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You are the single most requested guest.

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And let me tell you, this has not been easy.

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Because we went to some hard places.

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But I don't think we'll ever talk about anything more important than this.

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Because it's not fear that gets in the way of us being brave with our lives and our work.

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It's the armor that we reach for to self-protect when we're afraid.

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And how that armor moves us away from love, connection, and our values.

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And the hardest work is being aware of what is my armor when I'm afraid.

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Is that automatic?

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Oh, no.

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It's a training.

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So let's start with that then.

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Brene Brown is an icon whose world-leading research in shame, vulnerability, and connection

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has inspired companies like Pixar, Google, and the US Special Forces to build stronger leaders

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and help the everyday person unlock their full potential.

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Ready?

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Is vulnerability important?

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It is if we want to be brave with our lives.

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But we are raised to believe that vulnerability is weakness.

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Like in my family, we were allowed anger, but sad was not an option.

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We needed to be tough.

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And so when I get scared, when I feel anxious, disappointed, I'm just angry.

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And so when you're raised without vulnerability, it'll put you in jeopardy.

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Like, you want to know what vulnerability is?

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Joy.

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Joy is so vulnerable that people choose to live, disappointed rather than to get excited about something.

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And risk getting sucker punched by disappointment.

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Like, there is no courage without vulnerability.

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Because courage is the willingness to show up and be all in when you cannot predict the outcome.

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Wow, I don't know if I thought about that before.

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But you can develop skills.

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Like at these four steps in courage?

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Yes.

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We've taken 165,000 people through this work that included how to build trust.

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And I've heard about your marble jar theory.

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Could you explain to me what your marble jar?

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Look at how excited you are.

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I know.

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So this is how we teach trust to the most senior leaders in Fortune 100 companies.

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It's awesome.

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Just give me 30 seconds of your time.

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Two things I wanted to say.

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The first thing is a huge thank you for listening and tuning into the show week after week.

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Means the world to all of us.

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And this really is a dream that we absolutely never had.

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And couldn't have imagined getting to this place.

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But secondly, it's a dream where we feel like we're only just getting started.

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And if you enjoy what we do here, please join the 24% of people that listen to this broadcast regularly

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and follow us on this app.

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Here's a promise I'm going to make to you.

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I'm going to do everything in my power to make this show as good as I can.

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Now and into the future.

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We're going to deliver the guests that you want me to speak to.

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And we're going to continue to keep doing all of the things you love about this show.

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Thank you.

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Brane.

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In order to understand all the work that you have done and the perspective that you have on the world

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and also who you are as a anomaly in many respects,

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I think it's probably important that I understand your earliest context where you've come from.

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What shaped you?

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I'm stuck on it.

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Am I an anomaly?

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Of course you're an anomaly.

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Of course you're an anomaly.

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That should be of no surprise to you.

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If you look at your outcomes, your outcomes are anomalous.

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So one would assume that there's some form, there's something that made you an anomaly.

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I would say that I'm a fifth generation Texan.

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I came from a fair amount of dysfunction.

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Parents doing the best they could with what they knew,

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both coming from really, really, really tough upbringing that included poverty, addiction.

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And so probably a lot of the stereotypes you would think about fifth generation Texan,

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tough don't cry.

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We were allowed a very small continuum of emotions were approved, you know, or approved,

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which were pissed off or okay, like anger was okay, but no, you know, couldn't be sad really.

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Vulnerability was not a thing.

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Vulnerability was weakness and scary and put you in jeopardy.

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I felt like a real outsider at home and in school.

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But I was really good at reading people, reading situations.

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I think a therapist somewhere along the way said, yes, that's hyper vigilance.

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You're hyper vigilant.

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You know, I can see everything around me and everything's going on.

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I can connect things very quickly that other people don't see.

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And there was laughter and there was love.

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But there was a ton of unpredictability.

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I was going to say isn't that typically what creates hyper vigilance is some kind of need to be that aware when you're young?

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Yeah.

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I mean, I think yes.

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Being fun loving was very valued in my family and being tough.

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These were the values.

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These are on the parental scorecard.

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This is what got you in A.

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Fun, easy, you can shoot straight, spit far, fish well, like really, drive fast.

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And so those things were very valued.

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Athleticism was very valued.

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But those fun things could turn really hard very quickly.

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There was a big pause there, four second pause.

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Yeah, I could just picture it like it's fun until it's fun until you've got a parent ejected from a game for being so hard.

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And that was your father?

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Yeah.

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Oh, he was really hard then if he was ejected from a game.

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Oh, yeah.

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Yeah, yeah.

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There's a photo I saw of you in your siblings where you're clutching your siblings.

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And I think you referred to it as you could see there was a certain fear in your eyes.

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Do you know the photo I'm referring to?

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Am I on a couch?

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You want a couch?

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Like a yellow velour couch, like from the 70s?

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Yes, yeah.

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I think about that picture.

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I like that picture.

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But there was definitely, I definitely had a protector role as the oldest.

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I mean, codename sister superior.

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It was jokingly, but it wasn't joking.

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Like if things got hard between my parents and they would get in volatile fights,

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I would go get all my siblings, put them in my room.

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I'd go downstairs and handle it.

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Like I was definitely the protector.

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Physically volatile fights.

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On occasion, but more emotionally volatile.

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Screaming and shouting.

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Yeah.

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Same with my parents.

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Yeah.

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Just loud.

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There's a background in my whole house where my whole childhood was just screaming.

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There was, yeah, way a lot of screaming.

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And there's a certain, like if you grew up with screaming, hearing screaming through a wall,

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you know that sound.

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Do you know that sound?

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Of course, yeah.

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There's my whole childhood.

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What was that?

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Sometimes they are screaming.

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Yeah.

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And so, yeah, I'm sorry, because I don't like to hear that about your childhood.

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And I don't like to know that about my childhood, but there was a lot of screaming.

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And so I think hyper vigilant, protective, responsible with a dose of be very fucking careful.

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Because I will protect my siblings.

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And how did that change your model of love as a young person must have been?

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Because I mean, I obviously feel the same way about my situation.

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And I think the lesson I learned was that love was like a prison.

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Because it was my mom doing the shouting.

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And my dad was the prisoner.

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And he wouldn't respond.

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So you got a woman shouting at him for six, seven hours a day.

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And him sat there like he's like an inanimate object looking at the screen.

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And I'm thinking, oh, okay.

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So if I get in a relationship when I'm older, then I'm going to be a prisoner to a woman.

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Okay.

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Doesn't sound to be like, and if you move to a different room, you should follow him.

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So I avoided relationships like the fucking plague.

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I did well until about 27.

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And then what?

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And then someone got over the wall and corrected to some of the evidence.

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They got over the wall.

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Yeah, Steve got over the wall.

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Damn it.

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That's your partner, not me.

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Yeah, not you.

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Oh, you're going to have a job right now.

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You're like, you've crossed a piranha filled moat that I like.

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But the drawbridge is like, I'm just see, I'm going to see my Steve,

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my Steve definitely, definitely got over the wall.

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But it was like game recognizes game.

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He had a wall.

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Oh, okay.

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Yeah.

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And so we had long conversations about our walls.

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And slowly through those conversations, we just, those walls crumbled with each other.

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And we've been together now for 38 years.

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Yeah.

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A hardest thing I've ever done in my life.

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Bar none, dude.

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Nothing has been harder.

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But I started dating Steve.

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Well, when we got married, six months after we got married.

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You said, for you, love was going to be being a prisoner.

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And having to just shut down to survive.

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Run away.

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Run away.

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Run away.

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They're confronted in their conversations now.

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Yes.

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No.

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For me, six months after we were married, I went to go see a therapist.

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And I said, I cannot do this.

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I got to get out of this marriage.

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And we had dated off and on for seven years before we got married.

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And I said, I got to get out.

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And she said, I could, this is hard.

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I could see how this is not working.

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And I was like, I had a twinge of defensiveness about Steve.

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And I said, what do you mean?

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And she said, he likes you so much more than you like you.

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It must be terrible.

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I was like, fuck you, man, you're fired.

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I was like, I thought, what?

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That's what I do.

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I'm going to give you one of my tells.

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If I do a really high pitched, what?

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That means I'm looking for my purse.

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And I know where the door is.

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I just kept thinking, what are you being?

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And he said, it's got to be very uncomfortable to be with someone who sees you and really knows you and loves you so much.

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When you have not found a way to see you and love you so much.

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It's got to be disconcerting.

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What an asshole, man.

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And it was true.

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I had to get to this point where I was like, maybe I should like me as much as he likes me and then make a better decision about whether this is going to work or not.

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When you grow up and pissed off or shut down are your two emotional opportunities.

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And Atlas of the Heart, I write about 87 emotions that I think are important to understand because the limits of our language are the limits of our world.

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When you have two buckets, then everything must go in those.

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In our research, over the last 15 years, we found the average person can accurately identify and name three emotions.

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Happy, sad, pissed off.

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And so in my family, sad was not an option.

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That was weakness.

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So you could be pissed or okay.

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So when I get scared, when I feel grief, when I'm anxious, when I feel disappointment, when I feel anguish, I'm just angry.

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There's two sort of outstanding question marks in my head.

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They might be the same answer.

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But you said earlier on that you didn't fit in at school or at home.

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And I didn't understand why you didn't fit in at school or at home.

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And I think that's the question mark in my head is the therapist said to you that you asserted that you didn't like yourself as much as he liked you.

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And I wasn't clear on what made you not like yourself.

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I wanted out of where I was raised.

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I wanted to leave everything I knew.

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And so I always felt like an outsider.

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I didn't want to, I mean, I wasn't popular.

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I wasn't dating a quarterback.

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That was a dream that my, my parents and their parents and their parents, you know, you were, you were a bear cadet and you dated a quarterback and you got a farm.

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So I felt not cute, not popular, not understood.

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And then at home, I wasn't easy going.

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I was anxious and always ready.

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And the point about self-esteem, which the therapist would have highlighted about not liking oneself as much as Steve liked you, where did that come from?

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Is that related in some way?

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Oh, because my parents parented with a very big heaping dose of shame.

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Oh, okay.

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So if you accomplish something or you don't accomplish something, you're made to feel bad about it.

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Yeah.

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And a ton of it was about a parents being fun.

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A parents.

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Yeah.

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Like, you know, big blonde hair with hot rollers, the higher the hair, the closer to God.

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And you needed to be tough and strong and throw on a baseball cap and get somewhere really quick, low maintenance.

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And you need to be a beauty pageant queen.

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Do you remember them ever being critical of your appearance in a way that has stayed with you?

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Oh, we got guests.

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I mean, I think not just them.

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I mean, I think having young girls and young women keeping them from developing threats to their self-esteem is not just a parental thing.

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It's like asking them not to breathe because the air is poison.

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It's like every message from everywhere.

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It's fashion magazines.

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You'd read them and you'd think, wow, I don't, I don't look like this.

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How am I going to look like this?

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You know, and you'd lather yourself up with baby oil and you put lemon juice in your hair.

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You put tin foil under your chin.

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Get as much sun cancer as you could because we didn't know, you know, like, you, you, we all wore jeans that you had to put on with pliers for the zipper because they were so tight.

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Appearance mattered.

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This is Texas, baby.

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You go off to university eventually and not a straight line, but eventually you get into university.

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Not a straight line.

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That's a sweetest thing you've said to me.

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I graduate from college, whereas 29.

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So you become a research professor in 2001.

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And you've been a research professor and many more things ever since then.

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You get your PhD in social work at the University of Houston, Texas between 96 and 2002.

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And really for the last couple of decades, you've focused on research.

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Understanding people obviously, there's so many more strings to your bow in terms of like media and podcasting and authorship.

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But over those since 2001, we're in 2025 now, just over two decades.

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My first question is, how is your perspective on how has the world changed in those last two decades in your view?

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Unions would say before any great progression, there is a regression.

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And I think that when you look at various, I know you have a very global audience.

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When you look at administrations, political administrations across the world.

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And you look at how power is being used right now.

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It will tell you a lot about what they're afraid of.

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But what is that face?

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We're going to have to pause.

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I was thinking about a conversation I had recently with my best friends.

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It must have been this weekend.

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Yeah, it was this weekend because it was my friend's birthday in Manchester, the UK, so we flew in.

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And we had a conversation about how the leading political narrative at the moment.

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This might be adjacent to what you were saying, but it's the way I interpreted it.

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The leading political narrative at the moment that seems to be getting people elected.

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Is if you say those people with that skin color are the reason for the pain and anguish in your life.

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It's actually the people below you that are coming over the border or crossing the English Channel on dinghies that are ruining your life.

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And it seems to be like a really effective narrative to power both in the US and the UK.

289
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Like the central narrative that is swaying elections, it seems at the moment in the UK and the US is those brown people on that bow or coming over the border are the reason for the pain in your life.

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And it seems to work.

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And that seems to be the thing getting power.

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So that's kind of what ran through my head when I heard this idea of power and what you're scared of.

293
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I actually think I inverted it.

294
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If I can tell you what to be scared of or find the thing you might be scared of or whatever, then I get power.

295
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But maybe it goes the other way too.

296
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I don't think we'll ever talk about anything more important than this to be honest with you.

297
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That's why I thought your response was so interesting because you may, if I was going to do the text box above your face, it would have said, well, holy shit, that's interesting.

298
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Because when you use power, especially power over, because there's multiple kinds of power, there's power within two and power within.

299
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So people that use power within two and power within work from a belief system that's completely different.

300
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We believe that power is infinite and can grow when shared.

301
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People who use power over work from a belief system that power is finite, like pizza.

302
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And if I give you any, I have a deficit.

303
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So it's got to be hoarded and protected and not shared.

304
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Power over is really important to understand because when people are using power over, they're definitely letting you know what they're afraid of because that's what they're focused on.

305
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And they're tapping into, and I think this is absolutely true.

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If you give people someone to dislike and blame for their pain and they look different than the people who are voting, you will win 100 times out of 100.

307
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If you say, I see your pain, I can tell you exactly the source of it and I can fix this for you.

308
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And the source of it is going to be easy to see. You're not going to see yourself in them.

309
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So that narrative that you are talking about, it is a full circle.

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People in power use power to address issues that they're afraid of.

311
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They gain power by leveraging fear and giving people an enemy.

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That's how this works.

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It works like this. I mean, I spend 95% of my time in organizations working with C-suite leaders and senior leaders.

314
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This is how it works in organizations, how it works in political, you know, how it works in faith communities.

315
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This is how power works in general.

316
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So power over is a very specific kind of power.

317
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And it's especially dangerous because in order to maintain it, you have to engage in periodic bouts of cruelty towards vulnerable populations.

318
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You have to remind people what you're capable of.

319
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So there's four types of power you speak about in...

320
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Yeah, we have that in your notes.

321
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...in strong ground, yes.

322
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Where are you surprised? I don't know.

323
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There's four types of power in leadership you speak about.

324
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There's the power over which is controlling or exploiting others' power with finding common ground and building collective strength.

325
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Power too, which is giving others agency and recognizing their potential and power within which is honoring differences and self-worth.

326
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So as a leader of a business, if I were to be successful, are you telling me that I need to stay away from power over and adopt another power within this list of four?

327
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Yeah, I think what we've seen be very successful over time is power with power too and power within.

328
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So collaborative power, co-creation power, self-awareness, metacognition, knowing yourself, knowing how you think and learn.

329
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So power with and power too, power over is excruciatingly difficult to maintain.

330
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We're not neurobiologically hardwired to stay in fear for very long.

331
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So if I work for you, if I work for you and you're using power over to lead me, you're threatening me with my job, you're threatening me with consequences, you're threatening me with emotion.

332
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One of two things that's going to happen for me neurobiologically.

333
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I am either going to just become numb to it.

334
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It's not going to be able to, you're not going to maintain, I can't maintain that constant level of fear.

335
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It's just too demanding, just physically demanding.

336
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Or I might get hyper normalized, I might just like this is what I work in, this is like crazy, this is it.

337
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But every now and then you're going to have to do something that demonstrates to me how chaotic and cruel you can actually be.

338
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Like you're going to have to engage in periodic acts of cruelty to remind me that the fear is real and to put me back in it.

339
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And so one of the things you're seeing right now, I mean like in the US, the deportation and immigration issues.

340
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This is not a president that has tightened his belt on immigration more than other previous presidents.

341
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But we've never seen masked people grabbing people off the street while children hold onto their legs screaming, mom, mom, mom.

342
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We've never seen that before, right?

343
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But we've had other presidents probably exceed the deportation numbers that we're seeing.

344
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But we've never seen that level of cruelty in display.

345
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That is a real display of cruelty as a reminder of who holds power and who does not.

346
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It also makes me think of relationships.

347
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When you were talking about how people are controlled with power over, a lot of people talk about narcissistic relationships or abusive relationships where they don't feel like they can leave or they don't leave.

348
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And up becoming a climatoist to the treatment.

349
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A big systems theory thing. I'm a systems theory person. I think in systems theory, I was trained in systems theory.

350
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I think if you don't understand systems theory, at least if you're leading an organization right now, you're going to fall behind because.

351
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The complexity inside and outside of organizations is such that we need a framework to understand how all of these individual systems are bumping up against each other.

352
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Like you probably bump up against 100 systems a day, right?

353
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Yeah.

354
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So what I would imagine the story I would make up about your success because this is true of any systems theory is in order for systems to thrive and grow.

355
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They have to keep permeable boundaries.

356
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Meaning they have to allow feedback to flow in and out from other systems to be aware.

