Dhru Purohit Show - How To Stop Self-Sabotage & Start Healing Your Body And Mind With Lewis Howes

Episode Date: February 23, 2023

This episode is brought to you by BiOptimizers Magnesium Breakthrough, Mitopure, and Levels. Today on The Dhru Purohit Podcast, Dhru sits down with Lewis Howes, a New York Times bestselling author, keynote speaker, and host of the industry-leading podcast The School of Greatness. Dhru and Lewis discuss why letting go of old narratives and healing from your past is critical for pursuing your goals and living to your fullest potential.   Lewis Howes is a two-sport All-American athlete, former professional football player, and member of the US men’s national handball team. His show The School of Greatness is one of the top podcasts in the world, with over 500 million downloads. The White House and President Obama recognized him as one of the top 100 entrepreneurs in the country under 30. His new book, The Greatness Mindset: Unlock the Power of Your Mind and Live Your Best Life Today, hits bookstores everywhere on March 7.  In this episode, Dhru and Lewis dive into: -How the stories we tell ourselves hold us back from achieving our dreams (3:16) -Lewis's life experiences that inspired his emotional growth (17:23) -The lows in Lewis’s life that lead to his biggest breakthroughs (24:34) -The tools that helped Lewis overcome limiting beliefs (38:17) -Old stories Dhru had to let go of to break free from a powerless mindset (57:00) -Overcoming self-doubt and stepping into self-acceptance (1:05:57) -How to handle people who challenge or limit your growth (1:14:51) -Tackling big goals and outsourcing help (1:24:04) Also mentioned in this episode: -The School of Greatness podcast -The Greatness Mindset here.  For more on Lewis Howes, follow him on Instagram @lewishowes, YouTube @lewishowes, or through his website, https://www.lewishowes.com. Magnesium Breakthrough really stands out from the other magnesium supplements out there. BiOptimizers is offering my community 10% off plus a special gift with purchase, so just head over to magbreakthrough.com/dhru with code DHRU10. Mitopure is the first and only clinically tested pure form of a natural gut metabolite called urolithin A that clears damaged mitochondria away from our cells and supports the growth of new, healthy mitochondria. Head on over to timelinenutrition.com/dhru for 10% off. Levels is an app that pairs with continuous glucose monitors and sends real-time feedback straight to your phone. Right now, Levels is offering my listeners two free months of their Levels Membership. Head on over to levels.link/dhru to learn more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It wasn't until I've been able to practice the art of going after a meaningful mission and feeling worthy and deserving of it and enough of who I am in the process where it's allowed me to feel peace and harmony that I've never experienced before my life. If you regularly feel stuck in life or feel that the past and the stories and the meaning we give to it are regularly holding you back from the greatness you know is possible in your life, Today's episode is for you. Welcome to the Drew Proet podcast. Each week we explore the inner workings of the brain and the body with one of the brightest minds and wellness, medicine, and mindset. This week's guest is a dear friend of mine, Lewis Howes, and he has a new book out. It's called The Greatness Mindset. Unlock the power of your mind and live your best life today. Lewis is a friend and we've been on a similar journey in our lives. We've been both in a place in our life where we felt stuck. where the version of us that we knew was possible was being held back by negative patterns and past insecurities.

On today's podcast, we talk about that. I have a bunch of juicy stories from my own life, and Lewis shares from his all with the intent of showing you how step by step we went through our lives, forgave the past, gave new meaning to it, and stepped into our true purpose. That's what he calls the greatness mindset. And that's what we're talking about today. Now, a little bit about Lewis, for those of you that don't know him, he's a New York Times bestselling author, keynote speaker,

an industry leading show host, podcast host. He is a two-sport All-American athlete, former professional football player. He actually played football in college with one of my dearest friends, Chris Gerbiz. Shout out to our friend Chris. And Lewis is also a member of the U.S. men's national handball team. His show, The School of Greatness, regularly on the top shows for health, is one of the top podcasts in the world with over 500 million downloads.

He was recognized by the White House and President Obama as one of the top 100 entrepreneurs in the country. I really enjoyed my podcast interview with Lewis today. A couple things we cover. We talk about the three biggest fears that hold us back from our greatness and our purpose and dreams in life. We also talk about a step-by-step process of healing your past. We also talk about what it looks like to understand that you, yes you, and when I say you, I also mean me, are part of the problem in your life because guess what? When you're part of the problem, I'm not saying you caused every negative thing in your life to happen,

but when you're part of it, when you contributed to it, that also means great. You can do something about it. How do you step into doing something about your life? So you can step into your dreams, goals, vision, the greatness that's in front of you. That's what today's episode is about. Stay tuned for a fantastic episode with Lewis House. Lewis, welcome on the podcast, brother. Congratulations on the new book.

Thank you very much, brother. Appreciate it. I want to start off with just like a big picture question. I think you are the best person suited to talk about this, not just because you have a podcast that's dedicated to this, but also because you lived it firsthand, right? So tell us a couple of the top ways that the stories we tell ourselves hold us back from achieving our goals and dreams in life.

It's interesting. My dad, my birthday's coming up in a few weeks. And my girlfriend's trying to throw a big, you know, she tries to make it a deal. Like, it's your birthday. It's your 40th birthday. We should do something like celebrate to acknowledge you. And I'm like, listen, I've never celebrated my birthday, right? And she knows this.

And when I told her this, she said, why? And I said, well, when I was growing up, my dad didn't want to emphasize how a young or how old I was. So I'd never had a birthday party. I think maybe when I was like two or three, they did like a little cake or something to get a photo. But from as long as I remember, I don't remember having a birthday party. And as I got to be like seven, eight, nine, I remember other people having parties at school and celebrations and me being like, huh, why don't we do this? So I asked my dad that I was like, dad, do you not love me? You don't want to celebrate my birthday? And he goes, I love you very much. But I have seen too much. But I have seen too much.

many people as they get older tell the story that they're too old to do something they want to do. They're too old to go after this dream. It's too late. Or people say they're too young to actually go after what they want. They need more time or experience or credentials. And so I just don't want to limit you from your life. I want you to be able to go after your dreams and grow up knowing you're capable of doing what you want. And I was like, yeah, but dad, you can still get me like some cakes and gifts, you know what I mean?

It's like, you still give me a present. But the story of that was, in extremely. extremely empowering for me because I never felt limited by my age. I never had a story or belief that I was too young. I feel like I got into this business world at a very young age. I wrote my first book before 25, even though I almost flunked out of English high school in high school, my senior year. I didn't allow like a limitation to say I can't do something.

So that was just one lesson that he taught me early on on let's celebrate your life every day and be grateful for every day, but not put emphasis on, oh, one more year you're getting older. That means it's harder to do something or it's easier to do something. Let's tell a different story about you're capable of doing it at any time if you want to. Or at least don't let it hold you back from taking action on doing something. Maybe it fails and that's okay, but at least you have the courage to act on it. So that's been something that I learned early on about telling myself the right stories to be able to have courage to take action.

Now the stories, there's other stories that have held me back from insecurity, self-doubt, just not feeling good enough, not feeling accepted in a certain life. So I did certain things based on a limited story as well to try to belong, to try to fit in, to try to feel loved and accepted, to try to succeed. So I felt like I was enough. And that didn't serve or support me either. So either side, there are stories that we can tell ourselves and we just need to be asking which ones are serving us at the highest level.

Yeah, it's a great reminder. And, you know, for a lot of people, even the idea that we're telling ourselves stories is new for them. They're like, well, that's just me thinking. So it's true. But to actually step back and say, no, everything is a story. Is it serving you? So, okay, so I've got a follow up question with that story that your dad, which, you know,

could look harsh on the front end, but provided you with some valuable lessons. But all stories are nuances. There's a lot of layers to it. And as we progress in life and as we evolve and we have a new relationship or other things, we have to constantly kind of go back to these stories and see. So when you said, you know, you have your 40th birthday coming up. Yes. Congratulations.

I turned 40 last year. All right. You said your girlfriend is trying to celebrate you and put something together. Yes. But I heard a little bit of resistance inside of that. Like she's trying to do it. It's like, no, I'm not sure if I want to. So is part of that story also to make it harder for you to accept celebration from people?

Does it feel like that narrative, right? I'm not trying to put that on you, but I'm just trying to, what was there? I think it's just more. It's just I'm not familiar with it, right? I'm not familiar with doing a big celebration of me. In some ways, you know, there's a, I acknowledge people on my show. I'm always telling people how much I appreciate and how much I'm grateful for them. And that's something that I'm used to.

I'm familiar with. And I can receive that type of acknowledgement as well. when someone makes a whole day out of me, for whatever reason, it just feels unfamiliar. And I don't know if it's necessary. That's the only thing. So I don't want to, I don't know, I don't want to make a whole big deal out of something where then you put emphasis on, okay, this day is important. And it's a reminder of age and time. I don't want to put emphasis on an age or a number and make it a big moment.

