Dhru Purohit Show - Neuroscientist Explains How To Rewire The Brain To Manifest Your Goals And Desires With Dr. James Doty

Episode Date: May 1, 2024

This episode is brought to you by BiOptimizers and Lumebox.  The concept of manifestation is often discussed, yet many need a clearer understanding of its essence and how to integrate it into their lives. Our guest today is poised to explore manifestation in depth, uncovering its neuroscience foundations and practical application. Today, on the Dhru Purohit Podcast, Dhru engages in a thought-provoking conversation with Dr. James Doty about the power and neuroscience behind manifestation. Dr. Doty shares his insights on how we are all actively manifesting our lives and provides practical exercises that can help us clarify our manifestation goals. These exercises are not just theoretical concepts but actionable steps we can start implementing today.   Dr. James R. Doty, MD, has been on the Stanford University School of Medicine faculty since 1997 in the Neurosurgery Department as a professor and more recently as an adjunct professor. He is also the founder and director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford and a New York Times bestselling author of Into the Magic Shop: A Neurosurgeon’s Quest to Discovery the Mysteries of the Brain and the Secrets of the Heart.    In this episode, Dhru and Dr. James Doty dive into (audio version / Apple Subscriber version): What is possible when you take agency and don’t look for external validation (00:00:20  / 00:00:20) You are actively manifesting your current life (4:00 / 4:00) What is manifestation from a neuroscience perspective (8:30 / 6:14) The mistakes people make when manifesting (10:00 / 7:46) Dr. Doty’s powerful childhood experience (17:00 / 14:45) The power of identity and what happens when losing the identity (32:00 / 27:42) Exercises to clarify and define your manifestations (37:00 / 33:20) How do reclaim focus and keep the noise out (49:00 / 45:36) The importance of action (59:00 / 55:33) How Dr. Doty approaches manifestation (1:05:00 / 1:01:36) What if you don’t know what to manifest (1:13:00 / 1:08:55) How to identify limiting beliefs and critical beliefs (1:20:00 / 1:16:25)  Releasing expectations (1:37:00 / 1:33:22) What happened to Ruth and final thoughts (1:43:00 / 1:39:10) Also mentioned in this episode: Dr. Doty’s book Mind Magic  Into the Magic Shop-Dr. Doty’s Podcast For more on Dr. Doty, follow him on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Go to bioptimizers.com/dhru now and enter promo code DHRU10 to get 10% off any order and free gifts for a limited time. Lumebox is offering my community $260 off their FDA-approved portable Red Light device!  That's over 40% off! Go to thelumebox.com/dhru and get your Red Light device. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Doty, today we're diving deep into the art and science of manifestation, including how an understanding of the neuroscience around manifestation can radically change our lives for the better. So I'd love to start there. Can you tell our audience that's listening and watching today what you think will be possible for them and their lives after listening to this interview? I think there are several aspects. One is, unfortunately, so many people give their agency away. And what I mean is that they look outside of themselves for something that will guide them

or that there's some cosmic presence out there that's going to intervene. And in fact, the first sentence of the book, as you know, is the universe doesn't give a fuck about you. And the reason is, is because the universe has no f***es to give. And the point is that so many of us, and I included, earlier,

in my life, I looked for external affirmation. People who would say, well, what you're doing is good or that's right or, geez, you did incredible things I like you, all with the goal of sort of making me feel okay about myself. And in some ways, this very much relates to that, because the answer is, only you have the power to make yourself happy. As Epictetus has said, and many other Stoics, you may not be able to control your circumstance, but you can control how you react to your circumstance. And in many ways, that's the truth about happiness. And also, of course, how you look at the world. So I'm sure you've been in the situation where you've shared with a loved one, a family member, geez, you know, I want this to happen. God, I'm so excited about this. I think this is a great

idea. And then they'll say something like, no, that's stupid. Why would you do that? Or you can't do that. And, you know, obviously that's very hurtful and for many people deflating. But if you have your own internal compass that guide you and you have a vision of what you want to do, and you do some fairly straightforward practices, but it's not as if it's a one and done. It's a process. I think the other thing people get confused about manifestation is that there's a timeline here, or it works out exactly the way you want. And there's not, and you have to be patient. One of the things I think that causes suffering for a lot of people is attachment,

and this is attachment to outcome. When everything is focused on an outcome, if it doesn't manifest or occur the way you wish, you're very disappointed and you're upset. The reality is most of the positive things about goals is actually the journey. It's not necessarily the destination. The same is true of manifesting. The other reality is that sometimes things don't manifest the way you want. And there are reasons for that. And some of them can be very complex or not straightforward. So the idea is how do I

use the tools I have to maximally increase the likelihood of my intention manifesting? There are no guarantees, but how do you use your brain, if you will, to bring about your intention? And I think that's what this is really about. But there is nothing in this world that's 100%. Well, there's a lot there, and we're going to unpack it all. And I'm going to start off with one of the early quotes inside of the book. You mentioned the first one, but there's another quote that's inside the book. And it's a key theme and idea for a lot of people who don't understand how much.

manifestation works and you are not just a writer, although being a writer is a beautiful thing. You're explaining this from a neuroscientist perspective. So I want to share the quote here that you shared in the book. He said, you may not realize it or believe it, but you're already manifesting your life. The question is, is it the life you want? So I think the first thing that I'd love to start off with is that many people don't realize it, but they're actually actively manifesting their current life. Can you explain that? Sure. it's like, if you will, any exercise. When you first start doing it, you're not very good at it. But the thing is, you have to actually practice it with intention, if you will,

meaning that you have to every day put forth effort. And all of us have goals and aspirations. But if we have no understanding or roadmap how to make those reality, then we're lost. So sometimes it'll work, sometimes it won't work. but there's no, if you will, organize plan in your head. And I think that's one of the first things you have to do is to one, actually examine your life and see what's worked, what hasn't worked, and also have a vision of the life you want. And that takes effort to do that.

The other thing which a lot of people don't appreciate, unfortunately, is that who we are today, how we act, how we interact, actually, for many people, is a manifestation of the baggage they carry from childhood. So if you grew up in an environment where, as an example, you were not loved. You did not develop appropriate attachment skills if people were hypercritical of you. That has an impact on every relationship you have, almost every interaction you have, and that can be self-sabotaging. So you also have to understand, as part of this process,

what are the drivers of your behavior? What are you not seen or don't understand? Because, as you know, many people as an example, in relationships, they always pick the same type of person, and oftentimes these codependent relationships. And if you go backwards, oftentimes it relates to how they grew up. Let's start at the basics. From a neuroscientist's perspective, what is manifestation? And even though you touched on it a little bit, give us some of the top misconceptions people have about what it isn't. Or what it is. Yes. I think I understand. So my definition of manifestation is that you, with intention, utilize tools to access parts of your subconscious, if you will, that will embed your intention. And as a result, have an impact on what we call your task positive networks, and then utilize that

information to maximize the potential of whatever that intention is. And what I mean by that is there are certain cognitive networks in your brain, and they work together to essentially make us who we are. but there are certain very specific aspects that are important to work together to maximize your ability to manifest. So you have something called the executive control network, you have what's called the salience network, you have the attention network, and then you have the default mode network. And all of those have to work together to allow you with the greatest likelihood to manifest your intention. When you look around today, what do you see are the top and biggest mistakes that people are practicing or not practicing when it comes to approaching this topic of manifestation?

Well, I think that, and I'll use an analogy that I hope makes sense. Neuroscience has learned about a great deal about, as an example, compassion. And if you look at essentially every religion, which spans thousands of years, there's certain fundamental principles that religions use to impart wisdom, as an example, compassion. And in fact, that's the basis of essentially every religion. But they're wrapped in a dogma, okay? And the dogma is associated with the particular culture. Okay? But the underlying tenants are actually, neuroscience has proven those to be the case, as an example, with compassion. And so we know, that fundamentally as a species, we evolved to nurture to care because we have offspring that

don't swim away or run off into the forest. They have to be cared for. So genetically, we have been endowed with aspects of our DNA, which guide us, as an example, when you care for another, you release oxytocin, which stimulates your pleasure and reward centers. Also, your physiology works at its best. Your heart rate decreases, your pulse decreases, your immune systems boosted. Cortisol levels, the stress hormone levels are decreased. Well, these are because we evolved to care, because if we didn't care, our offspring would not survive. And in many ways, religion has understood this through experiential effects and wrap this around

a dogma. And in many ways, this is true of manifesting. If you look back at the history of manifesting in the first and second century, AD, there's something called hermeticism. And it was this idea that all is in the mind, which fundamentally is true. And then this then, though, was picked up by what we call the new thought wave, a guy named Phineas Quimby, if I recall correctly. And he promoted this idea that your mind could do anything. And again, that is true. But then it went to the next level, which went to what is it? Thinking grow rich and also fundamentally the secret. Now, where did these go off track? Well, let's just deal with the most recent one, the secret. The problem with the secret is that it creates a narrative of self-interest, of selfishness. I

want. And the problem with I want for so many people is on some level, the reason people I want is because they're insecure about themselves. And what I mean by that is most people want to make an impression to others that they're okay. Like as an example for myself, when I was younger, I carried a lot of shame and insecurity. So I thought, well, I'll become a doctor. I'll become a neurosurgeon, I'll become a neuroscientist, I'll become an entrepreneur. And at each one of those levels, I believe that, well, now I'm going to be okay, and all these people are going to look at me, and I'm going to feel good about myself. And it doesn't happen for most people. Because in Western capitalist society, there is this narrative that success means money,

wealth, position. That then translates into happiness. And of course, you know as well as I do, there are zillions of people who are unhappy who have all of these things. And so pushing the narrative that I want actually decreases your ability to manifest. Now, am I saying, well, that's impossible, it won't happen? No. The fundamental techniques, though, that have developed actually are techniques in many ways that do support this idea of manifesting your intention. But you can actually, if you will, maximize those effects much greater by using different techniques. And one of those is to look at the world through a different lens. And that lens is through the lens of compassion and being of service to others.