357
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I'm just going to give you a very good example. I'm very excited about the female.

358
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The experts you had on around menopause women's life. I mean, I'm so excited about that.

359
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Like just to be honest with you, Mary Claire is my doctor.

360
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Yeah, yeah. Dr. Haver.

361
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So what is interesting is the systems that just that podcast bumps up against.

362
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And the systems that would be sending feedback that hey, this is not for me. I'm not clicking on this.

363
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I've shared that first one with 100 people.

364
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Because there's a reality to our lives that is uncomfortable for people.

365
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But those are your partners and your moms and your bosses and it's real.

366
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And I can guarantee you if this was happening with two dudes.

367
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Yeah.

368
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Like it'd be a good bajillion dollar, whatever over a trillion, bajillion, I don't know.

369
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But just thinking about that one podcast and the systems that you're touching, health, women's issues, family systems are affected.

370
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Like that podcast hits 20 systems that I can think of in my head right now.

371
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The divorce rates of people of women in their 50s and 60s.

372
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I mean, right? Yes or no? Yeah, 100% yeah.

373
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Right. So a healthy system has permeable boundaries, meaning feedback is flowing in and out all the time.

374
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What happens when the world gets complex is we start not wanting the feedback.

375
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The complexity is too big.

376
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So we start shutting down those permeable boundaries.

377
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Well, what happens to a system where the boundaries are no longer permeable at atrophies?

378
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And the process of atrophying, the system becomes self-referencing.

379
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Are we good? We great. Are we right? We're right.

380
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Are we on target? We're on target.

381
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Because the boundaries of the system are no longer craving outside feedback, even when it's tough.

382
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And in businesses today, the geopolitical realities, the market changes, AI, I mean, it's crazy.

383
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And so our predisposition to shut down uncertainty and complexity is the biggest threat to the systems in which we work and live.

384
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The self-protect, close the wall, put up the drawbridge, fill the moat with piranhas.

385
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We just don't have that luxury. We've got to keep the boundaries permeable.

386
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We've got to keep learning, guessing, unlearning, relearning.

387
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One of the added complexities is the rise in algorithms.

388
00:26:51.000 --> 00:26:55.000
And actually, when I think about algorithms that are powered by AI,

389
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they're going to be even better at knowing what you want to see, so that you spend time,

390
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so that you consume more adverts, which means probably the best thing to show me is either something really fearful or to confirm what I already believe.

391
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100%.

392
00:27:07.000 --> 00:27:11.000
An algorithm that was doing up is it probably wouldn't be an enjoyable experience for the average human brain.

393
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It would cause too much dissonance, too much discomfort.

394
00:27:13.000 --> 00:27:14.000
But great for democracy.

395
00:27:14.000 --> 00:27:18.000
Great. Yeah, fantastic. But terrible for running a business and selling ads.

396
00:27:18.000 --> 00:27:21.000
So any company that takes that approach will go bankrupt.

397
00:27:21.000 --> 00:27:26.000
This is why TikTok, I think, has been so successful is the algorithm is, I don't use TikTok.

398
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So I have a TikTok account. I don't have the app on my phone.

399
00:27:29.000 --> 00:27:33.000
But from what I hear is it's so unbelievably addictive.

400
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People describe it to me and they're like, oh, my God, it's so addictive.

401
00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:37.000
But the shit is the devil?

402
00:27:37.000 --> 00:27:38.000
Yeah.

403
00:27:39.000 --> 00:27:44.000
But it's, people are driven by incentive, right?

404
00:27:44.000 --> 00:27:48.000
And your share price is going to tumble and you're going to be fired.

405
00:27:48.000 --> 00:27:52.000
And you're going to lose your status and your power if you don't do that.

406
00:27:52.000 --> 00:27:55.000
I'm playing levels of it obviously.

407
00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:58.000
No, I agree.

408
00:27:58.000 --> 00:28:01.000
What do you think the solution is?

409
00:28:01.000 --> 00:28:09.000
And what responsibility do the bros who run these tech platforms have?

410
00:28:09.000 --> 00:28:11.000
It's complicated.

411
00:28:11.000 --> 00:28:14.000
Well, I agree. I'm not looking for an easy answer. Go ahead, hit me.

412
00:28:14.000 --> 00:28:19.000
Well, and I just think it's complicated because what an objective party would say,

413
00:28:19.000 --> 00:28:22.000
who's just looking at the incentives of these groups of people,

414
00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:26.000
is if they don't do it, then I know will.

415
00:28:26.000 --> 00:28:29.000
So even with AI now, you know what I mean?

416
00:28:29.000 --> 00:28:32.000
I'm like, I've sat with all these experts and I'd keep hanging up against this wall,

417
00:28:32.000 --> 00:28:36.000
which is, OK, if we just banned people in the United States from pursuing this super

418
00:28:36.000 --> 00:28:40.000
intelligence strategy, then Russia and China get their first.

419
00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:46.000
Then the United States, unfortunately, are going to end up being Chinese French Bulldog.

420
00:28:46.000 --> 00:28:47.000
And actually, I can't refute that.

421
00:28:47.000 --> 00:28:48.000
I go, no, you're right.

422
00:28:48.000 --> 00:28:51.000
Because we would have to literally lease the technology off them.

423
00:28:51.000 --> 00:28:56.000
It will be so powerful and give such an economic advantage that you will have to lease it off China.

424
00:28:56.000 --> 00:28:59.000
You're OK. I guess Sam Whitman doesn't need to crack on.

425
00:28:59.000 --> 00:29:03.000
Or else, so it's complicated.

426
00:29:03.000 --> 00:29:06.000
I mean, this is where I end up every time.

427
00:29:06.000 --> 00:29:09.000
I mean, look what happened with TikTok. China made an algorithm.

428
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It was unbelievably addictive.

429
00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:13.000
The United States have just had to buy it off them.

430
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Because they were scared that the data was going to be used against the United States.

431
00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:18.000
So, prime example, like China, like, fuck it. We don't care.

432
00:29:18.000 --> 00:29:19.000
That's right.

433
00:29:19.000 --> 00:29:22.000
Yeah. And they made an unbelievable algorithm called TikTok,

434
00:29:22.000 --> 00:29:25.000
which just captivate, you know, the youth are all just, I can lose in their brains.

435
00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:28.000
So, I don't know. I don't know. It's rough.

436
00:29:28.000 --> 00:29:30.000
Spiritual crisis.

437
00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:32.000
Yeah. I mean, you just laid it out.

438
00:29:32.000 --> 00:29:35.000
You just laid it out.

439
00:29:35.000 --> 00:29:37.000
We're emotionally dysregulated.

440
00:29:37.000 --> 00:29:39.000
We're distrustful of each other.

441
00:29:39.000 --> 00:29:42.000
We don't trust ourselves very much. And we're disconnected.

442
00:29:42.000 --> 00:29:44.000
I can't give up on people, though.

443
00:29:44.000 --> 00:29:46.000
I'm not built that way.

444
00:29:46.000 --> 00:29:52.000
Like, I just believe that we are more good than greedy.

445
00:29:52.000 --> 00:29:56.000
You know, I was in conversation with Trevor Noah at an event.

446
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And I mentioned this term that I was really excited about.

447
00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:03.000
And he challenged me on it.

448
00:30:03.000 --> 00:30:06.000
And I said, I think what we need is cognitive sovereignty.

449
00:30:06.000 --> 00:30:12.000
We need a wrestle control away from the algorithms

450
00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:17.000
and decide what we consume, what we read, how we think,

451
00:30:17.000 --> 00:30:20.000
think critically.

452
00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:25.000
We need to think about our attention and our focus

453
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as commodities that people are after.

454
00:30:28.000 --> 00:30:31.000
Because they're after them, right?

455
00:30:31.000 --> 00:30:33.000
He had an interesting point, though.

456
00:30:33.000 --> 00:30:34.000
He always has an interesting point.

457
00:30:34.000 --> 00:30:35.000
Start you think?

458
00:30:35.000 --> 00:30:38.000
It's so tough to talk to Trevor because he's always got an interesting point.

459
00:30:38.000 --> 00:30:40.000
He's always got an interesting point.

460
00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:43.000
Damn it. And he's funny.

461
00:30:43.000 --> 00:30:46.000
But he said, no, we need less cognitive sovereignty, Bernay.

462
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I'm like, what do you mean?

463
00:30:47.000 --> 00:30:49.000
He goes, everything's about the for you page.

464
00:30:49.000 --> 00:30:50.000
Everything's for you.

465
00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:52.000
We need communal sovereignty.

466
00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:57.000
He's like, you know, the whole problem is that your for you page

467
00:30:57.000 --> 00:30:58.000
is completely sovereign.

468
00:30:58.000 --> 00:31:02.000
You intellectually and spiritually, I'm a paraphrasing what he said.

469
00:31:02.000 --> 00:31:06.000
I'm sure it was like, finding here I'm better looking.

470
00:31:06.000 --> 00:31:15.000
But he, and then I was trying to think about like, I guess maybe that's not the right term.

471
00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:18.000
Let me tell you what scares me the most.

472
00:31:18.000 --> 00:31:21.000
I'm in some weird rooms because of the nature of my job.

473
00:31:21.000 --> 00:31:27.000
I'm in rooms where the people who run these platforms and the CEOs of these business

474
00:31:27.000 --> 00:31:29.000
and the founders are in these rooms.

475
00:31:29.000 --> 00:31:31.000
And I hear them talking.

476
00:31:31.000 --> 00:31:37.000
And I hear things that are so misaligned that it panics me.

477
00:31:37.000 --> 00:31:42.000
So I hear someone say, hey, you know, tech billionaire.

478
00:31:42.000 --> 00:31:44.000
What, what should my kids study?

479
00:31:44.000 --> 00:31:45.000
I'm worried for my kids.

480
00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:48.000
Well, they should study coding, physics, you know.

481
00:31:48.000 --> 00:31:51.000
And then five minutes later, as if that answer didn't happen,

482
00:31:51.000 --> 00:31:55.000
someone will say, what do you attribute your success?

483
00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:57.000
I mean, deeply when you think about it.

484
00:31:57.000 --> 00:32:02.000
And the same person will say, my deep reading of philosophy in the Stoics.

485
00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:06.000
And so then I'm thinking to myself, well, which is it, dude?

486
00:32:06.000 --> 00:32:10.000
And then I, then I start to extrapolate from there and wonder

487
00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:15.000
if there is a thinking class that's emerging

488
00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:18.000
where they're like, we're going to read philosophy

489
00:32:18.000 --> 00:32:21.000
and we're going to read the liberal arts

490
00:32:21.000 --> 00:32:23.000
and we're going to study history.

491
00:32:23.000 --> 00:32:26.000
And the rest of you just keep scrolling.

492
00:32:26.000 --> 00:32:28.000
Don't worry about the big words.

493
00:32:28.000 --> 00:32:30.000
Well, we'll handle all the big words for you.

494
00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:33.000
Like, it's like when they asked Steve Jobs,

495
00:32:33.000 --> 00:32:37.000
well, your kids must love the iPad.

496
00:32:37.000 --> 00:32:41.000
Steve Jobs said, my kids don't have an iPad.

497
00:32:41.000 --> 00:32:45.000
And then his biographer who spent time with his family said,

498
00:32:45.000 --> 00:32:46.000
he wasn't kidding.

499
00:32:46.000 --> 00:32:48.000
There's no technology.

500
00:32:48.000 --> 00:32:52.000
At dinner, they're talking about art and history.

501
00:32:52.000 --> 00:32:55.000
The hardest chapter I've ever written in my life of any book

502
00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:58.000
was the chapter on grounded competence and strong ground.

503
00:32:58.000 --> 00:33:00.000
What is the set of skill sets and mindsets

504
00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:03.000
that I think we're going to need to future ready

505
00:33:03.000 --> 00:33:06.000
and future proof ourselves to be leaders moving forward?

506
00:33:06.000 --> 00:33:09.000
And I think what was hard about it was the complexity of,

507
00:33:09.000 --> 00:33:12.000
it was probably a combination of 30 different mindsets

508
00:33:12.000 --> 00:33:14.000
and skill sets.

509
00:33:14.000 --> 00:33:18.000
And when I was done, you know, for commercial reasons,

510
00:33:18.000 --> 00:33:20.000
someone on my team immediately said,

511
00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:23.000
geez, this is like a, if you can train people in these things,

512
00:33:23.000 --> 00:33:26.000
this is really, this is like really important.

513
00:33:26.000 --> 00:33:31.000
And the first thing I thought was, fuck that, my kids.

514
00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:33.000
Trying to change main.

515
00:33:33.000 --> 00:33:34.000
I get it.

516
00:33:34.000 --> 00:33:35.000
It's important.

517
00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:37.000
We'll develop some instrumentation and measure it.

518
00:33:37.000 --> 00:33:38.000
We'll train folks in it.

519
00:33:38.000 --> 00:33:39.000
I think it's trainable.

520
00:33:39.000 --> 00:33:40.000
It's teachable.

521
00:33:40.000 --> 00:33:41.000
It's measurable.

522
00:33:41.000 --> 00:33:45.000
But really, I want this for my kids.

523
00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:47.000
I want my kids to know systems thinking.

524
00:33:47.000 --> 00:33:50.000
I want my kids to know anticipatory thinking,

525
00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:53.000
situational awareness, temporal awareness.

526
00:33:53.000 --> 00:34:00.000
I want my kids to have this complex set of skills.

527
00:34:00.000 --> 00:34:02.000
Do I want them to have jobs one day

528
00:34:02.000 --> 00:34:04.000
or are they worried about a shareholder value?

529
00:34:04.000 --> 00:34:05.000
Really no.

530
00:34:05.000 --> 00:34:09.000
I want them to own their mind, own their intellect,

531
00:34:09.000 --> 00:34:13.000
own their attention, and own their focus.

532
00:34:13.000 --> 00:34:16.000
I want them to read.

533
00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:19.000
I want them to understand history.

534
00:34:19.000 --> 00:34:22.000
I want them to develop pattern recognition skills.

535
00:34:22.000 --> 00:34:24.000
Because these are the skills of the future.

536
00:34:24.000 --> 00:34:30.000
I want them to be able to hold the tension of nuance and paradox.

537
00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:32.000
When everything in their brain is saying,

538
00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:34.000
pick one, pick one, reconcile.

539
00:34:34.000 --> 00:34:35.000
I'm uncomfortable.

540
00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:36.000
Pick one, reconcile.

541
00:34:36.000 --> 00:34:37.000
I'm uncomfortable.

542
00:34:37.000 --> 00:34:39.000
That's neurobiology.

543
00:34:39.000 --> 00:34:42.000
In those 20 years of your career,

544
00:34:42.000 --> 00:34:46.000
what have you been exposed to from a 30,000 foot perspective?

545
00:34:46.000 --> 00:34:50.000
What are the wide range of reference points

546
00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:55.000
that you draw upon to be the person that you are today?

547
00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:58.000
Because it feels like you've got a very wide range of references.

548
00:34:59.000 --> 00:35:01.000
You're someone that cares a lot about history.

549
00:35:01.000 --> 00:35:02.000
That comes through in your answers.

550
00:35:02.000 --> 00:35:04.000
But I'm wondering in your career,

551
00:35:04.000 --> 00:35:06.000
what are the experiences that you've had?

552
00:35:06.000 --> 00:35:09.000
Have you been working directly with patience?

553
00:35:09.000 --> 00:35:12.000
Is it academic reference points you're drawing upon?

554
00:35:12.000 --> 00:35:14.000
Yeah.

555
00:35:14.000 --> 00:35:16.000
No one's ever asked me this,

556
00:35:16.000 --> 00:35:20.000
which I've been grateful that no one's asked me.

557
00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:22.000
So what a pain in the ass.

558
00:35:22.000 --> 00:35:26.000
But because no one's going to like the answer.

559
00:35:26.000 --> 00:35:28.000
I'm excited by the answer now.

560
00:35:28.000 --> 00:35:30.000
Everything.

561
00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:32.000
Like every single thing.

562
00:35:32.000 --> 00:35:36.000
Yes, I love history.

563
00:35:36.000 --> 00:35:42.000
Yes, I read academic papers all the time.

564
00:35:42.000 --> 00:35:44.000
Yes, I wake up in the morning and I read

565
00:35:44.000 --> 00:35:46.000
because of the nature of my work.

566
00:35:46.000 --> 00:35:48.000
I read The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times,

567
00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:50.000
Bloomberg, The Financial Times.

568
00:35:50.000 --> 00:35:52.000
Yeah, I read a lot.

569
00:35:52.000 --> 00:35:56.000
But there's a chapter in the book that was one of my favorite

570
00:35:56.000 --> 00:36:00.000
to write on the transitions home from work.

571
00:36:00.000 --> 00:36:04.000
And how tough they are.

572
00:36:04.000 --> 00:36:06.000
And how if you're like me,

573
00:36:06.000 --> 00:36:08.000
you've had a very frustrated partner look at you

574
00:36:08.000 --> 00:36:10.000
more than once in your life and say,

575
00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:12.000
hey, I know it was stressful.

576
00:36:12.000 --> 00:36:14.000
I don't work for you.

577
00:36:14.000 --> 00:36:16.000
Change gears.

578
00:36:16.000 --> 00:36:18.000
Have you ever had that?

579
00:36:18.000 --> 00:36:20.000
No comment.

580
00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.000
I use a metaphor in that book,

581
00:36:24.000 --> 00:36:26.000
in this chapter,

582
00:36:26.000 --> 00:36:28.000
of a lock.

