The Iced Coffee Hour - Harvard Psychiatrist on How To Get Ahead of 99.9% of People (Starting NOW)

Episode Date: December 11, 2023

BetterHelp If you’re struggling, consider therapy with our sponsor BetterHelp. Click https://betterhelp.com/icedCoffeeHour for a 10% discount on your first month of therapy with a licensed professional specific to your needs. SonicPower: Visit https://www.SonicPower.co and use code ICED for 20% off your order!! Subscribe to HealthyGamer GG / Dr. K - Harvard Psychiatrist on How To Get Ahead of 99.9% of People (Starting NOW) - https://www.youtube.com/@HealthyGamerGG NEW: Join us at http://www.icedcoffeehour.club for premium content - Enjoy! Add us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jlsselby https://www.instagram.com/gpstephan Official Clips Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeBQ24VfikOriqSdKtomh0w For sponsorships or business inquiries reach out to: [e-mail] For Podcast Inquiries, please DM @icedcoffeehour on Instagram! TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 - Intro 02:23 - Why School Isn’t Made for Smart Kids 07:44 - IQ vs EQ 14:02 - Why Dr.K Was Sent to India 28:48 - How to Attain ‘One Pointed Consciousness’ / Tantric S*x 42:28 - The Power of Studying Your Internal Self & Desires 58:05 - The Nature of Desire 1:11:38 - Help Others By Asking Questions 1:21:36 - The Theory of Karma 1:36:32 - Why ADHD & Autism are More Common in Today’s World 1:54:42 - Restless Leg Syndrome 1:57:14 - Dr.K Analyzes Graham & Jack 2:03:24 - Dr.K on Dating, Tinder, & Red Flags 2:18:02 - Digging into Jack & Graham’s Relationship 2:26:25 - The Key to a Happy Marriage 2:32:52 - The Framework for a Fulfilling Life 2:43:50 - Closing Remarks *Some of the links and other products that appear on this video are from companies which Graham Stephan will earn an affiliate commission or referral bonus. Graham Stephan is part of an affiliate network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites. The content in this video is accurate as of the posting date. Some of the offers mentioned may no longer be available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Nespresso. Hear that, that's your next obsession. Every coffee, a new world. Every sip, a new taste. This is the new Nespresso. One touch, endless possibilities. Iced, flavored, long, short. Because some days call for that espresso kick.

And sometimes, a smooth, silky latte just wins. It's exceptional but effortless. Like actually effortless. Simply press, brew, and explore. Nispresso, what else? Keep exploring at nespresso.com. You can take seemingly an average person and you can turn them into something extraordinary. And if you take an extraordinary person, what you will find is that they have gone through some kind of process to make them that way.

You're always using the instrument of yourself. And once you start teaching people those things, you see an astronomical improvement and basically like all dimensions of their life. Happiness, income, life satisfaction. Study to become a monk, trained and taught at Harvard Medical School. I'm a clinician. I've done neuroscience research. Can you cure depression? The scientific answer is... Thank you very much. Dr. Kay, Iloke, or Healthy Ganger, Gigi.

Sure. You came on the iced coffee hour podcast. You do these things where you psychoanalyze other massive creators. You've done it for Ludwig. You've done it for XQC. You've done it for destiny for all of these people. And they are so fascinating. And I'm noticing amongst like those ultra successful people,

they are uniquely special or different in the way that their brain works. Have you noticed this? I mean, so all these people are outliers, but I think the really interesting thing is that, you know, when I talk to these people and for the record, I don't psychoanalyze them. Like psychoanalysis is like four hours a week for like years and years and years. That's really what psychoanalysis is. But I think that if you look at like generally speaking human beings, we share a lot. Like the fundamental nature of the way that our mind works, the way that our brain works, like we all basically have the same parts of the brain. All of the parts of the brain do the same things.

and in some people, the activity levels of different parts of their being, their personality, their brain call it whatever you want to, are just at different places, right? And so that's what really creates an outlier. I mean, there may be some genetic differences, of course, but I think generally speaking, my experience has been overwhelmingly that you can take seemingly an average person and you can turn them into something extraordinary. And if you take an extraordinary person, what you will find is that they have gone through some kind of process to make them that way. And like that was the experience of like my life. Like absolutely. So they just weren't born as an extraordinary person. I mean, so it depends on how you define

extraordinary. So like you can look at IQ for example and you can say like all these people probably probably have super high IQs. But like there are a lot of people in society who have the same level of IQ that's like let's say streamers have or people who are very successful. And interestingly enough, there's even some data that suggests that high IQ on on the whole correlates with like success up until a point. But if you're a very, very high IQ, there's some evidence that suggests that it's actually very hard to be successful. Is that why gifted kids are often special needs? That was one of your most viewed videos. Yeah. So this was something that blew my mind when I was in residency training. I had a supervisor one time that told me that like, you know, gifted kids are like special needs kids.

And that kind of blew my mind. And I asked her like, what do you mean by that? And so she started explaining this to me. And then I sort of realized it. And I realized that. And I realized that. that this is what had happened to me. So if you think about a child who's gifted, right? So let's say that you're in like the top one or two percent of IQ. The first thing to understand is that your experience of school is going to be very different. Right. So kids who are very smart literally have needs that are different from the average kid.

So if we look at academics, school moves at the pace of the slowest child, right? If we look at our school system, what's it designed to do? schools are not places where we take kids and we try to have them live up to their fullest potential. Kids are places, if you look at like the mandates around schools, it's about like leaving no child behind. So the system is sort of designed to take the worst performing kids and kind of like make sure they're doing okay. So if we look at like special education at schools, what is special education for it's for the kids who are struggling, not the kids who are bored. And this is what tends to happen with kids who are super smart is that they get bored with school. I remember when I was like in the first grade, I, you know, my math teacher gave me a worksheet and she was like, here's the worksheet. And so I did the worksheet and I walked up to her and I said, here, like 10 minutes later, I gave it to her and I was like, can I have the next one? And she's like, what do you mean the next one? This is what we're doing today. And so school is incredibly boring. And then what tends to happen is that these kids start to like flounder in a lot of ways. They get distracted in a lot of ways. They become uninvested in education. The other problem that they run into is that,

if you're a kid who does really well in school and you're not challenged, you don't develop study habits. So this is a really common problem where what happens is you're at the top of your class in the first grade, second grade, third grade, fourth grade, fifth grade, sixth grade, seventh grade, you hit high school and now suddenly you need to study. And you haven't developed any study habits and you literally do not know how to study. So what you'll see is this like tanking of GPA for kids who have high IQ. As they reach the natural point, where their raw intellect is no longer sufficient for learning calculus, right? And so these are the kinds of needs that kids have that we don't sort of recognize when they've got high IQ.

There's also other kinds of data. So if you look at the rate of depression, so if you look at the prevalence of depression, about 9.5% of people on a given day will be depressed. If you look at people who are in the top 2% in terms of IQ, it's 36.6. And so it's like staggering that like, you know, these kids, while they're gifted in many ways, we sort of think about IQ as just sort of a straight positive, which I think if you have an environment that is conducive to it, it probably is. But taking a smart kid and putting him into an average world is something that is like oftentimes very, very difficult. Yeah.

Do you think that homeschooling is a solution to that? I mean, it could be, but we have to presume that the people who are doing the homeschooling, know how to provide for the special needs of the kid who's super smart, right? Sure. One thing that I think is rare that shouldn't be so rare is kids moving up and going down in grades. Because I was just talking to my brother's friend who went up four grades in elementary school and he said because he was so bored that he, like you said, couldn't develop those

study habits because he wouldn't need to study for those exams because he could rely on his raw intelligence. And then once he went up four grades, he actually fit the general IQ of the, or not the IQ of, but like, you know, he would need to study the same amount as the other, his peers. And it actually ended up really positively affecting him for the rest of his life, whereas other people it really hurt. Don't you think that maybe there's some social issues that affect you, though, if you skip too far ahead and you can't relate to your peers and maybe you feel like maybe you're a bit

of an outsider? Like the kids that go to college, like at 16? Yeah. So, I mean, my brother went to college at 16. So, like, he's one of those kids. And I think there's definitely some kind of price to be paid. But let's think about the baseline. So how many kids who go to college?

college at 18 fit in, right? Like, I'd say maybe 50%. Sure. So absolutely there are social changes that there are additional social pressures. And we kind of see this with homeschooling, right? So a lot of parents who will homeschooling, right? So, we'll be super careful about creating a positive social environment. So they're involved with like extracurriculars and sports and things like that. So I think that it's a fair assumption to say that this person is going to have some kinds of social difficulties. But I think the biggest thing to kind of consider, is that these kids will be viewed differently, right? So they'll have some kind of mystique because you've got a 16-year-old who's hanging out

with 18-year-olds, or in the case of your friend. I mean, four years is a lot. You've got like a 13-year-old who's just hitting puberty, who's in grades with like 17-year-olds, right? And that's like, that's really challenging in a lot of ways, for sure. Is IQ genetic? And if it isn't, how is that something that you could necessarily measure accurately? Like, our IQ tests, do they work?

So there is a part of IQ that is inheritable. So there's a portion of it that is absolutely genetic. You know, we're probably talking about somewhere between like 50 and 70 percent, is my guess. I think we're pretty good at measuring IQ. But the key thing is like, it's not like, take our IQ test on the internet. That's what I did. Same. And so if you really look at it, like real IQ testing done by like a neuropsychologist or a psychologist is like kind of hard to get.

get access to. Like, I think it's a test that takes maybe even a couple of hours, and it's sort of like very standardized and stuff like that. The validity of it also depends on it not being publicly available, so people can't, like, practice for the test. So I think IQ is a pretty valid construct. I think the problem with IQ is that we use it as a substitute for all of these other important constructs that most people ignore. Like EQ is at the top of the list there, where if you look at actually like success in life, EQ correlates more highly with success than IQ does. What are the differences between the two? So EQ is emotional quotient. And I kind of think about it as being broken up into a couple different pieces. So this is stuff like self-awareness,

emotional regulation skills, even things like empathy and being able to develop relationships. So these are all parts of like EQ. And a really good example of this is you can look at, So what do you all think the average income is for the top 2% of the population? Top 2% of income earners. Probably 400 grand. I would say, 500 grand. 2%? Oh, is it higher?

No, no, go ahead. I was going to say probably. The world or the U.S.? I think this is U.S. U.S. Yeah, I would say probably 4 to 500 is my guess. 350. Yeah, so y'all are in the ballpark, right?

So I think it's somewhere, I don't remember if it was 250 or 400, kind of depends a little bit on, it's actually perfect, like somewhere around 300, 350, which just means, you know, they're all kind of like finance bros, so spot on. And my answer is a little closer than Jacks, though. It actually was not. If we rewind the tape, we'll see. Four to 500 is my guess. 350. And while we're taking guesses, Graham, guess how much this super nice, super fancy espresso machine would cost you? I don't know. That's pretty nice. 200 bucks. If you went with a traditional retailer, that would be the cost. But with today's sponsor, Sonic Power, you can get really high quality electronics for just a fraction of the cost. For example, this espresso machine, 120 bucks.

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Thank you, Sonic Power for sponsoring today's video. and now let's get back to the podcast. So now let me ask you all a question. What do you think the top 2% you'll know what Mensa is? Yeah. What do you all think the top 2% of Mensa earns a year? My guess is probably

150. I'm guessing it's going to be a surprising data point. So I'm going to say probably like 90. 150 for me. 100. So top 2% of Mensa, spot on,

actually earns like 25 to 30% of what top 2% of the total population. But my guess is, because a lot of those people are more on academics, or maybe they need something that's so just like mentally stimulating that those fields don't pay as much as the people who maybe are getting into like sales. So possible, right? So there's all kinds of interpretations of the data that we need to be careful about.

But I think a big reason for that is like think about who joins Mensa. Right. So like a lot of times, this isn't a dig on Mensa, but like people who are utilizing their intelligence in a active way in the world oftentimes don't have time for MENSA. MENSA. And a lot of times people will join MENSA at a young age, but I think the key thing about MENSA is that, you know, it goes back to this idea of like IQ is like a gifted kid with special needs where they run into these problems. Like a lot of super smart kids that I work with, you know, they run into these problems where they like don't develop study habits. So then when it comes to college and landing a job or they're socially isolated, they're more prone to things like depression. And if you think about, you know, how do you make 400 grand, like networking is a huge part of it. Self-awareness is a huge part of it, knowing when to keep your mouth shut and when to talk. Being able to regulate your emotions is a huge part of it. So I think that what you probably need to be successful is like some minimum level of IQ,

and it probably scales some as you get smarter and smarter and smarter. But what I've seen the most transformation, because IQ is relatively fixed, is teaching people EQ skills. So as you teach people more about themselves and how they function as human beings, right? Because at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what you do. You're always using the instrument of yourself. And we never get formal training about why can't I wake up in the morning, right? Why do I like coffee?

Why do I get dependent on coffee? Why do I get dependent on pornography? Why do I feel the way that I do? Why do I feel uncomfortable presenting in front of my bosses? Like there's all kinds of stuff about you as an instrument that we never learn. And once you start teaching people those things, you see an astronomical improvement and basically like all dimensions of their life. Happiness, income, life satisfaction, like financial stuff.

So how do you go about analyzing that for yourself? Or do you think that you would need someone else's help to kind of get that information out of you to like work on that? You can actually figure out, in my opinion, you can figure out most of this stuff by yourself. It's just probably going to take you a lot longer. So the first thing is that, you know, before I went to med school in residency, I spent about seven years studying to become a monk. And that was like transformative for me.

And what I really loved about it is like I was struggling in school. So I basically like I was a smart kid. I was, you know, I jumped a grade. And then like was doing fine in school until I kind of hit high school in college. And then I started like failing out of college because like just getting straight Fs. I was like one of these gifted kids who didn't learn how to study. And so one of the things that really frustrated me is like I knew what I needed to do. Right.

So like I just need to wake up every day. And like I need to go to Spanish class at 8 a.m. And I have trouble waking up. So then the next semester I was like, okay. like let me get a 8 a.m. Spanish class. That way, it'll force me to wake myself up. And if I force myself to wake myself up at 8 a.m., then my day will be productive. So I tried all of these intellectual techniques to analyze my life and try to figure out, like, how I should optimize things. But the basic problem is that, like, this thing did not listen

to this. Right? So I knew what I needed to do. I just couldn't bring myself to do it. And what I really found when I went to India and I was like failing out of college and my dad was like we've tried everything like alok you need to go to india right so he's like and i was like all right fine whatever well what does that mean he says alick you just need to go to india you're like dad i've tried everything i'm getting f's you got to go to india so how is india going to like straighten you it's a great question so i'm indian yeah so you know my family is lucky enough it's my karma to have this kind of background and my parents are wonderful people and they tried everything so like as i started failing they tried to try to try tough love they tried um you know they sent me to see a

They kind of tried everything under the sun, and nothing was working. And so, like, I think they understood that there is a knowledge about the self in the east that is very powerful compared to the West. And if you all want to understand that, the simple thing to understand is that all of our scientific understanding about you, neuroscience, psychology, whatever, none of it actually applies to you. It's all population-based. So when we say, like, do you all get that? Yes. Right? So this is the problem.

For the average view, I think probably explain that. Yeah. So this is the thing that's kind of confusing for people. So if I say that like, let's say SSRIs or antidepressant medications are 30% effective for depression. Does that mean that if I give you an antidepressant medication and you are depressed, you will get 30% better? Absolutely not. So what we do in Western science is we take 10,000 people and we give us.

and we give them something, like we'll give them, let's say, antidepressant medication. And then we'll see, on average, what's the improvement? So what you really need to understand is amongst those 10,000 people, there are actually 10,000 individual responses to these medications. And then what we do is we average all these together, and then we kind of say, this is what's right. So the best example of this is, like, do you all know where we got 2,000 calorie diet? Any idea?

Probably just the average person, right? Absolutely. So it has nothing new with science, nothing to do with metabolism, nothing to do with physiology, nothing to do with carbs or keto or any of that stuff. It's not scientific at all. Literally what we did, there's this thing called the N-Hane study. And what we did is we asked Americans, do you have any health problems? And they said no. And then we said, okay, for all the people who have no health problems, how many calories a day do you eat?

And then we literally averaged that number. And this became a recommendation. So if we use this system for fashion, right, what would be our recommendation? We're going to take what you're wearing. We're going to take what you're wearing. We're going to take what you're wearing. We're going to find three random women on the street. We're going to take all those pieces of clothing. We're going to average them together. And everyone's going to wear like a gray smock, right? That's our recommendation. So a big thing that a lot of people don't realize is that Western medicine is not individualized. And this is precisely why you can read a paper on neuroscience. Let's say you read a paper on neuroscience that says willpower correlates with success. And then what do you do with that? Like I read a paper on neuroscience. Let's say you read a paper on neuroscience. That says willpower correlates. I read. that paper and then do I get better at willpower? Like, there's no, there's no subjectivity to it. So in the East, the way that they learned about their mind was very different. They started with me, and only me, I don't care about anybody else. How does this instrument work from a subjective standpoint? And this is why the West, I mean, the East developed meditation, because someone

sat down and was like, how do I control my mind? How do I calm myself down? What is the technique that works? So what we see in Western science is that we're very deficient in techniques. We know everything about the science of charisma and the science of willpower and the science of memory. But have we figured out what's the best way to learn? Have we figured out what's the best way to boost willpower? You know what the answer is? What's the one practice that we have that boosts willpower and memory? Boosts willpower and be meditation? Absolutely, right? And they figured that crap out 6,000 years ago, 10,000 years ago, by some estimates, without a single scientific study. because they looked at what actually works for an individual, not what works for a population.

