wow

we've now recorded more than 100

episodes of the diary of a ceo

and i've had some of the most amazing

inspiring and life-changing

conversations with some of the world's

most accomplished experts business

people psychologists athletes you name

it so this week we're going to do

something a little different

something many of you have requested for

a long time and something i've always

wanted to do

this week we're going to look backwards

this week i'm going to share with you

the key moments the actionable

life-changing epiphany-inducing moments

from the last 100 episodes that had a

lasting impact on me

that changed my life

so without further ado

i'm stephen bartlett and this is the

diary of a ceo

i hope nobody's listening but if you are

then please keep this to yourself

we hear this

phrase

a lot which is find your passion yeah

and i almost feel that it's it's in many

respects quite harmful because it that

question is kind of loaded it it assumes

a singular passion for a star it assumes

that you can discover it like an easter

egg and then and also um the the context

in which that question usually sits in

it implies that once you find it

then it's you know then it's the the the

it's a can of unlimited like happiness

and orientation forever and then that's

yours and it i just feel like sometimes

language can be harmful because it

it simplifies very complex things and

sometimes multifaceted plural things you

know so i wondered if that you know that

phrase uh find your per find your

passion was

something you um you felt similar about

or yeah yeah i do i mean yeah it's true

that passion can be a significant

multiplier of human potential

so you know people are passionate and

engaged in a business they can direct

their energy in a in a worthwhile

meaningful manner so so so it's it's

worthwhile but you're right but um

there's a big difference between passion

big difference between happiness and joy

some are in the moment at home i think

joy is in the moment and i think

happiness is something um that we

continually continually adjust towards

um your passion can be a significant

multiplier of human potential

particularly in the workplace so it does

have a place it is something which is

useful to understand and it ultimately

it always comes down to personal

introspection and self-awareness for me

and i think that um we need to work

harder at understanding ourselves and

when we are constructing a mindset which

is conducive to performance

so we optimize our potential when we're

in a particular state of mind and that

state of mind might be passion it might

be relaxation it might be enthusiasm

might be enjoyment but we need to almost

get to know ourselves and know that um

there are certain things which enable us

to do others and once we work backwards

and understand what that looks like

maybe we can gain some more consistency

i say to a lot of sports people and to a

lot of business people that consistency

of mind gives you consistency of play

and i'm convinced of it and the more

consistent we can be in our thinking

we understand um the building blocks the

component parts to success yeah the more

success we can have

and how does one establish consistency

of thought um because i completely agree

with that i completely agree i've seen

that in my own life when i've been

consistent with my thinking i've managed

to you know perform the same habits

every day um but then sometimes i'll

lose consistency in my thoughts because

i lose um

[Music]

