THE ED MYLETT SHOW - A Journey of Finding Your True Purpose Feat. Mike Posner

Episode Date: March 10, 2026

What If Everything You’ve Achieved Still Isn’t Enough to Make You Happy? Today’s conversation with Mike Posner is one of the deepest and most powerful discussions I’ve ever had on this show. You probably know Mike from his massive hits like Cooler Than Me and I Took a Pill in Ibiza. But the man sitting across from me today isn’t just a Grammy nominated artist. He’s climbed Mount Everest, walked more than 2,900 miles across America, survived a rattlesnake bite, and gone through a profound spiritual and emotional transformation that completely changed his life. Mike shared something that stopped me in my tracks early in this conversation. He said that despite all the success, the money, the recognition, and the adventure, his greatest achievement wasn’t any of those things. It was changing his emotional set point from depression and negativity to joy, faith, and love. That shift didn’t happen because of fame or accomplishments. It happened when he finally stopped lying to himself about the fears and stories that were running his life. We talked about something so many people struggle with but rarely admit. The pursuit of recognition and significance. Mike was honest about how much of his early career was fueled by the desire to be liked and validated by others. And if we’re honest, most of us do the same thing in our own lives. What makes this conversation so powerful is how Mike explains the transformation from chasing significance to living a life of service, contribution, and authentic connection. One of the most powerful moments came when Mike shared the four questions that helped him turn his life around. Questions that forced him to stop drifting and start living intentionally. Questions like “Do you actually want to live?” and “What do you truly want?” These questions sound simple, but they have the power to completely change the direction of your life if you answer them honestly. What I love about Mike’s story is that he’s proof that external success does not guarantee internal peace. But he’s also proof that you can change your internal state, rewrite the story you’re telling yourself, and build a life that is rich both internally and externally. This conversation is about awakening. It’s about purpose. And it’s about learning how to live a life that truly feels worth living. Key Takeaways • Why changing your emotional set point may be the most important achievement of your life • The dangerous trap of chasing recognition and significance instead of real love • How the stories you tell yourself quietly shape your entire reality • The four life changing questions that can help you rediscover purpose and direction • Why success without inner fulfillment still leaves you feeling empty • How shifting from seeking validation to serving others transforms your life 👉 SUBSCRIBE TO ED'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL NOW 👈⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   → → → CONNECT WITH ED MYLETT ON SOCIAL MEDIA: ← ← ←  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠INSTAGRAM⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠FACEBOOK⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LINKEDIN⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠WEBSITE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

One plus one equals more of the greatest stories. Hulu on Disney Plus. Stories about survivors. The most dangerous planet. Family. Retribution. Murder. Prophecy.

Beer and propane. Bali Dillard. Blake Pantha. The ultimate. The ultimate soldier. Chicago, all right? The best of the best stories now with even more from Hulu. Amazing.

Have it all with BYU on Disney Plus. In communities across Canada, hourly Amazon employees can grow their skills and their paycheck by enrolling in free skills training programs for in-demand fields. Learn more at aboutamazon.ca. This is the Edmireland show. All right, welcome back to the show, everybody. So I was thinking about this guy this morning. I'm so excited I got to talk with him.

I've been waiting about six months to do it. I think he's the most interesting man in the world. Do you guys remember those Dosakis commercials where the guys like the most interesting man in the world? I'm pretty sure this guy qualifies, and I'm not exaggerating when I say that. This is going to be such a compelling conversation today. Let me throw a few things at you. Grammy nominated.

I took a pill and a Beezza. You all know that song. Cooler than me. Great song. That's just two of a whole bunch of them, right? But on top of that, the same guy who's done all that, he's climbed to Mount Everest. He's done the 31-mile Continental Divide Trail, Journey, Trek. He's hiked across America, 29-00.

hundred plus miles. He's been bitten by a rattlesnake on top of it and almost died. And he's like got this very gentle, kind spirit about him. He's also gone through like a major life transition as well. But like, and this is all in 37 years. So I'm pretty sure he qualifies for the category. Mike Posner, finally welcome to the show, brother. Great to have you.

Hey, and good to meet you. And thanks for having me on. And, you know, it's humbling to hear that introduction. but you know all those things that I've done they've been amazing and I'm mostly proud of them although I'm also keenly aware that some non-trivial part of the inspiration to do them was I was addicted to getting other people to like me and they're not my biggest accomplishment even all those added up together on the external my biggest accomplishment is I went from somebody whose emotional home base, their set point was depressed, was negative to somebody

whose emotional set point now is joy, faith, and love. And not saying I don't dip down every once in a while, and sometimes I can go even higher, you know, moments of bliss and ecstasy. But you can change your emotional set point, and that's my greatest achievement. And I hope I hope that we can put other people on the path of doing the same thing because it's possible. If my depraved rear end could do it, then anybody can. I've had 850 shows. I think that's literally the best opening sentence of any guest out of 850. No disrespect.

We usually ease into the good stuff. You're already getting off to a fast start here. Sorry. No, it's awesome, man. So let me ask you, let's just start there. We're going to let this thing flow. By the way, I relate to that set point being kind of, I don't know if I'd call mine to depressed, I'd call it kind of melancholy.

Yeah. You know what I mean? I relate to that very much and I think a lot of people do. So is there some way you would say initially that there was a catalyst to change that? Did you get a bottom of some type? And what did you do to begin the journey upwards? Yeah, man. Like I had accomplished all these things.

