The One You Feed - Redefining Wealth: The Truth About Money & Happiness with Sahil Bloom

Episode Date: March 18, 2025

In this episode, Sahil Bloom explores the idea of redefining wealth and the truth about money and happiness. He also shares a different definition of wealth – one that goes beyond financial success and taps into time, purpose, and relationships. Learn how to start finding the balance between striving for more while appreciating what’s right in front of us. Key Takeaways: The trap of “more” and the power of “enough” Why time is your most valuable currency How to create a “Life Razor” that guides your biggest decisions The hidden cost of success and how to redefine it on your own terms How to balance ambition with presence and joy For full show notes, click here! If you enjoyed this episode with Sahil Bloom, check out these other episodes: Finding Joy in Your Relationship with Money with Elizabeth Husserl How Relationships Shape Our Happiness and Well-Being with Robert Waldinger How to Discover What Matters Most in Life with Tami Simon Connect with the show: Follow us on YouTube: @TheOneYouFeedPod Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify Follow us on Instagram See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If you are chasing more because you just want a bigger number on your scoreboard, you want more fancy things to try to impress other people for whatever reason, you are going to end up losing sight of the things that are more important along that journey. Welcome to The One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think ring true. And yet, for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear.

We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction. How they feed their good wolf. What if everything you've been told about wealth is missing the point? For years we've chased more. Money, success, achievement, only to find it doesn't always bring fulfillment.

Today's guest, Saul Hill Bloom, had everything society says should make you happy. But it wasn't until a quiet morning with his newborn son that he understood what true wealth feels like. So how do we balance striving for more with appreciating what's right in front of us? Can we redefine wealth beyond dollars and status? What happens when we start treating time as our most valuable currency? That's what we're going to explore today. I'm Eric Zimmer, and this is The One You Feed. Forty-five years ago, a Virginia soul band called The Edge of Daybreak recorded their debut album,

Behind Bars. Record collectors consider it a masterpiece. The band's surviving members are long out of prison, but they say they have some unfinished business. They had a daybreak, eyes of love, but supposed to have been following up with another app. Listen to Soul Incarcerated on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Reality TV and social media have love all wrong. So what really makes relationships last? On this episode of Dope Labs, poet and relationship expert, Young Pueblo breaks down the psychology of love and provides eye-opening insights and advice we all need. You should not be postponing your happiness. Your greatest happiness is not necessarily going to like

come from a relationship. Your partner should add to your happiness, but your happiness is really coming from within you. Listen to Dope Labs on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Are you hungry? Colleen Witt here and Eating While Broke is back for season four every Thursday on the Black Effect Podcast Network. This season, we've got a legendary lineup serving up broke dishes and even better stories. On the menu, we have Tony Baker, Nick Cannon,

Melissa Ford, October London, and Carrie Harper Howie turning Big Macs into big moves. Catch Eating While Broke every Thursday on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your favorite shows. Come hungry for season four. Hi, Sahil. Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for having me. Thrilled to be here. I'm really excited to talk with you about your new book, which is called The Five Types of Wealth, which is really a holistic way of looking at the different ways in our lives in which we can be wealthy. And I think it's interesting to look at A as a way of seeing where we might want to be more wealthy, but also as a way of really recognizing there's a lot of places we already are wealthy. And I think recognizing that is really important because self-improvement is part of the game,

but so is self-acceptance, you know, and appreciating what we have. And we're gonna get into all that after the parable, but let's start there. And in the parable, there's a grandparent who's talking with their grandchild and they say in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other is a bad wolf,

which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandchild stops bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandchild stops, they think about it for a second, they look up at their grandparent and they say, well, which one wins? And the grandparent says the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. It really is an important representation to me of a simple fact, which is that you have the power to choose. Each day we have a choice in which wolf we'll feed. We can feed the dark wolf and be filled with anger, fear, hate, jealousy, envy, or we can feed the light wolf and be filled with hope,

kindness, joy, love, optimism. And at the end of the day that choice is fundamentally yours. Wonderful. I'd like to start with a quote that you use at least once in the book, if not a couple of times, which is you say never let the quest for more distract you from the beauty of enough. Let's start there. I'm glad you pulled this out because this is such a fundamental and important concept to the entire book, the entire idea, and really my life in general. The genesis of this was a very personal experience, which was that shortly after my son was born, you know, after a two-plus-year journey with infertility that my wife and I had faced,

we were blessed with a little boy. And I was walking him around outside early one morning, and an old man came up to me on the street and said, I remember standing here with my newborn daughter. She's 45 years old now. It goes by fast. Cherish it. And I took my son home and I brought him into bed. My wife was still asleep and the son was kind of coming through the windows and he had this little smile on his face. And I just had this sensation that for the first time in my life, I had arrived. But there wasn't anything more that I wanted.

That moment was truly enough. And that was when that line came to me of never let the quest for more distract you from the beauty of enough. Because it is so easy in life to allow the things that you prayed for to become the things that you complain about. We see that over and over again in our own lives.

The house that we prayed for becomes the house that we complain is too small. The car that we prayed for becomes the car that we can't wait to trade in. The relationship we prayed for becomes the relationship with the person that we criticize. Today's version of more becomes tomorrow's version of not enough if we allow it to. If we don't stop, pause, catch ourselves, and pull ourselves back into that moment and recognize that sometimes you are literally living out your prayers. So that is what that quote, what that line is all about. To never allow that chase, that quest for the more, whatever it is, whatever more we're

searching for, to distract us, to pull us away from the beauty of enough in the present moment. Yeah, that's so beautifully said and so very true. We adapt to nearly anything and start to take it for granted and then you're even you know going a step further which is we then see it as a burden, which is a really fascinating thing and is a surefire way to never be happy in life. And so there's this balance and I think I've been exploring it on this show for a decade and I mentioned it kind of in the beginning and you're getting to it right in this question. How can I both strive for more, whether that be financially, in my relationships, etc. How can I do that? Because I do think