583
00:36:28.000 --> 00:36:30.000
And how did that come to me?

584
00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:32.000
Because I was reading the book series,

585
00:36:32.000 --> 00:36:34.000
The Rivers of London.

586
00:36:34.000 --> 00:36:36.000
And in that book series,

587
00:36:36.000 --> 00:36:38.000
there are two gods of the Thames.

588
00:36:38.000 --> 00:36:40.000
And the Teddington lock

589
00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.000
is where outside of London and Teddington

590
00:36:44.000 --> 00:36:46.000
is where custody changes for them.

591
00:36:46.000 --> 00:36:48.000
So I went to the Teddington lock

592
00:36:48.000 --> 00:36:50.000
as I was interested.

593
00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:52.000
I met the lock master

594
00:36:52.000 --> 00:36:54.000
that runs the lock.

595
00:36:54.000 --> 00:36:56.000
She gave me a three hour lesson that day.

596
00:36:56.000 --> 00:37:00.000
We let narrow boats through the Thames.

597
00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:02.000
I learned how lock works.

598
00:37:02.000 --> 00:37:04.000
And that's the metaphor that I use

599
00:37:04.000 --> 00:37:06.000
to talk about the research on

600
00:37:06.000 --> 00:37:10.000
what do we do when we spend all day locking in?

601
00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:12.000
Hyper-focused compartmentalizing,

602
00:37:12.000 --> 00:37:14.000
getting shit done.

603
00:37:14.000 --> 00:37:16.000
And then instead of going home to our partner,

604
00:37:16.000 --> 00:37:18.000
when we get home, we spend 30 minutes

605
00:37:18.000 --> 00:37:20.000
in the garage on TikTok,

606
00:37:20.000 --> 00:37:22.000
because we can't bear to go in.

607
00:37:22.000 --> 00:37:24.000
So why do we do that?

608
00:37:24.000 --> 00:37:26.000
Because we need a lock through period.

609
00:37:26.000 --> 00:37:32.000
We need time to go into a chamber metaphorically.

610
00:37:32.000 --> 00:37:34.000
Change levels.

611
00:37:34.000 --> 00:37:36.000
Let go of where we were.

612
00:37:36.000 --> 00:37:38.000
Lower ourselves to the rhythm of what we're doing now.

613
00:37:38.000 --> 00:37:42.000
Cognitively we would call it cognitive and domain shifting.

614
00:37:42.000 --> 00:37:44.000
And we need time.

615
00:37:44.000 --> 00:37:46.000
So I looked at the lock master

616
00:37:46.000 --> 00:37:48.000
at Teddington and said,

617
00:37:48.000 --> 00:37:50.000
this should have taken a long time.

618
00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:52.000
Can we get this chamber filled up a little bit quicker?

619
00:37:52.000 --> 00:37:54.000
And she said,

620
00:37:54.000 --> 00:37:56.000
locking through takes what locking through takes.

621
00:37:56.000 --> 00:37:58.000
If you rush it,

622
00:37:58.000 --> 00:38:00.000
you risk capsizing.

623
00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:02.000
We get home,

624
00:38:02.000 --> 00:38:04.000
and then we walk in the back door.

625
00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:06.000
And it's like, I can't find my shin guards.

626
00:38:06.000 --> 00:38:08.000
I think I left them on the pitch.

627
00:38:08.000 --> 00:38:10.000
Where are my goggles, mom?

628
00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:12.000
Oh my god, you didn't sign the permission slip.

629
00:38:12.000 --> 00:38:14.000
You get the zoo.

630
00:38:14.000 --> 00:38:16.000
And you're like,

631
00:38:16.000 --> 00:38:18.000
take me back to work from the boss of everything.

632
00:38:18.000 --> 00:38:20.000
So where do I learn those things?

633
00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:24.000
Well, cognitive and domain shifting come out of psychology.

634
00:38:24.000 --> 00:38:28.000
Jim out of the lock master at Teddington.

635
00:38:28.000 --> 00:38:30.000
There's wisdom everywhere.

636
00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:32.000
I put it together through stories and metaphors.

637
00:38:32.000 --> 00:38:34.000
I mean, another thing in the book.

638
00:38:34.000 --> 00:38:38.000
I mean, I'm standing on the sideline at D.K.R.

639
00:38:38.000 --> 00:38:42.000
The University of Texas longhorn football stadium.

640
00:38:42.000 --> 00:38:44.000
And I'm standing with Manuel Acho.

641
00:38:44.000 --> 00:38:46.000
Do you know Manuel?

642
00:38:46.000 --> 00:38:48.000
No.

643
00:38:48.000 --> 00:38:50.000
Yeah, he played for the long horns.

644
00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:52.000
He played for the NFL.

645
00:38:52.000 --> 00:38:54.000
Now he's a writer.

646
00:38:54.000 --> 00:38:56.000
So I'm standing there.

647
00:38:56.000 --> 00:38:58.000
And we're watching the game.

648
00:38:58.000 --> 00:39:00.000
And I look at him.

649
00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:02.000
How would you define pocket presence?

650
00:39:02.000 --> 00:39:04.000
And pocket presence is an American football term.

651
00:39:04.000 --> 00:39:06.000
So do you know American football?

652
00:39:06.000 --> 00:39:08.000
Throw the ball or run the ball or hand off the ball

653
00:39:08.000 --> 00:39:10.000
to get the ball down the pitch down the field.

654
00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:12.000
Right?

655
00:39:12.000 --> 00:39:16.000
And when the ball is snapped and the ball is put into motion,

656
00:39:16.000 --> 00:39:24.000
there's about 12 to 1400 pounds of really angry people trying to drive me into the ground.

657
00:39:24.000 --> 00:39:28.000
The people that are protecting me from those defensive guys

658
00:39:28.000 --> 00:39:30.000
are called my offensive line.

659
00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:34.000
And the way they do it is they form a pocket around the quarterback.

660
00:39:34.000 --> 00:39:38.000
And the quarterback uses that time to decide,

661
00:39:38.000 --> 00:39:40.000
where am I going to throw the ball?

662
00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:42.000
Am I going to run the ball?

663
00:39:42.000 --> 00:39:46.000
And pocket presence is the ability of a quarterback to use the

664
00:39:46.000 --> 00:39:50.000
on average 2.8 to 3 seconds he has

665
00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.000
to read the field, understand where the defenders are, and make a decision.

666
00:39:54.000 --> 00:39:56.000
And so when I asked Manuel Acho,

667
00:39:56.000 --> 00:39:58.000
how would you define pocket presence?

668
00:39:58.000 --> 00:40:00.000
He said,

669
00:40:00.000 --> 00:40:02.000
and I want you to think about this in terms of your business.

670
00:40:02.000 --> 00:40:06.000
The ability to read the field without seeing all of it

671
00:40:06.000 --> 00:40:10.000
and trusting your team well enough to make a move,

672
00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:14.000
even though you can't see everything.

673
00:40:14.000 --> 00:40:18.000
What are the skills that you need right there?

674
00:40:18.000 --> 00:40:20.000
One, temporal awareness.

675
00:40:20.000 --> 00:40:22.000
You guys know how much time you have to get rid of that ball.

676
00:40:22.000 --> 00:40:24.000
I get it down the field.

677
00:40:24.000 --> 00:40:26.000
They say Tom Brady, who played for the Patriots,

678
00:40:26.000 --> 00:40:28.000
is it any of this ringing a bell?

679
00:40:28.000 --> 00:40:30.000
Tom Brady,

680
00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.000
they said his pocket presence was so good he could tell

681
00:40:34.000 --> 00:40:38.000
where his offensive linemen were by the vibrations

682
00:40:38.000 --> 00:40:40.000
through his cleats on the field.

683
00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:44.000
So temporal awareness, situational awareness,

684
00:40:44.000 --> 00:40:48.000
what's going on, anticipatory awareness.

685
00:40:48.000 --> 00:40:50.000
Think about a great football player.

686
00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:52.000
Think about masala.

687
00:40:52.000 --> 00:40:56.000
You don't kick the ball to where the striker is.

688
00:40:56.000 --> 00:40:58.000
You kick the ball to where the striker is going to be.

689
00:40:58.000 --> 00:41:02.000
So anticipatory and situational awareness.

690
00:41:02.000 --> 00:41:04.000
Pattern recognition.

691
00:41:04.000 --> 00:41:06.000
Have I been in this situation before?

692
00:41:06.000 --> 00:41:08.000
Do I know where's the goalie in the cage?

693
00:41:08.000 --> 00:41:10.000
Where are they standing right now?

694
00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:14.000
I'll take my inspiration from sports all the time,

695
00:41:14.000 --> 00:41:18.000
which is why there's so many sports metaphors.

696
00:41:18.000 --> 00:41:22.000
I think there's not a better metaphor to describe work right now

697
00:41:22.000 --> 00:41:26.000
than primarily football.

698
00:41:26.000 --> 00:41:30.000
So throughout your work is this idea of connection.

699
00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:32.000
I did a mushroom.

700
00:41:32.000 --> 00:41:34.000
I did magic mushrooms with my girlfriend a couple of years ago,

701
00:41:34.000 --> 00:41:36.000
first time I've ever done it.

702
00:41:36.000 --> 00:41:40.000
And the message that came through for me was about connection.

703
00:41:40.000 --> 00:41:43.000
And that word has had a fond place in my heart ever since

704
00:41:43.000 --> 00:41:45.000
is being really, really important.

705
00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:47.000
We live in a society that's more lonely than ever before.

706
00:41:47.000 --> 00:41:49.000
More disconnected in many ways as you describe it

707
00:41:49.000 --> 00:41:52.000
or you're referencing the spiritual crisis that we're living in.

708
00:41:52.000 --> 00:41:54.000
This word connection, what does that mean?

709
00:41:54.000 --> 00:41:56.000
Does it mean on an individual basis?

710
00:41:56.000 --> 00:41:58.000
Does it mean me having friends and relationships?

711
00:41:58.000 --> 00:42:00.000
Is that connection?

712
00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:02.000
Is that the type of connection I should be looking for?

713
00:42:02.000 --> 00:42:05.000
Or do you think people need to ladder up further

714
00:42:05.000 --> 00:42:09.000
to their city, their town, their world,

715
00:42:09.000 --> 00:42:12.000
to the community, to something bigger?

716
00:42:12.000 --> 00:42:16.000
God, what does connection mean in this context?

717
00:42:16.000 --> 00:42:18.000
Yes.

718
00:42:19.000 --> 00:42:21.000
I think the answer to that question is yes.

719
00:42:21.000 --> 00:42:24.000
We're neurobiologically hardwired to be in connection

720
00:42:24.000 --> 00:42:25.000
with other people.

721
00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:27.000
And in the absence of connection,

722
00:42:27.000 --> 00:42:29.000
there's always suffering.

723
00:42:29.000 --> 00:42:32.000
Always suffering in the absence of connection.

724
00:42:32.000 --> 00:42:36.000
So I think, I mean, just how we're built, mirror neurons,

725
00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:39.000
our ability to sync up neurobiologically

726
00:42:39.000 --> 00:42:42.000
when we feel connected and are hearing each other.

727
00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:45.000
So to me, connection is the ability to be in a relationship

728
00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:47.000
where we can both give and receive

729
00:42:47.000 --> 00:42:52.000
where we feel seen, heard, believed, valued.

730
00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:56.000
That is, that human connection is really important

731
00:42:56.000 --> 00:42:59.000
on a micro level, one-on-one with other human beings.

732
00:42:59.000 --> 00:43:03.000
I think a sense of belonging and a sense of place.

733
00:43:03.000 --> 00:43:08.000
And I don't know that that necessarily needs to be a location,

734
00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:15.000
but a sense of being a part of something bigger than you,

735
00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:17.000
I think is also important.

736
00:43:17.000 --> 00:43:22.000
So love and belonging, connection, irreducible needs.

737
00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:29.000
I think spirituality, I define spirituality

738
00:43:29.000 --> 00:43:32.000
is being inextricably connected to other people

739
00:43:32.000 --> 00:43:34.000
by something bigger than us.

740
00:43:34.000 --> 00:43:38.000
Maybe that's love, maybe that's God, maybe that's fishing.

741
00:43:38.000 --> 00:43:40.000
Like, you know, it's different for other people.

742
00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:42.000
For me, I'm faith is one of my values

743
00:43:42.000 --> 00:43:45.000
and I'm a pretty serious God person.

744
00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:48.000
I'm a pretty deep person of faith.

745
00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:50.000
I guess I would ask somebody,

746
00:43:50.000 --> 00:43:58.000
what is that thing that transcends difference?

747
00:43:58.000 --> 00:44:02.000
Political difference, ideological difference, race, gender,

748
00:44:02.000 --> 00:44:07.000
belief systems, class, what is it that brings you

749
00:44:07.000 --> 00:44:10.000
to a common humanity place?

750
00:44:12.000 --> 00:44:13.000
Like for me, it's God.

751
00:44:13.000 --> 00:44:14.000
That's a big challenge.

752
00:44:14.000 --> 00:44:16.000
Because I try to work for an ethos

753
00:44:16.000 --> 00:44:19.000
where I try to find God in the face of everybody that I meet,

754
00:44:19.000 --> 00:44:21.000
even if I want to punch you in the throat.

755
00:44:21.000 --> 00:44:25.000
I try to, like, that's my thing,

756
00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:27.000
in some way I'm connected to you.

757
00:44:27.000 --> 00:44:31.000
Whether I like it or not, and whether I like you or not.

758
00:44:33.000 --> 00:44:35.000
And when you talk about belonging, it's interesting.

759
00:44:35.000 --> 00:44:37.000
In your book, Braving the Wilderness,

760
00:44:37.000 --> 00:44:40.000
which I think the question is going to stand up by the subtitle here.

761
00:44:40.000 --> 00:44:43.000
The quest for true belonging and the courage to stand alone.

762
00:44:43.000 --> 00:44:46.000
This appears to be a dichotomy or a contradiction,

763
00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:48.000
to belong but also to stand alone.

764
00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:52.000
Why are both of these important?

765
00:44:52.000 --> 00:44:53.000
Why is it important to belong?

766
00:44:53.000 --> 00:44:54.000
What does that mean?

767
00:44:54.000 --> 00:44:58.000
And why is it also important to stand alone?

768
00:44:58.000 --> 00:45:01.000
Because I don't think you can truly belong

769
00:45:02.000 --> 00:45:07.000
to anything or any group if you don't belong to yourself first.

770
00:45:08.000 --> 00:45:14.000
True belonging requires us to be who we are,

771
00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:17.000
not to change who we are.

772
00:45:17.000 --> 00:45:18.000
That's fitting in.

773
00:45:18.000 --> 00:45:20.000
Fitting in is the greatest threat to belonging.

774
00:45:22.000 --> 00:45:25.000
Which takes us both back to our childhoods, right?

775
00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:26.000
Yeah.

776
00:45:26.000 --> 00:45:29.000
Fit in, fit in, fit in, fit in.

777
00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:35.000
The problem is that that chameleon kind of skill set

778
00:45:38.000 --> 00:45:41.000
means that in order to fit in,

779
00:45:41.000 --> 00:45:43.000
the first person you betray is yourself.

780
00:45:43.000 --> 00:45:45.000
We've got to be able to stand alone.

781
00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:47.000
And that's what's happening right now in the world.

782
00:45:47.000 --> 00:45:50.000
I mean, if I look back at Braving the Wilderness,

783
00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:54.000
that was maybe the only prophetic book that I think I've ever written.

784
00:45:54.000 --> 00:45:56.000
Like that, like that, I don't think I'm profit-like,

785
00:45:56.000 --> 00:46:00.000
but man, did I call what was happening in terms of the big sort

786
00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:04.000
into ideological bunkers where we're going to get to a place

787
00:46:04.000 --> 00:46:07.000
where I don't even know you,

788
00:46:07.000 --> 00:46:11.000
but I'm going to call you friend because we hate the same people.

789
00:46:13.000 --> 00:46:17.000
And you over there, I actually do love you.

790
00:46:17.000 --> 00:46:20.000
You're a family member of mine.

791
00:46:20.000 --> 00:46:23.000
But I'm not, you know, because we don't believe in the same things,

792
00:46:24.000 --> 00:46:26.000
you have no meaning in my life.

793
00:46:26.000 --> 00:46:29.000
Like it's like we have gotten to the place where

794
00:46:29.000 --> 00:46:32.000
ideological bunkers,

795
00:46:32.000 --> 00:46:34.000
and those are so dangerous because hear you,

796
00:46:34.000 --> 00:46:39.000
and I like, let's say that we have the same belief around immigration.

797
00:46:39.000 --> 00:46:42.000
So we're going to flip this table over,

798
00:46:42.000 --> 00:46:44.000
and we're going to get behind it in our ideological bunker,

799
00:46:44.000 --> 00:46:47.000
and we're going to be like, yeah, we're right,

800
00:46:47.000 --> 00:46:50.000
and these guys are fucking crazy and fuck y'all.

801
00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:53.000
You know, and then one day I'm going to turn to you and say,

802
00:46:53.000 --> 00:46:56.000
you know, one thing I'm wondering about

803
00:46:56.000 --> 00:47:01.000
is how are we going to solve the problem

804
00:47:01.000 --> 00:47:06.000
with the folks coming over in the dinghies from France

805
00:47:06.000 --> 00:47:10.000
because I don't think we're going to be able to go without solving it

806
00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:14.000
because we do have an employment issue in a housing crisis,

807
00:47:14.000 --> 00:47:18.000
and then you go, you're out.