Because as I was saying, modern society pushes a narrative of success that frankly leads to emptiness. We are designed to care for people, as I mentioned earlier. When you manifest your intention and actually don't have it self-directed, but have it directed to be in service of others, it allows for all the other stuff to happen, but it's more powerful when it's focused on the other. And the other thing that happens is most people have an idea of what they want. They don't understand what they need. And those are far different things, unfortunately. And by redirecting how you look at the world, then that strengthens that ability to manifest.

I'll give you an example really quick. There was a young lady who read my first book, which, as you know, talked about my own challenges growing up, but also the path I took to becoming a doctor and getting into medical school when probably by all rights, that should not have happened, at least by traditional metrics. and a young lady reached out to me, and she was from Sri Lanka, an immigrant, and she said, you know, I've applied to med school three times. I was rejected. You know, I read your book. I wanted to just ask you, why did that happen? Can you help me? And her situation was she wanted to be a doctor, not to be of service, but because she wanted to make her parents happy. And those are completely two different ways

to look at the world. If you look at it, I need this to do whatever it is, which is a selfish goal, to make her parents happy. And there's nothing wrong with that. Don't can be wrong. Versus, though, looking at it through the lens of saying, I want to be a doctor because I can help people and be of service. An indirect benefit of that will make my parents happy, but my goal is to be of service. And as a result, with a little coaching, she recently graduated from medical school. And I've had that conversation multiple times with people. And it is a distinction between those two worldviews. To set the stage for the rest of the interview, because you touched on it a little bit,

I want to talk about your life growing up. And the mentor who you ended up meeting, who not only changed your life, but taught you many of these principles. of manifestation. So your life growing up, your early life was a tough life. You grew up in poverty with an alcoholic father, and you shared on our first episode together on this podcast also about your mother and her challenges of suffering from chronic depression. There was a lot of hardship, there was a lot of instability that was there. And then one day you walked into a magic shop, for real, for real, like this is a true story, and met a woman named Ruth who changed your life and changed your brain. Tell us about Ruth and

what you learn from her so that we can continue and build on that foundation. Yes, and in fact, that is the foundation. Imagine being a 12-year-old in the situation you described, and there's something, of course, as you know, and many of your listeners, called adverse childhood experiences. And, you know, if you have poverty, if you have alcohol or drug abuse, if you have mental illness, all of these different aspects, when you add the numbers up, if you will, the likelihood for you succeeding in society diminishes in proportion to how many of those you have. And that's the power of these adverse childhood experiences to negatively affect your life.

So for me at the age of 12, I had a complete sense of hopelessness, despair, a self-talk that said I had no future. And I walked into this magic shop and there was this woman, Ruth. And the interesting thing about Ruth, and this is actually, I think something that's very profound, is this is a person who had a radiant presence. And this is a person who was non-judgmental, accepted you, had a smile on her face, did not treat you as if, as an example, I was a child and she was an adult, and what I had to say was meaningless. She treated me as an equal. all of these things create a situation of psychological safety, which means when you feel safe, you're open, you listen to others. And in fact, if you look at our political discourse by creating a narrative of fear, people shut down and they don't listen.

In this case, though, she made me comfortable, and I told her the truth when she asked me some challenging questions. But at the end of it, she said, listen, I'm here for another six weeks. if you show up every day, I'll teach you something that could change your life. Now, there were four aspects of that. One was, I did not realize that my background, because of its chaotic nature and unpredictability, made me very tense because I never knew what was going to happen. I didn't know if my father was going to come in drunk.

I didn't know if my mother was going to attempt suicide. So, you know, this creates this constant fear and anxiety. and as a result, your muscles are always tense. So the first thing she taught me was how to relax my body. And again, what you'll see here, these initially are the fundamental precepts of mindfulness practice. But this was before mindfulness was ever talked about. This was before neuroplasticity was talked about. So she taught me this relaxation technique.

And again, I was 12, and to be frank with you, I thought it was all sort of. BS, and I was just showing up because I had nothing else to do, and she was giving me cookies. But once I mastered that, then she taught me essentially how to look at the world in a different way and to focus. And this was using, in this case, a candle, and it allowed me to attend and to be present. And the thing is to learn, you have to attend. You have to be present. And so once she taught me that, then she taught me a practice, which I called Opening the Heart,

which was, one, many of us have a negative dialogue going on in our head, and she made me realize that that is not truth, and that it was within my power to change that narrative to one of self-affirmation. And that was very powerful, because when you're hypercritical of yourself, and many of us or more hypercritical of ourselves than we are of anyone else, that influences how you see the world. So once I was kind of myself, it also made me understand that everyone is suffering

and made me look at the world through a much gentler, kinder lens, recognizing that fact. But the most important thing relative to our conversation today is she taught me a visualization technique, which at that time was really only used primarily with athletes. And it was this technique of visualizing what you wanted to be. But the other components of that, and which she had me frankly do, was to write my intention down, to read it aloud,

to read it to myself silently, and then visualize myself in that position or with it with what I wanted. Now, here is where the mistake by me was made, and which I think is the mistake with the secret. What did I, as a 12-year-old write down? I wrote down, I wanted a Rolex, I wanted a mansion, I wanted to be worth a million dollars, etc. And the challenge with that, of course, is that clearly those were my own, self-interest, but I didn't know any better or have any self-awareness or insight. And I thought, oh, if I get those, I will be whole, I'll be happy, my life will be full. And I did go down that

path. I accomplished every one of those things. And I did use these techniques. The problem was that they were all focused on me. And at the end of completing all of them, I was empty and more unhappy than I had ever been because I was self-focused completely. And even though I became a doctor, which of course is a good thing, and don't get me wrong, I was always a good doctor, but I became a doctor because it would increase my status and also it would guarantee me a paycheck. But it was about me again. When I changed the focus to say it is about service, it's about caring for others, it made incredible things happen. As you know, from the first book, I ended up becoming a very successful entrepreneur.

I ended up becoming friends with the Dalai Lama, founded a center at Stanford. I became the chairman of the Dalai Lama Foundation and ended up knowing a lot of the major spiritual religious leaders around the world. And it's interesting because the trajectory went from rags to riches, And as you know, though, I ended up losing almost $80 million in six weeks and was back to rags again. And in the face of that, I ended up giving away $30 million, which is another story to charity. But the reason I did that was I realized I was wrongly focused. And I gave that money away to live up to sort of the principles that Ruth had taught me and that I had missed.

And anyway, that made me rich again, but it made me rich in a different way. It made me rich in the sense that I ended up meeting the most extraordinary people in the world. I ended up doing actions that changed many people's lives. It allowed me to write the first book. It allowed me to write this book. And so by changing that perception from not just me, but outwardly, to be of service, really changed everything. You know, you described this time in your life and you say, I was never more miserable in my life than when I had everything. When you were at the peak of what many people would look at as external success, public company, millions of dollars that are present, homes, vehicles, etc.

