Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - The Science of Happiness with Arthur Brooks

Episode Date: October 2, 2025

Join us for an insightful conversation with Arthur Brooks, one of today’s leading voices on happiness, purpose, and living a meaningful life. We dive into what truly makes us fulfilled, how to navigate life’s transitions, and practical ways to build a life you love. Whether you’re seeking more joy, clarity, or balance, Arthur shares wisdom drawn from decades of research, teaching, and writing including his bestselling book The Happiness Files. We’d love to hear from you! Comment below with your own experiences, lessons, or questions about happiness and purpose, and share this conversation with someone who might need a little inspiration today :) Love you guys! Shawn & Andrew Subscribe to our newsletter ▶ https://www.familymade.com/newsletter Follow our podcast Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/shawnandandrewpods/ Follow My Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/ShawnJohnson Follow My Tik Tok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@shawnjohnson Shop My LTK Page ▶ https://www.shopltk.com/explore/shawnjohnson Like the Facebook page! ▶ https://www.facebook.com/ShawnJohnson Follow Andrew’s Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/AndrewDEast Andrew’s Tik Tok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewdeast?lang=en Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up, everybody? Welcome back to a couple things. With Sean and Andrew. I think this is one of my favorite interviews we have ever done. This was incredible. Honestly, this was like peak podcast for me. When we started this podcast, I never thought we'd ever be able to have a guest like Arthur Brooks on our show. Professor at Harvard University. And you guys, I don't think I've really ever said I've had a favorite on this show. I try not to say that.

But he is by far top two we've had. It was an unbelievable experience to sit here in this room with him and to see the amount of wisdom that just tumbled out of his mouth. It was unbelievable. I have said multiple times within like Andrew and I and our work table that I will have to go back and listen to this podcast a hundred times because I still like I'm still trying to digest even a sense. that he said. I know. It's a lie. But it's so beautiful. It's so intentional. It's so wise. It's backed by all of his statistical,

analytical data. The way he has conversations makes you feel not intimidated. He converses and argues in such a beautiful way, his points and his ideas. And I just babe. Yeah, top two.

I want to say actually probably favorite, but probably favorite ever, actually. Very kind and gentle man. It was really an honor to meet him. And again, the amount of wisdom that Arthur Brooks has is incredible. To give you a little background on who Arthur Brooks is, he has written a whole portfolio books. Many of them I have read and they are phenomenal. From Strength to Strength is one I highly recommend. But he's also written other books with titles such as Love Your Enemies. His most recent book, which is the occasion for our interview in our conversation, was called The Happiness Files. And That's really what he spends a lot of his time thinking about. That's what his class at Harvard is all about. So to see his perspective and insight on what creates happiness and what happiness is was really a insightful conversation. So we hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Arthur and the Arthur Brooks team. Thank you for the time and for arranging this. And we hope there's more. Also, go read every single book he has ever written. Truly. He's just amazing. He wrote a book with Oprah. He wrote a book with Oprah.

He's done everything, babe. Yeah. He's amazing. Thank you, Arthur Brooks. Without further ado, let's roll into this one with Arthur Brooks. The top ten, it's like it's eclipsed all the other things, except for Duke, it's eclipsed all the other years season. So, yeah.

It's good. I mean, it's better than UVA now. Wow. Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah. It's good to hear. The way that you do this in academia is you say everybody applies to a bunch of schools, right?

And everybody's got their stretch schools, their reach schools, the ones that they're, they're, they're, would really like to go to and they think they can get into and there's the safe schools right and you want to know where people where else they're getting in and how they're making the decisions so traditionally harvard everybody applies to harvard and stanford right and when they get into both it's a it's a two to one Harvard versus stanford decision so but that's going the wrong direction starting to Princeton tends to be like Harvard four to one Princeton wow right and Vanderbilt is now getting to parody with the second-tier ivies. Wow.

So people are choosing Vanderbilt over Cornell, over Brown, over Dartmouth. Wow. Yeah. That's a big deal. How do you know so much, Arthur? I'm a college professor. It's like, if I was like, how do you know so much about NFL football? Andrew?

It's like, because I have a professional football player. How many books have you written? 15. Yeah. 16th is coming out in April. Why do you write so many books? Because I want to learn stuff. These are the things I...

And so I write a column every week in the Atlantic. And every week I write a column about the question that's burning on my mind or that somebody has asked me. And I don't know the answer. And so I have an opportunity to actually learn about it and write about it. Because if somebody has that question or if I have that question, lots of people have that question. And when the question is way, way, way too big for a column, I'll make it into a book. What have some of those questions been? So different things over there.

So I wrote a book in 2019 called Love Your Enemies. And part of it was because there was the beginning of what we really see today, which is kind of a culture, war manifest in politics, which is ghastly. It's the worst. And the answer to that, of course, is the most subversive teaching in all of humanity, which is to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. And I said, okay, I'm going to take that on as a behavioral scientist. What does it mean to love your enemies and how do you do it in real life?

How do you do it? I didn't know. and I wanted to do it because I'm a Christian, but I'm a scientist. So I'm not a Christian scientist, but you get my point, right? And so I had to write the book about it to figure it out. And that's what happened. So later, the next book that I wrote was I was trying to figure out what to do with my career. And I was kind of transitioning. It was in my mid-50s. And I was kind of freaked out, didn't know what I was going to do next. And so I figured out how the brain works for transitions in the second half of life and how you can be successful and happy. And I wrote a book called,

from strength to strength about how to go from strength to strength. That's from the 84th psalm. Mikhail al-Khael in Hebrew, may you go from strength to strength. And I figured out how people who do it and are successful and happy, how they do it, how they do it differently than the people who don't do so well. And it's a behavioral science book, but it's a practical question that a lot of people wanted the answer to. So that's how I do books. I'm sure you hear this all the time, but I would be remiss if I didn't remind you that many of your books, from strength to strength included have changed so many lives. I hear about that book all the time so much so that I had to read it.

And you're like, dang, you know? That's funny. Thank you. I appreciate that. I've talked to a lot of athletes, actually. Yeah. Because athletes have early, big, big, big shifts that are necessitated by the fact that your body doesn't do it, even at 30, what it did at 20.

And you've got to change. So how do you understand the strengths that are happening now that you don't know about that might happen in the future? so a bunch of cyclists have reached out to me. They tend to get old later because you can be a really good professional cyclist in your 30s, which, you know, in gymnastics, that's very old.

It's like Great Grandma. That is Great Grandma. Yeah. There's one. There is one girl still competing. Really? She's in... Germany, I think?

She's in her late 40s. Yeah. Holy Macro. Who's that? Oxana Chusavitna. She's competed in six Olympics. Is she winning? He's winning.

In her 40s? In her 40s. Well, there you go. I mean, of course, that's... She should be studied. That's preternatural. That's weird. Yeah.