I had walked across America. I climbed the tallest mountain in the world Everest. I had millions of dollars, millions of followers. everything that a perfect life was supposed to be on the outside. Even, listen to this, I even had an Instagram account full followers that I had convinced I was inspiring. Right. I was already teaching, selling people to dream that I got it figured out. And then I remember I was at my home in Michigan.

And it just was like the Jew saint here. I am, and I remember this year, I was eating clean. I was doing the ice bath. Actually, my body looked beautiful, but I kept getting sick. And I kept getting depressed. And I couldn't figure out why. Like, what is missing here? I got everything on the external, including that.

It's supposed to be health, right? I'm doing all the right stuff. And what is not working, but something was not working. and everything was irritating me. I got this lakefront home. I'd get out of the ice bath. I'd look in the reflection on the sliding door. And like, if my abs didn't look just perfect, I was upset with myself.

Someone was wrong. I'd go in that sliding door and my mom was there because I knew what a good person was supposed to act like. A good person, they're kind to their mother. So I'd invited my mom up to stay at the house for a week. But she was putting some dishes away and the sound of the dishes. laying against each other. It was like sandpaper grating against my very being. Like everything irritate me. And then I remember I went downstairs and I checked my phone. And I had a message from one of my managers at the time. And it was a screenshot. And he goes,

I just need you to know if this is true. And it was a screenshot of from Instagram. And someone said, a singer who walked across America got my friend pregnant and abandoned the child. And I said, I knew I didn't abandon a child because I would never do that. But the way I was living my life, I wasn't sure that I hadn't had a child and maybe the person just never told me because I was being sloppy with my energy. And I was afraid of intimacy. So I would get in weird relationships, one night stands on the road, things like this. And I wasn't sure. I'm like, dude, do I have a kid out there?

And the stress of all these things start add on to one thing after another. And I called my friend Doug and I go, hey, man, like, I need help. I either need a high-level therapist because, you know, I have a freaking ego, right? at the time, like, I'm special. So I need like some special therapist who like knows about famous people. Or I need some high level life coach, you know, that gets it. So Doug, he goes, well, you could just talk to me. I said, with all due respect, he's one of my best friends.

I go, you're about to have a child. And I got, I got a lot of problems. So if I had just one, come on, I'd ask you for help. But these things are stacking. And before I would get over the one, Another one was hitting and I was overwhelmed. And I think a lot of people know that feeling like I'm just underwater with problems. Great description.

And so he said, okay. And a few days passed and then he forwarded me a voice note. And the voice note was from Tony Robbins. And Tony said, Mike, Doug shared a little bit with me about your story. And I'd be honored if you came to my event. date with destiny as my guest in December. And it was like, you know, August. I was like, well, what the hell do I do till then?

But, and I almost didn't go. I was like, man, that's kind of far. But my whole life was like just kind of negative. I'd look for the negative in it. So anyways, Doug said, you got to go, man. So in December came around. I went to the conference and I was a little skeptical. Cole at first. I was sick again. And I was like, do, she even like, do this. And there came a moment.

I think it was the third day of the conference. And Tony's leading some exercise. By the way, I love Tony. He changed my life. He's leading some exercise. And he didn't teach this. He was doing some kind of meditation thing, like a visualization. And he didn't say this in the, in the activation. But it's like, God just spoke to me in the moment. It just, just landed in my nervous system in a way I knew was true. It was like, you are getting sick, you are getting depressed because you are avoiding the fact that you are scared to death of relationships. You're scared of intimacy. And until you address that and face that fear, life, hey, life, I'm only giving you pain to wake you up because I want you to go this way so you can have

what you actually deserve, what you're actually here for. You got to stop. lying to yourself because I had this whole story you know if if love happens great but I'm not really looking for it the truth and I believe myself but the truth underneath all that was how I really wanted to have love I really wanted to have a family I was I'm here to have a family oh we as men we're here to provide we're here to protect right part of our nature and so I was letting this part of my nature die underneath all these lies I was telling myself and life told me in that moment or You know, I call it God. I believe in God.

But for some people, maybe they don't like that word. The word doesn't matter. You know, whether you call it life with a capital L. I think God and life are in many ways synonymous. I think God, life, love, maybe all one thing. It's above my pay grade. But whatever it is, it gave me the message clear. Face the fear.

Or we're going to give you louder warning signals. The pain is going to get worse until you wake. up. So I had a choice at crossroads. It was like, I'm either going to change my emotional set point. I'm going to stop lying to myself, which I had these stories. I'm going to avoid in person. Relationships

are hard. You know, my relationships don't work out. Give up all these stories rooted in the past, rooted in fear, and step into who I really am, which is a man, a leader. And it's one or the other. You're going to go that way, and I knew where that was going

to end. If I kept going the way I was, I was going to be a dude with, you know, six-pack abs and millions of dollars at his mansion alone. 60 years old and people knocking the door. Mike, how you doing it? I got a big fake smile on my face. I'm doing good, but inside I'm a lonely man. That's where my life was headed.

My gosh, bro. And or is face the fear and it's a whole bunch of expansion, growth, freedom, beauty, joy, faith, love, some pain also, right? There's pain on the journey, but way less suffering, right? And so that was it. That was the turning point.

And I have not looked back. It's been, I think, three plus years since that moment, and I cured my own depression. Wow. I want to ask you, that's it. That was, whoa, here we go. So I want to ask you about that. first off, this story thing, everybody is real. This story you tell yourself about yourself and your life,

you're doing everything in your personal power you possibly can, to quote Tony personal power, to confirm the story and make it true. Amen. As you validate it over and over and over again to find more proof, that's your reticular activating system in your brain. It's scanning your environment to find more and more proof that what you're saying about you is true.