808
00:47:18.000 --> 00:47:21.000
My care for you, my connection with you,

809
00:47:21.000 --> 00:47:25.000
completely dependent on you not questioning anything

810
00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:28.000
we agreed to back here.

811
00:47:28.000 --> 00:47:32.000
Well, that's counterfeit connection.

812
00:47:32.000 --> 00:47:34.000
What's real connection?

813
00:47:34.000 --> 00:47:36.000
Wait, I got to know what's going on in your mind

814
00:47:36.000 --> 00:47:38.000
because your face is like, we got to play poker.

815
00:47:38.000 --> 00:47:41.000
Where'd we put that on our agenda?

816
00:47:41.000 --> 00:47:42.000
What are you thinking?

817
00:47:42.000 --> 00:47:44.000
I was just thinking about being a putcaster,

818
00:47:44.000 --> 00:47:46.000
and I sit here with all types of people.

819
00:47:46.000 --> 00:47:50.000
I had Kamala Harris sit here three or four days ago,

820
00:47:50.000 --> 00:47:54.000
and I'll have someone on the right sit here.

821
00:47:54.000 --> 00:47:58.000
Then I'll have Michelle Obama, then I'll have Jordan Peterson,

822
00:47:58.000 --> 00:48:01.000
and I'll have the opposite of whatever Jordan isn't.

823
00:48:01.000 --> 00:48:05.000
I was just thinking about how that's also kind of made me feel

824
00:48:05.000 --> 00:48:09.000
like I don't belong because that is quite rare.

825
00:48:09.000 --> 00:48:11.000
There's probably not a podcast on Earth

826
00:48:11.000 --> 00:48:14.000
that has had both Michelle Obama and Jordan Peterson.

827
00:48:14.000 --> 00:48:15.000
No.

828
00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:16.000
Yeah.

829
00:48:16.000 --> 00:48:17.000
And then Kamala Harris after that,

830
00:48:17.000 --> 00:48:19.000
I didn't manage to scare Michelle off.

831
00:48:19.000 --> 00:48:21.000
I didn't scare Jordan off.

832
00:48:21.000 --> 00:48:25.000
And so you kind of get attacked from both sides.

833
00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:33.000
Oh, I mean, look, if you're not getting threatening shit

834
00:48:33.000 --> 00:48:37.000
from the far left or the far right,

835
00:48:37.000 --> 00:48:40.000
if you're not getting both, you're not doing your job.

836
00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:41.000
Amen.

837
00:48:41.000 --> 00:48:42.000
Period.

838
00:48:42.000 --> 00:48:45.000
Oh, God, it is heartbreaking.

839
00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:46.000
Yeah.

840
00:48:46.000 --> 00:48:49.000
It will break your heart, and it will remind you

841
00:48:49.000 --> 00:48:54.000
of why standing alone is on the front of that book,

842
00:48:54.000 --> 00:48:59.000
because what it will do is it is window the right word?

843
00:48:59.000 --> 00:49:03.000
It will narrow your belonging, your true belonging,

844
00:49:03.000 --> 00:49:08.000
down to a very few people.

845
00:49:08.000 --> 00:49:10.000
I mean, I completely understand how it happens

846
00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:13.000
that a podcast like me will end up picking aside

847
00:49:13.000 --> 00:49:15.000
because there is safety in numbers.

848
00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:17.000
Well, because there's an ideological bunker

849
00:49:17.000 --> 00:49:18.000
because we flip the table over.

850
00:49:18.000 --> 00:49:19.000
100%.

851
00:49:19.000 --> 00:49:21.000
At any point, you know, when the left attacks you're like,

852
00:49:21.000 --> 00:49:22.000
wow, the right looks pretty good.

853
00:49:22.000 --> 00:49:25.000
And the right attacks you, you don't have the left looks pretty good,

854
00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:30.000
because standing in no-man's land is not the place you want to be.

855
00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:34.000
I know I'm never going to succeed in this.

856
00:49:34.000 --> 00:49:37.000
Like, I know I'm never going to succeed in converting people

857
00:49:37.000 --> 00:49:41.000
to being nuanced and to not get viscerally angry

858
00:49:41.000 --> 00:49:43.000
when I have someone on the show who's on the right

859
00:49:43.000 --> 00:49:45.000
or viscerally angry when I have someone on the show who's on the left.

860
00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:47.000
I'm already aware that when the commodity comes out,

861
00:49:47.000 --> 00:49:49.000
it's just going to be a bunch of people that didn't listen,

862
00:49:49.000 --> 00:49:51.000
and within the first three minutes, the comments section

863
00:49:51.000 --> 00:49:52.000
is just going to be fat literally.

864
00:49:52.000 --> 00:49:53.000
Yeah.

865
00:49:53.000 --> 00:49:55.000
And I'm like, part of me is trying to win that war

866
00:49:55.000 --> 00:49:59.000
with my audience, where they too will just listen.

867
00:49:59.000 --> 00:50:01.000
And I know that you don't agree with a person,

868
00:50:01.000 --> 00:50:03.000
but can you just listen?

869
00:50:03.000 --> 00:50:05.000
Because that's what I do, and it's not some act I'm putting on.

870
00:50:05.000 --> 00:50:07.000
It's not like I walk out there and I start,

871
00:50:07.000 --> 00:50:09.000
but I'm right-winging my kitchen or left-winging my kitchen.

872
00:50:09.000 --> 00:50:11.000
Generally, the way my brain works is,

873
00:50:11.000 --> 00:50:13.000
oh, I see this good in this individual.

874
00:50:13.000 --> 00:50:15.000
And then I meet someone else who's on the other side,

875
00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:17.000
and it's, oh, there's a couple of points of good.

876
00:50:17.000 --> 00:50:19.000
I agree with them on this.

877
00:50:19.000 --> 00:50:21.000
That's how I am.

878
00:50:21.000 --> 00:50:23.000
And it feels so weird.

879
00:50:23.000 --> 00:50:25.000
Because when you go on the internet, you don't find yourself

880
00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:28.000
being compelled by either side entirely.

881
00:50:28.000 --> 00:50:29.000
No.

882
00:50:29.000 --> 00:50:31.000
No, and I think it's really confusing.

883
00:50:31.000 --> 00:50:33.000
And the only limit I have really is

884
00:50:33.000 --> 00:50:37.000
I am not probably going to have a conversation with you.

885
00:50:39.000 --> 00:50:43.000
If your beliefs question my humanity.

886
00:50:43.000 --> 00:50:45.000
Okay.

887
00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:47.000
That's going to be my line.

888
00:50:47.000 --> 00:50:51.000
That's going to be the line for me is going to be

889
00:50:51.000 --> 00:50:55.000
if you're a cruel or name-colle,

890
00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.000
or if your core beliefs about who I am,

891
00:50:59.000 --> 00:51:03.000
or who other people are dehumanizing.

892
00:51:03.000 --> 00:51:07.000
I can't do that.

893
00:51:07.000 --> 00:51:11.000
Because now I betrayed myself in order to make a political point

894
00:51:11.000 --> 00:51:13.000
about nuance.

895
00:51:13.000 --> 00:51:19.000
Because dehumanization is a really interesting and hard thing.

896
00:51:19.000 --> 00:51:23.000
When you look at the research of people who study dehumanization

897
00:51:23.000 --> 00:51:27.000
and we talked about earlier with immigrant populations.

898
00:51:27.000 --> 00:51:33.000
There is a circle of moral inclusion.

899
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:35.000
We are not built.

900
00:51:35.000 --> 00:51:39.000
We are not hardwired to hurt each other.

901
00:51:39.000 --> 00:51:41.000
To kill each other.

902
00:51:41.000 --> 00:51:45.000
Assault rate beat.

903
00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:47.000
We're not wired for it actually.

904
00:51:47.000 --> 00:51:51.000
So in order to do that,

905
00:51:51.000 --> 00:51:55.000
you've got a person here inside your moral inclusion.

906
00:51:55.000 --> 00:51:59.000
You've got to push them outside of moral inclusion

907
00:51:59.000 --> 00:52:03.000
to be morally excluded from somebody you see as human

908
00:52:03.000 --> 00:52:05.000
and worthy of moral inclusion.

909
00:52:05.000 --> 00:52:09.000
And the first step to moral exclusion.

910
00:52:09.000 --> 00:52:15.000
Moving people out of a safety zone where you don't do horrible things to them.

911
00:52:15.000 --> 00:52:19.000
The first way to move people out is language throughout history.

912
00:52:19.000 --> 00:52:23.000
As long as people have lived.

913
00:52:23.000 --> 00:52:27.000
You hear people in this administration calling a community of immigrants

914
00:52:27.000 --> 00:52:31.000
an infestation.

915
00:52:31.000 --> 00:52:35.000
The same way we would talk about animals or rats.

916
00:52:35.000 --> 00:52:41.000
And so my only limit to hard conversation

917
00:52:41.000 --> 00:52:45.000
is if you're operating from an ideology

918
00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:49.000
where women or dogs, immigrants or illegals,

919
00:52:49.000 --> 00:52:53.000
if you're operating from that place of moral exclusion,

920
00:52:53.000 --> 00:52:57.000
you are too dangerous for me.

921
00:52:57.000 --> 00:52:59.000
But other than that,

922
00:52:59.000 --> 00:53:03.000
I'd probably be willing to have a conversation with anyone.

923
00:53:03.000 --> 00:53:05.000
But I can understand why people pick sides.

924
00:53:05.000 --> 00:53:07.000
I tell you what, it is lonely.

925
00:53:07.000 --> 00:53:09.000
Yeah, that makes sense.

926
00:53:09.000 --> 00:53:11.000
Yeah. It's nice to hear that.

927
00:53:11.000 --> 00:53:13.000
It's really nice to hear that.

928
00:53:13.000 --> 00:53:15.000
That is...

929
00:53:15.000 --> 00:53:17.000
Yeah.

930
00:53:17.000 --> 00:53:19.000
We've talked about it quite a lot.

931
00:53:19.000 --> 00:53:23.000
Me and Jack, who's been producing this show since the very beginning,

932
00:53:23.000 --> 00:53:27.000
we've talked a lot about how we understand the temptation to pick a side.

933
00:53:27.000 --> 00:53:29.000
And actually one of the greatest compliments of journalists has ever given me

934
00:53:29.000 --> 00:53:31.000
is they wrote in the article.

935
00:53:31.000 --> 00:53:33.000
And this wasn't a journalist that liked me.

936
00:53:33.000 --> 00:53:35.000
They just said,

937
00:53:35.000 --> 00:53:39.000
we're unable to ascertain which political party he is part of.

938
00:53:39.000 --> 00:53:43.000
I thought that was a great compliment because...

939
00:53:43.000 --> 00:53:45.000
I mean...

940
00:53:45.000 --> 00:53:47.000
That's a journalistic ethos.

941
00:53:47.000 --> 00:53:49.000
I think they would want to pin me down

942
00:53:49.000 --> 00:53:51.000
and say he's fucking...

943
00:53:51.000 --> 00:53:53.000
They'd have to sound right-wing or something else.

944
00:53:53.000 --> 00:53:55.000
But they said,

945
00:53:55.000 --> 00:53:57.000
in a not very nice piece they'd written about me or whatever,

946
00:53:57.000 --> 00:53:59.000
they said we're unable to figure out what side he's part of.

947
00:53:59.000 --> 00:54:01.000
And I think that's a compliment because it's true.

948
00:54:01.000 --> 00:54:03.000
And I think it allows me to do my job better

949
00:54:03.000 --> 00:54:05.000
that I don't have too many preconceptions when I meet people.

950
00:54:05.000 --> 00:54:07.000
I try to meet people for the first time.

951
00:54:07.000 --> 00:54:09.000
Which I enjoy.

952
00:54:09.000 --> 00:54:11.000
I think you're pretty good at that,

953
00:54:11.000 --> 00:54:13.000
because you are insatiably curious.

954
00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:15.000
It's lovely and terrible.

955
00:54:15.000 --> 00:54:17.000
Why terrible? It's terrible for an avoidant.

956
00:54:17.000 --> 00:54:19.000
I found this out recently.

957
00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:21.000
I've known it my whole life,

958
00:54:21.000 --> 00:54:23.000
but I found it out recently because I had a conversation.

959
00:54:23.000 --> 00:54:25.000
If someone's uncomfortable with vulnerability,

960
00:54:25.000 --> 00:54:27.000
then I'm like the fucking worst nightmare.

961
00:54:27.000 --> 00:54:29.000
You are.

962
00:54:29.000 --> 00:54:31.000
Which is interesting,

963
00:54:31.000 --> 00:54:33.000
because I don't think she was super vulnerable.

964
00:54:33.000 --> 00:54:35.000
Really?

965
00:54:35.000 --> 00:54:37.000
Maybe not.

966
00:54:37.000 --> 00:54:39.000
Carefully optimistic vulnerable.

967
00:54:39.000 --> 00:54:41.000
Yeah, that's probably right.

968
00:54:41.000 --> 00:54:43.000
You're cognitively a believer.

969
00:54:43.000 --> 00:54:45.000
Yeah.

970
00:54:45.000 --> 00:54:47.000
And trying to move the rest of you to it.

971
00:54:47.000 --> 00:54:53.000
You've got the journalistic ethos of

972
00:54:53.000 --> 00:54:57.000
equal opportunity

973
00:54:57.000 --> 00:54:59.000
and social curious guy, right?

974
00:54:59.000 --> 00:55:03.000
What do you think the responsibility is

975
00:55:03.000 --> 00:55:07.000
of someone who has a platform?

976
00:55:07.000 --> 00:55:15.000
To that or understand the credibility,

977
00:55:15.000 --> 00:55:17.000
especially when it comes to science

978
00:55:17.000 --> 00:55:19.000
or those kind of things of what their guest is saying.

979
00:55:19.000 --> 00:55:21.000
I think that

980
00:55:21.000 --> 00:55:23.000
the school of podcasters

981
00:55:23.000 --> 00:55:25.000
haven't really

982
00:55:25.000 --> 00:55:27.000
we don't have the

983
00:55:27.000 --> 00:55:31.000
training that journalists do.

984
00:55:31.000 --> 00:55:33.000
So we're almost catching up in that regard,

985
00:55:33.000 --> 00:55:35.000
especially if you become a big podcaster,

986
00:55:35.000 --> 00:55:37.000
because you kind of held

987
00:55:37.000 --> 00:55:39.000
in a different level.

988
00:55:39.000 --> 00:55:41.000
So more recently,

989
00:55:41.000 --> 00:55:43.000
one of the things we do is we've

990
00:55:43.000 --> 00:55:45.000
had a PhD who does exactly that

991
00:55:45.000 --> 00:55:47.000
who after this comes out

992
00:55:47.000 --> 00:55:49.000
will go through everything that you said

993
00:55:49.000 --> 00:55:51.000
and then put on the screen

994
00:55:51.000 --> 00:55:53.000
things that were

995
00:55:53.000 --> 00:55:55.000
not within scientific consensus.

996
00:55:55.000 --> 00:55:57.000
But that in itself

997
00:55:59.000 --> 00:56:01.000
is a decision.

998
00:56:01.000 --> 00:56:03.000
Yeah.

999
00:56:03.000 --> 00:56:05.000
It is a decision.

1000
00:56:05.000 --> 00:56:07.000
It's not a choice

1001
00:56:07.000 --> 00:56:09.000
without consequence either.

1002
00:56:09.000 --> 00:56:11.000
No, some people don't like it.

1003
00:56:11.000 --> 00:56:15.000
What led you to that choice?

1004
00:56:15.000 --> 00:56:17.000
When your podcaster reaches lots of people,

1005
00:56:17.000 --> 00:56:19.000
you're forced to

1006
00:56:19.000 --> 00:56:23.000
just kind of go

1007
00:56:23.000 --> 00:56:25.000
to what I said earlier about the political stuff.

1008
00:56:25.000 --> 00:56:27.000
You're forced to really get clear

1009
00:56:27.000 --> 00:56:29.000
on what you believe.

1010
00:56:29.000 --> 00:56:31.000
And what matters to you

1011
00:56:31.000 --> 00:56:33.000
is that you need to be able to

1012
00:56:33.000 --> 00:56:35.000
make people believe in people

1013
00:56:35.000 --> 00:56:37.000
even if it's not nice.

1014
00:56:37.000 --> 00:56:39.000
And it kind of goes to something

1015
00:56:39.000 --> 00:56:41.000
that I read in your work which is

1016
00:56:41.000 --> 00:56:43.000
how objective isn't to be nice,

1017
00:56:43.000 --> 00:56:45.000
it's to be kind.

1018
00:56:45.000 --> 00:56:47.000
So for example, the conversations

1019
00:56:47.000 --> 00:56:49.000
we have about AI like I'm well aware

1020
00:56:49.000 --> 00:56:51.000
that that's not going to necessarily make you feel great.

1021
00:56:51.000 --> 00:56:53.000
But I think the avoidance

1022
00:56:53.000 --> 00:56:55.000
of discomfort in through history

1023
00:56:55.000 --> 00:56:57.000
hasn't led to great places.

1024
00:56:57.000 --> 00:56:59.000
So if you think there's a bus coming

1025
00:56:59.000 --> 00:57:02.420
there might be a bus coming and if experts are telling me there's a bus coming, I think

1026
00:57:02.420 --> 00:57:04.460
we should have a conversation about the bus coming.