i lose i guess i lose attachment or sort

of my anchor with my my why yeah and i

talk a lot i've talked a lot in this

podcast over the last couple of weeks

about this realization i've had this

year with the gym which was every year

february march i was incredibly

motivated to go

i was fired up trying to look good for

summer yeah and then obviously once you

look good and summer has ended

it's almost like you've lost your

anchor right so like you get into

september and the why which made you go

and to think consistently every day

has been has evaporated and i'm tr i

can't get myself to go to the gym in

october right do you know i mean i

always think that consistency of mind

comes from understanding the intrinsic

quality of our decision-making processes

and i say that a lot to people in sport

and in business so yeah you can make a

good decision and have a really bad

outcome or you can make a bad decision

have a good outcome and this is why i've

worked with leadership teams who have

confused luck for genius made really bad

decisions with a great outcome you know

markets have changed competition's done

something something's just worked in

their favor um so um this is really

important for us to not judge our

decision making by our outcomes

and we often do so we'll say this is a

good decision because it resulted in

this or this is a bad decision it

resulted in that and we can only

understand the outcome retrospectively

so it's wrong to measure our decisions

by the outcomes and we need to go back

to how we made a decision in the first

place and once we start to understand

the intrinsic quality of our decision

making process we can become more

consistent in how we make decisions and

therefore have more control over those

outcomes so i think that you know

two things i think that and then we'll

use you as the example here steve

that consistency of mind will come from

knowing how we make decisions i don't

understand that we put

our weight into evidence how much we use

prejudice and bias and opinion whatever

it might be but let's understand how we

make decisions and in that way we can be

consistent in um how we apply our logic

and thinking and feeling to try and

determine some best outcomes and then

the other thing and um as you've just

positioned is reframing

let's stand back and create some time

and space to understand and um you know

why we do things and why we don't do

things

now i always say that um the people are

most successful and i've had a pleasure

working with six sports people who got

to number one in the world i can

guarantee you one thing i had in common

was that

um they um they never made big changes

and um it was small changes so i'm a big

big believer in the one degree of change

if you take two parallel lines and you

move one by one degree it may not seem

much at first but it's a really big

difference between where you start and

where you end up

so um everyone's trying to you know make

a dramatic change and see change from

tomorrow i'm going to be different i

think it's about doing something a

little bit more than what we've been

doing it ratan a bit more consistently

and then the other thing with these

people who obtained you know what i call

um super achievements at home so they

did really really well um is that they

actually worked on their strengths they

started to understand what was good

about them and do that some more so we

think to be better as human beings i'm

gonna be better as a business or a team

of people we need to fix our weaknesses

um i'm not sure that's true i actually

think it's more about understanding our

strengths and playing to them so

i've actually worked with teams before

in business and in sport who have

actually weakened the strength by trying

to strengthen a weakness

if you think about it it's ridiculous

and actually weaken the strength by

trying to strengthen the weakness we

need to be careful so i think

understanding what's good about us

understanding you know where our

behaviors come from in regard to the

thinking before it and then reframing

some of those words and pictures and i

guess that's what you've done with your

gym example because i guess change some

of the words and pictures in your head

to therefore feel differently which has

resulted you in acting differently yeah

and i really you know i was i was

valuing intensity over consistency and

intensity wasn't sustainable right so i

was going through the summer like to the

gym two times a day i was starving

myself like eating things that i i

didn't want to necessarily eat yeah and

the the consistency came from being a

bit more um realistic with myself being

like you know if you miss the day of gym

it doesn't matter you don't have to

perspective yeah perspective isn't it

yeah and i think do you know it's funny

because again so many sports people have

worked with and business people who will

lose perspective they'll lose the

tournament and it's dreadful you know

win a tournament i've i've made it you

know it's just turning point for me now

they win a big contract you know in

business and you know this is us now

we're set up you know or they lose a

contract and um life has never been so

dreadful

um but i think that we need a better

perspective on things so their ability

to think more long term term to be more

forgiving you know to understand with

more um reality at uh what's good and

what's not so good um it's probably the

way forwards i want to talk about

failure yes now

which seems like a good thing to talk

about and in your book philosophy you

you list

seven

failure principles

number one

failure just is failure is a fact it's

inevitable it's going to happen to all

of us no matter how much we try to avoid

it i guarantee that it will happen and

that can feel scary but it can also feel

liberating because once you've accepted

it as a fact there's no point in trying

to avoid it so you might as well take

the risk

so acceptance of failure starts with the

observation of it

failure is a fact but how you respond to

it is within your control whether you

decide to feel like a failure for many

years after the thing that's happened or

whether you think to yourself okay well

that's taught me something and i'll do

it differently next time

i guess the risk there is

one bad failure people stop trying

exactly and then i i was thinking this

is very similar to confidence in the way

that like if you have one bad failure

your performance next time you get an

opportunity if you actually don't manage

to just avoid it completely will

probably be worse because of nerves and

that you know the memory if i'm terrible

and yeah and then that's going to

increase your chances of failing again

and then the kind of like self negative

reinforcing cycle kind of continues and

you your confidence and your sort of

yeah your guts kind of cascade downwards

and can for some people work in the

other direction where you have a success

your confidence builds you walk on stage

to do that you know public speech next

time around with a bit more confidence

you do a better job which increases your

chance of success and it cascades

upwards

about how failure works from your

experience it can work like that i mean

to take the example you've just given

one of the ways of looking at that if

you're then stuck in a downward cycle

and you're failing and you're trying the

thing is that you're therefore in the

wrong situation so you're in the wrong

workplace for instance that that isn't

generous enough to like

make you feel okay after your failures

or doesn't make you feel like you can be

your true self in which case i would

argue you need to remove yourself from

that situation and find the place that

does suit you

or it can be a question of mindset and a

question of applying that mindset that

we've just talked about which is okay i

failed i'm feeling in a downward spiral

how much of that is fact that's a very

difficult thing to do on your own when

you're a very low ebb and that's why i'm

a huge advocate of therapy and again i

know that i come from a privileged place

where i can afford therapy but even if

it starts with

reaching out to your friend and talking