That's why that old adage of, if you believe it, it's true, actually comes to fruition. But I want to go back a second. We'll talk about what you did to shift. But before we do it, I want to ask you something, maybe you haven't considered this. Maybe you have. But I, too, relate to that.

I had a story one time I was building my first, like, big home. It's just a great blessing. I had financial resources for the first time building this mansion. It's just a stressful day. I was mad at the contractor. We had just lost a business deal. And I'll never forget it. I walk in the living room with this house that's being built.

And I'm just furious, right? And if the quality of your life is the quality of your emotions, I was losing big time. And in the kitchen, building my kitchen, were these about six men. They had mariachi music playing. They were dancing. They were working. They were doing work they were great at that they were proud of. And they were joyous and blissful and passionate.

And I remember standing there like an idiot in the middle of this house under construction going. They're winning in life and I'm losing. But on Instagram, I'm the dude with the mansion. But I'm the dude living in these emotions of stress, fear, anxiety, worry. These men live in bliss. And I remember going, you better change something right here. And in my case, this is what I want to ask you about. I want to meet you in the middle here.

I had to try to figure out why it was this way first. And maybe that's not relevant. Maybe you just decide to change. But in my case, I realized something about me. Since I was a little boy, and I think a lot of people do this, I confused significance or recognition with love. Meaning when I was a little boy, if I brought home an A or I hit a home run or I had big muscles when I got older, I got what felt like love. It's like superficial love, acknowledgement.

And so in my little brains, significance and recognition was love, except it's not. They're two totally different things. So I was great at significance, terrible at feeling loved or giving love. Do you relate to that at all? Let me share something with you guys, and I don't say this lightly. Since using rose nutrition, liposomal NAD plus, no joke, I feel incredible. And I don't say that about all the supplements that I take. When you're running companies like I do, like many of you do, leading teams, making high stakes decisions every day,

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That's why I love Hello Fresh. And it's delicious food. Like, I've never had any more healthy food in my life that tastes this good. They got 35 high-quality protein to different meals. You've got glp1 friendly ones you got Mediterranean they got all wholesome ingredients none of the bad stuff that you put in food but the other thing that i like about them is you know what you can get seafood on there now for no upcharge there's three times the amount of seafood on there my favor by the way is the rib eye so go to hellofresh dot com slash my let 10 fm to get 10 free meals plus a freeze willing knife which is a hundred and forty four dollar value on your third box offer valid while supplies last free meals applied as a discount on first box new subscribers only varies by plan yeah of course

organized you know first two and a half maybe three decades in my life around you know why do you think us uh you know artists become artists you know it's like we want that hit of significance from the audience we we have often some psychological flaw that we haven't cleaned up yet and we we We want to manipulate the audience to giving that fake love or the attention, that significance, so we don't have to look at that thing. And so that's unfortunately a large percentage of the artists we have. They don't feel the love, the real love. And so they're trying to outsource it, crowdsource it, right?

And I'm not saying that with judgment because I did it for years. And sometimes, to be honest, it'll try to rear its head to the day. And I say, hey, I love you, but you're not, you don't get to drive the car anymore, you know. And so I talk about the three stages of artistry and their relationship with their fans. And it probably applies to influencers, podcasters, things too. But I come from the music world. So I see the first stage is Puppy. You started to get some recognition.

and you go, wow, like, this is incredible. And what could ever go wrong with this? Like, I actually, maybe I don't even need to have a wife or a girlfriend because I get all this. Like, I feel so filled up from these strangers who all see the essence of how great I am. And if you've done great work, that's true. There's only seeing your essence and not all your, you know, your flaws. And so there's some, there's something to that because you're presenting. the jewel inside yourself and your art

and a bunch of people are relating to that and you're getting this attention back and acknowledgement. So that's stage one, it's puppy love. Stage two, I call disillusionment because something happens where you go, dude, some of those people

they don't like me, they're not paying attention anymore. There could be a dip in popularity and scope. Wow, this changes. Or some people flip and they go from liking you to hating you or some people just come out of nowhere and they're hating you so this is man I thought I had this security from this this significance but now it's gone and that's painful that's what I call it disillusionment now a lot of people get stuck there and they get in this love hate relationship with their audience but there's a third level a third

stage and that service. It's going, okay, once I actually addressed the thing that you just got clear on, you addressed it, hey, this came from when I was a child. And, you know, I'm going to stop living under that programming. Because it's just programming that I've operated under for years and we can change any habit. We can change any. It's one of the things I love

about Tony. You don't have a disease, depression or a disease I had. It's not something I had. It's something I had. is something I did. Yeah. And so you get clear on in stage three, you get clear on, okay, what are these flaws or these pain points that maybe come from childhood? And sometimes, Ed, they even come from before childhood.

Sometimes they come from your mom's childhood. I mean, I know for sure there's some stuff that I picked up from my mom. And when I was in my early 20s, I was kind of, like, upset with her about it. But then when I learn more about her, I said, you got it from your mom. And then it probably went on from there. So sometimes it's not even us, but it's up to us to end the cycle. So you get clear on, okay, what are my pain points? What are these old stories?

What is the new ones that are going to tell? And where am I going to start real relationships with real love? And then I'm going to go back to my audience. I'm actually going to serve them. It's not about manipulating them. anymore to get this hit of significance. It becomes about what can I give. And it can become one of the great joys of your life.