Oh, on my 40th birthday, we did this big thing. thing. I'd rather be we just celebrate life on a continual daily basis and we pick a random day to celebrate and not just like, oh, but it was my 40th birthday when you had to do something big. Why? Why is that important? Like, yes, let's acknowledge the good that I've created in life and we can acknowledge my lifespan up to this date and the lessons and the mistakes and, you know, acknowledge all of it. But the emphasis of time limits. us. And so I have a little resistance around that. But she's also in full alignment. She doesn't like to focus on the number either. So she's like, we're not going to celebrate the number,

but we get to celebrate you and your life. And I said, okay, that's fun. It just feels weird to have like a bunch of people around just like celebrating you all day personally. But it's just because I've never really done it. Yeah. You know, that sometimes is an exercise in itself. I know. Just trying it. Yeah. Having been friends with you for a long time, there are other things in your life that I see you acknowledge and celebrate. I remember the first time that you hit like a big milestone in your podcast. I'm still pretty early. There was the acknowledgement. Yes. Because it also isn't just about you. The thing that I bring in is that the celebration of you, and I'm the person that has the hardest time with this. And I'll tell you my version of my story, right? Which is a little bit different.

But the acknowledgement of you is also the acknowledgement of all the relationships around you. And giving people the opportunity to celebrate you is actually a, allowing them to give a gift to you. That's true. And when they get a chance to give a gift to you, they feel complete. That's true. I know. So my version of the story of why I don't like to be celebrated, right?

I can see it in you, brother, because I have the same thing to me. Yeah, tell me. Is that when I grew up, you know, a lot of immigrant families, the whole reason that they even moved from my family's from originally like ancestries Indian, but we are four-generation Kenyan, they love their life in Kenya. But the whole reason that they even moved from Kenya to America was all about how do we provide a better life for our kids. And so that immigrant mentality and that immigrant hustle is actually really beautiful that everything is about, okay, how do we set our kids up for the future? So immigrant families on the whole are generally, they're really good about like living on like nothing.

Right. Putting everything into savings trying to either buy a business. and my dad never growing up, like gave me the new sneakers and the new kicks. And he couldn't even understand like, why would people want that? But my college fund and tuition was fully paid for before I even got into high school. Wow. Right. So that was the emphasis on education.

My parents saved. My parents stayed. Literally when I was younger, I thought, wow, we don't really have a lot of money, even though my dad has a good job. Like something must be going on. And I didn't understand the whole background. It's extreme discipline he had. It's incredible.

discipline and again, hats off to a lot of these families who came from very tumultuous areas. You know, the reason that we left Kenya is there was a coup attempt. And it was the day that I was born, August 1st, 1988. My mom had to give birth to me in the basement of a hospital because most of the staff left and there's bombs going off outside. My dad literally, because back in the day, you would drop off your wife to the hospital. And then when the baby was born, then you'd come back and you'd come and get her. You're not sitting there all day. You're not sitting there all day. You got to work. Yeah.

My dad dropped off my mom like 24 hours earlier because she was beginning the labor process. Then he turned on the BBC that morning of and like heard that there's a national curfew in Kenya. And there's like bombs going off and other stuff. He didn't know, are we alive? Are we dead? Is his wife okay? Like they had no idea. So when you come from those tumultuous areas and times, you are like, look, what actually is the thing that I could take with me anywhere?

It's education. Yes. Right. So let's put all of our effort and energy on that, which also meant going back to your story, birthdays were pretty light. Pretty light. You get a little cupcake maybe if you're lucky. Little light, little this. Everybody's working. Everybody's busy, right? And they also, it made me feel like great, I'm happy to be here with my family. But as I got older, I was like, I would rather just us have dinner. Yes. Then, you know, put up celebration and other stuff, which,

number one, I don't need that. But also there was other side, which is that I don't like doing things that are not intentional. So even if it's that one cupcake, right? If it's that one thing, just don't make it a last minute thing. Let's make it intentional. And I don't mind. I don't need a big celebration.

I just want it to be intentional. So as I grew up, I felt that anything that somebody was going to do was not going to be intentional. Even just like a small picnic outside, but you're picking a couple of my favorite things or whatever. Anything done with intention is beautiful.

And then I thought anything that's not intentional is that a reflection of maybe I don't mean that much to that person. So I got into the habit of not celebrating it because I was like, oh man, this is going to be like somebody's going to try to put it together. It's not actually going to be good. And good doesn't mean big. Good doesn't mean you spend a bunch of money on it. It's not intentional. And then I realized like, you know what?

The people in your life, they want to celebrate you. Sure, you can tell them like, hey, instead of doing that activity, I'd rather do this. And it was also practice for me to let them show up the way that they wanted to. hard because Martha's been for like six months she's been trying to plan something. I'm like, let's just keep it chill and relax, you know, just have some friends and family over, but it doesn't have to be a whole adventure. You know, she wants to go big and I'm like, I appreciate and love you for wanting to pour into me, but it's going to make me feel more uncomfortable if it's like a whole long day experience, you know? Yeah, there's preferences, right? We all have preferences

and the way that we want life to show up and there's nothing wrong with you sharing the preferences. But that was a good example of how stories shape us. and set our life up. And especially these early childhood stories. You've been super vocal on your podcast, on social media, about how early life experiences, if we don't question them, understand them, and also forgive them in a way,

they will run our life. And so many of the negative patterns that we have come from these early beginnings. Can you give us some examples? Well, our emotions are a byproduct of all of our past memories and the meaning we give them. And so therefore we react and get emotional in a beautiful way and a neutral or a negative way or a triggered way based on experiences we've had in the past and the meaning we placed on those experiences. So if we are easily triggered and easily upset and easily feel taken advantage of, abused, not enough, or whatever it is, is your trigger, which was most of my life was a trigger of not feeling good enough, feeling taking advantage of and feeling abused,

based on the memories and experiences I had that caused me to feel that way. And the meaning I gave those experiences from sexual abuse to being picked last on sports teams to my brother being in prison for four years and not having friends during that time because it's a small town and everyone knew from being, you know, laughed at in school because I was in the bottom of my class and just couldn't, couldn't memorize, read and write and articulate things as ways as other kids could. so I just got kind of picked on a lot and just feeling like, okay, everyone's out to get me, everyone's taking advantage of me, no one loves me.

That was the meaning that I gave a lot of these memories and experiences and events that occurred. So my emotions are tied to those meanings from those memories. And therefore, I would get very angry, triggered, or upset and reactive when I felt in my teens and my 20s that I was in that type of experience, when I felt like, oh, someone's taking advantage of me, there's a wound. They're triggering me. They're pushing that button. I'm going to react emotionally based on those memories and the meaning that I feel like this still causes today, these stories. And it wasn't until I turned 30 when I started the process of

creating new meaning, creating different stories and finding stories that could benefit my present and my future as opposed to make me suffer and stress out more. So healing, mending, and forgiving and kind of revealing and opening up about past pains, the things that I was most ashamed of, where before when I concealed those things, they made me feel powerless. In a ways, I thought I was protecting myself

because if people really knew these things about me, they want to accept me or they want to like me or love me, so I'm going to protect myself and not get made fun of. But in a sense, that had power over me. So I had a powerless mindset. In page 201 of the book, I talk about the distinctions of a powerless mindset if you're living in that in any way versus the greatness mindset in concealing past pains

is one of those distinctions. Being controlled by fear is another one of those distinctions. I was consumed and controlled by fear. And that's why I would project myself in a certain way of false confidence that wasn't authentic to who I truly was because inside I was really insecure and afraid. And so when I started to mend heal and go on a journey of healing, which has been a decade and it'll continue to be a lifelong journey, that's when I started to emotionally respond differently. And again, once I was able to create new meaning from these memories that caused a lot of pain, process, practice, and integrate new ways of feeling about these memories and new ways of

feeling about the experiences now that could have caused me triggers in the past, it's allowed me to have a lot more peace emotionally. It's allowed me to be able to manage the stresses of the world with more ease. You know, I was just talking this morning about I'm in the process of something that could cause a lot of stress for people. And it doesn't mean it's not stressful, but I'm able to manage certain things and go through the loss of someone in my life who's a friend of mine and deal with just multiple things at once that 10 years ago,

would have caused me to be in complete breakdown emotionally because I wouldn't have had the tools of navigating and creating the meaning around it and having a different story around it. So once I've learned to practice it, and it's a constant practice of emotional regulation, Dr. Rahul Jendal, do you know him? He's a brain surgeon who's done over a thousand brain surgeries. and he is also a PhD neuroscientist. So he studies the mind and he studies the brain. When I asked him, what's the number one skill that every human being should master

and that you think every human should really know how to master after a thousand brain surgeries and after studying the mind and just seeing how people show up in life with studying these two? He said emotional regulation is the best skill of we. can develop. And I have to back that because I was driven emotionally based on stories of the past that caused me to react and respond and create success. But it didn't make me feel peaceful, abundant, or congruent still in harmony with myself. And it wasn't until I started to learn how to regular emotions where I was driven to achieve and serve. And

at the same time, and I learned to receive how to feel peace, abundance, acceptance, self-love in the process. I think there's a lot of people that are driven to succeed, but still don't know how to love themselves at the end of the day, no matter how much success they have. And I feel like that is one of the biggest failures. When you are successful, when you accomplish your goals and dreams, when you really sacrifice and commit to something that is exciting you and you're driven by it and you still don't feel enough at the end of the day, I feel like that's a big failure.

