Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Eric Zimmer on Why Surrender Is the Secret to Your Best Life | EP 569

Starting point is 00:00:00 Coming up next on Passion Struck. It took everything away from my identity that wasn't about being an addict. That was it in the last couple years of my addiction. That was all I was and all I lived to do and it consumed every waking moment of my life. How am I going to get the next fix? That's it. That was all there was. It took every part of my identity away, any part of me that was anything different and ultimately I

Starting point is 00:00:27 think the thing about addiction that really becomes the thing is this belief that I can't do anything else I'm never going to do anything useful or important or interesting because this thing. Welcome to passion Struck. Hi, I'm your host, John R. Miles, and on the show, we decipher the secrets, tips, and guidance of the world's most inspiring people and turn their wisdom into practical advice for you and those around you.

Starting point is 00:00:59 Our mission is to help you unlock the power of intentionality so that you can become the best version of yourself. If you're new to the show, I offer advice and answer listener questions on Fridays. We have long form interviews the rest of the week with guests ranging from astronauts to authors, CEOs, creators, innovators, scientists, military leaders, visionaries and athletes. Now let's go out there and become

Starting point is 00:01:27 Passion Struck. Hey Passion Struck fam, welcome back to episode 569. If you're new to the show, thank you so much for joining us. You have just joined a community that's all about igniting passion, living intentionally, and creating a life of purpose. Let me ask you, have you ever felt like your life is being pulled in a hundred different directions, leaving you unable to focus on what truly matters? What if I told you that the key to living a life of purpose and focus isn't about eliminating distractions, but understanding and managing them in a way that helps you take back control of your attention? That's exactly what today's guest is here to help us with.

Starting point is 00:02:05 In this episode, I'm sitting down with Eric Zimmer, a behavioral coach, certified interfaith spiritual director, and host of the award-winning podcast, One You Feed. Eric has an incredible story of overcoming addiction, rebuilding his life, and now helping others live intentionally by feeding the good wolf in their own lives. Eric's journey from facing personal challenges to becoming a source of inspiration for many

Starting point is 00:02:30 offers a powerful reminder that no matter where we start, we can transform our lives through small, intentional actions. In today's conversation, Eric shares his personal journey of overcoming addiction and rediscovering his purpose. The power of small, deliberate actions in creating lasting change, how we can shift our mindset and cultivate habits that align with our values, practical strategies for overcoming shame and finding resilience,

Starting point is 00:02:54 and lastly, how to create a life of purpose, even when the road feels overwhelming. Before we dive into today's episode, let me quickly recap some recent conversations. On Tuesday, I had the privilege of speaking with Dr. Ethan Cross, where we explored how to harness our emotions to create a more purposeful life. It was an episode you won't want to miss, and this past Friday, I shared a solo episode on the importance of fighting for your soul and staying aligned with your true purpose. Be sure to check it out if you missed it. If you love these conversations and want to dive deeper into topics like emotional resilience, self-awareness and intentional living, make sure to explore our episode Starter Packs. They're available on Spotify or at passionstruck.com slash starter packs. Don't

Starting point is 00:03:33 forget to subscribe to my live intentionally newsletter at passionstruck.com for exclusive content, challenges and tools to stay aligned with your goals every single week. Now let's dive into episode 569 of the Passion Struck podcast with Eric Zimmer. Thank you for choosing Passion Struck and choosing me to be your hosting guide on your journey to creating an intentional life. Now let that journey begin. I am absolutely thrilled today to bring you Eric Zimmer. Welcome, Eric. Thanks, John. I'm glad to be here. As the conversation progresses, I'm going to ask you some questions about your podcast,

Starting point is 00:04:14 but I just wanted to start out by paying you a compliment that I love the way that you interview and I love what you do with your show. So thank you for bringing it to the world. Oh, thank you, John. That's very kind. Eric, my show centers on this idea that everyone matters and that we can rebuild our lives intentionally. To begin with, I'd love to hear what does the idea of mattering mean to you personally?

Starting point is 00:04:44 That's a really good question. I've never thought about that in that way. So I would say that mattering means that everybody has, for each individual, we have an interior world that is really important to us. And we have a tendency to see our internal world as really important, and everyone else is not that important because we're not living it. But when we can invert that and think about the fact that everybody's internal world is as important to them and their lives are as important to them as mine is to me,

Starting point is 00:05:26 we realize then there's no way that anyone doesn't matter because it matters deeply to that person. And so I think it's really a matter of seeing that everybody wants the same basic things. One of the things that has been really helpful for me over the years is to think about how every person wants some version of more enjoyable good experiences and less bad experiences, or said differently, they want to experience more pleasure and have

Starting point is 00:06:01 less pain. That's true for every single human. And that's a commonality that is underneath all of us. And that matters. Everything up from that ends up being strategies. It's the strategies that people employ to bring those things about. And I think when we can see things that way, we're better able to connect with somebody at the most deep level, which is that to them and the people around them, they matter a lot. And so it's a way by thinking about mattering both for ourselves, but also for others, we can de-center ourselves as the center of every single story. Well, Eric, that was really profound. And you were one of the first people I've ever had on the podcast who gets my vision of mattering. So I love that you brought our sense of self-matter

Starting point is 00:06:58 and its impact on helping others feel they matter in the reciprocal nature that it has. So what a profound way of describing it. Couldn't have said it better myself. Well, thank you. It took me a few minutes to get there, but hopefully it made sense. Absolutely. I always in these interviews love to give the audience

Starting point is 00:07:17 some backdrop of who you are so they understand where we're going. And I think you do the same thing in your interviews. Looking back as a child, you struggled with kleptomania and were really acting out. Looking back, tying to this concept of mattering, do you think those behaviors were connected to a deeper sense as a child to feel seen and to feel that you mattered?

Starting point is 00:07:45 Probably, yes. I think more than anything, it was a way for me of feeling alive. And what I mean by that is I think that the way that I was raised, and it's not unusual to a lot of people of our generation or before, is that there's only certain ways that you can be seen and that are okay. If you're different than that, then what often we do is we will mute those parts of ourselves so that we are acceptable to the people who love us or should love us. And my experience is if you do that long enough, you push down, in my case, you numb and deaden everything in order to be acceptable and be okay. And then the problem with that, though, is that feeling numbed and deadened is a really awful feeling. It feels terrible. So then you're seeking some way to then feel alive. And so I think for me, that's stealing made me feel

Starting point is 00:08:47 alive. It had an energy to it and it had a, the danger had some adrenaline. So I think that's a lot of it. But yeah, I probably some of it also was simply trying to say, yeah, I matter or in a strange way, finding what is the thing that I could be really good at. Like I was athletic but not great athletic. I was never going to be a star. I was really good in school but not again not exceptional. It seemed like in some way this was this thing that made me different or special. Not a great different or special I now recognize, but I don't think I knew that at the time. Okay, and I think we all have these upbringings