The question that I have for you is you described this as being wrongly focused. and I want to bring up and paraphrase a well-known Jim Carrey quote. You know, he says that, and again, I'm paraphrasing here, we'll put the right quote inside the show notes. He says, my hope and dream would be for everybody to be rich and famous so that they know and understand that having riches and being famous doesn't really amount to much and doesn't make you happy. Was this a necessary stage in your evolutionary?

and journey in your soul's consciousness. Did you have to go through a little bit of this materialistic, external stage for you to become the person you are today? Well, I think that's absolutely correct. I would like to believe everyone doesn't have to go through that. But the nature of who we are oftentimes is that we don't always believe what we hear. But that's definitely a truism. But if you go further to Jim Carrey's story, and I actually use that as an example in my book,

he made a comment also that I realized it wasn't about me. And he attributes that to changing his life, how he looked at the world. And so once he did that, he did get everything he wanted, which was, if you will, to be famous and to impact people's lives in a positive way. But again, as he said, it wasn't about he realized the money and all that went with that. Now, I have had people say, well, it's easy for you to say, I want to have the buddy to try and see what happens and see how bad I feel. And I can certainly appreciate that. And don't get me wrong, listen, I think working hard and having that type of success is fine,

as long as it's not the only thing you do. And what I mean by that is we're looking at the difference between hedonic and eutamanic happiness. Hadonic happiness is self-pleasure. It's maximizing your own pleasure. What we know from a variety of studies is that that's transitory. It's not long-lasting. Utamanic happiness is more related to purpose and meaning. And it's a different type of happiness, but it's a much longer lasting.

and deeper type of happiness. And so, yes, udamonic, I mean, hedonic happiness is fine, but you just have to look at it for what it is. And I would also say you also have to understand that unless you view it for what it is, that will create suffering. And what I mean by that is, listen, I live in a very nice house. I have a Porsche.

I've had numerous cars. But if it all goes away tomorrow, I am okay. And that is the difference. For most people, they use that as either their identity or their tool, which they use as a crutch to get along in the world. And that is the big difference, not having attachment to these things, because attachment and craving are one of the greatest causes of suffering. I know from your story and following your work over the years, one of the people that you've had the pleasure of connecting with is Eckartoli. And one of the biggest teachings and takeaways that I've gotten from him is, I feel he does a

really good job of describing the difference and the distinction between attachment, which sometimes people say, well, of course I'm going to be attached to my mom, my dad, my loved ones. He says, what we're really talking about is identification, right? and it's the identification, which you just used the word identity, it's thinking you are that thing. It's having a BMW and thinking because you have that, this adds to the stature of who you are.

When you were at your height and you, everybody around you was saying, look at this rags to riches story, how are you wrapped up in the identification of the things that you had created? What was your identity like at that time? Well, as I said, I did believe that, I mean, imagine at one time I had a, I think, a $6 or $8 million house overlooking the ocean. I had a villa in Florence. I had a penthouse on the top of a building in San Francisco.

I had a Porsche, a Ferrari, a BMW, a range rover, and there's another one in there somewhere, Ferrari. Anyway, I had all of these things. And, you know, and I was single at the time, and I was dating sort of. of the starlet type, not that there's anything wrong with being a starlet type, but my intention was to go out with attractive women and be seen. And it was, on one level, it was, wow, this is great, but it was great because all my friends said, wow, you have everything. It wasn't great, though, because I felt I had everything, because I was still empty inside. I wasn't fulfilled. I was still insecure. I still needed these things as crutches, right, to give me my identity. I mean,

you know, as well as I see somebody in a Ferrari, oh, wow, man, God, they must have a great. Well, that's cool. And, you know, that's what I was doing. And it wasn't so much necessarily just enjoying the Ferrari. It was like driving around and being seen in the Ferrari. And on some level, again, it's okay, but you have to see it for what it is. You know, you write about this in your book and also in the new book as well. But ultimately, he went through. a pretty stressful bankruptcy. But in going through this, what again, many people could see as a rock bottom moment in your life, you completely set the foundation for something new. Walk us through that. During this most painful period of your life, how did it deepen your understanding of not

only who you were, but the true meaning of manifestation? Well, again, as you said, for all intents and purposes, I had done everything the secret told me to do, and I was horribly miserable. And after losing almost $80 million, I went back and reflected in my home, which was overlooking the Bay in Newport Beach. And I did go through a period of great reflection, and I realized the mistake I had made. I had focused on selfish goals, and they had not made me happy. And so I reached an inflection point where I had to make some decisions. And it was interesting because in my particular case, after losing all that money and being

effectively bankrupt and $3 million in the whole, two people became my friends. One was a banker and one was a lawyer. borrowed $15 million from the bank based on stock that I had at that time which you could, and the stock was now worth nothing. And so the banker came to me and wanted his money and asked me how he was going to give him his money. And my lawyer, of course, I consulted with. And I had to sell essentially everything. Now, the interesting thing was I had made some donations to charity based on stock that I had.

and that was my only asset. And my attorney, when I was talking to him, he said, you know, Jim, our junior partner, he actually did not file the paperwork. You don't have to give any of that stock away. And I thought about that for a while. And after this period of reflection, I said, no, I want it all to go to charity. And so it turned out, when the company went public, that ended up being $30 million. And so here, I gave away $30 million when I was $3 million in the hole.

And people, including my present wife, said I was insane at the time. But it was the best decision I ever made. And the reason it was because it liberated me. And what I mean by that is so many people who are poor, every action you make is not to be poor. And it holds you prisoner because you look through the, lens of, I have to have this, I have to have this to feel safe. When you can walk away from it all, then you're liberated. It's not driving you anymore. And you realize it has no meaning. It can't control you, can't make you do things you don't want to do. As an example, I'm sure you see.

There are people, you know, we're in Santa Monica right now, and I'm staying in West Hollywood. You know, there are people who will sell their soul, either to be famous, to get money. And it has no basis on morals, ethics, or anything. It's they're fixated on money. And money gets you nothing. In fact, in many cases, it makes you miserable. You know, in this process, you write inside of the book is you reconnected with the original true intention and meaning behind Ruth's advice, right? Ruth's advice. And part of that in the book moving forward from here, now that the audience is

caught up to date with the story of where you were at the time, is helping people understand how to get what they actually truly need, not necessarily what just shows up on the surface of what they want. So I'm going to jump around a little bit and we're going to come back to the brain. But talk to us a little bit about that. For people who are trying to clarify, how to distinguish between the superficial wants and the deeper, more meaningful goals, is there any exercises, tips, strategies you can share with them that could help prevent them from having to go through their own version of their rock bottom? Sure.

Well, again, as you said, use the word clarify. One, you also mentioned that this idea we're already manifesting. the first exercise is to sit down in a quiet space and you can get a pen and paper and write it down, but to really think through the trajectory of your life to date, to see what are the mistakes I've made? If I repeated these mistakes, were my actions aligned with who I wanted to be? And for most of us, if we do that, we realized we made many wrong turns, but we also will see patterns that limit us. And also understanding that there is no outside magic that's going to fix everything.

And this is this idea of taking over your self-agency, where you realize that within you, there's an incredible power and tools within yourself that actually maximizes your ability to get everything you need, not necessarily everything you want. And for so many, the want, though, is the thing that causes suffering. It's the one thing that misguides them. As an example, you look at influencers. You know, why do they want to be famous?

Why do they want to appear as if their life is perfect? Because they're coming from a place of scarcity, emptiness, and fear. So by putting on this act that everything is okay, I have everything, look where I'm at today, look at my makeup, it's perfect, look who I'm with. it's a hollow narrative that doesn't get you anything. Now, the sad part is, as you well know, I mean, you have a number of sad situations where influencers realize the emptiness and they go into deep depressions. And unfortunately, there's a group of people who follow these people who believe the narrative

and they go into depression and some have committed suicide sadly. Because, again, when it's self-focused, there's nothing. there. It's only through connection, being of service. And the reason I say that, look at as an example, the Blue Zones, or the work of Robert Waldinger at Harvard with the longevity study. These are, in terms of the Blue Zones, these are people in different parts of the world who are happy, and they live a long time. Now, in regard to the Blue Zones, people say, well, you know, they eat a plant-based diet primarily, they exercise, they don't smoke, they drink a little bit. But all of those things are important, but the most, most important thing is human connection

and relating to other people depth of relationships. And this is true also in the longevity study. Why is that important? It emphasizes the power, one, of your mind by being able to focus in these areas, which actually are good for you in terms of your mental and physical. health and is associated with longevity versus saying, I want, I want, I don't care about anybody else, I don't need you, it's all about me. That is an empty, you know, dead in place to be. And it's sad because people repeatedly confuse that. And part of it is a narrative that we've

created in Western society by, again, relating happiness by the acquisition of things. And you're also distinguishing in the book that there's nothing wrong with accumulating some things. But if your entire life's purpose is things, you're going to end up in a place where you're completely unfulfilled. Is that a correct distinction? Yeah, you know, I'll give you an interesting example. I was in Aspen one time given a talk and I was invited to a party put on by a very wealthy fellow. And so we pull up to the residents and, you know, it's one of these $30 to $50 million. are mega mansions, right?

And the guy's a widower. And he's in his 80s. You open the door, there's a painting that's like supersized of him holding a set of skis. A set of skis. A sea, a skis, like, you know, skiing on the mountain, right? So you walk in, and I end up talking to the guy. And he looks at the watch I'm wearing. And he turns me, goes, do you know what this is?

Like, yeah, it's a watch. He goes, that watch is a million dollars. Okay. And it says, come here. And I don't know why he's doing this, right? He says, come here. He takes me out to his garage. And, you know, there's a Ferrari there.

