The School of Greatness - How To Discover & Unlock Your Fullest Potential w/Psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman EP 1116

Episode Date: May 28, 2021

“Greatness is realizing your full powers of your entire being."Today's guest is humanistic psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman. He received a P.h.D. in cognitive science from Yale University and has taught at Columbia , NYU, the University of Pennsylvania. He hosts The Psychology Podcast and is author of 9 books, including his new book, Transcend: The New Science of Self-Actualization. In 2015, he was named one of "50 Groundbreaking Scientists who are changing the way we see the world" by Business InsiderIn this episode Lewis and Scott discuss Scott’s revision of the hierarchy of needs and what it means to be fully human, the best psychological practices to help you improve your life, how to discover your purpose and define your core belief system, why self-doubt destroys our ability to achieve greatness, and so much more!For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1116Check out his book: Transcend: The New Science of Self-ActualizationCheck out his website: www.scottbarrykaufman.com Check out his podcast: The Phycology Podcast The Power of Erotic Intelligence with Esther Perel: https://link.chtbl.com/732-podFind Lasting Love with Matthew Hussey: https://link.chtbl.com/811-pod

This is episode number 1116 with New York Times bestselling author and one of the top psychologists in the world, Scott Barry Kaufman. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur, and each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

Psychologist Abram Maslow said, if you deliberately plan on being less than you are capable of, then I warn you that you'll be unhappy for the rest of your life. And Winston Churchill said, attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference. My guest today is humanistic psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman, and he received a PhD in cognitive science from Yale University and has taught at Columbia, NYU, and the University of Pennsylvania. And he hosts the Psychology Podcast and is the author of nine books, including his latest book,

Transcend, The New Science of Self-Actualization. And in 2015, he was named one of 50 groundbreaking scientists who are changing the way we see the world by Business Insider. And in this episode, we discuss Scott's revision of the hierarchy of needs and what it means to be fully human. The best psychological practices to help you improve your life today.

How to discover your purpose and define your core belief system. Why self-doubt destroys our ability to achieve greatness and so much more. This is a extremely powerful and insightful episode. Make sure to share this with someone that you think would be benefited from it. Someone that would be benefited from it, someone that would be inspired by it, someone that could help improve the quality of their life as well. Just text them the link on the show notes or lewishouse.com slash 1116, or you can just

copy and paste wherever you're at on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And as well, make sure to subscribe to the School of Greatness over on Apple Podcasts and Spotify if you haven't yet, so you can stay up to date from the latest and greatest from the School of Greatness podcast. Okay, in just a moment, the one and only Scott Barry Kaufman. Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness podcast. Very excited about our guest. We've got my man, Scott Barry Kaufman in the house, man. Yeah.

Good to see you, brother. Good to see you, too. Good to see you, too. Very excited about this. We've had a crazy year and the new science of self-actualization, what you're talking about in your new book, Transcend, is stuff that I'm fascinated with because we're all looking to improve the quality of our life. We're looking to have more love, more connection, more purpose. We're looking to have more fulfillment, happiness, self-esteem, all these

things. And you have broken down and re-imagined Maslow's hierarchy of needs, essentially, and created a new process, a new framework for living a great life and what we need in order to go through the waves of life in order to transcend to be the best version of ourselves. I like the way you put this. Right? So I'd love to break it down. And first here, if you can share, what is Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs,

for people that don't understand it fully, what does that process and framework look like? And then what is your Kauffman sailboat in order for us to learn what that is too? So a lot of people might not have heard of like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, but surely they've seen the meme on the internet with maybe toilet paper at the bottom. It's a pyramid with various levels of needs that one needs to fulfill in order to be able to focus your attention on self-actualization,

which is becoming all that you're uniquely capable of becoming. So the needs for connection, the needs for self-esteem, the need for safety, all these things that clearly if your mind's preoccupied, you're hungry, right? Like you're not focused on self-actualization, you know? So it's contextual as well throughout the course of our day. You know, if you feel very lonely, your mind is preoccupied with the deprivation of your loneliness.

If you don't feel like you're getting any respect, your whole consciousness is directed towards respect me. You're in part onto the world. You want the world to bend to your will in a way. Where is respect on that chain of needs? In Maslow's original, it was the highest up

before self-actualization. Respect. Esteem, esteem, esteem. He called it esteem. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we want, we need, if we can't eat, the only thing we're thinking about is food. Yes.

If we're sick, the only thing we're thinking about is getting healthy. If we have nowhere to sleep, the only thing we're thinking about is shelter. Yeah. And then once we have that foundation, it's the next level of- Loneliness, then loneliness, social connection, and then once we have that foundation it's the next level of loneliness then loneliness social connection and then esteem then esteem which is respect

credibility i guess or being respected within your community respecting yourself and then getting respect from others yeah so he had both of those forms of esteem he talked about okay and the next one is so that so the connection comes before belonging and connection, the need to belong, the need to make connections with others, and then esteem was higher in his original model. And then the top is? Then you self-actualize. And what does self-actualization mean?

You know, Maslow, here's some like cheeky, not cheeky things, but things that like reveals, grand reveals. First of all, Maslow never drew a pyramid. You know, people don't know that. It's in all the textbooks and it's like management textbooks, all these management business schools. They learn it if there's no pyramid. Also, he didn't like the term self-actualization. I found in an unpublished essay, because I read all of his unpublished stuff, like just researching.

I found in a footnote, he said, I hate that damn word self-actualization oh my god i should i should send you you send you a you know take a picture because it's like when i discovered i almost fell off my chair you know he actually never said the words he did he definitely used the term self-actualization but towards the end of his life he started to think of it more he he preferred the term fully human oh i like that yeah yeah and and that's, he started to think of it more, he preferred the term fully human. Ooh, I like that. Yeah, yeah. And that's how he started talking about it later in his life. He just didn't use the term as much.

What does fully human mean in your mind? Sure. I'll tell you, in his earliest years, what he meant by self-actualization first, he thought of self-actualization as becoming your unique creative potential. What is the thing within you? What's the song within you, right, sort of thing. That's definitely how he viewed it in his early life. But becoming fully human as he started to think about this concept more broadly

was how can you kind of bring your whole self to the table, you know, not just like your talent, you know. You can become self-actualized and not be very transcendent, not be very, you know, not give back to others, not kind of get outside yourself. And towards the end of his life, he started to distinguish between self-actualizing non-transcenders and self-actualizing transcenders. Two different classes of self-actualizers. The self-actualizing non-transcenders, the person who goes to work, you know, like, they clock in, they do their job, maybe their job isn't something that necessarily contributes much to society, but, you know, they're good, they go home.

It's not fulfilling to them personally. It might even be a little bit fulfilling, but it's not something that's really getting outside of themselves, you know, and doesn't have be in line with what Maslow called the B values. The B values. The B values, the values of being itself. So these are values that you don't need to do them for any other reason. Truth, justice, beauty, meaningfulness.

He has a long list of the B values. He calls them the B of perfection. Excellence. Excellence is one of his B values. You know, call the B values? Perfection. Excellence. Excellence is one of his B values. You know, you strive for excellence for excellence sake. You strive for beauty for beauty sake. You strive for truth for truth sake. Not to get likes,

not to get followers, not for accomplishments, but just to be in that state. To be. You know, you want more meaning in your life, not so that you get famous. You want meaning. Right.

Yeah. Okay. So self-actualization and then self-actualization plus transcendence transcendence and what's transcendence mean well you know it's i wish i had a really pithy death well actually i do have a pithy i have a definition but it ain't pithy i have a complicated definition because i just want to distinguish between as i do in my book between healthy transcendence and unhealthy transcendence. Okay, what are those? So you see a lot of these gurus who preach transcendence, and then they kind of molest everyone in their parish or whatever.

And it's like, you're like, oh, you're really transcending. It's built on a very faulty foundation, as Maslow put it. He called it pseudo-growth, growth built on a faulty foundation. And I call it pseudo-transcendence. Interesting. It's transcendence built on really you're trying to get your self-esteem needs met. You're really trying to get your loneliness so you've built all this stuff to have connections with others. But healthy transcendence is a viewpoint of, I didn't even get into my cell boat model,

so maybe we're skipping ahead, but yeah, it's the view of the seabird. A bird that's looking above your life. You know what I love about you? I love that we just jumped transcendence. We're like, f***, hold on. Let's get there. Let's just go right to transcendence. Well, this is what everyone wants, right?

You want safety. You want connection. You want to feel loved. You want to feel purpose, mission. But ultimately, you want to feel like what's my... Connected to the rest of humanity. Yeah. What's the greatest potential for my life?

What's the meaning of my life? Why am I here? How can I serve my purpose and do it fully? That's right. And so what is healthy transcendence? Healthy transcendence is an emergent phenomenon. And I'll explain every part of this. Healthy transcendence is an emergent phenomenon resulting from the harmonious

integration of one's whole self in the service of cultivating the good society i can break that down uh you know so for me that's kind of like my definition of greatness i always tell people that that interesting the way that i i view greatness is um it's discovering your unique talents and gifts that are inside of you, and pursuing your dreams using those gifts and making an impact on the most people you can in the pursuit of those dreams. So it's figuring out who you are to pursue the things

you're making. Yours is pithier. And then helping as many people as you can along the way. Maybe helping as many people as 10 people. Maybe it's 100 people. Maybe it's your whole community. It's your city or your country. Maybe it is. But maybe it's just your family, and that's fine too.

But helping as many people along the way that you're capable of helping. And, yeah, I love that. And the key thing I try to point out there is also that it's important to have integration there of all the various sides of yourself. Because, you know, and I feel like you, I don't know, can we get personal about you for a second? Yeah, of course. I mean, I feel like you've really, your whole growth process has really been a process of integration. You know, you had certain sides of yourself you weren't proud of at some points in your life.

And you didn't let, and you brought it into the rest of you. You didn't like, you started to have acceptance, right? Yeah, absolutely. Well, it was very shameful for most of my childhood. I mean, most of my adulthood. I was shameful of things that had happened or things that I had done, happened to me or things that I created in the world. And I hid those shames.