Starting point is 00:09:35 that shape who we are today. And my parents, when I look back, were extremely different in their styles. My father really grew up with a father who was an alcoholic and who was removed. And so he tended to more lash out and anger. And my mom was more perfectionist to say. And in your case, you had two parents

Starting point is 00:10:01 who had different manifestations of depression. Your father's anger and your mom's withdrawal, if my research is correct. You've done good research. I'm impressed. How did they impact your emotional development and your coping mechanisms? We know from a whole lot of study and experience at this point that our early years shape a lot of who we are, both in our personality development, but also just in how our brains are actually formed and wired. So it's really important. And I always find this an interesting topic because on one hand,

Starting point is 00:10:41 there's a lot of studies that really show if you've had difficult early experiences, you may have a difficult later life. And I think that's helpful to know, so that we understand who we are, and maybe why we are some of the ways we are, but ultimately that is not a very empowering mindset either. And so it's how do I hold both those things? I had these early experiences that shaped me, causing me to be the way they the way I am in certain ways and are still acting upon me. And I have some degree of agency to be different. So I think that wasn't an answer to your question. I was setting up the answer. I think it certainly shaped me in lots of ways. I have my theories of in what ways it shaped me, and they align with the current psychological theories of what would be. And if we know anything about science is that 20 years from now, we'll look at a

Starting point is 00:11:38 lot of these things and be like, well, they thought it was this, but it's really that. And we'll realize it wasn't exactly the way that we thought it was. But I think in general, what I got from both of my parents was a stay unseen. Don't be upset. Don't ask for too much. Don't make any sort of mistake. My dad's anger was I would try and do something and if I didn't do it well, he would get angry. Whether that was worth throwing the baseball together or playing golf or he's trying to teach me how to hammer in a nail, whatever it is. And I think for my dad, he was just trying to make me better, right? And I don't think he knew really how to relate.

Starting point is 00:12:21 So I got that from my dad, which was like, don't make any mistake. Be very careful. Don't instill this day. If I do anything wrong, I'm looking around me like who's going to be mad for really silly things. And then from my mom, I think I spent my whole life up until my early twenties being focused on not being my dad. Because my dad was very his depression came out as irritability and anger and it was way out there. It was very obvious it was easy to see. What I didn't see was the other iceberg I didn't want to hit, which was my mother. And my

Starting point is 00:12:57 mother's was much more just a very pessimistic way of looking at things. Her depression took the shape of deep withdrawal from the world. I have one memory of my mom before about 18 and it's her sitting at the table playing solitaire for hours. That gives you a sense. So I think the ways that shaped me are don't make a mistake, don't have needs that are going to be difficult for somebody to meet because then they're not going to like you. And then just this withdrawing nature of my depression. And my depression, when it shows up, it actually gets both those. I get the irritation and I get the sort of deadening. Yeah. Thank you for being vulnerable and going into that. It sounds like your parents struggles added to such a layer of complexity to your upbringing and really impacted your sense of self and your ability to be seen and navigate your life as a young person.

Starting point is 00:13:59 So I think that backdrop really builds on where I want to go next. And I've heard you mention in other conversations listening to you that And so I think that backdrop really builds on where I want to go next. And I've heard you mention in other conversations listening to you that addiction doesn't always stem from when dealing with trauma, but can result from chronic stress or a sense of, as we've been just talking about disconnection. What, what do you think contributed most to your own path toward addiction? This is again where I think we're speculating, right? Addiction is a very complicated thing.

Starting point is 00:14:36 Why is anybody addicted? We know some things. We know, for example, as you said, that trauma or adverse childhood experiences make you way more likely to become an addict, right? That's just it's a pretty well documented fact But we know lots of people who had terrible childhood experiences far worse than I ever had and did not become addicts And we know lots of people who seem to have had a pretty good childhood and end up being an addict So there's it's the it's really multifactorial in the different things that causes it.

Starting point is 00:15:05 So when I say why I think I became an addict, I'm stating a working hypothesis, because we just don't know for sure. But I do think for me, it comes back to that sense of feeling alive. When I first really started getting into drugs and alcohol, some of it was probably pain escape, but a lot of it was that the world came alive for me in a way that it wasn't normally. There's an old movie called Days of Wine and Roses, and it's about an alcoholic couple. And the husband gets sober and at one point he's trying to get his wife sober and she's not and he's talking to her

Starting point is 00:15:49 about it and she says something along the lines of, life is normally in black and white for me but when I drink all the colors come on. And that's for me the best description of what the early journey into addiction was. It turned all the colors on Now the problem with alcohol problem with addiction is as you go You start behaving in ways that you don't feel good about

Starting point is 00:16:17 Which then means that the only way you know how to deal with an uncomfortable emotion is to drink or get high Then you do that again. You do something you feel bad about, you're worse than you were and you're in a descending cycle. So over time, my addiction became about avoiding the shame of being an addict, right? That becomes a driver, becomes the main driver of addiction at a certain point, I think, is it gets a life of its own. But early on for me, I think it was really about life coming alive to me, the world feeling like it was interesting,

Starting point is 00:16:50 and I wanted to connect to it. And that's the opposite of what my depression generally is, where I can tell when I'm in this depressive slump. I don't get depressed in the way that I used to. I always remain functional, and I can do the things I need to do, but I'll just notice I walk into a bookstore and I won't find anything I really want to read, which is unusual for me because my normal state is I walk into a bookstore, I could walk out with 30 different books I'm interested in. So that anhedonia, I think, is such an unpleasant feeling,

Starting point is 00:17:21 that inability to derive pleasure from things that normally bring you pleasure is what drove me early on to addiction because it, like I said, it turned the colors on. So I want to tell you this story. I used to volunteer in a cold weather shelter, which is ironic here in Florida because it doesn't feel cold that much, but when it does, it, it, it certainly you can tell the difference because we're used to it being so hot. But I remember one of the most rewarding aspects of this volunteer work that I did was a lot of people would volunteer and they would try to avoid the homeless. And instead, I would try to connect with them and try to understand their stories. And I once met this gentleman who used to be a cardiologist.