1027
00:57:04.460 --> 00:57:07.580
And actually me having that conversation, I get messages all the time which is like,

1028
00:57:07.580 --> 00:57:11.100
please stop talking about this subject, it doesn't make me feel good.

1029
00:57:11.100 --> 00:57:14.860
I'm very anchored to like what might my job is here and I think it's, we can push people

1030
00:57:14.860 --> 00:57:25.280
further towards, we can create progress through on this conversations.

1031
00:57:25.280 --> 00:57:30.060
So when the podcast got bigger and you get more and more, you get attacked more for any

1032
00:57:30.060 --> 00:57:33.020
of your guests that you have on, you have to get clear on what matters to you and what

1033
00:57:33.020 --> 00:57:34.020
your job is.

1034
00:57:34.020 --> 00:57:35.900
And so one of the things I thought was actually when we have these conversations, I want

1035
00:57:35.900 --> 00:57:40.540
them to be as accurate as they possibly can be, it's for the listener who might be confused

1036
00:57:40.540 --> 00:57:44.820
because it's in confusing world in this new world, it's in the media.

1037
00:57:44.820 --> 00:57:45.820
So we do that.

1038
00:57:45.820 --> 00:57:48.740
I really respect that, I just want to say.

1039
00:57:48.740 --> 00:57:55.940
I don't think that that choice is the easy choice.

1040
00:57:55.940 --> 00:57:57.660
What is the easy choice, do you think?

1041
00:57:57.660 --> 00:58:06.160
The easy choice is, I'm going to let you say whatever you want and I'll let my listener

1042
00:58:06.160 --> 00:58:11.380
sort out if it's real or not.

1043
00:58:11.380 --> 00:58:22.340
And I'll take no responsibility for the credibility or the facts that are being presented.

1044
00:58:22.340 --> 00:58:33.780
What I think is interesting about what you're doing is, it just seems like a very solid

1045
00:58:33.780 --> 00:58:41.380
approach where I'm a big believer in science, you know, I'm married to physician, I'm a

1046
00:58:41.380 --> 00:58:46.900
social scientist, like I'm not going to be the golden child of this administration when

1047
00:58:46.900 --> 00:58:48.380
it comes to science for sure.

1048
00:58:48.380 --> 00:58:53.980
Like I have a I love science shirt that I wear with a DNA scarf.

1049
00:58:53.980 --> 00:58:58.300
So like I'm like, I'm very real about that.

1050
00:58:58.300 --> 00:59:08.540
I also don't think that everything that we see that is projected as peer reviewed clinical

1051
00:59:08.540 --> 00:59:13.740
trial, you know, I think challenges to that system are also important.

1052
00:59:13.740 --> 00:59:18.380
I think science cannot be a self referencing system any more than any other system can

1053
00:59:18.380 --> 00:59:19.380
be.

1054
00:59:19.380 --> 00:59:27.260
So to have people that have different opinions or new opinions on, but to let your listeners

1055
00:59:27.260 --> 00:59:32.220
or your viewers know that this is not an opinion where there's a lot of data collected

1056
00:59:32.220 --> 00:59:40.220
or that this is a controversial opinion is respecting people's cognitive self determination.

1057
00:59:40.220 --> 00:59:42.980
I just think it's an interesting way to do it.

1058
00:59:42.980 --> 00:59:48.660
I just I think I launched the podcast and it became very big during COVID.

1059
00:59:48.660 --> 00:59:51.620
I'll go to yeah.

1060
00:59:51.620 --> 00:59:59.100
And so Houston is home to the biggest medical center in the world, like in the world.

1061
00:59:59.100 --> 01:00:02.260
And I live in the medical center area.

1062
01:00:02.260 --> 01:00:05.780
In the beginning, there were just, you know, it just, they're never stopped being funerals

1063
01:00:05.780 --> 01:00:08.940
for physicians and people working on COVID.

1064
01:00:08.940 --> 01:00:16.180
And so to hear on podcasts that it doesn't exist or that you can use, you know, Windex

1065
01:00:16.180 --> 01:00:21.060
or, you know, like simple shit like that, I just started to, and then I got into a little

1066
01:00:21.060 --> 01:00:23.420
dust up around it in my own situation.

1067
01:00:23.420 --> 01:00:35.020
And so I'm always interested as we enter this world in platform and podcast responsibility.

1068
01:00:35.020 --> 01:00:42.620
It is a, it's a slippery slope and it's a very, and there's no, there's no perfect outcome,

1069
01:00:42.620 --> 01:00:44.140
like you don't want to go too far either way, right?

1070
01:00:44.140 --> 01:00:46.860
You don't want to like, oh, the government get involved and tell you what truth is or,

1071
01:00:46.860 --> 01:00:47.860
right?

1072
01:00:47.860 --> 01:00:54.460
But you also don't want to stray into conspiracy land and away from science because, you

1073
01:00:54.460 --> 01:00:58.660
know, there are things that are notable.

1074
01:00:58.660 --> 01:00:59.660
Yeah.

1075
01:00:59.660 --> 01:01:00.660
There are things that are notable.

1076
01:01:00.660 --> 01:01:01.660
But yeah.

1077
01:01:01.660 --> 01:01:04.700
But I don't know.

1078
01:01:04.700 --> 01:01:07.460
I, I, I just think it's an interesting question for this time.

1079
01:01:07.460 --> 01:01:12.100
And I think it's an interesting question when you have a platform that's powerful.

1080
01:01:12.100 --> 01:01:16.820
And I think if you're doing the best you can to make decisions based, what, what is

1081
01:01:16.820 --> 01:01:21.420
the question that drives your decision making?

1082
01:01:21.420 --> 01:01:22.420
For me?

1083
01:01:22.420 --> 01:01:23.420
No, like it just injures you.

1084
01:01:23.420 --> 01:01:24.420
Oh, genuinely.

1085
01:01:24.420 --> 01:01:25.420
Yeah, I got yours.

1086
01:01:25.420 --> 01:01:29.020
You want to, you want to help your listeners and you want to do good.

1087
01:01:29.020 --> 01:01:30.020
Yeah.

1088
01:01:30.020 --> 01:01:34.060
That's a different thing than downloads.

1089
01:01:34.060 --> 01:01:35.060
You can do both.

1090
01:01:35.060 --> 01:01:36.060
You can do both.

1091
01:01:36.060 --> 01:01:37.060
Yeah.

1092
01:01:37.060 --> 01:01:40.660
But if you're only filter, well, you, you'd go for fucking total conspiracy.

1093
01:01:40.660 --> 01:01:41.660
Right.

1094
01:01:41.660 --> 01:01:42.660
Right.

1095
01:01:42.660 --> 01:01:43.660
Right.

1096
01:01:43.660 --> 01:01:44.660
Right.

1097
01:01:44.660 --> 01:01:45.660
Right.

1098
01:01:45.660 --> 01:01:48.060
And the answer, I just know that it's an important question.

1099
01:01:48.060 --> 01:01:49.060
Yeah.

1100
01:01:49.060 --> 01:01:50.060
And you know what?

1101
01:01:50.060 --> 01:01:51.060
I'll be honest.

1102
01:01:51.060 --> 01:01:52.060
I mean, we're not journalists.

1103
01:01:52.060 --> 01:01:53.060
We're not journalists here.

1104
01:01:53.060 --> 01:01:54.060
So we don't really understand the rig.

1105
01:01:54.060 --> 01:01:57.060
And I've got a lot of respect for journalists and the, the effort they've put in to understand

1106
01:01:57.060 --> 01:01:58.460
the journalistic method and all those things.

1107
01:01:58.460 --> 01:01:59.860
I feel like we're somewhat catching up.

1108
01:01:59.860 --> 01:02:04.460
We didn't, this podcast went from zero to 70 million people a month in four and a half

1109
01:02:04.460 --> 01:02:05.460
years or something.

1110
01:02:05.460 --> 01:02:06.460
I like it.

1111
01:02:06.460 --> 01:02:07.460
So, and we're just, again, holding on.

1112
01:02:07.460 --> 01:02:09.060
Like me and Jack didn't run a podcast before.

1113
01:02:09.060 --> 01:02:10.060
So I didn't run one before.

1114
01:02:10.060 --> 01:02:12.060
And so we're not catching up.

1115
01:02:12.060 --> 01:02:16.140
And part of the, part of the way that we're shaped is with feedback and you get lots of

1116
01:02:16.140 --> 01:02:17.140
feedback.

1117
01:02:17.140 --> 01:02:18.140
Don't have this person.

1118
01:02:18.140 --> 01:02:19.140
I'll never speak to this person again.

1119
01:02:19.140 --> 01:02:20.940
And you kind of about that stuff off.

1120
01:02:20.940 --> 01:02:25.940
But if there's any, ever anything that actually feedback that actually is in contradiction,

1121
01:02:25.940 --> 01:02:30.980
that does test your own mission or your own values, then you listen and you, you know,

1122
01:02:30.980 --> 01:02:31.980
you can start to innovate.

1123
01:02:31.980 --> 01:02:35.940
And one of the things that we thought was smart was to have the pop-ups on screen, which

1124
01:02:35.940 --> 01:02:38.180
everybody is probably familiar with by now.

1125
01:02:38.180 --> 01:02:39.100
And it's a balancing act.

1126
01:02:39.100 --> 01:02:42.620
We don't want to completely discredit everything that a guest has to say.

1127
01:02:42.620 --> 01:02:45.340
But we also just want to give context.

1128
01:02:45.340 --> 01:02:46.780
And that's kind of context what they're saying.

1129
01:02:46.780 --> 01:02:48.380
If some things are ridiculous, we'll just remove it.

1130
01:02:48.380 --> 01:02:51.020
Like if something's absolutely, or we'll not publish the episode is probably a better

1131
01:02:51.020 --> 01:02:52.020
way of saying it.

1132
01:02:52.020 --> 01:02:56.380
We had a couple of episodes where people said some guests and things, which are just absolutely

1133
01:02:56.380 --> 01:02:57.380
fucking crazy.

1134
01:02:57.380 --> 01:03:01.180
You don't need a PhD to know that you can't exercise by lying on the ground.

1135
01:03:01.180 --> 01:03:04.900
Like this one guest said to me that you can build your muscles just by laying on your

1136
01:03:04.900 --> 01:03:07.420
back or whatever and not doing anything.

1137
01:03:07.420 --> 01:03:08.420
We just didn't publish the episode.

1138
01:03:08.420 --> 01:03:14.460
And I can just say as a PhD that I have attempted that, yeah, it doesn't work.

1139
01:03:14.460 --> 01:03:20.660
I know it's for jams, yeah, I can, I can, I can give you a PhD on the, just lay, yeah.

1140
01:03:20.660 --> 01:03:21.660
Yeah.

1141
01:03:21.660 --> 01:03:26.380
No, I think that I respect the approach, which is one of the reasons I decided to come

1142
01:03:26.380 --> 01:03:28.900
on, because I respect the approach.

1143
01:03:28.900 --> 01:03:35.700
We're not perfect, but we're trying, but that's the thing that you're walking a path.

1144
01:03:35.700 --> 01:03:39.340
The world of business looks entirely different today than it did 15 years ago.

1145
01:03:39.340 --> 01:03:43.100
Back then building a brand meant having huge budgets, warehouses, office space and lots

1146
01:03:43.100 --> 01:03:44.340
of lots of staff.

1147
01:03:44.340 --> 01:03:48.100
But now you can start a business with your laptop and idea and the right tools, and I

1148
01:03:48.100 --> 01:03:51.140
would know more so than anybody else because that's exactly what I did.

1149
01:03:51.140 --> 01:03:54.300
Shopify is one of our longstanding sponsors on this show, and they're a brand I often

1150
01:03:54.300 --> 01:03:58.260
refer people to when they're starting their businesses, because it's a tool that contains

1151
01:03:58.260 --> 01:04:00.340
many more tools within itself.

1152
01:04:00.340 --> 01:04:03.060
And when you're starting out, everything is everywhere.

1153
01:04:03.060 --> 01:04:04.060
It's messy and it's confusing.

1154
01:04:04.060 --> 01:04:07.460
So having everything in the same place is incredibly useful.

1155
01:04:07.460 --> 01:04:12.860
Shopify puts store design, payments, inventory, shipping and even AI tools all in one place.

1156
01:04:12.860 --> 01:04:16.900
And you can sell directly from your website or on social media, essentially wherever your

1157
01:04:16.900 --> 01:04:18.500
customers spend their time.

1158
01:04:18.500 --> 01:04:20.860
It's truly a brilliant business tool.

1159
01:04:20.860 --> 01:04:26.900
So if you want to give it a go, head to Shopify.com slash Bartlett and sign up for your $1 per

1160
01:04:26.900 --> 01:04:30.940
month trial period, that Shopify.com slash Bartlett.

1161
01:04:30.940 --> 01:04:35.300
On that point about me and vulnerability is vulnerability important because there's

1162
01:04:35.300 --> 01:04:38.700
a lot of performative vulnerability taking place in the future.

1163
01:04:38.700 --> 01:04:43.380
Is it an important thing for my health happiness, my future to be a vulnerable person?

1164
01:04:43.380 --> 01:04:46.180
Well, let's define it.

1165
01:04:46.180 --> 01:04:52.700
Vulnerability is the emotion we experience when we have, when we are up against uncertainty,

1166
01:04:52.700 --> 01:04:55.380
risk and emotional exposure.

1167
01:04:55.380 --> 01:04:57.980
So vulnerability is what I feel.

1168
01:04:57.980 --> 01:05:05.180
It's the cringe, the awkward, the thing that I, the emotion I feel in times of uncertainty,

1169
01:05:05.180 --> 01:05:06.700
risk, our emotional exposure.

1170
01:05:06.700 --> 01:05:12.780
So it was really interesting because at a hard time helping people understand because we

1171
01:05:12.780 --> 01:05:18.340
are so raised to believe that vulnerability is weakness that it took a trip to Fort Bragg

1172
01:05:18.340 --> 01:05:22.260
working with special forces to ask soldiers a question.

1173
01:05:22.260 --> 01:05:26.660
Let me a single example of courage in your life.

1174
01:05:26.660 --> 01:05:30.260
One example that you've witnessed or you yourself have done.

1175
01:05:30.260 --> 01:05:36.740
One example of courage that did not require uncertainty, risk, or emotional exposure.

1176
01:05:36.740 --> 01:05:37.980
No one could answer it.

1177
01:05:37.980 --> 01:05:41.100
Finally, a young soldier stood up and said three tours.

1178
01:05:41.100 --> 01:05:43.420
There is no courage without vulnerability.

1179
01:05:43.420 --> 01:05:45.140
So is vulnerability important?

1180
01:05:45.140 --> 01:05:48.100
It is if we want to be brave with our lives.

1181
01:05:48.100 --> 01:05:56.140
If we, if we want to be able to manage ourselves in a way that's values aligned and courageous,

1182
01:05:56.140 --> 01:06:04.380
we have to be able to reconcile how we feel when we're uncertain at risk or exposed.

1183
01:06:04.380 --> 01:06:08.820
I mean, and really, weirdly, the next week after the trip to Fort Bragg, I was with

1184
01:06:08.820 --> 01:06:15.020
Seattle sea ox, the football team, NFL team, asked the players, giving an example of courage

1185
01:06:15.100 --> 01:06:19.140
on the field or off that did not require vulnerability.

1186
01:06:19.140 --> 01:06:20.700
They said that it's not possible.

1187
01:06:20.700 --> 01:06:27.100
There is no courage like if you're doing things in your life, in your work, and there's

1188
01:06:27.100 --> 01:06:33.660
no risk, no uncertainty, and no exposure, then they're not brave.

1189
01:06:33.660 --> 01:06:40.140
If you know how it's going to end, that is not courage.

1190
01:06:40.140 --> 01:06:45.740
Courage is the willingness to show up and be all in when you cannot predict the outcome.

1191
01:06:45.740 --> 01:06:50.740
Courage is saying, I love you first.

1192
01:06:50.740 --> 01:06:53.260
That's, you want to know what vulnerability is?

1193
01:06:53.260 --> 01:06:54.260
I love you first.

1194
01:06:54.260 --> 01:06:56.260
Have you ever said, I love you first?

1195
01:06:56.260 --> 01:06:57.260
I'm not sure.

1196
01:06:57.260 --> 01:06:58.260
Yeah.

1197
01:06:58.260 --> 01:06:59.260
It's been a while.

1198
01:06:59.260 --> 01:07:00.260
But it's hard.

1199
01:07:00.260 --> 01:07:01.260
It's, you know.

1200
01:07:01.260 --> 01:07:02.260
So I need to give context.

1201
01:07:02.260 --> 01:07:10.260
It's been a while since I've been in that situation.

1202
01:07:10.260 --> 01:07:12.260
Well, you've had to go first.

1203
01:07:12.260 --> 01:07:13.260
Yeah.

1204
01:07:13.260 --> 01:07:14.260
Yeah.

1205
01:07:14.260 --> 01:07:19.460
I mean, there's just a great story that I tell about, I gave a talk here, it was actually

1206
01:07:19.460 --> 01:07:23.660
in LA, and afterwards a kid came up to me, he's probably 22 or 23, and he said, can I tell

1207
01:07:23.660 --> 01:07:26.620
you a story about your work and how it's really changed my life?

1208
01:07:26.620 --> 01:07:27.620
And I was like, sure.

1209
01:07:27.620 --> 01:07:33.380
And I kind of crowd grew around, and this is like the last time I ever got penned, like

1210
01:07:33.380 --> 01:07:37.380
not being able to exit a stage, because it was such a traumatic, it wasn't traumatic.