that's a natural human thing. It seems built into us. And also be satisfied with exactly where I am. And doing both those things is, at the same time, turns out to be the thing that's an art far more than it's a science. The fundamental tension there is an important one to wrestle with. And the way that I wrestle with it is to say that the quest for more needs to be grounded in the right things. It is dangerous if it is about something as surface level as money or fancy things. If you are chasing more because you just want a bigger number on your scoreboard,

you want more fancy things to try to impress other people for whatever reason, you are going to end up losing sight of the things that are more important along that journey. If you are chasing more because it's your purpose to go and build something big, because you really feel fundamentally that you want to grow that you want to develop yourself You're trying to get better at the things that you're working on. That is a very well grounded and Important pursuit and there's nothing wrong with that one where it goes awry for people and where they lead themselves on the road to the Rich yet miserable existence that we know a lot of people are living is when that chase for more is just about these things like money or fancy things. I agree with you that

that's a fundamental distinction and I have found even in my own life, even if my striving for more is pointed in the right direction, you know, I want to become a kinder person or you know it's about growing this show, which is kind of the way that I try and put love into the world, that even within there, I can get caught in this more, more, more, which pulls me out of the moment. So I think what you're saying is first off,

we've got to be really clear about what we're striving for. And if that's misguided, we're always going to be off track. And then the second part comes to even when I'm on the right track, how do I relate to being on that track? And how do I relate to being on a journey that, you know, there's not a destination on? Yeah, I think that this comes back to a really beautiful quote. I believe it's Viktor Frankl who said that our power exists in the space that we can create between stimulus and response. And that concept of space is really essential to the whole book. It's one of the pillars of what I think of as mental wealth is the ability to create space. And the reason that space is so important is because that is where you actually get to choose your response.

To go back to the wolves parable, the ability to choose every single day, you actually need to have the space to choose. You need to be able to stop and pause so that you can choose your response. Which wolf are you going to feed? The same applies to this never-ending chase. If you're able to pause on a daily basis and appreciate the things that you have

while still pursuing the things that you don't that are grounded hopefully in the right reasons, that is where you find your sort of Goldilocks, like your sweet spot from a life standpoint. I think it was Kurt Vonnegut in 1997, he gave a commencement speech at Rice University, and he talks about his uncle Alex, who had this tendency when things were going nice and the day was really pretty out,

he would just stop, he would pause and he would look up at the sky and he would say, if this isn't nice, what is? And that idea of forcing yourself to pause and appreciate those moments, literally say it out loud, say if this isn't nice, what is? On a more regular basis, I guarantee you will find new joy in the journey in your life Yeah, vaudegette also has that classic story about enough of where he's at a party with Joseph Heller the author of catch 22 and they're looking around and seeing all these people who have way more than they do and Joseph Heller basically I think I'm paraphrasing says something like yeah, but I have something they don't, which is I know what enough is. Yeah, exactly. The knowledge that I've got enough, it sort of all relates to one of my

favorite stories of the fisherman and the investment banker. I don't know if you've ever heard this, but this investment banker goes down to an old Mexican fishing village and he comes across this old boat and the fisherman is in the boat and has caught a few fish and the banker says how long did it take you to catch those fish and the fisherman says only a little while and the banker asks why didn't you fish for longer? The fisherman says well I have everything I need in the morning I fish for a little while then I go home I have lunch with my wife then I take a nap and then in the evening I go into town and sing and dance with my friends and the the banker's like, you got this all wrong.

What you need to do is you need to fish for longer so you can catch more fish. Then you can buy a second boat. Then that boat will make money. You buy a third boat, a fourth boat, a fifth boat. Eventually you build a fishing boat enterprise. You move to the big city. You take the company public and you'll make millions.

And the fisherman says, and then what? And the banker says, and then what? And the banker says, and then what? Then you can retire and move to a small fishing village. You can fish for a little while in the morning, and then you can go home, you can have lunch with your wife, take a nap, and in the evening go into town and play music and dance with your friends. And the fisherman kind of just smiles and walks off.

And that story, it's interesting, is common interpretation is to say that the banker is wrong and the fisherman is right. I actually think it's more nuanced than that. I really think this is about the two of them having a fundamentally different definition of what enough looks like. The banker may be grounded in this purpose

of building something big, creating jobs, creating this growth, pursuing his definition. And he's trying to apply that map of reality to the fisherman's terrain, which is fundamentally very different. The fisherman is already living his enough life. And so for the two to be seen as in conflict is very interesting because that's what happens

when we spend all of our time on our phones, comparing our lives to other people. We start getting obsessed with someone else's life and starting to apply their map to our reality, which is a recipe for discontentment. Absolutely. I had an experience of this not too long ago. We spend a lot of time in Atlanta. My partner Ginny is from there. And I'll be driving around Buckhead and one of the most noticeable things about certain areas of town are the houses are enormous on these giant plots of land. Like it's a lot of money that you just see kind of right out there. And if I spend enough time driving around there, my brain starts

going like, gosh, shouldn't I, maybe I should have a house like that. Why don't I have enough money to have a house like that? And then at the same moment as I was thinking that, I turned my attention back to what I was listening to on the radio and it was a band called the Gaslight Anthem. They're kind of a punk type band a little bit. And then it reminded me of like what my ethos actually is. And I was just able to see right in that moment how easily I was getting turned away from my ethos to buy what I was surrounded by and what was attractive and I needed help to be reminded of where my true values are and I think that's kind of what you're

speaking to here and the and the problem is sometimes we don't get those reminders often enough and so we just get more and more sucked into this idea of someone else's success. Yeah, and it's so governed by the environment that you are in, the people that you're surrounded by. I will say anecdotally, my friends that live in New York City or Los Angeles struggle with this much more than my friends who live in a small town in the suburbs. It is very much like a cultural indoctrination.

If you're surrounded by people who measure their worth in terms of how expensive their kids' school is or how many weekends they get to spend in the Hamptons or what charter plane they're taking to X, Y, or Z, it is very, very difficult to opt out of that game when you're surrounded by it. The environments that we operate in really do govern our reality. They really shape the way that we view the world.