Starting point is 00:18:12 He was one of the top cardiologists in Tampa Bay. And he had so much stress in his job and he was having some problems in his relationships with his wife that he started to go down this path of using drugs and One drug led to another drug which led to another drug which led to a full-blown addiction and Then he started stealing Painkillers from his practice and other things got caught and he lost it all

Starting point is 00:18:41 His wife left him his kids wouldn't talk to him and he lost it all. His wife left him, his kids wouldn't talk to him, he lost his medical license and he was just telling me that you see these people like me who are homeless and you think it can't happen to you and he goes you don't realize how close any of us potentially are to this happening to them and he described to me that addiction often feels like a slow unraveling. Did it feel that way to you as well? For sure. I do think it felt like a slow unraveling, although my addiction took off really fast. I had started to drink a little bit early in high school and I drank strangely, but I can look back and see, okay, that's not normal behavior. But then I founded this tutoring program for disadvantaged children and I saw what alcohol

Starting point is 00:19:32 and drugs were doing to their family lives. I saw the chaos that their parents' alcohol and drug use put into their lives and I just was like, I'm not going to do any of that. And I just became completely no drugs, no alcohol, not because like today I need to, but because I just didn't want any part of that in my life. But then when I did later on start drinking, it was like I was, I feel like I was shot out of a cannon. It wasn't like I slowly build up. It was like, I was suddenly drinking every night in excess and then other

Starting point is 00:20:05 drugs added. But yes, it was certainly an unraveling over time where it went from something that I'm doing, you know, drinking, which is what a lot of people at the age of 18 or 19 are doing to ending up at the age of 25 being homeless heroin addicts. It was an unraveling and it was a somewhat slow unraveling, but in some ways it was a fast unraveling for me, which I'm actually really grateful for. I'm grateful for the fact that when I start using,

Starting point is 00:20:33 and I stayed sober eight years and I started using again, and when I do, it gets bad really fast. And I'm grateful for that because it's unsustainable. I can't keep doing it. And I know a lot of people who are stuck, what I would call in the middle, which is that their drug and alcohol use isn't causing their life to burn to the ground.

Starting point is 00:20:59 But it's also not a net positive either in their ability to move their life forward. It's not bad enough to do anything about really, or it doesn't seem to them that it's bad enough to do anything about, but it's also a real limiter on their growth and ultimately their happiness. And they stay stuck in that space. And I've seen people stay stuck in there for a long time. So I'm grateful that my unraveling ultimately is a little faster than the average.

Starting point is 00:21:28 I can completely understand where you're, what you were just talking about, because I think that's what happened to me in my own life. I have been sober now for about, I don't know, going on 18 months and. Congratulations. Yeah. I didn't really ever look at it. Like I had a problem. I just didn't feel like I was performing at my best and that I was looking at the

Starting point is 00:21:57 alcohol to like you were describing early on, bring out areas of me that I thought Brent brought out different dimensions. And the more I have focused on my own self-worth and doing the inner things to really know me, the less I have felt over time the need to drink, to bring out a part of me that I'm already happy with the person I am. But one of the things that was really interesting to me, because this isn't the first time I've stopped drinking. I've done it before is when you go out just to see how much of a norm it is in

Starting point is 00:22:36 society, it is the norm, not drinking is not the norm. Absolutely. And it has really been impactful on more than I even suspected it might on some of the relationships, both seeing from my perspective how much of my activities surrounded around drinking is the common element, but also how many people have pulled away from me now that I've stopped to still partake.

Starting point is 00:23:06 So have you seen any of these things in your own life? Oh, sure. I mean, alcohol is everywhere in life and now more and more marijuana is starting to be that way also. And the vast majority of people don't have any problem with it. So they're able to enjoy something that I think ultimately is enjoyable. If I had the choice, could I occasionally use drugs or alcohol? Would I? Probably, because they're enjoyable. But I can't with any kind of reasonableness, but it is everywhere. And learning to navigate that, we're right now, we are staying with my partner, Ginny's, some of her friends. And they are the sort of people that have a couple drinks every night, at least the nights we've

Starting point is 00:23:49 been there. I don't know what their pattern is outside of that. And they keep asking me, do you hear? Do you want a glass of wine? Do you want a cocktail? And I keep saying no, of course. And in my mind, just the other, just yesterday, I was thinking to myself, at what point do I say to them that I don't drink? Not because I need to give a reason, but because at a certain point I worry that it starts to seem antisocial. And I would experience this back when I was in the workforce, when I was in the software business.

Starting point is 00:24:20 People would keep inviting me to happy hour. We're going out after work, we're going to have a couple of drinks, we're going out after work, we're going to have a couple of drinks. And I going out after work. We're going to have a couple of drinks. And I'd say, no, because I don't want to make a big production out of it. Oh, I'm an alcoholic. I mean, I don't want to do that. And yet at a certain point I found with people, if I liked them, I had to say, Hey, here's why I'm not going out with you afterwards.

Starting point is 00:24:39 It's not because I don't want to spend time with you or not because I don't like you guys, because I do, it's just, that's not really my scene, going out and having a couple drinks. So yeah, learning to navigate that is interesting. And I'm probably not, I think being around drinking, situations where drinking is the primary focus, are things that I tend to avoid, because A, I don't think I'm as fun at them as other people are,

Starting point is 00:25:06 and B, I don't enjoy them in the way that other people are. Now, I don't avoid where alcohol is, or I'd have to lock myself in a closet, but I do tend to avoid things where drinking is the main activity. I want to go into something because I loved when I was doing my research that you were a software developer and you got into that because much of my career was spent in information technology. I started on the network side, information security. I've been a developer myself and then ended up taking on more management roles over it, eventually becoming a CIO.

Starting point is 00:25:44 I understand the development world well. up taking on more management roles over it, eventually becoming a CIO. I understand the development world. Well, here's where I wanted to go with it. Oftentimes I found developers to be some of the most creative people I knew. I also found them oftentimes to be sensitive. And do you think there's any connection between sensitivity and creativity and the vulnerability to addiction? So first I'll say I'm not a software developer.

Starting point is 00:26:12 I was just around software development for my whole career. Software startup companies, then leading large software products and then doing being product manager. So I was everywhere around development. So to clarify that, the second part of the question though about sensitivity and creativity and vulnerability to addiction. I think the answer seems to be yes. I wish the answer was no. I wish that there was no linkage there, but there does seem to be. And so I think that people who are more sensitive are likely to be more creative. And I think being more

Starting point is 00:26:52 sensitive means you might be more likely to succumb to drugs and alcohol. And then there's the fact that the scene, particularly when you're young, the scene around creativity has alcohol and drugs often baked into it. My thing was rock music, right? And of course, I mean, sex, drugs, and rock and roll, right? It's all embedded into one package. But I think you see that with writers. I know a number of fiction writers

Starting point is 00:27:20 who've done very well at New York Times, bestsellers. And they talk about, and a couple of them Times bestsellers and they talk about and a couple of them have gotten sober and they've talked about how hard it is to disentangle that notion of the creative writer who's also a drunk right a Hemingway sort of set the archetype for this among modern writers so I think it's a combination of yes, those personality traits make you a little bit more likely. And I also think that the creativity world, even more than a lot of parts of the world, do have, there's a romanticization of substances that can be very problematic. And then I'll just end that by saying my experience is also, you can be creative. If you're somebody who's felt like your creativity comes from drugs and alcohol, you can be creative without them.