I didn't talk about them, which made me suffer. So when I started to talk about them and forgive myself and forgive others and heal, then it allowed me to go beyond that state of being that I was in. I was able to create and accomplish a lot, but I still wasn't feeling connected. I wasn't feeling like things mattered as much. I was still suffering. And so I was wondering why am I... You felt a disconnection between self and world. Absolutely. And I was like, why am I feeling this? Let me just do more and work harder and win more. But it wasn't supporting my overall growth. Yeah. And see, now you're very comfortable in your own body. It's obvious to me. You're at ease with your being. Absolutely. It's a phrase

I like to use. Yeah. So transcend yeah. So transcendence, healthy transcendence, is essentially the definition of greatness. And we're all trying to get there, essentially. Is that what I'm hearing you say? We should all be striving to get there, but it's going to take safety, connection, self-esteem first before we can really get to those levels. So I'll explain my new revised Kauffman sailboat model. So I'll explain my new revised Kauffman sailboat model. So my revised hierarchy of needs, there's no longer a pyramid, because Maslow never even drew a pyramid, where a whole vehicle that needs to be integrated. That's why a sailboat works. All the parts have to work together optimally in order for that sailboat to really move in its most purposeful direction. I'll put up a graphic or something here as well for people so they can see how they can zoom in or something we can do that yeah you've got you've got mad technology here you know so how is yours different than yeah his what it what is well it

keeps the spirit of what Maslow see remember there was no hit Maslow's a pyramid he never drew a pyramid if you actually people betrayed the spirit of his original theory so I'm trying to like bring in the original spirit with my own flavor, you know. So in his original theory, he distinguished between the being realm of human existence and the deficiency realm. D versus B realm of human existence. When we're in the deficiency realm or we're deficiently motivated. So another way of saying is deficiency motivation versus growth motivation. When we're in the realm of deficiency motivation, we're motivated by what we are lacking. And like I said earlier, you know, we try to, we basically are screaming for

the things we're lacking in the world. Like if we're hungry, feed me, you know, if we're lonely, like be my friend, you know know which paradoxically makes people not want to be friends with you because you come across as needy and that's really an interesting paradox but um if you're really um uh need like low and respect you demand risk you demand respect you need to respect me yeah demand it you demand it but the growth realm of human existence is a whole different realm um if you can get to the growth realm of being, you no longer want the world to conform to you. You actually start admiring the world on its own terms. You start to admire people on their own terms,

and that's called be love, love for the being of others. That's what Maslow called it. So in the D realm, you have the need for connection, but in the B realm, you have be love, which is just love for the being of others not for what they offer to you you know like maybe someone wouldn't doesn't even offer you connection but you can still admire them you can still love them you know you can still be curious about them right so the B love is a whole different so so what I did with the sailboat is

the boat itself is the deer is the D realm right you need if you have too many holes in the boat itself is the D realm, right? If you have too many holes in the boat, you know, the boat's going to sink, right? The water's going to come in and sink. If you're too deficient in the needs for safety, the need for connection, the need for self-esteem, and they all work together as a system is another point I want to make. It's a feedback loop. I call it the insecurity cycle. People who are deficient in any one of

those three tend to start quickly becoming deficient in the other two right so if safety is deficient then your self-esteem and your connection feel lonely yeah if your connection is low then you don't have self-esteem or confidence you don't feel safe that's exactly right and if you have low self-esteem then you feel disconnected and lack of safety as well. That's right. Wow. Yeah.

And you feel like nobody respects me. Nobody cares about me, you know. So it's a cycle. So that's the boat. But if the boat is safe and secure, you're still not going to go anywhere unless you open up the sail, right? So it's not enough to just be safe and secure. Some people are acting these days like the ultimate is just to be the lack of what they have, you know, not no longer lack what they have.

And then they're going to be happy. It's like, no, no, no, there's needs to be something above zero, right? You can't just get from negative 50 to zero, right? You don't go to, you go to a psychologist and you're anxious. You have generalized anxiety disorder. A lot of people, are you just satisfied if you leave the psychologist no longer being anxious in the world? There's still nothing added to that. So once you can open the sail and move with vulnerability against the inevitable winds and waves of the sea, you move in a purposeful direction with a spirit of exploration, be love, and purpose. Despite knowing that

the waves could come crashing down on us at any time and even though we're all in our own boat we're moving the sea the same sea together so that that way can come crashing on many boats at the same time you know so we need to be connected to rest of humanity and also still have that bravery and and exploration drive to just go despite our fears you know i was nervous today i was nervous this first time I've put on a suit in a year. This is the farthest I've driven in over a year. Five miles. Yeah, exactly.

Six miles. You know, and it's like, I was a little nervous. But the thing is, you have to move in life. You have to keep moving. And that's the sailboat metaphor, is you have to open that sail ultimately, or else you're not going to grow. You have to get outside your comfort zone.

And when you open the sale, there's exploration, love, and purpose. Yeah. So another way of putting that is whereas security is the base of security is safety, the base of growth is exploration. Does that make sense? So safety and exploration. Because you could have safety, connection, self-esteem, but if you don't have exploration, you don't, you're not, if you're not growing,

then you feel stagnant, you feel disconnected, you probably feel less safe then also, right? Yeah, that's exactly right. Something's missing, I gotta shake something up in my life. Yeah, and you know, sometimes we might not even feel safe and still choose, say, I'm gonna choose exploration, you know? Like sometimes we don't have to wait till we're fully safe in order to explore and why is that um why

are some people like you know take two people some people have the fear and they don't grow and some people have the fear and they do is that kind of question yeah that's a great question yeah yeah i like that i just want to be close just zoom in on the question you know because it's like i wish i knew the precise answer. Some have done personality differences. Maslow did write that, like, the self-actualizers he studied seemed to, as opposed to being frightened by the unknown, they were turned on by the unknown. Excited. He used the word excited.

I get excited. Yeah. excited. I get excited because I don't know if there's ever been like a bad moment when something didn't work out or I failed or like I was humiliated. I can't look back and say that ruined my life. Like it might've been a moment of embarrassment and might've affected me the earlier in my life when I didn't know how to use those emotions for good or I didn't know how to transcend the feeling of embarrassment or loneliness or rejection. But as I look back at my life, and you talk about this in your book

about the history of looking back, we should look back at the history of our life like a historian, I think you mentioned that. Yeah, yeah. And- Basil talked a lot about that. Yeah, yeah, and as we look back like a historian, like okay, look at all these different moments

and years and timelines and chapters and pages that we turned. And if I look back, I'm like, every decision I made that had a risk that was scary turned out for the better. Like, even if it turned out for the worse, it eventually built a foundation of like, I can do this. I can go after what I want, and I'm still going to be alive. And my family's still there for me, my friends, you know, it's going to be okay. And I think a lot of people live in a state of deficiency realm or a state of fear that they don't want to go after what they could be or what they are interested in doing because

that risk is too big and they're too afraid of i guess feeling a lack of safety connection and self-esteem yeah if i risk and i fail then i'm gonna lose my house no one's gonna be my friend and i'm gonna have zero confidence in myself yeah which makes it very then there's no foundation to the sailboat you got it you nailed it a lot of people who um fear um uh their their self-esteem need is so important to them. What's really going on with them underneath it is they have a fear of shame. In terms of what? Like if I fail? If they fail, they'll be shamed. They'll be revealed as not as smart as they thought they were or not as great as they thought they were. I mean, you've interviewed so many great people. And do you find a common theme in terms of

there are many moments in their life where they definitely weren't great? Absolutely. And they were okay with that. It didn't put them in a downward spiral of depression where they were no longer able to pick themselves up again. So how do we free frame life in a way so we can actually take on risk, take on growth,

take on challenges and not hurt our self-esteem when we do fail? Because we're all going to be failing in order to grow. It's not going to be like, I'm going to win at everything and be perfect and it's always going to be a New York Times bestseller and everyone's got to praise every decision I make. That's right. So how do we build our self-esteem foundation so that no matter what happens in the results of our life,

we're still confident and esteemed in who we are? I think the best way to look at self-esteem and the healthiest form of self-esteem is as, again, I'm going to use the phrase emergent phenomenon. I'm a really big fan of that phrase. It's not something that you shoot for. The problem with people who show mental health issues is that they have made self-esteem itself the goal, as opposed to the outgrowth of a natural outgrowth of pride, healthy pride in something you built, some form of mastery,

as well as your social relationships. Psychologists distinguish between hubristic pride and authentic pride. And I think the healthiest route to uh to self-esteem that the kind of self-esteem that'll really um lead to growth is authentic pride what's the difference authentic pride versus hubristic pride is driven by um the path of uh the need for dominance the need for power um uh the self-esteem becomes the goal in itself you know often incompetent yeah demanding commanding respect commanding goal it's the goal yeah it's a having the accolades as much as possible so that it reflects on your ego what why do people live in that state what do you call that the hubris hubristic pride

stick price like why do people and what happens when we come from that place if that is our goal? You know, both evolutionary psychologists have studied this because both evolve. And there's a reason why it exists in the human gene pool. You know, both paths evolved over the course of human history for different purposes. But they both served its function. in history for different purposes. They both served its function. You know, dominance, you know, being able to be the, you know, the top person in your clan, you know, on the Savannah certainly had its meeting benefits, you know what I'm

saying? Yeah, of course. But, you know. Sure. But that wasn't the only pathway to meeting. See, the thing is, there was also people in the tribe who were the experts, the professors who were getting laid just as much. The wise men.

Yeah, the wise. Yeah, exactly. And both pathways evolved and still exist in our gene pool. And there also are some genetic factors here. Some people are actually more predisposed to one path or the other. But it doesn't mean we can't change or we can't grow in our life and we can't kind of shift our pathway. Yeah, okay.

So the authentic pride, so what happens when we live from that state of hubristic pride? Will we ever feel fulfilled? Even if we get command, the respect and get all the accolades and accomplishments and money and houses, if that is the goal, will we be fulfilled and happy inside? No, it really is like a hedonic treadmill. Yeah, you keep running on this treadmill, but you never get to the end of the treadmill. Have psychologists studied people that have lived in that state of being who actually are happy? I'm sure they exist. I'm not the kind of person who will say that there's never, never, or that one must live their life. In fact, I want to be clear about something in my book is I'm very clear

that self-actualization and the path of self-actualization is one where you find the path that works best for you and your own unique constellation of traits, characteristics, life experiences. Only you can choose what path works for you, and you should own it. I think there are a lot of people who have made their life work for them, who know that who they are at various points in their life. These things change. The thought of, for some reason, Tucker Max is coming to my mind. There was a point in his life where he changed he did but i also there was a point in his life where he owned

being an asshole yes and this this is what i think is interesting is that i don't know why that example i think that's irrelevant actually that why that example because i i feel like i knew him before and then after as well yeah and and then you know he put on his website at one point he's like i am tucker max and i am an asshole and I don't know if he was fulfilled in that moment of his life But he found something that met his own unique Constellation of traits and I think it's interesting because I'm not I'm not a judge. I'm like the least judgmental person You know, you know, you know, maybe not the absolute least because you've met a lot of cool people, but I'm very non-judgmental. So I, for instance, I do personal coaching now, right? And I have like 17 clients. And for every single one of them, I just like, I be love, you know, I sit, it's not my job to like

condemn someone, you know, it's my job to sit back and listen to them and see what is at this moment in their life, what kind of life works for them, you know? And maybe at this moment in their life what what kind of life works for them you know and maybe at this moment in life for some people they have such as excess of anger and excess of that they need to get out in in and I so I want to kind of help them cultivate it in a productive direction but you know I'm not here to say what works and what doesn't work if that makes sense of course but the authentic pride is more in a state of being as I'm not here to say what works and what doesn't work, if that makes sense. Right, of course. But the authentic pride is more in a state of being as I'm doing this for the art of it. I'm doing this for the process of gaining excellence in the process and being prideful in what I accomplish for myself,

not what others recognize as something great. Yeah, it's the more sustainable path. I'll say that. It's more sustainable overall. If you're thinking about this over the long haul, you're not about flash and burn, right? For some people, maybe they just want to flash and burn. But if you're thinking about a life well lived,

I teach the course, The Science of Living Well. It really is about this kind of authentic mastery of yourself, the world, and other people. Yeah. I love that. So how do we rid ourselves of insecurity? I wish there was a magic wand. Is it possible to?

