The Ryan Hanley Show - Cultivating Joy in Everyday Life with Eric North

Episode Date: June 17, 2024

Became a Master of the Close: https://masteroftheclose.comReflecting on a business partnership that crumbled at the height of success, I was on a quest for deeper fulfillment. Enter Eric North, a dynamic entrepreneur turned happiness coach. ✅ Join over 10,000 newsletter subscribers: https://go.ryanhanley.com/ ✅ For daily insights and ideas on peak performance: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanhanley ✅ Subscribe to the YouTube show: https://youtube.com/ryanmhanleyConnect with Eric NorthConnect on InstagramSubscribe on YouTubeEric shares his profoundly transformative journey from building successful ventures to dedicating his life to helping others find true joy. Together, we unearth the delicate balance between ambition and personal happiness, exploring the pivotal shifts that guided Eric to his true calling.We dive into the significance of maintaining a cheerful attitude, inspired by the resilience of a beloved aunt who taught me the power of joy in everyday moments. Emphasizing that happiness isn’t a destination but a continuous journey, we delve into routines for cultivating gratitude and combating the societal tendency toward quick judgment and anger. Eric and I reflect on how internal mindset and present-moment awareness are key to genuine contentment, drawing wisdom from Michael Singer's "The Untethered Soul."The episode crescendos with insights on fostering positive relationships and staying true to oneself. Through personal anecdotes, I share my evolution into the “happiness warrior,” illustrating the importance of self-discipline and visualization in achieving one's dreams. Eric and I discuss how to rebuild strained connections and approach interactions with goodwill and understanding. We wrap up with a heartfelt exchange of gratitude, showcasing the profound impact of authentic conversations and the power of staying grounded in our true selves. Tune in for an episode brimming with practical advice and inspiring stories.

Hello everyone and welcome back to the show. Today we are joined by Eric North, a lifelong entrepreneur turned happiness coach. Happiness is something we all want in our lives, but yet we oftentimes do not prioritize or pursue. This is an incredible conversation. You're going to get a ton out of this, particularly if you're an ambitious and driven person, lots of tidbits, lots of ideas, lots of tactics to build moments of happiness into your life that can culminate in ultimately a happier life in general. If you enjoy this show, guys, make sure you subscribe, whether you're listening to the audio podcast or watching on YouTube and know that I love you for watching this show. Let's get on to Eric North. Let's go. Yeah, make it look, make it look, make it look easy.

Hey, stand up guy, boom, ten toes. Big body pull up in a Range Rover. I can chase a whole game when I say so. I pull up, shut it down, yeah. My mindset is very, very, I used to be, I'm a very, I'm a businessman, so I'm a very, I'm an entrepreneur. And I had spent so many years building my businesses that I stopped having fun and being creative. You know, I just was like, oh, what's going on? So I started doing all this stuff to kind of change my direction.

And I want to make money with my mouth. Yeah. And my words. OK, that's that's where I am. So I'm getting ready to publish a book. I'm working on negotiations. It's really rough but the major publisher um and what i really am trying to do just you know my goal is thomas my publicist has made his his vision is i will be like a household

name someone that people will say hey man we're having a really bad day let's you know hold on let's click into the happiness warriors who he has to say okay yeah that's my dream that's what i could really do that that's what i know i can do yeah that's where we're going with it. Anywhere you want to go with me, ask me any questions. I don't care. I'm very open. I don't, I don't have any, you can't trip me up because I'm open. It's not an open book. Okay. Yeah, no, I love it. And, and I'll be honest with you. Uh, my journey is, is very similar. I'm actually in a weird moment where I just exited from a business that I started in 2020, seven days before COVID hit upstate New York. And got rocked by that, invested all this money in starting this business and put all this work in. Launch day, seven days later, everything gets shut down, blah, blah, blah.

Well, I sold it two years later. We were acquired, worked there, and then negotiated an early exit in November of 2023. And I've kind of been of two minds and I've had one foot in the, I love being an operator. I love running businesses. I feel like I have the disposition for it. I've been executive multiple times, both as CEO, CMO, and then as a founder. And I love that side. I also have this other equally powerful and equally driven side, very similar to you, where I love helping. I love educating. I love sharing. I love creating. And this podcast has been a through line for my career.

It's amazing. And you do such a professional, you're in charge. I can tell that this is your thing, you know, so that's great. I feel the same way. I tell you, I had a very similar experience. I had and i let one of my other partners go crazy with the budget and for everything and all of a sudden we were shut down and i had health insurance to pay for for everybody i had all kinds of you know i had a lot to do and then i had to get rid of that partner and i had a huge financial you know i look at money as if you're the right thing you'll make money i've never you know i don't want to lose money ever but if i have to part with it to get away from something it's going to be like a divorce maybe. So be really careful who you go into business with. And that's really the lesson that I learned. And it's more about, I don't really need anyone. I have myself. So maybe that's how you are too.