about it or reaching out to your work

helpline and talking about it or

texting shout the mental health charity

or calling the samaritans that's

a really valuable step

and the other thing that i would say

there is that i'm very aware that my

definition of failure

which is what happens when life doesn't

go according to plan

has a fatal flaw

which is that sometimes there are

failures that are totally cataclysmic

that we couldn't possibly have predicted

that go against any plan whatsoever like

a global pandemic

like

a terrible illness that you contract

like the death of a loved one

it would be monstrous for me to sit here

and say

those failures are as easily assimilated

or learned from or dealt with as fading

or driving tests and so i'm not saying

that at all

those kind of failures will require a

process

of mourning and coming to terms with the

thing that you've lost

and that's absolutely right and as it

should be

my only thing is the way that i choose

to live my life is

i mourn but i don't have to constantly

relive the pain i can still feel sadness

about something but i don't need to live

in that place of reliving it constantly

becoming a victim yeah

and becoming defined by that i can

choose to be defined by something else i

can choose to be defined by my response

to it

i can choose to find some kind of

meaning in something that was

meaningless at the time

and that's how i choose to live my life

because that makes it less sad

and i and i think that that choice is

available for most of us so point number

two in your book is you are not your

anxious brain i think you've talked

about that i met this man called moe

gowda he used to be the chief business

officer of google x but he wasn't happy

and he has a lot to say about

expectation versus reality so if we can

manage our expectations of life so if

they're equal to or less than our

perception of events and how they turn

out then we can be happy or contented

and

he was the one who really brought it

home to me that we are not our worst

thoughts

that our thoughts are produced by our

brain as organic matter in the same way

that blood is pumped around our body by

our heart like

we wouldn't think we were defined by our

blood so why would we think that we are

our thoughts

actually

as you know the premise of all

meditation is that you can observe your

thoughts who's doing the observing

that's you that's you

why would you need thoughts

like

you don't need to communicate yourself

so your thoughts are just being produced

by your brain constantly

and i found that really helpful the idea

that

once you realize that

you can train your brain to think

differently

and to replace negative thoughts with

positive ones as much as you're able so

he gave this incredibly moving example

his son ali died at the age of 21 during

a routine operation

and in the aftermath of ali's death moe

would wake up every morning with tears

streaming down his cheeks and his first

thought would be how he died

and it was

an unbelievably oppressive

grief-stricken thought and after a few

more weeks of it he was like i just

can't live like this i can't live like

this

and so he challenged his brain to come

up with a different thought

and each morning he would wake up and he

would still think ali died and he died

and he'd still be crying but he added

something to that sentence and he added

yes but he also lived

and in that differently expressed

sentiment was 21 years of memories of a

father and son who were best friends and

that was what enabled him to carry on

living and if he can do that in that

situation i sure as hell can do it when

someone criticizes me on instagram

it was a really helpful lesson

almost everyone feels they have failed

in their 20s so i think that a lot of

people struggle in their 20s

particularly in this day and age because

of the curse of comparison and because

we live in a culture of curated

perfection where you're constantly

comparing yourself to your peers

filtered appearance on instagram and the

life that they seem to be living so

we're comparing our insides with

everyone else's projection of their

outside exactly yeah and for many people

although i know not you but for many

people it's the first time that they've

come out of full-time education

and come out of a system of exam and

reward exam and reward and there is no

exam that you can sit to show that

you're being a good grown-up so you feel

quite lost plus piling on top of that

the pressure to find your passion to

like make a career for yourself but also

to earn enough to pay or rent

living in house shares like just trying

to make your way

and trying to forge your identity

in this day and age it's just so hard to

do all that at once and then you're like

oh and i should be having like a

thriving personal life and i should

either be in a long-term relationship or

having one night sounds and making

footloose and fancy-free and drinking

roads and then at the weekend making

vegan brownies because i got to watch

what i eat and all of that sort of stuff

and it's

exhausting and so really what i wanted

to say in that failure principle was

that so many people come on podcast and

say that they feel they failed at their

twenties and i think a lot of us fall

into the trap and i did too of believing

that we had to have our life sorted out

by then and actually your twenties are a

decade of transition of discovering who

you are of grinding up the spices of

life in your pestle and water and the

older you get

my experience has been the more you know

yourself and the more you know what you

want to do and that's where success lies

i've had so many more opportunities

after leaving my 20s behind in the

rearview mirror

wow

when we choose to share our

vulnerabilities is when we feel most

satisfaction

most connection i think is what i said

well i don't why is it so satisfaction

on my own i like that too because you

probably do feel personal satisfaction

it's like but when we choose to be open

about our vulnerabilities that's

paradoxically when we find the most

strength and the source of the most real

connections with other people amen yeah

and that's something that i have

genuinely learned through the podcast

the first season of the podcast i did i

was very much i came from a very

traditional

newspaper journalist background so for

me it was like i'm interviewing

my guest i will ask the questions and i

will listen and then i would ask another

question and it was only as time went on

that i felt more comfortable

sharing my own experiences and whenever

i did that i had such an incredible

like feedback

loop of like just

amazing people sharing their stories and

their vulnerabilities and also saying

that they felt less alone because i

shared mine and really that's what my

entire life is about ultimately

is

connection and so

i really want to encourage people not to

be scared of opening up about the things

that they perceive as their weaknesses

because so often what you think of as

your most personal shame turns out to

have most universal resonance

and that was certainly my experience

talking about fertility and miscarriage

and divorce like actually

that's where i've had

the greatest impact i think and i'm so

grateful for that

why do you think that is why do you

think vulnerable in terms of like why it

has such wide resonance why do you think

that is

because i think that when we're

vulnerable we're being real

and we're letting our masks slip and

you'll see a glimpse of who the

authentic person is and there's

something

just

absolutely quintessentially human about

that so it's a human recognizing another

human

it's a human recognizing another human

beneath the pretense and i think it also

reassures people because as we've been

talking about

in this culture that we live in which is

so defined by social media

and how you appear and the

currency of perfection again it's such a

relief it makes you feel like you can

breathe and someone's like oh god i'll

tell you about today i sat in bed in my

pyjamas eating hummus direct from the

top because i felt really down that's an

act of singular generosity to someone