Yeah, it's weird. So I was really, I'm more interested in kind of how your brain works. So what do you do that will favor your cognitive patterns that you have when you're in your 30s, 20s and 30s versus in your 40s and 50s and 60s? And I didn't know. And I wanted to do the right thing. I wanted to go to the next thing that would be something I could be really, really happy doing it. I put together a happiness business in my late 50s. pursuant to my own research

on how I could be happier which is and it turned out to be I'm a case study my own research. I'm always experimenting. I have to jump back. I want to go back to Love Your Enemies real quick because I had one question. We literally did a podcast two days ago on redemption and it sparked the idea and conversation of

people who will rebuttal our belief which is do you actually believe everybody is worthy of redemption and the whole idea of loving your enemies is learn to pray and ask for forgiveness and be happy for your enemies. Is there a point in which that's not worthy? I mean, of course, only God knows. Literally only God knows. But we believe, as Christian people, that it's never too late until you're dead.

And it's funny because, you know, there's the parable of the workers, you know, the workers, that the master of the vineyard goes out to get workers at 9 o'clock in the morning, right? And he gets a bunch of workers. And then he goes out again at noon, and then he goes out again in the afternoon. He finally goes out at 5, and he gets a bunch of workers. And then in the day, they're lining up to get paid. Obviously, what we're talking about is people at different parts of their lives that are not working in the vineyard, and then getting paid as eternal bliss in heaven.

And he pays them all the same. and the guys who came in at 9, they're like, what a jip? What are you talking about? This isn't fair. And he says, it's my choice. Who are you? You know, I get to pay, it's my vineyard. I get to, and people say, okay, well, that's, you know.

And we don't like that. But the truth of the matter is that the guys who are happiest are the ones who were working all day. Do you want to be hanging around, hoping to make a living and bored all day, and then just getting saved by the bell? the people who had it luckiest are the ones who were righteous from the beginning of the day. And eternal mercy really is that, you know, the people who their life was a struggle and their life was full of trouble and sin. And for me, the essence of what forgiveness, what heaven, what godliness is really all about is that there's even help for the people who are most help less.

and those are the people that we'd say, they don't deserve redemption. On the contrary, they were the most miserable of all. They were the people who needed the most help. And that's the God I believe in. You've written a lot of books about happiness. Congrats on your newest, The Happiness Files. Thank you.

Is happiness meaning? Happiness, meaning is one macro-nutrient of happiness. So, I mean, we're all interested in human optimization. We all know a lot about nutrition and fitness, of course, because you need to, if you're going to work at a really high level. And when people talk who care about their fitness and health, about food, they always talk about the macronutrient profile. And if you're not feeling well, you know, if you go to a new country, for example, and you're not feeling good, you should examine your macronutrient profile because probably the new cuisine is giving you too much of one protein, carbohydrates, and fat, and not enough of another. most people who don't feel well you find they're eating too much carbohydrate and not enough protein generally speaking that's the case i don't know too many people getting too much fat and uh that's the

same thing with happiness happiness has three macronutrients and it's not happiness is not a feeling that's the smell of the food right it's it's evident happy feelings are evidence of happiness happiness is a combination of enjoyment satisfaction and meaning those are the three macro nutrients And you need to understand each one of those, figure out where you're weak, get your macronutrient profile together, study it, change your habits, work on it, and you'll get happier. And meaning is one of them. Differentiate enjoyment from satisfaction. Enjoyment is pleasure plus people plus memory.

So what it is is the things that you really, that make you feel good, but that you memorialize with your conscious executive centers of your brain. that don't manage you so you don't become an addict these are the things like you know having dinner together right um going for a swim in the ocean you know a nice glass of wine if that's your thing but in a social setting you know that's one of the reasons that for enjoyment but beer commercials never feature a dude alone in his apartment pounding a 12 pack right which is how many people use the product they show the same guy opening a beer with his brother or friends and making memories

because they're saying effectively one of the secrets to happiness is our beer plus your friends and the memories that you make. And that's the formula. So almost anything that feels good

and can be addictive, which, you know, everything from highly glycemic carbohydrates to internet use can be addictive. If you're doing it alone, you're probably doing it wrong. That's what it comes down to.

And that's enjoyment. Satisfaction is different. Satisfaction is the joy you're going to understand this. the joy you get from an accomplishment after struggle, that's satisfaction. Like, I did that. And I suffered a lot to do that.

I mean, nobody understands that more than gymnasts. Because it's pure suffering. Pure suffering. Pure suffering. And it's like two seconds at the end. Like, stuck it, right? And that's what, and that's satisfaction from that. Now, the problem is that you can't keep it.

so you have to delay your gratification and then you can't keep it. So there's a lot that goes into becoming really, really good at satisfaction but it's super different than enjoyment. I feel like in today's world, though, we're living the opposite of that. People feel like they're chasing happiness,

but they're chasing instant gratification for a moment. And so they don't get satisfaction. So life is not satisfying as a result. So are you retrying to... define what happiness is to people because our culture is teaching happiness in a very different level. Well, they're teaching happiness in ways that are utterly false. They're saying that pleasure instead of enjoyment and immediate gratification instead of delay of gratification, and they're

promising that if you get satisfaction, you'll keep it forever, which is wrong. That's completely wrong. It's entirely transient. It's an interesting point, actually. This is research that you've seen, no doubt, that Olympic medalists very often suffer a clinic. depression after they win their Olympic gold. That's because they fall prey to the arrival fallacy, which is, it was so satisfying making progress, progress, progress, progress, that when I hit the goal, it's going to be ultimately satisfying, and I was going to love it forever.

And, oh, it's just another day. And I'm still alone with me in my head afterward. And that is, I mean, it's like wreaks havoc on your brain chemistry. And so you have to become really good at understanding that the arrival fallacy is really a fallacy, and life is all about progress. life goes on. And then there's a whole, one of the great things about every world religion and philosophy is it teaches you that your satisfaction at last is not a question of all the things that you have. It's the things that you have divided by what you want. Havs divided by wants. If you want

a really satisfying life, don't just have more or want less. And then life gets interesting. Couple that with ambition though. You seem like an ambitious guy. Yeah, yeah. How do you reconcile wanting less with high ambition. The question is when we talk about these wants, we're I was talking about worldly wants. Worldly wants comes in four categories. Money, power, pleasure, and fame. Those are the worldly idols.