I mean, are we always going to be insecure at different, if we're seeking growth, will there be insecurity in our life? As I write about in the book, I think it's unrealistic to say that anyone gets it to zero because we're such a social species and if you were to get to zero you probably would dip into the realm of psychopaths and they're a unique breed of humans that don't seem to give a f**k about anyone you know and i'm not saying that we should get to that point so i think the fact that we do

have a little you know that that is that we don't get to zero is actually means that we're human you know that is there a way to be compassionate caring and completely secure like not insecure yeah please you know self-confident i do and being aware that hey if i fail it's going to be okay and it's i still love myself yeah possible i do think so i think you you can still keep caring about what people think of you to a certain degree because it'll help you be better but without personalizing it so much and without it uh stopping you're dead in your tracks you know i i do think we can get to that state absolutely yeah and you also talk about in the book that I saw around self-esteem versus narcissism. I love that distinction.

Like confidence versus narcissism. You read my book. I went through it. It's hard for me to finish any book, but I went through it. I'm impressed. Yeah, I'm a big fan of that distinction. Yeah, so how do we know when someone is a narcissist versus someone who's just extremely self-confident yeah no and how do we make sure we don't cross over from confidence to narcissism I got into a

Twitter fight with Scott Adams did you see that I didn't see it he's like he's like psychologists who study who studies narcissism are stupid basically they don't know what they're talking about like Narcissism is a great thing. What they're doing is people who are just confident and we're just calling them narcissists. Now I beg to differ with that because I actually think there's a really important difference between confidence and narcissism

that needs to be recognized. People who score really, really high in narcissistic traits, and by the way, I think we all are somewhere on this spectrum, so I'm actually not a fan of the way, I think we all are somewhere on the spectrum. So I don't, I'm actually not a fan of saying there are narcissists and then there are not narcissists. You know, people who score high in narcissistic characteristics is like how I like to phrase it. Which is, what are those characteristics? Well, the core of it that distinguishes it from just run-of-the-mill confidence is entitlement.

That is narcissism. That's like, you're throwing darts. Where's narcissism? Where's narcissism? Center. Oh, entitlement. That is the nail. That's like you're throwing darts. Where's narcissism? Where's narcissism? Center. Oh, entitlement. Anyone that thinks they're entitled to anything. Everything. Everything. They think they're entitled to everything in the world. Even things they haven't earned. Things because they think they were born special. That's the thing. That's the heart of a narcissist. Yeah. That's the heart of the narcissist. Yes. Yes. That's the heart of a narcissist yeah that's the heart of the narcissist yes yes that's the heart of a narcissist yes yes beautifully put um people with confidence you know can think they're enough without thinking they're the best or superior you know um and even people who are um great you know

who um do great things in their life can still be great without thinking they're the greatest human being. You see what I'm saying? You can own that you're great at what you do and that you've put in the work, you've mastered it, but that you're not entitled to special privileges more than anyone else who's suffering in this world, because we're all suffering in this world, you know, the Buddha. Yeah. Life is suffering. Life is suffering, yeah. we're all suffering in this world you know with the buddha yeah as you know you know right right um you know like you're not uh you know entitled to everything like if you're in line at an airport you know the person who scores high in narcissists will be like i demand to be the first one in line

well it's like well why you know why exactly is that you know but you absolutely um have a cultivated sense of confidence and and and in a lot of ways the most the most authentically confident people tend to be the least narcissistic which is an interesting paradox at least entitled yeah I find that really interesting there's an ease of being about them I'm gonna go back to that phrase so how do we get to a place of that confidence level? What's the keys to confidence? So the two major forms of confidence are mastery and self-worth. Self-worth is I'm enough. There's nothing else I have to achieve in order to be any more worthy as a human being.

How does someone believe that when everything is against them? When they're broke, they just got dumped, they just got fired, they're 100 pounds overweight, they're sick. How does someone believe I'm enough with all the breakdowns they might be going through? Or even one breakdown. This person left me, I'm worthless.

How do we change that? You know, it's such a good question and I would say that no matter your circumstances, no matter how dire things are, if you just go out and you just smile at a stranger on the street

and make their day, they see you as worthy. You improved their life in a moment, which means you as worthy. See, the- You improve their life in a moment, which means you're worthy. And you just proved to yourself that you're a worthy human being. See, this is the thing, is like,

there are little things you can do to just remind yourself, because I think the fact is that we're worthy, without doing anything else, you know? But the problem, as you describe, is that we forget it, because we have so many things telling us that we're not. Or we isolate ourselves. Does that make sense? Yeah, of course, as you describe, is that we forget it because we have so many things telling us that we're not. Or we isolate ourselves. Does that make sense? Yeah, of course.

We isolate ourselves and we stay in this story and this script that keeps us small, stuck, worthless, feeling. Even though it's not the truth. Go volunteer for a soup kitchen for one day and you'll be reminded of the humanity of others. You'll be reminded, oh, I'm a human too. of the humanity of others, you'll be reminded, oh, I'm a human too, you know? Now there are things I need to work on so that I can have a sustainable life and maybe even be great at something.

It's wonderful to aspire to greatness, right? But you're not aspiring to be superior as a, you know, the puffed up kind of narcissist. Yeah, I'm better than someone else. Yeah, yeah. So confidence equals mastery plus self-worth. Self-worth, yeah. And what are some other ways that we could build self-worth

besides just remembering that we are worthy? Even if we remember, but we look at our body in the mirror and we say, but I'm not proud of the person I see in the mirror. I'm not proud of the actions I've had in the past. I'm not proud of losing my job or my partner leaving me. How can I build self- worth besides just smiling at people? Right. Right. Well, I would frame the question a little differently if I may,

because I think that like the self worth should be taken as the assumption of the starting point, not the thing that you're trying to build. And the reason why I say it that way is because what if you flipped it around and you looked at your facts? No, not you, but the person looks at themselves in the mirror and they're like, COVID has made me a complete slob. Then I would argue the best framing of it is, well, I'm worthy, so therefore I'm going to lose the weight. The unworthiness start is what motivates you to get to work. Not the destination.

As opposed to, I need to get to work so that I can be worthy. Wow. So self-worth is the starting point, not the goal. I'm worth it. I'm worth it to take care of my body once and for all. How do we realize that? I mean, can you just start telling yourself that? Sometimes we can believe things over time if we tell ourselves enough.

Now, I'm starting to sound a little bit like Stuart Smalley from the Saturday Night Live skits in the 80s. I don't know if you remember those. Like, I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and by God, I'm worth it. I'm hearing myself talk right now. I'm like, I sound like Stuart Smalley. But in a way, there's a truth to it. Affirmations are not the worst things in the world so now you're a psychologist and i'm hearing you talk a lot about a drink go for it i'm hearing you talk a lot about um not being needy

in society because then i'll actually repel people massive distinguish between needing love and unneeding love what is the difference well or you can even say need needing love and unneeding love. What is the difference? Or you could even say needy love and unneeding love. Needy love is like where you're demanding, love me, you know, because I love you, you must love me. You know, where unneeding love is you don't ask for anything in return for the other person. You actually just admire them like you're watching a sunset. Carl Rogers, the humanistic psychologist, said, when you watch a sunset, you don't say, oh, it's a beautiful sunset, but I wish the bottom corner was just up a little bit this way,

and that the hue of the redness was a little bit lighter. You admire the fucking sunset. Why don't we admire humans like we admire sunsets? Why do we demand love and return in certain ways? Or why do we need that from people? It's conditional. Other people's love is conditional on the extent to which they return your love.

But it shouldn't be that way. Yeah. But I'm sorry, I feel like I interrupted you because you were getting at the paradox of being needy. No, yeah, I think I love... You're a psychologist at Columbia. You write these deep research books on all these topics on

human behavior and psychology and there's another world that you're starting to sound like to me which is this law of attraction world which is you know don't be needy because then you'll repel people is that one of the principles and the law of attraction it's like you know be a magnet for attracting what you want in your life and in order to be a magnet to attract you know great business relationships or the career opportunity or the right uh intimate partnerships you can't be chasing them you can't be like i need you please pick me please will you be my boyfriend will you be my girlfriend please will you hire

me like you can't be in this begging needing state yeah you need to like be unattached you have to let it go you gotta let it go that's that's true you got to be unattached and you got to build your your own confidence your own self worth in order to be a magnet to attract those things to you and you have to start looking at yourself in a more positive light and things like that. So you're sounding similar to what I hear in the law of attraction, woo-woo world, if you will. Oh shit, well I've made the case there can be wisdom in the woo-woo. I've made that case.

Well is there science in the woo-woo as well? Yes, so that's where I said, where I say it can, that's what transcend is. I'm trying to do the science of woo-woo. Right, right, right. Yeah, that's exactly what transcend is all about. By the way, to your point, there was this cat who I emailed, like, almost every week when my podcast first started.

I was like, Will you be in my podcast? Will you be in my podcast? And he was like, get away from me. He ignored me, you know, like, then I would, like, talk to his people, and they'd be like, you know, like, yeah, like, yeah, no, he's really busy.

You're too needy, yeah. No, they didn't say that explicitly, you know. But I'm just like, two, three years. And then I was like, you know, I'm just not going to even just. Maybe like two, three years went by. I get an email from this cat, you know. He's like, all my friends keep, like, mentioning you in every conversation I'm having these days. Like, they're like, do you know Scott Barrett Kaufman?

And he's like, can I be on your podcast? And, of course, my immediate reaction was like. he's like, can I be on your podcast? And of course, my immediate reaction was like, go fuck off. Screw you, I asked you for years. I was like, now you want to be on my show.

Now I'm big enough for you. I'm not even going to lie, my immediate reaction was like, oh, I'm busy, sorry I didn't have my assistant respond. But once that ego subsided, we ended up having a talk and it was just a wonderful conversation. I used to do this 15 years ago when I started

salsa dancing. I did the same strategy in a sense for just kind of like a cheeky ego, I guess, that I had back then where I was very passionate about salsa dancing. I still am. I haven't done it as much because of the pandemic, but for 15 years, I've been salsa dancing around the world. I've traveled the world to the best salsa clubs. I've danced with some of the greatest professional dancers at clubs, right? And it's been a joy of mine. It was a skill that I learned to master, which built self-worth and confidence and all these different things in me because it was hard because it wasn't something I was good at When you get good at something that you are afraid of man your comments level goes up to another level at least it does for me Yeah, anyways, I stand out in a salsa club

If you can imagine this mostly mostly Latin people that are mostly about a foot taller than me I'm this tall white dude right that doesn't speak the language. They're taller than you? No, I'm a foot taller than like pretty much everyone that I'm dancing with essentially, right? Guys, girls, everything. And I would walk into a club and I would observe and I would look for the best dancer on the dance floor. The one that scared me, the one that intimidated me that she was so great that I was like,

I don't know if I can dance with this girl. And I would look to see who she was. And then I was like, I don't know if I can dance with this girl. And I would look to see who she was. And then when there was a moment after a song would end and a new song would start, I would go up and ask them to dance because it scared me. It was terrifying. Terrifying because it was a new city. It was a new place I'd never been to.

I didn't know the people. They didn't know who I was. But I don't look the part in a salsa club. I look like I'm an outsider. And most of the time, these girls would reject me. They would say, no, I'm okay. I would go up there and kind of be like, hey, I love to dance, but they would reject me.

