Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - How To Feel More In Control Of Life: A Revolutionary Approach to Stress, Relationships & Inner Peace with Mel Robbins #525

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

Studies show we spend up to 70% of our mental energy focusing on things we can't control, which affects our relationships, stress levels and health. But what if there were two simple words that could help us all break free?   Today's returning guest is Mel Robbins. Mel is a former lawyer and someone who has now become a sought-after expert in life improvement, mindset, and behaviour change. The occasion for her second appearance on my podcast is the launch of her latest book, #1 New York Times best-seller The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About. In this episode, you'll learn about: The 'Let Them Theory' mindset tool - understand the two simple but profound parts: "Let them" for accepting what you can't control, and "Let me" for focusing on what you can The 5 questions that Mel thinks we should be asking ourselves The truth about failure - discover why the fear of failing isn't about failure itself, but about others' opinions Breaking free from people-pleasing - learn why we struggle to ask for what we need and how to start prioritising ourselves Emotional maturity - understand why adults often behave like "8-year-olds in big bodies" when emotional, and how to develop greater emotional intelligence The health-stress connection - explore how being triggered by others' actions leads to unhealthy coping mechanisms, and how to break free from this cycle Relationship wisdom - discover why criticism and disappointment are normal, and how accepting people as they are improves relationships Over the past few years, Mel has amassed an incredible 25 million followers online because of her unique ability to connect with others.  She is passionate, articulate and very relatable - and this conversation is full of practical tools to help you transform your relationships, lower your stress, increase your energy and feel more in control of life.   Support the podcast and enjoy Ad-Free episodes. This January, try FREE for 30 days on Apple Podcasts https://apple.co/feelbetterlivemore. For other podcast platforms go to https://fblm.supercast.com.   Thanks to our sponsors: https://calm.com/livemore https://thriva.co https://drinkag1.com/livemore https://exhalecoffee.com/livemore   Show notes https://drchatterjee.com/525   DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your doctor or qualified healthcare provider. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on the podcast or on my website.

By constantly thinking about what other people think, believe, do, feel, all of your energy and power is going to other people. So you have none left for yourself. And then you've missed the single biggest truth about life. It was never over there. The power is in here. Hey guys, how are you doing? Hope you're having a good week so far.

My name is Dr. Rangan Chatterjee and this is my podcast, Feel Better, Live More. Studies show that we spend up to 70% of our mental energy focusing on things we can't control, which affects our relationships, stress levels and health. But what if there were two simple words that could help us all break free? Well, today's returning guest is Mel Robbins. Mel is a former lawyer and someone who has now become a sought after expert in life improvement, mindset and behaviour change. The occasion for her second appearance on my podcast

is the launch of her latest book, the number one New York Times bestseller, The Let Them Theory, a life-changing tool that millions of people can't stop talking about. In our conversation, you will learn the two simple parts that make up this powerful mindset tool. Let them for accepting what you can't control and let me for focusing on what you can.

You'll also learn the five questions that Mel thinks we should all be asking ourselves. Why the fear of failing isn't actually about failure, and why we struggle so much to ask for what we really need. We also talk about emotional maturity, why adults often behave like 8 year olds in big bodies, why criticism and disappointment are normal, and how accepting people as they are and not how you wish them to be is an essential ingredient for good quality relationships. Over the past few years, Mel has amassed an incredible 25 million followers online in no small part because of her rather unique ability to connect with others. She's passionate, articulate and very relatable.

This conversation is full of practical tools to help you transform your relationships, lower your stress, increase your energy and feel more in control of life. I wanted to start Mel with five questions. In the introduction of your new book, The Let Them Theory, you share these questions that you've been asking yourself for years and you put it to the reader that there's a benefit in them asking these questions off themselves. So if it's okay with you, I want to go through each of these five questions. And I'd love your commentary on why it's such an important question. Okay?

First question. Why am I so afraid of failing? Yeah, that's a big one. Just stop as you're listening right now. And consider the truth that there is something that you would like to change or try in your life. Like maybe you want to write a book, maybe you want to start a YouTube channel or a podcast, maybe you've thought about changing careers.

And yet, even though you have thought about this, you have seen other people do it, you maybe have felt a little jealous, for some reason you're not doing it. And there's a reason why. And the reason why is because you are worried that if you were to try it, you might fail. And if you realize that this is something

that's happening in your life, that you wanna become financially secure, this is something that you really dream about, you would love to, but you don't even get started, it's because you don't believe you're gonna be successful. You're afraid that you're gonna fail. you're going to be successful. You're afraid that you're going to fail. And so what I started to see in my own life

is that there were a lot of things that I wanted to be doing, but I was stopping myself from doing them. There were a lot of things I wanted to try, but I either thought it was going to be too hard, it wasn't going to work out, so why even bother? And what's interesting about being afraid of failing is why would it matter?

And that gets to the deeper truth about what's underneath it. You're not afraid of failing. You're actually afraid of other people seeing you fail. You're afraid of feeling inferior to other people who tried the same thing and it worked out for them, but it's not working out for you. Yeah.

And when you start to realize that my God, it's not about failing at all, it's about the opinions of what other people are going to say about me, what must be true about me, and the eyes of other people. If I go after something and I look stupid, or it doesn't work out, or it's a giant eye roll to everybody, so you're not afraid of failing at all. You're afraid that other people's opinions will be that you're a failure.

And when you go deep like that, and you realize, wait, well, that stinks, because number one, I'm never gonna be able to control what other people think, and I'm allowing that fear of something I can't control, because people are gonna think whatever they're gonna think about you. They're gonna have whatever opinions.

Half of them are so consumed in their own lives they're not even paying attention to what you're doing anyway. But you're allowing that fear? Yeah. I mean, this is one of the reasons why a lot of people who wanna learn how to make money online or who wanna learn how to do something with social media

or who wanna learn how to market themselves or put themselves out there, don't do it. Yeah. It's because of this nagging sense that if I were to take this risk, if I were to make this change, if I were to be so bold as to just say, I'm going to take my social media

and I'm going to use it to market my real estate business instead of just posting photos of my kids. That other people are going to think something and that makes me a failure. It's so powerful, Mel. There is actually a story in your book about Molly, a friend, the interior designer that really kind of speaks to this. Yeah. So this is a story about, and look,

here's my belief. You and I share this belief in the limitless potential that you have inside you to change your life. You have fundamentally changed who you are, how you live your life, the way that your life looks, your career over the past decade. I've done the same thing over the past decade. Yeah. I've done the same thing over the last 15 years.

There is not a chance in hell that you could come up with an excuse or a reason that would make me say, you're right, you have no power here. You're right, there's nothing you can do. There's always something you can do. And oftentimes, what I've found in my own life is that I've spent so much time and energy looking at whatever everyone else is doing, that I am not paying attention to what is within my control, which is my actions, how I spend my time,

my response to things, what I do, what I don't do. And so that brings us to the story about Molly. So Molly, not a real name, I'll just say that to protect people from feeling like, oh my God, I'm in a book. So, and I've had like seven people go, am I Molly? And they're not interior designers because the experience that I'm about to explain

is a universal feeling. So Molly in the story is an interior designer and she calls me one night and she's all upset about something. I'm like, what's wrong? Like it sounds like something really bad's happening. She's like, oh my gosh, well. And she goes on to tell me the story. And there's a woman that is in her friend group

and it's not really a woman that Molly's good friends with. It's a woman that's kind of annoying, she's a little overbearing, a little bit of a bragger, and she has now gotten into the design business. And Molly has gotten her certifications, Molly has been in business for 10 years, Molly has employees, she has big projects, I mean, she has a lot to be proud of.

Yeah. So all of a sudden, this woman from the neighborhood gets into the design business. And now their whole friend group is just going on and on and on about how talented this irritating woman is. And as Molly hears about this, she of course, checks out the woman's website, checks out the woman's social media.

It's beautiful. It's modern. And Molly's thinking, I haven't updated my website in six years and I know I've needed to. I'm not doing anything on social. And now all of a sudden this chick, who's not even a real designer, and who by the way, these photos are her house and

she didn't even decorate her house and now every like and so Molly loses her mind and Here's the point of the story For years Molly has known that she needs to get serious about marketing her business better for years Molly has been talking about updating her website. For years, Molly has been talking about the fact that she needs to start to get serious about social media. She hasn't done it.

And now all of a sudden, this irritating woman comes along and she is doing the exact thing that Molly has been stopping herself from doing. And this is very important because when Molly was like, what should I do? You know, is she going to steal my clients? Like everybody thinks she's a better designer. Again, now I'm worried about people's opinions about this woman versus me. I'm also mad at myself because I'm seeing somebody who I know has no advantage, no trust fund,

no special anything. She's done exactly what I've been keeping myself from doing. And now I don't have any excuses because if this chick can do it, there's nothing stopping me but me. And so she's like, what should I do? I'm like, you should pick up the phone and thank her

because this irritating woman is in your life for a reason. She's there to make you angry. She's there to make you jealous. She is there to stir something up inside of you that you need to recognize that your excuses are BS, that you can find time, you can figure this out, you haven't made this a priority, but the fact that you're angry and jealous of this person actually means that this matters to you.

So it's time to get out of your way, it's time to stop with the excuses, and it's time to just make a plan and figure this out. And it brings me to a point, Dr. Chatterjee, that was so life-changing to me, because I was basically, when I was in my 20s, 30s, and even into my 40s, I was a walking red flag as a friend, because I hadn't done enough work internally.

And when you're insecure about yourself, when you are in a state of struggle or lack, you cannot give other people what you do not have to give to yourself. And so I was the kind of person, Dr. Chatterjee, where I would see somebody else winning in life and I was jealous. I could not authentically be happy for somebody,

even the people that I love, even the people that I know work hard, even the people that I love, even the people that I know work hard, even the people that I know deserve it, because I was in such a state of lack. And what was interesting to me about the story about Molly and learning the let them theory and starting to use it in my life is that no one can take anything that's meant for you. No one can take anything that's meant for you.

No one can. Only you can do that to yourself. See, this woman that all of a sudden starts posting beautiful things on social media and starts a design business and is doing all these things that you've talked yourself out of doing, she's not taking anything from you. Exactly.

I never knew that. See, I would see somebody else's wins as my loss. I would see somebody else having a brand new kitchen or a beautiful new house that they deserve, that they worked for. And I'd walk in and kind of fake smile as I'm getting a tour and it looks like the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in magazines.