Now, I don't think that you're a wrong or bad person because that's what I experienced most of my life. I succeeded on goals but didn't feel loved. I accomplished things. I committed. I was disciplined, dedicated, worked hard, but still didn't feel enough. And it wasn't until I've been able to practice the art of going after a meaningful mission and feeling worthy and deserving of it and enough of who I am in the process where it's allowed me to feel peace and harmony. that I've never experienced before my life.

You know, personal development journeys are a zigzag, right? That classic sort of meme, you know, going up, down. Success is never like up and to the right. Yeah. What in your story was first, you know, you mentioned a few different things. You mentioned regulating your emotions. You mentioned your mission, right? Coming up with that big mission, which is a big part of this.

Yes. The meaningful mission, chapter three. You know, what was one of the biggest breakthroughs that even just got you started? Because a lot of people were listening, the question is like, how do I actually get started? Do I just one day decide to create a new meaning for my life? I think it's really hard for people to have a breakthrough when life is good or when life is bad. I think we get comfortable in the familiar of good and bad. For me, the big aha moment was when I had multiple breakdowns all at once.

It's when I moved to L.A. about, I guess it was like 12 years ago now, 11, 12 years ago, I felt like everything was going right in my life. I was living in New York City. I was playing with the USA National Handball team, which is a dream of mine. I had, you know, multiple years where I'd made seven figures in my business and sales. You know, after being on my sister's couch, like four years prior to this, so I felt like I was doing the right things.

And then I moved to L.A. for a girl. And the day I landed, she broke up with me. And it was up and down for the next six months back to together, breaking up, confusion, where are we going, all these things. At the same time, I was going through a, essentially a business breakup with my partner, my business partner at the time for a previous company that I was 50-50 in. And we just did not align on the vision we had. I had one vision.

He had a different vision. I didn't have the tools on how to communicate effectively, neither did he. So it was just kind of like this friction and this kind of like unhealthy communication between both of us on how to manage the vision of our business. Then I was taking my frustration and anger out on the basketball court and just kind of getting in scuffles and fights, just having fun playing pickup basketball. I would get so triggered inside emotionally from the littlest comments, the littlest things where I felt like these people are trying to hurt me or take advantage of me when we were

just having fun playing pickup basketball. So kind of these three scenarios in life, I had break. down, break down, breakdown. And it was after I got in a pretty bad fight, actually, on the basketball court in West Hollywood, the mean streets of West Hollywood and Beverly Hills, when I realized, oh, wow, okay, I just turned 29, so it was 10 years ago, just turned 29, or I was 29 at that time. And I was thinking to myself, I'm a grown man, essentially, but I'm acting like a little child, getting in a fight, playing a pickup basketball game.

I don't know to navigate my relationship. It's up and down. It's on and off. It's confusing. I have no clarity. And this business is falling apart. And I'm the common denominator at every scenario. I'm the common denominator.

It's not maybe there are some, there's some wrongdoing on their side, but at the end of the day, I'm the source. I'm responsible for each one of these events happening. and not breaking through them because I lack the tools, the awareness, the wisdom, and the emotional regulation on how to effectively move through each scenario. Now, I'm not saying it's easy, but I lacked the tools. And it was those three kind of breakdowns that were all pretty extreme in a sense. They caused a lot of pain and suffering internally, right?

It was like this, I didn't know the answers, that I didn't know to break through. And my ways of being, how I had typically done things weren't working. So something was often me because it wasn't getting the results to create freedom, fulfillment, peace, and clarity in all these scenarios. And so after this one fight that I got in, I remember I was like, what am I doing? Like I was kind of shaking because I got in this fight and I went home to my apartment off Doheny and I was kind of looking myself in the mirror for the first. first time and really seeing myself. Now, I had like, you know, bloody knuckles and I was kind of just

shaking with the adrenaline because I was like, what did I just do? You know, the guy ended up being okay. He was, you know, he was fighting me. I was fighting him. It wasn't like I did this by myself. But I remember looking in the mirror, shaking, and I couldn't recognize myself. I just didn't know who I was anymore. And I'd been living with a desire to win, to succeed, to live. look good and to be right for so long that I felt like I, you know, I just didn't know who I was. And the, that was the wake up call for me, like looking in the mirror after this and saying, man, I'm the source of all these things. I started to reach out for support and just ask people like, hey, I'm struggling with this. Any suggestions? And I started to do a lot of different

things. I met with therapists. I went to emotion intelligence workshops. And I just started trying different things. I was open. And those first couple things, the workshops I did, the therapists I met with helped guide me in opening up and facing myself for real for the first time. I was concealing a lot of past pains. I was really limited and fearful emotionally. And I wasn't willing to address it. I just kept masking and masking and projecting a false sense of confidence that was not authentic or real.

And it got external results, but left me feeling very unfulfilled and not living in peace internally. So that was the beginning of a journey that has been an up and down 10 year journey of processing the past, creating new meaning and new stories around why certain things happened, forgiving myself for things that I wasn't a proud of or shameful of, forgiving others that I felt like did me wrong throughout my entire life. and really reparenting the younger, emotional or psychological, wounded version of myself and saying, you are safe, you are whole, you are healthy, I got you.

I got you. I'm here for you. Thank you for going through all the pains you went through to get to where we are today. You don't have to hold on to this anymore. We're safe now. I got you. I love you. I'm here for you.

Kind of having a different relationship with my younger self that was so confused that still didn't know the answers and that lived in uncertainty for so long about all the scenarios and situations in life and saying and creating meaning around this is why it had to happen so that you have a bigger heart now. So you have more compassion now. So you have more humility now. So you want to serve people in a different way now. That's why all these things had to happen.

And creating that meaning. has given me peace. It doesn't say, it doesn't mean I, you know, am glad all these things happen or I want other people to go through sexual abuse or trauma. I don't want that for anyone, but I can't change the past, but I can change the meaning of the past. And that gives me peace. That's beautifully said, brother. You know, it just makes me think of that sort of old adage, you know, what you resist. Persist. And so much of the energy. And the past, and the past, that we say are negative in our life. Yes.

Right? Us, maybe somebody's dealing with constantly procrastinating or fear of taking on this new creative endeavor or they have a book they want to write one day like yourself or start a project or just show it better in their relationship. But they have all these fears of things not having worked out in the past. There's so much energy that keeps that fear alive and that energy is all the things that we're trying to keep down. Yes.

We think we're holding it down by pushing. But that just continues to give it. more energy. Yeah. Or eventually it'll explode. And eventually it'll come out in some way, whether it be physically on your skin or physical ailments, it'll cause pain in your body, it'll cause psychological pain, emotional pain, and eventually it has to come out in some way.

It does. You know, you've had Dr. Gabor Matte on. Yes. We've had him on as well too. He's amazing. And his latest book, The Myth of Normal, is really talking about that. How much explosion of these chronic diseases, especially, you know, he really highlighted. how women in particular, you know, most of my audience that listens to this podcast,

especially health podcasts, it's a lot of women. One thing that he wants to highlight is not that it doesn't impact men too, right? It all impacts everything. But women's bodies are so much more sensitive and they're better at recognizing what's going on, you know, partly because they have their monthly rhythm they go through. You know, they're just more in tune with nature just as a whole. And so that stress and life being, you know, kind of fake, it takes its toll. And you feel that stressor and it can sometimes, unfortunately, and my wishes that wouldn't happen

anybody, but often does, shows up in the form of an ailment that we go to. Physical ailments. Physical ailments. A lot of those are tied to emotional stress, right? And that's what Gabon Gabor Mata talks about. It's the emotional pain we're holding on to manifest in physical pain. And the second part of what you were talking about, you know, really it got so bad for you that you had nowhere else to look besides yourself.

It's it. It reminds you this other quote by this, you know, this coach who was formerly a VC, Jerry Colonna or Corona. I always get his last name messed up. It says, how, my most powerful questions we can ask ourselves is, how have I been complicit in the things in my life that I say I don't want? Right. Doesn't mean it's your fault. Right. But you've been a part of it because the law of responsibility says, if I wasn't at least a part of it, that means that I can't do anything.

If you looked yourself in the mirror and said, it's not me. Right. It's everybody else. Right. If it's everybody else's fault, guess what? You can't do shit. I know, man. To change it.

And that moment for you was finally the thing that led you to text, message, call a few people and say, I'm struggling. I need help. What a powerful breakthrough for you. I think there's people that are listening today that are, you know what? Finally, I'm being honest with myself that maybe I haven't been willing to look at myself and say that I'm the common thread in my life. That's it, man.

And one of my closest friends was like, Again, another thing, a low point, he was like, after this fight, he was there. He said, I don't want to play basketball with you anymore if you're going to keep acting like this. He's like, I don't want to, you know, I love you and I'm your friend, but I don't want to hang out with you that much if you keep responding in this way. If you keep, essentially, he was saying if you keep allowing your past pain and your traumas to run your life today, to react in ways that are harmful and could cause us to get in fights with strangers for no reason. I don't feel safe around you because you. haven't healed those things. You haven't created a process of peace in your nervous system, really is what it is. Because it's the nervous system for me when I would see something,

I would interpret it and then my nervous system would get heightened and I need to defend myself. As opposed to relaxing and healing the nervous system and the emotions tied to it and allow myself to just experience life differently as a more neutral events occurring. Not everyone's out to get me or everyone's taking advantage of me, but really thinking, okay, how can I be peaceful in the most stressful situations? Not hide all my emotions, still have a wide range of emotions and feel sadness and grief and love and joy and all the invulnerability, but not be triggered emotionally to react or defend. And I think unless there's a real threat physically, emotional triggers, I feel like, cause us a lot of pain. What were a couple of the things that you were doing, early techniques,

you know, people teaching you stuff? What were some of the early techniques or tools that even if they sound so simple were crucial in you regulating that nervous system? Well, I think it was one of the one of the exercises that I did was creating a new emotional contract with myself and a new healthy identity. So I guess you could call it kind of like a mantra. but it was deeper than that. It was more of like I am something new and I'm becoming something new. So I used to feel like nothing was wrong with me because I was getting success and results and accomplishments.