Aristotle talked about him that way. Or Thomas Aquinas literally called these the idols in 1265 and is like suma theologia. But there's great behavioral science. Everybody falls prey to one of those idols more than any other. Money, power, pleasure, fame, right? Money means resources. Power means persuasion over others. Pleasure we've already talked about, but it also means security or comfort. If you're checking your stock portfolio every day, you've got a pleasure problem because you have a

security problem. And then last but not least is fame, and that's the admiration of the world, the world's admiration, which, and that's the hardest one, because fame is the only one of the world's idols, you can only ever be happy in spite of. It will always make you unhappier, even though you think it'll make you happier for evolutionary reasons. Mother nature's a liar in your head. The right things to want, the right desires, the Buddhists always talk about trying to attain right desire. But as Christians, we believe this too, are faith, family, friendship, and work that serves. That's what she should be ambitious for. Faith, strong faith. Reliable faith. family life and we all understand that friendship meaning like real friends not deal friends and we

know the difference and work that serves work that people need and those are the right for so there's the the mistaken for and there's the virtuous four the vicious four and the and the virtuous four which of the vicious four do you struggle with oh for sure it's the honor of the world honor honor honor honor I could live perfectly without power I was a CEO for a long time and bum me out and people called me people called me boss I mean I don't want to be anybody's boss I don't I don't want to

anybody to boss me I mean I'm I'm like a liberty freak right pleasure I'm I'm pretty austere I mean it's like I can I can go a long time without

you know feeling good money okay okay but but now it's getting hotter in here right because I've eliminated two and but I figured out I mean I'm 61 I've figured it out that, I mean, money's okay, but there's not that much fun stuff you can do with it. But the applause of the world, that's a hard one. That's a hard one. That's a hard one for me,

because I want to be appreciative for the things that I do. And I want to be, I want to have the prestige among the right people. I mean, it's all these, it's just an idol. But here's the thing. When I understand that, then I have power because I recognize it. What about you? What's your idol? Probably security. Did you grow up under insecure circumstances? Very. Money, was it money issues? Yeah. Okay.

So you don't have a money idol, but you do have a... It was always like money and safety. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I just started traveling the world alone at the age of 11. Nice. So, yeah. Nice. I wouldn't recommend that, but...

It makes it sound like you were like running the rails of the hobo, but that's not what you mean. That's not what I mean. So yeah, I would say like the security side of that when you were saying pleasure resonated. Yeah. What would you say? What's your idol? Andrew, what's your idol? I'm surprised at my answer, but I would say pleasure.

I think, I'm thinking about how I'm an adrenaline junkie. I'm always chasing like experiences or like that thing. And yeah, I would say it's the pleasure side of me. A lot of professional athletes actually have that. They want outsized experiences that will get them out of their heads. And part of that is the distraction that comes from, it's not really the adrenaline. It's the flooding that distracts you from the hum. that distracts you from the, you know, the narrative all the time.

That's spot on. And at the end of the day, man, you have to go home to you. Yeah. You know, one of the reasons that people who travel constantly that they, you know, it's funny. I had a friend who was like, oh, man, he was in the, I mean, we all travel all the time. It's like, I'm on the road 48 weeks a year. But he was on the road five days a week for, you know, out 300 nights and all this is like, ah, it's killing my marriage.

It's killing my marriage. She doesn't understand. This is what I got to do. do. And they always come to me because I'm a happiness guy. And so I'm doing practically clinical work at this point on my friends. I don't have clients. I have friends. And he says, I don't know what to do. And I started kind of pressing him and probing a little bit. And it became really clear. The reason on he was on the road is because he didn't want to be home. People do what they want to do, right? And that's the same thing as people who seek experiences. You don't want to be home with Andrew.

Yeah. Alone. But I'm, I'm. I don't even always need to travel for me. That's not what I mean. The experience is the, it's the, it's the, you want to be out of the groove. Yes. Out of the groove, out of the groove, right? And I think the scary thing is, for me, when I, I actually enjoy not traveling, especially in this phase of life, but I will try to inject the out of the groove things

and the daily life, which I think like, every second of the day. If I had to choose a vice that I would be prey to, it would be like gambling because you're like, oh, dude, just freaking, give me another, give me another one. Yeah, that's actually not adrenaline. that's dopamine. And adrenaline and dopamine, I mean, they're both involved the adrenal glands sitting above the kidneys, et cetera. And, you know, if you've had a lot of outsized experiences, I mean, we all understand how dopamine works at this point. It's a neuromodulator that's about liking and learning and wanting. And we have it because we needed to learn how to do new stuff that would be rewarding so we could survive and pass on our genes 250,000 years ago. And the place to see, and you're, you know, the, the troglodyte easts, We're like, you know, it's like one of them's wandering across the savannah and comes across a new watering hole. It's like three gazelles around. He's like, gling, gloom, clung, plin his head.

And he learned that thing because he's got that little pleasurable neurochemical. And so then he thought about it the next day. And he got a little bit and he went back to the watering hole. See if you could get more. He wasn't chasing the gazelles. He was chasing the dopamine. Right? And if you've had a lot of dopamine in your life because you've had a lot of outsized, outlandish experiences, you've wired your brain to do that.

That's how that comes around. And you have to be very self-managing so that you're not chasing that in a frustrating fashion. There are, I think, better ways that I'm able to pursue it. I think our work actually lends, it's a good outlet because it's like, if I create a video, I just love the creation process. It's not even publishing necessarily

of getting the feedback. It's just like the excitement of we're going to do something crazy to film, you know what I'm saying? So that's been a good outlet. But I'm curious, you mentioned athletes are prone to that because of the distraction. Right. And I was thinking about my professional football career.

Ultimately, I was able to navigate what was a tumultuous professional career on my part because I had this anxiety that I felt at the pro level and only the pro level. You're an overanalyzer. And my antidote was distraction. But I'm curious, have you done much? I know you talk about depression, anxiety, loneliness, polarization, sports-related anxiety. Are you... All kinds of performance anxieties, for sure. Yeah.

For sure. And part of that is that the... And I do a lot of performance anxiety, not just with sports, but with incredibly high performers across all different kinds of fields. Generally speaking, the anxiety that comes from performance at the highest level of performance is because it stems from a deep, deep, deep-seated fear of failure.

Deep fear of failure. And what that is is weird, because you're not actually afraid of what would have happen if you failed. You're afraid of how you'd feel about yourself if you failed. You're afraid of your feelings. And so it's like, why am I afraid of my emotions? Because we're human. And if you've, if it's like, you're looking at mirror and you're like, that guy's a winner. That guy's an NFL player. Then what you set yourself up to be is I feel good about that person because of the title that I have given to that person. And if I lost that, that person in my eyes would be

worthless and I don't want to face those feelings. I want to cry right now. Yeah. Dang. And this is the thing. And there's something else about this too that really high performers have. That why do you feel that? Because you feel as a high performer like you better, you can't, you're unlovable.

You're unlovable unless you're earning it. And how do you earn it by doing something incredible? So all high performers have this in common. Like, yeah, straight A's straight A's. you know, good in sports, first chair in the orchestra. And that's when mom and dad paid attention. That's when mom and dad said, you're a good boy.

You're good boy. You're good girl. Right? And so the result of it, you programmed into your little brain that I'm lovable when I do these things. I'm not lovable because I'm lovable. I'm lovable because and when I do these things. And that's how your brain is wired.