And then I would get in the car and then because I was so insecure and lacking, I first of all couldn't be authentically happy for that person. Because I'm like, if they're getting this, it means I can't. And then I get in the car and I turn to my poor husband and blame it on him.

Why couldn't you have gone into finance? Why did you have to be a nice guy that cared for people and doesn't make money like what you like, as if it's his fault? And here's the message that I have about other people's success. Number one, other people will never block your way. They lead the way.

If somebody else has a beautiful kitchen or a brand new podcast, or they've got a wonderful relationship with their kids, or they've turned their health around and they've lost a bunch of weight, that means you can do it too. Yeah. But if you pour time and energy into watching them

and to allowing your jealousy and your insecurity to consume you, you're wasting the very energy and time that you need to focus and wake up every day and chip away at working on the things that you want. And this is the biggest revelation. Like, you know, a lot of us don't feel like we have any power. And there were times in my life where I felt like I had zero power too.

But what I've come to realize is that you will never take control of your life until you stop trying to control everybody else's. Yeah. You will never feel powerful in your life until you stop giving your power away. And if you're sitting there listening to my voice or watching us on YouTube right now

and you're thinking, well, I don't have any power, baloney. You have so much power and currency. Your most, your biggest power is your time and your energy. And you talk so much about energy and your health. And I'm gonna tell you something. If you're exhausted, if you're not achieving your goals, if you can't catch a break, if you're constantly overwhelmed, you're not the problem. The problem is the power you give to everybody else.

The power you give to their thoughts, to their actions, to their moods, to their expectations. Every time you allow somebody else's behavior to impact you, or you allow their emotions to bother you, or you allow their opinions or the fear of their opinions to stop you, or you make it your job to make people happy, you are giving power to other people. And it took me until I was 54 years old to realize that holy cow, there's a different way to live.

And the different way to live is to just let people, let them have their thoughts, let them have their opinions, let them have their business and their success and their brand new kitchens, let them have their disappointments and their expectations, let them. I gotta focus on me. Let me remind myself that I got power here

because I can always control what I think, what I do, and how I process my emotions. And that's how I take responsibility for my life. Yeah. That's the big theme for me in your book. It's responsibility. It's about agency. It's about a sense of control that we can take back if we've given it away.

I mean, that's such a key point, isn't it? One of the reasons we're so tired all the time is because we waste, and I use that word intentionally, we waste so much of our own internal energy on things outside our control, on the reactions and opinions of other people. And that Molly story, the reason I wanted to talk about it is because it's a universal story. And here's what I want to say about that. First of all, you said the keyword here, responsibility. Responsibility is just the ability to respond.

That's what responsibility is. You take responsibility for your life by understanding that you are in control of your ability to respond to life. And that's the secret to life. That's the secret. Right there. And this is not a new idea, by the way.

Like I did not create the idea that what's happening around you does not need to happen to you. I did not create the idea that your power is not in trying to control out there, it's in trying to control in here. This is Stoicism, this is Buddhism, this is Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning.

And what I love about these two words, let them, is that it has all of its roots in this philosophy and truth that has been true about human beings and life since the beginning of time. Which is, any time you try to control something that you can't control, it just creates stress and frustration for you. And the more you give up trying to control everything,

the more control you gain. And I've spent my entire life getting sucked in, well, I shouldn't even say sucked in, because that implies that somebody else pulled me in. I have spent my entire life- Pulling yourself in. Pulling myself in, allowing myself to be involved in people's drama, affected by people's moods,

frustrated by things that I can't control, scared about what people are doing, scared about their opinions, all of which I can't control. And these two words, just saying let them, it was like discovering there's a completely different way to live because there is. When you learn how to detach. And this is another thing that the let them theory really is.

If you understand detachment theory or radical acceptance, this is how you apply it in modern life. It's ancient wisdom and therapeutic modalities and some of the greatest spiritual teachings in a simple tool for a very frustrating and stressful moment in human history. Yeah. So you can apply it. That's what this is.

And so back to the Mali story, the interesting thing about jealousy is that I used to get consumed by jealousy. If I saw, you know, a group of people going away, I would be jealous I wasn't invited. If I saw somebody else getting, you know, the promotion I thought going away, I would be jealous I wasn't invited. If I saw somebody else getting the promotion I thought I deserved, I would be jealous. If I saw somebody getting the better shift, if I was a waitress on Saturday night, I would be jealous and frustrated.

The thing about jealousy is that you can only be jealous of things that you actually want. And so if you're willing in those moments of jealousy, of things that you actually want. And so if you're willing in those moments of jealousy, whether it is, you know, a lot of us see other people renovating their homes, right? Or having a nice car or, and you're like, I'm jealous of that. Okay, great.

Well, let's go a layer deeper. Because what if jealousy didn't mean that there's something wrong with you? What if jealousy is a signal from your values? That there's something important that you're ignoring? That friend's brand new kitchen that you're happy for her, but you're super jealous about? Okay, good.

Let's go underneath that. Feels like it's a two-step process, what you're describing, where process one is understand that you're jealous. Okay. And you know, I think one of the things people love about you Mel is how open you are on your podcast, on social media and in this book you share very openly, I think towards the start about, I think it's an old friend of yours and they had the most beautiful house

and your kids loved hanging out there and you wanted to be happy, but you couldn't. Yes, I was so jealous. I mean, I'm like, have you ever had an experience, Dr. Chatterjee, where you and your wife, you pull into somebody's house, you're like, how do they have this much money? Like the driveway's long. It's like they've got the playroom with like four bunk beds.

And you're like, no wonder my kids are always here. And the thing about those moments is, it's normal to feel that way. And it's normal to struggle with these conflicting emotions of being both happy for your friends that worked hard and who are awesome and deserve this stuff, but to then also feel sorry for yourself and really jealous. And so if you then can use, let them, okay,

let them have a better house to me, let them have the most amazing bunk room for the kids, let them enjoy this. Now let me go to the let me part. Let me really ask myself, what exactly am I jealous of? What exactly is bothering me? Because I'm not jealous of somebody that has a penthouse in Dubai.

I don't want to live there. It wouldn't even stir any emotion in me. But for the things that are meant for you, I believe jealousy is a message from your future self. I believe jealousy is such a kind of frustrating emotion that it is trying to organize the energy and friction that you need inside yourself to actually wake up and recognize that where you are is not where you want to be nor where you're meant to be. What I think it also says to me is the importance of honesty, right?

So when I say it's a two-step process, what I'm hearing from you, Mel, is this idea that you pull up to your friend's house and I appreciate you weren't able to do this 10 or 15 years ago, right? But you can now do it, which is you'll pull up and step one is recognize that I'm not being happy for her. I'm not being happy for her. I can't be happy for her. This is ridiculous. She's my friend.

But despite me loving her and wanting to spend time with her, there's something inside of me that's raging. I think some people get stuck there now. Of course, I lived there for decades. In stage one, without realizing, okay, stage one, be honest with yourself. Don't try and pretend you're not feeling that, which is what I think a lot of people do. But then move to stage two, you call it let me. The way I hear it for you, it's kind of like you recognize it, spend a bit of time understanding

what precisely is it about this person and their life. Molly can apply the same thing with their interior designer business, right? And then what can I now do about it? Correct, because here's the thing. The let them theory is a very simple mindset tool. And it is ultimately about control and freedom. That's what it's about. Yeah.

See, I learned in researching this that there is a fundamental, hardwired need. All human beings have it. The need to feel in control. You talk about it all the time. It is a survival instinct. And you need to feel like you're in control of your life, your future, your decisions, what's going to happen at work today, the food that you eat, what you're going to do this weekend? And here's the problem the problem is everybody has the same need for control and if you dr. Chatterjee do something that annoys me or Bothers me or hurts me or irritates me or frustrates me or makes me concerned about something your behavior now makes me

or makes me concerned about something, your behavior now makes me feel something that makes me feel the need to try to control something. Because your behavior, if you're worrying me, I now feel a little out of control. So I then make a fatal mistake. I then cross the line and I try to change you. Exactly. I try to get you to change your mind

or change your opinion or do that thing I want you to do or to take away the hurt that I feel and now I'm bumping up against your need to be in control of what you're doing and That's how I lived my life for 54 years. I was constantly Crossing over the line in my relationships and in life crossing over the line in my relationships and in life because I was trying to push other people or I was frustrated by other people or I was jealous of other people or I was angry about what they were doing

or I was judgy about what they were doing. And we all have a family member or a parent who you know that anytime that you go be with them, they're gonna have their opinions and then you brace. And so then you wish that they were different. This is a dynamic that's never gonna change until you change. Because one thing that you will never, ever, ever,

ever be able to control is what another person believes, feels, thinks, says, or does. You're never gonna be able to control that. And any time that you spend trying to is a waste of your time and energy. It just makes more frustration for you. And ironically, what I also learned is that when you push other people

because you're worried about them, when you try to pressure other people to lose weight or get in better shape or make more money, you're not motivating them, you're actually triggering their need to be in control of themselves. And you create resistance to the very change that you want. And I worked against this fundamental law forever. And so the let them theory is super simple.

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health, sports performance, nutrient levels. And also with Thriva, you can test your ApoB levels, a much more reliable indicator for your risk of heart disease than standard cholesterol tests. For listeners of my show, Thriver are offering an exclusive offer of 20% off your first Thriver cycle when you enter the promo code LIVE MORE at checkout. Just visit thriver.co to get started today. That's T-H-R-I-V-A dot C-O. Thriva, listen to your blood. The first step is anytime anybody else, whether it is the person that is,

whether it's the government or it's traffic or it's one of your kids or it's your boss's mood or it's your in-laws, anytime anybody's behavior bothers you, just say let them. Because when you say let them, you are cueing to yourself, I recognize that I can't control the government, I can't control my spouse, I can't control my mother-in-law's mood, I can't control what my boss is doing right now, I can't control it. Let them. I can't control the fact that there's traffic right now on a Monday morning, which is super

stupid while everyone's trying. Let them. Because if I can't control it, when I say let them, I'm putting up a boundary. And I'm saying, this isn't worth my time and energy. And then you say the second part, which is let me, and this is the more critical part, I think, this is the more powerful part, because let me, every time you say let them, you separate yourself

from allowing the world to impact you in a negative way, and you separate yourself from making it your responsibility to make other people happy or meet their expectations. And then when you say, let me, you now cue yourself every time, Dr. Chatterjee, there's only three things in your control ever. It's what you think right now about what's happening. It's what you do or don't do.