Then what I would do is make it my mission by the end of the night for them to come. To show that you're good. Yes, and I would go find other girls and dance right next to them for hours. And I wouldn't go approach them until they came back to me and most of the time they'd be like hey you want to dance i'm like no i'm good yeah you really did that so i did the same thing as you i can really resonate with that yeah it was like no you didn't want to dance with me before because you judged me and now you see me and now you want to but it

was you know i stopped doing that after a while but that's ego it doesn't but but i really resonate with it like i feel like a lot of people can really resonate with that you know yeah yeah so what is this uh where's the science of neediness in terms of like why does that repel people the need to chase something to have something that you don't have is it is there science behind it why that doesn't work i have often thought that there needs to be a book on this topic the paradox of neediness you know um could be the title of the book or something yeah um because um people always asking why do people why do young women why are they like the bad boy you know well it's like it's not that they love asshole it's not they're like oh i love people

who are mean to others you know they um there's um a detached detachment there where you feel and i think what might be going on to a certain degree is what you do is you feel like you're the one has agency in making the choice when you feel you feel coerced if the other person is needy right you want to because humans want to feel like know, I want to hear what you think of this take. But, for instance, if someone is completely not interested in you or whatever, and you approach them, you feel like, you know what? I'm the one that's in control of this situation. I made the choice.

I want this person. You know? There's also the, obviously, supply and demand aspect of it as well. We all want what we can't have. That's the obvious one. But I think there's a more subtle thing going on. We want to feel like we made the choice. Even in the case where they saw you later on killing it on the dance floor,

and then they approach you, they feel like, okay, now I'm in control of my life. I've made the decision. As opposed to if they're coming at me and I say, okay, we kind of lax agency. Interesting. What do you think of that take? I think so, yeah. Us making a conscious decision of what we want to do.

Not someone like, not that I was like needy or begging, but when someone's like, please stay in a relationship with me. I can't live without you. It's like, ugh. Do I want to do that? No. Do I want that responsibility and that weight of someone who can't live without me or someone that needs me right now for this business deal or needs this job? If someone is in that state, it's almost like you can sense they're lacking confidence.

If they need something, that means they're lacking something. They're not a complete human being. They're not a whole healthy human being. And that energy kind of repels people, I think. And we've all been there. We've all been there. I mean, I've been there. I've been needy in relationships and all these things.

I wish we had more compassion for needy people. Yeah, it's so hard, though. It's the paradox. I wish in an ultimate world we would be able to have a common humanity there like even on like you know like i just i remember the dance club is in the 20s you know that's a that's a traumatic experience to me to approach you know and they you know they're like oh you know it's like what do you mean like i'm a nice guy my mother tells me i'm great. You should talk to my mother.

But no, it's such, when you're young, 20, 21, 22, that's like traumatic. Traumatic. Do you know what I mean? When a girl rejects you. It's traumatic. Yeah. But, you know, also, you can also see it from the women's perspective as well. It must be traumatic for them to have these guys like grinding up on them.

Yeah, yeah. Like all around, it's, you know, for everyone. I don't feel like dance clubs are a really wonderful situation. So how do we learn to detach the outcome of what another person says about us to us? How does someone learn detachment? Because it sounds like detachment is the key to helping you attract certain things,

maybe not always, all the time. You wanna have a goal, you talked about you wanna have an aim, you wanna have a goal, you wanna put all the time. You want to have a goal. You talked about you want to have an aim. You want to have a goal. You want to put your sail up and be in a direction towards something, but not being attached to the result. Buddha's non-attachment.

Buddha's non-attachment. And here's an interesting psychology finding. People, you know, have you heard of attachment theory? You know, like secure and insecure and anxious attachment. Yes, avoidance. Avoidance.

Well, researchers were curious, how does the Buddha concept of non-attachment relate to attachment theory? They found that those who scored high on a scale of Buddha non-attachment scored up the kazoo high in secure attachment for attachment theory. In secure attachment, is that the best one we want to be? Yeah, well, I wouldn't phrase it that way, but it's the healthiest. The secure attachment, is that the best one we want to be? Yeah, well, I wouldn't phrase it that way, but it's the healthiest.

The healthiest, yeah. It's the greatest. The healthiest attachment style. Yeah, yeah. Some secure. Yeah. For if you want to cultivate a healthy relationship. Some people, by the way,

score high in avoidant attachment style and they're perfectly content with that. They just don't want to be in relationships. It's the anxious attachment that's really most problematic. What is the anxious attachment? You're clingy. Clingy. It's the needy. It's the needy. But isn't that an interesting finding that those Buddhist non-attachment, like I don't need this outcome to define me. I don't need this out. You're not so tied to the outcome, right? They tended to feel more secure in their attachments with people. They tended to feel more or less anxious in their attachments with people. I think there's an interesting... How do we get there, though?

Yeah, you love those questions, how do we get there, which are good questions. I'm like, I'm better at the descriptive than the prescriptive kind of I am getting more in the prescriptive world right there are cheesy answers to that question like meditation

you know more but that are true cheesy but true you know I say cheesy because that's what the answer to everything

nowadays it's like well how do I meditate more you know but it does help a lot to help you detach from your thoughts

you know because the key there is you want to not identify with yourself as much as we do and we Automatically identify with ourself and then it causes us to without thinking about it act act in ways that we later regret You know but the more that we can create that space you know between separation himself. Yeah Yeah, and not it's not we're not identified identified. We actually see it as for what it is, but it's not who we, it's not, you know, there's a higher I. It's transcendence. It's in the book where the bird is above the sailboat.

Yeah, yeah. You're looking down at yourself. The perspective of the seabird. That's nice. You're looking down at yourself. Yeah, yeah. And humanity, you know, all of humanity. It's interesting because when I went to, I went to India for a few weeks to study meditation, about five years ago now I guess it was, and we practiced.

Did you stick out there? I did stick out there too, yeah. But we practiced many times, in a weird way, leaving our body. Like in meditation practice, our mind leaving our body and like seeing ourself mentally kind of rise above and looking down at ourself, right? And then it got to the point where I was like, okay, we're above ourselves 10 feet. Then we're in the clouds looking down at ourselves. Then we're going beyond the world looking down at all of humanity. And then we're going into other, this sounds weird and woo-woo-yey but it's like going into the universe and seeing the the earth as a speck and then going farther and expanding out and and seeing the earth gone and if you expand yourself from yourself mentally visually and some type of practice then you can look at things from a different perspective like

you talk about in your book yeah i think that's the key is seeing yourself from a different perspective than in the chaos of self all day long. Absolutely. I have a friend, David Yadin, who is my research collaborator. He now does a lot of work on LSD and well-being at Johns Hopkins. But he has this virtual reality device and he brought me into his office once. He's like, put this on, put this on. And then it was the view from space he called it the overview effect and wrote a really

cool paper on the overview effect um how did it feel when you experienced it you know i a different perspective um i my my whole self-reference changed i was from it was the view from space from the view from an astronaut looking at earth um And it really does shift. It shifts everything around. You're like, wow, where's myself now? Where's myself when I'm not on earth, when I'm not even on earth? It's crazy, man. What's a psychological practice that you think we can take on a daily basis?

Three, four, or five things that you think, hey, no matter what you're going through, life is great, life is. Maslow had a whole list of, and I reprinted them, they were unpublished ways to get into the B realm of existence. Really, they weren't published? Yeah, no, no, I gathered them together through various things. You're like a research seeker,

you're just like diving into all of it i am a nerd that's what you're trying to say um live more in the b realm and a whole bunch of things i'm just gonna rattle through things um uh sample things uh keep your eye on the ends not only on the means fight familiarization seek fresh experiences. Get out of the deficiency world by deliberately going into the B realm. Seek out art galleries, libraries, museums, beautiful or grand trees in the mountains or seashore. Avoid dichotomizing the D realm and the B realm. They should be hierarchically integrated. An either-or choice is not necessary.

The firmest foundation for the being realm is to have satisfied deficiency needs, such as for safety, connection, or self-esteem. But the important thing is to know that it's still part of you, right? Deficiency is a part of us? Deficiency is always going to, could be at any moment. At any moment, you could be hungry again. It's not like once you get in the be realm, you're above others. You're above humanity. I think that's the point he was trying to make there. It's important to keep your ground in humanity. So we want to be in both realms or more in the B realm?

We want to live more in the B realm, for sure. But we want to not suddenly think life's a video game where we've reached that level and then we're now seeing other humans from a higher view. We're still human. I think that's the point he was trying to advantage. We're better than still here. You know, we're still human I think it's the point is to say cultivate periods of quiet meditation getting out of the world and getting out of our usual locality immediate concerns apprehensions and forebodings Periodically get away from time and space concerns away from clocks calendars responsibilities demands from the world duties and other people go to the dreamy state

I've often said the daydream you should create daydreaming timereaming time in your day. I'm such a, I call this strategic messing around. It's like the time where you schedule it so where you can just do nothing and allow yourself, I want to play a game. I want to read. I want to explore. I want to brainstorm. I want to just daydream. It should be on your to-do list. It should be, you know know spontaneity embrace your past embrace your guilt rather than running from it be compassionate with yourself be understanding accepting forgiving and perhaps even loving about your uh foibles as expressions of human nature enjoy and smile at yourself um ask yourself how would this situation look to a child to the innocent to a very old person who's beyond personal ambition and competition?

Just you know older people I would say the generation I think it's the the and brawny where's book the five regrets of the dying. It's like they wish they didn't There's so many wishes that they wish they didn't have done looking back and they're like okay this just doesn't matter at this stage of my life you know i love that yeah it doesn't matter that's different vantage point yeah when you're when you're you've got five years left or two years left you're like this stuff doesn't matter doesn't matter yeah i'm there um this this stuff's so good that i read a couple more go ahead um do not conceal your ignorance admit it um do not let anyone force roles on you that is do not act the way other people think that a doctor minister or teacher

should act if it is not natural for you you know um i like this one engage in deliberate experimental philanthropy if sometimes you are no good for yourself depressed anxious at least you can be good for someone else isn't that good good? Isn't that good? And this perhaps is my favorite one. If you find yourself becoming egoistic, arrogant, conceited, or puffed up, think of mortality or think of other arrogant and conceited people and see how they look. Do you want to look like that? Do you want to take yourself that seriously to be that unhumorous? This is a sampling of things. Yeah. Wow. So the B realm is the state that we want to be that unhumorous. This is a sampling of things. Wow. So the B realm is the state that we want to be in

more frequently. But even if we're in there frequently, the deficiency realm will pop up from time to time. It's human nature. Maslow said human development is always two steps forward and one step back. It's not like a video game.

And that's, I think, how we need to think. You're not always leveling up. It's not a leveling up. You need to choose growth. Here's this quote, you know, you can move back towards fear,

you can move forward towards growth. You just have to keep choosing the fear option again and again and avoiding, no, choosing the growth option again and again

and avoiding the fear option again and again. And that's life. Well, and the growth option is probably leaning into the fear and not holding back and saying I'm afraid so I'm not gonna act it's knowing this is the fear is I feel fearful so I need to move towards it I need to grow I need to overcome and there's never a stage in our life at least I haven't realized I just turned 38 and there's never a stage in our life where it's like,

oh, I've got to figure it out. I've grown so much, I don't need to grow anymore. There's always a new experience or level that we need to grow into, right? Yeah. What happens if we stop growing? Yeah, I would say, you know, with growth, again, it's not like levels. I know a lot of people use that metaphor. You know, we never stop growing. Again, it's not like levels. I know a lot of people use that metaphor.