And that's where we are in the West. And it's great. I mean, Western medicine isn't bad, right? I'm a medical doctor. And it's good in a lot of ways. Because if we look at something like cholesterol medication, if I'm seeing 100 patients and I want like this population to die less of heart attacks, I can give them cholesterol medication. It'll improve the health of the population as a whole.

But there's no individuality to it. And so this is where I think that like what my dad kind of circling back to the point at hand is he sort of recognized that like what I needed was like something that can be taught in India. Like I need, I don't know exactly what he understood, but he kind of said like, hey, this is what you need. Because they tried everything else. You just need to go. And for once in my life, I just like listen to him. I didn't know what I was getting myself into. I didn't know what I was going to do there. I didn't know. But I know that I had tried everything that I needed to try and like nothing was working. So I needed something drastic. And that it certainly was.

Okay. So you go to India. You arrive. What is what happens? Do they just send you? you to like a camp or something in India? You have family in there that you stay with or how does this work? Great, great questions. Okay. So the first thing you understand is I've been to India a ton of times, but I went to a part of India that I've never been before. Don't know anyone. Don't speak the language. How much did you know going into this? Nothing. You just showed up in India. He said, you need to go. We booked a plane ticket for 10 days and then I hopped on a place. What is like, like, okay, I'm wondering as a kid, my dad says, Jack, you have to go to the homeland. You're going to Wales. And I'm like, okay, I know nothing about Wales. They send me off to Wales.

I arrive, then what? I'll tell you. I'll tell literally what happened. Okay, so I, so this conversation with my dad is at 2 a.m. It's in our living room, okay? And the reason we're having this conversation is it's the end of my sophomore year. It's my second year on academic probation.

I'm on the verge of failing out of college, or I've already sort of failed out. And it's like, if I continue failing, they're going to kick me out, okay? Then we've tried everything. He's tried yelling at for the last three years. We've been having like heart-to-heart talks

and trying to problem-solve and whatever. So we're both like, we're just both resigned. We're like, this is screwed, right? This is just not working. So then he just says you need to go to India. That's like, that's what it was. You know what? While we're on that topic, we talk a lot about financial success here on the channel, but what's even more important is the mental health along the way. So when today's sponsor BetterHelp reached out, I actually signed up myself for a few different sessions, and my therapist gave me some really helpful insight that I had never heard of before that really helped me understand my ADHD. So I got a lot of answers as to why I do the things the way that I do. And also the

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So if you're interested in getting started with BetterHelp, check out BetterHelp.com slash iced coffee hour or use the link down below in the description to get 10% off your first month of therapy. Again, the link is down below in the description to get 10% off your first month of therapy. Thank you so much to BetterHelp for sponsoring today's podcast, and now let's get back to the episode. So then I get on a plane, I go to the airport, and I land in Bangalore, and then, like, I don't have a phone number, I don't know what's going on. Like, I don't, like, this was like back before cell phones were a thing. This is 2003, okay?

So, like, I'm sitting there and I was like, well, shit. Like, I don't know what. Can I? Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally sorry. Okay. So I'm, like, sitting there, right? And then this, like, finally, like, you know, I don't know if you guys know, but you know, when you go out of the airport, you walk out of the baggage claim,

there's a bunch of people waiting for you. Like, your family's waiting for it. Then they wave. They're like, oh, my God. Right. So, like, everyone leaps. And then there's one guy waiting there. And I walk up to him in a,

I'm like, are you here for, to pick someone up? And he's like, yes, okay. And I'm like, are you here to pick up Alok? And he's like, okay. And I'm like, do you speak English? And he's like, okay. And so I was like, are you here to pick me up? And he's like, okay.

And so I didn't know who this guy was. He was waiting for someone. And I'm the last person there. So I get in a car with him. And then we're in the car. Get in this van. And then we're in this van for like two hours. And we clearly, like, we leave the city and we're driving out of the hills.

There's, like, no light, okay? And then, like, we, we, like, drive. There's a gate. There's a guy at a gate. The guy opens the gate. We drive through. This is, like, two and a half hours in. It's, like, a bumpy road.

There's, I can't see anything. Because the power had gone out. Okay. So then, like, they, like, walk me to a place. And then, like, this lady comes out and she's, like, you know, oh, hi, Alloak. You know, like, I know your father really well. I'm Dr. Nagara. knock. And so I was like, cool. Okay, thank God. I came to the right place. They show me to my room.

It's about midnight, maybe 1230. So I like brush my teeth. I change. I go to sleep. Super bare room. I don't know if you guys have even seen like, you know, like poor conditions and developing. It's not like poor, but, you know, it's like super simple kind of like old school like clay floor, single window, you know, fan that doesn't work, like very simple bed. So I go to sleep. And then suddenly I'm awoken. by the sound of a bell. And then I'm like, and I hear this bell. Like, someone's ringing this bell. And I look outside and I see the moon.

Like, what is going on here? So I'm kind of like, is something wrong? So I think that there's a fire or something, because it sounds like a fire alarm. And I step outside and I hear people moving in the rooms, but no one seems panicked. So I'm like, I don't know what this is, but let me just, I guess I'm going to get dressed

because I hear people, I hear toilets flushing and whatnot. So I can get dressed and then I kind of wander outside. It's like 4.30 in the morning, the moon's up. Next thing that I hear is, what was that? And then I hear it again, and then I hear like literally 50 or 60 people like vomiting. And then I walk out and then I see like in the moonlight there's a ditch.

And there's about 50 people lined up. And there's a handful of people walking behind them. And all of these people are vomiting copious amounts of stuff into the ditch. And I'm like, oh my God, what have I walked into? Is this like the plague? Am I going to die? Turns out that there's this yogic person. practice called Vamandroti.

When Vamandhoti is a practice that you do where you drink like a gallon of isotonic water, so salt water, and then you vomit it up. And it turns out that this practice probably has a ton of health benefits. Has it been studied very well, but is really good for like allergies and things like that. You know, I can't recommend that as a medical doctor because we don't have the data. But that's just one of, and I'm like, oh my God, what is this place? And so it turns out that nothing was wrong and that this is just a yoga cleansing practice or should the practice, which helps you, you know, clean out your, like, lungs and your

stomach and, like, all this other kind of stuff. And I know it sounds shocking. And so what I discovered in India was that was my experience of what I walked into, actually. So I think I was answering a question. Okay. So a couple things. How were you not just horrified? Because I was horrified. I would not trust getting into a car with a guy that couldn't speak my language. I didn't even know if I was picked up by the right guy. He drives for two hours in a van. In the middle of nowhere, I wouldn't. I would just, I would call my dad and be like, dad, is this the guy? Like, send him a photo of the guy.

Like, are you sure? 2003, there's no cell phone. A landline. There's got to be a pay phone somewhere. But you just, how were, so even just getting in the car with this guy. Maybe times were different back then. So when you say, let's understand something. Forget about times.

It's not about times. Okay. It's about me and you. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. So when you say you're terrified.

Yes. Terrified of what? Losing my life. Getting kidnapped. Your life is worth something? Yes. Mine wasn't. Well,

Right? Like to be honest. Okay, so were you like depressed in things or was it? I'm sure. Like take your pick, bro, of whatever mental state that is negative you would like I was going nowhere. Dude, I was someone who was a smart kid failing out of college. You know, the town that I grew up in, five out of five Indian kids that were in my grade in the whole city, three of them became doctors. Right.

So like super high expectations. like failing at life miserably trying everything that I knew because I'm a smart kid I'm supposed to be what what was I what did I have what was worth losing nothing and nothing worth losing that makes sense so you're here at this place how does this change your perspective what do they do how do they start so the first two weeks I'm crying every day um every day I get on the phone and I call from a pay phone right so they have like a pay phone like one pay phone in the And like I'm on the verge of telling my dad, like, send me a ticket. I want to come home. I hate it here. Like, I can't eat anything. I've got like all kinds of GI problems from like stress related stuff and things like that. So I'm like on the verge of vomiting. It's boring there. We're doing a bunch of yoga and we're like learning some meditation techniques, but it doesn't really do anything for me. And then so for the first two weeks like I hate it, I hate it. I hate it. And then what I remember like, I even remember the daily phone calls and thinking to myself like, I'm going to tell them like to send me a ticket and I want to come home. And then. Over the course of that phone call, I'm kind of like choking back tears.

And I just, I say like not today. Like I'm not going to like cave today. I can always get a ticket tomorrow. I can last like one more day. And it was also like a ton of shame. It's not like pride and like perseverance. It's like shame. It's like I can't even do this.

Like I'm going to call my daddy and say like send me a ticket like I've washed out of this due. I couldn't handle the shame of it. And then what started to happen is I made one particular friend who's probably the closest thing to a guru that I've had. But he was actually another student in the ashrum. And then I started like, we would go on a walk every day. And like, we would just talk for about an hour and a half.

And I was just blown away by like what this person understood. Like he started like helping me understand things about myself. I was like, you know, we were talking a little bit. And I think he also understood that I needed help. Right. So he started to steer the conversation in particular ways where I would ask him questions. So like one day, for example, like he brought me a book and he's like, hey, I think you should definitely like read, you know, these particular chapters. And then we'd talk.

What book was it? I think this one was kundalini tantra. I'll try to Google search that. It's not a book I would recommend people read. Is it yoga? No. Sure. Okay.

We can talk about what yoga is if you'll want, but in the eastern system of, you know. But this kundalini tantra is more tantric than yogic. Got it. So tantric. You guys are familiar with that term. Tantric sex is usually what people talk. There's a tantric, a tantric technique to have a prolonged period of sexual activity without orgasm.

Edging is what you're saying? It's kind of, oh, well, so no, it's not, actually, so it's not edging. It's not edging. No, no, no, because it actually, technically it's not edging. I'm just trying to understand. No, no, so what it is, actually, it's way better than edging. So much better than edging. This is the beauty between the east and the west.

Got it. So in the west, what we do is we edge, right? And what is edging? It is delaying orgasm, so you build up that internal frustration, so that when you finally ejaculate, then it feels really good. Right? That's edging. Yeah. So the Thonthrix do it way better.

They have orgasm without ejaculation. An orgasm doesn't end until ejaculation happens. So they're able to have orgasms for like 40 minutes at a stretch. You're kidding. No. That's what Thontricks sex is. Graham wants to know how you do this so badly. So.

I mean, so this is where like how to do it. Check, you have no one to use it on. For the average person listening. Okay. It's for the average person. It's not something to be done. Oh. Yeah.

So I would not recommend it. Why? Because then you just, I mean, you give up on all other things in life. No, no, no, no.

No, no. It's all I need is this. So the key thing to understand about, I guess we're talking about Dantric sex now. So here's the key thing to understand. So all meditation

is designed to elevate your consciousness to a certain level. Okay. Now everyone's like, what does that mean? Like, oh, like, let's like elevator. energies to like no so i want you all to think about your life right so like right now how do you

feel how do i feel yeah i feel amazing right now incredible i'm like super happy okay i'm a seven okay six and a half so like are you saying gen like generally no in this moment in this moment honestly i would say like a nine and a half i'm so happy why i'm because i have so many questions about psychology, just general philosophical questions and stuff like that. And I feel like I can learn a lot from you. And these are questions I've had ever since I was a kid. Okay. So what is your mind doing right now?

Well, generally speaking, I would say 85% of time is very present and just listening to what you have to say. And then there's other 15% of the time. So one in seven seconds, I'm like kind of just like thinking about something else. And it's like, oh, I wonder about this. And then you're saying something and I'm applying that to my own life. When did I do this? Okay.

So let's understand a couple things. Okay. So what do you all think is the correlation? You said you're 85% focused, right? So what is the correlation between the level of focus and how good you feel about yourself? I would say higher focus feel better. Never thought of it before. Okay.

It's like the flow state, right? Like when you get into a... Okay, so rule number one of this discussion is what we're doing now. You are not allowed to cite anything. Okay. Okay. We're going to learn 100% from our own internal experience. Okay.

Because who the fuck knows if the flow state is even a real? real thing. Like, who knows? It could be a conspiracy. We don't know. Science could disprove it a year from now, right? That's what science is really good. I mean, we disprove stuff all the time. Okay. So, let's talk with Graham for a second. So, Graham, if you sort of think about the happiest moments in your life, like, it doesn't have to be like the birth of your kids or anything like that. But like, think about those moments where you just feel the best. Yeah. Can you give me an example? Usually I'm working on something I'm really excited about. Usually those are the moments that, like the flow state for me, which is time to stops. And all of a sudden it's,

Okay, okay, hold on. So now we're getting to a couple good things. So let's talk about time stopping. What is the quality of the mind? What is the mind doing when time is going? It's occupied. Something. Okay. So let's talk about when time is moving super slow, the opposite of stopping, right? What kind of thoughts do you have when your mind is like, oh my God, this is like, oh my God, when your mind is like, oh my God, what thoughts is like, oh my God, you're thinking about this and then you're thinking about this. So this is the first thing to understand. The level of focus of the mind correlates with happiness. Okay? And if we think about when we're unhappy, and also we have to have mind active to notice the presence of time. That's the other thing. You'll get that? I know it sounds kind of weird.

But is our mind active when we sleep? Kind of, I mean. No, I mean like dreams are you from that. Yeah. Yeah, right. So no neuroscience. Okay, we can talk about REM sleep and sleep. Unconsciously active, but.

How do you know that? Dreams? Is that unconscious? I would say so. I don't think you necessarily control your just sometimes a dream. Do you control your thoughts? Sometimes no. I don't.

I feel like a lot of thoughts are just unconscious thoughts that bubble up. I don't really control them. Yeah, I would say the majority of thoughts we don't control. Right. If it was the default state of human beings to control their thoughts, any human on the planet could pick up a chemistry textbook and read it from cover to cover. We do not control our mind. The mind controls us.

Okay. So let's kind of go back to the task. hand, which is understanding the nature of mind, time, focus, happiness, all this crap. So first thing to understand is that the more distracted mind is, the more you're going to be aware of time, the less focused mind is, the less you will be aware of time. And sleep is a great example. So sleep is like a state of essentially no mind, except when we dream. Sure, we'll get to that maybe. That's kind of a tangent. So the first thing to understand is that the activity of the mind correlates with the perception of time. And so when we enter something like a flow state,

the perception of time disappears. The other thing that's happening in a flow state is we have focused mind. So if you sort of think about, let's talk about not being able to enjoy dinner. Let's say I'm going to dinner with y'all. And we're like having fun, but if my mind is not focused on the dinner

and I keep on thinking about, oh my God, these guys are going to ask me to teach them how to do dantric sex. And that's only a problem because I only want to teach one of them. How am I going to fix this? Right. So the more distracted my mind is,

the less I enjoy the present moment. With me? So now let's talk about orgasm. What happens when you come to your mind? Go ahead, Graham. Waiting for you, Jack. The moment of orgasm is really powerful from a consciousness standpoint

because your mind becomes completely one-pointed. That's why it feels so damn good. So if you look at human beings, what do you gravitate towards? You gravitate towards things that bring your mind to one-pointedness. I'm walking down the beach and there's a sunset, and I'm not thinking about anything. I'm just there, right?

And I'm absorbed in the experience of the present. Or I'm whitewater rafting. And when I'm whitewater rafting, I'm just there. I literally cannot afford to think about anything else. And the interesting thing about orgasm is orgasm is one of the very few physiologic techniques that automatically induce complete focus of the mind. Right? And even if we look at people, like there's, if you look at people who have,

like sexual difficulties, right? So an orgasmia or difficulties with desire and stuff like that, someone who has anxiety and has difficulty maintaining an erection, it all makes sense, right? Because now we understand that if sex is about present and focus and orgasm is one-pointedness, but I am anxious, I'm thinking, is my partner enjoying it, or are they not enjoying it, blah, blah, blah, then I don't enjoy it. It's difficult for me to attain that one-pointed state. So sex and orgasm specifically is essentially a meditation technique. And all meditation techniques are designed to bring our mind originally to one-pointedness and then transcend mind entirely.

The activity of mind completely stops and we still retain awareness, which is something that very few people – actually, most people have probably experienced it, but it's like in glimpses here or there. And maybe like whitewater rafting is a good example where there are times where in a flow state, your mind is still active, usually. but there are times where y'all will hopefully have had in your life where like literally your mind had no thoughts but you were still awake and fully present. Has that ever happened to y'all? Outside of orgasm. Yes.

Examples. Pickle ball. Right. Like ping pong too. Like you just get into that groove where you're just doing those forehand, forehand, forehand, forehand, forehand, and the ball is just like bouncing. You're kind of listening to it. You're talking about ping pong or masturbation? Ping pong.

Yeah. Yeah. I haven't experienced masturbation, of course. But yeah, in ping pong, yeah, you just get into that flow state where you're just like, just keep the ball on the table. Right. So then, like, if you think about it, you're not even having thoughts. No.

And even, I would even say, so this is the cool thing about meditation is as you transcend mind, you also transcend ego, which is like, oh my God, let's transcend the ego. It's not anything so mystical. So you become one with the pickleball. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like you lose yourself. You stop being this guy.

Muscle memory. Like your body's kind of controlling you. Your body is controlling. And even your mind is on auto. pilot and you're just present. And if I were to, if I were to ask you, like, you know, like, you'd forget about your haircut. You'd forget about everything. You're just one with the pickle ball. And so this is the goal of meditation, is to attain these states of mind. And the reason that they do dothoric sex is because during that sustained state of orgasm, it's not about pleasure.

So this is why I say that y'all are not ready for it, okay? Because it's powerful stuff. Y'all are playing with fire here. And so what we really want to achieve is it's a tool that's used to sustain that state of mind for an extended period of time by powerfully harnessing your physiology. That makes a lot of sense. And I think it explains why I like pickleball so much and why Graham likes work so much because he always says like when he's working, I ask him like, why does he like it? He's like, why just get into this flow state?