Starting point is 00:28:15 It's a transition. My experience is it's a transition and the way of creativity changes a little bit, right? I think I got more ideas when I was still like drinking or smoking marijuana. I think more ideas just came out of me. But so many of them were terrible. They were terrible ideas, right? And so now it's a little bit different. And then I think there's also something about the prolificness of young artists compared to older artists, particularly in the music and writing space. I mean, you have to go back and wonder with the Beatles have

Starting point is 00:28:52 ever become the Beatles or the Rolling Stones ever become the Rolling Stones or Guns N' Roses or, or Metallica. I mean, there's so many of them, where drugs played an overwhelming portion of their exploration and what they produced. David Bowie, others, you could go on and on. Right. Yeah, absolutely. It does seem to be baked in there. But I think that for people who... I think we could argue with a lot of bands, a lot of those people, there's the flip side, there's Kurt Cob Cobain, the Janis Joplin,

Starting point is 00:29:26 there's the Jimi Hendrix, there's all the great artists that we lost because of their addiction. And what might they have gone on to do? What work could they have done? You look at someone like Bob Dylan, who doesn't seem to have battled those demons in the same way. The guy is still making great music in his 70s or is he, he might even be 80, I don't know. The guy's still making great music and yes, that creativity can be fueled in the short term, but it's really a long-term play that an artist, I think, wants to be about. I think I've heard you say something to this degree or write something about how the goal isn't to just be able to do this for today or tomorrow. The goal is how do I sustain

Starting point is 00:30:11 this over the long term? And so in that way, I don't think drugs and alcohol are actually useful to creativity over the long term. I think you have to find a different fuel source. That may have been a fuel source early on for people, but ultimately, I think there needs to find a different fuel source. That may have been a fuel source early on for people, but ultimately I think there needs to be a different fuel source if you're gonna do it long term. Yes, and I just wanted to pick up on a couple things you said because I know for me when I was younger and I've always been a creative person, in fact, my mind sometimes would never shut down

Starting point is 00:30:40 and that's part of the reason I would drink was to try to quiet it down because I couldn't sleep and do other things. And the other part of the reason I would drink was to try to quiet it down because I couldn't sleep and do other things. And the other portion of me is I've always been an introvert. So in social settings, it helped give me the courage to speak out and be a different version of myself. So it was very advantageous for those things. Now, I want to ask you, have you ever seen the documentary where they created we are the world that that song.

Starting point is 00:31:11 If it's funny that you should say that because no, I did not see it. And, but my friend, I have, I'm on a group chat with a few of my old friends and they're right now discussing the documentary of the making of do they know it's Christmas strangely Strangely enough, just today they're texting all about that. I've not seen either of them though. Well, it was really interesting and I'm just going to talk about Bob Dylan for a second, because Bob Dylan ends up showing up to this. You have Stevie Wonder there and obviously Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie and everyone else,

Starting point is 00:31:45 but out of all of them Bob Dylan might have been the biggest name there. And yet in this film, Stevie Wonder, them almost having to manage him because Stevie Wonder wanted to make the song his own and Michael and Lionel had already written it when they invited him into it. Lionel had already written it when they invited him. But Bob Dylan shows up and the song they end up producing is way out of his vocal range for a lot of it. And instead of asking them to do anything else or trying to sing parts that were out of his vocal range, you watch him on camera and there are many elements where he's participating

Starting point is 00:32:26 but he just doesn't sing. Like he's encouraging the others. And it was very striking to me that he had so much understanding of himself and confidence that he knew his place, he wanted to be there to support it but he didn't make it about him. And it was just an interesting thing that I thought I would share. Yeah, that's awesome.

Starting point is 00:32:47 I think I would enjoy that. And I think when you get all those egos of that size together, it's got to be interesting. It's got to be a fascinating thing to watch. Well, and the whole filming of this happened after they went to an awards ceremony. So it's already happening from like midnight to five o'clock in the morning. And they keep bringing more and more alcohol and drugs and other things to it. So yes, I could only imagine. So I want to go back to your journey and I often talk about this concept of defining moments. And I think we all have defining moments who shape

Starting point is 00:33:20 who we become. Was there a moment or realization for you that led you to finally seek help and begin your recovery journey? I think this is a really interesting question because I agree with you about defining moments and I also know that I agree with you from I was preparing for to talk to you on my show and I also know that you believe in that it's the small decisions we make over and over again that really shape who we are. And I'm at work on a book and the book really starts off with what my defining if you're going to make a movie of my life about addiction, this would be the key moment, right? And I am 24. Yeah, 24 or so. It's winter and I get arrested for multiple felonies and I lose the job that I'm in.

Starting point is 00:34:14 The job that I was in had a van. I was sleeping in that van. I lost that. And I went to treatment because I was gonna be really dope sick. I was a heroin addict. And I went to treatment because I just needed a couple days to have somebody help me detox a little bit.

Starting point is 00:34:31 While I figured out what the hell am I going to get the money to keep doing what I'm doing. And I went there and at one point they did the intake and they sat me down and they said look you really need our 28-day treatment program. sat me down and they said, look, you really need our 28 day treatment program. And I said, I don't think so. I don't think that's a good idea. Now, why I would what I possibly thought was so important, I had to leave for cracks me up today. But I went back to my room, and we I had what we call in sobriety, a moment of clarity. I had a moment where I realized, if I go if I don't, if I don't do something different, if I go back out there, I'm either going to go to jail for a long time, right? I've already got potentially 50 years of jail sentences

Starting point is 00:35:16 hanging over my head, and I'm going to go back and start stealing more again, because it's the way I'm going to get drugs. So I'm either going to jail or I'm going to die. I weighed 105 pounds. I had hepatitis C. Like I was dying. And I had that moment of clarity where I thought, okay, I'm going to go. And I went back and I said, okay, I will go to treatment. So that is the defining moment. If we were to film my life, it's a defining moment. What I think is interesting about it is a that moment wouldn't have meant anything if it weren't followed by thousands of tiny choices that actually allowed that moment to stand out there. And there were all sorts of other things that led to that moment.

Starting point is 00:35:58 Me trying to go into a different detox for a couple days and that not working and me trying narcotics anonymous and that not working, and me trying narcotics anonymous, and that not working, and me trying to move to another state so I don't buy drugs, and that not really working, like all these other little things that we go through. So I think we can pull out defining moments, but I think that if we isolate them from what comes before and after,

Starting point is 00:36:21 we miss part of the bigger picture, right? We miss part of the fact that, right? We miss part of the fact that those moments are created out of something and they only stand out because of what comes next. I think that's a fabulous answer and you ended up going into the 12-step program, which has a whole underlying philosophy of service. Yes. which has a whole underlying philosophy of service. Yes. My question around this is one of surrendering. How did surrendering both to the process

Starting point is 00:36:55 and more importantly to the need for help become a critical part of your recovery? This is a really interesting thing to talk about because the first step of a 12-step program is, like you said, we admit we are powerless over alcohol and our lives have become unmanageable. This seems to be an idea that works for certain people, and it seems to be an idea that for other people feels profoundly dis-powering, un-empowering, right? I'm powerless. For me, the surrender really became about, for that period of time, me saying, if I re-engage in a