And it doesn't replace a primary relationship or your family, but it's a place for you to pour love out and contribute. It's so true, brother. By the way, I don't think, I think you could replace artist with human. I think most humans are figured, well, if I get enough money or I get a bigger house or I got the right shoes or, you know, people look up. to me, I'm going to feel different about me. This thing you just said on significance,

I can tell you an inside thing. It's interesting. Rob Deardick is a good friend. He's been on the show a couple of times. And we had this running thing because this is a topic once you have a breakthrough in your life that you really discuss with one another. And so I remember telling him, I go, man, I'm not into significance anymore recognition. He's like, me either.

Like, almost like we were above it, right? And so we went like six months bantering back and forth about how evolved we had both become, you know? And we're at a Rams game. together and our wives were sitting in between us and I can't hear him and he's like hey hey and I'm you know what he goes and finally I can't hear him I go what do you say he goes I'm a liar and I go what are you talking about he goes let's go get a hot dog and I'll tell you and we walk up he goes bro I still love significance and recognition I go good dude I'm so sick of lying about this so do I right but he said

something what you just said he said but I get it now by contributing so I feel significant when I'm giving. That's the difference, bro. And so I think I get it in a healthy way now. That's it. And he goes, and that contribution is because I love people. And so it's just a subtle loop that changes. But this is like one of the more profound conversations we've had on the show because

I think this is just humans. I don't think it's just singing or just speaking on stage like I do. I think it's human nature to be this way. So let me ask you, I mean, this is a broad question. But if someone was listening, this going, bro, I'm with you. And I live kind of in a lower state of being a lot where I'm down or melancholy or worried or anxiety or all the way to depression like you've described. And they said to me, hey, brother, like, what, what do I do? What do? What would you say to that person? I would ask them four questions, but they can answer the questions themselves, you know.

So they, I would challenge or invite that person to ask themselves these four questions. The first comes from my buddy Chris Wark. Chris Wark wrote the book, Chris Beed Cancer. It's an incredible book. He cured himself of cancer without Western medicine. And he's helped thousands of others to repeat this miracle. And he credits his entire journey of healing back to, I think he was getting a massage or a rakey or someone.

He went to get some bodywork done. And the healer asked him this question. they go before we start this journey I got to know do you want to live yes or no and most of us have never really asked that question

seriously to each to ourselves because you know these things build up you talked about them early these micro resentments there's a little bit of feeling a lot of us have of, hey, you know, I'll do this, but I don't really want to. I'm here, but I should be doing something else. And it's so, it's so ubiquitous in a lot of our experience of life that it's just kind of running in the background. And a lot of us think that it's actually part of life.

It's not part of life. It's an impediment of life. And so most people answer that question, yes, but they realize like there's something sort of not as good as they, think it should be. And that part, I'll go on a small side tangent and I get back to question two. That part of oneself that goes, hey, I think, I think my life is supposed to feel better than it does. Where does that come from? Because that's really interesting. A lot of us have this idea that life should feel better than it does. but better in a way that maybe we've never even experienced. So how is the mind telling us about some experience that we don't know anything about? Right.

So I have a theory. I don't know if it's right, but I think it's right. And I think it comes from beyond the mind. I think that feeling is true. I think that's our soul. Or if you don't like that word, your higher self or like your deeper self going, hey, there's more for you here. And the pain you feel is actually the chasm between where you are and where on some level

you know life should be. Not externally, but the feeling, the experience of life. Right. It's like when you see those guys working on the house, the pain isn't just that you felt anger that day because we all feel anger sometimes. The pain is something is recognizing there's a chasm here. And the amount, the further, the wider the chasm, the more the pain. So, oh, I think that part of ourselves is correct.

And it's a larger part of ourselves calling us to grow, calling us to become more. So that's the end of the tangent. Now, what's the second question? The first question was, do you want to live? Yes or no. The second question is, if yes, and most people say yes. Why? Why?

And this question, it comes from Victor Frankel. Chris asked it also, but it's man's search for meaning. And what Nietzsche say, he who has a why can endure almost any circumstance, any how, any condition, can overcome anything. And all of us have a purpose of being here, but not all of us have uncovered it yet. And by the way, it changes. Your purpose when you're 15 is not the same as your purpose or your 30.

And it might change week to week. And Victor Frankel talks about that in the books. He goes, stop measuring life and saying life isn't meeting my expectations. And start asking, what does life expect of me? What does life expect to mean in this moment? And the purpose, your purpose of life might not be some overarching thing, some crazy it might just be to hold that old lady's

hand to look at that child and it might be something very immediate yeah so that's the second question and the third question my buddy my buddy Elliot Bissnow

so it comes with a story am I rambling too long not in the least so the third question is came from Elliot, I was at a point, another low point in my life. This low point came before the one before. It was a bunch of low points, right? And so I had reached this point in my life where my father had just passed away.

A couple of my peers that I worked with the music industry, Avichi and Mac Miller, they had just died. and there was this feeling like exactly what I just referred to. Like there's something inside me that I'm not expressing. Like there's some difference between what I have to give and what I'm actually giving. And it doesn't feel good. It feels like I'm wasting life.