I know I'm not supposed to use that term. But where that's all he's thinking about. And anytime I break him from that or like we'll be in there talking about a title and thumbnail and I'll hear like and Macy walks in. I'm like, no, he doesn't say that to his fiance, but you can tell like he just wants to be in that state of like, that is all he's focusing on. Yeah.

So if you kind of look at it, so this is the thing about meditation is we as human beings. Some of us figure out how to attain one pointedness of the mind. That a lot of human beings will figure out, right? And the key thing to understand about meditation is that it's a state, I mean, not meditation, but what we're going for is a state of consciousness. And there are many ways to attain that.

state of consciousness. So Thantricks, sex is one, meditation is another, flow state, pickleball, runners high, video games. Working out, sometimes video games. So when I work with e-sports professionals, I try to teach them how to enter the flow state and become one with the game. And they know what I'm talking about. And that's when you see these players who enter the state where they are literally like seeing the future. And it's like they know

exactly what's going to happen on the map. They know exactly where these people are going to be. And if you're on the opposite team, when someone is like the god of the video game, it feels like you're playing against someone who's superhuman because they are. They've transcended, like, basic human functioning. So is that your biggest takeaway going to India was simply the point of focus leading

to happiness? That's a very core fundamental. It may be the biggest takeaway. I'd have to think about that a little bit. But I would say the first thing that I learned that I really fell in love with is, like, this was a course in myself. So we formally study mathematics. We formally study mathematics.

We formally study, you know, all kinds of stuff, like even psychology. But people who study psychology don't become better human beings. Like you can take a course on addiction, right? You can even get a PhD in addiction. It literally does not, it's not the same as addiction treatment. So learning something subjectively and learning something like informationally are like two different things. And so the coolest thing about India is this was a course in myself. Where do my desires come from?

How can I conquer desire? Like literally, how can you control any part of your mind? How can you control desire? Where does happiness come from? Where do my desires come from? Like, where do my thoughts come from? Why can't I wake up? On some days, I can wake up at 8 a.m.

And go to Spanish class. On other days, I can't. What's the difference? And this is what I found so frustrating is no one could give me that answer. And I even looked at science, right? And science will say, like, circadian rhythm. But how do you fix that? Like, we don't have a course in the self.

like literally how does your digestion work? What determines whether you're constipated or not constipated? We don't teach people these things. And so what I loved in India is suddenly I was in a class that taught me about all of the things that were fucking my life, which is me. I want to bring up something that I've been thinking about a lot lately, which is the fact that we have a lot of different ideologues and experts that try to force their framework on certain people, such as like you have the Andrew Tates, you have other personal development. gurus and stuff like that. And they're all saying like different things, but they're all promising that these things

will make you happier and fix you, right? And so you're taking these data points, you want to apply it because they're coming from a place of authority, right? But then every single time I listen to this, I feel like this data suggests, nope, this is wrong, you should go with this. And then the only other thing that I have to fall back on

that actually is of substance would be my own personal experience rather than like looking at what the data suggests. And it was more effective when I look at my own personal experience. And that's what you're saying you kind of experienced in this monk culture in India? All these people have different answers. And let's say that for the sake of fairness or charity or whatever,

that there's a varying level of evidence for each person. Correct. Right? But everyone has some kind of evidence. So I think the reason that you have a thousand different answers is a really great principle from medicine, which is any time you have a thousand treatments for something, none of them work. Think about that for a second.

Why would that be? Probably each one is tailored to the specific person. Nope, it just doesn't work. So let's think about, like, do we have, like, a treatment? Like, if you get pneumonia today, how many, how many, what are the treatment options? N pneumonia? Yeah. Whatever medicine they have.

Antibiotics, right? Y'all take antibiotics. It's not like, like, there's a thousand things for sleep, right? There's, like, all kinds of sleep aids and someone's, like, use this app and do this meditation and, like, eat this diet, have camamil tea. you can take medication, right? Because there's a variability of response. But just from evolutionary standpoint, us humans figured out, like, oh, like before you have surgery, what they do is they take some betadine and they swab it all over the world.

Anywhere you have surgery, take betadine or some kind of alcohol, they swab some part of your skin. Anytime you go to the doctor's office, get a little alcohol pad before you get an injection. When something works, all of humanity adopts it. Stuff like clothing and cooking food. Right? So anytime something really works, it is universally adopted. And what's going on with, I think, all these people have different ideas. I don't know. Sorry if I'm cutting you off here, but is I think that they're saying, okay, this is what maybe worked for me or this is what the science has. And they're saying it'll work for you. And they're also doing population-based medicine.

Right? They're saying it'll work for everybody. Like they're talking to the internet. They're not talking to a sample size of one. They're saying, if you want to be rich and successful and famous or whatever, get laid. then this is the path. But that's like fundamentally different from how I think things work, is that I may, so I've like studied to become a monk, trained and taught at Harvard Medical School. I'm a clinician.

I've done neuroscience research. If you ask me, will this work for you? My answer would be, I don't know. I have no idea. Is it worked for 100 people I've worked with before you? Absolutely. But one thing you learn when you start practicing clinical medicine is just because it works for 100 people,

does not mean it works for the 101st, like 100%. And medicine is going to teach you that the hard way because you think it's going to work, and that's when you hurt a patient. That's when you fail a patient. Because you assumed you knew what was going to work. And so you're like, yeah, this is going to work. Done.

And that's when something doesn't work because human beings are individual. Right, like we're all unique. We all have a unique set of genetics, life experiences, right? Mental faculties. even there's uniqueness within you that varies from day to day. Your caffeine level will affect your state of consciousness, will affect the level of anger that you feel.

Your caffeine dependence from month to month will alter all of those things. How did being a monk affect all of these beliefs? What was that like for you to be a monk? So super cool. Yeah. So I think a couple things happened. One is, so after my first summer there, so I spent three months at the ashram, I went to my teachers and I was like, I want to become a monk.

And so one of my teachers was brilliant, or they're all brilliant in their own way. And so he's like, okay, that's great. We're thrilled Alok that you are very excited. Good, Veta. That's very great. Go back, finish your schooling, get doctoral degree, and then come back when you're 30 and will take you. He didn't say it at the time, but what I now understand now is that becoming a monk is about giving up forsaking life.

It's about sacrificing, giving up your life, okay? I don't have shit worth giving up. there's no sacrifice. So what my teachers told me to do is go and do rise to the top of what you can. Put forth 100% effort. Go get a doctoral degree. Have something worth giving up. And if you still want to give it up, we'll take you.

So what does it mean to be a monk? I mean, it depends on the tradition. But kind of the takeaway that I got with a big lesson that I learned because my teachers were awesome was that being a monk actually has nothing to do with the external. It has entirely do with the internal. So if you think about what does the monk do from day to day, right? They just meditate like basically a lot. They'll do karma yoga, which is like service and other kinds of things. But basically like all the practices, it's all like an internal journey.

Like the journey for enlightenment is not gained by wearing a fancy mala and wearing robes and shaving your head. And like that's not, I mean, there's plenty of false monks out there who don't know what's going on, right? Like it's kind of weird. But like once in a while we'll have like this enlightened being who like creates a religion, whether it's like Jesus or Buddha or whatever, but we have thousands and tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of priests and monks who clearly are not enlightened.

And so my takeaway, and this is what I thought was beautiful, is my teachers are like, you don't actually need to forsake life. And what I sort of discovered is that you can live life fully, but like it's internally the way that you respond to things that determines whether, in my opinion, you're really, I would use the word saddhak.

So saddhak is someone who is pursuing spiritual discipline and like pursuing the road to enlightenment. And it's even beautiful because it's not a job. It's hard to describe. So saddaks are not the same things as monks. Monks are like formally like, you know, you take vows and this kind of stuff. But a saddak is someone who's like going for the prize, which doesn't necessarily mean a monk. So my concern with the pursuing enlightenment.

Now I notice you said pursuing the road to enlightenment rather than pursuing enlightenment. I'm just going to assume we're talking about pursuing enlightenment. Nope. You're saying. Great catch. Okay. That explains a lot. Okay.

So basically my problem is. Like I've been, like I said, I've had these questions, philosophical, psychological questions I've had my entire life. And I try to read these books, these personal development, these growth books. And I've read so many of them. And they're good books. I love Eckhart Toll, okay? I really, really, really do. And I found a lot of value in his books.

But then I read something else that spits the contrary. And then I wonder, like I said earlier, like which one is right. And I think the problem is I read the one book that changed, I would say, my perspective on all this was Sid Hartha. Funny enough. I'm sure you've probably read it at some point in your life. I don't remember. I probably read it in high school or something. It says very similar things to what you're saying now, which is like for the truth you look within. And it tells a story of this kid that grows up and he's supposed to be, he's the Brabman's son, if you know what that is. So he's supposed to grow up and be like this legend in his town and very like, I would say enlightened. And then he

goes and that's not satisfying enough for him. So then he goes and he lives with the, what do you call the the the the people that oh ascetics uh i don't know which what was c et i c ic so ascetics are like monks or saddugs right that that relinquish all pleasure yeah everything in order to that's asceticism yes so he does that and it doesn't satisfy him it doesn't fulfill him so then he goes and lives a life of vanity where he like makes a bunch of money and becomes a merchant and does all these things and it doesn't make him happy and then he lives with gotama the um the buddha for a little bit and it doesn't satisfy him. And then at the end, he just sits by a river under a mango tree. And then he finds like enlightenment just looking and listening to the river. And I loved this because I had read

so many personal like development books and everything. And all these people telling me like, this will make you happy. This is how you find fulfillment, et cetera. You follow this framework. And then in this book, it's just like, just sit, kind of listen to the river. And I think it was implying obviously some form of like meditation or heightened consciousness, right? And so I know it's kind of like counterintuitive because I'm still trying to like find something. I would say in order to rather, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. So if I'm hearing you right, so like if someone listens to that and they're like, okay,

instead of learning all these things, the right technique to enlightenment is to sit by the river and listen to yourself, right? Well, it's not saying that as like a strict framework, but just kind of like look internally. Yeah, right? So then we can say, okay, look internally and then I will become enlightened, right? But if I look internally, it's not going to work. So you're right that there's a lot of counterintuitive. So let's explain.

Okay. So this is why it was a great catch that I said, I'm pursuing the road to enlightenment, non-enlightment. So I'm not going to get in line. It ain't going to happen. So let's understand a couple things. So let's talk about Buddha.

So one thing to understand is that the road to enlightenment is not like a good thing. It's like a road of frustration, despair, and like last-ditch efforts and a Hail Mary's. So if we look at Buddha's life, okay? So Buddha was like a king or a prince. So respected, powerful. married a beautiful woman, had a healthy kid, had everything that he wanted in the world. And in humans, I was going to say in the West, but probably humans, we think that when we're unhappy, we think something else will make me happy. So anytime I feel unhappy, I think

if this circumstance in my life was different, then I would be happy. So there's one really interesting thing is if you look at all of the enlightened beings that come out of like India, in India there are forecasts. So Brahman's or the priests, these are the closest to God, the teachers and experts of meditation. Below them, you have the chattrias, which are the nobles. So the nobles are like kings, right? So they, like, fight wars and they eat meat and they, like, have sex and stuff like that. Brahmans can have sex too.

And below them are the merchants or the voyshas, and below them are the shudras or the laborers. So it's kind of interesting because if you look at all the enlightened beings that come out of India, none of them are Brahmins, or maybe arguably one. So everyone who gets enlightenment is a king. So Buddha was a prince, Krishna, which is like a Hindu god. was a king. Ram, who's another Hindu god, was a king. So we've got like three enlightened beings,

and I'm sort of defining enlightened being is like, this person was so special that like a religion kind of cropped up around them. I think you can make a very clear kind of historic and anthropological argument that these people were extraordinary, like outliers of outliers. That's why religions popped up around.

So then the question kind of becomes, why aren't the experts in meditation like the ones becoming enlightened? And the answer is really fascinating. And it's that what happens to the kings is they think, okay, I am unhappy. And so they go and satisfy that desire. And then they're unhappy because of something else. And they satisfy that desire. They satisfy that desire. And eventually they discover that no amount of satisfaction of my desires will ever bring me to happiness. And then they're screwed because the formula,

the game that 99.999% of people on the planet in the history of humanity, this is the game that we've been playing for happiness. Y'all are unhappy about something. you're unhappy about your haircut. If you had gotten a different haircut, then you would be happier, right? I mean, marginally. I don't know if happy is the right term,

but maybe satisfied. Sure, right? So the positive, affective experience, right? So like the contentment with life, the lack of frustration, the lack of maybe a tiny amount of shame

or whatever. You said everything's fair game. Yeah, no, by all means, by all means. Dig in. Agreement, yeah, go for it. All right.

So this is what happens. It's like these people attain everything. And then they're like, this doesn't work. And then they're screwed. And that absolute despair that nothing is going to work is actually the fuel that you need to become enlightened. Whereas the Brahmins, they're like, oh, we're going to be ascetic. We're going to forsake material things. So what they actually do is they never, there's a seed of desire that's always there.

The Brahman wakes up in his hut, goes to the king's palace, teaches them meditation. for an hour, eats a great meal at the King's Palace, goes back home, and eats a simple meal at home before dinner and then goes to bed. So every day they're traveling to the King's Palace. They're seeing the person who has everything. And there's a seed of desire there that's left. You can get it really small, but you can't really get rid of it 100%, or it's very hard to. And so the really interesting thing is that it is through the gratification of your desires for some amount of time that you'll discover that desires are not the root of happiness. And once you learn that lesson internally, then you can really start chasing it.

Wow. Okay. So the interesting thing is that most of the people that I work with who are like really on a spiritual path are also professionally, incredibly successful. And what I try to help people do is they'll come to me and they'll be like, you know, let's say moderately successful. And they'll be like, I want to learn spirituality because I'm unhappy. I work in private equity and I've been doing this for a while and I have anxiety and like it's causing problems in my marriage and like I'm a managing director here. and like, I don't know, like, I've gotten to where I wanted to go. I took all the right steps in life, but like I ended up in the wrong place.

Like, I was supposed to be happy and content. And I encourage you all to just think about the people that you know who are incredibly professionally successful, right, the most successful people on the world. And just based on what you know about them, would you describe these people as like happy and content? Probably no more than the average person. Right? So, and there's data, right?

So I get to break the rules that, you know, money correlates. with happiness up until a point. And I think that it's hard to be content when security is at risk. But in my overwhelming experience, what I find is that the people who are really on the spiritual path are the people who start out as materialistic. Because that's when you really get, it's a very powerful learning to recognize that nothing in the world will make you happy. But you can't know that until you have everything in the world.

You think that you need to hit like the lowest low. to break to, I would say, find some form of, not find enlightenment, but like end up on that road towards enlightenment and really start questioning the things that you've believed. Probably that you have to achieve so much to then, I think, go to something like that. Well, it's just about sacrifice, right? What do you mean? Losing things that you thought were valuable and then getting that reality check of like,

you know, I don't need to lose anything. Go ahead. Oh, I was saying from your perspective, it seems like when you achieve so much, then it's like what's the next thing? I could achieve and I think that would be enlightenment at that point. Not like a rock bottom thing, but like, okay, I've got everything I need here. More is not going to help that. So what don't I have? Enlightenment. So I think I think y'all are both right, but I think the question is the wrong question. And so listen to me, okay? So what are you all doing? You're saying, okay, there's this internal path, right?

And what are you asking? You're saying, is this the circumstance that leads to the right internal path? Or is that the circumstance that leads to the right internal path? So I know it sounds kind of weird because I talked about this shared set of circumstances as scientists. So by the way, when I first went to India, I was super skeptical about all this kind of stuff. And I'm still skeptical to a certain degree. But I think that we can look at data and we can say, okay, like here are the core principles. But at the same time, I would say that you don't need any particular circumstance because the work is actually internal. You don't technically have to have a lot of desires.

I mean, fulfill all of your desires, you can start right now and just look at the nature of desire. And what happens when you fulfill a desire? Does it lead to happiness, right? So let me ask you all a question. What do you all like to eat? What's like a favorite indulgence? In and Out. In and Out Burger.

Okay. So like what is the correlation between what is like eating in and out? Let's go with In and Out. I think it's a little bit more indulgent than Poki. This is a healthy chat over here. So if we think about like like what happens when you eat in and out what happens to your happiness i would say like it it goes up when i'm when i'm eating it and then afterwards not all of the time but sometimes i'm like i shouldn't have ordered three burgers you know

and then i feel a little bit like yeah you know not this one okay so so let's even give you the ideal scenario okay so let's say that you eat in and out and you don't have three burgers you have two yeah two is good okay two is good and then what happens to that desire what is you feel happy right because you had two burgers yeah and you also feel proud of yourself because you didn't overdo it, right? So there's a second happiness there. Well, I don't usually order two burgers. So it's, I couldn't, I couldn't put myself in that situation. Yeah. So, so I don't get fries, by the way, guys. So don't think I'm some like indulgent person, but I get three burgers. Okay, go ahead. So, so, but what happens over time? So now that

you've satisfied your desire. Yes. And we'll get back to the guilt in a second because there's a lesson to be learned there. But then are you happy forever? No. No, I wake up the next morning. And usually, you know, my stomach doesn't feel fantastic. Okay. And then I would say I am back to my baseline. Okay, two days in, three days in. I forget about it. Okay.

And then what happens eventually? I get in and out. Very good. Right. So the first thing to understand is that now we're stuck, y'all. Think about this. So now your happiness is dependent on your access to in and out. This is the way that you're structuring your life.