And we forget that not doing something is often the more powerful choice. And number three, you get to control how you react to your own emotions in this moment. Do they rise and fall? Do you breathe through it? Do you use your three, four, five breath?

And some of the tools that you talk about all the time and one of the pillars, the four pillars of relaxation and settle yourself? Or do you allow your emotions to run you over like a freight train and next thing you know you said something you've regretted or you've spent 90 minutes if you've written one of those emails where it's like back back back and you're like best and then send and does nothing but keep you in a stressed out state and so And so it really is a tool that you can use in endless ways to recognize when life is getting to you

and that you're giving time and energy to something that you can't control, and you're now choosing to recognize it and say, let them, which means you protect your time and energy. And then when you say, let me, you remind yourself, no matter how scary this is, no matter how tired I am, no matter how alone I am, let me remind myself through my attitude, my actions and my ability to process my emotions, I actually can make this a little better, I have power, I have choice. Yeah. It's such a powerful tool. I mean, as you say, there are echoes of stoicism, philosophy, religion. But what does that speak to? It speaks to the fact that this is a universal human truth.

But I think what you've done so beautifully is by distilling it down to two words, two very simple words, two deceptively simple words. That's where the power comes. That's where the practicality comes. And, you know, one of the things I'm really passionate about at the moment, Mel, which I think this book speaks of is this idea that stress has become common parlance now, you know, how are you feeling? Yeah, I'm okay. I'm a little bit stressed. You know, that's how normal it is. But I don't think people realize that stress is twofold. There's external stress, the amount of emails you have to do,

the things that your boss has asked you to do, the things you have to do to take your kids to after school club or for your parents, whatever it might be. But then arguably more important is what I call internal stress. The stress that we are generating ourselves, right? You talk about control.

This is within our control. I am generating my own response to this neutral external events. And I think the gold in this book for me is, and it's a goal that I felt on my own life over the last few years, it's this idea that once you understand that there is an event and in between that event and your response, there is that choice. You can choose, you can work on this skill, the let them skill, right? Over time and realize I don't have to let that thing stress me. No. Like I said, share with you just before we started recording.

I'm in Boston at the moment to come on your podcast. Okay. And we've recorded a great conversation and we just flipped the mics. I meant to be flying home tonight. And as I was getting ready to come to your studio, I got a text message saying that the flights canceled. The older version of me would have absolutely stressed out. ready to come to your studio, I got a text message saying that the flight's canceled. The older version of me would have absolutely stressed out. Oh no, I've got to do this. I've learned over the years, there is zero point, right?

I could even apply, let them, let the airline cancel the flight, right? They've already canceled it. They've canceled it. I can't do anything. If I generate a whole load of internal stress, I went, what about this? What about that? It is what it is, right? Let's just see what the net expense option is. You know what's beautiful about this? I want to unpack this because it's a simple example,

but just like you simplify so many overwhelming topics for us, it would be so easy in the telling of that story to miss what you actually did there, and to understand how that micro decision in a moment that could be overwhelmingly stressful to take over. So when you get the news that the flight is canceled or that the

person doesn't love you anymore or that you're getting laid off from your job, the thing has already happened. So you know sometimes people say to me well is this just mean you're a doormat? Does this just mean you don't care? I'm like no actually you're a doormat right Does this just mean you don't care? I'm like, no, actually you're a doormat right now. And you're allowing too many things to have too much power over you. So if the flight's already canceled, doesn't it seem kind of stupid to allow something

that's already happened to derail everything else? And if you do then work yourself up in a state where the flight is canceled, now you're angry at the airlines and you're upset about this and it feels like this always happens to me and now I'm gonna do this and not. Pity party.

Well that and you have taught me, just if you have taught the person listening, that allowing that agitation means you've just created a physiological chain reaction in your body that has consequences for your health, for your focus, for your state of mind, for your happiness, for your ability to connect,

which means something very important. When the airline cancels the flight and you say, let them, let them, like they're doing what they need to do. I have no control of this, I'm just gonna let them. You shut down the stress response, which means you are now able to meet this moment in a very different way. Exactly.

Because you're calm, you can think clearly, you're not rattled by it. And so one of the reasons why I'm so excited for people to have this tool is because even when life just deals the cruelest blow, somebody that you love dies. You lose your job and it is the only income that you have. Let them is not going to take away the pain of what's happening.

What it does is it helps you understand in those situations, what part of this can I control? I can't control the cancer diagnosis. I just have to let them tell me the bad news. I have to let the health situation be what it is. And when you say that, what you're doing is you're protecting your fear and your stress response from something having too much

of an impact on you because what you need in the scariest moments of your life and in the scariest moments in your neighborhood or your country or your marriage or your family, what you actually need is you need the ability to think clearly. You need the ability to be able to bring the best of you to this moment. And if you allow everything to derail you or stress you out, you're not actually going to be able

to help other people. You're not going to be able to help yourself. You're not gonna be able to truly face to truly face whatever the thing is that you're scared to face. Life today is a death by a thousand cuts. I mean, I think everybody in the United States is bracing for four years of just irrational headlines and scary news.

And my philosophy about this is why would I give somebody who is that uncontrollable any power? Like there's nothing I can do to control somebody who is that narcissistic and out of control so I just need to let them because they're going to do whatever they're going to do whether you're talking about somebody that's in government or you're talking about your mother-in-law. Let them because they're going to do what they're going to do. That's not where your power is.

And when you say let them, what's also amazing in your relationships is that you actually, for the first time, call out, this is who this person is, this is who they're not, I see you exactly as you are, so I'm not gonna brace, because I know what I'm dealing with. I'm gonna let you be you.

And then you say, let me, let me focus on how I'm going to respond to this. And how I'm not going to respond to it is I'm not going to sit there and stress myself out trying to control or predict what's going to happen because I already know what's going to happen. Because people reveal who they are through their behavior. Yeah. I mean, there's so many threads to pull on there. I'm going to go back to these questions just because I think they're so powerful. Okay, so the first one you've covered beautifully, why am I afraid of failing? The second question

that you asked yourself repeatedly and you suggest that we ask ourselves is, why do I have a hard time asking for what I need? Because you have been programmed to believe everybody else's needs and expectations are your responsibility to meet. And this is true for men and women. So if you're female, you were raised to believe that your parents' happiness is your job.

You're probably leaning more into the people pleaser category. Like you think if everybody's happy and nobody's disappointed, whether it's your friends or it's your partner, or it's your parents or your kids, then you're good. So you are so focused on everybody else's needs and moods and happiness that you are last on the list.

And by the time you collapse into bed, you have zero energy left for yourself. So you have life inverted. That's why you have to ask, why do I have a hard time asking for what I need? Because I think my job is to actually give everybody what they need. And so I'm not even thinking about my needs. For men, it's the same thing.

Exact same thing. My husband, Chris, is the founder of a men's retreat called Soul Degree. And he doesn't share the details about what people share, but over the years I've asked him, what's like the big theme that comes up at the retreats that men talk about that I think people would find surprising? And he said, oh, it's very clear, number one theme.

And I said, what is it? He's that the men that he works with say, my role is as a provider. My job is to take care of everybody. My worth is in the work that I do and the money that I make. It's in the doing. And most of the men that he works with,

they don't even know what they need. Now, when I first heard that, Dr. Chatterjee, I'm like, that's not true, because women feel that way. Well, guess what? Based on the research, that's exactly how everybody feels. That it's your obligation to provide for or to take care of everybody else's needs. And because you have put everybody else's happiness and wellbeing and their wellbeing

first, that's why you got nothing left for you. And that's why you might not even know what you need. Because you've been so focused on everybody else's, you've never even stopped and asked yourself, well, what do I actually need? How do you change that? Well, you cannot get sober until you stop drinking. You cannot take care of your needs until you stop taking care of everybody else's ahead of your own. And that doesn't mean you become a narcissistic, selfish,

closed off human beings. It means you start to create space and boundaries between you and other people and you start to recognize every time you say let them and you say let them be in a bad mood. You've just stopped yourself from stepping in and trying to put them in a good one. Hold on. This is really important. So, we're talking about when we don't put our own needs first and we're constantly doing things for others, right? And I think what you're saying, Mal, is if I, in that moment, decide,

no, no, I'm tired, I've been overcommitting, I need an evening to myself tonight to nourish myself. And you're saying if someone around you is unhappy with that. Oh, are you really gonna stay in? But we said that we would go see our friends, Dr. Chatterjee, and you know, I'm just bummed because I thought we were gonna do this, come on.

You're basically saying, it's okay for them to be upset. Of course. But it doesn't mean you have to change your behavior to stop them being upset. Correct. It's a subtle, but really important difference, isn't it? It's a huge life-changing idea that in that moment, when you wanna stay in and your partner or your kids

or whatever are now disappointed because you don't wanna go to the you don't want to go to the thing or you're not going to the thing. Let them be disappointed. Let them get a ride from somebody else. Let them go without you. And here's what's interesting about disappointment. Like I've lived my whole life

navigating other people's moods. Seriously, like if you're disappointed, I'm gonna bend over backwards to make sure you're not disappointed, whether it's in business, how many times have you said yes to something, you're like, why did I say yes to this? Well, it's because you didn't want people

to be disappointed in you. But here's what I want you to consider about disappointment. And I only saw this as I started saying, let them and let me in my own life. Oh my God, I've been so afraid of disappointment. It's a beautiful thing. It really is. I mean, if you can't make it out for dinner

to a friend's birthday and they're disappointed, isn't that good? Yeah, exactly. If somebody wants you to go and do something for a speech or a business and you can't make it and they're disappointed, isn't that good? Of course it is, it means they want you there. And here's the other thing,

your parents, your children, your business partners, your boss, they're capable of experiencing the normal human emotion called disappointment, and they'll get over it. And even if this is a person in your life that loves to hold disappointment over your head, let them. Because it only has power if you give it power. Let them try to guilt you. It only has power if you change your plans because you're trying to make their mood change.