So I thought it was everyone else's problems and everyone else just didn't understand and get me. So everyone else was wrong. I wasn't wrong. That was my ego. And I used to feel like there was nothing wrong with me, even though I couldn't sleep at night and was stressed out a lot. But when I got faced myself and started doing some of these exercises and workshops, one of the exercises was around creating a new identity and shaping the identity I wanted

to become and step into. So maybe it wasn't who I actually was yet, but I wanted to step into this and become any time that I felt like I was falling back into a negative pattern or in reaction or falling from grace emotionally. And that contract was, and still is 10 years later, that I am a loving, passionate, wise man. And before that, I believed that I was stupid. I believed that I was the dumbest person in every room. I believe that I was more frustrated and unforgiving based on my actions.

I was angry based on my actions and reactions. I didn't think I was an angry person, but based on results, I showed up angry when I was triggered. And I said to myself, this no longer serves me, the people around me, or my mission. It doesn't help these things. It drains my energy. It sucks the life out of me. It lowers my vibration.

It causes less abundance to come to my life and less joy. So is it really helping me to emotionally react in triggering situations? were not and it didn't help. So I had to realize that this is not helping me. This is not serving my mission and I want to be clear on my mission and move forward towards that. And I also knew that was hurting me in relationships like being reactive, being guarded, being triggered was hurting me in intimate relationships, business relationships,

friendships, friendships, family. And so I said that's not what I want to be anymore. So I want to become someone new, a healthy identity. And I used to be a very intense self-critic to my internally, speaking poorly to myself, man, you're stupid, what an idiot you are. I can't believe you did that. You're such a dummy. I would say these things to myself. So I created an identity of those things because I believed them. And so when I started to realize, okay, I need a new contract for my identity in my life, a contract that I speak and own, a contract that I write

down in words, and I sign the contract. That's what I did. So there was an exercise that allowed me to create this contract with myself identity in an empowering way as opposed to the disempowering way that I'd done for 30 years of my life before then. And I think a lot of the world speaks to themselves in negative tones and words internally and externally to other people. How many friends have you met in the past who were like, oh, I was such an idiot here. I can't believe I did this stupid thing. You know, I just was not good enough.

I just didn't believe in myself or I wasn't pretty enough to go do this. I don't have the skills to do this. So why would anyone pick me? When we are so self-critical, it only disempowers us. We live in a powerless mindset with that state of being. The greatest mindset is creating a healthy identity with self. And being a positive self-coach, not a negative self-critic. This may seem pretty basic concepts, but a lot of us don't apply this on a consistent basis.

And so when I created this contract, I am a loving, passionate, wise man. Sign it. I had to embody it and believe it. And at the moment, I'd realize that that wasn't who I was fully, but it was who I wanted to become fully. And I was excited about embracing that way of being and practicing it. So it was a daily practice of saying this contract to self for a long time. When I would get triggered, I would say, no, I'm a loving, passionate, wise man. So what is a loving, passionate wise man do in this scenario? How does he respond?

How does we react? How does he show up? And I started living into that until it became me, until I embodied this way of being. And I remember thinking to myself, well, I can't write smart because I don't believe I'm smart. At the time, I didn't believe that because of past experiences. But I actually did believe I was wise. I believed I had like incredible relationship wisdom.

I understood people. I believe that I was really good at strategizing an idea and bringing it to life. I believe that I was really street smart, right? So I actually did believe I had wisdom and experience. So I could so me being like I'm a loving, passionate, intelligent or smart, high IQ individual wouldn't have resonated with me. So it must be an authentic belief that you're stepping into that. that resonates. You can't lie to yourself.

I did have love, but it wasn't consistent. So it was there, but now I needed to be consistent with it. I did have passion, but I also had a lot of anger. So it wasn't consistent. So now I'm going to transmute the anger into passion more consistently. I did have wisdom, but now I wanted to do it more consistently. So I became this contract and I stepped into it daily until I didn't need to say it to myself anymore, I became it. That's so powerful. And like you said, it can seem so simple on the

surface and yet it's so profound. And I think one of those profound things about it that's actually not simple in practice is that most people don't realize that they're constantly telling themselves some story. Now, it doesn't look like you waking up and immediately saying, I'm an idiot. Yes. Right? Sometimes it could look like that, but often it's in the background. You don't even realize that you have another contract with yourself. And you never maybe intentionally signed it, but life gave you a bunch of experiences and you co-signed it. Exactly.

So that contract is already there. So this isn't about like, oh, this is weird here. You know, you come up with some new mantra or contract. That seems a little strange. By the way, you already have one, whether you think you have one or not. Whether you signed it or not, you've been living by a certain set of beliefs. Call it a contract, call it a mantra or a limiting belief, whatever you want to call it. However, whatever tool or experience or exercise necessary to support you and moving forward,

I'm all four. And for the last 10 years, I've done a lot of them. The only thing I haven't done is psychedelics. But I feel like I've done and tried pretty much every type of therapeutic healing modality from emotional intelligence and leadership workshops that allow you to do a lot of exercises is embodying forgiveness and healing past pain, to, you know, weeks long meditation retreats in India where it was more about mindful meditation, to, you know, week long intensive neuroscience retreat with Dr. Joe Dispenza, where it was more about the science of the mind and how it

affects the body. So heavy and intellectual intelligence, data, neuroscience, and practice, to Wimhoff breathing and all types of types of breathing. breathing strategies to release trauma from the body to cold therapy exposure, to hot therapy exposure, to talk therapy with multiple different therapists and coach over the last decades, to just constantly being in the journey of interviewing the top neuroscientist, therapist, healers, spiritual leaders in the world over a decade and applying these things over time. So I haven't done everything, but I've done a lot of different things.

and whatever works for you, do it. Use whatever emotional, psychological, or physical tools to support you and empower you to step into a better version of yourself that feels more peace, love, and freedom, whatever it is. And if it's psychedelics, cool. I've just never done it. And I am actually, for me, I have a lot of friends who have done it and swear by psychedelics. I've seen too many of the cases of how they affect the brain negative.

and seeing people actually go downward after psychedelics, that for me, I'd rather do everything without external drugs first in order to heal and process and create new tools. That's my belief. I feel like the body that we have, the brain and the, all the makeup inside of us is the strongest pharmacy, is everything in the body. it knows how to heal. It is the greatest healer if we allow it to do its job. So I believe with the body and with other psychological and emotional twos, we can heal and have strategies for peace and harmony.

But that being said, if I went all these years and none of these things worked and I tried everything, I'd probably be like, okay, let's try the drugs. So I don't want to say, like, don't do that, but I've just never done them, so I don't want to endorse it. You know, these are all tools in the toolbox. Yes. But fundamentally, and you and I are simpatico in this area, is at the end of the day, what tool is going to help you reestablish a different relationship with yourself? 100%. And as somebody who, like you, done a lot of emotional intelligence workshops and many of the same things that you mentioned. Yes.

For years, people would tell me, I had a lot of the early experts like Dr. Roland Griffiths on my podcast. you know, psilocybin researcher at Johns Hopkins who really broke through a lot of this stuff. For years, people would say, you know, try, try this, try that. Right. And I say, you know, I have nothing against it. It's just not calling me now. It's not calling me now. It's not calling me.

And then last year, I met a group and I was like, oh, you know what? I liked their approach. Yes. I liked how they were approaching it and the fact that they were making it sacred. Right. It was a real pilgrimage and it was really something that we were doing. and I decided and I put that just because you brought it up, I'm just adding into this.

I went to my loved ones, my wife who I recently married, and I went to my parents who listened to my podcast, shout out to my mom and dad, and I went to my brother-in-law, who had also expressed some interest and listened to a few episodes. And I said,

this could be a really interesting experience. Would you guys want to do this together? That's interesting. And this group that was based in Hawaii, you know, obviously this is all, you know, talk to your doctor, everything else like that, all the things, it's technically not legal to do, but generally decriminalize in different areas, set up this incredible retreat for us.

That's beautiful. Three weeks ago, we went. Really? And my parents and my wife and my brother-in-law and two of my best friends, we all had this journey and experience. Wow. And it was one of the most mystical experiences of our life. That's beautiful.

Now, every single person there has put in the work. Yes. Beforehand, yeah. beforehand. And even I've had top experts in psilocybin and different psychedelics that are out there. In our case, we were, you know, it was a deeper experience with mushrooms, right? And they tell you that 90% of the benefit is not the trip. It is the integration. The application. The application. That's the only thing, because you can go to any type of workshop that can get you a heightened state and feel like, oh, I just released all this stuff, it's life-changing. But most people go back to their old way of being

within a few months after the effects wear off. Everything is about the integration of whatever you do. Therapy is the same way. You could have this big awakening in therapy. But if you're not applying the lessons daily when life happens, you won't integrate it. And so it won't be effective. And there's a lot of people that I know who swear by ayahuasca and mushrooms and psychedelics. and it's like they got to do it every month. And I'm like, well, what's the point of doing it every month? As opposed to just applying it after once or twice and applying the things you're learning and not needing a drug.

