Motivation Daily by Motiversity - START WITH WHY - Simon Sinek Motivational Speech

Episode Date: May 22, 2026

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We're also preoccupied with ourselves, you know? I had what a lot of people would be considered a good life as living the proverbial American dream. You know, I quit my job to start my own business, made an okay living, had great clients, did good work, and yet I'd lost my passion for that and didn't want to wake up and go to work anymore, which was embarrassing because superficially everything was just fine.

I was pretending that I was having, happier, more in control, and more successful than I was or felt, which is quite frankly pretty draining and pretty dark. And it wasn't until a very, very close friend of mine came to me and said something's wrong. She was the first one to notice something. And I came clean and I sort of let it all out. It was that catharsis that sort of lifted this heavy weight off my shoulders. I was no longer alone. It was no longer a secret.

And all of the energy that was previously going into lying, hiding and faking now went into finding a solution. If you allow someone to sit and struggle with you, it actually deepens the relationship. But what we're talking about is risk. What we're talking about is being vulnerable. And it requires more courage, as you've learned, that actually requires more strength to say I'm anxious today than it does to lie and say everything's great. That's the irony.

Superficially, it's stronger. But in reality, it's cowardice. If you want to be an elite warrior, you better get really, really good at helping the person to the left of you and helping the person to the right of you. Because that's how people advance in the world. I don't like the conversations of strengths and weaknesses because strengths often have liability.

I'm really confident. Okay, in the wrong context, you're arrogant. But weaknesses also have several linings. Yes, it's important for us to understand our characteristics that we exhibit, of which some of them in certain contexts are huge strengths, and some of the exact same characteristics in the wrong context are huge weaknesses. right? So it's very, we have to be very careful when we label people or generations as being strong or weak, because the answer is it depends.

We have to take the time to foster and take care of people around us to nurture our relationships, because when we're going to be doing something difficult, when we're going to be swimming upstream, when we're going to be innovating and doing something different. There are days we're going to doubt ourselves. There are days we're going to get knocked in our ass. There are days that storms are going to rise. and we have to have people who say, I got your back. You need to do this. There's no such thing as winning global politics, and there's definitely no such thing as winning business. Business is an infinite game. And yet, when we listen to the language of too many leaders,

they talk about being number one, being the best, and beating their competition. Based on what? There's no agreed upon objectives. There's no agreed upon timeframes. And so what ends up happening is you have people building organizations and leading with a finite mindset playing to win in a game where there's no such thing as winning.

Leadership is not about being in charge. It's about taking care of those in our charge. And the very responsibility of a leader is not to drive performance. Leaders are not responsible for the results. Leaders are responsible for the people who are responsible for the results. And the problem is, is we don't teach people how to lead.

When you're very, very junior, we give people tons of training how to do their jobs. Some people get advanced degrees how to do their jobs so that they'll be good at them and if you're really good at your job, will promote you, and eventually you get promoted to a position where you're now responsible for the people

who do the job you used to do, and we don't teach you how to do that. So how can we expect people to be good at their jobs if we don't train them how to do it? Like, would you go see a doctor that didn't go to medical school? No. So why would we work for a leader

who has no training in being a leader? That's why we get managers. That's why we get micromanagers. That's why we get toxicity. It's not because they're bad people, it's because they don't know what they're doing, and they're making it up as they go along. And those lucky times that we get to work for a great leader,

well, they were lucky that they probably had a great leader before them, or they learned it somewhere else, or maybe they had a terrible leader, and they committed to do the total opposite of everything. The point is, they learned it. Well, we have to teach leadership so that leaders can create environments in which all of us can work to our natural best.

We teach leadership as if it were a finite game. You know, people start business with the goal of winning or being number one, and that's a problem, because that's impossible. Let me give you a hypothetical example to make my point. Two CEOs. The first CEO says, our number one priority is growth. And of course our people are important, because if we take care of our people, we will meet and exceed our financial goals. Second CEO says, our number one priority is our people. And if we take care of our people, we will always meet and exceed our financial goals.

our financial goals? Which one would you rather work for? I don't want to try it. I mean, it's obvious, right? It's obvious. So this is what it means to prioritize will of resources. It has, of course, of course, money matters, but the people matter more. The United States Navy SEALs are perhaps the most elite warriors in the world. And one of the SEALs was asked, who makes it through the selection process? Who is able to become a seal? And his answer was, I can't tell you the kind of person that becomes a seal. I can't tell you the kind of person that makes it through buds.

