadly is catch they take these crab fishing boats out in the Bearing Sea which is like Terrible and they put cameras on them and we watch right the reason that's I guess significant is because these crab fishermen have I think one of the top five deadliest jobs in the world you know I don't know what the exact number is but dozens of fishermen die every year doing

this so they have cameras only on five or six of the ships even though there are many many many ships that go out Fishing every season and they don't really come into proximity with each other because you know the ocean's huge and they usually sabotage each other and give each other false information cuz they're all competitors they're all looking to get the crabs and you know make sure that they find them somebody else doesn't and you know it's business right it's just business it's okay we all do the same thing in our own companies and

in this one episode this Big huge storm was so violent that they had to bring all the pots which are the big cages that they catch the crabs in they had to bring all the pots back on the boat uh and wait out the storm and just by dumb luck one of the boats that had cameras on it was in proximity of a boat that didn't have cameras on it and so they filmed they had secured all their pots on the deck and so they started filming the other boat and they filmed a guy climbing

on the outside of The cage securing the pots and all of a sudden a huge wave hits the side of the boat and the guy is not there anymore and the people on the boat with the camera start screaming Man Overboard Man Overboard Man Overboard and they turn their boat towards where they think he might be he's a stranger they don't know him they don't know the the crew members of the other boat and yet they react and they turn towards him and they find him in the drink and for those of you who Don't

understand how dangerous this is if the water is so cold that if you're in the water for I think that it's a minute or a minute 30 hypothermia will set in and you die and they come upon him and he's screaming don't let me die don't let me die and they pull him on board not out of the woods yet they strip off his clothes because it's wet and cold and they wrap blankets around him to prevent hypothermia from setting in and he Survives and it's overwhelming and the captain comes down and this is all

on I mean you can go watch it on TV the camera comes the captain comes down and he hugs this stranger this young man his competitor he hugs this guy as if he's his own son I lost it everybody is crying and you realize what happened here was a human interaction and the reason they risk their own lives to help this other person even though they spend Every other day trying to get ahead and sabotage is because at the end of the day they're all crab fishermen and they know something about each other and they

know something about the risk that they all take to do this and when push comes to shove they will put themselves out there to help each other for no other reason than they get it they're one of the same I will promise you that every single member of that crew that day went home with a feeling of fulfillment I Promise you that every single person on that crew that day felt more good in their hearts and in their jobs than the richest day they've ever pulled in my question is is what are you doing to

help help the person next to you don't you want to wake up and go to work for the only reason that you can do something good for someone else would you want them to do that for you by ourselves as individuals we are not very good um we cannot lift heavy Weights by ourselves and we cannot solve complex Problems by ourselves but in groups we are remarkable and so all of this stuff whether it's life whether it's whatever your job was in the service whatever your job is out of the service whether it's finding a

new job um whether it's making your way finding out sort of what your passion is all of these things are incredibly difficult they're all incredibly complicated and the person Who thinks that they can tackle any of these problems by themselves is a fool plain all you're a fool you cannot I'm going to tell you you cannot do it alone and so asking for help is perhaps the greatest single thing anyone can ever learn especially where everything is new and the stresses are different and and often feel overwhelming and scary totally unfamiliar and the longer you

are in the service the scarier it is um because this is you had 15 years Doing one thing knowing one thing learning a culture and now not only is it new people don't even understand what you did and what you know the military is one of the most misunderstood cultures in the world it's so closed and insular that people just don't know it so you're dealing with that as well and so to ask for help in any form is brilliant I this is the single thing that completely transformed my own culture I had a small

business I quit my Job and started my own marketing uh consultancy a bunch of years ago and for a few years I ran on force of personality and it was great but then if you have a little bit little bit of success force of Personality doesn't work anymore and all of a sudden things started crashing on in around me cuz I couldn't I couldn't do it all and I thought I had to know all the answers and if I didn't I pretended I did cuz I thought that's what I had to do and I Learned

uh I learned the very very hard way where I came it was a dark period that I had to learn to ask for help and it turns out I was surrounded by people who wanted to help me they just didn't because they didn't know I wanted it or needed it and it was the willingness to ask for it or accept it that transformed my life and put me on the path that I'm on now now I'm really open about I can tell you stuff I'm really good at and I'll tell you I'm good at that

and I'll Tell you I am not good at that I need help with that if I'm struggling if I'm stuck if I'm confused I say can I ask you I call up friends I call up people mentors and say I need your help can you help me and here's what I've learned about the building of trust we don't build trust by offering people our help we build trust by asking people for help that's what actually creates trust because it's an expression of vulnerability right it allows people off To offer us safety and protection and that's

an act of service for the other person listening is a trust building exercise right take it down to a personal relationship if you've been in a if you've ever met a romantic relationships a loved one right making someone feel heard doesn't mean you're wrong saying sorry doesn't mean you're wrong it just means you take accountability for your for your actions and I think it is Important that when somebody objects to vaccination that we don't demonize or villainize them but we we attempt to hear them make them feel heard doesn't mean we have to agree but

they have to feel heard and you know listening is not hearing the words it's making the other person feel that they were heard we don't get to decide when hearing has happened when listening has happen they do and by the way it's not 100% successful either you know because some People are just hellbent on and it and but that's a minority and so I think the exercise of sitting down with people and say tell me tell me what's what you're going through tell me what you're afraid of I I want to understand because we're trying

to make everyone safe I I want to I want to hear what what your thing is and let them tell their story we have no answers we're not there to object we're not there to react we're not there to fix or tell them that they're wrong Women are better than this than men and I think that has to happen and it can happen simultaneously they're not mutually exclusive I'll give you one one example which is I have a friend who refused to get vaccinated and I sat down with her and I said tell me tell

me your reasoning right she goes well this new technology like I don't want to we don't know it hasn't been out long enough like we don't know so what I hear is fear of the unknown okay I go go on and she I Let her talk and say her thing and explain all the the things and I and then and I simply said so you're afraid of the MRNA technology right yes and I want them with my DNA I said well just so you know it's 20-year-old technology but then I found something I could agree

with her but but you're right it is the first time it's been commercialized you're absolutely right this the first time we've put it in the market so I affirmed her Fear and then I said do you get flu shots every year she goes I do I said okay Johnson and Johnson is a good old fashion flu shot it's a different technology it's not M mRNA so you're 100% right if you're afraid of of the new technology don't get madna or fizer but Johnson and Johnson is it's just like a flu shop the same old Tech

and she went it is and it is she went and got a madna shot because she just wanted to be heard Because most of her friends when she said I'm not getting vaccinated yelled at her told her she was stupid told her she's an idiot told her she's letting her friends down told her she's making other people sick told her she's a risk to society that doesn't make somebody's mind open up all I did did was let her feel heard I think we do we can't we have to do That I think some people turn

off the humanity when they go to work you know they they they they may be you know loving parents and loving friends and loving you know uh uh children to their own parents and yet for some reason there's a switch that they think that that's irresponsible to do at work now I'm not talking about necessarily wearing your heart on your sleeve every day there is something called emotional professionalism you know if you're Having a bad day you can listen I'm I'm a little off my game today but you can't sit in a meeting with your

arms folded and be grumpy and give one word answers that's that's emotionally unprofessional you know you can have hard feelings but you can't go around screaming and yelling at people so I think there's a there is emotional professionalism but I think for some reason especially as people make their way up the ranks they think that expressing any kind of Emotion is a sign of weakness um even that word vulnerability we talk you know it's such a common word now being talked about in in the business world that you have to be vulnerable to to this

day it makes some people feel very uncomfortable I don't want to be vulnerable well all vulnerability means is saying things like I don't know or I need help or I'm overwhelmed or can you you know can you help me do this because I don't know how to do this or I've been Promoted to a position where maybe I need more training and the reason we're afraid of saying that is for fear that it makes us look weak which will then damage our careers the reality is the total opposite by saying I don't know means someone

