On Purpose with Jay Shetty - Robin Sharma: #1 Way To Live A Rich Life & How To Change Your Money Mindset

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

What is the #1 way to live a rich life? How can changing your money mindset impact your life? Robin Sharma is a globally respected humanitarian who, for over a quarter of a century, has been devoted t...o helping human beings realize their native gifts. Widely considered one of the top leadership and personal mastery experts and speakers in the world, his clients include NASA, Yale University, and the Young Presidents' Organization. His #1 international bestsellers such as The Everyday Hero Manifesto, The 5AM Club, The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari, and Who Will Cry When You Die? have sold millions of copies in over ninety-two languages and dialects; making him one of the most widely read authors in the world.  Robin shares his wisdom on the significance of releasing resentment and redefining our relationship with wealth. He also talks about exploring the essential daily practices that promise personal growth, the complexities, and at the same time, the benefits of altering our social circles, and provides insights into nurturing a healthy relationship with money. Jay and Robin unpack the pivotal role of rest in our daily routine and productivity, and how to break free from the chains of multi-generational cultural norms.   In this interview you'll learn: How to release resentment How to treat money as a tool How to rest properly How to cultivate great friendships The daily practices to transform yourself Whether you're seeking to overcome generational patterns or find peace in solitude, this episode is your guide to a more fulfilled and intentional life. With Love and Gratitude, Jay Shetty What We Discuss: 00:00 Intro 04:26 Don’t Be A Resentment Collector 08:47 Money Is Your Servant, Not Your Master 12:33 When Are We Happiest? 15:01 Where Do We Start? 19:12 3 Daily Practices to Transform You 23:37 2 Reasons Why We Can’t Change Our Circle 27:06 Joy Is A Great GPS 28:28 Why Rest Is A Necessity 34:35 Breaking Multi-Generational Culture 41:07 Why You Need to Spend Alone Time  43:00 Rewire Your Relationships With Money 45:35 There Is A Time For Every Season 48:22 What Are Scarcity Scars? 54:13 What Is A Great Friend? 57:10 Don’t Confuse Kindness With Weakness 01:00:33 Someone’s Victory Is Your Possibility Episode Resources: Robin Sharma | Website Robin Sharma | TikTok Robin Sharma | Instagram Robin Sharma | YouTube Robin Sharma | Twitter Robin Sharma | Facebook Robin Sharma | LinkedIn Robin Sharma | Books The Wealth Money Can't Buy: The 8 Hidden Habits to Live Your Richest Life See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Hi, I'm Laura Vanderkam. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker. And I'm Sarah Hart Unger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer, and course creator. We are two working parents who love our careers and our families. On the Best of Both Worlds podcast each week, we share stories of how real women manage work, family, and time for fun. From figuring out childcare to mapping out long-term career goals, we want you to get the most out of life. Listen to Best of Both Worlds every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or
Starting point is 00:00:32 wherever you get your podcasts. Tune into the new podcast, Stories from the Village of Nothing Much, like easy listening but for fiction. If you've overdosed on bad news, we invite you into a world where the glimmers of goodness in everyday life are all around you. I'm Catherine Nicolai, and I'm an architect of Cozy. Come spend some time where everyone is welcome and the default is kindness. Listen, relax, enjoy. Listen to stories from the village of nothing much on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Starting point is 00:01:08 Hi friends, I'm Danielle Robay. And I'm Simone Voice. And we're here to introduce you to The Bright Side, a new kind of daily podcast that's guaranteed to light up your day. Every weekday, we're bringing you conversations about culture, the latest trends, inspiration, and so much more. We'll hear from celebrities, authors, experts, and listeners like you. Whether it's relationships, friend advice, or figuring out how to navigate life's transitions,
Starting point is 00:01:36 big and small, we'll talk through it together. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's the point of climbing this mountain that the world says we should climb in order to be successful and happy and realize at the end of a career, the end of a life, we've climbed the wrong mountain. International bestselling author. 20 million plus copies sold.
Starting point is 00:02:01 One of the world's top leadership experts, Robin Sharma. I've mentored a lot of super rich people and money is all they have. How does one balance ambition without attachment? Hey everyone, I've got some huge news to share with you. In the last 90 days, 79.4% of our audience came from viewers and listeners that are not subscribed to this channel. There's research that shows that if you want to create a habit, make it easy to access. By hitting the subscribe button, you're creating a habit
Starting point is 00:02:39 of learning how to be happier, healthier and more healed. This would also mean the absolute world to me and help us make better, bigger, brighter content for you in the world. Subscribe right now. The number one health and wellness podcast. Jay Shetty. Jay Shetty. The one, the only Jay Shetty. Hey, everyone, welcome back to On Purpose,
Starting point is 00:03:03 the place you come to to become happier, healthier and more healed. I'm so grateful that I get to sit down with some of the most fascinating people in the world, thought leaders, experts, insight leaders, celebrities, athletes and artists to mind their brain and their minds for insights, hacks and habits that I know will improve yours. Today I get to sit down with one of my all-time favorite guests. The fact that he's not sat with me for the last five years is shocking to me
Starting point is 00:03:33 because I've been a fan of his work ever since I was a teenager. I got to talk about it with him the last time he was on the show. And today we're going to be talking about his new book that I cannot wait for you to read. I promise you this is a book that you're going to invest some time in and energy in this year that will transform your life. I'm speaking about the one and only Robin Sharma, globally respected humanitarian who for over a quarter of a century
Starting point is 00:03:58 has been devoted to helping human beings realize their native gifts. Robin's number one international bestsellers, such as the 5 a.m. Club, the Everyday Hero Manifesto, the monk who sold his Ferrari, the Greatness Guide, and Who Will Cry When You Die have sold over 25 million copies.
Starting point is 00:04:19 And Robin's newest book that we're talking about today is called The Wealth Money Can't Buy The Eight Hidden Habits to Live Your Richest Life. Please welcome to the show Robin Sharma. Jay, it's such a pleasure to see you again. Hey, I saw you outside and we both felt it and I really appreciated that because there was this childlike excitement
Starting point is 00:04:41 that you were coming today. And when I was reading this book, and I've loved all your books, I'm a fan already, but when I was reading this book, I loved it even more so because it reminded me of the kind of books I grew up on. And what I mean by that is it's fresh, it's new, it's innovative, but it speaks to that deep soul consciousness
Starting point is 00:05:07 level of us as humans. And it speaks simply, it speaks effortlessly, it speaks poignantly. And I have so many questions I want to ask you today, but I just wanted to thank you because your work over the years has been masterful. Getting to know you personally has been beautiful. We often exchange text messages. And I remember even when my first book came out, the amount of support you gave me, it was huge.
Starting point is 00:05:32 And so to meet one of your heroes and for them to live up to and exceed all your expectations is a really beautiful experience to have. And I'm glad that I get to have that with you. So thank you, Robin, thank you so much. Well, you're more than generous, Jay. When I saw you here outside of the studio, I felt the same way.