We never stop growing. I mean, Karen Horney, one of my favorite, most underrated psychoanalysts, says we have the potential to learn and grow until the day we die. This is a quote of hers. And I really do believe that to be true. And I think that even like there are examples of people, the last two days of their life They're on their deathbed and they look back at their life and they decide they're gonna like forgive someone, you know Like they're going they can make a big decision, you know, they're gone and even in their last breath. They have made it They've chosen growth, you know, so I think we could choose growth until we die. Yeah

What's the thing that you're most afraid of these days that you haven't chosen to grow into oh interesting um uh yeah okay you're struggling this is a really personal question yes yes but committing to a long-term romantic relationship wow that's a really personal admission so you avoidant attachment style? What is that attachment style? You know, I'm secure attachment, but I like to play. I don't know how else to say this. I don't know how else to say this. I do believe in honesty.

You asked me a question. question you know I love it I my need for exploration is so freaking high that I love partners and and and lovers that are high in that as well but it can make it hard to commit one monogamy one person and maybe I don't have to make that choice so I'm I'm working on that Wow it's a very personal admission I feel like I never admitted that on an interview before. That's interesting. But yeah, yeah. So why is that something meaningful to you right now,

like a committed, intimate relationship? Why is that meaningful? After COVID, after being so alone for so long and reaching a level, a depth of loneliness that I have not experienced my whole life prior to this year, I feel like I'm yearning for something, a higher form of spiritual love that I've been content not having up to this point, really, to the degree that I've had.

And so I definitely, that's where my mind is going these days, yeah. Interesting. You've been okay without that deeper spiritual love up until now? With one person, yeah. Right. But now that's something you're seeking. I can see the merits of it.

Really? I can see the merits of it. Do you feel like once you create that, you'll be like, Oh, but I really did that exploration stage of me. It's like, now that I have it, it's not as exploratory. And you feel like that part of you will have to die? No, I think the ideal thing would be, and I am, you know, this is why I am seeking it. You know, find someone.

You don't have to compromise yourself. I don't think that's what anyone should do. You have to find the life that works for you. So I'm in the process of finding the life that works for me and owning it. And, you know, finding someone who is that same uh journey of self-actualization you know so you know i'm dating trying to find someone who's on that same you know you know someone whose openness to experience levels are as high as mine which is hard to find because my openness to quite frankly quite frankly my openness experience levels are three standard

deviations above the mean which means high three standard deviations about what does that mean bell curve bell curve uh after one standard deviation of the mean you know you have like 85 after two standard deviations point top two percent once you get to three we're talking point oh oh oh oh wow of a standard of living or no no this is it's statistics you have to take a statistics course to really understand what a standard deviation is. But when you have a bell curve, it's all normalized. What percentage proportion of the population are various things. When you're in the middle, it's like the most people are the most populous.

And you're the tail, some of the tail, tail of the right, the very tail. Is this based on what? Your standard for living or your quality of life? No, openness to experience. How high am I relative to the threshold for experience for experiencing newness and i'm so open right and that sometimes if you want to commit to something you got to close something right right sometimes you got someone who may not feel safe next to you in that situation if they're on the other side oh yeah i mean if you're like all the way extreme,

like close minded, like if you're close minded, to that degree, those people I don't really feel comfortable with, you know. But I think, you know, striking maybe a healthier balance in my life would be good. You know, because I'm so open, like I don't care who you are, like, you know, like you're a serial killer,

I'm like, well don't, A, don't kill me, but B, tell me all about, you know, what it's like to be a serial killer. Because isn't that interesting? It's interesting. That's fascinating. That's fascinating. They probably shouldn't, they should be in jail about you know what it's like to be a serial killer because isn't that interesting it's interesting they probably shouldn't they should be in jail but yeah like A like don't kill me like I don't want that I'm not that open but you're curious mind yeah I'm so curious about people about um I don't like to limit my uh options my freedom to explore but you know I mean look I so anyway you you asked me I'm telling you know, I mean, look, I, so anyway, you, you asked me, I'm telling you

where I'm, what I'm struggling with, you know, is kind of finding the, the right, the right life for me. Yeah. How does a psychologist who studies this stuff approach a committed long-term relationship if that's the fear or the uncertainty in your life? Yeah yeah I think it's just one of those things that maybe I will decide I mean I'm still in exploring mode so people are explaining to me what the the polyamorous life looks like and I haven't fully explored it but I'm still in exploring you're the right city for that yeah right friends in Venice Santa friends in venice santa monica do you know what i'm saying the people who are into that world though they love it like they swear by it yeah and i'm not a heart i also don't know anyone convinced i also don't

know anyone who's been in that world for over 10 years and it's still healthy interesting and still swears by it that's really i haven't i've met people who are like three to five years in and still okay. But I haven't met couples like after 10, 15, 20 years who are like, this is the way. We swear by this. It's worked for two decades for us. It still works today. I just haven't.

Maybe because I'm not in those circles necessarily. But I don't see that being talked about a lot. The reason why I'm not 100% sure it's for me is because I feel like, I'm not gonna say dealing with one person's hard enough, but I did kind of just say that, but cultivating a healthy, meaningful relationship with one person is hard enough.

Well, I think also cultivating a spiritual loving relationship with one person is a full-time Energy commitment feels like and if you're in three to five, it's hard to give the spiritual love. I'm a DD I I feel like that would be so I know that I would inadvertently it up You know, there'd be one woman to be like, how come you didn't attend to my needs with it? And it's like look I didn't mean to not do it. I just, my brain scattered across five women here. You know what I'm saying? Like, give me a break.

It's a lot of needs. You know, but, you know. And if one of them are needy, you're going to repel them and say you're not for me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, yeah, yeah, yeah. The whole, that's the callback in improv that you just did. I love that.

So, you know, you see what I'm saying. It's like I feel like I would rather commit, and this is where I think I'm going, is really just trying to commit to really building something beautiful. Because I think I could. I mean, I do it with my work. You know, when I wrote a book, you know, Transcend, I put my heart and soul into it, you know.

You know, I feel like I could certainly put my heart and soul into it you know um you know i feel like i could certainly put my heart and soul into a relationship do you think human beings can put their heart and soul in their purpose which is the top of the sailboat the purpose and their love life can you put your heart and soul in both full energy full commitment and both thrive to accomplish the levels of I want to know I want to know isn't that Casey and Jody's song you're saying no but I really want to know the answer to that question and um I've devoted so much of my life to my work you know and like nine books you know it's like just like and then it's like you know I'm curious if I put that same energy into cultivating a relationship but you're saying can, can you cultivate both? And that's the very, both at the same time.

And that's the really, truly interesting question that I wanna know the answer to. Can I ask you a personal question? Sure. Are you in a relationship right now? Yeah, yeah. How's that process been? Were you skeptical that you could do it?

And then now you've realized it's, I'm still skeptical. Okay, okay. I mean, was I skeptical? I've been in long-term relationships for the last decade. so I wasn't skeptical I could be in a long-term relationship but it's always for me the fear lies in is this going to take me away from my mission or support me in going after my mission more because for me it's weird to say I hate to say this maybe I shouldn't say I hate to say it, but I feel guilty sometimes saying

that the most important thing to me in my life, beyond my health and my personal, I guess, the health of my mind, my body, and my spirit is my mission. That's the most important thing at this stage of my life. Now, maybe when I'm 70 or 60 or whatever, in a few years I might say, the most important thing is my family. My family is important.

It is a priority. It's not the only, the top priority. And I feel guilty sometimes saying that publicly even, because I know so many people say family is everything. The only thing that matters is family. The relationships you have are the only thing that matters the intimate relationship is the most important thing and I think we're societal pressures yeah and I agree that it is an important thing and I want it to be a high priority I just don't know at this stage of my life if it's a

greater priority to put more time and energy and attention into that over my mission because how does your girlfriend feel about that well it doesn't mean i don't neglect her i mean i spend a lot of time and energy a lot of commitment a lot of you tend to her needs 100 at least i do my best yeah right 100 do your best i understand my best and i believe i you know i'm there for all of her needs yeah um but i'm also but it means if I'm the rest of my time is on my mission, I'm letting go of other things that I wouldn't be able to do as much based on just time. So it's learning how do I evolve, how do I grow into a new version of myself so that I can be 100% in my mission.

And what I've learned in the last couple of years is like, okay, I've got to build a team. It can't just be all me and a couple of us doing it all, all day long, obsessing like, okay, I've got to build a team. It can't just be all me and a couple of us doing it all, all day long, obsessing over the mission. We've got to build a team, let go of responsibilities, trust people, it's like you have to elevate and grow into the sailboat. It's like you've got to reach out beyond what you're comfortable with, learn new skills,

master new things, build confidence, fail, take a step back, whatever, in order to be able to be there for the relationship, my health, and the mission. And so it's definitely been a journey. It's beautiful, but it's challenging at the same time. So I think for you it'd be like, okay, you're obsessive in the books every year, and this is all you do,

but maybe you have to hire a couple more people to help you with that. You've got a researcher now, but maybe you need three researchers in the future if you wanna have three hours a day with your partner and explore. It's like, that's a challenge. It's a challenge.

I think it's also one of those things, once you find the right person, things kind of take care of themselves as well. I could definitely see a universe in which I found the right person and then these issues just wouldn't be an issue anymore you know like it'd be nice to have like an adventure partner life adventure partner you know like I really would like to support someone else and what they're doing it's I don't want it to be all about me you know but it has

got to be the right person until then I'm gonna play play away man so exploration love and purpose yes is once we have safety connection and self-esteem those are the next three things were so the way I just say I want to show someday my wife I want her to watch this episode sure yeah I feel like I'm glad we documented yes pre pre me finding the one but I feel like I do get a feeling someday I'm gonna find the person and then I want to have them watch this episode. Watch this episode. I love that. Yeah. Sorry to interrupt you. No worries. We got safety, connection, and self-esteem are the things that we need as our foundation. Yeah. And then after

that it's exploration, love, and purpose. Yeah. Why is love not something, is that same thing as connection? Be love. Love for the being of others, it's different than connection. A higher sense of love. Higher form of spiritual love. Loving humanity, the world, the universe, everything. Treating each human as sacred. Each individual existence as sacred. Love for the being of others, not what they do for you or what they can provide for you or even if they offer a way to satisfy your loneliness

independent of all that independent and how do we discover our purpose that's a good question i don't know if we there's one purpose that we discover but i think that there are a lot of callings that um that if we're listening outside of ourself, we can hear them. And we can see ourselves as having a reasonable number of skill set to be able to contribute to it. I don't think it's any more dramatic than that. People act as though, what if I never find my one true purpose? It's like, chill. There's multiple things.

Trust me. There's a lot of needs in the world that need fulfilling and you can offer that i love the idea of just listening i think we're too caught up in reacting to things constantly on our phone observing other things or responding as opposed to being still listening from a young as a young child i was alone a lot. And I remember feeling very insecure. I didn't have safety connection or self-esteem for many years of my childhood. I didn't feel those things. And I would sit alone.