There's a Bentley there, et cetera, et cetera. And I'm going, I'm not sure why you're telling me. And he says, well, you know, I just want you to know that I worked really hard for this. The long story short is he then tells me he's. miserably unhappy. And I say, well, look, you have all this stuff. Why are you unhappy? He says, I want somebody to love me. And I said, okay. And he said, I heard you're a guy who, you know, coaches people and you have these insights. He says, could you help me? And I said, yes. He says, how would you do that? And I said to him, I said, I'll meet with you for 10 hours.

Okay, it'll cost you $1 million. Okay. Now, here's a guy who's worth hundreds of millions of dollars, right? He looks at me, goes, how about $500,000? And you look at the guy. And then his daughter comes over, and she overhears this conversation, or his granddaughter. And she says, maybe it was his daughter. But she says, you know, Papa, why wouldn't you give that to him?

That's nothing. And, you know, you could be happy. And he goes, oh, you don't know anything about money or life. You know, that money is for you. And she says, I already have more money than I can spend. I don't need any more money. And he looks at him and he says, foolish girl. And he never did anything.

And my point is, here's a guy. He knows he's miserable. You can tell by his actions of showing off, you know, this massive home, this million-dollar watch, these several million dollars in cars, there's nothing there. And he keeps trying to impress people by showing you the stuff which has no meaning. Is that what you normally charge somebody at that level, or were you just kind of messing with him a little bit? I would, geez, I would hope to God somebody would pay me $100,000 an hour. But no, I was just messing with him.

And I would have charged him that because I would have given him what he wanted if he just listened. because, I mean, the point was for many people like that, there has to be a price attached to it for them to think it's worth anything. And in fact, actually, that's the way it is for most people. In fact, if you give away a program, people will be suspicious. If you charge them for it, they think it has value. And it's an interesting paradox. You know, step one in people going down the path. You know, zooming out here for a second, actually, I'm going to back up.

when I think about our interview so far for the 30 minutes or so that we've been chatting, and I'm imagining myself as an audience listening to it, and I'm hearing that you've written a book about manifestation, but how manifestation used correctly with the right focus can actually give you what you need and not necessarily what you just think you might want. And there's a caveat, which is you're not denying the fact that tapping into the power of manifestation could also give you some things in your life. And sometimes there are very noble things that are there. Somebody might be a small business owner and they want to see the size of their business double, not necessarily just to put extra money in their pocket, but to hire more people,

to pay their team members more. You know, it's both the interweaving of the selfish and the selfless combination of those two things that are there. So I'm hearing as an audience member is we don't want an extreme of one situation or another. We don't want to be the person who's solely motivated by external things. In one aspect, you have this gentleman who lives in Aspen. There's another aspect that's there. And I would say that the other extreme is somebody who foregoes all sense of worldly, worldly items and says, I'm going to devote myself to a cause, but their entire identity is wrapped up in they have to do something. I'm the protester.

I'm the activist. I'm the person that needs to make all sacrifices. I don't need, you know, everybody who stands against it is completely against me or this cause. And I've met people like that, just I'm sure like you've met people like that. And that would be like in another extreme. So from an audience standpoint, they're seeing that you're kind of somebody that's navigating them through the middle of it, which is there's nothing wrong with having

things. It can't be the sole motivation of our life. And if we learn how to tap into the power of manifestation, we can actually not just create for ourselves. Yes, some things, but not only things, the deeper riches that we're actually looking for, which is true connection, impact, and meaning in the world. Is that a fair way to understand the conversation so far? You summarize the book.

I don't need to say another damn word. You've ruined the whole. No, I think that's exactly right. And that's an incredible insight. You know, it's interesting, the extreme of this person who, you know, he sacrifices everything. That is as pathologic as in the other direction because this guy has created a narrative. His identity is tied up into sacrificing everything and having everybody recognize that he sacrificed everything, right? Because that is a thing that he is carrying with him that causes just as much suffering.

because you see, then he looks at it, I did this, I'm doing all of this, and I'm against the world, but I'm doing it. You see, that's just as the same, actually, as the other direction. Both are you going. Yeah, of course, and that's the challenge. Now, I would contrast when you talked about the example you gave a small business owner, if the small business owner is going through the perspective of, okay, how can I make the most money? okay, I'm going to raise the prices maximally.

I'm going to pay the employees the most minimal wage. I am going to figure out a way where I can skim my taxes, da, da, da, da, da. If that's his primary motivator, that is raw, okay, and he's going to be unhappy, and he's not going to be able to manifest. If it's a narrative of, I want this business to succeed in this community to be of service to people, to offer them goods, services that will improve their lives. I will pay my employees a fair wage. And doing all of that, he will prosper. Because again, and this gets into some other aspects of the book, but then you

have an energy about you that's a positive energy. And when you have positive energy, that actually affects everyone around you. You know, the first step that you talk about in the book to step into that positive energy when it comes to manifestation is reclaiming. the power of your mind to focus. Why is so, why is focus so key? And how do we step away from the noise that's causing us to be unfocused or focused on the wrong thing? Well, I think that is a challenge, especially in modern society, because we have so many distractions. And whatever social media platform you're talking about, you, I'm sure appreciate, and many of your audience members, may. But, you know, these people hire neuroscientists and psychologists to figure out how to make

somebody addicted to their narrative, their social media platform. And it is a time sync that takes people away from doing all sorts of wonderful things. But again, you have to reclaim your ability to focus. As I was saying earlier, what Ruth taught me was how to focus, because that's the only time you can learn, and that's the only time you're present when we have your attention, your full undivided attention. So I think that's a critical aspect of regaining your attention, but it takes effort, but it's readily available. And once you reclaim your attention, then you can direct your attention, and then you can direct your intention inward to impact your subconscious.

And what happens is when you have an intention and you use your attention to embed your intention into your subconscious, then the process of these cognitive brain networks, which are parts of the brains that work together in different circumstances, then it empowers them. And as I was mentioning, as an example, we have this thing called the salience network. So once you are able to embed your intention. there, then that creates this process on a subconscious level where you're looking both internally and externally for events that actually will make you manifest your intention. And this is also where your attention network gets empowered, if you will, because once you are searching around finding those things that will connect you to manifest your intention, then that will activate your attention network. so you then become focused on that.

And it will then downplay your default mode network and also the nature of what we call your executive control network will actually make it manifest, if you will, because when your executive control network is empowered, it is actually the to-do part of your brain. It makes it happen. So once you embed your intention, that then activates your salience network,

which then empowers your attention, which then allows your executive control network to actually make that intention manifest. Maybe that was all confusing. No, I'm with you. I'm with you. And people can always hit rewind. Yes. And practice attention.

Right? Exactly. And the thing is, in the book, there's actually a six-week program that goes through every aspect of this, which is, you know, one, understanding what you have been manifesting, how inefficiently that may be. and why you're doing that, and then actually clarifying your intention and then actually embedding your intention. If there was one thing that people listening today could start and one possibility of something that they might stop, for example, to strengthen this power of attention, which goes back to this

step one, reclaim your power to focus your mind, what would be something that you might suggest to them? one thing that they could start, and maybe one thing they could stop. One of the problems that I have is that I have a tendency to say, I have to do this and I'm going to do it now. And I pick something that's really hard and complicated, and I'll go, I'm going to do it. And invariably, if you do that, you almost always fail. The most important thing is baby steps. And you look at a book, as an example, by BJ Fogg, which is called, I think, Tiny Habits.

And then there's another one called Atomic Habits. But if you look at changing little things in your life where they actually become habits, in some ways that's learning how to embed your intention. If you're doing just one thing, okay, and you're making it happen, that in and of itself is a process of focusing your intention. And creating these little habits can be extraordinarily powerful. Because what happens is when you're not directing your, attention, then you're wondering around all the time. And once you start doing things that require

this effort, you realize how powerful that is to make things manifest. And you start small, and then you move to larger things. I think the other thing is you have to give up attachment to the outcome. Because, again, and this may sound strange, but in some ways we're talking about the difference between fear and love. And what I mean by that is attachment to an outcome in some ways creates anxiety and stress, which is a manifestation of engagement of your sympathetic nervous system, which fundamentally is a fear reaction. Okay. So if you're attached to that, you're always worried about that. I have to get there. I have to get there. Yet the very nature of that internal dialogue is actually working against you. And that's not to say having a goal isn't

important, it's to say that goal becomes so prominent that that's the only way. Yet we know for manifestation that it can take a different pass and turns, and in some ways, it is smarter than you are about knowing the best way for something to happen. As an example, let's say you wanted, let's say, a different house. And you created this whole narrative. And you created this whole about that. And the narrative being, though, I want this bigger house because I have a large number of children, it has a larger yard, and not just I want this house to impress people. Again, two different perspectives. But if you go through all of that and you say, I want it in this place, in this neighborhood, and I want it this big and da-da-da-da-da-da. And you go through