So again, I'm not against it or for it. I've never done it. And I think the way you did it makes sense if you're going to do it in a sacred environment with close friends and family. But applying the lessons continually is where you gain the wisdom. not just I had an awakening and a mystical experience and it was the craziest experience in my life. Okay, and three weeks later, are you still an asshole?

Are you still, you know, not open with your loved ones? Are you still not generous and giving? Are you still beating yourself up? Then the experience was a great moment, but you've got to do the work consistently to apply the things that you're holding your back. You know, your pain analogy earlier was really the, for me, was the unlock also in my own life.

How much can you look at the pain, the thing that you're stuffing below, you're spending all your energy, people don't realize it, they're wearing a backpack and it has 500 pounds of rocks in it and it feels like life is so tough, even the things that should bring them join their life. I used to have a story around how capable I was and my contribution to things. So when I would have a company that would do well, when I would have a situation that would do well, when I would have a business partner and we'd have a strategy that worked out and the company would make millions of dollars and I was a part of it. I was not the only part of it.

I would always discount that and I'd say that was just luck. Really? Yeah. Wow. That was my narrative. That was my narrative. That wasn't something that I was a part of along with the team and that I shepherded it and I was a part of that success.

It was like this was random. And, you know, through doing some of these. Man, I wish I had some of your randomness, you know? And, you know, I know a little bit of your journey, so I know kind of some of the workshops and stuff you've done. I've done similar ones, but maybe they were called different things. And one of the narratives that I got very clear on is that when I was younger, I, like my parents, especially being immigrant parents, put so much emphasis on school. And I really struggled right around the age you start doing like regular like spelling and arithmetic. And I don't know about your school back in the day, but when you'd get a bad grade on a test, you'd have to take it home and your parents would sign it to show that they've seen it, not wait till the report card.

So I was getting all these bad grades on test. And I'm bringing it home to my dad. And he's like, we spend so much time with you. We spend all this time after school with you. And like, we're just at the beginning of arithmetic and math and other things. And you are not like just struggling a little bit. You're really struggling. like my parents are like banging their head against the wall and I get reprimanded.

So what did I learn how to do? Okay, parent, the teacher gives you the paper. I'd crumple it up and I'd stuff it in my desk. Because when I take the paper home, I get in trouble. I get scolded. Well, what do kids do? They're trying to just avoid pain. Yes.

Stuff the paper, stuff the paper, stuff the paper. Finally, like three, four weeks later, my teacher's like cleaning the desk and like my desk is underneath in the little cubby is overflowing. Oh, man. She pulls it out. She calls my parents and I'm home at the time because this is after school. And my parents pick up the phone and are like, yes, yes, this is his parents. And I see them looking at me.

And then my dad is like looking over at me and talking to my teacher and then puts down the phone. It's like, how could you lie? That's the, that was the phrase. Ooh. That was the phrase. The shame around that, the guilt. And I internalized in that moment. I knew immediately what it was about.

I am a liar. Oh, no. And internalizing, I am a liar, is that anything that I'm involved in, right? Even if I see that there's some success attached to it, that, no, no, no, that's not me. That's luck. Wow. Because if that was me, there was some part of me that also felt that, well, I'm a liar. Well, if I'm a liar, is this true?

So instead of leaving it to me, let's leave it up to luck. It was luck. I got lucky this time, right? Until I really understood that narrative. And these stories we tell ourselves when we're a kid are so powerful. It was such a tiny moment. And that was my version. For somebody else, it's going to be not getting picked for the team.

It's going to be somebody telling you you're not pretty enough. It's going to be somebody telling you you're not smart, whatever it is. Until I unpack that story and really, like you talked about, gave it a new meaning and understood, I'm just a child. I'm just doing the best that I could. In my case, actually fast forward, this teacher actually was a big unlock to my life. She started noticing me. She started spending more tension because my dad. and my mom asked her for help and she saw oh it's not that he's not trying he's not putting in work

he actually is genuinely he has dyslexia wow and dyslexia is something that affects the same part of the brain that controls math and spelling yeah and i had to stay after class to go to this training yeah and it was one of the biggest changes but also i don't know if you know this but 60% of fortune 500 CEOs have dyslexia i know this one thing that looks like a wound in one area actually becomes this superpower superpower. Why? Because if you have dyslexia, you get good at asking people for things. You ask, you're not afraid to ask the dumb question because you really need it broken down to you.

And those are things and skill sets that follow you along in life. Yes. Right? Yeah. And when did you realize this and what allowed you to start processing differently? I, for the first time, got a glimpse in it. I was probably around the age of 22. I did this program called Landmark Forum, right?

Which is probably like a sister program to some of the work that you've done. Yes. And in there and in seeing that a lot of our negative patterns come from insecurities. And those insecurities also make us good at certain things. And when you get good at something, you also don't want to get to the root cause of that pain. and me spending all this effort and energy not wanting to address the truth which is that deep down inside

I actually fundamentally believed that I was somehow a fraud or a liar. And what is the beautiful part of that? The kid who was just trying to do his best that didn't know. And yeah, I'm not dyslexic anymore. It pops up every so often here and there. Even if that thing is in the past

and you've healed it and you've moved on, maybe emotionally you haven't healed it. Right. So seeing it in its truth, similar to your story, understanding where it came from, forgiving myself, maybe apologizing to people. Because when you believe, when you're driven by this thing,

I'm not a liar, I'm not a liar, I'm not a liar. Guess what? Later on your life, you develop bad habits where you actually become that thing because you're spending so much energy trying not to be. Wow. So I had to forgive myself, but I had to go apologize to some people.

Projects that weren't handled well. Parts of me where I did not want to tell somebody, I'm overwhelmed. I can't take this on because if I did, that would mean that I'm a liar and I shouldn't have taken on the first place. And meanwhile, everybody around me would have said, okay, hey man, listen, you're all good. Dude, I would run to a meeting 15 minutes late and I'd be so worried about telling the person that I'm running late because I promised that I'd be on time.

If I'm not on time, I'm a liar. If I'm a liar, I'm a fraud and that's exactly what's running my life. I don't deserve anything. So I wouldn't tell them I'm running late and then I get there. And people would be like, dude, a call would have been nice. Sure, let us know before. Let us know before. It would nice, you know?

And I think I'm such a failure. And meanwhile, these people around you, they just love you. And it's not a big deal to them, but it's a big deal to you. We all have stories like that that are running our lives and are running the show until we decide to question. I know, man. What's been the thing that you had to let go the most recently? What did you? What was the big awakening at the, the mushroom ceremony?

You know, for the mushroom ceremony, well, I'll give you two answers to that. Yes. Right. I'll give you the first and the second. The big thing that I've let go recently is something that you and I have jammed out a lot about, and that's the topic of relationships, right? I still fundamentally was attached to this idea that a powerful relationship that I'd have with somebody needed to be this fiery rollercoaster of ups and downs.

No, man. And my entire adult life was a lot of those relationships. And how did those work out for you? They didn't. And they caused a lot of pain on both sides. A lot of pain. And then meeting somebody, my wife now, Yasmin, and she has her stuff together. You know, she knows how to argue in a way that is not trying to tear each other down.

That there's not a deep insecurity that's running the show behind her. We all have our insecurities, but that there's enough awareness to know like, hey, listen, I don't want to destroy our relationship. we can talk about this thing that we disagree about, but we still love each other. We still care about each other. You know, they always say like who you choose to marry is one of the most important decisions of your life and picking somebody who we can continue to build with

instead of re-questioning the foundation. That was a huge insight. And I realized I had some addiction around these fiery relationships because I thought that that way of loving meant that you were in the present moment and you were alive. And I didn't need that. anymore.

No. Right? I never needed that, but I got clear on that. Wow. In terms of my journey, brother, the thing that came up for me

was something so beautiful and simple. I've always felt from the time that I was young, that I won the lottery with my family, right? Especially my siblings. I have two incredible sisters that from the time that we were young were my best friends.

Wow. And we're all so close. They work in my company now. It's amazing. We love hanging out together. We just vibe. We get a lot. And a lot of that was our, my parents really setting us up to be like, look, when you grow up

one day, it's kind of like you guys versus the world. So like you got to have each other's back. And this is what it looks like. Sure, we fought just like any other siblings. We had our stuff. We had that. We weren't like this enlightened family that had everything figured out. But there was this continuous frame of what does it look like to have each other's back.

And we carry that through. And that set the foundation of my future, you know, friendships. Even the way that my sisters would show up in the world, I'd be like, you know what? one day I want to find a partner or a wife that has similar traits of that. It really, maybe it came in a little bit late, but it came in eventually. And the download that I got from my journey, and I'm interviewing my parents actually later on this week to talk about their experience was something super simple. It was this idea that I am meant to do more things with my family.