I have often said to people that your environment that you spend time in, it's a two-way feedback loop because you shape your environments for sure, but your environments then in turn are shaping you. You really want the environment that you operate in to be a reflection of your core values because it will be very difficult for you if the two are in tension. Yeah, and I think a lot of people find themselves in this spot. I know a lot of our listeners certainly do because I've just heard from enough of them and worked with enough of them over the years where they've achieved some degree of conventional success, at least in the way that like they've got a home, they've got retirement savings, they've

had children. And then somewhere in there, something wakes up in them and starts desiring more. And yet they're firmly embedded in this place that had these different values. Rightfully so, they're very hesitant to be like, well, I'm just gonna blow my whole life up here, right? Because they may have a good family and a wonderful spouse, but they need something else. And I think that's why it can be so helpful

to try and seek out, even in smaller doses, people who align with your values. It's so important in being able to stay the course with anything, I think. Yeah. I mean, the people you surround yourself with fundamentally determine your outcomes. There is clear scientific evidence that the expectations of the people that you surround yourself with actually determine whether you are kind of rising or falling to meet those expectations. The Pygmalion effect is the name of this psychological phenomenon whereby we rise to the level of

the expectations that others have for us. So if you're surrounded by people who believe you are capable of more and sort of lift you up, you will actually rise to meet those expectations. But similarly, if you're surrounded by people who make you feel bad, who put you down, who tell you you don't have enough or who show you feel bad, who put you down, who tell you you don't have enough or who show you that with their actions or their behaviors, you will fall to the level of those expectations and the way that you engage with the world. And it is fundamentally a call to action to be very, very careful about the people that

you allow into your energy, into your reality, because they really will have a profound impact on your happiness or misery in life. Let's talk through that in a little bit more depth. I'm curious how you would think about this because you clearly value family and loyalty to family to some degree. And so let's take my scenario where somebody is middle-aged at this point, and they find themselves surrounded by maybe their family and people that maybe do have lower expectations or don't support their values. And yet one of their core values is to be of support and love to the people that are

around them. You know, how would you go about thinking about honoring those two values? One which says, hey, I do recognize that the people that I'm around affect my trajectory. And one of my values is I don't only see the people in my life that I love as an instrument for making me more successful. neutral force in your life versus a truly net negative in your life. And at the end of the day, the person that you need to be most loyal to is yourself. And I don't mean that in the sense that you just, you know, cast everyone else off and you're like, you know, fundamentally selfish, but you do need to protect yourself in certain ways from people who consistently drain you and pull you down. And the way that you do that does not have to be cutting people off.

The most traditional way that people talk about this is like, oh, if you have a family member that treats you poorly, you have to just cut them off, never see them again. And that's easier said than done. And it's frankly unrealistic in a lot of cases. Like, I have family members who have not been a positive force in my life. Fortunately, not direct blood relatives,

but family members who I see at every holiday or close family friends who are the same. And the way that I always advise people to manage that, which is the way that I have come to terms with it, is just because you are around someone physically does not mean you have to open up to them energetically or spiritually, if you believe in that You can be closed off to someone if you know that someone is a toxic force on your life

If you know that they happen to say things that are negative or they put you down in certain ways You don't have to open up to allow them to put the knife in and by the way, this is the reason that scientifically ambivalent relationships Relationships that are sometimes supportive and loving and sometimes demeaning, are actually more negative for your health than purely toxic ones. This has been shown over and over again, like that you know you put someone up on stage to give a talk. If the audience is purely toxic versus if the audience is ambivalent, sometimes booing, sometimes cheering, the

blood pressure spikes and stress levels of the speaker actually are worse when the audience is ambivalent because it opens you up when they're really nice and so then the knife on the demeaning part really hurts the toxicity. And I think that with relationships and family members that really applies. We need to really monitor who and how they are impacting our energy in those ways so that we can create those level of boundaries that just allow us to continue in our own flow. Yeah, that's such a great point and

I agree ambivalent relationships like that are really difficult to sort out because sometimes they're good and you're like okay this is great and then sometimes they're really bad and you're like oh oh, God, maybe, you know, if it was just always bad, it would be clear what to do. You'd be like, all right, you know, I really need to minimize my time with this person or, you know, put them out of my life. And if it were only good, you wouldn't be having to struggle. I think that so many things in life we end up with ambivalence about and that ambivalence

is really challenging. Yeah, absolutely. Completely agree. I sort of ascribe to the wisdom that you should give everyone a second chance but never a third. And I think that that is kind of a healthy way to approach these things when it comes to relationships and when it comes to relationships that are sort of on the edge for you in your life. Life is too short to allow people into your energy that are truly a consistent

negative force over and over again. The first time someone's that way, I personally default to empathy. I assume a person's having a bad day. Even when I encounter a stranger and they do something that is sort of negative, like treat you in a certain way, it's like something is going on in this person's life that caused them to act this way. Give someone a little bit of grace. But when it becomes a consistent pattern, it's no longer something that's just a one-off. So I want to get into the different types of wealth here in a second. But before I do, I'd love to talk about the life-raiser. Tell me what the life-raiser is.

So the life-raiser is this concept of having a simple, single statement that is an identity defining rule for your life. A razor, just as a term, is a sort of rule of thumb that allows you to simplify decision making. So a life razor is a rule of thumb that allows you to simplify decision making across your entire life. The way that I articulated in the book

is best brought to life through a story, which is Mark Randolph, the first CEO, the founder, co-founder of Netflix, has this thing that he has talked about and written about in the past, that throughout his entire technology career, he had a hard rule that on Tuesdays at 5 p.m., he was leaving the office to go out on a date with his wife.