But I can tell you the kind of people who don't become seals. He says the guys that show up with huge, bulging muscles covered in tattoos who want to prove to the world how tough they are, none of them make it through. He said the preening leaders who like to delegate all their responsibility and never do anything themselves, none of them make it through. He said the star college athletes who've never really been tested to the core of their being, none of them make it through. He says some of the guys that make it through are skinny and scrawny.

He said some of the guys that make it through, you will see them shivering out of fear. He says, however, all the guys that make it through, when they find themselves physically spent, emotionally spent, when they have nothing left to give physically or emotionally, somehow, some way, they are able to find the energy to dig down deep inside themselves, to find the energy to help the guy next to them.

They become seals, he said. You want to be an elite warrior, it's not about how tough you are, it's not about how smart you are, it's not about how fast you are. If you want to be an elite warrior, you better get really, really good at helping the person to the left of you and helping the person to the right of you. Because that's how people advance in the world. The world is too dangerous and the world is too difficult for you to think that you can do these things alone. If you find your spark, I commend you. Now who are you going to ask for help and when are you going to accept help when it's going to be? offered. Learn that skill. Learn by practicing helping each other. It'll be the single most

valuable thing you ever learn in your entire life to accept help when it's offered and to ask for it when you know that you can't do it. The amazing thing is when you learn to ask for help, you'll discover that there are people all around you who've always wanted to help you. They just didn't think you needed it because you kept pretending that you had everything under control. And the minute you say, I don't know what I'm doing, I'm stuck, I'm scared, I don't think I can do this. You will find that lots of people who love you will rush in and take care of you. But that'll only happen if you learn to take care of them first.

Nelson Mandela is a particularly special case study in the leadership world because he is universally regarded as a great leader. You can take other personalities and depending on the nation you go to, we have different opinions about other personalities, but Nelson Mandela across the world is universally regarded as a great leader. He was actually the son of a tribal chief, and he was asked one day,

how did you learn to be a great leader? And he responded that he would go with his father to tribal meetings, and he remembers two things when his father would meet with other elders. One, they would always sit in a circle and two his father was always the last to speak. You will be told your whole life that you need to learn to listen. I would say that you need to learn to be the last to speak. I see it

in boardrooms every day of the week. Even people who consider themselves good leaders who may actually be decent leaders will walk into a room and say here's the problem, here's what I think, but I'm interested in your opinion, let's go around the room. It's too late. The skill to hold your opinions to yourself until everyone has spoken does two things. One, it gives everybody else the feeling that they have been heard. It gives everyone else the ability to feel that they have contributed. And two, you get the benefit of hearing what everybody else has to think before you render your opinion. The skill is really to keep your opinions to yourself. If you agree with somebody, don't nod yes. If you disagree with somebody, don't nod no. Simply,

sit there, take it all in, and the only thing you're allowed to do is ask questions so that you can understand what they mean and why they have the opinion that they have. You must understand from where they are speaking, why they have the opinion they have, not just what they are saying. And at the end, you will get your turn. It sounds easy, it's not. Practice being the last to speak. That's what Nelson Mandela did.

There was a former Undersecretary of Defense who was invited to give a speech at a large conference about a thousand people. And he was standing on the stage with his cup of coffee and a styrofoam cup, giving his prepared remarks with his PowerPoint behind him. And he took a sip of his coffee and he smiled and he looked down at the coffee. And then he went off script. And he said, you know, last year I spoke at this exact same conference. Last year I was still the Undersecretary and when I spoke here last year they flew me here business class

and when I arrived at the airport there was somebody waiting for me to take me to my hotel and they took me to my hotel and they had already checked me in and they just took me up to my room and the next morning I came downstairs and there was someone waiting in the lobby to greet me and they drove me to this here same venue they took me through the back entrance

and took me into the green room and handed me a car. cup of coffee in a beautiful ceramic cup. He says, I'm no longer the undersecretary. I flew here coach. I took a taxi to my hotel and I checked myself in. When I came down the lobby this morning, I took another taxi to this venue. I came in the front door and found my way backstage. And when I asked someone, do you have any coffee? He pointed to the coffee machine in the corner and I poured myself a cup of coffee into this here style. He says the lesson is, the ceramic cup was never meant for me.