Starting point is 00:05:49 There was a spark in my eye. And I've been looking forward to seeing you. So thank you for such kind words. You're more than kind and more than humble. So thank you. I mean it, I mean it. All right, well, let's dive straight in. And whenever I'm interviewing someone about a new book,
Starting point is 00:06:04 I like to not give away the book, but I like to have a conversation around the concepts and themes that stood out to me that I think are so powerful. And when we talk about living a rich life, when we talk about living a full life, it's a really interesting conversation because I think all of us have grown up with definitions
Starting point is 00:06:23 of what a good life looks like. And obviously in the book you break down the eight hidden habits as you call them of the areas that matter. But you have so many amazing chapters in it that they dive into the depths of it. And the one first one that resonated with me was don't be a resentment collector. When I looked at that chapter, I was thinking about people I know in my life, I was thinking about people I speak to, and I realized that actually it's very easy, because life can be hard,
Starting point is 00:06:54 because life can be challenging, to collect our resentments, to place them on a wall almost as art, and to refer to them and talk about them and find validation and value through them. What's a resentment that you've seen people carry around for the longest period of time? Well, so you saw a lot of interesting things in there. And the first thing is there has been a cultural hypnosis, Jay, that you are rich when you have a lot of money. You're rich when you have a big stock portfolio.
Starting point is 00:07:26 You're rich when you go to the top of the financial mountain. And for 15 plus years, this is something of experienced mentoring, billionaires, sports superstars, CEOs, movement makers. A lot of these people sadly are cash rich and their life poor. And so what's the point of climbing this mountain that the world says we should climb
Starting point is 00:07:49 in order to be successful and happy and realize at the end of a career, at the end of a life, we've climbed the wrong mountain? So this book is based around, as you know, the eight forms of wealth. Now, I wanna be really clear. Money is one of the forms of wealth. Money puts food on the family table.
Starting point is 00:08:05 It gives us freedom. It allows us to do great things for people in need. Having said that, there are seven other forms of wealth. The first form of wealth is growth. We were talking about that before we started. To be in hot pursuit of your finest self is a form of wealth. To spend your days doing a little bit of work on yourself so you know more of your gifts and your talents,
Starting point is 00:08:29 so you build wisdom, so you build wonder, so you build bravery is a form of wealth. And so in that first section, there's 25 chapters. One of them is, don't be a resentment collector. And I really do think that a lot of us go through life and people hurt us and rather than process through it and metabolize the hurt and use pain as a purifier, we swallow it and we allow it to build up.
Starting point is 00:08:56 And it creates what I call in the book a resentment stack. And it's that old idea, you know, heal what hurts you so you don't go out there and bleed on people who didn't cut you. And so moving through as, you know, entrepreneurs don't really talk about forgiveness and athletes usually don't, but if we move through the forgiveness and let the people who've hurt us off of our backs, we build intimacy with our creativity, we get to know ourselves, energy rises, wellness rises, and we just become more of the people we're meant to be. I find often, don't you feel this, that humans oscillate between extremes?
Starting point is 00:09:38 So often we have a culture that idolizes money, and then we sometimes develop a mindset that demonizes money. And then we sometimes develop a mindset that demonizes money. We have a culture that may idolize fame and then we demonize fame. We idolize success and then we demonize success. And we're not great at finding the neutralized, the purified version, which not only are we deeply seeking, but seems to be the healthiest place to land. And so you spoke about, and I was very happy to see that money is one of the forms of wealth,
Starting point is 00:10:16 and you're just expanding that there are seven others. But I find that often when people hear like, and I think I've been very clear that I've never talked about how money doesn't buy happiness because I think money is a really powerful energy and powerful resource, which you of course talk about in this book as well. But why do you think or how do we stop ourselves
Starting point is 00:10:39 from idolizing and then oscillating to demonizing and what is the middle path? Like what is that perspective that we need to develop? That's a beautiful question. Allow money to be your servant, not your master. And it's that old proverb, be in the world, but not of the world. So be in the world, make money.
Starting point is 00:10:58 There's 25 chapters on how the billionaires do it. Make money, have nice things, go through life, treat yourself, treat your family. Having said that, don't identify with your wealth, your financial wealth. A lot of people, their self-identity is determined by their net worth. Makes me think of Jim Carrey, we're in the land of films
Starting point is 00:11:20 and movie stars right here, and he said, you know, I wish everyone could be rich and famous to realize it doesn't make a difference. And so it's almost as if we're going through life. We all have holes within us. And we're looking for outer things to fill the holes. And I guess what I would humbly suggest is nothing on the outside will ever
Starting point is 00:11:41 fill the holes we're trying to fill on the inside. So have the nice car, have the nice house, take the great vacations, but don't be defined by those. And don't think those things are gonna somehow make you wake up one Friday morning feeling fantastic. And that's where the other seven forms of wealth come in. Money is one of the forms of wealth, but there are seven others.
Starting point is 00:12:04 For example, growth, are seven others, for example, growth, wellness, family, craft, and those kinds of things as we pursue them. I mean, for example, number form of wealth, number three, family. I've mentored a lot of super rich people and money is all they have. I've been to places where I remember one in particular I write about and I was asked to attend an assignment to mentor someone, most beautiful house I've ever seen. I walked by his art collection, walked by his car collection indoors, walked by his book collection, went to a subterranean passage, smelled cigar, finally got to the room where the titan of industry was,
Starting point is 00:12:46 and we talked for two hours. Through the conversation, I asked him, I said, you know, so who do you share all this with? Must be amazing. You must be able to do anything with the people you love. And there was just a long, long silence. And he has no family. They won't talk to him. He's all alone. And so what's the point of having the beautiful house and all the nice family and they won't talk to him. He's all alone.
Starting point is 00:13:05 And so what's the point of having the beautiful house and all the nice things if you don't have someone to share with, you know, I was recently with my parents, my dad will be 87 in June. And the more years I get behind my belt, the more I realize like family is so incredibly important. There's a chapter, have three great friends. Yeah, that's one of my lists.
Starting point is 00:13:31 Right? Not a thousand or whatever digital friends, three great friends that allow you to be seen and you can be yourself with. That's a form of riches. In that chapter on, or that section on family, there's also something called the 10,000 dinners rule. And that comes from Ayesha Vardegs, one of the UK's most famous divorce lawyers. And she was asked, you know, look, you've seen so many
Starting point is 00:13:58 relationships fall apart. Can you share what makes a great relationship? Number one, she said separate bedrooms. And number two, she said 10,000 dinners. If you can see yourself having 10,000 dinners with someone, because looks and fades, lust might dissolve, but if you can see yourself having 10,000 dinners with someone, hold them close
Starting point is 00:14:19 because great love is hard to find. How does one balance ambition without attachment? Because I feel that the natural cause of events for most of us is we have ambition or drive, we then have achievement, and then that achievement leads to attachment because our value becomes our ability to get things or our ability to have achieved.
Starting point is 00:14:45 How do you have but not have the attachment is the question. I think human beings are built to progress. I mean, I think we are happiest, not when we're resting, and there's a lot in the Wealth Money Camp I about recovery, enjoying life, and all those things. Having said that, I think we are happiest
Starting point is 00:15:02 when we are materializing our primal gifts. We are happiest when we are chasing what I call your Project X. We are happiest when we're moving in the direction of our Mount Everest. So ambition is not a bad thing. I would say, what's the root of it though? What's driving you? Is it driving you from an unhealthy place? Are you doing it for FFA, fame, fortune, and applause?
Starting point is 00:15:28 Are you doing it because really deep inside, you're overcompensating. You don't like yourself very much. So you're hoping to get the applause in the world to make yourself feel better. But if you are ambitious and creating your Taj Mahals or your Katrin Lurai or your Moonlight Sunnata because you want to push magic into the world.