Kind of a good thing, though, sometimes, right? I mean, isn't that motivation for incredible, achievement for sure but but you should also teach value at a foundational level yeah if i'm a parent and look this is a problem if you're trying to earn her love it's a problem if you're trying to earn her love and this is what high performers do they're trying to earn their spouse's love right they're trying to earn their children's love i mean look i'm still trying to earn my father's love and he's been dead 23 years i'm like i'm a professor at harvard you're proud of me he was a professor yeah right And that's just kind of, that's the wiring that goes into really high performance.

Now, it's not deterministic. You can be free, but you've got to know. You got to know that that's the tendency. You have to understand that, you know, God doesn't love you more if you're a better long snapper. He doesn't love you more. He loves you because you're his son. That's the whole point. And maybe you put roofs on houses and maybe you're temporarily unemployed, but you're still his son.

and that's what actually it comes down to. And that's why a supernatural perspective on this is freedom. And it's really the only freedom. But American culture in society cannot be built on that. You know what I'm saying? The culture has benefited so much from that performance and security. I know. It's like, thank God for that neurosis.

Honestly. It's like, we built this country on those bad feelings. So where is the appropriate place for that identity that you're talking about? No, I mean, you can, look, strivers are going to strive. Strivers are going to strive. Even if you were completely free from this, you'd be strivers. You would be, the two of you, be strivers. You'd just be happier strivers, right?

You'd be happier strivers. I'm not saying you're not happy because you're actually, the point that you're, the fact that you were able to articulate this suggests that you're pretty free. I mean, that you're pretty self-aware is the way that this works. And you have a successful happy marriage and, you know, life is good, right? but in your weak moments this is where you'll go back to

then your weak moments this is where you'll tend you'll be you know when you're feeling a little insecure then you'll try to earn love earn love earn love and that's and then you'll look at it and say and she'll say she'll be like you're doing that thing again

and it's okay this is pretty much the exact reason we started the podcast talking about marriage was we work on our marriage every single day we do not have perfect marriage. We, we argue. You argue? That's so weird. I haven't argued. I've been 34 years.

I've never had an argument with my wife who's from Spain. He lied. 10,000 arguments later. But we live in a culture of world where people will look at us on social media and say, I want that because it's so perfect. Right. It's so wonderful. And if only I found that perfect person, did the perfect thing. But playing into everything that you've talked about as far as like the family, community, having not the idols, but like the actual tangible things that give you purpose

and meaning happiness, our world does not promote that. Right. And to all the naysayers who would follow us and follow the podcast and follow social media, they're like,

well, you can say that because you are famous because you do have money, because you do have power. You do have all of those pleasurable items. Right. And I won't feel that

until I have it. Can people learn this without attaining any of it. Is there an approach to teach people that marriage can be fulfilling and also very difficult? Or are people stuck in this, you're either a striver who's going to work for or you're not?

So it's a great question. And most people do figure this out for a very weird reason. Their dreams never come true. See, in my business, there's an old saying, woe be unto the person whose dreams come true. Inevitably, they find they had the wrong dreams.

And for most people, it's like, yeah, man, if I had their Sean Andrews' money, yeah, that'd be great. But I'm not going to. So I'm just going to go to the park with my kid. Yeah, it's okay. It's actually pretty awesome and the whole thing. And they're happy. And they're happy because they actually didn't get the wrong,

they didn't have the wrong dreams and have those dreams come true. The unhappiest people that I meet are the people who didn't cultivate those particular virtues, had their dreams come true in terms of the worldly idols, and are chasing those things weirdly and fruitlessly for the rest of their life because they're not getting the feeling they thought they were going to get. It doesn't mean that rich people are unhappy. On the contrary, many of them actually had good values and money was nothing more than an intermediate goal to get the things that they wanted. But the unhappiest people that I meet are the people who are just wrapped around the axle about these things. Now, there are more unhappy people

of modest means than there were because of social media, for sure, because of social comparison, because they actually see, and they do compare themselves to you, and they wouldn't be as unhappy if they were still in their small town and just meeting their friends at church and at the YMCA and having an ordinary life. So it's gotten worse. But most people still are happier than most celebrities. Most non-famous people are happier than most famous people. And it's because they dreamed it didn't come true lucky them it's fascinating something the way you phrase that question it makes me think of you know there's always a pushback online when it's someone who has money telling someone who doesn't have money money's not going to bring fulfillment yeah easy for you

to say oh of course of course and the truth is that money will eliminate a lot of sources of unhappiness up to a pretty modest level and so there's nobody who who's paying attention who thinks that poverty is awesome is not poverty is lousy what i'm talking about is a normal you know relatively prosperous american life thank god we live in this country where being ordinary is great you know it's really great but what really matters above you know middle class living is the functionality of your relationships and the love in your life the faith that you've got the friendships you cultivate the way that you understand your work is serving other people that's what matters But even, even you saying that, it's almost more broadly the problem of what's your advice

to people who are hearing this wisdom and skeptical or like, let me try. How does one apply wisdom? Yeah. Yeah, no, that's, it's true. And the way that I talk about with, you know, people who are, I mean, my students are MBA students at Harvard. I mean, they're going to be the masters of the universe. The average starting salary, I think, coming out of our MBA program is $210,000 a year. It's good money is the way that it works.

But I work with all kinds of different people all over the place. And at the end of the day, I ask them, what do you prefer? Do you prefer that big paycheck or do you prefer to have a close relationship with your children? And they always choose having a close relationship with their children. They always choose it. And I say, okay, so where are you investing your time and your energy and your attention? and most ordinary people are actually paying attention to their relationships. They actually are.

And they could make more money. A lot of people could make more money, but it's not worth it. And when they reflect a little bit on the decisions they've made in their own lives, and I'm not talking about people who are really struggling here. I'm talking about ordinary Americans who are, they'd like more, take it. But they're pretty happy with their lives because they're making some pretty smart decisions every day. And that's great. we talk a lot on our show about we like audit our lives yeah very frequently smart

weekly honestly daily but we're also very analytical that way of like how can we optimize our life our happiness our joy our marriage our kids everything to a person wanting to start at like ground level with like I'm not happy I want to be happy right what's like a first step they can take yeah yeah yeah so the first thing is is to recognize what happiness isn't isn't. The biggest mistake that people make when they're not getting happier is that they think that happiness is a feeling and they're going for a feeling. That's the wrong point of view. And part of the reason is because to have the happiest possible life is not to be perfectly happy. That would mean no negative emotions. Fear, anger, disgust, sadness. These things exist in the limbic

system of your brain as an advanced warning system that something might hurt you, that something is bad for you. And if you didn't get fear, you'd be dead in a week. You should be really, really grateful for negative emotions. They keep you alive. The second is negative experiences that you have. You only learn and grow from negative experiences. And besides, if you're not having negative experiences, it means you're dead. That's life on earth, right?