Right. Like think about that. And here we are. And you go chase the in and out because you want the in and out and it makes you happy, but like, hold on a second. Now you're like, fucking in and out is going to determine whether you're happy on a day or not. Not to mention what you said earlier, which is a brilliant insight, by the way, that oftentimes satisfying our desires also comes with a cost.

So I'll give you an example of, let's use an in and out, but let's space it a little bit. So I want to eat an in-in-out burger. Yeah, it's going to be great. I'm excited. I'm even happy before I have it, which is interesting, no? Something to be learned there. So then what happens is I have my first burger. And then am I happy?

I would say you are satisfied. Yeah. So like I would say maybe happy. I don't know. Like happiness is kind of a dangerous word. Yeah. It's so dangerous. So let's just talk about.

Are you 100% positive? No. What do you need to be 100% positive? Another burger. Absolutely. Right. So even when you gratify a desire, it grows and you want it again. And then even if you have that second in an out burger and then you have that third

in an out burger. And now you've crossed the bad end of desire. And we've got into like the shame. part of town where now you feel guilt. So if we really think about it, like how much joy do you really get out of this? The first burger doesn't do it. It creates more cravings. The second burger kind of feels sort of good because your stomach is like, we're done now, bro. Like your stomach tells you this is enough. But your mind is like, fuck no. One more, baby, let's go. I want that joy, the joy that I used to have. Oh my God, that first burger was so delicious. And the second burger

was so delicious. I'm chasing the past and I want to recreate it. And so you have that. third burger and then you're filled with guilt. And now it's like if you really think about it, the anticipation causes you to suffer. Even the first burger doesn't give you perfect happiness because you want that second one. And that second one as you're eating it isn't good enough because your mind is like, I want to be hungry again and have my first burger. That's really what you want. And so the mind goes on chasing, chasing, and the more that you look at the gratification of your desires, the more you'll realize that you're kind of screwed, like no matter what you do. So you don't, I think it helps, and we have data to suggest that there's a certain path that helps people get to enlightenment.

I think that is a scientist. And at the same time, you don't need it. But what if we switch in and out for something like the gym, something healthy? Or pickleball. Or working, you know? Like, how would this be different? Because you have the negative effects of eating too much in and out. But what about doing something like that that's positive that you're just as equally obsessed with?

the gym. I'm excited to go to the gym. So I encourage you all to look at it, right? So let's talk about the gym. What is your relationship with happiness in the gym? Love going to the gym. Getting a good point. Yeah.

So I'm guessing that, so when you go to the gym, are you perfectly satisfied when you leave? Most of the time. Usually I want to do more. I'm like, I should have pushed myself hard. Okay, right? So there's a slice of unhappiness. And so let's think a little bit about when you go to the gym,

what is it that gives you your contentment? I love being able to zone out. Like for me, put on my YouTube videos. This is not desire. This is not the gratification of desire. This is attaining a state of mind. Okay. Not the same thing.

Got me. Okay. Right? Aren't you desiring that state of mind? Absolutely. And what does that do? What is desiring a state of mind of peace? What does that create for you?

Happiness, right? No. Fuck no. Are you kidding? What is attaining a state of mind? No. Desiring a state of mind. Oh.

What is that? Right? Because why does this guy love the gym so much? I'll tell you why I loves the gym so much. because the rest of his fucking life, he can't get it. You see that? Because your mind is so, like, you love work and you love the gym because the rest of your mind, you're not in that peaceful state of mind.

And so you don't like the other parts of your life. You don't like cleaning the toilet. You like going to the gym, zoning out, feeling good about yourself. I think I like tasks. I like things to do throughout the day. Sure. Like I feel productive. Sure.

Sure. Right? So I think that also feeling productive, I think you're going to end up sort of in the same place. Now, if we're talking about a state of, mind, then that's kind of my point, is that the fulfilling of desires, the reason that desires are so good is because if you really pay attention to your process of eating in and out, there's an orgasmic moment sprinkled in, right? When you're not doing the thinking.

And that's the thing is when you take that first bite of in and out, are you, the first bite of the second burger, where everything is aligned. And in that moment, you're just enjoying the burger. You're not thinking about number three. You're not regretting number one. You're not thinking about the gym tomorrow. you're not feeling guilty. So if you really look at even the mechanism

of gratifying your desires, it is that when you gratify your desire is usually for a brief period of time, you enter a particular state of mind. So what's the end goal? Is it just to be content with any end? Is it to have extended periods of time in that state of mind?

Huh? Because I heard two questions. The end goal, right? Yeah. What's the end goal? Is it being content anytime, not having anything that you need? The end goal for who?

For the average person. I have no idea what the end goal is for the average person. But like, okay, but you're suggesting that it's not such a good thing when I'm on like that perfect equilibrium where like the sauce and the burger, the ratio is perfect and I'm just fulfilled enough. Like achieving that is not a great, a good thing? What do you think? Achieving that, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

Probably probably not a good thing because it means about you to eat a third burger, you know? Oh, no, no, no, no, no, not allowed. So that moment of perfect equilibrium is exactly what you're chasing. And how does it feel to have that perfect moment of equilibrium? I think chasing instant gratification, generally speaking, broad swipe or broad strokes here, is not a good thing. Like if you want to assign as a general framework, what is good for me, what is bad for me, you find something that is painful immediately, but yields rewards down the road,

the same way that like gratification immediately, pain down the road, you want to go with the long-term benefit. Okay, so great point. So let's talk about instant gratification, okay? So the problem with instant gratification is that if we think about it, there isn't a, the problem with instant gratification is not in the gratification. It's the price that you pay for the gratification. Does that make sense? Yes.

So it's not the state of mind. That's the beautiful thing about instant gratification is when you do this particular thing for that flash of a mode. So I'm an addiction psychiatrist. So like, I'll talk to people about using heroin, right? And I talk to them and I'm like, this was before I understood the addiction psychiatry. I'd be like, I don't understand. Like heroin is ruining your life

You're like on probation at work Your wife is divorcing you Your kids hate you You mortgage your house You took a second mortgage out on your house In secret and you spent it on heroin Like I don't understand how you just It's ruining every part of your life

I don't understand why you can't just stop Because everything that you tell me that you love That's falling apart in your life Is caused by heroin And he's like bro you don't understand The moment I use heroin all of the things that are falling apart in my life go away. That's what fixes the problem.

It doesn't create the problem. It fixes it. Because while I'm high, I don't care that my wife is divorcing me. I don't care that I'm heavily in debt. I don't care that my kids. It's the only thing that makes me feel good. Right? So instant gratification, that bliss that we can create chemically is a wonderful thing.

If it wasn't a wonderful thing, we wouldn't have addicts. The problem is when you describe instant to it, It's the price that we're willing to pay for transient states of happiness. Eating that second burger isn't so much of a problem, and life is meant to be enjoyed. The tricky thing, the reason that we, the key thing that we don't understand is that thus far, since we have not studied ourselves, with even 1% of, y'all, y'all make a beautiful podcast. How many hours have you all spent analyzing the podcast that you make?

What do you think? I don't even know. I didn't know so many. like 10,000, 20,000, 30,000. Three and a half years, right? I think probably my ballpark would be about 10,000. Sure. Right.

So, and like how many hours do we spend studying like what makes us happy and what's the nature of our desire? And what you'll discover is that the instant gratification is great. Like it's that state of mind. It's always the state of mind. So then the question becomes, and this is the problem that we make is because we haven't studied it, we believe that the gratification of desire is the default way, it is the default way, but is the only way to attain that state of mind. We never try to cultivate the state of mind independently.

We never ask ourselves, what are the thousand different ways that we can get to the state of mind? And gratification of desire is just one of them. Orgasms another. And orgasm is not the same as desire, right? So even if we think about the sexual act, there's the I want to get laid, and then there's the, yeah, now we're naked, which is. is a fulfillment of a certain desire.

And that's like a state of like sort of bliss. And then there's the actual state of orgasm, which is like a no mind state if you really pay attention to it. There's like no mental activity at all. Post not clarity and all the stuff that happens afterward, then your mind kicks into gear, right? So you're saying people generally stumble across something where they get to this no mind state, right?

Like this pure bliss, equilibrium, everything's perfect. They stumble across something like that. And then they continue to pursue that. but on like kind of like an unconscious level whereas if they had more conscious thoughts about hey I want to achieve this state in other areas of life and they pursue that then it would serve them better so here's what I think happens I think human beings do what our brains are designed to do okay which is that when I feel a certain way I form an association so like what happens is you like how why do you go eat in and out because your brain is like where is this happiness

coming from it's coming from the burger So it is a reflexive thing. It is a biological thing. It is an evolutionary thing. Okay? And so then what happens is it's kind of common sense, right? That's why everyone in the world is chasing desires because it's actually a default state of like how it works. It's like simple reward circuitry, nucleus accumbens stuff.

Like I'm sure you all have heard about this from other guests, right? So when you eat in an out burger, you get a spurt of dopamine and the nucleus accumbens. It reinforces behavior, gives you pleasure. You want to do it again to get that pleasure again. But we also know from neuroscience. Remember, I'm allowed to cite things y'all aren't, is that sustained activation of the same circuit doesn't work. Right?

So this is how we develop tolerance. Playing the first game of League of Legends or Dota or Valerant or whatever you want to do is lots of fun. The eighth hour doesn't give you the same amount of fun. So what people will do is they'll naturally continue chasing their desires because that's the only consistent way that they know how to get to like a state of peace or contentment. Transcend.

And y'all, oh my God, do you guys know how much people envy you? Especially Graham. You know why they envy him? This guy is so lucky. He feels at peace when he's working. Holy crap. Everyone on the planet wants to be like Graham. I wish I could love my work

because then I could be super successful and I wouldn't have to suffer for it. I wish I loved work as much as I love orgasms or heroin. We got to clip that. Hear that, Josh? Okay, so there's a couple things I want to dive into here. I would love for you to finish your story too, but while we're talking about Graham, okay, so I love talking about myself. I have these theories.

I love talking about Graham. So I've known Graham now, don't know how many years. Four and a half years. Four and a half years. Okay. So fairly well, because I've lived. It'll be five in March. Because I've lived with him as well.

I've lived with him for eight months here and like, no, eight months in L.A. And then, what, about a year here? So quite some time. We're business partners, best friends, so many things, right? I notice this kind of like lower vibration, undertone of stress, impatience, negativity, like more neurotic thinking, et cetera, a lot in him. I see very little negative thinking. And I absolutely, and I absolutely, I have the speaking Starbucks cup right now, okay?

And I love him for it, right? Like I enjoy spending time with him and everything, but I notice these things. And as his friend, I like to provide suggestions on how I think he can improve his life. That's just what I like to do. Right. You want to know what you could do to improve his life? Don't talk about the, look at his face. Don't talk about the negative things about him in public.

That's number one. But keep going. Oh, he doesn't really. No. I speak about Graham extremely highly. And what I'm saying, I notice these like lower vibration things such as stress and stuff like that. This is me trying to be productive, not just saying this for, viewers or anything. I would agree with them on the stress. The negativity. Okay. Graham.

This is, you know. You have the Starbucks Cup. Okay, go ahead. The Starbucks. Okay. My bad. So, anyways, and I try to provide suggestions to him that I think would make him better off. Is that, like, he really seems happy when he's working, but I'm nervous that a lot of the work is about the ends. It's about, it's, and he says he attains like this flow state, yes, which, which I, I agree. I can totally understand that. But part of me is concerned that he continually places his value and worth and stuff on the ends rather than enjoying the process. And so I want to know, maybe for Graham, what would you say to somebody like Graham that thinks maybe something will continually make them happy, but they continually find themselves in

this lower vibrational state? I would never say something to a person like that. Why? I would ask them questions. So I think there's like the fundamentals are different here. So like you think he needs help, right? And you've diagnosed some problem because you know him really well. Right.

So you preface this with, I've known you so long. So you started out by stacking the deck of like, here's all the evidence for why my opinion is correct. Right. And then you said, this is what I've observed. It's clear to me that you love the guy and that you want to help him and your heart is in the right place. But if you kind of pay attention, how did he respond to what? you said. He combated it. Absolutely. Some of it I agreed with. The stress I agree with. Sure. So you're self-aware and stuff like that, but affectively, like emotionally, like, he did not

like that, bro. Like, y'all can go back and watch the tape, or just like watch. There's a lot of good, how did you feel about it? I'm indifferent about it. I think there's a healthy amount of, like, back and forth that Jack and caught. I totally, I totally, like I was giving Jack crap for his haircut. So it's like back and forth. I totally agree that there's a lot of health here. I'm not trying to create a mountain out of a molehill, but I saw something called micro-expressions. And I, and I, I Please, no, dive into it. I love this. I got some degree of discomfort from him, the moment you brought it up, like when you were saying

like all this kind of stuff, and I'm not surprised that he pushed back on some of it. But so you want to help someone, right? What do you know about them? Just what you've observed. I mean, clearly, I mean, a very small portion of all of the things in their life, the determinism, right, in his life that has led to him making certain judgment calls. And then all I observe is this, like I said, a lot of times stress and like lower vibrational things.

And from there, I try to understand where is that coming from. Okay. So, Jack, so let me ask you, how many things have you said to Graham to try to help him with this? I would say I've brought it up over the course of a few years several times. Right? And what effect has it had? So far none, but you're a professional.

So I'd like your opinion on it. So what I'd say is that you're a smart guy, right, Jack? You know your stuff, bro. Come on. I think I'm, you've read a lot of books. Oh, tons of self-help. Yeah, tons of self-help. You're very insightful.

You're very intelligent. You all have a podcast where like literally the best and brightest minds, present company accepted. Come to your podcast and share with you the wisdom of just the crazy successes they had and how they built their life. You are very equipped. You say you're not a professional. You may not be a trained psychotherapist,

but you know a lot. Right? I would have a good understanding. Okay. And despite you knowing so much and reading so much and learning so much and knowing this guy so well, everything you've said hasn't. helped. Stop saying. Start asking, right? I agree with that. I agree with that fully. A hundred

thousand percent. Without a doubt, yes. I think people imposing their own beliefs on what will improve someone's life, as I alluded to earlier, is just overall a negative thing rather than understanding and them understanding for themselves. So it's not about what you're saying is right or wrong. So here's the crazy thing. Every single thing that you've told him is going to help. Right? Well, it potentially could have applied, but who knows, right? Ah, no, so potentially could if applied. So I'm going to say my statement again. You tell me if you agree or disagree. Yeah. Everything you told him is going to help. If applied. So everything you told him is going to help. Why isn't it being applied? Because he doesn't want to.

Okay. How do we get him to change his mind? He probably has to find out for himself. How do we help him find out for himself? Asking questions. There we go. And look at what we just did with you. What do we do with me? Did you pay attention? you changed his... You asked me questions. Yes. There you go. And now you get it.

Right. Okay. So this is something my entire life, I have done this, where if I see an issue with someone else, using the term better off, just as a broad stroke, I try to understand where they're coming from, and I see some place where they're suffering in their life. And I try to assist them and make them better off. I have done this my entire life. I try to fix people, right?

And so I see these things in Graham, and I wonder why people do. don't listen to my advice because I've continued to give advice from my 25 years of existence to people and they don't apply it right and they are not better off from my advice so I would say in the past year maybe two I've kind of recognized the fact that they do need to find out for themselves right and there is merit in suffering and and and I would say letting someone suffer or letting someone but but at what point at what point do you step in and say something I know it's a super no Jack, so here's, like, once again, I think you're, so you're brilliant. Okay, so let's just, like, I'm about to say something that I think could come across is harsh, but I think you're ready for it.

So let me just, yeah, yeah. Let me just cuddle you for a bit, okay? So, like, you care a lot about other people, right? And you read a lot and you learn a lot. You've applied it to your own life. You know how to help other people. You know 100% that it's going to help him. Like, you know that. Like, you can give me some humble shit answer to make you not sound arrogant because you're virtue signaling and you don't want to seem like an asshole, but in your heart of hearts, you know it's going to help him, right? Yes.

Okay. So let's like, let's be authentic with ourselves, number one. Okay. Okay. So now the question, I think the reason, the problem that you're running into is like, so you want to help people. Yes. Right.

And that drive to help people causes you to help people. And then you want to like make the world a better place and love and stuff like that. Where you need to start, sure, you can learn techniques. I've just told you, okay, you can ask questions instead of say things. And so now like, Jack is like, yeah. Now I'm going to like ask everybody questions and then I will help them and I will make the world a better place because these are the people that I love and I'm going to help them. Have you ever asked yourself why you want to help all these people? Why?

Because it's it satisfies my selfish desire of being happy, I would say. Do you know that? I like it when somebody makes a difference. I tell someone to open up a high old savings account. I just did this with a close family friend or not a family friend, a hometown friend. He did it. And then I texted him and like, hey, did it. your interests come in and he's like yeah i just made x amount of money off of x amount of money this

is amazing i'm like like this is awesome you know what i see someone that so that's overweight and i want to help them lose weight if you really want to fix this issue yes the key thing that you have to understand is it's being driven by this it's not actually about the other person it's i mean it is about the other person there's satisfying my own selfish desire yes right so so then and it's i i even think the way the word selfish desire i think is a mental construction i don't think that's in a sense what it is. I think you've observed something within yourself and then you've like read a bunch of books and you've said this is what's going on. That's not, I mean, that's a piece of what's going on. So I think if you really want to get good at this, you have to really dig into where does this desire?

Because it's like, sure, it makes your ego feel good. But it's like deeper than that. Right? Probably. Yeah. Like this is like it's a part of who you are. I would say so. Yeah. Right. It's not. So satisfying your selfish desire is on the. narcissism, an ego spectrum. This isn't narcissism. This is, this is, you know what this is? This is debt, bro. What is it? Debt, you owe these people. You think so?