Starting point is 00:15:50 If you're doing it because you're in pursuit of a craft, the fourth form of wealth, pursuing a craft. If you're doing it because you want to be of service, Mahatma Gandhi, I know one of your heroes as well, he said, to lose yourself in service in others is to find yourself. So if that's what's driving you, then I believe your ambition is absolutely healthy and only good. Absolutely, I couldn't agree more, I think.
Starting point is 00:16:22 And what's really interesting about that way you process ambition is that it's so internal. Externally, two people could look like they're living the same exact life, but internally they're living a completely different one, because one is motivated by attachment and one is motivated by service. One is motivated by FFA, as you said, and one is motivated by service. It can only actually ever be known by the individual and those closest to them. And one of the things that I know my audience struggle with,
Starting point is 00:16:52 I know that my friends struggle with, I know people in my life, and I read this chapter, I was like, this is the one that I'm gonna tell them to listen to and read immediately. You say the best way to start is to start. And I find that everyone I know, or a lot of people I know I should say, struggle to start because they're so scared
Starting point is 00:17:14 of what people will say, they're so scared of what people will think, they're so scared of rejection, they're scared of failure. I spoke to a friend the other day, he said to me, he said, Jay, I struggle with trying new things because since I was young, I kind of followed a path. I went to college. I knew I was going to study this particular thing.
Starting point is 00:17:36 So I got that degree. I only applied to two jobs and I got both of them because I'd studied the right degree. And so I've never really had a door shut on me before. So now that I want to do something different, it's impossible to think that nine out of 10 doors may close. So I find that so many people struggle to start, even though we know it's the place to start, because they're so scared of rejection,
Starting point is 00:18:00 lack of validation or failure. So how do we start when that's what's going on in our head? How do you write the book that'll change the world? You go home and you write the first page. How do you get super fit? If you want to get super fit, you go on the first walk. How do you find true love if you are all alone? You talk to that person in the grocery store.
Starting point is 00:18:29 As simple as it sounds, if you look at the great monuments, Taj Mahal, 22 years, one of the wonders in the world, it started with the first block. Another wonder of the world, the great pyramid of Giza, 2,500 blocks, 50,000 workers, one of the monuments the world looks to. It started with that first stone. So I was in Dubai on a radio show and this wonderful broadcaster asked me, like, you
Starting point is 00:18:53 know, this is all fantastic and so where do we start? And I think you're right, the very question speaks of some degree of fear because underneath it is really exactly what you're saying if i. Stand in my true power if i live my values if i chase my apical ambitions if i live the life i truly want to live if i let go of the energy vampires and fill my life with people whose lives i want to be living. If I become all those things, what if I fail? What if I stumble? What if I get laughed at? And that's where I think it's really important to remember the shortness of life. That's why people, when they talk about mortality, they almost apologize. Sorry to talk about the shortness of life, but I think talking about the shortness of our lives is inspirational. Because when we remember how quick a human life goes by,
Starting point is 00:19:56 no matter how long we get to live, and when we may be every day in our meditations, or in our journaling, and our private conversations, we remind ourselves soon or late we will be nothing more than a pile of dust on a mantle above a fireplace next to Little League trophies. Number one, we don't take ourselves too seriously. And number two, we live to the point.
Starting point is 00:20:18 I think what we are as human beings is we are great postponers. We are busy being busy. We are maximalists versus minimalist. We put off, we're going to do these things later. But accident, illness, death, all those things are a part of life. And I think as simple as it sounds, it's really important. One of the chapters in the book is put your last day first.
Starting point is 00:20:44 Another chapter at the end is have a living funeral. Buy the cake, buy the daisies, invite your family, hear what they would say about you, tell them how much you love them, and remind yourself that life is really very short. When you find that bright spot to help you get through your day, it's powerful. That's where The Bright Side comes in. A new daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that's bringing you a daily dose of joy. I'm Danielle Robay. And I'm Simone Boyce.
Starting point is 00:21:15 Listen, both Danielle and I are reporters. We've covered the news and we know the world can feel heavy. But The Bright Side podcast is a space to have a little fun, to learn something new, and get into some friendly debates. That's right, join us five days a week to see how life can look from the Bright Side. We'll hear from celebrities, authors, experts, and listeners like you.
Starting point is 00:21:38 Whether it's relationships, friend advice, or figuring out how to navigate life's transitions, we'll talk through it all together. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Parents, if you've ever experienced bedtime battles with the kids, I'm going to let you into a little secret. I'm Abbey, a mother of two, and I had these battles myself.
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Starting point is 00:23:16 That was great fun! Cowie, what do you say? It was! And that time when we did the science experiment and Billy made raisins dance! That is so cool, Billy! He did! Ha-ha! Not to mention when a certain Elliot took up swimming classes with Lisa. That was me!
Starting point is 00:23:35 Bet you can't catch me. I'm going to get you! All this fun and more in our Stories for Kids. Lingo Kids Stories for Kids is now available on story button, the kid friendly device for screenless podcasts. Listening, listen to stories for kids on the iHeart radio app, apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What have you seen in the people that you've coached people that you've worked
Starting point is 00:24:04 with seminars for, you know, 25 years or more now, what have you seen has allowed people to give themselves the permission to fail? Like where have you seen people become comfortable with discomfort and failure? What has been that habit or that practice that has made them go, this is okay, this is normal? Wow. I would say, first of all, MVP. As you know, in athletics, MVP is most valuable player. And that's an acronym I use for meditation, visualization and prayer.
Starting point is 00:24:40 So, you know, I wrote the 5 a.m. club and for years, I get up at 5 and I do the victory hour. But these days I get up at 4 and it's really beautiful for me. I live in this old farmhouse in Tuscany and I hear the roosters off in the distance and I hear these dogs barking and I just lay there in bed and I meditate and I visualize and I pray. And it really works. Now it doesn't transform your life in a day, what does? But small daily seemingly insignificant improvements when done consistently over time and that
Starting point is 00:25:18 practice of meditating on becoming less fearful, visualizing yourself as the person you want to be. Maybe in a scenario, maybe it's in a business, maybe it's in a presentation, maybe it's asking someone out, maybe it's running a marathon or just getting to the gym. Seeing yourself with your eyes closed while the world is asleep and just feeling at a cellular level and the colors. Visualization is incredibly powerful. And then prayer.
Starting point is 00:25:46 It's so easy to forget this time-honored truth. Every prayer is heard. And if you don't believe in God or you don't believe in spirit, then I'm sure you believe in your subconscious. And so prayer, MVP is a very powerful tool. Second tool, I call it the pre-performance paragraph. So what you write about deepens commitment. What you write about sets a default
Starting point is 00:26:15 about how you're gonna be. So writing a paragraph is part of your morning routine in your journal about who you wanna be in that day. Brave, strong, resilient, positive, writing it out in detail, just a paragraph is a very, very powerful tool. And then third thing I could continue, but the third thing is you become your conversations.
Starting point is 00:26:37 The sixth form of wealth, and the wealth money can't buy, and it's a form of wealth is your community. You become your social circle. It's like, I don't know if you like good wine, but great wine comes down to a great terroir. The terroir is the surrounding, the ecosystem, the wind, the soil, the sun, et cetera. Well, as human beings, we become our terroir. If we are around toxic people, if we are around people playing victim, if we are around people who stand for low standards, we are around people who minimize the power of personal
Starting point is 00:27:10 growth. We are around people who are takers. We will become the people we surround ourselves with. And we could get into the science of mirror neurons, which cause us to mimic our social circle. We could talk about emotional contagion, which is the scientific phenomenon of us adopting the dominant emotions of the people we are around.