else who can then have the space to talk

about how they're feeling and that

brings us to the topic of mindset really

nicely you know i've heard you talk

about having a growth mindset and a

fixed mindset what is the difference

between the two

so i think for thank you for what it's

worth i think this contrast is is so

important i mean i can talk about it

through my own life but

you know in a fixed mindset people think

that success however defined is all

about talent

having the gift

having the genetic inheritance and or

you know having the personality trait in

order to excel

a growth mindset is saying okay talent

obviously matters it's a factor

but it's not enough it's what we do with

our talents

so people in a fixed mindset have two

massive risks one they think they're so

talented they don't even need to try so

think of a young person who's just been

um invited to join the manchester united

academy and they're suddenly getting

money into their bank account they're

able to buy the fast car and they think

i'm god's gift and they and the amount

of academy coaches who have come to me

and said we don't understand it we had

this hard-working youngster we invited

them into the academy and then they just

went off the rails it's a fixed mindset

they think their success is assured so

they stop putting in the hardy arts and

don't transition into the first team so

that's one danger the other danger

is

people who don't think that god's gift

but like me at goldman sachs you make

one failure and you interpret that as

meaning i obviously don't have talent

therefore i'm just going to give up

you see what i mean yeah so that's the

negative version yeah so you've got the

i'm super talent is everything

and i've got it so therefore i don't

need to try talent is everything i don't

have it therefore i should give up

they're both terribly

uh damaging i think a growth mindset it

doesn't mean that we think we're all

going to be the best speaker in the

world i wasn't the best table tennis

player in the world i never got into the

top 20 of the world rankings but with

that attitude i maximize my own

potential i'm very intrigued as to um

you know some certain people in our

society

are more self-believing than others um

you see differences in um

genders and races and and backgrounds

and i think a lot of people in my dms

and this is where the question comes

from i have so many young kids in my my

dms that are struggling with

confidence or

lacking self-belief

and i wondered if you had any words of

wisdom for those in my dms that

can't find confidence and self-belief

i

think for what it's worth

um

that self-belief self-esteem

other things are that kind of overrated

um and the reason goes back to something

we said earlier i mean there was a

movement in the 70s and 80s in western

education

to build self-esteem in young people and

the way to do it was to let them succeed

all the time

right so you won't remember this but it

would you give them easy tests

get them to pass

and give them lots of and then praise

them for how super talented they were

they get all this self-esteem and they

can change the world people were so

worried about undermining self-esteem

that there were no losers in sports days

at some schools i don't know have you

heard of this

everyone's a winner yeah ever gets a

sticker you know and that was all about

building it was called the self-esteem

movement right but it failed and the

reason it failed

is because

people would keep succeeding and you

know they'd get all this self-esteem and

then then they'd be given a difficult

test

right or they would leave school and

they'd actually hit the real world where

they would fail and what happened

all the walls of their world would come

crumbling down oh my goodness i've never

felt before right self-esteem that is

frag and people would protect their

self-esteem by not trying new things

right

and and that's a disaster self-esteem

can be very fragile i i like to talk

much more about resilience

we want people we i want my children to

be resilient to try new things to mess

up

but not to be devastated by it

and that i think is a much better quote

now it may be that when people are

talking about confidence what they

really mean is resilience i want to be

able to walk into

to a room give it my best shot things

don't go slightly wrong i'm going to

carry on regardless every person who's a

success

has had some really tough difficult

moments

and i just think that's an inevitable

part of learning how do we build

resilience in ourselves growth mindset

is very strongly related to it so

instead of um you know for parents out

there i don't you probably have a very

young audience i'm so major but but uh

the parents out there it's very easy to

praise young people for their talent

you're super talented they've just drawn

a picture you're super talented you're

the next picasso you think they're going

to develop all this self-esteem

the problem as i've said is that you

know the moment they draw something that

isn't picasso as soon as they get

negative criticism oh my goodness i'm no

picasso after all

um much better thing to do is to praise

them for the effort

or the process well i love the way that

picture that the colors fit together

they think oh right if i want to develop

as a painter i have to make the colors

fit together in a more sophisticated way

you're aligning

their mind and motivation with the

journey they need to take to fulfill

their potential so it's good experiments

praising for effort praising for process

is a much more um positive thing than

praising for talent and fixed attributes

it's interesting because in my company i

came to learn that um the most effective

way to get my teams to innovate was to

praise them for the effort and the

process as opposed to the outcome

because if it became about the outcome

the successful failure of the experiment

then um which is largely actually

outside of their control right when

you're doing so if i say to my team

right we're going to build this website

and we think it's going to do this

whether it does that or not whether

there's product market fit whether it's

a success or a failure isn't actually in

their control the bit they can control

is starting doing it and the process of

getting to the point where we press go

live

and so we what i learned in the last

year of my business was we would

celebrate the um conducting the

experiment not the outcome of the

experiment

exactly right actually that is exactly

the same thing and it's interesting that

if you look at r d you know um have you

had a six sigma yes yeah so one of the

things i mean one of the big master i

mean six sigma is a great process you

know like lean manufacturing or

um

your toyota pro things of that kind it's

basically squeezing out variation

isn't it

so if you imagine making a car

or you know manufacturing car all it

takes is one component in the engine to

be of the wrong size or specification

and the whole thing won't work so six

sigma is about delivering and executing

with no variation

but when you're innovating you need

variation you need to try new things if

you're trying to create a new computer

program a new website or a new drug and

you don't know which combination of

ingredients they're going to create you

need to try lots of combinations if you

penalize people for failure oh my god

and you're only judging them on the

outcome

and it fails and then they're like

stigmatized they will never try

you need you know that's where failed

fast cars

yeah you've nailed it that's exactly the

insight that i think is is important for

some people that's terrifying yeah the

thought of like

throwing themselves into that place of

uncertainty that they have to travel

through before they get to their new

self how do you get someone to come

willingly into uncertainty to leave that

job or to you know take on that

promotion or to

pivot in their career when they're

scared of

the unknown or you know it's like well

then i would think about what i would

think about rather than what i'm afraid

of i'm thinking about what i'm excited

about

and so rather than i'm afraid of what

i'm going to leave behind or i'm afraid