Absolutely. This is carmic debt, baby. I, interesting. Okay. Okay. I appreciate the insight. Do I agree or do I disagree? I would say I err more on the side of disagree because I will do this for plenty of people that I that I don't feel like I owe. Oh, no, no, no. You don't know. Right?

Okay. So I know that this is something that you're going to disagree with because you don't have a framework for it, and I haven't explained it. But if you want to know what's really going on, this is what I would, here's what I think you will accept, okay? The first is that there's genuine love, correct? Yes. There is some gratification of the ego, correct?

Yes. But there's something else. There's like a hunger. There's a compulsion, which is not gratification. which is not gratification of the ego because if it was, the compulsion was gratification of the ego, we'd see narcissistic kind of behaviors.

Tell me I'm beautiful. Like, tell me I'm great. Like, tell me I'm awesome. You don't need to, you don't want them to tell you that you're good. You need to help these people. Like, you get that hunger? Like, do you feel that?

Yes, yeah. Where does that come? Because that ain't ego, bro. I would say I do, it's part of my personality to always strive for fairness. This isn't about fairness. Well, you said it's servicing a debt, right?

Sure, but I think that's a mental. So, and this is where I know. I agree. I do think that they're a little bit misaligned, yes. So here's my point. I know that y'all aren't going to get this, right? But this is a conversation where my goal here is like a little bit different, which is like, I'm going to plan to see that ain't going to make sense.

Okay. But as over time, if you guys really want to understand, I can try to explain it. But over time, what you'll discover, so this is another thing about the East, right? So like the stuff that I learned in India, a lot of it has some. scientific validation, but the majority of it doesn't. But I don't think that's because it's scientifically incorrect. I think that the science is way too slow because they've been doing this stuff for thousands of years. So they have thousands of years of development without scientific validation. And there's all kinds of scientific evidence, overwhelming scientific

evidence for the theory of karma. And we just don't realize it because we don't think of it that way. So like let's go back 2,000 years, okay? And let's say let, okay, like, so the theory of karma says that certain things about this life are determined for you before you're even born. How radical is that? Very. Is it true? I don't think I would like that like hair color. Is that determined before you're born?

Before, based off of the genes, probably. Oh, interesting. So there is a mechanism that determines your hair color, your height, your eye color, your HLA type and the predisposition for autoimmunity. All of these things are, influenced before you're ever born. Right. Right.

So genetics is actually a huge scientific support point for the theory of karma, because they said this for thousands of years. And then we discovered genetics and then we moved it out of the theory of karma. We said this is a whole new thing. But now it's like, duh, right? Genetics is common sense. It wasn't common sense 4,000 years ago. Gregor Mendel hadn't even been born.

Wouldn't be born for thousands of years. And they sort of figured out that there are factors in your life that are essentially cause and effect. So now the question becomes, do all effects in your life have causes? Yes. That's your answer? Yes, I would probably do with that.

Do all causes have effects? Yes. 100%. This is like Newton's third law, I think, right? Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. So that's like common sense, right? So we also have Western conceptions of this, like the butterfly effect. Butterfly flaps its wing through some crazy chain of cause and effect.

So now the question, becomes, at what point does the chain of cause and effect end? So we're saying that, okay, hair color is fair. If I slap you across the face, there are going to be karmic consequences. That's, like, completely fine, right? We're not talking about that you'll hate me. We mean, like, just the physics of it. So physics, cause and effect is consistent with karma.

So karma is essentially that actions have consequences. That's all it is. And then the thing is the yogis, they sort of figured out, okay, where does this end? Where does the karmic chain end? And they figured out that cause and effect is a fundamental principle of the universe. And even the time at which you're born, the fact that you're born, the fact that you're born in this year has a cause, right? And that everything in this world is caused by something else. And it is an insight into that that is when karma becomes kind of mystical.

And I may have lost people there, but it's like harder to understand. But you all get what I'm saying? Yes. Right. So even the fact that you'll live together for four and a half years has causes, has observable causes, but also has subtle causes. And this is where karma gets into the weird mystical stuff that is not scientifically valid at all. I think it'll become validated. I think just like Newtonian mechanics validated a piece of the theory of karma, and then genetics validated another piece of the theory of karma. And then Bessel van der Kolk's work on like trauma validated another theory of karma

that actions have consequences on a psychological level, which was something that 200 years ago, or even 100 years ago, scientists would have said is completely ludicrous, right? That everything is like behaviorism or its neurohundred. or it's the subconscious. So like the simple idea of cause and effect, the theory of karma is nothing but cause and effect. And it's to recognize that every aspect of your life has some kind of cause.

And then there are certain learnings that will give you a better handle on that stuff. But what I feel from you is that there's an ego gratification part, but that ain't it. But what I think you'll discover and you should explore this is really look at like, why do you want to do this? Where is this hunger and where is this drive coming from? And what you'll discover is that you can't pinpoint it to any psychological event in this life. You won't be able to find an antecedent cause. That explains the power of what you feel.

I agree. Yeah. I would agree with that. So when you say in this life, do you mean like a past life? It's been predisposed, right? Just to give you all a weird example, okay? So a couple of years ago, so I do psychotherapy, right? So in my psychotherapy practice, like, so I'm, like, I use evidence-based medicine.

Okay. So sometimes patients come to me for this stuff, but like even when I teach it, I'm very clear with them that this is not like, there's no scientific evidence of this. So with meditation and stuff, I'll say, this is what we know scientifically. This is what the traditions have been saying for thousands of years. This is what I feel confident about from a clinical perspective. If you're curious about exploring the rest of it, I'm happy to teach you, but just understand that there's no scientific evidence behind what I'm going to say next, okay?

So I've had a couple of patients that have had like lifelong mental disorders. And the weird thing is that like, you know, I had this one patient and she's amazing and has taught me so much. And then like, so she's had anxiety her whole life. And so I'm teaching a class somewhere. And someone comes up to me after the class and they're like, hey, like I really loved what you taught us. Is there any chance you'd be willing to see my wife? Like just would you do like a consult or something? And we have a professional relationship.

I was like, sure. So this person has had anxiety for many, many, many, many years. And has also been in, like, clinical treatment for many, many years. And she's doing fantastic. Like, is doing really well, you know, is, like a well on the track to partner at her particular firm. Is professionally successful, has kids, is happily married. Like, everything is great. Going great.

And so after a while, so she's, like, curious about this sort of spiritual stuff. And we're doing some level of psychotherapy. But she also has other clinicians that she works with. And then like, you know, one day she's kind of like, hey, can I tell you something and I've told anyone? And I was like, sure, right? Like, you're a therapist, you can do that. And she's like, I haven't even told any of my other therapists this stuff. And I was like, oh, okay.

Right, but not really. I was just like, yeah, tell me, because we were in a particular space in therapy where it's not exciting or anything. And then so she starts telling me about like these memories that she has. And like I ask her, so there's some kind of work that you can do that. It's called somsodic work. So these are like the somsars are like the carmas of the past that sort of are present in your current life.

And you build them in this life too. We can talk about that in a second. But so she basically starts telling me about these like very vivid memories that she never had. And so what I did is I kind of treated it like even the fact that she never had it. And her specific experience was really harrowing. And she's like, I asked her like, when you feel anxious, like what is the image that comes to your mind? And she says, I'm underneath the floorboards. And I know that if I make a single noise, the booted feet on top will like know that I'm there.

And I know it's all over. And every day when I feel anxiety, like this is what it is. it's this thing. And so this has never happened to her, right? So there's like no evidence that she's actually been in this situation. So I talked to her a little bit about it. I'm kind of shocked by this. And so then I tell her like, okay, here's my take on this. So if we accept the theory of karma, we would say that this is a somscar from a past life, which is present in this life. There's other scientific explanations. Maybe you watched a movie when you were three years old, and the movie was really scary and it traumatized you some way. It doesn't have to be something mystical

from a past life, right? There's all kinds of different explanations here. At the same time, what do you feel about, like, psychotherapizing that trauma, right? Like, what if we work with whatever that emotional, mental energy is? And this is what I think is like on safe territory in terms of science, is just sort of saying, like, okay, once something exists in the mind, like, who knows where it came from?

But you can metabolize that thing. You can heal that trauma. We do that, and she gets way better. So now I come out of that experience, and I start to wonder a little bit about, what do I need to learn from this? Right? Does this mean that karma is real? No, actually, we have no evidence that karma is real. But we have one really interesting clinical hypothesis. And that clinical hypothesis turned into a question that I started asking patients, which is, hey, do you have any traumatic experiences that never happened? Do you want to talk about those? And oh my God, the number of people that will talk about this stuff, if you, like, and they're like, yeah, like, this is like crazy. But I have these impressions. I have these memories. You know, people think that this is all like, some people think these are reporting. pressed memories.

But it's been really interesting therapeutically. And there's actually some decent, actually not decent, some very low quality evidence by really being fair about it, that, you know, I'm not the only one. There have been multiple psychotherapists and psychiatrists that have sort of made this discovery and have worked with like memories that don't exist. Now, that's what we know is that the memory doesn't exist or that the event did not happen. But there's a big difference. And this is where I kind of take issue with a lot of people who are like,

into Eastern mysticism because they're not scientists. So they'll say, ah, see, this memory doesn't exist. Therefore, it must have come from a past life. That's an extrapolation I don't think you can make. But going back to you, was that too tangential of an answer? No, no, this is great. So going back to you, just my take on this stuff, right? So I know what narcissism looks like.

I know what altruistic personality disorder looks like. So altruistic personality disorder is something when people feel super depressed unless they're helping someone else. So it's a part of their personality that my value, you as a person depends on whether I'm helping other people or not. I know what all the stuff looks like. I don't get that vibe from you. So I think what's going on with you is something deeper is what I would call it. So whether you want to call it karmic or what, in my experience, I think the best words to describe it or karmic debt. And I use that term, I'm giving you something that I know you're

going to reject because what are you going to do after this podcast? I'm probably going to look it up. Absolutely. Right? In that order. Absolutely. So this is something that like I'm planting a seed and you're going to go explore it because I know that's what you're going to do and that's all I want you to do. I don't want your acceptance here and now. I want to open a part of you to explore this for yourself. If I want to know about my karmic debt, I want to go and I want to research it. I want to understand it. I'm never going to come to some actual substantial answer. Excellent. Right.

And then what's going to happen next? I am going to be left, I would say, as an unfilled cup, right? Absolutely. So you can't find the answers outside. Where are you going to look for him, bro? Inside, sure. There you go. Okay. Got it. So for these past life experiences, whatever that might be, why do people tend to have the same recurring fears?

Let's say whether that be heights, spiders, darkness, certain things are all pretty common. Is that just an evolutionary thing that, you know, afraid of heights because it's dangerous? It's a great question. I think it's a question that the answer, which is very scientific, actually has an implication for karma that a lot of people will reject because they're actually by. So let's think through this, okay? How does a phobia for a spider develop? Usually it happens through a traumatic event, right?

So if we think about phobia, like I had a phobia of like a kangaroo, because I got bit by a kangaroo when I was in Australia. Okay, so it's kind of weird phobia, right? So if you sort of think about, we all know this like scientific fact that you can rest as much scientific evidence as you want, that people learn to fear things. If we look at the neuroscience of fear development, when I have an aversive stimulus or a painful stimulus,

will learn to fear it. So we all fear hot pans, right? We don't touch hot pans because we know that it burns us. If someone, if I take a hot pan, and we don't think about it as I fear hot pans because you are dealing with it in a way that doesn't evoke fear. But if I walk in with a hot pan and I push it towards you, your response will 100% be fear, right? So we actually have overwhelming evidence that phobias come from traumas, right? We have some evidence that some phobias come from some kind of genetic impression. Which, by the way, what is that? Oh, it's a memory from a past life.

Interesting, right? Because that's what a genetic impression of an inborn phobia is. Do you all get that? It's like, we have genetic memory, which is literally memories from a past life. So then if we sort of say, okay, if phobias come from psychological traumas,

we know that we can track those back. So we can track back, let's say, 50% of phobias to psychological traumas. completely scientifically plausible. Where do the other 50% come from? So one of two things. One is they come from somewhere else. Or two, is that they come from a psychological,

the scientific principle is the same. We just don't know where the psychological trauma is. You'll get that? So if you sort of assume the theory of karma, then everything makes sense. This is simply a psychological trauma from a past life, which, by the way, through things like epigenetic memory, we also have low quality evidence for.

So this is where a lot of people who are like into the theory of karma will say like, oh, like we have this data from Holocaust survivors and epigenetic changes and inherited anxiety and inherited features of PTSD and stuff like that. And there's some evidence there, but I think it's far from conclusive. So we have some evidence that memories, like literally now, we know that memories can be transmitted between generations. So now the, then the next question becomes, okay, so like, was it you, right? Or was it a different human being? And that gets a little bit more complicated. But does that answer your question? It does.

Yeah. Let's talk. A little about certain mental ailments, such as like ADHD and or like autism. Okay. And the reason why. We're going to go there, Jack. So we kind of brought this up before the podcast,

because obviously we take the online quizzes. Okay, everyone does, and I see this disgruntled look in your face. What is your take of these online quizzes? Do you think that if it says, hey, you should talk to a professional, that you should actually proceed and talk to a professional? Part of me thinks it's a little skewed. I think it was my idea to take the quiz. I'm not sure.

It was either me or Alex, right? It doesn't matter. But basically, as a bit of a background, we kind of talks amongst ourselves. You're like, maybe we're autistic. I don't mean this in like a joking way, but like I think all of us have unique traits that kind of point in that direction.

And so we each took a quiz, the four of us, me, Jack, Maisie, and Alex. I think on that quiz, if you scored a 25 or higher, you lean more in that direction. 24 and below, not so much. Between me, Jack, and Alex, I think I scored a 24. Alex was like a 23, 24, and Jack was a 25.

So what are the chances that all three of us lean in that direction? That's a question that I don't have a simple answer to, but I have a complete answer. Cool. It's just not simple. So let's start with your first question of, what do I think about these quizzes? Well, that depends on the quiz. So some websites, for example, will use validated instruments, right? So these are things that these are scientific instruments that are constructed, tested.

We do things like factor analysis and stuff like that. We develop these instruments ourselves at HG because the instruments out there don't capture what we want to capture. But there is a rigorous scientific process to determine whether the questions I ask you literally correlates with what I'm trying to measure. So one of the things that we see a lot is like, especially like in the private sector, you have a lot of people who will develop their own tests, like personality tests or whatever. And like all of these tests, like the reason they're very successful is because they have a lot of face validity. So they're very similar to astrology in the sense that like why do people believe in astrology? It's a more complex answer. But one reason is because when you take the test, it feels right to you, therefore you believe it.

So the successfulness, especially of a lot of these privately determined tests or like whatever, you know, like websites that people use, the reason that people visit those websites, what they're selecting for is not scientific validity of test. I don't know if you all have ever done like a scientifically valid test, but it's a fucking pain in the ass. It's like 300 questions. It takes 90 minutes. And they ask you the same name questions over and over and over again. That's what it takes to get to scientific validity. There are some versions of that that are a little bit better. Like we have things like the PHQ 9 or the PHQ2, which are screening tools for depression. So we've got some decent stuff that's short form. But generally speaking, stuff is like takes hours to really, if you really want to get a faithful representation of what is going on with someone, Our science isn't really that good. So should we trust these tests or not? It really depends on the test,

but I think a lot of people are building tests that are very accessible and people like it when they fill it out, which is really what they're designing the test for. That's what they're shooting for because scientifically valid tests are really boring to take. So I'm skeptical of many of those things. Second thing, but who knows?

I mean, maybe someone is doing all the factor analysis and constructing stuff. Yeah, this was like a 30 question. quiz that maybe 10 minutes. Are all all autistic? Okay. So statistically, let's understand a couple things about autism. Autism's on the rise. Okay.

Now, we don't really know if it's on the rise because we're detecting it more or it's actually like increasing in the percentage of the population. So are we catching cases? Are we getting better at catching cases? Which is certainly true. Or is it actually like increasing in the whole? I think both are correct. So if you look at one of the things that correlates with like autism spectrum,

diagnosis. So like usage of antidepressant, anti-anxiety medications during pregnancy correlates with it, ultimately a very small effect, but it does have an effect. Maternal and paternal age also correlate with autism. So we're all having kids later. So I think that's like there's some data that suggests that that's possible. But I think the reason that all you all are testing high, so maybe it's a bad test, who knows, right? And if we sort of think about if I'm designing a test that I want to engage people, I'm not going to give them a yes and I'm not going to give them a no. What I'm going to give him is a maybe That makes them wonder and curious

And then what I'm going to do I don't know if there was a CTA or anything like this Sign up for this for a more advanced test There wasn't no Unsophisticated website And his fiance scored very low Not yeah not very low But definitely on the no

So then the other thing to understand Which I think is a key point of the complexity Is I think as a society We're developing features That the Venn diagram between the average person And someone with autism is like overlapping more.

And that's primarily through things like technology use. So if we look at some of the features of autism, it's things like difficulty with social connections, difficulty with empathy, sometimes difficult, a lot of rigid thinking, a tendency for things like perseveration. And this is absolutely happening to everyone because of tech.

So if we look at like what's happening, so this is something that we help a lot of people with in our community is there's a social skills atrophy that's going on across society. And unfortunately, text messaging doesn't, isn't just as good as in-person interaction. So if you look at the brain, so our brain interprets a lot of information from people, right? So I'm paying attention to your facial expressions. I'm paying attention to your body posture. I'm paying attention to all kinds of stuff.