And I got just reel down, reel down. And I grew a big beard at the time. I just turned 30. and I remember I had a new album coming out and you know at that it was about maybe seven, eight years ago at that time you would still go to a lot of radio stations and you basically schmooze

you know, shake these guys' hand make you know pretend like you're their best friend and so then they put your song on the radio and they can get like these 12 year olds addicted to your song and that's supposed to be success and I'm just like telling Elliot we were in Alaska on a camping trip and I'm like dude I'm done like I don't I'm 30 I'm what am I doing I don't want to play this game anymore like I'm through I don't want to do it and and when I say

I'm done I'm like I was really there Ed like I had thoughts of like I should kill myself whoa like like I I there's something about how I'm showing up in the world that feels like it's taking away from the world, not adding to it. And so I said to Elliot, I go, dude, I don't want to do this anymore. I'm done. He looks at me, by the way, I think friendship is seeing another's potential so clearly that they can see it themselves. So that's Elliot. He's incredible.

And my depressing word just kind of like bounce off him as if he's got a force field. And he looks at me and he goes Because I just told him I don't want to do it I don't want all this stuff And he goes Well what do you want? I never

I never asked that question I'm sitting here bouncing around my life Making lists and lists Of what I don't want And if any of your listeners Like if your mind is like mine By the way you're not your mind But if your mind is like mine

It creates lists of things that happened in the past you didn't want. It's got a list of things right now that are happening you don't want. And it even has a giant list of things that haven't happened yet. But if they did, you sure as heck wouldn't want those two. So no wonder, no wonder I was miserable. I sat there. I thought, what do I want?

What a question? And I couldn't believe the words that came out of my mouth. They were, I want to walk across America. Well, I almost couldn't believe I said it. Had you ever thought that before? Yeah, I had heard about a guy who had done it five years ago. And I remember I thought, that was, that's pretty freaking cool, you know? And then I just threw on the back burner.

Like, I thought maybe I'll do it one day. But then I got back to business as usual, make album going to her, make album going to her, make album going to her. And then in that moment, that's what I wanted. And that was the answer. It came from beyond my mind. I almost heard the words come out of my mouth as if someone else said it, I was surprised. And I reeled back.

Because when I heard the words come out, I went, my mind came back in and I said to Elliot, I said, but you know, I told my manager about this once and he said it was a crazy idea. Elliot goes, that's great news. I like Elliot. I like him too. I said, what do you mean?

It's great news. He goes, that your manager said it's a crazy idea. I said, what do you mean? He goes, you've got to understand, man. Not all crazy ideas are great, but all great ideas are crazy. So good. And he goes, so your manager thing is crazy is a great sign. He goes, and I think you walking across America is a great idea.

So I eventually did that walk, and it changed my life. It didn't cure me in my dad. depression, but it gave me some amazing tools and eventually put me on the path that got me to where I did. So that's question number three. And I'm stealing that. Steal it because I steal from him all the time. By the way, I asked him, I go later, you know, because it was such a deep moment.

I said, because he's one of my best friends. So I go, dude, did you make that up? He goes, what? Not crazy idea line? He goes, I don't know, probably. He didn't even know. So maybe he got it someplace else. I think he did.

I think he was sharing the world for sure. I think he channeled it. But the last question is sort of just an expansion on that, which is, you know, what really would make life worth living? So I would start there, you know. Answer these four questions and get a little momentum focusing. on what I do want, you know, what I do want. By the way, it's the best way to give someone feedback, right? Don't tell them all the things that they just did that piss you off.

Ask them to do what you want them to do. Hey, hey, this would really make a difference for me. It would light me up if you did X, Y, or Z. It works. So life is rigged in a way where we get what we focus on. So life is rigged in such a way where when you focus on what's wrong, you notice more of what's wrong, you get more of what's wrong. When you focus on what you want, right?

And Jesus said, pray as if you've already received it. Right? I think that's true, right? We got all this new age stuff came out about law of attraction, right? And it's all true. But Jesus was talking about it 2,000 years ago. Pray as if you've already received it, right? It didn't come from the secret.

And I love the secret, right? But this concept has been around for a long time and it's true. We get what we focus on. And so you got to get clear on what you want. You got to get clear on do you want to live? You got to get clear on what's your purpose, what's your why? Because without a why, dude, I don't care. You can have the craziest life.

It'll turn to mush. It'll turn to drudgery if you don't know what that why is. You got to get clear on what you do want and what would make life really worth living. All right. I love when you guys send messages out on social media about the show. And lately, you've been getting a few of these messages about my wardrobe. I was wearing this sweater, this tan sweater. And I kept getting all these messages from guys going, where did you get that sweater, bro?

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Find technology built for the way you work at Dell.com slash XPS built for you. Built for you. This is a master class, brother. I didn't know we're going to go this deep. Come on. I think I would add. I just want to keep rifting and I want you to be doing both of the teaching here today. But, you know, everybody, this is what we're really talking about is beginning to live your life with some intention.

auditing where you're at. Is this still my dream? Is this still what I want? Is this what I wanted when I was 15? But now I'm 30? That's not what I want anymore, right? It's okay to audit your life and audit and ask yourself these questions because that's a life that's live with intention. That's a life when you get to the end of it.

You go, okay, I gave it everything I had and I maxed out my life. But one where you just live unconsciously with all of your patterns running all of the time. It's just like a book that's the same chapter on every, the same page. same chapter every time you turn the page, it's the same experience. So if you want a different experience, you've got to ask different questions. And one thing Tony does talk about that I do as well is the quality of your life is often the quality of your emotions. But a lot of times your emotions come from the questions you're asking yourself. Huge. It's huge. You said something really profound earlier that was like of a million profound things. And I'll mess up how you said it.