can help us but in instead we choose to lie hide and fake very often which eventually gets revealed enough stress piled on on that lying hiding and faking collapses either professionally or personally we either We we either feel the stress or or the projects we're working on start to go haywire and very often when we get to those points everybody knows anyway and uh the amazing thing that I've learned is when you say um Can somebody help me um we're surrounded by people who would love to help us they just didn't think we needed it

because we acted as if we didn't so I think a large part of it is is quite frankly fear fear that have I expressed these things that'll that People will think I'm not qualified for my job the the the opposite is true and remember when you are in a position of leadership you don't actually have to be better uh at doing the job that the people you lead you have to be responsible for taking care of them to make sure they're good at their job but for some reason we think that I have to be

better than you at your own job because I'm the leader completely false I just have to make sure that you're Equipped you have the tools the training and the psychological safety to to be the best you can even if it's better than me success is an elusive thing right what is it and I think it's very interesting that if most people can't define success well it means you made x amount of dollars or but if you make x amount of dollars but you spend more are you successful or well it means you come home happy

every day okay how do you Know when you're happy you know so I think success is a funny thing which is we all seem to pursue it but we don't know how to measure it or actually how to define it so how do you pursue something that you you can't measure fascinating so when people say to me how do you measure success it's a question we all have to ask ourselves am I successful I don't know I mean I had a good year last year and what does that mean does that mean I made a

lot of Money does that mean I was really happy oh I'll let you decide right right um maybe neither maybe both I had a good year last year but am I successful and the answer is no I don't feel I am because I'm trying to build a world that doesn't exist yet I'm trying to build a world in which 90% of people go home at the end of the day feeling fulfilled by the work that they do so I definitely took a step a big step forward towards that goal but I'm still so far away

so Somebody said to me then how do you know if you're successful and the answer is if it can go by itself and so what is more interesting to me as a measurement of success is not the the markers per se it's not the the financial goal or the the size of the house that you want to buy those are nice things go for it those are but those are not measurements of success those are just nice things to collect along the way for me it's momentum I want to measure momentum Which is you know

when when something is moving and you start to see it lose momentum you're like uhoh give it a push because if you don't give it a push it's going to stop and an object in stasis is much harder to get going it requires a lot more energy to get something started than it does to keep it going right and so if you don't let it stop and you can keep it going this you know it still might slow down down there but you can get it going again much easier and for Me the opportunity is

to get the ball rolling faster and faster and faster and faster and faster and bigger and bigger and bigger it's like a snowball and my responsib ability is because it's not rolling downhill yet it's not on automatic yet I need to still keep it going to find that critical mass where I can go and at the point it can go by itself without me then I will find something else to do and that may not happen in my lifetime I I think we Must ALL Stop measuring promotions salaries and these things but rather measure the

momentum of your career does my career have momentum can I see it moving in the right direction can I see it Gathering Moss you know can I see that it's e becoming easier for me to keep the momentum it's becoming easier for me to grow the size of this thing it's it's requiring less effort that's the thing we need to measure that's the thing that we need to be cognizant of which is the Momentum of our careers not just the the markers that we think Define our success dopamine is the feeling uh that you found

something you're looking for or do you accomplish something you set out to accomplish so you know that feeling you get when you cross something off your to-do list that's dopamine feels awesome you know when you when you have a goal to to hit and you achieve that goal you're like yes you feel like you won something right that's dopamine The whole purpose of dopamine is to make sure that we get stuff done right the historical reason for dopamine we would never eat if we only waited to get until we got hungry because there's no guarantee

that we would find food so dopamine exists to help us go looking for food we get dopamine when we eat which is one of the reasons we like eating and so when you see something that reminds you of something that feels good we want to do the behavior that Helps us get that feeling right so let's say you're out there going for a walk and you see an apple tree in the distance you get a small hit of dopamine and then what it does is it focuses us on our goals and now we start walking

towards the apple tree and as The Apple Tree starts to get a little bigger we feel like we're making progress you get another little shot of dop Meine and another little shut of dopamine until you get to the tree you're like yes okay This is why we're told you must write down your goals your goals must be tangible there's a there's a biological reason for that we we're very very visually oriented animals you have to be able to see the goal for it to biologically stay focused right if you don't write down your goals if

you can't see your goals it's very hard to get motivated to get inspired for example think about corporate Visions right a corporate vision is have to be something We can see right that's why it's called a vision you can see it right to be the biggest most respected to be the fastest growing are not Visions they're nothing right what does that even look like expected by whom your mother yourself your friends your shareholders who knows what's the metric don't no it's amorphus doesn't motivate us just like I can't tell you you will get a bonus

if you achieve more you're going to ask me how much More I'm going to say more doesn't work you need a tangible goal you need a tangible goal right here's a great vision Martin Luther King I Have a Dream that one day little black children little white children will play on the playground together and hold hands together we can imagine that we can set our sights on that and every time we achieve a goal and achieve a metric and achieve a milestone that makes us feel like we're making progress to the go the Vision we

can see we keep going and going and going until we achieve something remarkable have to be able to see it dopamine like I said dopamine is the feeling you get when you set out to find something you're looking for as well talked about the to-do list I came home from a trip just a couple days ago and I had a bunch of errands to run and I wrote down a little list of things I had to do and off I went right and I was Walking past something I remembered oh I have to do that

and I hadn't written it down on my I hadn't written down on my to-do list so I went in and finished what I needed to do and then when I came out I then wrote it on my to-do list and then crossed it out cuz I wanted the dopamine feels good dopamine comes with a warning dopamine is high highly highly addictive here are some other things That release dopamine alcohol nicotine gambling your cell phone oh you think I'm joking okay we've all been told that uh if you wake up in the morning and you crave

a drink you might be an alcoholic well if you wake up in the morning the first thing you do is check your phone before you even get out of bed might be an addict if you walk from room to room in your own apartment holding your Telephone you might be an addict when you're driving in your car and you get a text and your phone goes beep we we hate email true we love the beep the buzz the ding oh right you'll be there in 10 minutes and yet you have to look at it right

now you might be an addict and even if you read it and it says are you free for dinner next Thursday and you have to reply immediately you can't wait the 10 minutes you might be an addict and for All you geny out there who like to think that you're better at multitasking but you grew up with the technology then why do you keep crashing your cars when you're texting you're not you're not better at multitasking you're better at getting distracted in fact if you look at the statistics ADD and ADHD have uh diagnoses of

ADD and ADHD have risen 66% in the past 10 years okay ADD and ADHD is a frontal lobe disorder right are you Telling me I of nowhere 66% of our youth have a frontal lob problem where did that come from no it's a misdiagnosis right what what are the what are the symptoms of a dopamine addiction to technology distractability inability to uh to get things done easily easily distracted you know shortness of attention it's all the same thing so we misdiagnose things it's this it's the addictive quality of dopamine we can also get addicted to

Performance in our Companies when all they do is give us numbers to hit numbers to hit numbers to hit and a bonus you get and a bonus you get and a bonus you get all they're doing is feeding us with dopamine and we can't help ourselves all we do is want more more more it's no surprise that the banks destroyed the economy because one of the things we know about dopamine addict is they will do anything to get another hit sometimes at the sacrifice of their own resources and their Relationships ask any alcoholic gambling addict

or or drug addict ask ask them how their relationships are doing and if they've squandered any of their resources it's an addiction dopamine is dangerous if it is Unbound balanced it is hugely helpful when in a comfortable and balanced system but when unbalanced it's dangerous and it's destructive you cannot have Innovation or progress without failure it doesn't exist uh and if you truly aren't failing As you're trying to innovate then you're probably not pushing very hard because you haven't broken anything you're taking you're making very very safe choices we could never put a person on

the moon without a bunch of rockets blowing up first like of course I I I met a CFO once I asked him the priorities of the company and he said efficiency and Innovation and I laughed and said well good luck with that you know Innovation is inherently Inefficient because it requires experimentation experimentation requires failure much is said about failed fast I actually don't like the term that we I think we overuse the term failure you know the problem with the word failure is it's like the word cancer it's too broad like if you have stage