And the big takeaway for me in learning to say, let them. Let my friend be disappointed. Let that business partner be disappointed. I love that they're disappointed that I can't make it. And still, I can't make it. Let me remind myself that it's my responsibility to live my life in a way that aligns with my values. And here's the cool thing. I had exhausted myself, Dr. Chatterjee,

trying to navigate life based on people's moods and whether or not people are happy and if I'm doing the right thing according to other people and trying to operate in a way that somebody would think a positive thing about me. It's exhausting. And nothing that you do actually guarantees that someone's going to think a particular thought anyway. Like you could literally bend over backwards after working a full day at the hospital, and then go to this party that you are so exhausted

that you have no interest in going to because you don't want your friend to be disappointed and you don't want to let them down. And then you get home and you can barely fall asleep and you regret going. And even though you bent over backwards and you went, the person could be back at their flat going, you don't even know why he came,

he was such a bump on the log. You know what I'm saying? So no one wins. No one wins, and the point here is, you can't control what another person's gonna think, and you can't control their emotions, and you can't control what they do and don't do, so if that's true, and the only thing you can control

is what you think and what you do, here's what I've found in the last 18 months of using this. It's the single most powerful thing I've ever discovered. When you start to say let them, and you create space between you and other people, which helps you not assume responsibility for people's moods and their success and their happiness, you also do something important.

You create the space around the health decisions that we make. You create this space when you then say, let me, where you recognize something that's really powerful that you've been overlooking is that the more that you say, let me, let me operate in a way that makes me proud of myself. Yeah. Let me make choices that align with what I value. And if you know that in your heart, you're making the best decisions that you can based on your values, that you know your intentions, what's interesting is you become very proud

of yourself. Yeah. And when you're proud of yourself, and you're proud of the way that you're showing up for life every day, you don't actually think about other people much at all. I met you this morning, Mel, the way I see life these days very much is, my responsibility, I believe,

or I would say maybe my number one responsibility each day is to make sure at the end of the day, I can look in the mirror before I go to bed and look at myself and go, yeah, I'm proud with how I showed up today. I lived in alignment with my values today. Because when you do that and when you can take a moment to appreciate that, actually, we live in a world of 8 billion people, okay? Not everyone's going to agree with that.

Some people are going to like what I've done. Some people are not going to like what I've done. That's an unwinnable game. Yes. But we all had been playing it. Oh man. You know. That's what these two words taught me.

I had life backwards. Yeah. Exactly. I was looking out there for the validation that I need to give myself. Yeah. There's also something in what you just said, which I think is really powerful. Okay. So there's let them and let me, but it's when you mentioned your husband, Chris, and you

mentioned his, the men's retreats. And when he's sharing with you, after you asked him, that a lot of men feel, I need to be the provider. I'm always there looking out for my family and other people. Who's there looking out for me? I don't even know what I need. Your initial feeling was, what are you talking about? This is like a woman's problem. This is what women say.

It's not, man, you guys have got it easy or whatever it might be. You watch the game on the weekends. You're like playing golf. What are you talking about? Yeah, but there's this idea that actually when people say something and share it with us, let's believe them.

I think this also plays into the let them theory. It's like, okay, instead of me projecting, I go, oh, what a load of rubbish. What are you talking about? Right, just a few weeks ago, Mel, I was in London doing some media around my new book. And I'm normally, when I'm in London, I'm busy. I don't have a spare moment.

I'm not there to socialize. I'm there to work. But because of the way a couple of things played out in my timetable, I had a spare afternoon, Sunday afternoon, completely free. I've got a friend who lives about one hour out of London and hadn't seen him in ages. And one of my intentions in 2025 is to spend more time with my friends. And I text him and said, hey man, listen, if you have a moment, I'm going to be around in London. If you want to come and grab some lunch

and shoot pool, whatever. And he got back to me, he said, give me a couple of days. Let me see if I can work it in. And then he actually told me the day before he said, hey man, listen, I'm going to really struggle. We've had issues in the house. One of the pipes is leaking. The kids have got a lot on at the moment. I would love to, but I'm just not going to be able to.

It's not the right time. I think so many of us, Mel, we start to make up stories in that moment. It's an event, right? And it goes back to what I said about you listening to Chris and actually taking people at face value sometimes. Like, I'm like, yeah, you know what? I could create a story that, oh man, if you really cared about the friendship, he would have made it in or whatever it might, whatever I might have done a few years ago.

But because I, I practiced similar things to the let them theory, I'm like, no, I feel calm. I feel good. Yeah, that sounds reasonable. No worries. I get it. It's not the right time for him. No worries. He's still one of my closest friends. He just couldn't come in on that Sunday. That's the way it goes. So can you speak to that a little bit, though, particularly with the through the lens of your husband, Chris, and this idea that we project and we think what are you complaining about? You got nothing

to complain about. your life's easy. How does your work fit into that? Just taking a quick break to give a shout out to AG1, one of the sponsors of today's show. Now AG1 has been in my own life for over five years now. It is a science-driven, daily health drink with over 70 essential nutrients to support your overall health. It contains vitamin C and zinc, which helps support a healthy immune system, something that is really important, especially at this time of year. It also contains prebiotics and digestive enzymes that help support your gut health.

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D and K2 and five free travel packs with your first order. These packs are perfect for keeping in your backpack, office or car. If you want to give them a try, just go to drinkag1.com forward slash live more Well, I think it's an incredible question and I can even widen it out even more people are allowed to cancel plans They're allowed to have a different opinion than you to cancel plans. They're allowed to have a different opinion than you. They're allowed to change their minds.

They're allowed to be upset. They're allowed to struggle. They're allowed to be who they are and who they're not. And your job in life is not to second guess or to judge or to be pissed off because people are not conforming to your expectations. See, it goes both ways. You're exhausted because you think you're supposed to meet everybody else's expectations. And the reason why you're frustrated is because the opposite is true.

You actually believe everybody else should conform to your expectations. And so the very thing that is draining your time and energy and making you overwhelmed and causing the outside world and other people's behaviors to piss you off or frustrate you or stress you out or annoy you or just make you feel just intense all the time, it's the exact same thing that creates friction and distance and unnecessary drama in your relationships. It's the expectations that we hold over each other and ourselves.

And when you start to say, let them, let them be who they are, let them be who they're not. Because the more you let people be who they are. Let them be who they're not. Because the more you let people be who they are, the more you're accepting them as they are. And that makes your relationships better. And the more you let other people live their lives, the more your life gets better. Because you're no longer holding expectations

over other people that they should be different than they are. You are learning the most fundamental and important skill in a relationship, which is learning how to accept somebody as they are and love them as they are and be more compassionate and graceful and loving with people instead of constantly judging and having opinions

and inserting your stories and wishing people were different. And then how it works with you is you recognize that the unfair expectation that you've held over your own head, that you should somehow be responsible for every other adult's happiness and every other adult's social plans? I mean, just think about, you know, when you find the time to have a dinner party and you haven't seen your friends forever because there's a real crisis in friendship that we're all feeling because everybody's busy and hybrid work screws up everybody's schedules

and people have gotten a little bit more hermit-like because of the experience of being in lockdown. Yeah, for sure. Like it just, and so if we're all feeling this way and then you go to have a dinner party and let's say you've got a couple of friends, you invite two people, like, should we have, oh, well, maybe we should invite those two.

Oh no, now we got four. If we don't invite so-and-so and they find out from this person, then they're gonna be upset. So we should probably invite those people. And the next thing you know, you either have a list of 20 people, 15 of whom you don't really wanna spend the evening with

because you're worried about what other people are gonna feel if they know they're not invited or you're so exhausted by the thought of what am I going to do with this that you just are like, forget it, forget it. It reminds me, I'm not sure I should be sharing this or not, but you've, which probably means I should. I remember when I completed my first book mail and you know how hard it is to write a book.

Okay. These things aren't easy. The most stressful thing is sometimes writing the acknowledgements. I don't know if you found this. I certainly found it with my first book. You don't want to forget anybody. You don't want to forget anyone. And then you end up mentioning everyone by name who you've, who's ever given you a leg up or done anything for you.

And it's interesting that as I have let go of the need to be liked by everyone in my latest, which is my sixth one, it was very simple acknowledgement section. And instead of name checking each and every single one of my friends, I said something like, you know, I'm blessed to have great friends. You all know who you are. And I said something really nice, but without naming them all. And why I'm sharing that is because it's not about the names, it's about me. And it's about my needs when I did my first book to make sure I'm not disappointing anyone.

What will they think? I must make sure, you know, trying to manage, trying to control, right? Maybe I'm being a bit harsh on myself, but do you know what I mean? No, I think this is, I'm going to give an example so the person listening will really feel what you're feeling in case you haven't written a book. So I want you to imagine that you are about to post something

on your favorite social media platform and for me I like Instagram the best so you pull out Instagram You're gonna select a photo or a video Now let me look through my camera roll Is this a good pit is that a good picture should I do this one should I do that one a good picture? Is that a good picture? Should I do this one? Should I do that one? A good picture for who? And then you put the photo up and you're like, swipe, swipe, swipe on the filters. Trying to make it look better. For who?

And then you go and write the caption and you're like, da da da, is this too much? Should I put an emoji? Delete, delete, delete. Should I put this, for who? And if you ever look at all your drafts, that is the graveyard of your self-expression and dreams. When you do the simple act of trying to share something online, which let me just remind you, your social media is not for your friends. It is not for your mates from university. It's not for your family. It's for you. It's for your self-expression. If you're in business, it's a marketing channel. And here you are editing yourself because you believe that there's a certain photo or a certain way to write a caption

that is going to guarantee that another person is going to like you or share. Like, you have given all the power to another human being. You will never be able to control whether they follow you, unfollow you, share it, save it, like it, whatever, comment. You will never be able to control that or guarantee it. And yet in that moment, before you hit post, you are, that's all you're considering.

And then what ends up happening is you get so stressed out and frustrated, you hit draft and all the drafts are evidence of how often this has happened. And then once you do post, what do you do? You go back and you check it obsessively to see like, okay, people are there now and if you don't, then you're deleting it. And so this is what I'm saying about this very sneaky

and destructive habit that we have, where we give the power to somebody else and we don't even realize we're doing it. And we give control to things that are beyond our control and then spend all this time and energy trying to ensure that our behavior somehow guarantees it's no. Yeah. It's a form of betrayal, isn't it? Yes. No. Yeah. It's a form of betrayal, isn't it? Yes, it is. And in fact, the example you just used there, if you play this out, not only can you not control

who's gonna like that post or not, or the image or what you've written, okay? So you're playing an unwinnable game. Yep. But then the follow-on point from that is, you've done something very dangerous. Let's say you have changed your self-expression in order to get validation from other people and you get that validation.