It was meant for the position I held. I deserve a styrofoam cup. Remember this. As you gain fame, as you gain fortune, as you gain position and seniority, people will treat you better. They will hold doors open for you. They will get you a cup of tea and coffee without you even asking. They will call you sir and man.

sir and ma'am and they will give you stuff. None of that stuff is meant for you. That stuff is meant for the position you hold. It is meant for the level that you have achieved of leader or success or whatever you want to call it, but you will always deserve a styrofoam cup. Remember that lesson of humility and gratitude. You can accept all the free stuff. You can accept all the perks. Absolutely you can enjoy them. But just be grateful. grateful for them and know that they're not for you. When we lead with an infinite mindset and the leaders that do lead with an infinite mindset have disproportionately more successful companies, more innovative companies, more profitable companies,

all of which are strong enough to last for a very, very, very long time. And not because they just have the financial wealth to weather storms, but the company continues to grow and innovate and reinvent itself so that it's relevant in the face of new technology and changing tastes. tastes and politics in the world. So that is the great irony. But it has to be genuine, meaning to say that I care about my people because they're a means to an end.

It's like, we only like you because you help us make money. Makes us not only feel used, but that we're a mechanism for somebody else's success. Where when we say we care about our people and money is the mechanism by which we can take care of people. You know, the more money we make, the more we can take care of our people and serve our customers. It has a profound impact on our desire to give more. And so much of the finite thinking that we have today, unfortunately, is a reasonably modern invention. It's not like business has always operated this way. The thinking of Milton Friedman, the 1970s economist, has really dominated sort of business theory today. He theorized that the responsibility of business, this is his

definition, the responsibility of business is to maximize profit within the bounds of the law. What about ethics? You know, like a pharmaceutical company that raises the price on essential drug, 200%, 300%, 500%, 500%, it's not illegal. It is unethical, right? It makes us uncomfortable, and yet the law is not broken. That's not a good enough standard to run a business. And it was his thinking that gave rise to the theory of shareholder supremacy, which was a theory proposed in the late 1970s, where we prioritized the wants, needs, and desires of a shareholder over the needs of the customer or the employee,

which is like a coach who's trying to build a great team by doing what the fans want versus what the players need. That's basically shareholder supremacy. And as I said, it was just a theory proposed in the late 1970 that was popularized during the boom years of the 80s and 90s. Mass layoffs where we use the livelihoods of human beings to meet arbitrary projections on an annualized basis at the end of the year did not exist, did not exist as a standard business practice prior to the 1980s,

did not exist. It was popularized during the 80s and 90s. And it's not for the people to prove to you that they're loyal, it's the other way around. Leaders set the tone. And so it's because of this general business theory that we've seen a steady decline, a steady erosion of loyalty in the business world today. We don't want to work at a company for 20 or 30 years, mainly because we're not sure we could. We're not sure that the company actually cares to keep us around that long.

And so we're constantly have our eyes open and we're constantly scanning. We come to work feeling uncomfortable that some of the decisions that are being made don't benefit the good of the employees. employee, that it really benefits this artificial constituency that we call the shareholder, which is really just a bunch of institutional investors. This is this shareholder myth because there's been a steady decline of the middle class being involved in the stock market for years. And the whole point of the stock market was that we all get to share in the wealth that we helped build because it's on the back of average Joe employees that produced the great wealth

in the nation and the whole point of the stock market, the genius of the modern day corporations, The genius of the public company was that we all get to share in the wealth that we're helping produce. Unfortunately, over the course of the 80s and 90s, we've seen systems produced where we're seeing the general population, the middle class, actually be less included in that success. Sometimes you're the problem. We've seen this happen all too recently with our new men of science and empirical studyers and these men of finance who are smarter than the rest of us until the thing collapsed. And they blamed everything else except themselves.

And my point is, is take accountability for your actions. You can take all the credit in the world for the things that you do right, as long as you also take responsibility for the things you do wrong. It must be a balanced equation. You don't get it one way and not the other. You get to take credit when you also take accountability.