four liver cancer or you have a mild melanoma those things are both called cancer but they are clearly not the same thing and the same thing is when we hear the word Failure some people think failure means experimentation but a lot of people think failure means catastrophe and so when we tell our company failure is good fail fast that literally scares people we don't want to fail so I think we need a new word right we want to avoid failure failure is catastrophic and it should be avoided but Falling I think we should encourage you

know when a kid falls off a bicycle we didn't tell them they failed we tell them they fell and What do we tell them get back up and try again so I don't want to tell people they failed I want to see people they fa and I want to encourage them to try again and you know brush off their knees so I think we should fall and fall often and I will judge the quality of innovation not necessarily by if you fell but how quickly you can pick yourself back up and try again I think

courage is external right the reason someone has courage to jump out of an Airplane is because there's a parachute on their back it's the external thing a world famous trapeze artist would never try a brand new death defying act for the first time without a net it's the net that gives them the Courage the Navy Seals are considered one of the highest performing organizations on the planet and a former seal was asked what kind of person makes it into the seals and he said I can't tell you the kind of person that makes It in

but I can tell you the kind of person that doesn't make it in he said the Star College athletes who have never really been tested to the core of their being none of them make it in he said the preing leaders who like to delegate everything none of them make it in he says the guys are show up with hulking muscles covered in tattoos because they want to show you how tough they are none of them make it in he s he said some of the guys who make it in are skinny and Scrawny he

said some of the guys who make it in you see them shivering out of fear he said but every single one of the guys who makes it in when they're emotionally exhausted when they're physically exhausted when they have absolutely nothing left to give somehow some way they're able to dig down deep inside themselves to find the energy to help the guy next to them in other words the reason these organizations and these people have the courage to do remarkable Things is not because of their internal strength it's because they have the absolute confidence that there

is someone to the left of them and someone to the right of them that cares about them and they will know that and it's the quality of the relationships that we maintain professionally and personally that give us the courage to do difficult things Isaac Stern the famous violinist said music is what happens between the notes well something like trust happens Between the meetings you know we few people think about the importance of building trust when they go to work or the what do I need to do today to build trust with somebody like that's doesn't

really go through people's minds but we have chitchat as we walk into the meeting we have chitchat when we walk out of the meeting and we see somebody the whole they're like oh meant to tell you something or you knock on someone's door and be like got a minute and all Those little innocuous interactions over the course of time like any relationship build trust it's about setting up the computer setting up zoom and having a work session with somebody you know like we're not working on the same thing but I want to work with somebody

a work buddy or having uh a lunch with somebody over Zoom or a Monday morning huddle where we talk about what's on our heart and minds but We do not talk business on purpose or Friday uh cocktails that are just voluntary but the most important one is to just pick up the phone and call people and say how are you that level of empathy just check in on someone and I think we neglect it because we get mired in the day-to-day but you know one of you know if you're organized or disorganized you know literally

keep a list of your team on a little card next to your computer and just you know go Through it and have I called this person a while and talk to this I'm just going to call and check in it doesn't matter if something's wrong or not wrong just check in on them you know don't wait for something to break and let people know that uh that there's connection and there's a way to reach out and say I need help and the most important thing is for leaders to be honest and open about their need

to ask for help and that that'll [Music] work and how happy are you think about it in your relationships in your work or career in your spiritual life are you you as happy as you want to be there are some who believe that wanting to be happy is the same thing as being selfish but really when you are truly happy you're feeling Joy aren't you a better you don't you vibrate on a higher level don't you love more deeply when you are Happy all of us will continue to discover that being happy is not only

a good thing but it is essential to that connection that we call soul feeling good is feeling [Music] God how happy are you the quiz we're going to give you is one of the most widely used tools in the study of true happiness there are people who study happiness and here is how it works you have to answer these five questions on a Scale of 1 to seven seven would be the highest number one this is a question answer this in most ways my life is close to Ideal number two the conditions of my life

are excellent number three I am satisfied with my life number four so far I've gotten the important things I want in life number five if I I could live my life over I would change almost nothing okay now add up your Score so if you scored between 31 and 35 you are considered extremely satisfied okay if you scored 15 or below you are considered dissatisfied with your life and if you scored somewhere in between you might have a lot of work to do you're you are really feeling bad about yourself I go so the day

that I took this test I was really very sad because my my little dog Sophie who I've had for 12 years has had kidney failure and on that day the Doctor told me that I had to put her down very sad and I realized as I was walking I was literally walking around crying because of Sophie and then I realized I could change the way I felt about it that I could think about all the wonderful times that I've had with her and what a comfort she's been in my life and it changed the way

I felt about it opri you make such an important point because I think for happiness a lot of times we're looking outside of ourselves For everything to be right for what's going on today yeah exactly but when you talk about happiness I think you're really talking about joy joy that's exactly you're talking about something that's inside you and it's in there regardless of how your day is and what's going on in your life and this is the big secret to happiness what I find is is when people remember that there's a place in them where

they're already happy and they can Connect to that place then you know that's the key to happiness ultimate how can you remember that you're already happy if you've never connected to that place well that's exactly true most of us haven't had the education or the example to show us that actually there is this innate happiness just waiting for us to make contact with it and where is it well I think the secret is based on some very Timeless principles and it starts with a very wild idea which is Actually that the physical world it doesn't

really exist it's a mental world and actually we project ourselves onto the world yeah absolutely and what did your spiritual teacher tell you well he said look actually Robert you're already happy and I said well that's great but I don't feel it so tell me what do I have to do and he said you have to understand that the pursuit of happiness can is is a mistake it's like you don't chase Happiness out there you learn that you're happy inside you and then you go running then you go into the world you were saying that

your spiritual teacher told you Robert many years ago that you can't pursue happiness that you are already happy and then you go out and do whatever it is that makes you feel fulfilled or whatever yeah so we have to handle it right because you see it's like if we forget the happiness is within us then no matter how much we Pursue it we'll always feel like we're further away from it that's right and this is what's so interesting is there's something called destination oh yeah destination addiction destination addiction is where you you live in the

not now it's always about tomorrow so you're chasing more next and there and you promise yourself that when you get there you'll be happy and I promise you you won't because you'll always set another destination Yeah and there's so many people watching us right now who are in positions that take a little bit of their spirit and they die a little bit every day because you're in a job that you hate you're dealing with people every day surrounded by Bosses that don't respect you and treat you badly and so you die a little bit I

think one of the big keys in the workplace is is the key to happiness is not to have a job it's to have a purpose there's a big difference yes and Actually you know if leaders in the workplace were to be really smart they would make sure that they supported people in having a purpose rather than just a job yeah cuz when you've got a purpose I think you feel like you're making a difference right doing something actually I was speaking at some University ones and that was the subject of my uh Speech I was

saying that you should not focus on success but focus on significance and focusing on Significance how do you be significant in the world how do you make significant contributions first to yourself then to your family and community and then the world and if you focus on that then success automatically comes completely true and and I think also you know the key to happiness is when you support other people in being happy yeah feels good that's right yeah why do you think we're in a happiness Slump I will tell you one of the most profound reasons