Starting point is 00:37:36 battle with drugs and alcohol, as in I try to use them successfully, which is the obsession of every great alcoholic or drug addict is that I will figure this out in such a way that I can continue to use or drink. That's our great obsession. We keep trying to figure that out. So surrendering to the idea that like, that's not ever going to work. I'm never going to figure that out. If I climb into the ring with drugs or alcohol, I am going to lose. Surrendering to that idea and then surrendering also to the idea that I have no idea how to live without drugs and alcohol, because I've been trying in

Starting point is 00:38:17 different ways for a long time to figure that puzzle out and I've been completely unsuccessful. For me, the surrender was, I can't keep doing this, I'm going to lose, and I don't know how to do this. So I'm going to, for a period of time, listen to what people who seem to have figured this out, think. Now, I think that what gets interesting is over time, people tend to, I think, take this powerlessness thing too far. They'll say I'm powerless over people, places, and things. And on one level, yes, we are. We cannot make people do a certain thing. But we have influence, right? We have lots of influence. And so powerlessness is this interesting thing. And I think it's at

Starting point is 00:39:05 the heart of one of what I think is the most interesting questions that show up in anybody's life over and over, which is the serenity prayer, right? I think we keep getting presented with is this something that I should change or is this something that I should accept? And knowing how to figure that out, I think it is really one of the biggest pieces of wisdom that any person can have. So I think that's a little bit of a mixed answer in that the powerlessness was really helpful for me as a concept in the beginning. But I also think that it was important for me as I became, as I continued to get sober, to realize that I wasn't powerless in all areas. And I think the other thing is that 12-step programs, you admit powerlessness because you believe you turn, you then go on to turn things over to a higher power, which means that you believe on some level

Starting point is 00:39:58 that there's something out there that is going to intervene on your behalf. And that's not actually something that I believe in anymore. And so then that becomes interesting if I'm admitting powerlessness or I'm turning things over, who am I turning it over to or what am I turning it over to? And we can pursue that further if you want, but I think that's the powerlessness doesn't make sense without that second piece, right?

Starting point is 00:40:25 You wouldn't just admit powerlessness or surrender if you didn't believe that you were then bringing in some other power to help. And I think that is how we get over addiction is we bring in different sources of strength, support and help. That's the key, I think if there was one thing I would say to anybody who's trying to get over an addiction Whether you go to 12-step programs whether you do it on your own whether you whatever way you choose and there's lots of ways To do it. I do think it's a matter of what

Starting point is 00:40:55 Resources can I marshal but that are going to help me to do this because I can't do it on my own So you gave me a great tip up for where I wanted to go. Anyhow, you were the host. I brought it up before, but I didn't give the name of the one you feed, which is based on a parable and I'll let you describe it. But at a high level, I've heard you mentioned that feeding the good wolf was a key part of your journey. What were some of the practical ways

Starting point is 00:41:27 you had to begin to starve the bad wolf? Yeah, the parable is, I'll just give it to people if they don't know, most people probably have heard it in some form at this point. It's the basic idea that we have two wolves inside of us. They're always at battle. One is a good wolf, things like that represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf which represents things like greed and hatred

Starting point is 00:41:51 and fear. And you know, which one of those wolves is going to win? And the answer is the one that you feed. And so one of the things I like about that parable is it doesn't actually have say that I have to starve the bad wolf. I like it because it points to that there are positive choices that I can make. And my experience is starving. If you have a negative behavior of some sort that you want to do away with, whether it's a full blown addiction or something relatively minor, if you just try and stop that behavior without thinking about what's going to replace it, or how are you going to meet the need that behavior was filling in your life, you're probably not

Starting point is 00:42:33 going to be very successful, or you're going to be successful, but it's going to be a painful kind of successful, right? I always wish I could do that, but I can't, which leads to feeling deprived and not being very happy. So in all cases, it's about what is the good part of me that I can feed? What are the positive parts of me that I can feed? And so early on for me that I heard that that parable the first time somewhere in Columbus, Ohio in the winter of 1995. And I heard it and it just made all the sense in the world to me, right? I was like, oh, yeah Clearly there's this bad wolf that is devouring everything and I keep feeding it and the good news about 12-step programs for me and the place that I was they gave me very specific

Starting point is 00:43:19 Instructions do these things and we think you'll make it so I it. So I knew what feeding the good wolf looked like at least then. I had this sense of, okay, these are the things that I can do that are positive. And if I put my energy and effort into doing those things, people who I trust and seem to have gotten over what I've gotten over, tell me that I've got a good chance of making it. How do I just do those things? There's a simplicity often to early recovery that I miss sometimes, because it was really very simple for me. It was like, keep going to meetings, call your sponsor, pray, read this book, do this thing. And it was very simple. Life is as

Starting point is 00:44:04 you go on in life and your life in general is more complex than that. It's not okay, here's the three things I need to do. And then everything is taken care of our lives tend to be more complex than that. I miss some of that early simplicity and knowing exactly what things to do. But I also think that into in our day to day lives, we also know some of the things that lead to us being happier and healthier and better people. And so the parable ultimately is about the fact that we have a choice, right?

Starting point is 00:44:34 We have a choice about what, where we're going to put our energy and that choice matters. Back to your earlier thing about matter. Absolutely does. And I just wanted to bring in the story of someone I mentioned from time to time on the podcast. Not sure if you ever interviewed him, but his name is Nate Dukes. And... No, the name sounds familiar though, but I don't think I've ever interviewed him and I'm not, I don't know his story. I interviewed him early on in this podcast and Nate has a similar in some way story to

Starting point is 00:45:06 you. He ends up going from college to a startup. Things are going well. He has more money than he's ever had in his life and he starts partying and that partying leads to more partying and more drug addictions and everything else. And he ends up at the height of all the success that he has, thinking it's a good idea to steal a car and driving it across many states, and ends up falling asleep at the wheel,

Starting point is 00:45:31 gets awakened by police two or three states over. He's also from Ohio, and he ends up going to jail. And after his time in jail, everyone keeps telling him, you can't change. And I remember in our conversation is you said the great thing about hitting rock bottom is that you get to build your life back brick by brick, and you get to do it in an intentional way. And you were just talking about some of the things around the 12 steps that are part of their formula. But as you began to rebuild your life, what were some of the first intentional changes you made, even if they seemed really small at the time? Well, I think it's helpful to give a little bit more context about where I was and what I was

Starting point is 00:46:21 doing. So I went into this 30-day treatment program, which extended to 45 days for me. And then I was out for a little bit. And then I made a decision to go into a six month halfway house. So my life, I had nothing to do during that, most of that window, except focus on getting sober. So I had hit rock bottom, right? And I had nothing, I could rebuild life completely.