I didn't have many friends. And I would sit alone and just ask questions. I was like, why am I here? What's the purpose of this? What's the reason of my life? Should I even be here? And I would listen I and I would listen and I would eventually get out of all the noise and I'd listen and I'd hear be like

something was calling me like I could hear something inside when I listened when I was still when I wasn't stressed and anxious I could hear something saying no stick around like go after this try this thing like go do this keep going after it like there's a reason behind it all and the i didn't know what it all meant but it makes as if we're a historian of our past like you write about in your book it starts to make more sense every chapter that we're in in our life and you know in 10 years i'm going to be looking back at these you know where i am now and be like oh yeah this made sense for what I'm doing then. I think if we look at it that way, it's more beneficial, but it's scary because we don't

know what our purpose is a lot of the times. But I think if we can be purpose in the moment, if we can say, I'm going to be purpose, I'm going to live in purpose by contributing to the person I see next to me, by working on myself, by helping others, and just being it, not trying to find purpose, then it's going to be a little easier. Do you realize you just added a new term to the Sebald model? There's be love and there's be purpose. Oh, really?

You just added that. I love it. I thought that was already it. Be purpose? I never used that phrase. Be purpose. Yeah. Being purpose.

Knowing that I am purpose. Just because you do that with love you extrapolate that to purpose it's brilliant we'll add that as a footnote in the next book no I'm not even joking

I'll be purpose reference this interview there you go so I think that's that's interesting even if we don't know what our purpose is we can be it though

yeah that's exactly right just showing up today is knowing that I am enough building the self worth and saying I don't need to

have something to be enough. That's exactly right. I am it. That's exactly right. Right. That's exactly right. And I just don't like that idea of the, I have a lot of my students,

what is the one true purpose? I just don't like the way of thinking about that. That's put way too much pressure on someone and limits you from seeing all of the callings, listening, listening to all of the callings that are coming outside of yourself. The key there is getting outside of your ego, getting outside of your own self needs and be aware of the needs of others. Your purpose can be as small.

Well, I wouldn't even call it small, but like if you're just a stay-at-home mom and you raise a child, that's actually, it could be a big purpose. Yeah. I adopted a cat about a month ago and um how's that going for you it's been great actually i've been thinking about adopting i adopted this cat i have a dog already that was my girlfriend and i had a dog was your girlfriend i have a dog with my oh my god yeah i have a dog with my girlfriend but i've been i had a cat like eight years ago that i loved it was a great cat that I adopted as well. But I gave him to my mom when I started moving.

I moved to New York City and I was traveling a lot and so I gave it to my mom. And I've always been like, for some reason, when you find a great cat, it's like, it added so much joy to my life. Really? You gotta find the right cat. It's like finding the right partner, you know?

It's like, if it's the wrong cat, it's gonna be a nightmare. Just like if it was the wrong partner. Yes, yes. This cat has been a great addition to my life and the purpose of just caring for the animal and supporting the cat and feeding the cat and like, you know, petting her

and just being in that energy. She brings me calm and peace. She purrs on me. I'm contributing to her life, well-being hopefully. And that sense of like, oh, I've got somewhere to go tonight to like take care of. That purpose, just even with an animal, is meaningful to me.

It's added value in the first month of adopting her. So there's things we can create in our life to develop that sense of purpose and being purpose on a daily basis. That's it, you create it. You create, you don't discover it, you create it. We just, we just nailed it. That's it.

But I have a theory and a thesis, help me flesh this out in your psychological researching approach approach that it is near impossible to achieve greatness if we doubt ourselves if we if we lack the belief in ourselves if we constantly live in self-doubt it's really hard to accomplish i think that there's i've seen so many different great athletes over the years who were way more talented than me. Freaks of nature, but they didn't believe in themselves. The coaches believed in them. Teammates were like, you're the best on the team. You're a freak of nature. But for whatever reason inside, they didn't believe it. And I have a theory that

it doesn't matter if the world believes in you and says, you're the greatest, you're the greatest of all time. You have the most talent, the most skill, the most potential. But if the person doesn't learn to build that self-esteem, that self-belief, that they will never be able to fulfill that potential or that purpose or whatever it is for them. And I also have this belief that it doesn't matter if everyone says you're the worst in the world or something. If everyone's against you, if you learn to build that confidence within and eliminate that self-doubt, that you can go accomplish what you're supposed to do, that what you want to do. So I'm curious your thoughts on this from a psychologist researcher point of view about

self-doubt. If we learn the ability to build confidence or if we only doubt ourselves, can we still fulfill that with that doubt inside of us? It does make it more difficult for sure. The interesting thing there is that your self-doubt can be separated from your confidence in your specific skill set. You might have a very, I don't know, like Michael Phelps, well, Michael Phelps, you know, suffered from depression, you know, but I think he would understand that he was pretty darn skilled in swimming.

Yes. But these things can separate from each other. So this sort of sense of self, kind of a core belief, it comes down to what psychologists call a core belief within cognitive behavioral therapy. down to what psychologists call core belief within cognitive behavioral therapy. The core belief there is sometimes I'm unworthy or I'm, you know, like I'm rotten at the core, you know, of me. And that can form completely independently of your whole mastery journey. That can form very young.

That belief can form very young in your life. Like I'm bad, wrong, rotten. Yeah. It often forms in the result of maybe if you're bullied when you're young or maybe even you had parents who were passive aggressive or verbally abusive or passive. There's actually a long list of things that parents can do to fuck you up, including giving you bad genes, by the way. That's another way they f*** you up. It's not always the way they treat you. They give you their genes. But we don't talk about that. Sure. But these are things that can be unlearned. And I think that it takes an active process of learned hopefulness to do it. Because learned helpfulness is the default response.

That's Martin Seligman's most recent discovery, is that the research he's done on learned helplessness, where we feel like we do have things that are open to us, but we have gone so long thinking that we're not capable of it, so we no longer get what really we could have. You know, like we do hold ourselves back. We have to actively learn hopefulness. It's not a process that just comes automatically because we get older.

Learn hopefulness. It's a whole process. Yeah. You know, we have to learn all the skills that allow us to recenter our attention and focus on our on our on our real chosen values in alignment of our values with what we're doing in our lives and to to constantly shift that focus away from from a self-concept To what we're doing, you know in the what are we doing not who are we you know? You know just take for take take for granted that who you are is enough, you know, okay move on Move on and you know now the focus is on what am I doing?

You know, that's my focus And you just have to keep exercising that muscle day in and day out you wake up in the mornings boom you spring out of bed what am i doing today not you don't wake up wake up spring out say who am i today it's like get over that get over that you know like if your self is going to shift from every morning you wake up that's not a very healthy way of of being in the world yeah i have a a contract that I created with myself about seven years ago, that is a mantra statement or a contract that I created with myself that says, I'm a loving, passionate, wise man.

And I say that because previous to seven years ago, I didn't think I was that. And so I created a process where I would say this to myself on a daily basis, where I would say this to myself on a daily basis. And I would find evidence to continue to prove to myself why I'm a loving, passionate, wise man. Because I always felt like I was this stupid, ignorant, unworthy type of mentality. I had confidence in certain areas of my life, in sports and other things. But then I also had doubts.

And I found evidence on why I was the dumbest in the class and dyslexic and all these things. But now I'm just like, well, I'm a loving, passionate, wise man. And I find evidence and I create and I do things daily that support that evidence, that support that belief. So good. So it's not just like fake belief. It's like, okay, no, I am this. I need to remind myself that I am this.

And I can do little things on a daily basis to show myself that I'm a loving man you grew into it yeah then I'm a passionate man that I'm a wise man yeah and you know I don't need to be the most intelligent human being but I'm a wise man and I make better decisions every day you're intelligent though yeah appreciate it thank you thank you but it's you think it's that learned hopefulness you know sometimes we're it's that learned hopefulness. You know, sometimes I believed that I was bad at the core of me for many years. I felt like I was rotten.

I would have dreams that my teeth were falling out all the time. And I remember talking to a dream analyst that was like. That's actually a common dream, right? And she was like, yeah, it's because you think you're a rotten person. And so your teeth fall out in your dream. And you, like, wake up and you're like, ah, where are my teeth? You yeah, it's because you think you're a rotten person. And so your teeth fall out in your dream. And you wake up and you're like, ah, where are my teeth? Or there's a string stuck in the back of your throat and you keep pulling it out. I've never had that one.

And so I had this dream for many, many years and my teeth were falling out or something. And I'd wake up in fear. And I was like, why is this happening? And that's what I heard. So I have no idea if that's true or not. But I think when we start to shift our level of thinking about ourself and create different values and then act accordingly to fulfill on those things, how important is it from a psychologist's point of view, the way we think and the things we say to ourselves internally on a daily basis?

Oh, very important. Self-talk is so key. Wait a minute. So it's not woo-woo? No, there's science to that woo-woo. There's science to self-talk. Yeah. Give me the science to self-talk.

You know, the secret is, you were referring to the secret earlier. I mean, the woo-woo would be saying that whatever you conjure in your head automatically happens in the world. That would be woo-woo. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, like, I'm going to have a lot of money in my bank account, and then I'll check my bank account. Boom! I wish the world operated that way.

But yeah, self-talk is very important, and particularly the narratives we tell ourselves about who we are and what we're capable of are really, really important. What is the science or the research proving about self-talk? Is there studies around this? Oh, for sure. I mean, there's certainly studies about various mindsets, if you want to go in that direction. Growth versus fixed.

Yeah, that's one of them. There are a lot of healthier mindsets versus unhealthier mindsets. There's the whole victimhood mentality, right? I mean, that's a version of self-talk, in my opinion. If you have convinced yourself that because you were a victim in the past, you will never, ever get out of it, you know, and be able to have hope in your life. If you tell yourself that story, you start to live that story. tell yourself that story, you start to live that story. Right. Yeah.

So how do we get out of that victimhood mentality and negative self-talk mentality if that's been a narrative we've lived with for decades? Yeah, I mean you can't rip people's defenses, you know, as a clinician, you know, the one thing you learn is you need to gradually until someone's ready, you know, they're ready. You can't, you know. You can't force it. And you can't talk to, and also you can't like, you can't. You can't force it. And you can't talk to someone who's in that mentality, and let's say they're screaming at you,

and you think it's going to work if you say, you know, you have a bit of a victimhood mentality right now, and it's not the healthiest for your growth and development. I read Transcend by Scott Perry Colton. They're going to get even more angry. You can't rip it off of people, and you can't rip it when you're not ready yourself. I think it needs to be a gradual process where you keep testing the waters. I teach an online course around my book where I have these growth challenges,

and one of them is called Test the Waters. And it's about you know so if there's a certain type of person you fear like like a lot of women who it's a great shame you know that they've been abused you know sexually abused but then they start to generalize a fear of men right in general I can't trust all right all men do this so they visually react whenever they see any man. They visually react like men are horrible. And then so testing the waters.

What if you engage in a conversation with a man? And did it go that bad? Are all men like that? And I don't mean to just pick on women. It can happen in anything. That was just one example I used. You know, like, you know, people in all sorts of ways can start to generalize a fear of a whole general class of something. Whether it's a whole general class of people or a whole general class of water.