I think is because everybody is looking at other people's social media what they believe to be other people's lives which is only a snapshot of other people's lives and feeling Envy about that and one of the things that Arthur and I talk about in this book is that Envy is the great Destroyer the happiness killer it is the happiness killer and so anytime you're anytime you're looking at anything else Within the you have already killed your own happiness or your ability to be happier in that moment and probably in moments to come so I coming

from where I've come from rural Mississippi never Imagining the life that I have for a long time I have felt that I had enough even though I kept getting more but inside myself I feel that I am enough which is one of the great lessons what is at the root of most people's dysfunction is that you don't think that You're good enough you don't think that you're worthy you don't own your own Essence and your own power I wonder how would you advise given everything that you've been through in your life and talked about in

your childhood how does one take agency over their life and their happiness I know this that many of the things that have happened to you have also happened for you and that I learned when the crisis or the challenge showed Up for me I immediately would ask sometimes out loud but certainly in my own conscious Spirit what is this here to teach me and how can I get that lesson as soon as possible and this I guarantee you the moment you have the conscious realization of oh this is why this is here showing up to

allow me to see whatever that is in your life it changes for you unhappiness is not the enemy no it is not the enemy the unhappiness and if actually one of the Things that's so powerful I think about uh what Arthur has written specifically is about how your em emotions are there to allow you to feel the feel and then take the wheel of this feeling that I'm having I'm having this feeling and now I need to do what and not to allow yourself to be overcome by the feeling so you have a feeling of

anger you have a feeling of sadness you have a feeling of disappointment does it mean you are those things you are those emotions so Now what am I going to do now that I'm feeling disappointed about a certain things first of all have a great understanding of your own identity and what is required for you to be happy and to know the difference between your negative feelings and your emotions and your state of being so my state of being is always a state of satisfaction enjoyment and purpose so when I first started having conversations with

families from you Know different walks of life that's when I came to understand that there is a common bond that we all share that we're all really seeking the same things and knowing that that thing was happiness came from the show and every day I would sit and talk with the audience for a half hour sometimes 40 minutes a producer would be like oh my god when is she gonna let go of the audience what I really want is to have a conversation with the audience to see why did you Come and what did you

get from the show and did you benefit at all and why do you watch all of that so 10 years in the audience became my focus group I would always ask people what do you want what would it take to make you happy and most people when I'd say what do you want they' just say I just want to be happy tell me what that looks like and as the years progressed women were more were able to identify what that Specifically was but when I first started asking that question in the mid 90s they would

always just say well I just want to be happy I just want to be happy well what does that look like Define it define happiness Define it and and what I realize is that most people have never defined it and then they'd say well I want my kids to be happy well that's your kids but what do you want and so being able to answer specifically what that looks like for you is the Beginning of being happier happiness is not a destination happiness is Direction I know that was a shift in mindset for many who

are reading this book can you expand a little bit on that yeah and you know this is the the problem with happiness is such a funny thing because we all want it every philosopher and theologian has talked about it everybody I mean how how how many times have people said that on your show I know that's what I say in The beginning of the book that thousands of times I became interested in the subject because every time I would sit with the audience and I'd say what do you want everybody would always say multiple people

would answer I just want to be happy I just want to be happy but yet when you ask them what does that look like for them hard to Define for sure and part of the reason is because it's not something that you can Define in any meaningful way we think it's a Feeling we think it's a destination it isn't either it you know happy feelings are nothing more than emotions and emotions are nothing more than in information that we need in reaction to the outside environment and and as a destination what would you why would

you want to be completely happy as the destination you'd be dead in a week because you actually need negative emotions and experiences to train you to keep you Vigilant to keep you safe and To be happy yeah to keep you alert to keep you to keep you on it yeah yeah yeah I mean maybe when I die and I'm in heaven I see the face of God the beatific Vision will be pure happiness but on Earth I'm telling you I need my negative emotions to keep me alive and safe I need my experiences to learn

and grow and so that's what people they they want to stay alive and safe but they don't want the feelings that keep them alive and safe and that's this conflict That they have which is why they feel so unsettled okay so I think particularly in this world of social media people think if I just get that I mean I I I see people toasting on private jets and I see them you know on beaches and you know hair their hair blowing in the wind and all that and people think well if I just had that

I I could be happy but we know you have the science to back it up that there're really four pillars and if you don't have all of those P pillars Working in your life you will eventually end up feeling not necessarily sad but lonely or distanced or disconnected that's right so the four pillars yeah the four pillars there's there's kind of the four pillars you think that you need and there's four pillars that you really do need the idol the things that look right but aren't are money power pleasure and fame those are the things

that mother nature says you get those you're going to be happy money power Pleasure and fame that's right but she lies Mother Nature lies she lies a lot because she wants us to keep running running running running running right because but it's Mother Mother Nature telling us that or is society telling us that because I think Mother Nature is telling us that that it's the four pillars well Mother Nature gives us these imperatives because she wants us wants us to be hungry you know and and she wants us to survive and pass on our Genes

yes and the way that you do that is with money power pleasure and fame right and she doesn't want us to figure out that those things never really satisfy so that we'll keep running and running and running that's called the hedonic treadmill what we really want and this is backed up by by by a lot of psychology Neuroscience behavioral economics all the research that we want is that there's kind of four things that are The Virtuous things that we should Be looking for the mother nature doesn't necessarily tell us but that if we take the

Divine path in life religious or not religiously understood better path in life we'll be happy and those are faith family friends and work that serves now if you give any teenage kid the choice between money power pleasure and honor or faith faith family good friends and good times and a work that serves others I mean what they going to take right I mean our society does Aid And ab bet Mother Nature's lie yeah because you know the the marketing Colossus tells us that if you get that car man you're going to be really happy if

you get that job you get that money if you get that 100,000 Instagram followers or whatever your number happens to be it's never High Enough by the way you're going to be happy but that's a lie is the bottom there's nothing wrong with those things yeah but if you get those things if we are so Lucky to get those things they should only ever be in service of the big four the good four they should only ever be in service they should be intermediate goals a rest stop in the New Jersey Turnpike Manhattan where you're

trying to get is faith faith and by that yeah yeah how do you use that money power pleasure and fame to enhance your faith family and work and friendship and friendship basically your love the love in your life and the love in the lives Of the people around you that's really what those those worldly goals should be used for if you want to have any shot at true [Music] happiness what's really the purpose of life if you can give an Insight on that isn't it fantastic that if there's no purpose you have nothing to fulfill

you can just live no but you want a purpose and not a simple purpose you want a god-given Purpose it's very dangerous people who think they have a god-given purpose are doing the cruelest things on the planet yes or no they are doing the most horrible things and they've always been doing the most horrible things because when you have a god-given purpose life here becomes less important than your purpose now life is Important life is important when I say life I'm not talking about your family your work what you do what you do not do

your party I'm not talking about that as life this is life isn't it life is within you or around you the ambulance of life you're mistaking the ambulance of life for Life your home your family your work space your party this is all Ambiance of life this is not life isn't it yes or no you're mistaking the ambulance for the Real thing no life is important because it's the only thing you know you don't know anything else do you know something else rest is all imagined stuff isn't it the only thing is that this is

beating and life and that's all there is it is of Paramount importance not you as a person that's not important but you as a piece of life it's very Important because that is the basis of everything when I say that is the basis of everything the universe exists for you only because you are isn't it yes or no the world exists for you only because you are otherwise it won't exist in your experience experience so in every way this is important so what is the purpose for this see if you had a purpose and if

you fulfilled it after that what would you do bored isn't It it is just that life is so intricate and so phenomenally intricate that if you spend 10,000 years looking at it carefully you still will not know it entirely if you spend a million years looking at it with absolute Focus still you will not KN in its entirety that's how it is there is is there a meaning to it the greatest thing about life is that there is no meaning to It this is the greatest aspect of life that it has no meaning to it

and there is no need for it to have a meaning it is the pet of one's mind that it is seek a meaning because psychologically you will feel kind of unconnected with life if you don't have a purpose and a meaning people are constantly trying to create these false purposes now they were quite fine and happy suddenly they got married now the Purpose is the other person then they have children now they become miserable with each each other now the whole purpose that I go through all this misery is because of the children like this

it goes on these are things that you are causing and holding these as purposes of life and is there a god-given purpose what if God does not know you exist no I'm just asking by chance I'm Saying in this huge Cosmos for which God is supposed to be the the Creator and the manager of this 100 billion galaxies in that this tiny little planet and you suppose he doesn't know that you exist what to do possible or no I'm sorry I'm saying such sacrilegious things but is it possible or no what if he doesn't know

that you exist what if he doesn't have a plan for you don't look for such Things the thing is the creation is made in such a way that creation and Creator cannot be separated here you are a piece of creation at the same time the source of creation is throbbing within you if you pay little attention to this process of life you would not need any purpose it'll keep you engaged for a million years if you want there is so much happening so much means so much unbelievable things are happening right Here if you pay