And he talks about the fact to go out on a date with his wife. And he talks about the fact that what he is most proud of from his entire career, which founded all of these incredible companies, built these incredible things, is not that he achieved those amazing successes, but that he was able to do that while still remaining married to the same woman and having kids who, as far as he can tell, love to spend time with him. And I thought that it was such an interesting thing after I spoke to him and reflecting on it,

because what I understood was that it didn't really have anything to do with any one date or the date in and of itself. It had everything to do with the identity that it established in his life, that he was the type of person that never missed a 5 p.m. Tuesday dinner with his wife. It means something about how he shows up in the world and it sends a clear signal, ripples, to everyone around

him about the things that he holds most dear and about the way that he is going to show up in these different situations in his life. To all have our own version of that Tuesday 5 p.m. dinner rule, some single identity-defining statement for your own life that allows you to cut through the noise in the various situations that you encounter is very powerful. So on my desk, I have a little sheet of paper that says, I will coach my son's sports teams. That is my life raiser. That is the idea that I am going to be the type of husband, type of father, type of community

member, type of individual who is always going to put those things first, who is going to be the type of husband, type of father, type of community member, type of individual who is always going to put those things first. Who is going to make sure that whatever decisions I have to make in life, they are not going to come into conflict with that ideal version of myself, how that version shows up in the world. Love at first swipe? I highly doubt it. What's your biggest red flag? No, no, no. What's your biggest red flag? No, no, no. What's your ultimate green flag?

These days, reality TV and social media have us thinking love is instant. We're marrying strangers at first sight, we're finding love through walls, or we're even judging people by balloon pops. But what really makes a relationship last? On this episode of Dope Labs, poet, author, and relationship expert Young Pueblo breaks down the psychology and biology of loving better, and he provides eye-opening insights and advice that we all need. It's a big realization moment that you should not be postponing your happiness. Like your greatest happiness is not necessarily going to like come

from a relationship. Your partner, they should add to your happiness, but your happiness is not necessarily going to like come from a relationship. Your partner, they should add to your happiness, but your happiness is really coming from within you. Listen to Dope Labs on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey y'all, it's your girl, Cheeky's, and I'm back with a brand new season of your favorite podcast Cheeky's and Chill. I'll be sharing even more personal stories with you guys. And I know a lot of people are going to attack me. Why are you going to go visit your dad? Your mom wouldn't be okay with it.

I'm going to tell you guys right now, I know my mother and I know my mom had a very forgiving heart. That is my story on plastic surgery. This is my truth. I think the last time I cried like that was when I lost my mom. Like that, like yelling. I was like, no. I was like, oh, and I thought, what did I do wrong? And as always, you'll get my exclusive take on topics like love, personal growth, health, family ties, and more. And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies. So my fiance and I have been together for 10 years.

In the first two years of being together, I find out he is cheating on me not only with women, but also with men. What should I do? Okay, where do I start? That's not love. He doesn't love you enough because if he loved you he'd be faithful. It's going to be an exciting year and I hope that you can join me. Listen to Cheeky's and Chill Season 4 as part of the My Kultura podcast network

available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Pod of Rebellion, our new Star Wars Rebels rewatch podcast. I'm Vanessa Marshall. Hi, I'm Tia Sircar. I'm Taylor Gray. And I'm John Lee Brody. But you may also know us as Harrison Dula, Spectre 2. Tabin Wren, Spectre 5.

And Ezra Bridger, Spectre 6 from Star Wars Rebels. Wait, I wasn't on Star Wars Rebels. Am I in the right place? Absolutely. Each week, we're going to rewatch and discuss an episode from the series and share some fun behind the scenes stories. Sometimes we'll be visited by special guests like Steve Blum, voices Zabarelio, Spectre 4, or Dante Bosco, voice of Jaiquel, and many others. Sometimes we'll even have a live way debate and we'll have plenty of other fun surprises and trivia too. Oh uh and me? Well I'm the lucky ghost crew Stowaway who gets to help

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So, I love this idea of a life-raiser and I have one of my own. I want to dig a little deeper here though. I'd love to see how you think about this, right? Like, you'll coach your son's sports teams. It's a good overall framing. But even with that clarity, you're going to be faced with lots of decisions about where time goes. Right? Do I put it towards one of my professional pursuits? Do I put it towards my son's development? And you're not always going

to choose your son's development. Because if you take that to its extent, you could spend your entire life doing nothing but focusing on your child, which it would be fine. How do you think about applying that? Like the Netflix guy's rule was pretty straightforward. Like I just have to make sure for an hour and a half on Tuesday I show up. There's a lot of latitude around that. How do you think about taking that I will coach my son's sports team and practically applying it as you go through your day to day life? To me it is about the statement about the type of person you are.

I mean my son is two and a half so he's not even on sports teams yet so this is very much a wide latitude statement for me. No, no. And I'm far from that type of parent because my parents weren't like that with me. But this is about the type of person that I believe I am when I show up as my best self. Let's take an example. Someone comes to me and offers me a new business opportunity. And I'm looking at it, and it's exciting.

They're going to pay me a bunch of money. But it's going to require me to be on planes for 100 days out of the year going around and doing a bunch of things. I can look at this card and say, well, this seems exciting. But what does the type of person who coaches his son's sports teams do in these situations? Well, I probably can't be away that much and still be the type of person who will be there

for my family in this way. So that means I might need to go back and adjust the opportunity. It doesn't mean I'm just going to blanket say no to it. But maybe I need to make adjustments to the construct of how it exists. Similarly, if someone comes and offers me a bunch of money, but it might jeopardize my integrity or morals the way that we're going to be making it, it's a hard

no. I can immediately look at this and just say, there's no way because I cannot jeopardize my relationship with my son or wife because for me to coach that team, that's not just my choice. That's his choice that he wants to have me around. That's my wife's choice that she's proud to have me out in the community with other people, so I cannot take actions that would jeopardize that if I'm the type of person who does these things. So it's really important to understand the ripples

that that one statement creates into other areas. And in Mark's example of the 5 p.m. Tuesday dinner, yes, it's just this dinner. It also creates a ripple to all of his employees because his employees see the CEO of the company creating these boundaries and prioritizing his family and having a life outside of work. Well, they're empowered to now do something similar. It's not to say that, you know, if you're a junior person you can do the exact

same thing, but they can create something because they know that there's a core value now and that makes them more loyal to the company. That makes them want to stick around and work together and it creates value for everybody involved. So it's really those ripples that extend off that single statement that become very interesting. Yeah, I love that idea. That is really good. And I also love the idea of having a statement. Because life happens fast, it

gets confusing, and having something that's that always at hand can be so valuable. Mine is just that I try and leave every situation, whether that a person, a place, better than I found it. Like that's just kind of my life raiser, just sort of orients me in general. Doesn't solve every decision making quandary I come up with, but it does point me in a direction and it's simple enough that it consistently can be useful. I love that one. That's a very, very good one.