Like, I'm scared of water. You know, talking about test the waters, you know. And then what you do is, you know, a little bit. But exposure therapy is the only way forward it's the only way it's you know you have to you have to move in the direction or else you stay in the fear option your whole life exposure therapy what does that mean you know like little by little um uh not having experiential avoidance you know experiential avoidance is constantly avoiding anything that could even slightest give you the experience again of what you had, you know. You know, so slowly, you know, starting to integrate yourself into the world,

into the thing that you fear the most, you know. And of course, you know, you still want to be safe, you know. You know, I'm not saying you escape the clutches of a serial killer, you go back to that serial killer and test the waters with a serial killer. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying be reasonable, but the point is the problem becomes when we generalize the fear to everything in the world

and it holds us back from realizing our full potential. Yeah, I have this thing called the fear list. Since I was younger, in my teens, I would create this fear list because I had many fears, tons of them. A lot of insecurities, doubt, things like that. And I would write down my fears every year. And in order to become more fearless, I had to overcome the fear list and check them off the list.

And so I realized that the only way that I could have more confidence, the only way I could believe in myself more, was by going all in on the fear until the fear disappeared. That's right. And I was fortunate enough to find that out like in my teens and it's been a huge gift for me over the last two decades, I guess, by, okay, what's missing in my life? Where am I not willing to take risks?

What am I still afraid of? What am I still resistant to? And I'll write these lists and I'm like, oh, that's the top of the, that's the biggest react. I'm nervous about that one the most. Dang. It means I got to go all in on that. Yeah. And what I like to do is create an experience or a game around executing it. And one experience I've told this on my, my show before is, um, I was terrified of girls when I was a teenager. teenager I don't know if you ever were or if you've just been this confident human being Definitely was definitely was and I remember saying like I'm sick and tired of just like being nervous around girls Like not even be able to have a conversation you feared rejection

I was a loony so that was the biggest fear rejection judgment humiliation was the biggest fear Yeah And I created the experiments in games for the last 20 years to overcome that fear, to throw myself into rejection, to do things that I shouldn't succeed at in order to see, like, what can I do if people reject me? I'm still here. You're still here. Feel it all.

Like, feel the pain, the embarrassment, the loneliness. Like, oh, but I still have this skill and this tool and this relationship. I'm still here. And I did that with girls in my teens where I was like, I created an experiment for a summer, for two and a half months, where every day whenever I saw a girl that I was nervous around, I had to go right up to them and have a conversation. And it was terrifying the first few weeks because I got rejected and laughed at.

One girl literally ran away from me. Can you imagine being a 16-year-old and a girl running away from you I was just like I am worthless no one loves me why am I doing this this is stupid right yes but you learn new strategies you learn ways of being you learn how to overcome that the more you do it yeah and if you take that rejection or failure as feedback and information, then you can apply it to the next thing that you're doing. I would even add one thing. I love everything you said.

I would add that if you can cultivate be love, you start to realize the sacredness of each existence. And if the person is, if the girl's running away from you, you cultivate a be love for her, where you say, oh, you know what? She made that choice and I totally respect. I love and accept her for who she is. say oh you know what she made that choice and i totally respect accept her from yeah you know what i'm saying not what she offers to me but i'm going to show be love to her you know like obviously like whatever was going on there like you it

wasn't a good match you know and she made her choice you know honor it honor it right you know yeah exactly yeah how do we isn't be loved great? It changes your life. It does. How do we create these, how do we discover these core beliefs and values that will support our journey? And what are some of the more supportive values and beliefs that you've seen or studied?

Yeah. A lot of these deficiency motivated ways of thinking really do hold us back. And the kind of thoughts and habits of pattern that allow us to move in the direction of growth are ones where we ask ourselves, what is going to lead me to more wholeness and integration and growth as opposed to what is going to make me look better than others, make me achieve more than others. They're very much, we call it an exploration mindset.

And once you kind of adopt an exploration mindset, everything changes in your life. I mean, everything, like you're curious about everything. You know, you become kind of a little adventure seeker. Yes. You know, even within your own mind, you become a little adventure seeker. You know, it's just not always exploring adventures outside, but you can have a rich fantasy life you can have a rich you know ideas and i think it's it's really keep choosing those habits over and over again yeah and committing yourself to it i like that man how do you think we can let go of limiting beliefs?

Isn't it a matter of practice? You know, little by little. These things don't happen overnight. There are people, I think both of us and everyone listening to this interview can think of, think of yourself when you were 16. Like everybody right now

listening to us, think of yourself when you're 16 and think about those limiting beliefs you had. Now think of yourself when you were 16. Everybody right now listening to us, think of yourself when you're 16 and think about those limiting beliefs you had. Now think of yourself now. I imagine there's a lot of people listening that will be like, they don't even recognize who that person was. So clearly you proved that you were capable of shedding it. But it happens over time.

You need to have patience and self-compassion with yourself I think I'm a big proponent of cultivating both of those things with yourself patience with yourself and self-compassion right for yourself the challenge is most of us beat ourselves up when we do something wrong or we fail or someone rejects us out you know we beat ourselves at least I did yeah many years of my life we say oh, oh, you're an idiot. You shouldn't have done that. That was stupid. Why did you do that?

And we don't move beyond that. Why do we kind of tend to go back into this beat-up mode, do you think? Yeah. I'll also say a narcissist tend to beat up others for their failures. They don't beat up themselves because they're godly.

They blame it on every single person in their orbit and they never blame it on themselves. They never take responsibility. So there's an inverse of that too that's unhealthy. That's the heart of narcissism too. The heart of narcissism. I love that when you say that out there. The first one was...

Entitlement. Entitlement. The second one would be they don't take accountability and responsibility. You beat up on everyone else but yourself. You got to take accountability and responsibility. When you fail, you beat up on everyone else but yourself. You got to take accountability and responsibility. I'm a huge fan of responsibility. Yes.

And you can take responsibility for your actions without beating yourself up. And I think that's what we're trying to nail. That is key. That's what we're having. So how do we take responsibility for our actions and not beat ourselves up in a negative way? Because you can acknowledge that if something didn't land you can be like huh you know I need to work on it I need to improve it you know but the point we don't beat yourself up on is is believe

your self belief that you capable of change and capable of growth I wrote a tweet the other day did not land the way I wanted it to boy did it not land the way I wanted to but I thought to myself and I started I got a lot of you way I wanted it to. But I thought to myself, and I got a lot of trolls and stuff, but then I responded to the trolls, and I said, you know what? I clearly didn't explain it the way that I meant to explain it. I think in the future,

I'm going to try to be clear what I meant. And they're like, like, you know, they didn't know how to respond to that. Sure, sure. But I meant it. You know, it's like, clearly that's what it is.

You know, I'm not, I'm going to take responsibility. But I don't feel like I'm a loser, you know? It's like, you know, clearly that's what it is, you know? I'm going to take responsibility. But I don't feel like I'm a loser, you know? I don't feel like I, you know, some deep core I revealed about my, you know? Right, right, right, right. It's like, wow, I really, that didn't land. I'm going to take responsibility for that, you know? Yeah.

What's something you discovered in the last year since writing this book? something you discovered in the last year since writing this book new research or new findings about human beings about psychology is there anything that you've discovered new i'm really fascinated with the lsd research it's like it research come out recently showing that people are healthier physically when they do more lsd really like where did that come from right like that's amazing um you know it can it can decrease you know uh i'm not talking about the abuse of it physically when they do more LSD. Really? Like where did that come from, right? Like that's amazing. You know, it can decrease, you know, I'm not talking about the abuse of it, obviously, but you know, use responsibly. I feel like you always had that to come, yeah, use responsibly.

It seems to be decreasing depression, you know, like expanding your sense of self. I'm fascinated with that line of research. I'm fascinated with other techniques that are being used, like technologies like transcranial direct stimulation, these caps you can put in your head. You go in the brain, you put something in there. It doesn't go in the brain. No, it's like a thinking cap. You're going to be able to buy it from Walmart someday.

What is it going to do? You put it in your head. It deactivates certain parts of your brain and turns up the juice on the creative parts of your brain. It allows you to overcome thinking blocks. Really? But it's also showing some promise for depression. It's non-invasive. I have never been under, but it's non-invasive. And apparently people who say it just feel tingle.

And it doesn't last forever. I mean, it's time-limited as well. It's not like your prefrontal cortex is forever going to be deactivated. So that's kind of interesting. I think there's a lot of hot areas. I find the narcissism research and the topic of vulnerable narcissism that I've studied really interesting. Yeah, I saw this in your book too. What does this mean, vulnerable narcissism?

It's more, it's you feel like you're entitled to special privileges not because you think you're great, but because you've suffered in the past. Ooh. Explain that more. That opens up a whole that opens up vulnerable narcissism. Yeah, that opens up a whole can.

So because I'm a victim because I'm because in my past I've been wronged. I've been wronged in particular. I deserve everything.

Ooh, man. That's a hot topic. I know., man. That's a hot topic. I know. I know. That's a touchy topic. But at the end of our interview, we don't want to, yeah, that's a whole other interview. So why, well, let's talk about it briefly.

What does vulnerable narcissism do to the person who is being that state? What is the benefit to that? And what is the negative side of saying, well, I'm entitled to this because this happened to me when I was younger, or this happened to my family or my parents, or this happened, you know, I didn't get what I deserved. It's a very self-limiting viewpoint. It really does hold you back from growth. It calls your interactions with others. It makes you miss out on opportunities for growth with others, you know? And it's not a good way to make friends,

it's not a good way to be trusted by others, it's not a good way to, it's not the best way to live one's life, a good life. So vulnerable narcissism equals entitlement, essentially, right? Well, here's the thing, I'll tell you my three-way, my three-factor narcissism model. Give it to me. Entitlement is the thread that runs through all four. It is the

heart, as you put it. It is the heart of all forms of narcissism, but they're moderators. So people who tend to be more extroverted tend to become more grandiose narcissists, whereas those who are introverted tend to become more vulnerable narcissists. Now, I'm not saying that most extroverts are not grandiose narcissists, most introverts are not vulnerable narcissists, but I'm saying if you have the entitlement plus extroversion or do you have the entitlement plus the neuroticism. It's actually less introversion, I would say more the trait neuroticism. So you can be an entitled neurotic

or you can be an entitled grandiose extrovert. And they're two forms. Sure. Does that make sense? Yeah, of course. Okay. And if you're neurotic, you see threat everywhere. You know, you think everyone's out to get you.

You start to get a complex. You know, that's vulnerable narcissism. You know, I've been wronged and I don't trust anyone. The slightest criticism, you go crazy. You're fragile. And you're fragile within. So you tend to be more prone to inner depression. Whereas grandiose narcissists tend to take out their anger on others.

But they tend to be content and happy. Actually, we found research showing that grandiose narcissists score higher in life satisfaction, even though everyone else around them shows lower life satisfaction. Because they get all their anger or frustration out of others. They take it out on everyone else. They fire everyone in your cabinet, for instance. It's not my fault.

But the vulnerable narcissist tends to be the one that shows up in the clinical realm. Because they keep it all inside. They keep it all inside and they implode instead of exploding. Interesting. In a way, I think it's a lot easier to have compassion for the vulnerable narcissist. It's harder to have compassion for the grandiose narcissist. Sure, sure.

Wow. Even though we should have compassion for everyone. Of course, of course, yeah. How does someone command respect as opposed to saying you need to respect me what's the person that is actually

well respected what is their way of being how do they build themselves up so that they actually do attract respect opportunities, love you answered that earlier though with respect themselves up so that they actually do attract respect opportunities love what is that we answer that earlier though with your respect yeah well you answered that with the dance your dancing example you didn't command the respect at a certain moment of time um there are people who

command respect by their presence by their their essence their being um and um and and i think that crosses introversion extroversion alliance there's a lot of quiet people who command respect. Not even by talking, you know. Some people can just enter a room, you know, and sit down. Everyone's like, oh, shit. Like, who's this person? What have they done in order to command that, you think? They do have a very, very strong core belief in themselves.