I mean, it's like people, oh, I'll be perfectly happy when I have a child. Have you had a child? Yeah. It's like, no way. I mean, it's one of the reasons that young parents like you, that enjoyment falls when you have kids. meaning rises, meaning you're kind of trading off the macronutrients of happiness along these lines. So the first thing to understand is you're not going for happy feelings. You're trying to figure out the formulas for the appropriate amount of enjoyment and satisfaction

and meaning your life. It's a project. The second thing is the goal is not to get happy, is to get happier. It's to get happier. And that's a self-managing project. That's a program. It's like getting ready for athletic competition. You're making progress every day, and that's where the greatest satisfaction comes in and to have that kind of goal. The third thing is to know yourself, to know yourself, to know that, you know, Joe down the street

seems like a much happier guy that he might be. He might be. Half of your happiness is genetic, right? And maybe you've got gloomy genes, but you get happier because that's what it comes from. And that's how I start people on these programs, is having their right understanding and their right expectations.

Then it's all about changing your habits and sharing with others. The way, a lot of people who watch this podcast for sure read a lot of self-help, a lot of self-improvement. And it's frustrating because that stuff is really

inspirational and not sticky. You ever notice that? You read one of these hot books and you're like, oh, yes, true! And I didn't change my life. Yeah. And after two weeks, it kind of burned away. there's a reason for that.

It's not sticky because it's only inspiration. When you have something that's a really, really good thing, you've got to do three things you want to really make a stick in your life. You need to understand it, like science, understand it. Two, you need to change your life. You need to change your habits. And three, you need to teach it. And so that's the first thing that I do with young people.

I said, I know you think you're happiness students. No, no, no, no, no. We're going to make you happiness teachers. And for you to do it, you better understand what's going on your brain. and you better be a living laboratory, and you better be passing it on every single day. And then you'll start to see yourself getting happier. That's when the miracles really start to happen.

Is Arthur Brooks happy? Happier. Happy year. The reason I studied this stuff is because happiness is hard for me. It's hard for me. I come from really gloomy parents. And so 50% of my happiness is not as a genetic proclivity that I don't like, and it ended up in places I didn't want to wind up.

And so I became a happiness professor because I wanted to do those three things, understand, change, share. And since I've been doing this for the past seven years, since I've created this business of public education and the science of happiness, using my background as a scientist in this public good, my happiness has risen by 60%. And I have good tools for measuring it. It's a real gift, I have to say. But humans are great at acclimating and forgetting. Do you feel happier? You know what I'm saying? Or is it you're now used to 60% doesn't feel like 60%. It just feels like the new norm.

Well, what you're talking about is that's called homeostasis. That point that you just made. And that's because emotions don't exist to be in permanence. If they did, you'd get eaten by a tiger immediately because you'd be enjoying something that's so wonderful that happened yesterday and you wouldn't feel fear of something sneaking up behind. you. Emotions are only there as an information system about what's going on. Your negative emotions

say you perceived a threat, you need to avoid it. Your positive emotions say you've perceived an opportunity, you should approach it. That's what the limbic system of the brain, which is ancient between 2 and 40 million years ago. You've got it in common with your cat. The squirrel outside has a limbic system more or less like yours. That's what emotions are for. And we misunderstand emotions all the time by thinking that that we're going to that's why mc jagger's saying i can't get no satisfaction he should have saying i can't keep no satisfaction but i try and i try and i try and i try because you're trying to keep good emotions around that's the reason for the arrival fallacy was so frustrating after winning an Olympic gold oh yeah yeah you're looking like you a very very knowing look to

you right now right yeah and that's a lot of wisdom right there right but the more that you know that then the more you can adjust your expectations. For sure. I mean, you're going to get more frequent happy feelings, but that's not what you're going for. What you're going for is a fulfilling life fully alive. That's what it comes down to. And when you can self-judge your life,

notwithstanding your feelings, so yeah, that's happier. That's happier. That's what all the tools that I use of self-assessment do. So the limbic system, it makes me think of the source of some of John and I's argument. What do you argue about? Everything.

A lot, honestly. Well, you're both strong personalities. Very. And you're both, I mean, you're both extroverts. Yeah. Right? You're both conscientious, for sure. I would guess that you both have very high levels of both positive emotion and negative emotion.

Yes. I have a test I could give you that would show you. There's a quadrant to be able to be above average in both positive and negative emotionality. Okay. Those are called the mad scientists. I would get, I would wager that you're both mad scientist. and that's like daggers drawn when you marry each other.

Oh yeah. But it's great. It's beautiful. It's great. We've definitely understood our arguments differently and it's less sharp and more like, oh.

You're getting better at arguing. We've got enough repetitions to know that like, oh, I know she actually means the best. I trust that she means the best for me and she's sharing her perspective that feels like friction for the better. But my question is,

I'm prone to say Sean is exaggerating or inflating this emotion some would use the word dramatic. I'm not proud to say this but that's an inclination of mine.

How does one know that like this is the appropriate sized feeling that I have? Does that make sense? Is that the right question? So be more tangible. Give me an example. Maybe your last argument when this happened. Tell me how it went down.

Let's have an argument right now. I'm going to remember where the last one is. We don't remember many of our our arguments. They're not that important like summer rains.

I get it. Usually our arguments, it's hard to give an example or like I am feeling my limbic system. Like I'm feeling this right now based off an action. Right.

I'm trying to remember what the last argument was. I'm confused. Why does Sean feel 10x when I feel X? Yeah. So let me give you a little example. Maybe this one works.

Okay. So Sean's like we're late for church can you please dress the baby right okay and you're like okay sure dressed about it and so you and so you dressed the baby and you brought the baby out and Sean's like you did it all wrong because it's like those that doesn't fit that doesn't go with that and the whole thing and then you got mad because you felt resentful about the fact that she was like so dismissive of your efforts this is very classic by the way this is a really really because, you know, men, men exist to be admired and women need to be adored more because

of evolution, right, because of evolution. You need Andrew to be like, baby, I'd fight a tiger for you. And only you. And just like, all you need to hear is like, that's the biggest gazelle anybody's ever dragged into our cave. I mean, that's like, and then you get really mad. She's like, you got blood on the cave floor again, or something like that. And it's like disproportionate to the fact that, you know, the baby had the wrong shirt on or something like that. And you're like, why is she getting so freaked out about the whole thing? But you're actually kind of resentful. Is that that kind of thing possible?

And then it's like half an hour later, you're in the car and you're like, it's okay. It's okay, right? It burned off the whole thing. So what's the conundrum at this point? So based on that, so what's the question? Why did she care so much? Yeah. And when I felt, I'm like, I did the thing.