And this information is reassuring. You all get that? So a lot of the reassuring information we get socially is like body language, tone, eye contact, stuff like that. Now, when I start texting people or using Discord or whatever, the brain is very efficient. So anything it doesn't use, it loses. This is why we forget languages. So if I start communicating with people in the absence of body language, tone, and facial expression,

the gears in my brain that interpret that stuff become rusty. And so then what happens is when I go into a social situation, I am no longer reassured by all of this information because that circuit in my brain is rusty, which then means I become anxious. And as I become anxious, we start engaging our problem-solving circuitry. Now I'm thinking, is this person like me? Not like me?

Oh, when should I enter this conversation? These people are talking back and forth, and I have something to say, but should I butt in? Will they feel it's bad? Oh, no, now the moment has passed. Now there's a pause in the conversation, but should I go back and mention this thing

that they were talking about 60 seconds ago, or is that awkward? So then what happens is when our brain does not have kind of empathic information, it uses cognition to make up the gap, which is what it always does, right? So when I, my left leg is damaged, if I pulled a muscle, my brain will naturally favor my right leg to pick up the slack. So what's happening in our society as a whole is we're becoming less empathic and less emotionally aware. Also because technology suppresses activity in the limbic system in the amygdala, which means that like literally

when I like, you know, I'm feeling bad about myself and I look at cat video. and then the feelings of badness go away. So we're getting more emotional, like more emotional dysregulation. We're becoming less empathic. We're interpreting social signals less well because we're using online communication. And this looks closer and closer to autism, right?

Because these are the deficits in the brain that people have with autism. They have difficulty with social connections, difficulty with empathy. They can just see things from their own view. So we also have online radicalization and echo chambers, which is leading to rigidity and perseveration,

which we see take your political conflict, whatever you want, we'll see it there. So I think these things are overlapping and makes it look like people are autistic. But I don't think we're actually getting autistic. I think we're affecting certain faculties that are consistent with autism. But that doesn't, you'll see that's, that makes sense, right? It's not autism. I think it's like ADHD. ADHD kind of, if you have ADHD, it mirrors a lot of the traits that an autistic person would have.

Right? Would you say that's an accurate statement? No, no. I, it's fair. Right. And I wouldn't say that, but it's fair. And I think that ADHD is, I'm guessing, on the rise, or maybe it's the same thing with autism. We're like, you know, where we have access to instant gratification, all of these things that basically make it.

So our expectation or our standards for a certain level of entertainment value are so high now that we need to have this instant gratification in every single facet of life. And I think that could mirror ADHD whether or not it actually like transform someone into someone with. ADHD. I'm not really sure. I don't know if that's like a possible thing. Why does it seem like ADHD is getting so common? It seems like half the kids growing up is like some form of ADHD. Yeah. So I think that's, it's a great question. I think it's the same thing as autism and exactly what Jack said. If the mind doesn't use something, it loses it. So if we look at attention span, so if you look at like people say, okay, like screen time is good or screen time is bad, sometimes parents, you know, will ask me, we do a lot of work with parents. And they'll ask me,

like one amount of screen time is good or bad. And that's, well, the issue is screen time isn't all the same. So there's a great guy named Carl Marcy was a colleague of mine at Harvard Medical School. He started an empathy lab thing where he ended up getting his company got acquired by Nielsen. So what he would do is hook people up to EEGs and like cardiovascular stuff and stuff like that. He would measure them in a bazillion different ways and then have him watch ads. And then he would tell companies this ad is the best based on the EEG activity, just brilliant idea. So I was talking to Carl about this, and Carl was kind of pointing out to me that, like, you know, when you watch Sesame Street and you're a five-year-old, there is a certain length of like what you're engaging with.

The story is like maybe seven minutes long. So now what's going on is that kids, the moment they get bored with something, so when you're bored with Sesame Street, you have to sit through it. And over time, even if you watch Sesame Street every single day, your attention span will actually increase because you're sort of forced to pay attention. Whereas now what's going on is people have such simple access to change the thing that they're viewing. So if you look at it, if you give a four-year-old, an iPad, over time what will happen is they won't watch long-form stuff. They'll just switch off of it more and more and more and more and more. Which is why if you look at a lot of these things that are very, very common for that kids will watch, it's like compilations of super short-form stuff.

So there'll be an hour of like a kid that's like looking at 60 second clips and is just like completely mentally checked out. So we absolutely have a society that is shortening our attention span. We also have a society. So another key feature of ADHD is emotional dysregulation. There's even some papers now that are suggesting that, you know, there's ADD, which is attention deficit disorder. And there's ADHD, which is attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. And they're even proposing a third subtype, which is like ADD with like emotional dysregulation, is the primary feature.

And so our technology is regulating our emotions for us, right? Because when I feel bad, what am I going to do? I'm going to look at cat videos. There's even a really interesting study that came out recently that suggested that 50% of women who use Tinder are using it to meet psychological needs completely outside of dating. And so people are super confused. And it's probably not just women.

I don't know why the study. I saw that video he did on that. It was really interesting. It's kind of interesting, right? So because people will wonder, like, why did this person? match with me in the first place. Like, you message them and they're like, screw you, you suck, you're ugly. And they unmatched.

And like, why did you do that? It's because they're fulfilling some other kind of psychological need. Anyway, so if we look at what's going on with society, there's a lot of stuff that is making our brains more similar to someone with ADHD. Now, that may be independent of probably a, my guess is a rise in ADHD as well, because that also correlates with, I think, like parental age. So as we're having kids later, like we're seeing more of this stuff. that's really interesting

what are the implications of giving a kid an iPad I go out to eat every now and then I just see this kid just just on the it's like nothing the world could be exploding behind them and they're just fixated on the screen that can't be good

what do you all think? I think it's terrible I think it's rotting away their mind and I think for kids to have access to TikTok I think is a bad thing even for myself I constantly delete the app to prevent myself from going on TikTok

because if I watch one It's just like five minutes goes by so fast. I'm like, what did I just do? So that's so interesting you say constantly, which means you're also constantly reinstalling it. Well, because I post on TikTok. So it's a bit of a double-ed, because I like to see the analytics of how my videos do.

But when I'm on there, I also like to see what's going on from a creator perspective, but I very quickly fall into the consumer. So this has always been true with parenting, where parents will do things to elicit behaviors in their children. So how do I get my kid to calm down? How do I get my kid to sit? How do I get my kid to eat?

And so in the past, like, we had to do all kinds of stuff to get our kids to sit and eat. But now we have this beautiful tool that, like, veggies them out, and then they become passive. And it's like, you know, you can just feed them and they'll be okay. So it's a beautiful emotional regulation technique. So, like, I don't know if you all. So in our case, for example, like, we're very careful around technology. But, you know, when our kids are on a flight, like we recently took a 30-hour flight with like a six-year-old and eight-year-old.

And so, like, during that time, we, like, use technology, right? Because that's what's going to happen. But even for the first 12 hours of the flight, no tech. And if you think about it, like, kids have been flying internationally all the time, and they've never had technology, and they've been okay on those flights. Right? But now what's going on is parents are so terrified of a particular behavior. So then what happens is they give the iPad to avoid the behavior.

But in doing so, what they're actually doing is reducing the cognitive training that they're putting their kid through. Now, so what used to happen when you were a child and your attention is developing or even as an adult is you'd have to force your attention somewhere, right? So I don't know if you all went to college, but like you have to force yourself to study. Your mind wanders, you force it to pay attention. Wonders, force it to pay attention. During this podcast, force it to pay attention.

And so now what's happening is we're not forcing kids to do that anymore. So now what's happening is we have a generation of kids who are no longer taking the stairs to get from floor one to floor three. Everyone's taking the elevator. And what it's doing is deconditioning our minds, which is why we see all of the problems that we see. Our minds are becoming weaker because we're not pushing them, right? Everyone's, our minds are constantly being driven around in mechanized wheelchairs.

We're taking elevators. We're taking escalators. We're not using our minds. We're restraining them with these external devices. That's what's going on. So I think giving your kid an iPad, just giving it to them, I think is a bad idea. How could parents counteract this? Is it simply taking away that stimulus from them?

So we do a ton of work with parents, and here's what we've learned. So it's my belief that technology is here and here to stay. It's also my belief that when you excessively restrict a child, there's a chance that they'll build that habit and things will be okay. But there's also a chance that they will flip out when they get unfettered access. So kids who, for example, like never partied and never had a drink and were like super like careful in high school, will sometimes go to college

and they will just flip the fuck out. So our belief is to teach restraint instead of restriction. And this goes back to like the yoga and stuff like that, right? Like what did I learn in India to control your desire, to understand how your mind works, right? So this is what we really encourage is it's not about access to screen time or not access to screen time. It's what are you teaching your child in relation to the screen.

So something that I do with my kids, Because I'll ask them. They're like first thing on Saturday morning. Can we watch something? And I say, sure. I'll ask them, how much do you want to watch? They'll say a lot. Okay, how much are you having fun?

I'll ask them in 30 minutes. Are you having fun? Yes. How much fun are you having so much fun? Do you all want to continue? Yes. Then I'll ask them after 30 minutes. If I try to take it away, they'll rebel.

But I ask them, are you still having as much fun? No. Nah, they start to get wiggly. They start to not like it as much. What do you all think about doing something else? No, we want to keep watching because once the dopamine hits, they want to stay. And I say, okay, this is what we're going to do.

We're going to stop now. I'm going to take you all to the playground. And then in 30 minutes, I'm going to ask you, are you happy you came to the playground? And if the answer is yes, then I'm going to take you to the playground next time. If the answer is no, I'm going to let you watch 30 more minutes. You're in full control.

Right? So a lot of parents will be like, you know, irrespective of what the kid says, I'm going to stop it. And the cool thing is like the kids will learn. And so now they're like, their technology usage is really good. They don't get to use it as much as they want, but they recognize that there is a diminishing return on technology usage, which is such a great thing to instill in a kid.

Yeah. I like how you're teaching them how to be a free thinker and make decisions for themselves because I feel like school really teaches you you have to be at this place, at this time, and do these things, and if you do exactly what we tell you, that's great. But then you go into the real world and you have no idea what you're supposed to do

if someone's not telling you what to do. Yeah, because I think that, like we were saying earlier, like school creates factories, right? It's like factories for putting out a certain kind of kid. We don't teach children how they work. Like we don't teach them about their mind. I mean, it's crazy. I'll do like workshops and stuff at like Fang level companies.

And I'll do literally the same workshop for like a group of nine-year-olds. And it's just as accessible. It's like where does your desire come from? There's a whole in-and-out discussion. You can have that discussion with a nine-year-old. They'll get it just as well as you did. The big difference is if you teach it to them when they're nine, like the whole trajectory of their life changes.

That's really interesting. Restless Leg Syndrome, RLS. Is that a mind thing or is that a body thing? Jack is terrible at this, just constantly his leg is like, that's not Restless Leg Syndrome. So you have something called Neat, which is non-exercise and something. Okay, let's talk about restless leg syndrome. So first of all, you ask, is it mind or is a body?

There's no difference. Okay. So like, what we're sort of learning is that more and more things are psychosomatic. So even things like physical ailments like arthritis, We think of arthritis as a physical condition. But if you literally get a phone call and you learn that your car has been stolen, that will affect your mind, right? Because it hits the mind first.

And then the mind will affect the brain. And the brain will release cortisol. The cortisol will increase demarginalization of white blood cells. You'll have 50% more white blood cells in your bloodstream, which means that your arthritis, which is an inflammatory condition, is going to get worse. So arthritis, too, is a psychosomatic condition. what we certainly know about restless leg syndrome is that it is certainly quite neurological as opposed to psychological. So we know that, for example, there's a problem in the dopamine transmission.

So dopaminergic agents are very helpful for restless leg syndrome. The other thing is that when we're talking about clinical restless leg syndrome, we're talking about people who, when they're in bed, they kick their legs so hard that they wake up. So imagine that like, imagine you're being attacked by a bear and it's trying to bite you and you kick it. The force with which you would kick that bear is the force with people with restless leg kick. So the first thing is it really makes things hard

for if they're sleeping with anyone else in the bed. The second thing is the force of the cake will literally wake them up. So now if this happens every 15 minutes, it's very hard to sleep. So restless leg syndrome is like, can be a quite, I think it's actually like an underappreciated, people don't appreciate how debilitating restless leg syndrome is. It's a game to be quite crippling for a lot of people. Wow. What's going on with you, I mean, I have no idea if you have restless leg syndrome or not,

but that's not what I'm hearing. What I'm hearing is that you're fidgety. Yeah, I would say so. Yeah. So there's a couple things. One is that about 10 to 15% of the calories that we burn throughout the day, for on average, we're going to get to the variability in a second is from non-exercise something, I forget what it's called, the abbreviation is N-E-E-E-T. So it's basically like this, right? And so we burn like 10% of our calories, just like fidgeting. Now in your case, what I would say is that you have a high amount of vata. So this is like an Ayurvedic concept, but you have a lot of wind in your body. So you're kind of fidgety, right? So we would say like even if you look at your hands,

your features are very angular. You're very like conversationaly dynamic. So like if I have a conversation with him for three hours, there's going to be a clear chain from A to B to C to D. We're talking about meditation. You've been kind of more running the show than he has, right? So you've been talking about meditation. We're talking about this thing.

And oh, by the way, what do you think about this? And if we go for 15 more minutes, your mind will jump to something else. So my guess is that you get bored easily. my guess is that you can dive into something for a long period of time, but then you may like leave it alone for a little while or move on to something else. So these are all consistent with Vata, which means that your mind is like the wind. It can blow really hard in one direction,

and it'll blow hard in a different direction later. So it's quite powerful, but it's not necessarily very consistent. That doesn't mean that you can't consistently have a career. It just means that the more variability that you have within your career, I think the more you will have your best mind. Whereas if I told you, hey, you're going to, going to work a nine to five job and you're going to climb the corporate ladder for a decade, he'd be better out than you would.

I 100% agree with him. Graham is extremely good at grinding. Like putting his nose to something. He's Guffa, which is earth and water. So stability, like low acceleration, high top speed. High acceleration, low top speed. That's really fun. Interesting.

So we have this joke. I'm the kite. He's the string. Absolutely. Yeah. That's our joke. He's the rock. You're the kite.

Yeah. That makes complete sense. That's very interesting. So the cool thing about Ayurveda is that you're able to make these diagnoses because there's physical correlations with mental attributes. So if you look at like the veins on the backs of your hands are going to be more visible than the veins on the backs of his hands. He has a roundness to his face.

You have more angularity. So what could you tell about that, about like facial structure? So your face is round. His is more angular. Your nose is round. His is more angular. His ears stick out more. My ears stick out more.

By the way, what do you think I am? Is this an angular nose or a round nose? Uh, yeah. Absolutely. Right? So I have high Vatha too. That's why we're viving so much and we're like, nice.

Let's talk about this. Okay, cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is the other thing to understand about Vathas is that the current society is very bit favorable. So the way to success, right? So you're talking about like all these people who come on and will say, this is the road. So our whole society is biased towards Bithas.

So nine to five, not nine to nine to nine. which he can pull off. Not midnight to 6 p.m. twice a month, which is probably what you can do. Right? So like vatas can work very intensely for a short period of time. Gaffas can work long periods of time. But everything is Pita oriented, 9 to 5.

Okay, if you look at like income, what correlates with the highest income over time? It's changing jobs every two to three years. So if you're staying a job for 10 years, because you're like Guffa oriented, you're going to get screwed. If you change jobs every six months, which you feel like,

because it takes you six months to get bored, that's going to screw over vatas. So our society is generally speaking bit the favorable. That being said, a big part of this stuff, if your vata is constructing a life that suits your doshah. So like I told y'all, this is just one thing I'm doing today.

I'm flying out and I'm going to do another thing, and then I'm going to work on a book, and then I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do this. So what I discovered is vata, is that if I did one thing, I would get exhausted. Get exhausted more quickly than my peers.

But something miraculous happened. If I was doing four things, if I was juggling as many balls as I could without dropping a single one, my energy levels were through the roof and my productivity is inhuman. Right? But it's not inhuman.

It's just I know how I work and I create an environment that suits me. The problem in today's society is we always try to shape the environment. I mean, sorry, we always try to shape ourselves to the environment, right? So someone looks at somebody else and says, oh, that person has a 4.0 GPA and they go to library every day. I want to turn into that person.

I want to be able to go to the library every day. So we spend all of this time trying to like, instead of discovering who we are, we don't even know. All we know is that we want to be someone else. I want to be more confident. I want to have less anxiety. I want to find the answers to life. I want to help other people, right?

And as you look at other people, we start adapting their traits. Instead, what we really need to do is understand ourselves and then start to shape the environment around us so that we don't have to adapt. Anytime you adapt, you're not operating 100%. Because you have a natural inclination, right? You have a biological, like circadian rhythm that makes you a morning person or a night person. Playing into that and leaning into that is actually how you optimize performance. So let's understand a couple things. I think for you, it's not which one is right.

What you've got to understand is there isn't a right. There are lots of rights, okay? And the beautiful thing is your mind is so dynamic that you can integrate those. This is like, I don't know if you've ever played a game where you like swap stances, right? Like I'm in like I'm in attack mode. I'm in guard mode. I'm in heel mode. So that's the way you need to think about your life.

It's not that there's a philosophy that's correct and a philosophy that's wrong. It's which philosophy do you want to employ at this moment. So you're like, you're changeable. You're adaptable. So stop trying to be one thing because, bro, how many more books do you need to read? How many more successful people? Who do you think has the answer? Because you see the merit in all of them and you're trying to bring them all together.

Don't try to bring them all together. That's his job. Right? He's going to integrate stuff. You get to swap. Just swap, baby. That's fascinating. Okay, we need to change the topic, so it's not so personalized.