of what might happen i'm expecting more

about

what could happen and when we focus on

what we want and what we could have and

you know it's it's optimism isn't it

it's about what's possible

and what could i achieve you know and

you asked me earlier about you know some

of the things about sports psychology

and visualization was one was a massive

technique really that i learned from my

sports psychologist and employed and

still use all the time and i think when

you can start to visualize

what that new role person

identity could be

and when you bring it to life with all

of your senses

and see it really vividly then that's

exciting

and what what could i achieve and what

could this look like

and

and the power of visualization is that

your mind

does when it's when you see it really

vividly your mind doesn't know the

difference between a vividly imagined

experience and a real life experience

what's your process for visualization

and now is it something that you do

actively you set time aside and do it or

is it just something that you

naturally now do

when you're

pursuing a goal so a little bit of both

as an athlete it was definitely

something that i would sit down usually

i'd be lying on my bed i would have done

some relaxation because the more we

clear our mind and relax the easier it

is to visualize and to see really

clearly and so i would it would be a

conscious right i'm going to spend the

next 15 minutes or even two minutes or

five minutes or whatever time i had

visualizing my next race and seeing

myself execute that race plan as

perfectly as i can and in exactly the

right way and i would visualize

everything from um

if it was

the olympic discipline and we've got

nine boats on a start line i'm seeing my

i don't know which lane i'm gonna be in

when it comes to race day so i'm seeing

myself racing every lane i'm seeing

myself with with the headwind with a

tailwind with it raining i'm seeing

myself [ __ ] up the start because that

might happen but then i just going to

recover from it and i'm going to see

myself recover and i'm going to see

myself win from behind i'm going to see

myself win from the front i'm going to

see

imagine

you know they'll start being delayed or

it's a full start you know all these

eventualities

so that when it comes to the event

i'm prepared

and it can just all unfold and i'm not

phased by anything that happens but but

most importantly i've seen it happen the

way i want it to happen and then i

believe that it can happen and what

visualization also does is when we when

we're visualizing a goal for example it

starts to activate the subconscious

to generate creative ideas about how we

can achieve our goal

it's it's it's my i don't know how it

works and why it works but it's

mind-blowing and it does work and it

starts to um

get your brain to perceive and recognize

the different um

resources that you need

to achieve your goal it's like the law

of attraction and it starts to activate

that in your life and bring in the

people the resources the environment the

circumstances that you need to achieve

your goal and so

now

what do i do i probably i do spend some

time

consciously going right i'm just going

to spend two or three minutes

visualizing my goal i'm seeing it happen

i'm seeing it realize

um but then other times i'm probably

just you know driving in my car and

subconsciously you know like daydreaming

almost but i think the the conscious

right i'm gonna visualize now

is really powerful

because then you start to

really it starts to ingrain in the

subconscious

quick one i talk to you guys about huel

a lot so i'm going to do a quick

intermission to tell you about a bit of

a change that's happened in the last two

months in my life as you guys know my

favorite heel product historically has

been the ready to drink which is these

bottles here they are nutritionally

complete however recently since huel

introduced the heel protein

this now plays a huge role in my diet

the salted caramel flavor protein from

huel which is only 105 calories and has

26 vitamins and minerals and 20 grams of

protein

um serves two rolls in my life now first

thing i do when i wake up in the morning

is i have a glass and then at night time

after i've been to the gym straight

after the gym i have a glass it tastes

amazing if you're going to try it follow

my instructions here

get a couple of cubes of ice put it in a

blender put on the salted caramel

protein and it tastes like a delicious

smoothie i've already gone through one

tub of this i'm actually on my second

tub and i've got two more tubs to go

before i'm gonna reorder more but

genuinely the salted caramel flavor

maybe because i have a liking for salted

caramel for me has been a game changer

professor steve peters steve's invented

this groundbreaking concept called the

chimp model and it focuses on how

there's these kind of three parts to our

brain the first part is called the chimp

which is our sort of desire to be

impulsive and irrational and emotional

and short term the second part is what

he calls the human and you'll hear him

talk about this which is logical and

rational and thinks in terms of facts

and thinks things through in the long

term and the third part is what he calls

the computer which is our set of core

values and beliefs i wanted to talk

about exactly that topic which is like

managing your emotional reactions

um across different facets of life and i

think

um

i'll go let me just give you an example

of a situation that i went through that

i've read about in my book so

i'm just going to be completely honest

because that's what i tend to do on this

podcast um i broke up with a girl and um

like two days later i found out that

she'd slept with somebody else and when

i even though i'd broken up with her

when i when i read the message that

she'd slept with somebody else

my brain yeah

revenge

message her to destroy her life

that's what my brain said to me but i

um and and i'm at a place in my life

where i feel quite

secure in my self-image let's say i

don't feel particularly insecure i'm i'm

i'm a confident person but even i

couldn't seem to get a grip of my own

desire to react emotionally in that

situation

um and really interestingly as well it

was actually my friend calling me i went

to the gym i thought maybe i'll go to

the gym and that'll like clear my head

it was my friend calling me and this i

don't know where this fits in psychiatry

but my friend said to me steve just

remember

you broke up with her she's probably

doing this to um make herself feel

better and to you know rebound or

whatever but um that was one of those

key moments where i was like god like

the damage you can do if you don't know

how to control that like primitive urge

to just bruh

okay you've covered a lot of ground yeah

that could be an hour's work here so i'm

going to take it back and try and go

very steadily to try and drive home

there's a lot of areas one is first of

all what would you expect somebody's

mind to do

confronted with the same situation what

would you expect them to do

probably the same exactly so nothing

abnormal happened there wasn't a problem

yeah you're saying this is absolutely

healthy

and normal but maybe not helpful yeah

and what you really said because you've

told me this if it wasn't a problem to

you you wouldn't have mentioned it so

clearly your human brain is saying i

don't want to get revenge that's not

what i want what i want

is to just be calm and collected accept

the reality of it and move on

unfortunately we have to learn now how

the mind works

so it's like saying you went to the gym

so therefore you're a fitness man if i

said to you right i've never been to a

gym for 30 years i'm going to go tonight

and at the end of the day i'm going to

be super fit

and you laugh because you know that's

ridiculous it's not the way the body

works so we have to now look at another

aspect so now we know it's normal how

does the mind work when we get a really

nasty shock and something which is

devastating so the

the reason that chimp is there and the

reason we're here

is for us to be safe and present the

next generation to the world that's what