Yeah. I struggle with that as well because it you know, it's been weird, man. This has been like an existential time for me because I love working with teams at the same time. I do too. I love creating teams. Yeah. Yeah. I found that there are certain, there are very particular in certain types of people

that I work really well with and there are a larger number of personality types that I do work really well with. And there are a larger number of personality types that I do not work well with. So, and I've had to learn that lesson the hard way a couple of times. So it's just business and life is so interesting, man. And I think you said it like it's, it's, it's driving towards what your calling is. And really that that's where I want to start to show here is my, you know, my first, my first question is, is really around, uh, you know, in, in researching you. And I think you posted this, I found this particular thing on Instagram and of all the things that I want to get into, this was the first one that popped out at me was this idea that, that, uh, you said a happier life is an easier life. And I have not necessarily found that to be the case.

And I don't mean easy in a negative way. I just mean, oftentimes in the pursuit of happiness, you have to do hard things. So maybe just break down this concept because I think some people may not necessarily understand. When I write, first of all, it just flows out. I have a writing time every day. It's designated by eight. If you see me doing anything else at 8.30, 8 o'clock in the morning,

then there's something really crazy going on. And I know you know what I'm really going to write about that day. I'm going to write a column. I'm going to write two columns a week that get published all over the web. But I start thinking about sort of themes and trends that I see with people and how they're talking about themselves and how they're feeling about themselves and how angry everyone is all the time and how quick they are to judge and run away.

And I think about my past life and how I was raised, and it was a sort of dysfunctional home. Great parents, but they didn't really do a great job, always with their example, it's okay, but they were loving, good parents. And I just, I want to teach. their example was okay but they were they were loving good parents and i just i i want to teach so like when i started this kind of teacher i want to help people so i started i started this kind of mindset about talking about how important is there a cheerful attitude a

cheerful attitude can really show a really strong sense of power and strength because over everything that's going on there's a cheerful attitude i can take and there's usually a twinkle in that person's eye. You know, those people you're, you're probably thinking about with me, it was my aunts. I had three aunts that were super, super, super intelligent and really good people that they did all their lives were devoted to doing good. And there was always a twinkle in my aunt's eye, even though she was going through a really hard time or she was, you know, facing a lot was facing a lot of stuff that came out of her at once. And she just got through life. And she was the original happiness warrior.

Everywhere she went, people just flocked to her and came to her and shared their life. And she listened to them. And she gave them love. Every person that came to her, she gave part of her love. And I just thought, she's not with us now, but I think that's all the other good things she did. I can go into that forever. But just that was the basic lesson that I learned from her. And also I was kind of a weird kid.

Okay, so I thought differently than other kids. I solved problems faster and different solutions than anyone else ever thought of. And it kept me kind of apart and kind of, I was part of everything, but in a way I wasn't. And sometimes I felt very disconnected. I felt like I was on a different track, a different age group or anything like that.

And it was my happiness warrior aunt that always made me feel like I was incredible. Always, throughout my entire life. Every success and victory I had, everything that was heartache, anything, she was always there. made me feel like I was incredible always throughout my entire life and every success and victory I had everything that was heartache and anything she was always there but she always was like a warrior so she kept things going and it kept me going and it kept me feeling a sense of self-esteem so I'm writing these things you know it's it's hard to be happy every day sometimes so let me stop ask another question so I'll ramble on, but that's really, my heart gets

into it for people because I feel, I feel for them. Yeah. I think, you know, what I've found in my own life and I'm interested in your take on this being that you've studied happiness so much is I feel people get hung up on happiness as a goal. And to me, that is not the appropriate way to think about happiness. It's so much more about the pursuit. And, and for a long time, and I'll just give you the context of this question is for a long time, I, I believe that, uh, you know, that, that cliche phrase life is about the journey. Not that that's the nature was complete bullshit. I, I was, I, I, I was like, that's nonsense. I think part of it was that I grew up poor in a tiny little town and nowhere. And I was like, yeah, the journey.

Okay. Try being poor as shit for a while, you know, living on garage sale and, you know, going to school with holy sweatpants because it was the only pair of pants that you had. And you know what I mean? Tell me it's about the journey, right? And, but as I, you know, fought and scrapped and made my way out and went to college and all these different things, um, I started to really understand that this, this pursuit of a destination or, or, or focusing on the destination did not bring any happiness and all the success I've achieved. It was never

when I was there, it was, it really was the grinding time of, of working through problems, sweating with people, being in the foxhole, whether it's on a sports team or in business or in a community group that I actually found happiness. And so why do you think so many people get hung up on the destination and never take the time to enjoy the moment when they're actually in it in that grind time? Well, that's the thing. When we're in the moment and I'm having a really good time, I generally forget to take pictures. Okay. So if I'm in a special

moment with a lot of special people, I generally forget to take pictures because I'm having such a good, I'm so involved and I'm so into what I'm doing at the, in the present. And that's where you find your happiness. Happiness comes from within. You have to have a sense of I'm capable. I give myself permission. I can give myself permission to be happiness. I deserve to be happy. Those are all things anyone can say. Those are all things that anyone deserves to say and should be able to say in their lives. I deserve to be happy, I give myself permission to be happy, and I am happy. Those are so important. And, you know, it starts, like you just said, it starts, it's not, what's the destination?