enough attention a million years of existence it'll keep you busy or more right now the need for purpose has come because you trapped in your psychological structure not in your life process your psychological structure functions from the limited data that it is gathered within that it rolls and right now your thought and emotion has become far more important than your life isn't it So so because of this you seeking a purpose as an escape from the trap that you have set for yourself it is a trap set by you you can easily come out of

it if the Trap was set for you by somebody else difficult to come out because they'll set the trap in such a way that you cannot come out isn't it so this is a trap set by you this is easy to come out but that is a whole thing why why it is so difficulties now You're identified with the Trap you like it you like it because it gives you a certain sense of Safety and Security and protection and individual identity if you build a cocoon around yourself it gives you safety but it also imprisons

you walls of self-preservation or also walls of self-imprisonment when it protects you you like it when it restricts you you do not like it that is why we have doors we like the walls cuz it's protecting us but we have doors so That way we can open it and get out when we want to it doesn't matter how nice it is we still want to go out isn't it so that is how it is with every trap that you set it doesn't matter how nice it is you still want to go out so the psychological

wall that you have built which gives you a some sense of identity which gives you some sense of being a person an individual person and which gives you security beginning to experience it like A trap somewhere you want to break it so one way of not breaking it is to find a purpose those who find a purpose in their life they become so conceited they will live within their own trap forever thinking that they're doing the most fantastic thing first thing you need is balance if you have balance then you can climb if you don't

have balance it's better you stay on the ground isn't It it's not safe for somebody who is not balanced to climb high it's best you stay close to the ground you should not climb so first thing is to establish a balance then you Los in your psychological structure then it's a wonderful thing if you lose in your psychological structure without balance which a lot of people are doing today see why does somebody want to drink alcohol or take a drug because it loosens your psychological Structure and makes you feel liberated for a moment but without

the necessary balance you have not worked for the balance but you got freedom freedom without balance is destruction Anarchy isn't it so first thing is to work for balance an enormous sense of balance where even if you dismantle your psychological structure you can simply live here dismantling your psychological Structure is an important process because that is your trap that is your security that is your stability at the same time that's your trap because the walls are set you feel secure but that's also your trap if you dismantle your trap you also dismantle your security isn't

it you also dismantle your sense of purpose you also dismantle everything that matters to you so that will need balance without balance if you dismantle you will go Crazy but don't look for a purpose because if you look for a purpose you're seeking Madness if you find one you are sure mad yes if you think you found a purpose in life you for sure gone crazy because only the insane people have purpose or people who have purpose are insane in many ways these are things that you create in your mind and believe It's true isn't

it right now fighting for my country is my purpose right now if it's necessary I will fight knowing fully well it's an unnecessary bloody fight then you will fight only to the extent it's necessary if you think this is your purpose you would want to destroy the whole world for what nonsense you believe in isn't it something is needed we'll do it with absolute involvement there's no other Purpose the purpose of life is to live and to live totally to live totally does not mean party every night to live totally means before you fall dead

every aspect of life has been explored nothing has been left unexplored yes before you fall dead even if you do not explore the cosmos at least this piece of life you must know it in its entirety that much you must do to yourself isn't it that's living Totally that you experience the whole of this all dimensions of what this is you did not leave anything untouched you just do that that will take a long time that's enough good enough purpose for you so this is the nature of the human being whatever you're deprived of you

think that is the highest thing whatever you don't have looks like at that moment that is the highest if you are not eaten for 2 days Food will be God yes certain no if you don't understand this close your mouth hold your nose like this two minutes will you ask for air or God God comes and says you want me or air you'll say hell with you I want to breathe because whatever at that moment you're deprived of that becomes takes honor enlarges itself in such a way it blocks everything out or in other words

when you're in any state of compulsiveness you don't see anything The way it is it gets exaggerated if your bladder is full 1 minute I'm talking about Enlightenment your bladder is very full are you interested I don't want any Enlightenment right now going to the bathroom feels like ultimate Liberation yes or no so just about anything when you're in a state of compulsiveness you don't see anything the way it Is life will get distorted to make you think that that is it at that moment so like like this human life passes from one comp one

compulsive state to another never allowing yourself that little bit of space where you could see things the way they are if you do not even see life the way it is can you handle it the way it needs to be handled it doesn't arise isn't if you don't see things the way they are you can never handle it the way it needs to be Handled because of this in many ways individual human lives and whole societies have become distorted Humanity when I say distorted it's normal I mean normal I was talking to a 14 15

year- old kids in a school and uh I couldn't believe that I was talking to about 11 12 of them young boys and girls and something came up and I was just asking them what are they going to do next because they were in their 10th standard Or something they're only talking about finding a job and earning a living I I couldn't believe this because my whole life I never thought of earning a living my dear father used to break his head this boy has no fear in his heart what will happen to him what

will happen to I said not having fear is a problem I thought fear is a problem I never thought not having fear is a problem according to The dictates of the Divine I was supposed to become a doctor because my father is a doctor at the age of 10 I told him no that's one thing I'm not going to be I'm not going to be a doctor but every day somebody is trying to work on me you must become a doctor you must become a doctor you know Indian family you must become a doctor if

you cannot of course now they all shifted to software I was in Chicago just a you Know 8 day just 2 days ago I came to India so what one week ago 8 days ago I was in Chicago and uh an Indian person came and asked okay what are you doing what else s that means he's a software engineer there was a time if you said what else you were a doctor now if you say what else it means you're a software engineer it is not because they are phenomenally interested in human Physiology they became

doctors not because they are having electronic this thing they became a software engineer just to earn a living is it not important I'm not saying it's not important all I'm saying is even an ant which is 1 millionth of your brain is capable of earning a living what's your problem with such a big brain why I'm saying this is this idea this horribly limiting idea Has been imposed into our youths that you must earn a living and that's the biggest thing this big brain earning a living is actually a problem on this planet I know

everybody's been conditioned to believe that it's not so I'm telling you it is not so earning a living is a petty thing for human consciousness but unfortunately whole humanity is investing all its energies and intelligence in in just earning a Living if this one thing does not change in the world that I'm not saying one should not all I am saying is it need not occupy the entirety of human consciousness to earn a living if you put one little finger to work it'll earn a living it's capable this is capable of that all human genius

has been smothered to death simply because everybody is thinking how to earn a living how to earn a living you know the moment they can earn a living they will sit down and Become fat you must be saying what can I do with this life isn't it you must be saying what is the greatest thing I can do with this life because one day you will fall dead do you know do you know you'll fall Dead one day so before you die whatever is the big possibility for this life should happen isn't it I earn

ear my living I earned my living this is a big Pride why don't you see every insect Every worm every bird every animal every creature in this planet is earning a living what is such a what is there to be so proud of about I earn my own living everybody's earning their own living isn't it only human beings are making a big issue out of it too big a issue when I look at it how human intelligence has has been sacrified at the altar of earning a living is unbelievable how many things human beings could

have done how many Incredible things they could have done but instead of that they're earning a living so it's very very important I'm I'm just thinking we should start a away particularly in schools and colleges that earning a living is not is a damn little thing it is not the prime of your life with one little finger you can earn a living with with this big brain when an can earn its living this big brain should it struggle to earn a living that has become a problem because You want to be like somebody else isn't

it you want to be like somebody else that enslaves you and once you are into this Checker nothing else is possible it just keeps you going and going and going endlessly now this person possibility of this simple thing called yoga is not about twisting your body is not about getting fit it's not about getting healthy this all these things nature will do for you if only if you live in tune with It this is about understanding the geometry of the cosmos through the geometry of your own system I'm calling this a geometry because Cosmos is