the chimps agenda is so what happened

there is the generation that you thought

you were going to get was taken away

from you so this is devastating so we

expect you to be devastated

we also expect you to accept the mind is

going to now grieve and it will take

approximately three months give or take

you're talking about heartbreak here

yeah you've got to grieve yeah so the

mind has a rule on the way it deals and

processes grief i can't speed that up

so if some like if i meet you that night

and i say right i'm going to get you out

of it i'm going to fail because you have

to go through these ripples and and work

it through so your human brain can do it

in seconds because that's logic she's

gone she was dishonest it's a good thing

she's gone now no more wasted time yep

that's easy but our the emotional chimp

brain has got to process it it cannot do

it overnight so you've got to now allow

around a 12-week process and you're

going to go through various stages

of grief in the loss of what is a very

significant relationship and on top of

that there was another insult it wasn't

just she said it's not for me she slept

with someone else so that is really

going to get your chimp you know we

expect it now to be devastated and your

chimps reaction some people wouldn't

but it's common that it wants revenge

it wants to say right if you did this to

me you're going to suffer now

in reality what you've just said by your

nodding is that's not what i want i just

want to move on and accept it wasn't for

me she did what she did that's her

problem not yours

and what your friend did is start to try

and turn it round with some facts to

calm your chimp down and say because it

always looks to the computer let's look

at reality and the reality is if i said

to you

um this girl is going to come back into

your life and they'll bring all that

pleasure you used to have but she's

going to have affairs every few weeks is

that what you want no no see you did

break it up

you know so you just try and look at it

in a different way and say let's look at

the reality and the facts of the

situation but you cannot stop the

grieving you can't stop the yearning or

the bargaining because guys in the

opposition often go back and plead and

then she'll say i made a mistake and and

then you have to make a decision

you know and then they'll bargain again

and then if you go through that you're

going to disorganize stage

but this can all be circumvented if you

suddenly met somebody new your chimp

might recover very quickly is that what

tends to happen well unless we know this

is the rebound right so this is never a

good thing okay i'm sure some of you

listen to going i have married the

person i met on a rebound so of course

it's all probabilities but generally

speaking you need time to get over this

gather yourself so you're in a good

place when you do meet somebody else to

have a good relationship

that's interesting so it's quite complex

the whole thing so yes rationally we can

pull you along but we've got to give you

a lot of tlc and that should go through

grieving don't be harsh on yourself and

what your experiences are totally

natural unhelpful but natural so many

people are going through a grieving

process in it could be a significant

life event it could be the loss of a

partner at the death order is there

anything in psychiatry from your

experience that can

okay that process is unavoidable but is

there anything that i can do to help

that process be easier

yes there is i mean one is understanding

it as you say if you start to go through

this and say to people like this is how

your mind has to do this

and like you tell me in the gym you

laugh i can't do it in the night well

how long and you still it's a bit of a

piece of string but roughly speaking if

you keep going regularly two three times

a week maybe three months six months

you're going to see a difference for

sure and it's the same with me

explaining the mind i would explain to

people that we go through a grieving

process you are likely to experience the

following emotions or stages in the

grief process but you are unique and

everybody grieves individually so it's

very important as i said earlier i don't

have a process uh you know like a recipe

and say this is what we're going to do i

work with you as you grieve but i want

you to get insights that's the key so

the work i do is giving understanding

and insight and then applying this so

you learn the skill of managing your

emotions and the skill of understanding

the skill of mind management that's what

i'm about teaching a skill base so you

can be independent of me but use me as a

fallback

on that on the point of rejection which

we talked about a second ago is it the

stories that i then tell myself about

myself which impact my self-image that

really hold that hurt me the most

because it feels like when you go

through emotional sorry romantic

rejection or heartbreak it feels like

um even if you it it's not the sort of

like front of your mind

the fact that someone didn't want you or

they were they wanted someone else

makes yourself tell yourself that you

are not good enough not pretty enough

not smart enough you weren't enough and

it feels like so much of the hurt and

the pain

lives inside that story you're telling

yourself about yourself and again if you

stop and we'd look at what you've said

there

are these factual statements or are

there impressions and feelings

impressions and feelings so we know that

the chimp brain is in full flow now yeah

so what we're saying is don't quench

that it's not wrong

it's expressing and it's like as i said

you've got this best friend so if this

happens to me i now said what is it

you're telling me and you'll go through

all this you know it's the end of the

world and you know clearly no one's ever

going to love you and and then we sort

of counter it by saying well let's look

at that so we start to rationalize and

that can help the grieving process

because we start saying well let's not

just sit there with these falsehoods

let's challenge them and let's replace

them with truths not brainwash it's no

good saying for example say i'm your

best mate and you've just fallen apart

and you say it's because i'm ugly it's

no good me said no you're really

handsome that's not

that's an impression again from me what

i'd be saying is let's look at facts if

we look at people in relationships do

people find a partner eventually and the

answer is most people yes so the chances

are very high and if you can get through

this

will you eventually get back on your

feet is there a future

yeah yeah there always is a future there

always is a future even for people in a

much more serious situation where they

become

suicidal and obviously as part of my

work

you can tell them with honesty there is

always a future and things do change and

feelings do move

so when you start giving these facts and

rationalizing the facts of the situation

that is going to be powerful for

starting to settle your emotions

but giving falsehoods

you know i know you can do it or you're

that's not going to set your trip

there's street wise yeah yeah so you'll

just keep agitating whereas if we talk

facts

then it'll settle but again there's a

key point here

we have to find the facts that resonate

with you as facts

because if i said like i just did will

you find another partner what's what's

the general rule if you said to me yeah

but i don't believe that everybody does

there's no point me forcing this truth

on to you i'd have to look for others

that might resonate with you yeah such

as if i go out and actually start

socializing when i'm ready then the

chances are i'll increase my probability

so that gives me a bit of hope you might

work with that yeah

so you've got to find what resonates

with the person

and again that's why i don't have this

recipe i'm saying discover them but

think around but you can offer common

things yeah

super interesting and it again it

perfectly explains why in that moment

for some bizarre reason my friend

telling me being very sort of rational

with me things that i genuinely did

accept to be true