Starting point is 00:27:31 So those would be three things. A third thing is really clean out your social circle, get rid of the toxic people. I think you can change the world or be around negative people, you can't do both. Yeah, the last one's such a, you know, we know it to be an age old truth, yet we struggle with it so much.
Starting point is 00:27:47 And I always wonder why that is. And before I ask you that, I wanted to share, yeah, I find that I found that whenever I'm complaining about someone in my circle, I am in that process becoming more like them. Like I remember years ago, I was complaining about someone because they always were complaining.
Starting point is 00:28:08 And I found myself becoming the biggest complainer I knew because I was complaining about this individual. And so often we're becoming like them, not because we're even mirroring them, we're becoming like them because we're behaving like them subconsciously without knowing. Why do we find it so hard? We've heard that a million times.
Starting point is 00:28:28 Why do we find it so hard to change our circle and to transform the terroir around us? Like, why do we struggle so badly even though we know that we are the average of the people we spend time with? Why is it that we're still stuck in the same circles? Often it's because we love them. we spend time with, why is it that we're still stuck in the same circles? Often it's because we love them. And I would, I would say reason, season, lifetime. Some people come into our lives for a reason. Some there's that old idea, which is some people come back into your
Starting point is 00:28:58 life to see if we're still stupid. So, yeah, some people come into our lives for a reason. Some people come into our lives for a reason, some people come into our lives for a season, and then some people come into our lives for a lifetime. Like I think of my partner Elle. You know, she's just that person who gets me, that person who, you know, I could have 20,000 dinners with. So I think we struggle because sometimes these energy vampires, Jay, are our parents
Starting point is 00:29:29 or our sisters or our best friends. And so we say, well, I love them. That's been my friend for 10 years or five years, but I would say, you know, if you're growing and you're reading and you're doing all these modalities and you want to live a true, your richest life and you want to materialize your gifts and talents and live at your best and someone isn't growing and they're always questioning you or you say here's a new idea, project and they're just going that would never work, here are
Starting point is 00:30:01 the reasons, etc. then you really have to ask yourself if that person is good for you and healthy for you. And I would say if you love them, maybe it's a parent that loved them from afar, or practice selective association and see them once a month versus texting with them or chatting with them on the phone every day. I'd say the second reason why we keep people who are not good for us or who are bringing us down in our life is the human being doesn't like to change.
Starting point is 00:30:28 We just don't like to change. And so it's so much, I would put it to you this way, I would say the discomfort of growth is always less dangerous than the illusion of security. And so I would say, yes, it's difficult to let people go. And yet that is always less dangerous than saying, I'm going to allow these people to stay in my life if they're just bringing me down. It's such an interesting thing because I often find also
Starting point is 00:30:57 that as we're growing in our personal growth, self-demealment journeys, we're often becoming less compassionate in the beginning. Like there's an immature arrogance that develops. If I'm moving faster than these people, I'm better than these people. I'm the one doing the self-work and they're not doing it. And even that mindset in itself is a sign that we've got a lot more work to do because if we're working so deeply on ourselves, our compassion should more likely
Starting point is 00:31:25 expand and hopefully we'd have the ability to set better barriers and boundaries with those individuals and develop the idea that we can have a group of people that we grow around and then you have a group of people that you have to give to often, right? Like I think that's what our life is made up of. Like life isn't just, we're not just surrounded by people that help us grow because we're obviously taking from them as well. And we don't want to be in a position where we're only giving, we want to be able to grow.
Starting point is 00:31:53 So it's almost like we have two sets of groups in our life at any real given time. Would you agree with that or? Well I would just say trust your joy. I think joy is a great GPS. And so, yeah, I'm not in any way suggesting be around people only who fuel you and who help you become you at your best.
Starting point is 00:32:14 I'm simply saying it's about what's healthy. It's about your joy. It's about being around people who you vibe with, who understand you, who have similar values, who support you and who encourage you. So I think your community is definitely a key, an absolutely key form of wealth. The fifth form of wealth is, the fourth, excuse me,
Starting point is 00:32:34 is your craft. And I think it's very easy to fall into the trap of thinking a job is a job, and not realizing that our work offers us an opportunity to get to know who we truly are. There's a chapter in there about do your project X, which is build your, and I think the world right now needs more magic in the world.
Starting point is 00:32:58 And I think a lot of us, what we do is we try to push out a lot of content, put out a lot, and I would rather do one masterwork than a thousand mediocrities. And I think, you know, seeing your craft as a chance to change the world is a form of wealth. What would you say to people who go, Robin, you know what, I just want to check into my job, clock my hours and come home.
Starting point is 00:33:22 Is that okay? Is there a better way to live? What would you say to that? I'd say, of course. I mean, the great thing about a human life is we all get to live in the way that we want to live. I've never subscribed to the hustle and grind culture. I think that rest is not a luxury.
Starting point is 00:33:39 It's a necessity. I think we have to enjoy the fruits of our labor. Having said that, I think almost in the world right now, hard work has a bad reputation. And I just think that seeing your work is noble. Seeing your work is a chance to pursue mastery. Seeing your work is a chance to serve and delight and astonish is a great form of happiness. If
Starting point is 00:34:06 someone wants to say, I just want to finish at five and go home, that's absolutely fantastic. I would humbly suggest though they might be missing one of the greatest sources of joy and well-being and inner peace. If you look at people, really happy people, a lot of them say, I would never retire. Why would I retire? It's my oxygen. And for me, I've got a great family life, and I think I have a good lifestyle. And yet, I just, what I do, this is year 31
Starting point is 00:34:36 in the field of leadership and personal development, and the opportunity to calibrate the craft. I spent one year of my life on this book. I did 20 different manuscripts, probably 10,000 little optimizations, every version. And I really suffered on this book. And you know, I have to, it was suffering, it was hard. I felt like giving up.
Starting point is 00:35:01 I could have mailed it in, the publisher would have said, absolutely fine. But there's a whole series of values here. Like my family name is on that cover. I'm only as good as my last book. I think, you know, pushing yourself to the jagged edges of your potential is how you grow. And, you know this, but I really feel I have a sacred trust relationship with my readers. And you set an intention before we started. I set an intention here too, which is to celebrate you for all the good that you do in the world and to have this studio full of light. And also, I just did a little visualization and prayer before I came over here for all
Starting point is 00:35:48 the people around the millions and millions of people who listen to your show. And you know, as you know, these are real human beings with hopes and dreams and fears and insecurities. And I thought about as many of them as I possibly could. Some are at the top of the mountain. Some people are struggling. Some people are in bad relationships. Some people are in the relationship of their lifetime.