a geometry planet Earth is going around the Sun what is it a diesel powered you think a big diesel engine is pushing it if it was the Roar of that engine would have killed us just the Perfection of geometry just keeps going and going and going isn't It the whole universe is geometrically perfect that's why it stays there otherwise it wouldn't and if you learn to hold your body in a certain way if the geometry of your body is in alignment with the geometry of the rest of the creation suddenly you will find that is

a wo a rapo which will allow you you can download the whole Cosmos into this one probably these days you don't have this experience anymore because you got All T Sky Dishnet and all that stuff but if suppose you had a television in your home in 80s when first the Duran came you are watching your favorite cricket match suddenly your television was then you climb up the Terrace and there is an aluminum Contraption if you do like this nothing will come if you do like this nothing will come you just get it to the right

place ah the world pours into your city signal this is just like that if you Learn to just hold it right the whole Cosmos will pour into you so engineering yourself does not mean engineering yourself to breathe little better to be a little more healthy no this is about realizing the full potential of what it means to be human you're just a piece of Life aren't you no no no no that's not true you are a bundle of thoughts emotions ideas opinions and prejudices right now not a piece of life if you sat here just

as a Piece of life not as a man not as a woman not as this not as that not as a thought not as an emotion just a piece of life this would naturally reverberate with the rest of the existence and right now you invested too much on little things like earning a living and having this and having that and missing everything oh should I not have this should I not have that having is not the problem clinging is the problem isn't it Having is not the problem what you have you become that after some

time and it's happening to you every little thing that you acquire is taking your life in some way isn't it all these things we acquired thinking that these things will make our life we got these gadgets because we thought it'll make our life right now this gadget is become a nuisance we can't keep our hands off it we're doing such sound messaging Somebody communication of course but not a communion so once you have come here you should not leave this place without knowing the full depth and dimension of what this life is about isn't it

nobody should live without knowing this because other things are subject to various realities we do not know whether you will get to run 100 m in 8 seconds what you you CLE we do not know whether you'll climb Mount Everest or not we do not know Whether you'll earn billion dollars or not but this much is possible you can explore the full depth and dimension of what this is because you don't need anybody's permission you don't need any kind of anything if you are willing it's there is it you may be willing to climb Mount

Everest but your lungs may not be ready your legs may not be ready with this it's not like that it is not demanding any particular capability It is not demanding any particular situation only your willingness but you see your willingness comes in installments nothing wrong if you had a 10,000 year lifespan nothing wrong fortunately you don't have that because if you hung around for 10,000 years oh what a measurable world this will be isn't it you may think whatever you Want but it's good you have come with an expiry date have you noticed on a

particular L when you when you very joyful 24 hours just went off like a moment you're miserable and depressed one day goes like a year on so only miserable people have a long life joyful people even if they live to be 100 it's too brief before you know what's happening it'll be gone where It gets over too fast but if you're miserable you will live long so it's a very brief life and whatever is of Paramount importance to this life must happen at the earliest not day after tomorrow isn't it it must be today so

the life process doesn't wait you need to understand your life is just a certain combination of time and energy energy we can manage time you cannot Manage it's going away it doesn't matter you're awake you're asleep you're okay you're not okay you're happy you're miserable going going going as I'm talking you're 2 minutes closer to the Grave time you cannot manage it's just going you can only manage your energy you can manage your activity how you make use of the time you can manage but you cannot manage time it's slipping away isn't it so if

you Recognize that your life is just a certain amount of time and energy you would definitely invest your energy in a way it is most meaningful to this life isn't it but if you do not understand this if you intentionally forgetful about the briefness of life life and you go about as if you're Eternal yes you are Eternal aren't you on a daily basis you're not aware that life will end for me and it could be today not to be terrified just to be in Tune with the fundamental Facts of Life that it is possible

that our lives could end today isn't it possible we are not intending we are not seeking that but it's possible isn't it if you miss this then you'll miss your whole life if you do not understand that you have an expiry date and it is not even fixed like a pharmaceutical product that you have another 2 years to live it could be just about any time if you miss this one fundamental Fact you sure to miss your whole life because everything that's vital will be tomorrow and tomorrow next never happens there is a a certain

Superstition in South India maybe it is here also particularly in Karnataka where on all the Village Homes in red paint it will be written Nala Nala means come tomorrow they write it in red paint because Devils will come wanting to Enter your house and they can see only red you didn't know this because they're looking for your blood they can see only red color so it's painted in red paint now Devil comes to your house and say okay this house is tomorrow and goes away but the fact is most human beings have done this not

to the devil but to the Divine if you done it to the devil it's okay but you done it to the Divine since It's tomorrow we meditate tomorrow so knowing life is not some superhuman effort if you stop being some other rubbish and just become life which is what you are knowing life is not far away it's right here we bought into this compl complete falsehood that at some point you're going to have the courage at some point you're going to have the confidence and It's total it's it's complete garbage and so there are so

many people in the world and you know you may be watching this right now and you have these incredible ideas and what you think is missing is motivation and that's not true because the way that our minds are wired and the fact about human beings is that we are not designed to do things that are are uncomfortable or scary or difficult our brains are designed to protect us from those things cuz our Brains are trying to Keep Us Alive and in order to change in order to build a business in order to be the best

parent the best spouse to do all those things that you know you want to do with your life with your work with your dreams you're going to have to do things that are difficult uncertain or scary which sets up this problem for all of us you're never going to feel like it you you only feel motivated to do the things that are easy right for me one of The hardest things to figure out was why is it so hard to do the little things that would improve my life and what I've come to realize and

what we'll talk a lot about today is that the way that our minds are designed is our minds are designed to stop you at all costs from doing any that might hurt you and the way that this all happens is it all starts with something super subtle that none of us ever catch and that is with this habit That all of us have that nobody's talking about we all have a habit of hesitating we have an idea you're sitting in a meeting you have this incredible idea and instead of just saying it you stop and

you hesitate now what none of us realize realizes that when you hesitate just that moment that micro moment that small hesitation it sends a stress signal to your brain it wakes your brain up and your brain all of a sudden goes oh oh wait a minute why Is he hesitating he didn't hesitate when he put on his killer spiky sneakers he didn't hesitate with the uh really cool track pants he didn't hesitate with the NASA t-shirt now he's hesitating to talk something must be up so then your brain goes to work to protect you it

has a million different ways to protect you one of them is called the spotlight effect it's a known phenomenon where your brain mag ifies risk why to pull you away from something that it Perceives to be a problem and so you can truly Trace every single problem or complaint in your life to silence and hesitation those are decisions and what I do and what's changed my life is waking up and realizing that I'm never going to feel like doing the things that are tough or difficult or uncertain or scary or new so I need to

stop waiting until I feel like it and number two I am one decision away from a totally different marriage a totally different Life a totally different job a totally different income a totally different relationship with my kids not like one decision I'm divorcing you in the marriage example but one decision on you know you could be having a conversation with your spouse and you feel your emotions rise up and within a tiny window those emotions can take over and can impact how your marriage goes or you can learn how to take control of that micro

Moment and make a decision to act in a way that actually shifts your marriage your life comes down to your decisions and if you change your decisions you will change everything when you set goals when you have an intention on something that you want to change about your life your brain helps you what it does is it opens up a checklist and then your brain goes to work trying to remove remind you of that intention that you said and it's really Important to develop the skill and I I say that word purposefully the skill of

knowing how to hear that inner wisdom and that intention kicking in and leaning into it quickly so for me my brain's saying that's it right there move as fast as a rocket Mel I wanted to change my life and I think most people that are miserable or that are that are really like dying to be great and dieing to have more we want to change we want to live a better life we want to create More for our families we want to be happier the the desire is there again it's about how do you go

from knowledge to action so the first thing in the story that's important is realizing that the answer was in me and my mind was telling me pay attention mean when I was 22 right after I graduated from darmouth I was so focused on making everyone happy that I almost chose the worst possible career for my personality it's not a bad career It just would have been horrendous for me I was interested in the environment so I decided oh you know I'll go get a law degree and then I'll go work in Washington and I think

maybe I'll work on environmental policy and I'd probably end up in some Cube farm and everyone was thrilled with the plan everyone it turns out but me so here I am I'm driving a U-Haul across country to go to law school and to get a degree in environmental law and something started To gnaw at me and with every single mile that I drove my thoughts were getting louder and doubts were starting to pour in my gut was telling me Mel turn the damn U-Haul around but the problem was that everything was already in place right