just completely diffused my brain

because he's acting effective as you're

human yeah that's what he's doing he's

coming in rationally and stepping back

and saying let's look at the facts here

yeah and he's hit some nails on the head

where you think oh that's settled me

down a bit yeah so but what tends to

happen is

you tend to isolate yourself most people

do this after this has happened and they

go within themselves and they engage

these emotions which generates more and

more falsehoods and distorted ways of

perceiving themselves and the world

instead of being able to which is not

easy talk to themselves rationally

and preempting things like you know

let's work with reality it's not easy to

do that so when you can't do it it's not

a failure you turn to your best friends

and they'll do it for you

so what is the cause of unhappiness as

you see it especially if you're building

sort of machine learning applications

that are gonna

you know

um solve you know make people arrive at

contentment or happiness in a

personalized way we must be able to know

what's causing this lack of

allow me a bit of time to explain it

because it it's simple when we get it

but it's not simple to get to it so so

happiness is very predictable okay if

you look back at any point in your life

where you ever felt happy there is one

commonality across all of those moments

that can actually be documented in a

mathematical equation okay

you've never felt happy

because of a specific event in your life

okay

take for example rain

rain doesn't make you happy or unhappy

there is no inherent value of happiness

in rain okay

rain makes you happy when you want to

alter your plants and it makes you

unhappy when you want to sunbathe right

and so it's not just the event rain it's

the comparison between the event

and an expectation in your mind of how

life should be okay if you're worried

about your plans then life should be

generous to me and get me rain so i can

water the plants and if life does that

then life meets your expectations and

you're happy okay and so happiness in

that sense becomes equal to or greater

than so it's really mathematics that

your perception of the events of your

life minus your expectations of how life

should be

okay and apply that to anything apply

that to anything so you know my favorite

example is nature

we're all happy in nature why are we all

happy in nature i mean you go out there

and there are ants and there are flies

and you know trees are crooked and there

are you know shrubs everywhere and

bushes and it's just really not that

hedged and organized but that's what we

expect

so you know nature's

chaos is what we expect nature to be and

so we feel happy you know nobody ever

sits in front of the ocean and says i

like the view but please mute the sound

okay you just take it you know it's it's

the monotonous sound and the view and

the wind and and the sun and the whole

experience right

and because of that

uh happiness becomes

very different than what was defined to

us okay what was defined to us is that

happiness is found in

a

gathering at the pub or a party or a you

know an activity or some kind of

pleasure or fun or elation or whatever

that is that's not at all true these are

i call these the state of escape okay

happiness as per the definition of the

happiness equation is events equal to or

beating expectations life going my way

okay and so basically happiness is that

calm and peacefulness you feel

when you're okay with life as it is

it doesn't really matter what life is

okay what matters is that you can be

okay with it

right so so you take you know

any example if your boss is annoying

and your expectation is yeah bosses are

annoying this is what life is about they

become bosses because they're annoying

right and and so if if that's your

expectation you're going to look at it

and go like yeah i need to learn the

skill of managing annoying bosses okay

and if that's the case then you're not

going to be upset about it

similarly anything else if you look at

it then it's not just the event

it's your perception of the event so you

have a uh something to influence it's

not just the event your partner might

say something hurtful on friday at 4 p.m

that's the event my partner said

something hurtful at sunday morning you

tell yourself he or she doesn't love me

anymore okay that's your perception of

the event that's not actually the event

the event is something hurtful was said

but your perception of the event is your

work is your it's your brain adding

color to it and then you compare that to

your expectations right you compared my

boss is annoying too my boss shouldn't

be annoying where did you get that from

right so we blur the happiness equation

we break the happiness equation because

of what i call the six and seven

okay six grand illusions and seven blind

spots

which are the six grand illusions are

basically

uh call them pathways

that the modern world teaches us to

navigate the modern world that our

illusions are not true okay

take for example control

everyone knows that to succeed in the

modern world you have to learn to

control certain events right

so you start to believe that the way to

succeed in life is to control everything

but the truth is even if you go down to

the basics of physics that we never are

in control

that the absolute design

of nature itself of the universe itself

is entropy and chaos right that's the

actual design and so if you try to

control it you're bound to be

disappointed a lot of events are gonna

miss your expectations okay and yes i'm

not saying don't control anything at all

but start to understand that you're

you're going to be selective because you

have a finite amount of effort and by

the way even if you're selective and you

you try to control everything sometimes

things will fall out of control if you

live your life through the illusion of

control

good luck finding happiness so six grand

illusions the illusion of uh of thought

the erosion or the illusion of self the

illusion of uh knowledge the illusion of

time control and fear okay now that's

one side and that disrupts your your

entire view of what to expect from life

because you're expecting

life to behave through a length of a

lens of an illusion the other side of it

is what i call seven blind spots okay

and the seven blind spots are not

really defects in your brain as a matter

of fact they are the very design of your

brain okay your brain is designed to

tell you what's wrong

okay it's not designed to you know if a

tiger shows up right here now

my brain has no

use whatsoever in telling me oh my god

look how majestic that animal is right

yeah it's a beautiful animal but my

brain will say we're gonna die okay and

we're gonna die is the idea that

basically makes our

uh our brain constantly look for what's

wrong blur the events of life you ask a

mother

and and she will say oh my daughter's

been sick all winter you know she just

had two episodes of flu three days each

but to the to the caring heart of a

mother that needs to be exaggerated to

the exaggeration is one of the blind

spots

your brain is trying to get you to take

action so it pushes you

it pushes you by exaggerating the event

a little bit so that you jump in and

take action and accordingly the event

you're comparing to you're comparing the

wrong event to the wrong expectation and

the happiness equation falls apart

under all of this you're inferring

something which i think will annoy a lot

of people and that is that happiness is

a choice

and that you you can choose to be happy

and that if you're unhappy and really

for many circumstances in our life day

to day and work and love in

relationships

personal responsibility is the

is the answer and entirely on you and a

lack thereof is the cause absolutely you

know what you just did you've just lost

us 88 of the audience to tell someone

uh it's your responsibility to get

yourself out of this horrible place that

you're in

is quite disturbing because we like the

idea of saying no no hold on no no it's

not me

life is treating me really badly that's

why i'm not happy okay i can't do

anything about it life took my son you