Starting point is 00:36:11 Some people are starting a new tech company. Some people are multi-billionaires. Some people are entertainers. Some people are athletes. What am I offering? I'm simply saying, I think through our work we have a chance to change lives. I was in London recently and I got into this taxi,
Starting point is 00:36:32 on London black cab, and the gentleman outside it was almost like he was on guard doing noble work. Jay, his car was shining, his tires were polished. I walked inside. The carpeting on the floor was perfect. And as we went to Heathrow, I sort of tried to deconstruct his winning formula. And this is on this fifth form of wealth, the fourth form of wealth, seeing your work is your craft. And he said, well, you know, I take my job seriously. It gives me so much pride. I get to meet interesting people. And then when we got to the airport, he goes,
Starting point is 00:37:07 look, look what I do before every person comes in here. And he had this shampooer, and he goes, look, and he turned it on, and he started shampooing the carpet, and then he had like the Windex, and I'm just saying, you know, whether someone is a CEO or a billionaire or a famous tycoon or a pizza maker or a yoga teacher or an astronaut, work has incredible potential to help us build
Starting point is 00:37:35 intimacy with our mastery but also give us incredible fulfillment. So it's a form of wealth. You know what? I love hearing that because I had personal experience of it as well just last week. So last week was one of my best friend's birthday. He was in town. And so I took him and a friend to Disneyland, you know, which is not a couple of hours away for his birthday.
Starting point is 00:37:57 And it was amazing. We were fortunate enough to, you know, have a private guide, like a a tour guide. Her name was Lexi. And I have not met someone this like, just for a long time I'd not met someone who is like that passionate, knowledgeable, smart, charismatic about their work. She knew every detail of history of the Walt Disney Park, right? She knew everything. She knew where Walt Disney had spent time. She knew what year that ride was built. She knew the little Easter eggs and the hidden stories about every single ride. Like it was just spectacular to be around her and to
Starting point is 00:38:40 learn from her. And when you're talking about mastering your craft, I was so amazed at how, you know, 26 years old, like, fully mastered the craft of hospitality, tour guide, entertainment, knowledge, smarts. And I said to her at the end of the day, because we were just so happy with the experience, I said to her, I said, you're going to run that park one day. Like, you have that energy, like, you're going to run that park one day. And she said, you know, she said to me after she was like, it's experiences like this that give me joy for what I do. And I was just thinking how special it was to experience that.
Starting point is 00:39:11 I love what I do, but to feel that from someone, it was, it was amazing. So shout out to Lexi if you're listening, but, uh, it was, it was such a beautiful experience. And I think that what's happened, I feel Robin, I know you work in leadership, you worked with so many organizations all across the world. Like I think for so long, because culture perpetuates and cascades down, because you've seen the person above you
Starting point is 00:39:36 not love what they do and not master their craft, but do the job, you then do the job and don't master your craft. And then the person who's coming up beneath you sees the same thing and then we repeat that culture because we see it being rewarded. We don't see what you just said. You just gave this beautiful example of,
Starting point is 00:39:55 you know, it took you a while to write this book. You suffered to write this book. It was hard work to put it together. And you said, I'd rather create a mastery than lots of mediocrities. But we see mediocrity being celebrated and rewarded. And masterpieces generally are hard to find these days, because of the amount of consumption
Starting point is 00:40:13 and the amount of creation. And so it almost feels that we have to be able to break generational cycles or break the generational curses or break multi-generational culture. How do we get the courage to do that when we see everyone doing the opposite around us? Well, I think there's a few things that come to mind. And the first thing is, you know, I love going to art galleries.
Starting point is 00:40:39 Me too. And I am absolutely inspired. I don't know if all your viewers can see it, but that almost looks like a Basquiat behind me, you know. So I'm just, I'm an esthete, that's a French word, as you know, for a lover of beauty. And this is not expensive beauty necessarily. I love the beautiful flower, I love going to art galleries and seeing the work of the masters. And I often, here in LA the other day, I went to a whole bunch of galleries. And I was around Cy Twombly.
Starting point is 00:41:11 Yes, oh I love Cy Twombly. I was around Forg, you know, and I just love these amazing, whether it's a, oh I went to Basquiat, I don't know if you've seen the Basquiat in Nogosia. I have, yeah, I need to go. Please, please go. And what I'm offering is don't do it. Don't do beautiful work for the applause. The applause will come as a byproduct.
Starting point is 00:41:35 Do beautiful, do your most beautiful work. Work hard on it. Calibrate it. Make it magic. See your work as part of a magic shot for what it introduces you to within yourself. And even if no one sees it, I think about Vincent van Gogh, one of the greatest artists of all time.
Starting point is 00:41:57 He sold two paintings. So he didn't do it for the money, he didn't do it for the fame, fortune, and adoration, he did it because he had't do it for the money. He didn't do it for the fame, fortune, and adoration. He did it because he had to do it. And he did it because he was an explorer. He was a magician. It did something inside him that made him feel very good. I think about J.D. Salinger.
Starting point is 00:42:19 One of my favorite books is Catcher in the Rye. Jay, he only wrote one book. And then he checked out into a subterranean passage in New Hampshire and he probably wrote I think was 30 other books, but he never published one of them. So how do you develop this kind of a philosophy? Well, you stop plugging into the cultural majority and doing what everyone is doing and you take a radical act and you start thinking for yourself. I think that's the power of the eight forms of wealth the book is based around. It's a framework, it's a Mount Everest for the eight most important elements of a life
Starting point is 00:42:59 well lived. It doesn't mean you're going to do them all in a day, but every day you advance on growth, on wellness, on family, on craft, on money, on community, on adventure, and on service. And you start to think for yourself. And I guess what I'm trying to say is you start to live your own life versus your neighbor's life. And I think that's a powerful way to live. No one wants to get to our last day and say, we lived like the tribe, we lived like our neighbors.
Starting point is 00:43:28 I, there's an acronym in the book called PENEM, the five forces of PENEM, parents, environment, nation, associations, and media. These five forces program us, and here's what they do, they cause us to forget who we truly are. And so I think we're born into genius and then we resign ourselves into ordinary and we become busy being busy
Starting point is 00:43:52 and we're playing with our phones and we're doing what everyone else is doing. But deep inside we have a voice of wisdom that sees the self-betrayal and we're in pain because potential on express turns to pain. So we're in pain because potential on express turns to pain. So we're in pain, but we don't know it. And so that's why we medicate ourselves with too much phone, too much digital, too much work, too much scrolling, too much gossiping because we don't like ourselves.
Starting point is 00:44:21 When you find that bright spot to help you get through your day, it's powerful. That's where The Bright Side comes in. A new daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that's bringing you a daily dose of joy. I'm Danielle Robay. And I'm Simone Boyce. Listen, both Danielle and I are reporters. We've covered the news and we know the world can feel heavy,
Starting point is 00:44:43 but The Bright Side podcast is a space to have a little fun, to learn something new, and get into some friendly debates. That's right! Join us five days a week to see how life can look from the Brightside. We'll hear from celebrities, authors, experts, and listeners like you. Whether it's relationships, friend advice, or figuring out how to navigate life's transitions, we'll talk through it all together. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple
Starting point is 00:45:11 Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. For all the parents out there, picture that it's bedtime. You and the kids have been busy all day. You know they're tired, but with all that anxious energy, they just won't go to sleep. This was my kids every night. But I did find that stories calmed their mind and gave them something to focus on. So six years ago, I created the kids podcast Bedtime History to help solve that problem. Bedtime History is a series of relaxing history stories that end with an inspirational message.
Starting point is 00:45:42 We have episodes about Jackie Robinson, Neil Armstrong, Maya Angelou, and Sokka Jowaya. Episodes also include topics like space exploration, engineering, the rise and fall of civilizations, and major events like the Civil Rights Movement and the Transcontinental Railroad. With over 2,000 positive parent reviews, Bedtime History is one of the top education podcasts. This week, join me and listen to Bedtime History every Monday and Thursday on iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Being human is not easy.