this whole exercise. And then suddenly another opportunity comes up, which is a completely different type of house than you imagine. But then once you get into it, you realize actually that was a much better choice for me for all these different reasons. Let's say, oh, it turned out that the school, the best school in the area was there, and that's where my children will go. That's a much better than the place I had initially picked, because your subconscious is sorting through all this different information that's at a subconscious level, so you don't appreciate it. And so when you get a different alternative, you may say, that's crude, I wanted this. Why didn't that happen? Well, there are all sorts of other things that were going on there that you weren't

weren't aware of, and that in some ways your subconscious actually guide you sometimes to a better choice. When a lot of us go back and we look at our life and some of the key things that we're proud about, could be finding a partner, a job maybe that you got involved in, so much of it when you look back, if you really pay attention to it, so many of the good things that have happened to us that have made us who what we are today have happened largely because of some version of happenstance. And so I'm continuously amazed at how a lot of us, including me, forget about the power

that we might have wanted one thing, and yet life took a different course. And it sounds like you're saying our subconscious could be involved, and we got something better than what we could have ever imagined. And I think that's exactly right. And this is the nature of synchronicity, which I talk about in the book, or serendipity, if you want to call it that, is that often, times the way these events occur, again, on a conscious level, we don't understand why they occur, but they occur for a reason that actually is much more powerful than what our initial

goal was in terms of our manifesting. And that's some of the extraordinary things about it, is that once you are able to unleash this incredible power that you have within and embed your intention, which I talk about these techniques in the book, is this almost gives a direct line into your subconscious, which allows it, and I think I use the example of a bloodhound. You give it a mission or a scent, and the subconscious bloodhound starts going around looking at the circumstances. I'm sure you've been at a party, and there's a lot of noise, but if you hear your name, you immediately turn to it, right?

because it's deeply embedded in your subconscious. The same is true when you let the bloodhound loose. As an example, there was a project I'm working on right now, and again, I use these techniques of manifesting, and I was at a coffee shop. And again, very loud, but a fellow about two tables over started talking about something that exactly related to this project. And, you know, I turned, and actually went over and introduced myself,

and we're working on a project together now, right? And this is how this works, because on a subconscious level, this bloodhound is always looking around to make serendipity or synchronicity happen. And that's the way it works. One of the areas that often gets misconstrued with manifestation that you chat about also in the book

is the idea that it's devoid of action. Can you talk about the relationship between manifestation and action, if there was maybe an additional criticism that might be there about something like the secret. I'm going to ask you what you did like about the secret in a little bit, too. I want to be fair to, you know, that work, that body of work. But one of the criticism would be that people walked away thinking that action isn't an important part of the equation. Can you talk about action? You know, at the start of the book, I said, you know, the universe doesn't give a fuck about you.

but I would also say God only helps those who help themselves. And what I mean by that is it's not like you just sit down and go, okay, I want this and it's one and done. I mean, it takes work. And as you know, the main ways to embed your intention is to make it familiar because the brain doesn't know the difference between what's real and what's not real. And by writing down, by reading silently, reading it aloud, visualizing that taking place, seeing yourself in that position.

And when I was a kid, I literally would do this 10, 15, 20 times a day. I mean, I had this list of 10 things that I wanted, and I would just go through it all day long. Now, some people talk about vision boards. Anything to constantly remind you and put at the top of your list. But there's another aspect, which is the reality that the brain receives about 10 million bits of information a second through your sensory organs. And of course, that defines who we are, and it's primarily related to homeostasis. On a conscious level, we're only able to process 50 to 100.

But that 50 to 100, we can actually direct with intention into our subconscious through something called value tagging. We put a value on it. Then that stimulates the salience network on an uncons. level to constantly be looking around for opportunities to have that intention manifest, and it directs our attention to that. And then once that happens and we see an opportunity, then again, that stimulates or empowers the executive control network, which gives you access to memory experiences and also the

to-do part of manifesting. And so using the technique with intention of taking the information that is at a conscious level, and if you will, value tagging it, then that fixates it in the subconscious and gives it the greatest likelihood to manifest. You know, some people think, well, I should be able to manifest anything I want. It doesn't work that way. Nothing's 100%. And as I said, it doesn't always work out the way you think it should.

And also, it doesn't often work in the timeline you would like. I mean, there's some people say, well, you know, I want this mansion to magically appear, and I'm going to give it till next week. And if it doesn't, you know, this whole thing is a failure. Again, there's no way it works like that at all. And again, to maximally have this work, I will again will suggest you, you have to change your perception of how you see the world. It has to be, in my opinion, in the context of how can I do actions that improve

the lives of others or have a larger meaning beyond myself. By doing so, you benefit. You benefit in all sorts of ways. And we were talking about compassion. In some ways, having that perspective is a compassionate act. When you are compassionate, based on our evolution, every part of your physiology works better. You're happier. You're more open. You're more thoughtful. Your physiology works. it's best. Your heart rate variability is decreased, which is a good thing. Your heart rate is decreased. Your blood pressure is decreased. Your immune systems boosted. Your cortisol or stress hormone levels are diminished. The expression of inflammatory proteins are decreased, all from being thoughtful and kind and compassionate and look at the world through the lens of how can I be of service and improve

the world. You have a dramatic, positive impact on yourself, but the very nature of that, it changes your goals and aspirations. You realize, yes, it's nice to have a Ferrari, but it's not the Ferrari, the Ferrari doesn't identify me. I don't need it, but it's nice to have it if it's there. And you're not attached to that. You're not attached to these things which people confuse with them and somehow having more makes people feel better about themselves when at the end of the day they don't feel

better about themselves. And that's the sad situation. You see some of these extraordinarily wealthy people. You know, they have 10 homes. You know, they each cost $10 million a piece. They have a $100 million yacht, and they fly everywhere. And all they're doing is running away because they're trying to find the next experience. Like, I'm going to be with this celebrity.

I'm going to be at this dinner. I'm going to be at the yacht. But it's all about the thing. It's not about a deep-seated sense of happiness. And the horribly sad thing is for so many of these people, they're so fixated on that that they have lost this and they're running around chasing nothing, when simply by changing their perspective, they could enhance the lives of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people

by just a small amount of the resources that they have. When you take an inventory of your life today and you're thinking about things that you want to put your attention on, both for yourself and for the betterment of all the projects that you're involved in, and the different leaders around the world that you work with, how are you approaching what you actually want to manifest? Does it look like some sort of traditional goal setting? Is it more spontaneous or do you use any other framework to actually get clear on what you want to bring and allow to unfold in your life? Again, like I was mentioning habits, the way my mindset is,

I work on projects that obviously benefit me in some way, but almost all of them, in fact, pretty much all of them are focused on being of service. As an example, there's a company I started called Happy.AI, that's hapPI.aI. And it is actually a mental health counselor for individuals who have stress and anxiety and loneliness associated with living in the modern world. The unique thing about it is that it uses an emotion assessment engine combined with an AI knowledge base of psychology and compassion-focused therapy actually connected to a human avatar.

And so the avatar actually talks to you and guides you in terms of queries you have about things that are causing you to stress. And so on the one hand, it's a private business, but on the other hand, its goal is to be of service. And it's very much structured to, it's not going after, how can I look at every customer as a profit center, it's saying, you know, we need to make X to survive and to satisfy our investors, but the goal here is primarily to be of service. And also, as an example, I'm working on a project,

a compassionate countries index, where we look at different countries and see how they're functioning in terms of, for the individual, in terms of thriving, what the country's doing, and what the country's obligations are to the rest of the world. And so, again, this is outwardly focused. But the benefit of that is that it will, if it's successful, allow me to do other interesting projects. And again, nothing to me at least is more deep than connecting with people and making their lives better. And it's pretty simple. And I think, you know, that's what you're trying to do. And I think using the different techniques we describe, this allows you to live a

happy life, a life of meaning and purpose, but also understand. that it's great to have things. It's the things aren't the point, though. It's to enjoy them. It's not to get lost in them. So once you've gotten to take this one step further, once you've gotten clarification on some larger goals, projects, things that you want to give love to,

within each of those, there's going to be micro things that you want to do. Now you've gotten the macro clear. Do you have a framework or a methodology that you use to support the principles that you're you use? you were taught by by Ruth in addition to the mindful practices. Again, you outline a lot of them in the book, making sure that you are not in constant fight or flight, making sure that your nervous system is set up in a beautiful way, making sure you're practicing mindfulness techniques on a regular basis meditation. You've written about that. Is there anything else that you do?

Are you actively a journal? Do you practice any kind of vision boarding that's there that allows you to tap into these things to help supercharge those projects? Yes, so I have a list of things I want to accomplish, and I will tell you, one has been sitting for 16 years, but it's an important one, and I still put effort into it, and it may or may not manifest in my lifetime. But yeah, so I have a list of things that I go through, and I review what I have written about them and look at the different aspects of connections I have to make them manifest. And I think about it.