I mean I'm already in the U-Haul the thing is already packed I'm already 10 miles into my drive um the tuition had been paid for the first semester I had signed a leas I mean I could not undo these things isn't that why it's so Difficult for you to make changes in your life because you think that things can't be undone the fact is any excuse that you come up with you can undo tuition can be reimbursed Apartments can be leased Plan B can be invented so I got up I repacked that U-Haul and I

drove out of town I let myself make a U-turn in life if you ever find your gut battling your head save yourself the drama I guarantee you your gut is Right guarantee you your Excuses can be undone and I guarantee you you can make a U-turn in your life right now if you want to every single morning Monday through Fridays at 9:00 a.m. I host a live call-in radio show on serious satellite radio it's called make it happen with Mel Robbins and the thing that's been so crazy about that show is every single person that

calls me on that show they call in because they're feeling stuck in their lives and they're resigned about Their ability to change their lives and I'm not talking about people that are nuts I'm talking about successful people like you and me that just somehow got stuck in their lives and I'm not talking about people that are looking for cheesy self-help I'm talking about people that really want to figure out how to move themselves forward and you know I find that so so many of us think that our dreams are unreachable or unrealistic and it's just

so sad I mean people think That their dreams disappear and if that's what you think congratulations you're officially stuck and the truth is that our dreams are always there and they don't ever give up on us we give up on them but here's the secret if you just force yourself and I mean Force cuz I know damn well none of you want to do anything about this but if you just force yourself to take a couple small steps there's always a surprise so let's talk about Starbucks Starbucks in 2008 very interesting thing happened and many

of you if you were in the financial services market then probably know this that their net income decreased by about 28% that year and at the time they had 16,000 stores in 44 countries and they had gone through this massive EXP explosive growth segment in terms of going from going public in I think it was like 1992 they only had 125 stores and now here we are 2008 they've got 16,000 so what ends up happening is Howard Schultz who was the chairman of the board comes back in as the CEO very complex situation right you've

got operations in 44 countries you've got massive reduction in terms of the profits that you have you've got the stock market and Wall Street screaming at you you've got customers that are going to Dunkin Donuts because there's a recession that's hitting so what do you do well he was very clear again back to The two rules what do I stand for like what is it what is what am I doing and what do I want the outcome to be so he was very clear that what he stood for as a leader and what Starbucks should

stand for is the Starbucks experience he wanted to go back to the beginning and reintroduce people to the romance of having a cup of coffee because you know that's how Starbucks launched in the beginning that he was traveling and was over in Italy and was Like God why don't we have places like these great stops to have a little cup of coffee over in the United States boom Starbucks an idea it's born it's launched so he decides he's going to do whatever he can to get the romance of having a cup of coffee back in

life in any situation whether you're talking about growing your company growing your bank account getting in a relationship getting out of a relationship getting something done at the school system that Your kids are going to on behalf of your kids whatever it is that you're up to in life this is the only question that you need to ask yourself what is it that I want because the truth of the matter is if you can answer that you can have [Music] it I eat only one meal a day most of the days one big meal I

eat and that's it and doctors telling me no no s Guru the way you're traveling this will happen that will happen you must eat at least Once in 4 hours something you must eat I said leave me alone I'm doing fine but now a big university in America comes up with this called intermittent fasting it's not nonsense it's good but they rediscovered something that we have known forever now everybody is saying there must be a 16-hour Gap then all your ailments will go away what the hell were we saying all these thousands of years the

simple thing is is there are many many aspects to this psychological Physiological but now cancer is on the rise in the world a cancerous cell is like a criminal in the society all of us have in our bodies only if they become their concentration becomes more than what they should be or they gang up and lo locate themselves in one place they become like organized crime there are big pockets in koi I'm sure hello and small time criminals individually operating operating in twos and threes uh we don't take it where Seriously we'll leave it because

happens but suppose all 100 of them got organized into your organized crime now we will crack down because we know now it becomes a threat to the society similarly cancerous cells are like this criminals they're moving around doing some damage their only problem is right now they're generally eating about 8 to 12 times more than what the other cells are eating so if You just give sufficient break between one meal and the other most of them will die because they cannot survive this is something we've been talking forever but now they discovered it with a

billion dollar research empty stomach and hunger two different things hunger means your energy level will start dropping but empty stomach is a good thing in the yogic Sciences today modern science also is coming in line with this but what we know by our experience you Can spend a billion dollars to come there because research is all about how many million dollars that's how it is your body and your brain works at its best only when your stomach is empty so we always make sure we eat in such a way how how much ever we eat

our stomach must be always empty within 2 to 2 and a half hours time maximum so we go to bed hungry always people think they cannot sleep they can sleep on an average for 25 years on an average I slept only 2 And 1/ half to 3 hours these days I'm getting little lazy and speaking sleeping anywhere between 3 and 1/2 to 4 and half hours in spite of the level of travel that I have when I say level of travel if I say my level of travel in the next few days you will fall

off your chair because in the next 10 days I'm in five different countries doing I don't know how many events all kinds of events so you are able to keep this up simply Because you don't over eat it's very very important Everybody Eats two meals I generally eat only one meal 4:35 in the evening because I I don't like to sit in front of the plate and worry about how much to eat I like to eat well so 4:35 in the evening if I eat a meal it's only next day any correction and purification that

needs to happen in the body your stomach needs to be empty it's very very important otherwise the Purification on the cellular level will not happen you pile up things and then you have all kinds of [Music] problem if food is not good enough to be touched I don't know how it's good enough to be eaten the cleanliness of your hands is entirely in your hands the cleanliness of the fork is not entirely in your hands and nobody else but you have used this hands as to how clean or not clean it is right now the

fork you Do not know who's used it how they've used it for what they used it and all they have to do is wipe it with the tissue and give it to you and it looks pretty clean [Music] above all you don't feel the food the first thing that's been taught to us is if food appears in front of you to hold your hands upon the food for a few moments just to feel how the food is if something appears on my plate if I just Feel this I know what to eat and what not

to eat what I should not eat I don't taste it and then reject it I just don't eat because my hands are the first level not tasting in the sense the tongue taste but knowing the food first thing is knowing the food but the food that's going to become a part of you first thing is your hands even if you physically don't touch it just being conscious and being there it clearly tells you how the food will Behave within you whether this particular food on this particular day should it go into you or not because

every day your body is not the same thing every day every moment it's different if you feel the food you just know whether this food has to go into you on this day or not if that much awareness is brought in we don't have to go on telling people what they should eat every meal they must decide what they should eat in that meal there is no One prescription that this is what you should eat for your life that will feel too claustrophobic that only this I can eat your selection of food and consumption of

food also must happen consciously more than what you eat how you eat it is also equally important when I say how you eat it these are all live substances every one of them had a life of their own whether it's a plant animal vegetable every one of them had a life of their own now in some way you Making food out of it you must consume it with atmost gratitude if you approach it with a certain sense of gratitude and reverence towards the food that you eat eat when I say reverence it may feel like

too much for you but I'm asking you let's say we put you in a room and you had nothing to eat for 5 days if God Appears in front of you what will you ask for food so that's how important it is you must understand the food on your plate Is not just a substance it is not a material it is not a commodity it is life it is the life making material for you so you must treat it as such right now when it's on the plate when it's out there it has no value

but the moment you consume it and it becomes your flesh and blood now suddenly it's of immense value why do we live like this it's very important when it comes on your plate itself you must treat it as a part of yourself with great reverence you must Consume just the way you consume it if you change that food will behave very differently Within you this is what Consciousness means if people say your Consciousness has no impact on your life only chemical structures have impact I'm very sorry for them because that's not how life Works human