Yeah, there's several examples in the book that I go through from people in sort of different walks of life. And that's a really important piece to this idea of the life raiser too, to recognize that your life raiser will change across the different seasons of your life. And that's a really important piece to this idea of the life-raiser too, to recognize that your life-raiser will change across the different seasons of your life. You know, my son is young now, this is clearly a key focus. When he goes to college or when our children are no longer in the house, it obviously doesn't

serve in quite the same way. So recognizing and assessing, sort of pressure testing, whether the life-raiser that you have is still one that suits the stage that you're in in life, is also just a healthy kind of natural process over and over again. Before we dive back into the conversation, let me ask you something. What's one thing that has been holding you back lately? You know that it's there. You've tried to push past it, but somehow it keeps getting in the way. You're not alone in this and I've identified six major saboteurs of self control. Things like autopilot behavior, self-doubt, emotional escapism that quietly derail our best intentions. But here's the good news, you can outsmart

them and I've put together a free guide to help you spot these hidden obstacles and give you simple, actionable strategies that you can use to regain control. Download the free guide now at whenyoufeed.net slash ebook and take the first step towards getting back on track. My son is now 26, so if he was your son's age, I might have a very different focus. The stage of life I'm in and the stage of life you're in are very different.

Yeah, I think that's exactly right. So we just alluded a little bit to stages of life and how you spend your time in different stages of life might be different. So let's move on to the first type of wealth that you talk about, which is time wealth. And my favorite part from this is just this very simple question, would you trade lives with Warren Buffett? Talk to me about that question because that is such a great and illuminating question. I love asking young people this question. It is such a simple articulation of a very important point, which is that time is your most precious asset. If I ask a young person,

would you trade lives with Warren Buffett? It's a hard-charging young person just starting their career. And I tell them he's worth a hundred thirty billion dollars. He flies around on a Boeing business jet. He has access to anyone in the world. He basically reads and learns for a living. Sounds pretty good, but you would never trade lives with him for one simple reason. He is 95 years old. There's no way that you should agree to trade the amount of time that he has left for all the money in the world.

And on the flip side, he would do anything to be 22 again. He would give up every single dollar that he has to be 22 and to have the amount of time that you have. So in that articulation, what you're recognizing is that your time has quite literally incalculable value, incalculable value. And yet on a daily basis, are you really wasting it? I mean, we're spending all this time scrolling on our phones,

comparing ourselves to other people, stressing about the past, anxiety about the future, all of these things that are fundamentally disrespecting this one most precious asset that we have, the one asset that we can never get back once it's gone. I love that question too because you first hear it and you think, well, of course I would, until you get to the 97, you know,

he's 97 years old piece. And I think then it kind of wakes you up to this idea. And as you were talking, I was thinking a little bit about, you know, we talk about spending time. If we really applied that idea of spending time the way we did money, there's a lot of ways I spend my time that I would not spend money on. It's really interesting to think about.

Like I do this thing, but would I pay to do that thing? Of course I wouldn't. That's a really interesting way of thinking about it. I've actually never articulated it that way in my mind, but it is an important framing. It is just really interesting what changes you start to make when you recognize that time is really the thing that you have. And that all of these moments, these windows of time are actually in a little bit more of your control than you think. That is a really important piece is to just recognize that you can actually create time

for the things or with the people that you really care about in your life. You can make decisions, you can take actions that actually create more of these moments with the people that you want to spend time with or For the things that you really enjoy for the experiences that you really want to have you can take actions that Fundamentally create time in that sense and once you realize that you start living differently in a lot of ways But it all comes from that awareness of the fact that time is the really precious asset, not the money. Right. And I think there's a second level to this. The first level is being intentional about where I put my time. I think the second level is being intentional about what I bring to the things I'm doing. And this gets back to where we started. You said, you know, certain

things that we used to pray for, we now see as a burden, right? It can be easy when you're trapped in the, just the word I use there describes the mind state that we're in, even though I don't believe in that word in this way, with your two-year-old for four hours. And it can begin to feel overwhelming. So your time is in the right place, but what you're bringing to that time is also an important part of what makes that time valuable or non valuable I think what you're hitting on is a really important concept Which is that your ability to direct your attention and energy into the moments or windows of time that really matter is

Where you achieve the greatest successes and outcomes in life There are these particular windows of time during which certain people or certain opportunities present themselves and they are weightier, they are more textured than others. The ancient Greeks actually had two different words for time. They had chronos, which was the idea of chronological, kind of linear quantitative time, and then they had kairos, which was the idea that not all time is created equal, that there are certain moments or windows that have more texture, that have more meaning or more importance.

And your ability to direct attention or energy into those is actually amplified in terms of the outcomes that you can create. So those moments with certain people that are really important, those business opportunities that are time sensitive that if you just lean into and really sprint at, you can generate these incredible outcomes for your life. It's sort of like the Lionel Messi version of playing soccer where he walks around the field the entire game

and then he sprints in the exact right moment to achieve the incredible outcome that he's going for. It's taking the approach of that to life rather than the consistent jog, finding those moments of time and deploying your attention and energy into them. I wanna do a thought experiment here with you, which is the business stuff I totally get, right?