It's a broad stroke for the audience. But that is... I think a lot of people will resonate with them. Amazing. Yeah. But I'd love to talk about relationships. Okay. How long have you been married for?

12 years. How do you meet her? Summer camp. And how did you know that she was going to be your wife? Um, I didn't right away. So this was, it's kind of an interesting story. So like, you know, I had known her for a while because we grew up going to the same summer camp. So I knew who she was, but I didn't really like know her.

Because like in summer camp, right, like I was in high school. She was in high school, but I'm three years older than her. So she's like a freshman and I'm like, I'm a junior or senior or something. So we were both counselors. And then the interesting, the funny thing is that I had, this was actually the summer. I just finished my time in India. So I came back and I was going to be a monk. And so I meet this girl who I find very attractive, right?

But like I've decided like I'm going to forsake my life. And physical pleasures are for the weak. I am powerful. I'm spiritual. I'm above that. No, not November all day long, baby, let's go. So the interesting thing is that I had struggled a lot with, like, confidence and shame and failing out of college and all that. You asked me, like, how were you not terrified?

It's because I didn't have a life worth living, you know? So I struggled a lot with, like, women. And I had watched all this stuff from pickup artists and stuff like that. This was, like, back when pickup artists were, like, before Red Pill became a thing. It's like... Favorite topic. I love this. I learned all these, like, techniques and stuff and tried them, but I just didn't understand the fundamentals.

So I met this girl. and since dating was out of the question, I could actually talk to her, right? You just talk to her because there's nothing to gain, nothing to lose. So I'm just like, hey, do you want to, like, you know, she's coming to, we're going to the same college,

so she's going to be a freshman. I'm a junior, and I was like, I'll show you around, right? So, like, I'll take you out, you know, like you're moving there for the first time. So, like, you know, I'll show you what the cool stuff is. Like, are you interested in that? She said, yes. So she insists that I asked her out on a date.

I was not asking her out on a date. I didn't think about it as a date. I thought about it as like, I'm 21, she's 18, she's new, I know something about this place. Like, let me just do a nice thing. So she insists that we were dating when I didn't think we were dating. I was just, you know, so. But then we started dating and then, yeah, I mean, so you asked how long, that's how we met. And then eventually, you know, I decided the celibacy thing wasn't going to work out.

And then, you know, found myself with a girlfriend. And it was, then that was confusing for a while in terms of the whole spiritual. thing, but then I sort of realized what I shared with you all earlier, that a monk is not about having sex or not having sex. It's about the attachment to lust or the freedom from lust that makes you a monk. And this is why we hear all these stories about monks and priests, and it's not just Christians, by the way. It's like all the religions, right? All these people have enforced celibacy who don't have the spiritual training are the ones that get into problems. And then they start, usually it's men putting their dicks where they don't belong.

So what I sort of realize is that, like, you know, it's about conquering lust, not about being celibate. So what was the point you realized you didn't want to be a monk anymore in that relationship? Did you tell her initially? Like, hey, I'm going to be a monk? Yeah, I think I told her, but she thought we were dating and I think she also knew me quite well. And she also, I think, I don't know that she ever, so she's told me many years ago that

you know, either you're going to end up as a Swami, which is like a guru, like, or you're going to end up as like something like what I am now. So she saw a long time ago that, like, if I had gone a different route and, you know, like I thought about it. And I ultimately decided, and even now actively, try really hard not to be a spiritual guru because it's a whole different thing. But so I think she kind of understood our relationship, I think, better than I did for a long time. and then eventually I kind of came around.

And then I sort of realized like, okay, like I don't have to give up being a monk to like be in this relationship. So being a monk is more about the identity, the values, the belief, the intent behind certain things rather than the actual action of your... Well, so...

Or why you're doing something. Yeah, so I would say technically being a monk is not about that, but that's why I use the word saddhak. Right. So saddhuk is a spiritual aspirant, someone who is interested in spiritual growth. So that's what I would describe myself.

as not a monk you're a de facto monk yeah so i think the most important part so all monks should be saddaks and when monks are not saddaks is when we run into problems that's where all the abuse comes from and the cool thing is you don't have to be a monk to be a saddak so when you speak to people do you also speak to people through relationships and why does it seem like right now i guess dating seems like a lot harder than it was maybe 20 years ago so he's here's the problem with dating in today's world. So the first problem is that we were sold a promise that turned out to be a lie. So if you think about dating apps, what is the premise of a dating app? The premise of a dating app is that you are a certain kind of person. And in your social circle,

you have access to only 40 people and you may not match with them. Right. So there's a perfect person somewhere out there with you, but because of the bounds of time and space, you will never meet them. what we're going to do is we're going to collect your profile and we're going to compare it to billions of other profiles. And we will find that perfect person. And if we combine these two people, then it'll make it easier for you to find the perfect person. That's the promise of a dating app, right?

Fair? Yeah. What's actually happened is the opposite. So now what's happening is that they say they have all these perfect people, but people are actually having to go through more and more and more people before they find the right one. The exact opposite is happening. Instead of making the process easier, so you'd have to go through 40 people before you find the one in your normal life.

Right? So if we go back to like 50 years ago, 60 years ago, 80 years ago, what was the size of social circle that you would find your mate? Probably like somewhere under 300 people for sure. But the dating app said, we're going to make it easier and what they actually did is make it harder. The other problem is I think a lot of dating apps, the information that they collect is something that a lot of people don't understand. The information that they collect does not correlate necessarily with relationship success. So this is another good example. So if you look at like, let's say if you look at streaming, okay?

So I can see my viewer account. And like streaming platforms will show me analytics. Why do they show you the analytics that they show you? They want more people. Yeah, they want more people to watch. So you can improve upon them. Are the analytics that they show you the ones that you need to be looking at to improve? I would say watch time.

AVD, I would say. So I would say probably not. So the analytics that they show you is what they can collect. Do you all get that? That's why like CTR, watch time, easy to collect. Does it actually correlate with quality? Like who the, I mean, so it correlates with quality, but it doesn't inform you as to what to do.

So this is a big thing. If you think about a dating profile, the dating profile has what we can easily collect and what we can easily represent. it doesn't contain what creates a successful relationship. Do you all get that? Yes. Right?

So this is a problem with dating apps is they have us fill out all this information, but a good match has nothing to do with hobbies and interests. If you all want to know, if you look at the science of connection, and even the science of sexual activity, there are all kinds of variables. There are four variables that correlate with sexual activity, none of which you can even detect or matching or connectedness that you don't find on a dating app.

What are those variables? So number one is a share. emotional experience. There was a study where they took people, they had people have a first date. The control condition is y'all are going to meet on a bridge

made of stone. The experimental condition is you're going to meet on a bridge that is a rickety wooden bridge. What they found is that the level of attraction between the two people was way higher on the rickety bridge. So anytime you can create

a shared emotional experience between two human beings, they bond. This is why people fall in love at rehab. So like rehab is a place where everyone's like fucking addicted and they're going through some stuff

but boy do they fall in love at an alarming rate. And if any of y'all have ever worked at rehab or people are listening to you, you all know exactly what I'm talking about because everyone who is working at the rehab is paranoid about the patients falling in love, sneaking out,

fucking all kinds of stuff. We're paranoid about it because it happens all the time. Shared emotional experience is what creates bonds. Second thing, 90 minutes of activity, 90 minutes of exposure is ideal. So as you go past 90 minutes, attraction tends to wane, sexuality tends to wane.

Third thing is, let me think about this. What do you mean about the 90 minute thing? You're saying like a first date? Just in general. Like if you want to feel connected to someone, you're getting to know someone. Oh, it's diminishing returns any. After night. Yeah.

So like 90 minutes is like where things start off. So you're saying if you're dating, it's optimal an hour and a half. and then kind of end it. So there's a group of people out there who have trouble getting second dates or we hear this like feedback a lot which is like there was no spark. So what is the science of the spark?

Right? Because what happens, everyone shows up and they're like, let's talk about our interests. Let's talk about our hobbies. It doesn't correlate at all with relationships. So values over time will be important for long-term relationships and will affect things like conflict.

So do we want to have kids? Do we not want to have kids? Do we want to be charitable? Do we want to accumulate wealth? Some of that stuff is very important. really important for long-term stuff. This is the other confusing thing that a lot of people don't get is that when they start dating, they're planning for a long-term relationship, but that's not how we exist as humans. We fall in love first. So this is the other thing I've seen. Every successful

relationship, or almost every successful relationship I've seen as a psychiatrist, and a lot of people may think, okay, like if you're a psychiatrist, don't you see bad relations? No, like most people actually have healthy relationships. Not everyone comes for couples counseling. Every relationship I've seen that's successful has at least one red flag. And even that, Everyone's like red flag, run for the hills. Don't run for the hills. Because when you have a red flag early in the relationship, you learn conflict resolution.

Can you manage conflict with this person? Right? So I had red flags early in my relationship. My wife had red flags. And we worked through those. And wow, it turns out that if you can resolve your red flags, that's actually like a very good prognostic sign for future relationships.

But we run away from them. The other thing that's going on, so does that explain the 90 minutes? So the thing about the 90 minutes is we just know, that something about attractiveness and like how much of a spark I feel like diminish that after 9 minutes. Could it just be mystery? Like you leave something to be wanted afterwards? Yeah. So I mean, I think there's all kinds of mechanisms. We don't know why. There's all kinds of hypothesis. But what we do know is that 90 minutes seems to be good. So shared emotional

experience. So I would say like, you know, go do something scary together. Go do something. It doesn't have to be positive emotion. You can actually share negative emotion. It's fine. This is why rom-coms, I think, tend to work well because we're sort of on the same. you know, like emotional wavelength. Another thing is, oh yeah, the dating has to be free of hassles. So the number one thing, not number one, I just say that metaphorically. But one of the key things is that when someone, when you ask people like what makes you want to, what makes you DTF?

You know, it's like this needs to be hassle free. So another problem that's happening with dating is that like dating is not turning into hassle free. In fact, it's becoming the opposite. So I'm selecting for my mate now, right? And in order to get this, you all need to pass my tests. So dating apps are increasingly becoming about filtering and like interviewing. They're not, it's not dating anymore. It's not like, let's see where this goes.

It's like, do you match my criteria? Which, by the way, is created by the dating apps because they create criteria. They ask you, what's your criteria? If you look at the history of humanity and the whole animal kingdom and mammals and all kinds of things, no one has criteria. It's like, hey, like, I'm going to do this dance for you. you into it or you're not into it, right? All that stuff is gone from modern dating,

which is why it's so hard. Because all these criteria and finding the perfect mate and planning for your life together from day one, like, I don't know how to say this, but an early relationship cannot withstand the pressures of a long-term relationship at the first date. You can't do that. That's why it crumbles.

So it sounds like the paradox of choice is making people look for disqualifying factors rather than qualifying factors, which used to be the way that people saw dating. So there is a paradox of choice, and absolutely people are more interested in disqualifying and qualifying, but I would say even go one level deeper. The fact that you are considering a qualifying factor

is not how people fall in love. No one is like, hmm, do you qualify for me or not? Is this good enough? No, everyone's like, well, fuck, this person is wrong for me, but, you know, like, This is fun. And you do stupid shit.

I mean, hell, my wife started dating someone who was celibate. Like, how much more of a red flag can you get? Like, how stupid? Like, how stupid is that? And there's other red flags. So, like, since I failed out of college, I, like, graduated at the age of 23 after five years. And then what did I do for the next three years? I applied to medical school.

So when I was 25 or 26 years old, 26, 27. And people asked my girlfriend, oh, what does your boyfriend do? He applies to medical school. That's literally what I did. I got rejected from 120 times. Red flag after red flag after red flag. How many people do you know

that would encourage their girlfriend to stay with some deadbeat-ass guy who's 27 years old, has no money, no job prospects, no job experience, and has successfully failed, almost failed out of college and has failed to get into medical school

for two or three years in a row. So what did she see in you? She saw me. She did not see the attributes. She didn't see the dating profile. And she was fucking right, bro. Right? So, like, that's the other cool thing is that, like, she was right.

And, like, got rejected from 120 times, ended up training and teaching at Harvard Medical School, right? As well as a list of other accolades. So, like, when you see the human, instead of the attributes of the human is, like, when you see successful relationships. How long does it take for you to see the human? I think it depends on the person, but I think people know very quickly. So let me ask y'all. Like, y'all have been together for four and a half years now, right? As business partners, we're not together.

I know. People have questions. No, no, no. I'm going to use this term carefully, okay? I don't mean in a sexual or romantic way. How long did it take y'all to fall in love? I would say for me, after we had dinner, Jack and I got dinner

That's off the rip Yeah Right He fell in love off the rip Well here's the thing To clarify Jack sent me like eight emails Wanting to do any amount of work

And I gave him a task to do Randomly after the eighth email He nailed the task And as a thank you I said How about this? Meet me across the street from my office And grab some food He was he was enthusiastic

About like I want more What else could I do And I was like Well I have this idea You down? He's like yeah I'm in. And so I saw this qualities. So it takes him one dinner. That's amazing. He falls in love quick and hard. I'm going to take this too. In fairness, I probably was in love with Graham before that

because I was a fan of his content. Like you know what I mean? So like for me, he was like an idol of mine. He made a measurable difference in my life. I got my first credit card because of him. I opened up a high yield savings account because of him. I did all of these things because of him. So I'd say like probably that and then him like finally calling me. I remember that was like a huge moment for me. You know what mean. So that's a red flag. So y'all fit the criteria. Okay. So number one is you fell in love, he fell in love. And he's got a huge ass red flag that you didn't know or maybe didn't think about, which is that he was infatuated with you before he met you. Yeah, but legit. But I think that helps with dedication. That's like, hey, so it made me love the idea of Graham rather than necessarily

Graham as a person. To me, that's why it's a red flag. That's why it's a red flag, right? Because you're falling, that's what infatuation is. It's falling in love with an idea instead of a person. But my point to y'all is if you look at successful relationships, I'm telling you, every relationship, including yours, has one red flag. I wouldn't see either one of those as red flags. I think falling in love with the idea of someone is a red flag. And I would say my love grew a lot deeper. Clearly.

Clearly you didn't see this red flag, right? I wouldn't, yeah. I don't know. I mean, but let's think, now y'all are famous, right? Y'all are, like, rich and famous. And if some, I know it sounds like y'all are in relationships, like romantic relationship. So, like, if someone shows up and is like, oh, my.

God. Jack, you are so awesome. You've changed my life. I love you so much. You're so handsome. That haircut is so fantastic. I can't get enough of you. Tell me what you want. I'll do anything, anything for you. Well, if they like the haircut. Right. So like... Then that's a red flag. So, so, right? Because like, you kind of know that this person doesn't know the real you. And, and if she asked you on out on a date, would you go? I'm assuming you're heterosexual. But would you go? I do. Depends how attractive you.

But I see this. Jack is filtering. Jack is himself on the podcast. So people that come up to him and be like, I vibe with you. I like it. Let me explain. He sees this very differently than I do.

He says I need to pick from a pool of our audience because they know who I am. And I see that as a day. Not because they know who you are, but because they share similar values and they've watched you enough to be interested in what you have to offer, that's what I think.

Not because they know who Jack is, but because they vibe and they resonate with what Jack says. I think I have a little less confidence in that because of the way that I felt towards you when we initially met. I was an, I would, I idolize you. And literally I said in the emails, I will do anything that you want me to do.

I think I specified, I will pick up Ramsey's cat poop. You know what I mean? Like I will do, but I think those are the qualities. I would say the same thing. If I looked up to somebody and I want to work with them,

I'll do anything. But there's nothing, no task below me. I fell in love with the impact that you made on my life. As far as falling in love with you as a character, I would say it took me a little bit because you were so different than anybody I've ever met before that had to understand you before I felt like I could truly love you, you know?

This is healthy masculinity right here, by the way. It was infatuation off the rip. And then after understanding who you are and then me coming to terms with, wow, this is somebody I've never met anybody like this before my entire life. You're so direct. It was hard for me to, because I've never been like in a relationship like that where some people were so up front. And then finally, once I was like, this is just who he is, because I started. you treat other people like that. You're very upfront, very blunt. Then I had to come to terms with, okay, can I accept this person for them in their entirety or can I not? And I said

absolute F yes, without a doubt, I can. And I think that's when I fell in love with you. So let's understand a couple things. First of all, you were in love with him before you even met him. You were infatuated by him. But once you got to know the real him, oh my God, it was so much better and you felt so much more in love. And if we look at this right here, right? So this is, I know we're not talking about a sexual or romantic relationship, but these qualities you will never find on a dating app. You all get this? Like listen to the way that y'all are talking about each other, the way that you get to know each other. This is how a real bond forms. But this, but the same thing that Jack met me could be how Jack meets a significant other. That's my point. Yeah. That's exactly my

point, right? So you're asking what's wrong with dating? The thing is, on a dating app, do you all get that the information on a dating app does not touch what we heard here to And I don't even think you guys understand what we heard here today because y'all were participating, but your listeners like, holy shit, listening to y'all talk about each other is glorious. It gives me faith in humanity. And I think that the infatuation that I had with Graham off the rip was not enough to have a lifelong relationship with him. And once that started to diminish and I saw these other parts of his character that I was not used

to, I had to then make that decision, am I in love with this person or am I not? And so that's completely consistent with, I mean, I know that everyone's meming about this. But like, for real, that's completely consistent with what I'm saying about romantic relationships, too. It can start with a red flag of infatuation, but whether it withstands the test of time, a relationship must grow and evolve. And that's the other problem with dating apps is everyone's looking for a finished product. So what people don't understand is I'm trying to find the right person for a relationship. That is impossible. A relationship is created by two human beings.

it is it is not something that you fit someone into you all get that because it's like organic and just if we listen to y'all's relationship right and you can think about the romantic relationships you've had you can even think about parental relationships all relationships grow and evolve over time and we don't really think about that at dating apps we're looking for a finished product that will slot into my life and even if you find someone who says they're willing to slot into your life chances are you will fall out of love with them over some amount of time because they're not exciting you in some way. Right? So sometimes like people will find exactly what they're looking for and sometimes it's great and sometimes it's not. But for most of the people that I've talked to

who have found successful relationships over dating apps, it's like, yeah, there was enough to get in the door and what I discovered was so far beyond what the app showed me. Because there's a fundamental data analytics problem, which is that dating apps cannot collect or share the actual actual information that correlates with a successful relationship. And that even is even more complex because what a successful relationship requires evolves over time. Relationships need, I work with my wife. She's CEO. She's my boss, right?