Is a trip to Paris for three days, it's not it's not that what's the destination is is is a trip to paris for three days that's gone like that is that going to make you happy it's going to you're going to tell a lot of people and show off but maybe some people get happy showing off with conquest i think sometimes i think it's it's a it's a uh we live in such a competitive world you know my happiness is better than your happiness that kind of thing and. And sometimes that comes down to showing off. Okay. So you think about it too. And I tend to think that we're much better when we're quiet about our accomplishments

and we show our strength through our actions and behaviors and our values. Yeah. That's where we find the happiness is the grind. It is the grind because it's like the satisfaction of figuring out a problem is so amazing, you know? Yeah. So if we agree that, you know, kind of being present in the moment and living through the experience as it's happening can yield a lot more happiness than maybe focusing on the destination. How can people be more present in the moment? How can they actually take that deep breath, look around for a second, go, wow, like this might be hard, but geez, I'm having a lot of fun while I'm here. Okay. Well, I am the happiness warrior, but I've had a lot of unhappy times in my life. And I think that's how I got here in some ways too. So I went through a really bad period of my life where it's usually another person involved

that causes us trouble. And I walked, I that relationship, and everything was really, my life was just blown up. I had to start over again, and that was daunting. I was like in my late 30s, and I was like, oh, this is kind of embarrassing. I'm starting over again. I'm not trying to, I screwed up my career. It was going really well. And now all I have left really is my body and my mind, and I need to work on that. And I thought I can do anything as long as I start taking care of myself.

So I started taking better care of myself. I started working out really hard, and then I started looking for jobs that challenged me that I wanted to work in. And then I started working for myself. And that was kind of another way to feel confident in myself and get out of that period where I forget about that, forget and forgive myself for the past. And that was really important, too. Do you think you have to go through conflict in order to be happy? Yes. Yes. I think we can't hide from conflict. I think the best thing in life is to face conflict head on, make sure and have a plan for it and have a have a measured

reaction you know and not to do it just haphazardly or um and um we need i think everybody i i have horrible things that happen to me sometimes you know a dog of mine will die or something will happen i had a major accident a couple years ago and i I couldn't, I had to get my legs rebuilt. I had to rebuild that. And I only felt bad one time. I felt like a little bit when I couldn't really walk. I was feeling like a little bit, I was sliding into some dark space. And I closed my eyes, I opened them up, and I looked around the room, and I started saying, hey, there's my sofa, there's my TV, there's my dog. And then I felt better.

And I heard that that was something that helps people deal with anxiety. And at that moment, that's all it took to save me. From that moment on, I went up. I went up, and every day I got better, and every day I got stronger, and every day I was able to move better. And it was just, I think, that dark period. It was like it was a wake-up call. It was very fast.

It was like an explosion in my brain that was like, don't go this way. You know, don't go this direction. Let's, let's, let's stop right now. Is this why gratitude is so, such an important component to happiness? Gratitude is everything. I always say that all the time. If we're not grateful, then we're not living our lives fully. We're not experiencing happiness fully.

We're just taking and taking things for granted. How does that go for most people to take things for granted? Not very well. So these things are just, I'm not a scientist of happiness, but it's observations and feelings in life that I want to share just of how I can turn a life that has had a lot of adversity into one that will have more adversity, will have further adversity, and keep happy all the time. And I'm always happy. I'm always happy. I'm always in a good mood.

I wake up every day with an affirmation saying, hey, Eric, today's going to be a great day. And I say that aloud. It's kind of crazy, right? Yeah. Good morning, Eric. It's going to be a great day. Sometimes verbalizing is the best way to get out of our own heads. Have you ever read The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer?

I've seen the book, but I have not read it, though. I like the word untethered, though. Yeah, incredible. Very quick read. You can read it in a weekend, no problem. And what he talks about in that book, and one of the reasons that it's one of the core books that are probably recommended dozens of times on this show. And people listening are probably sick of hearing me recommend it. It's because he breaks down in probably the most tangible way that I've experienced this idea that we're not our mind and we're not our body. And that the voices and feelings that we experience from these things are not actually who we are.