Starting point is 00:46:17 This is not just this unique thing that is happening to me. I'm Megan Devine, host of It's Okay That You're Not Okay. This season on the show, I'm joined by leading actors and musicians and activists and authors, all discussing their often invisible losses and what they've learned about being seen and supported in difficult times. I used to think that I had to make myself suffer in order to serve, right? To be breathless all the time. From the everyday grief that we don't call grief, to losses that rearrange the world,
Starting point is 00:46:46 everybody's at least a little bit not okay these days. And all those things we don't usually talk about, well, maybe we should, together. This has been an experience that is so beautiful. Thank you for inviting me into what feels like kind of a sacred space here. It's okay that you're not okay. New episodes each and every Monday, available on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Starting point is 00:47:11 For sure. Well said. I mean, it's so funny to say that one of the things I work on with my clients that I work with privately, I'll ask them to... We write a book for them, which is called their Book of Values. And it's a book of values, which is called their book of values. And it's a book of values, mindsets, habits that they practice. We design the cover, we print the book, only one copy, and they carry it around with them in their bag wherever they go. So wherever they go in the world, they can pull it out, and whenever they forget all the self-work they've been doing,
Starting point is 00:47:42 they can look back at a guidebook for themselves. And I always tell them, we're only ever going to publish one of these. This doesn't get shown to your family. It doesn't go to your friends. It's not something you have to promote. You don't market it. It stays with them.
Starting point is 00:47:54 And I was inspired by it because I remember reading Benjamin Franklin's 13 virtues. To me, that was the idea of it. It's like, how could you have a book that you carried around, that represented you, that held your identity, that made you like yourself, because that's who you were. But you often had to remind yourself of who you were
Starting point is 00:48:17 while you were caught in the penum, you know, the five points you just mentioned now. And I think that idea, and anyone can do that. You don't have to be well known to do that. You don't have to be successful to know that. I know you talk about the value of journaling. Like that's what a journal is. It's a space where you carry around your heart.
Starting point is 00:48:35 If you see it that way, right? You carry around your thoughts and you can re-edit and, you know, systemize your thoughts and make sense of them. And one of the things I've been hearing from a lot of people recently is this thought of like, realizing they need to rewire their relationship with money. People have either been trained to believe
Starting point is 00:48:57 that money is bad, money is evil, money doesn't buy happiness, money is the root of all evil, money will make you lose friends. There's so many statements about money that have been programmed into our penum, whether it was our parents, whether it was media, as you said, all the others that have programmed us. And all of a sudden you get to a point in life
Starting point is 00:49:21 where you realize, well, now I just have unhealthy beliefs about money, so whether I have it or I don't, I don't have a healthy relationship. How do you start rewiring that? If I could, before I answer that, you talked about something that I think is so important, the book you do with your clients. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:49:40 And I think that speaks to something that is so essential in the world right now, which is solitude. I think genius loves isolation. I think we are so in the world right now, and there's so much noise we can't hear the signal. And so I think spending some time every day alone is so powerful, whether it is in a journal, whether it is on a nature walk,
Starting point is 00:50:04 whether it is one of the chapters in the craft section is go ghost for a year. Take one year, go to Bali, go to Vietnam, go to Medellin, go to Stockholm, leave your phone, take the classics, read them, study them, learn MVP, meditation, visualization, and prayer. Take long walks and get lost. Talk to strangers. Find yourself, and after that year,
Starting point is 00:50:27 or six months or three months, come back to the world reconnected with who you truly are. So I think being alone and going ghost is important. So you talk about how do we rewire our relationship with money. I think the DNA of transformation is awareness. So it's the process of first
Starting point is 00:50:46 of all realizing that money is something but it's not everything. So our society says, measure your success by your net worth. In many ways, that's how society tells us to think. We pedestal the billionaire. We don't put the gardener or the teacher or the firefighter on the front cover of the magazine. So understanding that money is not everything and it won't be the source of your – like I've met so many people who have sold their companies. I think one person in particular, he said, we had a liquidity event. We were waiting for the funds to wire into the account.
Starting point is 00:51:23 My whole family was sitting around the table. We watched the to wire into the account. My whole family was sitting around the table. We watched the funds go into the account. And he goes, I went into the account and I didn't feel any different. And it's that Zen proverb, wherever you go, there you are. So realizing that trap. Number two, realizing of course money's important. Gets you a better way to journey through life.
Starting point is 00:51:47 In some ways, less stress. You can do great things for your family. You can help people in need. You can get things that you like. There's nothing wrong with material objects. But not defining yourself by your art collection. Not defining yourself by your art collection. Not defining yourself by your net worth. Because then that becomes just another drug of choice.
Starting point is 00:52:12 So it's what I was saying earlier, which is making money, prosperity is a wonderful thing. I mean, if you look at the universe, there's no scarcity. There's flowers everywhere and there's clouds and there's so much. The universe is abundant. So there's nothing wrong with abundant forms of money. I don't think we need to make it bad at all. But not using it and having it as our god to the point where actually we become so busy chasing money and we forget about the other seven forms of wealth.
Starting point is 00:52:44 We forget about our family. We forget about our wellness. What's the point? There's one wisdom tradition they say, when we are young we would sacrifice our health for wealth. And when we get old and wise, we would sacrifice all of our wealth for one day of good health.
Starting point is 00:53:02 So making money is not a tall, bad thing, but let's not sacrifice the other seven mountain tops that are important for a truly well-lived life. Yeah, having a more expanse definition is so required because we're often also only measuring our success in life and happiness based on that one metric. I think that measurement piece is so interesting
Starting point is 00:53:25 because I was saying to a friend a couple of years ago, he really slowed down from his work because he fell in love and he found love and he's gone on to get engaged to that individual and at some point soon, they'll get married. And he always felt that that year was such a wasted year in his life because he was looking at it through the lens of the business didn't progress. My financial life didn't progress.
Starting point is 00:53:51 And I've said to him so many times, I said, that was one of the best investments of your life because you found love. Like you'll look back at that year as the best year of your life of all time, but if you're only measuring your success. And I was like, you have no idea how that stability is going to impact your career in the next few years. You could have been distracted looking for love for the next five years, and your work would have been distracted. Here you are, you found love in one year, and now look, you'll have that stability, and it's so
Starting point is 00:54:18 interesting what we measure makes such a difference, and I like that you're giving us eight things to measure, as opposed to one thing, like that you're giving us eight things to measure as opposed to one thing. And then you start to realize how rich you truly are because no eight are going to align every year anyway. These are eight priorities of a truly great life. And you talk about that love story. How rich, how wealthy are those two people? I even think about the times
Starting point is 00:54:49 that we are dealing with heartbreak, the times we are dealing with tragedy. The ego says this is a waste of time. The ego says I should be productive. What's more productive than navigating the hard times and using the painful moments to introduce us to our strengths, using the difficulty to make us wiser, to teach us forgiveness, to help us learn the great human virtues of patience and understanding. So I think it's our ego that tells us, oh, we're wasting time if we're building love. We're wasting time if we're healing. We're wasting time if we're
Starting point is 00:55:33 going through a hard season on our journey. But it's all grist for the mill, you know? I think the person who experiences the most wins. And work is important, but let's not confuse productivity with busy, and let's not confuse movement with progress. And I think a great human life has many different seasons and many different elements, and maybe there's a time for each of them. Absolutely. You talk about knowing your scarcity scars.