Yep. In some ways that's even worse because now you know that the way to get validation from others is to change who you are. Just look at every woman that posts on social media with their breasts out and their ass in the camera. You're getting positive reinforcement for that. And look, if that's your form of artistry, go for it. But I would be willing to bet that 99.9% of those accounts

that are actually real human beings and not bots are actually a deeply insecure person who is seeking very toxic attention and getting it. Proving your point exactly. And look, here's what I'm gonna say, let them, if that's how they wanna live their life, let them do it. Let me say something very pointed and provocative to challenge the person listening who may be doing that,

who deep down knows that this is not the life you wanna be leading. This is not the attention you actually want, that there's deeper work to do and you are trapped. And here's the thing, no one's gonna come and fix us. At some point, you're gonna have to wake up and understand that any change you wanna make is on you. And all of the time, all of the energy that you're pouring into seeking validation from others,

chasing their opinions and their likes, and hoping that people are gonna be happy with you and you're gonna win them over, all of that is a waste of your precious life. You need to take all that time and energy back and really assess for yourself. At the end of the day, when I'm laying on my deathbed and I look back, I want you to be proud of yourself.

I want you to look back, I want you to be surrounded by people that you love and that love you back. I want you to look back, I want you to be surrounded by people that you love and that love you back. I want you to see the time that you had and go, wow, I really used the time that I had in a way that makes me proud. And so if you're not in that moment and you can't authentically say,

I am proud of who I am, I am proud of the way that I spend my time, I'm proud of how I start my day and take care of myself, then wake the fuck up and make changes. Because you can. Yeah. In fact, one of the top regrets people have on their deathbed is I wish I lived my life and not the life that other people expected of me. Yes, well, that's question number three. Yeah. Question number three, what is stopping me from living my life the way I want to live it?

You are. No one else is stopping you. You are stopping yourself because you are making other people a problem. You are looking at other people's success and you think it is an example of your failure. You are looking at other people's success and you think it is an example of your failure. You are looking at other people and you think they are the source of your happiness.

You are looking out there for the validation that you need in here. And this is why, look, again, nobody gets sober until you first stop drinking. You will never take control of your own life until you first stop trying to control everyone and everything out there, what they think, what they do, all of it. And you pull it back and you focus on you and figuring out what's going to make me proud of myself.

What kind of person do I want to be? What do I want to think about this? What do I want to do in response to this? On the subjects of only we're the ones who can make changes in our own life and get us out of the hole or change where we are, it kind of leads on to question four, right? So question four out of these five questions that you've been asking yourself and you encourage us to ask ourselves is, why do I procrastinate and overthink every decision?

So the procrastination, as you know, Dr. Chatterjee, is a stress response. Yeah. And if you think about any of the research around fight or flight, there's a third stress response, which is freeze. And if you want to talk about procrastination from a medical or physiological standpoint,

typically you're procrastinating because the thing that you need to do is going to require a lot of mental energy to do it. Whether you're procrastinating on paying your bills or procrastinating on balancing your checking account or you're procrastinating on working on your resume or you're procrastinating on paying your bills or procrastinating on balancing your you know checking account or you're procrastinating on working on your resume or you're procrastinating on cleaning out that back closet that you know you need to do or the garage or whatever and A lot of us

When we get overwhelmed by life or we're already as you've been teaching us are in a stressed out physiological state, the ability to bring a lot of energy to something that requires focus is not there. And so I just want to acknowledge that there's a deeper physiological reason for procrastination, and it's almost like a trauma response to life. You freeze.

procrastination and it's almost like a trauma response to life you freeze the over thinking and the going up in your head Has a lot to do with the fact that again When you've got to do anything in life or you're thinking about things that you want to do You immediately consider how other people are going to react to it. Most of the things we overthink about, whether it's how we're going to get out of debt

or how we're going to face this diagnosis or how we can care for our aging parents and still find time for ourselves, there's information and there's simple things you can do. I mean, all of your work, your six books provide the roadmap. The reason why we overthink though, is since the beginning of being little,

we have been around adults that typically are a little reactive, a little predictable, unpredictable, I'm talking about our parents. And as kids, we've had to develop this skill of paying attention to how other people are responding and what their moods are. So we are trained since childhood to consider how our behavior

or what other people's moods are in, and then to think about it and respond. And so for me, one of the things that has helped me a lot is when you catch yourself overthinking, what if this happens? What if that happens? What if the other thing happens? All overthinking is about things that haven't happened yet. Right?

So one thing that has helped me a lot is to say, let them, and then whatever the thing I'm afraid of, I just say. So for example, if I'm worried about what somebody's gonna think, well, what is so-and-so gonna think, if then that I start overthinking about it, I say this, let them think something negative. I don't ever say to myself, I don't care what people think.

I don't care what they think. If somebody says that, they care what people think. I don't care what they think. If somebody says that they care what somebody thinks the best way to deal with overthinking and being afraid of what other people are going to do in reaction is to say let them Have a negative opinion. Let them be disappointed. Let them be angry with me Let them misunderstand me because now you're calling out the very thing that you're overthinking about. You mentioned this idea that I don't care what people think. Uh-huh. That's not true.

Yeah. So it's really interesting to me. You are, well, there's a couple of things that come to mind Mel. You are, I would say, a once in a generation phenomena. And what I mean by that is there's something about you that people just absolutely love. People can really relate to you. You share so much of your life, your struggles, the things that you've got wrong, right? You know, within my team, I've got people who just love you. You know, I shared when you first came on my podcast

that one of my team members only joined my team because they use your five, four, three, two, one methods. They were too scared to write to me and apply. And they were reading your book and they said, right, five, four, three, two, one, send. She got a job. And let me give you another example in that. Cause there's the person listening,

there's an email or you want to send or a job you want to reply to. And isn't it interesting, the only thing that was stopping her is she was worried that you would reject her or worried that you were going to think she wasn't worthy of it. Exactly. And so again, an example of these moments where she was giving power to your opinion

over the email that she was waiting to send. Yeah. And you can apply it to your last book, the five, four, three, two, one habit, right? Which she used. So this fourth question, why do I procrastinate and overthink every decision? Well, your last one was on a tool that people can use. I need to do this. Five, four, three, two, one, do it. Yeah, the five second rule, do it. But again, the same thing applies to the let them theory,

because I guess the lady who applied to join my team, as you say, she was worried about what I would think. Who's this person? She's not worthy or whatever story she created in her head. It's not going to matter anyway, because he's never going to hire me. But she could have also applied, let them, hey, let him. I'm going to write this email and you know what? If it's not the right job for me, if I don't get it, that's okay as well.

Yeah, let him. It shouldn't stop me writing it. Correct. Yeah. Do you see what I'm saying? That's the perfect example of how you have made other people a problem. Yeah. I have now, there's a job I want and I'm not applying for it because I am making up a story

about what Dr. Chatterjee is going to do in response to an email I haven't even written yet. And so I have now put Dr. Chatterjee's made up action that I can't control in between me and the action I could actually take to land my dream job. How fucking sad. It's ridiculous on many levels because if you even think about it through the lens of time, the amount of time and energy we waste, like we said before, right? Thinking about other people's opinions, actually writing the email, sending it would probably take 10% maximum of the time that is spent. Should I? Shantai? I'm not sure. I don't think I'm the right person. They probably want someone more experienced. Do you know what I mean?

It's like, when you look at it rationally, it's absolutely crazy. But I've shared with you my view. Why do you think so many people resonate with you and your message? I think it's multi-layered. The reason why is because, you know, I started sharing things that I was discovering,

like counting backwards five, four, three, two, one, to get out of bed when the anxiety would pin me down and I didn't feel like I had it within me to face the day because there were just so many problems in my life. So I just started five, four, three, two, one, and I'd launch myself forward. And I was sharing these things with friends, and then friends would tell friends,

and then started to use social media to share these things because I have caused myself and people that I care about so much pain and heartache, because I didn't know. I didn't know what my problem was. I didn't know what I could do differently. I didn't know why I was trapped in these really negative thinking patterns

or these really self-destructive patterns of behavior that hurt me or that hurt other people. And as I started to claw my way out of the mental and the physical and the financial hole that I had dug for myself and fallen into, and I began learning that there were simple things that I could do to treat myself a little better, to be a little bit better of a person, to improve my health. I thought, you know, if I can save anybody the headaches, the heartaches, the pain that I've caused myself or other people, that is a life well lived.

And every time I've shared something, whether it is the simple story that everybody on the planet can relate to of going to a friend's home that is a hell of a lot nicer than yours, and the very childish but normal reaction that you have, and the conflict that you feel, if I can actually tell that story and it makes you stop beating yourself up for being a horrible

friend and it helps you to understand that there's something deeper there for you to learn, then that painful experience has value and meaning for me and for you. And, you know, I, and I never ever will get too far away from the painful things to forget that I'm just trying to share things that help move the needle in a normal person's life. Yeah. And I think the relatability comes from the fact that even in this wild, incredible, just unimaginable, like I can't on some level even believe that I've gone in 15 years from alcoholism, almost divorce, almost $800,000 in debt, leans on the house unemployed to building what I've built and changing who I am. Like at my core, I know I've always been a really good person, but there was so much crap that had built up and so

much evidence that I had based on bad toxic behavior on my part that I lost that connection. And so I just feel like I still have the same values. Like I, what I want now is I want more free time. I want to see my friends. I want to spend more time with my husband. I want to spend more time with my adult kids and my aging parents. I live in a tiny, small town.

I have no interest in the big, shiny bullshit that people may think is part of hosting what is right now the number one ranked podcast in the world on Apple Podcasts. And I think it's very cool that as a 54 year old mother of three, I stepped into the podcast space and this show is not only making a difference, it is dominating globally. And so that example, Dr. Chatterjee, the fact that I don't have a PhD,

yes, I'm an extraordinarily intelligent person and I'm clearly a very, very good businesswoman, but I'm just somebody's daughter, I'm somebody's mother, I'm somebody who said, you know what, I'm tired of thinking about a podcast and being pissed off and jealous that Dr. Chatterjee's doing it, and my buddy Jay Shetty's doing it,

and I'm just gonna do it. And so I do think that part of the appeal is that people can see that I actually just am exactly who you see that I am. And we joke a lot in my family because my daughters will call me, they're 25 and they're 23, and they'll be like, oh my God, you look horrible.

Why are you posting that video? That's what people like. But no, but here's the thing. That's not a gimmick. See, I went to the grocery store looking like that. Why the fuck would I put on makeup? In here on the podcast, it's a little different because these lights are damn bright, right?