So to explain, you said you're not your thoughts or you're not always what's going on in your mind. You said something like that. What did you mean by that? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this machine in our brains that's just saying words, saying thoughts, it's not who you are. It's some very small part of your being as a soul. You know, what is it? Chardin said, we're not human beings having a spiritual experience. We're spiritual beings having a human experience. So the mind, right, was evolved to keep us safe. It's a scanning device often for what's wrong. Because, you know, our ancestors, if you believe in evolution, the ones that scanned for what was wrong that noticed all this little sound or that over, they were paranoid. They

survived because they noticed they noticed the potential danger when it occurred and so all of us have what's called a negativity bias built in meaning we tend to focus more on what's wrong because this mind thing is here to keep us alive it's not here to make us happy it's not designed to So if you live your whole life in your mind, you're not going to be fulfilled because your soul is way bigger than the mind. And so I'm a big meditator. I also love, you know, as much as Tony equally in a different way, Eckartow, who teaches we're not our mind. And I don't know about you, what we talked about earlier, you know, this thing is always saying what you don't want. want. But it's just always saying stuff all day long. And some of the stuff it says is great.

And some of the stuff it says is really stupid. And most of what it says is very repetitive. If you ever take a day, you know, a lot of people, I've had this blessed life with a lot of freedom. So I've been able to do weird experiments. So like I've gone to a retreat center for a total of two months of my life where they put you put you in a little cabin and they just leave you there and once a week they drop food off in the bare box so you're taking you're taking care of the woods already chopped so you just sit there and you meditate and and when i watched my mind just sitting there for hours a day seven hours it's like hey this thing it's often pretty negative not always and it's super repetitive yes if you have

ever take a day, if you ever take a day, and I know not everyone has this luxury, but even if you take two hours and you just sit down without your phone and you just observe the thoughts in your head, I forget who you had to quote, all of humanity's problems stem from the fact that a man and woman too is in the olden days, right, is that we cannot sit quietly alone in a room. So if you ever take just two hours and just watch the thoughts you have, you'll be amazed. First of all, you'll forget you're doing it almost immediately and you'll get carried away with your thoughts. But then after a while, you notice it keeps thinking the same thing. And it's like, so our culture is almost a monument to rationality to the thinking mind, right?

we have for better or worse gotten away from the churches, the synagogues, the mosque, and we worship more the university, the scientist, right? And science is amazing, right? It makes all our lives great and comfortable, but it's not going to make you fulfilled.

So you are not your mind. I'm not my mind. Ed is not his mind. We are the consciousness I'm the consciousness that gets to move Mike Posner around. I'm not even Mike Posner, right? That's like I believe a costume that I'm wearing this go around. And the more we can identify with the part of ourselves is actually beyond language, beyond words.

You can just feel it. And in moments of quiet, and everyone's had these moments. Virginia Woolf called these moments a being, right? Everyone's had a moment where it just made sense. the mind actually stopped. It was pure belief. That's you. That's the real you.

I'll tell you, like I just tell you, this idea, I just want to say this too. I just want to acknowledge you just for a second. You are making a difference. This is a real contribution. I just want you to know, like legitimately. Like, this is extraordinary what you're sharing. And that's worth acknowledging in you. Like, God's really using you, Mike.

I mean, truly. Truly. And, you know, everyone, what Mike was saying earlier about your brain and, you know, these repetitive thoughts, your mind is always trying to move towards what it's most familiar with. And so if it's familiar with these, you know, there's ruminations of what you're worried about and afraid of or not liking or not going well, you're going to get more of it because your brain's designed to conserve energy. It's lazy. And so that's why a life that's not evaluated is an unlived life. And so what we're really talking about here is just the gift of today because you and I are both blessed.

We could go somewhere for a week. Some people listen is going, I got three kids. I've got to pick up from school. I got to do homework. I've got to take them to soccer. I've got to get back to work. But here's the thing. You have to give yourself those couple hours once a week somewhere.

Did you sit with yourself? Sit with God and just be with you. And if you can't do that, you have to ask yourself, why do I not enjoy my own company? And why do I need other people around me all the time? That's worth at least asking why. And then I think it's building your own recipe that causes change in you. Don't want to ask you about this. And maybe it's not one of the formulas.

But as I read about you, and I've known about you obviously for a long time. But it's not normal resume, bro. I mean, let's just be honest. I mean, I haven't climbed Mount Everest. I haven't walked across the country. I haven't done the continental divide. I almost haven't died of a rattlesnake bite.

I don't have, you know, Grammy nominations. Like, I'm just a dude with a flag behind him doing a podcast, right? That's all I am. But like, so I don't relate to all of that. Having said all of that, though, humans develop sort of recipes to their wellness, their bliss. If you look at your life, it looks to me like challenging yourself to do something is one of those recipes. Like you, it appears as if part of you living your life is a challenge that then you go pursue and see if you can expand your being relative to the level of that challenges. I always say, I'm addicted to the expansion of my being, right?

Thank you. Is part of your formula from time to time coming up with a challenge for yourself to see what you're capable of? Or is that something in the past? It's evolved. It's evolved. But it's definitely part of it. Right. And life will give you these challenges anyways.

Right? So it's like, I like to put challenges in my life. So I'm inviting in the grow. I like to set a goal. sometimes where I go, hey, the version of me setting this goal cannot do this. I actually have to become some version of myself that I'm not now in order to get this done. So I like a goal like that. In the past, they've been some physical challenges, some expeditions, things like that.

But I'll be honest with you, Ed, because I was an armament. me a one for so many years. The challenge now that, you know, and I have somebody, you know, I still run the altars and stuff, right, here, there, right? It's important for me to keep that sort of warrior part of life. But the number one challenge, right? I want to be humble today, right? Because it's like, I receive what you said.