Like this is the time you go hard. If we're talking about time with family, let's say you recognize that the first 10 years of your son's life, you call them, I that the first 10 years of your son's life, you call them, I think, the magic years. I've always said the glory years of parenting are like five to 11. But you're right, the first 10 years are so critical. You can't just pick a couple of moments to sprint there, right? Because that would be the equivalent of what, you know, people call the Disneyland dad, right? You drop in and you take your kid to

Disneyland and you create these great moments but day to day your wife is doing kind of all of the work and one of the things that I found is that sometimes training my attention in non-important moments to be prepared for the important moments is valuable I mean I think in many ways this is what meditation is. Meditation, I think, is training your attention in a moment that theoretically isn't that important, right? Because you're just sitting there with the goal, at least my goal, is the ability to actually really inhabit the important moments. I love that articulation, training your attention in the unimportant moments for the important moments. I love that articulation. Training your attention in the unimportant moments for

the important moments. It's not dissimilar from my articulation of the reason we do hard things. I am an avid cold plunger, way past the point where it's no longer trendy like it once was. And the reason I believe in doing that is because I fundamentally believe that when you take on voluntary struggle, you are more well equipped for the involuntary struggle that inevitably comes into your life and you're sort of articulating the same thing when it comes to these moments which I love. I do tend to think of life more on a season basis than on a day's basis and I think that balance as a concept, attention as a concept is actually more well thought

of on a kind of waves versus specific tiny moments like the Disneyland trip. Because that is a really helpful framing, at least for me, that has provided a lot of comfort and it's provided a lot of security in how we think about our sun and this journey. I mean, like just to be fully transparent, the last three, four months, I've been in a season of unbalance, like truly sprinting to put these ideas out into the world that I care deeply about, that I think are going to impact a lot of people.

And being able to do that without stress and anxiety, knowing that it is in service of a season of balance to come. That my wife and I are going to be able to zoom out and spend tons of time together with our son, present moments, energy there, because of the fact that I sprinted and really leaned into this thing

and was able to create that. That is a really important reframing of these things because what it tells you is that you don't have to stress over a lack of balance in the days, as long as you understand on the zoomed out view that you're working towards the balance in the seasons. I agree a hundred percent with that idea because people talk about work-life balance and I think when you look at it in short chunks you might see that it's really out of balance if you're looking at a day or a week

You know if your kid is sick that week may be way more child than work because you're at home And you know you've taken days off to take care of the child and suddenly work is out of balance But I think the trick comes like I think you've been real intentional about okay Once I get through this time, which is a book launch, right? A book launch demands a ton out of someone. Once I get on the other side of that, I'm going to be very intentional about how I'm rebalancing this. I think the problem that a lot of people fall into, and I did this, I think for a number of years, was I kept believing that just on the other side of this project, I was in the software world.

Once we get this release out, then I'm going to dial it back. And the reality was, particularly if someone else is setting your priorities, like the gas pedal is all the way down all the time. And so I think in those situations, it did become more important to recognize, like, okay, I have to watch a little bit closer that I don't get stuck in the belief that, okay, I'll balance this out later. And the next thing you know, three years have gone by.

Later is the most dangerous word in the dictionary. We say, I'll spend more time with my kids later. I'll spend more time with my partner or my friends later. I'll invest in my health later. I'll find my freedom and purpose later. And the sad thing is that later just becomes another word for never. Because those things are not going to exist in the same way later. Your kids are not going to be five years old later. Your partner, your friends won't be there for you later if you're not there for them now. Your health won't be there for you

later if you don't invest in it now. You won't magically wake up with freedom and purpose later if you don't build those things now. And so the idea is that you have to design these things into your life in some tiny way today. It doesn't have to be dramatic. We know that life has seasons and you're not going to be able to massively focus on all of these things at all points in time, but they need to be designed in in some tiny way on a daily basis otherwise you'll just end up regretting it later. Love at first swipe? I highly doubt it. What's your biggest red flag? No, no, no. What's your ultimate green flag? These days, reality TV and social media have us thinking love is instant. We're marrying

strangers at first sight, we're finding love through walls, or we're even judging people by balloon pops. But what really makes a relationship blast? On this episode of Dope Labs, poet, author, and relationship expert, Young Pueblo, breaks down the psychology and biology of loving better. And he provides eye-opening insights and advice that we all need. It's a big realization moment that you should not be postponing your happiness. Your greatest happiness is not necessarily going to come from a relationship.

Your partner, they should add to your happiness, but your happiness is really coming from within you. Listen to Dope Labs on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey y'all, it's your girl, Chikis. podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hey y'all, it's your girl, Cheeky's and I'm back with a brand new season of your favorite podcast, Cheeky's and Chill. I'll be sharing even more personal stories with you guys. And I know a lot of people are going to attack me. Why are you going to go visit your dad?

Your mom wouldn't be okay with it. I'm going to tell you guys right now, I know mother. And I know my mom had a very forgiving heart. That is my story on plastic surgery. This is my truth. I think the last time I cried like that was when I lost my mom. Like that, like yelling. I was like, no.

I was like, oh, and I thought, what did I do wrong? And as always, you'll get my exclusive take on topics like love, personal growth, health, family ties, and more. And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies. So my fiance and I have been together for 10 years. In the first two years of being together, I find out he is cheating on me, not only with women, but also with men.

What should I do? Okay, where do I start? That's not love. He doesn't love you enough, because if he loved you, he'd be faithful. It's going to be an exciting year, and I hope that you can join me. Listen to Cheekies and Chill, season four,

as part of the My Kultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Pod of Rebellion, our new Star Wars Rebels rewatch podcast. I'm Vanessa Marshall. Hi, I'm Tia Sircar. I'm Taylor Gray.

And I'm John Lee Brody. But you may also know us as Harrison Dula, Spectre 2. Tabin Wren, Spectre 5. And Ezra Bridger, Spectre 6 from Star Wars Rebels. Wait, I wasn't on Star Wars Rebels. Am I in the right place? Absolutely. Each week we're going to rewatch and discuss an episode from the series. And share some fun behind the scenes stories. Sometimes we'll be visited by special guests like Steve Blum, voice of Zabarelio Spectre 4, or Dante Bosco, voice of Jai Kell, and many

others. Sometimes we'll even have a Live Way debate. And we'll have plenty of other fun surprises and trivia too. Oh, and me? Well, I'm the lucky ghost crew Stowaway who gets to help moderate and guide the discussion each week. Kind of like how Kanan guided Ezra in the ways of the Force. You see what I did there? Nicely done, John. Thanks, Tia.