That we're this separate thing. You can call it the soul, you can call it whatever you want, but that all the voice in our head is oftentimes is there strictly to keep us alive in the next moment, right? The feelings and emotions and pain that we feel in our body, et cetera, is are just, they're just data points meant to keep us alive for the next moment. And that if we can untether our soul from, you soul from the voices and the feelings and the emotions, then we can start to experience who we really are. And I believe, as you do, that gratitude is an incredibly important part of untethering ourselves from these voices because it pushes back against all the negativity that you get quite often. Now, so I guess my next question is being that gratitude is so important to happiness. How can someone who's listening to this, who wants to build more

happiness into their life and maybe isn't being intentional about it, how can they start to experience more gratitude or practice more gratitude in their life? Well, I think here's what I do. And I have routines. I have routines for everything. And I have things that I have spiritual routines that I do. And my biggest one is, I'm not so much praying, but before I go to sleep at night, I'm sitting here, I'm doing some deep breaths on the side of my bed. And then I say, I say, I did my best today, I'll do better tomorrow. my that's my mantra every single night as i say before everything before i want to rest myself i want to go to rest sleep peacefully and i'll have to check myself and make sure i and when i say that statement if there's anything that i that i

regret i'll say that aloud too and i'll say this is something i don't need to do ever again or this is something like i handle differently and i think about that and then the next day is awesome yeah next day I wake up in a great mood and I have a good day every day. Even if something hits me hard, something better shows up in the next minute. That happens a lot too. Serendipity.

I firmly believe in serendipity and particularly how Steven Pressfield talks about serendipity in The War of Art pressfield talks about serendipity in in uh the art of or the war of art uh when he talks about the muse and the resistance and what comes out of feeding the muse uh again if if you guys at home haven't read uh the war of art regardless of you know take the art part out of it because you can insert whatever it is that you do in your life that book is incredible

very good book i read that yeah yeah it, yeah. It's tremendous. Pressfield's wonderful. So, you know, I think one of the things that you talked about was permission to be happy. I think the idea of giving ourselves permission to do things is incredibly powerful. So when we're talking about happiness in particular, there's a lot of people who I run into and a lot of my work has to do with advising startups and executive coaching. So I run into a lot of people who are either one of two scenarios. Most of the time when people reach out to me, they're either incredibly overwhelmed or they're stuck on something. And oftentimes when they're stuck, they, they find themselves in a place of – they start doubting themselves.

Incredibly talented, brilliant people, 99 out of 100 times exponentially more brilliant than I will ever be in my entire life. Yet they find themselves in these places where they're doubting themselves. And I'm like, you can do things that other people can't even imagine, yet you're questioning your ability. And it's mostly because of what you said. They're not giving themselves permission. So how would you recommend to someone who does find themselves in a moment of darkness or despair or negativity or just a brief moment of self-doubt,

how would you recommend that they give themselves that permission to turn that corner and start to come back to the light? There's two easy things. There's two easy little tricks. First one, just to close your eyes, you can do anything you want. Think of three things that make you happy right away. And the first three things that make you happy. And you just reflect on that. That'll usually raise happy. That'll usually raise happiness.

Maybe smile from that too. Cause a fake, even a fake smile is actually a real smile and it does raise and it raises our endorphins it makes us feel happier and the second thing i think is really important is to be able to like write down your accomplishments in life because sometimes we're not really we kind of forget all the great things that we've done and we kind of forget all the people that we've helped and we've kind of forget about all the value that i think a lot of people forget about all the value they've created in their lives and they take one little setback or they'll look at somebody else that's doing better than they are. And it'll just kind of be a step backwards where we're a lot of, we're missing out on a lot of talent because people are afraid to move forward because they're afraid of failure. They're afraid of success.

Success is a big one. Success is really kind of hard to take. It's not easy. I agree with you. I, you. I'm interested in your take on this particular concept. I talk a lot on, I do solo episodes as well. So the cadence of this show is an interview and a solo episode. And the solo episodes, I talk a lot about a fear of status and that I actually do not believe, failure to me is just a label. It's a, it's a, it, it, it really, it doesn't exist. It's, it's not real. However, what I think people are actually saying when they may have a sense of a fear of failure or a fear of success, uh, cause,

cause I think these both play into the same thing is that they actually have a fear of status and that they're very worried about their status changing. And, you know, for the better, you know, for the consequences that come, if you improve your status, as well part of being able to weather a status change in your life is, is an intrinsic motivation, or, or happiness that you have, regardless of where you are in a social structure. So how do we cultivate that so that it's not just something that we can call on when we need it, but we're literally living in a sense of happiness kind of every moment of every day as much as possible? I think it's that removal of the cutting off that need for external validation, first of all.

If we need external validation for something that we do, then we're not on the right track anyway. So we're not doing anything for us, we're doing it for the sake of others. I think this plays into what you're just saying, is we do much in our life, most people get stuck in a trap where they think they're living their lives in expectations of others, under the rules of others, under the dictations of others.