But when I'm home, when I'm just living my life, and so I feel like I am just very tied to making sure that I never forget that the reason why I'm doing this is because I want to continue to learn. I want to continue to be a better person and a better friend and a better mom and a better sister and a better wife and a better daughter. And I also am doing this because I know how much pain

I've caused myself and people I love, and I didn't mean to. And I think we can all do a little bit better. And when I was at my lowest moments, Dr. Chatterjee, it wasn't ability that was missing. It was hope. It was this opinion that things are so far gone, or I'm such a shitty person that even though I believe what Dr. Chatterjee is saying,

I'm convinced this won't work for me, so why would I try? And so I think that's one reason why people really understand that I mean it. Like I'm not the kind of person that fakes it. I'm not the kind of, I spent too much of my life pretending to be somebody. I've been hanging out with you for the day on and off the mic.

Mel is literally the same person off the mic as she is on the mic. Okay, I've seen it firsthand. With such a big public profile, Mel, you're obviously like anyone with a public profile, subject to criticism. Okay, so there seems to be a very natural connection between the let them theory that you write about

and how you might tackle and deal with criticism. Oh, of course. So how do you find public criticism and how do you use the let them theory? Maybe there was a time in your life where you didn't use it. And now that you do use it, how does it change things? Oh, I just let them. Let them say what they want.

People are going to think, believe, have opinions about and feel things even when they're not true. Let them. If you can't control what people are going to say, do and feel about you, why would you spend any energy trying to manage it? There is nothing that somebody could say that would actually upset me.

And here's why. I know the truth of who I am. And I know the truth behind the intention of what I do and why. And so people can have whatever opinions they want. They can write whatever they want. They can comment whatever they want. Let them. It's so liberating.

I hope like if people don't have negative opinions, then I'm not saying anything of interest. See, somebody that comes at you, Dr. Chatterjee, he's a quack, this advice is so stupid, who needs a medical degree? People attack the messenger and the message that they actually would probably be saved by. You know, the biggest criticisms that I get

is typically kind of snarky comments around how simple it is. Like I remember when the New York Times wrote an article that was largely very, very positive. Same thing with Time Magazine. The only kind of negative vibe in it was that, you know, this is kind of profoundly stupid and simple stuff she's saying,

count backwards five, four, three, two, one, whatever. Here's the thing for me. Let them. Because if the only thing that you're able to question is the simplicity, then you don't even understand the complexity of issues that keep people stuck. Yeah, exactly. And you don't understand the reason why

somebody deeply relates to me. I understand how hard your life is. I understand how overwhelming things are. The last thing anybody needs in today's world is somebody being intellectual and trying to be smarter than you, because you're already carrying the weight of the world. So I am in the highest service and can be the most impactful if like you, Dr. Chatterjee,

I am handing you something that is so simple that even with the weight of the world on your shoulders and even when you feel like there's nothing that's gonna work, that you feel a sense of hope that maybe just maybe this might. And so if it doesn't matter what people say, I mean, like let them have negative thoughts. People attach simplicity all the time.

They don't realize how difficult it is to get to simplicity. I've experienced similar things myself. I'm sure you have. And it's like simplicity is how you help people make changes. When you make it complicated, so you have to do this and track this and do this and do this.

Who does it? Very few people. And here's the thing, when somebody is able to make something look easy, whether they make a podcast look easy, or they make a speech look easy, or they make their marriage look easy, or they make the fact that they're in good health look easy, or they make the process of change look easy, or they make the fact that they're in good health look easy, or they make the

process of change look easy. What you know when it looks easy is that there was an extraordinary amount of hard work that went into making it easy. Yeah. On the subject of criticism not bothering you. Yeah. Because, you know, a big part of the Let Them Theory book is about... Well, let me just say something. Because you were framing the question in terms of strangers, and in terms of the public, and in terms of the press. If my daughter is upset with me because she believes,

like a recent thing that happened is she said to me, our daughter that lives out in Los Angeles, and I know she won't be upset by this. She just said, I'm excited that you're coming out, but can you please not just fit me into a work trip? Can you take an extra day? Can you come a different time if, you know, I'm only see you for dinner? And that bothers me.

What bothers me about it, first of all, I'm grateful that she told me. Because here I am, and again, this gets to the point too about relationships. Two people can have very different opinions about the exact same thing and we often do, and still love each other very much. My daughter can think I am squeezing her in and she's an afterthought. And I can think that this is extraordinary,

that I'm able to go to Los Angeles for work and Kendall's schedule lines up because she's very busy too, that we can actually go to dinner and we can actually do a yoga class and we'll be able to see each other. And both things are true. So let her have her opinion, let me have mine,

and then let us come together, share openly without trying to manage each other or change each other's opinions, and figure out what to do about it. And so the reason why her opinion matters, and the reason why I care about her opinion, is because my deepest value is family and connection. My deepest value is making sure the people that I care about know that they matter to me. And so it does make me sad and upset that my actions are the way that I've behaved in the past

and here I have been thinking, this is amazing. I have a job that gets me to LA every quarter and I get to see my daughter and how cool is that? Whereas her experience is, I only see my mother if she's on a work trip. And both are true. Both are true. And when you start saying, let them and let me,

what's so fabulous is you actually create space for both things to be true and then to learn how to, without changing each other's opinions, accept both and then figure out what we're going to do about it. It's much more honest actually. Yes. It's much more honest because when we're trying to change other people's opinions without realizing it, we're kind of being a bit manipulative.

Yes, or we don't tell you the full truth because we're afraid you're going to be disappointed, you're afraid you're going to be hurt or we're afraid you're going to be hurt. And then there's this weird friction because you can already tell when somebody's like kind of, this is especially true with family. I'll tell you, we went on a family trip where my dad was turning 80 and his big bucket list is going to Machu Picchu. And so if you've ever been on one of these trips

where there's like 11 of you, you may be in matching t-shirts or not, you know, around the person's birthday, you're in a van, you're traveling around with a tour guide. And when the trip started, my brother and his family arrived and my nephews who are 16 identical twins, one of them had the flu.

So the flu then moved from row to row to row in our van, as we're traveling through Peru. It was the single best vacation we've ever had. So the flu then moved from row to row to row in our van as we're traveling through Peru. It was the single best vacation we've ever had. Why? Because anytime somebody got testy or hungry or, you know, whatever, you could hear people in the van go, let them, let her. My mom was like, oh, you don't want to, you want to come today on the morning stuff? No problem, stay at home, let them.

There was zero controlling. There was just space for everybody to be with each other and be more flexible with one another and more gracious with one another. And respectful. Yes. You're another individual and you see the world differently. Yes. Right?

It's really beautiful. And, you know, I know controls at the heart of the book. So it's compassion. Deeply. See, people misunderstand the message in the beginning because everybody loves saying, let them, because you feel superior. Yeah. Like a lot of times when traffic's backing up, you're like, let them or the plane gets

cancer. Like, let the airlines. You're just like, I wouldn't do it that way, but I'm going to let them, and I rise above this, and I'm a little judgy, my friends go away without me, let them. But everybody misses the let me part. Because if all you do is say, let them, let them, let them, let them, you're going to then find

that you feel a little isolated and lonely. Or you feel like a doormat sometimes, I guess. Yes. Well, the interesting thing about the doormat is that you can feel that way, but when you start to see that you're a doormat, you're going to recognize, I've always been this way. See, when you say let them, you're not saying, let them abuse me. Let them not call back. Let them talk down to me. What you're saying is,

I for the first time in my life, when I say let them, I'm actually recognizing that this person's treatment of me is how they feel about me. I am calling out. When I say let them talk down to me, I'm not allowing it. I am naming it. And then I say, let them talk down to me. I'm not allowing it. I am naming it. And then I say, let me remind myself,

I choose who gets my time and energy. And if this person talks down to me, if this person ghosts me, if this person will not give me the love and the respect that I deserve, I have to let them because they're revealing what they actually feel about me. Now it's on me. I get to leave any relationship, any conversation, any job, any interview, any date, any dining room table, anytime I choose.

Yeah. There's a beautiful bit in the book where you say, the more you let people be who they are, the better your relationships will be. That's right, because this was a big concept for me. My relationship, for example, with my mom is not my mom's responsibility. It's mine. Yeah.

And if I want the relationship to get better, I have to stop wishing she would change. And I have to change. And we often focus on the other person and the changes that we wish we would see in them. I wish they managed their mood better. I wish they didn't drink so much. I wish they treated me better. I wish they did this, that, and the other thing.

I wish they made more money. I wish they were a more positive person, more social, more proactive. Stop it. Stop it. Trying to change somebody isn't loving them. Let them be who they are. Let them be who they're not.

If you want the relationship to change, you have more power than that person. You change your energy. You change your approach. And if in doing that, it gets worse or nothing changes and you still have complaints, then it's time to look in the mirror and say, let me ask myself if I can actually choose this relationship or not. Yeah.

There's a key subtlety in the let them theory. I'm keen for us to highlight. Okay. In the let them theory, I'm keen for us to highlight. Okay, so let's go back to criticism and what you said a moment ago, okay? Some people may say, well, is some of this a bit of toxic positivity, right? Is you saying, let them, someone's gonna criticize me,

let's say a member of the public, we're not talking about your family now. Or even the family. Yeah, let them, someone's going to criticize me. Let's say a member of the public. We're not talking about your family now. Or even the family. Yeah. Let them. It doesn't bother me. I didn't say it doesn't bother you. The reason why you have to say let them is because it does bother you. Okay. So this is the key point because you're not saying ignore your emotions and just stoically move on.

Nope. Right? So let's just, let's just explore that because I don't want anyone to misinterpret this part of it. I think this is a brilliant question. So here's the thing. The issue isn't caring. The issue is that you give more weight to your family's opinions than you give to your own. And with family in particular,

it feels like we've gotten to this point in the world where everybody is completely intolerant of holding space for opposing opinions about anything. And what troubles me is I see this almost knee-jerk stress response in relationships, where if I don't like your opinion, then I cut you off. If I don't like that you're disappointed in the fact that I don't want to be a lawyer anymore.