I mean, I will actually meditate about that particular pot project. And what I find is that when I do that, it unfreeze my mind in the sense I'm not just focusing everywhere on these different things. I focus on that and I sit with that. And then I see all these different connections that can happen. and then hopefully they do manifest. As an example, I've been working on creating an international day of compassion. So one of the aspects of that is you need to have a leader of government, write a letter in support of this, right?

Well, I just happened to be in Hyderabad and an ashram, and Modi ended up coming there, and he had planned to come there. but getting him on board with this project. President of India? Yes, yes. Or I was reached out to by the King of Bhutan, who I just happened to end up talking to after they asked me to, and now I'm heading to Bhutan to talk about this further with him. So did I plan from the start that it was going to be these two individuals?

No, but that's where the process. led me, right? But you do actively think about these things. You meditate on them. You get messages from what? You're subconscious. Yes, absolutely. In terms of possibilities that would allow these things to further and even some insights

about what would be the pathway to it. And then do you write those things down? Yes, yes. And sometimes I will write them down and I will rewrite them and refine the vision. And, yes, and so that's sort of the process, actually. And so many of the techniques that people are familiar with, they are powerful. It's just tweaking them a little bit in the context of how you activate your mind to make the manifest are really the keys here. I'm not dismissing manifestation and some of the techniques that have been described.

what I am dismissing is the woo-woo and the pseudoscience that floats around with this and that limits people, as an example, sort of being self-focused when the power is in actually being of service to others and then you're getting all the other things. It's not, I want this first and the other thing doesn't matter. The other thing is the most important thing. When it comes to the topic of manifestation, one thing that I often hear from my audience whenever it comes to goals, manifestation, strengthening their focuses, what if you're somebody that actually doesn't know what they want in life, but rather feels that the life that they're living right now, there's something more there for them? They just don't know what. What would

your recommendation to this person be? Well, I think that's an excellent question. I would suggest there's probably a lot of those people who don't know for sure what they want. In fact, actually, I have many friends. You know, I knew in fourth grade I was going to be a doctor. Well, that makes it pretty easy. And if you will, I manifested that. But I have friends who are in their 30s, 40s, who still have no clue. And they sort of get bounced around. I think that that's okay. I think if you attune yourself, though, again, to looking at the world through the lens of how can I I be helpful, that in some ways gives you direction versus worrying about if your house is bigger than the next persons or you're driving the latest car. Again, that's where people get sidetracked.

And so if you go through, if you live a life looking at the world through this idea of what are the actions I can do to just be helpful, the world seems to have a desire to help. you. Now, is this true 100% of the time? Of course not. Have people had horrible things happen to them who sort of were on the right track? Of course. And that's why on some level, you know, people say, well, you know, the universe is against me. The reality is that there's so many different things going on that we can't control everything. And even doing everything the absolute correct way will lead to disappointment. And that is the way it is. You know, I use this technique of having an optimistic disposition or dispositional optimism. And the idea is that I have a deep-seated

belief that things will work out the best for me. I have a deep-seated belief that if I'm kind and thoughtful, that that will be a tool to make that happen. But I also accept that I have no control over things, on some level, and that all I can do is the best I can do. But have I had major disappointments, of course. And I, the key is not to get lost in them. The key is to understand that disappointment, the ups and downs are just part of life. And yes, people have some horrible circumstances, and yes, people, unfortunately, are in circumstances of which they have absolutely no control and they're suffering and being punished for things that are not in any way their fault.

And I cannot sit here and tell you, geez, just do everything in my book and life is going to be roses. It's not going to work out that way. Unfortunately, it doesn't work out that way. and I do not have every answer for the world's suffering. So I'm not going to pretend that, oh, just read my book and you'll have a happy life. There are circumstances that are horrible that people have to live through or die from. And I do not have, nor does anyone else, I believe, have the power to make those instantly disappear or make them get better. I wish I did.

But it also begs the point that each of us, though, has a world in which we live in. And within that circumstance, we can have an impact. And so what I suggest to people is within your sphere of influence and your ability to have an impact that you use it to make people's lives better. And sometimes that's just saying hello to somebody. Sometimes it's buying them a meal. Sometimes it's just reaching out if they seem hurt or upset. And again, this is the nature of being present. It's being present that actually results in a happy life.

You're present to events that are happening every step of the way. Versus, as you know, there are people who they set a goal and they discard everything in their pathway to get to the goal. Because the goal is the tenement to the only thing that is important in their lives. And they miss their life because they're focused on that. You know, it's like these fellows who, you know, we have people who say, you know, I wake up at four in the morning and I run half. a marathon, and then I eat 1,900 calories a day, and then I go and I do this, and I do that. Well, what type of a life is that other than sort of a selfish, narcissistic view of the world? But this is only my opinion there.

Some of these people have millions of followers, so you could argue, I know nothing. Well, would they have millions of followers or they only have one follower? the real question is, is that life working for them? And maybe there could be a situation or circumstance. Somebody wants to go through a period of life where they really want to challenge themselves and they want to overcome limiting beliefs. And at that point in time in their life, they're focused on that. And they could end up being somebody who might be, you know, deeply happy.

No, no, I think you're absolutely right. And I think your point about limiting beliefs, people are suffering and they will do actions that overcome those limiting beliefs. I think the problem is for some of those people, though, is the statement is if I do it and you're not able to do it, you're a loser. And I think this is the message. The projection to the audience. Yes.

And I think, unfortunately, for some people, this is the message. And they beat themselves up every day saying, well, you know, this guy said he does this. And I've been working on this, you know, and I can't do it. And, you know, why isn't that possible for me? So I think there is a balance like there is with everything. And so, yeah, some of these techniques to make you healthier and to overcome these limiting beliefs, which is really what we're talking about in the nature of manifestation,

your own created limiting beliefs, because you have to overcome those to have the power to change your life. And so I think that is important. You know, again, I'm taking this to the extreme. that happens to some individuals who, in fact, I know a guy who he's sort of that way. And he says, you know, you're a loser man because you don't do these things. And I said, well, I don't think anybody's a loser. I think people have different paths. And it's not fair to call somebody that, you know, and not everybody is you, right? Of course, for sure. You know, on the topic of limiting beliefs,

there's a whole section in the book. It's step three, which is remove the obstacles in your mind. And it goes deep into this topic of identifying these limiting beliefs that are holding us back. You know, you mentioned just before we got into this part of the conversation, disappointments. We've all had disappointments in our life. We've all had things that have gone not according to plan and sometimes severely feel like we might have been, you know, disenfranchised by something or wronged by a situation. And then there are times where those things can permanently hold people back because, you know, they've contributed to added on built upon a limiting belief. You talk about some techniques that people can use, which is step one, is even identifying that you have a limiting belief in the

first place. What are some of those techniques that you talk about? Well, I think the most important thing is actually identifying them because, again, many of us go through life, as we were talking about earlier where we talk about we have a vision. We're always trying to manifest, but we don't have any understanding of how manifestation works. One of the impairments of manifesting is limiting beliefs, and a narrative that you tell yourself, which many people do, which is, I'm not good enough, I'm not worthy, I don't deserve love, it's not possible. And as soon as you say something like that, that becomes your reality. So having self-affirmation, being kind to yourself. And again, it's like some of these other aspects of manifestation. You have a list and you repeat them,

you have actually a list of affirmations you tell yourself and unlimited possibilities that you tell yourself over and over again so that that becomes the dominant narrative, not, I hate myself, I'm never going to be anything. I think that's, probably the most powerful one. One of the techniques that I use, which is actually from my first book, but I still use to, if you will, balance me and not get me lost in sort of my own limiting beliefs, if you will, is I go through a mental exercise every morning. And it sets my intention for the day. And it gives me the tools not to get lost, one, in aspects of the of our modern world that distracts me, but also empowers me.

And so what I do is I wake up every day, and I sit by the side of the bed, and I actually do a breathing exercise, which I know you know, and many listeners, the very nature of doing a breathing exercise actually engages your parasympathetic nervous system, right? And that's where you're more open, you're more thoughtful, you're more creative, you're more productive, your physiology works its best. And I do that for a little bit, and then I go through an exercise of thinking of the awe that inspires me in this world, and then also the joy of living in this world. And then I go through this alphabet of the heart.

And it's ten letters of the alphabet. C for compassion for self and others, D, recognizing the dignity of every person, E, practicing, equanimity, F, practicing forgiveness, G, having gratitude, H is humility, I is having integrity and values that bind you, J is for justice, or responsibility for caring for the vulnerable, K is kindness, all of this is contained by love. You know, when I talked about earlier, this is this distinction between fear and love. when you walk with the world with fear, you create a perception in your head of scarcity. You grab onto things, you want things, and you're insecure about yourself. So you grab onto things that you think will make you look better to others because you're always looking for outside affirmation.