They're being told what to do, told how to think, told how to do everything. And they get used to that, and then it puts you in a big trap, and then you've kind of lost every sense of who you are. There's no happiness there. There's no sense of accomplishment.

So the first thing to do is to stop the ego right in its tracks. Change of status is a change in direction. It doesn't necessarily mean nothing's permanent. Time changes everything. So time changes everything and we have lessons to learn.

There are always messages everywhere we are at any point in the day. There are messages. Sometimes we see them. Sometimes we receive them. Sometimes we just, they get lost in the energy of the universe, but they're always there. There's always the next step ahead. It's right in front of us. So. Yeah. I'm reading a good book on decision. I love reading about decision-making and I'm reading a book by Annie Duke

called thinking and bets. And she references a strategy. And I apologize. Anyone who's listening or watching, if you can leave it in the comments on YouTube, if you, uh, if you know the name of the person and I'll go back and try to find it. Uh, she references someone else's work called the 10, 10, 10 strategy for this at this time element, which I think is so incredibly important.

And I'm so glad you brought this up in which the, the, the creator of this strategy, who, again, I apologize that I forget. I just know it's an Annie Duke's book. Um, uh, she says, think about how this thing will impact you 10 minutes from now, 10 days from now, and then 10 years from now. And she said, if, if it's not gonna, if it's not going to change your life 10 years from now, then 10 days from now in 10 minutes from now, now doesn't matter. Right. And and I'm not doing the full strategy justice, but I think we we put so much pressure on things as if this small change in our life is going to last forever. And oftentimes we attach a preconceived notion that a change is going to be for the negative, right? Something will happen. And maybe, yeah, it doesn't feel good to get fired or to miss a promotion or not get a sale or be

rejected by a partner, a relationship partner or whatever. But we, it doesn't just because that thing isn't perceived publicly as a positive doesn't mean it's not a positive for you. And do you have any strategies for reframing the events that happen in our life to, to kind of swing them towards what could potentially be the positive aspect of that change versus focusing only on kind of the external, maybe a societal negative implication of that change? I, well, I have a rule that I won't let my, I won't let my thinking, I won't let my mindset go into a negative space. I won't start thinking what ifs, I won't start, because I don't think you can ever tell what's going to happen. You may have no idea what's going to happen.

I also believe that we don't know what anyone else is ever thinking at any time. We don't know what's inside our partner's brain or in our husband's wife's brain. We don't know what they're really thinking. We have a general idea, but we make too many assumptions. We make too many assumptions that hold us back, keep us from moving forward, keep us from being happy, keep us from showing up for life, really, is what it comes down to. I use that terminology a lot. My work is very simple. I think I use things like show up you know learn it and that means that actually has a lot of meaning show up has a lot of meaning but just simple things that we can take i always have one of the reasons i love what i do is because throughout my life i

was i was trying to find out my calling is i would i would listen to people and they would talk to me and they would start telling me you know and i and i how they feel about their value and where they're going in their lives and i would always say i don't want to solve anyone's problems that's not who i am i'm not going to tell you what to do but i'll put a little spark in them with some words now you've used some really good phrasing today of how you talk to people it's putting that spark you have so many great things about you behind me and there's like those words your words changed my life and i have a lot of i've a lot so as i was becoming the happiness warrior and the stage that i haven't even gotten to that yet but i um was with a really what was

it with my best friend down on vacation in miami and i was talking about you know being being entrepreneur and owning businesses and and i was you know I was feeling like I'm on the go. I'm on the go all the time. But I'm not getting a chance to really express myself other than being kind of like this important guy out in public in a conference or something. And I wanted to be more authentic. And my friend said, you are a way better version.

I'm not going to say someone's name. You're a way better version of a... You know how to make people feel good. You know how to bring the best out of people. You're a motivation expert. And you do it in a way that people don't feel threatened. They don't feel like their finger, someone pointing a finger at them empowers them instead. And you can forget about me and forget what I've told you. But still those words will stay in your head.

And to me, it's just about helping others have a better journey, you know, have a better time in life. So how did you become the happiness warrior? Well, I'll make it really short. I, when I was 18, I kind of thought I had potential to be a model and I was like, well, I'd be a model in New York city, but I've never, I was too afraid to ever have any voice that ever. But in my 40s, I did some men's physique competitions,

NPC men's physique competitions. I got kind of into that. I got kind of into that, the self-discipline and all that stuff. And then as I did that, I started getting a lot of invitations to do photo shoots. And then I kind of liked that kind of life for a little while because I'd travel somewhere and take some shoots. And then I said, OK, I want to take this to a professional level. I want to get an agent in New York City. And there's an agent that I had to visualize that does all the body models, all the guys that were fit.