I don't want to major in business. I want to major in philosophy. And now you have an opinion that I'm screwing up my life, then what I'm seeing that really troubles me is an inability to lean towards somebody. Instead, what I see is people icing people out, not sharing about their life, not leaning towards somebody to say, well, why do you believe that? And so the let them theory is not supposed

to actually hurt your relationships. It's supposed to teach you the emotional maturity and the compassion and the confidence to be able to care about what somebody thinks, to care about why they may think that way, but to care more about the decisions that you make about how you're going to live your life. the decisions that you make about how you're going to live your life, and again, learning this incredible skill that two things can be true at once. Yeah, I love that. Yes, and so I'm not saying that it's easy if your parents,

for example, have a bigoted opinion, or if they do not accept the person that you wanna date or that you wanna marry. That's not an easy situation. It's also not easy if you are in a career that is sucking your soul dry and you want to go and launch a business and your partner is the loudest voice against you. Let them. Because here's the issue.

The reason why most people criticize what you're doing is typically not because they think you're an idiot. It's because they're deeply concerned that it might not work out, or they're concerned that you're changing and now they feel like you're somehow rejecting them. And when you don't understand that people can have their opinions,

they can be disappointed in you, they can be pissed off at you, they can not understand why you're making decisions that you're making, and they can still love you. That's basically the definition of family, learning how to love people that you hate sometimes. If you are able to go let them, let them believe what they want to believe, let them have their opinion, but then you also, now that you have space,

because you're actually allowing somebody to be an adult, people are allowed to believe what they wanna believe. And most of the time, when people believe something that you don't understand, there's a deeper reason why that has to do with their life experience. Like I believe certain things about money and about savings and about wealth that my great grandmother would never believe because of when she lived and her experience in the depression.

I mean, because her frame of reference is totally different. Everything makes sense actually once you understand someone's life story. Of course. It all makes sense. Yeah, if I were you, if I had your childhoods, your experiences, your first job, your toxic boss, I'd probably see the world in the same way as you. Like, let me just play this out, because I love that you brought this up. Let's just say you're in this situation where your parents do not understand why you don't want to become a doctor, right?

Their hopes and dreams and expectations and based on their upbringing, the highest, most respected thing that you could become as a doctor, it would mean that they are wildly respected. It would mean they had done their job as a parent. That's their belief, let them have it. Now you over here, you're like in university,

you're an artist. You were gonna be a doctor, but now that you're studying, you're like, I don't like any of this. And you start to realize, wait, being a doctor was their dream and expectation, it's not mine. Here's what's interesting about this moment. The person who's at university is terrified

of disappointing their parents. The parents are terrified that their child's gonna screw up their life. They're also worried about what their relatives and their friends are gonna think. They're also now questioning, did we make the right decisions because our dream had always been XYZ. And here's what's interesting about this.

The parents expect the child to believe the same thing they do. The child expects the parent to believe the same thing they do. And so the problem isn't the people and their opinions. The problem is we expect other people to do as we please and to think what we want. And that's not how human beings work. And so when you say let them, you create the space for someone to have their life experience

and to have their beliefs. And then because you're not at all trying to manage it, you then get to say, let me remind myself. I get to choose how I live my life. And I also get to choose how I'm going to respond to this disagreement. Do I lean toward them or do I lean away? And it's my hope that more and more people learn this skill

to lean towards somebody that is disagreeing with them, to understand why so that we can seek deeper connection. Because if we can't do that, the division that we see online, the tension that people see, the polarization, it's going to get worse and worse. And so if you can start to practice this in your family and with your loved ones, that's the ripple effect that I'm hoping that this achieves. Yeah, that example is so powerful because if that kid at university then sacrifices their dreams and their desires and their wants in order to keep their parents happy, just fast forward 10, 15, 20 years.

Because frankly, I've seen this a lot. So I'm in a family of Indian immigrants. Okay. So growing up, I knew a lot of other people like me. And in Indian immigrant families in the UK, you will usually find one of the kids are at medical school. Why? Because it's hugely valued.

Okay. Now, for some people, it's the right choice. Yeah. For a lot of people, it's hugely valued. Okay. Now, for some people it's the right choice. For a lot of people, it ain't the right choice. And so one of the reasons I find that people in their mid forties suddenly wake up and feel stuck, lost, unmotivated, they're drinking to excess on Friday and Saturday nights, it's actually a symptom of the problem. The problem is they actually had what I call an over reliance on being liked by other people. And as I say, the cost of being liked by everyone is that you no longer like yourself. And that's why, you know, one of my favorite bits in this book is the middle section dealing with someone else's emotional reactions, which I think a lot of us don't want to do.

And there's such a powerful bit at the start of that section. When you write, the reality is adults are as emotional as children and it is not your responsibility to manage someone else's reactions. As long as you let other people's emotional immaturity dictate your choices, you'll always come last in your own life. That is profound. I was just one of these people that felt so tuned into other people's moods and emotions. And the second somebody was emotionally reactive, upset, angry, or passively aggressive,

silent treatment stuff. My job to make everything okay, my job to make everybody in a good mood, my job to make sure my kids aren't sad or upset or bummed, nobody's disappointed in me. And it was a life-changing realization in researching this because I started to notice, I say let them a lot if somebody's snarky, I say let them a lot

if somebody rage texts me. I don't need to respond. And what I started to learn from the experts, and I'm sure you know this to be true, is that the skill of emotional maturity, which is the ability to understand your emotions and the ability to feel them and process them in a mature way without barfing them on other people,

or acting like a kid throwing a tantrum inside an adult body. It is not anything someone's born with. It's a skill. You have to actually want to learn it. You have to be taught it. You have to practice it. And there is almost no one on the planet that has ever been taught how to do this.

And one of the main reasons why is nobody, none of our parents been taught how to do this. And one of the main reasons why is nobody, none of our parents were taught how to do this. Yeah, exactly. And so I have this rule that I adopted from my brilliant therapist, Dr. Ann Daven. She basically, I was talking about this family member who's got a narcissistic personality style. We all have somebody like this in our life

that it's always about them. You know, an evening with them is going to be fraught with all the attention on them. It's draining. And one of the coolest things about the let them theory is, you know, you used to go into those situations with said family member or friend, and you would brace. And you would wish that things are gonna be different,

and you would hope things would be different. You can just now go let them. I know who this person is. Why would I expect them to be any different? I'm gonna just let this play out and remind myself, let me remind myself, I don't have to sit at the table. I don't have to be part of this conversation. I don't have to give this a lot of energy

because this is who this person is. But I was talking to my therapist, Anne, about how can I make sure this person really doesn't bother me? And she said, look, Mel, the vast majority of adults are just eight-year-old kids in big bodies. Yeah.

And it was so life-changing to hear that because she said to me, she said, you know, just think about it. Most adults can't handle their emotions. It's why your boss screams at you. It's why people write those like three page long emails and then signed it, best regards. You know, it's why you'll be out to dinner

and if a friend has a location or like, I see you that you're near me. Why didn't you let me? You're like, what? This is a grown ass adult? It's why people give you the silent treatment. In fact, there's a part in the book where, here it is, it's on page 112, where you line up childlike behavior.

So this is a behavior of like an eight year old. When kids are overwhelmed emotionally, they run away from you. What do adults do? We avoid confrontation, same thing. When a kid doesn't get what they want, what do they do? They go sulk in the from you. What do adults do? We avoid confrontation. Same thing. When a kid doesn't get what they want, what do they do? They go sulk in the corner. What does an adult do?

They give you the silent treatment. Right? When a kid feels deeply sad or scared, they shut down. Adults, ooh, you men, you guys act stoic all the time as if things aren't bothering you. Same thing. When a child is at a store and they don't get the toy they want, they flop on the floor and they throw a tantrum.

It's exactly what adults do. They rage text at you, they flip you off at traffic, they vent at you. That is an adult tantrum. It's emotional immaturity. Kids slam doors, adults slam doors, kids lie, adults lie all the time. And so these are all examples of when

somebody gets flooded with emotion and they have not developed the capacity or skill to actually process it. So they tend to either shove it down and then pout or give you the silent treatment or lie about how they feel or drink it away or they vomited at you. And I was a vomiter.

I was the kind of person that when I would get frustrated by life, I was the classic person that would come storming in the door and slam down my bag from work. And then I would be horrible to the people that I care about the most. And then I would say this, I'm so sorry. It's just been so stressful at work, traffic, and I, and for years, I had this inability to protect myself from outside stress, and I had this inability to process all the frustration

and inconsiderate behavior and the tension that I felt, and so I just would literally take it behavior and the tension that I felt. And so I just would literally take it out on the people that I care about. And when I started to recognize, okay, I'm just like eight years old. Like there's a little third grader in my body right now. Mel, I don't want to act like this anymore.

How do I get control of this? Well, you get control of it by, first of all, recognizing that this is everybody. And so what I also love about this is that if you have somebody in your life that's emotionally volatile or narcissistic in their personality style, we tend to fear them and tiptoe around them.

When you start to imagine that your boss is just an eight-year-old kid on the other end of that nasty email, you pity them. And it's not a demeaning thing. You literally are like, I feel sorry that you live in a body that must have that much stress and tension that you actually think you need to take it out on me. I see what's happening here. You have no ability to process normal human emotions. And what a shame you're going through life like that, but I am going to let you because it's not my job to be your parent. Exactly.

And I think my sense from you, Mel, and you can tell me if I'm right on this or not, my sense is that one of the reasons you're so passionate about this new book and this let them theory idea is because you know damn well what it feels like when you don't live your life in accordance with this theory. Yeah, say hello to the first 54 years of my life. Yeah, and you also know the calm, the freedom,

the sense of control, the peace. I didn't know this was possible. Yeah. I would hear like people like you talking about what's possible when you really relax, when you really start taking care of yourself. And I will admit, I had that thing, like I could get a little bit of that, but I didn't really understand what it meant to be in a body that feels calm and present.

Well, I don't think I knew until recently. Why I'm so passionate about these ideas that I share, that you share, Why I'm so passionate about these ideas that I share, that you share, is because on the other side of this deep realization that you can't manage other people, you can't control their behavior, you can't change them, right? That's for me at least this idea that every external event really is neutral and it's the perspective that we choose to take on it that determines its outcome. That really resonates with me and my brain and how I see the world.

Once you get that and you practice, right? Cause people aren't just going to buy the book and immediately go, oh, I've got this nailed, right? They're going to learn it and through the stories you share in the book, they're going to go, oh, I can apply it there. And little by little, week by week, month by month, you start to change. And in a month, in two months, in three months, you're going to feel like a different person.

Oh, I'm never going back. Yeah, well, you can't go back. Cause even if you did go back, I contend that you'd notice, oh, there I go again, I'm falling back. I'm not doing it, not doing it. I, the level of peace. And look, there are days that are frustrating.