That sounds very awkward, but it works really well. We had kids together. Me and her dating a celibate monk is version 1.0. Right? And then it's like not celibate person and it's loser. That's a different relationship. Then it's medical student. Then it's like faculty at Harvard Medical School.

Now it's influencer. Then she's my boss. There's so many different relationships there that a real relationship is not something that you can capture on a piece of something. And they evolve and grow over time. But a good barometer for the health or success, predictive success of a relationship would be those four things that you shared. Yeah, so I don't think I shared all four.

So connectedness, sorry, 90 minutes. shared emotional experience, free of daily hassles, and I'm forgetting what the fourth thing is. But there's a fourth. And then what about going from a healthy relationship then to a healthy marriage, keeping the excitement, keeping the spark, keeping the interests?

You can't limit it to 90 minutes anymore. So I'll answer this question. I'm tempted to answer the question the same way I answered. The last one is, how do y'all keep it fresh? So now we come full circle to tantric sex. which because it's not sexual in nature y'all can do and it's not it's no homo i swear no okay but let's let's understand a couple things okay so the first thing is to understand that a relationship evolves over time which we've already talked about but the second thing the most important thing

that i think transitions into marriage i don't know if it's necessarily marriage or like from the short term to the long term relationship is that early on you have so much neurochemistry working in favor. So you're excited by this person. There's novelty, there's attractiveness, the sex is new. We sort of know that in a default state, the amount of arousal that you feel with a new partner is greater than what you feel with like a partner over time. That's in the default state. Now, a lot of people will interpret this as like, this is a biological truth. The core feature of human beings that a lot of people who are like, this is the biological truth, the core feature of human beings is that we're not bound by our biology. We're the only species on the

planet that does things that are biologically, we're not, we have consciousness and we have the ability to shape and change our internal environment. Now, it's possible animals can do this, but we don't have really any evidence of that. We have some evidence of maybe self-awareness. But like a dog can't wake up one day and decide, like, I no longer want to eat this thing. Like, they're just not capable of that. They can be trained, but that internal process isn't possible. So we're not defined by our biology as human beings.

and celibacy is a great example of that, right? So, like, people will be willfully celibate, and it's actually, like, works. So I think the biggest thing that is required is you have to understand that when you first start dating someone, things are going to be easy because the neurochemistry isn't in your favor. You're going to feel hornier.

You're going to feel more excited. You're learning about this person. There's going to be a lot of stuff that's working for you. So the factors work for you and work for the relationship. Over time, what starts to happen is you have to start working. You have to start doing the work. So over time, what feels natural, right, when y'all got together, and the first time you all had dinner and it was like, oh my God, this is so natural.

I'm like, this is a fit that was made in heaven. And over time, that wears out, right? And then you all have to start putting work into maintaining the relationship. So I think this is where a lot of people fall short is that relationship feels easy at the beginning. And then people will break up because it's starting to feel hard. This used to be so easy. And that's what happens to everybody.

It gets harder for everyone all the time. It's the people who recognize this is getting hard, and this requires my effort, and now I'm going to have to put intention into it. And once they solve those problems, that actually makes the relationship stronger. So when things get tough, like some people are like, this is not what I signed up for because it's very different from what it was early, right? Early on, you've got your honeymoon phase and you're willing to overlook all the red flags. But at some point, case and point of celibacy, right, there was a red flag. There was also failure on my part, a second red flag. but at some point, those things have to change.

And I think the biggest problem that I see in modern relationships is this attitude that, like, I don't have to be what someone else wants me to be. Like, I am perfect the way that I am. If you don't, if you can't accept me at my worst, you don't deserve me at my best. So there's like this weird attitude of like independence and radical acceptance, which I think leads to toxicity. And it's like, yeah, sorry, like this is just the way I am. Screw you.

If you don't like it, you can leave. But where do you find the balance in that between accepting a person for who they are and saying, this is just me versus knowing if that's something you need to work on? So it's beautiful because I don't think you need balance. I think what you need is both. So let's understand something about acceptance. So people will say like, you know, so acceptance is accepting where you are. And growth is about where you want to go.

So the pitfalls here are that some people don't actually accept their partner. So based on, so a simple example is, like, let's say like body count, okay? So whether it's high body count or low body count, like, I don't care. I'm not placing a value judgment, but some people will say, you know, you've had, like, so this is especially true of like men who have fewer sexual partners and especially substantially fewer sexual partners than their female partners. So they will feel insecure about it.

And they won't be able to accept. So there's some kind of like, even though they're dating, they're saying accepting things. Internally, they don't accept. And internally, they feel resentment. They feel shame. They feel some amount of like, you know, like, I should have been better or whatever. I don't know, whatever. So if you kind of look at that in that moment, this partner, even if you're dating this person,

you're not accepting them. Now, that's one thing. But change over time doesn't mean stativeness. In fact, it's the opposite. So if I'm working with someone who is, let's say, an alcoholic, the first step to change is acceptance. As long as you're in denial, you can't accept, as long as you're in denial, you can't grow at all. Right. So with Alcoholics Anonymous, it's like, hi, my name is Alok. I'm an alcoholic.

They start with acceptance. So I don't think that it's a balance between the two. I think one actually leads to the other. The problem is that we've started to think about acceptance is like carte blanche to do whatever you want. That's not what acceptance is. Acceptance is acknowledgement of the present circumstances. And then once you acknowledge what the present circumstances are like in my case, like I realize like, holy shit, this girl is not giving up on me. she deserves better, right? And there's two things that can happen when a dude has that thought. Number one is, oh my God, you're going to leave me, right?

You're going to leave me and you're going to find someone better because you deserve better and you don't deserve me. The second is, I'm going to become better. I'm going to become what you deserve. And it's when people start doing that when both parties do that in the relationship. I'm going to be what you deserve. I'm going to grow for the sake of this relationship. I'm going to get better.

It's not accept me at my worst. If you can't accept me at my worst, you don't deserve it. me at my best. It's that I'm grateful that you're accepting me at my worst and you deserve nothing less than the best 24-7 and that's what I'm moving towards. But you cannot do that unless you accept that there's a part of you that's shitty here and now. If we were to draft up a framework for someone to live like the most meaningful, fulfilling possible life now I know probably frameworks are the most productive thing because you can't really apply that to everybody. Let's just say this is what my take is and I want to hear what your thoughts are on it. There are three things.

which would be a consistent sleep schedule, diet, and exercise. I think those three things are extremely important. Those are the things that you need to nail, right? And then after that, I think that you can then go on to like more non-physical things, such as like practicing acceptance, practicing surrender and relinquishing desire, right? And then from there, potentially going on to the next thing, which would be crafting your environment to be conducive or conductive or whatever for who you are, like the things that you, like we discussed earlier in this conversation.

Would you agree with that in those steps, or would you say that's a little bit too rigid? I don't agree with those steps. And in a few moments, I think you're not going to agree with them either. So bear with me, okay? So you said, what's the foundation of your thing? I would say physical health, so like exercising, getting a consistent sleep schedule, and proper nutrition. Okay.

And then what's step two? Step two would then be the non-physical things, which I think could reasonably follow getting the foundation, right, which would be relinquishing desire. Relinquishing desire, practicing surrender. So let's say, let's take a case, okay? Yeah. So, and I apologize if my answer was arrogant. But so let's say that I have trouble sleeping. How do I take care?

How do I get a consistent sleep schedule? How do I get a consistent diet and how do I get consistent exercise? Well, the reasonable answer would be you probably need to exercise more throughout the day to make yourself tired enough to go to. to bed at night? Yeah, but how do I do that? Exercise? Yeah. It'd be the other pillar.

So it'd be like, I know, but how do I get myself? So like most people don't exercise regularly, don't sleep a full night and don't healthy night. Oh, so you're saying how do you get the motivation to start going? Yeah. Right? So you're saying those of the foundation, how is that foundation built?

Because we're presuming that it's not built, right? So people aren't doing this. Okay. Interesting. Okay. So I have heard plenty of different answers to such a question, which I think the most reasonable one would be just kind of just have to do it. And then doing it is hard.

Just have to do it is not a half. How? How do I do it? How do you go to sleep at a regular time and how do you exercise? So you gave me a how for sleep. Right. So you gave me a how for the sleep is the exercise regularly. Right. Setting standards for yourself.

So a lot of people set standards for myself. Shit, I set standards. But they don't follow them. Why not? Probably because they have a history of not following them. Okay. So where does it start? When the consequence of not following your standards does not properly, is not enough

to deter you from not following your standards in the first place. What is the subjective experience of that person? So let me put it a different way. Why doesn't someone eat healthy? Let's say I go out to a restaurant. I'm like, I should order a salad, but instead I get a burger. Right. I think a lot of it has to do with the consequences not being enough.

Okay. So but then the consequences aren't enough, right? So the consequences don't change. Right. So how am I going to change that? You can impose your own consequences, right? But then I guess how can you follow that? Yeah.

So which part of me imposes consequences? The thinking brain. So here's the crazy thing. Relinquishing desire is not what comes after exercise. Relinquishing desire is literally what is required for exercise. Okay. I don't want to exercise. I want to sit at home and play video games.

Conquering that desire is literally how you get to the gym. I don't want to go to bed. conquering that desire is how you go to bed. Okay, to use your own philosophy against you now, how would you then get the, what tools do you use in order to relinquish desire? It starts with awareness. Okay, how do you become aware?

You pay attention. How do you pay attention? Close your eyes. Okay. No, right now. What are you aware of? Your voice. Okay.

I'd say my hungry stomach. I would say my knee bouncing. That's how you do it. Okay. So I have become aware. Graham, you do this too. Close your eyes. What do you worry of?

My eyes being closed. Okay. What else? Your voice, me sitting in the chair, paranoia about the time. That's what I'm aware of. Okay, so now we are aware. So I want you all to notice something.

Open your eyes. So what happened to the, things that Graham was aware of over the stretch of the awareness exercise. So what happened is he became aware of more and more things and also subtler and subtler things. So it started with the physical, it became the mental. And then if he kept on noticing that awareness, he could even discover the origins of the paranoia. He could discover all kinds of things as he just increases his awareness. So don't be distracted.

No, it's to give yourself time to... Yeah. I think both of those are true, right? So don't be distracted. What I would say is don't be distracted as hard because you don't control your distraction. What you control is your intention towards awareness. Interesting. Okay. Right. Okay. So it was kind of like a little bit of like a conscious, like meditative state a little bit in a sense, right? Awareness. Awareness. Okay. Now you said actually on something that it doesn't matter if you are meditating all of the time. It matters the quality of the, not meditating, but let's say just say awareness, right? The quality of the awareness. How do you increase the quality of your awareness? So I think the biggest

mistake that people make with not increasing the quality of their awareness is that they follow a metric for meditation. So they say, I'm going to meditate for 15 minutes. I'm going to install an app on my phone. I'm going to set my timer. I'm going to force myself to sit down and meditate, which means I'm going to observe my breath. But what they're doing is checking a box. They're actually fulfilling a set of external conditions, which is closing my eyes using the timer. This is meditation. Meditation is not that. Meditation is awareness. So literally, it is being aware.

Right? So what are you aware of? You can start with that question. And this is why we have techniques. Right? So certain techniques will, so I'll give you all like, this technique is going to work

maybe better for you than for you. But if you chant Ome, you know how to chant Ome? No, just Ome. Okay. So Ome is chanted very simply. Okay, so I'm going to give you meditation technique. Is that cool?

Yeah. Okay. So Ome is not Ome. It's Ome. Ah, ooh, and um. So all it is is your mouth fully open. Ah. And then transition open as big as you can.

Ah. And then transition slowly to closed. Ah. Perfect. That is literally what Ome is. And this is why people are confused because I think O-M is O-M. It's not many people, if you look at the more authentic religious traditions, they will have A-U-M.

So if you chant Ome, you chant Ome seven times. And I want you to notice where you feel vibration in your body. Am I supposed to do this right now? No, not, man. It's just in the future, right? So people can do this at home, right? And it's really simple because you know how to chant home. It's perfect.

Just start with your mouth open, exhale, and then close your mouth gradually over time, and you're done. And where do I feel vibrations? Where do you feel vibrations, right? So for someone who's a vata like you, you're curious. You want answers, right? So if I give you an answer, what are you going to do that? It's probably test it and question it. Right, or reject it or compare it.

You're going to cite something else, but what about this, but what about this? But what about this? That shit ain't going to work for you. I can give you all the answers, not going to be enough. You'll enjoy it intellectually, but it's not going to change. It's not good. Yeah. That's funny.

Yeah. You'll get, it's intellectual masturbation is what it is. It feels good. It is. It really is. Yeah, but no one's going to get pregnant this way, right? We really want to change. So then what I'm going to do is I'm going to tell you.

And then if you're motivated, you can do it. If you're not motivated, you don't have to do it. If you're not motivated, you can go read a thousand books on motivation and find your motivation. You can do whatever the fuck you want with it. If you do this practice and you observe where the vibration is, you will discover something. And this is how we cultivate awareness. So depending on the person, depending on their temperament, depending on their cognition, depending on their personality.

This is the other problem with meditation is that everyone teaches the same thing because there was a master. And how did the master come up with the technique? The master came up with the technique because he understood the stuff or she understood the stuff. And she individualized particular techniques for their disciples. And then what happens is the disciples learn the technique and they mechanically teach it, which is why everyone is doing mindfulness and no one is.

getting enlightened. So what we do to increase your awareness is just do this, just observe. And as curiosity for you will help because now you're looking for something. And if I give you something to look for, then your mind is going to be focused. Okay. So we have to practice awareness via probably meditation. That's the simplest way, the best way. But if it doesn't work for you, you don't have to do it that way. There's awareness in other ways like when you get into that low state. Sure. Yeah. Okay. Right. Okay. And then that is what could then spur. Hopefully, like you realize internally that certain things would be better for you to do.

And then you don't have the desire to continue doing the things that are negative. Beautiful. Okay. Right. And how did you formulate that? Because you've done it. You realize that you used to have desires that controlled you. And then you had an internal revelation that changed your behavior.

It's not willpower. It's understanding. And that is why you ask people questions, right? Yes. So another good example of awareness raising is psychotherapy. Right? So we're asking questions in a particular way that raises someone's awareness. Like if you're working with a narcissist and they don't think they're not aware of other people's internal emotional state.

So by helping them become aware of that, then they're like, oh, wow, like this is crazy. Like we can cure narcissism. Like we can cure it. It's crazy. Permanently? Absolutely. Absolutely. Is it just giving them a set of tools?

I thought they were fully atrophied those parts of their brain, that you cannot connect those synapses. No, no, no, no, no, no. So if you look at something like borderline personality disorder, which I think is very similar to narcissism, narcissism is more common in men. Borderline personality disorder is more common in women. I want to say 95 to 99% of women with borderline personality disorder

are cured 16 years after diagnosis. 50% two years after. By what, real life or by psychotherapy? Both. So a lot of people, no longer qualify because as they, there's all kinds of nuances to that. So maybe the nature of the illness in the first place is that it's transitory, right? It's not that it's transitory, it's personality.

Right? So, and does personality change over time? Yeah. 100%. That's it. Can you cure depression? The scientific answer is probably not and we don't know. My instinct is absolutely.

For 51 plus percent of people is what my, what my, gut tells me. I tend to agree that. So my clinical experience, and that's based on clinical experience. So what I mean by that is how many people have walked into my office qualifying for a mood disorder like major depressive disorder, and how many of them, after completing treatment, are sustainably able to not qualify for that disorder without ongoing support. So if they complete a course of psychotherapy for like two years, let's say, or medication

or whatever. And then like five years later, if you measure them, do they have any depressive episodes? I would say 51% of people, 51 plus percent of people don't. And even if you look at the data on depression, the majority of people who have major depressive disorder, I think the, not the majority,

but the plurality of them have only one. Hearing him debate Hormosey on this would be insane. Oh, man, if we could. It was Hormosey. He's the guy that's coming on. Alex Ramosi, he is amazing. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

You want to say where people could find you? Sure. Besides the description. I'm Dr. Kay. So I run an organization called HealthyGamer HG. Healthygamer.G. Our YouTube channel is HealthyGamer underscore Gigi. I think those are like the best places to find us.

We're on all the platforms, but YouTube, Twitch, and website, this archaic thing. Thank you all so much. All links down below. Thank you guys so much for watching. Thank you for coming on and making this trip out here. That means a lot. I wish we had an extra hour. I wish we had extra several hours.

You guys want to see another one? Just comment down below. Just comment down below. We'll make it happen. Okay. If you make it to the very end, just let us know. We read all the comments and, I mean, we do a part two. Yeah, and depending on what y'all want for part two.

So the other thing I'll ask you all to comment is if you all want to go more solo and you all want to dive in, we can do that. But that I'll leave up to y'all. That'll be interesting. That sounds good. Thank you, guys. Until next time.