consciousness has a deep and profound impact on everything that we touch especially the food that we are making another life as a part of ourselves when we're doing such an act It's very very important we treat it with utmost gratitude and and reverence habit means you are functioning unconsciously if you're functioning unconsciously that's a bad thing because the whole thing about being human is we are capable of doing things consciously that is the beauty of Being Human that we can do everything consciously what an animal does unconsciously we can do the same thing consciously we

can eat Unconsciously or we can eat consciously we we can breathe unconsciously or we can breathe consciously everything that we can do we can do it consciously the moment we do something consciously suddenly that human being looks very refined and wonderful just because somebody walks and speaks consciously doesn't he become a beautiful human being yes or no that's all so why is it that we're trying to develop habits as if there's a good thing habit means Fixed realities where you don't have to think you get up in the morning and it'll happen to you no

don't try to automize your life that is not efficiency that is the efficiency of the machine this one is supposed to function intelligently and consciously nobody's expecting it to function like a machine so about food and stuff food must be suitable for the body that we eat for it is for the body this is a building material for this body the food That you're eating what is is the appropriate food unfortunately is all messed up right now traditionally we ate very sensible in this country but this thousand years of Innovations have brought other kinds of

food cultures and today the National Diet is pizza or pasta what is it which is one I don't know both were competing so we are losing our sense about food it's definitely time to look at what is the most suitable thing if I Go into that food it's a very long process but uh you must experiment with food not just by the tongue but by the body you eat something today and see just learn to observe how agile and how active your body feels after eating this food if it feels like it wants to go

to the Grave that's not good food if it feels like it wants to be alive after eating this except coffee if you eat food and your body feels very agile and alive that means it's good Food body is liking it if you eat something it feels dull that means it's not liking it it's having difficulty with it that's why it feels dull so just on this basis there's a much I mean this is a very simplistic way of putting it we must understand this food is not a religion food is not a culture food is

just the fuel for this machine yes there may be cultural aspects to The Taste there may be even religious tinge To to the food over a period of time but essentially food is fuel for this body so with what kind of food will it function minimum struggle within itself and Maximum Impact so suppose you buy a petrol car and pump diesel into it it may still roll around but not at its Optimum similarly various foods you can eat and still somehow it functions but those community ities which have eaten with care you can clearly see

a distinct Difference in the way they function the levels of intelligence and whatever so in India we prescribed food for different people in different way if you're doing menial jobs you eat one way because you need physical muscle if you doing other kinds of trading and other kinds of activities you eat another way if you are a fighting class you eat differently and now if you are into education spiritual process and subtler aspects of life then You eat differently if you are in education one of the greatest challenges is to stay focused on something the

godamn text book The Wonderful text book that is written is written for an average intelligence it's a common prescription it's not written for the brilliant student it is written in a way that it's a common prescription everybody gets it at that textbook how much effort it is taking for a whole lot of people how They have to read it 10 times to get it but you lie down in your bed and read a love story you remember every word yes or no how come so you don't lack memory you don't lack focus it is just

that textbook and your chemistry is not uh working so what you need is a higher level of focus a higher level of involvement and another great enemy for a student is because this textbook is such a tranquilizer the moment you open It go to cinema till 2: a.m. you're up open the textbook at 9:00 right there you smash into it so sleep is another big enemy so what kind of food do you eat so there is no inertia in the body in yogic way of seeing things we looking at tamas rajas and satwa tamas means

inertia rajas means activity but no balance satwa means absolutely balanced kind of energy when you're in education you need a very balanced kind of energy Because you have to focus on something which doesn't naturally interest you it's not something that with which your chemistry is jelling if your chemistry is jelling you are always focused on that one isn't isn't it here there's no chemistry but you have to focus on that for this you need a balance and a steady mind for this you need need to eat in a certain way to put it very simply

food goes through your body through the elementary Canal from your mouth to your anal Outlet there is a pipe through this it runs going through various stages of digestive process many of you biology people right it goes through the elementary Cano now it begins with the the lip here if you look at this all the herbivores and carnivores if you look at the animal kingdom there are heror and carnivores are two main segments of animals in the world one eats vegetable Matter another eats meat if you look at the element trick and all the way

it is built between herbivores and carnivores there's a distinct difference everything in the human beings suggests that you are naturally a herbivore but for the sake of survival we became carnivores if you look at the moment jaw moment all the carnivorous animals have only cutting action heror have cutting and grinding action there are molars but cornor don't have widespread molars they Have just inisar canines everything looks like cutting teeth all the heror do gring what do you have book so you are supposed to chew your food why you supposed to chew your food is that

you have enzymes in your saliva where if you take a little bit of raw rice and put it in your mouth just for a minute you will see turn sweet right here because right here carbohydrate is being converted into sugar right here so if you eat Properly then we say about 30 to 50% of your digestion should happen in your mouth so this part of the digestive system is expecting half digested food or partially digested food but right now the way we eating is mostly we putting not only undigested food but partially destroyed food so

the amount of food that you need to get the same amount of energy is increased you eating much more food than what you should eat to generate that much of energy because of That there is inertia in the body because it has to process so much more food than what it should there is inertia once there is inertia your sleep qu increases see this is not that you must deny yourself sleep that's not the point but if you eat right and do a certain things with your body you see very effortlessly within 3 to 4

weeks you can drop your sleep quarter anywhere between 2 to 3 hours 1 and 1 half to 3 hours Very easily you can drop if you just eat consciously and just learn to sit properly you know just the posture your geometry of the body and what goes into the system if you just manage these two things you will see sleep qua will just come down like that just to tell you for over 25 years I have largely manage with an average of 2 and 1/2 hours of sleep now I'm getting lazy and I'm sleeping averaging

Somewhere around 4 and 1/ half hours now but 7 days of the week okay 365 days non-stop on on on almost every day my daughter didn't call me for a month I asked what the hell is the problem with you why are you not calling she said every 6 hours you're in a new city what the hell I'm supposed to do I said okay which is true in one day sometimes we're doing three cities so it's a Non-Stop activity and today many people around me have Learned to do this over 150 people around me are

doing this kind of activity averaging 4 hours sleep and 7 days of the week they're on on on all the time and they are not irritated they are not frustrated they're joyful and they're wonderful why this is is there are many aspects to this but one important aspect is food how you eat not only what you eat how you eat is also very important because food is a live thing one simple thing all you girls can Do is just see various health issues and inertia issue Focus issue just bring 40 to 50% of the food

in its raw form that means it's alive it must be a LIF cell it can be a vegetable it can be a fruit it can be a nut it can be sprouted gram at least 40 to 50% the food that you eat must be alive you eat dead food and you want to live this a little difficult thing to do because you have to raise the dead now but if you eat live food One thing you will see is the state of your mind your focus and your sleep cters and above all staying awake is

not good enough you have to stay alert isn't it how alert you are how Focus you are only to that extent everything yields to you in this world isn't it so what is the level of focus will determine whether the world yields to you or not isn't it and one more aspect of life one more aspect of food is when you consume something it must be of a simple uh Genetic code in the sense it must be a very simple software vegetables fruits nuts Sprouts they're very simple more complicated means animal food becomes more and

more complicated suppose you eat an animal which has some amount of emotion and the life of its own now the code in the that we were talking about this your body is just an accumulation of memory which means a certain software isn't it this is the most complex software human Software is the most complex software on the planet of all the creatures so if you eat an animal particularly a mammal if you eat it has a similar kind of complexity maybe not as complex as this similar level of complexity because it has thought and emotion

of its own now for you to break that code and integrated into your system you are not fully successful so it will leave traces of certain qualities within you you cannot break that code and make it a Part of yours because it's a different and complex code if you eat a leaf or vegetable a fruit a nut or a sprout this is much simpler if you must eat non-vegetarian food you must eat that which is furtherest away from you so generally fish and water l life is furthest away from you so if you must eat

non-vegetarian food the best thing to eat is uh you have a you are on the coast fish is the best thing to eat that way [Music]