Versus when you're able to let that go and look through the other lens, it opens things up for you. There is no scarcity. Everything is possible. The world is a generous and kind place. It's not something to be scared of. And when you look at through that lens, you make many more connections with people, and actually people want to help you. And one of the most important aspects of manifesting is to create this energy about you

where people want to connect with you and help you. And I'm sure you have met people who you meet them, and there's this incredible energy about them, this joy about them, and you're going, wow, I want to be around this person. I mean, it's incredible. And then there are other people who you meet and you want to get away from as quickly as possible. And the reality is what people don't appreciate is when we reattune our psyche, if you will, it changes your vibrational energy. Now, I know in some spheres of woo-wness and pseudoscience people use this, and you know, and make up all sorts of aspects of this.

But many of what they say is true based on neuroscience. As an example, your heart puts out an energy that goes five or six feet beyond you. And it has an impact on others. And when you carry that energy with you, it sort of changes the environment. And in fact, I'm sure you probably know, as an example, if you have a group of women who live together, over time, their periods were synchronized. will synchronize. And when you're around people and you carry that energy, and there are other people like that, that creates an immense amount of power and connection between those other people.

In fact, you even look at a metronome, which is an inanimate object, theoretically, a metronome or a non-living object, if you put five of them together on a table, at some point, their oscillations will match. And so there is this energy about you that you do have some control over. It's just you have to learn how to embrace it and use it to your advantage. So you're basically telling people that if they get bad vibes from somebody, pay attention to that because there might be something there. I would say that can be very, very true. I think the kids these days call a vibe check.

You know, it's funny you say that because there are all these abbreviations, people use which, you know, you'll get text messages from, I guess, or the adolescents, we call them, or is it Gen Zers now? And I have no clue what they're, you know, like IRL. What is that? In real life, right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, so. I heard you on another podcast you did recently, where you were alluding to one way, one practice that you can use to identify limiting beliefs is to catch yourself being critical of yourself. What are the common areas where you quietly, people don't even realize it. It's a thought in their head. They don't realize it that their mind is thinking that thought. Often it's from their default network. It's not them trying to think

this thought on purpose, so it's old beliefs, and there'll be a critical thought about themselves. So if you catch these thoughts when they happen, when you say, oh, my gosh, that was so stupid. Sometimes people say it out loud, but often it's quietly. They're telling themselves, you're an idiot. Why did you say that? You'll never be loved, et cetera. That could be one way of seeing, you know, some clues of what your limiting beliefs are. Well, the thing is, again, as soon as you say that, it's.

putting sort of a seed down. And again, we're talking about habits. That becomes a habit. In fact, I have a good friend who's a super nice guy, but it's like, you know, every five or ten sentences, he says something critical about himself. And, you know, in some ways, I think it's self-deprecation to be accepted.

But it's a dangerous thing, too, because, again, when you make these statements, that can become reality. And again, your brain doesn't know the difference between what you say or think and what is real. As an example, studies have been shown that if you think about exercising your muscles, they actually get larger just from the thought of exercising your muscles. And this has been shown in a number of studies. And so when you sit there and say, you know, I'm worthless, that was stupid, I'm stupid, I'm stupid,

then that starts getting embedded and you start believing it. So what I have done and try to do for myself because it happens to all of us is as soon as I start to think that or say it, I say the opposite or a statement of affirmation every time. What's one of your most favorite affirmations that you use personally? I am worthy. You know, so often we have this thing in our head that says, well, I don't deserve this. and versus, yes, I deserve it. In fact, I deserve a lot more because I'm a thoughtful, nice, kind person. And there's nothing wrong with telling yourself you're a thoughtful, nice, kind person, if you are, of course.

Now, I would suggest you that nothing is 100%, and there's a subset of people who probably think I'm a jerk. And maybe in their world, I am. But that's okay. I don't know of anyone who has 100% success rate. And, you know, people carry their own baggage or biases, which, you know, make them feel uncomfortable around some people. As an example, even in my own training, as a neurosurgeon, you know, the most competent and probably most well-respected teacher of mine,

you know, was a huge fan of mine. And, you know, when I was worked with him, Things went really well. I had a lot of respect for him. He had a lot of respect for me. But there was another fellow who was insecure about himself. And so he would always have to beat me up and make comments, negative comments, because I was very good at what I was doing, but it made him feel more uncomfortable,

so he had to be critical. And I felt actually sorry for the guy that he felt he had to do that, but there are people like that. And you sort of have to understand that often. Sometimes, the manner in which somebody interacts with you, oftentimes has nothing to do with you at all. In fact, I had a case several years ago of a colleague, a physician, much younger than me in his 30s. And we were working on a research project, and I would meet with him every couple weeks. And super nice guy.

And we were meeting. And it's like out of the blue, he starts an argument about something. It was completely irrelevant, but it's going, no, that's not true. I disagree with that. And I don't think we should do that. I'm like looking at the guy going, I'm like, it's like a complete personality change. And, you know, what many of us do oftentimes in those situations, we, you know, react to them. Like, what the hell are you saying?

That's, you know, and you get into this conflict. But this was so unlike him. And fortunately, I had worked on my own emotion regulation, which is to be non-reactive oftentimes. times or to be more thoughtful. And I looked at him and I said, you know, this is not like you at all. What's going on with you? And he looked at me for a couple seconds and he burst into tears. And what had happened was that he had quit his position. And as you know, in the United States, you need to get gap insurance, COBRA insurance. And he, you know, was married a young family, two children, and he thought that he didn't need to get it because it was expensive, and he was getting

this other job in a couple months, so why get it? Well, in the interval, his wife found a lump on her breast turned out to be cancer. So now he had no insurance. So the driver of his behavior, it wasn't about a research project. He was terrified and scared. That was the driver. And that happens oftentimes to us where we don't know what's going on with somebody else and why they're reacting a certain way. And this is also the idea of giving people the benefit of the doubt. Now, the rest of his story, fortunately, was that I was able to help him get retroactive cobra insurance. He got it. The breast mass was removed.

She didn't need any other treatment, and they're fine. But it just reminds you that you can never know what is going on in someone else's head. And the other aspect is also, I'm sure you've probably been cut off in traffic by somebody. Yeah. And at least for men, I'm sure women would never do this, but we sometimes use a hand gesture or perhaps use a profanity. But the reason I bring that up is, you know, you think about that and you do get suddenly angry and, you know, tense up and you're wondering why this person did that. But then if you reframe it, and this again, all about perception, how it is in your control to see the world a different way, if you reframe that and sit there and say, well, you know, the passenger in the car was this guy's wife. She was nine months pregnant. Her water broke. She's bleeding. He's trying to get her to the hospital. Then suddenly, oh, my God, you know, I understand what's going on here. And I'm much more, I'm not angry anymore. I just hope they get there safely, right? But in a microsecond, you can reframe how your mind sees the world.

And I think that's what we all should do. And part of that is giving people the benefit of the doubt, hoping that our actions help others. All of that will maximize your ability to manifest. Because in some ways, it's all about focusing on the love aspect of our lives, not being fearful of our lives. So would it be fair to say that the more we're holding on to a victim narrative, that life is happening to us, that other people are doing things to us, that we don't have agency, the harder genuinely it would be to manifest our goals and dreams? Absolutely. I think that's a great summation. You're actually saying things much better than I am, so I thank you for that. So I appreciate that. But I think that's right. And now, again, as I said earlier, there are situations. that people can't control. But I think people can't control how they respond to events. And if every time they respond to an event is, I'm a victim, this shouldn't have happened to me,

people are taking advantage of me, I have no control, then they actually, unfortunately, manifest that. And so most people do have the ability to take control of different aspects or see the world in a different way. The very nature of seeing the world in a different way actually increases your ability to manifest. And that's by not being a victim, but understanding within you is an immense amount of power to change your circumstances. And by using the techniques that I talk about, this can actually change your life and change your life for the better. But not only your life, it changes everyone's life around you. I was on X.com, formerly known as Twitter, a few weeks ago, and I came across this really cool clip from the CEO of Navidia.

I'm blanking on his name. But this is now one of the most successful companies in the world, chip manufacturers, the chip behind all these AI devices that people are using in different things. Well, it's funny you say that because a friend of mine worked there and about a year ago, he said, you know, Jim, you really need to buy stock in Navidia. I didn't. You weren't able to manifest that. Yeah, well, apparently I chose not to. Well, one of the things the CEO was saying in Town Hall that he was doing slash fireside chat was he said that he's seen since the earliest part of his career that when individuals come in

with very high expectations, whether these are people that he's mentoring, whether these people are senior leadership that joins his team. He said, the higher your expectations are, the less successful you'll often be with many of these outcomes. You kind of touched on this a little bit earlier, but this idea that we have to release expectations and be open to the magic that wants to unfold. How do we do that? And how do we straddle both releasing expectations, but really having the drive to actually pursue some of these goals that we want to achieve in our life, not just for the betterment of ourselves, but for the people around us. Well, again, there's nothing wrong with setting goals and working very hard to accomplish them.