Starting point is 00:46:44 In the beginning, all that rebuilding was laying the foundation for a way to remain sober. That was all that I focused on. And I had the luxury to do that time. I mentioned that I got sober for eight years and I went back and drink and maybe we'll talk about that too. But at that time, all I had to do was lay the foundation for my sobriety. Then, once I got out, then I started having to do the things that everybody generally has to do, which is I have to figure out a way to make a living, and I have to figure out a way to feed myself, and I mean all these things that I just hadn't really had to do that much before,

Starting point is 00:47:21 which is a real, I was given a real gift to be able to do that. I suppose, again, to your friend's point, when you tear everything down, there is a certain freedom in where you choose to go. I think then it became about what are the things that, and they're very similar things now, And there are very similar things now, 16, no, I guess that was 25 years ago. 25 years ago, there are similar things, right? Which was, what things do I need to do that take care of my inner world? Right? Basically, my thoughts and my emotions. How am I tending to those things?

Starting point is 00:48:01 Then how am I tending to my physical needs? For me, that comes down to eating well, sleeping, and exercising. And for somebody, I found that getting those things reasonably on point makes the biggest difference in my mental health, right? So they're all related. And then what things do I need to do to build a career

Starting point is 00:48:24 or a way of making a living in the world? What's my contribution going to look like? And I think for all of us, we're trying to figure those things out. And then there's always relationships also. I'm not sure that's a really good answer, but. Well, I have a follow-up. Yeah. Yeah. It created this thought in my head. What did addiction take away from your sense of identity? And how did you begin to reclaim it? Oh, I mean, it took everything away from my identity that wasn't about being an addict. I mean, that was it in the last couple years of my addiction. That was all I was and all I lived to do. And it consumed every waking moment of my life.

Starting point is 00:49:05 How am I going to get the next fix? That's it. That was all there was. I would try and read books like The Basketball Diaries by Jim Carrol or Junkie by William Burroughs to try and make being an addict something romantic. But underneath all that, it doesn't feel that way, right? And so it took every part of my identity away, any part of me that was anything different. And ultimately, I think the thing about addiction that

Starting point is 00:49:38 really becomes the thing is this belief that you can't, becomes the thing is this belief that you can't, at least for me, I can't do anything else. I'm never going to do anything useful or important or interesting because this thing owns all of me. People often talk about addiction in a sense of slavery, and it is that way. If you were a slave, you got to just only do what the master told you to do, and that's where addiction was. I got to only do what I needed to do to feed the addiction. And then early in recovery, my identity was as a person who's recovering. If you'd bumped into me in those days, it wouldn't have been five minutes before I was telling you that I was a heroin addict, right?

Starting point is 00:50:30 Because it was the only identity I had at that point. Over time, as I began to, yes, I'm a recovering alcoholic and addict, but I'm also, I do this kind of work, and I'm in a band doing this and I like to read this. And my identity started to become more multifaceted and I began to be more of a person who was, and so my identity then began to reflect it. But I would say the short answer is it took every identity I had except just being an addict, which ultimately means I'm going to die or

Starting point is 00:51:08 I'm stuck here, which is a terrible feeling. Thank you for that. And I now want to talk about self-compassion. And I want to do this from two different lenses. What role self-compassion played in your recovery, but also what role did self-compassion play when you had that relapse where you went back after eight years and started drinking again,

Starting point is 00:51:36 because I'm sure as you got into that, you went through another period where you were probably not very happy with yourself. I think self-compassion is critically important in the role of us being able to change things. I think it's unintuitive. We tend to think that if we're really hard on ourselves, that will drive us to change.

Starting point is 00:51:58 And I'm not gonna say that never works because it does sometimes, but change is really, to me, ultimately about learning to do something in a different way. And we don't learn well when we are in shame because it's a very activating state. And when we are extremely emotionally activated, we tend to not be thinking very clearly. And thinking clearly is what we need in order to learn. So self-compassion becomes A, it just feels better to be self-compassionate, right? It's one of the biggest changes I think we can make is to live in a brain that actually likes itself, right? When that's not the case, it's very close

Starting point is 00:52:45 company with someone who's very negative, right? So it's A, one of the biggest changes we can make just for simple quality of life, but it's also critically important to our ability to change. And I think one of the great things that I got in 12-step programs was that I got to see lots and lots of other people who I could look at now and see that they were good people, that they lived a life that was valuable, they did good things, but yet they could describe being just like I was. The other element is the 12-steps from an addiction perspective is based on something called the disease model of addiction. And it basically says you have a disease and it's not your fault. Now, we could spend, we could and I have spent a lot of time talking about the ways in which I think that's a helpful and a not helpful frame.

Starting point is 00:53:43 But early on, it's a very helpful frame because it takes it out of moral failing. I'm an addict because addiction is a condition and I got it and you know what? Once you have it, you're not gonna just think your way out of it. And so that was really helpful in self-compassion also, was to be able to do that.

Starting point is 00:54:06 At the same time, that is married with responsibility. So it's not your fault that you're an addict, but it's absolutely your responsibility to figure out how to not be one. You are responsible, but you're not at fault. And so that was the beginning of self-compassion. As to your second question, when I went back out after about eight years and started drinking again, in the beginning, I just,

Starting point is 00:54:33 I didn't think it was a problem again. It was fine. I was enjoying it. And, but the fact that I had to go back and get sober again, we can shorten that story to, it didn't end well. And going back was really difficult. It was really hard because 12-step programs, there is certainly a lot of importance given to the length of time that you're sober. Probably an importance that maybe overstates what it

Starting point is 00:54:58 really needs to be, although it's important. So I went from being somebody with eight years who had sponsored hundreds of people who was very involved and sharing meetings, I kind of missed her in a way. And now I'm back with zero days. And that was really difficult. And I don't think there was anything for me to do except just recognize, okay, I did what happened to me is what happens to addicts. And you just deal with those very uncomfortable feelings of coming back and being essentially at the beginning again. Now the reality was I was not at the beginning again. I did not lose what I learned in those eight years, right? I started from a place where I had a lot of knowledge and tools that allowed me to move

Starting point is 00:55:44 forward. So even though on the AA day counting chart, I lost my eight year coin and went to a 24 hour coin, it's not like I had lost all those things. But self-compassion I think is really important. It's a balancing of recognizing the forces and the factors that cause you to do the things that you do that you may not feel good about, along with the responsibility of saying, I'm going to change those things. Thanks for sharing that. And yesterday I was talking to my friend, Bob Sutton, who wrote the book on closing the gap between knowing and doing. And as someone who's lived through it

Starting point is 00:56:27 and also coaches others, I think you've seen how behavior change is so difficult for most people even when they know that they really need to do it. Yeah. What do you think are the most critical conditions that need to be met for someone to make lasting changes in their behavior.