A lot of the athletes would come to this agency and sign there. And I'd see them getting signed all the time and you know online so i said okay no one's ever done this before let me go to la and do a photo shoot and get discovered no one's ever done that before no one's ever gone to la oh i want to get yes they have thousands of people come every day to la to get discovered and find and do photo shoots and become and then they get jobs as waiters for a while they have to be patient and I wasn't really very patient. I'm in my late 40s. I don't have a lot of time.

And I did a really good photo shoot with a new photographer that I never worked with before. And on Monday morning, I'm on the plane getting ready to take off, and the phone rings, and it's the agent in New York that I had visualized signing me. Saying, hey, how fast can you get to New York? So I get to New York a couple weeks later, sign as a model,

and that was another learning experience and humbling experience. Pounding the pavement, literally, and going to auditions, and being a lot of really incredible people that you're up against. And my whole mantra over New York is always, the best of the best comes to New York. I need to make sure of my best but i need to be happy so i

always had this kind of happy expression people always tend to like me when i came into the office to you know get lined up and um my agent i had another agent that came along and she was uh she was really incredible and i and but kobe all these things were happening and i was kind of tired and that kind of i was in that was in new york i'm living in dc got a little hectic so i stopped stop modeling and i still wanted to do it i still wanted to be really good at it but i had to stop for a while and concentrate on my business and then one day she called me up and she said i know you don't want to hear from me but and that that's not true but she's i know you'll hear from me but i'm determined that you're going

to be on television. You know, I'm going to start using, I want you to be, I want you to go in a whole new direction with your career. And then COVID hit. So then we stopped. New York shut down. Everybody shut down. She moved to Hawaii.

I was very happy for her. She fell in love and moved to Hawaii. And one last thing she said with me was here's a publicist call him and he's going to help you so i said what the heck is a publicist i have no idea what a publicist even really does at that point so i called my publicist had about a one hour conversation with him it was a beautiful like perfect october day the sun was perfect the sky was blue and he said I'm getting chills. I'm gonna call you the happiness warrior.

And that's gonna be my next big thing I'm gonna create. I'm gonna create the happiness warrior. We're gonna write books and be on TV and all this stuff. And that's how it kind of happened. And it's a lot of work. It's hard work. It's a lot of discipline every week. It was giving myself permission

to write a column every week. So big life-changing steps in a man in his late fifties. Okay. So, um, it also takes a lot of faith in that too. The faith in that I, I am the happiness where who gave me permission other than myself, you know, and that's, that's the only permission that I need. So that's why I'm the happiness warrior. Okay. And it's just, I'm unapologetic about it. So that's why I'm the happiness warrior. It's just unapologetic about it. I'm proud of it. I'm proud of it.

Yeah, no, I think it's phenomenal. I mean, I think the world is in a moment, our society is in a moment where anyone who is working to spread happiness and positivity and connectivity throughout our culture is someone who needs, is someone who needs to be shared, their story needs to be shared, their voice needs to be shared, because, you know, every day you, if you turn on the TV, turn on social media, whatever, look in your email, all you see is negativity. So do you think that this is a particular moment in time in which, you know, you are needed? And have you seen, have you seen that in your work? Have you seen the response to your work kind of play that out? I have been, I'm not surprised, but I've had, I have so many people who believe in me, who want to help me, who do, who are all like,

they read my stuff, they comment on what i'm doing but they follow me and they and they look and they look at what i'm doing as uh something really important in their lives too and they tell me oh i read your column today or i saw your video and you know what your video is 15 seconds but it changed my whole day because you're up there helping someone helping all of us and it's just it's just i can see it growing and i don't want to be the only happiness warrior i'd like to have a lot of happiness for us i'd like to have kids become happiness warriors because ultimately it's really it's really our young people that need so much right now and you know us older folks you know we've we've survived a lot of things and we've

been through a lot but i think it's the kids that i want them to have a better future you know a safer emotionally safer happier you know, a safer, emotionally safer, happier, you know, self-confident future and all kids. I don't want to leave anyone out. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I agree with that. I think that, um, I think that, you know, I'm, I'm of, I I'm always of two opinions on kids. I have to say, I have two young kids right now and I'm trying to raise them as best I can. You know, I'm divorced, but I co-parent pretty well with my ex-wife. So that works out pretty well, but it's, it's tough. You know, I think there were a lot of things in my own childhood that obviously, you know, per that time were not necessarily positives, uh, in the way certain things were

handled, but at the same time, there were, there are things that I, I feel like we've gone, the pendulum has swung a little too far towards safety. Uh, I think that, you know, we have to, there's a good balance, like kids shouldn't run wild, uh, you know, intense bullying and things like that. Definitely. You know, it's definitely, those things need to be, be taught out and trained out of kids and understanding and communication and all that kind of stuff. But we've also, you know, in an effort to curb, you know, just using as a microcosm bullying, we've made our youth programs and schools and education so helicopter-y that the kids don't even know how to react to mild situations. They need to be able to stand on their own. They need to be

able to, I agree 100%. They don't need a helicopter parent. They don't need to need to be involved in what they're learning they can just kids are going to learn what they're going to learn yeah right they're they're intelligent i mean most most of them figure things out on their own they know more than we think they do most of the time and you'll you'll i'm sure you're always like what you know so yeah i said i don't i don't have any kids but i i kind of have i've always had a very sort of mentor approach to a lot of young people. And I have a lot of young employees that are really important to me because they work with me for years. They stick around because I give, I try to give, I don't even try, I give everyone that works for me a really great opportunity to be successful. And that's also important.