And it may not make any sense to anybody who's listening. It's like, oh, wow, that's all you got from it. but the clarity that it came up in and the simplicity that it brought to my life was so clear that all these things that I felt like I was chasing or going about in one direction or another it actually was as simple as like to have fun and do good work in the world with my family is something that is so meaningful for me. Now, another component that was there is that, you know, I know recently your father passed away, right? How long ago was it?

A year ago. One of the reasons that I want to do this journey with my dad in particular is that all the research around psilocybin, the most interesting thing to me is that people who approach their later years, who there might be some trepidation about, well, what happens after this or just even fear around dying. A lot of the research that's been done around psilocybin is that there is a sense of on oneness that opens up. You can match it with your faith or religion or tradition. And that on national surveys, the people who go through this experience at an appropriate dose that's assisted, not like a recreational friend's bachelor party weekend in Joshua tree, like an assisted experience.

A fully integrated experience is that older people especially get a little bit of a taste of I feel connected to this greater source that's there. Beautiful. And it's not intellectual. It's feeling. Feeling and physical experience. And my dad is a naturally spiritual person, but the experience that he went through was he literally was in his version.

You know, he identifies as Hindu and that tradition is a big part of his background. He felt that he was, there's no other way to say it, but he felt that he was in heaven. Right. With the creator and in a loving place and this feeling that my dad got that taste, even though he's so spiritual, he's so involved in his temple, he's so involved in his community, he's been, he's such a stand-up person that's there. A lot of those things can be very intellectual in our life. But for him to feel, feel, feel that and us to go through that together and us to have that

moment afterwards was huge. Wow. So this experience with my dad having that and this feeling of like, as my dad, dad gets into his later 70s and I hope knock on wood, he's healthy, he has a good life, everything to know that my parents got a little taste of that and that that fear around the afterlife or whatever is next is not present in that way. That's big. That's huge.

That's huge. I think all of us want to feel the experience of unconditional love and harmony and peace. And if we can do anything to create that now and remember the feeling. so we're not leaning on fear as much is a beautiful thing. So I'm super glad you guys experienced it together. It's really cool. You know, we, I brought up your dad. And I've seen some beautiful posts that you've written about him.

You've told me some stories over the years of, you know, you and him finding new and interesting ways to like reconnect. Yes. Right? And to take some of the wisdom that he, you know, gave you over the years and continue to apply it in your life. You know, looking at this book and you putting it out there, link in the show notes, you know, please people pick it up and pick up a copy for a friend who is struggling is stuck. Anybody who feels stuck, this is a fantastic read for them of like, great, I'm stuck. Like, how do I go forward from here?

Yes. I have some gap between where I want to be and where I'm now. This is a great book for that. What would be one of the sections inside of the book that you think your dad would be most proud of? Probably the, I mean, I think you'd be proud of all of it, but I think the part of overcoming self-doubt. The whole book is really about figuring out why you doubt yourself. I believe self-doubt is the killer of all dreams. When we doubt who we are, when we doubt our abilities,

when we doubt our dreams and manifesting them, we just are holding ourselves back from actually creating something beautiful in the world or feeling what we want to feel in the world because of this insecurity and doubt. There are three main causes of self-doubt. And that's the fear of failure, success, and judgment. And I think he'd be proud of, you know, this, it's really been 10 years of research from interviewing all these individuals on the root cause of us doubting ourselves is from these three fears.

And what's underneath each one of these fears is I'm not enough. And if we can look to why we believe we're not enough in some certain fear, again, around failure, success, or judgment. And the root is, I'm not enough. And so I'm afraid to fail. I'm not enough. And I'm afraid of what success will bring. I'm not worthy of it.

Or it's too much weight. Or I'm not enough because of the fear of judgment of what other people will think and how they'll respond and what they'll say about me. It's the I'm not enoughness with myself underneath it all that holds us back and causes us to doubt ourselves. So when we learn the art of having a new relationship, relationship with self, that I am worthy enough. Maybe I'm not where I want to be.

Maybe I don't have the skills yet. Maybe I'm not extremely happy with how my health journey has been or my actions or my habits yet. But I can look to my last memory to right now and say, man, okay, I'm here. I am worthy enough. Now, I've got to take some actions in different ways to improve upon it. But at least getting to a place of harmony of acceptance of where you are. now. It's one of the hardest things I think for a lot of us to do. That's why I used to say,

well, you know, I just got lucky, but I'm actually not deserving. I'm not enough because I'm a liar. I'm a fraud, right? So I don't really deserve this. And it's not really mine. We don't fully claim what you've created. We must learn to claim all of our life and face everything, all our fears, shames, doubts, insecurities, wrongdoings, things that have done wrong to us, all of it. Claim and own it and accept it and say, this is where I am right now. Face yourself in the mirror and say, I don't have to like it.

I don't have to agree with it. I don't have to want other people to go through this, but I accept where I'm at. And now I'm going to create a game plan of how to improve upon it. One of the things that I think keeps us in a feeling and a fear of I'm not enough is we allow ourselves to be consumed by these fears. that keep us in that narrative. So one of the practices that I've done over the years is creating a fear list,

the things that really caused me to doubt myself the most. What are the activities where I feel most insecure? Public speaking was one of those, dancing was one of those in public. You know, learning a language was one of those because they all made me feel I'm not good enough. I'm not smart enough, talented enough. And therefore, people will judge me based on my not being enough. I won't belong.

I won't fit in. I won't be accepted by others. That was the fear. But when I learned to say, well, how do I fully belong, fit in and accept myself? That's when everything started to shift for me. But we're so worried about belonging and fitting in with others that we project certain things to try to have friends, family, community, support us and love us and accept us. But when it's coming from a place of I'm not enoughness, it doesn't matter how much people

love us. We are not able to receive their love fully because we are, lying to ourself. We don't accept and love ourself. So the journey of getting to I am enough will give you the courage to make a list of all your fears and start going all

in on those fears one by one knowing it's going to be humiliating, knowing it's going to be embarrassing, knowing you're going to fail and it's not going to be successful right away. Public speaking was a journey of mine for a year of complete humiliation and embarrassment. But I got to a place of

I'm enough. I'm never going to be as good as someone else in this thing, but I can be the best that I can be. And the process of actually doing this every week, making it full of myself in front of a group of people who are professional speakers. And proving over time is actually going to give me more confidence and has become a superpower of mine like you talked about. The thing that was once one of the biggest insecurities for you dyslexia is now one of the biggest superpowers. Same thing for me with public speaking. It's like now it's something as a tool to serve my meaningful mission. But if I didn't have the courage to overcome the fear consistently, it still hold me back.

So I had to learn how to say I accept and acknowledge who I am even if I'm not the best speaker. But I'm going to do these actions every week for a year so that I feel good about me. So it's not about being complacent and just saying I'm enough with who I am and I'm not going to take action. It's I accept where I'm at and now here are the things I want to improve upon and I get to take action so I build the confidence within me on those things where I feel limited. When we do that, that becomes extremely powerful in our life. So I think he'd be proud of kind of that discovery that I've had and the practice of it and the pain I've gone through for many years in order to overcome those things.

just because I feel like he didn't have he went through an accident, you know, 17 years before he passed and lived in a state of kind of suffering for 17 years. And I feel like he didn't have the full brain capacity to live the life that he wanted to because of the brain trauma. So it was just kind of an unfortunate and sad amount of events that occurred where he wasn't really able to fully recover. He could have a conversation. He could do limited activities, but he couldn't work.

He couldn't drive. He couldn't cook for himself. So he's kind of limited in his mental capacities. And I think, you know, it's just sad. Life can be very sad sometimes of why these things happen. And again, I can really be upset about this, which I was for many years and really hurt by it, until I learned to accept this is the situation. And I got to create different meaning.

And if he didn't go through his accident, I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't care about humanity. I would have cared only about me because he was kind of a safety net for me. He was like, you know, go live your football dreams. And then when you're done, like, you can come work with me and you'll always have a job. You know, I've got this business. You can help like run it with me and then you'll be fine. But it's not really what I wanted.

And so when he went through his accident, it made me really start to figure out, well, what is it I want? What is my mission? what do I feel called to do? And maybe that would have been something if I was called to do it, but I wasn't called to do it. So it was nice to have that as a backup. But when that was removed and he had to essentially sell his business because of his disability at that point, I had to get clear on what I wanted. I had to get really clear on a meaningful mission for me and live with urgency, realizing that this could happen to my father in a moment when he's on a vacation, having fun. this could happen to me.

So what type of life do I want to live if I'm like it a year, if I only get a month, a day, like what type of life do I want to live? And, you know, I think he'd be very proud of the way I'm living it. That's a beautiful man. And going back to like how our conversation started off, even the idea of him passing on the torch to you to say, listen, these are the lessons that I gave to you.

And now you creating this platform to be able to give those lessons to other people. Exactly. The ones that came from your dad. Exactly. And that's the highest expression of, you know, honoring our parents, our ancestors is like passing on that wisdom, right? What was the phrase?

I'm a wise. Loving, passionate, wise man. I'm a loving, passionate, wise man. And, you know, through the support of the people before us, you know, we can really step into that. I want to ask, you know, sometimes people step into action. And they're writing down that mantra, that. phrase, that thing, getting clear on their meaning. And they notice that as they start to shift a little bit, the people around them, sometimes friends, sometimes family too, get a little nervous.