Starting point is 00:56:03 This one really resonated with me because I think we don't realize what a scarcity mindset we've built up over time in all of these areas. I don't deserve love. I manifest bad health. I must be going to get sick. I'm going to ruin this and throw it all away. Like these are repetitive thoughts in people's minds.
Starting point is 00:56:26 In scarcity in each of these areas that you break down as the eight priorities. Somewhere deep inside of ourselves we believe we don't deserve career success, love success, wellness success, craft. I could never be good enough to do that. That's for special people. That's for the Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan. That's not for me. Like those people mastered their craft. So these scarcity scars that exist,
Starting point is 00:56:52 how do you even develop the idea that your scarcity scar doesn't have to be your reality forever? So there's an idea that I share called recruit a dead board of directors. And recruiting a dead board of directors is about the power of mentors. And all it takes is one conversation with an interesting person to revolutionize the way we see the world. And we talked about the Pentum programming, the five forces, and so many ways we adopt the,
Starting point is 00:57:29 when we're little kids we have these social cues and we watch and listen to how our parents see the world. And that's what parents do, they teach us how the world works. And for a lot of parents, they teach us scarcity. Money doesn't grow on trees, I had one client, his father repeated over and over and over again. All rich people are liars, cheats, and thieves. How many times do parents say,
Starting point is 00:57:53 that's a great idea, you want to be in the NBA, or you want to be a painter, you want to be a best-selling author, you want to be a billionaire, be reasonable. Makes me think of George Bernard Shaw. He said, the reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable one persists in adapting the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. So what is recruiting a dead board of directors all about? Well, it's like if you can't have a mentor
Starting point is 00:58:25 who's a possibilitarian and who mentors you and teaches you how to do it, then find some dead people through their books that influence you. And so how do we heal these scars? Well, we realize that genius is less about genetics and it's more about your daily habits. You know, if you look at the people we put on pedestals, the Hedy Lamars,
Starting point is 00:58:47 the great actors, the great athletes, Aristotle Onassis, Nelson Mandela, one of my greatest heroes in my life. And you read their biographies, these people are all cut from the same cloth as we are. The story of human greatness is all about people from ordinary circumstances wiring in new habits, taking risks, getting knocked down so much and being resilient. So I think having a dead border, I even think of Kobe, you know, you mentioned Kobe. So he actually said, you know, I got in the NBA and I thought everyone would want to be best in the world and want to be iconic. And he said, I realized a lot of people got
Starting point is 00:59:37 in the NBA and that was their badge of honor. They were good and they just started partying and they might do one workout every day. And he said, I realized that if I got up at three o'clock every morning, practiced from four to six, went home, had breakfast, et cetera, went back, did another workout, 11 o'clock to noon, went home, had some lunch, recovered, rested, did another workout, went home, had dinner and did a fourth workout, To use his words, after a period of four or five years, I would develop an advantage so great that no one would ever catch up. So all I'm saying is people whose lives we want to be living,
Starting point is 01:00:16 they're not cut from some magical cloth, scarcity scars, like the richest people. I mentioned Aristotle Onassis. He started with $250. But they're just doing a series of practices and they're adopting different ways of seeing the world and they're not playing victim and giving away their power to external things and steadily through time, they build the lives that we now admire. Well said. The reason why that resonates so strongly with me, I've often said, and I love your
Starting point is 01:00:46 language around it, I've often said that I've been mentored by people I've never met because I had the fortune of reading Martin Luther King when I was young, reading Steve Jobs, you know, when Walter Isaacson wrote his brilliant book on Steve Jobs, reading Einstein, you know, it's just, it's amazing that we're so obsessed with what people think of us as opposed to how people lived. And it's, we think a mentor is about who can give me direct advice. And we're so interested in advice as opposed to, you can actually study the action that that dead board of directors did in that scenario.
Starting point is 01:01:24 How did they deal with stress? How did they deal with scenario. How did they deal with stress? How did they deal with pressure? How did they deal with failure? How did they deal with success? Like, what did they do? Like, it's so great to have a dead board of directors. I love that language because you can actually study the actions, not just the advice.
Starting point is 01:01:38 And we often get so lost in advice that we miss out on realizing it's behavior change, it's action, it's habit change, as you're saying, that really makes the shifts in our life. And you mentioned this earlier, I wanna come back to it, was this three great friends rule. And I love that you talk about having three great friends. I heard recently somewhere, I can't remember,
Starting point is 01:01:58 I was browsing on social media and someone said, you need 3 a.m. friends as well. Like friends you can call at 3 a.m. and they'll pick up the well. Like friends you can call at 3 a.m. and they'll pick up the phone. How do you know? What is the quality of a great long-term friend? What is a great friend?
Starting point is 01:02:13 I'm not sure we even know anymore. A great friend is someone you can be yourself with and they still love you. Great friend is, I had a line in the book, you're in a foreign country and 3 a.m. they hop on a plane and they come get you. A great friend is someone who you can laugh with. Great friend is someone who you're going through your most difficult times and they'll listen to you for hours. A great friend is someone who accepts you, someone who helps you be seen. A great friend is someone who, when you're with them,
Starting point is 01:02:52 you feel joyful versus depleted. So I think it's really important, you know, in this world where we are maximalists, we want to be all things to all people, we want to have so many different friends. Focus on three great friends. We want to read a hundred books. Master three books. Maybe it's Jobs' – Isaacson's autobiography on Jobs like you mentioned. Maybe it's The Prophet by Khalil Jubeirahan. Maybe it's The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.
Starting point is 01:03:27 Maybe it's Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, one of my favorite books of all time. But I think just being a minimalist is so powerful. Build your life around a few things. Even in work, I mentioned it. Rather than pushing out a thousand pieces of mediocrity, do one thing incredibly well. Even if it takes five years, ten years, there's a chapter called Make Your Project X in the Wealth Money Camp. And the example is the Duomo in Milan. How long they spent on it. In this world where we want to do something in an hour and they get the rewards, or maybe a week, maybe a month, it took 600 years to create the Duomo.
Starting point is 01:04:15 These are values of an unspoken age, 600 years of calibrating, refining, optimizing to create the Duo. And so that's what a Project X is. Rather than doing lots of things, you do one thing. Maybe it's one work of art. Michelangelo took four years of working on the chapel of the Sistine ceiling, but he got the job done. So minimalism is very, very powerful.
Starting point is 01:04:47 And one of the things you said there, this idea of we're almost trying to be so many things to so many people that it's hard to find the right friends. One of the things you talk about is do not be a doormat. And I find that that becomes that people pleasing mentality, that ability to, I can mold and I can be whatever you want me to be. And I can be lots of things. And we feel validated that way.
Starting point is 01:05:10 But in the end, we're just becoming a doormat. Everyone crosses over a doormat and a doormat welcomes everyone in the same way. So when I read that, I was like, how do we be kind, but not be a doormat? How do we be service oriented, but not be a doormat? How do we balance that art of being welcoming, but not being a doormat? How do we be service oriented, but not be a doormat? How do we balance that art of being welcoming, but not being a doormat? Well, you know, for many years, like you Jay, I've talked about the power of just being kind.