1211
01:07:37.380 --> 01:07:43.940
It was like, he said, well, I was dating this woman, and I was so crazy about her.

1212
01:07:43.940 --> 01:07:48.460
So I took her to eat to our favorite restaurant, and I waited until the dessert came, because

1213
01:07:48.460 --> 01:07:55.860
we love this chocolate volcano, and I ordered it, and I said, I love you.

1214
01:07:55.860 --> 01:08:02.460
And she looked at me, and she said, I think you're awesome.

1215
01:08:02.460 --> 01:08:07.500
And I think we should date other people.

1216
01:08:07.500 --> 01:08:11.100
And then she ubered home.

1217
01:08:11.100 --> 01:08:15.540
And so I was like, Goddamn, this is a war story, I've ever heard him.

1218
01:08:15.540 --> 01:08:21.620
This is not a good story, and he said, so I got my car, and I drove home, and the whole

1219
01:08:21.620 --> 01:08:28.620
way home, I just kept saying to myself, over and over, fuck Bernabre home, fuck Bernabre

1220
01:08:28.620 --> 01:08:29.620
home.

1221
01:08:29.620 --> 01:08:34.660
When does this, when, when's the turn on the story, you know, and he said, I got home and

1222
01:08:34.660 --> 01:08:39.980
I walked into my apartment, and I pushed the door open, and both my roommates were wired

1223
01:08:39.980 --> 01:08:43.340
in, and they were on their computers, and it looked up and said, dude, what's going

1224
01:08:43.340 --> 01:08:44.340
on?

1225
01:08:44.340 --> 01:08:50.300
And he said, I told her I loved her, and she told me I was awesome.

1226
01:08:50.300 --> 01:08:55.540
And one of my roommates looked at me and said, that's not how it works.

1227
01:08:55.540 --> 01:09:00.020
When you are going toward them, they go away.

1228
01:09:00.020 --> 01:09:04.220
So you're always kind of going away, so they come towards you.

1229
01:09:04.220 --> 01:09:11.980
And he goes, oh, no, no, I don't want to be that dude.

1230
01:09:11.980 --> 01:09:13.700
I was daring greatly.

1231
01:09:14.540 --> 01:09:19.740
And he said, both of his roommates just got teary eyed and went, right on, man, right

1232
01:09:19.740 --> 01:09:20.740
on.

1233
01:09:20.740 --> 01:09:25.380
Like, there is no courage without vulnerability.

1234
01:09:25.380 --> 01:09:30.820
How can you say your brave if you're not putting yourself out there?

1235
01:09:30.820 --> 01:09:34.540
So many people have been through things, which have made it very, very difficult for them

1236
01:09:34.540 --> 01:09:36.540
to be vulnerable.

1237
01:09:36.540 --> 01:09:41.540
I was speaking to someone yesterday who was cheated on, a bunch of attachment issues

1238
01:09:41.540 --> 01:09:44.140
in their early childhood.

1239
01:09:44.140 --> 01:09:48.260
And funnily enough, when I was talking to her about, I was asking her questions about,

1240
01:09:48.260 --> 01:09:51.300
because I'm very deep person like this carries over into my personal life.

1241
01:09:51.300 --> 01:09:54.500
I was asking her questions about the things she'd been through and whenever else.

1242
01:09:54.500 --> 01:09:59.820
She just shuts down, and she told me that she, what were the exact words?

1243
01:09:59.820 --> 01:10:08.140
She said that she finds vulnerability to be a form of intimacy that she tries to stay

1244
01:10:08.140 --> 01:10:13.620
away from because she needs to really, really, really trust the person before she opens

1245
01:10:13.620 --> 01:10:14.620
up.

1246
01:10:14.620 --> 01:10:18.020
And I think this is a trend you see across a lot of people, they won't open up enough

1247
01:10:18.020 --> 01:10:23.020
to form a connection because they've been hurt before by opening up.

1248
01:10:23.020 --> 01:10:24.860
And it feels too scary to do that.

1249
01:10:24.860 --> 01:10:32.020
And that results in them being single, alone, unhappy, so on and so on.

1250
01:10:32.740 --> 01:10:38.220
Yeah, I mean, I think what you said was so loaded with so many things.

1251
01:10:38.220 --> 01:10:43.420
So first of all, there's this very interesting relationship between vulnerability and trust.

1252
01:10:43.420 --> 01:10:45.340
And how does that work?

1253
01:10:45.340 --> 01:10:48.820
And people always ask me what comes first, trust or vulnerability.

1254
01:10:48.820 --> 01:10:49.820
Do I trust you first?

1255
01:10:49.820 --> 01:10:50.820
Then I'm vulnerable?

1256
01:10:50.820 --> 01:10:51.820
Or am I vulnerable first?

1257
01:10:51.820 --> 01:10:52.820
And then I trust you.

1258
01:10:52.820 --> 01:10:55.220
And I think it's a very slow stacking.

1259
01:10:55.220 --> 01:10:56.500
We get to know each other.

1260
01:10:56.500 --> 01:10:57.500
I share a little bit.

1261
01:10:57.500 --> 01:10:58.500
I don't share.

1262
01:10:58.900 --> 01:10:59.900
Nice to meet you, Steven.

1263
01:10:59.900 --> 01:11:06.300
Here's my darkest, horrible, most painful trauma, you know, because that is actually, that

1264
01:11:06.300 --> 01:11:10.060
kind of litmus testing is actually a form of armor.

1265
01:11:10.060 --> 01:11:14.860
I'm going to throw something at you that our relationship in no way has been built

1266
01:11:14.860 --> 01:11:16.700
long enough to hell hold.

1267
01:11:16.700 --> 01:11:17.700
You're going to go away.

1268
01:11:17.700 --> 01:11:21.700
And I'm going to use that as verification that vulnerability is dangerous.

1269
01:11:21.700 --> 01:11:23.700
Like that's litmus testing.

1270
01:11:23.700 --> 01:11:27.500
Let me prove to you that you're not trustworthy.

1271
01:11:28.500 --> 01:11:29.500
Oh, I see.

1272
01:11:29.500 --> 01:11:30.500
You're backing away.

1273
01:11:30.500 --> 01:11:31.500
That's what I thought.

1274
01:11:31.500 --> 01:11:34.900
I'm backing away because we haven't built a relationship that can bear the weight of

1275
01:11:34.900 --> 01:11:36.700
this story.

1276
01:11:36.700 --> 01:11:37.700
Can we start?

1277
01:11:37.700 --> 01:11:38.700
Can we start small?

1278
01:11:38.700 --> 01:11:39.700
OK.

1279
01:11:39.700 --> 01:11:44.900
Vulnerability, trust, vulnerability, trust, vulnerability, trust.

1280
01:11:44.900 --> 01:11:50.500
I think in my work, we call that the smash and grab.

1281
01:11:50.500 --> 01:11:56.500
I'm going to hit you with something really big and then watch you go away and use it as evidence.

1282
01:11:57.500 --> 01:11:58.500
Yeah.

1283
01:11:58.500 --> 01:12:04.500
And it takes a really skilled person to say, yeah, I'm really, I'm taking in what you told

1284
01:12:04.500 --> 01:12:05.500
me.

1285
01:12:05.500 --> 01:12:07.500
I want to be respectful and honor that.

1286
01:12:07.500 --> 01:12:12.500
And I don't have a way to file it right now because I don't know you well enough.

1287
01:12:12.500 --> 01:12:14.500
So I appreciate the share.

1288
01:12:14.500 --> 01:12:15.500
I mean, we also call it spotlight.

1289
01:12:15.500 --> 01:12:19.900
And so like, if I had a military grade spotlight that they use in the wilderness, I worked

1290
01:12:19.900 --> 01:12:21.900
with the military a lot.

1291
01:12:22.900 --> 01:12:25.300
I picked it up and put it in your face right here.

1292
01:12:25.300 --> 01:12:27.300
What would you do physically?

1293
01:12:27.300 --> 01:12:30.900
That's what that's our reaction to too much vulnerability too fast.

1294
01:12:30.900 --> 01:12:31.900
Yeah.

1295
01:12:31.900 --> 01:12:34.900
Like, yeah, I don't know, I don't know you.

1296
01:12:34.900 --> 01:12:38.900
So you're talking about the slow stacking of courage and vulnerability and trust.

1297
01:12:38.900 --> 01:12:46.900
And then you're also talking about that when we've had a lot of hard things happen to us.

1298
01:12:46.900 --> 01:12:51.460
I think this is where I really believe in the democratization of coaching and therapy

1299
01:12:51.460 --> 01:12:57.500
that a lot of times we have to work with people like we have to get help to be able to open

1300
01:12:57.500 --> 01:13:02.980
up and take off some of the armor that we put on because sometimes that armor that we

1301
01:13:02.980 --> 01:13:05.900
put on is fricking survival.

1302
01:13:05.900 --> 01:13:12.900
I mean, and you want to start adding you want to start adding variables like race, gender,

1303
01:13:12.900 --> 01:13:20.020
like, you know, any, anything where there's social systems also at play, that's survival.

1304
01:13:20.020 --> 01:13:25.620
Like telling me right now at my career, like, hey, you should be vulnerable with your new

1305
01:13:25.620 --> 01:13:30.900
team and talk about your previous failures, you know, well, of course I could do that.

1306
01:13:30.900 --> 01:13:34.700
And I would do it and everybody would clap and they think, man, she's so brave.

1307
01:13:34.700 --> 01:13:39.500
And take the new person who's a young black woman or the new first LGBTQ person on a team

1308
01:13:39.500 --> 01:13:44.820
and say, hey, tell, tell everybody, don't tell anybody shit.

1309
01:13:44.820 --> 01:13:52.660
Develop trust first, develop, see how, how, trust your own instincts about the accountability

1310
01:13:52.660 --> 01:13:55.780
of this group to hold themselves accountable for their behavior.

1311
01:13:55.780 --> 01:14:02.460
Like vulnerability is not more necessary for any of us than anybody else, but certainly

1312
01:14:02.460 --> 01:14:06.060
more difficult for other, for some people for sure.

1313
01:14:06.060 --> 01:14:11.300
And I think what's hard about that, what's so painful, probably the most painful part

1314
01:14:11.300 --> 01:14:19.580
of my career is that regardless of why the armor is on, without vulnerability, you cannot

1315
01:14:19.580 --> 01:14:28.420
access the experiences that are the most meaningful in life, love, to love someone

1316
01:14:28.420 --> 01:14:31.660
is to be vulnerable from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed, you know that

1317
01:14:31.660 --> 01:14:36.220
you're in a relationship to love is to be vulnerable, right, and if you ever buried

1318
01:14:36.220 --> 01:14:42.060
someone you loved, like I lost my mom two years ago, like my kids, it's like having

1319
01:14:42.060 --> 01:14:46.420
your heart live outside of your body, like to love is to be vulnerable, because it's

1320
01:14:46.420 --> 01:14:56.980
to risk grief and losing, belonging is vulnerable, the most vulnerable human emotion, joy, joy

1321
01:14:56.980 --> 01:15:05.060
is so vulnerable that when some of us get close to it, we dress rehearse tragedy to prepare

1322
01:15:05.060 --> 01:15:12.300
for disappointment, like it's so vulnerable that we don't even let ourselves feel joy

1323
01:15:12.300 --> 01:15:14.940
because we're so afraid someone's going to rip it away and we're going to get sucker

1324
01:15:14.940 --> 01:15:23.060
punched by disappointment, yes or no, like people choose to live disappointed, rather

1325
01:15:23.060 --> 01:15:28.380
than to feel the risk feeling disappointed and get excited about something, yes like

1326
01:15:28.380 --> 01:15:33.100
the first time my kids shared with me when they were young, certainly not the way I was raised,

1327
01:15:33.100 --> 01:15:39.420
but you know I really, really want to make this team mom, and I said I want to pause you

1328
01:15:39.420 --> 01:15:45.500
for a second and tell you how brave it is to talk openly about something you want so

1329
01:15:45.500 --> 01:15:51.300
much when you don't have control over whether you get it or not, I want it for you because

1330
01:15:51.380 --> 01:15:55.940
you want it, but regardless of what happens, I admire your courage for wanting something

1331
01:15:55.940 --> 01:16:02.420
and sharing out loud that you want it, because if you don't get it, I'll know that it was

1332
01:16:02.420 --> 01:16:09.180
a crushing blow, but that's so great because I'll be here for you in that happens either way.

1333
01:16:09.180 --> 01:16:18.260
So we, and I'm really, I'm a really, we call it foreboding joy that joy is so good, just

1334
01:16:18.260 --> 01:16:22.620
waiting for the other shoe to drop, and people who have trauma histories are really like that,

1335
01:16:22.620 --> 01:16:29.860
like for me, because of the way I was raised, when something good happens, I'm like, oh God,

1336
01:16:29.860 --> 01:16:33.780
now what's going to happen? Statistically, bad shit's going to roll around any second

1337
01:16:33.780 --> 01:16:38.540
now, and it's interesting because the group of people that we research, the only group

1338
01:16:38.540 --> 01:16:43.940
of people that could take that, you know, there's a bodily quiver, right, vulnerability,

1339
01:16:43.940 --> 01:16:50.740
have you felt it? Yeah. Yeah. The only people that can really lean into joy consistently are

1340
01:16:50.740 --> 01:16:58.900
people who use that vulnerability quiver as a reminder to be grateful, to be able to practice

1341
01:16:58.900 --> 01:17:06.900
gratitude in that second. So gratitude is a huge enabler of joy. Is that automatic or can one train

1342
01:17:07.220 --> 01:17:14.660
that? No, it's a training. Oh, shit, no, I had to, I, I mean, standing in my front door, watching

1343
01:17:15.540 --> 01:17:20.740
my 16 year old daughter walk down the sidewalk with her boyfriend in high school and getting his

1344
01:17:20.740 --> 01:17:29.140
truck for, for prom, right? And I'm standing there, and I'm like, God, and you know, what am I worried

1345
01:17:29.140 --> 01:17:34.900
about? You know, prom night, like Karek, right? I push my, I want to tell the story of the military,

1346
01:17:34.900 --> 01:17:39.700
it's always like pregnancy. I'm like, no, no, no, no, Karek. And so I just remember staying there

1347
01:17:39.700 --> 01:17:46.660
and she gets in and, and I'm staying next to Steve and Charlie, my, my sons, you know, at this time

1348
01:17:46.660 --> 01:17:51.140
he's 10. And I'm like, I'm so grateful. I'm so grateful. I'm grateful for this moment. I'm

1349
01:17:51.140 --> 01:17:55.140
grateful that I'm a part of it. I'm grateful that they did the croissage and the boutonnier

1350
01:17:55.140 --> 01:17:59.380
over here. I'm grateful that I got to help pick out the dress. I'm so grateful. And Charlie goes,

1351
01:18:00.180 --> 01:18:06.900
looks at Steve, what's wrong with mom? And Steve goes, she's, she's practicing gratitude,

1352
01:18:06.900 --> 01:18:10.820
let her do it. Otherwise, she's going to get on a crazy train. It's going to be all health. And you

1353
01:18:10.820 --> 01:18:17.060
know, like, because part of me wants to say, Oh, God, oh, God, like so beautiful and so joyful.

1354
01:18:17.620 --> 01:18:21.940
And getting your truck and follow them right now, if he's speeding, I want to know about it. If

1355
01:18:21.940 --> 01:18:26.820
he's not stopping fully to stop sign, follow them until this date is over. You know, that's

1356
01:18:26.820 --> 01:18:32.980
that's what I want to do. Because I'm afraid. Because that the joy of that moment was just too much

1357
01:18:32.980 --> 01:18:42.420
for me. Too vulnerable. It appears you've overcome various traits of old René Brown.

1358
01:18:43.300 --> 01:18:47.700
I'm overcoming. Overcoming? No, I'm not over. I'm not overcome. Have you overcome anything?

1359
01:18:49.220 --> 01:18:55.060
Yes, the belief that I will overcome anything. I've overcome the belief that I have overcome the

1360
01:18:55.060 --> 01:19:06.900
belief that I will ever arrive. I am grateful for the skills that I have that are new skills

1361
01:19:07.460 --> 01:19:12.500
that keep me more aligned with the person, the mom, the partner, the leader that I want to be. But I

1362
01:19:13.860 --> 01:19:21.540
I am mindful of all that I try to say very mindful that I am scary when I'm scared

1363
01:19:21.780 --> 01:19:28.420
that I catastrophize very, very easily. And that's painful for everybody around me. And I don't need

1364
01:19:28.420 --> 01:19:35.540
to be liked. I just need to be myself like, but those are things. Because I will sit down like two

1365
01:19:35.540 --> 01:19:40.580
days ago and be like, oh, my God, I'd be so freaking easy to be liked here. I was like, this will be

1366
01:19:40.580 --> 01:19:43.220
this would be a piece of cake. And I'm like, shit, I don't do that anymore.

1367
01:19:44.260 --> 01:19:49.540
Two days ago, yeah, out of all. Just with a group of people that I knew what it would take to be

1368
01:19:49.540 --> 01:19:58.260
liked. And you made the choice to be yourself. Yeah. Why? Because now the person I'm going to betray

1369
01:19:59.220 --> 01:20:06.100
last is me. Yeah, I hope I see you again, but not that important.