I know God, when I'm at my best, God is working through me, right? And not all the time because sometimes my brain gets in the way. but my challenge now is I'm building a family and some of the things that I'm teaching today dude like when I'm with my fiance who's the most wonderful woman in the world I sometimes get angry right I'm like oh where did that come from oh

that's the part I need to work on now right this is like this is life pointing me in the direction where I need to work on and so for me when I said it evolves it's less about going and doing something doing something really hard with my body although that does

that does do it's a certain flavor of the expansion but having done a bunch of those the one that's more challenging for me is being less selfish being in a family unit putting others before myself doesn't come naturally to me

because I've been I've been doing the Mike Posner thing for a lot of years And so that's where the juice of my life is now. It's the most challenging part of my life now because I need to grow the most to have the family that I want, that I will have. So there's some pain in that for me. And I welcome it. And so the other things have been training. And the other thing about there's been a lot of external achievements in my life.

And like I said, part of that was by design. I wanted to become somebody I was proud of. Part of that was I wanted to, you know, get attention. I wanted to be able to go in the podcast and have my like, oh, he's the most interesting, right? So part of it was not good motive. It was significance. And part of that, I think, is grace. I think that, listen, I want to share light with the world.

And for some people, they'll listen to me versus someone. someone else because I got all these things. That's right. And I got to report back, hey, I was still at that Michigan house depressed. I was still in Alaska with Elliot thinking maybe I should kill myself. And so maybe I think so. God gave me all those blessings and then he gave me the pain with it. So I could teach from a place, not from having read it in a book, but from having lived it.

Hey, like, I got the external stuff, but I wasn't winning the internal game. And you want to be there. So let me help you win the internal game. And you can win the external game too. There's a lot. There's a lot of teachers on that, right? And you can have both. Amen.

I agree with you. Like, I, listen, some of us have just chosen our giftedness, if we're great at it, grabs attention. My sister, I think, is the greatest school teacher. She's actually an assistant principal now. Her gift is to work with children, right? she's she's expressing her gift and pushing the expansion of her being daily she's not going to get lots of recognition for that gift she'll get it when she gets to heaven right so many of you your

recognition won't be here it's okay to go chase money there's nothing wrong with that there's nothing we want to have a big house that's okay it's just what we're both telling you is but nothing's worse than a couple rich people telling you it's not worth getting rich that's right it's certainly better probably to have financial means than not correct if something's a goal of and you and God work together to make it real, that's wonderful. But when it becomes your identity, you will be empty. And so that's the difference. I'm just curious, I'm watching you.

Well, said. Well, you embody it. I said it. So there's a difference. Some days. I want to ask you, if I had met you at 30, East 37, when we're recording this, you have a certain, and everyone's hearing it, there's a spirit about you. you that's, I'd call it wise, like an old soul, but very gentle.

There's a peaceful spirit about you. Had I met you seven years ago, would that same spirit have been present? Or have you sort of, or has that changed in you? In other words, externally, are you different also in the way that you communicate, you vibrate, you know, you go about your life. Is there been a difference in that? Or did you always have a little of that? I think there's a huge difference.

I mean, I feel way different. My frequency, like we talked about my set point. 30 was that, 30 was like that conversation with Elliot. That was like, and that's part of what I want to share too with people like, because maybe there's someone listening to this who's really in a tough moment, like really in a tough moment. And maybe no one knows about it. But keep going.

Because at 30, I had no. No idea would be this good. Not the external stuff. I didn't know how I could feel this good. And you can't have a life without pain, but you have a pain with a lot less suffering. So at 30, to answer your question, I always go through a lot of pain. I think I was seeking a lot already. I was already in the meditation.

I already read. I'd already spent a lot of time seeking out answers because I was searching for them. I was just getting ready to walk across America. So I think I could probably spit some game at that point. But looking back, was I really mastering that, the feeling part, the internal part. Yeah, no, I hadn't figured that out yet. And I haven't fully figured it out now. But I got it more figured out than then.

Is part of that figuring it out, you talked about relationships earlier, I just have this feeling listening to you and I don't know this, that I have to believe, this is just my belief system. And you can believe whatever you want, everybody. I love all of you. But doing this alone without a knowing or a growing relationship with your version of God, sure is hard. And for me, you know, I'm where I'm at in my life through God's grace. I'm pretty bold about that fact. I love people that, you know, I love people. And so whatever your faith choices, that's not what today's episodes about necessarily.

But I'd be making a huge miss if I didn't ask you about that part of your life. Has your relationship or understanding of God changed over this time as well? And is that a big, is that the most important relationship you have or one of them? Yeah, it's the most important. And it has changed. I grew up in a Jewish household, but I was raised what was called secular humanistic, meaning I went to Sunday school, but I wasn't taught anything about God. I asked my mom about this later. I said, why did you raise this like that?

She goes, I had a childhood where a lot of stuff was forced on me. and so we raised you that way not because I don't believe it she believes in God but we raised that way because we wanted you to make a decision when you're an adult sorry but actually that makes a lot of sense so

then the spiritual part of my life really started with my friend Big Sean Big Sean yeah do you know Big Sean yeah I do I know who he is yes so he and I we met in Detroit when we were kids so we're the same age

so I knew him when I was 18 and then my music started to take off then his took off and I saw him about I think we're probably 23 24 and he was like glowing like glowing and the external part of his life was

exploding as well and I said to I'm like dude what what do you what changed He goes, you got to read two books. One is the alchemist. And the second one was asking it as given.