Yeah. I feel. Yeah. I think, too, what the question might be, not to speak for you, but I'm guessing off of our arguments and our conversations that we've worked on, is what is, in your opinion, the difference between immediate emotion and averaged out emotions over a long period of time. You can go back and look at your data charts and say, when I do X, Y, and Z, when I don't put away the dish, it makes Sean mad, right? There's like, there's averaged out emotions that we can like find patterns in.

Andrew, I, Andrew has a different perspective on there should be no validity to immediate emotions because it's not within a pattern I have traced over the course of time. So you're too far outside of the bell curve. You're on one of the, you're on the far right tail of something of emotionality. Now, what it means is that,

her limbic system is more active than yours, and especially if she gets angry, like, mad at you, then what that means is that she has a jumpier amygdala. Her amygdala is more, is, like, easier to trip. And everybody's got a different, and it's actually worse when men have a really, really jumpy amygdala, because that's, you know, men yell and, you know, men create bigger, bigger problems. And, but it's very, one of you is going to be a more emotionally reactive than the other. Who's right? you both are I mean you both are because the point is that you love each other for the person that you actually are despite the fact that that that's a source of friction wow that's actually a source of friction and the truth is I can tell you right now that if she weren't like that you'd find her boring and my guess is that you probably dated a girl or two who is not emotionally very reacted and you're like what she dead sounds exactly like every story I've heard yeah and so and so that's the thing and that's always the thing in a in a good marriage is that your your weakness is your strength and vice versa And recognize it as such is the reason that you get 60 years married together.

So you can get it all figured out. And weirdly gets easier. Weirdly it gets easier. And it's much more helpful. Actually, it's super interesting. I've been reading these papers recently about what, you know, early on in pair bond mating, which is how we clinically call, you know, falling in love in my profession, that women look for resource cues and men look for fertility cues a lot. That's just normal because of our evolution.

But later on, what both partners want is three things a lot of. One is character, dependability, loyalty, and trust. The second is positive emotionality, making sure that you're not just bringing bad stuff home. You're also bringing positive emotionality. So you're saving some of the fun stuff. And third is spirituality. And so the couples that do the best as they grow older together, they see their marriage more and more and more cosmically as an antenna to God, more and more and more. More and more. more and more. And so getting more religious together is just like this magic formula is how this whole thing works. And that's really important because then when you do that, then there's still some dirt in a glass of water, but you're just pouring water and pouring water. The couples that struggle with this metaphor, the ones that struggle, they'll, you know, they put teaspoonfuls of dirt in the glass of water and then they focus on the dirt. And then occasionally they'll go to couples counseling where what you're doing is stirring the dirt. starting dirt

and they talk about the problem the couples that do better they just pour tons of water into that glass there's dirt in there yeah but the more if you flood it with

with more water baby and that's just like good stuff good stuff good stuff I could save most marriages by sort of three things this is hubris right this is this exaggeration

when you're when you're together and you're talking you're staring at each other in the eyes no that's because you need this oxy Which you got when your babies were born, but you also get it from him. You have three times as much as you. You have, you get vasopressin, more vasopressin. Vassopressin is like the defense molecule, but you still get oxytocin, which is the love and bonding molecule. But eye contact between the two of you, super important. When you're talking, you're not looking at your phones. You're looking at each other in the eyes. Number one. Number two, when you're together, you're touching. Touch, touch, touch, touch. If you're walking, you're always holding hands, right? When you're sitting on the couch, watching television, you're

touching, right? And number three, you're having more fun together, doing more fun things together. This stuff will release all of these neurochemicals that you really, really want. But what that does is that's just, that's just flooding the zone with good as opposed to rehearsing the bad. There's always going to be this. I mean, it's like, she's interesting to you because she's, you know, a difficult person sometimes. And right? And it's like, and then it's funny and good, as opposed to, oh, here we go again. Right. Within a marriage, going back to like, the gloomy, like if you have a gloomy past? Yeah.

How do you deal with a gloomy spouse? Yeah, that's a hard one. And it's especially hard because men and women, they exhibit gloom in different ways. We're talking about minor depression, for example, or major clinical depression, for that matter. Women get sad, men get mad. Right? And so a grumpy husband is a sign that your husband is depressed, as opposed that your husband's a grump. Like, something's so grumpy.

No, your husband's probably depressed. he's not going to start crying like i broke a shoe lace no going to be like throwing the shoe across the room and and you know yelling at the cat you know that kind of stuff that that that is what that really means and taking that seriously is really important but somebody who's chronically gloomy that's that's a high high high cognitive load on a marriage that's a really really hard thing to do that's that's a responsibility of both partners to take care of the other person and to take care of yourself. And that's, the main point is this.

The greatest thing that you can do for your marriage is take care of your own happiness. That's the most important thing you can do. The greatest gift you can give to your kids is taking care of your own happiness. You know how they always say you're never happier than your unhappiest child? That's bad parenting. You should always be happier than your unhappiest child. You should always be working on it. That's why your happiness is the greatest gift, the greatest project you can undertake for the

sake of your marriage and family and the people who love you and that, that you should you love. That's a gift to them. This is shifting gears more of a how your mind works. You've written 15 books. Innumerable columns. Lots of columns. Lots of columns. How do you organize all this information in your mind?

What tricks and tips do you have? Well, part of it is the writing itself, because when you write things down, you move ideas. Remember, we talked about how self-improvement is not sticky. And that's because it's kind of an impression. It's like a flash into the limbic system of your brain, into your lizard brain. When you write things down, you're transferring information and the experience into the prefrontal cortex, which is the bumper of tissue, 30% of your brain by weight behind your forehead. That's your really human part of your brain. You do not share

that with a squirrel out back. This is only human. I mean, this is, this is only human. I mean, your dog's prefrontal cortex is wafer thin. Yours is like this big honk in supercomputer. trillion transistors is the kind of supercomputer that this would constitute. There's nothing like in the universe. That's what AI is never going to, it's just no, no. It doesn't hold a candle to this miracle up here, right? And so what you want, if you want to be able to use information, is make sure that you're, that you're absorbing the information in the correct part of your brain. And the best way to do that is by writing it down. Let's write things down. And so if I want to learn something, I write about it. If I have a little question, I read a column. If I have a huge question, I write a book

is what it comes down to. And then I own it. I forget stuff, of course. Sometimes, you know, I'm doing my own podcast, and it's about something I wrote about last year, I got to go back and read my own stuff. And more than once, because I'm hundreds of columns in, I'll write a column, think it's clever. And it turns out it's a copy of something I wrote two years ago. And I'll have to Google it and find out. So it's an imperfect system. Our episodic memory is stored in a part of the brain called the hippocampus. And you have to remember things. You have to reassemble them from different parts of the hippocampus.

You have a weird filing system is the way that that works. The more you write it down, the more you archive and the more that you record things consciously, like with your hands, the more you're going to own it and be able to use it. But as we're talking, it's been wild as you've just been saying all of these systems. Yeah, I'm going to have to go back to listen and listen to this because you've said so many things that I really have to digest. Science, science, science, science. No, it's like our, it's our geek love language. Like, this is our, I'm shocked.