1370
01:20:07.700 --> 01:20:13.140
Some people might find that somewhat demoralizing to know that they too might never cure

1371
01:20:14.580 --> 01:20:17.940
parts of themselves that they're desperate to change. I think people, you know, they often

1372
01:20:17.940 --> 01:20:24.420
come to podcasts like this or read books like yours, looking for solutions fixes to not liking

1373
01:20:24.420 --> 01:20:29.620
myself to the way that I react to my emotions. They want to fix it. Because if they can fix it,

1374
01:20:29.620 --> 01:20:37.860
then they can be happy. I don't think that's in the consideration set for a very beautiful reason.

1375
01:20:38.340 --> 01:20:48.820
That if we could fix it and never have to wrestle with it again, we would be so short,

1376
01:20:48.820 --> 01:21:00.340
ungrace for other people, that we would be times. So you think it creates a form of empathy for

1377
01:21:00.340 --> 01:21:05.620
this? Yeah. I mean, like, I'm not going to, I have like really serious boundaries. I'm a very

1378
01:21:05.620 --> 01:21:11.300
boundary person. But when I see someone behaving a certain way, I was like, ugh, my asshole sees

1379
01:21:12.100 --> 01:21:15.780
your inner asshole right here. I get it. I get what you're doing. I'm not going to tolerate it.

1380
01:21:15.780 --> 01:21:20.340
I'm going to set a boundary around it. But I'm not really judging you for it. It's just that

1381
01:21:20.340 --> 01:21:33.300
behavior is not okay right here. But you like yourself now? Yeah. Yeah. I do. I, I, I,

1382
01:21:36.100 --> 01:21:48.420
do. I can, I can, I can, I can, I can, I can say that pretty, I like what I'm becoming.

1383
01:21:49.940 --> 01:21:53.140
And for anyone that doesn't like themselves, what work is that to go into getting to the point

1384
01:21:53.300 --> 01:22:09.380
like what you think you're becoming? I think the hardest is maybe one of the biggest

1385
01:22:09.380 --> 01:22:17.140
findings of my research over the last 25 years is it's not fear that gets in the way of us being

1386
01:22:17.140 --> 01:22:23.780
brave with our lives and our work. It's armor. Everybody's afraid. It's okay to be afraid.

1387
01:22:24.740 --> 01:22:28.980
What's dangerous is the armor that we reach for to self-protect when we're afraid.

1388
01:22:29.780 --> 01:22:41.060
And how that armor moves us away from love, connection, and our values. And so I think the hardest

1389
01:22:41.060 --> 01:22:49.700
work is for me constantly being aware of what is my armor? What am I, what am I grabbing for when

1390
01:22:49.700 --> 01:22:56.100
I'm afraid? What am I grabbing for when I want to protect my sense of self-worth, my ego? Like,

1391
01:22:56.100 --> 01:23:04.900
and, and how heavy that shit is. You know, at some point I had to wear it because that was

1392
01:23:04.900 --> 01:23:17.700
survival for me growing up. But this is the big developmental milestone of middle age,

1393
01:23:17.700 --> 01:23:23.700
which you are squarely entering, which is kind of when the universe grabs you by the shoulders

1394
01:23:23.700 --> 01:23:31.300
and pulls you really close and says, I'm not fucking around anymore. It gave you gifts

1395
01:23:31.700 --> 01:23:41.460
choosing not to grow into them is not benign. There's a consequence for that and your armor is

1396
01:23:41.460 --> 01:23:49.300
getting in the way. You're a grown-ass person now. You have different choices. Let go of what

1397
01:23:49.300 --> 01:23:57.780
doesn't serve. And that is the big milestone I think that we have to wrestle with in midlife.

1398
01:23:58.740 --> 01:24:03.780
What no longer serves that's preventing us from growing into who we want to be.

1399
01:24:05.060 --> 01:24:08.820
And is that where vulnerability comes into the picture? Oh, for sure. Because all the armor,

1400
01:24:09.620 --> 01:24:17.140
all the armor is about vulnerability. It requires a huge amount of, I was going to say,

1401
01:24:17.140 --> 01:24:22.180
self-awareness. Yes. That some people just don't could probably never accomplish.

1402
01:24:22.180 --> 01:24:26.740
I mean, that's what I think metaphor is helpful.

1403
01:24:29.220 --> 01:24:34.340
I mean, most of us can understand if you back me into an emotional corner,

1404
01:24:36.180 --> 01:24:42.260
what are you going to get? As a leader, I know my armor, perfectionism, micromanagement,

1405
01:24:42.260 --> 01:24:49.620
I get super intensive, I get recklessly decisive, I know my armor, and my team knows my armor.

1406
01:24:53.060 --> 01:24:58.660
I think my armor in my personal life, especially when it comes to my kids, when I get,

1407
01:24:59.380 --> 01:25:07.380
when I feel vulnerable, is control, control, control. Take over all the chess pieces.

1408
01:25:08.900 --> 01:25:16.580
But that's what a good idea. It's not possible. It's just pretend that's called anxiety,

1409
01:25:17.300 --> 01:25:21.380
like pretending that you can control the chess board of other people's lives, your own,

1410
01:25:21.380 --> 01:25:28.180
much less other people's lives. But I think I do it out of fear.

1411
01:25:31.700 --> 01:25:38.180
Is fear the opposite of courage? Where is it? No, I think the opposite of courage is armor.

1412
01:25:39.700 --> 01:25:41.620
I think the opposite of courage is self-protection.

1413
01:25:43.140 --> 01:25:47.540
To be courageous in this context, whether it's as a leader or in another environment,

1414
01:25:47.540 --> 01:25:50.580
you talk about these four steps to encourage you to talk about it in strong ground.

1415
01:25:51.620 --> 01:25:56.660
Yeah. This was research that emerged like 15 years ago, and I was really, really nervous,

1416
01:25:56.660 --> 01:26:01.060
because I'm a grounded theory researcher, I'm a qualitative researcher. So a grounded theory

1417
01:26:01.060 --> 01:26:06.500
is only as good as it's ability to work new data. So you develop a hypothesis or a theory

1418
01:26:07.140 --> 01:26:14.740
based on data. And then as you collect more data, does the hypothesis hold? And we collected that

1419
01:26:14.740 --> 01:26:23.860
data pre-pandemic, pre a lot of things. And so I was really worried about the four skill sets of

1420
01:26:23.860 --> 01:26:31.380
courage, which are identifying, understanding your core values. I would love to do this exercise

1421
01:26:31.380 --> 01:26:38.420
with you sometime. To understanding what gets in the way of you wrestling with vulnerability,

1422
01:26:38.420 --> 01:26:44.580
kind of owning it and moving through it constructively, three, how to build trust and how to become

1423
01:26:44.980 --> 01:26:52.580
super important, trustworthy to yourself, self-trust. Because one of the first casualties of failure

1424
01:26:52.580 --> 01:27:00.180
or disappointment or setback is we lose our ability to trust ourselves, our ability to make

1425
01:27:00.180 --> 01:27:04.820
good decisions, our ability to take care of ourselves. And the last one, which is my favorite,

1426
01:27:05.540 --> 01:27:10.980
because it can really, I've seen it really change in organization is how to get back up after

1427
01:27:10.980 --> 01:27:18.020
failure and disappointment, how to reset, how to be, how to manage your own bounce when hard

1428
01:27:18.020 --> 01:27:26.340
shit happens. So those are the four skill sets of courage. Again, evidence-based, observable,

1429
01:27:26.340 --> 01:27:33.220
measurable, and teachable. We've taken 165,000 people through this work across 45 countries,

1430
01:27:34.100 --> 01:27:41.220
collected data on all of it. It's so exciting. And it was stood all of the complex changes

1431
01:27:41.220 --> 01:27:47.540
over the last five years, including AI, organization, because this is where we do our work. I'm not a

1432
01:27:47.540 --> 01:27:51.300
therapist or clinician. I don't work with like families or individuals. I may have a therapist,

1433
01:27:51.300 --> 01:27:58.420
but I'm not one. So I think you can develop skirt courage skills.

1434
01:27:59.380 --> 01:28:03.940
This, the third point is braving trust. Yeah. And I've heard about your marble jar theory.

1435
01:28:03.940 --> 01:28:08.740
So I've got a jar of marble. I saw that. Could you explain to me what your marble jar,

1436
01:28:08.740 --> 01:28:15.860
look at how excited you are. I know. So this comes, you know, where do I get my information?

1437
01:28:15.860 --> 01:28:21.780
Ellen's in fourth grade, my oldest. She comes from school. The front door closes. She slides

1438
01:28:21.780 --> 01:28:27.460
down the door into a heap sobbing. Oh my god, Ellen, are you okay? Are you hurt? What's going on?

1439
01:28:27.460 --> 01:28:34.980
She says that something hard happened. She shared it like very confidentially with one or two of

1440
01:28:34.980 --> 01:28:40.900
her friends during recess. When she got back to the classroom, they had told everybody in her class,

1441
01:28:40.900 --> 01:28:47.140
all 30 kids. Everybody was laughing and pointing and making fun of her. And she said,

1442
01:28:47.140 --> 01:28:54.740
I will never trust anyone again. And my response immediately to my, in my mind was damn straight,

1443
01:28:54.740 --> 01:29:00.340
not a good person. You trust your mama. And that's it. That was my response. But again,

1444
01:29:00.980 --> 01:29:06.340
that's not the right thing to do, right? You want a kid who can develop trust with others. So I

1445
01:29:06.340 --> 01:29:11.780
said, trust is really hard. She said, I don't understand it. And her teacher at the time, Mrs.

1446
01:29:11.780 --> 01:29:18.980
Bachum, had a marble jar. And when the, when the, when the class would collectively make good

1447
01:29:18.980 --> 01:29:23.700
decisions, she would put marbles in this empty jar. And when it got full, they'd have an extra

1448
01:29:23.700 --> 01:29:28.820
recess and party. And so immediately what came to me, because I'm describing trust, which is a

1449
01:29:28.820 --> 01:29:34.500
hard concept to a fourth grader, I said, trust is the marble jar. She's like, what do you mean? And I

1450
01:29:34.500 --> 01:29:40.020
said, every time you share someone, something with someone that's confidential and they don't share

1451
01:29:40.020 --> 01:29:46.100
it, they get a marble. Every time you build trust, when you want to share something really private

1452
01:29:46.100 --> 01:29:51.940
and personal, you look for a friend whose jar is full of marbles. Do you have any marble jar

1453
01:29:52.900 --> 01:29:56.740
friends? She's like, not the ones I shared with today. And I said, who are your marble jar friends?

1454
01:29:56.740 --> 01:30:02.100
And she said, Hannah and Lorna. And I said, tell me something they do to earn marbles. Oh, well,

1455
01:30:02.100 --> 01:30:07.140
like if I get to my tray late at lunch and there's no place to sit, Lorna will scoot over and give

1456
01:30:07.140 --> 01:30:12.420
me half her seat. And then we just share one seat. And I can sit at the table. And then the other day,

1457
01:30:12.420 --> 01:30:17.300
when I had strep throat, Hannah was worried about me. So remember her mom called and said, Hannah's

1458
01:30:17.300 --> 01:30:21.220
worried about Ellen. Why wasn't she at school? But then the biggest thing that Hannah did was the

1459
01:30:21.220 --> 01:30:27.140
other day, Oma and Opa, my parents, my mom and her husband, came to my soccer game and Hannah

1460
01:30:27.140 --> 01:30:34.260
looked over and goes, oh my god, you're Oma and Opa are here. And I said, why was that a big deal? And

1461
01:30:34.260 --> 01:30:38.740
she goes, because everybody's divorced and remarried. And I've got eight, you know, four sets of

1462
01:30:38.740 --> 01:30:44.100
people. And she remembered their names. And what was shocking to me is that Ellen was conveying

1463
01:30:44.660 --> 01:30:53.460
that these marbles were being earned on these very small, she knew my grandparents name. She gave

1464
01:30:53.460 --> 01:31:00.580
me a seat to sit at. She checked on me when I was missing school. And so it made me start thinking

1465
01:31:00.580 --> 01:31:05.060
about the literature on trust. So I immediately go to the Gotmans. Have you had the Gotmans on here?

1466
01:31:05.060 --> 01:31:11.380
Oh, twice, yeah. Yeah. I mean, just like, yeah. So I go to the Gotmans research on trust. And I read

1467
01:31:11.460 --> 01:31:19.220
right off the bat where Gotmans say, trust is earned in small moments every day. He tells a story,

1468
01:31:19.220 --> 01:31:23.300
it's my favorite story that he tells. And I've had them on my podcast and I've done blurbs for

1469
01:31:23.300 --> 01:31:28.420
their books and written forwards. It's just great. So he tells a story about how he's also a mystery

1470
01:31:28.420 --> 01:31:32.900
lover like me. He's on the second or last page of his mystery. He's like, oh my god, oh my god,

1471
01:31:32.900 --> 01:31:39.300
who did it? And he jumps up to go brush his teeth. And he gets walks to the bathroom and he sees

1472
01:31:40.020 --> 01:31:45.860
his wife crying and brushing her hair. He's like, shit, don't look. Everything's good. Just go

1473
01:31:45.860 --> 01:31:50.660
to the bathroom and get back in your, get back to your book. And he's like, that's a sliding door

1474
01:31:50.660 --> 01:31:57.860
moment. I can, I have a choice in that moment to build trust and stop and say what's going on

1475
01:31:58.500 --> 01:32:04.340
or to build betrayal and pretend like I don't see her hurting. So I stop and take the brush out

1476
01:32:04.340 --> 01:32:11.300
of her hand. I start brushing her hair and say, what's going on? That's a sliding door

1477
01:32:11.300 --> 01:32:18.660
moment that we have all the time, right? And so to me, trust is built slowly over time,

1478
01:32:18.660 --> 01:32:25.060
a marble at a time. And that's how, that's how we teach trust to the most senior leaders

1479
01:32:25.060 --> 01:32:32.180
in Fortune 100 companies that trust is a marble jar. It's earned. Leaders believe in your

1480
01:32:32.180 --> 01:32:37.780
leader. So you know, you know, the temptation. Leaders believe that in the middle of a crisis.

1481
01:32:39.780 --> 01:32:43.860
You know, you put the numbers together and there's a fever dream in the United States and there's

1482
01:32:43.860 --> 01:32:48.820
new tariffs. And you wake up and, you know, you're, you've got a revenue line that's in crisis.

1483
01:32:48.820 --> 01:32:53.860
And then you can just look at your people and say, hello, everybody. There's a like back to the

1484
01:32:53.860 --> 01:32:59.780
executive presence. Trust me. Here's what we're going to do. That means nothing to people. What

1485
01:32:59.780 --> 01:33:03.460
matters is the leader that walks past you in the morning and says, hey, good to see you,

1486
01:33:03.460 --> 01:33:11.780
Stephen. How's your mom's chemo going? Marbles. Marbles. Then when the crisis happens,

1487
01:33:11.780 --> 01:33:16.100
you don't need to say, trust me. You just need to say what's on your mind. They trust you.

1488
01:33:17.540 --> 01:33:22.340
The other thing I think is often played my mind is as a leader, sometimes you say things and those

1489
01:33:22.340 --> 01:33:28.980
things can't happen for whatever reason, things change. Right. And I think leaders sometimes

1490
01:33:28.980 --> 01:33:33.700
think that trust is always being correct, always predicting everything correctly, always being right.

1491
01:33:35.700 --> 01:33:44.820
No, trust is. And I think we had nailed this. I thought this was how this was going to happen.

1492
01:33:45.620 --> 01:33:50.660
We were wrong. You've been working your asses off for six months on this. And I've got to

1493
01:33:50.660 --> 01:33:54.820
deprioritize it today, standing right here in front of you. But I'm not going to bullshit you.

1494
01:33:55.460 --> 01:33:59.700
You've been working your ass off on a priority that literally does not exist today.

1495
01:34:01.460 --> 01:34:07.380
I want to stop and say thank you. I saw what you were doing. I want to be completely transparent

1496
01:34:07.380 --> 01:34:12.020
about why the priority is shifted. And then I'm going to ask you for the same level of work on the

1497
01:34:12.020 --> 01:34:20.420
new priority. Yes or no? Yeah. And in the blame and responsibility often rear their heads. That's

1498
01:34:20.420 --> 01:34:25.220
right. That's right. Go like this, but I'll ask you something. Oh, no, one marble. There you go.

1499
01:34:25.220 --> 01:34:29.700
Oh, yeah. Is that a marble? Yeah, it is. Yeah. Because you didn't have to say that. You know,

1500
01:34:30.980 --> 01:34:34.500
I think that sometimes people say you got some shit on your shirt. I'm like, that's thank you so

1501
01:34:34.500 --> 01:34:39.300
much because it would have been much easier for you not to point out the bogey on my face or whatever.

1502
01:34:39.300 --> 01:34:43.380
You know what I mean? I don't trust somebody that doesn't do that. So I guess it is a marble.

1503
01:34:46.100 --> 01:34:49.540
Someone said to me a couple of weeks ago on the podcast, they said, I trust people who say things

1504
01:34:49.540 --> 01:34:56.100
in public that is against their near time interests. I thought, oh, hi, that's good.

1505
01:34:57.380 --> 01:35:06.820
That's like a, that's like a, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. It's been better for them, right?

1506
01:35:07.700 --> 01:35:12.740
It's the trust in the marble jar has been very helpful for us. And let me tell you, there are behaviors.

1507
01:35:12.980 --> 01:35:18.820
This is plastic. There are behaviors in relationships where you take this whole thing

1508
01:35:18.820 --> 01:35:23.620
on the slamming of the ground. Cheetah. I think that's an obvious one.