It's important. Everything's, everything, happiness comes from so many, it's important everything's everything happiness comes from so many it's it's it's it's just a collage of things because so many things made me happy i think to myself one of my responsibilities every day is to hold myself up for my employees and to be a good example to set a good example and to communicate effectively and you know and to give them some hope in life too because i came from i mean i had a. Because I had a lot of things in my life that were very difficult. I had to also kind of go along with a lot of secondhand clothes and things like that at some points in my life too. I know what it's like to have very little money for lunch

when you're working all day. Now my situation has changed. It's really important for me for not, I don't want anyone else to have to live that way. But I do think you need to make your own way. And I do think this whole, the safety, I said to have a safe environment, not with any predators, but to have a safe environment, they need to fight all out. They need to work things out themselves and learn. Yeah. Good examples. You have good examples in their lives.

And I think that's the key. You know, what I try to talk about with a lot of my friends when they're having kids and stuff is like, it doesn't, you know, what you say is important, but understand that it's what you do that's going to shape your kids. And, you know, if they, you can say respect women, but if you treat their mom like shit, that's what they're going to pick up on, right? And it's the body language. It's the way that you respond to them. You know, if they make a simple mistake

and you're overly sharp because you're tense, because you, you know, you can't leave work at work, that's going to impact them. And, you know, it's't leave work at work, that's, that's going to impact them. And you know, it's these little things that, that we don't, that we don't think about. And a big part of why I do this show is one, I, you know, I think that personal development and personal growth is, is the key to, to, to not just happiness, but satisfaction, purpose, meaning, you know, meaning in our lives. I think it's incredibly important. Additionally, I, I like to bring on people like yourself who, who can help give just a new perspective on, on independent thinking. We've lost,

we've, we've, I feel like too, we've, we've outsourced our thinking to talking heads and, you know, and I, and I know I do a podcast, so maybe it seems a little, uh, like I'm, I'm, um, you know, I'm being disingenuous, but I try not, I try not to tell people how to live. I just try to show them, you know, not even really the way I live as much. I try to just highlight you guys because the guests, because we need to be independent thinkers. And I don't think you can be happy if you're allowing someone else to dictate what you think about and how you think about things. And, and, and to your point, going all the way back to kind of failure and status and all those kinds of things, it's like, it's okay to have an opinion, have that opinion be wrong and change that opinion. Right. It's okay. It's amazing. have that opinion be wrong and change that opinion.

Right. It's okay. It's amazing. But that, that, that would, that would solve almost all of our divisions in this country. Yes. But it's just seven words, you know? And yeah, it's, it's my, my, my, my, my, one of my really heartfelt goals of this is I've most of us have relationships and things that have been really strained in the

last few years and we've and how do we get that back again how do we how do we move forward and I'm not going to solve that problem but I want to solve the problem of how we think about ourselves yeah we just have a better positive image of ourselves we want to share that with our friends again we want to share our positive things that we're doing in our lives and i think that's how we come together with energy builds up and there's you know and and you know if oh that guy he's not so bad anyway and you can and you can say i made a mistake and i'm thinking differently now and that's okay yeah and we don't need to go into a big apology session i don't like those either but just a little acknowledgement and respect it's really what it comes down to i i completely agree i completely agree you know one of the

episodes uh i had an episode about three months ago that uh i don't want to say it went viral but it it was very it did very well for you know kind of commonly how the show does you know just exponentially more and that it was all about how to have a political conversation with a friend who disagrees with you and still love each other was what the, was what the show was about. And, and I had a friend on who had different political views than I do. And basically, and I, and we've had so many conversations about stuff, you know, I knew that we would still be friends after, but what I wanted to show everyone is like, we can have different takes. We can see things from different angles. Ultimately when we're, when we're approaching any conversation, not just the political conversation

from different viewpoints, from a place of being a good actor, trying, you know, not trying to impose my will or be right, but to ultimately just have a conversation and express views, that most of the time we're going for the same goal, just approaching it from different angles. And if we could come at things in our life from the standpoint of, I believe this person has best interests in mind, they're just approaching it from a different angle, then you can find all these common places, even if ultimately your end viewpoint is different. There's so many commonalities and we've lost that, right?