Do you have nothing in your hands or you're not reading off of anything? It is straight from your memory. Are you thinking in pictures? Are you remembering the page that you wrote it down on and that's how you're pulling it? What, like, how do you think? Oh, yeah. So, I mean, well, part of it is really, really helps that I have written and published these things. and been responsible for these things.

The second thing is like anything else. I mean, when you're in your area of expertise, we talked about professional sports, you'd be blowing my mind with the stuff that you'd be telling me. It's like, what, how do you know that? Well, I don't know how I know that. That's what I do for a living. And so it's basically, this is just professional sports for me,

is how it comes around. The third thing is I'm old, right, which is helpful. I mean, I'm 30 years older than you. I'm 61. Are you 30, how old are you? 34. Yeah, nice. Nice. I remember those days. Good, good hair. And so being older, you have a lot more stuff in

your archive. I mean, the way that your hippocampus works is like a library. And you don't actually lose anything. The reason you don't remember when you were a baby is because you pruned back the connections to those memories, not because you don't have those memories. It's just that the synaptic connections have been pruned back so you could use your brain for other things. But all this stuff is in your library. And by the time you're in your 60s, that library, man, it's like the New York Public Library. That's the reason that you're working memory isn't as good, because your little librarian has to go look, you know, go find that volume someplace. And 15 minutes later, he comes back and says, that guy's name is Mike. And Mike is long gone

and you feel like a moron. But the truth is just because, you know, big library. That's also the reason you're going to be really careful about what you consume. Because it's going in your library, and that's what you're going to be looking in the archives for. And you're going to be having a conversation with somebody about something useful and weighty and significant, and you're going to come up with a metaphor from Better Call Saul, because that was what you were watching. And that went into your archive or some dumb song or whatever. So don't waste the shelf space is super important. So that's what it comes down to. And then being as quick as you can on your feet, the way that you do this by practice. It's like anything else. your brain has to work and has to work fast. And what I do for a living is I give 150 speeches a year. I lecture in front of Harvard students, which is like dancing through a field of IEDs, right?

Better get it right. And I do a lot of media. And so I'm exercising my brain constantly. And so that combination of things can offer you by the time you're in your 60s and 70s, the best mental facility as opposed to the worst. And that's what's ahead of you, which is a great future, right?

Yeah, I'm excited to get old. Oh, it's the best. It made it feel like a responsibility as I'm aging. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the best. No, I'm telling you, it was so crazy. I had no idea. I feel physically better in many ways

than I did when I was in my 20s because I'm in much better physical shape than I was. My mental acuity is much higher, and I'm asking my brain to do the things that are appropriate to my age, which is very different. than when I asked my brain to do when I was your age. I have something called crystallized intelligence,

which is pattern recognition and wisdom as opposed to invention capability. You're much, much better at coming up with a new thing than I am, writing a new song, writing a poem, you know, coming up with a new mathematical theorem. But I'm going to be much better at my age as saying, that relates to that, that's all these things. And this is a story that all coerce.

Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, yeah. Are you at all ever shocked at how all of your findings seem to mirror biblical wisdom? Like, does that ever, because I'm just thinking, you know, you talk about burnout in the happiness files. Yeah.

Thinking about the Sabbath. Yeah. Right? That's almost like pre-deposites along the way to prevent burnout. Yeah. Talk about community. Uh-huh. Even, I know you related the satisfaction portion of happiness to sports,

but the joy of accomplishment after struggle reminds me of family and having kids and marriage. You know, it's like, yeah, it's like, that's, that's an accomplishment when you raise children well or do marriage well. Yeah. These seem to be highly mirroring. Yeah. Yeah. It's all, it's, and that's because it comes from the same, the same source, ultimately. My father was a very brilliant biostatistician.

He was a, my grandfather was a theologian and philosopher. so academia is like the family business for us and my father was a really a really strong Christian and his father was a Methodist minister and missionary actually my father was born in the Navajo Nation where his father ran the Methodist mission schools as a matter of fact and and my father always said that he was a he was a much better Christian because he was immersed in science it's like he understood Picasso because he saw Picasso's works, see, and this is the thing. Iron sharpens iron. There's a lot of argument about faith and reason as if they're at odds. And a lot of modern people want to tell you

that faith and reason are at odds. Now, to say that reason and faith are incompatible is to say that the life of Picasso is incompatible with Picasso's works. That's insane. That's insane. If you want to be a good intellectual and serious about this great art, you need to know a lot about his paintings and appreciate them and also know something about the artist. And you will understand the artist better when you see the works. And the works will make more sense if you understand something about the artist. And for me, this is how being a behavioral scientist, to me, a Christian, all fits together. And it's no surprise that I'm coming across the scientific basis of biblical principles every single day. That's what's exciting. I can't believe it. The stuff that I'm

finding, like, oh, I do a lot of work on money and happiness, for example, money and happiness, right? And what you find is that you can be very happy having money unless you love the money. And that sounds an awful lot like St. Paul to Timothy who said that the love of money is the root of all evil, not that money is the root of all evil, right? And it helps me understand the nature of what Jesus was talking about, about attachment to these worldly things, not the evil of worldly things per se. So to understand what my career is trying to do is a secular apostle of of a better world, a world that has more salvation in it, is to, this always moves me, you know, this thing on the, when Jesus comes into Jerusalem on this last week, and he's giving,

he's giving, he's giving instructions to his disciples about how to prepare everything. And he says, okay, go, go to this house, like, gives him an address, and, and take a cult, you know, from the, from the, from the stable. And they're like, like, just take a cult from the stable. I mean, they're going to ask questions. And he says, what should we say? And he says, the master has need of it. Like, oh, good. And sure enough, you know, they go and they say, the master is need of it. And that's kind of how I feel about my work. The master has need of it. The master has need of it. And that's what I want to be, ultimately. And that's why there's this synchronicity between the cosmic truth and the scientific earthly truth

is because they're working together and they're working together because the master is need of it. Wow. What's the simplest way? I don't think there's a way to make it simple, but we're obviously Christians everything we do revolves around our faith.

But there is a large group of people who say, just not for me. Mm-hmm. What's your convincing statement to make people curious and head down the route of a faith-based life? One of the things that the happiest people have in common is not that they're Catholics like me. I like it. I recommend it. It's good.