You mean self-esteem. They have a strong confidence level. They have a strong belief, calm. You mean self-esteem? They have a strong confidence level? They have a strong belief? Calm? What is that? I would say, I would go further. I would say in my sailboat metaphor,

their boat is rock solid. And that's all the things that I put in the boat. They feel safe. They feel, they don't feel like they need people for their own, to be happy. For their own, even loneliness. You know, they don't feel like they need people for their own loneliness. They don't need people to satisfy that hole.

And then they feel a sense of self-worth, and they feel like they've mastered things in their lives. I think when you get the complete package of the boat, I think that probably you start to witness someone who commands respect without commanding it. One of the things that was on my fear list was being alone when I was younger. In my early 20s, I remember thinking I'd never had a spare hour by myself, really. It was always like, okay, I'm in school, I'm in sports class, and then right afterwards I'd go hang out with friends until I go to bed.

And there was never this, and when I was alone, I was like, insecure. So I remember saying, I need to be alone, I get to be alone to master this, insecurity. This is a fear of mine. And for years, I said, I'm going on dates by myself, I'm going to lunch by myself, I'm going to movies alone, which was like terrifying to go to a movie by myself. I was like, this is weird I would do everything that I could alone not my whole life, but I was like I'm scheduling alone time Do you feel like you're a loner? Now no, no did you feel no I felt like I was insecure. I needed to be I Only could be around other people to be happy

I see and so I was like I need to be alone learn how to be happy. And so I was like, I need to be alone, learn how to be happy on my own. Enjoy my own company, which I didn't enjoy. And then I started to really like fall in love with myself, if that sounds weird, by being like, okay, like I just enjoy being here. I enjoy my own thoughts. But before I didn't enjoy it.

I love being with myself. Exactly. No, it's great. And I think it is great, yeah. I think that's- I laugh at myself all the time. Yeah, yeah, and be okay with it. I'm happy I'm being with myself. Exactly. No, it's great. And I think it is great, yeah. I laugh at myself all the time. Yeah. And be okay with it. I'm happy I'm being alone.

So it's now become like something I'm really grateful to be alone a lot of time, to have the space and time. But something we talked about as well is in terms of confidence, self-worth, knowing that I am enough. But mastery, you said, is also another element. Is it mastering one thing? Is it mastering many things? Is it the more things you master, is also another element. Is it mastering one thing? Is it mastering many things? Is it the more things you master,

the more confident you become? Or you can just be, you know, an excellent researcher for your whole life and that will still give you confidence in other areas of your life? I don't know if you have to achieve. Mastery seems like a different concept than necessarily external achievement.

I mean, Abraham Maslow distinguished between self-actualization and achievement. He actually thought that he wasn't self-actualized, but he thought his wife Bertha's mother was self-actualized. And his wife's mother was just a very good person. He actually viewed self-actualization as a project of understanding who are good people in the world. He started his whole project with the Good Human Being Notebook, the GHB Notebook, he called it. I got access to it. It was really cool. Really? Yeah, it was cool to see.

He has the Good Human Being Notebook where he just took notes of people. That's how his whole research started people don't realize that it started with him just observing who are the best specimens of humanity that he could find um he called it and and that that's really what he was his search was to understand and that's not always tied to achievement um yeah success and money doesn't mean you're the best human being. And you can master things. You can master a craft without getting the accolades, without getting the achievement. The question is, are you proud of your life?

I mean, isn't that it? That's it, yeah. You know, like, you have to be, only you can make that decision. You can't, people read so many self-help books, they have gurus, they have this and that that thinking that someone else is going to ask and you can pay people to to make that answer for you you know you could there are people that would be happy to take your money and tell you you know what you should do in your life before you can be proud of your life but i hate to break it to you but you know it's like you're the only one, you know, they can decide, you know, and if you're just, if you're proud of, you know, like the relationships you've cultivated and your job, you know, and you're like, that's enough for you.

That should be, that should be enough for you. Yeah. Yeah. I love this man. Yeah. What's the thing you think? You came prepared. You like, you really came prepared.

Oh my God. I love this stuff though. I love this stuff. Yeah. Wow. A prepared. Oh, my God. I love this stuff, though. I love this stuff, yeah. A couple of final questions for you. I'm so impressed. What's the question you wish more people would ask you about this topic around transcendence and self-actualization? I think, like, I don't know if it's a cop-out to say I wish people would ask me less around this topic. They often ask me how-tos.

You know, how do you self-actualize? It's like, you know, the whole point of self-actualization is what does it mean to be the best you in the whole freaking world? Like no one else has as much potential to be you best you in the whole freaking world like no one else has as much potential to be you than you people who spend their whole lives trying to be someone else like like it's like like for instance they play basketball like I'm gonna be Michael Jordan basically what you're saying is hey Scott how do I self actualize someone else's self what the hell does that mean like what a

stupid question like how do I self actualize someone else's self what the hell does that mean like what a stupid question like how do i self-actualize someone else's self you know like that is it doesn't make any sense you know like that's that's a that's way that's the shortest way to waste your life you know um you know what the the question that is a good question but that people don't ask me that I want people to ask me you know is not how to but You know You know what does it mean to live a self-actualized life not how to self-actualize? What does it mean and it means finding the life that works best for you? owning it

Creating creating yourself who you want to become like you did. You created it. You create it. And you take full ownership over what you are and what you've decided. That's it. Not vulnerable narcissism. I love that. I want people to get the book. Powerful book, Transcend, The New Science of Self-Actualization by Scott Barry Kaufman. Make sure you guys check this out.

Really powerful. It's like the researched version of a great self-help book with all the data, science that's in there that backs all these things. Nerdy self-help. It's really cool. And I enjoy it very much. For me, you've got a lot of great stuff in here that helps you just improve the quality of your life, your relationships. So many great exercises and examples in here.

Thank you. Really love what you created. Very excited for the growth and success of this book. Make sure you check out Transcend. Thank you. Two final questions. Yeah. This is called The Three Truths.

I don't think I asked you this the last time because I don't think I started asking this question until later. But I'd like you to answer a hypothetical question, scenario,

that you get to live as long as you want to live and you get to accomplish all of your greatest dreams but at some point you've got to turn the lights off on your life

and transcend into the next realm. Yeah. You've got to leave your body and go to the next place. And you've got to turn the lights off on your life and transcend into the next realm. You've got to leave your body and go to the next place. And you've accomplished everything. But for whatever reason, you've got to take all of your written or audio or video work with you. So no one has any of your written word or recordings of your content anymore. Wow.

It's all gone to the next place with you. Holy shit. But you get to leave the next place with you. Holy shit. But you get to leave behind three lessons that you know to be true. The three lessons you've learned that have helped you

and supported you throughout your life that you would then share with the world that this is all we would have to remember you by are these three lessons or what I like to call

the three truths. What would you say would be your three truths? Don't play the games people impose on you um you have a choice to love and are you getting this down yeah because i don't know what's coming out of my mouth next um and um uh trust yourself are they good? are those good?

I don't know of course yeah it's just it's your truth it's what I felt I didn't know what was going to come out

but it's what I felt it's your truth I like that I want to acknowledge you for a second Scott for your constant pursuit of finding these answers

in science and in research thank you you do the work that most people don't have the patience or time to do. You study things deeper and deeper than people are willing to study them to find,

and then you bridge the gap from hard things to understand, science of things, and then making it more accessible, which is what I really appreciate about you is bringing the nerdy science into practicality, into a place where we can understand it and use it for a benefit. And so I acknowledge you for making this art, the work and bringing it to life for your authenticity and constantly showing up for who you are and the journey that you're on, man. I really acknowledge you for this. Thank you. Likewise.

I want people to get the book. They can follow you you on social media is there one website that they should go to as well to learn more about you yeah you know scottbarrykoffman.com has like all the goodies i think i also i host a podcast called the psychology podcast that you've been on yes great and um uh and uh people people might be interested in some of those interviews yes um but can i just praise you for a second as well? Sure. Would you mind if I did? I am so proud of just, like, B-Love, watching you with B-Love over the years.

Thank you. And what you've built up, and the way that, the manner you have, the way you command presence by selflessly getting outside of yourself in your interviews. Thank you. It's a beautiful thing to behold. I appreciate it, man. Thank you very much.

I've learned that hiding or trying to pretend that I'm better than I am or that I have it all put together or that I'm perfect in some way or polished for me was the old version of me that didn't serve me about eight years ago and I realized that, like, oh, I've got a lot of crap I need to let go of so it's it's a constant journey of you know being loved and I think it takes being vulnerable and talking about what you said well here's where I'm at in my life and relationships and stuff I think the more human beings are being that way we drop the narcissism we drop the entitlement and we're saying well we're just figuring it out and sometimes when

you're vulnerable you never know what happens And who knows maybe my Instagram will light up with women who? But I'm not eating I'm not eating I don't need it right now. I don't need it. I don't need it. I'm cool I'm cool. You're cool, but I really love this interview. It was a spread. I'm so glad we're able to do this appreciate it, man Final question. What's your definition of greatness? Oh, boy, it's a wonderful question. Jeez, I think I need to think about that. Greatness for me is realizing your full powers of your entire being and bringing your entire being to the table.

So not leaving any part of you on the table, but bring your entire being on the table so it can have the maximum positive impact on the world. Scott, thanks, my man. Appreciate you, brother. Thank you. Appreciate you too. My friend, thank you so much for being here and listening to this episode. I got so much value being across from Scott and learning these new strategies, this new science to help improve the quality of our life.

If you got as much value, make sure to spread the message of greatness and help some friends out. Text a few people, post it over on social media. Make sure to tag me and Scott as well over on social media so we can see who's listening and make sure to connect with you over there as well. And we'd love to hear the part of this episode you enjoyed the most. Make sure to leave a review over on Apple podcast and a rating to let us know which part impacted you the most from this episode. And as well, make sure to subscribe over on Apple podcast or Spotify. Just go ahead and click that subscribe button right now so you can stay up to

date on the world's greatest individuals on how they unlock greatness and teach you their strategies as well. And if you want inspiring messages sent to your phone every single week from me, then text the word podcast to 614-350-3960 to get on our special texting community list. And I wanna leave you with this quote from Andy Rooney,

who says, "'Everyone wants to live on the top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it. Oh man, isn't that true? There's so many times in my life where I've accomplished some of the biggest dreams and goals and was actually unfulfilled when I accomplished them. But the parts of learning, of growing, of feeling, of who I got to meet along the way, of who I became, of overcoming the challenges to get there, were some of the most rewarding moments that I look back on. And still today, I'm so grateful of the opportunities for growth every single day.

And now I've learned how to really celebrate the accomplishments. Before, I didn't know how to, but now I can really celebrate them, the achievements, the accomplishments, the big moments. But man, it's the daily journey, the daily breath and the process of getting there that is so rich and full of life. And I hope you're enjoying those daily moments as well. And I want to remind you, if no one's told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy and you matter.

I'm so grateful for you. And you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.