Starting point is 00:56:46 I've thought a lot about this. And I think that there are two sort of core competencies that people need in order to make a change, right? And to me, they come down to these aren't exact terms, but I'll use them. I'll call them structural and emotional. Structural change is things like if you're trying to do something positive, it comes down to having a really good and clear plan of what you're going to do and when you're going to do it and what are you going to do when you try and do it and it doesn't work out and what are you going to do when you get off track because you know you're going

Starting point is 00:57:18 to get off track and how can you set up your environment in such a way that you are more likely to do this thing. And it's all these things that we know about behavior change science that we've learned over the years that is structural. It's all about a plan, a really good and clear plan. And those are really important. And oftentimes, if someone gets those things, it's enough for them to make the change they need to make

Starting point is 00:57:45 and they're on their way. And there's a whole other element of it which is emotional. And it comes down to what do I do if I've done everything I can to set myself up for success. There's still going to be the moment where it's me and the decision, whether that decision is do I pick up a drug or drink, or do I go to the gym, or do I put down my phone and go to bed on time, there's still that choice point, that moment. And so I think that's the second piece, is to learn what's going on inside of me at that choice point

Starting point is 00:58:23 when I make the wrong choice? What was I thinking and what was I feeling? And then thinking, okay, what could I try and say to myself or do differently at that moment that's going to get me to go the other direction? And so if you only do that second half, I think you're going to lose again and again because you're relying on self-control, which is a limited resource. If you gathered 30 of the leading behavior change scientists in the world in a room and asked them to agree on one thing, I think

Starting point is 00:58:57 the thing they would agree on is that the extent that you rely on self-control is problematic because it just isn't a really robust thing. You have to have it, but what you wanna do is make sure that you need it as little as possible, but you still need to know in that moment, how can I ultimately choose the thing that I want to choose? It reminds me, speaking a behavior scientist of this concept from behavior science called choice bracketing.

Starting point is 00:59:28 I'm not sure if you're familiar with it or not. But it's really about a way of thinking about decisions that involves considering, do you evaluate your choices separate or together? And most of us practice narrow bracketing, where we're thinking too much about just an individual decision. We're broad bracketing. Really, you take a step above it and you look at the consequences series of choices together. Yeah. Yeah. We used to in 12 step programs call that playing the tape

Starting point is 00:59:59 all the way through, right? You're focused on how the chocolate chip cookie is going to taste right now, or you're focused on how good it would feel to be drunk right now, or whatever. But you got to keep going. Okay, well, what's after that? And then what's after that? And I think also, like you said, I think it's really important that we consider choices and decisions in a broad concept. in the whole context of our lives. I see this a lot with people who are constantly on the self-improvement loop. And what I mean is they listen to podcasts like yours or mine, and somebody comes on and says, you really should be doing X. And they go, oh, God, okay, great.

Starting point is 01:00:41 I need to do X. That sounds good. Right? But X now has added to a list of X, Y, Z, Q, T, S and B that they're trying to do. And if you look at that thing individually, you might go, yes, that's a good thing to do. But when you look at your life as a whole, when you look at it, you go, wait, there's no way that I'm going to do all these things. I have, let's say I'm a busy professional with children, and my parents are aging, and I have to take care of them,

Starting point is 01:01:11 and I've managed to carve out 30 minutes in the morning for myself to take care of myself. That's an accomplishment. But they don't, and they then use that 30 minutes to exercise, say, for example. That's great, but a lot of those same people are going to be feeling bad about themselves over and over again because they're not also meditating and they're not also journaling and they're not also... right? When you look at things in the whole

Starting point is 01:01:38 context you go, I can't do all those things. I often times when I coached people, one of the things I thought was the biggest victory was the number of things we arrived at that they weren't going to do, which might feel defeatist, but it's not. There's no point in feeling bad about the fact that you don't have time to meditate every day. If you don't have time to meditate every day, you're better off just going, okay, I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to feel bad about not doing it. And it's the same thing with people who find themselves in a situation of saying yes to too many things, because we evaluate it based on the thing. Somebody comes to me and says, Eric, would

Starting point is 01:02:18 you like to go to Oklahoma City and talk to a group legislatures about opium or opium policy. Yes, absolutely. I want to do that. 100%. I want to do that. The problem is I need a little bit more information. Well, when is that going to be? And right.

Starting point is 01:02:39 Because now, so I need to not just consider whether I want to do it. I need to consider how does it fit into the whole context. And so that's that I think what you're saying in general with choice bracketing, right? It's a bigger view of what's happening. How does this thing fit into the big context of who I want to be? So I want to end our discussion by going to Zen teachings, because along your journey, you ended up becoming a big fan of Zen, and it seems to be, as I can see, a real counterbalance to your earlier approach to life. Zen really emphasizes direct experiences over conceptual thinking. Yes. How do you think that aspect of it as we've been talking about behavior change etc helps

Starting point is 01:03:34 people bridge the gap and become more present in their lives? That thing at the end that you said there is it is a training in being present. It is a training in what's here right now and learning to see things that you don't normally see. It's a means of turning what seems very ordinary into something that is extraordinary because you're giving it more love and attention. And that's its main, I think that's its main purpose. And so it's a good remedy for somebody like me who is super conceptual and always somewhere else and always can think of a way that things could be better than they are. Any situation.

Starting point is 01:04:23 Yeah, it's a beautiful day, it's sunny degrees, the sun's out, but I wish the wind, can we just turn the wind down like two miles per hour? Or yeah, it's a beautiful sunny day, the wind's not blowing, it's a blue sky, but boy, it sure would be good if my left knee wasn't a little bit tight, right? This is constant fiddling with the controls of existence.

Starting point is 01:04:44 And Zen is a counterbalance to that. It says, stop doing that. Just be okay with what is here and look at it more closely. In those ways, I think that's why Zen has been really helpful for me. It does not push concept, it pushes presence and attention. I always love looking back at Phil Jackson's career and how he used Zen to really influence the way he was coaching these players who each had mega

Starting point is 01:05:15 personalities and even realizing when it comes to Dennis Rodman that sometimes you got to let him go and do his own thing to bring him back into the fold of what you want him to do. Yeah. Phil Jackson is pretty much a certified genius, I think, and certainly drew a lot from Buddhism in really interesting ways. And I want to end on this. You and I have both interviewed a ton of interesting guests along the way. What has surprised you most about hosting the podcast?

Starting point is 01:05:48 Is there something that's profoundly changed your perspective? I think I've been doing this a decade. Perspective change, I think it changed a lot in the early years. And then over time has become, you hear very similar things again and again. That's not bad because we forget we need to be reminded, we need to understand

Starting point is 01:06:09 it at a different and deeper level. The thing that comes off the top of my head when you ask that question right now is interviewing people who by all measures are pretty successful people. I tend to interview authors a lot. So these people who've written books and have been very successful at writing books or they've been very successful in their academic career and then they went on to write a book, these people have written multiple times, bestsellers, all this, that they all have, they still have self-doubt. They still, when they're in the midst of the thing, aren't sure they can do it. And that is a tremendous comfort to me because when I am trying to do something, so I signed a book deal and I'm in the midst of the manuscripts due in a few months, and I know you've written a book, and it's really hard. It is really hard. Because my standard is very high. I've been reading

Starting point is 01:07:11 these type of books for a decade. I know what's good and I know what's not. And I really want to write a good book. So my standard is very high. So when I'm in the middle of it, it's really difficult. And what my brain says is the fact that it's difficult means that you're not good enough to do it. Instead, I've been fortunate enough to talk to enough people to know, no, that's just how it feels when you're in the midst of trying to create something. There will be a period where you're like, I can't do it. I don't know enough. I'm not smart enough. Whatever it is, that will happen no matter who you are. And I think that we often take that sort of doubt and difficulty as a sign that we can't do something or shouldn't be doing it. We're not made to do it. And

Starting point is 01:07:59 so it's great to talk to somebody who's written like three New York Times bestsellers and they're like, I don't know if I can do it. And I'm like, well, of course you can do it. You wrote three New York Times bestsellers. And their brain will go, well, yeah, you did it before, but you can't do it now. And so I just think that's a really great thing to know that is going to come along for the ride. It's normal.