We've lost that. Like I pick a side on a topic and then I'm given 17 other topics that I have to have this view on because I've taken this view on this one thing and I can't change because I said I was this thing now. And it's like, that's just not actually how any of us work. And I feel like it creates, you know, it creates so much angst and anxiety and diss and, and, and dissension in inside of organizations and in community groups and families. And it's like, really, we're all pretty good people trying our best, who when we when we actually look at the cross cuts, there's so much goodness, and love, and gratitude. And

to me, it's, it's this ability to think independently that allows us to see through the nonsense to get to the really good stuff in the middle, which is where all the happiness is. Well, there you go. And I, I agree with you 100%. That was something I would have said almost, almost the same words. I have a, um, a last summer I got, I started reconnecting with an old friend and I got to start getting together with like five or six guys that I've known since I was in my 20s or college and we started walking we were walking together we walked every Sunday morning we meet at 8 a.m it's early if someone else wants to come along great but most people don't make the 8 a.m they just cut out so

the five of us usually go walk six or seven seven miles. Sometimes it's in the parks. It's kind of strenuous. And we all have, we're all entrepreneurs. We all have our businesses. We've all, we're all established. You know,

we've all been around town for a long time. There's no competition. We're all successful. And we're all different types of nationalities and everything too. And we have different political views. We don't talk politics, but we talk about the issues that we have in our lives and their businesses and how dishwashers are 24 an hour now and you know things like that

and i tell you what our political differences may be i mean i think the overall like you said the overall goal the overall at the end point we're all the same okay but i tell you if i'm slipping down that hill i'm going down the side of a cliff one of those guys is going to push me up okay i know that we're all there for each other and yeah we tell each other every week hey love you guys and we think to ourselves and i say we say hey we if we don't say that we're going to really be sad that we don't say that to each other and if we can do that everyone else can do that too and a lot of times the best thing to do and this is me too because i think it's a body mind connection go for a for a walk. Go for a walk with a friend. I do a lot of that.

I do a lot of videos about walking with friends. And I think walking with a friend is one of the most healthy things we can do. So if you want to solve a problem, go for a walk with a friend. I think more interesting things happen in my life on walks with friends, hikes with friends. Yeah, I completely agree. I'll tell you. And we can leave it here. One of the best things that I think about in our society today,

particularly for men, this is particularly true for men. When I was growing up in my teens, so I'm 43, so this is 30 years ago, hugging a dude and telling him that you love him, you know, you just, you know, you slap guys up, you know, whatever. But it wasn't today when I see someone, you know, big bear hug, love you, man. Great to see like that part. That's, that's a part of our society that I think I'm so, you know, I think I'm very happy.

And I think we should celebrate the fact that it is much more socially acceptable to express joy, compassion, love for other people openly, and especially for men. been better at this. But men in particular have really taken that, you know, the culture has shifted to where men can be much more open with each other in terms of the feeling of connection and how they express that. I think that's a wonderful thing for our society and something that we need to cultivate. I'm really big on that principle as well. I think that men need to reconnect with each other and have friendships. And I think those friendships, they grow and they spread to, and then they become, Hey, I know you guys, we trust you, you know, this guy, you know, and then it's becomes, becomes something bigger than ourselves. So that's what, that's what it's all about. Everything that we do in life,

it's really bigger than us. Our actions are bigger than us. Everything is it's about, it's about the community of people that we all share this planet with. It's not getting any less crowded, so we better figure it out, right? That's for sure. Eric, it's been a great pleasure speaking with you, man. This has been wonderful. I love the work you're doing.

I love the message you're sharing. If someone's listening to this, where can they get more from you? Where's the best place for them to go to learn more about you? I love Instagram, the happiness warrior official. Same thing on TikTok, which I'm starting to do a lot of videos on there. My Facebook is also the happiness warrior. And then I have a website, thw, thwarrior.com, where I just started selling merchandise. I have baseball caps and hoodies and t-shirts.

So awesome. I'm getting out there. Awesome. I have baseball caps and hoodies and t-shirts. Awesome. I'm getting out there. Awesome. I love it. Well, guys, I'll have links to all that in the show notes, or you can just look up Eric directly. But if you're listening, wherever you're listening to this, or if you're watching on YouTube, just go in the description and you'll find links to all of Eric's social properties. Eric, it's been such a pleasure, man. I appreciate you. I'm so grateful, Ryan. It was so awesome. I could talk to you for hours. Okay. So we're great. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. Let's go. Yeah. Make it look, make it look, shut it down. Yeah, they know running this game and the game for me. I never switched to no change in me. The only thing changing. Close twice as many deals by this time next week. Sound impossible? It's not. With the one-call-close system, you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals in one call. This is the exact method we use to close 1,200 clients in under three years during the pandemic.

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