There are days where the stress gets to me. There are days where I vent at my business partner and then I'm like, why did I do that? I'm so sorry. But here's what I'm proud of. The amount of time between the emotional reactivity and my ability to clean it up and apologize is like a minute.

Yeah. It's not a day. And- Well, that's massive for your relationships. It's massive. And the number of times that it happens, 95% less. Because I value my time and my energy

and my peace so much that I've now been saying let them and let me so much. I like the let me part especially that I am not going to allow myself to have things that don't matter affect me the way they used to. Yeah. And actually one thing that I really believe about this new book of yours, Mel, even on the surface, it could be seen to be about relationships. And it is. It is, yeah.

Right? It's about relationships with other people, your relationship with yourself. To me, it's also about health, right? And to me, the reason, there's many reasons it's about health, but one of the key reasons, which I don't think people talk about enough in health and wellness, is the why behind our behaviors, right?

So if you're constantly getting triggered and stressed out by the actions of other people, what do you do? Sugar, alcohol, like numbing, distraction, right? So we think more knowledge about the sugars, what we need. No, if you apply the let them theory in your life and you develop this inner calm, I bet that people's behaviors are gonna get better as well. Their health behaviors, because those behaviors were there as a symptom

of the internal stress they created by the way they interacted with the world. The easiest way to start using the let them theory is to simply protect yourself from daily stressors. Like, you know, if you're standing in queue at a little market and there's two cashiers open, five people in front of you, and there's like tons of people around,

but five other empty cashier register things, and it's like beep, beep, beep. What do you feel in your body? and it's like beep, beep, beep. What do you feel in your body? You feel the flood of stress. And in that moment, if you're the old Mel Robbins, you would start rocking back and forth. You'd anxiously look at your phone. I'd turn around and roll my eyes at the person behind me.

I'd get frustrated if I saw people working in the store, but they're not coming to cashier. And now I'm thinking I can run the store better than the people running it, and I'm mad. And here's what I've just done. I've allowed something stupid to put me in a fight or flight response and trigger the stress psychology in my body,

which impacts me for the rest of the day. And I've also lost sight of something. I have control. Let them be slow. Let them run the store like this. And let me remind myself that I can leave. I could actually, instead of rocking back and forth, I could actually close my eyes and practice

your three, four, five breath technique. Yeah, anything you want. Once you realize that you have the power, that's the key. That's the key message in this book, right? Yes, and to your point, if you do that in a micro moment and you do that all day long,

let them with the stressful email, let them with the traffic, let them with no seat being offered to you, even if you're pregnant and you're on the tube, let the patients, family that you're taking care of as a nurse be rude to you because they're stressed out and scared. Just let the parents of the kid who you're teaching, you know, not understand how hard you're to let them. Like if you insulate yourself from those moments of stress that drain you, that just impact your health, one two word phrase at a time, you're actually

protecting yourself from the things that are hurting your health. Yeah, I love it. So we've gone four of the five questions. Got it. So to finish off the loop, because I said five at the start, so I'm going to remind people of the four and then get to the fifth one. Okay, so the first question, why am I afraid of failing? Number two, why do I have a hard time asking for what I need? Number three, what is stopping me from living my life

the way I want to live it? Number four, why do I procrastinate and overthink every decision? And the fifth one, arguably the most powerful one, what is underneath all that doubt? What's underneath all that doubt is your attempts to control things that you will never be able to control. Every time you try to control what somebody else thinks or you worry about it or you are

frustrated by somebody's opinion or their behavior, or you're annoyed by what somebody does or doesn't do, or you navigate your life around people's moods, or you make it your job to make everybody happy around you, you are focused on something that is outside of your control. And if you are spending time and energy on something that you'll never be able to impact, of course you're going to doubt yourself. I mean, it's never going to work.

And so you're in this loop where by constantly thinking about what other people think, believe, do, feel, all of your energy and power is going to other people. So you have none left for yourself. And then you've missed the single biggest truth about life. It was never over there. The power is in here. The power is in what you do, what you think, how you process your emotions. And when you start to focus on what you can do, on the choices that you do have,

on what you want to think about what's happening, all of those times that you focus on your response, you take your power back. You recognize that, oh my gosh, no matter what's happening, there are things I can control. And when you focus on what you can control, it makes you feel safe. It makes you recognize that you have agency.

It makes you feel like there are things that create forward momentum. And every time that you lean into what you can control, it makes you feel a little bit more capable, which then makes you feel a little bit more confident. I mean, you doubt yourself when you stop yourself from taking action and when you obsessively push against a wall that's never gonna move.

And I think we know when we're quietly giving up on ourselves. I think, you know, see, I choose to believe that everybody has within them the ability to change their life for the better. And I also believe that you are capable of achieving things that are way beyond what you could imagine for yourself. And I also believe that anything that is in your way

is something that you have put in your way because you have told yourself that there's nothing you can do and that's a lie. There's always something you can do through your attitude, through the actions you do or don't take, and through the way you react to the emotions that you feel. Early on, Mel, you said that you've caused people a lot of pain in your life. I think a lot about the concepts of regret.

Yep. Okay. And I'm interested, as you've evolved as a human being I think a lot about the concept of regrets. Yep. Okay. And I'm interested as you've evolved as a human being over the last few years, even in the writing of this book, which clearly has been life changing for you and for many of the hundreds of thousands of readers around the world now. Because my question is, what's your relationship like with regrets? You know, there's tons of regrettable things I've done.

And there's a tremendous number of things that I wish I hadn't done. And it's a long list. And I wish that I could go back and remove any of the pain that I caused other people because I do know that I never intended to. There's a big difference between what you intend though and the actual impact. And so while there are things that I wish I hadn't done and there's a lot of pain that I wish I hadn't done, and there's a lot of pain that I wish I hadn't caused.

I have created space for two things to be true. I understand that absolutely everything that's ever happened to me has led me to this moment. And given the impact that I am able to make and the things that I have experienced and achieved, and most importantly, arriving at a moment in my life where I am truly proud of the person that I am. Which is something I could not say about myself for probably the first 54 years of my life. I was proud of some of the accomplishments, but deep down I still wrestled with a lot of hatred,

a lot of regret, a lot of shame. Even though I talk openly, there was still something unresolved. And so I have created this space for two things to be true. I hate that things that I did cause people pain and I wish that I could erase it, but I can't erase parts of my story. Yeah.

And I've apologized for the things that I've done, and I've done the only thing that you can do when you cause yourself or other people pain, and that is to dig deep, to understand the very important and personal message that, and the lesson that you needed to learn through those things exactly and then work your tail off to Become a better person and not do that again because you can apologize through your words but that's important but a true apology is a change in behavior.

And what I know as I sit here today is that I have changed who I am through my attitude and through my behavior over time. And one of the reasons why I do believe that the person listening and the person that they're gonna share this with can change their life is because over the course of the last 15 years, I've changed absolutely everything about mine. And it's not gonna happen overnight.

But if you make a decision that where you are is not where you wanna remain, that you do wanna grow, that you do to remain, that you do want to grow, that you do want to learn, that you do want to change the way that you move through your day, then that decision is all you need because it turns your life in a completely different direction. And then what you need to do is I encourage you, like think about a 15-year timeline. We often think about what could I do in a month. When you're thinking about whether or not you could change your life and give yourself

a decade, do you know how much you can change in a decade? You can change everything. You can meet the best friends of your lifetime. You can have an incredible marriage. You can get yourself out of debt and make a ton of money. People around the world have figured out how to do this, and they've been in the exact situation that you're in. You just have to make a decision that where you are is not where you're going to stay.

And then you have to get up every morning and put one foot in front of the other. And that's all that it takes. Well, you're an incredible human being. You are doing such phenomenal work in the world. You've written a quite brilliant book. Thank you for coming back on the show. Thank you for loaning me your studio for the afternoon to have you back on the podcast. And I can't wait for the next to have you back on the podcast.

And I can't wait for the next time we get to chat. Me either. Thank you. Really hope you enjoyed that conversation. Do think about one thing that you can take away and apply into your own life. And also have a think about one thing from this conversation that you can teach to somebody else. Remember when you teach someone, it not only helps them, it also helps you learn and retain the information. Now before you go, just wanted to let you know about Friday 5. It's my

free weekly email containing five simple ideas to improve your health and happiness. In that email, I share exclusive insights that I do not share anywhere else, including health advice, how to manage your time better, interesting articles or videos that I've been consuming, and quotes that have caused me to stop and reflect. And I have to say, in a world of endless emails, it really is delightful that many of you tell me it is one of the only weekly emails that you actively look forward to receiving. So if that sounds like something you would like to receive each and every Friday, you can sign up for free at drchattyg.com

friday5. Now if you are new to my podcast, you may be interested to know that I have written five books that have been bestsellers all over the world, covering all kinds of different topics, happiness, food, stress, sleep, behaviour change and movement, weight loss and so much more. So please do take a moment to check them out. They are all available as paperbacks, eBooks and as audiobooks which I am narrating. If you enjoyed today's episode, it is always appreciated if you can take a moment to share the podcast with your friends and family or leave a review on Apple podcasts. Thank you so much for listening. Have a wonderful

week and please note that if you want to listen to this show without any adverts at all. That option is now available for a small monthly fee on Apple and on Android. All you have to do is click the link in the episode notes in your podcast app. And always remember, you live more. Just wanted to take a moment to tell you about my first ever UK theatre tour taking place this March. So I've just finished two days rehearsing for the show with the entire tour team, the director, video tech, sound crew, tour manager, and I'm even more excited for these live shows than I was when I first announced the tour. Now if you enjoy listening to my podcast, I think you are going to love

coming to this tour. Don't think of it like a book tour. Think of it as an immersive, transformative, fun evening where you will walk away with a personalized blueprint of the things you need to work on in your own life. It's not just me on a stage talking to you. There will be lots of interactive moments and a few surprises. Now, I know that many of you listen to this podcast to learn things that will help you thrive, but I also know that at times it can feel hard. On this tour, you are going to be in a room with other people who are interested in the same things as you are which will feel Incredibly special and give you a massive boost. These events are going to be fun

inspirational Educational and hopefully will be the springboard You need to take action as we move out of winter and get into spring as we move out of winter and get into spring. There are 14 shows all around the UK, the two warm-up dates in Wilmslow and the London Lyceum date has just sold out. So don't delay if you plan on picking up tickets. All details can be seen at DrChatterjee.com forward slash events. So get your friends together, make a night of it and I hope to see you in person in just a few weeks.