I think that the challenge comes in, and there are two parts of this. One is to always have beginner's mind. And what I mean by that is as somebody gets expertise in something, they start closing their mind off to different possibilities. And also, when someone is firmly attached to a very, very specific outcome, then they're only focused on that and not the other possibilities that can allow them to have success with a slightly different outcome. And what I mean by that, it may not be exactly what they want or envisioned.

it's slightly different, but because they're so fixated on it being exactly the way they want, in many ways it disempowers them. Because one, they're not open to other options, and you have to always be open to other options, and this is the nature of beginner's mind. So the goal is wonderful. It's though believing that there's only one way to do it, and it's your way, that I think causes people problems. And I think that's what he's talking about. They're so fixated on their vision of the goal, they're not open to any other possibilities.

And being open to possibilities, that's the magic. Where does magic come from? My book. Well, it's available all of us at any time. It's just we have to recognize it's with us. And again, this gets back to when we talked about the law of attraction in some ways. idea that it is all in our mind, and it's though our gift to be able to control our minds. As you know, I mean, these different mind training techniques are extraordinarily

powerful. As I use an example in the book, these Tibetan meditation masters, or another example is Wim Hof. You know, they control their body temperature, their heart rate, but again, it's not effort you have to put in the work to do that. And the thing is that having access to the power of your mind and then utilizing the techniques to increase the strength of that are really the key here. And we did mention individuals who go to extremes, well, it's not because it's easy.

It's because these people have used the techniques to master the power they have within themselves to control their minds. You know, I had an interview with a guy named Charlie Engel, and he's an ultra-autra-marathon runner, and he's been doing it for many years. Now, the stimulus for that probably was he was also a crack addict at one point, but he has such control over his mind that he doesn't feel pain. And so for him, these long ultramarathon distances, he does them. And it's not because they're easy, but he's mastered how to control the signals from his mind that tell him to stop or not to do it or it's not possible.

And I think many of the people who are talking about these extreme individuals, they have mastered the same techniques. And it is possible if that is what you feel you need to reach. sort of or to reach your goal or if you will to promote thriving for yourself. But again, thriving can be defined in many different ways by different people. So we went through a bunch of these steps that are part of this six-step process that you were taught by Ruth when you first encountered her and met her. And you went in to the magic shop looking for something to do a trick. Was it with a thumb?

It was a thumb, a plastic thumb. It was a plastic thumb, right? Yes, yes, I still have that thumb, although it doesn't fit my thumb anymore. But yes, that's exactly right. Yeah, and you took those things. And in your first book, you talk about this account and the lessons that ultimately led to you building and creating this life where both externally, you were able to create a lot of what people would say is success. You having lost that, again, those external items. but reconnecting to this deeper sense of who you are and going on to found many incredible projects,

become neuroscientist, neurosurgeon, helped the Dalai Lama with the foundation, co-founded it with him. And in this new book here, it's going deeper in the process of actually what is the step-by-step process of manifestation. And the last chapter, I believe is chapter eight, you walk people through exactly a protocol for it. Either chapter eight or chapter nine. It's like a whole protocol. if they want to go through that process that's there. Yes, it's a six-week program.

Six-week program, and they can walk through that. For those that didn't hear our first episode, where I asked you about this question, whatever happened to Ruth? It's interesting you bring that up because I've been asked that question numerous times. The interesting thing is when I was 12, she was probably in her 50s, and so I didn't find out what happened to her actually until I wrote the first book because what happened was after I'd had this interaction with her, I actually, several months later, went back to the strip mall where this magic shop was

and it was every store there was closed and there was a fence surrounding the strip mall and I don't know what they were going to do, remodel it or whatever, but all the businesses were gone. So I never had another interaction with her at all. And it was sort of what happened was sort of evocative because I, as you recall, used to have this orange stingray bike with this banana seat that I used to ride around it. And I rode my bike up there, and it was dusk, and the wind was sort of blowing, and there was this blue sky with sort of streaks of clouds there. And I was just wondering, like, did I imagine all of this? I mean, it was really strange. Now, the sign on the store was still there, so obviously I didn't.

But it was just the most strange experience. It was as if it was brought there for me, right? And then it was gone. And I was sitting there thinking about this. The wind blew, and this huge tumbleweed hit me in my bike. It was actually a very strange experience. But what I found out later was that, A few years after my interaction with her, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and died from the breast cancer.

Now, what's strange, though, later, after that book came out, I got an email from a fellow, and he said, my parents were best friends with Ruth, and her last name was Workman. And he said, I want to share something with you. So he and I met, and he actually had a book that she had given to his parents, that she had signed, as a gift to them, and also a necklace that she had given to his mother, which he gave me. So I sort of have this connection to her. That's beautiful. And of course, her legacy lives on through the books, the interviews, the work you've done,

and that you continue to do in this world. And she's become now a mentor to all of us. Well, thank you. That's kind of you. But, you know, and again, it's, it's, I didn't appreciate it at the time, but she said basically to pay it forward. And so, again, you know, I didn't understand the lessons initially, and it was all about me, right? I was doing this stuff for my, to be accepted, to be told I was okay. And I lost touch with what she really was sharing with me and the power of it.

And so once I lost everything, it put me back to this period of reflection to really understand the key lessons that she was teaching me. And really that's what's in this new book is the lessons that she taught me, the power of them, and hopefully to allow you not to make the same mistakes I've made. But again, when you're young, it's sometimes you have to learn yourself. But hopefully this will give sub people the ability to avoid those and really manifest their dreams and change the world in a positive way. You know, with Ruth's influence on your life, I am also thinking about this question that Einstein was known for sort of putting out there. You know, he was saying, paraphrasing here, but one of the most important things that a human being can ask himself is, is the universe a place for good, right? is a universe, a driver of goodness. When you think about the world today and where it's headed,

are we headed for the better? Are we headed for the worse? And what is all of our part in the unfolding of it? We'd love to hear your thoughts on that. Well, I'm glad you've really saved the easiest question for last, probably. I think the universe, and again, I use the universe cautiously, because in the book, and I will answer your question, because in the book I said the universe doesn't give a fuck about you, but at the end of the book, basically I said you are the universe. But I do believe that the universe is good. I would like to believe that. Do I have any empirical evidence of that? No. But it doesn't matter because all of us create a life, hopefully, that allows us to be our best selves.

And while the universe may not care, in fact, I was talking to John Hamm about this, and he said, at best it's indifferent. But it doesn't matter what the universe, whether it's good or bad. It only matters how I see myself in the world and how I choose to see goodness in the world. And I think inherently 95% of people are good. Otherwise, the world wouldn't work. 95% I believe. It's only a very small percentage that take us on these extreme paths that cause us problems. I think, yes, we will continue to have significant ups and downs,

and we will unfortunately not learn from the history that has been before us. But at the end of the day, I think that goodness will prevail. Dr. Doty, thank you so much for being here. It's such a pleasure to actually meet you in person after being so inspired by your work and loving our first interview together. The book comes out, May 7th. Would you just share the title again? We'll put the link in the show notes.

And of course, you have your own podcast too, so I'd love to give that a mention as well. Oh, sure. Oh, that's kind of you. So what's the first question? Oh, the book, the name of the book. Mind Mad, Mind, Magic, the neuroscience of manifestation, and how it changes everything. My podcast is called Into the Magic Shop. And that's pretty simple, and it's based on the first book. and I strive to have people who are being kind, being compassionate, who are trying to improve the world on that podcast,

which I think hopefully inspires people. The other thing for people, I mentioned happy.a-i-h-a-i-P-P-I.a-I. And actually, at this moment, anybody can sign up and try the app. There's no charge for it. And if you do sign up, please share your comments. And also there's a center that I run at Stanford called the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, of which the Dalai Lama is the founding benefactor. And we teach courses on compassion, self-compassion, and how to deal with stress and anxiety. So, Drew, thank you so much.

I appreciate you having me. And it is a pleasure to meet in person. So thank you again. No, thank you. And on the topic of goodness, thank you for brief. you so much goodness today to our audience. We'll have the links for everything you mentioned below, especially the book which I enjoyed. Please pick up a copy. Dr. Doty, thank you again for being here. Thank you. Hi, everyone. Drew here. Two quick things. Number one, thank you so much for listening

this podcast. If you haven't already, subscribe, just hit the subscribe button on your favorite podcast app. And by the way, if you love this episode, it would mean the world to me. And it's the number one thing that you can do to support this podcast is share it with a friend, share with a friend who would benefit from listening. Number two, before I go, I just had to tell you about something that I've been working on that I'm super excited about. It's my weekly newsletter, and it's called Try This. Every Friday, yes, every Friday, 52 weeks a year, I send out an easy-to-digest protocol

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