1509
01:35:30.660 --> 01:35:36.260
There's one that's more has a more ragged edge of grief and distress than even cheating,

1510
01:35:37.300 --> 01:35:39.220
which is just slowly disengaging.

1511
01:35:43.700 --> 01:35:53.860
Yeah. Emotionally disengaged. Yeah. Yeah. Gosh. That's a ragged, that's a ragged

1512
01:35:53.860 --> 01:35:59.540
edged break on that marble jar. And it just happens over time and every other people think that

1513
01:35:59.540 --> 01:36:06.820
they're nuts and it makes them question their own judgment. Working in the sales team at a startup

1514
01:36:06.820 --> 01:36:11.460
can be a strange experience because one month you're chasing leads like the future of the business

1515
01:36:11.460 --> 01:36:16.340
depends on it, which often it does. And then the next month you're buried in them pressure builds

1516
01:36:16.340 --> 01:36:20.500
up and eventually it starts clouding your judgment. Then you end up making a reactive decision

1517
01:36:20.500 --> 01:36:26.420
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1523
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1524
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audience pipe drive.com slash CEO. So it's time to join the 100,000 companies that are already

1525
01:37:04.340 --> 01:37:10.900
using pipe drive by going to pipedrive.com slash CEO now. I did something at 24 years old

1526
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that has had a profound impact on my life. I set myself the challenge of posting every single day

1527
01:37:15.140 --> 01:37:19.620
on my social media channels. And at the time I was doing it to grow my following, but it had this

1528
01:37:19.620 --> 01:37:24.740
profound impact on my life and two remarkable things happened when I did that. I managed to learn

1529
01:37:24.740 --> 01:37:29.220
faster because every single day I'm capturing what is happening to me and trying to distill it down

1530
01:37:29.220 --> 01:37:33.940
into something that I can share with the world. But more remarkably, it led me to building a

1531
01:37:33.940 --> 01:37:38.420
following of many millions of people. And that's the basis that I used to launch the driver's CEO.

1532
01:37:38.420 --> 01:37:42.820
And that's why I want to tell you about our sponsor today Adobe Express. They are the platform

1533
01:37:42.820 --> 01:37:47.780
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1534
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1535
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in graphic design. It's accessible to use for all of us, even if we don't have the technical

1536
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1537
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knowledge like I did at 24 years old, then head to Adobe.ly slash Steven and get started with

1538
01:38:06.580 --> 01:38:13.380
Adobe Express. That's Adobe.ly slash Steven. You have been in a relationship much longer than me,

1539
01:38:13.380 --> 01:38:17.300
but we shared a lot of similarities in many ways. I was wondering if you were to give me

1540
01:38:18.340 --> 01:38:23.540
any relationship advice that might hold my shirt together over the next 30 years.

1541
01:38:25.540 --> 01:38:29.220
I mean, you could give me so much, I know, because I've seen so much of the incredible...

1542
01:38:29.220 --> 01:38:32.340
I've actually stolen so much advice. One of the things I stole recently, which my girlfriend

1543
01:38:32.340 --> 01:38:36.900
talked about was sometimes I'd come home and I'm on like 10% and I heard you say this.

1544
01:38:36.900 --> 01:38:41.140
Oh, yeah. And I just, I don't communicate to my girlfriend that I've got like 10% left.

1545
01:38:41.140 --> 01:38:43.780
Yeah. And then she might want to try and work through some shit.

1546
01:38:43.780 --> 01:38:47.060
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's going to go bad. It's going to be bad.

1547
01:38:47.060 --> 01:38:49.540
Yeah, let's not do this at 1am. No.

1548
01:38:50.260 --> 01:38:54.340
And I saw you talk about how you communicate, you vocalize what you have left in the tank

1549
01:38:54.340 --> 01:38:58.740
to give context to the person. I guess to create some empathy for both of you, but I've stolen that.

1550
01:38:58.740 --> 01:39:03.380
But is there anything else that you think might help me over the next 30 years to have a good

1551
01:39:03.380 --> 01:39:06.500
relationship with my girlfriend with all the risks that you see?

1552
01:39:07.060 --> 01:39:08.580
I'll just start by saying I think therapy.

1553
01:39:10.100 --> 01:39:16.500
Couple's work is like so incredibly powerful and helpful. I think the Gotman's work

1554
01:39:17.780 --> 01:39:23.060
is really like we read the Gotman's work together sometimes. I think that's helpful.

1555
01:39:23.060 --> 01:39:27.220
I'm surprised you were willing as someone that struggles with vulnerability.

1556
01:39:27.300 --> 01:39:31.460
Oh, yeah, no, for sure. What you won? No, I was willing.

1557
01:39:31.460 --> 01:39:37.700
Oh, really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I struggle with vulnerability, but I really respect humility

1558
01:39:37.700 --> 01:39:44.100
in people so much that even if I'm not feeling humility, I will fake humility and be like,

1559
01:39:44.100 --> 01:39:49.620
I need help. And then I'll say, shit, this is real. This is hard. This is the Gotman number.

1560
01:39:49.620 --> 01:39:54.180
I got like damn, and they just call the thing a thing. They hurt my feelers.

1561
01:39:54.180 --> 01:40:02.980
But I guess the biggest thing is that neither Steve and I nor I had any modeling of what a

1562
01:40:02.980 --> 01:40:16.100
healthy relationship look like at all. And I think one commitment we made is to just keep showing up.

1563
01:40:16.100 --> 01:40:21.220
I think these are the three commitments. Keep showing up. Don't buy into the bullshit that it's

1564
01:40:21.220 --> 01:40:24.980
supposed to be easy. It'll be the hardest thing you ever do and ask for help.

1565
01:40:26.660 --> 01:40:32.020
And that's not, there's no, I wish I could give you like a, here's the secret to it.

1566
01:40:32.020 --> 01:40:37.300
But the secret to us is we keep showing up. We know it's not supposed to be easy.

1567
01:40:38.580 --> 01:40:44.100
And we get help. And the help being you tend to hate my house for help. Well,

1568
01:40:44.260 --> 01:40:53.780
we get external help, but we read. We try new things. We try new tools. We're just,

1569
01:40:53.780 --> 01:40:58.500
we don't ever want to be done learning and trying to be better for ourselves and for each other.

1570
01:41:00.580 --> 01:41:12.580
And that's a lot. I mean, 38 years together is not just like the slow, slow role movie of a life

1571
01:41:12.580 --> 01:41:24.260
in a family, but we've buried parents. You know, we've gone through illnesses. We've raised,

1572
01:41:24.260 --> 01:41:31.060
you know, kids. We've, we've gone through different seasons in our own lives where we were not

1573
01:41:31.060 --> 01:41:38.260
synced at all. It's really, really hard. But it's, I'm more proud of it than anything I've ever done

1574
01:41:39.140 --> 01:41:45.540
because my set up for success was zero. You've buried parents. Yeah. Christmas day.

1575
01:41:46.100 --> 01:41:50.180
My mom died in Christmas day after my sisters and I were there at her primary caregiver

1576
01:41:50.180 --> 01:41:52.340
for four years with dementia. Who is?

1577
01:41:58.020 --> 01:42:04.180
I wouldn't wish that shit on the people I hate the most. I know I try not to hate people,

1578
01:42:04.180 --> 01:42:10.660
but God gives me grace for it on occasion. But I would not wish that on anybody.

1579
01:42:12.900 --> 01:42:15.860
You know, there's the reality of it. You know, she gets there. There's an accident. You're

1580
01:42:15.860 --> 01:42:25.300
showering your mom. You're bathing your mom. You know, and she knows just enough to be humiliated by it.

1581
01:42:25.300 --> 01:42:37.140
But this is life. Like this is this is caregiving, you know, and it's a tremendous emotional,

1582
01:42:37.140 --> 01:42:44.260
physical, mental weight that falls primarily on women who are also in the workforce.

1583
01:42:45.300 --> 01:42:52.660
You know, thank God I had two sisters. So there's three of us. But and many people have very many

1584
01:42:52.660 --> 01:43:01.700
people have zero. It's like you and your PhD researcher have resources. A lot of resources.

1585
01:43:02.820 --> 01:43:08.820
And I think it almost killed me, you know, and so it almost killed you. I mean, yeah, it

1586
01:43:12.020 --> 01:43:20.340
to lose someone that you love like I love my mom and bits and pieces and chips and bones and, you know,

1587
01:43:20.340 --> 01:43:28.820
like that is, you know, and then there was a day when she just got incredibly, incredibly cruel.

1588
01:43:28.820 --> 01:43:37.460
Like my mom was the fulcrum. Our family changed on her back. Like she was the first person to go

1589
01:43:37.460 --> 01:43:46.420
to therapy. She left my dad. She got us into therapy. She worked three jobs. She changed everything.

1590
01:43:46.420 --> 01:43:51.380
She talked about the long history of addiction in our family, you know, on both sides,

1591
01:43:51.380 --> 01:43:58.260
everywhere. She changed our family. And so to say she was like, you know, somebody who I respected

1592
01:43:58.260 --> 01:44:07.620
and revered like was an understatement. And, you know, and we did so much healing work around

1593
01:44:08.980 --> 01:44:14.740
kind of how she showed up as a parent in her marriage with my dad. And so then the one day I

1594
01:44:14.740 --> 01:44:19.540
went to go take care of her. And I saw that thing that hadn't seen since I was 14, you know,

1595
01:44:19.540 --> 01:44:26.260
and I'm 54, you know, and it literally like I couldn't drive like it brought me physically to my

1596
01:44:26.260 --> 01:44:36.100
knees. Like like my husband had to come and get me. And I don't like, like I can't talk about

1597
01:44:36.100 --> 01:44:39.620
without getting emotional because it's not like I blamed my mom because she's in the middle of

1598
01:44:39.700 --> 01:44:47.780
this disease, you know, but it was like I didn't see her for two months after that. And Steve kept

1599
01:44:47.780 --> 01:44:53.220
saying, I said, I can't. And he's like, you got to, you got to heal from that. I mean, just imagine

1600
01:44:53.220 --> 01:44:59.700
being dropped back in a worst case scenario situation when you were 13 or 14. And then, you know,

1601
01:44:59.700 --> 01:45:05.860
you're just like, I can't, I can't. And, you know, my sisters were like, I got, we got, we got

1602
01:45:05.940 --> 01:45:10.900
this. And then they'd go through a period where they were like, I can't right now. And then,

1603
01:45:10.900 --> 01:45:20.660
okay, I got it. But Steve always had it. She was like, I got the diaper. I'll take him to dinner.

1604
01:45:21.460 --> 01:45:26.420
I'll meet with the doctors like that's partnership. You know what I mean, that's partnership.

1605
01:45:27.540 --> 01:45:28.900
How did you, how did you deal with the grief?

1606
01:45:29.620 --> 01:45:37.380
Well, don't send me your hate mail. But, you know, when she died, it was nothing but relief.

1607
01:45:38.420 --> 01:45:42.260
I've had this. I've never not heard that. Yeah. I'm someone that had a parent with

1608
01:45:42.260 --> 01:45:46.020
struggling with dementia. Yeah, it was completely relief. I mean, the day before she died,

1609
01:45:46.020 --> 01:45:53.060
I think we had a really important time with her. And I'm sure she is, you know, playing

1610
01:45:53.140 --> 01:45:57.300
dominoes with Ann Richards and Molly Ivans and great other female Texas politicians.

1611
01:46:00.180 --> 01:46:03.140
But, because my mom was very radically political, but,

1612
01:46:10.340 --> 01:46:18.500
the window of grief was just years of, there was, you know, very early on, there was no calling

1613
01:46:18.580 --> 01:46:22.820
her to say, oh, Charlie got a really cute date. Let me show you the homecoming pictures or, hey,

1614
01:46:22.820 --> 01:46:29.300
Ellen, you know, got into her master's program that that all just went away just every week.

1615
01:46:31.380 --> 01:46:38.500
And so that's why, you know, the whole, the whole strong ground book, there's a, there's a

1616
01:46:38.500 --> 01:46:44.660
sentence in the, in the first chapter that said, I have a sticky note on my window, on my mirror

1617
01:46:44.740 --> 01:46:48.740
in the bathroom that says, I'd rather be the oldest woman in the gym than the youngest woman

1618
01:46:48.740 --> 01:46:56.580
in assisted living. Because I do believe in the connection around exercise, you know, dementia,

1619
01:46:56.580 --> 01:47:01.060
and I, I took care of my grandmother with dementia with my mom.

1620
01:47:03.620 --> 01:47:08.260
And my mom and my grandmother made a lot of different lifestyle choices than I've made, but

1621
01:47:08.580 --> 01:47:16.660
the whole strong ground metaphor is that I went to go see a trainer. And one day he looked at me and

1622
01:47:16.660 --> 01:47:23.860
he said, he caught me brown. He said, find the ground brown. And I looked down and I said, okay,

1623
01:47:23.860 --> 01:47:30.020
and he goes, not the floor at the ground, take your feet, push in to the ground, use your mind to

1624
01:47:30.020 --> 01:47:35.140
connect with your body, push into the ground, and then tell your mind, you're going to be using

1625
01:47:35.220 --> 01:47:44.500
fucking lats. And I was like, okay, so I did it. And I felt them. And I started whispering every time

1626
01:47:44.500 --> 01:47:51.940
I would do a weightlifting thing, strong ground, strong ground. Strong ground, an unbelievable,

1627
01:47:51.940 --> 01:47:56.660
unbelievable book. So we didn't cover everything in this book today, which is a great shame,

1628
01:47:56.660 --> 01:47:59.860
but hopefully we'll speak again in the future. But it's the lessons of during leadership,

1629
01:47:59.860 --> 01:48:04.260
the tenacity of paradox, which is something I was keen to talk about, and the wisdom of the human

1630
01:48:04.340 --> 01:48:08.260
spirit. All of your books are amazing. You said earlier on that, someone called your wizard when

1631
01:48:08.260 --> 01:48:13.300
you're younger. That's exactly what I think you are. I think you're a wizard. Why? I think you're a

1632
01:48:13.300 --> 01:48:18.020
wizard. You have an unbelievable pattern recognition, understanding of humans. You have so many wide

1633
01:48:18.020 --> 01:48:23.220
reference points that it appears to be magic to a muggle like me. I had a time in the team we're

1634
01:48:23.220 --> 01:48:26.500
going to run through the door if I'm not careful, but we have a closing tradition on this podcast,

1635
01:48:26.500 --> 01:48:29.140
with the last guest leaves a question for the next guest. Why knowing who they're leaving it for?

1636
01:48:29.140 --> 01:48:33.060
You actually know this person. Do you know the next guest? No, you know the one that left the

1637
01:48:33.060 --> 01:48:38.180
question for you. Oh, got it. They didn't know it was for you. Dear beautiful and highly intelligent

1638
01:48:38.180 --> 01:48:49.940
next guest, what are you optimizing for right now? Strength and longevity,

1639
01:48:51.380 --> 01:48:56.740
mentally, physically, spiritually and emotionally. Strong ground.

1640
01:48:58.340 --> 01:49:02.980
The lessons of during leadership, the tenacity of paradox and the wisdom of the human spirit,

1641
01:49:02.980 --> 01:49:10.500
you are, I'll try to think of those any others, you are the single most requested guest.

1642
01:49:10.500 --> 01:49:14.420
And you have been on the show for a long, long time, for three or four years. When we ask people

1643
01:49:14.420 --> 01:49:18.020
who they want me to speak to, they say your name. And they say your name because of the incredible

1644
01:49:18.020 --> 01:49:21.220
work you've done through your own podcast, which I'm going to link on the screen and below right

1645
01:49:21.220 --> 01:49:25.460
now, but also through some of these incredible books, which have changed people's lives. If you're

1646
01:49:25.460 --> 01:49:32.260
unfamiliar with Brunei's work, I think people will understand after listening today how much they're

1647
01:49:32.260 --> 01:49:38.260
missing out on. I highly recommend you go and listen to Brunei's podcasts, but also to check out

1648
01:49:38.260 --> 01:49:43.940
this book, Strong Ground, which I'm going to link below. Also, Dare to Lead, I think all of the

1649
01:49:43.940 --> 01:49:48.500
leadership team in my office referenced Dare to Lead so often, which is an incredible book about

1650
01:49:48.500 --> 01:49:53.540
Brave Work, Tough Decisions and Whole Hearts. You make the most beautiful artwork. Consider these

1651
01:49:53.540 --> 01:49:57.140
books to be artwork, again, because they pull on so many different reference points to make something

1652
01:49:57.140 --> 01:50:01.860
that feels so original. And you've helped so many people, the fact that my audience have demanded,

1653
01:50:01.860 --> 01:50:05.700
I speak to you for so long, I think, as testament to that. And you're a wonderful human being.

1654
01:50:05.700 --> 01:50:10.980
And actually, one of the things you've inspired me to be is myself, because that's exactly what I

1655
01:50:10.980 --> 01:50:14.740
find you to be. So thank you so much, Brunei, for your time today. It's deeply, deeply appreciated.

1656
01:50:14.740 --> 01:50:18.100
More so than I could say, I think you're a wonderful human being. Please come back again soon.

1657
01:50:18.100 --> 01:50:24.420
I will. I have enjoyed every minute of this. I would say it has not been easy, because we went

1658
01:50:24.420 --> 01:50:28.900
to some hard places together, but it's been meaningful. Thank you.