They don't like it. They don't like it. It's like, who are you? Why are you trying to be something different? Why are you changing? We used to have a way. We used to complain together. And that's how we connected. We used to drink together. That's how we connected. We used to do this. We used to do that. whatever it might be, what have you seen that you get started? You know, you ignite that booster rocket. You're taking off. But you feel this immense sense of gravity of the people who say that they love you around you, but they want you to be the old version of you.

I've lost a lot of friends over the years, not because I wanted to, but because they just didn't resonate with me anymore and they didn't want to reply to my calls or hang out anymore. And it was hurtful when it started to happen. It started to happen after college. Here I had like, you know, hundreds of guy friends from playing football and sport, basketball, and track and these relationships, these bonds that I created going through extreme pain and adversity, overcoming challenges and having these journeys with guys. And I remember when I went to pursue playing arena football, professional football,

I would try to call them and be like, here's the journey, here's what I'm doing, here's the tryouts, this and this. And some people weren't excited for me. A couple people were, and we had great conversations, but the people, they just weren't interested or they were in fear or they were frustrated that I was going and doing something and they weren't doing the thing that they wanted to do, whatever it was. And that was sad for me because I felt alone going after the things that I wanted in a lot of ways.

My family's always been very supportive. Although they didn't really know what I was doing, they were always like, yeah, go do your, go to your dream, even though they didn't know what I was doing. They supported me, at least, which was great. But it was always kind of the friends. And it's like I've had to evolve and know that some people are going to continue to grow with me and be excited about what I'm up to and others are going to not be excited. And so I had to learn in my early 20s that the hard way. And now I'm just accepted it.

And I've got some really close, like, core group of friends. So I feel like we'll ride with me no matter what happens. And then others that are, you know, there as well. who will support it, but some may not. And learning to accept people for who they are and show up for them the best way I can. And just be okay with it. If people aren't happy with me anymore, okay, I accept that.

I appreciate you and I want the best for you. But it was challenging in the beginning. And it hurt me a lot. It really did hurt me a lot. And now I just know this is part of life. It's the whole crabs in a bucket mentality. You know, there's a bucket of crabs. and one crab tries to crawl out,

the other crabs pull the crab down back in the bucket to be like with the rest. And sometimes when the crab keeps trying to go out, they'll actually break the legs of the crab off so it cannot leave the bucket. And, you know, you just want to make sure you're around of other group of people that all want to get out of the bucket together

and want to put you on your shoulders and push you out, not to try to break your legs on the way down. Yeah, and also like, having empathy for them. Yeah. Because they love you. And even though you know you're on this journey to better yourself, they see it as it's putting distance between you and that.

And they out of fear may say things to you. This is a very common thing. And then our response, which is the only thing that we can control, goes back to chapter number six, fear of judgment, number three, is we get worried. We get worried about being ostracized. Yes. We get worried about being kicked out of the tribe. And we're like, I have it hard enough trying to achieve all these goals and dreams. And the people who love me, you don't have my back.

Like I need to downregulate and make myself, you know, something else. But anytime we do that, we create so much more pain for ourselves because we're not living our life in authentic way. I had to do. In my early 20s, I felt alone. And it scared me because I was chasing after kind of my football dreams and then business dreams. And it actually scared me for a while.

This was part of my fear. was on my fear list was being alone. And again, public speaking, dancing, being alone, all these different things were on my list. And I said, this is going to cripple me for the rest of my life if it's still a fear. So I had an intentional, I don't know, a couple of years where I decided to go out by myself alone for lunch, for dinner to the movies on a walk to the park. I went on a date with myself essentially. It kind of sounds weird.

and I wanted to build a healthy relationship with me around being alone and accepting myself and having fun by myself, having good conversations with myself, and shifting the narrative from being a scary thing to a beautiful thing. And it took a couple of years of practicing it where it was hard. I'd go out by myself, I'd go to the movies alone. I think everyone's kind of looking at me or I just feel like an idiot. and I started to rewrite the story of like appreciating myself, having fun with myself, meeting strangers and having new interactions with people alone, not needing to be with a friend

all the time. And that gave me a lot of power today. And for the last, you know, 15 years by practicing that because I haven't been influenced to fall back down just because I was afraid of being alone with friends. It doesn't mean it's always fun. but I think going after what you want can feel lonely at times if you don't have the right people around you to support you. That's why I think it's really important to choose quality friends, choose quality people in your life who are on a mission of growth and that want to grow.

They don't have to be changing the world, but they're in the process of growing, of developing, of acting in accordance with alignment of their habits and things like that. And they just want to keep improving. Again, you can be at different levels of success. But if people have a mindset that is about growth, I'm down with those people all the time. It's like you were practicing a version of this stoic idea. They say like, die before you die. A tiny way, you know, you were afraid of, you know, being alone.

So you're taking yourself on dates. You're hanging out. You're going to watch a movie by itself. There's a lot of things in our life that we want to work up to. and never underestimate the power of doing a tiny version of that. You want to write a book? What does it look like to just write something small? Yeah.

Post it. Share it with, you know, I don't know about friends, but people that are growth related or interested in that subject. Just a tiny version of that. Sometimes I think the other version of people, and it's probably another, the other side of the coin of I Am Not Enough, which is there's a grandiose vision, but no ability to put it into out.

action. Yes. And so the goals, I see this a lot. The goal is so ambitious, so big, which I love anybody having a big ambitious goal, but it's basically they're starting at square one. And it's that big goal or nothing. Right. It's I'm going to make some crazy amount of money in a certain amount of time or I'm going

to fall in love, get married and start a family in like six months or something that just like is so crazy and ambitious, which great. sometimes those things happen, but without the steps that are taking us there. For somebody who's in that category, right? The person who's always starting new things but then kind of quitting them and having some new goal, what would you say for them or is there a section of your book that you feel that is a good thing for them to jump? Yeah, towards the end, I talk about enlisting support.

I look at my life as an athlete and life as a sport. And when you think of the greatest athletes, who are the greatest athletes you can think of, just like two or three? like the world champions, the ones who win every year, like who are a few names that you can think of? The Williams sisters, you know, Jordan Brady. Yep. Okay.

So all these men and women who are world champions time and time again, when they got to their first world championship, none of them did it on their own. They all had a great coach that got them there. When they won their first championship, they didn't say, thanks, coach. I think I got it from here, the rest of my career. I'm going to go do this on my own now. They actually, most of them hired more

coaches, more support. They got more support. And that's called wisdom. Let's say, hey, it's hard to get to the top. It's hard to stay on top. Now when everyone's trying to pull me down, all these other crabs in the bucket trying to bring me down or beat me, let me have more support, more coaching around me to find my weak spots and improve upon the things to make me better. And I think a lot of people try to do life alone. And I'm not saying you need to have a coach, but I think it's important to enlist support, whether that's accountability, whether that's a guide, a therapist, a friend who's a mentor who's done it before you to guide you.

When I got into business, I didn't do it on my own because I didn't know what I was doing. I found support. And as I've continued to grow, I've got an emotional coach that I meet with almost every two weeks, not because I need it, but because I want to continue to elevate myself and prepare and prevent things in the future from happening. I've got, you know, a business coach, I've got a nutritionist coach, I've got a workout coach, and I think these are wise things to have. I could also have accountability in certain things if I didn't want to invest in coaching,

but I really feel like we should be finding support in every area of life where we feel deficient and finding support in the things we're actually really good at to keep us there and help us to improve. I just think it's wisdom. I talk about creating a personal advisory board. Again, you don't have to have money to do this, but you have to have courage to reach out and build relationships with people and ask for support. And again, the biggest companies in the world have advisory boards for a reason. You have an advisory board for a reason in your company. And it's not because you're weak or small-minded. It's because you're wise and you're looking for wisdom from other people to accelerate or minimize problems.

So why go through life without a coach in every area or an accountability buddy or friend who's a little bit farther ahead than you in that area of life? And why try to do it on your own? I just think it's wise. Such a great answer. And I think that there's this individual. I definitely was one of them in the beginning of my journey who having super grandiose goals, but not having an accountability partner, not having a coach.

And again, when I had no money, not even just having a friend saying, how are you doing? Are you making progress on that? Them keeping me accountable and me keeping them accountable because I didn't want to be seen. Because again, this goes back to the fear of failure. What if somebody actually holds me accountable and I don't make progress? Well, guess what? I don't make progress on my goals all the time, but you get back up. Exactly.

You pivot or you double down on that thing. Yeah, it's like what I said with you, you know, when I saw you today, I was like, man, you look amazing. You know, you got lean. And you're like, well, I've got a full. team that works with me on my workouts, my nutrition and all these things, and they're supporting me and getting the results I want. I'm sure you're just fine on your own. And you can go to the gym and work out hard and you can eat well. You know what to do. You're in the world of health and wellness. But like all great individuals, we can do these things once or multiple times,

but sometimes we just need a little extra support when we're going through some of the challenge. and having a coach or a team or someone to hold us accountable makes us just go that extra little rep or that be accountable at the highest level and support us in our goals than us getting away with it from missing a few days here and there on our own. I have this men's group that meets in L.A. every Thursday.

Wow. And you actually have some mutual friends. Your buddy Chris. Yes. Obviously he moved to Tampa, but he started his own group out there. That's great. We call it Man Morning.