Starting point is 01:05:38 And it sounds so simple, but being kind. Staying in a hotel, remembering there's someone going to clean my room after I leave the room. So put the bath, the towels in the bathtub. Straighten out the bed. Leave the room service tray clean. Little acts of kindness. Not only are gifts you give to someone else, it's a gift you give to yourself. You respect yourself more. So then people come up sometimes say to me, well, if I'm kind, people will take advantage of me. And I would say, people will only take advantage of you if you allow people to take advantage of you. Let's not confuse kindness with weakness. There is a time to always be kind, but that doesn't mean you let
Starting point is 01:06:21 people walk over you. And that makes me think of another idea that I write about, which is the importance of, you know, in this world right now, it's so easy to live the same year 80 times and call it a life. And there's one chapter called, Be a Perfect Moment Creator. And the story I tell in there is of Eugene Kelly, O. Kelly, excuse me. And Eugene O. Kelly used to be the former CEO of KPMG, the accounting behemoth. And one day he walked into his doctor's office
Starting point is 01:06:56 to get the results of a routine medical, and the doctor came out with an expression you never want to see on the face of your doctor when you go to get your results. And he was told he had 90 days left to live. He had an interoperable brain tumor. So confronted with his mortality, he realized for the first time he had never in all his years as a corporate titan, he had never taken his wife to lunch. He had missed so many Christmas concerts of his daughter.
Starting point is 01:07:26 He had never spent time with his friends walking through Central Park and having conversations. And so he decided to re-engineer his last 90 days. And he said, I wanted to become a perfect moment creator. And he spent those last 90 days. He actually died roughly 90 days after the report from his doctor. But I think that's so powerful, you know, when you're with your family, when you're with your work, when you're with yourself, each and every day, find some way to create a perfect moment.
Starting point is 01:07:57 Maybe it's giving a gift to someone through a compliment. Maybe it's taking some time to do something that fills you with joy. But being a perfect moment creator I think is a form of wealth money can't buy. For sure. Robin, I have one last question for you, which I think is such an interesting challenge for so many people right now. Your rule is see another's winning as your victory. And I think we live in a world right now where seeing other people winning is,
Starting point is 01:08:31 we take it as a reflection of our losing. Where we see others winning as a reflection of us being inadequate. We see someone winning as a feeling of we're behind. We see someone else winning as a feeling of there's not enough space, it's too consumed. There's too many podcasts in the world. There's too many books in the world. There's too many Instagram reels in the world.
Starting point is 01:08:54 Like, how can I do anything? Like, if that person's winning, then they've taken my spot. We live in a world believing that there's a finite number of seats in the theater of happiness and in the theater of dreams and that there isn't a seat with our name on it, rather than seeing another's victory as our own. How do we train ourselves to do that?
Starting point is 01:09:17 Well, this is such an absolutely important point. And you're right, a lot of us look on one of the social media feeds and we see someone, and as we all know, a lot of that isn't real, so that's the first thing. We don't know the truth of how someone's really living. The second thing I would say is you do want to train yourself to see someone's victory as an example of possibility. And you want to train yourself, and how do you do it at MVP, meditation, visualization and prayer. Prayer is very powerful. You know, or when you're writing, write about your insecurities, write about how you're feeling
Starting point is 01:09:52 when you see someone else winning. You know, metabolize the feelings of inferiority by noticing them, by journaling about them, simply by sitting with them, processing through. That's how you move through, as you know so well, how do you move through a feeling of insecurity, not enoughness, you acknowledge it. And you don't give away your power, you don't make excuses, you don't throw rocks at those people, you go,
Starting point is 01:10:15 what is it about their winning that is bringing up my not enoughness? And you work through that not enoughness, through journaling, through meditation, through prayer, through silence, through journaling, through meditation, through prayer, through silence, through stillness, through nature walks. And so I think if we can train ourselves to say, wow, that person is doing so well and applaud them and feel good for them and say if they can do it, I can do it, I think we're going to be much more peaceful. I would also say about the podcast, someone is going to launch a new podcast
Starting point is 01:10:48 that is going to do incredibly well. Why not you? Someone is going to write that new best seller tomorrow that is going to dominate the list. Why not you? Someone is going to launch that new business that's going to change the world. Why not you?
Starting point is 01:11:04 And then the last thing I'd say about is, we all know, but this kind of a way of being where we see someone else's success as something that brings out, you know, like we have resentment for it, is coming from a place of great scarcity and fear versus generosity. And if we are stuck in scarcity, then we're never going to bring our magic to the world. We're operating – I mean, everything we do reflects who we are.
Starting point is 01:11:31 And if we're in scarcity and we're – really, it's about jealousy. And if we're feeling jealous at someone else's victory, then it has nothing to do with them. We need to work through our feelings of jealousy until we get to our next level of consciousness and evolution. I think it's a great opportunity to see what other people's success bring up for us. Robin Sharma everyone, the book is called The Wealth Money Can't Buy The Eight Hidden Habits to Live Your Richest Life. Robin, I'm so grateful for your time, your energy for pouring into this book, for us picking some of my favorites today. But like I said, there is so much in this book to unpack.
Starting point is 01:12:08 Please tag me and Robin on Instagram, on X, on TikTok, on any platform you use on social media with your greatest insights, the chapters that are speaking to you. Take pictures of the book and post them and tag us so that we can see which moments inside this book are resonating with you strongly and which ones you're trying to apply.
Starting point is 01:12:26 And as Robin beautifully said, it's not about reading a hundred books this year, about three that you can master. If we can learn to master the wealth money can't buy, it will hold such a deep and profound impact in our life that will value 30 years from now, 50 years from now. Robin, thank you so much again for your time, your energy, your presence. Always grateful to be with you and I'm so grateful that you put this book together.
Starting point is 01:12:53 Thank you so much for your time, Jay. Keep changing the world and really a joy to see you again. If you love this episode, you'll really enjoy my episode with Selena Gomez on befriending your inner critic and how to speak to yourself with more compassion. My fears are only going to continue to show me what I'm capable of. The more that I face my fears the more that I feel I'm gaining strength and gaining wisdom and I just want to keep doing that. Hi I'm Laura Vanderkam. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker.
Starting point is 01:13:28 And I'm Sarah Hart Unger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer, and course creator. We are two working parents who love our careers and our families. On the Best of Both Worlds podcast each week, we share stories of how real women manage work, family, and time for fun. From figuring out childcare to mapping out long-term career goals, we want you to get the most out of life. Listen to Best of Both Worlds every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi friends, I'm Danielle Robay.
Starting point is 01:13:58 And I'm Simone Boyce. And we're here to introduce you to The Bright Side, a new kind of daily podcast that's guaranteed to light up your day. Every weekday, we're bringing you conversations about culture, the latest trends, inspiration, and so much more. We'll hear from celebrities, authors, experts, and listeners like you. Whether it's relationships, friend advice,
Starting point is 01:14:20 or figuring out how to navigate life's transitions, big and small, We'll talk through it together. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Tune into the new podcast, Stories from the Village of Nothing Much, like easy listening but for fiction. If you've overdosed on bad news, we invite you into a world where the glimmers of goodness
Starting point is 01:14:48 in everyday life are all around you. I'm Catherine Nicolai, and I'm an architect of Cozy. Come spend some time where everyone is welcome and the default is kindness. Listen, relax, enjoy. Listen to stories from the village of nothing much on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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