It was a book all about the law of attraction. So I read these books and they sort of open in my eyes to have a spiritual part of my life. I would run. I would say, well, I used to be depressed. I would say, I am joy. I would say, I am faith. I am love. And it taught me to reframe challenges when they came.

but I learned to ask this new question, what am I supposed to learn from this? Inherent in that question, you know, assume the subtext is like there's something out there that is like actually gifting me this experience. Byrd Katie says life, life's not happening for you. Excuse me, life's not happening to you. Life's happening for you, right? Her book right there. And so that was a big part of faith. And then it evolved.

Like even it's evolving. Excuse me. In the last year of 2025, I had some, excuse me, I had some wild experiences with, with Jesus moving in my life, signs in my life. Like just, I don't want to go. It's like, you know, crazy, excuse me, crazy stories, but just having wild signs where Jesus was moving in my life. And so it's evolved so much and it's evolving.

But it is the most important relationship. Louise Hay says, my security does not come from my bank account, my spouse, or my parents. It comes from my ability to connect to all that is, which I call God, right? And that's the only place

I'm always mess up this lion from scripture. Jesus says, you know, don't store up your treasure where a rust and thieves can get them or something. I don't know the exact way to say it. But what he means is everything on this earth, it changes, it goes away. You can't place your security in another person. Even in my fiancee, I love her. If she could give me that security, she would, but she's a human being, right? She can't be exactly what I needed to be at all time.

And what kind of man would I be? You know, but that's what I needed. So you can only get that security from one place. And that's God. I think that's what we're all searching for. And it's a personal relationship. And I'm like you. I love people.

I'm here to just be a blessing. The more we can realize, You know, our life actually, my life actually doesn't belong to me. That this higher power, and we talk about not being the mind, I think that's how you connect to it faster, right? You identify with this part of you that's connected to it. And you start to live a life that I'm stepping into more, is scary for me, Ed, where you just listen to that thing as it guides you. And sometimes it speaks to us in dreams. dreams, sometimes it speak to us through other human beings.

And sometimes it speaks to us through that still small voice inside us. And that's the life that I'm interested in leading, not one that's like, hey, I read this, this is the next step. I don't know. I don't go do that. I feel like I'm on a magical journey. And the breadcrumbs get left for me by God. I just try to follow what it says and here we are.

Bro, I'm sitting here emotional. I'm being this quiet because I can't believe we've had this conversation today. And I first off, I just remember this as you're afraid, Jesus holds you in the palm of his hand. And so he's always with you. It'll never leave you nor forsake you. And so you don't have to have that fear. But I know exactly what you mean. I have it from time to time as well.

It just makes me emotional to see this. The whole conversation, I've done 80s. and some odd 900 of these none have flown by this quickly and none have i felt like i'm just in the beginning not the end of this conversation i truly mean that and um i'm going to make you come back on here and do this again i would like be my pleasure because bro like uh you know i'll just tell you that you're being used for good and um and you're remarkable just accept that please Thank you. And I also, something's out right now that we need to talk about at the end because here's the good thing about this conversation. It's been so incredible. I'm 100% sure everybody

stayed to the end. That's how good this is. And I think everybody's with me saying, please come back. But what's up with I went back to Abiza? We need to know about this. So tell us. Yeah, it's incredible. So it's such a blessing. We talk about my life story, you know, today. And I get to encapsulate a lot of these moments with music. You know, so you want to know how I felt, right, at this moment at Elliot, listen to a real good kid. You know, I made an album

a lot of these chapters of life. And so when I look back on this body of work of music, it's pretty cool because it's all there. But I think it's 12 years ago now, I wrote a song called I took a pill in a Beezza and it was a very successful song. And it was a heartbreaking song. song about how empty my life was having reached fame, but kind of on the other side of it.

And the chorus was all I know are sad songs. Maybe two years ago on my birthday, because I wrote the song on my birthday, 26th birthday, I wrote an Instagram post. I said, you know, 10 years have gone by. And this song, every lyric in it is now untrue in my life. life. So I went through each line. I said, you know, what I was talking about in my life at that time when it was honest and vulnerable and it was real at the time, I go, all these things that are transformed in 10 years. Like, what a great, what an amazing 10 years. Thank you. And I had a guy that works me on social media. So he would, the post went viral. So then he would like every six months, he would change the post, repost it up and go viral. again, you know how they do that, right? And they keep telling me all this keeps going, keeps being taking off.

People keep resonating with the message. Finally, my fiance says to me, well, you keep doing this post about how your life changed. She goes, why don't you rewrite this song with new words about your life now? So I said, hey, I'm supposed to come up with the song ideas, you know? Come on. You're creeping out of my territory. So I thought this is a good idea.

So I did so. And it came out, it just came out more beautiful than I could imagine. So I'm really excited to share that song with the world. And people can go check it out. It's called I went back to Abiza. And it's about transformation. Okay. You're coming back to the Edmai Let's show.

Yes, I am. Yes. I can't wait to meet you in person, man. Yeah, brother. Same here. We need to do that. We'll do it soon. too. So everybody, I just sometimes already know what your response is. So I'm not going to add anything to

today. This was extraordinary. And put this one in a time capsule. And I'm really grateful for you, bro. Really grateful for you too. God bless you. Man. Hey, everybody. This is, this is why I do the show. It's why this old man is still doing this thing right now. It's days like today. This is why I do the show right here. God bless you, everybody. Please share this. Max out your life. This is the Edmireland Show.