In fact, I think somebody set up a website, manmourning.com, like if people want to set up one in their area. And every Thursday we get together, you know, usually like not 52 weeks out of the year, but like at least 30. So it's pretty regular. And we get together. And inside of that group, we basically are asking each other like, what's something you're celebrating today and what's something you're navigating? And at the end of it, you know, we walk, we're lucky in L.A. We can walk on the beach. We can walk up.

There's hikes. Everywhere you go, there's like a nice place to walk. that's over here and pretty much a year-round which makes it great and in this hour we meet at eight we walk from eight to nine in this time period at the end of the the group we open it up and say often like who here needs support like and two guys will just be like hey okay i'll keep each other accountable on that i have one of the buddies inside of that group uh restaurant tour you know multiple serial entrepreneur here in los angeles and he's like hey you know i've always wanted to do cold therapy and there's a great place down the street from where the office over here, I was like, you know what, let's meet.

We'll meet at 7 a.m. in the morning. We'll go do it together. We'll keep each other accountable, right? We'll spend three and a half minutes at negative 400 degrees or whatever the cryo chamber is. And it's a tiny little thing. But, you know, confidence is built when you make a promise. I'm going to do something for yourself. You show up and you look back on your day and you have all these promises that are built up. So for people who don't have confidence right now, or feel like, you know what, I don't know. I need to see some proof that I am enough. Even making small commitments fulfilling those showing up, that is your receipt that you're on your way and that will make you so much more excited about committing to and taking on the next thing in life. Yeah, and I think it's actually the smaller commitments we do consistently that are more important than the big things that we, like the big goals. I'm going to do this in six months, like, but what are the daily actions that will support those results?

and actually kind of letting go of the results of like the end of results and saying, well, I showed up from myself for these six months every day or three days a week. I feel like you build more confidence from that than the actual end result. Because it shows you I'm a person capable of doing what I say. And it is all about the destination, obviously. I mean, sorry about the journey, not the destination about how we show up continuously, not the end result. There's a lot of things that I went after where I got the end result and I wasn't happy.

I showed up, I did the things consistently, I got the end result after five, 10, 15 years of wanting this big end result. And I still wasn't happy because I didn't feel enough. So you can still do those things and not feel enough. You've got to learn both doing the things consistently to feel enough and also knowing that you are enough and deserving through healing and mending so that when big things happen, you can actually celebrate and appreciate them. We're talking about your birthday coming up, but what are some other,

ways that you consistently celebrate yourself. Every day, man, it's a celebration. I think about, you know, I wake up next to a beautiful person every single morning that is smiling and laughing and kissing me and telling me how much she loves me. For me, that is a massive celebration because, as you know, you experienced a lot of ups and downs and relationships in the past. And so did I. And this was always a dream of mine to wake up next to someone.

who smiles and is joyful in the morning, who appreciates me, who loves me, and accepts me for who I am. That is a celebration because it gives me peace and energy. So every day I wake up, when I wake up next to her, if we're not traveling, I feel like it's a massive celebration to wake up and feel peace in my heart

and not feel pain like I used to feel. That's a huge celebration. One question about that before you go on. You know, a lot of couples, especially you've been together for well, you get in this automatic period, especially when people are very successful. This happens to very successful people, you know, who are successful in their own right, have good jobs, careers, whatever, and you get into autopilot. Are there things that you guys do that anchor,

that celebration that just make it a little bit easier to be like, wow, this is like a moment that we're sharing. And like 10 years ago, this was my biggest dream, but we have it right now. I think when you experience a lot of pain in previous relationships of it not working out, you can really appreciate when you have someone who is an incredible person. So I'm in a stage, and I hope to stay in this stage of just constant appreciation with her. When I wake up, I tell her how much I appreciate her, just because I know how beautiful this is and how sacred the relationship is compared to 15 years of me. again, I don't blame anyone else I was in it.

I chose certain people. I stayed in these things that weren't healthy in alignment with my values, vision, and lifestyle. And so that's all my responsibility for experiencing that. Every night, we have a ritual. It's very simple. I feel like anyone could do is we, before we go to sleep, we both share three things we're grateful for or from the day. And one of them is about each other.

And so by anchoring that routine and ritual every night, whether we're together, or FaceTiming or whatever, it just keeps us in a state of appreciation. And I believe what you appreciate appreciates in value. What you pour into and invest in will grow over time. So because that's, you know, it's two minutes at night. And it allows me to anchor that before I go to sleep as opposed to being frustrated or resentful or upset. I anchor gratitude, appreciation, acknowledgement, and ultimately,

peace before I sleep. Now where I wake up peaceful because I went to bed peaceful. And I wake up in gratitude and I hug her and I kiss her and I tell her I'm so grateful to be here. It's so beautiful to wake up next to you. And she's smiling and she's kissing me and it feels beautiful. So to have that ritual, even if I don't see her all day or don't talk to her much throughout the day, to have that is something that is a beautiful ritual. I love that.

recently my wife and I we set up this thing because we noticed, you know, it's the nature of reality that you kind of get off track a little. Yeah. You get into a routine of whatever life. So we've been quite busy right now. I've been doing a lot of podcasts, you know, early part of the year.

My business partner's launching a book. So I saw a few times I would kind of come home because my place is not that far away from the studio over here. I get to, I can walk if I want to. I get home and, you know, she's just getting out of her meetings. I'm kind of coming back.

We see each other. We're both just trying to eat a little bit before we go on in the next thing. Like, hey, babe, how are you good? Like, how's your day? Like, still friendly, still good, right? But still in your own little space. Still in our own space.

And I said to her the day, I was like, I went to her room. I said, hey, you know, are you busy right now? Are you in a Zoom meeting or anything like that? Her office? And she's like, no, no, no. I was like, I want to do better. I get home. Like, I want to greet you.

I want to give you hug. I want to say, I love you. And I want to say, how are you doing? It's something tiny. It's beautiful. Right. And I'm not saying that I'm going to be some perfect husband that's going to figure out how to just keep on doing that forever. But it was a tiny little reminder that was like, oh, I'm on autopilot a little bit too much.

We do the gratitude thing too. Yes, yes. But I want to create something else. When I come back, I just want to see you and just like really kind of be with you for a second. It's beautiful. And she had this moment. She was like, I like this. I'm game.

I'll work on it too. That's great. We'll go, man. It's great. Anchoring the celebratory moments in life. Yeah, she does a great job when I come home. I mean, she's incredible. When I come home, she like, I don't know if there's a time she hasn't done this.

I'm trying to think. Maybe it's not every time, but it seems like it is. I come home and she runs and jumps in my arms and she gets excited. And I'm just like, wow, it makes me, I've never experienced that. So it makes me feel like I want to come back and I want to be around her because she's excited to see me. She runs, she jumps, she's tiny. So she like jumps up on me. She kisses me.

She's like, it's so good to see you. I've missed you. And that feels good when someone feels missed and acknowledged and appreciated. So I try to do my best to appreciate and acknowledge and see her the way she loves to be seen, the way she loves to be loved. And luckily, our love languages are very similar. And I think when you show up as yourself and someone receives love that way, naturally, it makes it more effortless.

It's like I don't have to do something that I'm not good at. so that she feels loved. So I feel like we got very, we aligned very well with our love languages as well, which helps both of us show up naturally who we are and the other person feels seen and loved because of that. Well, the thing that I want to, you know, acknowledge about you here in this moment

and what you're sharing, you know, there's people that are listening that maybe aren't in a relationship right now. And part of this greatness mindset is finding those moments all the time that we can get a chance to celebrate and especially one of the hardest ones is the one in ourselves. Yes. When we celebrate ourselves more, when we acknowledge ourselves, when we see how we were doing the best that we could, even when we messed up. And sometimes we have to own up to that mess.

Sometimes we have to clean up that mess. Sometimes we have to apologize for that mess. That's all part of this mindset that's there. When we see ourselves in those little moments and we acknowledge that and we anchor it, that's us basically creating a new framework. Yes. And we're getting out of that default neural network, right, that they talk about in sort of brain science. Our ego that was fighting so hard to have this vision of us because its deepest fear was of the unknown. And now when we're acknowledging all these little moments where we're showing up and doing the best that we can,

especially in areas of life that we might have struggled in, that's a little moment of finding that that's these moments of finding the love, the joy, the appreciation in ourself. And it makes it so much easier to do and everything else. And I feel like from the get go of you and I meeting and like connecting through Summit series. It's been like 10 years now. a long time now. 10, 11 years. I've known you. I've always known you as somebody who is so generous with your acknowledgement of other people.

And that always felt as like, wow, this person's done the work of being generous and acknowledging of themselves. Not that it was all easy. Right. But they're noticing those things. And, you know, I want to just recognize it inside of you. I hope to be even more and more like that. I appreciate it, Drew.

Thanks, man. Appreciate you. The book is out there. The greatness mindset. Unlock the power of your mind and live your best life today. you have a bunch of cool things you're doing with the book that are out there. People pre-order it right now. You can pre-order it.

You can go on Amazon. You can go wherever you get books, pick up a copy. And yeah, check me out. Louis House, School of Greatness. And let me know what you think of it. Awesome, brother. A pleasure to have you back on the podcast. Thanks, brother.

Appreciate you. Thank you for being a really great friend and a mentor in my life. Of course. Appreciate you, man.