But what they have in common is that they have a transcendent understanding of their lives, which is to say that they're not stuck in the me, me, me, me. It's like, I mean, Mother Nature, she's such a liar about happiness. She lies because Mother Nature doesn't care. She wants you to survive and pass on your genes. That's all she cares about. You're just a troglodyte to her. Just like, you know, get more mates and get more buffalo jerky for the winter in your cave

and all will be well. If you want to be happy, that's a divine thing. You want to be happier, that's a divine thing. Humans are funny because of this big prefrontal cortex that will mediate, our consciousness, you've got animal impulses and you've got moral ambitions. Only humans have both animal impulses and moral ambitions. And you want to get into the moral ambition space. That's when we're talking about doing things in spite of what you want. We want to think about ourselves all day long, which is why you look at your notifications on social media. You have a will

of iron if you're not actually wondering what people are saying about you. That's just a mirror. That's why you look at every mirror that you pass. Am I here okay? I don't say that. Anyway, you get my point. It's like, used to. And so one of the things that happy people, happier people all learn is that if you can transcend that, life is going to get better.

You got to zoom out. You know the most popular class for undergraduates at Harvard? I've heard is astronomy 101. It's not my class. Astronomy 101. Right? And the reason is not because they're astronomers. It's because they go into class on Thursdays, all bummed out because I had an argument

with my mom. I don't think my boyfriend likes me anymore. And they come out 90 minutes later going, I'm a speck on a speck. Yeah. It's such a relief. You need to transcend. And there's lots of ways to do it. I mean, you can roll your own.

I mean, study the Stoic philosophers or, you know, walk for an hour before in dawn in nature, nature without your devices or or study the works of Johann Sebastian Bach. But one of the single best ways to do that is the faith of your youth. That's standing in awe. That's recognizing there's something so much greater than you. It's funny. Were you raised in a Christian home? Yeah. You were too, right? Even though you're on the road by yourself at 11. I hope you had your Bible. No, but the hotels did. But there's a thing. There's a funny thing. People ask me all the time. It's a related question to this. What can I do so my kids will follow the faith? Because so many people fall away. I'm Catholic. People falling away like crazy, right? And I say, I know the

answer to that related to what we're talking about right now. It doesn't matter what you tell them. What matters generally is what they see their father doing. Right. So when I was a kid, my dad, great scientist, brilliant man, huge, six foot two, right? And I thought he could lift the corner to the He was so strong. He was a math professor. He could not. And he and my dad was proud and would not have, you know, bowed or bent the knee to any other man. But my dad was on his knees every night next to my bed praying with me. And that had a huge impact on a little dude cognitively. It's like there's something bigger than my dad. There's something bigger than my dad. My dad is standing in awe. And what it meant to be a man was this. stand in awe. That's what I meant to be. And that's the most beautiful thing, because then later I realized that that is the secret to getting happier, is to stand in awe, is to get little, not to get bigger. And that's the opening advertisement to people say, it's not for me. Well, you need something. Yeah. You need something. And I got a product that's pretty good off

a shelf. Real quick, it's fascinating. You say the stand in awe, our four-year-old little boy. Yeah. We have this tradition of like, they're just developmentally, they're getting like fears at night. Like, what if a monster comes and gets me? And we'll say like the simplest prayers.

Be like, oh, you have nothing to be scared of because God's here. And just like, that's not. And if your room is clean, the monster won't come. Exactly. But. If you get A's in school. Yeah. Uh-oh.

Yeah. But specifically... Performance issues. Earned love. Specifically, our four-year-old will ask me. He won't even ask you, like you. He'll ask me all the time. But is he stronger than daddy?

Yeah. And is he bigger than Daddy? Yeah, that's what's going on here. You tell him no. Yeah. Yeah. Daddy's strong. Daddy played in the NFL.

Obviously not. That monster didn't make it out of college ball. Yeah. No. I just think it's funny because he's always like, but... So God's stronger than Daddy? And I'm like, what? Oh, yeah.

That's it. That's it. And it's stronger in every way. Stronger in every way. Even Daddy is bowing for the Lord. And that's huge. That's huge. I mean, if you can't bow before anything, life is just so boring.

Someone asked a question I hadn't put that much thought into, but they're like, how do you know you fully given your life to something? And I was thinking about Game of Thrones. That's my archive. It's on the shelf. They talk about bending the knee almost to something. You just said that, but it's like, I would say that's, what are you bending the need to? Yeah.

And it's just, it is a fascinating way to think about it. The great power. Also to the idols. Yeah. And this gets us back to what we were talking about before. People bend the need of money, power, pleasure, or honor. Yeah, yeah. Which is super, super problematic.

Even though you know that that is not the ultimate power, you still bend the knee to it because you've subjugated yourself to this idol. Yeah. Yeah. This is my closing thought. I could see here for seven hours. I was going to say, yeah. But the kids were almost away.

Yeah. I guess this circles back to the rival fallacy and also ties in this part of the conversation but you mentioned how it's a problem when athletes achieve the thing and then they're disappointed that letdown. I think about Michael Jordan and I don't know if you saw the last dance

but of course. It's a great documentary. Yeah, there's that part where he talks about how he had a vendetta against this guy because this opponent supposedly said something. Right. And it turns out they asked the opponent and he was like, I never said that. And Michael Jordan was constructing all these narratives

so that the arrival fallacy didn't seem like it really hit him in the same way as like that letdown. I'm sure he has his own issues, whatever. But like, I think it's fascinating to me to think about religion, faith, at the very least, I think this is what Jordan Peterson talks a lot about,

is that narrative that keeps you going and in the game and there's not that letdown out. because it is like this continuous storyline or something else. You're whipping yourself. You're finding something that will whip you. Which is how imposter syndrome works. People will use imposter syndrome to keep themselves in the game.

Because positive energy is better, but negative energy works. It just does. And for high performers, many of them are just driven by negative energy. The problem with that is that it ends poorly. Positive energy can end well. all negative energy doesn't. And if you're basically, I'm going to show my old man. That's

negative energy, man. If it's, I want to live up to his, earn his love, that's not great, but that's certainly better than, you know. It's interesting because I've actually been doing work on how the motives for earning money affect the happiness and money equation. And if you're, if you earn a lot of money, but you're thinking, I want to create intergenerational wealth and I want to do all this philanthropy and for something positive with the money it's it's very positive experience but if it's like I want to show everybody that I'm not a loser I want to live up to my dad's expectations because I don't think he really loved me I want to prove to myself that I'm actually worth something woe beyond to you and this is a lot of what

it comes down to or anything in your ambition in life if you're just trying to get back at that you know that it's like that girl who i was in love with her and she wasn't in love with me she'll be sorry that's not good fuel that's very dirty fuel yeah fascinating do you have closing thoughts this is just incredible your your wisdom is amazing and it's great thing with you thank you for doing this what you're doing the show you know lifting people up and bringing them together um you're doing as a witness with all the things you've done with your careers and what you're doing is showing the vulnerability and love in your marriage showing the kind of values that people need of so they can be happier people that's that's that's it's it's incredible witness and i appreciate it

well thank you for being inspiration honestly for living a life well lived where you've we've built a life of positive archives and now you're now you're teaching it and uh it's refreshing so thank you for giving us the time and thank you for all the work you've done my pleasure