Starting point is 01:08:20 It's not enjoyable, but it's normal. And that for everybody, no matter how they might look like they are succeeding or doing well, their life can feel hard to them. It's back to where we very started, right? Everybody's internal world is full of the things that they're worried about and concerned about and the doubts that they have, along with lots of all kinds of great stuff in there, too. But that remains in my experience in nearly everybody I've ever had who's been open enough to share that.

Starting point is 01:08:53 Yeah. I was talking to Dan Pink one time and he said the same thing. He said, I am only as good as my latest book. Yep. Um, which you think about his legacy. It's a pretty powerful statement. Um, yes, exactly. You and I are convinced Dan Pink can write a great book, right? But Dan, when he's in the hard part of it, is not. And that's good to know.

Starting point is 01:09:15 Yeah, well, you look at some people who are very prolific writers, and they pump out tons of product, and then you look at someone like Susan Kane, who comes up with books very seldomly, but when they do they're masterpieces. And it's because knowing her, she pours so much into it to make sure she's getting to that quality level that she believes it needs to be at. Right. And she's allowing time for things to germinate and come about. There's another writer, Oliver Berkman, who's written a couple of really good books recently

Starting point is 01:09:51 about the finiteness of life and how that affects time management and productivity. I was fortunate enough to interview Oliver. He was like our second guest ever, like a decade ago. And he'd written a book called The Antidote Happiness for People Who Hate hate positive thinking and I think he was a column, I know best title ever, he was a columnist for I think the Guardian. Anyway I got to know him a little bit and we met in New York and became friends a little bit and I was able to see this period for him where he had done that thing and he had not yet done this thing, right? This next book, I can't remember the title of it. His latest one is called Meditations for Mortals,

Starting point is 01:10:29 but I don't remember what the one right before it was. But there was this long period in between there. And I think that for anybody, when there's that long period, you doubt whether you've got it, you've got something, right? And then Oliver takes this amount of time where these ideas are germinating period, you doubt whether you've got it, you've got something, right? And then Oliver takes this amount of time where these ideas are germinating and he doesn't quite have it. And then the book comes out and I think it is a masterpiece.

Starting point is 01:10:54 And it's because I think he was willing to be in that uncomfortable space in between. And I think Susan has that ability also. Well, I'll have to check out your episode with them, because I've got Oliver coming up for an interview in the next couple weeks. Oh, I think you'll find three or four episodes with Oliver. I've had him on multiple times. I think he's brilliant. Funny guy too. Really nice. Yep. So tell him I said hello. I will. Eric, it's been really a profound honor to have you on the show. For those who want to learn more about you, where's the best place for them to go? You can find our podcast called The One You Feed and any of your podcast players, or you

Starting point is 01:11:35 can go to oneufeed.net. O-N-E-Y-O-U-F-E-E-D.net. You can get our newsletter. We send out weekly newsletters. I've got programs that I lead and teach so you can find everything there. Eric, it was surely a pleasure. Thank you so much for doing this. Thank you, John.

Starting point is 01:11:52 I really enjoyed it. And great preparation. Very good. Thank you. Very good. What an inspiring and thought-provoking conversation that was with Eric Zimmer. His journey from addiction to intentional living reminds us that no matter how far we fall, we all have the power to rebuild. Eric's insights on feeding the good wolf, aligning

Starting point is 01:12:09 with our values and embracing small, deliberate steps towards change are lessons we can all apply to our own lives. One of the biggest takeaways from today's episode is the importance of intentionality, how making even the smallest, deliberate choices can transform not just our careers, but our entire sense of self-worth and purpose. Eric's exploration of Zen, behavioral change, and the idea of mattering is a powerful reminder that we can create a life that truly resonates with who we are no matter where we start. As we wrap up, take a moment to reflect on your own journey. Are there areas where you might be feeding the wrong wolf or letting autopilot guide your decisions? What

Starting point is 01:12:43 small intentional step can you take today to start moving toward the life you envision? Remember, the power lies in choosing your path, rather than letting it choose you. If today's episode resonated with you, please take a moment to leave us a five star rating in review. Your feedback not only helps the show grow,

Starting point is 01:12:59 but also empowers others to discover these life-changing insights. And if you know someone who could benefit from Eric's message, share this episode with them. It could be the spark they need to begin their own transformation. For links to everything we discussed today, including Eric's work and his podcast, The One You Feed, check out the show notes at passionstruck.com. You'll also find information on our sponsors at passionstruck.com slash deals, where you can take advantage of special offers that help fuel the show and bring you incredible content every week. Beyond the podcast, I'm passionate about sharing these messages through

Starting point is 01:13:28 speaking engagements with organizations, conferences, and teams. If today's episode sparked something in you and you think these insights could inspire your organization, I'd love to explore how we can work together. Visit JohnRMiles.com. And don't forget to subscribe to our Live Intentionally newsletter for exclusive content and weekly challenges and you can also watch today's conversation on YouTube. Check out the John R. Miles channel and the PassionStruck Clips channel for highlights and key takeaways. Before we go, here's a preview of what's coming up next on PassionStruck.

Starting point is 01:13:58 Joining us is Shigeo Ishii as he shares his incredible insights on how to build a life of resilience, clarity, and intentional growth. It's an episode filled with actionable strategies for overcoming adversity, cultivating mental strength, and unlocking your fullest potential. There's nothing wrong with the William James equation. I mean, it's really brilliant. But two ways to maximize the self-esteem. One is maximize your success, then your self-esteem is higher. But the other approach is reduce your desires. If you want a lot, then the success has to be enormous

Starting point is 01:14:34 in order to get equation like high outcome. But by reducing ambitions, even your successes are little, if the desire is small, then you could feel good about yourself. Thank you, as always, for spending your time with us here on Passion Struck. If you found value in today's episode, the fee is simple. Share it with someone who could benefit from these powerful insights. And as always, do your best to apply what you learn here so that you can live what you listen. Until next time, live life passion-struck.

Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Eric Zimmer on Why Surrender Is the Secret to Your Best Life | EP 569

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