know life took my son i have the right

to be unhappy yes life took your son

that's true and you have the right to be

unhappy but you're never going to get

out of unhappiness if you wait for life

to bring him back or you wait for life

to correct its action okay the only way

you can come out of unhappiness is if

you choose

and say okay it's going to be a long

journey it's gonna take a lot of time

okay and i'm gonna try and try and try

but i'll get there

and neuroplasticity proves that

neuroplasticity basically tells you that

if you just

run a happiness kind of activity once a

day every day your brain will be better

at it

and i mean please don't get me wrong but

what do most of us do every day we watch

negative news we swipe on toxic

positivity and we're just drowning

ourselves in negativity and then what

happens

what happens is we become really good at

being negative we become really good at

finding what's wrong with life become

very good at you know getting pissed off

with the prime minister right because

it's an activity we do on daily basis so

your brain goes like this must be

important for her or him okay i'm just

going to make sure i have the neurons

aligned around that and so you're

basically we're basically configuring

our brains to be unhappy and and that is

the kind of neuroplasticity that we need

to shift

you know if you if you go to the gym

and

lift weights every day you're going to

look like a triangle if you squat every

day you're going to look like a pair

okay the same is happening inside your

brain you just don't see it if you're

constantly watching you know news media

right

you're literally building your muscles

that are concerned and are

you know

critical and are worried about the world

when in reality most of the time you

can't do anything about it

there's something in there which is

clearly a theme in i think three topics

we've touched on which is this theme of

like radical acceptance oh absolutely i

mean this is what i call the jedi master

level of happiness so there are three

levels of happiness right i call it the

happiness flow chart

events are going to piss you off it's

just the truth

if you can manage to acknowledge your

emotion and say oh my god i feel so am i

angry is this anger i mean this is this

what i'm feeling and then and then you

take that feeling and you say to

yourself okay interesting

i am angry i need to do something about

it i will give you three steps okay the

beginner's level is

ask yourself if what you're thinking is

true

your partner said something hurtful on

friday your thought is he or she doesn't

love me anymore okay ask yourself if

that thought is true if it isn't drop it

there is no point to be unhappy if it is

then let's go to the black belt level of

unhappiness which is can i do think

something about it

that's the second question is it true is

question one can i do something about it

this question two right and oh honestly

by the way it doesn't take more than two

seconds

to feel the emotion ask yourself if it's

true and then go to say to to uh to can

i do something about it and if yes then

do it what are you waiting for text him

or text her and say baby can we please

talk over dinner what you said on friday

hurt me

okay instead of just banging your head

against the table hoping that they will

find out and come and say oh i'm so

sorry you know i i i was teaching this

this story really hurts me i i was

teaching you know when before lockdown i

i taught a lot of people in workshops

and seminars more than 20 000 people one

one day one of them comes to me in the

first break and says what are you

talking about what do you mean happiness

is a choice you have no idea what

happened to me

okay and i said okay and she said when i

was 17.

she was 74 at the time

can you believe that

57 years of holding on to one thought

hitting her head against the wall

right and i hugged her i hugged her i

cried and i said did it work

did all of that work

or was the better thought

okay it was horrible

but can i do something about it okay and

that's question number two

that's black belt sometimes however

there's nothing you can do about it

whatever she experienced could be

irreversible what i have experienced the

loss of ali is irreversible there is

nothing you can do about it okay and i'm

not asking everyone to get there quickly

but the jedi master level of happiness

is to say okay

it happened and i have no choice to

change it there is nothing i can do to

fix it so can i accept it

but not surrender and lie down and you

know and die accept it and then start to

do something to make my my life better

despite its presence or maybe because of

its presence okay can i accept that ali

died and start to spread his message so

that my life and the life of others

become better can i do that i call that

committed acceptance okay and it's very

simple if you commit and accept to if

you accept things you you can't change

and commit to make your life better

despite of or because of their presence

nothing can beat you

nothing can beat you and yeah does it is

it horrible that i actually managed to

move on and and you know

not hit my head against the wall for 27

years

does that say i don't love ali what are

you talking about i do rally i cry about

missing him

still today right

it's not that it's there is nothing to

prove in that what what i can prove is i

love him so much

that i actually dedicate my life to

spreading his message that's so much

better

than sitting there and saying ah life

hit me i don't like life right

that's a six-year-old attitude honestly

okay

adults will say okay

and especially business people i mean

your audiences huh

the market changes all the time do you

sit down and go like i lost another deal

or do you just get up and say

why did we lose this deal what can we do

about it

right and if if there is something wrong

with the product can we change the

product

right

well you talked to there about business

in particular rings very very true

because in business and you've been you

know very successful entrepreneur

yourself and worked with teams you'll

get people who are

high in defaulting to logic in moments

of chaos and also default to personal

responsibility and those that don't yeah

and the outcomes of both groups are

quite predictable

very different and actually this this

approach of is it true

uh can i do something about it can i

accept it and and

commit

i learned that in business and it's a

very simple business approach now most

of us do that in business

but when it comes to our personal life

we don't do that

and interestingly

most of us by the way who do that in

business are very successful in business

and most of us who do that in life are

very successful in life

it's not just happy it makes us makes us

successful because it doesn't waste our

cycles on things that are not necessary

so if you can do it at work do it at

home do it in your life do it in your

relationships it's really a very

straightforward flow chart

i hope you enjoyed that look back at my

uh life-changing moments from my first

100 episodes i've got to say november

december january we're publishing

the best podcast we've ever published

when i saw the guest lineup i genuinely

was like i looked at the list and

thought

how how is it possible that my idols

world exclusives people i've wanted on

this podcast since it began many years

ago have all decided to come in the same

month and honestly november and i guess

we're recording with within that month

which will be published over the next

three months is the reason i started

this podcast and it's a real sign of

where it's going and the platform it's

become so

thank you for sticking with me it's

going to be one hell of a last quarter i

know that's going to change my life for

good that's for sure

and i can't wait to bring you more

people's diaries have a wonderful week

quick one as many of you know i've been

trying to make my life a little bit more

sustainable as it relates to energy ever

since i sold my range over sport and

bought an electric bicycle and my energy

as a sponsor of this podcast one of the

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