So hang on, because it's going to be a fun ride. Cue the music! Listen to Potter Rebellion on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You talk about these five types of wealth. I'm just going to put them out there just real quick. Time wealth, social wealth, mental wealth, physical wealth, and financial wealth. But you have a concept in there of we tend to think about these things as like I'm investing in this or I'm not.

And you talk about trying to take a dimmer switch approach to these five different areas of wealth. I think this piggybacks on what you just said. Talk to me about that mentality. I'm glad you brought this up because I do think that this is probably the single most important idea to understand in your own life, for building the life you want.

The traditional wisdom around creating change in your life is that you have to pick an area that you're gonna focus on. You turn the light switch on and then every other area of your life gets turned off while you focus on the one. So if I'm going to be trying to build my career, build my finances, I turn that switch on and too bad relationships, too bad health, too bad mental health, those all get switched

off and I'm just going to be hard charging. And we actually pat a lot of people on the back for saying things like that. We say like, oh, obsession is good and grit, and like we use all these positive words for sacrificing all these other areas of your life to build the one. I fundamentally reject the idea that you have to do that. All of these areas of your life exist on dimmer switches. And you can and probably should have one area turned up,

that is the area that you are focusing on during this season of your life, but it doesn't mean the other ones are turned off. It just means they're gonna be turned down. And the important point here is that down is infinitely better than off. Because anything above zero compounds positively. We know that when it comes to money,

if you put $50 or $100 in the S&P 500 today, that's better than zero because it's going to stack up and compound over long periods of time. The exact same thing applies to these other areas of your life. Your relationships, sending the one text to the friend when you're thinking about them is better than doing nothing. Going for the 10-minute walk is better than doing nothing. But what happens is that ambitious people allow optimal to get in the way of beneficial.

So they say, oh, I don't have an hour to work out, so I'm just not going to work out. I don't have an hour to go on a coffee date with this friend, so I'm just not going to talk to them. That is the worst mentality. That is the light switch being turned off. And if you allow those light switches to be off for too long, you can't turn them back on or they will be very difficult to turn back on. So what we need to do is just have them down low.

Design a tiny investment on a daily basis in those areas, into your life on a daily basis. Send the text to the friend when you think about them. Call your mom for two minutes in the car. Get the group together for the annual trip once a year. Do the 15-minute walk even when you don't really feel like it. Journal for three minutes in the evening, breathe for three minutes in between meetings.

Whatever those tiny things are, they stack wins because anything above zero compounds. I love that line, anything above zero compounds. I used to say to coaching clients all the time, a little bit of something is better than a lot of nothing. It's this core idea. The other thing that I think speaks to why this is such a useful strategy is that these things tend to amplify each other, right? Like if you are taking good care of your physical health or decent care of it and your mental

health, your professional world is probably going to do better. So again, I think there's these ways that not only are they each important individually, they work together to a certain extent. I have a friend, Jonathan Fields, he wrote a book a number of years ago. The main idea was we have these different areas of life buckets similar to what you're talking about and that the lowest level of one of them can end up being a cap on all the others if you're not careful. I love that. I have often thought about that in the context of physical wealth, you know, your health, that the reason I harp on it so much, the reason I think it's so important

is because it is a catalyst for all of the other types of wealth. When you take an action in your physical wealth and you see an outcome, that rewires your brain to remind yourself that you are capable of creating change in your world, that you are capable of doing something and getting the desired outcome. That has ripple effects into everything else that you do because you start to see yourself that way, you start to recognize that you are capable. So if you're ever feeling down and you start doing that, you start to remind yourself of that fact, suddenly you have this new energy to go and take on other things because you recognize that you have that power.

You remind yourself of that power that you have. I agree and for me exercise is sort of this keystone type habit, right? And it is because of what you just said but it's also because doing it actually does give me more energy. And that energy then can be deployed to these different areas of wealth, right? If I have enough energy, then I'll go out after dinner to see a friend versus just collapsing on the couch and watching Netflix,

if I have energy to do it. And so for me, that is the keystone that unlocks a lot of other things. That's absolutely right. Completely agree. All right. Let's move on to social wealth for a minute, which again, I love this idea of just having a question that anchors this whole thing, which is who will be sitting in the front row at your funeral. And this comes from an exercise I learned it in the seven habits of highly effective people like 25 years ago, where you imagine your funeral. And this comes from an exercise I learned it in the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People like 25 years ago,

where you imagine your funeral and you imagine what people get up and say about you as a way of orienting what's important to you. But you've given it a slightly different spin. So talk to me about this front row idea. The idea is to visualize your funeral, but not in a morbid sense, in an empowering one. Which is to say, at your funeral there will be a lot of people that will show up, and certain people will sit down in the front row. The recognition that those people hold a very special place in your world. And the recognition that you need to ask yourself whether or not you are cherishing those people, whether you are cherishing your front row people, making sure that they know that special place that they hold in your world, and whether you are being a front row person to someone

else out there. Yeah, I love that idea. I love the funeral thing in general, because it allows you to step back from your life and think about what's important. But I had never thought of it in this sort of front row way of really thinking about who would be in that for us. And also, I love what you said where it's, am I being a front row kind of person? Am I being the sort of person that would deserve to sit in the front row for these people?

Yeah, I think that that's the important piece is like flipping these things on yourself and recognizing your own actions and how your actions are either creating or pushing you away from that future that you want. In a lot of the visualizations that I run through in the book, there is this idea of identify and visualize the future that you want, then ask yourself whether your actions in the present are bearing out that future. And if they're not, you can change your actions

in the present, that's great news. You can actually do something different today that will create the future that you want. But recognizing that there is that gap between what you want your future to look like and what it is likely to look like if you don't change is The important first step that awareness that self-awareness which most of us are afraid to confront Yes

the reason I Talk about I bring up all these questions in the book is because I fundamentally believe one important fact which is The answers you seek in life are found in the questions that you avoid. The questions that you avoid asking about your life. That is what we need to dig into. If we can sit with those questions, then we're able to actually uncover and act on these answers that will change our world. That's a great way of thinking about it. I've led groups of people through the funeral exercise before, without the front row

edition. And for some people, it's a really difficult thing. It's a really difficult thing because they are forced to see indeed the way in which they are not living according to what they want their quote unquote legacy to be. And a lot of us have a tendency when we come face to face with something that's uncomfortable, a question that's uncomfortable is to run away from it. And it's very easy to do. Yeah, I mean, look, there is nothing forcing you to confront these questions. It's much easier to just sit around, scroll on your phone, you know, avoid asking these questions, avoid making the changes that are hard. Everything in the world today is about reducing friction. All of the technology we've developed over the last 20 years has reduced friction in your life. It's made it easier to press the eject button out of these challenging situations. You have more choices than ever before. Everything is easier if you want it to be.

And unfortunately, what you find is that the friction actually created a lot of meaning. The friction actually was a good thing because on the other side of that friction was the most beautiful things in life. And on the other side of the friction of asking yourself these hard questions is the life that you actually want to build for yourself. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Let's talk a little bit about mental wealth. What does mental wealth mean to you? Mental wealth is all about purpose. It's about growth.

It's about creating the space necessary to actually wrestle with some of the big unanswerable questions in life, whether through spirituality, meditation, solitude, what have you. Mental wealth is fundamentally about allowing yourself to pay the price for your distinctiveness in the world. I talk about this shareholder letter that Jeff Bezos wrote where he says that the fight against normalcy is the most important fight of your life. You have to every single day pay a price to maintain your distinctiveness, to walk your path rather than the one that was handed to you. That is really what mental wealth is about.

It's about paying that price, about doing the things, pursuing your curiosity, pursuing your growth, to allow yourself to live your life rather than consent to the default that was handed. Before we wrap up, I want you to think about this. Have you ever ended the day feeling like your choices didn't quite match the person you wanted to be?

Maybe it was autopilot mode or self-doubt that made it harder to stick to your goals. And that's exactly why I created the six saboteurs of self-control. It's a free guide to help you recognize the hidden patterns that hold you back and give you simple, effective strategies to break through them. If you're ready to take back control and start

making lasting changes, download your copy now at OneUFeed.net slash ebook. Let's make those shifts happen starting today. OneUFeed.net slash ebook. That line jumped off the page to me. It's a life that pays the price for its distinctiveness. Such an interesting way to think about what we're trying to protect. You say that the mental wealth is a life of victory in the fight against equilibrium. And that's another way of, you know, sort of pulling us back to what is kind of well that's not the right way to say it because distinctiveness is actually what is its normalcy as you say it or average yeah that's exactly right and I just think that this is not about that being grand

or impressive to anyone else you know there's this important idea of Dharma you know ancient Hindu idea of your sacred duty. And the most important part of that is that your dharma does not have to be grand, impressive to other people, sound so incredible or big. It just has to be yours. And doing your dharma imperfectly is better than doing someone else's perfectly.

That is so liberating to understand that your purpose, your pursuits, the things that you are excited about or doing, the path that you're walking does not have to be impressive to other people. You don't need to go off and do these grand things or feel like you need to build the billion dollar company or be the biggest, you know, best at whatever it is. You just need to live your life. You need to walk your path, not one that you've been handed by default. You need to live by your own design.

Yeah. Going back to what we talked about earlier, which is that even if you have your life pointed in the right direction, you can still get caught up in the concept of more, more, more versus enough, enough, enough. And I think that this happens to us in these Dharma purpose type things because we think that if we're not starting a charity that eliminates hunger in Africa, we're not doing anything valuable or important. But as we've talked about seasons of life, for a parent, that's a pretty critical, it's a pretty critical Dharma right there, which is in the years that your children are little, raising them to be good people. Amen. Amen. Could not agree more. We're near the very end

of our time here, but I would love to just end with one idea that you talk about, which is that falling in love is easy, growing in love is hard. This goes back to that idea of friction. Falling in love is what, growing in love is hard. This goes back to that idea of friction. Falling in love is what you see on social media. It's the beautiful manicured photos, the filtered moments, the perfect honeymoon phase, all of those fancy things. But that's not reality. Real, beautiful, deep loving relationships

are built through shared struggle. They're built through the growing, through the periods of crawling through the mud with someone, through embracing the friction and finding your way to the other side. And until you embrace that, until you recognize that we need to focus more on the growing than the falling and recognize that that idea applies to much more than relationships in life, you will never find the things that you are actually seeking. Beautiful. Well, I think that is a wonderful place for us to wrap up. Thank you, Sawhill.

I really enjoyed the book and I've really enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much for having me. This was a thrill. I can't wait to get to chat again soon. Thank you so much for listening to the show. If you found this conversation helpful, inspiring, or thought provoking, I'd love for you to share it with a friend. Sharing from one person to another is the lifeblood of what we do. We don't have a big budget, and I'm certainly not a celebrity, but we have something even better and that's you. Just hit the share button on your podcast app or send a quick text with the episode link

to someone who might enjoy it. Your support means the world, and together we can spread wisdom one episode at a time. Thank you for being part of the One You Feed community. 45 years ago, a Virginia soul band called The Edge of Daybreak recorded their debut album Behind Bars. Record collectors consider it a masterpiece.

The band's surviving members are long out of prison, but they say they have some unfinished business. The Edge of Daybreak, Eyes of Love, was supposed to have been founded up by another app. Listen to Soul Incarcerated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Reality TV and social media have love all wrong. So what really makes relationships last? On this episode of Dope Labs, poet and relationship expert, Young Pueblo breaks down the psychology

of love and provides eye-opening insights and advice we all need. You should not be postponing your happiness. Your greatest happiness is not necessarily going to come from a relationship. Your partner should add to your happiness, but your happiness is really coming from within you. Listen to Dope Labs on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Are you hungry? Colleen Whit here and Eating While Broke is back for season four every Thursday on the Black Effect Podcast Network. This season, we've got a legendary lineup serving up broke dishes

and even better stories. On the menu, we have Tony Baker, Nick Cannon, Melissa Ford, October London, and Carrie Harper Howie turning Big Macs into big moves. Catch Eating While Broke every Thursday on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your favorite shows. Come hungry for season four.